Leftover turkey quesadilla

LONG TIME NO SEE!!!

I haven’t updated for a few months now… it’s because I was busy with my full time work AND 2 courses.  I don’t think I will ever do it again because it was super stressful – no life except for work and study.  I didn’t have enough sleep for 4 months.  Oh well… it’s all history now! 

Anyways, I hope you all had a great Christmas.  It was my turn to host Christmas dinner last year (2011, which was only last week!).  I bought a President’s Choice easy to bake turkey.  It was super easy!  Just take it out from the freezer and pop it in the oven for a few hours.  The turkey didn’t look big, but since it was boneless, it was ALL MEAT!  It was way too much for my family of 15.  I have LOTS of leftover.  I have been eating turkey leftover since Christmas and I still have leftover!!!  So… here’s a super easy recipe for turkey leftover – Turkey quesadilla.

Sorry the picture is not very good.  I used my iPhone to take this picture…

Ingredients:
Chopped up turkey leftover
Finely chopped green onions
Jam (any jam)
Cheese (any cheese, I used brie and Saint. Paulin Cheese)
Tortilla

Methods:
1) Heat up a frying pan – medium heat.

2) Spread jam on a tortilla.  Put it in the frying pan.

3) Put the turkey on the tortilla shell, then sprinkle the green onions and cheese on top.

4) Put another piece of tortilla on top.

5) Flip.  When it’s warm, it’s ready!

Tomato Beef Curry

Experiment: Tomato Beef Curry

Introduction:
You know, many inventions are created by mistakes or accidents, like potato chips, Cheese, post-it notes, penicillin etc.  While I was following a recipe to make Dry Curry, I happend to run out of some of the ingredients, and since I didn’t wanna waste some food, I added way more than I should have.  I didn’t expect this messed up dish would taste ok at all… But… it turned out very well!  It was super yummy.  I shared it with some of my co-workers, and they all liked it.  Well then!  I gotta write it down coz… I don’t know if I can replicate this messed up recipe again!

Materials: (serves 12-16 people)
900g minced beef
300g Chinese celery, chopped
1 white onion, finely chopped
1/2 red onion, finely chopped
6 cloves of garlic, peeled and finely chopped
few slices of ginger
6 red chili peppers, seeded and finely chopped

Oil
Parmesan Cheese (optional)
Rice/Spaghetti
Cilantro (to garnish)

Seasoning:
3 tbs curry powder (Safeway brand)
1/2 pack of Glico Curry
1 can of diced tomato (about 756ml)
3-4 dried bay leaves
3 tbs Soy Suace
6 tbs ketchup
6 tbs Worchestshire sauce

Procedure:
1) Heat up a big pot, pour in some oil.  When the oil is hot, put the white onion, red onion, garlic, ginger and red chili peppers in.  Stir until the fragrance comes out.

2) Put the minced beef in.  Stir well.

3) When the beef is half cooked, put the Chinese celery in.

4) Put all the seasoning ingredients in.  OH put the water from the diced tomato in as well! 

5) Let it cook for about 15-20 minutes.  Stir occasionally to prevent it from burning.

6) Prepare rice or spaghetti.  Put the curry on top of the rice/spaghetti, sprinkle parmesan cheese on top, then garnish with cilantro.  DONE!

Results: 

 

Discussions:
1) It was meant to be dry curry.  The original recipe asks for 6 tbs curry powder and NO glico curry brick.  Also the diced tomato was supposed to be just 2 cups instead of almost 3 cups, 3 onions instead of 1.5 onions.  The original recipe asks for regular celery instead of Chinese celery.  OH and I ommited the carrots… so you can add some carrots in.

2) I don’t think this dish is particularly spicy.  Add more red chili peppers if you want it spicier. 

3) In case you’re wondering… how come the rice in the pictures is not “white.”  Well… it’s coz I mixed 3 kinds of rice together.  2 of the 3 types are not white, but a bit of yellowish.  That’s why the rice turn out to be a bit of yellow.

