Restaurant Daniel NYC

Canapes of Mushroom Quiche, Eggplant Ratatouille, Parmesan Crisps filled with Goat Cheese and a sliver of Anchovy over Pine Nuts and Sundried Tomatoes

Paté of Quail and Foie Gras “aux Raisins”
Verjus Pickled Basil Seeds, Watercress, Walnut Pistou

Caramelized Sea Scallops with Summer Truffle
Crispy Potatoes, Satur Farms Beans, Arugula Purée

Muscadet Braised Striped Bass with Herb Salad
Lettuce Wrapped Tartar, Fried Oysters and Pantelleria Capers

Roasted Quail with Foie Gras, Romaine

Warm Chocolate Financier
Bergamot Gelée and Confit, Lady Grey Tea Ice Cream

Vanilla Peach on Almond Shortbread, Melon Sorbet

Petits Fours of Chocolate and Espresso Wafer Cookies, Pistachio and Orange Macaroons, Artesanal Marshmallow, Chocolate Fleur de Sel Truffle, Madeleines

Nessa's Dinner Party

A menu of favorite foods for a very dear birthday girl

Antipasto of Dried Apricots and Israeli Dates
Affettati Misti of Salumi, Prosciutto and Pancetta
Bruschetta with Tomatoes, Basil, Onion and Garlic
Formaggio Platter with Brie, aged Cheddar and Peppercorn Jack
Cracked Pepper, Sesame and Poppy Seed Wheat Crackers
Ziti with Sun Dried Tomatoes and Portobello Mushrooms
Side of Oven Roasted Summer Squash and Broccoli
Dessert Duo of Chocolate Truffles, Mini Oreo Cheesecakes
And a Sweet Ending of Chocolate Latte Ice-Cream Cake

Mint Chocolate Truffles

8-oz bittersweet chocolate, chopped
1/4 cup heavy cream
1 tsp peppermint extract
cocoa powder

In a medium glass bowl, combine the chocolate and the heavy cream. Melt the two together, whisking frequently, until just smooth. This can be done by placing the bowl over a small saucepan of gently simmering water, or by putting the bowl into the microwave on high in 10 second intervals, whisking between each.Whisk in peppermint extract.Chill at least 30 minutes.Remove from refrigerator and let the ganache soften until it is easy to work with. Form teaspoon-sized balls (using a teaspoon and a small knife to shape them) and roll in cocoa powder.Makes about 24-28 truffles, depending on size and whether you sample any ganache.

Mini Oreo Cheesecakes

1 package Oreo Cookies 2 (8 oz.) packages cream cheese, softened 1/2 cup granulated sugar 1 tsp. vanilla extract 2 large eggs Foil or paper muffin cups

Instructions:Preheat oven to 325 degrees F. Place foil or paper muffin cups in a muffin pan. Split cookies in half. Put the side of the cookie that has more icing in the foil or paper muffin cups, icing sides up. Reserve the remaining cookie halves and set aside. Beat together the cream cheese, sugar, vanilla, and eggs. Spoon mixture into the muffin cups about 3/4 of the way up. Crush the remaining cookie halves and sprinkle over tops. Bake in preheated oven for 20-25 minutes. Let cool, then refrigerate for 1 hour or overnight. Enjoy!!! Makes approximately 15 mini cheesecakes. I served these little goodies topped with a dollop of hand whipped cream and sprinkled more crushed oreos on top of it.

Easy Raisin Cinnamon Buns

My family (my mom to be precise) loves raisin cinnamon bread for breakfast. Sometimes she takes it toasted and with butter, but mostly just on its own. I love it too and always take it just on its own because it's so yummy. Gardenia California Raisin Loaf, Pepperidge Farm Raisin Cinnamon Swirl, Sunmaid Raisin Bread Cinnamon Swirl - we've tried them all.

I've experimented with a couple of recipes and have found this good 'no-fail' raisin bread recipe from busycooks.about.com. I followed it closely with a few modifications: I halved the recipe, used bread flour, omitted the eggs and shaped into buns than baking it into a loaf. I didn't make a sugar syrup as I found the bread sufficiently sweet. After baking, I felt that the bread could use a bit more cinnamon but otherwise, found it a tender, quick and easy bread.

1/2 cup sugar 2 packages active dry yeast 1-1/2 cups warm milk 2 eggs 1/2 cup butter, melted 4-1/2 cups flour 1 teaspoon salt 1 teaspoon cinnamon 1-1/2 cups raisins 1 cup powdered sugar 2 tablespoons milk 1 teaspoon vanilla

Grease a 13x9" pan and set aside. In large bowl, combine sugar and milk and stir until dissolved. Sprinkle yeast over this mixture and let stand for 5 minutes. Add the eggs and beat well. Stir flour, salt, and cinnamon into the mixture.

