subway

things have been crazy lately. i've been baking a little on and off but in my flurry of activity i've forgotten to take pictures. the balcony garden is also coming along quite nicely but again i've forgotten to take pictures. so to entertain you today i've posted up some more pictures from my (almost) long forgotton new york trip.

one of my favorite things about new york is the subway system. having been born and raised in california i am very used to the car as my one and only mode of transportation. when forced to take BART on a working stint in emeryville i seemed to attract every odd and/or smelly person on the BART train, so my perception of mass transit is not a particularly happy one. in new york however, the subway can take you ANYWHERE and chances are there are about a couple thousand people also heading in that same direction whom buffer you from the odd/smelly/crazy people (who normally like to talk to me). it's great! for $2 you can go anywhere along the line. i snapped these pics because i liked the pictures of the working people on the walls of the subway. somehow i got some random people in the shot. i don't usually like taking pictures of people i don't know but they didn't seem to mind.

chive dumplings

I saw garlic chives at the grocery store one day and, for some reason, became obsessed with the idea of chive dumplings. You know how it goes. I used this recipe, but pre-made gyoza wrappers. I don't think they were thick enough and are a far cry from these examples that I just found today. They almost make me want to make my own wrappers. Almost.

9/11

9/11 has come and gone. i didn't really feel like blogging about it on the actual date. about a month back i visted ground zero during a short trip to new york. i was taken aback by the sheer size of footprint of the building. it's amazing how much our world has changed since then. it's also crazy to me how much it has stayed the same.

shepherd's pie

Awhile ago, I decided that a crumpled heap of papers in an old seaweed tin was not the ideal organization system for my recipes, and I put them into a binder. Since then, I have been thinking about the shepherd's pie recipe that I saw. I went grocery shopping, but I ended up at Ranch 99, which is not generally a place that sells ground lamb, so after some mild harassment from the meat counter dudes, I was on my way with ground beef.

Once I was back at the apartment, I discovered that I had two recipes. One was a gourmet version and the other was more of a college student version. Since I didn't have pearl onions, tomato paste, turnips or dry white wine on hand, I decided to go for the college student version. Naturally, I then discovered that I didn't have any button mushrooms, aka ingredient number two.

This past weekend, I had picked up some buna-shimeji mushrooms at Mitsuwa. I don't think I've ever had them before and I had been seeing them both there and at Ranch 99, so I got some. I didn't think that shepherd's pie was really the traditional dish in which buna-shimeji are used, but I think the Cheesecake Factory shepherd's pie has shiitake, so in they went.

First, I had to do some quick research on buna-shimeji, which yielded some interesting results:

- health benefits for mice eating buna-shimeji/beech mushrooms. I'm not a mouse, but maybe the mushrooms can counteract whatever artery hardening I'm going to get from eating all that ground beef.

- a big discussion on takikomi-gohan, or kinoko-gohan, in which buna-shimeji mushrooms can play a starring role

- images of happy mushrooms

Basically, I ended up following neither of the recipes that closely. I threw in some frozen carrots and peas, ground beef, onions, garlic, leeks, thyme, black pepper, red wine, and a beef bouillon cube. It was not bad.


Shepherd's pie is not that photogenic.

origami

i'm hoping that sandia is still in her origami phase. that way she can buy this book and i can borrow it! i just love tomoko fuse books. =)

week 4

so the lettuce seeds are coming along well. they grow so fast! yesterday was their last day in the teacup. as cute as they were in the teacup, i had to transplant them into a bigger and more practical (meaning not as cute) clay pot.

mini cheesecakes

Lately I’ve been trying to be more organized. This is a very difficult task for me. Especially when I’m living alone. Living alone means that I can be as messy as I want (or don’t want) and nobody else is affected by the crazy big mess except for me. A huge cleaning spree however, was sparked by the fact that for a time, whenever I walked into my living room I would either bruise myself by walking into something or puncture myself by somehow stepping on something. Who put that stuff there?! Oh wait, it was me. =p

