Snickerdoodles :: Apparently Just an American Thing

I've been baking a lot for my office lately. For one thing, I think my coworkers deserve better treats than Restaurant Cravers Pringles and bread stick crackers on the snack counter. But it also gives me a great outlet to bake like crazy but not get diabetes by eating up a whole batch of cookies before they go bad.

I made Snickerdoodles from the Flour Bakery cookbook last week and they turned out great. That book is amazing. The response in the office to this particular batch was interesting. The Americans nearly jumped out of their seats to grab one, swooning over how much they loved Snickerdoodles. The non-Americans all sent me messages like "What is that?" and "A Snickerwhuddle?" and "Why's it called that?" Both responses surprised me. I like Snickerdoodles but they're such a simple cookies, I didn't think anyone would go ga ga over them. I also didn't expect anyone to question them and look at me like I'm playing an evil trick on them. It's just a cookie, man. Chill out.

Here's the recipe I emailed to an inquiring coworker:

Snickerdoodles

114g room temperature butter

150g white sugar, plus about 30g for coating

1 room temperature egg

175g flour (I prefer a half and half mix of bread (strong) and cake (weak) flour but just one or the other would work too) 

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/8 tsp salt (basically a pinch) 

1 tsp cream of tartar 

30g cinnamon

30g white sugar

1. Using a standing or hand mixer, cream the butter and 150g sugar until light and fluffy. About 5-8 minutes. Or you can use a wooden spoon, but this will take about 10-15 minutes. がんばってね！

2. Beat in the egg on medium speed for 2-3 minutes until it is thoroughly combined. Remember to use a rubber spatula to make sure all the butter and sugar a the bottom of the bowl is mixed in too. 

3. In a medium bowl, mix the flour, baking soda, salt and cream of tar tar. On slow speed or with a wooden spoon, mix in the flour mixture just until all the flour is mixed in. 

4. In theory, you're supposed to fridge the dough over night so that the butter and sugar flavors really absorb into the cookies. But who has the patience? You can get away with just putting it in the fridge for a few hours, but I think the dough needs somewhat chilled before you bake so that it's not sticky and they don't spread too much. 

5. Mix the 30g sugar and cinnamon in a bowl and set aside. Using a spoon, scoop up some chilled dough and roll into a ball in your hands. Roll the dough in the cinnamon sugar mix and place the ball on a baking sheet lined with baking paper. The size depends on how big you want your cookies to be. When I made this recipe, I had about 22 cookies. 

I like lots of cinnamon and sugar, so I dip the balls in the sugar mix a second time just before going into the oven. 

Bake for 15-18 minutes at 180C or until the edges are golden. Let them cool for about 5 to 10 minutes before moving to a plate to cool. 

Jam On It :: Easy Little Bread

Baking a loaf of bread from scratch - there's no better feeling. Except for when you actually get to eat said loaf of bread. Whatever your toppings of choice, there's really no substitute for warm freshly baked bread. 

But of course, it can also be very intimidating and most people just don't have the time or patience for it. Sometimes, it is a giant headache. But sometimes, it's awesome. So, if you've ever wanted to bake a loaf on your own but were too scared, please give this Easy Little Bread recipe a try! I found this recipe on 101 Cookbooks and was intrigued by the home-y, simple approach.  It's not messy (no kneading) and the bread is hearty and delicious. This loaf was our Sunday night dinner and I think we'd be perfectly happy if this was a weekly meal. 

Easy Little Bread 

1 1/4 cups / 300 ml warm water
2 teaspoons active dry yeast
1 tablespoon runny honey
1 cup / 4.5 oz / 125 g white flour
1 cup / 5 oz / 140 g whole wheat flour
1 cup / 3.5 oz / 100 g rolled oats (not instant oats)
1 teaspoons fine grain sea salt
2 tablespoons butter, for brushing

1. Dissolve the yeast and honey in warm water. Let stand for 5 to 10 minutes. 

2. Meanwhile, sift the flours, oats and salt in a large bowl and grease an 8 cup bread pan with softened butter. 

3. When the yeast mixture looks foamy, add the dry ingredients and mix well. 

4. Pour the batter into the pan. Cover with a damp kitchen towel and let it rise in a warm dry place for 30 minutes. 

5. Pre-heat your oven to 350F/180C. Bake the bread for 35-40 minutes. 

6. Remove loaf from the oven. Run a paring knife along the edges to loosen up the loaf and turn the loaf out onto a wire rack to cool. 

