Garden Chef's Needle and Pen

The countdown is on... it's three days before Christmas! Everybody just seems so busy with last minute shopping. I see picture greetings of loved ones and friends on blogs I follow and on FB! Family pics in front of the Christmas tree, stockings hanging on the wall, more and more colors of the yuletide season.  My last post entitled, " Colors of the Yuletide Season: Sauteed String Beans with Tuna " was inspired exactly by everything I see these past days and weeks. Towards the end of that post, I said next time I'll use coconut milk. And that's just exactly what I did! So here's another variant of the dish --- with coconut milk and Spanish Sardines!                                Ingredients: 2 tbsps olive oil from the Spanish sardines 1 clove garlic, minced 1 small onion, sliced thinly 1 piece Spanish sardines, flaked 2 bunches of string beans, cut 1/3-inch long 1 cup coconut mil...

Wow, I see red and green --- colors of Christmas anywhere! Looking at the photo I'm about to post here, gave me the title for this feature in an instant. Thanks to all the posts I read about the season... decors, gifts, food and all!  Inspired by a dish I tasted in a conference I attended in Bali, Indonesia last month, I made a very simple dish for lunch today. I couldn't move on thinking of all the green string beans I saw on that large platter. Too bad, I couldn't get a shot of it while finding my way through the queue.  So here's a very simple version of the dish.  Ingredients: 1 tbsp olive oil 2 cloves garlic 1 medium onion, sliced thinly 1 tbsp ginger, sliced thinly 2 bunches of string beans, cut 1 tbsp shrimp paste salt and pepper to taste 1 large tomato, sliced 3 tbsps left-over scrambled egg with tuna  Steps: Saute garlic, onion and ginger in olive oil. Add string beans and shrimp paste.  Season with salt and pepp...