Mix in raisins and spread batter into prepared pan. Brush top with melted butter. Cover and let rise until double, about 30 minutes. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Bake bread for 30-35 minutes until golden brown. While bread is baking, combine the powdered sugar, 2 tablespoons milk and vanilla and whisk until smooth. When bread comes out of oven, drizzle with the powdered sugar mixture and let cool.

Black Sesame Noodles in Oriental Lobster Broth

The bonus that comes with a home cooked lobster dinner is that you get to keep the lobster shells, if you so wish, to make a tasty soup stock! One Friday evening, we had fresh steamed lobsters, miso clam soup, pumpkin mushroom risotto and steamed broccoli; I decided to save the leftover lobster shells for a future attempt at making lobster stock. I kept the heads and tails, discarding the broken and smaller shells, and doubled bagged them in freezer proof ziplock bags.

After perusing a few recipes, I decided to make a simple broth. Most recipes were for a bisque but I didn't feel like a heavier soup so I sort of made up my own. I started by sauteing chopped garlic, onion, ginger and shitake mushroom. This was followed by the lobster shells. Thereafter, I added water, salt, pepper and soy sauce to taste and let the broth simmer over low heat. This made a good tasty soup to which one can add noodles, vegetables and other seafood ingredients. I finished mine with black sesame noodles and Chinese leafy greens. Simple but good.

Favorite Things in the North End

Italian biscotti, cakes and pastries...



Ice-cream stuffed cupcakes and candy-coated cones...



All kinds of spices, herbs and nuts...

Sandwiches and Schlesingers

The Parish Cafe on Boylston (www.parishcafe.com) is a sandwich shop that lets you choose from a list of gourmet sandwich creations from the city’s top chefs including Ming Tsai, Barbara Lynch and Jasper White. These sandwiches don't come cheap, starting at $11 and running up to $20. Despite the price tag (I mean, at its most basic, this is really some stuffing between two slices of bread), I was sufficiently curious about Parish Cafe to stop by and order the special sandwich of the week. This week's special was The Schlesinger; created by Chris Schlesinger of the East Coast Grille in Cambridge, the sandwich featured melted Monterey Jack cheese on warmed banana bread, topped with smoked ham and mango chutney. On the side, it came with some pickled ginger and red cabbage. It was an unexpected combination but it worked well for me and I enjoyed it very much!

That lunch got me thinking about other sandwich ideas and I've decided to list some of my favorite sandwich/wrap combinations:

• potato salad (here are two variants I've tried (i) with hard boiled eggs, crab meat, chopped green beans and black pepper, mustard and mayo to taste (ii) with hard boiled eggs, corn, scallions, capers, chopped giardiniera and mayo to taste)
• curried tuna salad with raisins and chopped apples
• sweet and spicy tofu wrap with carrots, corn, greens and brown rice
• hummus with cucumber, tomatoes and onions

How This Blog Came To Be

This blog's raison de'tat, if you will, is simple. It was conceived the summer of 2007 when I was in the extremely enjoyable space between completion of graduate school and commencement of full-time employment. One of my summer agenda items (as Earl, the thieving brother in the movie, Rocket Science, tells us, 'you need an agenda and then a sub-agenda and then your sub-agenda has its own agenda') was to back up the data in my computer. I still like my trusty Thinkpad but he had been exhibiting erratic behavior of late. I decided then that this blog would become a repository of the recipes and menus I had been saving in a Word document. Instead of shelving them alongside various graduate school homework, essays and assorted files in the 'My Documents' folder, they would have a site dedicated just to them. This would also allow me to share my recipes easily for friends who've requested them in the past. As I began on this blog, it started to grow and little by little, it has now become a space where I write about anything food-related.

My culinary preferences are strong, as are the people who have influenced the way I think about food, such as my Peranakan grandmother and my mom who juggles work and family and takes pride in daily home cooking. And of course, there is the inimitable Jacques Pepin who makes French cooking accessible to all (Jamie Oliver, Rachel Ray, Nigella Lawson, Bobby Flay, you are all wonderful and I like you too but there is only one great TV chef for me). Food is comforting, unpretentious and always enjoyed best with company. Good food comes from the heart, is timeless and brings people together. And my taste for ingredients and flavors is as diverse as the places I have traveled to and the foods I have grown to enjoy. They reflect the spiciness of Indian curries, the delicacy of Japanese sashimi, the heat of Mexican mole, the freshness of Provencal cooking, the richness of foie gras, the inventiveness of fusion cuisine, the earthiness of Ghanaian food, the pungency of cheese, the sweetness of Southeast Asian desserts and the heartiness of good ol' Southern cookin'.

