Pan Roasted Clams - Delish!

Made this for dinner last Wednesday for C and I as a predinner to the Japansese curry we were also cooking. The recipe is from David Chang's Momofuku cookbook for Pan Roasted Bouchot Mussels with OS but since I'm too scared to cook with mussels (ever since Tony Bourdain said he does not eat them in restaurants because of the unknown of how they are stored and held), I substituted clams. C loved them and said they were really good.

Now that I have more free time with school being done (did I mention I was taking grad classes--I got a 4.0 this semester) and it is lonely cooking for one, I have been trying to cook Sunday night dinners for some of my friends. This past Sunday, I made my own duck ravioli and then 12 pounds of clams. We ate almost all of them, but saved a few for my roommate who was at work at the time.

I forgot to take a picture of the homemade ravioli because I was busy cooking everything else. I did not love them, but my dinner guest said they were good. I served it with a demi-glace sauce. I also saved a lot of the duck fat to be used another time. Mmm..

Just Another Sunday

Everything is fabulous these days. I've been really happy and satisfied with 2011 so far. I just can't believe it is almost the end of April already!

J and N visited for the weekend. It was great and fun to catch up, not to mention all the laughing (even if it is at my expense...). I ended the relaxing weekend with baking all Sunday afternoon and having my usual Sunday night dinner at R&C's.

Blueberry Mochi Cake before going in the oven.

Result: Delicious. I love the texture of mochi and this was not too sweet. For the recipe, click here.

Chai-Spiced Crumb Coffee Cake. The crumb is my favorite part of coffee cake. I had about 3/4 of cup of crumb left. I should have sprinkled more in between the layers of the batter.

Because I did not think the chai spices were dominate enough. The cake was slightly dry for my taste as well. R said it was really good and he would pay money for it though. :) For recipe, click here.

Broken Glass Jello. Really easy to make. Super colorful.

And easy to share. The only hard part is waiting for the jello to set. I do not have much patience so waiting overnight for the final product was very difficult, but the results were well worth it. I don't normally like jello, but these were so fun and summery. For recipe, click here.

And I made mushroom and leek risotto for the Sunday dinner but I left in a hurry and forgot to take a photo. It was tasty though, just so you know. Happy Baking.

2010 in Baking

So it's been awhile. I cannot believe it is 2011 already. It's been crazy these past few months with work and prepping to start graduate school this spring (first day of class is next Tuesday, eek!). I have not even been keeping up with the blogs that I read, much less finding time to write my own. I am going to try to post slightly more frequently, but no promises. In the mean time, I figured I mind as well post up pictures of food I made before 2010 ended that I never got around to doing. In no particular order:

Pumpkin Stuffed with Everything Good (everything being cheese, bacon, bread, thyme, cream, etc.). Best recipe of 2010. From Dorie Greenspan. I heard her talk about it on NPR around Thanksgiving time and had to make it. So easy to make and so delicious.

If the pumpkin was the best recipe of 2010, these french cheese puffs are number two. I could easily eat a dozen of these. This is a David Lebovitz recipe and is fairly simple to make. I like to use a smokey cheddar or a saltier cheese. I also like to eat them plain or add a piece of salami with it. Either way, they are amazing!

Chocolate Macarons filled with Nutella ganache

Three cheese (Brie, Gruyere, Fontina) fondue with Champagne

Blueberry Oat Bar

Fourth of July Red Velvet Cupcakes

Tres Leche Cupcake (a la Martha Stewart)

Soba's One Year Old Birthday Cake (took the Wilton Basic Cake Decorating Class). Made KAF's classic yellow cake paired with Wilton's buttercream frosting.

Zucchini Bundt (to be honest, I can't really remember what this was, but I think it was zucchini).

Strawberry Daifuku (strawberry wrapped in red bean paste wrapped in mochi)-another YouTube Cooking with Dog recipe.

Lemon Cupcakes with Whipped Cream Frosting

One of my best friend's sister saw that I had a made a cake for Soba for her birthday and asked if I would make one for her dog, Drama, tenth birthday. I agreed and made the top 8 inch cake suitable to be eaten by a dog (carrot cake with peanut butter honey frosting and cream cheese honey decorating frosting) and the cupcakes fit for human friends (vanilla cupcake with buttercream frosting and white chocolate bone accent).

Mini pumpkin cheesecake-Joy of Baking recipe adapted to cupcake sized portions so it is more easily shared.

