More yum

Tonight's dinner was inspired by a meal I'd eaten last month with my co-workers. I'm a big fan of Vietnamese spring rolls and after rekindling my love for them at a phở restaurant in a neighborhood called Jeongja (a lovely mix of foreign restaurants/shopping there) we all went out to a restaurant that serves do-it-yourself spring rolls.

I was, as you may guess, in all kinds of epicurean heaven. The lettuce and cilantro and beansprouts and cellophane noodles and cucumber slivers and, most especially, the grilled duck slices, all wrapped in the cool, delicate embrace of edible rice paper, caused the rusty wheels in the long-dormant home cooking section of my brain to spring into action.

I. Could. Make. These. At. Home.

EUREKA! So after I'd spent my weekend cleaning and making my kitchen all kinds of purdy, I made a mental plan to cook two specific dishes: the mirin-glazed salmon in my previous post and the aforementioned spring rolls.

I managed, thanks to the help of my co-workers, to find everything I needed to make it a culinary event (in this case, cilantro - the key to an excellent combination for rice paper filling, and mirin - the key to glazing a mean salmon). Tonight I managed, between bites, to remember that I owned a camera and that I like taking pictures of food.

I watched Jamie Oliver cooking with fresh herbs and plants from his garden. What a lovely idea. If I didn't have a red thumb, I would probably try to grow herbs. Alas, I kill everything plant-like that I touch. Happily, this keeps the veg section at AK Plaza in business and the nice ladies that work there employed to assist hopeless foreigners another day.

I did have a bit of an after-dinner thing tonight. Although I did have a lovely dinner, I had less shrimp today than last time and there was just...the smallest hint of yearning for more.

Happily, and I'm still smiling about this one, I found a wine shop in AK Plaza that sells...yes, blessed readers...real cheese.

Let me type that again, slowly.

R E A L C H E E S E

I'm talking hard, strong, grateable, palest of yellows Parmesan Reggiano. My love for this cheese knows no time, nor boundary. Here it was, at long last, right near my subway stop these whole four months. It's as if, cherished reader, I had found one of you in the wine section. We embraced, I sniffed it a little and rubbed it on my face. The salesladies seemed to understand. They smiled knowingly, as if they too had come to know the deep and true love one can share with really old milk.