So, I forgot my blog’s second anniversary or birthday or whatever you want to call it. I don’t feel bad though since I prefer factors of three and plan on having a mini-celebration next year.
If I remember.
A Valentine’s cake for the husband, which just happened to be two days before my blog’s birthday.
FRE
Posted in Cooking & Eating at Home, Food, Life, Random
Tagged bad photography, being random, birthday
So, last night I was watching a bunch of reruns of No Reservations on the Travel Channel. I am a huge fan of Anthony Bourdain and absolutely love his brilliant, snarky, honest attitude. I find it quite refreshing in this day and age of dumbed down cookie cutter television programming, and I’m totally looking forward to his new show “The Layover.” I know there are some of you out there that despise the man, but whatever, I really don’t care. You should probably go run to the donut shop so you can make yourself a hamburger or something.
Anyway, I guess I missed the techniques episode, which reminded me that my cousin James still needs to learn some skills. As you may recall, James did not inherit the cooking gene from our family. I’m not too sure why the hell it didn’t happen to him, maybe it’s some sort of disability. I’m hoping that he will become a wonderful cook later on in his life, since it is mandated by the Luong family to share our culture and love of food with any future little Jamesies out there.
So, here is the No Reservations: Techniques Special that I watched last night. Hopefully my cousin and the rest of you noncookers will learn something useful and to appreciate the greatness that is Anthony Bourdain.
Posted in Cooking & Eating at Home, Food
Tagged Anthony Bourdain, Cooking, eating, food, No Reservations, recipes, Techniques, The Layover, video
I’ve been known for singing random songs about people and making up crazy words. More so now that I have a kid. Anyway, most of my made up words are actually just a shortening of a long word or a combination of two words, my most famous being stantials, which means “something substantial.” Here it is in a sentence for you contextual people: I’m starving! I need stantials to get me through the damn day.
Perhaps my predilection for inventing new words is due to me being from Southern California where we have a habit of abbreviating our speech, i.e. rad, fave, raunch, whatev, ridic. Yeah, whatev, I DGAF.
Anyway, my whole point of this post is to make a list of “some cooking essentials,” also known as scentials, for my cousin James. I’m pretty sure all that he has in his cupboard are his roommates’ cooking utensils and pans. Maybe he bought himself a pair of chopsticks and some shot glasses, but other than that I’m assuming he has nothing. He probably eats ramen out of a mug and everything else off of paper plates or paper towels.
Alright, so here is my list of scentials that my cousin needs to slowly start collecting to make cooking fun and easy. Without the scentials, you’re just scrambling to find something that will make do, and the only thing you really should be scrambling are eggs.
Things to cut with:
Posted in Cooking & Eating at Home, Food
Tagged Cooking, Cousin James, lists, scentials, shopping
Over the past few months, I’ve kept hearing about this new brand of nước mắm, Red Boat Fish Sauce, that’s imported from Phú-Quốc Island in Vietnam. The majority of nước mắm that we get here in the U.S. is either from Thailand or Hong Kong. These versions are diluted with water and contains preservatives and MSG, while Red Boat is an “all-natural, first press, ‘extra virgin’ Vietnamese fish sauce.” This means that the only ingredients are anchovies and salt, and that makes me extremely happy.
I’ve always tried to stay away from foods that contain preservatives in my attempt to live healthier, and recently, to lose weight. Being half Vietnamese, and having my mom live with me for the first three months of my baby’s life, it has been very hard to not consume quite a bit of the heavily diluted, preservative laden nước mắm. So, recently my mom and I decided to order a few bottles of Red Boat Fish Sauce online since the closest store* that carries the product is an hour and a half away.
Once our shipment of five bottles came in, we opened one up to take a good whiff and noticed that it was not as pungent and fishy smelling as the other brands. After an initial comparison taste test between Red Boat and the other nước mắms we had in our cabinet, we concluded that Red Boat, with its well-rounded depth of flavor, was by far more superior than the others. It will definitely become a staple in our household, as well as my mom’s and aunts’, whom we gifted the remaining bottles to.
Yesterday, I decided to devote the majority of my food posts to my cousin, James, who loves to eat like the rest of our family, but for some odd reason did not inherit our cooking gene. He needs to learn how to make the basics if he wants to survive on something other than instant ramen and Taco Bell, especially now that he’s about to graduate from college and enter the so called “real world.” So, here are a few recipes that he, as well as the rest of you, can make that uses nước mắm.
Nước Chấm 1
Coarsely crush the chili in a bowl, and add the fish sauce and sugar. Stir well until nice an syrupy. Dip sour green fruits, like green mango, papaya, or apples in the sauce and enjoy as a snack.
~~~
Nước Chấm 2
Combine ingredients into a small sauce pan and heat until boiling. Let sauce cool to room temperature before serving. Leftovers can be stored in an airtight container in the refrigerator for 2 weeks. If you do not cook the sauce, you should enjoy it immediately.
