Braised Five Layers Pork with Extra Firm Tofu

I made the above to bring to a friend's potluck gathering.  I took a chance and bought the Five Layers Pork to make this.  Honestly, it was the best thing to do as the fat would melt-in-your-mouth and blended so well with the meat and oh so good.  Yes, I know it was sinful but I never buy this for our own family consumption so this was just an indulgent once in a blue moon.  I actually threw away some extra fat while slicing the meat which I kind of regretted because the other party really liked it.  Oops!

I used the extra firm tofu to braise with the sauce and it turned out so well marinated as the flavor of the sauce all went into the tofu.  Since I simmered the tofu in the sauce, it turned soft and oh so flavorful.

The recipe of this braised dish can be found here.  I had made this numerous times and it was all good.  I started to miss this dish already.

Oven Steamed Tom Yam Salmon

I loved to use my oven to steam fish.  It was fast and cleaning up was easy.  That's why I named my fish oven steamed tom yam salmon.  I always oven steamed my fish with Teriyaki sauce, miso paste, Chinese soy sauce,  yellow bean paste and I wanted a change.  I was getting bored with the same old way of steaming fish after a while.  And I thought I could try it with Tom Yam paste, but not just the paste alone as I wanted some kick.  So, I added an extra sauce in there to make it better.  Read more to find out.

I likes this as it was a little spicy, a little sour and went really well with rice.  Took less than 15 minutes and you would have a delicious dinner waiting for you. 

Ingredients:

2 pieces of salmon fillets

2 Tbsp. of tom yam paste

1 Tbsp. of chili paste with soy bean oil

1 Tbsp. of hot water

1 Tbsp. of key lime juice

Cilantro leaves for garnish, cut cilantro stem for steaming together with fish

Method:

1.  In a bowl, mix together tom yam paste, hot water, chili paste in soy bean oil.  Set aside.

2.  Rinse salmon.  In a baking pan, line a piece of aluminum foil, big enough to cover the salmons.  Add two pieces of salmon fillets on the aluminum foil, spread the top with the prepared paste and cilantro stems.  Add the lime juice.  Then, wrap the foil to seal the fish.  It has to be completely sealed.

3.  Put into a preheated 450'F oven and bake for 10-15 minutes.  How long depends on how thick your fillets are.

4.  When done, take it out of the oven, carefully open the foil and garnish it with cilantro.  Serve hot!

Healthy Wheat Oatmeal Waffles

As you know, I just bought a waffle maker.  With the new toy, of course I got to create healthy recipe to serve my girls.  I have a bag of instant oatmeal that no one wants to eat.  So, making waffle is the way to go as I don't like to waste food.  Again, I am making this sweeter as I am going to serve it plain and as a to-go breakfast.  After I added the flour and instant oatmeal, the batter was a bit watery so in some whole wheat flour.  I also wanted to incorporate some fruit into my girls breakfast, so I thought of dried cranberries.  I can say one piece of this waffle is pretty healthy because it has oatmeal, whole wheat flour, milk, dried cranberries, honey and eggs into the mix.  What's best is it is homemade!  When I was done with the waffles of course it was the taste test time.  Quickly gathered my girls and asked them to try.  My girls loved it!  Great news for me as this is way healthier than the basic waffle.

This wheat oatmeal waffles actually crispy on the outside and soft and fluffy on the inside when still warm.  Just remember to cook it until brown.  This recipe is for those who prefer healthier recipe and with adaptable taste.

Ingredients:

2 large eggs

1 cup all-purpose flour

1 cup instant oatmeal/ quick-cooking oats

1/2 cup whole wheat flour

4 tsp. baking powder

1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon 

1/4 tsp. salt

4 Tbsp. brown sugar

2 Tbsp. honey

1 3/4 cup 1 % milk

1/2 cup canola oil

Dried cranberries, as needed

Method:

1.  In a big bowl, hand whisk the two eggs until fluffy.  Add in the rest of the ingredients except dried cranberries and hand whisk until all is blended.  Set aside.

