For some reason, I think that if I write it down here, publicly, that things will actually get done. (^_^)
– experiment with breakfast pilaf and take photos
– bake bread because I ran out
– plant some microgreens
– get the City Pickers box prepped
– plant okra in said box
– make duck ham
– buy milk and salad greens
To my much loved Hamilton Beach BlendMaster, Jr. # 5972B,
You were given to me by my second oldest sister back in the days when I was not such a food nerd. I bet you were just a $15-$20 product, but I felt like I was on the road to cooking awesome food when I unwrapped your box. (It was Christmas, I think.) You only had a two year warranty, and, to be honest, I didn’t think you’d last past it.
You were mine before immersion blenders were on everyone’s wedding registry. I think we were at around ten years together. You helped me through dental surgery, *several* times, and I am forever grateful. I thought we’d last into February at least, but it was not to be.
Rest in peace.
Please don’t hate me for replacing you with a colorful Cuisinart.
This is the most random post I’ve ever made on this blog. Between my sister (Stealth Eater) and I, there are a lot of cookbooks in our arsenal. Most of the time, our tastes in books do not crossover. Once in a blue moon, they do.
This will be a list of everything we own. I’ll update it whenever appropriate/possible. My sister has more books than I do, or so we think. I have some cookbooks stored in a couple of different places, but the books I’m listing here are on my “current bookshelf.” Maybe I’ll add the other cookbooks at some point. This list of books is mostly so that we can avoid buying duplicates (which we’ve done!), and start borrowing from each other. (^_^)
I finally got around to making yogurt. It’s pretty easy even though the directions can be lengthy. For little ol’ me, who doesn’t eat a lot of yogurt over the course of a week, making a quart of plain yogurt does not save me any money. Chances are that a quart of whole milk costs the same as a quart of plain yogurt at your local market. Factor in labor and the energy your stove took to cook up the yogurt, you realize that it’s not cost effective at all unless you make big batches of yogurt at once.
You would think that this means that I won’t be making yogurt anymore, right? No, not quite.
The chewiness came out better… but then it turned out that this batch had too much water in it. It was too sticky.
A few of them were made into scallion buns for fun.
Many childhood breakfasts, for me, involved mantou (饅頭). The little soft pillows of steamy goodness cycled in and out of my eating rotation, but mostly appeared during weekends. My family never made them (my mother and my grandmother were never interested in cooking anything that seemed complicated). So, we always bought them frozen in Chinatown made by a local company. I always ate them the same way: first by removing the outer skin, and then slowly unrolling with every bite. This ritual was never broken until my mantou stopped being produced in a rolled form. Continue reading
Honestly, I didn’t eat fabulous things while in Antwerp and in France. The fanciest meal I had was on my last night there. I had duck confit, which is one of those dishes that I usually think about ordering but then go order something else. A couple of the people I was traveling with convinced me to order it (the other choices were salmon and cod). It was good, and needed the accompanying sauerkraut to help cut the fattiness… but honestly? Chinese roasted duck, the duck that I grew up with, is much tastier. The flavor is bolder. However, the duck confit was wonderfully tender which is something you won’t get with roasted duck.
So, here are my pictures:
Breakfast at Hotel Banks, Antwerp:
(cookie recipe inside this entry)
I’ve been trying to think of something fun to post…
I should post the few food photos that I took while I was in Europe…
But in the meantime, I was thinking that I’d post something a little random but fun.
There’s a Japanese goth band in Tokyo called Auto-Mod. The vocalist, Genet, has a blog that he posts to very regularly. I’m not an Auto-Mod fan, but I’m definitely a fan of Genet’s blog!
Why?
He posts a lot of photos of whatever he’s eating. And I mean *a lot*. It makes me want to visit Japan again and soon because I want to stuff my face after seeing so many yummy pictures of ramen, curry, soba, and sushi!
Have fun!
See that photo? I took the photo, but I didn’t make the rice. My friend Dawn did for Tammy’s dinner party. Dawn dropped the rice at my house earlier that day because she knew she was going to be late for dinner. I really can’t complain though – this gave me time to whip out the heavy digital camera and a chance to smell the rice all afternoon.
And when I say this smells amazing, I mean it smells AMAZING.