Harry Potter Cupcakes in celebration of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 1. Movie was amazing! I can't wait for the part two. Chocolate mint cupcakes with thicken whipped cream frosting.

Chouquettes: French Cream Puff filled with Nutella cream (adapted from David Lebovitz's recipe)

2010 was not too shabby, but it sure went by fast. I am expecting great things in 2011. Happy New Year!

Cold Soba Noodles

Summers in Southern Arizona gets ridiculously hot so one of my favorite things to eat for lunch is cold soba noodles. It's so quick, refreshing, and delicious!

I cooked the soba noodles in a large pot of soft boiling water (no rolling boil like you do with pasta and no salt!). Drain and rinsed in cold water. You can soak them in an ice bath, but I was too hungry to wait so mildly cold and not completely chilled was fine with me.

Then, you can add anything you like to it. We used shitake mushrooms, green onions, dried seaweed, and added a raw quail egg. I know making the tsuyu sauce is not too hard, but nowadays there are so many brands of tsuyu in Asian markets, it just makes things easier. I bought the Danya sobatsuyu the other day at Lee Lee's and it was just as tasty.

T had these Asian dishes and platter lying around so we finally used them. We're not usually this fancy ;)

Lemon Bundt Cake

In the middle of April, my boss was out of work for about two weeks because of knee surgery. I really like my boss so on the Monday of her return, I decided to bake her something. She loves lemon flavored things so I decided to make her Ina Garten's Lemon Yogurt Cake, which I had made a similar version in the past.

I made one and a half of the recipe so it would fit into a bundt pan because it was easier to serve at work. T made fun of me because he said, "What is this? The 1970s?" But after it was done, he even said it looked nice.

This cake has a really nice texture and is very moist. The lemon sauce that you pour onto the cake and the glaze gives it an extra oomph!

Dulce de Leche Duos

From Dorie Greenspan's Baking From My Home to Yours, she had a recipe for dulce de leche cookies and I just had to make them. I made my own dulce de leche (peeled off label from a can of sweetened condensed milk, put two tiny holes on top, put it in a sauce pan and made sure it was constantly filled with water 2/3 way up and let it cooked for about 3 hours), but the store bought stuff worked just as well and is way faster.

The recipe is a little time consuming because the cookies are small and you have to spread dulce de leche on each one to make a sandwich. I used a teaspoon to drop my cookies, but someone had suggest pipping them- just make sure you don't go much bigger than a teaspoon because the cookie does spread and when they are too big, they are a little too crispy.

It is rare that I eat a lot of my own baked goods, but these were so delicious that I must have eaten a good amount of them myself before sharing. They were so good that I made them twice that week and everyone LOVED them. I highly suggest these!

Dulce de Leche Duos
by Dorie Greenspan from Baking From My Home to Yours

2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 t baking soda
1/2 t salt
2 sticks (8 oz) unsalted butter, at room temperature
3/4 cups dulce de leche, plus more for filling
3/4 cup packed light brown sugar
1/2 cup sugar
2 large eggs

Position the racks to divide the oven into thirds and preheat the oven 350 degrees F. Line two baking sheets with parchment or silicone mats.

Whisk together the flour, baking soda and salt.
Working with a stand mixer, preferably fitted with a paddle attachment, or with a hand mixer in a large bowl, beat the butter at medium speed until soft. Add the 3/4 cup of dulce de leche and both sugars and continue to beat until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes.
Add the eggs one at a time, beating for 1 minute after each addition. Don't be concerned if the mixture looks a little curdled- it will smooth out when the flour mixture goes in. Reduce the mixer speed to low and add the dry ingredients, mixing only until they disappear into
the batter.
Spoon the dough onto the baking sheets, using a heaping teaspoon of dough for each cookie and leaving 2 inches between them.
Bake the cookies 10 to 12 minutes, rotating the pans from top to bottom and front the back at the midway point. The cookies should be honey brown with a light sugar crust, but they will still be soft, so remove the sheets from the oven but don't touch the cookies for another minute or two. Then, using a wide metal spatula, transfer the cookies to a rack to cool to room temperature.
Repeat with the remaining dough, making sure you cool the baking sheets before spooning the dough onto them.
When the cookies are completely cool, spread the flat bottoms of half the cookies with a small amount of dulce de leche, and sandwich with the flat sides of the remaining cookies.
Makes about 30 sandwich cookies

Vanilla Panna Cotta

I love my friend N and she loves panna cotta. It was over a month ago that I decided to make her some panna cotta. I do not remember the occassion, but she did help me immensely when I was having car troubles so perhaps I was being nice? Can't remember.

