Video: Be Our Guest - New restaurant at WDW New Fantasyland

I can't help it, I may not like the scary Disney movies but I do love the parks. Disney Imagineers at Walt Disney World in Orlando, Florida provide an inside guide to the Magic Kingdom's newest themed restaurant, Be Our Guest, based on the award winning movie, 'Beauty and the Beast'. There's also a walk-up food area that is open at select times. Ask a cast member near the entrance of how to go in and see what's there and if you wish to dine there, make reservations well in advance of arriving.




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California's Gold: The story of In-N-Out Burger

Hubby talks about In-N-Out Burger all the time when he lived in California. I don't get it, isn't a hamburger a hamburger? But of course if I say that in front of diehard burger fans I would get stabbed by the glare I get from this obviously ignorant question. haha

I was fascinated with hearing the story of the heiress and youngest female billionaire when this story broke there was only one video clip of her. She seems to be the rare case in today's social media and hyped up rich-kid scenario that spends their families's wealth and good name into something good and doesn't like the limelight. It's funny, there's so much hype about the menu that's not on the menu that it makes this veggie burger, only fish, no meat-eater want to check it out if we're ever in the vicinity of one of these iconic burger joints.

This is a documentary of how American's youngest female billionaire, Lynsi Torres' grandparents began their family business in Baldwin Park, California, with one burger joint in 1948 to over 200 In-N-Out restaurants into a billion dollar business without franchising.



California's Gold: In-N-Out Burger from R J on Vimeo.


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Read more: Lynsi Torres: is her recent celebrity good for business?

Watch video: Good Morning America Story of: Lynsi Torres

Hawaii's comfort food

Rice bowl, sometimes this is all you need...

Sticky rice, Aloha Shoyu (soy sauce) and Furikake (seaweed seasoning).

No matter where you go (live/visit) or what you do, no matter the country, the culture, the people - you always want your comfort food. Being from Hawaii, the main staple is rice, medium grain, sticky rice. Jasmine rice will do in a pinch. Top it with a little seasoning and definitely add some shoyu (aka soy sauce,) preferably Aloha brand and I'm home. How bout you?

Check out more food articles, recipes, photos and stories on: Orlando Cooking Examiner

Dr. Oz 3-Day Detox Cleanse

Dr. Oz's 3-Day Detox Cleanse

New Year, holidays, family feasts, football - whatever your overindulgence is, at some point we all need to press reset on our bodies. With that bit of data I thought I'd post a link to my review of Dr. Oz's 3-Day Detox Cleanse. Here's a picture of how I began.

Eliminate harmful toxins, restore your system, and reset your body with this detox cleanse from Dr. Oz. All you need is 3 days and a blender. 

Although you could use any blender I find that the best blender to grind all the ingredients to be blended into a smooth smoothie is the Vitamix. Be sure to bookmark this page to take with you when you go shopping. If you live in Orlando, Florida, the best place to buy your fresh fruits and veggies at a great price is Freshfields Farms.

I posted my detailed experience with this detox drink at this link: Orlando Cooking Examiner - Dr. Oz Detox Cleanse - a review.

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Street Food: Thailand - Veggies in Broth

Street Food in Bangkok, Thailand - Veggie Soup?

I love to travel, no matter if we're in or out of the country, there's always something interesting to see, smell and taste. On a brief day stopover in Bangkok, Thailand we were able to see much of the people out and about, especially during lunch when the street food vendors were their busiest. The colors, sights and aromas of the area were alive and tingling to the senses.

I'm not quite sure what this woman was cooking in this large pot, but from the items on her table it seemed to be a vegetable broth soup. The food vendor added sprouts and other fresh veggies to a bowl and then topped it with the broth.

Recipe: Fast and Furious Tomato Sauce

Tomato sauce on bow tie pasta with garlic bread

Here's a simple tomato sauce that anyone can make quickly with a few ingredients from their pantry. This base sauce can be used as the foundation to any tomato sauce for spaghetti, any pasta dish and great as a layer between lasagna. Be creative by adding veggies, meat balls or ground meat in the sauce.

