Tasty Vegetables for the Lazy Ones

Growing up eating almost exclusively homemade Chinese food, I can remember the only time where the oven was put to its intended use, and not as a storage space for extra pots and pans as it was in my parents' kitchen. It was during one unfortunate Thanksgiving where my parents got it into their heads that in addition to the usual feast of a mountain of home cooked Chinese food, they would also roast a turkey and finally satisfy their curiosity about this American tradition. Needless to say, the turkey was a complete failure, undercooked, dry and so unappetizing that our dog was the only one who ate more than one bite.

I didn't take to the oven easily. It took me about two years to get over my simultaneous amazement and mistrust that most things cook in the oven untended for relative long periods of time. Having grown up with a tradition of Cantonese cooking where most things are cooked over high open flame for short periods of time, an oven is almost the antithesis.

But boy oh boy have I come a long way. My new favorite way to cook vegetables is to simply roast it. Roasted squash, perfect for winter soup. Roasted beets, simply divine. Roasted asparagus with olive oil, salt and pepper, I can eat everyday for the rest of my life. Roasted cauliflowers with spices, possibly my new favorite snack. The list goes on and on. The best part is that no matter what vegetable you roast, the only thing you have to do is turn on the oven, drizzle the vegetables with some oil and seasoning to taste, stick it in the oven and minutes later, voila! Deliciousnes!

ROASTED BELL PEPPERS

Preheat oven to 425 degrees Fahrenheit. Rinse peppers and pat dry. Line in a baking pan, making sure not to overcrowd them. Brush generously with olive oil. Roast for about 30 minutes, rotating pan about half way through. Peppers are done when the skin is moderately blackened and blistered. Wait for peppers to cool and then peel off the skin and top before serving.

ROASTED PEPPER PASTA SAUCE

Roast peppers as described above. Puree skinned peppers in a food processor or blender. Season with some finely chopped parsley leaves and salt and pepper to taste. Serve over cooked pasta (big shells work well because it scoops up the sauce) and shredded Parmigiana cheese.

ROASTED EGGPLANT

Preheat oven to 425 degrees Fahrenheit. Slice eggplant width wise about 1/2 inch thick. Line in a single layer on a baking sheet. Drizzle with olive oil and salt and pepper to taste. Roast for about 20 minutes, until tender and browned. Flip slices over about half way through.



ROASTED ASPARAGUS

Preheat oven to 425 degrees Fahrenheit. Line asparagus in a baking pan in single layer. Sprinkle with sea salt and fresh ground pepper to taste. Drizzle generously with olive oil, about 2 tablespoons. Roast for 15-20 minutes or until tender and slightly browned.

RISOTTO WITH ROASTED PEPPER BROTH

Roast peppers as described above. Puree skinned roasted peppers and dilute with water or broth in a 1:1 ratio. Simmer over low heat.

Cook Risotto according to directions, using the roasted pepper broth in place of water or chicken stock. Season according to taste.

Les Petits Gadeaux

Pardon the French, but after over a month in a French speaking territory and three and a half years of French class, I was able to utter four phrases in French to a cab driver yesterday. Les petits gadeaux, or little cakes, is what I made today and I refuse to call them by its proper English term of "bite size" cakes. I've never taken to the idea of bite size food. Don't get me wrong, I love party appetizers and fancy h'orderves as much as the next person, but the idea of taking regular food and shrinking it to "bite size" portions just doesn't sit well with me. Call me a hypocrite, but why oh why would one prefer something that's a quarter the size of what it's intended to be?

Cake is the exception. See, for me, eating cake is all about the frosting to cake ratio and I like me extra frosting. I figured out that the ratio of frosting to cake is dependent upon the surface area of the cake, so simply put, increase the cake surface area and the amount of frosting goes up! With a smaller cake, every piece is a corner piece with at least three frosted sides; none of that middle piece nonsense where there's frosting on only the top side.

I am quite proud of this frosting. I like a frosting that is light and easy to make, none of the precarious nonsense where you whip, whip, whip and it never comes together. (I had a mishap once with a Swiss buttercream frosting, and though I will still devour it if presented to me, I will think twice about attempting to make it again.) Unlike egg white, which I have never had success with, cream will never let you down, provided you give it a bit of time, and it's not as heavy as cream cheese. You can increase the maple syrup by one or two more tablespoons if you want a sweeter frosting, but I felt that with a heavy chocolate cake, three tablespoons was just enough to provide a subtle maple flavor without drowning out the flavor of the chocolate cake.

