(10) Honey Toast

It’s a popular dessert in Japan now in young generation. Actually I was shocked by its appearance at the first time I saw it. What was the inventor thinking about? He or she must be a toast lover or a dessertaholic who take dessert as meals, or why he/she need such a huge and sweet dessert?

There are lots of different version of this desserts and every of it looks pretty and sweet, just like the dessert which only appears in a fairy tale.

How popular it is in Japan? They even build a mesuem for it!

It's the website: http://www.pasela.co.jp/food/honey/museum/index.html

Please go visit the website and you will be surprised by the creativity (or craziness :P) of Japanese.

It has a beautiful appearance which looks like a jewelry box and that’s also one of the important reasons why it’s popular among young generation, especially women. Frankly speaking, this dessert consists of toasted toast, honey, sugar, and other things you prefer such as fruits, chocolate or caramel as decorations. Though it is simple, the taste is good and sometimes we easily ignore the wonderfulness out of simplicity.

Recently in Taipei, a coffee shop which served honey toast as their recommended dessert opened and it soon became very famous. If you want to have an afternoon tea there, you have to book before two months or wait in line for at least two hours. Besides, the honey toast sold there at a high price. As a result, if the ingredients are easy to find and the steps are few and simple, why not try to make it on our own?

Prepare half loaf of toast and take the white part out.

It’s a little bit hard to explain in words so there’s an illustration. The red lines are where we cut.

Cut them into mouthful cubes and spread butter and some sugar on them then put them in an oven. Whether to toast the toast crust depends on you.

Put the cubes and other ingredients you like such as fruits or chocolate into the toast crust. The most recommended decoration is ice cream for it’s icy and the toast is hot and crunchy.

If you want, you can also replace the sugar with salt or garlic butter and make it a salty dish. There’s an example. http://www.chinafoodtv.com/u/junzhi/archives/2010/3309.html

No matter which version you like, its simple taste and beautiful appearance are attractive. It’s not hard to make but it does bring some changes and surprises to your normal daily meal.

(9) Homemade ice cream

Summer is coming. Cool drinks and a variety of ice cream, frappe, smoothie are almost daily necessities for some people. Ice cream is a super popular dessert. However, though the flavor and specialty of it become more and more diverse and attractive, the artificial additives and resources of ingredients are often unknown. Especially we often eat food which is harmful to health unconsciously due to the progress of technology.

As a result, more and more people tend to cook or bake cuisines by themselves and it leads to the inventions of many novel “food producers,” such as bread maker, which help you making bread from the first step, mix ingredients, to the last step, bake at a time with only one machine automatically. I wanted to buy an ice cream maker before. Nevertheless, after I found that I have to put one of the components of the ice cream maker into freezer for at least twelve hours before I use it, the decision of getting one was totally disappeared. Though I give up buying the machine, the desire of eating a special, safe and clean ice cream is still in my mind.

Thanks to the magic of Internet, it’s easy to find recipes and the way of making ice cream on your own without the help of expensive machine. I made some ice cream last summer following the recipe and the finished product is perfect. Even though my father, who considered the ice cream will taste like frozen sweet butter, said that it was really delicious “ice cream“.

Ingredients:
A:

Whipped cream: 200ml
Milk: 300ml
Vanilla extract: 1 teaspoon
B:

3 Egg yolks
Sugar: 90g

Milk and whipped cream are important to ice cream so use the high quality one for yourself.

Steps:
Mix A together, heat it to hot but not boiling.
Mix B together in another container.
Add B into A slowly (don’t pour all of it at a time) after A is at room temperature, it’s important or the egg yolk will be cooked into small clumps.
Heat the mixture on low flame and keep stirring until it becomes dense.
Put it into freezer.

The last step takes lot of patience because you have to take it out, blender it every hour, put it back to freezer, then keep this cycle until it become “ice cream”.

I suggest that you can do what you what to do, such as reading a book, or watching TV during the waiting time, or you will become restless because it is hard to stop the desire of eating it when the recipe forces you to look at the unfinished product, however, remember to find a alarm.