Taiwanese Meat Sauce with Mushrooms (台式香菇肉燥)

Experiment: Taiwanese Meat Sauce with Mushrooms (台式香菇肉燥)

Introduction:
Well after I made the Miso Meat Sauce last time… I just fell in love with meat sauce. Not because I love meat in particular, but it’s just SUPER convenient. It’s pretty much good for ANYTHING. If you don’t know what to eat, just make rice or noodles, microwave some meat sauce and Ta Da~ A meal is done.

Anyway, this facebook blogger that I subscribe to… she was making meat sauce too!!! This time she made the Taiwanese Meat Sauce with mushrooms. It looked super yummy… so I decided to make it so that my miso meat sauce won’t be too lonely in the freezer…

You can pretty much order this meat sauce on rice in every TW restaurants. I guess it’s like a basic dish for TW cuisine? Hmm… It’s not hard to make, but it’s a lot of preperation (as the blogger said). This time I only made about 1 kg of pork, but next time I’ll defintely double (or triple) the recipe so that I can freeze up more!

Materials: (serves about 6)
1kg of regular ground pork
6 dried shitake mushrooms
4-6 hard boiled eggs, peeled
1/2 cup finely chopped garlics
1/3 cup deep fried garlic* (which I didn’t use this time, but will try it next time)
1/2 cup finely chopped shallots
Oil

Sauce:
1/2 cup soy sauce
1/4 cup cooking wine
1-2 tbsp Five spices powder
1 tbsp rock sugar
1 tbsp peanut butter
syrup**

*You can buy the deep fried garlic in Asian supermarket. I tried making it… but did not succeed. The garlics turned bitter. I think it’s better to buy it than to make it. Oh well… maybe it’s coz I’m not skilled. Please let me know if you know any tricks on how to deep fry garlic!

*Syrup: In a small pot, heat up 2 tbsp sugar and 1 tbsp water. When the sugar caramalized, i.e., changes colour to brown, add another 1/4 cup of water. Watch out coz the water splashes! You can take a look at the picture below. The top right corner is the syrup that I made.

Procedure:
1) Soak the dried shitake mushrooms for a few hours (or over night) until soft, cut them into small pieces.

2) Heat up a pot. Add some oil in, and then put in the finely chopped garlics and shallots. When the fragrance comes out, put the ground pork in as well.

3) Put the mushroom, deep fried garlic, soy sauce, cooking wine, five spices powder, rock sugar and peanut butter in. Mix well.

4) Put in the syrup.

5) Put the peeled hard boiled eggs in as well. Make sure that the sauce can cover the eggs and everything. Add more water if needed.

6) Turn the heat to low, cover the lid and let it cook for about 1 hour. Stir occasionally to prevent it from sticking.

7) Cook until the liquid has dried up.

Results:

Meat sauce on rice with a marinated egg

Meat sauce on noodles

Discussions:
1) The blogger suggested using pork belly for this dish. I follwed her suggestion, and… I don’t think I’ll ever do it again becuase a) pork belly is actually more expensive than ground pork, b) I had to cut out so much fat from the pork belly… which made the “meat portion” even more expensive, and c) it took me so long to cut the pork belly into small pieces.

2) For the cooking wine, the blogger suggested Shaoxing wine. I don’t have it at home, so I used sake (Japanese wine). But then my co-worker told me that there’s a certain taste and fragrance to the Shaoxing wine, and it’s cheap. I’m gonna buy it and try next time I make it.

Reference:
The blogger did an exellent job in writing the recipe and taking pictures of the cooking process. Definitely go take a look!

