1 small carrot, peeled and sliced
1 cup broccoli flowerets
1 cup mushrooms, quartered
1 small onion, diced
2 cloves garlic, sliced
1 cup bean sprouts
1 tablespoon vegetable oil

1/3 cup soy sauce
4 teaspoons rice vinegar
4 teaspoons sugar
1 tablespoons vegetable oil
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 teaspoon ginger puree
1 tablespoon cornstarch
white pepper

1. Combine all of the sauce ingredients and puree in a blender or with a hand mixer until smooth.
2. Heat oil in a wok or large skillet over medium heat and add carrots and broccoli, frying until the broccoli becomes bright green.
3. Add the mushrooms, onion and garlic and continue to fry until mushrooms become just tender.
4. Turn up the heat, toss in the bean sprouts and half the sauce and bring to a boil.
5. Turn off the heat and stir vegetables, allow sauce to thicken slightly then serve over cooked white rice with the remaining sauce.

Makes 4 servings

1 pound lean ground beef
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 teaspoon ginger puree
1 small onion, minced
2 teaspoons vegetable oil
1 tablespoon curry powder
12 eggroll wrappers
oil for frying

1. Heat vegetable oil over medium heat in a large skillet.
2. Saute garlic, ginger and onion until tender.
3. Mix in curry powder then add ground beef. Cook until beef is no longer pink and set aside to cool.
4. Lay out an eggroll wrapper like a diamond in front of you and place a heaping tablespoon of the beef in the lower part of the diamond.
5. Fold the bottom edge into the center of the diamond and then fold the sides in as if you were wrapping a present.
6. Roll the wrapper up and seal with a bit of water or egg white.
7. Repeat until all of the beef has been used.
8. Fry the rolls in a deep fryer or in a shallow level of oil over medium heat in a frying pan. Make sure to use an oil that has a high smoke point.

Makes 16 rolls

We had a huge lunch today at a local restaurant, The Barcelona. Then we went to the Marble Slab Creamery where we managed to stuff copious amounts of ice cream into our aching bellies. Hers was a pina colada inspired coconut and pineapple mix and mine tried to imitate Chunky Monkey (my personal favorite) with banana, chocolate and walnuts. Those folk definitely know a thing or two about ice cream.

We weren't feeling very well afterwards and took a long nap. When we woke up it was already dinner time and neither of us were feeling hungry. We tried to think of the lightest thing possible so, of course, we ended up settling on a light Asian theme utilizing what was left in the fridge.

I didn't like the Stir Fry, but I don't particularly like stir frys in general. To me they all end up tasting relatively the same no matter what you put in them, the flavor of soy sauce drowning out everything and leaving a sort of bittersweet aftertaste in your mouth. Shannon, on the other hand, really enjoys the sweet and sour Asiany sauces and enjoyed this dish.

The Curried Beef Rolls are something that we have had before and tried to recreate. Since the only elements are curried beef and egg roll wrappers, we figured it wouldn't be too difficult. Thankfully we were right and they turned out pretty much as imagined, a nice crispy egg roll shell with a gingery curry flavored beef in every bite. Unfortunately we didn't have any plum sauce and had to substitute with crab apple jelly, but that managed to work out quite nicely since apples and curry tend to compliment each other.