Too Much Food

Recreating an Old Favorite: Black Sesame Polvoron

26-09-2009

Cookies, Cut/Shaped Cookies, Dessert, Filipino, Recipe, Taiwanese

One of my favorite Taiwanese confections are 杏仁餅 (almond chess cookies; or, as I like to call it, almond-flavored crack), a sort of marzipan-flavored candy with a crumbly, sandy, shortbread texture. They’re slightly sweet, buttery, with a salty backnote, and pair perfectly with a nice cup of hot tea. However, it’s hard to find these things in the U.S.; since the ones I see in Asian supermarkets usually are loaded with tons of additives and preservatives, I tend to shy away from buying them. Since it doesn’t really seem worth it to buy a $2000 plane ticket back to Taiwan to purchase freshly made 杏仁餅, I made up my mind to make them myself.

Recently I came across this recipe from Rose at Spots For Dates via tastespotting for Filipino polvoron. Looking at the recipe and the photos, I saw how similar the Filipino polvoron was to the Taiwanese 杏仁餅; perhaps this was the recipe I was looking for?

At the time of making these, I didn’t have any almonds, so instead of subbing them for the macadamia nuts in the original recipe, I used freshly toasted and ground black sesame seeds. You may substitute your favorite nut/seed in this versatile recipe; just make sure they’re finely ground (but ground so much they turn into nut butter) to facilitate the shaping of the polvoron and for the best texture and mouthfeel.

Black Sesame Polvoron
Makes about 20 pieces, depending on shaping method

What you’ll need:

1/3 C (80ml) black sesame seeds, lightly toasted until fragrant
1/2 C (4 oz., 125 g) butter
3/4 C (330 g) all-purpose flour
1/4 C (45 g) granulated sugar
1/4 C + 2 Tablespoons (90 ml) powdered milk
pinch of salt, to taste

The procedure:

If the black sesame seeds you have are raw, place them in a large skillet over low heat and toast until fragrant. Try not to leave the pan as it’s difficult to tell whether black sesame seeds are burnt. Go by smell; once the seeds smell fragrant and nutty, scrape the seeds into a bowl and set aside to let cool.

Grind the cooled sesame seeds into a fine powder. I use a suribachi that I bought at my local Japanese supermarket; these things are super easy to use and they do the job quite well (you get a mini-workout in the process too!). If you can’t find a suribachi near you, a spice grinder or a coffee grinder would work equally well.

In the meantime, prepare the roasted flour by heating your large skillet over medium-high heat; once hot, dump the flour in and spread it around the pan and turn the heat down to medium-low. Keep stirring the flour so that it doesn’t burn, roasting it until it turns a golden color and lets off a nutty fragrance. Keep your eyes on the flour so that it doesn’t burn (unless you want random bits of burnt flour in your final product, an unfortunate mistake I made the first time I tried making these).

Once the flour is done roasting, scrape the flour into a bowl and set aside; return the skillet to the heat. Dump in your butter and let it melt (but don’t let it brown, we just want it melted). Once the butter is melted, add the roasted flour, sugar, powdered milk and a pinch of salt and stir with the spatula so that all ingredients are well mixed; at this point, it should look a bit gritty or sandy. Continue stirring, allowing the milk powder to toast, once it smells fragrant, take the pan off the heat and pour the mixture into a bowl and let it cool slightly.

At this point, you can shape the polvoron in several ways; the easiest is just to press the mixture into a well-oiled, foil-lined baking pan and cut into the shape you desire after it’s been refrigerated. If you feel like putting more effort into it, you could try using a mold like I did here (I was trying to recreate the chess piece shape that I remember so fondly). Essentially the basic process for shaping is the same whether you use a pan or a mold, take the polvoron mixture, press into the mold, pop it out of the mold (if not using a baking pan), and place on a sheet lined with wax paper or foil and refrigerate. Once refrigerated, the polvoron’s shape will set. Just make sure you shape the polvoron while the mixture is still warm; once it’s cooled, it is much more difficult for the mixture to stick together.

Or, if you can’t wait for the polvoron to set, you could eat it hot, straight off the burner in all its sandy goodness. I’m sure if you sprinkled it on top of yogurt or ice cream, it’d be delicious (Note to self: try this next time I make polvoron . . .)

Enjoy!