The recipe is simple so let’s make ice cream at home this summer! :)

(8) Healthy and Money-Saving Hamburger

You must suspect that why I describe hamburger as something healthy and money saving, which is totally opposite from the reality. A lot of people love hamburgers, the worldwide delicious dish. However, a good hamburger must use quality meat and fat and it leads to high calorie. Besides, being influenced by western culture, we are used to eat hamburgers with bread, French fries, smashed potato, lots of seasonings, drinks which are usually soda, and little vegetables. These entire elements makes hamburger becomes an evil which has an attractive appearance and impresses the public with the prejudice and disadvantages of hamburger.

It seems that I am trying to defend hamburger? Maybe it is also one of the reasons I want to introduce the recipe.

Mouths ago, one of my favored TV programs called “料理東西軍” showed the recipe.

“料理東西軍” is a definitely a cruel reality show and I always be tortured by it. Most strangely is that I can't not help but keep watching this program. The main context is that in every show, there are two chefs compete with each other, both of them have to cook a similar dish (for example, Chinese cuisine versus Chinese cuisine or pasta versus pasta) and try to win other guests’ minds. During the progress they tries their best to drive you crazy (because you are not assured to eat the dish) by the delicious food and selected ingredients. In the end of the program, the guests vote for their preference and the majority can enjoy the dish while the minority stares ay them without anything to eat.

The topic was “a low calorie meal in summer” on the very day I saw this recipe.

The chef replaced part of meat with tofu (the dry and hard one which is common in traditional markets) and substitute part of animal fat for green bean noodles. Besides, he added cabbage in it to improve the diversity of texture.

This is the approximate quantity of ingredients:

Cabbage: 100g
Tofu: 180g
Meat: 150g
One egg
Salt, peppers and other seasonings as you like

Before mix them together, remember to dry the tofu or it is hard to shape the hamburger. You can find something (a pan or a mug, it doesn’t have to be very heavy) to press the tofu or simply put it in a microwave for one or two minutes.

The chef suggested that once you start to cook the hamburger in a pan, don’t flip it until it shaped. Besides, if you have an oven and extra time, after both sides of the hamburgers are shaped, wrap them with aluminum foil then put into the oven. The finished product will be much more juicy and tender than the pan-fried one.

You can make lot of is and store them in the freezer. No matter adding cheese and ketchup as an Italian style dish, pan frying them as bruch served in a decent coffee shop, roast it in American way, or stew it as Chinese traditional dish “紅燒獅子頭”, there are many ways to enjoy it.

The taste of it is no as heavy as the traditional hamburgers and it’s a good way to make a change when you are tire of it. It saves not only your money but also your figure.

(7) Soufflé

Actually I haven’t baked this dessert for it is an advanced one, which needs more professional equipments such as an oven with the function of adjusting temperature and an automatic mixer. However, it is really an attractive dessert (sometimes added vegetables and cheese and served as an appetizer,) as a result, I still decide to write an essay about it. Maybe later one day when I get an advanced kitchen I can find the recipe and memory my thought again. :P

This beautiful dessert has a special history which rivals its appearance. During the time of Middle Age France, rich people lived in an extremely extravagant way. They spent four hours a day on having a meal with twenty cuisines. In the end of the meal, no one could afford to give a tiny bite but they still needed a dessert as a formulaic full stop. As a result, the chef designed Soufflé, which means “blow” in French and has a fluffy and moist texture, to critic the empty and prodigality of their lives. Soufflé’s main “ingredient” is the air so when it leaves oven, it will soon sink. One of the ingredients, egg white foam, makes Soufflé puff up almost one time higher than the container. Nevertheless, the beauty disappears with minutes.

However, nowadays every chef tries hard to make the beauty of it longer. Perhaps because that though people knows the cruel truth, they still want the wonderfulness stays no matter it’s true or fake.

The ingredients of two serving:
2 eggs (white and yolks separated)
1/2 cups milk
2 tablespoon flour
2 tablespoon butter
3/4 cup cheese
1/8 teaspoon crème of tartar (optional)

Pre-heat oven to 185°C and melt butter in a pan, add flour and cook (whisking constantly) until it just begins to turn a light brown color.

