What's going on in my kitchen

Dinner tonight: roast chicken glazed with soy sauce and garlic; salad dressed with a mixture of Asian fish sauce, oil,
and lemon juice; enoki mushrooms briefly sautéed in oil, with soy sauce. Always lots of cooking in my kitchen!

Above are some new and old condiments and ingredients that I find especially useful to have in my kitchen:

• First, a new ingredient, Asian fish sauce. I used this new item in my salad dressing tonight. It's actually pretty fishy! Made in Vietnam, mostly made out of fish. No sugar! I plan to try more recipes that call for this product.
• Tomato paste in a tube. I use a squeeze of tomato paste in many, many sauces to add richness of flavor and color. It's one of my most important ingredients, though rarely used in quantity.
• Balsamic vinegar. Lots of uses! When browning onions, I use a dash of balsamic to make them brown faster, and to add a touch of sweet-sour flavor. When heating ready-made frozen Chinese dumplings, I add a bit of balsamic along with the water that is called for in the package directions. Of course it also goes into salads and occasionally a drizzle on fruits.
• Peanut sauce. A nice condiment with many foods. We dipped our roast chicken in it tonight. I know you can make your own by blending peanut butter with Sriracha (another good ingredient to have on hand), but I buy it anyway.
• "Better than Bouillon." A really good instant stock for soups and sauces.

What else has been going on in my kitchen lately?

Just after we returned from Florida, Len did some of his bird editing and
identification at the kitchen counter, but later moved upstairs.

And I have new magnets from the Everglades, the wildlife refuge on Sanibel Island,
and the Ringling Circus Museum, along with older magnets.
Cookbook shelves are next to my refrigerator.

I've been back from my trip to Panama and Florida for almost a week, and I'm still really happy to be cooking in my own kitchen again.