1) Facebook page

2) Blog

Miso meat sauce on rice (肉味噌ご飯)

Experiment: Miso meat sauce on rice

Introduction:
Hmm, latelyI’m trying to make some dishes that would last me a few days, or something that I can make lots and put in the freezer for a while without loosing much taste.  Well, meat sauce came into my mind.  I have made miso meat sauce before, but I lost the recipe, so  I searched on Cookpad to find the recipe.  Well, I found lots of recipes on cookpad (actually, what can’t you find on cookpad?).  I found that many of the recipes include soy sauce, sugar, sake, mirin, and of course, miso paste.  The proportion varies from recipe to recipe.  Well, I just took the “average” and added the leftover seasoning in my fridge.  The result?  Good good! hehe!  And I have enough leftover to put in the freezer! 

Materials: (serve about 6)
1-1.5 lbs ground pork1.5 tbsp sugar

1.5 tbsp finely chopped shallot
1.5 tbsp finely chopped garlic
1.5 tbsp finely chopped ginger

1 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp sake
1 tbsp mirin
1 tbsp sugar
2 tbsp miso

Oil

Rice
cuccumber, thinly slice

Procedure:
1) Turn the heat on high.  Pour about 1 tbsp oil in a frying pan.

2) Put in the shallot, garlic and ginger.  Stir until you can smell the fragrant, then put the pork in.

3) When the pork is almost done, put in the soy sauce, sake, mirin sugar and miso. 

4) Turn the heat to medium, and let it simmer.  Stir occasionaly.

5) When the liquid has evaporaated, it’s done!

6) Put rice on a plate/bowl, then put the cuccumber on rice, and then the meat sauce on rice.

 

Results:

 

Discussions:
1) You can add an onsen egg on top to add more “flavour.”  I loooove eggs!

2) You can put this sauce on top of steamed veggies, or stir fry veggies with this.  Or you can put eggplants into this sauce as well.  It’s pretty versatile!  That’s why I like this sauce.

3) The proportions of the seasonings and sauce are quite… arbitrary.  If you like it sweeter, you can add more sugar, or if you like it spicier, you can add more ginger. 

 

Tuna Mayo Rice Bowl (ツナマヨご飯）

Experiment: Tuna Mayo Rice Bowl (ツナマヨご飯）

Introduction:
My friend, Miss S, was telling me about a dish that she saw in a Japanese recipe magazine.  She highly recommends it, coz it’s quick, cheap and yummy.  Well, doesn’t it sound “cheapickdorable?”  hehe.  Anyway, I think this dish is great for summer coz you don’t need to turn on the stove at all!  Oh, provided that you have a rice cooker of course. 

Materials: (serves 2)
2 bowls of rice
1 can of tuna
a few stalks of green onions, finely chopped
mayonnaise (as much as you like)
Salt and pepper to taste
2 eggs

sesame seeds
shredded seaweed

Method:
1) In a small bowl, mix together the tuna, green onions, mayonnaise, salt and pepper.

2) Put the rice on top of  a plate, then half of the tuna mayo on the rice. 

3) In a small cup, crack the egg in, and then pour tap water into the cup.  Just pour enough to cover the egg.  Microwave it for about 20 seconds, or until it’s cooked on the outside and runny on the inside.  You might actually have to test it coz everyone microwave is different.  OH and I find that the container makes a difference too!  So it’s better to microwave it for shorter time first then slowly add 5 seconds at a time.  Anyways… you can try it at home.

4) Put the egg on top of the tuna mayo.

5) Sprinkle as much sesame seeds and seaweed on top as you like.

 

Results:

 

Discussions:
1) I think this dish took me like… 5 minutes to complete? 

2) It’s a cheap dish!!!  Miss S told me that one time she got her tuna for $0.49, and that was quite recently.  So this meal would cause her about $1.00 and it feeds two people!  So cheap.  I’ll remember to stock up on the tuna next time it goes on sale.

 

 

 

 

Coconut noodles with mango sauce

Experiment: Coconut Noodle with Mango Sauce

Introduction:
Have you ever thought about having noodles for dessert?  I had never thought about it, until my dear friend, Miss S, sent me a recipe for making “coconut noodles.” Well, it’s not as difficult as it sounds.  What you need are jello mix, mango, and a tool to make dessert.  Ok, I lied.  The original recipes asks for more stuff.  But who wanna make things more complicated when it can be done in a few steps, right?