Optional additions:
~~~
Tương Ớt
*Note – You Bay Area people are lucky since there are a plethora of stores you can easily purchase Red Boat Fish Sauce from, perhaps it’s because the owners are from San Jose. Hopefully more stores in Southern California will start carrying this brand.
Posted in Cooking & Eating at Home, Food
Tagged artisanal, Cooking, Cousin James, eating, food, health, the basics, Vietnamese
Here is recipe number two that I made last week in order to clear out my overloaded fridge. Sorry, I’m not much into writing lately. I’ve been feeling a bit pooped, and not too sure why. Perhaps it’s because I’m 35 weeks pregnant, have swollen feet, and need at least a two hour nap daily. But hey, I should be glad that I’m not working or going to school at the time being. If I were, I’m sure I wouldn’t be the most pleasant of people to be around.
Sausage, Kale and Potato Soup
Extra virgin olive oil
1 package of sweet Italian sausage
3 russet potatoes, peeled and cubed
1 large onion, diced
3 cloves of garlic, minced
1 tbsp Italian seasoning
2 quarts of chicken broth
4 red potatoes, peeled and cubed
1 bunch of dinosaur kale, stemmed and sliced into shreds
salt and pepper
In a large Dutch oven, brown sausage in olive oil over medium heat. Remove and let rest. Slice sausage into bite-sized pieces when cooled. Set aside for later.
Add the russet potatoes, onion, garlic, and Italian seasoning to the remaining oil. Sauté for 3-5 minutes, and then add one quart of chicken broth. Cook until potatoes are very tender.
Once potatoes are tender, use an immersion blender to puree soup. Then add the red potatoes and remaining broth to the blended soup. Bring to a boil.
When soup comes to boil, add sausage and kale. Reduce heat and let simmer until red potatoes and kale are tender. Add salt and pepper to taste.
Serve with a salad and crusty bread.
Enjoy!
FRE
I’ve been getting my veggies delivered to me regularly from Farmer Fresh to You about every other week. With last week’s shipment, my fridge was overflowing so I had to quickly make a couple of dishes to ease the overload of food. Here is one of the recipes I made last week.
Mushroom & Asparagus Quiche
1 pie crust
extra virgin olive oil
1 bunch asparagus, trimmed and cut into 1 in pieces
8 oz mushrooms, sliced
4 eggs
1 ½ cups heavy cream
¼ cup parmesan cheese
¼ tsp Celtic sea salt
¼ tsp pepper
dash of nutmeg
Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Prick bottom of pie shell with a fork. Bake in oven for 12 minutes. Cool for about 10 minutes.
While pie shell is baking and cooling, sauté asparagus and mushrooms in olive oil until al dente. In a medium-sized bowl, beat eggs, heavy cream, cheese, salt, pepper, and nutmeg with a whisk.
Once pie shell is cooled, place sautéed veggies in the shell and then pour egg mixture on top. Bake at 375 degrees for 40 minutes. The quiche will puff up and turn a nice golden brown on top.
Serve for dinner with a salad and/or soup, or serve for breakfast with sausage/bacon and your choice of potatoes.
Enjoy!
FRE
My mom lives down in San Diego and unfortunately I don’t get a chance to see her often. So, a few weeks ago she decided to come up for an extended visit. Normally, my mom does all the cooking for the family, whether it’s at her house or a relative’s house. I believe that it’s both a curse and a blessing that she’s a fantastic cook. I know very few people who can taste a dish once and go home and recreate it, often making it even better than the original recipe.
Anyway, since I’m no longer working and have more time on my hands I’ve been improving and adding to my list of recipes inside my mental database. I figured I would give my mom a much needed break, and cook for her during her stay with me. Yes, I allowed her to cook me a meal a couple of times while she was here (she’s a very pushy woman), but for the most part I did all the cooking.
Here’s one dish that my mom particularly loved:
Turkey Chili
A few swigs of extra virgin olive oil
2 cups chopped onion
2 cups chopped bell pepper
9 garlic cloves, minced
2 lbs ground turkey
1 jalapeno pepper chopped
2 tbsp chili powder
2 tbsp brown sugar (or 1 tbsp brown sugar if using ketchup instead of tomato paste)
1 tbsp ground cumin
3 tbsp tomato paste or 4 tbsp ketchup (I don’t always have tomato paste in my house)
1 tsp dried oregano (or Italian Seasoning if that’s all you have in your cupboard like me)
½ tsp ground black pepper
¼ tsp Celtic sea salt
2 bay leaves
1 ¼ cups of fruity wine, preferably red but go ahead and use white if you have an open bottle in the fridge
2 cans whole or diced tomatoes, undrained (coarsely chop the whole tomatoes)
2 cans kidney beans, drained
Heat the olive oil in a large pot. Add the onions, bell pepper, garlic, turkey, and jalapeno to the pan. Cook for 8-10 minutes or until meat is browned, stirring to crumble.
Add chili powder, brown sugar, ground cumin, tomato paste (or ketchup), dried oregano, black pepper, salt, and bay leaves. Cook for 3 minutes, stirring constantly.
Stir in wine, tomatoes, and kidney beans. Bring to a boil, cover, reduce heat & simmer for a couple of hours. Stir occasionally.
