Quick Pickled Daikon Salad

The other day, my mother in law picked out some beautiful daikon for me at the Asian market, and put them in my cart. They were young, and tender, so full of promise. I love daikon, but have no idea how to cook it so it doesn't come out bitter and nasty. I planned on having her cook them for me, but then...Life. My kids got sick, which got her sick, which meant we didn't see her for a few days, and before I knew it I was in danger of losing my daikon and PANIC! Google to the rescue - since daikon are simply really big white radishes, as far as I can tell, they can easily translate to other cuisines. I found a recipe that made a salad from daikon and carrots. Well, it sounded tasty enough, so I tweaked it for what I had on hand...and it was delicious. I mean, it was tasty the day I made it, but when we finally finished it off today (three days later), it was divine. Kids? Go find some daikon. You will thank me.

Daikon come in varying sizes, depending on how old they are. The daikon I used were on the skinny side, meaning they were younger. They were so sweet you could eat them raw and plain. Older, fatter, daikon isn't tasty raw, or plain. It is spicy and a tad bitter. Those daikon are delicious stewed, which is another recipe for another day. 

Enjoy! 

Quick-Pickled Daikon Salad

Ingredients:

3 young daikon (about 2" across and 18" long)

Salt

1 Tbsp. finely grated fresh ginger (grate on a microplane, if possible)

3 Tbsp. rice vinegar

2 tsp. lime juice

1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil

1 tsp. toasted sesame oil

1 tsp. sugar (optional)

1 green onion, chopped

Peel the skin off the daikon with a vegetable peeler, and then slice them into 1/4" thick rounds. (Taste the daikon first - if it is sweet, go 1/4" thick. If it is extra spicy or bitter, go thinner. You can also choose to shave the daikon with a food processor or your vegetable peeler.) 

Put the sliced daikon into a colander, toss it with 2 pinches of salt, and set it aside to drain. It won't lose a lot of water, but set it in the sink to be safe.

In a large mixing bowl, combine your grated ginger, rice vinegar, and line juice. While whisking, slowly drizzle in your olive oil, then your toasted sesame oil. Add your daikon rounds, and stir to coat. Add sugar, to taste. Add the green onions and stir to combine. 

Can be served immediately, or left in the refrigerator to further blend the flavors. Eat within 3-4 days. Stir well before serving. 

Soy Milk / Tofu Fa (Tofu Pudding) (Vegan)

Sometime last year, I heard about a book called Asian Tofu, by Amy Nguyen. I wouldn't usually be excited about a book on tofu, but this book had something different - tofu fa. Since living in Hong Kong over a decade ago, I have been looking for a way to make this treat at home. Sure, it is available at stores, but I could always find something to complain about. It had a weird odor. The syrup was mouth-numbingly ginger-y. It was only available at a tiny tofu shop on Mott Street, in NYC Chinatown. (*drool*)

So. This book was praised by someone I trust, AND it had a recipe for my elusive Tofu Fa! I was sold. Onto the Christmas Wishlist it went, and (lo and behold), there it was on Christmas morning. (Thanks, Aunt Winnie!!)

It still took me a few weeks to get my act together and gather the perfect trifecta of time, inclination, and ingredients. I followed Amy's recipe for soy milk, with one small change, but when it came time to make the actual tofu, I realized I had picked up the wrong solidifying agent. Oh well - it worked out in the end. 

Amy suggests using gypsum, a food-grade plaster of paris. I have never been able to find that in stores, so I grabbed agar-agar instead (a gelatin made from seaweed). I looked online, and found that the general consensus was to use a ratio of 1/2 tsp. of agar agar to 3 cups of soy milk. The resulting tofu was a bit firmer than the traditional tofu fa, and didn't weep at all. (Usually, water will seep out of tofu as it slowly becomes firmer. This tofu was...well, it was more like very tender jello. I didn't mind at all, but a purist might turn their nose up.) 

The other change I made was to remove the bean skins, after soaking the soy beans overnight. It only took a few minutes. I used my hands to crush the beans up a bit, and then scooped the skins out. If you do this under water, the skins will naturally settle to the top of the pile. If you agitate the water, it is pretty easy to pull out the skins. You don't need to get them all, but you want to get the majority out as they are pretty bitter. 

The night before you want to make your soy milk or tofu, put a scant cup dry soy beans into a large pot, and cover with water by about 3-4". The beans are ready when they split in half easily. Crush the beans lightly with your hands, and remove the bean skins from the mix. If you swirl the beans around with your hands, the skins will rise to the top of the beans and you can scoop them out and throw them away. 

When you are ready to make your soy milk and/or tofu fa, you need to get set up. Get out your blender, a large pot (non-stick is awesome here),  a colander, a bowl just smaller than your colander, a cotton towel, a potato masher, and a wooden spoon. Once you get started, you don't want to be wandering all over the kitchen looking for stuff! 

Put the colander over the top of the bowl, line it with a cotton towel, put the potato masher nearby, and set the whole thing aside. 

