- Hey, I'm Carla Lalli Music
and this is everything I eat in a day.
So as soon as I wake up, I don't think about my children.
I don't think about my work.
I think about my tea.
I drink black tea in the morning.
Specifically, I love Assam tea.
I buy it at Kalustyan's in New York City on Lexington.
If you haven't been to Kalustyan's, you haven't lived.
I'm very specific about how I brew it.
So, I get out my Zojirushi,
which is the single best hot beverage container in the land.
And I do two tea cups worth of loose tea in the thing,
hit the timer, three minutes.
I take that with milk.
If I'm really living my best life, when I get out of bed,
my husband will have already made the tea
and it will be sitting next to the sink
and when that happens... Yes!
Then just take it back and bowl.
So coffee doesn't happen till later.
After I have the tea and the milk, I usually sit down,
I work for a few hours.
Around noon, I go to the gym.
Really, the motivation the whole time I'm at the gym
is that there's a coffee after.
I'll get, in the summer, iced coffee, regular milk.
Then when it's hot coffee weather,
hot coffee and regular milk.
If I'm having coffee at home, I might get a little fancy.
So I keep Grady's in the fridge.
Grady's cold brew is like, it's so good.
They put a little bit of chicory in it
and it gives it this nutty delicious flavor.
Then I'll get out the milk frother
if I'm really feeling myself,
and do oat milk or regular milk,
froth it up, pour it over ice,
and then just a little bit of flaky salt.
That is delicious.
Okay. So, after the coffee is happening, it's lunchtime.
If I'm solo, couple of things I love.
Going to sound really weird and old lady-ish.
I love cottage cheese,
specifically, the good culture cottage cheese.
It's like the Greek yogurt of cottage cheese.
It's just very delicious and tangy and creamy.
I get into some Persian cucumbers, really small dice.
Then, if I have a nice tomato,
I'll do a super small dice of that,
but it could be any crunchy thing.
Mix that together.
More flaky salt,
mild chili pepper, like Aleppo or a Gochugaru,
a drizzle of olive oil,
black pepper,
and then if I have them,
the fried shallots that come in the tub,
and maybe some nutritional yeast on that.
That's delicious
and it has all this protein and it actually makes you full.
That's a typical lunch. I also love a roll-up.
Sliced Turkey,
a little strip of Mayo,
then I'll hit it with kimchi,
and then some sliced cheese
and roll that up.
That's like a roll-up and you can just have three.
You might have five. It just depends on the day.
Other favorite lunches,
any kind of big salad.
So, Little Gems, Romaine,
purple cabbage chopped up,
chickpeas, feta, diced avocado,
my mom's vinegarette, Carole's vinegarette.
Toss, toss, toss.
Everything starts to get all juicy and delicious together.
Oh, and shaved parm.
I'm not a huge snacker.
When my kids are home,
I actually feel guilty about it
because I think other households have snacks.
There's a special part of the cabinet for snacks.
My favorite snack is popcorn
and my really favorite way to have it is alone.
I don't love to share my popcorn.
It's just, the amount of popcorn I have to make
if I know I'm sharing,
I'm getting a Dutch oven out because it's just like,
I need a lot of popcorn.
Great for procrastinating. Yeah.
If I have to write, then my mind is going to popcorn,
which is the time it takes to go make the popcorn,
but then, after you make it and you're eating it,
you can't type anymore.
Because if you've ever tried to type while you're eating,
it's physically impossible.
So it's a great procrastination trick.
But I pop it in usually coconut oil.
Pop, pop, pop, pop, pop.
Obviously, we pop every kernel, into a big bowl,
nutritional yeast, black pepper, salt, MSG,
mild chili flakes, and then, if I'm really feeling sassy,
there might be a smidge of granulated garlic.
It tastes like a nacho Dorito and it's so, so great.
Another snack we keep around is...
there's always Medjool dates in the house
and we have something called an energy sandwich,
which is, you take the Medjool date, you take the pit out,
and then you stuff it with crunchy peanut butter
and that's called an energy sandwich.
And then rice cakes, also.
A lot of people don't like rice cakes
and they talk a lot of garbage about "They're cardboard"
and "They're terrible"
and "Only people who hate themselves eat rice cakes."
They're wrong, but it has to be salted.
If you're having an unsalted rice cake be nicer to yourself.
If you've made an abundance of popcorn,
and then you get down to the bottom,
and you have free radical of all of the seasonings,
get yourself a rice cake and butter it,
and then just like face down into the thing,
prolong that whole snack.