The recipe for this dish comes from a Hari Krishna book (seriously!). No, Dawn is not a Hari Krishna. She is very, very Italian American. However, she is a “part-time vegetarian” (as I like to call it). Stealth_eater is also a part-time vegetarian but for very different reasons. Dawn loves fish and chicken, but doesn’t really care for the taste of red meat at all. Stealth_eater does it for “health” reasons… but seeing as her health hasn’t changed for the better , she is thinking about putting some red meat back into her diet (the omnivore and the cook in me rejoices). But anyway, since Dawn is a part-time vegetarian, she loves the recipes in her Hari Krishna book. And it didn’t hurt that the book only cost her a couple of bucks.
Rice with Green Peas and Almonds
source: The Higher Taste
serves 4-5
1 cup basmati rice
3/4 tsp salt
4 green cardamom pods, slightly crushed
2 cups water
1/4 tsp turmeric
2 tsp ghee or oil
1 cinnamon stick, about 1 1/2″ long (but Dawn used a 3-4″ stick without problem)
6 whole cloves
1/3 cup sliced raw almonds
1 cup fresh or frozen peas
Bring the water, salt, and turmeric to boil in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Keep the pan covered.
Heat the ghee/oil in another medium saucepan over low-medium heat. Fry the cinnamon stick, cloves, cardamom pods, and almonds until the almonds turn a pale golden-brown. Add the rice and saute for about 2 minutes or until the grains turn translucent.
Pour in the boiling water, and if using fresh peas, add them now. Stir, increasing heat to high, and bring the water to a full boil. Immediately reduce the heat to low, cover with a tight-fitting lid, and gently simmer (no stirring) for 15-20 minutes, or until the water is all absorbed and the rice is tender. If using frozen peas, quickly sprinkle them over the rice halfway through the cooking time. Turn off the heat, and allow the rice to steam for another 5 minutes.
Serve while hot.
I baked this weekend! Exciting, isn’t it? I even took pictures and edited said pictures.
nutmeg cake with orange blossom syrup
Anyway, my friend Tammy (whose lovely photos of some of my foods grace my food entries) was having her annual lamb dinner (with non-lamb options for people like me). Nearly all of her guests brought something to nibble on, including myself.
The newest cookbook that sits on my bookshelf is Warm Bread and Honey Cake by Gaitri Pagrach-Chandra. When I saw this recipe, I knew I had to make it!
Pros: It came together pretty easily.
Cons: My cake was half the height of the cake in the book photo! I was pretty sure that I had my eggs and butter at room temperature, and I tried really hard not to over-mix. On top of that, my syrup could have been bolder.
I think I might try cake flour next time and see if it gives a better result. However, please don’t think this means that this was a bad cake! For a total experiment, it still yielded pretty tasty results (and it was not too sweet, thankfully).
adapted from Warm Bread and Honey Cake
6 oz all purpose flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/8 tsp salt
1 loose tsp nutmeg (I used freshly grated)
1 stick of butter, softened
4 1/2 oz brown sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
4 Tbsp milk
6 Tbsp orange blossom syrup
Preheat oven to 325F. Grease a 1-lb loaf pan.
Mix flour, baking powder, salt and nutmeg. Sift this.
In a separate bowl, beat the butter until smooth. Add the sugar, and beat until creamed and fluffy.
Whisk the eggs loosely in a small bowl with the vanilla. Add the egg to the butter mixture bowl in two batches, beating well and scraping down the sides of the bowl. Then use a whisk to fold in the flour mixture in three batches, alternating with milk.
(So, you’re adding 1/3 flour mixture, 2 Tbsp milk, 1/3 flour mixture, 2 Tbsp milk, and the final 1/3 flour mixture.)
Pour into the loaf pan, and bake for 40-45 minutes (or until a tester is inserted and comes out clean).
Remove the pan from the oven, and poke several small holes into the cake (making sure to poke all the way through to the bottom). Slowly pour the syrup over the cake. Let it cool about 5 minutes, then remove the cake from the pan. Let the cake cool completely on a wire rack. After that, wrap the cake well in plastic wrap and let the flavors meld for a day before serving.
Orange Blossom Water Syrup
make about 1 1/2 cup
Put 1 1/4 cup granulated sugar, 3/4 cup water, and 1 tsp lemon juice into a small saucepan. Bring to a boil, stirring constantly, until sugar is dissolved. Reduce the heat and let simmer for 5 minutes. Take the pan off the heat and let it cool about 5 minutes.
Add orange blossom water to your liking (I ended up using 1 1/2 Tbsp for the cake… but I now think that it should be 2-3 Tbsp).
Use the syrup on cake, in tea, and anything else that suits your fancy!
~Mikan
Awesomesauce Eats 