“Lotus Pad” (Mandarin) Pancakes

By: Pinjing

01-09-2009

Bread, Chinese, Cuisines, Flatbreads, Recipe

I’m back in Taiwan! (I’ve blogged my first meal here). I won’t be doing much cooking or baking (there’s too many good things to eat and try here). I do have a few recipes queued up that I haven’t posted yet so I’ll work on that as well as posting about all the things I eat while in Taiwan . . .

This is another recipe I tried from the Wei-Chuan Chinese Snacks Cookbook way back in June for “Lotus Pad” (Mandarin) Pancakes. If you’ve ever been to a Chinese restaurant and ordered mooshu pork (a sort of “burrito” stuffed with a chopped pork, cabbage, wood ear mushrooms, bean sprouts and shredded egg filling), you’ll recognize these as the flatbreads that are used as the wrapper.

What’s interesting about these flatbreads is the technique employed to make these pancakes super thin: you must roll them out and cook them in pairs. After you finish cooking them, you peel them apart to get two super-thin wrappers (ideally they will be very thin; obviously I need much more practice). Give it a try!

“Lotus Pad” (Mandarin) Pancakes

Adapted from Wei-Chuan’s Chinese Snacks Cookbook

Makes 20 pancakes

What you’ll need:

2 1/2 C (300 g) all-purpose flour
3/4 C (180 ml) boiling water
1/4 C (60 ml) cold water
1 T (15 ml) sesame oil

The procedure:

In a large bowl, add the boiling water to the all-purpose flour and mix until you have a rough dough. It will be dry at this point, so don’t worry about obtaining a smooth dough.

Add the cold water to the rough dough and knead until smooth. Cover the dough in plastic wrap and set aside for 20 minutes to let it relax.

After 20 minutes have elapsed, remove the dough from the plastic wrap and knead it again, on a lightly oiled surface so that it is smooth and elastic. Shape the dough into a long roll approximately 20 inches long, then cut into 20 pieces, each 1 inch wide.

Place the sesame oil in a small bowl and have it ready on the side.

To shape the pancakes: For each piece of dough, and using the palm of your hand, flatten it until into a round, approximately 4 inches in diameter. Dip your fingers in the bowl of sesame oil and lightly oil the top surface of each pancake. Place two pancakes together, with the oiled sides touching, and roll them out until they are 6 inches in diameter. It helps to try to pair pancakes that are similarly sized. Repeat 9 more times to form 10 pairs of pancakes.

Preheat a griddle or skillet over medium-high heat, then lower to low heat and and dry-fry the pancakes for approximately 30 seconds, or until small, golden bubbles appear on the bottom. Try to keep rotating the pancakes with your fingers to fry them evenly. After 30 seconds have elapsed, flip the pancake over and repeat the same procedure, rotating the pancake and checking the bottom for the tell-tale golden bubbles.

Remove the pancake from the pan and gingerly separate the pancakes from each other. I am warning you, they will be hot, so be careful! Place the separated pancakes on a plate and cover with a kitchen towel to keep them warm and moist.

Mandarin pancakes are slightly chewy but not tough; the use of sesame oil also make them lovely and fragrant. They’re also really versatile; use them in conjunction with your favorite mooshu recipe, or anytime you need a tortilla-like flatbread. My mom liked smearing them with peanut butter, rolling it up and enjoying it for breakfast.

Enjoy!

What I ate on vacation: Part III: Eating Copenhagen

By: Pinjing

26-08-2009

Cuisines, Danish, Photo Post, Reviews

If you missed the last two posts in my three-part series, be sure to check them out here:
Part I: Cruise Food (Aboard the Emerald Princess)
Part II: Offshore Eats (St. Petersburg, Russia and Rostock, Germany)

In planning our vacation, my dad made sure we had a couple of extra days in Copenhagen after the cruise to explore the city. The transition from having every single meal (whether it be an extensive buffet or a formal four-course meal) at our fingertips on the cruise ship to being completely on our own for finding our meals was interesting, to say the least.

My sister and I were totally willing to undertake the challenge of getting our meals on our own (we love any opportunity to explore the cuisines of other cultures); however, after eating western (therefore, unfamiliar) cuisine for 10 days on the cruise, my grandparents were seeking the familiar (our first lunch was at a Chinese restaurant near our hotel). Being the obedient grandaughters that we are (seniority is a big thing in Taiwanese family culture), we decided go along with it . . .

The first night we ended up at a McDonalds, and since I wanted to try something different, I ended up ordering a burger humorously called “The Little Mexican” (that name would never fly in the US). Basically, it was a hamburger dressed with shredded lettuce, cheddar cheese with a “spicy” taco sauce and sour cream. Sounds gross but it actually ended up not being too bad. Price hurt though, as this went for about $5 US.