There is so much interest in cooking now. It has become quite the activity of choice for any self-respecting metrosexual and hosting dinner parties with fancy canapes is simply de rigueur among well-heeled (maybe with Jimmy Choo's) sophisticates. A friend of mine who knows the folks at Williams-Sonoma tells me that their latest product line is built around developing high-end cookware targeted at men. And you know this is reaching peak levels of interest when every kind of media is exploding content around cooking and chef-wannabes (Has anyone watched reality TV, cartoons or the movies lately? Say, maybe you've heard of Top Chef, the Next Food Network Celebrity, Ratatouille or No Reservations?). Who knows how long all of this interest in matters culinary is going to last? But it does not matter, really. All of this is good news for the food enthusiast and cooking amateur like me, who can now find formerly inaccessible ingredients affordable and available at the grocery store just round the block (anyone for truffle-flavored olive oil or saffron at Trader Joe's? Or how about kimchee at Shaw's supermarket, located next to the fresh mung bean sprouts?). And the proliferation of culinary themed magazines and websites mean there are more luscious photos of food to savour and fun recipes for exploring.

My entries are not always chronological (as I am sometimes digging through archives of recipes and food-related ideas I've collected) but they are always personal and genuine, and are about things that I have tried. Thanks for reading and please feel free to share your thoughts by adding a comment or two :)

Cooking a Chinese Dinner in Romania

Sweet and Sour Chicken with Mixed Vegetables Stir Fried in Soy Sauce

How did I end up cooking a Chinese dinner in Romania? This all happened quite unexpectedly. I was in Romania at the end of May on a volunteer trip with Habitat for Humanity and became friends with a couple of local university students who were acting as translators for the group. Over drinks at a bar (it was a very hip and swankly bar called Diesel right at Union Square in Cluj-Napoca) one night, I shared that I enjoyed cooking and food very much. It turned out that Romina was also a cooking enthusiast (in addition to being a Tae-Bo instructor, English-Romanian translator as well as university student majoring in English and Swedish)! As we chatted, she suggested that it might be good fun for us to get together one evening and for me to cook a Chinese dinner for her and her flat mates, as they have never had Chinese food before! Of course, I couldn't refuse - what an excellent excuse for me to shop in the local markets and what a rare opportunity for me to get into a Romanian kitchen! Romina started to make plans and subsequently also invited Alina and Vlad (two other translators for the group) who were very keen on the prospect of having 'authentic' Chinese food.

Chinese food is very rare in Romania. In fact, I didn't notice any Chinese restaurants in the capital city, Bucharest (although admittedly, I wasn't looking for them). While very excited about this, I was quite concerned about how I might pull off a Chinese dinner, without knowing what sort of ingredients I might find in the markets or grocery stores. Moreover, the burden of the knowledge that this would be their first taste of Chinese food weighed on me, as I had to devise a menu that would give a fair representation of Chinese food but without being too alien in tastes that it might be offputting. After all, Chinese cuisine is one of my favorite (and one of the tastiest, dare I say) cuisines in the world and I wanted to make sure my Romanian friends had a favorable impression of it! Budget was, of course, also another consideration. I was on a tight budget as I hadn't anticpated spending much on this trip and did not bring a lot of cash. Balancing these considerations, I set out to explore the local food stores.

In Cluj-Napoca, I noticed a small Chinese fast food style restaurant and went in to check out . What did they have on their menu? Not quite the same offerings as American Chinese food restaurants, but close enough! They featured various stir fried noodles such as lo mein equivalents, 'Singapore' fried noodles, egg fried rice (of course) and various stir fried dishes including stir fried chicken in soy sauce. (I don't think they actually called anything General Tsao chicken.) Ok, so this gave me an idea of the expectations of Chinese food my dinner guests might have. My next stop was then the local grocer followed by the fresh market to figure out what ingredients were available locally. There were pretty limited options in the grocer so that made it easy for me to decide on the menu - stir fried sweet and sour chicken and mixed vegetables in soy sauce!

Blueberry French Toasts, Strawberry Jam Biscuits

Sweet and warm from the oven - that's the best way to enjoy both of these brunch treats. The biscuits are very easy and quick and can be prepped just the morning of the brunch while the french toasts need overnight prep.

Jam Filled Biscuits
(I had halved this recipe, but used 1 egg and it worked out well.)

• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 tablespoons white sugar
• 3 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup butter, chilled
• 1 egg
• 1/2 cup cold milk
• 1/4 cup favorite jam (I filled my biscuits with my home made strawberry jam and that was yums!)

