Haw-Asian? What the hell is that? I don’t blame you for asking. My good friend and future roomie, Mare, coined the phrase. It’s Hawaiian and Asian all run together, which is the popular thing, these days, if you didn’t know. Anyway, I made a fabulous dinner on Saturday night and I’d like to share it with all of you.
First, I used the Pineapple Skewered Shrimp recipe from The Pioneer Woman Cooks as a base. I used chicken instead, though, and didn’t use any of the optional additions like red pepper flakes (too hot for me!). I found that a package of chicken tenderloins, cut down the center, creates perfect pieces of chicken for skewering. I marinated the chicken, overnight, and it did fine. I worried about the teriyaki sauce “cooking” the chicken, the way soy sauce or lemon juice can do, but my cooking-gifted sister assured me that it would probably be okay.
Second, another friend recommend an Asian Slaw as a side dish. After using my friend Google to figure out what an Asian slaw is (I only had visions of KFC coleslaw in my head), I came up with my own version. Since our grocery store was curiously out of some ingredients, it got re-engineered on the fly. I ended up with:
1 head of Napa cabbage, chopped finely
1 package of sugar snap peas, each pea sliced in half
1 package Ramen noodles
3 T. sesame seeds
Crumble the Ramen noodles onto a baking sheet, add the sesame seeds. Toast in a 350 degree oven for about 4 minutes, shaking periodically (I shook at the 2 minute mark). Add all ingredients and toss together with Asian Dressing.
For the Asian Dressing, I used a Pampered Chef gadget I got long ago…the Measure, Mix & Pour. This handy little device has recipes for different dressings right on the container; all you have to do is pour to the measurement line. Then, you just up-and-down the plunger and it all mixed together nicely. There’s a spout for pouring. Pretty cool and easy. The Asian Dressing included ingredients of soy sauce, ground ginger, sugar, pressed garlic and vegetable oil. I used sesame oil for about half of the vegetable oil required. That was the key to an amazing dressing, I think. The Boyfriend raved about it for a day and a half.
The final piece of the meal was a quick Rice Pilaf. Admittedly, it came from a box and it was the Near East brand. I’ve always had good luck with their products, and this time was no different.
All in all, it was pretty easy preparation. I did most of the prep the night before and it didn’t take much time, at all. The morning of, I skewered the meat and pineapples. Then, I took a daytrip out on the creek. The only thing I had to do when it was dinner time was cook the rice and tell The Boyfriend to fire up the grill!
