Dear New Year

Dear New Year:

There are truths I hold to be self-evident. I like to eat dark chocolate at 3pm while I am at work trying not to go cross-eyed after countless hours in front of a computer. I still promise to eat my oatmeal and sneak spinach into my breakfasts.

I will stop saying “I’m almost thirty and…” and, instead, I will just spend the year being 29.

I’m going to go to my weight lifting class. Weekly. And it isn’t because the instructor is a hot Australian that gives every command in a sweet Aussie accent. I think he shaves his legs. And that’s the end of that.

I’ll try to be more kind to my super sensitive tummy. But I am not going to give up Indian food. Learn to deal?

I’m going to be a better Aunt. Starting with sending handwritten letters. Even if my nephew is only 9 months old and can’t read, but my niece is 9 years old and probably doesn’t know what snail mail is.

I packed up two big boxes of things to donate (read: de-clutter the space a la Happiness Project), including the amazing Homer Simpson slippers my college friend gave me eight years ago. Sorry, Marisa!

Oh, and please don’t tell anyone that in the twelve days since 2012 began, I’ve only eaten 3 home-cooked dinner meals (um, where have I been?), which means I’m measuring in at a weak 25% rate. I’m gonna do better. I even collected the ingredients to make a Mediterranean chickpea salad called Balela, pumpkin rice laksa soup, and Vietnamese noodles with sweet chili tofu. It’s going to be good. There are vegetables involved.

And finally, my friend Jennie swears by the motto that if you love life, life will love you back. If loving life means having a foodie-gasm over a salted chocolate cookie while time….stops…count me in. I love you, cookie life!

Let’s take it slow. Be passionate. And put some spinach in our breakfasts.

With love (and optimism),

Morgan.

Momofuku Milkbar in San Francisco

If New York comes all the way to San Francisco, you get your ass to the landing dock to greet New York with open arms.


You tell your boss, friend, husband, dog, whathaveyou that, come hell-or-high-water, you need to drop what you are doing to be at the front of this line.


My first glimpse of the coveted bounty turned me into a sugar-grabbing feisty greedy little rapscallion. I felt feverish and downright selfish. It was a quick transformation that surprised even myself because I am not known for having a sweet tooth at all. I mean, I had kale-apple-lemon-ginger juice for breakfast.


But my eyes glazed over and I morphed into a sugar-crazed demon (before any actual sugar had even crossed my lips). My friends wanted to get some savory lunch at Fatted Calf, and in no polite tone at all, I growled “I’m having sugar for lunch, thank you. With a side of sugar”. Say again?


Menu:
crack pie
compost cookies
blueberry cream cookie
cornflake-toasted marshmallow-chocolate chip cookie
chocolate chocolate cookie
corn cookie

Everyone, including yours truly, was reaching for the crack pie and the famed compost cookie – a veritable mash up of chocolate, cornflakes, pretzels, chips and coffee grounds – all the things that you might shovel into your mouth after a bad break up and have completely lost all rationality. But at the end of the line, a golden ray of sunshine caught my eye. Corn cookies.

It looked like a standard sugar cookie, but unapologetically yellow, signaling its solid foundation of corn and butter. Corn. And Butter. Say it with me. It’s Thanksgiving and we’re in this together.

Don’t go all chocolate chip on me and be tempted to question her logic to put corn in a cookie (or ice cream, while we’re at it). Surrender to a mouthful of old-fashioned spoon bread, rich with sweet corn flavor and studded with gritty stone-ground corn meal. Compress that corn pudding flavor into a cookie with a thick, dense chew that can only be achieved by patiently chilling your dough. I made myself dizzy wondering How can this one bite be so full of flavor? Obviously (it’s not obvious at all), it’s a no brainer to use corn flour and mix it with sugar, eggs, flour and salt until it resembles a thick scoop of wet sand. But Tosi stretches her brain to fit in even more corn flavor by turning dehydrated corn into corn powder. Zing! Houston, do you copy? Thank you, corn. Thank you, Tosi.

You can tell that this cookie didn’t achieve its perfect state of flavor and texture (oh my god, the texture) because Tosi waved around sticks of cheap grocery-store grade butter and generic all-purpose flour. No, this takes mindful effort (and a lot of it). This kind of magic is unmistakably the result of sleepless nights, large cups of creativity and espresso shots, and baking boot camp at 2 am (when all the best work happens). Sissys need not apply.

