Cute Streak

Uber-cute, portion-controlled lunch. bacon and stir-fried Taiwanese bitter greens. looks great. feels hungry. 

Organic tart frozen yogurt on a giant bed of shaved ice. strawberries, kiwi, mandarin oranges, and mochi bits. BLUSH - Original Shaved Ice (Choice of four toppings included).

Cute may not be the right word, but it was free and delicious. RED RIBBON BAKESHOP - Pandan Macapuno Chiffon Cake.

Gadget: Potato Ricer

photo credit: me -- money shot of the finished mashers is by my sis


I've likely been lusting after my own food mill or potato ricer since high school. I'm sure I was introduced to them through the likes of Martha Stewart and Lidia Bastianich. Who wouldn't want to make your own crushed tomatoes for a marinara sans skins or ungluey, fluffy mashed potatoes?

Traditionally, our family has used those squigley-line stick mashers, the backs of wooden spoons, or the occasional pastry cutter to take care of our potato-mashing tasks. The results have always been tasty, but I knew I could aim for perfection. I aimed to possess a potato ricer as soon as the price was right.

It wasn't until I found a clearance potato ricer from Target [I'm pretty sure it was under the Chefmate label] for about $3 that I finally made the leap. My mom was skeptical of any true usefulness of the thing, but once I made her our first batch of riced mashed potatoes did she truly believe. Sadly, the ricer was so poorly constructed that it didn't even last through a second use.

I knew I wanted to have a heavy-duty ricer in time for Thanksgiving, so after consulting Cook's Illustrated equipment reviews and spending time window shopping on the web, I had a purchasing game plan. Time passed until it was the week of Thanksgiving. I didn't want to risk an online order, so I put my walking shoes on.

Ideally, I wanted to spend under $20 and get a Cook's Illustrated Recommended model [Bethany Heavy-Duty Potato Ricer]. Fail. Not one potato ricer or food mill was to be found at my local Target store.

My search was limited to a store I could walk to on my lunch break. Crate&Barrel. Sur La Table. Williams-Sonoma.

I already knew that Williams-Sonoma had a $30+ potato ricer that seemed superbly efficient and heavy-duty. The demo video was very convincing. W-S would be my last stop.

First, I went to Crate&Barrel. It carried one model. Blah. I wasn't convinced.

Second, I headed to Sur La Table. This store had at least three different ricers and three different food mills. $20 models were not as well-designed as the W-S ricer, and the $100+ food mills were too pricey for me. No go.

Last, I walked into Williams-Sonoma. To my surprise, my dream ricer was one of the first products displayed in the store. After holding it I was convinced. It had true heft; I didn't think it would break anytime soon. The hopper also seemed larger than the other models I'd seen. It had holes on all sides of its hopper making me believe the online demo marketing buzz that it would take less effort to mash more potatoes, too.

So without any hesitation, I paid the $34 + tax and took home the Deluxe Angled Potato Ricer, a "Williams-Sonoma exclusive." It still takes some elbow grease to get the potatoes through the hopper, but since I'm short, using the ricer on a lower counter top seems to work best. I'm pleased and am completely free of buyer's remorse. After all, it's an investment.

My Thanksgiving mashers were delicious, could-like, and lump-free.

Ghost of a Dinner Party

Last month I decided Hurricane/Tropical Depression Felicia was a good enough reason to invite people over to eat. At first I was hesitant to announce my party plans, but after a few days of watching the trajectory, it seemed like it wouldn't do major damage and would die down before landfall. Afterward, I was super-juiced that "my" hurricane didn't kill anyone.

Since Felicia was on a path from Baja to Hawaii, I thought a Mexi-Hawaiian menu would be quite appropriate.

• Bottled Coke (USA and Mexican)
  
• Elotes Asados featuring Japanese Kewpie Mayo
  
• SPAM Musubi
  
• Slow Cooker Kālua Pork Tacos
  
• Dulce de Leche-filled Churros
  

As with most common with my dinners, I rarely remember to photograph what I make. The only pic was of the last cob of grilled corn schmeared with Kewpie mayo, showered with cilantro, sprinkled with Cotija, just awaiting a sprinkle of two of my shortcuts to extra flavor... mouth-puckering Tajín seasoning (dehydrated lime juice is surprisingly addictive) and/or smokey bacon salt.

The Kālua Pork was my first time trying to dry-roast a piece of meat in the slow cooker. I took a hunk of bone-in shoulder, seasoned it with some salt, liquid smoke, and wrapped it in [frozen] banana leaves. The amount of fat it shed was positively shocking. A little Mi Pueblo salsa and fresh corn tortillas warmed on the grill made those suckers tasty, but a the meat was little dry.

Low sodium SPAM was the dark horse and clear winner of the evening. Nga helped my wrap them using my new acrylic sushi mold. There's something deeply simple and pleasurable about rice and pan-fried SPAM.

Stacey and Mark picked up the filled churros at Mi Pueblo. We reheated them on the grill and admired how the dulce caramel oozed from the center of every inch - in one continuous stream, top to bottom.

****

A couple weeks ago, I ended up improving the pork by using fresh banana leaves to line the pot and added a touch of Coke to keep the meat moist. I drained and shredded the roast and seasoned it with a little Mr. Yoshida's sauce a la Costco. I made 17 lbs. of the pork and less than half a pound remained for a crowd of 50.