Drain your beans and put them in the blender with 2 cups of water. Meanwhile, put 3 cups of water in the large pot and put it on the stove to boil. Blend your beans until they are completely smooth and creamy, then add them to your pot of water. Bring the whole thing JUST to a boil. Be VERY careful. What you are looking for is for the whole pot to foam up. It will look like a root beer float, and you have about 5 seconds to kill the heat and do your best to beat back the foam if your pot isn't tall enough to contain it. Good luck. Don't blink! 

Once the foam has subsided, carefully pour the whole pot into the towel-lined colander set up. While that drains, immediately rinse your pot out in the sink. Once these beans get dried onto a pot, it's really, really, REALLY hard to get them off. Really hard. (That's a pun. Get it? It's hard? Whatever.) 

This was my Draining Set-Up. I lined the colander with a cotton towel (in the first picture), and poured my boiled "bean smoothie" into it. After it had drained for about 5 minutes, I gathered up the edges of the towel and twisted them together with one hand, compacting the okara into one glob. Then I kept twisting, and pressing on the bundle with my potato masher, until all the liquid had been extracted. 

(okara, after pressing out the soy milk)

(It is very important to rinse everything immediately. Otherwise, the leftover bean residue is pretty stubborn!)

My strained soy milk. Obviously, I used a pot to catch the milk, instead of a bowl. My second time, I used a huge 10 qt. non-stick dutch oven for all the stove-top bits, and it was a DREAM to clean up. I highly recommend it. Not as pretty as a lime-green Le Creuset pot, though. So, there ya go. Get your strained "milk" onto the stove, in something you don't mind cleaning afterward, and bring it to a low boil. Simmer it for 5 minutes to finish cooking the raw beans, and...congratulations! You have soy milk! It is delicious hot, it is delicious plain, it is delicious sweetened, and it is delicious cold. 

However, if you are like me and prefer to eat your soy milk in a semi-gelatinous state...keep going! Ladle half of your soy milk into a container. I like to use the container I am going to pour my finished tofu fa into, so I have one less dish to wash. So. Find a container that will hold at least 3 cups, and has a lid. Ladle about half of your soy milk into that container, and whisk in 1/2 tsp. of Agar-Agar. Bring your remaining soy milk back to a low boil, and pour your Agar-Agar/soy mil mixture back into the pot. Really stir this well - the Agar-Agar will want to settle to the bottom, and that won't give you nice tofu fa. Whisk it up, stir it violently...whatever floats your boat. Just get it back up to a boil, boil it for about a minute or so, and then kill the heat. 

You might want to put your container in the sink for this next step. You're going to pour the tofu fa mixture into the container, from at least 12" above the container. Putting it in the sink makes sure you don't need a step stool for this. Pouring it from high up makes sure that the whole mixture has one last time to really churn up and get that coagulant mixed through out the whole batch. Now cover the container with a towel, then the lid, and put it somewhere for at least 15 minutes. Don't touch it! After 15 minutes, you can carefully transfer it to the refrigerator. After an hour or so, your soy milk has magically transformed into tender, melt in your mouth...tofu fa! 

Serve topped with syrup. Plain old maple syrup will certainly work, and I think my tofu-loving 5 year old prefers Mrs. Butterworth's. The more traditional route would be to simmer 1 brick of Chinese brown sugar (pin tong) on the stove with about 1 cup of water to make a sweet syrup. A slice of ginger can be added as well. 

Divide the tofu fa between four bowls, and top with a few spoonfuls of the syrup. Enjoy warm or cold! 

Soy Milk / Tofu Fa (Tofu Pudding)

Serves 4

Ingredients: 

1 scant cup dry soy beans

Water, divided

1/2 tsp. Agar-Agar

Syrup (optional)

1 brick pin tong (Chinese brown sugar)

1 cup water

The night before: 

Soak your soy beans in enough water to cover them by about 3-4 inches. The beans will swell. 

Cooking time: 

Drain the beans and place in the blender. Line a colander with a tea towel, place it over a bowl, and set aside. Put a non-stick pot on the stove with 3 cups of water and bring to a boil. Put 2 cups of water into the blender and blend the beans until they are smooth and creamy. 

Pour your pulverized beans into the pot of boiling water, and bring back to a boil. Be very careful - it will foam up quickly and will overflow the pot if you are not careful. As soon as it foams up, turn off the heat and carefully blow and stir the bubbles back into submission. Pour the mixture into your lined colander and let it drain into the bowl. 

Immediately rinse out your pot, and put it back on the stove to use again. Gather the edges of your tea towel and press the bean pulp (okara/ dau ja) into a ball. Use a potato masher to press the remaining liquid out. (The okara can be discarded, or saved for eating in other recipes. I feed it to my chickens.) 

Pour the drained milk back into your pot and bring it to a boil. Simmer for 5 minutes, stirring constantly to prevent it from scorching. If you see a skin form on the top, you can pull it off and eat it. It is called tofu stick, and can be dried and saved. I prefer to call it a mid-chore snack, though. 

