Well the move’s not going well, but we’re almost all settled in to the new place and are trying to get our home straightened out. It’s such a chore to deal with people using a kitchen you use when you know they don’t wash their hands and then go around touching everything, or they’ll eat anything you put in the fridge so I hope you didn’t want it. It’s not that they’re bad people, but they don’t think about anyone but themselves usually and they’re kind of callous.

But on the bright side, I come baring a new freebie! Coca-Cola now has an application on Facebook called the Ahh Giver, which is basically a little animated Coke postcard. But if you get to it just at the right time on Monday (and while supplies last), you can send your friend (or have them send you) a coupon worth 99 cents off of a 14-16oz Coke! Check it out HERE!

A simple recipe today for a fake Chashu Ramen you can make when you’ve got almost nothing in the house, like we do. It’s simple, it’s tasty and it goes a little something like this:

3 oz of uncooked ramen (for the love of Thor, not the freeze-dried kind, try for real ramen if you can!)
2 quarter-sized slices of fresh ginger (peeled and crushed)
3 C ready-made chicken, pork or beef broth (we used chicken)
4 hard-boiled eggs (peeled and cut in half from pole to pole)
2 large handfuls of fresh baby spinach
2 standard sized hotdogs (cut into strips)
Soy sauce to taste

Prepare your ramen according to the instructions on the package then drain it into a colander and rise with cold water to stop the cooking process. Set aside.

In a wok or large sauce pan bring the broth, hotdogs and ginger to a low boil then reduce the heat and simmer for a good 5 minutes. Turn the heat back up and add your salt and a few dashes of soy sauce. Return to rolling boil.

In a decent sized bowl portion out a fourth of the noodles in one fourth of the bowl, dedicate one fourth of the bowl to spinach, another fourth to hotdog strips and the final fourth to one of the hard boiled eggs (cut side facing upward). Once your bowl is arranged, ladle your boiling broth over the top and cover it your bowl with a bowl lid or plate for a few minutes.

It serves four, it’s cheap and easy to make and very tasty. It’s not really chashu ramen but still good when you don’t have a lot in your house. Be sure to serve it with a little red chili sauce and maybe some hot mustard.

Well my camera’s not working, and even when it was I couldn’t figure out how to control the blasted thing which meant fuzzy pictures on a good day, badly lit ones on a bad. Half of the photos here are from a mobile phone, which was the only way to get a semi clear picture!

On top of that I just find myself working too much to really get into blogging what little food I do make, which is a shame actually. With no room down here (hopefully will change once I’m moved), bad lighting, no usable camera and no money to buy food, I’m sorry to say that this blog is boring even to me, lol.

It’s just as well, really, because I’m in one of those no food slumps and because of that I may start posting recipe-related articles with no photos because I’m not actually making the dishes. Here’s to hoping the camera and food situations get better!

This recipe is for Tacos Valhalla, once again the photos are awful but I am trying to get a better camera so please bare with me!

It’s basically a non-beef taco made of seasoned turkey meat with fresh, cold toppings to give it sort of a salad taste instead of a really taco-y taste, which I prefer.

The recipe is very simple, brown half a pound of taco-flavored ground turkey in a skillet (we used a wok), on medium-low because turkey does not behave like ground beef – don’t make the mistake I made and follow the instructions on the package, lol!

Then we used our beautiful new toaster oven (only $18 at Walmart, works like a dream!) to toast two regular corn taco shells for set on ‘toast’ for about five minutes.

The toppings for this are fairly simple but they’re what make this Tacos Valhalla. You need fresh or canned tomatoes (diced), a bit of salsa (we go with peach or mango at our house) and plain vanilla yogurt. We’d have used shredded lettuce but we didn’t have any on hand, so the tacos aren’t as salad-y as I usually like them to be. This dish is best served at room temperature, because the cold toppings give it a great fresh salad taste with a unique sweetness (like sweet cream, not like candy lol) and a great tang. It really tastes more like hearty salad than a taco!

Here’s a tip – a well seasoned wok will never need to be greased, so you shouldn’t have to use any oil or even cooking spray for this, so it’s a great way to get your protein without all the fat!