My Pink Jungle: Good Eats - French Toast, Guacamole

Reposted: My Pink Jungle: Good Eats - French Toast, Guacamole: Every now and then, my husband and I will have cravings for food that we have had in the past or we have imagined would be good. Sometime...

The BEST Chinese Food in Northern Florida!!

Okay, so it's been what.......9 months since I last posted to my blog?  OMG!!!  Needles to say, life took a turn a little while ago.  I got promoted to management at my job, and the word "time" became a very limited and precious commodity in my vocabulary!! Well, seeing that it's Christmas Eve morning, and everyone else in the house is asleep, I found the "time" to do what I love the most!  (Well, eating and cooking is probably what I love most, so I guess posting to my blog would be what I love to do the 2nd most...)

Yesterday I took my wife and kids to this little hole in wall (or as my wife says, ..."hole on the wall") place in a section of town that we call Madarin, here in Northern Florida.  The restaurant in called:   Peony Asian Bistro .


It is hands down, the best Chinese food in Northern Florida! 


With that being said, I must give you a little history of why I make that statement;  I have lived most of my life in Southern California and have traveled abroad to several countries in Asia;  South Korea, Singapore, Indonesia, and the Philippines to name a few.  Additionally, I have traveled elsewhere in the world, and love the authentic Chinese food that I have experienced in those places.  In fact, the best Chinese food that I have ever had was in Vancouver, British Columbia.  I was on my honeymoon with my beautiful new wife at the time, and was so enraptured with her, that I didn't even remember the name of the place!   On the other hand I have been in Northern Florida only 7 years, so needless to say, not too fond of the culinary options available here, based on the food I've had in other places.  As I mentioned in a previous blog, where else but in the South, does a vegetable sandwich come automatically equipped with cheese and fried bacon?!?! 


Peony Asian Bistro is truly an authentic Chinese cuisine experience and absolutely, the best Chinese food experience I have had since living in Northern Florida!!! My wife is from the Philippines, has also lived in Southern Cal, and traveled abroad with me, so her palate is the same as mine. She simply adored this place!  Peony has items on the menu like:  JellyFish Salad, Pork & Taro Hotpot and Crispy Mantou.

My wife (the same one that I was enraptured with in British Columbia) had the Curry Chicken and shared some with me. It was out of this world! In fact, is was even better than we've had at any Indian restaurant! I usually don't eat beef that much, but the picture of the Beef Chow Fun on the menu looked so appetizing, I had to try it. It was magnificent! Wide rice noddles with skirt steak, onions and bean sprouts in a very light brown sauce. Simple, but oh so good!! My kids had the Lo Mein noodles and the waitress told me she would put chicken, shrimp, and pork in it since they don't really have an official kids menu. My little munchkins devoured those noodles!! I mean ALL of them!!

The decor at Peony Asian Bistro is very nice and tasteful with a touch of sophistication. The prices are very good too. It is located right on the corner of Hartley Road and Old St. Augustine Road in Mandarin.

If you are in town, try this place. You won't be disappointed!

Does Fish Sauce Go Bad???

Hmmm. The thought of it has kept me up some nights...



I posted this in honor of my beautiful Filipina wife, who looooooooooves fish sauce!!!!!!  Partly as a joke, but mostly because I found it to be quite interesting.  We have a lot of fish sauce in our house.  3 large bottles to be exact.  One bottle of Phu' Quoc (it's a Flying Lion Brand, but I can't read what's on the rest of the bottle because it's in Vietnamese and I have not yet mastered the interpretation of the Vietnamese language; something that's on my to-do list, just not this year though), one bottle of Patismansi (fish sauce with calamansi.  I love calamansi by the way.  Calamansi is a citrus fruit that is grown on a tree primarily in Southeast Asian but especially in the Philippines.  It is a Philippine lemon.  Use is over Pancit and it is "delish"), and one bottle of Ocean Delight Fish Sauce, which is basically fish sauce with Bagoong.  If your'e not from the Philippines and are not familiar with what Bagoong is, definitely don't drink it straight from the bottle the first time you come across it!! My kids love the stuff.  For me, it has been an acquired taste.  Or rather, should I say, a taste that I have not yet acquired.  It is definitely my Achilles' Heel.  Bagoong is basically fermented fish and brine mixed together.  The fermentation process takes about 11 months and what's left is a very pungent mixture that I swear, will grow hair on our tongue!!  If Superman had encountered Bagoong before he encountered Kryptonite, Superman would have conquered Kryptonite!!!!  All kidding aside though, it's not that bad.  It is basically a tasty mixture of salty and fishy combined into one sauce. My favorite though is still the Patismansi.  I use Patismansi in a lot of dishes, even those that are not filipino. As far as the Bagoong though, I basically mix it with noodles so I barely know it's there.

There is that "green glow" though that never seems to go away.......