Panna cotta is super easy to make since baking is not even necessary. I tweaked a recipe for vanilla panna cotta that I had found on epicurious.

The recipe ask that you mix 4 tsp of unflavored gelatin into 2 cups of cream until it gets soft, but I was afraid the finished product would be too stiff so only used 3 tsp.

While the gelatin softens, heat 2 cups of whole milk, 1/2 cup of sugar, and the beans from 2 vanilla beans until the sugar has dissolved, amount 2 minutes. If you do not have vanilla beans, you can add 4 tsp of extract after the sugar has dissolved.

Whisk in the cream mixture to the milk mixture slowly. If you see lumps, make sure to strain this through a fine mesh sieved. Ladle the mixture to ramekins. Cover and refrigerate until the mixture has stiffen (about 6 hours).

I did not have enough ramekins for the amount of mixture so I used some of my white stemless wine glasses, which actually looked really nice.

I made my own quick strawberry sauce (heated 2 pints of strawberries, half cup of sugar, quarter cup of water, until the strawberries have broken down- adjust sugar and water if necessary) and spooned some on top.

I still have not figured out my light box and it's driving me insane! Photo above is with no flash and looks too yellow. Photo below is with a flash, white but horrible!

Pon Pon Patapon and Kingman

We went to Kingman, Arizona to visit T's family during his Spring Break from school in the middle of March. The day we left for Kingman was also T's birthday. He said he wanted a funfetti cake. I haven't made a box cake in ages and I thought it was funny that I was going to make one for the love of my life. I even said I could make him something fancier, maybe a chiffon cake or something more challenging, but he said nope, only funfetti- so funfetti it was.

Before we left, he had bought himself a PSP and was obsessed with this game called Patapon. I decided to theme his cake with the characters from Patapon (they are really cute afterall). I printed out pictures of the characters onto cardstock and staked them to wooden skewers. I used food coloring to make the frosting purple. I wanted to make a two tiered cake, and since his mom did not have wooden dowels, drinking straws worked just as well.

For not having a box cake in awhile or funfetti for that matter, I actually really liked it.

Also, Soba saw snow for the first time. She was so cute bouncing all around!

Momofuku Pork Belly Buns

After making the Pork Steam Buns awhile ago, S suggested that I test out the famous Momofuku's Pork Belly Buns by David Chang. She sent me the recipe here. It was simple enough and did not require that many ingredients, but there were a lot of steps.
My initial thought had been to make the brine for the pork belly on Monday night and have it sit until Tuesday after work, where I would roast the belly and make the dough. However, after making the brine and then reading through the entire recipe, I realized if I started at 5:30pm (usual time I get home after work), we would not actually eat until midnight. Thus, I had to push the work off to T, who graciously accepted and they turned out great!
I have never actually had Momofuku's before, but my sister had. I asked her if they were the same and she said no. She said Chang's were very greasy and fatty and the ones we made were not. She didn't actually say which ones were better, but she did say these were very good. Success!

They were absolutely delicious. The fattiness of the pork, lightness of the buns---heaven. I stopped my inner fat kid though and only had two buns while T had six! If it didn't take hours to make or was not so fattening, I would want to eat them all the time! I saw that the cost at Chang's restaurant was $9 for two buns. I think this cost us about $10 for over a dozen buns and we still had pork belly leftover.

Note: I used my light box and my sister's digital SLR camera to take these photos. I still cannot get the lighting the way I want it (why is it so yellow/orange?), but I think they turned out better than my usual iPhone photos. The second photo was without the lights and just the camera's flash.

Lemon Thyme Sea Salt Shortbread

I heard this recipe on NPR a few months ago and thought it sounded delicious. I love lemon flavored things and thyme is my favorite herb. I thought the sea salt would make an interesting addition to the savory biscuit.

I had really high hopes for this being really delicious, but unfortunately, I did not like them. They were very dry and I didn't think the lemon or thyme flavor really stood out. But maybe I just could not get over the very dryness of a usually very buttery shortbread.

It was weird that I blended the butter into the flour at room temperature. Typically, when making a dough, the butter should be ice cold. I might try these again sometime with some tweaks to the instructions. I made these the same night as the gorgonzola and leek creme brulee so I may have been distracted working on two separate thing. The best part about them was the nice salty finish on top.

