Shabu Shabu - a Quick but Elaborate Meal?

Looking for a meal with many materials but don't need too much preparation? Try having a Shabu Shabu dinner!

All you need is a small pot and maybe (you can do this over the stove if you want) a portable stove. Pick up the veggies and meats or whatever you would want for dinner. Have these materials cut into thin or small pieces so it would be easy to cook. I recommend that the meats are thin into thin bacon size strips, it makes it easy to cook and to seal in the favor. In addition, prepare a dipping sauce of your choice, I recommend Japanese ponzu, a light, delightful citrus-based vinegar sauce & goma-tare, a rich, favorable sesame sauce.

This step is optional, but you can prepare a mixture of chicken stock & water as broth (and once again, your choice) or just use plain water. Place the small pot over the stove and wait till boil and then submerging the meat and vegetables you want and eating it when it's cooked.

You might think, why is this method so popular in Asian countries, isn't this just boiling meat? When you cook using the Shabu-Shabu method, you're actually just cooking the meat & vegetables quickly in its natural juices and flavor. In addition, the water broth starts to collect all the different flavors of the meat and veggies like a big rich soup, so as you cook, everything will start tasting great. Sounds strange, but give it a shoot and you might like it!

Not to mention, this is a very healthy way to cook things, and you can eat whatever you want! ^_^

Simple Gourmet Breakfast

 The Corner Cafe & Bakery offers on alternating days a breakfast sandwich with eggs, choice of meat, cheese and choice of sandwich bread (bagel or brioche). Priced at $3.50, cheese and meat + $1.00, there isn't necessarily a significant value proposition in making it at home vs. ordering one on house-made brioche. However, you cannot beat the kitchen to mouth benefit of this morning starter dish. Even a short walk from the cafe allows a meaningful amount of the magic to dissipate.

Unless you want to enjoy your breakfast delight in the cafe, which isn't a bad idea, you'll want to make it at home. Fortunately it's easy to make and limited by your own creativity.

The success is in choosing quality ingredients and mindful preparation.

I don't believe in one-stop shopping, but most if not all of the ingredients can be found in a reputable gourmet grocery store.

 Shopping List:

• Brioche
• eggs (free range)
• meat? (applewood bacon, ham, chicken apple sausage)
• cheese? (Swiss, American, Cheddar, Fresh Mozzarella

Steps - This will be a relatively quick dish to make so timing is important

1. If you plan to add meat, prepare first. It will take the longest
2. Heat meat as necessary or desired for type chosen.
3. When meat is about 1/3 of the way prepared, get your egg portion (1 or 2 eggs) started
4. Toasting bread is very important in my breakfast sandwiches. Toast your brioche after you put your egg(s) in the pan.
5. These steps should result in the brioche being ready in time for the eggs, in time for the meat. If cheese is part of the plan, place the cheese on top of the egg(s) and before the meat.

 This sandwich is ideal with freshly squeezed orange or grapefruit juice but a proper cup of coffee is not bad either.

Having trouble making coffee at home? This may be the tool for you. Cuisinart DCC-1200 Brew Central 12-Cup Programmable Coffeemaker, Black/Brushed Metal

How to Make Gnocchi at Home

The first time I tried gnocchi in a restaurant I absolutely loved it, and couldn't believe these heavenly little pillows of dough were made with just potatoes and flour. Wasn't there cheese hidden in there somewhere?

Turns out no: with freshly made gnocchi, all you need is a little red sauce, pesto or Gorgonzola sauce to make a delicious, comforting dish.

Unfortunately, it's impossible to recreate the dish properly with store-bought gnocchi. Every time I've tried, the result is a heavy pile of starchy rocks that sink right to the bottom of your belly.

But here's the good news: they're relatively easy to make at home, and you can customize the dish by substituting spinach, sweet potato, ricotta or butternut squash for some (or all) of the potatoes. Here's the basic recipe, adapted from similar ones by Smitten Kitchen and Mario Batali:

Basic Potato Gnocchi
Serves 4

1 lb starchy potatoes (like Yukon Gold)
3/4 C flour, plus more if needed
1 tsp salt
1 egg yolk, beaten

Boil the potatoes until well done and drain, rinsing with cold water. Peel them when cool enough to handle with a towel. 

Pass the potatoes through a potato ricer, grate them over the large holes of a box grater into a large bowl, or grate using the grater blade of a food processor.