7. Optional - Brush the top of the loaf with softened butter to give it an extra buttery crust. 

Slice and eat!

Bacon and Leek Pasta

 I'm not sure why it took me so long to make this dish. There are lots of ingredients that are difficult to find in Japan. But thick cut bacon and leeks are not. In fact, they're plentiful and of the highest quality. If you watch people leaving any grocery store in Japan, you'll notice a slender green stick poking out the top of everyone's bags. They're leeks and Japanese food relies heavily on it. Back home, I always stayed away from leeks because they were such a pain to clean. But in Japan, they're already cleaned for you so you can just rinse quickly and cook away. It's great!

You can use regular bacon or pancetta if you're fancy. I used thick cut bacon because you can find it easily in Japan. I cut back on the amount of cream on this particular evening because I was feeling healthy, but if you want to have a super rich sauce, go crazy on that cream and butter.

Bacon and Leek Pasta

2 Leeks, just the white and light parts
2 slices of thick cut bacon or 8 slices of regular bacon
2 TB butter
1/4 cup of white wine or chicken broth
1/4 cup of heavy cream
Your pasta of choice - enough for 4 people
salt and pepper

1. Slice the leeks and bacon
2. Cook the bacon until brown on medium high heat.
3. Lower the heat to medium and add the leeks and butter. Sautee until translucent and soft.
4. Turn the heat back up to medium high. Deglaze the pan with white wine or broth.
5. Turn the heat back down low and add the heavy cream. Stir and cook for 2-4 minutes.
6. Add cooked pasta and pepper generously.

Top with parmesen cheese and eat! Great for leftover lunch.

Recipes From Mom :: Warm Crab Noodles

Remember when my mom put me through Vietnamese cooking Bootcamp before I moved to Japan? Well, this was one of the dishes she taught me but I hadn't made it in Japan until this week. Mostly because I wasn't sure what kind of noodles to buy but I gave it a guess this week and guessed right! Hooray! This is a super easy recipe if you can buy cooked crab meat easily. In Japan, it's a seafood aisle staple and not too expensive either. 


Crab Cellophane Noodles (Mien Xao Cua)

two packs of cellophane noodle
one full cup of fresh cooked crab meat
3/4 cup chicken broth
one small white onion, finely chopped
salt and pepper 3 scallions chopped
1 tablespoon sesame oil
olive oil

1. Soak noodle with cold water for one minute. Drain and cut to preferred size (4-5 inches long)
2. Heat two table spoon of olive oil
3. Stir fry onion until clear
4. Fold in crab meat, add salt and pepper to taste
5. Cook two minutes at medium heat, and set aside the crab mix in a bowl.
6. Put pan back on the stove, bring two tablespoons spoon of chicken broth to boil7. Add the noodles and slowly spoon in chicken broth. The noodles will soak up the broth so keep adding more broth until the noodles look clear and tender, but be sure not to add too much broth at a time. This is process is similar to making risotto.
8. Fold in crab mix at low heat for one or two min.  Add the  sesame oil.


Transfer into a dish, garnish with cilantro or chives.


And as my mom said in her emailed recipe - "Voila, bon appetit!"

Creamy Crabby Croquettes

I was feeling extra adventurous a few weeks ago and was fangin' (a new word I've picked up from my Australian friend) for something fried. You can buy warm creamy croquettes at any grocery store in Tokyo. The fillings vary from plain old potato to minced pork and creamy crab. I decided to give the crab variety a shot at home with a Harumi Kurihara recipe found in one of her monthly magazines. 

I love fried food a lot but absolutely hate frying things at home. For one, I'm constantly dodging oil splatters left and right. Due to my height, I guess my face is probably more in danger of scarring than others. I also hate frying because it ruins my grand plan to remain ignorant to how unhealthy my foods are. 

In any case, these were delicious! The filling is composed of a homemade white sauce, potatoes and crab. Being in Japan, you can get prepared crab at any grocery store for pretty cheap. The white sauce was made in the microwave which made the whole process easier to manage. Once you mix the filling into balls, a quick roll in potato starch, egg and panko crumbs and you're ready to fry. 

These were super tasty but I felt pretty guilty eating more than 2. I guess they're better for parties or picnics where you can unload the guilty delicious calories on others, but it was fun to make at least once. 

In an attempt to health-ify the meal, I made a really easy soft tofu chicken salad with sesame dressing. This was tasty in its own right and probably something I'll make more often than the croquettes. 

