每週新挑戰 Weekly Challenge – May 11

朋友說每週都要挑戰新菜做不同練習是不是跟自己太過不去？老實說，我並沒有逼自己做什麼，是很自然而然去想下週做什麼好呢？滿腦子都是ideas，呵呵！也許正如股神說的 “Without passion, you don’t have energy”。

A friend said “Is weekly challenge too tough on yourself?”  Honestly speaking, I never push myself to do anything.  It’s the passion deep inside me that I cannot stop thinking everyday “what to practice or try next week?”  Full of ideas in my head.  Maybe, this is what exactly Warren’s wisdom said “Without passion, you don’t have energy”.

自以為5月11到17日這週產量有點低，但當我列出我上週的練習和哪些練習想跟大家分享的時候，卻發現至少有一半的練習體驗值得跟大家做一些分享，當然，我不打算在這一篇博客轟炸你們所有的分享，會慢慢一個一個來，畢竟好幾個新嘗試還是需要多一點練習。

I thought the week of May 11 wasn’t a very productive one.  However, when I list down all my practices, I found that at least half of them worth sharing with you all.  Of course, I won’t bombard you guys with everything in this blog.  I still need more practices for some of the recipes.

1. 烤雞 Roasted Chicken 🐔
2. 牛肉塔可 Beef Taco 🌮
3. 肉末長青豆 Stir Fry Green Beans with Minced Pork 🥬
4. 花生酥 Peanut Butter Cookies 🥜
5. 香煎三文魚配花椰菜飯 Salmon with Cauliflower Rice 🐟
6. 高麗菜豬肉餃子 Cabbage Pork Dumplings 🥟
7. 番茄牛油果烤多士 Tomato Avocado Melt 🥑
8. 烤豬排 Roasted Pork 🐷
9. 肉桂蘋果 Apple Cinnamon 🍎

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什麼是Taco Tuesday? What is Taco Tuesday?

上週覺得最成功的應該是牛肉塔可 Beef Taco，來了美國之後，發現很多餐廳都有Taco Tuesday，就是週二點Taco可以買一贈一之類，因為疫情，在家就會想做一些之前會去餐廳吃的菜，Taco是其中之一。

I think the most successful dish last week is Beef Taco.  Since I came here, I found that Taco Tuesday is a common practice in a lot of restaurants especially bars here.  It’s basically a buy one get one free promotion.  Due to COVID-19, I would like to make some dishes to “resume” some of our rituals when we can dine out.  Taco Tuesday is one of them.

墨西哥卷有很多種，Taco算是一種，也是我比較喜歡的，相對比較清爽，Taco的組成可以說有三大部分 There are various kind of “Mexican wrap”.  Taco is one of them and it’s one of my favourite.  It’s relatively less heavy.  There are three main parts of a Taco.：

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~ 玉米卷 Wrap ~

經典的Taco是用想玉米片一樣脆的Taco Shell做的，但也可以用軟身的餅皮，在美國的超市，你能找到各式各樣的餅皮。脆的Taco Shell，簡單用微波爐熱20秒就可以（包裝上都叫你用烤箱但太麻煩了），軟身的餅皮，我一般就會用平底鍋兩面熱一下就可以。 We usually use hard taco shell (like nachos) in classic taco.  There’s also soft shell.  All are available in the grocery stores here with many different varieties for you to choose.  Hard shell is more our favourite kind.  For hard shell, you can simply heat it up in microwave for 20 seconds (they usually recommend you to heat it up in the oven in their package but it’s too troublesome if you want a quick dinner).  For other type of soft taco wrap, I usually pan fry both sides a bit on a frying pan.

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~ 餡料 Filling ~

餡料的話，經典Taco是牛肉餡，當然你可以做各式各樣的，在很多專賣Taco的店就有很多不同的，雞肉、豬肉甚至海鮮，但我個人還是比較喜歡牛肉餡  As for fillings, ground beef is the classic.  Of course, you can make any kinds of style with different kinds of meat – chicken, pork or even seafood.  I personally like beef the best!

牛肉餡的做法很簡單，切碎洋蔥，炒鍋裡先炒香，加入牛肉餡炒，加入紅甜椒粉、孜然、蒜粉、辣椒粉（比例是1：1：0.5：0.5），再加鹽和黑胡椒粉調味，有食譜會建議加點雞湯再煮濃稠一些，但我和西人不喜歡taco的餡料太濕，而且加了洋蔥，牛肉餡煮出來不會太乾的。

Beef filling is very easy to make.  Chop some onion.  Stir fry the onion until it’s slightly soften.  Add ground beef.  Season with paprika, cumin, garlic powder and chili powder (proportion: 1:1:0.5:0.5).  Season further with salt and black pepper.  Some recipes would recommend to add some chicken broth.  However, both Mr. Large and I do not like the beef filling with too much sauce.  Besides, with the onion in the beef, the beef filling won’t be too dry.

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~ 配料 Topping ~

組合Taco的時候，經典的配料就是Salsa、芝士Cheese和酸奶油Sour Cream，Salsa醬可以在超市買現成的，我就喜歡自己在家裡做，比較新鮮，個人不是特別喜歡Sour Cream的味道，我一般不放。When assemble a taco, the classic toppings are salsa, cheese and sour cream.  You can get salsa easily from grocery stores but I like to make my own at home.  It’s much fresher!  I do not like much sour cream and thus I usually do not put any.

Salsa的做法也是很簡單，兩個人的話基本上一個番茄、一個牛油果、四分一個洋蔥和少許芫荽就可以，番茄、牛油果和洋蔥切粒，芫荽切碎，加入少許檸檬汁（或蘋果醋）、鹽和黑胡椒拌勻就可以。Salsa is very easy to make at home.  For two person, you only need one tomato, one avocado, 1/4 onion and some cilantro.  Cut tomato, avocado and onion into dices and chop cilantro.  Mix them well with a little of lemon juice (or apple cider vinegar)  and season with salt and black pepper.

~ 香料 Spices ~

不管是墨西哥菜或者印度菜，有幾種基本香料是很必須的，所以，你可以一次在超市都買全這些香料，你會發現非常多的菜式都能用的上，這些香料包括：孜然 Cumin，薑黃 Tumeric，蒜粉 Garlic Powder，紅甜椒粉 Paprika，辣椒粉 Chili Powder。

Spices are very important in both Mexican and Indian food.  There are few fundamental kinds of spices that I would recommend you to stock up at home from grocery store.  You will find them very useful in many dishes.  They are: cumin, tumeric, garlic powder, paprika and chili powder.

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其實做法很簡單，看似複雜是因為需要的材料有點多，但其實家裡只要備好香料和餅皮，你也可以每週家裡Taco Tuesday！Taco is actually quite easy to make at home.  It looks like complicated as it requires quite a lot of ingredients.  However, you only need to ensure stocking up all the spices you need and the taco shells.  You can also “Taco Tuesday” at home!