sheetz

It's just a rack that came with my tabletop convection oven that I'm using as a trivet.

^Thanks, I'll try that next time. And you're right about that fried tofu. It's just as good as the seafood itself!

LOL. I was hoping nobody would ask for a recipe. This was the first time I ever made it so I just added a little of this and a little of that until it "tasted right." It's pretty simple, though. Put some iceberg lettuce in the bottom of the pot, along with some ginger, black mushrooms, chicken stock, oyster sauce, dark soy, light soy, sugar, shao hsing wine, sesame oil, and bring to a boil. Add some cornstarch slurry until pretty thick (the juices from the seafood will thin it out later on). Toss in some fried tofu cubes, various kinds of seafood (lightly marinated with salt, tiny bit of cornstarch and wine), sliced chicken (marinated with soy, sugar, cornstarch, wine) and bring back to a boil. Cover and simmer for a few minutes until seafood is 3/4 cooked. Remove from heat, give it a toss, adjust the seasoning and serve. The pot keeps the food hot so it will continue to cook after it is removed from the heat, which was annoying because I had to rush to take pics before the seafood would get overdone.

Wow, that hot pot looks gorgeous! Today I made a Cantonese version of a "hot pot" with tofu, seafood, chicken, mushrooms, and lettuce.

I was excited to see my tiny grocer received a shipment of candied winter melon. Of course that means I'll be making wife cakes this week!

Mmmm, I have a craving for pork belly now! I didn't have much at home so I made scrambled eggs with shrimp

Jason, in my experience 3 tsp of dark soy (you did use dark soy sauce, right?) is enough to darken 2 lb of fresh noodles, but I don't know if the quantities might be off becauase you use dried noodles.

Here are a couple of photos from this past week: There was a great sale on frozen jumbo sea scallops at a local store this week. These were coated with chopped almonds and sesame seeds and pan fried according to a Martin Yan recipe. Then served with a mustardy sweet and sour sauce. A simple curried chicken stir fry.

If you really want the meat to be infused with the flavor you gotta marinate the chicken for at LEAST 24 hours. 72 hours is best.

If the mushroom stems are tender enough I don't bother cutting them off. I'd just love to see the reaction of my Toisanese mother if I ever suggested she throw away the mushroom stems. You'd think I was asking her to cut off her leg or something.

We also had dinner at New Concept over the holidays but did not splurge on any high ticket items. It was a weeknight and the restaurant was not particularly busy. It took a very long time to get our food and it seemed like they lost our order, but after bugging the waitress once the food came out promptly. We started off with a soup with some type of salted fish. I don't remember exactly what it was on the menu but it wasn't cheap--we had to get a double order to feed our group so the total for this course was over $40. Next came scallops in a butter and herb sauce Beef with Sugar Snap Peas in a spicy sauce, which appeared to be made with tenderloin and not tenderized with baking soda like how most restaurants do it. Veggie Medley. Nothing special but tasted ok An interesting tofu dish made with thinly sliced tofu formed into a pretty pattern with a seafood filling in the center. I'm still trying to figure out how they cooked the tofu and plated it without breaking the tofu into pieces. Shrimp in Egg Cream. This was deep fried and coated with a sauce made from, I believe, salted duck egg yolks. Sweet dessert soup with black eyed peas Total bill was just over $100. The food was interesting and tasted good, but the soup was way overpriced for what you get.

Just the other day I was watching a cooking show from Hong Kong off livestream and the host made scrambled eggs with shrimp. One of her tips was to make sure to beat as little air into the eggs as possible. To accomplish this she separated the eggs first and then beat the yolks separately before gently stirring them into the whites. Also, instead of salt she used light soy sauce because it blends in easier. Anyone else ever watch this show? It's in Cantonese w/ Chinese subtitles and is on Friday night 9pm-10pm Pacific time in the US, so I guess that would be midday Saturday in Hong Kong. This was the first time I had ever watched the program, but my impression is that while the host is extremely chatty and can go off topic a lot (she only made 3 dishes in the whole 60 minutes) she does give some cooking tips that I had never heard anywhere else. Also, one of the reasons the program is 60 minutes is that none of the prep work is done ahead of time. For example , another dish she made was steamed pork cake and they showed the entire process of very finely mincing the meat with a single cleaver from start to finish, a process that took about 15 minutes.