1. In a large bowl, whisk together flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt. Cut in butter or margarine until crumbly. Make a well in the center. Beat egg until light and frothy, and mix in milk; pour all at once into well. Stir lightly to form a soft dough. Add more milk if needed.

2. Turn dough out onto a floured surface, and knead 8 to 10 times. Pat or roll out to 3/4 inch thickness. Using a round cookie cutter, push straight down to cut. Arrange well apart on a greased baking sheet. Make a deep hollow in the center of each biscuit. Drop a small spoonful of jam into each hollow.

3. Bake in a preheated 450 degrees F (230 degrees C) oven for 12 to 15 minutes. Serve hot.

Servings Per Recipe: 14. Amount Per Serving - Calories: 156

• Total Fat: 7.3g
• Cholesterol: 34mg
• Sodium: 266mg
• Total Carbs: 20.1g
• Dietary Fiber: 0.5g
• Protein: 2.7g

Overnight Blueberry French Toast

I got this recipe from allrecipes and it also came with a suggested blueberry sauce for the french toast. I omitted the cream cheese (I wasn't sure I would like that in my french toast) and didn't try the sauce (thought it might be too sweet) but instead, served with additional maple syrup on the side for those who needed it sweeter.

• 12 slices day-old bread, cut into 1 inch cubes
• 2 (8 ounce) packages cream cheese, cut into 1 inch cubes (used a handful of shredded mozzarella cheese instead)
• 1 cup fresh blueberries
• 12 eggs, beaten (use 8-9 eggs instead)
• 2 cups milk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1/3 cup maple syrup

For the sauce:
1 cup white sugar, 2 tablespoons cornstarch, 1 cup water, 1 cup fresh blueberries, 1 tablespoon butter

1. Lightly grease a 9x13 inch baking dish. Arrange half the bread cubes in the dish, and top with cream cheese cubes. Sprinkle 1 cup blueberries over the cream cheese, and top with remaining bread cubes.

2. In a large bowl, mix the eggs, milk, vanilla extract, and syrup. Pour over the bread cubes. Cover, and refrigerate overnight.

3. Remove the bread cube mixture from the refrigerator about 30 minutes before baking. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).

4. Cover, and bake 30 minutes. Uncover, and continue baking 25 to 30 minutes, until center is firm and surface is lightly browned.

5. In a medium saucepan, mix the sugar, cornstarch, and water. Bring to a boil. Stirring constantly, cook 3 to 4 minutes. Mix in the remaining 1 cup blueberries. Reduce heat, and simmer 10 minutes, until the blueberries burst. Stir in the butter, and pour over the baked French toast

Servings Per Recipe: 10
Amount Per Serving
Calories: 489
Total Fat: 24.9g
Cholesterol: 312mg
Sodium: 410mg
Total Carbs: 51.8g
Dietary Fiber: 1.5g
Protein: 15.2g

Peachy Chicken, Minty Chocolate Chip Cookies and Mocha Brownies

It is early in the morning and I've woken up and can't fall asleep. Insomnia (or a bad dream, in my case) happens to the best of us, so I decided to clean out emails that had been sitting in my 'Sent' items for awhile. In the process, I found a couple of recipes that were requested by friends after I had them over for a small group dinner and wanted to post them here for safekeeping.

Here is the recipe for a baked chicken with peaches in an orange sauce (it is very rough and I don’t have any measurements because I always improvise and taste while cooking, so nothing is too exact)

1. Season chicken breasts with salt and pepper
2. Make a marinade sauce with orange juice, honey, mustard, brown sugar
3. Pour half of the sauce over the chicken, coat the chicken and let it marinate for a couple hours
4. Put the chicken in the oven and bake at 400 for about 15 minutes, remove and turn the pieces over
5. Reduce heat to 350 and let it bake for another 30 minutes, you can put in the peaches at this point (depending how soft you want them, you can also put them in just 15 minutes before they’re done. I used canned peaches so they were pretty soft to begin with, so I baked them just 15 mins. You could also use fresh peaches and actually, I think this would work pretty well with pineapples and apricots too… (hmm, I might try that another time)
6. Heat the remaining sauce till boiling, lower the heat to a simmer and let it reduce so that it thickens. Keep sauce warm on stove
7. When chicken is ready, spoon sauce over chicken and you’re done!

And here is the recipe for the mint chocolate chocolate chip cookies. As with all cookies, this one is more scientific and I got it off the web. I think it was allrecipes.com. The recipe was actually for chocolate chocolate chip cookies so I’ve pasted it as it is. What I did was to substitute the chocolate chips for mint chocolate chunks. (Basically, I bought mint dark chocolate and chopped it up into chunks). Also the recipe asked for 1.5 cups of sugar but I used 1.33 cups instead.

