The Famuyiwa Dinner Diary : Asian Meals

I take pride in making delicious, healthy meals for my family. I also enjoy cooking so I’m not afraid to try something different. In my house we really enjoy variety so we rarely eat the same meal twice for at least a month (unless we really loved something and need an encore). With that said, I’ve been stuck in a dinner rut lately. It has been a struggle to come up with a weekly menu that I’m excited about. My husband always suggests I look back over old menus I’ve made and re-do them but not even that was getting me exited about dinnertime. Then it hit me! Why not pick a cuisine and use that as my inspiration for the week? So I did. Welcome to the Famuyiwa Dinner Diary!

This past week I decided to make Asian inspired meals. Asian food is heavy on the vegetables and that’s exactly what I wanted for my family. My sister had also just purchased a wok for me that I had yet to use so Asian food seemed like the right direction to go.

I did a little research to gather some simple recipes because I don’t have a lot of time on my hands for cooking with two needy little ones. The recipes I chose were so tasty and didn’t take long to make. I will note that chopping veggies for these recipes can drastically increase the time it takes to prepare a meal so buying pre-chopped or shredded veggies where you can saves a lot of time.

I visited my local Asian market to get my ingredients. Unfortunately, they didn’t have everything I needed so I did have to make substitutions and adjustments to a few recipes. Nothing lacked in flavor or deliciousness but the meals were obviously not completely authentic. Judging by my family’s clean plates, the assignment was still completed!

 

The first meal we had was Asian fried chicken and Som Tam, a salad typically made with green papaya, Thai chilies, garlic, long beans, grape tomatoes, and dried shrimp. I didn’t have all of these ingredients, which sucked. I was missing the most important ingredient, green (unripe) papaya so I found a recipe that used ripe papaya and included other ingredients I could access.

I’ve had this salad before during my travels in Thailand and I loved it. I knew what it should taste like and this didn’t taste the same. I wasn’t a fan but my husband enjoyed it. Also, I shaved my carrots and instead of julienning them to save time. I think this was too far off from what it should be for me to have enjoyed it. The chicken, however, was great!

The second meal I made was stir-fried char sui pork and veggies. This meal came together in about 30 minutes and tasted divine! I don’t have much to say about this other than yum!!

Next we had Ginger-seasame steamed vegetables and dumplings. I cheated on the dumplings and bought the premade frozen ones. I don’t feel bad about it. They were delicious! The steamed vegetables were showing off too. Yummy in my tummy! My 3 year old ate all of his food and asked for more. This meal also came together quickly and I was happy to see my family enjoying such a healthy dinner.

Fourth in the line up was Thai spicy chili and basil fried rice. Who doesn’t like fried rice? The spicy chilies and basil definitely delivered on flavor. My son doesn’t like anything spicy so I reserved a little rice for him without the chilies.

Lastly, I made Thai style pork and noodle stir-fry. Again, YUM YUM! My husband and I couldn’t stop eating these noodles. They did have a little kick from the red curry paste but we like spice so it was perfect. (My son ate chicken nuggets that night.) The pork was crispy and salty, the veggies had just the right amount of crunch and the noodles were thick and soft. The recipe called for hokkien noodles but I couldn’t find those. I used udon noodles instead.

Listed below are the links to the all of recipes and my ranking for favorites!

If you’re stuck in a dinner rut too maybe these Asian inspired recipes can inspire something new for your dinner table.

My Rankings (Favorite to Least Favorite)

1. Thai style pork and noodle stir-fry

2. Ginger Sesame Steamed Veggies and Dumplings

3. Char Sui Pork and Veggies

4. Asian Fried Chicken and Som Tam

5. Spicy Thai Chili Basil Fried Rice

• Som Tum- https://goop.com/recipes/papaya-salad/
• Garlic Soy Fried Chicken – https://mykoreankitchen.com/dakgangjeong-soy-garlic-fried-chicken/
• Ginger Sesame Steamed Veggies – https://www.tasteofhome.com/recipes/ginger-sesame-steamed-vegetable-salad/
• Spicy Thai Chili and Basil Fried Rice – https://www.delicious.com.au/recipes/thai-spicy-chilli-basil-fried-rice/rd23hktd
• Char Sui Pork and Veggies – https://www.delicious.com.au/recipes/stir-fried-char-siu-pork-mince-broccolini/6103495d-70ff-4b60-a40a-725d8256d6f5
• Thai style pork and noodle stir-fry – https://www.taste.com.au/recipes/thai-style-pork-hokkien-noodle-stir-fry/127dbdb0-4e87-4ce4-a264-579d505277b9

Next for us is Polish food! Can’t wait to see how this goes!