bfmp: blog for me please!

i gotta step outta the kitchen, but i'll be back. in the meantime, i was wondering if anyone would be interested in blogging for me pleeeeeease! it's v. simple--i provide the photos, you provide the appropriate comments/recipes/instructions/insults. c'mon, it'll be fun. at least more fun than checking an un-updated blog for awhile....

oh, commenters, might be wise to space out your replies. don't know when the viking will let me return.

macadamia-coconut macaroons with mint tea

got this from a magazine--donna hay or olive or good food? i don't know, but now i can't find the recipe, the page, those magazines. man, i am losing my paper and my mind.

ukoy

ukoy, patties made from finely grated camote (sweet potato), papaya, and onions, topped with shrimp, and fried with a tempura-like mix of flour, cornstarch, and water. one of my favourite filipino dishes, mainly for the texture--you bite into the crispy, caramelized shell, and inside the veggies are meltingly soft and sweet.

self-saucing chocolate pudding

bill granger, again. kind of like those schmantzy lava cakes, but lighter, not so sweet, with a lovely, cocoa-ey ooze when you dig in. mmmm. recipe here.

grilled gravlax pizza

when i made the asian-style gravlax, i also cured a bit with peppercorns and lots and lots of dill. even though it's cured, it has to be eaten soon, and i keep forgetting to pass by the store to get some brown bread and capers to eat it in a traditional manner. so last night, i made a simple pizza dough base (3 cups of flour, 1 cup of water, glug of olive oil, salt, and a packet of yeast) in the bread maker, got a mani-pedi (aah), then slapped that dough on the grill with some olive oil, turned it over once, then added fontina cheese. once it got all grilly crisp on the bottom and gooey cheesy on top, i topped it with thinly sliced gravlax, sour cream mixed with dill, and some chives.

matcha meringue with mango

this sort of deconstructed pavlova is on the other end of the dessert spectrum from the ladyfinger sammich: matcha green tea meringue, with sliced mango, ginger-lime thingy, and a bit of mint. the matcha meringue was made with the four egg whites left from the custard i made for the frozen cream, 2/3rds of a cup of sugar, and a tablespoon of powdered green tea, beaten until stiff peaks form, then baked in a low heat oven until dry.

i am seriously bad at baking meringues, they always go brown on me, but it doesn't matter for this as the lovely celadon colour comes through anyway. i usually start with an oven preheated to 250˚f, and bake them for an hour, then drop the temp to 200˚f and bake them for another hour, then leave them in the oven overnight until they are dry. doesn't always do the trick, depending on the humidity, so i'll turn on the oven and try again. tricky things.

i don't make tiramisu

it's not that i don't like tiramisu, it's just that everytime i buy the savoiardo/ladyfinger biscuits for it, i end up eating them all. so very, very, good in a weird old-lady cookie sort of way--dry, not so sweet, not so rich.



since the ginger-lime cream i made was excessively rich, i decided to pair it with these biccies by sandwiching a couple spoonfuls in between them, then wrapping them up and bunging them in the freezer for lovely little frozen treats, ready at any time. mmm. there's that purple clingfilm again.

ginger-lime frozen cream

last week's impulse purchase had been taunting me prettily on the counter all weekend, so i finally decided to do something with it. of course, deciding to do something is often the biggest effort i'm willing to expend in a project. it would have been lovely to see this in a ginger-lime cheesecake, a slice, or a glaze for a roasted chicken, but that would require expending more energy than i was willing to in the kitchen. there was a beach/a bar/a friend/"shaun of the dead" beckoning.

since we're in the middle (beginning/end) of an endless summer, i went for the coolest option: freezing. i mixed one cup of milk, with one cup of heavy cream, and one cup of ginger-lime marmalade (any marmalade/jam/preserve would work) in a saucepan, and heated it on low heat until the marmalade melted and the mixture just came to the boil. i whisked four egg yolks in a separate bowl, took the cream-marmalade off the heat, and slowly added it to the yolks until well incorporated. i returned it to the heat, and cooked it on medium-low until a custard was formed. i waited for it to cool, threw it in a container, and into the freezer. every half hour for a couple of hours, i'd stir the mixture up, breaking down the ice crystals, so a smooth frozen cream would form. it did. yay.