Where is this senseless rambling going? OH! So while I was cleaning I found this mini cheesecake pan that I had borrowed from a friend. I think I’ve had it for over a year because I distinctly remember MOVING with it. Hahaha… oh well… she has my pan and I have hers. Neither of us really cares (I think). The thought was anyway, that I would actually USE the pan and then give it back to her. Since it’s almost fall mini pumpkin cheesecakes with cinnamon crust sounded like a good idea! I actually used the pumpkin butter like they suggested but I think that you could probably make your own or just add a bunch of spices to regular canned pumpkin and it’d probably come out ok. For some reason though, when I made the first batch, I missed the part in the recipe that says TURN THE OVEN DOWN AFTER BAKING CRUST! so when I cooked the first few they were really puffy in the oven but then sank down making a crater like depression right in the center of the cheesecakes. Tasty but not that attractive. The second batch turned out better. Imagine that! Following directions pays off! It’s weird though because the recipe says it makes 12 but after filling the first tray I had a lot of batter left. So the recipe actually makes about 18.

dinner party?

i don't really know that it qualifies as a dinner party but i hosted a dinner for three the other day. i was contemplating appetizers when i realized that i had all i needed in the house already!

goat cheese appetizers

4 ounces goat cheese
4 ounces cream cheese
4 cloves roasted garlic*
1/4 cup whole almonds
freshly ground pepper
crackers of your choice (i used erica's kitchen shortcrust savoury boats. i purchased them at the grocery outlet. so cute in their little boat shape.)

bring the goat cheese and cream cheese to room temperature. mash cloves of roasted garlic with a fork. chop almonds, reserving a few whole almonds for garnish. toast almonds in oven. combine goat cheese, cream cheese, roasted garlic, and chopped toasted almond and mix well. add cracked pepper to taste. portion goat cheese mixture onto crackers and garnish with a whole toasted almond. number of servings depends on the type of cracker used.

* to make roasted garlic preheat the oven to 350 degrees. take a bulb of garlic and slice in half so all of the cloves are exposed. brush exposed cloves with olive oil and place both halves face up in an oven proof dish. cover the dish with aluminum foil and bake for approximately 45 minutes.

for dinner we had korean short ribs, some sort of chinese vegetable, and steamed rice. the dinner wasn't fancy or anything so i didn't take any pictures. dessert was fun to make thought. i've had tarts on the brain ever since i tried my hand at a peach tart the other day.

i've always been afraid of crust. it's a fear likely instilled in my by my mom. in her own words, "i hate making crust. it always turns out really hard. and all that work!" but since i tried the shortbread crust and that turned out ok i thought i would try out another one. the food processor method seems pretty quick and easy so i tried another recipe that used the same method. gourmet food plaza posted a recipe for a pear tart with cornmeal crust so i gave it a whirl. i have to say that the recipe was pretty disappointing. while it looked tasty the flavor was completely lacking. the poached pears were pretty bland and the custard mostly just tasted like scrambled eggs. guess i'll have to try my hand at tarts one more time to get a winner! any suggestions for a recipe?

week 1

i'm trying to grow my own produce. since corn doesn't grow well on a condo balcony i decided on lettuce and spinach instead. the seeds actually sprouted! the spinach seeds had some strange directions. "wash in a mild detergent. rinse and then soak for 24 hours." i wonder why you have to wash them?

at least if i grown my own spinach i won't have to worry about e. coli like on the spinach in our stores!

kanzashi

The idea of tsumami kanzashi, folded fabric flowers that adorn hair accessories, has been floating around in the back of my mind for awhile, but recently I decided to give it a go. Naturally, any project had to involve excessive internet research before getting off the ground. First, there was this tutorial on crafster as well as another to make rounded petals. Then there was this. Finally, there were movies!

I think I did things the hard way, but I ended up with this. I used up some rayon scraps from a lavender eye pillow-making binge I had a few years back and some hematite beads that I bought in college(!).



When all was done, I felt a little bit like Koma Neko. Now what do I do with this thing?

signs you might be obsessed with gardening

• You get really excited thinking about decomposing compost.
  
• You laugh at the author of a gardening book who says that starting seeds in cottage cheese containers is far superior to any other hackneyed scheme like starting them in egg cartons, only to realize that you have actually considered starting seeds in egg cartons.
  
• You fantasize about various ways of killing snails.
  
