Place you should try: Asha tea house

If you blink you will miss it. Right on the corner of Shattuck and University in Berkeley, tucked behind the Citibank is the best Boba you will ever have. Quality teas, always shaken, and seasonal fruit flavors such as kumquat await you. The space is also well designed. It is pretty much stripped down to is cement core, but details such as interesting lighting features and perfect soft lighting will make you want to stay. The people helping you are usually nice. There is also a table where you could store your points card alphabetically by name. It reminds of me of the way we used to have to fetch library books by looking through those drawers. You know you always leave your points card at home! I hate that! I get scared someone will steal my free drink but I am hoping for the best and hope someone adds stamps on mine instead! Parking sucks. No lie. But there is a garage the next st. Hope for the best! 

I just discovered America's Test Kitchen

I've been cooking for 10 years now and have never caught a single episode of ATK. It must have been SoCal. My cable never picked it up, which is strange because its on Public TV. So now..I am not only a Public radio junkie. I am officially a Public TV junkie. I love ATK. They test the recipes before they show you how to make something, combining science with food. I caught the episode where they make Chicago style pizzas. I never had Chicago style pizza's until I moved here to The Bay Area where 2 main local chains seem to hold the title for the best deep dish pizza -Zachery's and Little Star. Well now they will have to compete with my kitchen, because I tried making Chicago Style Deep Dish Pizzas and I conquered it! Its quite fun make it, and dare I say, easy to make. This may be worth putting together versus the commute, wait, and price of having it out. Another reason, why I like ATK, recipe and procedures are dummy proof and you can find ingredients at your local grocery store. No need to go to a specialty and the ratios are easy to follow. I may have the recipe memorized by now. I may have watched the video over 5x times. I won't write the recipe, because I already told you where I got it. But here are my pics! To make life easier, you will need a Standing Mixer and you will need probably a good 3 hrs saved for your 1st time making it for all the Prep and Baking time. There's a few resting periods, but time passes easily as you are preparing other parts of the pizza during the resting periods such as the sauce and the toppings. After practice you can probably knock one out after 1.5 hrs. Baking time is actually not that long at a good 30 mins, made in your 9" cake pan. The fascinating part is that at one point you take your dough and put a layer of butter on top. Then roll up the dough like a jellyroll! How fun! This is what makes the flully layers. The butter creates steam in between the layers. Each pie has about 1 stick in butter in it over all between it being in the dough recipe, the layer, and the sauce!  Our pizza toppings had three themes, The kid pleaser with pepporoni and mushroom. The sister pleaser: with Italian sausage in the sauce and anchovies sprinkled on top, mushroom and olives of course. And a meat-zza for the men. That had sausage, pepperoni, bacon, olives and mushroom. And lucky dudes, their pizza pie was made in a cast iron pan, which produced a crunchier crust.

Pantry staple: Fresh pasta

So..so far. I may sound like I only eat dishes with rice. Not true. While, yes, rice may be my favorite grain. I love pasta! Or rather noodles. I make ramen or a pasta dish probably once a week. Have you tried fresh pasta? I love the bite of fresh pasta. I actually crave for that texture, not just simply pasta. My favorite source for fresh pasta is Pheonix Pacifico. Their kitchen is located in Berkeley. I have yet to visit their kitchen, because they were closed the one day I went. So...I wait for them to arrive to my doorstep at the Temescal Farmers Market in Oakland. I think my fridge always has a batch of one their pastas. I love their linguine cut the best. My favorite flavor is their Habenero and Yellow Pepper Pasta. I'm addicted to the taste and heat habenero. The have other flavors as well such as Garlic Parsley, Meyer Lemon, and Portabella Mushroom pasta. 12 oz of pasta will set you back about $7. I will do a variety of things to the pasta including making a bolognese sauce with an Italian sausage, mushrooms, tomato, and red wine sauce. The lemon and parsley  pasta go well with more lemon, cheese (try goat chevre or grated parmesan), and green veggies, such as brocollini or asparagus.  Here are photos of their pasta before I turn in into something awesome.

Pantry staple: Chicken wings

Chicken wings are good to have in your freezer. They are cheap and easy to out together.  A little salt and pepper can already make decent wings. I made 3 batches of wings that set me buck 3 bucks or something. The first batch just had garlic powder, salt, and pepper. Rubbed on right before frying. The other batch I had marinated in habenero pepper, tamarind, soy, vinegar, lemon, and a little cinnamon (Caribbean inspired) <---that was my favorite batch. The 3rd batch was marinating in greek yogurt, saffron, and citrus. Notice that I am just reusing things in my pantry. Not a mistake. Here are a pic of my garlic chicken wings. I simply fried them in coconut oil of course. Working for a company that sells fat sorta makes you not scared of fat. Carbs and sugar..now that's what spikes your insulin and helps you store fat. I'm not a doctor though,. So...don't take my word on it.

Oops Sorry for Sucking for not Posting!

Sorry. For not posting for awhile. Maybe I have not cook in awhile (not true). Maybe things just got crazy. Maybe I have not figured out what this blog will do.