Wait, while we're talking about butter and salt,
another snack that I learned from my mom is
the really dark pretzels like the Pennsylvania Style Dutch.
You have that, and then again, the softened butter.
The butter has to be softened,
and you're swiping your pretzel with the butter,
and that is a great way to have a pretzel.
I'm not a huge snacker.
Ever since the panorama happened,
I'm cooking dinner for four, every single night.
Early on, I kind of asked the group,
"Is everybody okay if we have rice every night?"
It's enough already. I can't be coming up with,
"What's the starchy thing going to be?"
Put it to the group, "Are we cool with rice every night?"
It was unanimous, so 100% every night I make rice.
Got really good at making rice in the pandemic.
I waited to buy myself a donabe,
which are the Japanese special clay pots
that are made for making rice.
They're incredible for making rice.
Anyway, things that are on repeat.
Tuna salad.
It's gonna sound weird but tuna salad on rice is so good.
That's like, if you ever get an onigiri
that has the tuna salad inside, this is like the reverse,
but same kind of flavors.
In my tuna salad, I put mayo, horseradish,
chopped peperoncino, I soak some shallots in lemon juice.
Delicious.
So that's the tuna salad.
And with that, usually I'm making Broccoli D,
which is, if you know, this is my most popular recipe.
This is broccoli and cheese in a pan.
You sear the broccoli, and then, you add cheddar cheese,
like a nice cheddar cheese,
and then, just let that melt over and kind of sizzle
and get all crackly crunchy
like the edge of a grilled cheese when it hits the pan.
So that happens.
But then there's melty cheese on top.
If we're with my parents at their house on any Friday,
we eat linguine with clams. Friday night is Clam Night.
So it might just be linguine with clams, garlic,
olive oil, a little white wine, or we do another version
that's like pancetta or guanciale, in the beginning.
Sometimes it's got a little tomato,
if you're in the summer season.
We love linguine with clams.
Actually, I don't like linguine.
It has to be spaghetti if I'm there.
It's flat. I don't want to be flat, I want to be round.
Oh, and then, Sunday nights,
every single Sunday of the pandemic,
hot weather, cold weather, I made pasta fagioli.
It was never the same and it was always good.
It starts out with a soffritto.
You gotta have a killer soffritto.
Garlic, onion, I might put fennel if I don't have celery.
Cook that down, you have to be very patient.
It takes like half an hour for the soffritto to get right.
It should be like, "Was it ever a vegetable?"
Now it's just a paste. Then, the beans go in.
Water. Water is fantastic. You don't need to use stock.
Then you cook it until the beans are tender.
Then you add a (beep) ton of greens.
Then you have to cook your pasta separately,
and then you bring them together.
So, sometimes I do it with anchovies.
Sometimes there's a dried Shiitake in there.
Yeah. Never the same, always good.
I'm working on all of my food aversions.
I'm not great about the organ meats, not my fave.
I like chicken heart yakitori, I've done that.
I like cartilage, which is weird.
When they have the kneecap cartilage in the yakitori, yes!
Give it to me.
I wasted years of my life not eating cartilage. I'm so down.
But like the organs, I don't know.
I'm not good with a kidney or a liver.
Favorite food city is, for sure,
a city I have not been to yet.
I haven't been to Korea. I haven't been to China.
I haven't been to London.
I don't think England is going to be my best food city,
but I still, I haven't been.
I haven't been to Turkey. I haven't been to Greece.
But I did have a chance to think about this question.
One of my favorite places to travel and eat is Costa Rica,
Playa Hermosa, Santa Teresa, that area.
My family and I have been going on vacation there
for like five or six or seven years.
There's two places that I look forward to we go.
One place is called chicken Joe's
and they make rotisserie chicken
and they make rice and beans
and they make an insanely delicious ceviche.
We could eat every night at chicken Joe's. Love.
Then the other place, Café Social.
It's like a breakfast lunch place
and they have a salad there and I'm telling you,
it's a zoodles salad.
I don't (beep) with zoodles.
If you gave me a zoodle in any other circumstance,
I would just be like, "Are you insane?"
But at Café Social, I think they called it Rainbow Salad.
It's zoodles in a wooden square bowl, also insane.
It comes with a sunflower seed pesto,
and some chopped cherry tomatoes, and beautiful avocado.
I dream about these zoodles.
I would never eat them anywhere else.
All right. That is everything I eat in a day.
Please check out my book "That Sounds So Good."
It's coming out in October.
I hope you check it out and thank you.