Ingredients

1 can 28 oz whole peeled plum tomatoes

1 can 14.5 oz diced tomatoes

1 can 6 oz tomato paste (to thicken sauce)

2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil (more or less to sauté onions and garlic)

1 small sweet onion - finely diced

1 clove garlic, minced

Kosher Salt and Pepper to taste or Mrs. Dash (Salt-Free, regular or garlic & herb variety)

Fresh mushrooms, sliced in pieces or 1 can 4 oz mushrooms (pieces and stems)

2 tablespoons Italian Seasoning or a mix of dry: marjoram, basil, thyme, oregano & rosemary

1 teaspoon of light brown sugar to taste

Pasta and Options

1 box of your favorite dry pasta

1 lb - meatballs or lean ground meat or sausage (optional)

Mix chopped veggies (optional, as desired)

Directions

Prepare all of your ingredients before you turn on the stove. Cut/chop/dice/slice and open cans, blend them if you wish – then heat up your pan with oil because when you add the ingredients it goes by quickly.

1. In a frying pan: drizzle enough canola oil to brown chicken, sprinkle salt and pepper or chicken seasoning on both sides of dry chicken, if the chicken is wet pat with paper towel to remove excess moisture so the oil won’t splatter on you – when using chicken with skin and bone – browns easily. If using boneless/skinless thighs – it will lightly brown.

2. While the chicken is browning, in a separate deep sauce pan or dutch oven, add extra virgin olive oil to brown the onions for 2-3 minutes until translucent. Then add the tomato paste and heat for another minute to bring out the flavor of the paste.

3. Add all of your other ingredients, except the basil and hold off on the salt and pepper until the end – this is the quick and easy part – into the sauce pan: garlic, mushrooms, Italian seasoning, can tomatoes, brown sugar. Stir well, bring to boil.

4. Add the chicken to the sauce and bring to boil, then reduce to med or low and cover sauce to allow the chicken to complete cooking in the sauce. Approximately 30-45 minutes. The flavors will marry together. Check the chicken for doneness by cutting a piece to see if it is cooked completely with no blood juices inside.

5. You can make your pasta while the sauce is cooking. No need to worry about the pasta being cold because when you add the hot sauce on the pasta it warms it up again.

6. Plate it! - Pour a ladle of sauce over the cooked pasta, add a piece of chicken or you can shred the chicken to go further in serving more people. Sprinkle the fresh basil pieces over the chicken and sauce; serve with a salad and garlic bread and enjoy!

Adapted from Lidia’s Italy: Marinara vs Quick Tomotoe Sauce from her cookbook: Lidia’s Favorite Recipes

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Recipe originally posted here on Orlando Cooking Examiner.

Help! My blender attacked me: Dangers of a Clumsy Foodie…

The case of the Vitamix Blender Attack

In each area of life we have accidents. The kitchen and bathroom are probably higher risk areas around the home due to electricity and water. However, the kitchen probably outweighs the danger zone due to knives and so-called heavy machinery.

Take today for example. I’m reaching overhead for my Vitamix blender and I grab the bottom of the blender to bring it down from the over the cabinets. Well of course the plastic blender container is on top of the base as I lift it up to bring it down. Well wouldn’t you know it, the plastic container, with the heavy blade base built into the Vitamix mixer part is top heavy and falls forward, hitting me in the throat.

Not to worry, I was only on the top of a three step stool, ladder thing and I didn’t pass out from the wind being cut from my airway. Yes, it did stun me a bit but all I could think was not to drop the plastic container part because it might crack on the ceramic floor below. Whew, I caught it well on my throat and came down from the step stool and all was safe, except my throat.

I placed my faithful and expensive Vitamix blender and the plastic container with the built in heavy blade on the counter. I then started looking in the freezer for an ice pack – found it and wrapped the ice pack in a dish towel, placed it on my throat, yes it hit it dead center where if I bruise it will look like I either tried to hang myself or someone choked me, not good for the hubby’s reputation but I digress.  No mark, time will tell if I held the ice pack on long enough.

Moral of the story? Always keep a flexible, soft cold pad in the freezer. Take the Vitamix plastic container down first, and then go back for the base of the blender. It will save you the drama. Just another entry to my life as a foodie.