Crab and Cream Croquettes recipe via NHK World/Harumi Kurihara 

Soft Tofu and Chicken Salad with Sesame Dressing

• 1 skinless chicken breast 
• 1 inch knob of ginger 
• 3 scallions 

1. Put the ginger, scallions and chicken in a pot. Cover with water and bring to a boil. 

2. Shut off the heat and cover with a pan. Let stand until the chicken has cooked all the way through. 

3. Remove the chicken from the pan and let cool. Shred and set aside. 

• 1/4 cup white sesame paste 
• 1 tsp sugar 
• 1 tsp soy sauce
• 1 TB rice wine vinegar 

1. Mix all the dressing ingredients together until incorporated. Alter the amount of vinegar to your own taste. 

Drain 1 package of soft tofu. Slice into 8 cubes and place on a plate. Pour dressing over tofu. Top with chicken and more chopped scallions. Eat chilled. 

The Holy Trinity of Japanese Cooking :: Soy Sauce, Mirin + Sake

I've been cooking a lot of Japanese dishes lately. Somewhere deep down, I feel cooking Japanese dishes at home is my own tiny way of showing solidarity with the rest of the country. I dusted off my Harumi Kurihara books and also picked up a few Japanese food magazines.  They have (relatively) simple instructions and those have been a lot of fun to tackle. Both in cooking and trying to translate the recipes properly. 

One thing you'll see over and over again in Japanese recipe is the prolific use of soy sauce, mirin and sake. Used in varying ratios, these 3 ingredients tenderize and flavor meat and fish in a distinctly Japanese way. These days, you can get all three in the Asian food aisle and if you want to have an under 10 minute dinner during the week, these are staples in your kitchen. Used either as a marinade or sauce, this mix is essentially what we Americans know as teriyaki sauce. The flavor is strong and sweet, so it goes perfectly with plain rice and veggies like shredded cabbage, boiled green beans or bok choy. Here's a really basic and super easy recipe for teriyaki chicken that I've come to crave weekly. 

Basic Teriyaki Chicken

1 boneless chicken leg (with skin)

sake ... 2 TB

soy sauce ... 2 TB

grated ginger ... 1/2 TB

oil ... 1 TB 

sugar ... 1 TB

soy sauce ... 4 TB 

mirin ... 4 TB 

1. Cut the chicken into bite sized pieces and season with pepper (no salt). Marinate for 10 minutes in the ingredients in red. Mix the sugar, soy sauce and mirin and set aside. 

2. Heat the oil in a frying pan on medium high heat. Add the chicken, skin side down and brown both sides. 

3. Once the meat has browned, add the rest of the ingredients to the pan. Once the sauce bubbles, turn the heat down to medium low and let it reduce until the sauce is thick and shiny. Careful not to burn the sauce. 

Serve with simple rice and vegetables. Serves 2. 

My Funny Valentine

I really shouldn't be writing this post. My apartment looks like a giant explosion of toiletries, winter clothes, summer clothes and plastic bags. That's right, I'm packing for vacation! This time around, Blammo and I are hitting up New York, Chile, Argentina, Savannah and The Bay Area for about 2 weeks. Yeah. It's going to be nuts. And awesome. And delicious.

We will arrive in Santiago on Valentine's Day, so I decided to bake some vday sweets well in advance. One of the season cake classes at ABC is a White Chocolate Strawberry heart shaped cake. It was adorable but not really my kid of cake. Buttercream frosting seems to be exclusively American and cakes in Japan are almost always topped with whipped cream or ganache. Nothing wrong with that but just not my style. It's pretty though, right?

For my lovely coworkers, who I am getting to know more and more these days I made a batch of Pink Frosting Cookies. When baking for my expat office, I try my best to bring a little piece of home to them and one bite of these cookies will bring you back to elementary school. My birthday is in October near Halloween, so whenever it was my turn to bring in a treat to share for my class, I always got white sugar cookies with bright orange frosting from Safeway. Well, regardless of what color the frosting is the taste will bring you back to those store bought Lofthouse style cookies.

The batch I made tasted spot on and I was so pleased to hear all the Americans say "oh my gosh, these totally remind me of ". Because I always use a 50/50 mix of bread and cake flour, the texture of my cookies turned out more cakey than I would have liked. They were basically cupcake tops. Not a bad thing at all. I don't mind the softness but maybe next time I'll try an 80/20 bread to cake flour mix to see if it makes a difference. 