Transfer grated potatoes to a large bowl. Add the lightly beaten egg yolk and the salt to the potatoes and mix well.

Add half of the flour to the potatoes and stir. Continue adding flour, using only as much as you need so that the dough will not stick to your hands. How much you need depends on how wet the potatoes are.

Form the dough into a ball. On a floured surface, knead the dough for about three or four minutes, folding the dough in half and kneading with the heel of your hand.

Now it's time to make the pillows! Take a portion of the dough (about 1/6 or 1/8 of the ball) and roll it out with your hands on the floured surface so that it forms a rope about 3/4 inch thick. Cut the rope into 3/4" pieces: 

 

Repeat with the rest of the dough, placing the formed gnocchi in a single layer on a lightly floured sheet pan so that they don't stick to the pan or one another. They can be kept this way in the refrigerator for up to 24 hours, if desired, but already you can tell the difference... Just look at these delicious little pillows!

 

To cook the gnocchi, place them into a pot of salted, boiling water. Cook until the gnocchi float to the top, plus one minute more. Drain the gnocchi in a colander, the return to the pot  Add 3-4 T of prepared or homemade pesto sauce and stir gently, then divide amongst 4 bowls. Top with grated Pecorino, Romano or Parmesan cheese and a pinch of hot pepper flakes, if desired.

If you are not serving your cooked gnocchi immediately, toss them with a glug of olive oil to prevent them from sticking together. Another option is to brown the cooked gnocchi in butter and sage, which is more of a Parisian style. Either way, freshly made gnocchi are a perfect dinner for a cold night! 

Spanish Rice with Sausage and Shrimps!

Unboxing video of Circulon Contempo Red Nonstick 10 Piece Cookware Set!!!

A Healthy & Uber Tasty Snack Service for the Office

I'm sure many office workers like me find ourselves having the craving for snacks in-between their meals. Unfortunately, most of the snacks that are in stores and featured in office vending machines aren't the most healthy (or tasty for the matter of fact) foods around.

My friend recently gave me a special invitation code and introduced me to a cool new service called graze, which delivers very tasty but healthy snacks straight to your office . Being the constant snacker but also a very health conscientious person, I decided to give their service a try.

I gotta say, the snacks look and tasted great, not to mention, very filling and nutritious too (graze includes a small sheet of all the nutritional facts within the box), so I don't feel bad plowing through these with my coworkers.

The first box of snacks I received was free, but for the set price of $6 a box (that's with shipping), I think this service is well-worth the price. Face it, snacks aren't that cheap, especially healthy ones. And we all know that company vending machines aren't the cheapest.... I guess they want some of that salary back some way.... ^_-  All things considered, I'm definitely going to consider subscribing.

While it is free to try, graze is quite exclusive as they are quite new and you need an invitation code to get in. However, you can sign up on the waiting list for an invitation and you'll eventually get to try this great service yourself!

Put An Egg On It!

Is seems like chefs are putting eggs on everything lately... Is this a New York thing, or are people just becoming comfortable with eggs again?

Dry salad? Put an egg on it!
Boring burger? Put an egg on it!
Sad soup? Put an egg on it!

It reminds me of this episode of Portlandia. It's a lot like "put a bird on it," except the baby version.

But I promise you, it's not that difficult and it really does make a big difference on a ho-hum salad, especially when it's cold outside and a chilly bowl of lettuce is the last thing that sounds good for dinner. This recipe was inspired by a fancy dinner at A Voce in New York City.
 
Peppery Fall Salad with Egg
1 tsp dijon mustard
2 T sherry vinegar
3 T olive oil
Pinch of kosher salt
Freshly ground pepper
2 fresh pasteurized eggs
4 C fresh, peppery greens like frisee or arugula

Mix up the mustard, vinegar, olive oil, salt and pepper in a cruet, or by whisking with a fork in a small bowl or using a tiny whisk - everyone has a tiny whisk at home, right?

Poach the eggs: Place a square of plastic wrap in a small bowl and spray it with just a tiny bit of cooking spray. Crack an egg into the wrap, so that it sinks down into the bowl. Then twist up the plastic wrap to make a little egg package, winding the closure as tight as you can. Repeat for each egg, then carefully place all the egg packages into a small pot of boiling water, being careful not to leave any portion of the plastic wrap hanging outside the pot. (Just trust me when I tell you that you don't want plastic melting down the side.) Boil for 4 minutes until the egg is just set, and carefully remove the egg packages from the boiling water with tongs.