CHOCOLATE CAKE WITH CITRUS MAPLE FROSTING
(makes about six 2"square cakes)

For the Cake:
(Adapted from a chocolate Madeline recipe)

• 1/2 cup butter, softened and cut into small chunks
  
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 3 eggs
• 2/3 cup all-purpose flour
• 1/3 cup unsweetened coco powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt

For the Frosting:

• 3/4 cup heavy cream (or whipping cream)
  
• 3 tablespoon maple syrup
• zest of one grapefruit (orange or lemon will also work well)

CAKE:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees fahrenhait.

Beat butter and sugar with an electric mixer until fluffy. Add in egg one at a time until blended in completely with the butter and sugar.

In a separate bowl, mix all the dry ingredients. Mix the dry ingredients into the butter/sugar mixture a little at a time until well blended.

Bake in a greased 4"x 8" pan for 20-25 minutes, until a toothpick or knife inserted in the middle of the cake comes out clean.

Cool cake on a wire rack. Once cooled, trim the edges off and cut cake into 6 pieces.

FROSTING:

Pour the cream into a bowl with most of the citrus zest and whip, whip, whip until the cream peaks. (This can be done with an electric mixer but the manual labor method comes with free anger management. No matter how much you yell and scream and curse at the still runny cream that you've been beating for ages and ages, it will not talk back and it will, eventually, transform itself into light, yummy frosting)

When the cream has been beaten enough, i.e. when there are peaks in the cream, pour in the maple syrup one table spoon at a time and fold it into the cream with a spatula.

Using a small spatula, spread the frosting all over the cake squares as evenly and thoroughly as possible. Sprinkle the reserved zest on top. If you have leftover frosting, dip the cake edge strips in them and enjoy!

Jiaozi

Today was a rainy, gray sort of day where the passing of the hours are unmarked and the world outside seems to have congealed into one big drowsy glob. In other words, the perfect day for ambitious cooking projects, and what can be more ambitious than rolling out dough for dumpling skin that could've easily been purchased in New York for one dollar a pack? But New York was of another time and place and I must move on and try, try to embrace all that East Farnham, Quebec has to offer.

My love of dumplings in noodle soup is unsurpassed, and after years of hunting around Manhattan Chinatown, I found a favorite spot that I patronized regularly. I always ordered the Cantonese classic wonton noodle soup, and Fu Kee on Lafayette Street did not disappoint. Their wontons were carefully wrapped so that the extra skin didn't clump together and their shirmp to pork ratio in the filling is just right. Their broth is flavorful without being too salty (the most common pitfall for noodle broth) and at $4 a bowl, I could afford to go whenever a craving struck (which was often). But alas, though I've been craving a good bowl of wonton noodle soup since I've been in Quebec, my standards for this humble dish are almost astronimically high and I didn't want to disappoint myself.

According to my boyfriend and others, there are places in Manhattan Chinatown where one can get five dumplings for a dollar. I have doubts about such places, especially since of all the numerous outings we had in Chinatown, William has never once shown me one actual place where the infamous 5 for $1 dumplings can be found.


Actually, I was a little skeptical about how these would turn out. Last time I tried to pan fry dumplings, it came out burned where it touched the pan and undercooked where it didn't, and I ended up breaking the skins and turning the whole thing into an improvised stir fry of sorts. Also, I've never made dumpling skins from scratch before, seeing as how I used to get fresh ones for around a dollar.

These aren't the most conventional jiaozi to be found, what with the Indian red curry paste and the Italian parsley leaves. I would've prefered to use groud pork and throw in some shittake mushroom, but as long as it tastes good, I'm not purist when it comes to "authentic" ingredients. I found a great blog about Chinese food with great instructions on pan frying dumplings. The ingredients for the filling are merely what I happen to have on hand; you can subsitute any ground meat or finely chopped vegetable, as long as they work well together. Any leftover fillings will work great in fried rice or stir fried with cooked noodles.

JAO ZI (DUMPLINGS)
(makes about 2 dozen)

• 1 lb. ground beef (or pork or even lamb)
• 1 small head of savoy cabbage, chopped and shredded
• 2 small onions, sliced thinly
  
• 1-2 medium carrots, grated
• 2 inch long ginger, peeled and finely chopped
• 3-4 mini sweet peppers, or 1 red bell pepper, finely sliced
• about 1/4 cup of parsley leaves, finely chopped
• vegetable oil for cooking
• salt and pepper to taste
• soy sauce to taste
  
• hot sauce to taste (or curry paste), optional
  

For the skin:

• 2 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for dusting
• about 5/8 cup warm water
  
• 1 tablespoon kosher salt

Heat up a pan on medium heat with some oil and cook ground beef until no longer red. Remove from heat and transfer to a big bowl.

In the same pan over medium high heat, throw in sliced onion, adding more oil if necessary. When onions have soften, 1-2 minutes, add in peppers and cabbage. Cook for 3-4 minutes until cabbage softens, stir in shredded carrot, ginger and parsley. Cook for an additional 2-3 minutes and season with soy sauce, hot sauce, salt and pepper.