Ok, I'm running out of things to say about Valentine's Day. I've watched all the new TV shows on my Apple TV and washed every single dish in the house which means, I have to either go to sleep or finish packing.

See you in 2 weeks with lots of pictures and stories from far and away!

Chao Ga :: Vietnamese Rice Porridge with Chicken

It's officially Tết, or the Lunar New Year, so again, Happy New Year! I had a lot of ambitious dreams of making some traditional Tết treats, like Banh Chung and Thit Kho but decided to go with something much simpler. We're talking 2-ingredients simple. Rice and water. That's all you need. Of course, you can fancy it up with toppings and flavorings, but at the core, it's just boiled rice and water. It's simple, healthy and perfect cold or sick food. In our house, when we were feeling under the weather, we got a steaming hot bowl of gingery, peppery Chao Ga instead of Chicken Noodle Soup. 

I've made this a few times in Japan and I think I've finally worked out all the toppings and flavorings to my liking. So here it is: 

Chao Ga :: Vietnamese Rice Porridge with Chicken

Porridge 

1 cup of rice, jasmine or japanese short grain

8 cups of water 

2 inch piece of peeled ginger thickly sliced 

1 bunch of scallions chopped in 1 inch pieces, whites only 

8 whole black peppercorns 

1. Put everything in a large pot. Bring to a boil then simmer on low for 1 hour. Stir occasionally and scrape rice from the bottom of the pan. 

Chicken 

1 chicken breast 

1 inch knob of ginger, sliced 

1. Poach the chicken breast in water with the ginger until done. Set chicken aside to cool. 

2. When the chicken has cooled, use two forks to shred into bite sized pieces. 

Customize your own bowl with different toppings. I put the chicken on top of a small bowl of soup and splash some fish sauce on the chicken. Then flavor the soup with Maggi Sauce. It also gets a healthy sprinkling of chopped green onions. One of my favorite toppings when I was little was something I called "carpet" which is a really salty dried pork that is then shredded (thịt chà bông). It looks like a giant jar of dog hair but it is delicious, especially in chao. 

In Japan, rice porridge soup is called okayu and is eaten with sesame seeds, mushrooms or umeboshi, pickled plums. In Hong Kong, congee is a popular breakfast meal filled with meat, fresh green veggies and greasy donuts. I'm sure other Asian countries have their take on chao and I'm sure that it's a sentimental dish for everyone since it can be topped and mixed with just about anything. 

Scallion Pancakes :: Homemade Delivery

A list of things I miss from home deserves an entire blog of its own. And while I can't make my own Wheat Thins, Cheez-Its or Corgis at home, there are a few things I can recreate pretty nicely here. Scallion Pancakes are one of them since it is such a simple recipe. Before I moved to New York, I didn't quite "get" the whole Chinese takeout phenomenon. But once I was introduced to Mama Buddha (now closed, wah wah) that all changed. Delicious egg noodle soup delivered to your door for less than $10?! Done. Scallion Pancakes were always a must order item for me - salty, crispy, chewy and the perfect vehicle for soy sauce. I imagine if I lived in NY right now, I'd be ordering a lot of Chinese take-out to avoid slipping on black ice and into a snowbank, as I'm prone to do.

Ingredients

2 cups of flour (bread or all-purpose)

1 cup of warm water

1/2 cup chopped green onions/scallions

1 TB sesame oil

1. Slowly mix the warm water with flour, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon. 

2. Once the water has been completely absorbed, knead the dough on a clean surface until the surface of the dough is smooth.

3. Flatten the dough into a large rectangle and brush the surface with sesame oil. Sprinkle with chopped scallions. 

4. Roll the dough into a log (like a taquito) then roll the log into a ball (like a cinnamon bun). 

5. Flatten the dough out into your hands. The point of this is to knead the scallions into the dough and distribute evenly. There are several ways to do it and I'm using the method I learned at ABC Cooking Studio.

6. Flatten the dough again, this time into a large circle, about the size of your skillet.

7. Heat some vegetable oil on medium high, then add the pancake. After about 4 minutes, the bottom of the pancake will be browned. Flip the pancake over and brown the other side. 

Remove and blot with paper towels. Then cut into wedges. You could eat these with just plain soy sauce, but I like to make a soy-vinegar-ginger-sriracha sauce. 