Carefully unwrap one egg onto the center of each salad, but wait to break the yolk until just before serving. The uninitiated dinner guest may be a little hesitant about mixing in the egg, but the resulting warm yolk offsets the peppery bite of greens, mustard and vinegar creating something entirely new.

Oh yes, and you can certainly add bacon to this. We do. (To everything.)

Pasture Perfect: How You Can Benefit from Choosing Meat, Eggs, and Dairy Products from Grass-Fed Animals

Going Nuts Having to Line up for Cronuts?

Cronuts, one of the other crazy fad food of 2013 along side of the Ramen Burger,  is one of the hardest food to attain. With a limit production every day, people start lining up before the crack of dawn in front of the Dominique Ansel Bakery....

But for people with jobs or better things to do, there's always alternatives to the original Cronut. For example, Crumbs and the Chikalicious offer their own variation on this croissant-doughnut pastry.

Crumbs' "Crumbnut"

Chikalicious' "Dough’ssant"

For a mere $2.95 don't expect too much from the Crumbs variation, I found it quite disappointing. Very dry and quite stale in taste, kinda like an overnight croissant.... However, Chikalicious' creation is well worth the extra $4 to buy it at their Dessert Club (which is conveniently across the street from the Chikalicious Dessert Bar). Airy, fluffy, light toasted, if it wasn't for the high calories, I think I would be able to eat 3-5 at once.

For the more amibitious foodies out there, there is also the option to make your own. Recipes to mimic the Cronut has been popping up around the web since its debut, look, even Amazon has a Cronut Kindle book: Croissant Donuts Preparing from Scratch~

The "Unoriginal" Ramen Burger [UPDATED]

Even if you are a Foodie or not, I think you must had heard of the crowd drawing Smorgasburg Ramen Burger. With a movie coming soon about his success, its hard to avoid tying in Keizo Shimamoto with the creation of this burger. While I have nothing against Keizo, having been credited as being the creator of the Ramen Burger, I think he might had been given too much credit for something that has existed long before his arrival. If you been in Japan, you would know that the Ramen Burger has long existed before him.
 

Personally, I think the Japanese version should be the real ones to be called a Ramen Burger. Why? If you had a bowl of Ramen Noodles before, you would know without me telling you.

While Keizo's creation is more of American Burger with an Asian Twist on the buns, the ones you can find in Japan is literally what you find in Ramen bowl but in a burger form! Now, you tell me what seems like a Ramen Burger more. ^_-

Ready to take you own shot to create a Ramen Burger? Start by stacking up with Ramens first with this deal from Amazon: Maruchan Ramen, Beef, 3-Ounce Packages (Pack of 24)!

UPDATE: Who is Keizo kidding? He copied the whole idea from Japan and now is going around suing people making something similar?

1. You're not a genius, your fame was built on hype.
2. This is not your original idea, please give credit due.
3. If you read the reviews of Bassanova and actually walked pass your near empty establishment a few times, you should be a more humble about your status in the Ramen Noodle world.

We have met the salads, and they are ours

Rare is the dive bar that serves good food, which is why most people don't eat in bars unless they're very drunk or not very discerning eaters. (It should be noted that the latter often follows the former.) But there's one special bar in Brooklyn with a vague nautical theme where I make an exception. The food there is delicious, far better than it has any right to be considering the whole bar looks like someone's basement in the Midwest. I'd tell you where this wonderful place is, but then I'd have to fight you for a seat.*

Now think: what's the sketchiest thing you could order in a bar? A salad, hands down. But I promise you, this bar's green salad with cheddar, onions and pickles is one of the best salads I've ever tasted. And I wasn't even drunk.

We recreated it at home recently and added bacon - because, why not? And so I give you...

Green Salad with Onion, Pickles and Cheddar

Serves 2 as a first course

4 C chopped green lettuce
2 oz. white cheddar, sliced wafer-thin
2 green onions, sliced thin (or 1/4 small red onion)
4-6 T sliced cornichons or dill pickles
6 T olive oil
3 T sherry vinegar
Pinch of salt
Fresh ground black pepper
3 slices of thick-cut bacon (optional)

To make the dressing, whisk the olive oil, sherry vinegar, salt and pepper together in a small bowl. If you're substituting red onion like we did, I'd recommend mixing that in too so that it has a chance to soften a little while you assemble the rest of the ingredients. You could even pickle the onion if you're feeling fancy.