Recipe from Savory Baking by Mary Cech. Click here.

Gorgonzola and Leek Creme Brulee

While looking for ideas for creme brulee flavors for my family last week, I stumbled upon a Gorgonzola and Leek Creme Brulee recipe on Epicurious.com. We were walking around the store earlier and T suggested I give it a try.

I have never made a savory creme brulee before and was excited to try this one out. I use to always say, "If I could only eat two things for the rest of my life, it would be donuts and cheese (except feta and goat)." I really like gorgonzola, but I was a little nervous that it was going to be too strong for the delicate custard, but it was not at all! The usually strong cheese really mellows out with the cream in the custard. The leek adds good flavor and texture. I've only had one bite so far because the custard has not set completely, but it was a tasty bite.

This is it before I added the parmesan crust. My roommates thought it was a quiche, which I guess it sort of is.

This is after the parmesan crust, which I browned by using my torch. I really do love that thing. Any excuse to use it is a good thing. T said it was one of the best things I've ever made. This is a keeper.

For recipe, click here.

Red Velvet Cupcakes

T's mom got me Martha Stewart's Cupcakes: 175 Inspired Ideas for Everyone's Favorite Treat for Christmas, and I had been itching to test out some of the recipes.

I had made the zucchini spiced muffins and one other recipe from the book since I was able to find the recipe from other websites, but ever since I got the book, I have not been able to decide on what to try first.

Last week, I suddenly had an urge to make Red Velvet Cupcakes. I probably have not made them in over a year and I could not actually remember where I found my old recipe, so I thought I would give Martha a try.

Sadly, they did not turn out. The batter was very thin and I opened my oven door to early to check them and they fell immediately. I do not like how she mixed the baking soda with the vinegar in the end. I do not know what really happened, but I think that was the downfall (literally). These went right into the trash.

The next day, I tried again, but this time I used Magnolia's recipe since I like their vanilla cupcake recipe so much. This batter was thicker, however, they also do the baking soda mixed with vinegar and it confirmed my belief that I am no good at that method. These cupcakes turned out better since I watched them rise from my oven window and was careful not to open too early. But they still were not very domed.

I made a mixture of mini and regular sized cupcakes. Everyone knows the best red velvet is topped with cream cheese frosting so I skipped Magnolia's vanilla and piped on Martha's cream cheese frosting. I took them to work and a sorority rush event and everyone said they were good, so I guess that's okay. For Magnolia's recipe, go here.

I think I will just have to go back and search my archive for what red velvet recipe I used in the past. I will probably try it again in a few months. I'm a little red velvet out after one complete fail and one minor fail.

Espresso Creme Brulee

I love creme brulee. I love how easy it is to make, it's sorta fancy, and everyone loves it. Last day after Thanksgiving, I ate dinner at N's house and her brother made espresso creme brulee, which was DELICIOUS. I asked him for the recipe shortly after via facebook, but I never got around to making it until last week.

I was mostly inspired to make it because I went to Ross to get another dog food bowl (since Soba is growing so fast and couldn't share with Obs). What I also found were six mini 2 oz. ramekin dishes! I love all things mini and these were such a great deal (six for $2.99) that I decided the next day I had to make creme brulee.

I also lost my home torch awhile back so I bought a new one. This was $25.95 and I love it. It is so much better than my old torch since it has so much more power. Oh, that brocolli on the board is from our garden.

Of course six mini ramekin dishes only holds 12 oz of the mixture so I made some in my normal ramekins and since it was espresso flavored, I decided to make some in our espresso cups as well.

Like I said, so simple. You only need a few ingredients and you just need to watch your custard so it doesn't overcook. If I do say so myself, these were perfectly done. I took some home to Phoenix and my family immediately asked me to make more next weekend. Therefore, this past weekend I brought them vanilla creme brulee, almond creme brulee, and of course, more espresso creme brulee.

Stay tuned: Tonight I made gorgonzola and leek creme brulee. They are currently cooling on the counter.