These bakery masterpieces are the brainchild of respectful collaboration between hardy people who push each other to be better, to do more, to work smarter. To create something out of nothing and to actually create the challenges they want to learn how to overcome; it’s the honest path to improvement. Hot damn, that’s what I call inspiring!

David Chang warns you: “Don’t let her nice demeanor and southern charm fool you; underneath she is a ruthless killer . . . just like her recipes in this book, where deceptively simple flavors and ingredients combine in ways that make grown men whimper. Resistance to her sugar manifesto is futile.”

I whimpered, all right.

Foodbuzz Festival 2011

This year’s Foodbuzz Festival was not about the food. It was about the people. And a lesson in social media and the importance of having a twitter account.

And I got schooled.

I was instantly taken back to how I felt the night before the first day of 5th grade.

I had meticulously planned out an outfit that I thought (at the time) would be fashionable and perfect for the first day of school. I was sorely misguided on what that meant and wore light denim short overalls with caramel leather boots with mauve-colored socks. With lace ruffles. I’m sure they were on clearance at Mervyn’s. The popular girls were wearing Esprit and Guess everything.

I figured I would be super friendly and smile to everyone in the hallways to try to lure them into being my friend. Instead, people wondered “who is this crazy girl and what is she so happy about?” and I’m sure I grinned and gestured in ways that can only be interpreted as creepy.

I was wondering what I would say during each of the endless rounds of 3-minute schmooze sessions with strangers trading business cards and blog names. I was nervous about fitting in and feeling left out. I searched for a friendly face and an invitation to join a dinner table.

I wanted to find just one person who was genuinely interested in talking with me and sharing why they were at the conference, what they blogged about and what they liked to cook.

I found three. Megan, Heather and Teri were full of smiles and happy to share in good company.



And then some.

I also had the good fortune of sitting next to Lauren and Kellie and her most welcoming smile.

So, what do bloggers do at a blogger conference?

This.

As I learned from Irvin's and Stella’s session on social media, an experience or moment isn’t real or doesn’t even exist if it isn’t memorialized on Twitter or Facebook.

Ashley also put together a really informative presentation on the basics of photography and moving away from auto mode. It’s not easy to teach via power-point, especially when you have a lot of material to cover, but she waded through victoriously and handed out homemade peanut butter cups to keep the crowd alive. After seeing several line ups of the same shot with varying ISO, aperture and shutter speed settings, things started to make more sense. Here’s to ditching auto mode!


(Don't tell her that I had to manually try to correct the exposure on the slide about the exposure.)

Tyler Florence did a cooking demonstration for cider-brined pork chops with herbed spaetzle and braised red cabbage.


Now that’s some good eye candy. And I’m not talking about the pork chops. But, honestly, most of the bloggers seemed more interested in wanting to talk to each other. And eat!

Saturday’s “Taste Pavilion” is essentially a food trade show where companies bring along samples and you get to see some of the new foods on the market and meet the people behind the labels. I was hoping to find this year’s “dough balls” that would capture the blogosphere like it did at the 2010 Foodbuzz Festival. Nothing stood out in quite the same way, but I did find these pickled raisins from Boatstreet Pickles in Seattle.

Boatstreet Café is what had inspired me to make pickled grapes for the Underground Market.

I learned that endive grows in the dark. Odd. But delicious.

There was a panel discussion on ways to take your blog to the next level: from photography, to finding (and developing) your voice, podcasts, and cookbook deals.

(from left to right)
Kath of Kath Eats Real Food.
Sarah of Peas and Thank You.
Joy the Baker.
Tracy of Shutterbean.
Megan of How Sweet Eats.

I snagged one quick moment to talk to Joy the Baker and her advice was do it because you love it.

But you know what pleased the crowd even more than all this good blog advice? Mama Pea’s dough balls that she had toted to San Francisco with love all the way from her kitchen in Oregon.

I wish I had known this trick to making friends back when I was in the 5th grade.

The Art of Sharing

Hi.

I guess it’s pretty obvious around here that I took a hiatus. A three-month hiatus. And I want to talk about why.

Since we last spoke, I’ve crammed in all sorts of things that I wanted to share with you.

1. I’ve flown to Colorado for a wedding of a dear friend (and drove to Denver, Fort Collins, Englewood, Larkspur and Boulder in a span of four days).

2. I’ve volunteered at the Kendall Jackson Heirloom Tomato Festival. I volunteer every year and it’s one of my most favorite weekends because an enormous bounty of gorgeous heirloom tomatoes (in over 150 varieties!) are at my disposal. For free, people.