• You consider whether or not you could use contact lens solution bottles for a cheap drip irrigation system.
  

pistachio cupcakes

Last weekend I tried out Chockylit's pistachio cupcakes with rose petal buttercream . I wasn't about to spend big bucks on pistachio cream, so I figured, I'll just make my own. Hahaha! I remember thinking that ck was a little crazed for making her own marzipan a few years ago, so I guess I have reached that particular level of insanity, because on Saturday I found myself food processing the life out of some pistachios. Then I didn't think they were smooth enough and I ended up using the back of my lemon reamer as a pestle and pounding them a little bit more, in addition to adding oil and sugar.

The rest of the cupcake experience was pretty straightforward, except that I didn't have any cupcake papers. As a result, the sides and bottoms of the cupcakes looked like they were peeling from a bad sunburn and they had a slightly metallic taste. I liked the crumb of the cupcake. However, they weren't that sweet, which I guess was balanced out by the buttercream, in which I used rose-flavored syrup instead of jelly. Also, I didn't think they tasted that much like pistachio, which I guess was the sad part. Maybe using cupcake papers next time would help or just using more pistachios?

experiments in pad thai

kaffir lime


it all started when my old roomie innocently asked...

"hey! have you ever made pad thai before?"

oh man. she never realized what a snowball she set in motion with that one little question.

as always, my quest started with a lot of internet research. why is it that every website with a pad thai recipe claims to be "authentic"? how do i know who to believe? man. this going to be harder than i thought!

a few hours later i finally settled on a recipe from thaitable.com and then i sat around for another couple of hours contemplating the ingredients. the list didn't seem too bad... hmmmm... tamarind paste, kaffir lime leaves, and *scratches head* isn't there lemongrass in pad thai? wait! what does kaffir lime even look like? better print out a picture of it before i head out, cause they probably don't speak english at the store...

i headed out to Sontepheap Market in east oakland. i had been there once before when i was on a thai food kick and knew it to be fairly well stocked (as well as close to my house). after purchasing all my ingredients i set to work...

my taste tester and i looked at the dish curiously. isn't it RED in the restaurants? why is my version BROWN? hmmmm... it tastes a little different too...

so after further research (aka actually READING the recipe that i selected) i discovered that "Compared to the red, oil coated version you normally find in western restaurants, this one is drier and more tastes fresher and more complex. I've never seen oily, red pad thai in Thailand."

so the quest for the restaurant AMERICANIZED version of pad thai continues (i've already picked out a couple of new recipes to try out) but apparently i now know how to make the kind of pad thai actually eaten in thailand! =)

santa ramen

if you haven't been to santa ramen you really should give it a try. in my humble opinion they have the best tonkotsu ramen in the bay area. the wait is always long (but it is still the best) and watchout because if you go on a tuesday then you are CLOSE (to ramen) BUT NO CIGAR! hahahaha... i apologize if that lame joke didn't make sense. sometimes my sense of humor is a little warped. =) yum.

Santa Ramen
805 South B Street
San Mateo, CA 94401
(650) 344-5918
Hours:
Mon, Wed-Sun 11:30 a.m.-2:00 p.m.
Mon, Wed-Sun 5:30 p.m.-9:00 p.m.

pain percentage

took my first trip to berkeley bowl this weekend. the rumor was that it is incredibly busy on the weekends, so in order to avoid the crowds we attempted to get there right when it opened. hmmmm... seems like a good idea right? well, if you're trying to beat the crowds at berkeley bowl, let me tell you that this is not the way to do it. hahaha...

once we got inside it was like a whole other world! the olive bar! have you ever seen so many different kinds of olives in your life?! i don't even like olives! but it was fascinating nonetheless. i loved the line of hot pepper sauces that were ranked in percentages of pain. in the two isles of bulk bins i even found dried cantaloupe. gee, and i don't like cantaloupe either! hmmmm... why am i so taken with foods that i don't really like? so fun!

and if you've never been, think of trader joe's on steroids.

pea seeds soaking...

finished quilt!

The delinquent quilt is finally finished. I sent it off in the mail this afternoon.



I started out with this swan fabric, since when the recipients of this quilt went to Europe, the groom was somehow convinced that if he ran or swam fast enough, he would be able to catch a swan. I had originally wanted to make a double wedding ring quilt, but ended up with this pattern instead. I didn't follow the instructions exactly, since they were for applique instead of patchwork, but the basic idea was there.



I machine quilted around each circle and drew new circles around each concave square shape.