Transfer to the same bowl with the cooked beef and mix throughly, adding more seasoning as necessary.

While the filling is cooling, measure out flour in another bowl and mix with salt. Have one cup of warm water handy. Pour in a little water at a time while hand mixing until the dough forms into one ball with no clumps. (I used 5/8 cups water but this can vary according to humidity and gluten content of the flour you're using) If the dough is too sticky, sprinkle in a little more flour and knead into the dough.

When dough is ready, knead it on a floured surface for a few minutes. Cut into four pieces with a sharp knife. Roll one piece out into a cigar and cut into four pieces. Get a clean, damp kitchen towel and cover 3 of the dough pieces. Dust a work surface with flour and flatten a piece of dough with the palm of your hand. Roll it out as thinly as possible, no more than 1/8 inch thick. Using a round cookie cutter or the lip of a glass jar, cut out as many circles as possible.

ASSEMBLY:

Place one piece of skin in your palm and spoon a small amount of filling in the middle. (Make sure not to over stuff or the skin will stretch and fall apart) Fold the edges together and make small pinches around the edge. If the skin is not closing up, dip your finger in water and brush it around the edge of the skin. The added moisture will glue the dough together. (You can also beat an egg and use that instead of water)

Disclaimer: I've never been prissy about food presentation, and though I pinched some pleats into these dumplings, by the end William and I simply pressed the edges together and didn't bother trying to make it look fancier. The important thing is to make sure that the filling won't bust out of the skin when you're cooking them.

To pan fry the dumplings, coat the bottom of a pan with some oil and line the dumplings, making sure not to overcrowd them. Place the pan with the dumplings on a stove over medium heat and cook for a few minutes, until the bottom side of the dumplings are golden brown.


Turn dumplings over and brown the other side for 1-2 minutes. When both sides have been browned, add about 2-3 tablespoons of water in the skillet and cover. (The water in the covered skillet creates stem, which cooks the dumplings without burning them) Cook for another minute. Remove from heat and serve.

Lumps of Brown Ugliness But Oh So Tasty!

Not having white sugar in the house shall not deter me from further cookie making. Oh no, for when I want cookies in East Farnham, a place so desolate as to be without any bakeries, I must bake my own cookies. What came out of the oven looked more like lumps of brown ugliness than cookies, but boy were they delicious. The toasted ground almonds smelled wonderful and reminded me of Chinese fried sesame balls filled with coconut shreds and crushed peanuts.

CRUMBLY ALMOND COOKIES
(makes about 12 small cookies)

• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 heaping tablespoons packed brown sugar
• 1/2 cup butter
• 1 cup coarsely ground toasted almond
• 1/4 teaspoon ground ginger

• 2 teaspoon cinnamon
• 2 tablespoon brown sugar

Beat butter and vanilla until soft and creamy. In a separate bowl, combine flour, brown sugar, and ground ginger. Mix flour mixture a little at a time into butter, mixing after each time. Pour in ground almond and work into dough.

Chill dough in the fridge. In the meantime, preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. In a shallow bowl or plate, crumble brown sugar and cinnamon together until well blended.

When the oven is ready, take dough out of the fridge. Pinch off a golf ball size piece and roll between palms to form a ball. Roll the piece of dough around in the plate with the sugar and cinnamon. Repeat until you run out of dough. Bake at 350 degrees F. for about 17 minutes. The sugar on the bottom of the cookies will caramelize and harden. YUMMY!

Sexy Breakfast Bomb

You can figure this one out just by lookin. The white stuff is mashed potatos.
Yeeeeeeah

Fish and Fruit? You Whack?!

Really now, the meal was much more appetizing than this picture would suggest. Remember the poor zested grapefruit from that tasty yogurt cake? I couldn't leave the poor thing in its zest-less misery, so I had to run its skin through a mandoline until thinly sliced and then proceed to eat its flesh. It's just that I am George and the poor fruit is Lennie; it was better that way for everyone.

And what else can one do with thinly sliced citrus skin but candy it up? My original plan was to make risotto with it, but we had just finished a rather heavy risotto dinner made with the fat skimmed off of a very beef-heavey pot of chili. I wanted something lighter that would compliment the citrus flavor. Fish came to mind, particularly the fish fillets that I spotted in the freezer.

I am a huge seafood lover and eat it as often as I can afford to. The fish I ate growing up and later learned to prepare for myself were mostly whole steamed fish and I've never so much as entertain the idea of purchasing frozen fish fillets. The whole concept is foreign to me and the first time I ever cooked with it was probably the aforementioned fish candy. But I can never say no to free food, and we are left with a bountiful amount of frozen and canned food from the owner of the house.