Materials:
a box of coconut gelatin dessert mix, which you can find in Asian supermarket
1 mango, diced into small pieces
sesame seeds
shredded coconut (optional)

Mango sauce:
1 mango, diced into pieces
2 tbsp milk
1 tbsp honey 

This is the coconut gelatin dessert mix that I bought. 

Instructions:
1) Follow the instructions on the coconut gelatin dessert mix box.  Pretty much it means boil water, when water boils, pour in the package.  Mix until dissolve.  Pour the liquid in a mold.  Put in the fridge until it solidifies.

2) While you’re waiting for the jello/pudding to solidify, you can prepare the mango sauce.

3) Put all the mango sauce ingredients in a mixer, and mix until it becomes smooth.

4) When the coconut jello/pudding is ready, cut the jello/pudding into long blocks – the size that would fit in the kokoroten maker*.

5) Put the coconut jello through the kokoroten maker, and push.  Tada!  The coconut noodles come out the other end!   

6) Put the diced mango on the noodles, then put the sauce on top of the noodles. 

7) Sprinkle the sesame seeds (and/or shredded coconut) on top.

 

Results:

 

Discussions:
1) Kokoroten is a Japanese dish.  Traditionally it’s made with Kanten (or agar agar).  I have never had it myself, but I have seen many pictures of it.  The idea of making jello into “noodles” is very intriguing, so I decided to try it myself.  Instead of using the traditional kanten, I’m using coconut jellow.  If you wanna see how kokoroten is made, you can go to here.

2) The original recipe is actually coconut “flat noodles.”  You’ll have to mix coconut milk, water, sugar and konnyaku powder together to make it into coconut jello.  I couldn’t find konnyaku powder in Vancouver, so… I bought the powder mix that I showed above.  OH and to make the flat noodles, you put a big piece of saran warp onto a baking sheet (with edges of course), then pour the liquid onto the baking sheet.  Remember it has to be THIN!  Then when it solidifies, your take the “noodle” out and then cut them into thick slices. 
Yeah I think it’s hard to imagine how it looks like.  If I ever make it again, I’ll definitely post it up here!

 

Japadog

[Guest post by the notorious Mr. Clam]

 

(Pictures taken from the Japa Dog website)

 

 

Yokoso Japadog.  (Can I actually say that?) It’s supposed to mean welcome to Japadog, but I’m not sure if that’s grammatically correct.  However, Japadog is not about a lesson in the Japanese language, but a lesson in culinary fusion.

 

The beloved Editor-in-chief of Food Lab Asia and I were about to venture out on a bike ride around Stanley Park.  We had ridden our bikes to the SkyTrain and took the train to Waterfront.  We hadn’t had breakfast and we were starving.  As good fortune has it, Japadog has opened up a stand down by Waterfront Station. To be exact, it’s at the intersection of Granville and Cordova.

 

 

 

Our dear Editor-in-chief ordered the very original Ebi Chili dog.  Ebi is Japanese for shrimp.  As you can tell from the photo below, there was plenty of teeny-weeny shrimp to tickle the taste buds.  I suppose this dog is not for the texture-sensitive eater, but I really liked my bite of this dog.

 

 

What’s more, there’s even shrimp hiding within the sausage itself.  I can see my texture-sensitive friends shuddering already.  Our taste buds, however, really loved the taste of shrimp embedded in the sausage and the texture was excitingly different.

 

 

 

I ended up ordering the Kurobuta Terimayo.  If we break down the name, we discover what’s in this dog.  (I guess there is a bit of a lesson in the Japanese language, after all).  Kuro is “black” and buta is “pig” or “pork.”  The “black pig” is apparently the Japanese bred version of Berkshire pigs.  Then there is teri, which is short for teriyaki, and mayo, which is (you guessed it) mayonnaise.  I also love all the love all the nori on the top of this dog.  Again, this dog may not appeal our texture-sensitive friends out there.  For me, though, I would have liked some bonito flakes to dance atop a sizzling dog (but that’s a different Japadog altogether).  This one is a classic alongside the Beef Terimayo.

