You never know what edibles you'll find at the local 99c only Store - everything from a package of Chia Seeds to a large container of frozen Chicken Livers. And here are some of the best, or at least, the most unusual Food Finds of 2015 that I've run across.
Even seaweed snacks have made an appearance. You know what they are right? They are super thin sheets of dried seaweed - they dissolve in your mouth like the host given to Catholics during the Eucharist - or those sheets of breath mints.
As a joke I gave out some to Halloween trick or treaters. Well, I had a fight on my hands when a group of teenage tricksters actually shoved at each other to get a package! I guess dried seaweed snacks have been discovered by the next generation, and good for them.
The 99c only Stores cater to local ethnic enclaves here in Los Angeles, especially Latin and Middle Eastern.
While this Mole may not taste like homemade to transplanted Oaxacans, you can't beat the price. Mole is a complex blend of spices and chilies, really too complex for the average cook to make. I found small boxes of it, and it tastes fine, especially paired with a nice fillet of chicken.
They also sell plantains ready to ripen for sweet fried bananas. I've made them to accompany my Cuban recipes, like tender Roast Pork and Black Beans. I also see peeled and frozen packages of Yucca, a potato-like starch that Central Americans go for.
Click on any photo to see larger.
Whole pomegranates appeal to Middle Eastern tastes buds. I like the sour/sweet pulp. Inside the cardboard hard shells there are tiny fruit lozenges with seeds, and you eat the bright red flesh with seeds - quite tasty. I made an cute video with my neighbor Bob's 4 year old daughter, Lola, where we try to get her to eat some. You can see it here.
My go-to drink of choice is Diet Cran-Pomegranate by Ocean Spray made with real fruit juice. They have carried it here for the last few years. After work I sometimes add it to a shot of gin over ice.
My beer of choice are 16 ounce cans of Henninger Beer from Germany. They don't carry it all the time and I always stock up when they do. It's a light crisp pale lager that goes down easy. I found another refreshing beer on sale once called Chang, from Thailand.
I've lucked out a few times with the frozen fare that comes in. I liked the Veggie Lasagna from Stouffer's and a Whole Grain Pilaf from Luvo. While the servings are small, the quality and taste are superior.
And there are always cans and jars of premade pasta sauce.
The hot sauce du jour is Sriracha, originally bottled in nearby Irwindale. Huy Fong Foods did not copyright the name so the Sriracha lable and flavor is turning up everywhere, like in ketchup and mayo.
99c only Stores offer a wide variety of fresh fruit and veggies,
sometimes it's even organic. You can pick up packages of tomatoes,
potatoes, mushrooms, lettuce and onions.
As for fruit, how about
whole pineapples for 99.99 cents! They even carry coconuts - good luck
cracking them, though. I usually settle for Coconut Chips.
Now don't rush out to your local 99c only Stores hoping to find all of the above. The preferred stock that comes through, often goes right out the door quickly, so that's it. When I find a great deal I stock up -- shopping there keeps you on your toes!
I hope you have had a year of bargains, too. Just stick with me and I'll keep pointing out all the money saving food items, that make up my cheap$kate recipes, I find this coming New Year!
These short clips set the table for how I start the day while on vacation. I always do a "Breakfast in "fill in the location here" video. It's usually a single-take camera move, with a bunch of food items local to the area. And later, I sync up an audio collage underneath the video.The audio can be any informative and fun sound bites I've collected all during the trip.
You gotta have volcanic, mineral-rich, Hawai'i Kona Coffee to start the day, along with the best local fresh fruit -- and a ripe papaya is featured here. Also, Hawaii's favorite grab-and-go, Spam Musubi, is shown in outrageous closeup. I became a fan of Spam Musubi on this trip. In my shot is a breakfast musubi stacked with bacon, egg, spam and sticky rice wrapped in dried seaweed! It shouldn't work, but it does...deliciously.
Make sure to come back to my blog when I review the premier eatery for Spam Musubi called the Musubi Cafe. How does a Bacon, Egg and Spam Musubi rate on The 99 Cent Chef's Cheap$kate Dining Scale of 1 to 9, 9 being best? And as a bonus the plain Egg Musubi is reviewed by my wife - will it be Wife Approved?
While shooting Breakfast in Waikiki, I literally noticed clouds in my coffee when I rehearsed the camera move. Wow, it's Carly Simon's song "You're So Vain" with the lyric "I had some dreams, they were clouds in my coffee, clouds in my coffee..." a literal interpretation visualized.
So after I shot the Breakfast in Waikiki camera move, I got out my Canon still camera and shot "Clouds in my Coffee" in time lapse. It took about about 10 minutes for the clouds to move through the reflective liquid surface of my coffee cup. In the final version I speeded up the footage from 10 minutes to 17 seconds.