One of my favorite parts of the quilt is texture created by the machine quilting on the semi-plain backing. Is it wrong to like the back of the quilt better than the front? Oh well.



Finally, I did machine quilting around the border and then sewed on the binding.


After I finished slip stitching the binding onto the back, for some reason, instead of celebrating, I got out some old scraps from a wall-hanging I had made lf for Christmas a few years ago and kept going...

chocolate chip cookies

Ever since I started baking I’ve been on a quest for the perfect chocolate chip cookie recipe. For years and years sandia and I have both been baking with the Mrs. Field’s chocolate chip cookie recipe and it has served us well. But every once in awhile I come across a recipe that just HAS to be tried. I had one of these moments when I was browsing something so clever’s website the other day. FLAT AND CHEWY?! So I had to try. The cookie is definitely true to its description. So if that’s what you like in a chocolate chip cookie (and I do!) you have to give this recipe a try!

paul masson cupcakes

*edited*

Guess who’s in charge of dessert tonight? =)

I thought I would use the chance to incorporate the recently acquired Paul Masson Mocha Caramel Liqueur into a dessert. While sandia and hk's suggestions of ice cream and a cocktail party were well received, I felt I needed something that was a little easier to transport.

This recipe makes about 50 mini cupcakes. If you don’t know what to do with 50 mini cupcakes you can probably make about 25 regular sized ones (give or take a few). Luckily I don’t think it will be too difficult to get rid of 50 mini ones. And they’re less guilt riddled if they’re mini! You might even call them DIET cupcakes!

*Just a warning. These cupcakes are for adults only. Just of whiff of them might knock you down! Hopefully everyone at dinner has a high tolerance. ;-)

Paul Masson Mocha Caramel Mini Cupcakes

Ingredients:
3 eggs (separated)
3/4 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup butter (softened)
1 cup light brown sugar (packed)
2 1/4 cups all purpose flour
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 cup strong cold coffee
3/4 cup Paul Masson Mocha Caramel Liqueur
Garnished with coffee beans

Preheat oven 350 degrees. Beat egg whites until stiff peaks form. Set aside. Cream butter and sugars together until fluffy. Beat in egg yolks one at a time. Sift flour, cocoa, and baking soda together. Combine coffee and Paul Masson Mocha Caramel Liqueur. Add flour and coffee mixtures to creamed mixture in alternating batches ending with flour; blend well. Fold egg whites into batter. Divide batter into 2 oz portion cups approximately three quarters full. Bake for 15-18 minutes. Makes approximately 50 mini cupcakes.

Mocha Caramel Cream Cheese Frosting
8 ounces Philly cream cheese
1/2 stick butter, room temperature
4 cups powdered sugar
2 Tablespoons Paul Masson Mocha Caramel Liqueur
1. Beat butter vigorously with an electric mixer.
2. Scrape the bowl and add the cream cheese and beat until combined.
3. Add the powdered sugar and liqueur and beat until smooth.

*edit*
so after the taste testing i concluded that the flavors in this recipe needed to be pumped up a little bit. for next time i think i will make the coffee SUPER strong (think vietnamese style!) and i'll either use a tad more cocoa powder or fold some chocolate chips into the mix. more than likely i'll probably do both! ;-)

trio of sorbets

in a monumental turn of events... mom and dad came over for dinner last week! i got so excited about the prospect of them visiting that i went a little nuts with the dessert. but if there's one thing that there can never be too much of... it's dessert. =)

the dessert menu for the evening was sort of an evolution of what happened to appear in my fridge over the past week. the first melon appeared when i had a friend over for dinner earlier in the week. her gift to me was one super sweet muskmelon! we had some for dessert that night... but that night my head was swimming. what will i do with all of the leftover melon? how will i possibly consume an entire melon by myself?

the answer? turn it into sorbet of course! now this may SOUND easy... but when you are a freezer food packrat like i am, this is no easy feat. with some food shifting, shoving, and repacking, and a resolve to eat the things i randomly decided to thaw, i created a space just big enough to fit the bucket part of my ice cream maker.

i settled on this recipe from the food network and got to work. a few days later ck and i headed to the city to check out a craft supply sale at the lab.* since the lab happens to be in the mission there were a bunch of very reasonably priced produce stands along the way. honeydew for $1?! how can i pass that up? mmmmm... honeydew. mmmmm... honeydew sorbet.

