When a culinary experiment goes well, a food blogger gleefully does a victory dance in the kitchen and a genesis story of his/her new success gets blogged about -- as to be expected. In the case of a kitchen experiment gone awry, a food blogger still retells the story albeit with less enthusiasm. But when a failure is not just an ordinary failure but one of epic proportions, a food blogger finds solace in a classic poem.
Growing up, I (as well as most Thai kids who had access to television) watched my share of Hong Kong TV series most of which were about jungle-trekking, mountain-climbing sword heroes -- kind of like this or this.
How big of a fan was I? Well, let's just say that when the main character was poisoned by his own sword trainer, literally stabbed in the back by a best friend-turned-enemy, or discovered that his girlfriend was his step-sister, I cried my eyes out. Not only was I emotionally involved, I was also very much physically involved. Everyday after school, my brother and I would practice all kinds of sword techniques very rigorously as if we were in Shaolin training camp. It was sheer miracle that all those years, neither one of us accidentally put the other's eyeballs out with our homemade bamboo swords. (If you ever imagine young Leela in a pink frou-frou dress hosting a tea party for her stuffed animals, please erase those false images from your mind posthaste.)
I woke up this Saturday morning to yet another snow flurry. Would making and eating fruit-based yogurt toppings hasten the arrival of spring?
These two yogurt toppings were made in 10 minutes. I woke up at 7:30. Made breakfast. Took pictures of breakfast. Ate breakfast. It's now 9:30 and I'm already blogging about breakfast. The joy of eating warm fruit toppings on cold, creamy yogurt is too great to not blog about.
I was in the mood for homemade ice cream, but too lazy to whip up a crème anglaise base, so I pretended I meant to make gelato.
Easy Stracciatella Gelato (Adapted from Chocolate by Nick Malgieri)
(Makes about a quart)
Printable Version
2 cups evaporated milk
1 cup heavy cream
1/2 cup sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon unflavored gelatin powder
2 tablespoons light corn syrup
2 ounces bittersweet chocolate
1 teaspoon mild-flavored oil, such as sunflower or safflower
This recipe has been updated. Please move over to the new post.
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You know how it is when you travel overseas. On the day you're about to leave the country, you're stuck with small change which is too much to throw away, yet not enough to buy anything of significance or worth a schlep to a currency exchange booth for. My personal tradition is to intentionally make a fool (and pest) of myself by showing up at the smallest local bakery or convenient store, pour the coins onto the clerk's counter and, in the cutest voice I can muster, ask him/her to choose for me anything, anything, in the store my coins can buy. I don't even give them my preference; I just let them surprise me.
This post is under renovation. Please pardon the dust.
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If someone asked me what I would choose as the one single dish to have as my last meal on earth, I would, of course, have a hard time coming up with an answer. However, I am sure the incomparably magnificent combo of hot-off-the-steamer Thai sticky rice, Thai-style grilled chicken, and this beloved Thai sweet chilli sauce would be hovering through my mind as one of the top five contenders.
Thai sweet chilli sauce has been a quintessential part of my life. A life bereft of it is simply unimaginable.
A rectangular Galette des Rois. Talk about an oxymoron. But I can explain ...
You see, (sigh ...) there's something about the great Ferran Adrià that brings out the inner rebel -- or, worse, the passive-aggressor -- in me. The excellence. The creativity. The impeccability. The precision. The detailed instructions in all of the elBulli cookbooks. Looking at the pictures of all the immaculate spherification of food going on at Adrià's restaurant, I find myself defiantly wanting to stand in front of the refrigerator, still in my pajamas at 3:00 PM, with crusted drool on my face and uncombed hair, eating cold leftover Chinese out of the original container, while holding the door open with my shoulder. With every "consume in one bite -- all at once" and "present on a nest of fennel fronds on a black plate," I descend further and further down into a state of defiance.