3. When a friend of mine broke up with her boyfriend, I took her for a classic bay area adventure: hiking in Edgewood Park & Natural Preserve and then getting lobster rolls for lunch. Fact: The Bay Area is equally as obsessed with lobster rolls as Boston.

4. I saw James Blake in concert. Holy crap, he is talented.

5. I flew to Japan for a family vacation. For two weeks! My sister-in-law, Hiromi, is from a remote northern village called Nagai in the Yamagata prefecture. It’s nestled at the base of the Asahi mountain range and it is C-O-L-D. It’s pretty obvious why she jumped ship (islands?) and moved to Maui where she met my brother, Chad. The purpose of the trip was to introduce my 6-month old nephew, Raidin, to his Japanese side of the family. Meanwhile, my mom and I introduced ourselves to countless bowls of ramen and onsen spas.

6. Before Maya closed, I weaseled the bartender into sharing the coveted recipe for their coconut mojitos (stay tuned). But not before I knocked back a couple of them first. In memoriam.

7. I went to the New Wave 80’s Sing-A-Long at the Roxie. If you have no idea what that might entail from the title, you are not alone. I didn’t either, but purchased a ticket immediately. It turned out to be a theater full of people dressed in 80’s gear (no doubt, fueled by American Apparel) and they played 80’s music videos with karaoke style lyrics on the screen while the crowd sang along (no doubt, fueled by free shots of whiskey being passed around). The emcee wore a banana hammock, an afro wig and boots. And nothing else. This kind of event would only happen in San Francisco.

8. I saw a documentary called Dirty Pictures, which is about a rogue chemist who discovered the psychedelic effects of MDMA (aka Ecstasy). He lives in the Bay Area, too, naturally.

9. For Halloween, we threw the largest party we have ever held in our 2-bedroom San Francisco apartment. Over 75 people attended, in full costume. And you know Jason insisted on getting a local keg of Drakes Denogginizer (turns out, most people aren't prepared to tackle a keg of beer with a 9.75% ABV, but they try anyway).

10. I saw Cirque du Soleil: TOTEM. I have been fortunate to see a couple of Cirque du Soleil shows, and the pricey tickets are worth every penny. I cannot even describe to you what these talented performers do with their bodies, but my jaw was on the floor for the entire 3-hour show.

11. I attended the 3rd annual Foodbuzz Festival, where food bloggers from around the country gathered to share their stories about why they blog, how they blog and what they blog about.

Which brings me back to the reason for the hiatus. Yes, I’ve been insanely busy (see above). But somewhere along the way, I lost my mojo.

I still cooked.
I still ate.
But I didn’t blog (despite thinking about it almost daily).

I had forgotten why I had started blogging in the first place. I was preoccupied with figuring out what to write and “finding my voice” instead of just talking openly and reaching out to connect to you. I had put the camera down in frustration over trying to teach myself the basics of photography instead of just picking up the camera and learning by trial-and-error.

At the blogger conference, we talked about identifying our goals for our blogs. Giving some serious, honest thought to that is what brought me back to why I created this space. I wanted to connect to those who are as passionate as I am. I wanted to belong to a community that gushed about seasonal produce (how nerdy!) instead of celebrity gossip (ok, maybe not instead of, but in addition to). And I wanted to share with you what I make in my kitchen because my passion lies in the sharing of food, community and love – the inherent connection that is built between people who eat together.

Photo courtesy of Jesse Friedman

I hope you will forgive me. I’ve got a lot of sharing to do.

dinner after the gym

I am not a runner. Let me repeat. Not a runner.

Somewhere near the two mile mark I feel like I might die. Really. I'm the jerk you don't want to have as a partner when you have to do "Indian Runs" at boot camp because I hold up the whole group puffing and panting. Sorry, Elizabeth!

So I was pretty shocked when one year ago a podiatrist told me that my really high arches were causing plantar faciitis. Common for runners. Pfffftwaaaaah??


Doesn't this foot look like it was born to be in heels? Instead, I got myself some orthotics and simultaneously signed up for grandma-in-training courses. It helps. A friend of mine who just finished massage school offered to study up on some foot massage techniques. Couldn't hurt. And I found that changing up the types of workouts helps a lot.

Here's what my past week of workouts looked like:

Saturday: 2.5 miles on elliptical + 25 mins swimming laps
Sunday: 25 mins swimming (while daydreaming about what I can make for lunch)
Monday: 60 mins strength training using free weights at 24Lift class
Tuesday: [rest]
Wednesday: [rest]
Thursday: Urban Bootcamp. Yeah, I did hold up the team. But I also did lunges, squats and push ups.
Friday: [rest]
Saturday: Whitewater rafting! (Seriously, that company is the BEST)
Sunday: Whitewater rafting!