Cook and drain the bacon until it's crisp; set aside to cool and then crumble into bite-size pieces. (If you're vegetarian, feel free to skip this step.)

Place the lettuce in a large bowl and mix in the dressing. Add the pickles, bacon and onion and mix well. Add the cheddar once the salad is plated. This last method is a tip from Healthy Appetite chef Ellie Krieger: adding high-calorie toppings at the end makes it seem like you have more and you'll feel more satiated than if they're hidden in the dish.


*Oh FINE. There's a clue in the title of this post. Just keep it between us when you figure it out, okay?

Pumpkin Pancakes - A Harvest-time Classic

One of the great things about working from home on Fridays last fall, besides simply working form home was that a nearby diner served fantastic pumpkin pancakes. They provided a great start to the end of the week.  Unfortunately, I have not been able to work from home as often this fall and have not visited my diner, the Eastside Eatery. A simple solution would be to visit the diner on the weekend and see if the pumpkin pancakes were once again available. However, I just as easily could make my own.

My goal, to make my own pumpkin pancakes with a twist that I am passionate about, a proper brew. I have often mentioned my interest in pouring a bit of the "suds" into my pancake batter to colleagues and friends only to be met with puzzled looks. When you look at it from a baking standpoint, it only makes sense. The yeast and other grain properties give "rise" in your pancakes and make them more porous for butter and syrup absorption, assuming one is into that sort of thing. If the right flavor, your beer will give your pancakes a nice malty flavor, not unlike the flavor benefits one would get from vanilla extract. On any given day, I would recommend Harpoon's Winter Warmer. However, we are in the midst of or perhaps the tail end of "Pumpkin Season". While visiting a Trader Joe's food store, I found their Pumpkin Pancake and Waffle mix. I purchased a box to see what good I could make out of it. With that in mind, I considered a beer that wouldn't challenge the pumpkin flavor but enhance it. I chose Samuel Adams - Double Bock.

 The recipe on the box can be followed but if you would like a twist, consider the following modifications:

• On box, 2 tablespoons butter | Recommended, 1 tablespoon cooking oil (I prefer extra virgin olive oil)
• On box, 3/4 cup milk | Recommended, about 1/2 cup milk & 1/4 cup beer (Sam Adams DB) If vanilla extract is preferred, maintain 3/4 - 1 cup milk and add 1 tablespoon vanilla extract

Complete this harvest-time dish with sliced chicken apple sausage or scrambled eggs with smoked prosciutto, dusted with fresh parsley.

Rosemary Roasted Chicken with Parsnips and Carrots from Plated.com

I recently had the opportunity to try out a new culinary service from an online site called www.plated.com.  I did not know what to expect but since it looked good on the site and seemed easy to prep, I went for it.  I ordered for a Monday delivery and the ingredients were promptly delivered at 4pm, just in time for dinner prep.  The box was well packed and insulated and had all the ingredients already pre measured for my Chicken Dinner.

Following these easy to follow instructions which we enclosed with the package:

And after all the cooking was done, here was my delicious end result:

Not only did it look great but it tasted delicious.  The instructions for preparation were easy to follow and I would definitely recommend to anyone who wants to have an easy gourmet meal that is easy to make!!

If you want a special offer on your first order, please click here:

Enjoy your first Plated.com order!!!

Ramen Burger vs the Rice Paddy Burger

If you are anything of Foodie or read my previous rants about it, I'm pretty sure you know of the Smorgasburg Ramen Burger. This concoction of two buns of noodle strains grilled together, topped with some veggies and a beef paddy created 2+ hours lines just for a taste of this.every weekend since its debut.

While Keizo Shimamoto's coveted creation is good, I gotta say, he's not the first one from Japan that went this route to twist the American burger. Long before the Ramen Burger, there was the Rice Burger.

Basically, its the same burger equation but with two buns of compressed rice. While some might think, "So what? So it's just another bun." However, put this into consideration, ramen noodles were built for ramen soup noodle dishes, they are meant to absorb the soup liquid (or otherwise it will get soggy), while rice does not have that property and has a high absorbancy of any juice or liquid that comes it way.... What does this translate to? You tell me!

If you ask me, if its the Ramen Burger vs the Rice Burger, I rather have the Rice Burger.