supah-rich, this stuff is. nicely gingery and limey (next time i'll add lime zest and grated ginger before freezing), and like buttah, baby.

i used this as a component to a couple of different confections which i shall post about...next!

guam ♥s SPAM

a couple of months ago, reid at ono kine grindz posted a photo of the very fabulous limited edition hawaiian SPAM can. hawaii has the greatest SPAM consumption of the states (6 cans per person), but scarily, guam beats that by 45% more per person.



in honour of such a dubious distinction, not only does guam have its own limited edition can, but it also has it's own flavour, the hot and spicy SPAM. yeah, i know, there's hot and spicy in other places, but as shawn radford, museum curator (!) for the official SPAM museum puts it:

"We actually make (a) particular can just for Guam, that's called hot and spicy. We do have a hot and spicy can that's sold in the U.S. However, hot and spicy made for Guam is really hot and really spicy," says Radford.

oh yeah, shawn, work that description there (btw, guam also has the highest per capita consumption of tabasco, roughly 4oz of sauce for every man, woman, child, baby, dog and turtle). i honestly can't tell you how spicy it is, but dang, it is enough to be inedible to some. i am guessing that it would be the equivalent amount of heat in a 2 oz. bottle of the stuff. haaaaaaht.



on the back of the can is a recipe for fried rice from a popular local diner, shirley's. this incensed some of the other dining establishments so much, they refused to serve the processed meat loaf altogether (didn't last long, although they still don't serve the spicy version).



i bought this rather fetching SPAM purse during my recent shopping spree at the abc store. it contains one can of spicy, one of garlic, a commemorative one, and a bumper sticker to boot. i don't know if it's a popular gift with tourists, but locals love it. claire, who is back on holiday, is bringing one back for a mainland guammie who specifically asked for guam SPAM. is there a difference? maybe with the meat, but definitely with the can.



this limited edition can commemorates SPAM's role in guam's liberation from japanese forces during world war 2. hm. perhaps as...ammo? as you can see, not as cute as the hawaiian one, but there's a cute carabao on the can. *on*, not in.

perusing the aisles of abc.

talk about convenience

abc stores, a familiar fixture in waikiki in hawaii, and in tumon here on island (three in vegas too!). a tourist haven of convenience items, food, and cheapo cheapie souvenirs. yay! more photos here.


neon sushi


onigiri/omusubi

recipe: gravlax, asian stylee.

i had a fresh, hefty salmon fillet i didn't feel like eating right away, but i was afraid a couple days in the fridge would do it harm, so i decided make gravlax, or cured salmon. gravlax is a swedish word, coming from grava, which means "to bury" (from the original method of burying the cured fish in the ground) and lax, or "salmon". i wasn't planning on burying it, although if i had that kim chee refrigerator, i'd be stylin'.

i decided to change my normal method for curing, which is traditional and uses a lot of dill for flavour. i took my cues from chef roy yamaguchi, who has several restaurants around the pacific rim that specialize in what he calls hawaiian fusion cuisine. one of the appetizers i've tried in his restaurant on island is an oriental-style cured salmon, which was wonderfully scented with lemongrass and ginger.

to make gravlax, you must cut the salmon fillet into two equal portions, leaving the skin on, but making several slashes in the skin. rub a couple tablespoons of vodka or sake all over the fish, then follow with a little white miso paste. in a bowl, combine equal parts of kosher salt, white sugar, and brown sugar (a quarter cup of each should be enough if your fillet is less than a pound). massage this mixture well into the exposed salmon flesh. prepare a mix of the following:

minced ginger
minced garlic
chopped lemongrass
peppercorns
chopped cilantro

spread this onto the exposed sides of the fish, then lay sliced ginger and a good handful of cilantro onto one fillet (and star anise if you like the flavour) then place the second fillet on top of it with the exposed sides facing each other, like a sandwich. wrap this bundle tightly in foil or clingfilm, then in a resealable bag. keep in refrigerator, weighted down--a storage box of leftovers, a six pack of beer, a wheel of cheese, whatever. resist the urge to peek for 24 hours.

the next day, open up the packet. the salmon should start to get a little translucent and compact. flip the fillets so the skin sides are pressed together (keep the ginger, cilantro and star anise in the middle as well), rewrap, refrigerate and weight. and wait. for another 24 hours.