Stop here for soy milk. Allow to cool and store in the refrigerator for up to 4 days. 

To make tofu fa: 

Ladle half of the soy milk into a container that has a lid. Bring the remaining soy milk back to a boil. Whisk the Agar-Agar into the soy milk you ladled out, then carefully pour that mixture back into the pot. Bring the whole thing back to a boil for about 1 minute, then carefully pour it back into your container. Loosely cover with a towel, then put the lid on the container. Do not disturb the container for at least 15 minutes. After that, it can be moved to the refrigerator. Once the tofu fa has solidified, it can be served warm or cold, with syrup.* 

Syrup: 

In a small sauce pan, combine 1 cup of water and 1 brick of Chinese brown sugar (pin tong). Simmer until the sugar has dissolved. 

Enjoy! 

"Traffic Light"

No recipe here, just a fun picture of dinner.

My mother in law made this for dinner the other night - a stir fry of onions, green bell pepper, dried daikon radish (choi po lup), and sweet chinese sausage (laap cheong). She finished it with a soy sauce/sugar/oyster sauce/cornstarch slurry. It was absolutely delicious! What made it even more fun was when my husband told me the nickname for this dish - it's called Traffic Light. Red sausage, green peppers and yellow onions and dried daikon. Cute, right? 

So, there you go. Enjoy! 

Catastrophe

This dish was first served to me on a campout, when I was 14. Now, when I say campout, I mean that a few leaders agreed to take a group of about twenty 14 year olds camping, to pass off some merit badge requirements for our summer camp. As we sat in a planning meeting, trying to hammer out the details, one of the leaders off-handedly mentioned that his family owned two condos near the area we were talking about camping in. All the eyes in the room were suddenly on him...and that, kids, is how my Great 4th Year Camp Out happened in a condo near the shores of Lake Chelan.

The strange digs didn't deter the more rugged of the leaders from feeding us true camping fare, though! Brother Potter pulled out a huge dutch oven in the morning and proceeded to cook us a one-pot camping feast. He called it, simply, Catastrophe.

The recipe is incredibly forgiving, and fairly adaptable. Basically, this is a mixture of breakfast meat, potatoes, onions, eggs,  and (if you like), cheese. Breakfast meat can be sausage or bacon, the potatoes can be hash browns, canned potatoes, or cubed potatoes. Some recipes call for cheddar, some call for Velveeta, and I leave it out entirely.

So. That's clear as mud, eh? I'll give you what I do for my family of 4. With a side of fresh fruit, this is a great breakfast for a lazy Saturday morning, or a fun dinner for a busy weeknight!

Catastrophe
Serves 4-6

Ingredients:
1/2 pound of bacon, raw, chopped
1 large onion, chopped
2 cups of hash browns (I use the cartons of dried hash browns, and use 1 carton)
6 eggs, scrambled

Toppings: (Take your pick)
Cheese
Ketchup
Hot Sauce

In a large dutch oven, cook your bacon until it starts to lose its fat and is sizzling. Add your chopped onions and continue to cook until the bacon and onions are cooked to your liking.

Drain off the fat (or leave it in, if you're feeling feisty), and add your hash browns. Don't stir too much at this point - you want the hash browns to get a little crispy, instead of just steaming them. Let them cook in the remaining bacon grease for a few minutes, then use a spatula to sort of turn the potatoes over, in clumps. Let them brown again. Repeat the process, stirring to break up the browned potatoes, until everything is looking nice.

Finally, add your beaten eggs and continue to cook (gently folding the mixture), until the eggs are completely cooked.

Scoop into bowls and serve with your choice of toppings. My kids prefer ketchup!

Aunt LoLo's Apple Blackberry Pie

The other day, I decided that what my family needed was an apple pie. Ever have one of those days? When you just really, really need a pie, to make everything right in the world?

I only had 4 apples left from the crate of apples I bought in the fall, so I dug through the freezer and grabbed a bag of blackberries I picked last summer to make sure I had enough filling. A search online gave me a pie crust recipe that didn't involve digging my food processor out of the back of the cupboard, and I got to work.

The pie was, unexpectedly, delicious. Probably the yummiest pie I've ever made! The real star of the show, though, was the crust. As my husband dug into his piece, he asked, "Where did you get the crust?" "Oh, I made it." "No, I know you made the pie, but where did you get the crust??" He thought I bought it. The crust is tender and flaky, and just a bit salty, to counteract the sweetness of the filling. This is a keeper!

Aunt LoLo's Apple Blackberry Pie
Makes one 9" pie

Crust: (recipe adapted from here)

Fill a measuring cup with ice and water. Set aside.

In a high powered blender, or food processor*, combine:
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp. salt

Turn the blender on at the lowest speed (variable 1) and slowly increase to medium speed (variable 5). Blend for 10 seconds, then remove the plug from the middle of the lid.

With the blender running, drop in:
3/4 cup Crisco

Blend for 5 seconds.

Add:
5 Tbsp. ice water

Blend until just combined. This should not form a ball. You just want it all equally damp.