• 1 cup butter, softened
• 1 1/2 cups white sugar
• 2 eggs
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 2 cups all-purpose flour 2/3 cup cocoa powder
• 3/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 2 cups semisweet chocolate chips
  

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).

2. In large bowl, beat butter, sugar, eggs, and vanilla until light and fluffy. Combine the flour, cocoa, baking soda, and salt; stir into the butter mixture until well blended. Mix in the chocolate chips. Drop by rounded teaspoonfuls onto ungreased cookie sheets.

3. Bake for 8 to 10 minutes in the preheated oven, or just until set. Cool slightly on the cookie sheets before transferring to wire racks to cool completely.

And Chocolate Mocha Brownie Cake

• 4 squares (64oz) unsweetened baking chocolate
• 3/4 cup (1-1/2 sticks) butter or margarine
• 2 cups sugar
• 4 eggs
• 1 tsp. vanilla
• 1 cup flour
• 1/2 cup instant coffee powder
• Semi-sweet chocolate, melted (optional – for topping the cake)

Prep Time: 10 min
Total Time: 45 min
Makes: 17 servings, about 2 pieces (cute when cut out with a heart shaped cookie mold) each

PREHEAT oven to 350°F if using a 13x9-inch baking pan (or to 325°F if using a glass baking dish). Line pan with foil. Grease foil. Microwave unsweetened chocolate and butter in large microwaveable bowl on HIGH 2 min. or until butter is melted; stir until chocolate is completely melted. Stir in sugar. Add eggs and vanilla; mix well. Add flour and flavored instant coffee; stir until well blended. Spread into prepared pan.

BAKE 30 to 35 min. or until toothpick inserted in center comes out with fudgy crumbs. (Do not overbake.) Cool in pan. CUT cake into sizes for serving. You may drizzle the top of each brownie cake with melted semi-sweet chocolate and then refrigerate until chocolate is set.

Chicken Pie and Buffalo Wings

The unlikely dinner of champions.

In the early evening, I baked a simple chicken pot pie for my usual games gang and Trevor. We then headed to King's for their Tuesday Trivia Night. After ordering a large plate of buffalo wings (20 pieces for the five of us), we decided to name our team 'The Wingers' (we discarded other potential team monikers which included 'Blueberry Fives', 'The Straits' and 'Paya Lebar Junior College'). Fully fortified, our team proceeded to blow the competition away. Although stumped by questions like the name of a neural disease that predominantly affects Eastern European children (Tay-Sachs Disease), the author of Mystic River (Dennis Lehane) and the singer who was the voice of John Jay Smith in The Simpsons (Michael Jackson), we still emerged the Trivia Night Champions!

(Incidentally, I also learnt some new food trivia tonight. Gefilte fish are poached fish patties or balls made from a mixture of ground deboned fish, most commonly carp. They are popular in the Greek Jewish community. And buffalo wings are so called because they originated in Buffalo, NY.)

We won a $35 voucher for our next visit to Kings (and of course, we will return next Tuesday to defend our title) and made our way to JP Licks for a celebratory round of ice-cream. If you were wondering about the preferred ice-cream flavors of victors, we chose Black and White Malted, Strawberry and Cappuccino Crunch. And here is a recipe for a super easy pie crust which I used to bake our trivia-quiz winning chicken pot pie tonight:

2 c. flour, heaped
Pinch of salt
1/2 to 2/3 c. oil
Milk to make one full cup (with oil)
（I added some dried rosemary for a more fragrant crust)

Stir quickly; roll between wax paper. Bake at 450 degrees for 10 minutes to use prebaked crust; or, bake per specific pie directions. Makes 2 crusts.

Best of Boston - Bakeries and Markets

Today was quite the perfect day for me because it involved a lot of my favorite activities - sipping freshly brewed coffee in a neighborhood cafe, munching on a baked-that-day chocolate chip cookie, reading a novel, and visiting different fresh produce shops and a farmer's market.




After lunch, I made my way to Flour Bakery + Cafe in the South End of Boston. Started by Joanne Chang, a former consultant and Harvard College Econ graduate (there is hope for those like me), it has been consistently featured in different 'Best of Boston' lists for its desserts, breads and sandwiches. I had a Scharffenberger chocolate chip cookie, which is made with two kinds of chocolate. I suspect the cookie is also baked with two types of brown sugar - light brown sugar and dark brown sugar - to give it an extra chewiness and richer flavor. With a small cup of french roast, it was the perfect accompaniment to The Sun Also Rises by Hemingway.