Espresso Creme Brulee (no source as N's brother facebooked me the recipe):
Ingredients
4 cups heavy cream , chilled
2/3 cup granulated sugar
pinch table salt
1/4 cup espresso beans placed in zipper-lock bag and crushed lightly
with rolling pin or meat pounder until coarsely cracked
12 large egg yolks
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
8 - 12 teaspoons turbinado sugar or Demerara sugar

Instructions
1. Adjust oven rack to lower-middle position and heat oven to 300 degrees.
2. Combine 2 cups cream, sugar, and salt in medium saucepan; add espresso beans to pan, submerged in cream, and bring mixture to boil over medium heat, stirring occasionally to ensure that sugar dissolves. Take pan off heat and let steep 15 minutes to infuse
flavors.
3. Meanwhile, place kitchen towel in bottom of large baking dish or roasting pan and arrange eight 4- to 5-ounce ramekins (or shallow fluted dishes) on towel. Bring kettle or large saucepan of water to boil over high heat.
4. After cream has steeped, stir in remaining 2 cups cream to cool down mixture. Whisk yolks and vanilla extract in large bowl until broken up and combined. Whisk about 1 cup cream mixture into yolks until loosened and combined; repeat with another 1 cup cream. Add remaining cream and whisk until evenly colored and thoroughly combined. Strain through fine-mesh strainer into 2-quart measuring cup or pitcher (or clean medium bowl); discard solids in strainer. Pour or ladle mixture into ramekins, dividing it evenly among them.
5. Carefully place baking dish with ramekins on oven rack; pour boiling water into dish, taking care not to splash water into ramekins, until water reaches two-thirds height of ramekins. Bake
until centers of custards are just barely set and are no longer sloshy and digital instant-read thermometer inserted in centers registers 170 to 175 degrees, 30 to 35 minutes (25 to 30 minutes for shallow fluted dishes). Begin checking temperature about 5 minutes before recommended
time.
6. Transfer ramekins to wire rack; cool to room temperature, about 2 hours. Set ramekins on rimmed baking sheet, cover tightly with plastic wrap, and refrigerate until cold, at least 4 hours or up to 4 days.

*He told me instead of doing the crushed espresso bean, he put in two tsp of Colombia Starbucks Via Instant, which is what I did. I made it before not using Via and the espresso taste is not as rich so I suggest that as well.

Pork Steamed Buns

T found this video about two weeks ago on YouTube posted by cookingwithdog. It's "How to Make Nikuman (Chinese-Style Steamed Pork Buns)."

I was visiting my grandma the same weekend he showed me the video so I asked her for some good dried mushroom and dried shrimp and I have since made three batches and he, two. I followed the video recipe exactly (except I added an extra dash or two of soy sauce and oyster sauce).

This is a photo of the first batch T made. He made the dough and the meat filling and I had to pleat, which I am terrible at doing, as you can tell:

The next day, I decided to try to make my own. I kept replaying parts of the video because I am not very good at dough making. I was paranoid that I was going to miss a step or mess it up somewhere along the way. But it wasn't too bad. I got better at the pleating!

It's actually very easy, but a little time consuming because of the prep of all the ingredients and waiting for the dough to rise. The dough is soft, fluffy and flavorful due to the dashi and sesame oil. The meat filling is filled with yummy goodness. We used cabbage from our garden which made it even better. We have about 5 plants of cabbage this big.

All in all, the buns are tasty and we will probably continue making these from time to time.

Snickerdoodles? Yes, Please!

I saw on M's Cherry Dot blog that she made a snicker doodle pie for Thanksgiving. She said she found the recipe in a magazine. You can see her pie and the recipe here.

I decided to try it myself on Tuesday since I love snickerdoodles (anything cinnamon, really) and was curious to see what a pie form of the tasty cookie would be like. The pie filling is simple to make and takes no time at all. I had T make me a pie crust because he makes the best one. They are always flaky and buttery.

The pie turned out great and delicious! It has a good texture and flavor. It is slightly tart from the buttermilk and not overly sweet. Just simple clean taste. My only complaint? You don't taste the cinnamon sugar that was sprinkled on top. T said it was the second best pie he had ever tasted (first being the Kahlua pie from Marie Calendar's, bleh I say--it's not even homemade). I will definitely be making this again, just with more cinnamon sugar.

I really do need to learn how to properly crimp the pie crust on the edge. This is the second time my pie edge has turned out all funky.

That same night I also decided to make snickerdoodle cookies because I was afraid the pie would not be good so I wanted a backup dessert. I made the KAF Sugar Cookie recipe (found here) and rolled them in cinnamon sugar. I ran out of all-purpose flour and had to use bread flour instead. Since this made them a bit more puffy, I had a hard time judging when to pull them out. I think they were a little overdone, but everyone who tried them said they were delicious.