*If you are using a food processor, you should be pulsing at each step to combine. 

Prepare your counter with two largish pieces of plastic wrap. Dump your damp dough onto one of the pieces and carefully knead it a few times until it makes a ball. Divide the ball in half, shape each half into a disc, and wrap them up their own pieces of plastic wrap. Refrigerate the dough for 1 hour.

Assembling the pie:

Preheat the oven to 425 and set aside a 9" pie dish.

Peel, core, and chop :
4 medium sized apples

In a large mixing bowl, combine:

Chopped apples
1 lb. frozen blackberries, thawed
1/2 cup white sugar
1/4 cup corn starch

Stir to combine, and set aside.

Remove your wrapped pie crusts from the refrigerator. Flour your countertop, and unwrap one pie crust disc. Roll it out until it is 12" across, and carefully move into your pan. The easiest way is to carefully fold it in half over your hand, and then unfold it into the pan. Settle your crust into the pan, making sure you aren't stretching it at all. Trim it so that the top of the crust is about even with the edge of the pan. Fill the crust with your prepared fruit mixture, stirring it first in the bowl to make sure the corn starch is evenly distributed.

Unwrap the second crust and roll it out so it is approximately 10"-11" across. Drape it across your filled pie crust. Go around the edges of the pan, rolling the excess crust under and using your fingers to press it into a pretty shape. Use a sharp paring knife to poke about a dozen holes in the top crust. Sprinkle with coarse sugar if desired, or brush with milk or egg wash.

Place the pie on a cookie sheet, just in case it boils over, and bake it until the top is lightly browned, about 30 minutes.

Black Rice and Coconut Milk Dessert

It's hard to know just what to call this - a traditional rice pudding, in America, is a sort of egg and cream custard, with rice cooked into it. This is almost closer to a risotto. A sweet, nutty risotto. This is my favorite dessert to order at Thai restaurants, so I thought I should try and make it at home!

Black Rice and Coconut Milk Dessert
Serves 8

Ingredients:
1 cup black rice ("forbidden rice". I've heard black glutinous rice can be used, but I haven't seen that, and plain black rice worked just fine. I think brown rice would work as well, but you'd be missing the classic deep purple color)
3 cups water
1/4 tsp. salt
1/2 cup sugar (or more, to taste)
1 can of coconut milk, shaken well and divided

In a saucepan with a good-fitting lid, combine your rice and water. Bring to a boil, reduce the heat and simmer (covered) for 30 minutes. The rice should still look like it's swimming in water, like a porridge, but if you try a bite, it should be soft and ready to eat.

Stir in your sugar and 12 oz. of coconut milk. Return to a boil, and then reduce the heat again and simmer for another 45 minutes. Stir it every 10 minutes or so - you really don't want it to burn! It will continue to cook, and get pretty thick. After about 45 minutes, it will resemble a classic rice pudding - thick and spoonable. Let it cool a bit, then divide it between 8 bowls and top each bowl with a bit of the leftover coconut milk from the can.

Coconut Shrimp with Carrots

Still working through the to-do list on my phone. Here is another great recipe that has been languishing for a while. Use your imagination - pink little shrimp, nestled up against brilliant orange splashes of carrot, all in a snowy, silky fragrant coconut sauce, served over rice. Everyone loves this!

Coconut Shrimp with Carrots
Serves 4, over rice

Ingredients:
1 pound carrots
1 pound shrimp
Salt & Pepper
8 oz. coconut milk
3 Tbsp. sugar
2 Tbsp. mayonnaise
Oil

In a bowl, sprinkle your peeled, deveined shrimp with salt and pepper, and set aside.
Slice your carrots into 1/8" rounds. Doing it on a diagonal instead gets you Pretty Points. Peeling is totally optional. Set aside.
In another bowl, stir together coconut milk and sugr until dissolved, and then add the mayonnaise. Set aside.

Heat up a medium fry pan, and add about 2 Tbsp. of oil. Add your carrots to the pan and stir-fry until they turn bright orange and just start to soften, about 2-3 minutes. Add the shrimp and stir those around until they are cooked through. Add your sauce and cook for another minute or two, or until the sauce is hot and smooth. Remove from heat and serve over rice. Enjoy!

Coconut-Scented Black Bean "Brownies"

I usually like to blog recipes when I have pictures to go with them...but I've been sitting on this recipe for about two months, and just need to get it off my to-do list. So. Picture little fudgey bites, completely gluten and flour free. Dairy free. Full of trendy coconut oil. Mmmm. I made these for a girls luncheon, and we ate the entire pan. It's the coconut oil that really makes these babies sing! I used a Vitamix to make these, but other blenders would probably work just as well. Just make sure you get everything completely blended and smooth.

Coconut-Scented Black Bean "Brownies"
Makes 1 8x8 pan

Preheat your oven to 350 and grease an 8x8 pan. Set aside.