2.  Preheat your waffle maker.  When preheated, spray with buttery non-stick spray and scoop some of the batter onto the waffle iron.  Spread some dried cranberries on top.  Then, cover the top and side with more batter.  Cover and cook until brown.  For mine is about 6 minutes.  Exact time depends on your waffle maker.

3.  Take it out with a spatula and chopstick and serve hot.

Or cool on wire rack and put in a zip lock bag and freeze for future use.  Toast in a toaster to heat it up.

Chicken with Colors Bell Peppers

I always have leftover chicken breast either from the rotisserie chicken or the fried chicken that my hubby bought.  You can either make it into chicken salad for the chicken sandwich or just stir-fry it like me.  Since we eat rice almost daily, stir-frying the leftover is my way to reuse the food.

I loved to buy color bell peppers when it goes on sales.  We must eat with colors as different color of fruits and vegetables will give us a different nutrient that our body needs.  But it is hard to convince my girls to eat bell peppers and onion.  From my posting, I noticed that I have used less onion in my cooking these days because I took their dislike into consideration when preparing meal, even without realizing it.  I used to cook most dishes with onion.  Guess I need to bring back onion in my stir-frying.

Ingredients:

One piece of leftover chicken breast from the rotisserie chicken/ fried chicken, skinned and shredded

1/4 piece of a small green bell pepper, sliced

1/4 piece of a small red bell pepper, sliced

1/4 piece of a small yellow bell pepper, sliced

3 cloves of garlic, minced

Dark soy sauce, 1/2 Tbsp.

Soy sauce to taste

1/2 Tbsp. Sugar

Method:

1.  Heat up your wok.  When heated, add in some oil.  Add in garlic, fry until slightly golden, add in bell peppers and stir-fry a little.

2.  Add in shredded chicken, stir-fry well.  Just to heat up the chicken at this point.  Add the soy and dark sauces and sugar.  Coat and mix well.  Turn off heat and serve on a plate.

Pork with Marinated Bok Choy

I was given some marinated bok choy from our friend who owns a Chinese restaurant.  This marinated bok choy was prepared by the head chef in his restaurant.  I saw this dish prepared by the head chef and it looked really appetizing and I was trying to replicate it.  Typing this post now I just realized I forgot to add red pepper flakes and I shouldn't add water (as the bok choy will release water when cooking).  The head chef version was dry and his pork was sliced really thin and small.  Not sure what was his seasonings though, probably just salt and MSG?

Anyway, this is my version without the MSG.

This was the marinated bok choy that I received.  I used this to cook porridge and it was really good. What do you call this?

Ingredients:

1 boneless pork chop, thinly sliced and marinated with some Chinese wine, salt, white pepper, sugar and cornstarch.

2 big bunches of marinated bok choy, rinsed and cut into small pieces.

2 cm piece of ginger, thinly sliced

4 cloves of garlic, thinly sliced

Sprinkle of red pepper flakes (I added it here)

Salt to taste

Sugar to taste

Dark soy sauce, a touch

Method:

1.  Heat up the wok, when heated, add in some oil.  Add in ginger, stir-fry until fragrant, add in garlic and red pepper flakes, fry until garlic is slightly golden, add in pork and stir-fry until no longer pink.

2.  Add in marinated bok choy and stir-fry well.  Add seasonings to taste.  Serve hot!

Basic Waffles

I finally bought a waffle iron!  Well, if I don't look at brand and read at the reviews, I can get a waffle iron for fairly cheap here.  You can call it my impulse buying.  My girls like to have waffle for breakfast but the frozen ones in the supermarket have partially hydrogenated oil in them even thought they were listed as zero trans fat.  So, I stopped buying frozen waffles a while back.  Thus, the best way for me is to make my own waffle using the ingredients I know and serve it to my girls.  I found the bellow recipe at allrecipes.com and modified it a little to include more sugar and added honey so that my girls can eat the waffle as is.  No extra spread of butter or syrup needed.  I am going to play with this recipe more to create a healthier version like using whole wheat flour or oatmeal flour, etc.