W. T. (Ph).

I love Vietnamese pho'.  My sister-in-law (I call her my "sister-by-law") got me hooked on this Vietnamese dish back in 2002.  She took my wife and I to a place on Pioneer Blvd. in Cerritos, Calif. called Pho' Tasty.  As expected, there are a million and one places to get pho' in Southern California.  Not so in Northern Florida.  Upon moving to Florida over 6 years ago, one of the biggest adjustments (or should I say, "sacrifices") that I've had to make, was suppressing my desire for International cuisine. Where else but in the South does a vegetarian sandwich come automatically equipped with fried bacon and cheese?  I always tease my wife about the difference between the South and Southern California:  in California, whenever you order a sandwich, the order taker will ask you,"...would you like cheese on that?” ; in the South, they'll ask you, ".....what kind of cheese would you like on that?"  A few years ago, I had a huge craving for some good ole' fashion authentic Mexican food.  Having lived less than 2 hours from the Mexico border for over 30 years of my life (my dad & mom relocated to Los Angeles from Dallas, Texas with my sister and I, when I was 3 years old), Tijuana and Tecate’ were hangouts that I frequented on nearly a monthly basis.  I know authentic Mexican food!  With my anticipations high, and mouth already salivating from the thought of succulent hand-tossed and made-from-scratch corn tortillas and grilled chipotle chilies for the fresh made salsa, I googled "authentic Mexican food" in Jacksonville, Florida.  Guess what popped up as the top listings?  TACO BELL!!!!  Needless to say, until recently, pho' was not even on the radar here in the South.

All that aside, things are changing.  My wife finally discovered a nice little Pho' restaurant in Jacksonville Beach. The name of the restaurant is P.K. Noodles. I was quite impressed!  There is nothing really fancy about the place; but don't get me wrong, that’s what’s so good about it - the cuisine is Vietnamese, period.  They even have Bahn Mi (Vietnamese Sandwich).  The food was very fresh and the restaurant very clean.  I loved the very fresh cilantro and mint.   As a connoisseur of Vietnamese cuisine, I highly recommend P.K. Noodles.

By the way, the "P" stands for Pho , and the "K" stands for King........you can figure out the rest!!!

Welcome to The Culinary Affection

Welcome to The Culinary Affection.

Who am I?  An easy answer to a simple question for some, but an Encyclopedia Britannica description for others.  Those "others" includes me.  I am one of those rare individuals that occasionally ponders whether the stork dropped them off at the right family, “in the beginning”.  Of course, my folks and siblings look like me, but that’s as far as the commonality goes.  I still haven’t figured out if I’m the one from a different planet, or if it’s them.  Honestly, I think it’s me.

I suppose in a perfect world, I would have been a chef.  However, after investigating that the cost of completing Culinary School was around $100,000, it didn’t bother me that my world wasn’t so perfect!  Ironically though, I can't venture to imagine myself couped up in the back of some gourmet kitchen for hours upon hours per day, creating the latest delectable "gastronomies" for the most sophisticated of palates.  I went to college to study Architecture, started, owned, and failed at a few businesses, drove a delivery truck for FedEx for awhile, and have probably had over 50 jobs over the last 30 years of my "career".  I finally settled down and found a niche in sales, which has allowed me to support my wife and 2 lovely children for nearly a decade now.

Ultimately though, my passion is food.

Bottom line.  I love food.  I love the taste of it, the look of it, the smell of it, and the ambience that it creates in any situation.  The best way to describe me is probably a Bobby Flay, an Anthony Bourdain, and an Andrew Zimmern, all rolled up into one complex individual.  When my son wants a grilled cheese sandwich, I don’t consider it too much work to cut a fresh baked Kaiser Roll in half, butter the outside ends and place Provolone, Mild Cheddar and shredded Parmesan cheese in the middle and then put it in a Panini press to melt the cheese and toast the bread to a delectable crunch.  My wife thinks I’m nuts, because my son is only 6!  Doesn’t everyone make a grilled cheese sandwich like that?!? (By the way, my sons favorite cheese is Smoked Gouda - I turned him on to it).  ;0)

 Don’t get me wrong though; I’m not a glutton.   Some of my other passions including training to be a tri-athlete (to ultimately compete in the mother of all triathlons:  Ironman!), traveling, getting my kids involved in modeling, and going on dates with my wife.  Never-the-less though, when all is said and done, food defines who I am.  I am the chef at my house.  I love to cook and experiment with new recipes and techniques.  FoodNetwork, the Cooking Channel and the Travel Channel are my go to channels and primarily the only 3 of the 250 channels that I watch (including over 20,000 on-demand choices) from my cable provider.  Because of this, William Sonoma by default is my favorite store.  On the other hand, since my philosophy is “Champagne taste, Kool-Aid budget”, I’ve resorted to standing in the kitchen utensils aisle at Target, and perusing over the gadgets on their shelves, for hours at a time.

So that’s me; in a nutshell. I hope you’ll enjoy me sharing my passion with you.

What you will find here is a cornucopia of culinary activity:  recipes, restaurant reviews, unique kitchen gadgets, the best of the best, culinary techniques from other cultures, and travel posts related to food.

Enjoy!!