Home Alone Again, Part II

Now, you would think that my family would know better by now, but apparently not. For, once again I have been left to my own devices. Let's see what mischief I can come up with in the kitchen today.

How about some Bananas Foster? That sounds like a plan to me.

Here I have some light rum, bananas, brown sugar, vanilla extract, ground cinnamon and unsweetened, unsalted butter.

Melt the butter and brown sugar and cinnamon in a pan. For one serving, I would use one tablespoon of butter, 2 tablespoons brown sugar and 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon.

Cut the banana into thirds and then lengthwise in half. Cook briefly in the melted sugar mixture.

Pour 3 tablespoons rum in a bowl or cup. Now you can pour the rum into the pan. If you are cooking over a live flame, remove the pan from the fire to prevent accidents.

Stand back and light the rum. Allow the flame to burn out before continuing. Add 1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract and stir to mix in.

Serve over vanilla ice cream. Rich and sweet and decadent.

That will teach my family to leave me home alone.

Home Alone Again

Let's see: it's Friday night, so the daughter is managing at her old high school's football game and the husband is at a bean supper up in Indianapolis (can I tell you how glad I am that the wives are not invited to that particular meal?). So that means that I have once again been left home alone. Who knows what sorts of trouble I can get into? Luckily for my family - and you - I decided to confine my mischief to the culinary arena.

Hmm, leftovers and imagination just might make for an interesting dinner.

I have some left over mustard glazed pork loin, some veggies from the fridge, a snack-size container of pineapple in juice, some pecans, a package of Udon noodles and some rice vinegar and sweet chili sauce. I think I'm sensing a sweet and sour pork dish here.

I chopped up all of my ingredients before heating some canola oil in a skillet. This is a quick-cooking meal so all the prep work should be done beforehand.

I added a chopped clove of garlic and some red pepper flakes to the line-up.

The onion, carrot and celery go in to the skillet first.

Now the cauliflower and broccoli join in the fun.

Both the pineapple chunks and the juice are added to the pan. At this point I also threw in a pinch of red pepper flakes.

The Udon noodles are soft so I didn't bother with boiling them first. I did set aside the seasoning packet, though. I have no need of mystery seasonings.

At this point the pork loin was also added.

I then tossed in about half a teaspoon of brown sugar, a splash of Aji-Mirin, a splash of rice vinegar and a glop of sweet chili sauce.

This is now ready for service. And can I tell you? This was good. The chili gave a nice bit of heat while the small amount of sugar and Aji-Mirin added just a hint of sweetness. There was no heavy, gloppy sauce to overwhelm the dish and the palate.

Maybe my family should leave me alone at home more often.