Snippets: Simple-looking is not simple, a lesson in soba and pasta

I do cook sometimes, whether it is soba, pasta, grilled meats, etc.

If you think this is just vegetables, shrimp and soba thrown in a pot, you are wrong. They were cooked separately and has distinct taste each. The vegetables were stir-fried with oil, garlic, onion, dash of soy. The shrimp were stir-fried with chili, garlic, basil, onion, ginger, Japanese cooking wine, on oil then a dash of water to prevent an oily aftertaste. Then the soba were boiled with garlic, onion, yuzu, miso, and dashi. It is a tasty, restaurant style soba of my own distinct taste.

I did another, a pasta, with shrimp and carrots. The carrots were cut into chunky bits, stir-fried to elicit the sweet taste, with garlic, onion, ketchup, and then doused with bit of water to render them moist rather than oily. The shrimp had roughly the same treatment as the version I did with the soba. The paata were boiled with Himalayan pink salt, basil, garlic, onion, for 9 minutes till al dente, then drained of fluids and then fried lightly with oil, with abit of white wine. Seaweed and sesame bits topped the dish.

Often, what seems simple, is not so simple at all. There is usually quite a bit of effort to present something of quality even if it appears simple.