Someone told me that it tastes better to create your own batter by using a grinder. Haven't tried it yet. ← My mother usually grinds her own rice but for convenience I just use the packaged flour and I do think grinding your own flour does tastes "cleaner." Perhaps the packaged flour picks up some off flavors if it has been sitting on the shelf for awhile or perhaps it is made with lower quality rice.

I've seen this on Iron Chef and I think it works on the same principle as velveting meat. After the flesh is partially cooked by the oil it becomes "set" and doesn't stick to the work anymore.

Growing up at home we always flipped fish. But when dining out with others the fish was never flipped. I was never told exactly why this was so I just assumed it was just more polite to not flip the fish in public.

I didn't do any exact measuring, but what I did was blend a pound of fish and an egg white in a food processor. Then add some green onion, cilantro, salt and pepper to taste along with a couple of tablespoons each of cornstarch and tapioca starch until it holds together. (Simmer some water in a pot and cook a small ball to test for seasoning and texture.) Scoop up the fish paste with your hands and fling it into a bowl a few times to give it a bouncier texture. Then form the fish paste into balls and drop then into boiling water. Turn the heat down and gently simmer for a few minutes until cooked.

Looks good! Did you buy ready-made fish balls or roll your own fish balls? ← I made them from frozen flounder fillets, egg whites, cornstarch, tapioca starch, green onions, cilantro, salt, and pepper.

Too much holiday baking has made me start to put on weight, so for dinner I prepared this light watercress soup with fishballs.

Eggplant with Minced Pork

Does anyone know how a decent quality dry sherry would compare to a decent quality shao hsing wine?

Hmm, somehow I don't think I could make them look so pretty if I put them in a tartlet mold. I'll have to try it and see.

So how the heck do they arrange the sago into such a perfect pattern?

I like things that can be served at room temperature like noodles w/ meat sauce, minced meat in lettuce cups, or white cut chicken. Also "cooling" soups like watercress.

aznsailorboi that ma lai goh looks incredible! Some of the other cakes I've seen are an even darker shade of brown and I wonder if it's because they use Chinese brown sugar sticks. I'd never heard of this before but it sounds like one of those "tricks" that cookbooks usually miss that's needed to make something just like "ah pah" made it.

I'm definitely not one to ask about particular brands of Sichuanese foods as I'm not Sichuanese myself and I don't live in a big city, so I buy whatever I can get my hands on. That said, the chili bean paste I use is made by the Har Har Pickle Food Factory in Taiwan. I think it's the only brand that my little local Chinese grocery carries. The jar looks just like the 3rd one down on this page with the blue label, except that it reads "Hot Bean Sauce" instead of "Chili Sauce." http://market.treasureshidden.com/index.ph...sort=20a&page=6 ETA: This is the hot bean sauce I use. http://www.curiouskumquat.com/product_info...085c3c9442a94bb As for the amount of oil, yes I personally would use less next time, but I wanted to make it very authentic the first time around. I have made other Sichuan recipes before that used lots of oil, so I wasn't totally shocked, but if you're not too familiar with the cuisine you might think the half cup is a misprint. As I was adding the cornstarch thickener at the end it was hard to tell the consistency of the sauce because it was being obscured by a huge pool of red chili oil! Sounds like you're another baker, too. Do you do Asian baked goods too or just mostly Western style stuff? I've found it tough trying to make Chinese style breads and pastries because there are so few good cookbooks for these items, and they are different enough from Western style baked items that you can't really use the same techniques or ingredients.