when it is done, the salmon should be sort of a cross between sashimi and lox, almost candied. slice thinly to serve.

i decided to serve mine on shiso (perilla) leaves. another hawaiian chef, alan wong, has an appetizer in his cookbook, new wave luau, of sizzled salmon belly and smoked salmon in chiso (shiso) leaves, which is where i got the idea.



mince the gravlax finely, with chopped cilantro, onion sprouts, and a squeeze of lemon and place on heaping mound on an individual shiso leaf. top with a mixture of sour cream, wasabi paste, and lemon.



simple, elegant, different.

baby, baye-baye bye....

truthfully, i am not sure what these little discs of mashed taro and coconut are called. i've been told they are baye-baye(báhyeh báhyeh), a particular delicacy from the negros oriental province in the philippines, but i thought those were made with coconut and pinipig, a sort of pounded rice flake. strangely addictive greyish discs of carb and coconut, these are. any ideas?

mussels in coconut milk

mussels, cooked in a broth of coconut milk, seasoned liberally with lemongrass, cilantro, ginger, garlic, lime zest, and green jalapeño chile pepper. as i was eating inhaling it, i thought it could be taken to another level if i had run all the herbies through a food processor or finely minced them so that the coconut broth would be a gorgeous shade of green and more intensely flavoured.

hm. next time.

dream kitchen

even though my kitchen isn't quite finished, i'm beginning to map out renovation of my folks' kitchen. i have a pretty good idea of what i want to do in there, but i'm still in the planning stage.

has anyone done any kitchen renovation? is there anything you absolutely LOVE about your space or something you would absolutely change, given the chance?

do you have a dream appliance? i have to say, i would love a kim chee refrigerator for home kim chee fermentation. hey! it's my fantasy. in it, i eat a lot of kim chee.

quickie cucumber condiment

quick cucumber salad to go with your red rice and barbecue: chop up some cucumbers, add to finadene.

now how simple is that?

recipe: easy chamorro red rice.

a staple at guam fiestas and on party plates is red rice. it is most likely a bastardization of paella, the saffron-tinted rice dish from spain. saffron threads are from the stamen of the crocus sativa which is indigenous to western asia, but is not found on guam. its substitute is achote, or annatto seed, which is found in the pods delightfully named bixa orellana, a shrub originally from the carribbean but transplanted on the islands during the spanish exploration days. achote does not have a noticeable flavour, but when the seeds are soaked in water, it imparts a distinctive orange-red dye, which is essential to the dish.



for this recipe, prepare 3 cups of short grained rice for cooking in a rice cooker. set aside.



sautée one finely chopped medium yellow onion (or half a large one), with 6 to 8 slices of smoky streaky bacon, chopped finely (i cut this bacon rather chunkily, by request). drain off any excess oil, and add this to the rice pot. for a vegetarian version, add a little more onion, and a little hickory or kiawe liquid smoke, if desired.



achote comes in seed form, which must be soaked, but also comes in more convenient powder or liquid forms. i use powder, which can be found in many latino food shops as annatto or achiote. i add one scant tablespoon of the powder for every cup of rice cooked, but adjust it according to your colour preference--i like mine to be more orange, while others prefer a deeper, almost paprika-hued red. close the lid to your cooker, and cook as regular rice.



mix the rice through to distribute the onions and bacon and it's done!

recipe: a lighter leche flan.

leche flan (léh-che flahn) is a baked or steamed egg and milk custard with a caramel glaze quite popular in the philippines. a typical recipe calls for a dozen egg yolks, condensed milk, and whole milk--a dairy delight. i like leche flan, but can only take it in small doses, as it's quite rich, sweet, thick, and creamy.

i don't exactly recall why i started making lighter flans. i don't think it was for health reasons, but while it's not healthy in any way, this version is probably less bad for you. i do like this better than most, as it's not as cloyingly sweet or that...that...i don't know how to describe it, it's that milky sticky cheese-like texture that bugs me sometimes. but it is still quite sweet, and rich. you will not mistake this for a "diet" recipe.

the typical philippine-style flan is oval shaped and relatively thin; the best mold i've seen is those large flat-bottomed ovoid sardine or mackerel tins (not the ones with the key; did you see "chungking express"? like the ones tony leung had.) if you don't have any, you can use pretty much anything round or oval or even loaf tins.