One thing I noticed is that food in Copenhagen is expensive . . . very expensive when comparing it to food in the United States. I couldn’t believe it when I picked up a fast food breakfast of espressos and breakfast pastries at a local 7-11 for my sister, dad, mom and myself and the total came out to be nearly thirty US dollars!

Another night we ate a Scandinavian restaurant chain steakhouse called Jensen’s Bøfhus (Jensen’s Beef House), which served virtually nothing but steak. I’m not a big beef eater, so I ended up just ordering a cold smoked salmon filet salad:

It looked a little sad here on the plate. It was a little too salty and I ended up just eating all the lettuce and leaving most of the salmon . . . that’s what I get for ordering seafood at a steakhouse.

The rest of my family’s steak and ribs were actually really nicely cooked, not dry at all and well seasoned. They were all served with various sauces (a red wine sauce for my sister, a mustard-based sauce for my dad) on the side so that you could dip your steak in if you wished.

I did have some opportunities to try some local cuisine though! I had heard that one Danish specialty was smørrebrød; these are open-faced cold sandwiches on buttered dark rye bread. Apparently “smørrebrød” literally means “butter and bread,” but it’s interesting to note that how the cold cuts, cheeses and spreads are arranged on top of the bread is considered to be a sort of art; the smørrebrød should always be constructed such that the end product is “a tasty and visually appealing food item.”

Walking around downtown I was able to spot this small store selling smørrebrød, so we bought two to try. My mom’s smørrebrød consisted of a ginormous beef patty topped with a poached egg and tomato and wrapped in lettuce:

I ordered a smoked bacon smørrebrød; this ended up being really delicious as the bacon was thickly sliced, and super fatty, the meat was tender while the outer edges of the skin were nice and crisp. With the sourness of the pickled red cabbage and the sweetness of the sliced peach and prune, the flavors came together really nicely.

Sausage carts (more like hot dog trucks) are even more plentiful in Copenhagen than they were in Rostock (they’re literally like the Starbucks of Copenhagen, you could close your eyes, throw a stone in a random direction and chances are you’ll hit a hot dog truck). However, don’t think that this means that these dogs are subpar; they’re anything but. Called pølser, these stands serve up what the Danish consider to be one of their national dishes.

A standard pølse is topped with several condiments; mine was topped with remoulade, ketchup, mustard, raw chopped onions, as well as fried onions and pickles. Sounds excessive, but it really was just a delicious, umami-rich party in my mouth. If I could go back to Copenhagen again, this would probably be the first thing I’d seek out.

My sister got this one that was bacon-wrapped.

I couldn’t leave without getting this cute traditional confection (bought at a local 7-11). I didn’t catch the name of this, but it was a thin cookie wafer topped with a piped marshmallow cloud and dipped in chocolate and coconut. See how pretty it is?

And it tasted good too.

Hope you enjoyed my three-part series on my culinary adventures in the Baltics! Be sure to read Part I and Part II if you missed them!

What I ate on vacation: Part II: Offshore Eats

By: Pinjing

25-08-2009

Cruises, Cuisines, German, Photo Post, Reviews, Russian

The other posts in this series:
Part I: Cruise Food (Aboard the Emerald Princess).
Part III: Eating Copenhagen

Continuing with my series on what I ate during my trip around the Baltics (see Part I for what I ate on the Emerald Princess), we move onto what I found in two of the stops on our cruise: St. Petersburg, Russia and Rostock, Germany.

The Emerald Princess actually docked in the harbor near St. Petersburg, so we actually had two full days to explore the city (most of the other stops were only a day or half a day in port). We decided to take advantage of this by signing up for a tour that spanned two full days. Included in the package was a two traditional Russian lunches, but the funny thing was, the menus for both the lunches were virtually the same! (excepting the soup and main entree). I guess the food that was served was what Russians consider to be the most representative of their traditional cuisine. I’ll mainly post about what we ate on the first day:

Walking in, we were greeted by a boisterous trio that played traditional Russian folk music for us while we dined; tables were lined up row by row to accomodate all the cruise passengers (I suspect this restaurant caters exclusively to the local tour agencies) and we all sat down for a multi-course lunch.

Our beverages: water, champagne and a shot of vodka.