Heat milk until it’s hot, but not boiling then add the milk into the container which has butter and flour in it slowly.

Reduce heat. Whisk a small amount of this hot sauce mixture into the egg yolks. Once you have mixed in the egg yolk, you must be very carefull to keep the overall mixture at a low temperature! Otherwise the egg yolks will temper and your roux will have a mysterious mottled texture.

Slowly add cheese and mix until it is melted into the sauce.

Use a mixer at medium or high speed to beat the egg whites with the cream of tartar until they are "stiff but not dry". (Once they peak, they're done.) Add 1/4 of the egg white to the sauce and mix.

Mix the sauce into the egg whites but “fold” them instead of stirring. This is important.

Place mixture in baking dish and bake for 30-35 minutes.
Remember to serve immediately. Though the taste remains the same, when souffles cool, they begin to collapse.

Soufflé is a dream like dessert and gives people kinds of imagines. Besides, lot of people ate it with dressing and the steps of how to eat it is like the picture.

Sometimes you need a relaxing time and Soufflé will be a good choice though it is a little bit troublesome to make/buy it.

(6) Semifreddo

Semifreddo is the name of a unique dessert from Italy, which means “half cold.” The concept is used and prevailed in the form of ice cream cake and frozen custard in puff or pie.


The texture of it is like frozen mousse and this dessert is usually made from ice cream and whipped cream. There are lots of different recipes in Italy and the most common one is using gleto (a kind of ice cream) as the main ingredient.




Actually this recipe makes me feel a little bit embarrassed for the steps are quiet simple.

However, the finished product is delicious and very decent, which seems to be the dessert of a good coffee shop, so that you can give it some decorations to surprise your friends.



Prepare custard and whipped cream and the amount depends on the size of your semifreddo. The only thing to pay attention to is that remember to keep their ratio in 1:1 (the measurement is gram). The recipe of custard can be found in one of my past articles; or you can buy well-made custard powder in hyper markets, which saves you lots of time.

Sugar is necessary but the amount is depended on you, however, remember that the taste will be lighter after it is frozen. The last one is frozen berries, all the ingredients you can buy in a hypermarket at a time.



This is an easy- to-make “icebox cake.” By definition, these cool, refreshing desserts are make-ahead: Mix all the ingredients up, and then let them sit in the fridge or freezer before serving.

Besides, semifreddo is an interesting dessert which you can change the flavor and ingredients of it under small (almost zero) percentages of failure.

For instance, chocolate, vanilla, coffee, milk, and nuts will be other good and attractive choices. I even found out a Japanese who lives in America make semifreddo with soymilk, tofu, and sesame on a website. Also you can make your own semifreddo by pouring dressing, add a layer of sponge cake or pie crust, or serving it in different containers.





Before enjoying it, remember to thaw it for a while in the lower layer of refrigerator.

Semifreddo is beautiful when it stays at, as literally speaking, half cold. Tasting it immediately is not the best choice and you have to give her some time to get used to the surroundings outside the cold, dark freezer. In my opinion, it is kind of interesting and philosophical. Just like getting along with others, working, and relaxing, the most beautiful moment is when you find out a balance and adjust yourself with the changes of environment well.

(5) Fried chicken wings

I used to consider fried food as a simple dish before. How could it be difficult? All I have to do is to dip the ingredients with batter and bread crumb, then put them into hot oil.

However, after one home economic (家政) class which the teacher asked us to fried onion rings in senior high school, I realized that frying food is not as simple as I thought because I fried at least five burned onion rings and another five raw in the beginning. The members of our cook group and I got very tired to measure and control the temperature of the oil, not to mention frying something merely "eatable."

Fried food seldom appears on the table of my home, not only because fried food is high-calorie and unhealthy but also because it’s troublesome to cook.