 

Kurobuta Terimayo

 

A quick glance at the menu at Japadog Waterfront, we see that there are some new dogs in the works.  There’s a Salmon Dog on the way.  I also have yet to try their Gokudare.  No Japanese lesson on this dog.  I haven’t the foggiest idea what gokudare means.

 

 

With Japadogs safely stored away in our digestive systems, we had enough carbs and protein to start the bicycle ride around Stanley Park.  See y’all later.

Chives, pork and shrimp gyoza (餃子)

Experiment: Chives, pork and shrimp gyoza

Introduction:
Mr. Clam is a HUUUUGE fan of gyoza.  I think he can have it everyday if he can.  I would love to cook gyoza as much I would like to but then… I always fail… which is very frustrating.  I don’t know about you… but my gyoza always stick onto the pan when I cook them.  For a while, I gave up pan-frying gyoza; I just boil them.  That way I will not tear the skin during cooking… what a good way of cheating! hehe!  (Well it’s still the same thing and it’s cooked, right?  It’s edible! )

Well until recently… I decided to give it a try again.  I searched on the internet and looked for ways to prevent gyoza from sticking.  I did follow some of the methods mentioned in forums, but still no luck.  I don’t know if it’s coz of the pan that I use or something’s wrong with the element.  ANYHOO… I found this interesting method… and it says it helps preventing the gyoza from sticking.  The trick is to use water with dissolved flour instead of plain tap water to cook the gyoza.  Well this very first time I tried this method, it worked!  Hope it’ll work next time too~

OH forgot to mention… I made chives, pork and shrimp gyoza this time.  Hope you like it!

Materials:
1 pack gyoza wrapper (the round type)
400g ground pork
200g Chinese chives, finely chopped
150~200g shrimp, peel and devein
1-2 tbsp chopped ginger

2 tbsp sake
1.5 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp sesame oil
white pepper – as much as you like

Cooking oil
300ml water
1 tbsp flour

1) Mince the shrimp until it becomes a paste.

2) Wash the chives, then let it dry.  Chop into small pieces.

3) Put the shrimp, chives, ground pork and ginger in a large bowl.  Then put the sake, soy sauce, sesame oil and white pepper in the same bowl.  Mix everything together until it becomes like a paste like texture.

4) Put about a table spoon of 3) onto the centre of the gyoza wrapper.  Wet the edges of half of the gyoza wrapper, then seal.  Make as much gyoza as you like.

5) Turn the stove on to the high heat.  Put some oil in the frying pan, and swirl it around to make sure that it covers every inch of the frying pan.  If you put in too much oil, pour the oil out.  You don’t want greasy gyoza… do you?

6) When the frying pan is HOT, put the gyoza in.  Let it cook for about 2-3 minutes.

7) In a small bowl, mix the 300ml of water and 1 tbsp flour together.  Mix until the flour is dissolved.

8 ) Pour 7) in the frying pan, and cover the pan with a lid.  Let it cook for about 8-10 minutes.  If there’s still water in the frying pan, just let it cook until the water evaporates.

9) Remove from heat.  You should be able to get the gyoza out without much difficulties!

 

Results:

Discussions:
1) If you wrap more gyoza than you can finish, you can store the gyoza in freezer.   Here’s how: Put a piece of tin foil on a baking tray, sprinkle corn starch on the tin foil and wipe the corn starch across the tin foil to cover every inch of the tin foil.  Put the freshly made gyoza on the tin foil.  Make sure that the gyoza doesn’t touch each other, otherwise you can’t separate them after they’re frozen.  Put them in the freezer for an hour.  When they gyoza is hard, then you can store them in zip loc bags.  (If you skip this step and just put the freshly made gyoza in a zip loc bag, they will be stuck together and you can’t separate them unless you break them – which would break the wrapper as well… not good)

2) The flour water actually makes the bottom of the gyoza golden and crispy! 

