Today's lunch was provided by my coworker's pro-chef wife. It was supposed to be burritos, but several factors conspired to make this... not-burritos.
That's not meant in any way to disrespect the Missus's cooking. Unlike many Korean restaurants that attempt and fail to replicate foreign cuisine, my coworker's wife does her best to respect Western food when she makes it. Today was no exception, except (1) the tortillas she'd selected for the burritos were too small to make anything other than teeny, enchilada-sized burritos, and (2) she'd picked rice-flour tortillas, which tasted fine, but as I wrote in my previous post, they were too fragile even after heating. The lack of gluten in rice flour makes rice tortillas far too easy to tear, and unlike what happens to corn tortillas—which also lack gluten—rice tortillas remain fragile after heating (corn tortillas, done right, gain a bit of a leathery texture when heated in a ripping-hot skillet). So I elected to make tacos instead of burritos, and so did my American coworker. (Our Korean coworker elected not to eat any of the food at all, which struck me as strange. He'd been reminded twice, yesterday, that today was an office-luncheon day, but he ended up bringing food from home, then he declared himself stuffed when the rest of us sat down to eat lunch.)
Here's my first taco:
coworker said he & the wife have a special place to get cilantro (remarkably fresh!) |
Here's my third taco:
coworker added that, if he told me the place's location, he'd have to kill me |
Consistent with the not-burrito theme, the Missus had made a burrito filling that was, as my coworker warned, more fajita-friendly than burrito-ish. When you think fajitas, you think thick and large cuts and chunks: long-cut bell peppers, big chunks of onion (for you weird-ass onion-lovers), and healthy strips of steak (preferably grilled: flank, hanger, and skirt are all acceptably standard for fajitas). That's approximately what we got today. I was thankful that the onions were cut large enough for me to avoid them with my narrow tongs as I hunted for my proteins and peppers. Surprisingly, the proteins also included shrimp along with chunks of skirt steak. In all, I had three tacos. I wouldn't have been able to do that had my boss been here, but he didn't come in to the office today. His loss.
From what I hear, the Missus is under some strain for this and that reason, so today's meal may be the last one she does for us—at least for a while. This means that, after two years, I'll be back to making food for the troops every calendar month. Selfishly, I think it's nice to be able to plan twice as many meals: I've got a lot of menu items on my mind, and my coworkers are often good guinea pigs for my evil experiments. I talked with my coworker about hitting the Missus up for a meal, but maybe only a couple times a year, so as to reduce strain on her. We'll see, over the coming months, how all of that works out.
And if this really is the last meal from the Missus for the foreseeable future, it's not a bad meal to go out on. I thoroughly enjoyed today's tacos, and in the end, the rice tortillas tasted fine, with their texture being only a minor, minor inconvenience. The filling was perfectly cooked, and the accompanying toppings/trimmings—pico de gallo, sour cream, lettuce, sriracha, and super-fresh cilantro—completed the flavor symphony with gusto. Great food as always. I'm going to miss this lady's cooking.
No comments:
Post a Comment
READ THIS BEFORE COMMENTING!
All comments are subject to approval before they are published, so they will not appear immediately. Comments should be civil, relevant, and substantive. Anonymous comments are not allowed and will be unceremoniously deleted. For more on my comments policy, please see this entry on my other blog.
AND A NEW RULE (per this post): comments critical of Trump's lying must include criticism of Biden's or Kamala's or some prominent leftie's lying on a one-for-one basis! Failure to be balanced means your comment will not be published.