Pho Ga :: The Inaugural Bowl

Ever since I watched the video above, I've been craving Pho. There is a pretty good Vietnamese restaurant in my neighborhood but since I've been cooking and blogging so much these days, why not give it a try at home? I googled a couple of recipes and decided that this Wandering Chopsticks post was a good jumping off point. I emailed my mom the recipe and she gave it the thumbs up with a few tips of her own. She suggested using fewer spices and concentrate on the ginger and garlic since those go so well with chicken. 

This being Japan, I of course had to make a few compromises. First, no whole chicken. Usually, you make the broth from a whole chicken. The bones are the most important part but most cuts of chicken are deboned in Japanese grocery stores. I managed to find 2 large chicken thighs with the bones still in and used those with a couple extra drumettes. In the end, this didn't turn out to be a deal breaker but the broth wasn't as deep as I had hoped for. Blammo begged to differ. He enjoyed the soup very much. I myself liked the chicken the best. 

Ingredients

1 whole onion, halved 

2 inch nob of ginger 

1/2 a head of garlic, smashed 

8 cloves 

1 cinnamon stick

4 cardamom pods

2 pieces of star anise 

1 whole chicken or a suitable amalgamation of pieces, as mentioned above 

2 teaspoons of salt

2 teaspoons of fish sauce

1 large piece of rock candy (or 3 tsp of brown sugar) 

1 package of Banh Pho (wide flat rice noodles)

bean sprouts

cilantro

lime wedges

chopped green onions

thai basil

sliced hot chilis 

Sriracha Sauce

Hoisin Sauce 

1. Char, roast or dry pan fry all the ingredients in red. The point of this is to bring out the flavors of each seasoning element. Keeping the broth clear is an important part of making Pho Ga. You don't want to have to worry about biting into a big chunk of star anise or clove. My mom suggested straining the broth through a fine sieve before serving, but that just seemed a little too much work for me. Also, I don't own a fine sieve. (Do you?) So, I got all MacGruber in the kitchen and whipped up my own little spice contraption.

E voila! I cut open a jasmine tea bag, poured out the tea leaves, replaced them with the pho spices and tied it back up. Worked like a charm. Removing the spices was a breeze and I didn't have too much debris floating around my broth. 

2. Wash the chicken and place it in a large soup pot. Add 2 tsp of salt and the charred flavorings. Cover with water. Bring the pot to a boil. Turn down the heat and simmer for an hour. Turn off the heat and let the soup cool. Then refrigerate overnight. 

3. The next day, skim all the solidified fat off the surface. I am sparing you a photo of this step. It is a little gross, but very necessary. 

4. Remove the chicken from the pot and shred the meat off the bones. I suggest using your hands. Again, it's a little gross, but very necessary. I like big meaty pieces but you can make yours whatever size you want. 

5. Set the meat aside in a bowl and add the bones back to the broth. 

6. Bring the broth back up to a boil and simmer for another hour. If you have a slotted spoon, occasionally skim as much floating spice and chicken bits out of the broth as possible. 

7. Season the broth with fish sauce and sugar. Traditionally, the broth is sweetened with rock sugar but brown sugar will work as well. You can also add carrots to the broth from the very beginning and the natural sweetness from the carrots will do the trick. 

8. Boil the noodles and add them to a large bowl. Top the noodles with pieces of chicken, cilantro, green onions and bean sprouts. Ladle the hot pho broth over the chicken until everything is covered. 

And that's that! Homemade chicken pho. Don't be intimidated. I was at first, because pho is something I usually only have at restaurants that specialize in it. But this was just as easy as making good old chicken noodle soup just with different spices and flavorings. I'd say the toughest part is getting all the ingredients, but if you're in the U.S., you won't have a problem at all. If I recall, they sell Vietnamese noodles in the Asian sections of Whole Foods and other grocery stores.

Potato Latkes and Chunky Holiday Apples :: Happy Hannukah!

Today while I was running, I was thinking about what I would eat for dinner. I ran the fridge inventory through my head and realized that I didn't really have much to work with tonight. Some old potatoes, onions, creme fraiche, kimchi and eggs. Oh and some leftover apples from yesterday's muffins. At first, it looked like it was going to be a take-out night. But then it hit me - Hanukkah! A few hours earlier, I had just seen a friend's blog post about the festival of lights (it's so early this year!) and as it turns out, I just so happen to have all the ingredients needed to make potato latkes. Bonus: I could try to make some sort of applesauce substitute. How resourceful. This got me very excited and the next few miles were a breeze. I mentioned a few days ago that nothing fuels my desire to exercise more than guilt, but a close second would be knowing that I can eat whatever the heck I want because I just burned a butt load of calories. It's a vicious cycle, but it works for me.

