09.09.08: Faux pho and NY home cookin'

First, an announcement for all two of Our Gentle Readers: He's travelling on family-related biz for a bit and so will have to update with His own good eats from the road, while She does the cooking AND the washing up all lonesome-like.

But tonite, She may make him a little jealous with Her pho-like interpretation of Jamie's fusion broth from last week, subsing prawns for chicken, cheating a bit with some M&S readymade fish broth, peppering the pot with some dried lime leaves and adding several spritzes of stinky fish sauce. Meanwhile, carrot prepared with the KTOTY, some cherry toms, toasted sunflower seeds, and mixed leaves conveyed a fresh batch of wasabi-lime dressing from plate to palate.

SHE SAYS: I was craving something simple and nourishing to keep up me strength while the mister's away, and this proved mighty fine for the purpose. It desperately needed the fish sauce, though - the M&S broth, while authentically shrimpy even before the prawns went in, proved far too delicate to carry a soup. Top tip: dry-grilling prawns is only a good idea if you prefer vigorous grill-pan scrubbing to reading, websurfing, watching telly, and various other enjoyable evening pastimes. Overall, the chicken version of the soup is more impressive, but this one's worth repeating with sturdier stock. Prettily piquant wasabi-lime dressing paired up with the deeply toasty seeds to make plain salad unusually mmm-worthy.

HE SAYS: Wow, She does make me jealous but I still had me some good nosh. After a long journey to NYC, I sat down with the family to a hearty roast chicken and vegetable plate which definitely surpassed all the airline crap I was offered on the plane. The salad was a simple crunchy lettuce affair with a balsamic dressing, not a carrot or beetroot in sight unfortunately, but still good. Ended the meal with a nice palate cleanser of mixed raspberries and blueberries. Lots of red wine was consumed and I collapsed into bed, tired but content. [Photo to come.]

KTOTY - kitchen tool of the year, aka julienne peeler