In your blender, add these ingredients, in this order:
3 eggs
1/4 cup cocoa powder
1/3 cup coconut oil, melted
2 tsp. vanilla
1 can black beans, washed and drained

Blend until everything is completely smooth - a few errant bean skins won't ruin these brownies, but too many would be distracting.

Pour your batter into your prepared pan and sprinkle the top generously with semi-sweet chocolate chips. (If you need your brownies to be completely dairy-free, skip the chocolate chips.) Bake for 50 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted near the center comes out batter-free.

Serve warm or cold, but consume judiciously - these are a big ol' pan of magical beans, after all. *grin*

Sushi Plates

I simply must share. I stumbled across this lunch earlier this week, by combining a few things I knew about my kids (they love pickled daikon sushi, they love korean salted seaweed, and playing with your food is awesome) and I came up with a lunch that was a huge hit.

 The plate is a hand-me-down from a neighbor, but she said it came from Pottery Barn. The kids loved all the little sections. Clockwise from the top, I have: soy sauce, oshinko (pickled daikon radish), salted seaweed papers, rice sprinkled with sugar. 

Both of the kids had thirds on their rice, and cleaned their plates. Success! I may have to remember this for lunches next year for school...

When Life Gives You Lemons...

....you make someone happy. Very, very happy.

Lemonade Concentrate

Lemons

Sugar

Water

Juice whatever lemons you have, then measure out your juice. Combine with an equal part sugar, in a small sauce pot. Stir, over medium heat, until the sugar is disolved. Set aside and let it cool. 

When you are ready for your lemonade, spoon concentrate into your cups, over ice, and add water. Presto! Fresh lemonade, whenever you want it. Enjoy! 

Coconut Garlic Tilapia

I have a case of tilapia in my freezer that I bought a few months ago at a seafood dock sale. (Basically, a middleman commits a group of people to spend X amount of money and we get to order seafood straight from the boats, same as restaurants do. Killer prices and really great quality. Perks of living near a port town, eh? Seattle kinda rocks. Yeah, I said it.)

Anyhow, this particular case of tilapia is...fishy. I mean, it's fish, yes, but I was at a loss. I usually just steam tilapia with ginger, top it with soy sauce, and call it a day. I've had to get creative with these filets. In the past I've had good luck with breading and pan-frying them, but I wanted something different tonight. These filets were inspired by this recipe I posted a few months ago. This was a hit with everyone, including the impromptu dinner guest that stopped by "just to say hello."

I served this with leftover white jasmine rice and sautéed romaine lettuce (tossed with 1 Tbsp. oyster sauce and 1 tsp. sugar). With the filets thawed out, and leftover rice in the fridge, dinner took all of 15 minutes from cupboard to table. Easy peasy!


Coconut Garlic Tilapia

8 tilapia filets
1/4 cup coconut oil
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 Tbsp. molasses
5 cloves of garlic, sliced
3 dashes salt
5 dashes fresh cracked pepper

1. Preheat oven to 400F. Arrange tilapia filets on a baking sheet or 9x13 pan.

2. In a small mixing bowl, use a spoon to combine the (hard) coconut oil, brown sugar, molasses, sliced garlic, salt and pepper. Adjust seasonings to taste.

3. Top each filet with a heaping spoonful of the sugar mixture, dividing up the entire bowl of the sugar mixture evenly across your filets.

4. Bake for 10-12 minutes, or until filets are cooked through and the topping has melted and started to caramelize.

Serve with rice and a green veggie. Enjoy!

Sweet Potato Smoothie

This one comes out tasting pretty darn close to my favorite Thanksgiving side dish. Enjoy!

In a powerful blender (I use Vitamix), combine:
1 roasted sweet potato, skin on
10 chunks frozen pineapple
1 banana, peeled and broken in half
12 oz. milk (I use almond or soy)
2 oz. Pumpkin Pie latte syrup (or sugar and pumpkin pie spice to taste)

Blend well and enjoy!

Orange Bran Muffins

Brains....Branny, Beautiful brains!

Just me? Really? You don't see bunny brai....oh, never mind.

When I was in my teens, I used to love to visit my Grandma Mary and snitch every last one of her bran muffins. She always seemed to have a container of them, stuck behind the fruit bowl and if I sat at her kitchen table, I could sneak my hand back there and grab a muffin. Or three. Grandma wasn't a baker, per say, but she did have one small drawer in her little 1950's kitchen dedicated to her bran muffins, so I know she took them seriously. Bags of bran, half used bags of cereal, and boxes of dried out raisins. They were perfect. I never got her recipe, but I do remember that it involved bran cereal.

Probably thanks to her, I developed a love for bran muffins. They are always moist and sticky, and I just can't get enough. It's been years since I have been able to sample one of her muffins, and I finally decided to make an attempt to recreate her muffins at home. I didn't have any raisins, but I will add those next time.

The recipe I used came from Better Homes and Gardens, the red and white checked cookbook. I made a few adjustments, and I thought they came out really yummy! I replaced the buttermilk with orange juice, and the white flour with fresh ground whole wheat flour. I really like making mini muffins, so that's what I did here. Mini muffins can be eaten in a single bite, which means fewer crumbs on the floor. They also cook in half the time of normal sized muffins. If you'd like to make normal size muffins, or even jumbo, adjust the baking time accordingly.

