Monday, January 14, 2013

Gemma's birthday snack for school

My kids are huge freaks about lemons.  I think they get this from their lemon obsessed Papa Steve.  I needed to make a quick snack for Gemma to bring to school on the morning of her birthday, so I grabbed my go to cook book "Barefoot Contessa at Home" by the wonderful Ina Garten.  I absolutely love any recipe she writes.  I swear that everything I have made with her name on it has turned out wonderful.  If you are not a cook and thinking about starting, her recipes are easy and extremely tasty.  If you google "Ina Garten" or "Barefoot Contessa" you will find tons of recipes to give you an idea of what her recipes are about and the types of ingredients she likes to use.  The Food Network also has a ton of her recipes in their archives.  

I decided to send her lemon yogurt cake since I had a fresh batch of yogurt and I knew the lemon soaked cake would make Gemma's taste buds happy.

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The cake is baked with fresh lemon zest and then soaked in a lemon syrup.  The finishing touch is a lemon glaze.  Unfortunately I didn't get a piece because the kids and teachers gobbled it up!  I guess I will have to make one for myself one of these days...


First week back in the kitchen...

I think I was a bit too ambitious my first week back in my kitchen.  I had bought a new cookbook by Kir Jensen "Sugar Cube: 50 Deliciously Twisted Treats from the Sweetest Little Food Cart on the Planet".  It was also Gemma's birthday week, so I hadn't really planned out what I needed to do for her party.

My first attempt of making something from the new cookbook was a success as seen in the previous  post.  My next attempt only showed that I was way too anxious to be back in the kitchen.  It seemed to have lost my patience while I was in Thailand!

I invited my dear friend Berenice over for lunch so we could catch up.  I made her Lakeshire Pork from the Avoca Cafe Cookbook along with braised cabbage with sherry vinegar and smashed potatoes.  My lunch turned out extremely tasty.  For dessert I decided to try out "The Ulitmate Brownie" out of the Sugar Cube cookbook.

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My ingredients...I am getting a little nervous I haven't seen my favorite brand of butter, Kerrygold, in a really long time.

There were 3 steps to the process of this recipes.  First the brownies, which were easy enough and made in cupcake linings.  The next step was a coffee syrup, followed by a dollop of chocolate ganache in the middle of the brownie cake.

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Getting ready for the oven...

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Finished brownie sans coffee syrup and ganache.

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The finished product.

I was a bit disappointed in the way that they turned out.  I really did not like them in a cupcake liner as brownie batter is a different consistency than cake batter and the stuck to the paper too much. The brownie was too sweet for my taste and I couldn't taste the coffee syrup enough (this could have been because the syrup was too sweet for me too).  The ganache looked great, but if I was somewhere other than China I would have tried a little harder to find a better quality of bittersweet chocolate.  Everyone who tried them love them, so maybe it was just me. One other thing I would do when I make them next time is to under bake them a few minutes.  I love a brownie with a gooey center!

Tuesday, January 8, 2013

Homemade Yogurt

I never was a big yogurt eater before I moved to China, but living here has made me appreciate the health benefits of eating the good bacteria that is in yogurt.  When I first arrived I was looking for healthy snacks for the kids and bought them these 10 packs of "plain yogurt".  They came with straws, which I thought was quite strange, but when I realized the reason was because they were as thin as drinking milk.  When I tasted one and tasted how sugary sweet they were I discontinued purchasing them.  

I had the great fortune of meeting a new friend, Asma who was from Pakistan who taught me how to make homemade yogurt that was thick and sugar free.  Back in those days it was very difficult to find a starter for your yogurt, but she would buy a starter from one of the local Indian restaurants and then use 2 tablespoons from her last batch for her next batch of yogurt.  

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I use 1 liter of the French brand of President brand UHT milk with 2 tablespoons of Carrefour brand Greek yogurt as a starter for the creamiest results.