I cook the same way I bake. I like to map everything out with pen and paper and measure out all my ingredients before starting any of the cooking. But I was so excited about the latkes tonight, that I just skimmed at a few recipes on my iPhone on the train ride home and gave it a go. It was quite liberating! Here's my recipe as best I can remember:

Ingredients


3 medium sized potatoes, grated  
1 medium sized onion, thinly sliced and quartered 
1 beaten egg
3 TB potato starch flour or just regular flour 
salt + pepper 

1. Place the grated potatoes in a bowl of ice water for 5 minutes. I have no idea why you do this, but I remember seeing it on a few of the recipes online. I assume it has something to do with making the potatoes ready for crisping.

2. Dump the water and put the potatoes in a dry bowl covered with a towel. Gather the corners of the towel together and squeeze all the excess water out of the potatoes. Water and oil are not friends and if you don't want to be dodging splattered oil during the frying stages, make sure you put some muscle into wringing out the towel. If you save the excess water in a bowl and let it sit for a few minutes, the starch from the potatoes will sink to the bottom. You can fish this out and add it back to your potato mixture. It will naturally thicken up your batter and make shaping your pancakes a little easier. I happen to have potato starch flour on hand, so I used that instead.

3. With your hands, mix the sliced onions and potato starch into the potato hash. Add the egg and mix well. Salt and pepper the batter well.

4. Heat about 3 tablespoons of oil (I used grape seed which is really neutral in taste. Good 'ole veggie oil will do fine too.) in a large skillet on high heat. Spoon some of the potato mixture into the pan and try to form a compact circle. You can probably fit 2 or 3 per batch. After about 3 minutes, turn the heat down to medium low. Flip the pancakes after a few minutes, turning the heat back up to medium high. Cook for another 3-4 minutes or until both sides are nicely browned.

The size of the pancakes are up to you, but I found that the smaller ones are easier to manage. Continue to add oil in between batches.

5. Lightly salt and pepper the pancakes right after you remove them from the skillet.

Traditionally, latkes are eaten with applesauce and sour cream. I was really tempted to squirt some ketchup on these Burger King style, but I refrained. I didn't have applesauce or sour cream, but I did have an apple and creme fraiche. So, I made a quick little chunky apple...thing (jam? chutney? compote?) and it tasted great. Sort of like apple pie filling.

If you're not making these for a traditional Hanukkah meal, try adding in other veggies like carrots, zucchini or green onions. Just be sure to wring out as much water out of all the veggies you use before mixing.

Ingredients for Chunky Holiday Apples 


1 apple, diced into chunks (I used a Fuji...as I am in Japan)
1 tsp cinnamon 
2 TB butter
3 TB apple juice (for some odd reason, we just so happen to have 1 pear juice box in the fridge)

1. Melt the butter in a saucepan on medium high heat. Add the the rest of the ingredients, coating the apples with the liquid. Once the liquid starts to bubble, turn down the heat and simmer until all the liquid has evaporated.

Whole Wheat Apple Muffins :: Healthy + Homey

I'm not sure if you can tell, but I'm on a bit of a baking roll. I am seriously tearing it up in the kitchen right now. Just as I've worked in my nightly jogs around the city, I've also worked in adequate kitchen time each night to experiment with new recipes.

Lately, I've been wanting to cook/bake things that are healthy and autumn-y. This recipe for whole wheat apple muffins satisfies both those cravings. They are also an ode to the inevitable Washington victory during this weekend's Apple Cup. (Woof!) They also remind me of home, which is bittersweet, I guess. My mom is a wonderful cook. She can whip up some amazing things in the kitchen, but she's not a baker. I'm still not sure if it's because she doesn't like to do it or if she doesn't want us to eat junk - only the lady herself can answer that question. Anyways, we are lucky enough to have a home surrounded by apple trees, so we are never short on apples. My mom was constantly handing out giant grocery bags to neighbors, guests, my gymnastics coaches...basically everyone we came in contact with just to get rid of them. One summer, my mom decided to bake some apple muffins with these homegrown apples and they were delicious. Of course, the mix came out of a box, but since we added in fresh chunks of apples they tasted 100% homemade to me.

Fast forward to tonight. I may not have grown these apples myself, but I did make the batter from scratch. I hope one day, my mom and I will make a batch with her apples and my batter. That would be stupendous. 