Enjoy!

Aunt LoLo's Bran (Cereal) Muffins
Makes 6 dozen mini muffins

Ingredients:
3 cups bran cereal (such as Kellog's All Bran)
1 cup boiling water
2 1/2 cups whole wheat flour (2 cups wheat berries, ground)
1/2 cup white sugar
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
2 cups orange juice (or liquid of your choice, being sure to include a little acidity*)
2 large eggs
1/2 cup canola oil

Grease 5 mini muffin tins, and set aside. Preheat your oven to 400.

In a small bowl, combine your bran cereal and boiling water. Stir to moisten everything, and then set aside.

In a large bowl, whisk together your dry ingredients, then set aside. Make sure you get the baking powder and baking soda clumps broken up!

In a large measuring cup or medium sized bowl, combine your wet ingredients. Whisk to break up the egg yolks.

Add your bran cereal mush and your wet ingredients to the large bowl of the flour mixture. Stir until just combined, making sure to incorporate all of the flour. (This is where you could stir in dried fruit or nuts, if you like.)

Spoon your batter into your muffin tins, and bake for 10 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the largest muffin comes out clean. Awesome warm or room temperature.


Enjoy!

*This recipe uses two leavening agents - baking soda and baking powder. The baking powder needs heat to work, which is why the muffins rise in the oven. The baking soda needs acid to work, which it would have gotten from the buttermilk in the original recipe. Orange juice is tart enough to make it go off, but a splash of vinegar or lemon juice in whatever liquid you choose would work just as well. Almond milk, soy milk, cow milk...probably even apple juice would be great! By using both leavening agents you get an initial fluff from the baking soda, and the last bit of oomph from the baking powder. This keeps these muffins from being too dense.

Whole Wheat Orange Cranberry Muffins

I woke up this morning just craving a muffin. Something chewy and filling, sweet but not greasy. (Honestly, what I truly wanted was one of my grandmother's bran muffins. I have no idea what she used to put in those things, but they were amazing. Got the job done, you know? Unfortunately, I never got the recipe from her, and I didn't have any bran on hand anyhow. I'll have to see if I can figure those out later.)

I pulled out the recipe book that came with my blender, and came up with these. They use both fresh whole wheat flour and white flour, so they are filling without being overly crumbly. The liquid comes from an egg (fresh from our coop!), a little bit of olive oil, and an entire orange. All of the wet ingredients are combined in the blender and whipped up into an eggy orange smoothie, then folded into the dry ingredients. Finally, cranberries are folded in to give these some contrast. With all the fiber from the whole wheat and the whole orange, these are delicious and very filling!

The original recipe used a loaf pan. I wanted my muffins now, though, so I used mini muffin tins instead.

Orange Cranberry Muffins
(Adapted from VitaMix Orange Cranberry Loaf)

Yield: 1 loaf, 12 muffins, or 3 dozen mini muffins

Grease your pan of choice, and preheat oven to 350.

In a medium mixing bowl, combine:
1 cup whole wheat flour
1 cup white flour
1 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt

In a powerful blender, layer:
1 medium orange, peeled and cut in half, plus a 2" piece of the peel
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup olive oil
1 large egg

Blend completely, and then pour your egg/orange mixture into your flour mixture. Stir until just mixed, and then fold in:
1 cup dried cranberries (or other fruit/nuts of your choice)

Portion into your pan, and bake until a toothpick comes out clean.
(Bake 10 minutes for mini muffins, or 60 minutes for a loaf. I imagine normal muffins would require about 25 minutes.)

Chicken and Red Date Soup

This soup is a classic in our house. Red dates are used in Chinese cooking to restore blood and energy, especially in women. If my (Chinese) mother in law has anything to say about it, I eat at least one serving of red dates every day for the first month after I give birth, or for the first week after I finish my monthly date with "Aunt Flo." I used to really detest the taste of red dates, but they have since grown on me. This is a truly simple soup, and pretty tasty!

Ma's Chicken and Red Date Soup

Ingredients:
10 red dates (hung jou) (紅棗)
1 chicken breast
3 quarts water (about half of a standard soup pot)

Bring ingredients to a boil, and reduce heat to a simmer. Continue cooking until broth is a rich brown color, dates have burst, and chicken is cooked through and can be shredded.

Salt can be added, but you certainly don't need it. Enjoy!

Baked Salmon with a Coconut Scented Soy Sauce Glaze

Tonight's recipe is based off of this one here. I made one change (coconut oil for butter) and it made an amazing glaze that was good on everything on our plates. I served this salmon alongside steamed broccoli, butternut squash ravioli and homemade "pizza bread" (this french bread recipe, with sun-dried tomatoes and chunks of mozzarella mixed in).