We started with a salad of tomatoes, cucumber, lettuce and dill; as an American who is tired of seeing salads in restaurants overly dressed with gloppy dressing or oily vinaigrettes, this rather dry salad was a welcome change. The herbal and refreshing flavor of the dill was what the salad relied on to give it its “punch,” and made for a very light start for our meal.

Two kinds of breads were served, a lighter, fluffy white bread as well as a sourer, dense rye-type bread. As a fan of dark, whole-grain breads, I really enjoyed eating this topped with a thin smear of butter.

Blini? (If someone can confirm this for me, that’d be great), a sort of savory pancake topped with some kind of sour-creamish dairy product and caviar. This probably was my favorite course as the pancake was light and fluffy, crispy on the edges and had a hint of creaminess in the middle. The saltiness of the caviar (I couldn’t help but think about ikura (Japanese salmon roe) the entire time I was eating this; it tasted exactly the same!) and the sourness of the cream really brought this dish together.

A vegetable soup was next:

Nothing much to say about this soup. I don’t think there was any cream, as the taste was not heavy or oily; it was probably the base of pureed veg that nadded body to the soup.

Our main course was some sort of chicken stew with vegetables with boiled rice; sadly this paled in comparison to the starters; the entree on the second day was a bit better (a piece of white fish with a cream-based dill sauce, vegetables and buttered mashed potatoes).

Dessert was a sort of berry-topped cake, served with a splash of cold milk. I happened to really like this; the berries were sour and the cake was dense and bit soggy from sitting in the milk (I’m one of those people that enjoys dipping bread or cake in milk; my mom can’t understand this quirk of mine), but other diners didn’t seem like it so much.

Overall, a good intro to Russian cuisine. Come to think of it, it’s probably the first time I’ve ever really had Russian food before; it’s difficult to find any restaurants in California that serve Russian fare, therefore, I can’t really speak for how authentic this was. It was a good learning experience nonetheless.

We were able to get some free time when we stopped in Germany; from our port at Warnemünde we hopped on a train to the nearby city of Rostock. By the main pedestrian thoroughfare, we found a farmer’s market:

Looking around, we were surrounded by carts and carts of vendors selling sausages and hot dogs; it seems as though everytime you turned a corner, there’d be another cart selling all kinds of wurst. By lunchtime, my sister and I were determined to try one as the smell of the sausages cooking was quite heavenly (this is saying a lot as I normally don’t eat meat on a day-to-day basis). We picked up a “Rostocken Bockwurst” just cause it had the city’s name in it, not really knowing what it was, but it turned out to be a good choice. Served with a fat dollop of ketchup and homemade mustard and a slice of toast (brot!), this was good, simple street food at its finest.

We couldn’t help getting a side order of fries, which the vendor dusted with a bunch of paprika and salt. He had a hell of a time understanding us as we didn’t speak German and he didn’t speak English so we both spent a lot of time making exaggerated facial expressions and waving our arms. And we spent about $2 for lunch between the two of us . . . probably the cheapest lunch we’d ever find while in Europe.

Later on in the day, we strolled along the pier in Warnemünde and picked up a few snacks to enjoy when we got back on the ship:

Super danish! A delicious cream cheese and berry pastry. Heart attack in a wax bag but really good.

I couldn’t help but buy this cute petit four. This was also really delicious: marzipan-based cake with chocolate ganache and pastry cream layers, topped with a poured fondant.

My sister bought this huge juice box.

If you’re interested, please read the other posts in this series:
Part I: Cruise Food (Aboard the Emerald Princess).
Part III: Eating Copenhagen

What I ate on vacation – Part I: Cruise Food

By: Pinjing

24-08-2009

Cruises, Photo Post, Reviews

I know, I know . . . I’m a horrible procrastinator. I’m already back in Taiwan and itching to tell you about what I’ve eaten so far and I still haven’t even begun to talk about the food that I ate when I cruised around the Baltics last month? Let’s play some catch up . . .

For our trip to the Baltics, my family chose to sail with Princess Cruises again after having an excellent experience the last time we cruised around the Eastern Caribbean. This time, we were on the Emerald Princess, which is a relatively new and large ship; despite having a cabin whose view was partially obstructed, and while I can’t really speak for the onboard entertainment and activities (my family prefers to go offshore on days that we stop at a port or just relax at our own pace on days at sea), I was really satisfied with the whole experience. Our cabins were spacious (by cruise ship standards), clean and well-kept due to the incessant cleaning by the cabin attendants.