Whole Wheat Apple Muffins

1 cup (115g) whole wheat flour
1 cup (120g) all-purpose flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt

1/4 tsp nutmeg
1 TB cinnamon

1. Sift the dry ingredients above in a bowl and set aside. Preheat the oven to 450F. 

1/2 cup (113g) unsalted butter, at room temperature
1/2 cup (99) granulated sugar
1/2 cup dark brown sugar, packed

1 large egg, lightly beaten

1 cup (226g) buttermilk

2 large apples, peeled, cored and chopped

1/4 cup walnuts

2. Cream the butter for about 5 minutes on medium speed. Add in the sugar and beat until fluffy and light. 

3. Add the egg and mix until incorporated. Scrape down the sides and bottom. This is especially important if you are using a stand mixer. There will be a lot of unmixed butter at the bottom. 

4. Slowly pour in the buttermilk while mixing the batter with a rubber spatula. Just until incorporated. Don't over mix. 

5. Fold in the sifted dried ingredients until half mixed. Then add the apples and fold until there are no flour streaks. 

6. Fill lined muffin tins to the top. Because of the apple chunks, you'll need to tap the pan on a hard surface a few times to get rid of air bubbles. Sprinkle some brown sugar and chopped walnuts on the top of each muffin. 

7. Bake at 450F for 10 minutes, then turn down the heat to 400F and bake for another 10 minutes. The muffins are finished when a toothpick comes out clean from the center of the muffin. 

Cool and enjoy. 

Parchment Paper Cupcake/Muffin Liners

I've been seeing these around on some blogs (and of course, Martha) and I think they're pretty swell. They look rustic, kind of like a muffin bouquet. They also make eating crumbly muffins a much easier and cleaner affair. They're very easy to make if you have parchment paper lying around. I've been pretty obsessed with parchment paper ever since Jacques Torres on PBS told me it was a must have item in the kitchen. You can make sturdy pastry bags, they give cakes a smooth finish and you can make muffin liners out of them! 

What you need: 

parchment paper

2 cups about the same diameter as your muffin tin that fit into each other, or if you have 2 trays of the same sized muffin cups, that will work too. 

1. Cut out large square sheets that are about 2 inches wider than your cup. 

2. Turn one of your cups upside down and place 1 square sheet of parchment paper on top.  Slowly press the other glass over the paper, pushing the sides down against the upside down glass. Twist the glasses back and forth to give the creases a good press. 

If you can understand my instructions, then it's really easy. Just place these in your muffin tin and fill just as you would a store bought liner. Just be careful not to get too much batter on the pointy corners that stick up. The batter will burn in the oven. 

Bow...down...to Washing-ton. 

French Onion Soup :: The Easiest Soup You'll Ever Make

It's winter. The weather kind of sucks. You miss home. What's the cure? Soup. Everyone likes soup. I like soup. Do you like soup? Well, you'll definitely like this soup.

French Onion Soup. Sounds fancy and complicated, no? Actually, no - it is not complicated at all. There are less than 5 ingredients, fewer than 5 steps and since you're just probably just going to eat this soup at home in your college sweats with your boo, you don't need to fuss over broiling the cheese and bread in that ramekin you probably don't own. The soup does take a bit of time, but you don't need to slave over the pot the whole time. May I suggest watching this in your downtime? Or you could start watching The Wire. (Oh who am I kidding, any pop culture nerd worthy of their snark has already watched the entire season by now!)

Ingredients

5 large onions, white or yellow - your call
1/4 cup of unsalted butter
4 cups of beef broth/stock (you can use chicken or veggie too, but I prefer beef)
salt
pepper

Optional Ingredients 

a crusty baguette, french or sourdough sound nice
gruyere cheese

1. Chop the onions. You'll want semi-small pieces so try cutting the onions in half, slicing, then halving the slices. This is probably the hardest part - be prepared to tear up. 

2. Heat a large soup pot on medium heat and melt the butter until it's completely melted and starting to foam. Add all the onions and coat with the butter. Salt and pepper the onions lightly. Cook the onions for at least 45 minutes on medium low heat, stirring occasionally. The onions will slowly caramelize. 

 3. Add the soup broth/stock to the onions. If you're feeling really sassy, you can deglaze the pan with a little red wine before adding the stock. And if you're felling even sassier, you could also add in a piece of star anise or cloves for some flavor. It's not necessary, but I took this cue from the way pho broth is made and if it works for pho, it can work here too, right?

