Wintermelon Soup and Steamed Chicken

Steamed chicken with Tibetan wolfberries and golden lily buds



Wintermelon soup with tiger shrimp and tofu

La Fermiere Yogurt

I recently went to the Made in France warehouse sale. It is a sale where many of the items are made in France, very popular with ex-pats. I tried the La Fermiere yogurt and was blown away. This yogurt is much different than the ones we get in the states. It is much thicker, like cheese, and the yogurt cultures aren't as tart. The yogurt is very creamy and it almost feels sinful to eat something so rich without it being really fattening.

I bought both the natural flavor and the honey one. Both are excellent. I enjoyed the natural flavor with a dollop of apricot jam. Delicious. My only regret is not buying more yogurt.


The other perk about this yogurt is that each is packed in a terra cotta container. You can re-use the container in a number of ways. I will have 4 of them; I wonder what I should put in them ...

Chicken Pot Pie

I'm not very familiary with chicken pot pie except when I had the Pilgrim's kitchen version of it, which I wrote about here. That chicken pot pie was so flaky and the filling was full of flavor. After that experience I wanted to have chicken pot pie again, but homemade so that I could control what went into it.

Last night I made chicken pot pie from scratch and it turned out very well. In the beginning I had my doubts since the filling didn't quite taste flavorful enough and tasted too thick. My fears were put to rest, however, when Ming came home and said that it smelled wonderful outside the house :)

The chicken pot pies turned out lovely and I'm looking forward to having another batch in the near future.

Chicken Pot Pie Prep


Chicken Pot Pie


Chicken Pot Pie
Chicken and stock ingredients
1 (3 1/2 pound) chicken
1 carrot
1 celery stalk
1 small onion, halved
2 teaspoons salt

Pie crust ingredients
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup chilled unsalted butter, diced into 1/2-inch cubes (best to chill cubes in the freezer for at least 15 minutes before using)
3 to 4 Tbsp ice water

Filling ingredients
4 Tbsp unsalted butter
1 large onion, diced
1 lb carrots, diced
4 celery stalks, thinly sliced on the diagonal
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1 cups milk
1/2 cup heavy cream
2 teaspoon chopped fresh thyme leaves
3/4 cup green peas
1 Tbsp parsley
3 teaspoons salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
2 1/2 c chicken stock

Chicken Stock
1. In a large stock pot, add the vegetables into cold water. There should be just enough water in the pot to almost cover the chicken (but not completely). Bring the water to a boil and then add the chicken. Let the water barely simmer for 1 hour.
2. After 1 hour, remove the chicken and let it cool. Allow the rest of the stock to continue to simmer.
3. Remove all the chicken meat from the chicken carcass and dice it. Discard the skin. Place the chicken carcass into the stock and let it simmer for another 2 hours.

Pie Crust
1. In a food processor with the dough blade attachement, pulse the flour, salt, and butter together. Pulse the ingredients together until the butter is in pea-sized pieces
2. Slowly add the ice water to the food processor, pulsing after each tablespoon. Only add enough ice water until the dough starts to come together
3. Remove the dough and refrigerate until cold. This dough can be kept for up to 2 days in the refrigerator

Filling
1. Melt the butter. Add the onion, celery, and carrots. Simmer together for 10-15 minutes, until onion becomes translucent
2. Slowly add the flour and mix thoroughly so there aren't any clumps of flour
3. Add the chicken stock slowly, stirring well to incorporate it.
4. Add the milk and cream slowly. Let mixture simmer for 10 minutes on low heat, stiring to ensure it doesn't stick to the pan.
5. Add the chicken, thyme, parseley, salt and peper. Stir together and season again if necessary.
6. Add the peas and stir. Remove from heat.

Assembly
1. Place the filling into 15 oz ramekins
2. Roll the pie dough to 1/4" thick and place on top of ramekin. Use a decorative cookie cutter to cut a hole in the middle of the pie dough and place dough on top of ramekin.
3. Bake at 425 for 20 minutes or until crust is golden

Turkey Brine

Two years ago we discovered the wonders of brining. Brining makes foods incredibly juicy and gives the food a wondeful aroma if you add aromatics into your brine. Our Thanksgiving turkey always comes out moist and we can't get enough of it. When you brine a turkey, the white meat tastes just as flavorful as the dark meat.

Brine
7 qts water
2 c kosher salt
1 c brown sugar
8 bay leaves
1 T pepper corn
3 pieces of dried tangerine peel
5 pieces star anise
2 T fennel
8 slices of ginger

Boil 1 quart of water and add the aromatics and sugar and salt. Let the mixture simmer for 15 minutes. Add the rest of the the water in and let the brine come to room temperature.

Place the turkey into the brine mixture and let brine for 24 hours.

