Quick and Easy Mapo Tofu Recipe

Mapo tofu...this dish is a very popular Chinese dish in western countries as well as asian countries like Japan. Mapo tofu is very simple and easy to make. Super delicious when served with rice! The key ingredients to this dish is ground pork, tofu, and the sauces Dou Ban Jiang 豆瓣醬 (Chili bean paste) and  Tian Mian Jiang 甜麵醬 (Sweet bean sauce). The sauces can be found in Asian supermarkets.

My fiance saw a poster of mapo tofu sauce mix box in a local Japanese supermarket and said to me he wants to eat something like that with rice. I decided to give this dish a try. Not the box mix but from scratch. Last weekend I made this and he loved it! Nothing makes me happier than satisfying his tummy. =D Success! If you're looking for something easy and quick to make, give this recipe a try!

Hong Kong Style Macaroni in Soup Recipe

When it comes to macaroni, many would associate it with mac & cheese. In Hong Kong, macaroni is often served in light soup and ham slices for breakfast. I personally prefer lighter flavors so I like mine in soup. =)

This recipe is quite easy to make. You can cook a big batch of macaroni and store them in the fridge. The soup base is also very easy and fast to make. Like congee, you can eat or serve this when one is sick. 

Japanese Cookies- Soba Boro Recipe

When I found this soba boro cookie recipe, I got super excited! I've been wanting to make some kind of Japanese cookies...I'm so glad I found this~ The cookies turned out wonderful! Very light and crunchy. I'm in love with them! <3

Soba = buckwheat. Buckwheat flour is the main ingredient for these cookies. I actually had a hard time finding this flour....went to 4 different grocery stores and finally found the one and only bag left at a organic grocery store. According to the original recipe, there's hulled and unhulled buckwheat flour. The hulled version is more pure and white. That is the one to use for this recipe. The unhulled version is more greyish, more 'pigmented'. I saw the unhulled version in the bulk section but I took a risk and purchased the last bag of buckwheat flour in the baking aisle. The flour was in a brown paper bag and it didn't say anywhere if it was hulled or not. It turned out to be the hulled version to my delight! sweeeet! 

For the Japanese sugar and the flower 'cookie' cutter, I got them from a local Japanese grocery store. The flower cutter is actually not a cookie cutter but a cutter for vegetables like carrots, mainly used for bento boxes. You can use a regular flower shape cookie cutter or whatever shape you like but these cookies are traditionally made in flower shapes in Japan. To make the hole in the middle, I used one of my Wilton decorative round tips to punch the holes. If you can't find the Japanese sugar, I believe you can substitute it with regular granulated sugar.

Guo Pei Congee Recipe

 
Last week my mom scared the crap out of me. She called me in the middle of the day last wednesday and asked me to pick her up from work coz she kept throwing up. When I got there, she looked really sick and weak. As I was supporting her to the car, she kept throwing up. I had to take her to the washroom and we stayed there for half an hour. She was feeling really cold but sweating a lot at the same time. She had to sit on the toilet to rest coz she was too weak to stand. Some lady in another stall was throwing up too...o___O I was thinking maybe its the flu! Luckily my sister was here to help and we took her to the emergency. The doctors did some blood test and gave her IV and other liquids. We were there for about 7 hours. After 7 hours of resting on the bed, my mom was feeling a bit better and was discharged. We asked the doctor what was wrong with my mom and they didn't know. It could be the flu or food poisoning. They had no idea!

The next day, my mom was still feeling really weak...so I took the initiative to make her some congee to eat. Whenever I'm not feeling well, my mom would make me plain congee or dried scallop congee. I always ask for salted duck eggs and some shredded dried pork on my congee. I really like that combination. This time I made her guo pei congee like how she taught me.

Chinese Dish- Silverfish & Chives Fried Eggs

Silverfish & chives fried eggs is one of my favorite mid-night snack dish along with plain congee, spicy cold shrimps, stir fried clams, etc... Now I'm craving for those dishes!! When I was younger, my parents would take us out to Chinese restaurants late at night and would order these dishes. Delicious! but that was a long time ago...so its been a while since I last had them. T___T... but over the Christmas holidays, my sister came to visit us from the states and we started talking about mid-night snack dishes that we used to have. We were gonna go together but something happened and we ended up not going. She flew back home the next day. Before she left though, she bought me some silverfish from the grocery store so that I can make some fried eggs with them...haha. Thanks! so I bought some yellow chives and made some fried eggs for dinner the day after.

It was not bad! Although it can't be compared to the restaurant ones (I don't have a gas range and a wok) but still not bad! This dish is very simple to make...and the most important thing is pan fry at medium heat to make sure the fish is cooked. I chose to use yellow chives instead of the green nira chives was because I remembered the restaurant ones were yellow chives. You can use nira chives if you want for more color, etc.

Homemade Korean Kimchi Recipe

When I think about Korean cuisine, kimchi and Korean BBQ comes to mind. Kimchi is a traditional fermented dish made with mainly cabbage combined with spices and other ingredients. Sometimes radish, carrots, onions, and seafood are preserved with the cabbage. Kimchi can be served as a side dish or mixed in with other ingredients to make kimchi fried rice or other dishes. Since they are preserved, they can be kept for a while in a tight container in the fridge. You can easily find kimchi in Asian supermarkets or you can always make your own. It does take a bit of work and it can be a little messy as well but making your own kimchi means you can adjust the spiciness and if you make a big batch, you can always give some away to friends and family.

I got the kimchi recipe here. This site is my go to site for Korean recipes. Lots of wonderful recipes and very informative too. She also has a YouTube channel with tutorial videos. Very nice! For the kimchi recipe, I halved the ingredients from the original recipe coz 10lb of cabbage seems a bit much for me since I don't eat kimchi that often. I also skipped the squid.

Japanese Cream Puff Recipe

I was introduced to Japanese cream puffs when Beard Papa's first Vancouver shop opened. There were huge line ups throughout the first day of opening. It was pretty crazy! I didn't get to buy any till a week later...and even then I still had to line up. The cream puffs were super delicious. It was light, creamy, and had just the right amount of sweetness. The most important thing it wasn't heavy or filling at all.

When I stumbled on this recipe a while ago, I knew I had to give it a try. It was a lot easier than I thought it would be...and the cream puffs taste just as good as Beard Papa's in my opnion...which was nice! There are a number of steps to the recipe though but it was definitely worth the time and work. When I first saw the need to use vanilla bean pods in this recipe, I wondered if I can use vanilla extract instead coz I never used vanilla bean pods before. I'm glad I stuck with the bean pods coz it gave the cream a really pleasant vanilla flavor and scent. Very nice!