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Orlando Cooking Examiner

Mom's Old Maui Cookbook Collection - Inspiration to Collect My Ohana Recipes

Some of mom's favorite cookbooks from the Island of Maui Collection.

Mom's Maui Cookbook Collection - I'll be posting some of the recipes as I make them with my own twist. I've continued my mom's hobby by continuing to collect cookbooks - although a challenge now with the internet, people create blogs and Facebook pages. However, every now and again, there's some really nice cookbooks - I'd like to do one with my cousins - collect all their favorites as we grew up and recipes from their parents. I think that is a dying art of passing on recipes from generation to generation.

Check out more food articles, recipes, photos and stories on: Orlando Cooking Examiner

Copyright 2013 mlehua

Harvesting Sweet Potatoes like Pulling in Netted Fish!

Community Garden Harvest

I harvested more than 20-pounds of sweet potatoes today. This is my first try at sweet potatoes so I was very surprised to see how much was underground when I pulled up the vines, it was like pulling in a net that was cast out to catch fish (we used to help my dad back in Hawaii when he would cast net fishing.) Many of the potatoes came up with the vines and the rest were like presents, jewels hiding under the soil - so much fun.

God's Provision

I kept thinking how awesome it is that God created this thing called planting or sowing seeds were we would place small seeds or spouts of plants into the ground - after watering and weeding, sometimes feeding it with fertilizer - then poof a few months later we have huge ground roots that we can cook and eat. Our God is so awesome the way He provides.

Where are Community Gardens?

At work we're fortunate to have a community garden, I don't know how big each plot is but I'm down to one plot which is easier to manage. I used to have about four plots but then my family gave up on helping and I ended up doing all the weeding, watering and maintaining that it just became too much. The garden doesn't do that well in the summer. I planted a few plants this past summer to cover half the plot cause I got tired of weeding and someone said that sweet potato plants are great ground covers to control weeds and didn't need much attention if we weren't planting this summer or were going away it didn't need much water, they were right! The plants were going great until one day, we had near freezing weather which killed most of the plant leaves.

I was going to leave the dead and live potato vines on the top soil but then decided to plant some other plants with hopes of a variety of veggies for Spring. I then buried the smaller potatoes with hopes that they will sprout for this coming summer, as it's a great ground cover to keep the weeds down when I won't be able to cater to the garden during the hot summer.

I've grown red potatoes which don't take much top soil space, everything is underground and I hope to plant it again. I just love growing potatoes!

Now I'll need to sort through sweet potato recipes and I'll post what I create soon. Since there's so many I will give most away and just finished washing two huge bags!

Check out more food articles, recipes, photos and stories on: Orlando Cooking Examiner

Copyright 2013 mLehua

Make Your Own Dry Adobo Mix: Recipe Seasoning for All Things!

Make your own Adobo Dry Mix

In Hawaii if someone said "Adobo chicken" it was usually a Filipino food that has vinegar in it and very 'ono (delicious in Hawaiian language). However, when I moved to Florida, there's a Latin dry mix called Adobo, in many varieties. I found that making my own mix from a combination of trial and error - this is a keeper. I put it on a lot of different foods as my regular go-to seasoning that I mix a batch up and then store it in an air tight jar and place some in a shaker bottle for daily use. The seasoning usually lasts up to six months but I use it so often I need to make a new batch every couple of months. Enjoy!

Adobo dry rub is used to season meat, poultry, fish or whatever you love to season. You can customize the recipe by adjusting the ingredients based on the spices you prefer.

Prep Time: 5 minutes

Total Time: 5 minutes

Ingredients:

• 4 Tablespoons Kosher Salt


• 2 Tablespoons Mrs. Dash


• 6 Tablespoons Garlic Powder


• 4 Tablespoons Dried Oregano


• 2 Tablespoons Turmeric Powder (or can use Sazon premix with turmeric for color)


• 2 Tablespoons Onion Powder


• 1 Tablespoon Ground Black Pepper


• 1 Tablespoon Cumin - dry ground

Preparation:

Mix ingredients together and store in an airtight container for up to 6 months.

Serves: Makes about 1 1/4 cups of seasoning.

Copyright 2013 mLehua