Though his uncompromising insistence on excellence is praiseworthy, the sense of loftiness and unattainability attached to his cuisine doesn't really inspire me to get into the kitchen and cook. Instead, it brings on a sense of despair, resignation, apathy, then unbridled anarchy.
The guy is a god. I get that. I don't argue with that. He's got more culinary talent in his left pinkie toe than I can ever obtain in my life. But do I really have to eat his matcha cream-smeared mochi ball in two bites? Would I get spanked with a spatula if I was to serve the fennel-infused pineapple batons on a (gasp) green plate with yellow polka dots instead of the specified black plate? What if ... if ... I, uh, choose to, like, not serve the said pineapple batons with a pair of silver tweezers as instructed?
Rats. I think I may have ruined my chance of ever getting a reservation at elBulli. 
It all started with me reading an elBulli cookbook the day before I was planning on making a Pithivier or Galette des Rois. Galettes des Rois are traditionally round; hence the name. Defiant, my inner rebel demanded that I make it rectangular in shape with an added instruction to say, "Because I can," to anyone who might ask why.
Galette des Rois Rectangulaire
(Adapted from Dessert Circus by Jacques Torres)
Makes a 6"x12" rectangular tart
One sheet of prepared puff pastry, thawed and roll out to a 12"x24" rectangle
One recipe of Almond Cream*
One egg
2 tablespoons of whole milk
2 tablespoons of light corn syrup
2 tablespoons of water
Ladies and gentlemen, meet my homemade butter. There are no preservatives or the ever-so-deceptive "natural" flavorings" added as is often the case when it comes to store-bought butter.
Though I've learned never to say never, I am very tempted to say that I may never buy commercial butter again. That's what's bound to happen once you have tasted the freshness and the creaminess of homemade butter. Even the uncultured buttermilk left from the process tastes absolutely delicious.
To make: Put in a bowl of an electric mixer cold fresh cream twice the amount of the butter you would like to make. Add one teaspoon of salt per 8 fluid ounces and start beating on low speed. You'll get soft whipped cream first then very thick whipped cream. Once you reach this stage, things happen fast so brace yourself. The cream will start separating from the whey and become very slosh-y. Squeeze out the whey and store the butter in a lidded tub in the refrigerator.
Homemade butter goes rancid quite quickly, so either use it up in a couple of days or freeze the surplus.
Note: (Added 3-6-09) I have experimented making butter by mixing some whole Kefir with the fresh cream (1/2 cup Kefir per every cup of fresh cream) and let the mixture stand at room temperature for an hour before churning. The end result is fresh butter that has a bit more tang to it -- somewhat like Irish-style butter.
Note: (Added 6-3-09) A tip from one of my readers, Rick: "... if you wash the butter with cold water 2 or 3 times to remove most of the whey, your butter will last longer, less chance of it becoming rancid. Put water and butter in a bowl and knead it with tha back of a spoon, change the water and repeat until the water remains clear. I usually knead the salt into the butter after the final wash ..." Thanks, Rick!
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The significance of these mini egg "muffins" or mini egg cups lies in the fact that these are the very first food from which I have ever made profits. First, some background information ...
When I was in elementary school, my cousins and I often played the so-called "Country Game." It is not a game wherein somebody wins and somebody loses as much as it is a way for a bunch of kids to pass boring weekend afternoons. What we did was form a mock country with a government and a group of private citizens.
Raw Dark Chocolate Pudding
(Serves 4)
Flesh of 4 medium ripe avocados
1/4 cup raw agave nectar
A pinch of sea salt
1/4 cup of carob powder (or what I use here which is Scharffen Berger natural cocoa powder)
1 teaspoon espresso powder (not raw, I know ...)
Seeds of 1-inch vanilla bean or 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/4 cup filtered water
Blend everything together in a high-speed blender until smooth. Do not over-blend as the heat from the blender will cause the avocado to become oily. Spoon the pudding into 4 serving glasses or bowls; cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate.
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