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I whisk the Greek yogurt in the bottom of my seasoned stoneware bread pan.  My friend Asma used a clay dish or a thermos to set her yogurt.  My stoneware pan has always worked great although I have used glass too.  

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Bring the milk to a boil and quickly turn the heat off to cool.  I let the milk cool until I can stick my finger in it for 3 seconds with out burning it.  Usually takes about 30 minutes to be cool enough to do this, but it depends on how warm your kitchen/house is.  If you forget about the milk and it completely cools, don't worry about it, it will still set.

Then whisk the milk into the stoneware pan with the yogurt.  I pop it in the oven overnight on a warm setting.  You can also put the yougurt in a thermos or if your house is warmer then mine you can put it on the counter overnight and it will set.  

The next morning you will have creamy yogurt that goes perfectly on a bowl of homemade granola!

Monday, January 7, 2013

My transitional blog...

This year is a huge transition year for our family.  We are getting prepared to move back to the United States after almost 8 amazing years living in Chengdu, China.  Chengdu has definitely become our second home and we will miss it more than words can say.  In celebration of our transition and to help me get through this difficult time I decided I would start a new blog to celebrate all of the wonderful cooking and eating I have had the chance to do while living here.  I thought I could share some of the things that I learned to make from scratch and some ways that I adapted recipes due to lack of ingredients.  I am going to continue to post most of my eating adventures on my original blog.  I hope to update this as much as I eat Sichuan food.   

After 3 weeks vacation in Thailand I was ready to get back into the kitchen.  I did a huge shopping trip including Metro, where I buy bulk supplies and fresh herbs, Sabrina's a specialty Western small grocery store, and Carrefour, a French chain grocery store with everything you need from toilet paper to frying pans to fruit.  

On the way to the shops I brought a few cookbooks with me to get my creative juices flowing and wrote my shopping list.  We are trying to eat less and less meat in our house and I had already had Sichuan food (which is hard to eat without meat) for lunch, so I decided I would make a vegetarian dinner for the family.    

I bought a new cookbook in Thailand called "The Sugar Cube" by Kir Jensen, which I thought was very fitting due to we may be moving to Portland, Oregon this summer.  The book is a bunch of recipes from Kir's food cart in Portland.  I thought I would make one of her breakfast dishes for dinner even though breakfast for lunch or dinner is one of my pet peeves.  I had hit the jackpot of fresh herbs at Metro, so I just couldn't pass up the opportunity to make this delicious breakfast strata.  I also loved the name of this masculine strata "Aric-A-Strata" although she claims it is named after an ex-boyfriend.  It took me a minute to figure out the title, but if anyone was a fan of the 80's drama "Chips" you will understand my meaning.  

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My ingredients.  I had to do some substituting in this recipe due to lack of items such as brioche (I refuse to make bread to tear it up into another dish.  I used white bread from my local bakery as the bread made in China is more sweet than the bread from home I thought it would make a good substitute.), cherry tomatoes (I found vine ripened tomatoes and used them instead.), and Portobello mushrooms (I used button mushrooms.).  

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My eggs, cream, paprika, nutmeg, salt, peper and fresh dill whisked together.

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Sautéing my mushrooms with some fresh garlic and thyme.

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You are supposed to let the bread soak up the egg mixture overnight, but of course I didn't read the full recipe before hand.  The other option was to wait 30 minutes and then bake.

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The finished product!

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Dinner is served...

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Due to my luck with the herbs we accompanied our strata with a creamy bowl of tomato basil soup.

All was delicious and I may try and make my own brioche to see how it would change the recipe.  I felt it was very filling and the fresh dill always adds so much to any dish.  Originally I started to make the strata in a tart pan, which was way too shallow.  Even my 9x9 pan was a little too small.  I think I will see what I can find at IKEA the next time I am there.  I think it would be beautiful baked in a round, glass dish.  I think I will have to invite a few girlfriends over brunch soon and give my strata another try.