Spicy Slow-Cooker Sloppy Joes

A few years ago, I was really into making spicy Sloppy Joes with turkey. I liked to play up a "Southwestern" twist on my Sloppy Joe dinners by serving them with jalapeno cheddar or hot sauce/Tabasco. I even have the mint green cafeteria-style serving trays that I used for my dinner parties to prove it. After recently remaking the recipe I discovered how delightful eating a Sloppy Joe becomes after the filling starts to melt away the integrity of the bun.

From Boston

I adapted my recipe from the PBS Everyday Food series.

Tools to keep your prep to a minimum:

Food processor
Crock-pot

The stuff for a group of four:

1 medium onion, finely chopped/pulsed
½ green bell pepper, finely chopped/pulsed
1 jalapeno or serrano chili pepper, finely chopped/pulsed
1 stalk celery, finely chopped/pulsed
2 garlic cloves, minced/pulsed
1/2 teaspoon red chili flake
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper (or more)
1/2 teaspoon, cumin
1 pound ground turkey
1 can (15 ounces) tomato sauce
1/4 cup ketchup
Coarse salt and black ground pepper to taste
8 hamburger buns, split and toasted

Steps to make:

1. pulse the veggies in smaller batches
2. add veggies, meat, seasoning, tomato sauce and ketchup to crock-pot
3. run the crock-pot High a minimum of 3 hours or run it on low for 5 hours to overnight. The longer the crock-pot runs, the more the veggies seem to disappear and cook into the sauce.
4. add salt and pepper to taste
5. Serve on buns for a delicious experience.


Variations: This makes an equally nice taco filling or nacho topper. Or add beans for a chili con carne dinner. Replace the meat completely since the magic is in the tomato sauce/ketchup/onion/garlic/pepper base anyway.

For a crowd: To feed a group of 20, I increased this recipe six times over. I saved some cash by using 80/20 ground beef and eliminated the spices. The batch fit into two large Crock-Pots.

One Look at Asia Fabulous

Remember the Tofu Egg Curry I made for Iron Chef? Jen helped me recreate it for Asia Fabulous!

Iron Chef Tofu Battle: NYC Chinatown Edition

Jen's boyfriend, Daniel, has been on a 6 month in NYC. While I'm not totally clear on the origins of our dinner party, it seems safe to say that one of his Princeton buddies, Olympia, decided to challenge Daniel to an Iron Chef-like dinner battle. From an email thread, I gleaned that he is apparently naturally suited to such a competition because of his "Bobby Flay-esque egotism." I received a voicemail from Daniel and a text from Jen: Would I go to NYC to be his "secret weapon/sous chef?"

I agreed at the last minute. I knew I'd be in town to have Filipino brunch with Jen and Thuy and Nicki pre-dinner battle. And, if I took the Chinatown bus, I'd only spend $30 round-trip. A day of good food, old friends, and new people? I couldn't pass it up.

The secret ingredient was announced at 4 pm in Chinatown. Tofu.

Jen thuy and I were in SoHo when we got the news. "What a piss-poor ingredient," I thought out loud. I was a little mad. Tofu? I rarely use the stuff. And we were against two Cantonese girls. They'd out-Chinese me for sure. I had to think out of the box.

Jen and I arrived at 5 pm just before Daniel. The girls, who went by both Queens of Canton and Team Canton, had pre purchased 6 or so different types of tofu. We claimed our tofu types and all shopped separately before returning to the kitchen. Both teams shared the stove and rotated to accommodate each other... by 8 or 9 pm we presented our dishes and started to eat.

True to Chinese form, Team Canton had a hot and sour soup with the soy-marinated tofu, wood ear, and pork. It was super yummy - you could taste the melted pork fat. They followed up with fish paste-stuffed tofu and eggplant. They even scored the eggplant so it'd "absorb more flavor." I thought it had good texture. Then they had a noodle bowl with tofu, kailan, red pepper and (a store-bought) roast duck. It was a pretty dish the judges liked in appearance. [The dinner "Chariman" originally asked that duck be our secret ingredient, so one of the Queens of Canton purchased this to appease him] Their closer was "tofu" almond gelatin topped with mangoes. I must say, I was a little skeptical of it's true "tofuness," butI'm sure it tasted just fine.

Daniel and I donned our yellow aprons and named ourselves "Team Awesome." We started our international tofu menu with a silken tofu/soy ice cream/peach-berry smoothie. It was California-inspired for sure. Daniel is not Canto, but he is obsessed with Sichuan food, so he used his Blackberry to craft a super-spicy ma po tofu. It got high flavor marks from the judges. Next I took the judges to Southeast Asia by making a yellow coconut curry with potatoes, okra, deep-fried tofu puffs and deep-fried hard-boiled eggs. I was so proud of this dish because the texture of the exterior of the eggs matched the puffs so well. Plus, the nooks and crannies of the tofu skin, egg "skin" held the sauce nicely. Then we closed with a trip to Italy. We combined silken tofu and ricotta to make a lasagna with a pork ragù and and homemade balsamella (bechamel) sauces. It was sooo surprisingly good we could have left out the ricotta entirely.

the judges deliberated on....

Flavor (ma po tofu and lasagna hit the spot)
Presentation
Creativity (smoothie and lasagna)
Use of ingredient

We won the flavor and creativity categories so it came down to points. .... and we won! Bringing tofu out of Asia was our biggest asset.