I spotted this book at Indigo and received it for Christmas with some gentle hinting. It’s not a common book, barely available in the USA and only available through select stores due to it’s UK publishing house. It’s got loads of pictures, in full color, and has recipes which are pretty simple to make. The description below is from Amazon:

This book offers advice on how to make the world’s best zuppa inglese; how to coat meat with flour and not get your hands dirty; how to keep your friands light and stop your souffles sinking; how to chiffonade a handful of fresh basil in 10 seconds; how to make a perfect beer batter for fish, and perfect chips to go with it; how to buy a fresh crab and get rid of the ‘funny’ bits; how to whip egg whites. This book provides advice on how to cook…everything. This book include a timeless collection of essential recipes that will save you trawling through old books to find Apple Charlotte, Bearnaise Sauce or pizza dough. All recipes have been triple-tested in the Murdoch Books Test Kitchen for guaranteed results.

There’s this great sidedish at Korean Grill House that I always end up hoarding. After a quick trip to P.A.T. didn’t show any sources for this spicy and savoury dish. So I headed to Maangchi for a recipe and cooked up my first batch. It needs some tweaking but I was satisfied with my first attempt. Recipe from Maagnchi is below:

Ingredients:

2-3 medium sized potatoes

onion

2 cloves garlic

soy sauce

1 tbs corn syrup

1 tbs sugar

half cup of water.

Recipe:

1. Peel the potatoes, wash, and cut them into 1 inch dice and make 2 cups.

2. Rinse the potato using colander in running water to remove starch.

3. Cut half onion into bite sized pieces.

4. Heat the pan and add 1-2 tbs olive oil and pour the potato into the pan.

5. Add 2 cloves of minced garlic and sauté it until the potato look a little translucent, then add the onion and keep stirring it.

6. Add half cup of water into the pan, 2 tbs – 2½ tbs soy sauce (depends on your taste), 1 tbs of sugar, 1 tbs of corn syrup and mix it and simmer it over medium heat for about 10 minutes until the liquid is evaporated.Tip: Keep checking and stirring not to burn it and to cook evenly, if it needs more water, add some.

7. When the potato is cooked, turn off the stove and add 1 tbs of sesame oil and sprinkle a pinch of sesame seeds.

I made this stir fry today quickly and with a bunch of stuff that was in the fridge, however it came out quite nice. The secret was lots of “rooster” sauce to make it extra spicy.

Since it was thrown together I’ll just put down the quick recipe instead of writing the full setup. Beef was sliced thinly on the biased and marinated with soy sauce and sesame oil. After stir frying I added all the vegetables that were cut bite size: bok choy, carrots, celery plus garlic and green onion for taste. Added udon noodles instead of normal thick-cut shanghai noodles because they were in the fridge. Finished with soy sauce and “rooster” sauce.

My proximity to the Korean Grill House, Oja and Little Korea has me craving a lot of Korean food at home. For a while I’ve been getting recipes online and making them on my own, however I just discovered a great website with both recipes and videos. Called Maangchi, it’s made by a Toronto ex-pat who now lives in New York. Her a great list of recipes of home-style Korean dishes.

Her recipe for Bibimbap is below, I used a variation of it in the picture above.

Bibimbap from Maangchi on Vimeo.

The perfect omlette is nice and fluffy, and not overcooked on one side. My way of doing the omlette requires no flipping! Instead, use that “broiler” function on  your oven that you never use. Be sure to move the racks in the oven as close as possible, leaving enough room for your omlette pan. Yes, this means you have to have an omlette pan without oven-melting plastic handles.

• 3 large eggs
• Soft white cheddar
• Ham, green onion, tomatos

1. Whip the eggs together using a whisk, not a fork. This makes it easier to get a light, fluffy omlette. Don’t overwhisk the eggs! I add just a touch of milk after whisking and gently fold in.
2. Turn the oven onto “broil” mode at a high heat setting (400F).
3. Turn the stove up to medium high, and melt a small pad of butter.
4. Pour in the eggs and let them form curds on the bottom. Once soft curds are formed, genlty push into the middle of the pan and let uncooked egg move to the sides. Repeat until most of the egg is cooked (usually when it’s hard to pour uncooked egg to the sides).
5. Layer your toppings on top of the pan, then put under the broiler until cooked (usually only a few minutes)
6. Enjoy!

Pupusas is a street food from El Salvador. I was getting ready to experiment in the kitchen when my friend suggested that I try a few dishes from that region.

• Corn Masa
• Refried beans and soft cheese (other fillings are also common)

1. Add water to the masa and kneed it until it turns into a non-sticky dough. You know it is done when you can press the dough and it doesn’t break at the sides.
2. Take a 2″ piece of dough and form it into a ball, flatten it into a round and add filling in the center
3. Close the sides of the round over the filling and then flatten the entire ball into a 1/4″ “pancake” shape
4. Grill on both sides for 3-4 minutes

I found this recipe on egullet and it’s quite a good one. The site includes lots of pictures of this process.