The trendy South End is also known for having a couple of gourmet fresh produce stores. I popped into Lionette's market to see what organic, local produce they had for the day and was pleasantly surprised to find that they sold fat in different forms. A sign posted at the day proudly declared 'Today's Fat Selection': lard, duck fat and shortening. Nice to know there are still good folks enjoying the flavors imparted by fat and that not everyone has gone crazy in pursuit of a low-fat, no-carb, substitute-any-other-diet fad. Plum Produce was another store I dropped by and it carries sometimes elusive, gourmet and seasonal ingredients such as white asparagus. I was less impressed by it as it was pricey and looked offputing to an everyday cook.

The last stop was the farmer's market at Copley Square. Held every Tuesday and Friday in the summer, the market showcased some of the freshest produce from local farmers. All kinds of organic and beautiful vegetables and fruits were on display as well as freshly baked goods from you would find at farmstands, such as fruit pies and cobblers. Iggy's Breads of the World (another veritable institution in the Bostonian bakery world) had delicious breads and pastries on sale and I promptly picked up a deliciously flaky and just sweet enough almond-paste filled croissant.

Strawberries In Balsamic Vinegar Caramel With Vanilla Ice Cream And Cracked Pepper

I was thinking about other ideas for fresh strawberries and remembered this simple recipe. I first had this in my professor's house. Dan was hosting our group and made this sauce for dessert. It rounded out a really enjoyable feast of beef carpaccio salad, crab bisque, steamed broccoli in soy sauce and fresh lobsters (all homecooked, with the exception of the bisque). I really liked the sweetness and unexpected flavor of the vinegar, and tried to make it for a dinner party one night. It was well received by my guests. (I served it with a nice, rich Whole Foods private label vanilla ice-cream. People have raved about Haagen Dazs' Vanilla ice-cream and I know Paul really likes B&J's Vanilla. Vvivi told me she likes Hood Vanilla. What's your favorite?)

1 Pint of strawberries (sliced)
3 Tablespoons of sweet butter
1/4 Cup of Light Brown Sugar
1/2 Cup Balsamic Vinegar
1 Pint of Vanilla Ice Cream

Heat saute pan on medium, add the sweet butter, when melted, add brown sugar. When the sugar is melted, add the strawberries, cook this for about two minutes, and add the vinegar. Cook until the sauce is at a medium thickness. Place scoop of ice cream in chilled bowls and spoon berries and caramel over top. Lightly sprinkle pepper over dish.

Fresh Apple Ginger Bread

Apples are one of my sister's favorite fruits. She loves them and knows them well. Just name your apple and ask her - Empire, Mcintosh, Macoun, Cortland, Red Delicious, Gala, Fuji - and she'll tell you about the differences. Her personal favorite (I think!) is the Fuji Apple. And she also loves a Qoo Fuji Apple juice drink, a beverage by the Coca-Cola company featuring a strangely intriguing but quite likeable blue Qoo character.

The little knowledge I have is gathered from conversations with her and picking notes I read when I went apple picking at Parlee Farms in Tyngsboro, MA, in the fall. So, I decided to brush up a little on apple trivia. The Dole website tells me that there are more than 7,000 varieties grown in the world, and about 2,500 in the United States! That is an astounding number but oh, wait, the reason why we don't really see that much variety is because 90% of apples grown in the US come from only 16 varieties of apples, and 8 of these make up 80%.

Anyway, here's a nice picture of some Mcintosh'es hanging from a tree at Parlee Farms. To end this post, I thought I'd share a quick bread recipe I like. I made this last fall and those who tried it (i.e my learning team mates at 8am in the morning) said it was scrumptious. This bread freezes well too.

• 2 cups whole-wheat pastry flour or all-purpose white flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 2 teaspoons ground ginger
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 2 large eggs, beaten
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil
• 3 medium-size tart apples, peeled and cut into 1/2-inch cubes
• 1/2 cup raisins and/or 1/2 cup unsalted mixed nuts (optional)

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Grease an 8-inch by 4-inch loaf pan.

Sift together the flour, baking powder, ginger, and salt; set aside. Combine the remaining ingredients and blend thoroughly. Add the liquid ingredients to the dry ingredients and combine just until blended thoroughly (do not beat). Pour into the prepared pan.

Bake the loaf pan for 80 minutes, or until a tester inserted in the loaves comes out clean. Cool on a rack for 10 minutes before removing from the pan.

Sweet Red Bean Bun

Anpan. Hong dou bao. Tau sar bau. Commonplace yet indelible. Found in almost every Chinese bakery, with similar versions in almost every Japanese and Korean bakery, the humble red bean bun is sweet and delightful. Undaunted by the challenge of working with yeast, and excited by a newly bought can of sweet red bean paste, I decided to embark on Project Anpan.