Salmon with Coconut Scented Soy Sauce Glaze
(Adapted from Pots and Pins)

Yield: glaze for up to 5 salmon filets

Ingredients:
Salmon filets
1/4 cup coconut oil
1/3 cup brown sugar
1 Tbsp. regular soy sauce

Preheat oven to 325 and use a paper towel to blot your salmon filets dry. Prepare a cookie sheet with a sheet of parchment paper, sprayed with cooking spray. Arrange your filets on the sheet, and bake for 12 minutes.

While the fish is baking, prepare your glaze: Combine coconut oil, sugar and soy sauce in a microwave safe bowl and stir to combine. Microwave as needed to get everything combined with few or no lumps of coconut oil remaining.

When your 12 minutes are up, remove fish from oven, carefully turn each fillet over with a spatula, divide the glaze between the filets. Bake another 8 minutes, and then broil for 2-3 minutes if desired to crisp up the edges.

Scallops in Black Bean Sauce

I found a half-full bag of scallops in the freezer this afternoon, and decided to serve them for dinner. Lo Gung (my husband) and I love scallops, but I try not to make them too often, so they don't lose their mystique. I pulled out my favorite asian cookbook (aptly named...The Asian Cookbook) and found this recipe. We love black bean sauce, so this was a no-brainer! I served it to my husband, and sister, and we all agreed....I didn't make enough scallops. It was that good. You get sweet, from the sugar and the scallops, cut with the floral notes from the rice wine, and umami from the soy sauce and black bean sauce. Yum!

(Psst...hey, guys? Just because I love this cookbook THAT much, I did some research.  I found my copy of this book at the student bookstore of the Culinary Institute of America, in New York. You, though, can get your copy online! There are a few copes available here, at Thriftbooks.com. If you are interested in Chinese, Thai and Indian cuisines, this is hands-down my favorite cookbook. Everything is just delicious.

(PS - Do you know what I also love? Thriftbooks.com. Most books, including this cookbook, are about $4, and shipping is free. )

(PPS - Thriftbooks doesn't know I'm mentioning them here, but a friend is one of the owners, and it's just all-around an awesome resource for really inexpensive used books.



Scallops in Black Bean Sauce (Si Jap Chaau Dai Ji)
Adapted from The Asian Cookbook, from Parragon Press

Ingredients:
2 Tbsp. Olive Oil
3 cloves garlic, sliced thin
1/4" fresh ginger, minced
1 Tbsp. Black Bean & Garlic Sauce (I like Lee Kum Kee brand, available in most Asian markets, like this)
18 good sized scallops (I used previously frozen scallops, and thawed them ahead of time)
1/2 tsp. soy sauce
1 tsp. rice wine
1 tsp. sugar
3-4 green onions, chopped (just the green part)

In a wok or dutch oven, heat your oil over medium-high heat. Add the garlic and ginger and stir-fry those for about 1 minute, or until they are fragrant (but not burnt!). Add the black bean sauce, stir to combine, and then add the scallops. Stir-fry those for 1 minute, to get some color on them, then add the soy sauce, wine, and sugar.

Lower the heat and continue to cook for 2-4 more minutes, or until the scallops are cooked to your preferred done-ness. Stir in the chopped green onions, and serve immediately. Serve over rice.

Hearty Spinach Sausage Soup

This soup came together from what was kicking around in the refrigerator...and isn't that always the best way for a soup to happen? It was delicious - savory, hearty and light, all at the same time. Served with some broiled cheese bread, this was a fantastic little supper!

(The cheese pictured above is called No Woman, from Beecher's Cheese in Seattle, Wa. It's a tasty white jack-style cheese with some Jamaican spices, onions and raisins.) 




Aunt LoLo's Hearty Spinach Sausage Soup
Serves 4 as a main dish, or 8 as a side dish

Ingredients:
1 package smoked beef sausage, chopped (like Hillshire Farm sausage)
1 onion, chopped
3 carrots, chopped
4-5 medium tomatoes, cut into quarters
1 bunch spinach, chopped
3 cups frozen corn
Olive Oil
Water
Salt and Pepper to taste

In a large dutch oven, brown your sausage. (Mine was frozen, so I put it in the pot whole, then removed it to chop it and added it back later. If you plan ahead, then go ahead and chop your sausage up, brown it, and move on to the next step with your sausage remaining in the pot.) If your sausage is a little lean, add some olive oil to the pot, then add your onion and cook until slightly translucent, about 5 minutes.

Deglaze the pan with a splash of water, then add your chopped carrots and stir. Add about 4 quarts of water and bring to a boil. Add chopped sausage (if you removed it at the beginning) and tomatoes and reduce to simmer. Cook until the carrots are tender.

Add your chopped spinach and corn, and return to a simmer. Continue to cook until the corn and spinach are warmed through. Puree lightly with an immersion blender and season to taste with salt and pepper.

Serve with grilled cheese toast and enjoy!