As for the food, we found Princess Cruises’s to be quite good (we give a slight edge to Princess’s over Norwegian, though Norwegian’s breakfast buffet layout and options were better). Here’s a sampling of what I ate while on the ship:

Post-buffet aftermath is never pretty. But hey, at least I put my utensils in the correct position to indicate that I’m done . . .

What most people don’t realize is that the room service is already included in your cruise expenses, so take advantage of it!

On the days where we’re at sea, my sister and I enjoy having afternoon tea; Princess does their version in one of their formal dining room complete with live music courtesy of a string quartet, waiter service, unlimited refills of hot tea, tea sandwiches, small pastries, petit fours, scones with real clotted cream and jam.

My sister’s plate: baguette with sliced ham, tomato and cucumber relish on a toasted roll, a slightly dry slice of pound cake.

My plate: Smoked salmon (love love love and would probably ingest in copious amounts if it weren’t for the sodium) and cream cheese tea sandwich, cucumber on a baguette, marbled shortbread.

Dinners were quite nice as we were allowed to pick our dining partners and when we ate (we’re not such a fan of pre-determined seating arrangements and dining times). I usually opt to pick light, fish based, non-dairy courses as the last thing I want to feel while I’m vacation is bloated and weighed down.

Some appetizers that we enjoyed included a caviar and seafood salad.

Another seafood salad lightly dressed in a cool citrus sauce.

A perfectly cooked red snapper filet.

Halibut, haricot vert with spiced tomato sauce, steamed potatoes.

I did deviate on the Chef’s Special Dinner when I ordered a roasted pheasant entree (accompanied by prociutto wrapped haricot vert, caramelized onions in a sweet sauce and steamed vegetables). Sadly, while the pheasant was juicy and well-seasoned, the sauce the caramelized onions was overly sweet and starchy (too much cornstarch) and was so gummy I couldn’t touch it after the initial bite. As for the veggies, it’s kind of hard to mess that up.

But . . .

I always have to save room for dessert. It’s become a bad habit of mine to always indulge in something sweet after dinner; the day just doesn’t seem complete without it. For the most part, the desserts on Princess were good; look at the pretty gourmandises plate that I got one night:

Top to bottom: candied fruit and almond slices, linzer cookies, which were my favorite of the bunch as the cookie was a perfectly executed buttery shortbread, chocolate cream eclairs and coconut macaroons).

Another night: A dessert wine and a plate of fruit.

One favorite dessert: a berry gratin with an almond-based crust and biscotti.

My sister and I also were greedy little pigs and went up to the twenty four hour buffets after our four course meals and snuck MORE desserts to take back to the room to enjoy later.

This poor tasteless muffin was doomed from the start.

Though I did get hooked on their awesome chocolate chip cookies. I should have gotten the pastry chef to give me his recipe as these were cookies that I long for: crispy on the outside, chewy in the center, studded with big chunks of chocolate. I’d always enjoy one as a late-night snack with milk tea . . . drooling now that I’m thinking about it again.

Overall, we had an excellent time on the cruise! We’ve heard stories before of people eating nothing but steak and pasta (two foods I’m not a huge fan of), but this wasn’t the case with Princess.

If you’re interested, please read the other posts in this series:
Part II: Offshore Eats (St. Petersburg, Russia and Rostock, Germany).
Part III: Eating Copenhagen

My Comfort Food: Black Sesame Shaobing / 黑芝麻燒餅 (Taiwanese Flatbreads)

By: Pinjing

10-08-2009

Bread, Chinese, Cuisines, Flatbreads, Recipe, Taiwanese

Taiwanese breakfasts have always fascinated me. As a Taiwanese-American born and raised in the US, I grew up eating stuff that most of my other classmates probably ate for breakfast: sugary cereals, poptarts, toast with peanut butter or jelly and the like. Once in a while though, my parents would take my sister and me to a tiny restaurant near our house that served traditional Taiwanese breakfast, which usually consisted of a steaming bowl of either a savory or sweetened version of soy milk (the savory version is the type I prefer, which comes garnished with small pieces of Chinese crullers (油條), chopped scallions, pickled vegetables and a dash of vinegar), potstickers, panfried turnip cakes, egg turnovers and fan tuan (a sort of roll made up of fragrant glutinous rice stuff with pork floss and a Chinese cruller). What my sister and I really craved, however, was the uber-Taiwanese breakfast of shao bing you tiao (燒餅油條). What is this, you ask? Let me enlighten you.