When I come home from the gym and I am starving, I pull out all the veggies I have in the fridge and make a BIG chopped salad.

Spinach, corn, black beans, tomatoes, carrots and mozzarella!

Creamy Balsamic Vinaigrette: Small spoonful of yogurt or vegenaise + balsamic vinegar + salt & pepper.


Served with Anderson's pea soup (my favorite canned soup) + grilled flatbread made from my sourdough starter!

I usually try to make soups I can store in the freezer. But, in a pinch, you can't beat this pea soup. It has a simple list of ingredients, the smoothest texture that makes it seem oh so creamy and naturally fat free. Zing!

It's really hard to cook when you are starving and tired. So I buy pea soup by the case because I come home hungry and tired a lot.

Sourdough Bread

A couple of weeks ago, my friend, Arie, came over to teach us how to make beer bread. I'm not talking about a quick bread made with beer. I'm talking about chewy, yeasted bread that uses wort in place of water! Wort is the amazing liquid created during the process of brewing beer. The boiling of grains and sugars create a sweet, malty aroma. Imagine a big giant bath of honey, grains, maple syrup, oatmeal, and brown sugar. Are you picking up what I'm putting down? The wort lends all of these flavors to create some of most flavorful bread I have ever tasted.

One of my favorite qualities about Arie is that he truly loves teaching and sharing his knowledge. I'd love to share that knowledge with you, but there were spreadsheets involved!

Like, Excel spreadsheets.

He busted out the metric scale and started talking about mathematical equations, baker's percentages and hydration ratios and I packed up my bags to leave my own house. No, I didn't. I got my hands dirty in the floury mess. But don't worry, Arie has detailed his process to share with you too!

The process starts with boiling malt grains to make wort that is typically used for brewing beer. I can't wait to show you what else you can do with these boiled grains!

If you get the chance to pop into a local homebrewing shop, go sample the various types of grains! The grains range from light beige to pale gold to caramel to amber to deep, rich chocolate. Crunchy tasty.

You gotta have a starter--a simple mixture of flour and water that sits out and collects the naturally occurring yeast in the air. Then, you add the wort and some bread flour to your sourdough starter and let it hang out. It sits out at room temp and bubbles up to make a "sponge".


This is where the spreadsheets come in--you weigh how much starter and water you used to determine how much bread flour and salt to add to create a dough.



The dough is heavy and dense and you can tell right away that it will pack a nice yeasted malty flavor.


After kneading and letting the dough rest, you can shape it into rounds or baguettes and let it triple in volume. Then, like a kid putting sprinkles on the cupcake, you can decorate with seeds, salts, and spices as you wish. Using a sharp knife, you can cut some slashes in the dough if you want to get really fancy.


I have always loved "everything" bagels, so I put on a coating of sesame seeds, dehydrated garlic, poppy seeds, oregano, fennel seeds and salt.


Bake. Bake. Bake.


And wish for a more evenly heated oven.


Thank you, Arie, for sharing your bread knowledge with me. With us.

Summer Living

Um. Hi.

Yeah, it's been awhile. Two weeks of working 12-hour days makes your head spin so fast you barely remember how to get home so you can shower and get back to the office.

But I've been learning how to still fit in some reminders of summer.

1. If you buy those "living butter lettuce" things with the roots still attached, you can make yourself some tasty Tofu and Mushroom Lettuce Cups and put those roots back into some soil with plenty of water for another round of lettuce goodness! I wasn't sure this was going to work and none of my internet searches provided any confident answers. But, on the 4th of July, I was enjoying some sunshine and playing washoes out on the deck and I decided I'd test it out.

And now nearly 3 weeks later, check out this little guy.


2. If you don't have time to grocery shop or get to the farmer's market and you've been eating take-out (or order-in) meals at your desk for the fourth day in a row, you can still get a CSA box of produce delivered to your door. And sometimes you get surprised by unfamiliar items, like these Spanish black radishes.


Thank you Groupon, for letting me try out Farm Fresh to You for only $15!

Unfortunately, not everything was ripe upon arrival (see those sad looking green heirloom tomatoes?!), but most things improved within a couple of days. I can't say I'm gonna stick with the service though, because I love the ritual of walking around the farmer's markets oogling at all the fresh bounty and meeting the farmers who have put so much care into their work. Yup, I'm a produce nerd.

3. I managed to round up the troops for our annual August whitewater river rafting out at Cache Creek. People get busy quick and it's so easy to overbook the weekends or say that it's too much work to herd cats for a summer outing. But I am always glad to put this trip together and I look forward to it every summer because it's the perfect time for such a trip. I'm particularly excited for this trip because my friend, Aja, and her husband, Chris, are driving up from Los Angeles to join us! And, just this morning, we finally found an affordable tent at Sports basement. Bring on the camping adventures!

4. If you wake up at 7am and its already sunny out on the deck, taking just 20 minutes to sit in a reclining chair before going to work can make you feel like you've been lounging around on a Saturday afternoon. Sometimes it's those little stolen moments that will get you through the week until Saturday rolls around and you can lounge around all afternoon...

5. Check out this Beach Buddy!


Oh. my. Raidin. cutieface.

I love being an aunt! I need to get back to Maui. Don't we all.

Summer, you are delicious.

June SF Underground Market

In May, I went home to Maui to meet my new nephew, Raidin. I call him Raidin Button, as in Benjamin Button because he sometimes wrinkles his face up like a wise old man in a baby's body.



I ate this for breakfast everyday:


And I spent the entire ten days eating my way through my favorite island eats that I had missed so much. For example, Da Kitchen takes island classics like loco moco and SPAM musubi to a whole new level of insanity - they coat their SPAM musubi in panko breadcrumbs, deep fry it and glaze it with a sweet teriyaki sauce! BAM!

Simply put, I'm in love with the food of the islands. It renewed my interest in and love of cooking dishes that are popular in Hawaii to share with the San Francisco community. I make everything from scratch, including making my own "SPAM" from a special blend of pork, duck and chicken.

For all of you who came to the March market asking where you could get more homemade "spam" and those who didn't get to try it before we sold out, I have good news! I will be selling more Maui Eats at the June SF Underground Market this Saturday, June 11 from 6pm -midnight.

Hawaiian Punch
Passion-Orange-Guava with a Hibiscus Twist

Homemade “SPAM” Musubi
Special blend of pork, duck and chicken! That's right--I made the "SPAM" myself. It might be my one and only proprietary secret (I've learned how to finally make this weird "mystery meat" in a respectable manner that takes away the mystery and puts Hormel to shame).

Soy-Glazed Tofu-Takuan Musubi
VEGAN musubi with glazed tofu, pickled daikon radish and seaweed seasoning.


Kalua Pig Tostadas
Slow-roasted pork cooked in banana leaves, cabbage slaw, smoky chipotle crema, and Maui onion* salsa.

* Note: Sweet Maui onions are a prized commodity. They are small, delicate and so sweet and mild that they are best enjoyed raw. I grew up with these bad boys, so I definitely notice when supermarket onions are bitter and sharp. I even used to help my friend, Lauren, peel and bag onions in the garage on her dad's Maui onion farm after school.

I am very excited to make Maui onion salsa with only the best onions around. What, you didn't think I would stuff fifteen pounds of raw onions in my suitcase bound for SFO?


You bet your sweet onions I did.

See you there!

Homemade SPAM Hits the Streets

You people are amazing, you know that?! Thank you for coming out to support my crazy endeavors. Thank you for appreciating the wonderful rice sandwich that is musubi. I had no idea you would profess such love for my homemade SPAM musubi. One woman said she could not believe that I am a practicing attorney by day and slinging Hawaiian food by night.

I think over 1700 people came to the night portion of the SF Underground Market this past Saturday. I'm sorry we didn't make eye contact or get to talk much. I had no idea I would be so busy that I a) did not even do a single lap around the place to check out the other vendors, b) did not get to go make silly faces at the photobooth at Sidesaddle Kitchen or eat one of her amazing raw lavender tortes, c) forgot to go to the bathroom as six hours quickly passed, and d) forgot to eat dinner (unless you count forkfuls of rice and a spoon dipped in gravy to test the temperatures).

Did you see the New York Times article on the Underground Market?! There's a photo of Neil diligently cooking his way through 120 (!) eggs made-to-order for loco moco.

I had made 86 (um, eighty-six?!!) musubi and they sold out faster than you can imagine. Sorry if you missed it! But don't fret, the homemade "SPAM" will make an appearance again in the near future. I was so excited about learning how to make it that you probably heard me shout "I made the SPAM myself!" even if you were just trying to order some hibiscus iced tea.

