David’s Pancit with Bacon, Salmon, Vegetables and more Seafood

Yesterday was my husband’s birthday so of course we had to have pancit! This post is dedicated to him and also to my mother-in-law (birthday the 17th), my grandparent’s-in-law (June 9th wedding anniversary, birthdays on the 10th and 11th), and uncle-in-law (birthday on the 1st). This weekend we are also celebrating my brother-in-law’s graduation from college. Lots of things to celebrate in June! (See the Remixed Chicken Tikka & Aloo Gobi post on June 1st for my sister’s birthday) I think this is a noodle recipe that’s perfect for all of these special occasions. It is hearty, meaty, yet light and fresh-tasting. It’s not as filling as pasta, but it’s satisfying. Plus, there’s bacon in it! In our families, you can’t go wrong with good bacon! We also love seafood and one of my husband’s favorite fish is salmon. In fact, at our wedding, he chose to have salmon over filet mignon. I think I’m becoming a salmon-cooking master. I cook it often as we are able to get good wild-caught salmon at the market. Also, a noodle dish isn’t a pancit unless there are some sort of veggies mixed in (and calamansi or lemon!). If my husband David were to make a pancit recipe,  I think he would make something similar to this, a noodle dish centered on fun ingredients that he enjoys with pasta (like bacon and shiitake mushrooms!) with rich flavors.

Molecular Mac & Cheese in a certain shade of orange

What? Molecular macaroni and cheese? Yet another macaroni and cheese recipe! Yes! If you like to experiment and spice up your weeknight dinners, this is a fun recipe to try. But it’s really delicious too! And you don’t need a roux! Yay that rhymes What makes this mac and cheese recipe “molecular” is the use of a molecular or modernist technique of emulsifying sauces (cheese sauces in particular) with sodium citrate. It’s a salt that comes from citric acid. Citrate itself is an intermediate in the citric acid cycle and thus is involved in the metabolic processes of aerobic organisms. If you majored in science, like I did, you would know citrate intimately, and if you finished a masters in biochemistry like I did, you would know it even more intimately as a friendly metabolite. Add on a sodium ion via bicarbonate and you get sodium citrate, which is nothing to fear. At least I don’t. It’s in our bodies even if you don’t use techniques from modernist cuisine.

Happy National Doughnut Day 2013!

Yay it’s Doughnut Day!

Every first Friday of June is a great odd holiday of National Doughnut Day. We’ve been celebrating this holiday for years. I think it was my husband who brought it up first when we first started dating. Since then, I always keep it in my mind to remember the day and to make some doughnuts. These round bread-y pastries  have always been popular, but in recent years it seems like it’s popularity has skyrocketed. There are even pretzel doughnuts, muffin doughnuts, and I still have to try those “cronuts!” Or maybe if you want to try a new type of doughnut, try some of the pao de quiejo donuts that I made a few weekends ago. With donut maker electric appliances and doughnut baking pans, no wonder these have become more popular, especially homemade. This year I tried a baked version from Official Hungry’s “Eat My Vegan” recipe. I have been eye-ing this for some time and adapted it to a gluten-free recipe.

Happy Birthday to My Sister! Chicken Tikka Masala and Aloo Gobi Matar Remixed

Happy Birthday to my sister! I hope you have a good time today! You deserve it! If only I can send you some of this food! A fun memory I have of my sister while we were kids was when we had some visitors over and a lady asked my sister, she was then a 3 year old, “What is your favorite food?” My sister responded enthusiastically, “Chicken and mashed potatoes!” However, the lady’s daughter, about the same age said “Malunggay!” I can’t believe I still remember this, it makes me laugh thinking about that time. So, for her birthday, I made chicken and mashed potatoes, inspired by Indian cuisine. She loves Indian food and even traveled to Southeast Asia for a mission trip last year as a nursing student. We are really proud of her achievements and desire to help people. In addition to serving many people, I think she developed a taste for foods with spices. So for her birthday, here is an Indian fusion dish:  Crispy potato chip chicken tikka masala with aloo gobi mash.

Brunching on donuts de pão de queijo com bacon…Happy Memorial Day Weekend 2013!

Happy Memorial Day Weekend everyone! We hope you all are getting a chance to spend time with family and remember those who served our country. Though this holiday is synonymous with grilling and eating outdoors, I think it is important to remember why this holiday is significant and why we get together and celebrate. Thank you to all who have served. We appreciate it today and everyday. Cheers to you all!

Like many people out there, we like to spend Memorial Day Weekend relaxing and spending time together. We eat good food and play with the dogs. I think we do this for many other holidays as well. Earlier this weekend I made a brunch dish that would be perfect for this holiday to make you feel happy and in the mood for going outside and/or grilling. Doughnuts of course! Well pão de queijo shaped into doughnuts with bacon added in. Also with a maple bourbon Hollandaise “glaze.”

Crispy Purple Yam Tots and a breakfast salad bowl?

I’ve been a proponent for salads as breakfast fare and was craving one lately. While watching Trisha Yearwood making Garth’s breakfast bowl on her Food Network show Trisha’s Southern Cooking, I suddenly had a craving for a breakfast bowl too. So, that lightbulb thought sparked in my head to combine the two cravings into a breakfast salad bowl with tots, of course. This time crispy purple yam tots for a nod to my Filipino roots. Why would you want salad for breakfast? Try this recipe, tweaking this to your taste if you like, and see for yourself.

Caramel sweet treats on a relaxing and surprise-filled Mother’s Day

This was a really fun Mother’s Day weekend! Relaxing and yet surprising! We hope you all had a nice Mother’s Day! As for the surprise, on Saturday, my husband, I, and the two dogs Pipi and Nutter drove up to “the Valley” at my husband’s parent’s house. His mom did not know at all that we would be there and she was so surprised and happy that we came up to spend Mother’s Day weekend with her. You should have seen the look on her face when we got in the door! A happy shock! It’s always a great time visiting them. Pipi and now also Nutter love visiting too!

We took her out for dinner at a cafe not far away from their house and had a great time. The only thing that could make it better is if the dogs could come along to the restaurant too, LOL. After dinner and walking with the dogs, I baked some alfajores, a sweet treat of caramel sandwiched in between two British biscuit-like cookies. I baked some at their house and then finished baking more at my parent’s house on Sunday evening. Lots of alfajores! This time it was alfajores–two ways:  whole wheat and a gluten-free variation.

A weekend with the dogs and some chocoflan

How was your Cinco de Mayo weekend? We celebrated with some festive foods such as tacos and I also baked some gluten-free chocoflan. We stayed home most of the weekend because on Saturday we brought home a doggy! We are watching him for the week and if he meshes well with us and our dog Pipi (who has made some appearances in previous posts), then he can stay! He is a 7 year old Pekingese named Nutter.

Avocado-Coconut Panna Cotta

One of my favorite desserts is panna cotta, a creamy gelatin-based dessert originating from Northern Italy in Piedmont (possibly since the Middle-ages). Panna cotta translates to “cooked cream” in Italian. So delicious. If I see it on a dessert menu, I am most often going to order it! Light, yet creamy and rich-tasting. I like it even better than custard. I think it is about time that I tried to make this dessert! But I always like to play around with ingredients. Tweaking things is a fascination of mine. I just can’t help it even if a food experiment sometimes ends up as a mess or something not palatable at all. Luckily, this recent panna cotta experimentation was a success. Panna cotta should be fool-proof. As David Lebovitz says, “Panna cotta is incredibly easy to make, and if it takes you more than five minutes to put it together, you’re doing something wrong.”

There are some great dishes out in the blog world that celebrate spring and all its green-ness and vibrancy, so I thought I would chime in and do something with avocados as they are in season here. Creamy and rich, I thought it would be a nice parallel in panna cotta. So here’s a spring recipe contribution:  avocado-coconut panna cotta.

Oaxacan-style Chicken and Dumplings (Mole Amarillito con Pollo y Chochoyotes)

Being a Philippine-American, I am naturally drawn to Mexican culture and cuisine as Philippines and Mexico share customs and traditions dating back to some 400 years. If you are interested in reading about the Mexican-Philippine cultural relationship, check out this article. Many  traditional Mexican dishes (non fast-food ones) that I have had remind me of Filipino home cooking and comfort foods. The first time I ate cochinita pibil at a Mexican restaurant, it reminded me of a pork dish that my dad would cook. Though there are some differences in ingredients used (for example:  Filipino adobo refers to a meat stew cooked in a vinegar & soy based sauce and Mexican adobo involves dried and/or smoked chiles), something about Mexican food transports me to my family’s table. I can feel the warmth and care put into making the dishes in the same way that my parents and other relatives do with Filipino food.

Since my husband is recovering from a nasty cough and it has been a bit cloudy outside last week, I made  Oaxacan-style chicken and masa dumplings (mole amarillito con pollo y chochoyotes). This orange-red colored mole is not usually what you would think about when talking mole. Probably the most common is the mole poblano or mole negro that involve chocolate and a slew of other ingredients and spices. There are several types of mole originating in Oaxaca and other states in Mexico, but this mole amarillito isn’t very complicated and doesn’t require so many ingredients. It is easy to whip up and is  full of flavor, I guarantee it!