Here's the short Clouds in My Coffee video:
There is plenty more in store for you, so checkout my latest tasty Hawai'i Travelogue video, and make sure to come back for seconds and thirds!
Breakfast in Honolulu - VIDEO
Play it here, video runs 1 minute, 11 seconds.
Breakfast in Honolulu YouTube video link for viewing or embedding, just click here.
Clouds in my Coffee YouTube video link for viewing or embedding, just click here.
Sushi is Man Cave Cuisine? You bet when it's an easy-to-make Hand Roll. That's what it's all about when you hang out in my Man Cave - simply delicious food.
You don't have to be an expert sushi chef to make my version of a Spicy Tuna Hand Roll. Just get out a sheet of dried seaweed and roll up some fishy filling and rice, with a few slivers of your favorite veggies. If you can make a burrito then you can do this recipe.
Go fishing and bring home the protein - or if you're a city boy then get some fish from you local fish monger. And for a cheap$kate version using fake crab (called krab) go to Hindsight at the end of this post to get the lowdown.
So read on guys (and gals,) I got it all laid out for you below. Man Cave Cuisine isn't all meat and potatoes.
The easiest sushi to make is a Hand Roll. And for my next Sushi Recipe Video I'll have you literally eating out of my hands.
When you dine at the sushi counter in a Japanese restaurant it can be intimidating -- all that precise assembling and slicing choreography.
Making a Hand Roll is like making a flatbread (or tortilla) sandwich roll. Just slice up some veggie and fish ingredients and pile it on a sheet of seaweed (known as Nori) half covered with cooked sushi rice -- then roll it into the shape of a pointy-end snow cone.
Japanese chefs work overtime on visual presentation, but a Hand Roll is more about what you put in, than how it looks.
For this Hand Roll I'm using Spicy Tuna. And Spicy Tuna is just mayo and hot sauce (usually Sriracha Spicy Chili Sauce, or an imitation brand) mixed into chopped raw tuna. But any hot sauce can be used.
(For a cheaper hand roll scroll go to the end of my blog post under Hindsight, and read about making one with imitation crab - I'll have a fake crab recipe, with photos and text, posted in a few weeks, too.)
If you made my Nigiri Tuna Sushi from the last blog post then you may have saved some tuna scraps. A hand roll is perfect for the small trims of tuna, any uneven pieces, and unattractive cuts. (When I make sushi I never throw away the fish scraps, unless it's just too stringy or chewy.)
The only tricky thing is spreading out sticky rice and rolling the Hand Roll. And even that isn't too difficult.
For handling sticky rice just dampen your hands. And for rolling, roll the loaded seaweed diagonally, and seal it with dampened fingertips -- the ingredients will hold together in a sleek black wrap.
With a hand roll the rice doesn't have to be perfect sticky sushi rice. You can use any favorite rice recipe. The sheet of dried seaweed will hold it all together.
You will need a good cut of raw fish (I get mine free from my fisherman neighbor Don, click here to see video.) For this recipe I used fatty tuna. I used a leaner cut of tuna for my Nigiri Tuna Sushivideo recipe from a last week. And Click here for a list of fish commonly used for sushi.
Probably the most unusual ingredient for a Sushi Roll is dried seaweed. They come in 8 inch square thin sheets; anywhere from 10 to 30 sheets to a package. I get mine at Oriental markets, but they are now being sold in some regular chain grocery stores. If you have a Little Tokyo or Chinatown nearby, then you can find dried seaweed, for a decent price. The best price I've found is 30 sheets for $2.49 -- that's less than 10 cents per sheet! Even if you have to pay twice as much, you will surely use up the whole package trying out everything in my Sushi Recipes Video Series.
I was intimidated to try making sushi for a long time, but now I do it frequently. The main thing is to do it a few times -- with a couple of mistakes under your belt, you will get better. I have.
So do check back for more sushi recipes, including a cheap, easy-to-make, California Roll, that's made with krab, cucumber and creamy avocado.
Spicy Tuna Hand Roll- VIDEO
Play it here, video runs 2 minutes, 30 seconds.
My YouTube video link for viewing or embedding, justclick here.
Ingredients for Spicy Tuna (2 to 4 rolls)
About 6 ounces of tuna - skinless and no bones. I used fatty tuna for this recipe.
3 tablespoons mayo - I used light mayo. Add more or less to desired creaminess.
1 teaspoon Sirracha Chilli Sauce - can also use a favorite hot sauce, grated horseradish, or a pinch of ceyanne pepper. Okay to add a little at a time to reach desired spicyness.
Other Ingredients
About 2 cups cooked Sushi Rice - for my Sushi Rice recipe, click here for text with photos, or scroll down to the end for video only.) You can use any type of cooked rice for a hand roll.