this recipe is enough for two flans:

6-8 egg yolks, depending on the size of the yolk and how firm you want your flan
1 can condensed milk
water
dayap or lime zest or vanilla extract or almond extract (i almost always use the citrus zest)

whisk the egg yolks together. add the can of condensed milk, one scant canful of water (swirl it around to get all the milk clinging to the sides), zest or extract. whisk together well. set aside.

the caramel topping is simple. i don't know if i should tell you how simple it can be, so first let me tell you the conventional method: place one cup of white sugar with 1/4th cup of water in a saucepan, cook over medium-low heat, stirring often, until the sugar begins to caramelize. once it reaches a light golden colour, turn off the heat, but continue stirring. the caramel should darken more to a light maple syrup colour. i'm not sure how long this takes as i usually make the caramel in the microwave, which i think is highly frowned upon, but let me tell you, it works. however, you really have to watch it--it can all go kablooey in seconds. it's best to make it in small batches, so for this recipe, put one-half cup of sugar and two to three tablespoons of water in a heavy glass microwaveable measuring cup (a 2-cup one works best), set microwave at highest setting, zap until it turns light golden colour (about a minute and a half in a 1300watt oven), turn off (it will continue to darken). you will need to stand in front of your microwave and watch the colour intently--it only takes a couple of seconds more for it to get too dark, bitter and acrid. if this sounds dangerous and/or overwhelming, stick to the stove top method. pour the caramel (quickly!) into the bottom of your mold, coat the bottom and a little up the sides (see pretty photo in previous post). this is enough caramel for one mold, so repeat for the second one.

fill each of the coated molds with half the custard mixture. it should not go above 1 1/2 inches from the bottom, unless you want to live dangerously, as any deeper and it may not set properly and collapse on you when you plate it.



me, i like to live dangerously (snort).

place the molds in a larger roasting pan, and then into the oven preheated to 375˚f. pour hot water into the roasting pan until it reaches halfway up the sides of the mold. cook in this bain-marie for 1 hour (up to two hours, if your flan is quite thick) or until the top and sides are firm (the middle might be a little shaky underneath the top, depending on the thickness of your flan). chill for several hours or ideally, overnight.

to unmold your flan, run a sharp knife along the edge, place a plate on top, and holding both plate and mold firmly, invert. the caramel will have thinned considerably, so take care not to spill all the amber loveliness.



update: four out of four flan tasters agree: "it's normal!"

chicken kelaguen in tortillas

typical guam snack: chicken kelaguen, wrapped in a flour tortilla, for the chamorro on the go.

the 8500 calorie sandwich

(i just realised that i have problems typing "calorie", i always type "caroline" first; all the carolines i know are skinnier than sticks. what does this mean?)

ANYWAY, to the sandwich. (found via new yorkish)

blueberry butter cake

i buy a lot of cookbooks and food magazines from australia because i think much of the food is suited to island lifestyle and product/produce availability. i look for simple recipes without a lot of pfaff (a little pfaff is good :-)), and of course, gorgeous photos.

i don't think i'd ever made something from a book where the end product looked exactly like the photo, until i discovered bill granger's cookbooks. whatever i cook from any of them looks just as gorgeous as the picture in the book. that is so hot. i am so shallow. luckily, the food tastes as good as it looks, most recipes are easy to prepare, and the ingredients can be found with relative ease. whoo, bill.

this cake is from sydney food, one of my favourite cookbooks overall. i would love to reproduce all my favourite recipes from here, but i think buying the book would be the better way to go for all concerned.

**update: i originally had posted the recipe ("sydney food," page 108) but i found it here as well. as i don't quite get the whole copyright issue thingy, just click on the link to get the full recipe.**



notes: i used 2 1/2 cups of blueberries, just because, and a tablespoon of yuzu (a japanese citrus fruit--if you were so inclined, i'd use a mix of lemon and lime) zest in the cake batter. my regular oven wasn't working so i used a tabletop convection oven on non-convection mode (bigger than a toaster oven, smaller than convential oven), and it took almost twice the cooking time, 1 hour and 45 minutes. hm. if anyone decides to try this recipe, could you tell me if the regular cooking time works?