3) The flour water will become like a sheet of paper after it’s cooked.  It “binds” the gyoza together.  Some Japanese restaurants actually serve the gyoza with the gyoza stuck together with that sheet of… golden crispy thing!

Ebi Mayo (エビマヨ)

Experiment: Ebi Mayo (エビマヨ)

Introduction:
I had this dish at Ms. Soto’s home last Christmas. It was super yummy! I asked her if it’s hard to make, she said no. Then… few days later, she posted the Ebi Mayo recipe on her blog. Well… not until now that I finally decided to make it. It’s just as it stated on her blog… it’s really easy and quick to make. Hope you enjoy it as much as I do!

Materials:
12 shrimp/prawns, peeled and deveined
1/4 sake
4-5 tbsp corn starch
Oil

Sauce:
3 tbsp Japanese mayonnaise
1 tbsp milk
2 tsp ketchup
2 tsp honey/sugar

Procedure:
1)Marinate peeled and deveined shrimp in sake for 2-3 minutes.

2) In a small deep pan, pour in oil that would cover maybe 1/3 of the shrimp width. (Ms. Soto said it should be about 1/4″ oil). Using medium heat to heat up the oil.

3) Dredge shrimp in the corn starch and fry in pan. Cook each side for about 1-2 minutes or until golden brown.

4) Remove and transfer to papwer towel. Pat to remove excess oil.

5) Mix all the sauce ingredients together. Pour the sauce on the ebi mayo and serve.

 

 

Results:

Discussions:
1) I didn’t eat the ebi mayo right away… but the shrimp was still quite crunchy! Not sure if it’s the corn starch. I didn’t know that you can use corn starch to coat something to deep fry food…

2) I don’t like deep frying… because I don’t wanna deal with the oil afterward. When I saw that you don’t need a lot of oil to fry the shrimp in this recipe, I was overjoyed!

Reference:

1) Soto’s Kitchen

2) Japan Food Addict – the original source of the recipe, which Ms. Soto followed.

Chicken teriyaki donburi (鶏照り焼き丼)

Experiment: Chicken teriyaki donburi (鶏照り焼き丼)

Introduction:
I was looking through my facebook the other day.  A friend of mine shared a link… and I clicked in there to see what it’s about.  Oh it’s the food blog of a Japanese chef living in Taiwan, Masa の料理ABC.  There are many Japnese dishes and desserts.  I clicked and see what kinda food I’d be interested in making, and I saw this rice bowl…

Materials: (serve 2 bowls)
2 bowls of rice
Chicken thigh with skin on
2 eggs
chopped green onions
seaweed

Sauce:
2 tbsp soy sauce
2 tbsp mirin
2 tbsp sake
1/2 tbsp sugar

Procedure:
1) Wash the chicken thigh and pat dry with paper towel.

2) Mix all the sauce ingredients together.  Marinate the chicken thigh in the sauce for 10-15 minutes (or longer if you want).

3) Beat the eggs.  Panfry the eggs into a thin slice.  Remove from heat.  When it’s cold enough for you to handle, fold the fried egg in 3 and thinly slice the egg.

4) Heat up a frying pan to medium heat.  Put the skin side on the pan and let it cook for a few minutes, then flip to the other side.  Put the sauce in, and cover the frying pan with a lid.  Reduce to medium low heat and let it simmer until chicken is cooked.

5) When the chicken is cooked, remove from heat and let it cool.  Cut into small pieces.

6) In a rice bowl, put the rice in, then the egg, chicken, green onion and seaweed.  Feel free to put the sauce in the rice bowl as well. 

 

Results:

 

Discussions:
1) The chef also mentioned that you can also use this teriyaki chicken to make a teriyaki chicken burger.  For more information you can go to here, it’s at the bottom of the page.