so with two melon sorbets under my belt i decided to make one to offset the sweetness of the melons. what does mom like best? limes! well limes are not that juicy. so lemons were the next best thing. =) i used a lemon sorbet recipe from lucious lemon desserts. i pretty much followed it exactly.

lemon sorbet
luscious lemon desserts
makes 1 quart

1 1/2 cups water
1 1/2 cups sugar
1 T finely grated lemon zest
1 1/2 cups fresh lemon juice
pinch of salt

1. bring the water and sugar just to a boil in a medium saucepan, over medium-high heat, stirring until the sugar has dissolved. remove the pan from the heat, add the zest, and let stand, covered, for 10 minutes.

2. pour the syrup through a strainer into a medium bowl and stir in the lemon juice and salt. let cool to room temperature. refrigerate the mixture, covered, about 3 hours, or until thoroughly chilled.

3. transfer the mixture to an ice-cream maker and freeze according to the manufacturer's instructions. the sorbet will be soft, but ready to eat. for a firmer texture, transfer to a freezer container and freeze for at least 2 hours before serving.

*btw the sale at the lab was awesome and i got some pretty cool stuff for super cheap.

bigger!

just in case any of you blog readers were wondering... my overachieving basil seems to be doing quite well! in the past week or so he seems to have gone through a growth spurt. maybe it's the miracle grow potting soil i put him in. ;-)

brick o rama

(Updated: I stupidly put my travel mug into my tote bag with my camera. The mug leaked, and the camera decided that it wanted to randomly take pictures.



It also would turn itself on (sounds so dirty!) and not read the memory card. It's stopped acting up, so now I can add in the pictures that I intentionally took.)

When I was up visiting lf, we started talking about my new garden obsession and she mentioned a website that I hadn't yet visited, You Grow Girl. It is still summer vacation for me, so like other grad students, when I am not doing work, I spend a lot of time doing peripheral research. A friend of mine recently stayed up until 4 am reading about lightning. Last night, I read about a bunch of stuff on You Grow Girl, including how you can grow stuff in a bag and make compost in a cheap container.

Yesterday afternoon, I was browsing the free listings on craigslist and found a listing for free bricks. I have been wanting to make raised beds, but am too cheap to put out the money for lumber, so I have been checking out craigslist and freecycle in search of free materials. After about a week of looking, there was a listing for free bricks. I set up a meeting to pick some up today and then, just before going to bed, I found another listing for free bricks, right in grad housing. What's better than free bricks? More free bricks, nearby! I felt a little weird driving around in my pajamas to pick up free bricks at such an odd hour, but whatever. The posting went out at midnight, and before I had the chance to make it there, someone else had already taken away the cinder blocks, so there are other people who are potentially weirder than me about their free building materials.

Today, I picked up the other set of free bricks (not as nice, with some mortar attached), but there were a lot more of them. I felt less bad about not going to the gym after moving 100 bricks (not exaggerating) into and out of my car. Then I picked up a storage bin at the hardware store to make my mini composter, and I was all set. My roommate somehow did not ask me any questions as I used an exacto knife to cut air and drainage holes in my storage bin. I shredded some old newspapers that I picked up in San Francisco (Rasputin Manifesto, SF Weekly and a copy of the The Onion that I grabbed because of the headline, "Local Oafs to Spawn") and then set out to find some browns.



There's a scary area between the street and the parking lot that is basically a barren weedfest with some native plants.



I tramped out there because I had recently seen another gardener head out there with his yard waste and basically all of the plants there look brown anyway. I sized up the plants in the area and picked out a few large prickly bramble bushes that looked like barbed wire tumbleweeds, that, oddly, were strewn over the weeds, but did not appear to have grown there. Where did they come from?

Even stranger, but much more exciting was my discovery of the secret renegade tomato plant in the middle of all the weeds.



It was well-staked and so much more healthy than my rather sad tomato plants that I've already given up on and dug up. I feel like doing a stakeout to figure out whose plant it is...



At last, here is how my garden plot looked after many hours of labor.




Thus concludes what has been, quite possibly, the longest blog entry ever on the craft collective. Thank you very much.

time warp

so i've discovered that mr blogger here likes to date posts with a
"created on" date and not a "posted on" date. so please excuse my posts as i do not necessarily post in chronological order.