a wedding minute

esther and lyndon are probably still celebrating. the little giveaways were chopsticks and a soy sauce bowl, a sachet of tea.

i don't know the couple very well at all; i don't even think they knew i attended. i wonder if they'll ever find out about this post.

the bride's brother made the cake. han is solo no more.

pocari (gonna make you) sweat

...by producing a bottle with a graphic of what looks to be a typhoon forming over southern japan.

just in time for one of the busiest typhoon/hurricane seasons ever.

garlic soup with linguiça and parsley

i saw a photo of a soup done by rick stein in the september issue of delicious magazine; i had fully intended on following the recipe, but i lost the issue, and i don't really remember what the creamy stuff was--potatoes? cauliflower? earwax? no matter. my cousin's aunt (other other side of family) has a predilection for cooking using visual clues, which can lead to some, uh, interesting results; lasagna made with enchilada sauce and processed american cheese comes to mind (sorry, tita--you do good soup, though). alarmingly, i seem to be picking up on this trait, but thankfully, i seem to stick to relatively "safe" food items (imagine if the soup had been blue...). so, i decided to wing it.

having said that, i'm not so sure about this one. i'm fairly positive i've got the visuals correct, and i'm close enough with the fried linguiça(portuguese sausage)and parsley that i used instead of the chorizo in the rick stein version. for the soup i settled on a garlic-potato soup made from chicken stock, sautéed onions in butter, a couple of potatoes and a head or so of garlic simmered until the potatoes and garlic go soft, a cup of heavy cream, then whizzied through the blender. a little salt, a little white pepper, and i had something very mellow but tasty. i garnished accordingly, and dug in.

hm.

the soup was full bodied, but cooking had tempered the bite of the garlic significantly. on its own, it was great, but with the addition of the linguiça (even milder than the chorizo), it became bland and tasteless. the spicy sausage was drowned in the sea of white, like a blanket of mashed potato. sort of a waste, really.

maybe i should have gone for the spicier chorizo. maybe i should look for the magazine.

in my shopping basket: kewpie

when i speak of mayonnaise, it's mostly kewpie brand japanese mayonnaise. what makes it different from the american stuff is that it's creamier, slightly sweeter yet slightly tarter, and generally just tastes better to me just because it actually tastes like something. it also comes in this really cool plastic squeeze bottle that has a star-shaped tip, so you've got an instant decoration tool.

salmon sushi

had a little leftover salmon, added some basil leaves, a little japanese mayonnaise, and onion sprouts.



onion sprouts. who knew. i didn't.

"At first I thought it was a giant football"

my photo service is wigging out on me, making it impossible to post photos. ok, all better now.

so, for your entertainment:

monster mushroom found in scottish field

and, to add to scotland's scariness:

scottish couple grow monster vegs by sprinkling them with rocks

meats and cheeses, wilma! what is going on?

poached salmon with herby potatoes

poached salmon, on a bed of potatoes in herby mayonnaise. completely and utterly inspired by/ripped off from a recent post on noodlepie about the incredible burrastow.

i've been drooling over the location and the food for the better part of a week now, so i thought i'd better do something about it. since it was easier to recreate the recipes than come up with $500k (burrastow's for sale!), i went for the salmon. pieman mentioned that the food was like "delia-gone-rough-around-the-edges", so i headed to delia, and found my starting point.

i boiled four largish red potatoes in salted water until tender, drained and cubed them, but left them in the pot to stay warm. i followed delia's recipe for the mayonnaise, but instead of the green herbs she suggested, i used what fresh ones i had: parsley, basil, dill, and mint. i folded the mayonnaise into the warm potatoes, and set them aside.

unfortunately, i didn't have scottish farmed salmon to work with, but that meant that i didn't feel so bad about cooking the fillet in the microwave--maybe sacrilegious, but it really works. i put the 1 3/4 inch thick fillet in a microwaveable dish, seasoned it with salt and pepper, topped it with 1 bay leaf, a generous amount of fresh dill, and a teaspoon sized pat of butter. it was then covered in clingfilm, and zapped at half-power in a 1200 watt microwave for 4 1/2 minutes. perfectly, barely cooked through--not a dried out bit anywhere.

mmmmmmmmm.mmmmf.mmm. i don't know if it's anything like what pieman and noodlegirl had, but it doesn't matter. still pretty darn good.