However, sometimes when my mother has no ideas about what to have as the main dish of dinner or feels lazy to prepare for meals, she will go to traditional market and buy some fried chicken wings from a vender. The vender is a generous and tender guy so my sister and I love him so much when we were still young and had spare time to go to traditional market with mother after school. Buying ingredients, observing how my mother cooked and at the same time sharing something interesting happened in school, and taking a bite secretly after the dishes were done are important parts of my childhood. Every time I got nostalgia, I recall and miss the taste of my mother’s dishes, the surrounding of traditional market, and the memories of the past.

As results, we take fried chicken wings as an example here. There are lots of tips of frying food perfectly. The most important of all is the temperature of oil; the second is the time, which means how long you fry.

After the batter is done (you can adjust the consistency by yourself, which decides the quantity of the crisp coating and whether the wings are heavy or not), dip the chicken wings in it.
Heat the oil. We don’t have to pour much oil in pan because it’s hard to dispose the used oil for ingesting them is not good to health; nevertheless, it is so wasteful to abandon it. Besides, using special one like sesame oil will add the chicken wing extra taste and aroma.

The temperature we need is around Celsius 165 degree. In order to measure the temperature, I use wooden chopsticks for help. When you put a chopstick into it and every part that stays in oil all bubbles, it’s time to fry the wings. Once you put the wings into the pan, don’t flap them until the lower side is well-shaped. In my opinion, it takes practice and patience to observe the best timing of scooping wings up.

The idea of placing green onion and pouring sauce (mixture of soy sauce, used hot oil, vinegar, sugar, and rice wine) on the wings which shown in the first picture is from traditional Chinese cuisines, which we can fine out in many restaurants.

(4) Rare cheese cake

Couple years ago, there’re still only few cake specialty stores in Taiwan. After the chain cake and bread store” 85℃” rises and spreads sharply, the opportunities of eating and knowing desserts become higher. 85℃ is famous for its low price and good quality. I remember that when one of the branch stores opened in Tainan, my hometown, my father often bought one or two cakes for my sister and me as dessert. At that time, we all considered cakes as a symbol of novel and happiness.

During that time, my favorite one is cheese cake. It’s not only delicate and delicious but also cheap. After years, when I browse recipes and surf the cooking websites out of interest, I surprisingly find that actually cheese cake is an easy-to-make and hard -to-fail dessert.

We can divide cheese cake from two different kinds according to the way it is made. The first kind is well-baked and another is much simple, only need to be froze. I am going to introduce the simple one.

Ingredients:
Cream cheese: 250g
Butter: 20g
Gelatin sheet: 3 pieces
Sugar: 50g
Whipped cream: 125g
Wafer: 50g

1. Put cream cheese at room temperature making it soft; dip gelatin sheets in cool water.

2. Shatter wafers into powder and then mix it with melted butter. Paste the finished product on the bottom of your container. You can replace wafers into cake or other cookies you like.

3. Add sugar into cream cheese, and heat it until it melt into half-liquid. Remember that don’t heat any dairy products directly on the stove. Take a bigger vessel pouring in some water, then put the container which has cream cheese in it. After cream cheese melt, add whipped cream and gelatin sheets. Keep stirring during the whole process.

4. Pour the finished product into the container which already pasted a wafer layer. After it cools, put it in refrigerator for two to three hours.

The marble-liked pattern on the top is also easy to make. When you finish the last step before send the cake into freezer, drain some melted chocolate on it and then use a toothpick draw circles casually.

(3) Miso soup

Miso soup is the most basic cuisine in Japan. It’s not only delicious but also good for health. Miso is made from soybean, which has lots of nutrition. It also stimulates metabolism, which means that it’s helpful when you need to go on a diet. Besides, it assists body with exhausting harmful remains. Above all are partly the reasons why most of Japanese stay in good shapes and live a long life.

The recipe is very simple and the ingredients are very common. The most interesting part of it is that you can add ingredients you like, such as tofu, fish, pork or vegetables. In Japan, people sometimes cook miso soup with a variety of ingredients and have it and rice as a meal.
Miso can be divided into many categories, such as red miso, white miso, soy sauce miso, and so on. Every kind has different flavors and advantages. Nevertheless, they all have one thing in common, which is that they are not appropriate to heating for a long time, or the fragrance will disappear.

