Cauliflower with Dijon Sauce

I found this recipe from allrecipes.com. I thought it was really good. I didn't know how else to cook cauliflower, besides the usual oyster sauce method. I think next time though, I'll cook it with yogurt instead, as suggested by one of the comments. Recipe can be found here. And instead of using the microwave, I boiled it for 5 minutes. Then I put it in the oven at 375 degrees for about another 5 minutes or until the cheese was melted. I hate using the microwave to cook food because that's not real cooking.

clipped from allrecipes.com

INGREDIENTS

• 1 head cauliflower, separated into florets
• 1/2 cup mayonnaise
• 1/4 cup Dijon mustard
• 1 cup shredded sharp Cheddar cheese

DIRECTIONS

1. Place cauliflower florets in a large glass bowl or casserole dish, and cover with plastic wrap. Poke a few holes in the plastic with a knife. Cook in the microwave for 5 to 7 minutes, or until tender.
2. In a cup or small bowl, stir together the mayonnaise, and Dijon mustard. Spread over the top of the cauliflower. Sprinkle shredded cheese over the top. Return to the microwave, and cook just until cheese has melted, about 2 minutes.

Steak, fries, and tomato

Yummy! Look what I cooked for my hubby. :)

New York Steak Strip with a side of fries and tomato onion garlic with cilantro. Good stuff.

food review

Critique on pork tenderloin with creamy mustard sauce.

It sucked. I wasn't impressed with the sauce at all. I think I'll stick to my breaded pork or ketchup worcestershire version.

For some reason, it came out all watery and very tasteless.

Downtown

I love this song!

pork tenderloin with creamy mustard sauce

This recipe is taken from verybestbaby.com/recipes. This is a new recipe that I'll be trying tonight and I'm very excited because I was running out of ways to cook pork.

Ingredients:
1 pound pork tenderloin
1 teaspoon vegetable oil
1/2 cup Nestle Carnation Evap. Fat Free Milk
2 tablespoons Dijon mustard
2 to 3 green onions, sliced

Cut pork into 1-inch-thick slices. Place pork between two pieces of plastic wrap. Flatten to 1/4-inch thickness using meat mallet or rolling pin. Season with salt and ground black pepper, if desired.

Heat oil in large, nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. Add half of the pork; cook on each side for 2 minutes or until browned and cooked through. Remove from skillet; set aside and keep warm. Repeat with remaining pork.

Reduce heat to low. Add evaporated milk; stir to loosen brown bits from bottom of skillet. Stir in mustard and green onions. Return pork to skillet. Cook for 1 to 2 minutes or until sauce is slightly thickened, turning pork to coat with sauce.

apartment hunt

We are looking for an apartment near the school I'll be attending next fall. So far, no luck but there are some potential places. I think I will have to leave this up to my hubby because I'm way too picky. For instance, we saw a place that was 1050 sq. ft. The size met our standards, but the quality did not: it was old and dark. I thought maybe I could fix it up myself with some paint, but the guy said we can't paint the trim or door which is a dark wood color. The sink, counter tops, and cabinets are all very old too, and dirty looking. It looks like roaches could take a vacation there. And the bathroom, I'm not excited about at all. The last occupant was there for seven years so you would think the owner would fix this place up a little and do some renovations. I guess not.

The places that are renovated are more expensive and not as big. We will never find what we want because we just don't have that kind of money yet. After all, both of us are students. We really do need more space. I think you will understand if you see our current place. There's stuff everywhere because there's no pantry or cabinets. It basically looks like a sick dorm to me.

I also wanted to find a place with a washer/dryer in the apartment unit, not within the apartment complex. I just don't understand how people can use a coin laundry to do their clothes. The water isn't even hot enough to wash linens and there is no way you can wash cashmere without having your own washer/dryer.

So like I said, I think I will leave this up to my hubby because I'm just way too picky. I'll just have to deal with it.

developmental psychology

The following was a writing assignment for a developmental psych course that I took back in the summer of '05. The course focused on the stages of development of an embryo up to the adolescent years. I saved it because I knew I would need it one day. Maybe you too.

***

This course has left me with much sage advice on how to handle, treat, take care of, and interact with children. For instance, without this class, I would not have known how to praise children: their effort, not their intelligence. If failure occurs in children, this method would reduce the chance of them thinking that they are incapable of mastering the task because they would feel their intelligence is fixed. Praising their effort, however, will foster them to keep trying until they accomplish the task. Likewise, I would not have known to express concerns about their negative actions rather than falsely labeling who they are from what they did. For example, if the child continually, but accidentally wets the bed, it would be more appropriate to say, "You wet the bed; let's clean it up," instead of "You are such a trouble maker!"

Because I believe in a healthy lifestyle, I can surreptitiously instill my eating habits onto my children by treating fruits as desserts and vegetables as snacks. A simple sentence, "We'll have oranges for dessert," will get children to have the mindset that fruits and vegetables are "goodies," instead of chips, candy, and other junk food. And, as I learned from Dr. Noll, I would have to steal the line, "You don't have to like it, but you have to at least eat one."

Obviously, the key to getting rid of a bad habit in children is to ignore the habit. But most parents give in and the key is not to give in. I would not have known that intermittently reinforcing the habit is horrible such that it will never help the child to rid the habit.

I will try my best to adopt the ways of an authoritative parenting style to promote a healthy emotional development of the child. I can do this by expressing lots of love and at the same time, be very demanding. To facilitate their language and cognitive development, I would ask open-ended questions such that they could not reply with a plain yes or no. Also, an important part of their development is providing support, such as social scaffolding. To do this, I would aid their thinking along the way. Most importantly, it would be very important for me to be a very good role model because children imitate actions more than what they are told.

critique on tonight's dinner

Pork
C-
Dry, not tender (I didn't tenderize it), sauce dried on pork (marinate for a few hours at most, not overnight because the sauce thickened), too gingery (will not add at all next time), not enough ketchup or worcestershire sauce.

Hearts of Romaine
A-
Needs a little more ponzu and needs to be a little crispier.

Nishiki Rice
A
It's good.

wow, this is funny!

clipped from msn.foxsports.com

Beijing officials want to ban 'bad English'

Municipal officials promised Wednesday to crack down on awkward, Chinese-inflected English, known as "Chinglish," and asked the public to help police bad grammar and faulty syntax.

[caption for picture] "Shangri-La is in your mind, but your Buffalo is not."
For more information on the story, click here.

When I saw this story, it reminded me of Taiwan's bathroom sign that read "WC." I never understood why they used WC. I thought it was bad grammar where they thought WaSh-room was spelled WaCh-room because phonetically, they sound the alike (ch sound as in chateau, not change or chrome). Upon further investigation, WC actually stands for water closet, also known as a flush toilet. So next time you visit and are looking for a washroom, the sign may say WC. And don't be surprised if they are squat toilets. *shivers

tomorrow's dinner menu

Pork slices
marinate in ketchup, worcestershire sauce, water (I don't measure, usu. do it by color)
add a spoon of sugar and desired amount of rice wine
add julienned ginger and minced garlic (optional-I don't always do this, depends on what I have on hand.)
bake in oven

Hearts of Romaine
wash and rip into bite size pieces
boil for a few minutes and drain
spike it with Ponzu (I like it better than soy sauce because of its citrus flavor)

Nishiki rice