1-2 sheets of dried seaweed - sliced in half
Favorite thinly sliced veggies - carrot, green onions, cucumber or avocado. For a hand roll, fill it up with any favorite sliced veggies, raw or lightly steamed.
Directions for Spicy Tuna Hand Roll
Have Sushi Rice at the ready, room temperature. To see my Sushi Rice recipe, click here.
Mix mayo and Sirracha Chilli Sauce (or your favorite hot sauce) in a bowl. Add a little hot sauce at at time and taste, to bring up to desired spicyness.
Roughly chop raw tuna into small pieces. Mix chopped tuna with spicy mayo. Cover and store in refrigerator until ready to use.
Thinly slice favorite veggies such as: carrot, green onion, cucumber and avocado. Slices can be long or short. You can use packaged shredded carrot or peel and slice your own.
For whole carrots just peel off skin and chop off ends. Split carrot in half across the middle, then split one more time lengthways. Finally slice carrot segments thinly.
For cucumbers slice in half lengthwise and spoon-out seeds. You can peel some of the cucumber or not.
For green onion slice off the green stems and give the stems one more slice lengthwise. (While the green stems are tasty they are tough to bite through, so slicing them thinly makes it easier.) You can sprinkle in some of the chopped white onion pieces too. (Discard green onion root and any wilted stems parts.)
Next, slice dried seaweed in half. It's kind of brittle so handle carefully. Please note that dried seaweed is super-obsorbant, so make sure cutting surface, your hands, and the knife are dry.
Time to bring it all together. Place halved seaweed section, lengthwise, on a dry surface. Dampen fingers and spread on a layer of Sushi Rice over about one half of the seaweed. Just enough rice to cover the surface, no need to pile it on too thick.
Now add spicy tuna on the rice-side of the seaweed. It's up to you how much fish to add - a thick or thin layer. Again, once you've made a few Hand Rolls then you will get better at figuring out the amount of rice to fish you like.
Okay lets wrap it up! Lay on your veggie slices diagonally over the spicy tuna and rice. Next, roll the seaweed in a diagonal direction: bottom left side to upper right side. (I'm right handed, but if you're left handed then make the hand roll filling on the right side of the seaweed, and roll it bottom right to top left.)
Finally seal the Hand Roll with a bead of water. When you have rolled it up moisten fingertips and wipe the seaweed end-edge and press it together. It should seal up and stick together easily.
The end result will look like an ice cream cone with the pointy end. You can make Hand Rolls one at a time or all at once.
Hindsight
If you don't like raw carrot, it's okay to seam for a few minutes to desired softness. This pertains to any veggie you like to use.
It's up to you how much veggies, rice and fish you add to each roll. You can be generous or skimpy doling out the spicy fish.
I know sushi grade raw fish is way expensive. A cheap seafood substitution is krab. You've seen the small frozen packages in seafood deli cases, and even laid out with fresh fish. It's tasty and you don't have to pry it out of a shell. Sometime the quality is suspect. It can be a little dried out from freezing for too long. An easy way to reconstitute, after defrosting, is to sprinkle on a little water, loosely cover, and do a 30 second micorwave (take out pieces as they get warm and soft, and continue to zap in 10 second increments, if krab pieces are still cool.) The krab will soften and plump up perfectly. Finally do a rough chop and mix it with the some Spicy Mayo.
Hand Rolls work well with imperfect rice, too. Since the rice is in a wrap, you can use reheated cooked rice from another day, or even defrosted from the freezer. Just make sure the rice is heated to room temperature.
You can easily use brown rice, just follow my Sushi Rice directions. And after the rice is cooked, let it set for an extra 10 minutes. Brown rice is toothsome with an extra nutty flavor, and more nutritious.
Cheap$kate dreams are made of these: krab, mayo, hot sauce, sushi rice, and a sheet of dried seaweed , form a Spicy Krab Roll. I like it that way, and you will too, if you give it a try. So, with an 8 ounce package of krab, you will get about 4 large sushi rolls with this recipe. And when you cut each roll into 8 slices, that makes 32 pieces!
8 pieces from one roll
It's also an inexpensive way to get your sushi rolling skills up to speed. If you haven't made a sushi roll before, I recommend starting out with my cheap$kate Spicy Krab Roll.
My first rolls were lopsided and often not tight enough, so when sliced the rice would halfway fall out. Or, I would forget to dampen the knife blade before slicing, and the roll would squash and the seaweed would tear unevenly. Oh well, you gotta ruin a few sushi rolls when you start -- but, in no time I quickly got the hang of it. Plus, the mistakes were still deliciously edible.
Here is a GIF of me hand-rolling a California Roll. As you see at the end, it's a little lumpy. To smooth it out just give the roll a final squeeze with a bamboo rolling mat. Click here to see the video.
And in this GIF I use a sushi mat. Click here to see how cheap it is to get a sushi mat online (less than $3 and you can get them at larger chain grocery stores, too.) For a video of sushi mat rolling, click here to see my Spicy Tuna Roll recipe.