Turn the heat to high to bring the soup to a boil, then simmer for another 45 minutes. The longer you simmer, the deeper the flavor. I was really hungry, so I simmered the soup for 30 minutes and it was still very delicious.

4. Your soup is done, but of course you could toast up some bread and melt gruyere cheese on top. What I really wish I'd done was made a grilled gruyere cheese sandwich to eat on the side of the french onion soup. Why don't you try it out for me and tell me how it goes?

Summer Rolls the Remix :: Bun Thit Nuong with Fried Scallion Rolls

Working off my kitchen high from yesterday's spring rolls, I decided to to take a stab at one of my favorite dishes Bun Thit Nuong. This isn't too different from a summer roll actually. It's like a deconstructed summer roll. You know how at Chipotle, you can order something called a burrito bowl? This is like a burrito bowl, but less gross sounding. It shares about 90% of the ingredients from the rolls which is good because I had a lot of leftovers that I didn't want to waste. An added challenge for the evening was making my own carrot and diakon pickles. I've never really pickled anything before and yeah, in theory, it seems pretty easy. But for some reason, I always shied away from it. After tonight, I don't think I'll become a pickling master but it will be nice to have a jar of these tangy and crunchy pickles in the fridge.

I made something really similar a year ago when my mom taught me how to make cha gio. Instead of cha gio, this dish has grilled pork in a sweet marinade. If I could get my hands on lemongrass paste in Japan, I would definitely add that to the marinade, but alas, I am without. I tried to get a proper recipe from my mom but she went to bed before she got my email and catering to my every request just isn't on the top of her list of things to do anymore. So I googled a bunch of different recipes, took what I thought made sense, sprinkled that with some of my own knowledge and gave it a try. It may not be the most authentic, but it is delicious!

I felt like I'd really miss the crunch of cha gio, but was also too lazy to whip up a batch. Instead, I paid homage to the nem nuong I had in Nha Trang in 2004. Once upon a time, there was a pretty kickin' night market on the beach and I had these amazing spring rolls with pork meatballs. What I loved most about these rolls was the crunchy fried scallion wrapped inside. It was just a scallion rolled up in rice paper and fried but it added the perfect texture and made these irresistible. I was really sad to find out that this night market is no longer popular, thus, the delicious nem with crispy scallions are gone.

Fear not! They live on in my memory...and now in my kitchen. I fried up some of the leftover chinese chives wrapped in egg roll wrappers and added them to my bowl thus officially making this MY recipe.

Ingredients


Fried Scallion Rolls

• Egg Roll wrappers
• Scallions, chives or any other herb you can fry

1. Cut 5 inch pieces of chives. Roll in egg roll wrappers, sealing with egg wash. 

2. Fry for 2 minutes on each side. Set aside. 

Thit Nuong 

• thinly sliced pork
• 1 TB fish sauce
• 1 TB sugar
• 1 TB mirin or sake
• 1 tsp soy sauce
• 1 tsp oyster sauce
• lots of black pepper
• 2 garlic cloves, minced

1. Put everything but the pork in a plastic bag and mix well -- make sure the sugar dissolves. Add the pork and marinate for 30 minutes to an hour. One thing I learned through Japanese cooking is that if you have thinly sliced meat marinating in alcohol, you don't want to marinate for longer than an hour. The point of the alcohol is to tenderize and if your meat is sliced too thin, you're going to break down too much protein.

2. Grill or pan fry. The sugar is going to caramelize and burn a little. Let it. That's part of the charm of this dish I think.

Nuoc Mam Sauce
Mix all contents together in a bowl. 

• 1/4 Cup Sugar
• 1/4 Cup White Vinegar
• 1 Cup of Water
• 1/2 Cup of Fish Sauce
• 1/2 tablespoon of crushed red pepper
• 1 Garlic Clove, finely diced

Bun Thit Nuong

• Cooked rice noodles, room temperature
• Lettuce
• Sliced cucumbers
• Bean sprouts (I totally forgot to put bean sprouts in my bowl -- doh!) 
• Pickled daikon and carrots
• Mint
• Cilantro
• Thit Nuong
• Peanuts
• Crunchy rolls, cut in half

1. Fill the bottom of a large bowl with rice noodles. Add all the veggies in varying quantities depending on your taste. 

2. Add pork and sprinkled crushed peanuts on the pork. 

3. Add some crunchy rolls. 

4. Top the noodles, veggies and meat with nuoc mam.