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).

Orange chicken

My father likes to cook. He didn't enjoy eating out much because half the time he would say, "I could make that." I've been spending time with family, and I learned that my grandfather would also try to recreate dishes he had while eating out. I must have inherited this trait. Here is my recipe for orange chicken.

Sauce:

1 blood orange juice and rind (remove rind and put in sauce too) 

1/2 cup coconut sugar 

1/2 cup unfiltered apple cider  vinegar 

1 tbsp tamari soy sauce 

Meat:

1 chicken breast

1 cup cornstarch

1 egg

Salt pepper

Extra Virgin Coconut oil for deep frying

Cut up chicken into 3/4" cubes

Season with salt and pepper

Dip in cornstarch, then egg, then cornstarch again. 

Heat coconut oil to a medium heat

Test to see if oil is ready by throwing in a piece. When temp is ready, fry your chicken pieces in it. 

Make the sauce while it is frying.

Combine all the sauce ingredients in a saucepan, and wait until the sauce thickens (until it coats the spoon as the French say). Don't forget to add the rind in. It's the best part of it! It's like having chewy candied orange rinds in your sauce. 

Remove chicken from oil. Toss in the sauce. Serve. 

Rice in a clay pot

Rice. So basic and yet most people can't make it without a rice cooker. I have a rice cooker but it big and takes 45 minutes to cook rice. Yes the rice always comes out perfect, but it's not worth my counter space or time. Try making rice on your stove top especially if you are only cooking for 1 or 2. It's easy. I like using my clay pot which I got from my local Korean market for about $12. You can put it directly on the stove. So, first I oil the pot. I usually do this with extra virgin olive oil. I do this so it is easy to clean. But some people like having that crunchy toasty layer of rice in the bottom, if you are one of them, then don't oil and let that crust form. Then I add the rice, I usually cook about 3/4 cup at a time. That is two servings of rice for me. Then I rinse it 1x-3x depending how milky the rice water looks. Then I add water. Now you can either use a measuring cup and equal parts water plus a little more. Or you can use the finger method of using your finger to measure the amount of water. How? You place your finger tip on top of the rice, and the water should reach the first line on your finger. Cool huh? Ok. So now, you turn it up on med high. Let it boil until the water boils off to the top of the rice. Turn off heat. Put the lid of clay pot on. Let sit for another 10 minutes. The clay pot holds on the heat and will continue cooking the rice. If you don't own a clay pot. Still cover your rice at the same time and then continue cooking on low heat for the same amount of time. Do not take the lid off! No peeking. And then it is don't. Does it have a toasty flavor? It's not burnt. In the Philippines and Guam, that bottom crunchy layer is the favorite part of their rice.