My school has an awesome nonprofit organization called Challah for Hunger where all proceeds from their bake sales go towards charity. Today, they opened their kitchens to the student body and we were able to customize our own challah bread! I like sweet things, so I made sure to stuff it with plenty of chocolate and top with sprinkles. Love my school!
Our Feast: turkey, cranberry walnut sauce, mashed potatoes, mushroom gravy, truffle mac and cheese, garlic green beans, homemade bread rolls, and roasted vegetables
Roasted turkey made with a dry brine and baked for over three hours
My sister was Head Chef for the entire Thanksgiving meal!
Caramel apple pies. We also baked pecan and pumpkin pies!
I am so thankful for such great followers, friends, and family! I hope everyone has a wonderful time surrounded by great food and even better company!
Since I was home for the weekend, my mom wanted to make one of my favorite foods: wonton soup.
Making wonton soup is one of the easiest meals! Everyone has a different way of making them and my mom’s is super simple. Even though I made this many times, all I remember are the ingredients: soy sauce, sesame oil, finely minced ginger, green onions, and ground chicken. My mom never measures when she cooks, so I am not exactly sure how much of each she adds to the recipe.
My version of wrapping wontons. Apparently, it’s wrong… but oh well!
For the broth, it can be as simple as hot water with a little bit of soy sauce and sesame oil. Chicken stock also works very well! We love adding veggies to our soup and honestly, all green vegetables make the dish amazing!
Homemade wonton soup with bok choy and broccoli
My sister planned this wonderful meal today after a trip to the Farmer’s Market and we all absolutely loved it: salmon belly and cobb salad, with a side of freshly baked bread (not pictured). Since she handled dinner, I took over dessert which was strawberry shortcake with homemade whipped cream. Most of our ingredients were purchased at our local Farmer’s Market that’s in our area every Sunday.
Since we loved this meal so much, we are going to make this our weekly Sunday dinner!
Pan-skillet salmon belly with crispy skin. This is the best part of the fish and the fat is good for your skin!
Cobb Salad to accompany the salmon belly, made with corn, avocados, eggs, feta, and tomatoes (grown in from our backyard)
Freshly baked strawberry shortcake with homemade whipped cream. Bought the strawberries from the Farmer’s Market that day!
The shortcake is basically a plain scone, so it’s great to go with breakfast. Just add a little jam.
Today, I decided to make something relatively new so I looked up some easy French recipes on AllRecipes.com.
My French-Inspired Dinner: French Onion Soup, Garlic Baguette Croutons, and Mussels a la Mariniere
Mussels a la Mariniere. Find recipe here
French Baguette that I’ll use for the garlic croutons!
French Onion Soup with slices of Swiss Cheese (it’s better if broiled before serving). Topped with the garlic baguette croutons. Find recipe here
To complete my little French dinner, I made some creme brulee!
It took a while to get the sugar shell just right, but it was worth it! Find the recipe here
All you need are eggs, cream (I prefer using half and half over heavy cream), and sugar. So easy!
Once my spoon cracked the shell, I truly understood the joy Amelie felt when she eats creme brulee!
Since I still had some leftover arugula from my Panini/Sandwich dinner the other day, I decided to make an entire dinner with the one purpose of finishing that one bag of arugula. Arugula is a very pungent leafy green, which makes it hard for some people to eat. My dad is a finicky eater, so I had to make this dinner as appetizing as possible for him (there’s a word in Chinese for those types of people). Thus, I made pizza!
I did all of this in less than two hours, which includes the homemade pizza dough. I made two identical pizzas because I was kinda lazy, plus they both used a lot of arugula.
Fresh ingredients on homemade pizza dough, ready for the oven!
Right out of the oven! YUM! I think I could have used even more arugula…
The pizzas consist of a ricotta cheese base (instead of marinara), generous slices of fresh mozzarella cheese, large beef tomatoes, a boatload of arugula, salt, pepper, olive oil, and thin shavings of garlic hidden under the cheese (garlic burns really easily when exposed to heat). It was really good, if I say so myself!
I was inspired to use garlic shavings from what I’ve seen on Gjelina Take Away’s spinach pizza I had the other day with my friend Allegra. I think garlic made this pizza infinitely better!
Although I used a lot of arugula on the pizza, there was still enough leftover to make salads for everyone. To make the flavors more palatable, I added thinly sliced granny smith apples, cherry tomatoes, and feta cheese to the arugula. These flavors all complemented the super-easy balsamic vinaigrette I made (olive oil, balsamic vinegar, Grey Poupon mustard, and half an orange squeezed).
A slice of pizza with a side of arugula salad
I was overall super impressed at how incredibly simple this meal was to make! I just served the pizzas on the cutting boards I used (which were clean of course) and since the pizzas were baked on parchment paper, there was not really anything especially large to clean.
Overall, this is one of the best tasting meals I made in a long time. Not only did my dad like the pizza, he even ate all of his salad! Plus, I finally finished off all of the arugula! I think this calls for a double “Mission Accomplished,” if there’s such a thing (there should be)! Whoot!
I credit all of my cooking skills to my very capable mom! Ever since my sister and I were little, she’d sit us down on the floor and mix flour and water together for us to play with. She basically made her own organic Play-Doh before it was cool (what a hipster mommy!).
Today, I am acting as my mom’s sous-chef. She decided to tackle the boatload of tomatoes in our backyard by making her famous Oxtail Stew. It’s a tomato-base comfort food that is commonly served all over the world. We are Chinese, but French, Italian, and Indonesian cuisines have also used this recipe. There are slight variations, but the main ingredients are basically the same.
Oxtail Stew made with tomatoes, cabbage, carrots, and celery. Garnished with freshly chopped cilantro
Although it may sound weird, oxtails are one of the most amazing cuts out there and if you cook it long enough, the meat just falls off the bone and melts in your mouth.
My mom never measures when she cooks so I am always surprised when her foods are constantly amazing! She eyeballs everything and depending on the ingredient, she can smell how much she needs to add to the dish (it’s so weird and it’s something only my mom understands).
Now I need to go into hibernation. I think this stew has put me in a food coma… SO GOOD…
I saw the untouched panini press I gave to my sister for her birthday, so tonight I decided to make my family a panini sandwich dinner.
I gave them the option to either have a club sandwich or a turkey arugula panini. In addition to our toasted bread of awesomeness, I made a side of asparagus cooked in a little of the leftover bacon grease. My sister helped with a large apple salad for a little extra green. This whole meal is my lame attempt to have a more sophisticated taste, but overall I think both sandwiches turned out alright!
Club Sandwich with panini grilled bread, turkey, lettuce, bacon, avocado, tomato, and a little mayonaise
Turkey Arugula Panini made with thinly sliced apples, sharp white cheddar , and dijon mustard. Fresh Green Salad. Steamed Corn. Bacon Asparagus [background]
This is great light lunch for those days when sandwiches and quesadillas just won’t do. I’m in love with wasabi so this meal is definitely for those with an acquired taste for nose-pinching spiciness.
Zaru soba sauce from the local Japanese market, wasabi and thinly sliced green onions
Zaru Soba Noodles
Mmmmhmmm this is definitely my favorite breakfast, thanks to my older sister: 1.5 soft boiled eggs, fresh fruit, toast with jam & butter, and a hot cup of coffee. It’s nice to be home for the summer where I can actually make my own breakfast once in a while!
Selene 