When you are ready to cook the turkey, stuff the cavity with lemon, carrots, celery, onion, apple, rosemary, and bay leaves. These extra aromatics really give the turkey a wonderful flavor as it cooks.

Jasmine Rice

Jasmine rice is characterized by its fragrant aroma. It is the rice most normally served in Asian restaurants. Everyone has their own favorite brand and it's debatable which one is the best.

My go-to brand had been the three ladies brand. I really liked it because the individual grains were separate from one another and it had a very fragrant and lovely aroma. Many people, however, recommended the Golden Phoenix brand. They really liked it so this past weekend I had run out of rice and decided to give the Golden Phoenix brand a try.

I found that I actually don't like the Golden Phoenix brand as much as the three ladies brand. The Golden Phoenix brand isn't very fragrant and is more chewy. Each grain of rice is almost too pronounced, causing the rice to almst be chewy to eat. The three ladies brand of rice is much more pleasing to my palate and my lesson is to not switch rice brands in the future.

Murg Makhani (Butter Chicken)

I love butter chicken, or murg mahani, whenever I go into an Indian restaurant. Yes, I know that it isn't true Indian food. I am, however, Chinese and my taste buds are sadly weak when it comes to spicy food. Murg makhani is one of the few things I can eat without breaking a sweat.

I was first introduced to butter chicken when I went to an Indian restaurant while vacationing in Canada. I can't remember the city now ... it was either Quebec or Toronto or Montreal .. but either way I picked it off the menu and I was delighted by the dish.

For the uninitiated, butter chicken is basically a roasted chicken in a sauce made from butter, tomato sauce, and cream. The flavors meld together wonderfully and the taste is pure, indulgent bliss.

I had been wanting to make murg makhani for some time now but never dragged myself over to the Indian grocery store to buy the requisite garam masala. All of the other ingredients are pretty easy to find in a normal grocery store except that particular spice. I finally got around to go going to my local Indian grocery store this past weekend and now I'm all set to begin to make my butter chicken.

You need to marinate the chicken overnight. Marinating it overnight helps to tenderize the chicken. If you have a meat tenderizer you can use that too to help infuse the flavors.

I made the butter chicken and .. well, it didn't turn out as I had hoped. The curry itself was way too thick. The recipe called for 1 cup of cashew butter which was way too much. Unfortunately I didn't realize how thick the 1 cup of cashew butter would make the curry until too late. The sauce was very thick and there was no way you could eat it. I had to dilute the curry just to thin it out .. and when it was thinned out the flavor was lost. :( At the end, the taste was just ok. It could have been much better were it not for the watered down curry.

I might try to make it again one day .. but right now I am of the opinion that murg makhani may just be better off eaten in a restaurant!

General Tso's Chicken 左宗堂雞

General Tso's chicken is a favorite dish of Americans. It is ordered a lot in many Chinese-American restaurants. I think that it has to do with the love of fried food and a goopy gravy-like sauce.

Fuschia Dunlop recently did research on the origins of General Tso's chicken. It was reprinted in the NY Times. I made the recipe last night and I was very disappointed. The taste wasn't what I was expecting at all and even Ming didn't like it -- and he's very forgiving when it comes to food. Many people have raved about the recipe so it was doubly disappointing to discover that it's not something I care for at all. The flavor was very sour and, for lack of a better descriptive word, the gravy lacked soul. There wasn't any body nor depth to the gravy; it was primarily sour and hot. It was missing something crucial. I know that this recipe was the original but, in this case, I think that some tweaking of it would most definitely benefit the diners. I made this recipe exactly as stated, something I rarely do with Chinese recipes, and I think that I would have been better off doing my normal a little of this and little of that.

I have made General Tso's chicken in the past and I much prefer that taste over this one from Fushia Dunlop's original version. I use a recipe from Food Down Under but I've tweaked it.

My General Tso's Chicken
Ingredients :
4 Chicken legs, skinned & cut
2 Egg whites
2t Cornstarch
1 T rice vinegar
1 T soy sauce
1 T shao xing wine
2 t Sugar
1 t Cornstarch, mixed with water
Peanut oil for frying
3 Dried red chili peppers
1 Scallion, chopped (separate & green parts)
Knob fresh ginger, minced
1 Garlic clove, minced
2 t Sesame oil
1 piece dried orange peel
1 T oyster sauce

Vigorously blend egg whites and cornstarch; add chicken pieces and toss to coat. Heat oil in large wok and add chicken pieces in batches, cooking each until golden, about 3 minutes, then drain.

Pour off all but 1 TB of hot oil from wok. Add peppers and stir-fry for 15 seconds; add green scallion, minced ginger and garlic and stir-fry for 15 more seconds. Add mixture of vinegar , soy, wine, sugar, oyster sauce, and orange peel stirring until heated through. Add cornstarch and water mixture and stir until mixture is thickened. Off heat, stir in sesame oil, garnish with scallion greens, and serve.