Chicken in yogurt and citrus and eggplant dip

Growing up on Guam, I was not exposed to that much food from outside our local food culture, so when I was first exposed to Persian food, I was delighted. It was quite easy to find Persian food while I lived in L.A, and I often had it out because, well, I 've never made it at home. Here is my recipe  for chicken marinated in yogurt, saffron, and citrus, eggplant dip, as well as saffron rice to accompany the dish. 

So first let's get your chicken marinating. 

Chicken breast

1 orange

1 lime

1/4 Onion

1 clove garlic

1/4 cup Yogurt

Pinch of saffron. 

Get your chicken breast. Remove zest from the orange and lime. Add to chicken. Squeeze all the fresh juice onto chicken. Add onion, garlic, yogurt, and saffron. Let chicken marinate while preparing rice and eggplant dip. 

The rice.

1.5 cup Basmati rice

2 cups water 

1/4 ts Saffron

1/4 cup yogurt 

First you need saffron. Smash it. Put it in about 2 tablespoons of water. Put it aside.  

Rinse rice a few times, then cook the rice in a lot of water, about 1 inch of water on top of the rice. Cook for 10 minutes on Low boil. Get your colander.  Drain the water out (like you do for pasta). 

Take about 2 tablespoons of rice out and mix with that saffron water you created. 

Oil your pot, and cover the bottom with yogurt. Add the white rice back in the pot. The yogurt will add flavor and help create a crusty layer of rice. Add the saffron rice on top. Stick holes in your rice to help rice steam. 

Stick towel on the top, covered and let the rice steamed. Then finished it off at a higher temp for a few minutes, to let the crust form. It's done. To serve, flip upside down onto a plate. 

Eggplant dip

1 large eggplant

1 onion

1 Clovegarlic

1/4 cup yogurt

1 tbsp fresh mint

 

Eggplant. I like to partially peel mine. Because I like skin, but not too much. Cut into 1/4" slices. Oil a sheet pan. Sprinkle salt and drizzle oil on your eggplant. Bake at 375 for about 15 minutes. 

Meanwhile, cut onions into 1/4" cubes and add to a pot that had about 1 tbs olive oil heating up it. Cook on low heat. Allie onions to Carmelize slowly, for about 15 minutes. 

Now your eggplant should be done. It should be soft now, a little see through, and a little brown. 

So add minced garlic to your pot. Throw in your eggplant. Smash it like crazy in your pot. Add 1/4 cup yogurt. Finish up with the minced mint. 

So now let's grill the chicken. Pull your chicken out. I have a griddle pan so I use that to grill my chicken, stove top. Great, if you actually have a grill. Remove chicken from marinade and pay dry with a towel.  That's how you get good grill marks. :) Drizzle with oil. Season with salt, pepper,And grill! Do not forget to grill a fresh whole tomato too. That is it is usually served. 

Sinigang (Sinampalukang) Manuk

Sinigang, probably after lumpia, adobo, and pancit, sinigang is another classic Filipino dish. Sinigang is a tart filipino soup. The tart ingredients help with tenderizing meat so you end up with a really tender meat in your soup. Sinignang is great to make with pork, beef, chicken, or fish. When making sinigang with white meat such as chicken and finsh, you add ginger to mix. For beef and pork, omit ginger. The tartness of the soup, brings out the sweetness in rice,so the always serve this soup with rice.

Historically, sinigang used local sour fruits, such as kalamansi and sinkamas, to sour the soup, but some time in the last few decades, a popular restaurant chain in the Philippines used tamarind in their soup, and it caught on. Now tamarind in sinigang is pretty much the default souring agent and most people don't think twice about it.

So how is everyone messing it up? By using store-bought ready-made soup bases!! I don't enjoy it when people use store bought soup sinigang mix because for one, most brands have shrimp as an ingredient, and I am allergic. Secondly, they usually have MSG, so you end up with a fairly high in sodium dish. Lastly, making everything from scratch will always be better.  Getting tamarind from your local store, is just as easy, as throwing in the soup base in your soup, so just do it! Make your sinigang from scratch! It would be best to use fresh tamarinds, but that is hard to find here in California, so head your Asian aisle or Asian grocery store, and get some dried tamarind. See my photo to see what it looks like.

Here is my recipe for Sinigang Sinampalukang Manuk

Ingredients:
Chicken (with bones and cut up)
Onion
Ginger
Tomatoes

Vegetables:
Mushrooms
Eggplants
Zuchini
Long green beans
Fresh Jalepeno (optional)
Kale, Spinach, or Water Spinach

Herbs:
Basil
Cilantro

For flavoring your soup:
Tamarind block, seedless, wet (in your Asian aisle, see photo)
Miso paste (this will add flavor and saltiness without actually using salt)

Red palm oil

Heat pot, add oil. I used red palm, for health benefits and because of its beautiful color. Add onions. Sweat it (Cook until it starts to starts to soften). Add Ginger. Stir. Add tomato. Stir. Add Chicken. Brown the skin, slightly. Add water. Add about 1/5 of the tamarind block. Low boil for about 10 minutes to let the chicken cook. Add non-leafy vegetables (mushrooms, eggplant, zuchini, green beans, jalepeno). Cook for another 10 minutes. Finish up with leafy vegetables (kale or spinach) and herbs (basil and cilantro).