Honey Whole Wheat Bread

(All photos courtesy of Sonja, from Simply Sonja Photography based in Bellevue, WA)

One of my most requested recipes, my Honey Whole Wheat bread! This bread is half whole wheat (fresh ground, if you can), half white flour, and all awesome. I use fresh-ground red wheat, but white-wheat would make a tamer taste, as well as a slightly smoother crumb.

One of the tricks is to use plenty of honey and olive oil. These two things condition the wheat to give you a nice smooth, sweet bread.


Fresh ground red wheat going into the 20 year old Bosch mixer. (I use the Bosch when I make 4-loaf batches. We keep one loaf out and freeze the rest. They come out of the freezer even better than when they went in.)

One thing you absolutely must do is to mix in the whole wheat flour FIRST, and then add white flour. This allows the whole wheat flour to plump up a bit and get evenly dispersed. The white flour can then work around it to form the gluten network it needs to make non-crumbly bread.

You can stop adding flour when your bread looks like this for a super fluffy, light loaf.

If your bread gets to this point, you will have a denser, sturdier loaf, perfect for peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.

All rounded up and ready for its first rise. I needed the mixer for something else, so I moved my dough to a greased bowl to rise, instead of just letting it rise in the mixer.


All baked up and ready to bag or eat!

LoLo Honey Whole Wheat Bread
Yield 2 loaves

Ingredients:
2 cups warm water
1 1/2 Tbsp. yeast
1/2 cup olive oil
1/2 cup honey
2 tsp. salt
4 cups of whole wheat flour (or 2 cups of wheat berries, ground. I measure whole wheat, not wheat flour. Fresh is best.)
2-4 cups of all-purpose flour

In the bowl of your mixer, combine water, yeast, olive oil, honey, salt and whole wheat flour. Mix until well combined, then add 2 cups of white flour. Continue to add white flour until the dough just pulls away from the side of the bowl. A stiffer dough will give you a denser bread. A lighter dough, with less white flour, will get you a fluffier bread. Once the dough is how you like it, continue to knead for 5 more minutes. Turn off your mixer, remove your dough hook, cover with a damp towel, and allow to rise until doubled in size (about an hour, in Seattle conditions). Remove dough from the bowl, divide into two loaves, *form and place into greased loaf pans. Allow to rise until larger by about 50%, then bake at 350 for 30-35 minutes, or until the bottom of the loaf sounds hollow when tapped with your fingernail.

To see how I form my loaves, go here. To find the rest of this bread course, go here.

Honey White Bread

(All photos courtesy of Sonja, from Simply Sonja Photography based in Bellevue, WA)

 This was the bread that started it all - the bread that was so delicious, my husband let me stop buying bread at the store. Wait...that sounds weird. Let me put it this way: I may be the cook in the family, but it's not fair of me to replace tasty bread from the store with nasty bread from home if nobody likes it.

Here is one of my most basic recipes, in pictures.

So, I experimented and tried new recipes until I found one that could surpass store-bought in quality and taste AND was less than half the cost of store-bought. (One loaf of this bread, even with olive oil and honey, is about $.75 if you buy the ingredients in bulk.)

I make the bread four loaves at a time, using my ancient Bosch mixer. The bread freezes beautifully, and is almost better from the freezer! It retains its moisture, and has a very smooth crumb.

Still too sticky. You want the dough to just barely stick to your fingers, but not climb to you and make a mess.


LoLo's Honey White Bread
Yield 2 Loaves

Ingredients:
2 cups warm water
1 Tbsp. yeast
1/2 cup honey
1/2 cup olive oil
2 tsp. salt
6-7 cups All-Purpose Flour

In the bowl of your mixer, add water, yeast, honey, olive oil and 6 cups of flour. (If you are concerned that your yeast might be old, you may proof it first: Combine water, yeast and honey in your bowl. Wait for it to foam, about 5 minutes, then add oil, salt and flour.) Mix with dough hook and add more flour as necessary, until the dough pulls away from the sides of the bowl and forms a ball. Knead for 5 more minutes, and then turn off your mixer.

Remove the dough from the bowl, remove the dough hook, spray the bowl with cooking spray, and return your ball of dough to your greased bowl. Turn the dough to coat with oil, and cover with a damp towel. (I like to wash my hands at this point, grab a fresh tea towel to dry them off with without shaking the water off my hands, and use that to cover up the dough. It seems just damp enough.) Allow the dough to rise until about doubled in volume. It's ready when you poke it with two fingers and it easily holds the indent.

When the dough has risen, remove from bowl, divide in half, and *form into two loaves. Place in greased loaf pans and allow to rise for 30-45 minutes, or until approximately 50% larger. Bake at 350 for 30-35 minutes, or until the bottom of the loaf sounds hollow when tapped.

Don't be afraid to play around with mix-ins! Dried fruit, spices, orange juice in place of part or all of the water. This is a really forgiving framework to work with. This is also the recipe I use for dinner rolls and cinnamon rolls - 1 loaf makes 12 dinner rolls or 12 cinnamon rolls.

*To see how I form my loaves, go here: How I Form Bread Loaves

For the rest of this bread course, go here: LoLo's Bread Class