Take a shao bing (a flaky, sesame coated flatbread of goodness), split it open and stuff it with a you tiao (a glorified deep-fried breadstick). Close it to make a carbalicious sandwich. Eat as is, or dunk it in the soymilk and stuff your face. This ain’t no Atkins-friendly breakfast here.

Sounds weird (carbs with carbs? It’s like making a french fry sandwich!) but trust me, it’s delicious. So when I was perusing and old Chinese cookbook that my mom had and saw a recipe for these flaky flatbreads, I knew I had to try it.

Black Sesame Shaobing (Taiwanese Flatbreads)
Adapted from Wei-Chuan’s Chinese Snacks Cookbook

Makes 20 flatbreads

What you’ll need:

6 C (720 g) all-purpose flour
1.5 C (354 ml) boiling water
1/2 C (118 ml) cold water
3/4 C (177 ml) roux mixture
1/2 tablespoon salt
1 tablespoon all-purpose flour
1/4 C (60 ml) sesame seeds
For the roux mixture: 1.5 C (365ml) flavorless oil (such as vegetable oil) and 3 C (360 g) all-purpose flour.

The Procedure:

Prepare the roux mixture: In a saucepan, heat the 1.5 cups of oil until hot. Add the 3 cups of all-purpose flour and stir to mix well. Cook the mixture over low heat for 10 minutes until the mixture is fragrant and lightly golden. Make sure you’re standing at the pan at all times as this can go from golden brown to burnt very quickly!

Set aside the roux mixture to cool.

Meanwhile, let’s continue on with the rest of the recipe, shall we?

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F (180 degrees C).

Place the flour into a mixing bowl and add the boiling water and cold water all at once and mix well. Knead the dough until it becomes smooth and elastic.

Using a silicone mat (or a lightly oiled surface), roll out the dough until it measures a 16″ x 16″ square.

Evenly sprinkle the surface of the dough with the roux mixture, salt and 1 tablespoon flour. Roll up the square tightly ina jelly roll fashion and cut the roll into 20 even pieces (you may have to roll it back and forth a bit to stretch it out to a workable length). For each piece that you cut, pinch the ends together to make sure none of the filling spills out.

Here’s where you shape the pieces and obtain the “flakiness” that characterizes these flatbreads. It may be a bit tricky as I’m not the best at explaining how to shape the flatbreads, so I’ve provided a sort-of step-by-step tutorial to help:

For each piece, place it on the board, such that the pinched edges are on the sides. Take a small rolling pin or dowel, and holding it horizontally, place it on the lower 1/3 of the flatbread.

Roll away from, so that the flatbread is about 4 inches square.

Fold the lower third of the square up to the center.

Then fold the top third down over that (if you’ve ever made croissants or any other laminated dough, this will start to sound familiar).

Now rotate the dough piece 90 degrees so that it’s vertical.

Again, holding the rolling pin horizontally, place the rolling pin now at the vertical center of the dough piece and just press down (don’t roll).

Lift your rolling pin and fold the top half of the dough over.

Dip the piece of the dough, smooth side down, into the sesame seeds, pressing lightly, so as to get the surface fully covered in seeds. Place the dough, sesame seeds side down, on your board and roll out into a 6″ x 3″ rectangle.

Transfer to baking sheet with the sesame side down and repeat with the other 19 pieces.

Bake the breads on the cookie sheet, sesame seed side down for 5 minutes, then flip the breads over and bake them for another 5 minutes or until they are a nice golden brown. They should puff up slightly.

These breads are flaky, crispy on the edges and tender on the inside due to the roux mixture and “quick” laminated dough technique; the traditional way of enjoying these flat breads for breakfast is to stuff them with crispy chinese crullers (you tiao or 油條) and eat with sweet or savory soy milk. In Taiwan they also stuff them with thinly sliced roast beef and scallions (called 牛肉燒餅) and is equally delicious. But it’s up to you; on the rare occasions that my mom bought these from the Chinese supermarket, I was really fond of splitting these open like English muffins and filling them with peanut butter and jelly in my Taiwanese version of the PB&J sandwich. If you do make these, leave a comment as to how you enjoy them . . . I’m always looking for new ideas.

Note: While my version of these flatbreads use black sesame seeds, white sesame seeds are used traditionally. My mom informed me that flatbreads with black sesame seeds usually indicate a sweet version rather than a savory version.