For the dough:
1 tablespoon active dry yeast (1 package)
3 tablespoons sugar
1 cup warm milk (100 to 110)
1 egg
3/4 cup vegetable oil
3 1/2 cups all-purpose flour, and more for dusting and kneading

Put the yeast and 1 tablespoon of the sugar in a small bowl. Add 1/4 cup of the warm milk. Let stand 5 minutes, then stir to dissolve. It should foam and bubble. If it does not, discard and use a fresh package of yeast. Stir in the egg, oil and remaining milk.

Put the flour and remaining sugar in the work bowl of a food processor fitted with the metal blade. Process 2 seconds. With the machine running, pour the warm milk mixture down the feed tube in a steady stream. Process until it forms a rough ball. If ball is sticky and wet, add a little more flour. Process a few seconds longer, or until dough pulls away from the sides of the bowl. Remove dough to a lightly floured board.

Knead dough, dusting with flour to keep it from sticking, until smooth and elastic, about 2 minutes. Place in a large oiled bowl, cover with plastic wrap and let rise in a warm spot until doubled, about 1 hour. Punch down dough and place on a lightly floured surface. It is now ready to form into rolls, buns or loaves.

If preparing filled buns: Cut dough in half. Form each half into a 12-inch long log; cut into 10 pieces. Roll each piece into a 4-inch circle. Roll outer inch of each circle 1/8-inch thin; leave middle slightly thicker. If right-handed, place a dough circle in palm of your left hand. Put a big tablespoon of filling in the; middle; put left thumb over the filling. With your right hand, bring up edge and make a pleat in it. Rotate circle a little and make a second pleat. As you make each pleat, gently pull it up and around as if to enclose your thumb. Continue rotating, pleating and pinching, then gently twist into a spiral. Pinch to seal. Place bun pleated side down on a parchment square. Repeat with remaining dough and filling. Put buns 1 1/2 inches apart on a baking sheet. Let rise until doubled in size, 30 minutes to 1 hour. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Beat egg yolks with water and sugar; brush over buns. Bake 20 minutes

Calculated for 1 buns (47g)
Recipe makes 20 buns
Calories 172
Calories from Fat 81 (47%)
Amount Per Serving %DV
Total Fat 9.1g 14%
Saturated Fat 1.5g 7%
Polyunsat. Fat 4.6g
Monounsat. Fat 2.5g
Trans Fat 0.0g
Cholesterol 12mg 4%
Sodium 10mg 0%
Potassium 57mg 1%
Total Carbohydrate 19.4g 6%
Dietary Fiber 0.7g 2%
Sugars 2.0g
Protein 3.2g 6%

Why Ginger and Molasses

Ginger and molasses occupy a special place in my list of favorite foods. And let me say that this is a highly competitive space, featuring other culinary contenders such as cheese, chocolate, vanilla, sesame, olives, chilli and garlic. However, I chose both of these ingredients because of the warmth and sweetness that they evoke and the aromas and flavors that are distinct and all their own.

Fresh ginger. That spiciness and fragrance has been a part of Asian cooking for years and that's where I love it best: as a key ingredient in some of my favorite foods - cooked with curries, grated in Hainanese chicken rice, boiled with tea and milk, pickled and served with sushi, stewed with pork belly, and simply steamed with fresh fish. But that's not all. The humble rhizome is now a regular feature in haute cuisine and found everywhere in any self-respecting chef's repertoire. Beet ravioli stuffed with candied ginger, lobster daikon rolls with ginger rosemary dip and chocolate wontons with coconut ginger ice-cream were just some of the interesting ones I found.

And what about molasses, you ask? How does this thick syrupy by-product from the processing of the sugarcane feature and why does it occupy such a coveted spot on your list of favorite ingredients? The answer is simple and purely emotional, as is usually the case with things we hold dear to us. Molasses lie at the heart of my favorite cookie of all time. The hneoh pneah is a flatish, round pastry with a flaky, fragrant crust. One bite into this small biscuit reveals a sweet center filled with sticky, dark brown molasses. The taste is unmistakable and a tiny morsel is all one needs to sample to know there is nothing else like it. As if to tease those who seek it out, these cookies are indigenous to a northern state in Malaysia. Only two bakeries produce them and neither company has an online presence nor distributors outside of Penang. And of course, this makes this little cookie, with its desirable molasses-filled center, an almost obsession.