Main ingredients (middle right, clockwise):
- Beef  about 3/4 lb
- 1 small onion
- 1 pack of fresh rich noodles, 2 lb (dry rice noodles also acceptable, soften in hot water first)
- 5 stalks of green onions
- 1/4 lb bean sprouts (mung bean sprouts)
- 1/8 lb yellow chive

Cut the beef into 1/8 inch slices.Marinate with sesame oil, chinese cooking wine, corn starch, light soy sauce, dark soy sauce, and ground white pepper.

Peel, trim and cut the onion into small wedges. Trim and cut the green onions into 1 to 2 inch pieces.

Use a small bowl, add 3 tsp of light soy sauce and 3 tsp of dark soy sauce. Mix well.

Use a pan/wok, set stove to high. Add 3 tblsp of cooking oil. Wait until oil is hot. Add marinated beef slices to velvet for a few minutes. Remove and drain the excess oil.

Clean and dry pan. Heat it over stove. Set stove to high. Add 4-5 tblsp of cooking oil. Wait until oil start fuming.

The following steps must be completed very quickly: Add the wedged onions and 1/2 portion of the green onions. Dash in 2 tsp of ShaoHsing wine. Immediately add the small bowl of light/dark soy sauce mix. The soy sauce will boil immediately.

Immediately add the rice noodles. Mix well and add the rest portion of the green onions. Mix again until the soy sauce spreads evenly over the rice noodles.

Return the velveted beef slices. Continue to mix well. Stir-fry for another minute or so, completed. Transfer the rice noodles to a serving plate.

Udon noodles come in these great little packages at T&T. I bought them and have been getting them regularly every trip. They store forever and keep better than the frozen kind which get freezerburned too often.

• Beef ribeye sliced thinly
• Udon noodles packaged
• Beef broth
• King oyster mushrooms
• Bok choy (or spinach or other nice green veg)
• Green onion/Scallion

1. Cut beef into very thin strips and cook on medium low heat in a fry pan. When finished, set aside.
2. Boil enough water to cover the udon noodles for only 2-3 minutes, then drain and set aside.
3. Bring beef broth (or chicken broth) to a boil, quickly add bok choy and king oyster mushrooms. Add noodles just a minute later, then finally the beef. Turn off the heat and let stew for a minute.
4. Plate and serve, garnish with green onion.

Today I made a recipe from Jamie Oliver’s show, Oliver’s Twist: Cellophane Noodle Salad

• 4 oz Cellophane Noodles
• olive oil
• 8 oz minced pork
• 1 large pinch five-spice spice
• 3 cloves garlic, crushed
• 2 tsp sugar
• 1 handful prawn, peeled, and, deveined
• 1 handful plain and skinned peanut, roughly, chopped
• 1 bunch spring onion, finely, sliced
• 1 bunch coriander, chopped
• 1 bunch mint, chopped
• 1 tbsp fresh ginger, grated
• 2 red chili, finely, sliced, with seeds
• 2 lime, juiced
• 1 tbsp soy, sauce

1. Soak the noodles in boiling water and drain.
2. Heat the oil in a pan, and cooking in batches, lightly brown the pork with the five-spice powder.
3. Add the garlic, sugar, prawns, and peanuts. Mix the rest of the ingredients for the dressing.
4. Add the drained noodles and the meat with the prawns and season with a little extra soy and a drizzle of olive oil.

I’m reposting an earlier recipe because I took a pic of the finished product earlier today. This is one of my “go-to”recipes since it’s not that hard to make, however it does require a lot of prep in terms of cutting and chopping everything to be ready for the quick stir fry.

• 1/3 cup sugar
• 1/3 cup tamarind paste (store-bought or made yourself – can be substituted with ketchup in a pinch but not recommended)
• 2/3 cup fish sauce
• 2-3 thai chili’s (or other chili that you prefer)
• 4 garlic cloves
• firm tofu (optionally soaked in soy sauce for a few hours)
• 1 package pad thai noodles
• 2-3 green onions
• 1 cup loose bean sprouts
• 1 carrot
• 1 lime
• 2 eggs
• 1 chicken breast (or 12 shrimps or combination of chicken and shrimp)
• 2/3 peanuts
• coriander/chinese parsley for garnish

1. Soak the noodles in warm water for 30 minutes, do step 2 while waiting.
2. Prep all the ingredients by slicking the green onion into 3/4″ pieces, julienne the carrot and tofu, wash the bean sprouts, and slice the chicken breast into thin strips.
3. Make the sauce by combining the fish sauce, sugar and tamarind paste, stir well until sugar is dissolved.
4. Put the wok on the stove and turn to maximum setting, when the oil in the wok is smoking, quickly add the garlic and chilies, followed by the chicken. If using shrimp, add shrimp when chicken is almost completely cooked and then cook thoroughly.
5. Move the cooked chicken and shrimp to one side of the wok, exposing about half of the bottom of the wok, add a bit more oil. When the oil heats up, add the eggs and scramble lightly, then mix the entire meat mix with the eggs.
6. Wait for wok to heat up again then add the softened noodles. Add the sauce to the mix and toss until almost cooked. Add the carrot/green onions/bean sprouts, toss, then serve on a plate.
7. Garnish with coriander and crushed peanutes, and slices of lime.