As you can see, I already played with this basic recipe to add some chocolate chips.   Last batch, I added some cocoa powder as well.  This waffle is slight crispy on the outside and soft and fluffy on the inside.  It crisp up more when toast in the toaster.  Homemade is definitely the best way to go!

Recipe adapted from Allrecipes.com with slight modification.  For my waffle size, it yields 12 pieces.

Ingredients:

2 eggs 

(A) 

2 cups all-purpose flour
1 3/4 cups milk
1/2 cup vegetable oil
3 tablespoons white sugar
1 tablespoons honey (optional)
4 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

(B)
Chocolate chips as needed

Method:

1.  Preheat waffle iron.  Beat eggs in a large bowl with hand beater until fluffy.  Add in (A) and hand beat until smooth.  Or you can blend it in a blender until smooth.

2.  Spray preheated waffle iron with butter flavored cooking spray.  Use a ladle to drop some of the mix onto the hot iron.  Sprinkle with some chocolate chips (try to spread it even) and add a little more mix on top.  Cover and cook until golden brown.  How long to cook depends on the waffle iron you used, just keep watch.  Serve hot.

3.  Put the leftover in the freezer bag and freeze for whenever.  Just toast it in the toaster until crispy and brown.  Since I put the frozen one straight from the freezer to the toaster, I had to toast it 2 times, one to defroze and the next to crisp.

Nagaimo Mung Bean Dessert

Nagaimo is also called 山药 or 淮山 in Chinese.  It is a type of yam that can be consume raw.  It has long been traditionally used as Chinese medicine and herbology.  They cut it and dried it in pieces for cooking Chinese herbal soup.  It's the white color herb that we called it 淮山.  I just learned that it has other name which is 山药 from my Chinese friends.  I learned this dessert from them as they gave me a container to try.  It was my first time tasting fresh Nagaimo, frankly I didn't like it as they cut it into big chunks.  It was similar to potato in taste but full of potassium, magnesium, zinc, vitamin C, vitamin B1, and more.  It is also low in calories and a high protein tuber.  I saw a Chinese cooking show, where they put cubed and blanched Nagaimo and Pumpkin into heated milk and serve it as breakfast.  Usually you can cook it like what you would normally cook a potato dish.

You can read more about Nagaimo here. And more about the nutritional facts here.

In this dessert, I diced the Nagaimo into small cubes so that it was easier for me.  Since I cooked it in a slow cooker, some of the Nagaimo was blended into the soup when stirring.  It still have pieces of Nagaimo but quite pleasant since it was not in big chunks.  Definitely a dessert I will be cooking if I buy Nagaimo again.

Ingredients:

Nagaimo, a segment of it (more or less depended on how much you like it)

1 cup of mung beans

A small piece of ginger, peeled and chopped into tiny pieces or leave it in big piece and smashed it if you want to take it out after cooking

Rock sugar to taste

Water to cover double the amount

The water amount that I used

Method:

1.  Peel the Nagaimo with a peeler (careful when holding it because very slimy and slippery), then rinse with tap water.  Diced into small pieces (you can cut it into bigger pieces if you like to eat it in chunks).

2.  Wash by rinsing the mung beans several times until the water is cleared.

3.  In a slow cooker, add in mung bean, chopped ginger, Nagaimo and cover with water.  Slightly more than double the amount.  Turn to high and let it cook for 3-4 hours, or until the mung beans are broken out.

4.  Add in rock sugar to taste.  Stir or wait until sugar dissolved.  Mix some potato starch with water, stir to mix well.  Slowly add into the dessert and stir until thicken.  If not thick enough, add more potato starch water.

5.  Good serving it warm or cold.  Keep the leftover in a container in the refrigerator to enjoy it cold.  Refreshing during Summer.  Or keep warm in the slow cooker to enjoy it warm.

Note:  You can cook this on the stove too, just have to keep watch.