Actually, the fish was delicious. I was a little skeptical of the recipe when I first conceived of it, but it definitely turned out better than I though it would. The key is to really slice that grapefruit skin thin and the triple blanching to get rid of the bitterness. More fresh parsley leaves wouldn't hurt either. The grapefruit and parsley flavor blended surprisingly well together and is very refreshing. We ate it with William's infamous mashed potatoes (which has more of whatever he can get his hands on than potatoes) and it was delicious. Next time I will bake it with a layer of homemade breadcrumbs on top for a crispy contrast to the texture of the fish.

BAKED FISH WITH PARSLEY AND CANDIED GRAPEFRUIT SKIN

• 1 lb. frozen Pollock fillets, thawed (I imagine other white fish fillets will also work)
• 1/2 cup Italian parsley leaves, packed (or about 1 cup loose leaves)
  
• 2 large cloves of garlic (or to taste)
• salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
• olive oil
• peel of 1 medium grapefruit, thinly sliced
• 4 tablespoons brown sugar, packed

Using a mandoline or really fine knife skills, trim the peel off the grapefruit and slice as thinly as possible. I used a mandoline and sliced the whole grapefruit on all four sides until all of the skin is off, with some of the flesh still attached, which is alright.

Blanche the grapefruit skin three times by bring to boil about 3 cups of water, dropping the skin in, and drain when mixture reaches boiling again. Repeat 2 more times. (This gets rid of the bitterness, as you can verify through taste test after each blanching.

After grapefruit skin has cooled, transfer to a bowl and mix in 4 tablespoons of packed brown sugar. Leave out overnight.

Combine parsley leaves, garlic cloves, about 1 tablespoon of olive oil, and salt and freshly ground pepper (1 teaspoon each or to taste) in a food processor and chop until well blended into a paste, adding more oil as necessary. (You can also do this in a mortar and pestle or hand chop it finely)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit and lightly grease a baking dish large enough to hold all the fish fillets in one layer.

In the meantime, squeeze out the excess water in the fish, one piece at a time and arrange on the greased baking dish, take care to not over crowd.

Spread the parsley paste evenly over the fish fillets. Top off with the candied grapefruit peel. Bake uncovered for about 20 minutes.

Zesty Yogurt Cake

Maybe it's out of boredom, or maybe it's this never ending winter, or more likely it's the sugar rush, but we've had cookies and/or cake every night since we've been in Quebec. We walked (yet another two hours) into town for groceries today and came back equipped with vegetables, fruits, butter and eggs. I believe that every home cook secretly enjoys some of the more repetitive tasks that are unavoidable in food preparation; the endless chopping of vegetables, for example, or the muscle straining whipping of butter and sugar. There is one repetitive task I've always found therapeutic: the zesting of citrus fruits. Also because I find zested citrus hilarious, like catching one's favorite professor in nightshirt and nightcap.

Though the refrigerator is now stocked with fresh produce, I felt an obligation to clear out some of the food the owner of the house left. Maybe it's the Chinese upbringing in me, but I almost never throw out food, even when the food is bordering on inedible. I've been meaning to use up the goat's milk yogurt left by the owner ever since she left town for sunnier parts three weeks ago, and judging from most of the food she left behind (we found canned food that expired two years ago! that means whatever is in the can is at least a decade old!), that yogurt probably has been sitting in the fridge for longer than I can imagine. But it smelled alright and yogurt keeps for a long time, right? Especially in the fridge. And there's no expiration date, which does NOT mean the date rubbed off, but rather, that it never goes bad.

What I really wanted was cookies, but we deliberately did not get more white sugar in hopes of curbing this baking frenzy we've been on. But alas, the brown sugar was giving me attitude and I just had to show it who's boss. The cake is moist and delicious and despite using only the zest, the grapefruit flavor really came through. I stupidly decided to bake the cake in a small, deep round dish rather than a regular loaf pan, but the cake managed to save itself from my stupidity. It took longer to bake and I obsessively checked it every minute after 15 minutes, but the longer baking time created a thin crispy crust, leaving the cake as moist and light as ever.

ZESTY YOGURT CAKE
(adapted from Smitten Kitchen, the recipe below is half the original)

• 3/4 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
• 1/2 cup plain yogurt
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 large eggs
• zest of one grapefruit (or lemon or lime, though the grapefruit was perfect for it)
  
• 1/4 cup vegetable oil

Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.

Zest the grapefruit into a bowl and whisk together with brown sugar, yogurt, vanilla and eggs.

In a separate bowl, combine flour, baking powder and salt. Mix thoroughly.

Measure out the oil. Whisk the flour mixture and oil into the sugar/yogurt mixture a little a time, mixing thoroughly and until batter is smooth.

Grease a loaf pan or small casserole dish and pour batter in. Bake for 15-25 minutes, depending on the shallowness of the pan. Cake is done when a knife or toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean.