asian tilapia

So it has come to my attention that none of my clothes fit me properly anymore.  I can't even zip up some of the pants.  I must confess that I have been shoving stuff into my mouth without really thinking about the consequences.  As a fashion conscious girl, this is unacceptable.  Not the shoving food part, but the part that 80% of my wardrobe is now useless to me.  So I've decided to do something about it.  Simple.  Go back to where I was before to look great and feel great.

I know dieting blows.  But I am trying not to think of this as a diet.  I'm trying to think of this as... becoming more health-conscious.  I need to really understand what I put into my body and how it affects me overall.  It has been a week since I've been loading myself with healthy protein (lean fish & poultry) and greens.  Anyway, more about that in the subsequent posts.  But I have to say, I'm still enjoying the cooking process even when I'm trying to drop the lbs.

Here's a good example.  This is supposed to be a "sesame tilapia".  But since I didn't have any sesame seeds, I've decided to just use my Asian common sense and throw something together.  And it was quite delicious.

Ingredients

• 2 tbs sesame oil
• 2 tbs low-sodium soy sauce
• 2 tbs rice vinegar
• 2 scallions
• 2 fillets of tilapia

Direction

Mix all the ingredients together and broil in the oven for 8-10 minutes.  

Palak Paneer (leave Indian cooking to Indians)

Ethnic cooking is extremely difficult if you don't really know what the dish is supposed to taste like. Sure I can follow the recipe, but in order to become a good cook, you gotta have that "sixth sense" that tells you to add a little bit more of this or that. I have never been a fan of palak paneer, mostly because of its appearance. But it's probably one of the most popular Indian dishes known even to the non-Indians. So I decided to give it a try.

FAIL.

I'm not sure if it's because I didn't puree the spinach long enough or pour enough heavy cream. I just did. not. like. it. at. all.

wak.

So I've decided to leave Indian cooking to the experts (for now).

Paneer

I made paneer. And it was ridiculously easy.

I had planned to use this for various Indian dishes, palak paneer included. (more on that later)

But for now, I'm just glad that I was able to make my own paneer without any issues.

Here's how I made it.

Paneer

8 cups whole milk

4 cups butter milk

1. Bring the milk to a boil in a large pot. Add the buttermilk and stir until the mixture separates into solids and liquids.
2. Line a sieve with cheesecloth and place it over a bowl. Pour the mixture into the cheesecloth-lined sieve to drain the curd, the discard the liquid.
3. Wrap the curd in the cheesecloth, place it in the sieve, and put a heavy weight. Let it drain for 20 minutes
4. Remove the cheesecloth. You can use the cheese immediately or refrigerate in a covered container for up to 5 days.

Pasta Puttanesca

The first pasta puttanesca that I have attempted. Possibly the best.

There are tons of pasta puttanesca recipes out there, but no one explained it or demonstrated more interestingly than Nadia G. from Bitchin' Kitchen. Pasta puttanesca is usually easy to put together and doesn't require ingredients that can't be easily acquired. What makes this recipe more interesting than others is the bite (red pepper flakes) and a hint of sweetness (brown sugar) that it brings. I absolutely LOVED this dish.

This is ridiculously simple to put together. You first cook the garlic, red peppers, and crushed anchovies in olive oil. Then add the cherry (or grape) tomatoes. Then olives, capers and brown sugar.

Finally the pasta.

That's it. It's that simple. Yet, amazing.

Indonesian Ginger Chicken

This is Ina Garten's recipe, which I've used before. For some reason, this time, I didn't think the chicken was as flavorful and tender as the last time. I did marinate the chicken in a ziploc bag for 24 hrs, instead of using a baking dish. I would think that using the plastic bag would help with the marinating process better. Hmmm... not sure how I can fix this going forward or even make this again.

Served with glazed carrots and basmati rice.

(Veggie) Meatloaf with Balsamic Glaze

This is by far the best meatloaf I have ever made. I took Bobby Flay's recipe and just added bacon on top. Adding bacon to any dish automatically makes it 10x better.

I hate meatloaf that has consistency of canned meat, such as Spam. This one held its shape, but stayed light/fluffy.
The complex flavor of the balsamic glaze made the plain old meatloaf into a gourmet dish.

Chocolate Peanut Butter and Banana Icebox Cake

So this is an awesome dessert if you love peanut butter. I mean really LOVE peanut butter.

I was watching a Cooking Channel show and thought this would be an interesting flavor combination and something easy to put together for a BBQ.

What worked: Taste factor - simply decadent and easy to put together.
What did not work: Difficulty finding chocolate wafers. Had to make them from scratch. Inability for the cake to hold its shape.

Results from the taste test: Not many people love the chocolate-peanut butter-cream combination. I think it was simply too rich for them although they didn't voice it.

Chocolate Wafers And Blogging

This is my 20938th attempt at blogging. I have created countless clever (what I thought at that time was clever) nicknames and domain names, published a few posts, and then completely abandoned them. My friends have called me out on it, but my excuse was that I simply could not keep up with it. So I decided to just post the food photos to my facebook album and be content with it.

I'm not content with it.

Lately, I am realizing how much I hate my corporate job more and more. I hate the drama, politics and headache it brings me. I hate how it does not bring joy to my life. Only thing that does seem to bring me joy about my job is when I bring food into work to share with my co-workers. This is a part of me that keeps my sanity (aside from travel, running, shopping, drinking, etc.), and I thought that I definitely need to log it. Otherwise, when I look back on my life, all I remember will be my miserable work days.

On backtracking my cooking. Because this blog is about documenting what I cook & bake, I found the need to go back to the memorable dishes I made before and document it. I plan to keep track of the recipes (through links mostly), and notes that I made while making the dishes. This is also a way to share great recipes with my friends.

........

Onto the chocolate wafers. One day, I was trying to find chocolate wafers to make an icebox cake that I was planning to bring to a friend's potluck. I went to 5 different (I kid you not) grocery stores in search of chocolate wafers. No one had such thing. Frustrated, I Google'd the recipe for the chocolate wafers and made them myself. Totally made the icebox cake making process more time & labor-intensive than what I expected. But I guess sometimes detours are needed.

What did not work: Wax paper does not equal parchment paper. Stoopid. I had hell of a time trying to peel the wax paper from the wafers. Such mistakes are not recommended for impatient people like me.

What worked: Everything else. Most grocery stores around me will never carry chocolate wafers, so think twice about the recipe when it calls for chocolate wafers. Do I have the time to make the wafers? However, if I really really really really need the wafers, I will definitely reuse this recipe.

Guy Fieri's Beef Brisket

Since I am not allowed to have an outdoor grill (high-rise condo), the closest thing to BBQ I can get is braised brisket. Honestly, I decided to make this after seeing this photo. But mine didn't exactly turn out like that, did it?

But it was quite tasty.

What didn't work: The amount of side ingredients that I had to buy just to flavor the meat and they ended up being pureed into a sauce that closely resembled baby's diarrhea. I think that maybe next time, I will stick to the minimum number of ingredients since I seem to have the technique down (braising). This recipe is also very labor intensive. Took me all day to make it and by the time my guest arrived, I was exhausted.

What Worked: The taste factor. Yes the meat was very tender, and yes the sauce was tasty. But it wasn't the BEST I had. I think that I can find a better recipe somewhere that requires less number of ingredients.

Would I make this again? Probably not.

Coconut Cupcakes

Working my way backwards here. These are the coconut cupcakes I made last week. After the earthquake fiasco, I thought "wow - I don't want to die while working, in front of my laptop." I decided to spend more time on what I love to do - cooking & baking & making people fat. Ok fine - I was bored after coming home early due to the earthquake.

This is Ina Garten's recipe, which I've used before (probably 5 yrs ago). Quite frankly, this is something I would make when I'm not feeling exactly ambitious. If I were feeling ambitious, I would make this.

The test subjects: the usual work people. They loved it. No complaints. (I try to fish for comments in order to improve my baking, but I wasn't sure if they are being polite or refraining from being honest in fear of losing occassional free grubs.)

What did not work: The instruction says to fill the batter to the top. This results in a muffin top that gets stuck to the pan and makes it very difficult to get the delicate cakes (not muffins) out of the pan in one piece. It was frustrating. I think Ina Garten was going for the scrumptious factor with oversized cupcakes and oversized icing, but still. I'm not that patient to pry the delicate little things out of the muffin pans one by one.

What worked: The taste factor. It hurts me to reveal the amount of butter and sugar used in these cakes. But hey, it made the cupcakes DELICIOUS and people loved them.

*Also - I am not sure these cupcakes can qualify as "coconut" cupcakes. Just because there were a few sprinkles of coconut flakes in the batter and on top of the icing, doesn't make them coconut cupcakes. Hence, I will attempt Bobby Flay's next time.

"Blueberry-Nectarine Crisp"

Found this recipe on Serious Eats.

What worked: My tweaks. I only used about 10 nectarines. I also used 3/4 of the topping. Had to increase the oven temperature to 350 after about 50 minutes because I was in a hurry and the top was not turning golden brown. (well, I ended up browning the top by turning on the broiler for about 3-5 min.)


What did not work: Oven temperature and the amount specified (# of nectarines and amount of the topping) seemed off. I guess because this is a 'throw-everything-in-and-watch-what-happens' type of recipe, I got lucky with the tweaks I made.


The result: Everyone LOVED it. Served with vanilla ice cream and it was simply devine.