Finally (back to the food)

By: Pinjing

08-08-2009

Just Words

I’m finally back! I can’t believe it’s been almost two months since I’ve last posted; I wish I had a good excuse for my long absence (well, I did spend a good while reconstructing my hacked blogs and then embarking on a three week vacation with family in Europe) but mainly I’ve just been enjoying life without being chained to the computer.

After going through nearly 3GB of photos I took on the trip I’ve picked out some to post to my Project 365 set on Flickr; feel free to click on through to see where I went while on vacation.

And don’t worry; I have been cooking and baking since I’ve came back. I’ll be posting some new recipes, restaurant reviews and things I ate while on vacation. In the meantime, here’s a sneak peek of some Taiwanese breads I made recently . . .

Gone Cruisin.

By: Pinjing

22-06-2009

Just Words

Off to Northern Europe for the next two weeks with family! See you all when I get back

Red Wine Biscotti

By: Pinjing

19-06-2009

Biscotti, Cookies, Cuisines, Italian, Recipe, Savory Cookies, Snacks

As some of you may know, my blog was recently hacked; I had several recipes pre-written, ready for publishing when I discovered that the hacker had completely wiped out my wordpress database, deleting all my posts, recipes and comments. I was devastated . . .

Needless to say, I have learned my lesson: always keep backups of EVERYTHING. I am so guilty of just being lazy and putting off this simple act of backing up data, thinking “Oh, I’ll just do it tomorrow . . . or next week . . . or later . . .” But you say this every week and when you really do need your backups, it’s too late.

Anyway, I know better now. In a way it was a blessing in disguise; it gave me a chance to breathe new life into the blog. I completely reworked the design of the blog and thought about how to better organize its contents. Hopefully you find the new changes welcome too. I hope to post not only more recipes but restaurant reviews and more thoughts on food in general. Because if you know me, I think about food. A LOT.

Ok! Off my soapbox and back to the food. I’ve always been intrigued with cooking with wine, and when I came across this recipe at Lisa’s Kitchen, I knew I had to try it. I don’t know about you, but I prefer my biscotti to be earth-shatteringly crispy and crunchy . . . not so much a fan of the tender version (wouldn’t it just be a gussied-up long, skinny version of a cookie?) I prefer bake my biscotti in my convection oven, making sure all traces of moisture have been zapped away . . . but if you’re in the tender-biscotti camp, by all means, bake them to your desired preference.

These biscotti were delicious, full of umami with a hint of sweetness in the end. Not only that, they’re super easy to make and vegan as well. By the way, this is a recipe that I had written before my site was hacked; it was a bit difficult to remember the exact measurements for the ingredients listed; for those who do give it a try, leave a comment and let me know how your results turn out.

Savory Red Wine Biscotti
Adapted from Lisa’s Kitchen
Makes about 14 biscotti

What you’ll need:

1 1/2 cups (180g) whole wheat flour
2 tablespoons (22.5g) of sugar
1 teaspoon of baking powder
1/8 teaspoon of sea salt
1/2 teaspoon of freshly cracked black pepper
1 tablespoon caraway seeds (I love this stuff)
2 sundried tomatoes, cut into small pieces and soaked in hot water for 20 minutes
1/2 cup + 2 tablespoons red wine
1/4 cup fruity extra-virgin olive oil

The procedure:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

In a large bowl, combine the dry ingredients: flour, sugar, baking powder, sea salt, black pepper and caraway seeds. Whisk the dry ingredients together to make sure they are thoroughly combined.

Drain the sundried tomatoes of their soaking water and add to dry ingredients. Stir in the red wine and olive oil until well combined.

Prepare a baking sheet with parchment paper. Scoop dough onto the baking sheet and roughly form into a log about 10 inches long and 3 inches wide (there’s no need to be perfect here). Place sheet in preheated oven and bake for 30 minutes.

After 30 minutes have elapsed, remove the biscotti log from the oven and let it cool slightly, about 5-10 minutes (or until your hands can handle touching it). Reduce the oven to 200 degrees F (if you have a convection oven, using the convection function is quite useful here in ensuring crispy, crunchy biscotti). Using a long serrated knife, cut the log into 1/2 inch slices (either on the diagonal or straight across, whichever you prefer). Place the slices, cut side up, back on the baking sheet and bake until desired crispness. My batch took about 30 minutes, with a rotating of the sheet and flipping over the slices halfway in between.