Uncover and cook for an additional 30 minutes, stirring occasionally. Discard bay leaves if you can find them.
Serve with shredded cheddar cheese and cornbread or rice or whatever you like. Even better, cook the chili the night before and serve for dinner the next day. For some reason chili, soups, and stews taste better the next day.
And leftovers can be used to make nachos!
Enjoy!
FRE
Last week I harvested all of the carrots, turnips, and parsnips in my garden in order to get the beds ready for the next planting. Needless to say, I had a sh*t load of carrots I wanted to use soon since I didn’t have much room in my fridge, so I decided to make some carrot cake muffins for Easter and my dad’s camping trip to Death Valley. As always, I was inspired by the Carrot Cake Muffin recipe by Martha Rose Shulman who writes Recipes for Health for the New York Times. Enjoy!
Carrot Cake Muffins (makes about 12)
2 1/2 cups organic whole wheat flour
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
2 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp fresh ground nutmeg
1/2 tsp ground allspice
1/2 tsp ground cloves
1/2 tsp Celtic salt
2 farm fresh eggs
1/2 cup turbinado sugar
1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil (or whatever vegetable oil you have on hand)
1 1/3 cups organic whole milk
1 tsp organic vanilla extract
2/3 cup of sliced almonds
2 cups of grated carrots
Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Grease muffin tins.
Mix dry ingredients together in a medium bowl. Mix wet ingredients and the sugar together in a large bowl. Add dry ingredients to wet ingredients and mix until well combined. Fold in the almonds and the carrots.
Spoon into greased muffin tins and bake for 25 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.
Posted in Cooking & Eating at Home, Food
For some reason I had over 20 apples in the vegetable drawer of my refrigerator. I like apples a lot, but there’s no reason to have that many taking up valuable room in the fridge, especially now that I have a bounty of fresh veggies delivered to me each week. So, I decided to make my family’s apple pie recipe for Easter.
Technically, the recipe comes from an old cookbook called, the Mennonite Community Cookbook, which my dad’s family gave to my mom when she first came to this country. This was the first cookbook I learned to use, even though we’ve only actually cooked a couple recipes out of the book. Anyway, here’s our adapted version of the Apple Crumb Pie.
Apple Crumb Pie (a.k.a. the Ryan Apple Pie)
6 apples (preferably tart, but I tend to use whatever I have on hand)
1 cup sugar (Turbinado or regular)
1/3 cup organic sweet cream butter (very cold and cut into cubes)
3/4 cup organic whole wheat flour
1 tsp cinnamon
Pastry for one 9 inch shell (I am unable to make a nice, flaky pie shell, so I buy the Marie Calendar’s shells from the freezer section and always end up making two pies at a time.)
Preheat oven to 425 degrees.
Pare apples and cut into eighths, put in a medium sized bowl. Sprinkle 1/2 cup sugar and cinnamon over apples and mix until well coated. Put apple mix into unbaked pastry shell.
Combine remaining sugar and flour into a mini food prep or large food processor. Pulse until well mixed. Next, add cubes of cold butter and pulse until crumbs are formed. Sprinkle crumbs over apples.
Bake the pie at 425 degrees for 10 minutes, and then reduce temp to 350 degrees. Bake for 35-60 minutes, depending on how done you like your apples. We like them nice and soft, so we bake the pie for 60 minutes.
Let it cool for a few hours, then slice and serve. Eat at room temperature or reheat it. Eat it a la carte, serve with ice cream or whipped cream, or put the pie in a bowl and pour milk over it and eat it like cereal (this is what my dad likes to do for breakfast when we have leftover pie).
Enjoy!
FRE
(P.S. For some reason I don’t know how to use my camera and there are date stamps on my pictures with the incorrect date! Luckily I figured how to fix it, but of course by then the apple pie was made and gobbled up. Lame.)
Posted in Cooking & Eating at Home, Food
Tagged Cooking, family, food, getting fat, recipes
Since I still had a cup of pumpkin puree leftover from the muffins that I made the other day, I decided to make some pumpkin waffles. It was dinner time when I decided to do this, so I figured I could just freeze and reheat them in the toaster for future lazy breakfasts. Here’s my version of the Weelicious Pumpkin Waffles.
Pumpkin Waffles (makes 12 waffles)
2 ¼ cups organic whole wheat flour
¼ cup flax meal
1/3 cup Turbinado sugar
2 ½ tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
½ tsp Celtic salt
2 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp ground ginger
4 eggs
2 cups organic whole milk
1 cup (or so) pumpkin puree
6 tbsp melted organic sweet cream butter
1 tsp pure vanilla extract
Preheat waffle iron. Mix the dry ingredients together in a medium bowl. Mix the wet ingredients together in a large bowl. Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients until smooth. Pour about ½ of the batter into heated waffle iron. Cook according to your waffle maker’s specifications. Eat with butter and syrup, or cool to room temperature and then freeze for later use. Reheat waffles in toaster or oven.
Posted in Cooking & Eating at Home, Food