Steps:
1. Prepare the ingredients you like and cut them into mouthful cubes. Tofu, green onion is the basic. Pork with vegetables or fish with kelp is recommended.
2. Boil a pan of water. If you ingredients are not easily to become cooked, such as clams, radish, fish, and meat, remember to put them directly after water boils and before it’s done, mix miso into the pan. However, if your ingredients are easily cooked, such as tofu and vegetables, you can add miso ahead then put the ingredients. The point is that don’t cook miso for a long time.
3. During the time that waiting for the second boil, never turn the flame to high. After it boils and all the ingredients are cooked, this soup can be perfectly served.

I like to add noodle or rice in the finished product and it can be an easy and delicious meal.

When you get familiar to this cuisine and the specialties of miso, you can make some changes. For example, add lot ingredients and more water and turn it into a chafing dish; or mix two different kinds of miso making the flavor of finished product more amazing and deep. The rest of miso can be use in a variety typrs of cuisines, such as the dressing or paste on roasted fish, pork, or lumps of rice.

Except some patient and practice, it's really not difficult.

(2) Sweet red bean soup

Sweet red bean soup is the most common dessert in my family. There’s a famous sweet soup store near my home in Tainan, and I love its sweet red bean and green bean soup a lot since I was still studied in high school. I think the reason why I love it so much is because that it’s not only delicious but also partly my precious memory of hometown and simplicity.

The first one in my family decided to try to make the sweet soup himself is my father because he was recalcitrant and believed that he can also make red bean soup which is as perfect as the one sold in store. As a result, he bought a pack of red beans and started his experiments. During that time, we made and tasted it together. Although in the end the person who made it successfully was my mother, my father insisted that he was an important and essential assistant. However, no matter who was the person who made the soup, this dessert already become part of my family memories.

Actually this dessert is easy to make and good for health. Red beans contain lots of vitamin B and minerals. Green beans, in Chinese medicine, can reduce the accumulated poison and exhaust bad air in the body. Both of them are good for human and appropriate to hot summer.

Steps:

1. Wash the beans and pick up the bad or small one. Add water in a pan, the height of it should cover over the beans, and heat it by high flame until it boil.
2. After it boils, pour a cup of water and wait for boil again. Then discard all the soup in order to eliminate the dirt and mouth-puckering taste.
3. Pour water in it. The ratio of beans and water is 1:4 or 1:5(at your will). Heat it at high flame. When it boils, turn to low flame.
4. Keep stewing it. When the central part of bean starts to soften, add sugar. Then you can adjust the amount of sugar and decide the soften degree by yourself during the process.

This recipe is different from those traditional one, we don’t have to dip the beans for hours and, in fact, omit this step will preserve the fragrance and flavor of beans. You can add other ingredients like sweet potatoes, Job’s tears, or oats. No matter eat it when it’s still hot or become cool is really an enjoyment.

(1) Taiwanese style cucumber pickle

Every time I go to a Chinese restaurant or noodle diner, I always expect whether it has cold cucumber pickles as a side dish. It is special and filled of nostalgic old Taiwanese flavor. Although every experienced cooker will say that it’s easy to make, for normal people as me it’s hard to keep a steady quality and good taste.

Each restaurant has delicate differences. In my opinion, the best way to find a best recipe is to try yourself because everyone has dissimilar preference. As a result, I provide a most prevailed one and the advantages of it Is that it’s easy to make and adjust.

Steps:

1. Wash cucumbers carefully because they often have lots of insecticides remains. Cut them into cubes and use the back of a blade to pound them. This step helps the pickle get flavor efficiently and well.

2. Sprinkle some sugar giving them stirring, and then add salt repeating the same step. Add sugar before salt can prevent cucumbers from losing too many water, which attributes to the sense of crisp. Wait for 30 minutes, pour out the exhausted water. (You can also preserve it if you can accept the flavor.)

