Arroz con Pollo on the Grill

By Andrew Hunter

This past Sunday, we enjoyed a simple Father’s Day at home…Marilyn, Ben, Nick and I. My only responsibility for the day was manning the grill. But instead of my usual steaks, burgers or fish fillets, I grill-smoked chicken thighs, then put my paella pan directly on the hot charcoal and made rice for an outdoor Arroz con Pollo.

Almost every culture has a version of chicken and rice, which is simple comfort food. I usually think of it as a Caribbean and Latin American dish, but Spain’s signature paella can be chicken and rice and I recently had congee at a Chinese dim sum joint. Besides some ingredients I couldn’t identify, the chicken feet and glutinous rice made this savory porridge another version of chicken and rice. The common thread is that the chicken is at least partially cooked in the rice, and the rice is usually wet, like porridge.

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Our Love of Sweet and Salty

By Marilyn Hunter

Our boys adore chicken teriyaki. It’s that sweet and salty combination that can’t be beat. In fact, Ben and Nick love it so much they conned our neighborhood sushi chef, Tashi, to wrap it with rice and sesame seeds in toasted nori for a roll that’s not on the menu. We go to Tashi’s at least once a week, so chef starts rolling when he sees the boys walking through the door.

Teri means glaze and yaki means grill…it’s a glaze made from soy sauce, sake, mirin and sugar. It’s a brilliant balance of slightly sweet and salty flavors. It goes just as well on fish and beef as it does on chicken. The sauce is easy to make, but save yourself some time and buy a high-quality bottled version.

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Feeding the Landfill

By Sandy Hu

Recently, The Wall Street Journal published a story called “Leftovers: Tasty or Trash?” in which the writer shared some eye-opening statistics:

- An average U.S. family of four throws away between $500 to $2,000 worth of food each year
- 25 percent of trash in a home (all avoidable waste) consists of vegetables
- 16 percent is fruits and juices
- 14 percent is grains
- 13 percent is milk and yogurt

Here’s another disturbing fact cited by the paper: After paper and paperboard, food is the next largest solid waste component in U.S. landfills and incinerators. A staggering 33 million tons of food was dumped in 2010 according to the Environmental Protection Agency.

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Carrot Salad - a New Way to Eat Veggies

By David Hu

I’m always trying to eat more veggies but most of the time they’re really an afterthought. There are only so many times you can steam or sauté vegetables before they get boring.

Today’s recipe is a carrot salad which can be enjoyed year-round because carrots are always available in the market. This dish has a great burst of flavor that comes from sweet-tart dried plums and Moroccan spices, and the salad will add some nice, vibrant colors to your meal.

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The Family that Cooks Together…

By Sandy Hu

So much of our family life and social life center around food and cooking. In December we had a big holiday party for 75 guests and the whole family – all five of us – prepped and cooked for it. We cooked our Christmas Eve dinner, complete with a Bûche de Nöel for dessert, and we prepared our annual Christmas night Dungeness crab fest.

We had a traditional Japanese New Year with soba noodle soup on New Year’s Eve and mochi soup on New Year’s Day. We ate traditional New Year foods like sushi and other celebratory Japanese dishes and each family member, including our new daughter-in-law Lynn, prepared a dish for the feast.

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