If I had a choice, I rather give up coffee and have food for the rest of my life.  I grew up in Eastern China and the main starch of our day was rice.  Rice was the essential item in every meal to go along with other side dishes to flavor the rice.  When I was growing up, I had rice for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.  I lived on an island and the back of our house had our neighbor’s rice patty field.  I did not have cereal and milk for breakfast or coffee shops.  So consciously I do not yearn for coffee as people who grew up around coffee would. In addition, I do not enjoy the taste of coffee because it’s bitter. Coffee with milk taste good but I am lactose intolerant so I don’t drink latte a lot.

Reading the two articles I realized the importance of coffee to the Civil War soldiers.  As mentioned in the article by Grinspan the word “coffee” is mentioned in the soldiers’ journal entries more often than combat weapons.  To the soldier’s coffee, it was the start of their morning. Soldiers would have conversation about coffee like men about the morning newspaper. Returning to base to a cup of coffee was their way to keep on going and fighting.  The food the soldiers had did not sound very sanitary like the puddle water used to brew coffee. Later on there was the United States Sanitary Commission who started to provide healthier and nutritious meals for the men who never stepped into a kitchen.  Meals were not always tasty but the soldiers would eat the bread last to wipe the remains off their plate or wet the bread in coffee.  Overall, coffee was an essential item to the soldiers’ meals just like how rice is essential for my meals.

This is a Japanese snack known as Takoyaki. It is filled with chopped octopus, tempura flakes, pickled ginger, and green onions, made of wheat flour based batter. The texture of this is that it is slightly crispy on the outside and it is soft and creamy in the inside, topped with takoyaki sauce, mayonnaise, and bonito flakes. The bonito flakes gives it a nice savory flavor. Takoyaki is usually served in 6 to 8 balls because it is not served as a meal but it will fill you up since the batter is made of wheat flour. You should definitely try this when you have the chance to.

This is the main dish that I had for dinner in the Industry kitchen. It is called Oven-Poached Shrimp, Cod, and Clams with Chorizo. As you see the name, these main ingredients are all listed. It also comes with the red pepper aioli, Anaheim peppers, fresh tomato and three pieces of focaccia on top. It is just a simple oven cooked seafood dish, but the three pieces of Italian bread make the dish look more classy. The texture of focaccia is rich, slightly chewy and it’s a little bland. However, when you deep it with the aioli, it tastes more delicious. The seafood tastes soft and the oven cooked method keeps them in the original flavor. This combination helps the dish increases its dining level.

The food item on this picture is called an oatmeal scone that I had this afternoon. This was my first time making this type of baking this type of bread in the college baking class. Originally this was supposed to be an oatmeal biscuit, however it was changed into an oatmeal scone. The texture of the biscuit was soft and flaky feeling. Its taste is different from any other biscuits, this biscuit also has orange zest and juice inside the bread giving it a fresh orange taste.Though some may say plain oatmeal biscuit is good enough I really do enjoy this interesting new taste of orange in this biscuit. Kind of looks like a pie.