3. Add vinegar and sugar, the proportion is 1:1. Adjust the amount according to the number of your cucumbers. If you like heavier flavor, pound and add some garlic and chili is a good choice. Cover the container then put it into refrigerator for 1 to 2 hours. During the process, stir it casually and taste it, thus you can adjust the flavor immediately.

It’s a flexible dish. You can decide whether to eat or to adjust the flavor at any time and at your will. Besides, put it in the freeze zone of refrigerator is a novel and amazing choice in summer because there will be some ice chips around the cucumbers. Moreover, you can change cucumber into cabbage or onion, they also become delicious under this recipe.

Chocolate Ganache

Ganache is the name of a kind of approach which means adding whipped cream (and other ingredients you like) in chocolate, and it is widely used in nama chocolate, truffles, stuffing, and paste. Nama chocolate is from Japan and the word ”nama” signifies “fresh”. Chocolate Ganache has many specialties. For example, the quality of the chocolate is very soft, smooth and easy-melted. It emphasizes the original taste of chocolate and that’s also why this dessert is so wide-spread.


Last week I went home and made this dessert with my younger sister, and I found that it was not as difficult as I had thought before.

The basic ingredients are only chocolate and whipped cream but you can add some sugar, nut, wine, tea, or something. It's up to you. The ratio of chocollate and whipped cream is 1:1 and if you want your ganache softer, you can change the propotion to 1:1.2.

First, mince the chocolate and put it aside in reserve. Heat whipped cream and don't make it boil. Formal recipe has strict limits toward the temperature of all the ingredients and the environment, but in here I just make the cream hot without measuring the real temperature.



Turn off the stove, and put chocolate into the whipped cream. Cover the chocolate with cream as possible as you can.

Next, leave it alone for three minutes. It is said that this is a crucial step which determine the flavor of ganache.


After three minutes, stir the mixture in the same direction until its thickness looks like mayonnaise (美乃滋). When the mixture blend well, pour it into models.



The last step is to place it in the refrigerator, and dice it after chocolate becomes solid. The white parts are cooking paper, it prevents ganache from sticking to the model.



If you have cocoa powder, sprinkle some on the finished product because the powder not only makes it tasty but also prolong the expiration date.


Most surprisingly was that when my sister and I shared the chocolate with my "desserts-resistant" Mom, she also loved this dessert!

pot stickers (pan-fried dumplings)

I believe that almost everyone, especially students, has a packet of dumplings in the refrigerator for it's really convenient. Whenever you're hungry, a plate of hot dumplings will be served within minutes. Besides, freezing dumplings are not only easy to buy but also very cheap in Taiwan. The best of all is that although there are a variety of stuffings, poaching them doesn't take you any efforts and skills.

As a result, I have a packet of dumplings, too. However, only poaching is a little bit boring and flat. Therefore, I decide to chllange cooking pot stickers. Coincidentally the articles in this blog are only about desserts so far and it's time to do something different.

Actually I had tried to make this dish several times before and unfortunately, what I got was either a plate of poor broken dumplings or a miserable dirty pan. After these experiences, I find that a good stainless pan and some common and influential tips will help you a lot. Please don't use cheap or bad pan or you will definitely go mad.


First of all, get some dumplings from your refrigerator and give them five minutes to "warm up." Because of the ice which adheres to the surface of dumplings will melt into water if you put them into pan directly and it makes your dumplings stick to the pan. (It will drive you crazy when washing the pan.)

At the same time pour some oil into the pan and turn the stove to low flame. The quantity of oil depends on whether your pan is stainless or not.



Line up the dumplings and remember to keep some distances between each other for they will inflate later. Make sure that every dumpling is stained with oil. Then turn the stove to medium flame until the surface of every dumpling become gold and crunchy.







Take a bowl and pour water in it, and add some flour. The flour-water doesn't have to be thick. Pour the mixture into the pan and it should flow one third of the height of dumplings.



Next, cover the pan and turn the stove to low flame. Waiting for ten to fifteen minutes (it depends on the size of your dumplings) and the dish is finished! I recommend you to shovel them instead of using chopsticks.




Pot stickers smell and taste good and amazingly, the number of the dumplings which makes me full is lower than poached dumplings.