Fresh Blueberry Bread

Sunday was a lovely day for berry picking and farm-fresh ice-cream. We drove to Tangerini Spring Street Farms in Millis, MA, and came back with 1.5lbs of fresh blueberries in a bag. We also had three large cups of ice-cream and a large smoothie between the four of us: Purple Cow (black raspberry ice-cream with dark and white chocolate chunks), Extreme Chocolate (rich Dutch chocolate ice-cream with chocolate chunks), Rainbow Sherbet (a mix of orange, raspberry and pineapple sherbet), and a Blueberry Banana Smoothie.

Deliciously juicy and sweet, the fresh pickings made a perfect excuse to bake a loaf of quick bread. I found this blueberry muffin recipe on allrecipes, but as always, I modified it (replaced sugar with maple syrup, reduced and replaced butter with canola oil and added more fruit) and made it my own. The recipe below produced a light and mildly sweetened loaf, which was just right for me. If I were making this for a brunch, I would double the amount of sugar, to suit those with a sweeter tooth.

• 1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour


• 
  
  1/4 cup maple syrup, 2 tbs white sugar


• 
  
  2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder


• 
  
  1/2 teaspoon salt


• 
  
  <3/4>


• 
  
  1 egg


• 
  
  1/4 cup canola oil


• 
  
  1 1/4 cup fresh blueberries

1. In a large bowl, whisk together flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt. Add milk, egg, and butter; mix until ingredients are moistened, do not overbeat. Stir in fresh fruit. Spoon batter into twelve greased muffin cups.

2. Bake at 400 degrees F (205 degrees C) for about 20 to 25 minutes, or until tops spring back when lightly touched. Serve warm. (Because I was making a loaf, I baked it at 450 for about 10 mins to brown the top and then for about 45 mins at 350, so that it was cooked through.)

Servings Per Recipe: 12
Amount Per Serving
Calories: 154
* Total Fat: 6g
* Cholesterol: 33mg
* Sodium: 265mg
* Total Carbs: 22.2g
* Dietary Fiber: 0.8g
* Protein: 3g

Maple Strawberry Jam

What is summer without fresh berries and cherries? Strawberries were selling for cheap last week ($3 for 2 lbs) and I thought a homemade jam would be a wonderful way to preserve the delightful flavor of these fresh berries. I could not find pectin in the local Shaw's so I substituted with gelatin. This produced a preserve which had the consistency of jelly, but it was delicious and the maple syrup added more complexity to the flavors. This was also wonderful as a sauce when microwaved in the oven.

4 c Sliced strawberries
1/3 c Sugar (I used 4 tbs of maple syrup instead)
2 tb Lemon juice
1 Envelope unflavored gelatin
1/2 c Water

1. In a medium saucepan, combine strawberries, sugar, and lemon juice. Heat 5 minutes, crushing the berries slightly. Bring to a boil; boll rapidly, stirring constantly, 3 minutes. 2. In a small bowl, sprinkle unflavored gelatin over cold water. Let stand 1 minute. Add to strawberry mixture and heat, stirring until gelatin is completely dissolved, about 3 minutes. 3. Let jam stand 5 minutes. Ladle into jar. Cover and cool slightly before storing in the refrigerator for several weeks or in the freezer for longer storage.

Honey Pumpkin Muffins

Bold, beautiful, and orange.

How can one resist the allure of pumpkins? Last Fall, we went apple picking at Parlee Farms in Tyngsboro and here is a picture of pumpkins fresh from the patch. I found a muffin recipe for this tasty squash and modified it, as always, to make it less sweet and more healthful. Moist and rich, these are delicious for the fall and anytime of the year, really!

• 1/2 cup raisins (used <1/2)
• 1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
• 1/2 cup packed brown sugar (omitted)
• 1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice (used cinnamon)
• 3/4 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 2 eggs (1 egg, 1 egg white)
• 3/4 cup canned pumpkin puree (1 cup)
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil (<1/2)
• 1/2 cup honey (>1/2)
• 1/2 cup chopped walnuts (omitted)

DIRECTIONS:
1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease a 12 cup muffin pan, or line with paper liners. Place the raisins in a cup, and add enough hot water to cover. Let stand for a few minutes to plump.
2. In a large bowl, stir together the whole wheat flour, brown sugar, pumpkin pie spice, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Make a well in the center, and put in eggs, pumpkin, oil and honey. Mix just until the dry ingredients are absorbed. Drain excess water from raisins, and stir in along with the walnuts. Spoon into muffin cups so they are about 2/3 full.
3. Bake for 18 minutes in the preheated oven, or until the tops spring back when lightly touched. Cool in the pan before removing from cups.

* Servings Per Recipe: 12
* Amount Per Serving
* Calories: 263
* Total Fat: 13g
* Cholesterol: 35mg
* Sodium: 217mg
* Total Carbs: 35.9g
* Dietary Fiber: 2.9g
* Protein: 4.2g