Many of you wanted to know how I made the spam, so I thought I would elaborate a little bit here. First, there was absolutely zero instruction online (and Hormel is quite secretive about what goes into their products). Enter Neil and his extensive experience making charcuterie. We talked about the flavors and textures we wanted to ultimately create and then crafted a way to acheive that (read: trial and error). Sometimes, you gotta go with your gut and see what happens (and cross your fingers that it will turn out the way you had hoped).

And, this is exactly how I hoped it would turn out.


First, I ground up a large quantity of pork, duck, and chicken (thigh meat) in a meat grinder. Then I stuck some pre-cooked ham into a food processor and blended it with the ground meat. I added smoked salt, sugar, a bit of curing salt and freshly minced garlic. Then, in small batches, I whizzed it all up in a food processor with some pork fat until it emulsified. Then I pressed the mixture into a baking pan, covered it with foil and put it in a water bath to cook in the oven at 300 degrees for about 3 hours until it reaches an internal temperature of 155 Fahrenheit. The water bath essentially poaches it and I rotated the pans every half hour to ensure even heating. The cooking process causes it to shrink down and the texture changes from a paste to a much more solid block. I let it cool for a few minutes and then I pressed it down with something heavy and let it chill and solidify overnight. This compacts the meat together and pushes out any air bubbles. In the morning, it was a solid brick that could be cut into slices and put into a frying pan to crisp up just like you would cook SPAM.

Voila!

I can't even tell you how exciting it felt to see the process working. I was beside myself when I saw that it looked, smelled and tasted like real SPAM, but I had the satisfaction on knowing exactly what went into it (nothing scary!). I kept saying "It's working! It's WORKING!". Now Neil and I can work on perfecting and developing an actual recipe and serving it up to you!

Keep your eyes out for its reappearance! You gotta try it to believe it.

**I also made some amazing vegan tofu-takuan musubi. I sauteed some extra-firm tofu in a sweet soy glaze and then put it together with takuan (Japanese pickled daikon radish) and seaweed seasoning.

Using a musubi press, I layered it all in between some freshly steamed calrose rice and wrapped it with a sheet of nori seaweed.

I was really pleased with the texture and flavor of this musubi and glad to provide a vegan option (where else can you get vegan musubi?).

I was planning on bringing more musubi to the New Taste Marketplace on April 2, but some circumstances take me away to Minnesota for the weekend. However, I promise to do my best to convince Jason to carry the musubi torch and bring more musubi for you!

March 2011 SF Underground Market

There have been a few milestones going on around here. In March 2010, Elianna and I decided to take part in the local foodie community by making some pickled grapes to sell at the SF Underground Market. Since then, Elianna has branched out to become the Executive Director for New Taste Marketplace and I have continued to share some food from the islands with the local community. I have even got a couple of reviews!

Come visit me at the SF Underground Market tomorrow. You will be so excited you did. There will be lots of food vendors with local goodies to share, music (maybe even a violinist?) and a full bar to extend shenanigans until 2 am.

If you come by, I will be slinging the best "ono kine grindz" (read: most delicious food) you can find in the bay area. Just don't ask me to "talk pidgin". I have enlisted the generous help of my friend Neil of Mission Gastroclub to help me create some impressive dishes:

Homemade “SPAM” Musubi
Special blend of pork, duck and chicken! That's right. Neil and I have figured out how to make homemade spam so we know exactly what went it in and it is De-LISH! I am really excited about learning how to finally make this in a respectable manner that puts Hormel to shame.


Soy-Glazed Tofu-Takuan Musubi
VEGAN musubi with glazed tofu, pickled radish and seaweed seasoning.

Loco-Moco
Homemade Beef Patty, Fried Egg & Miso Gravy served on a bed of Nori-Scallion Rice

Hibiscus Tea
Sweet-sour hibiscus steeped with a hint of cinnamon and island love.

I'd love to see you. Come on, pretend you're an islander, even if only for a day.

Quinn Walker Makes an Entrance

Exactly one month ago, on February 25, 2011, our dear friends, Heather & Matt, brought a little boy named Quinn Jae-Hwa Walker into this world. And they haven’t slept a wink since.

Quinn is gorgeous. Especially when he flutters open his tiny little eyes and wrinkles up his lips into a perfect little “o” shape.


Swoon.

My brother, Mark, will testify that his memory of the first three months of his daughter's life is one blurry, sleepy haze. My other brother, Chad, and his wife are having a baby in April, and I'm betting that Chad is savouring his sleep now while Hiromi is stock piling food in her freezer. It’s amazing, I'm told, how fast time flies when every drop of attention and energy is spent on making sure a baby is warm, happy and comfortable. When do you sleep? Never. When do you eat? When you remember that you haven’t eaten anything in sixteen hours.

So, Elianna and I decided to cook up a feast fit for new parents. There was even a shared google document titled "Operation Feed the New Parents". We wanted to stock their fridge and freezer with the kind of comforting food that sleep-deprived friends can reheat in seconds when they don't even have the energy to order take-out.

Left to right, back to front:

Spicy Veggie Thai Yellow Curry with Steamed Jasmine Rice

Vegan Thai Lentil Soup with Lemongrass

Pre-Grilled Rack of Lamb (courtesy of Neil and Mission Gastroclub)

Harvest Grains (israeli couscous, orzo, chickpeas, red quinoa) with Spinach

Trader Joe's Root Vegetable chips

Chicken Chickpea Soup (with homemade stock)

Fresh sweet potato bread

Banana Walnut Muffins

Lemon Yogurt Cake with Poppyseeds

It's not the best photo, but you get the idea. We were in too much of a rush to play with lighting and our friends were hungry!

To be honest, it made me feel good to do this for them. Being a new parent is no easy feat and I wanted to offer whatever support I could (which, if you know me, "support" comes in the form of food).

Happy one-month old Birthday, Quinn. We are all so blessed for your arrival in this world.

SF Beer Week 2011

Well. Despite a diligent regimen of daily Emergen-C vitamins, green juice and avoiding anyone who looked even remotely sneezy on the train, I got a cold right smack dab in the middle of SF Beer Week. Last year was excellent fun, and I had really been looking forward to this. Jason has been busy writing extensive beer coverage of the events around the city. I have been busy parking it on a couch for the last four days.

Things started off well. I made it to the Opening Gala. Between events at Triple Rock and The Jug Shop, I sampled over 30 sour beers. In. A. Single. Day. I even made it to a beer dinner on Valentine's Day.

And then. Sick! And I have been feverishly shivering and coughing since. Unless you count scrambled eggs, a batch of soup and some infamous no-knead bread, I have cooked absolutely nothing in the past week. On the upside, however, I think things are on the mend and I expect to be better by the weekend. Three-day weekend.

With all this beer talk going on, I was motivated to round up my "beer cellar". It's kind of funny to even call it a cellar; it's more of a small collection that I inevitably gathered in the last six years of dating the beer geek, whose real cellar actually contains over 500 bottles. I have come around to really appreciating beer in those six years. And i've learned a lot about various styles and flavor profiles. Unsurprisingly, it turns out that I like 1) really rare beer, 2) sour beer (with heavy fruit content), 3) beer that is never going to be bottled and can only be found on tap in one spot on one day, 4) beer with really high alcohol or 5) really expensive beer. And so, my collection reflects just that: ten highly-coveted sour beers!

So, in honor of SF Beer Week, here it is. My cellar, from left to right.

Russian River Consecration (10% abv)
Russian River Toronado 20th Anniversary (10.4% abv)
Alpine Chez Monieux Belgian Kriek (5.8% abv)
Lost Abbey Framboise de Ambrosa (7% abv)
New Glarus Cran-bic (6% abv)
Russian River Framboise for a Cure (5.9%)
Lost Abbey Veritas 006 (8% abv)
Cascade Vlad the Impaler (8% abv)
Lost Abbey Cable Car (7% abv)
Russian River Supplication (7% abv)

December New Taste Market

Just the thought of holiday shopping makes me feel exhausted. I am a pretty resilient and fiesty woman, but honestly, I sort of crumble in the face of pushy crowds, forced shopping deadlines and endless mental sales calculations to figure out how much money I am spending. This year, my family has opted for a Christmas Eve dinner with a singular $20 gift exchange (distributed according to my mom’s favorite gift exchange game). My gift, not surprisingly, will be food-related (any suggestions?).

In an effort to avoid chaotic holiday shopping, I'm thinking I might either make gifts or pick up some locally-made gifts to celebrate the talents of others who make some fine products. I started collecting some local goodies and DIY projects to give away as gifts. At the November New Taste Marketplace, I bought some homemade tofu and a DIY tofu-making kit from Emily's Tofu and some small batch organic coffee beans from Tutmak Coffee. I'm not entirely sure which relative I could realistically give a tofu-making kit to, but I'll worry about that later.

If you still need to do some holiday shopping and want some homemade gifts, come check out the December New Taste Market on Saturday, December 18 from 4pm-9pm.Over 30 vendors will be offering everything from garam masala granola and artisan chocolates to homemade fermented miso and maple soda! Besides giving gifts made with love, you are helping St. Gregory's Food Pantry, which gives away tons of fresh food to more than 1,200 households each month. Holiday spirit doesn't come in a better form than helping others in need.

And...due to some begging requests, the pickled grapes are back!Come find me at the market and sample some! They are fanastic additions to salads, cocktails and cheese platters.

Photo courtesy of Jesse FriedmanThe pickled grapes are inspired by Susan Kaplan and Renee Erikson's pickled magic of Seattle's Boat Street Cafe, where they pickle everything from figs and asparagus to prunes!

I bought heaps of local grapes and hand cut each and every little sphere to let the pickling liquid really seep into the flesh. The grapes take a little swim in a white wine vinegar bath flavored with heaps of black pepper, freshly-cracked cinnamon bark, mustard seeds, cloves and just a hint of star-anise, for good measure. They snap open with a burst of sweet juice and just enough tang to make you wonder why you haven't thought of pickled grapes years ago.

I hope to see you at the market on Saturday!

Happy Holidays, dear readers. I hope it is really special.

Foodbuzz Festival 2010

It was my first time attending the Foodbuzz Festival. What a weekend! The itinerary was filled with extravagant meals, workshops, trade shows, and scavenger hunts, but the best part was having people who share my foodie interests come together to indulge in some foodie fun. The weekend kicked off with a street food dinner at Fort Mason, which included 4505 meats (aka Ryan Farr), Tacolicious, Pizza Politana, Spencer-on-the Go, Roli Roti and Namu, and some Off-the-Grid vendors like Curry Up Now. Luckily, I have the privilege of considering these guys “the usual SF suspects”, so I didn’t feel as pressured to go around and have 9 dinner portions that could only result in a food coma and/or tummy ache. I still managed to eat my fair share, though. And then some. Somehow, I didn't take many pictures of the food like these smart people. But I did eat two of these paneer kati rolls from Curry Up Now.
When feeling a little nervous and intimidated by a large crowd of new people, a little gift exchange can quickly put foodies all on common ground. Kath gave me some of her husband’s homemade “Matt’s Crack’s”. And I got to give Mama Pea some 100% Maui Coffee, which she said her hubby would greatly appreciate.

Saturday started bright and early with a little workshop on photography.Laura of The Cooking Photographer and Marc of NoRecipes shared some photography tips and talked a lot about various types of lighting set-ups that you can use at home for food photography.For lunch, we shuffled over to the Metreon for a trade show of gourmet food purveyors. Imagine 350 food bloggers and their family and friends surveying the scene, snapping photos, eating, collecting cards and eating. I also met Sabrina of Rhodey Girl Tests, who confided that she loves to test out recipes and agreed to work on the ever troublesome recipe for chickpea fries to find one in which the fries actually hold up in shape and texture. Now that’s a foodie friend I am grateful to have! There is one highlight I must mention. We were head over heels for Annie The Bakers cookies that are suspended in the cookie dough state before actually becoming a cookie. She actually designed a recipe and technique to capture the shape, texture and taste of cookie dough despite being thoroughly baked. If you love cookie dough, order these now!

Dinner was served in the historic SF Ferry Building, with food catered by Paula LeDuc and wine pairings by Bonny Doon. I sat at a table with some lovely new friends who candidly shared their stories about food blogging and made me feel welcome.

DINNER:
Golden beet tart with crimson beets, feta, currants, argula and basil puree:

Seared scallops with braised fennel and champagne beurre blanc sauce:

For the vegetarians, a fancy tofu option:

Pan-seared black cod over a butternut squash puree with wild mushrooms:

After dinner, several enthusiastic bloggers set out for a scavenger hunt, but I was so sleepy from the busy day that I headed straight home. On Sunday, we had a nice brunch and said Farewell to our new-found foodie friends.

The food throughout the weekend was nice and all, but I have to say that it is meeting all of you that truly inspired me. It made me so happy to know there are people crazy foodies out there just like me who love to talk about food, who scan their fridge in the morning already thinking about what they will make for dinner, who like to go home and cook to relax after a long day. I even found other lawyers with food blogs! I was reminded why I love cooking and sharing my experiences with all of you. I hope I can stay in touch with those that live across the country and maybe even put together some meet-ups for us local SF bloggers!