I get a half pound of krab for 99.99 cents at my local 99c only Store, and even at a regular seafood market krab is about half the price of any other seafood. The quality of krab can vary, sometimes it's a little dried out and stringy, while other times it's perfectly moist and sweet. An easy way to reconstitute dried and stringy krab is to sprinkle it with water and zap it in the microwave for about 30 seconds until soft and warm - it works quite well.
Regular white rice is cheap. Most sushi recipes call for special (meaning expensive) sushi grade rice -- well, don't believe the hype. Any type of white rice will do fine, and you can make it with more expensive and nutritious brown rice. It's mainly about how you cook the rice, not the grade of rice. Under Directions below, I have a link to my Sushi Rice recipe video.
The only tricky ingredient to find are sheets of dried seaweed, called Nori, but even that is easier to purchase these days at larger chain grocery stores. And if you live near an Oriental market, then that is the cheapest place to get it. Dried seaweed for sushi rolls are about the size of a sheet of computer printing paper (8 inches by 7 inches.) They usually come 10 to 30 sheets per package. A sheet of seaweed seems brittle, but when cooked damp rice is added, it becomes soft - malleable and easy to roll.
If you've been following my Sushi Series, then add this to your repertoire. If you are new visitor, then a Spicy Krab Roll is a perfect cheap$kate sushi recipe to start with.
Ingredients (about 4 rolls, or 32 pieces when sliced)
8 ounces krab - roughly shred or pulled apart. If frozen then defrost first.
2 to 3 tablespoons of mayo - more or less to your own taste. You want enough to mix into krab until it's as creamy as a macaroni or potato salad.
1 teaspoon hot sauce - I used Sirracha Chilli Sauce. You can also use any favorite hot sauce, or a pinch of ceyanne pepper. Add a little at a time to reach your own desired spicyness. You could just leave it out completely for a sweet Krab Roll.
4 sheets of dried seaweed - depending on how much spicy krab you stuff into sushi rolls.
Directions
Prepare Sushi Rice according to my recipe, click here for details. The rice should be room temperature when making sushi.
Roughly shred, or pull apart, krab pieces. Taste a piece and see if you need to soften it -- by microwaving. An easy way to reconstitute, after defrosting, is to sprinkle on a
little water, loosely cover, and do a 30 second micorwave (take out
pieces as they get warm and soft, and continue to zap in 10 second
increments, if krab pieces are still cool.) The krab will soften and
plump up perfectly. Finally do a rough chop (or hand-shred) and mix it with the some Spicy Mayo.
Mix mayo and Sirracha Chilli Sauce (or favorite hot sauce) in a bowl. Mix shredded krab and spicy mayo in a bowl. If necessary, cover and store in refrigerator until ready to use.
Now time to bring it all together. You can use a bamboo sushi mat or just roll it up with your fingers. It's easier to use a mat, but now I just do it by hand. If you do it by hand then keep your fingers dry and tighten it up at the end, if needed, with a sushi mat.
If using a bamboo sushi mat lay it out on a dry surface. (Dried seaweed is very absorbent and sticky when wet.) Place one whole dried sheet of seaweed on center of sushi mat.
Now dampen your hands (as Sushi Rice is sticky and water will make handling easier,) and spread out an even layer of cooked rice over the dried seaweed.
You will be rolling sushi, so leave a half inch edge empty of rice. You can cover all the seaweed, on right and left sides, with rice. As for how much rice you pile on, it's up to you. I just do enough until you can't see the seaweed underneath -- about a 1/4 inch deep.
When seaweed is covered with rice (except half an inch along one edge) gently press on the rice with damp fingers, so it's spread evenly across the seaweed.
Now you can pile on the spicy krab. Cover about a quarter to a third of the rice with spicy krab. I spread it across the center area, end to end. You can use a lot of spicy krab or just a little - it's up to you.
Now time to roll it up. You can rotate the mat away from you to roll, or keep it facing you. Roll the loaded seaweed with a medium pressure as you go, tightening the roll. Keep rolling and adding pressure until you reach the half inch of clear seaweed at the end.
Dampen your fingers and moisten the seaweed edge and just press together to seal.
Once the roll is sealed, wrap the roll one more time in the mat and give the roll even squeezes from end to end. This will help keep the roll from falling apart when you finally slice it.
Remove the mat and place the whole Spicy Krab Roll on a cutting surface. Take a sharp knife and dampen the blade with water. I start in the middle and slice in half. Then I slice each half into 4 pieces, so I get 8 slices per roll, total. You can make thicker pieces if you like, to get 6 pieces total. The object is to make each piece edible in one bite.
You can eat the sushi as is, or pour a small plate of soy sauce and dip sushi pieces as you eat them.