I also made a lime-cilantro-roasted peanut version, substituting beer for the wine, roasted peanuts for the caraway seeds, and throwing in a bunch of lime zest and home-dried cilantro. It smelled delicious while it was baking but the end result lacked the zesty punch I was going for. I’ll have to work on this one a bit more, so I’m not going to put up the recipe yet.

New Resolution, Old Recipe: Savory Braided Onion Loaf

By: Pinjing

02-05-2009

Bread, Recipe, Yeasted Breads

I was recently going through my old photos and realized I have a huge backlog of food-related photos that I have yet to write about; recipes I’ve attempted, places I’ve visited and restaurants I’ve tried. I know I haven’t been the most diligent of bloggers, but I hope to change that!

If you haven’t noticed already, I’ve added a nifty recipe index (for now, recipes are sorted alphabetically, I hope to have versions sorted by ingredient, type and hopefully even a thumbnail index in the near future).

Now back to the food . . .

I baked this loaf when I first started getting interested in baking breads from scratch; I remember perusing The Fresh Loaf for hours on end, reading about other baker’s experiences and learning from their advice. I saw this recipe for a braided onion loaf using powdered onion soup mix (which we had a packet of, strangely enough, as we never buy those things usually?) and I had to try it.

A note on the recipe: The measurements given (and the ones I used at the time) are in US/English measurements, not in metric. At the time, I wasn’t tuned into the advantages of baking by weight rather than volume; I know a pet peeve of mine (and for some of you too) is when a bread recipe doesn’t give metric measurements. I’ve included the metric conversions, but keep in mind that depending on the types and brands of flours, sugars, and fats used, your mileage will vary. Just use your baker’s intuition and adjust accordingly.

Savory Braided Onion Loaf
From The Fresh Loaf, adapted from Bernard Clayton’s New Complete Book of Breads

For the poolish:

1 cup (120g) all-purpose unbleached flour
1 cup (236g) water
1/4 teaspoon instant yeast

For the dough:

All of the poolish
3 – 3 1/2 cups (360g – 420g) all-purpose unbleached flour
1/2 cup (244g) milk
2 teaspoons instant yeast
2 tablespoons (24g) sugar
2 tablespoons (28g) butter or shortening
1 1 3/8 oz. package of onion soup mix
1 (60g) egg

For the egg wash:

1 (60g) egg
1 tablespoon milk

The Procedure:

On the night prior to baking, in a large bowl, mix together the ingredients for the poolish. Cover with plastic wrap and let it sit overnight.

The next morning, combine 2 cups (240g) of the flour, the yeast, sugar, and the onion soup mix. Mix in all of the previous night’s poolish, milk, egg, and butter, adding more flour if required to make a dough that is smooth, moist, tacky, but not sticky. This is an enriched straight-ish dough, so we’re not looking for a high-hydration artisan type of dough here.

Knead the dough (either by hand or by stand mixer) until proper gluten development is achieved (I always test using the windowpane method.) Place the dough into a greased bowl, mist lightly with oil, and cover with plastic wrap. Allow the dough to rise until doubled in size, approximately 90 minutes. This is the first fermentation.

After the first fermentation, remove the dough from the bowl and shape it into a braid (the recipe on The Fresh Loaf has a good illustrated tutorial), or whatever shape you like. Cover the loaf with a towel or plastic wrap and allow it to double in size again, approximately 45 minutes. While you are waiting for the second fermentation, preheat the oven (and baking stone, if you have one) to 450F (230C).

Just before baking, mix together the ingredients for the egg wash and brush the top of the loaf lightly with the wash. Place the loaf into the hot oven, reducing the temperature to 375F (190C) after 5 minutes. Bake for another 30 minutes, rotating the loaf halfway through the baking time. If the bread starts to look to dark due to the glaze, tent the loaf with a piece of aluminum foil to prevent further browning.

The loaf is done when dark-golden brown and the inside temperature registers at least 190F (85C). Please please please always test the inside temperature of your breads as the last thing you want to do is cut open a beautiful-looking loaf to find a gooey, underbaked mass inside! Let it rest for at least an hour (the bread continues to cook as it’s cooling!) before slicing.

Enjoy!

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What I ate on vacation: Part II: Offshore Eats

What I ate on vacation – Part I: Cruise Food

My Comfort Food: Black Sesame Shaobing / 黑芝麻燒餅 (Taiwanese Flatbreads)

Finally (back to the food)

Gone Cruisin.

Red Wine Biscotti

New Resolution, Old Recipe: Savory Braided Onion Loaf

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