thanksgiving Tag

In All recipes, Bakery/Pastry, Seafood

OYSTER GUMBO POT PIE

INSTEAD OF BEING SERVED WITH RICE, THIS FOOLPROOF AND INTENSE OYSTER GUMBO IS BAKED… BUBBLING UNDERNEATH A DRAPERY OF FLAKEY PIE-CRUST MADE WITH COLD APPLE JUICE

11.24.2015

In All recipes, Bakery/Pastry, Dairy, Sweets

PUMPKIN SPICE COCNUT ICE CREAM IN A BLANKET

I LIKE TO HIDE MY VEGETABLES IN ICE CREAMS

Starting this Sunday, we’ll leave Bejing for more than a month, traveling to Hong Kong (for work), then Taiwan, then maybe Lisbon… Madrid… St Sebastian… or who knows. Traveling used to be a big part of who we are, but we haven’t done this kind of “long distance/large scale” travelling for 2 years now, you know, for personal reasons, and I’m finding that it’s taking a bit of practice to get our grooves back.

So today, I’m quickly leaving you a recipe that I made from some leftover pumpkins. As you know, I like to hide my vegetables in ice creams. And do you know that pumpkin and coconut milk are great pals? We got that from Thailand. And do you know that ice creams are so much better on a pancake-cone instead of a regular one? Learnt that from Seoul.

And I can’t wait to find out more, out there, on this new journey.

11.20.2015

In All recipes, Bakery/Pastry, Sweets

CRANBERRY VIENNESE SANDWICH CREAMS

The crochet side-pate is from Dishes Only.

THEY ARE THE COOKIE-VERSION OF A FEEL-GOOD MOVIE, EMOTIONALLY EQUIVALENT TO A BOX OF GOLDEN TWIN-PUPPIES EACH HUGGING A HAPPY GIGGLE.

This is what I’ve been busy with for the past 7 days, recreating Mark & Spencer’s Viennese raspberry sandwich creams. What does that say about me, spending 84 hours scrutinizing a processed junk-food from a super chainstore, I don’t know. But I had to make it.

If you ever had childhood experience of reaching into a tin-box, and sneaking one of those buttery nuggets of vanilla cookies into your mouth as your first memory of pure foodgasm, then I guess, you can sort of understand. But this, this is better, upgraded. You can either go to your nearest M&S to see for yourself, or you can stay here and do it at home. But how I got here, however unexpectedly long it took, was no vanilla road. Checking out all the trusted recipes that were already out there, which, affirmingly, were all very similar to one another, let’s just say that I thought it was gonna be easy. If they all agreed on it, it must work fine, right? Humppphhh…

I made my first batch last weekend. Well, it did work fine… how do I put it… wonderfully just okay I guess. Wonderful in the sense that, flavor-wise, it was exactly what Viennese cookies are supposed to taste like, fireworks of buttery crumbs exploding in a vanilla sky. No doubt about that. But just okay because, and maybe I was being obsessively anal about it but still, I had a major textural issue with them. It was one thing to have cookies with so much butter that they “melt in my mouth”, but it was something else entirely when they could barely hold themselves together even under the slightest pressure of a finger. Like, I was scared to touch them… like literally, they eroded on my fingers. I mean, if that sounds like a “dat a problem?” to you, then great, but I might add that they also had a paste-like and almost glue-ish texture in the mouth that… I just couldn’t quite get over.

11.04.2015

In All recipes, Meat, Poultry, Soup

HOW TO MAKE SICHUAN MA-LA HOT POT ON THANKSGIVING

WE, THE POT-HEADS, NOW ALL DO THIS…

THIS IS HOW, THROUGH NUMBING PAIN, THAT WE GIVE THANKS.

Do you know that the Chinese applies an ancient wisdom originated along the Yellow River, to an age-old question that has long plagued the minds of all mankind? It’s the monthly family gathering next weekend… It’s the awkward dinner with newly-made friends/colleagues… It’s the unavoidable meal with the in-laws… Hell, It’s the freaking birthday of Confucious! No matter what the occasions really, we all found ourselves asking: What should we eat for that? True, it’s no easy question but the ancient wisdom has answers. Yes. Yes, we have an answer to that. All of that. As a matter of fact, it’s a one single answer, a last minute answer if need be, a one-pot-fix-all solution to any gatherings large or small, where no one, truly, wants to bear the responsibility of putting the foods on the table. To that we say…

Let’s do hot pot!

It’s not overstating to call it a wisdom. Hot pot is the perfect answer to any large dinner parties, especially where there’s equal importance to being well-fed, as well as simultaneously, feeling well-entertained. First of all, instead of conjuring a meal of a dozen courses, there’s only one cooking to be done. Then instead of being splattered into small groups, every guests gravitates from a feasting table with a dramatic pot of boiling stock in the center, and everyone cooks what they like -from an array of offerings such paper-thinly sliced meats, dumplings, meatballs, vegetables, even starches like noodles and fried doughs (yes!) – and how they like it, all from and in the mothership of a pot that just gets better and better throughout the meal. Perhaps there’s something to the theatrics, or to having a “center piece” so lively and fluid… but what I can tell you is this, that strangely, the conversations around a hot pot table, is never cold.

11.24.2014

In All recipes, Bakery/Pastry, Dairy

THANKSGIVING ROUX BREAD

For the innocent sake of running an adequate food-blog, I’ve been slowly sucked down to a rabbit hole passing the disorienting stage of flying pies and falling biscuits, deep down to the world of cultivating gas-farting micro-organism on my kitchen counter (quite deep when you actually think about it). My falling journey has brought to you and myself, things I wouldn’t even think of doing just a little shy of 2 years ago, things like palm sugar brioche, dreamy Hokkaido milk toast, Taiwanese gua bao, Roman Bonci’s pizza, creamy carbonara pizza, clarified butter English muffin, pillow beignets and this rocking potato roll.

If I look into the mirror right now I wouldn’t recognize myself.

11.22.2013

In All recipes, Seafood, Vegatables

RED HOT OYSTER+KIMCHI DRESSING

I thought I was going to forfeit the ticket to this year’s Thanksgiving recipe frenzy. I thought, for some strange reason, that this year’s Thanksgiving is sitting (impossibly…) on November 18th, and that by the time around November 12th when I start to entertain the idea of a Thanksgiving recipe, that it would already be too late… After all, I heard this is a holiday meal that people plan ahead for. I heard that even before the first leaf turned brown, the happy Californian designer-turkeys still obliviously eating their organic feeds, have no idea that someone in New York has already claimed the right to carve them apart and break their wishbones in two months-time. Better not tell them is what I think.

So the point is, a few days ago I suddenly realized I do have time this year, that it wasn’t too late. I could still do this! I could still… well, here’s where I ran into another problem.

11.19.2013

In All recipes, Bakery/Pastry, Snacks, Sweets

APPLE PERSIMMON PIES

Season-transitioning flu… they just love me so. A tender… suffocating love. So listen here’s what I can do. With my energy level slightly above a wheezing squirrel, I’m gonna save any effort on an elaborate sales pitch with delicious stories for you to try this. This being – fry your damn pies and do it this way. I’m not gonna go there… Instead, I’m just gonna give it to you straight, as in bullet point-style. As in STONE-COLD FACTS. Yeah. Because we all believe in science. Right? So eat this because:

11.05.2013

In All recipes, Bakery/Pastry, Sweets, Vegatables

SELL OUT

I recently landed in a couple of situations where I had to articulate the idea of my blog, a sales-pitch so to speak. The effort quickly brought brightened realizations to myself that whatever effort I made to explain the original vision or benchmark that I set out for when I started doing this, is now tainted with contradictions. A derailment, so to speak.

10.19.2013