What Did You Eat on Thanksgiving?

Well, my plan was to go on a diet...ok, after this Thanksgiving...lol. I got my free turkey but no one wants to eat it. So my parents cooked sweet n' sour lobsters, pan fried noodle, honey mayonnaise shrimps, shark fin soup, quails, and my pak tong koh for Thanksgiving. Everything tasted great!

On Black Friday, we went to the Best Buy and the mall. Man, the line for Best Buy was super long! The line was long enough to wrap around the store. I didn't wanted to wait so I went to the mall instead. A lot of things were on sale...but I didn't get anything. :( Another disappointing Black Friday. I'm not gonna listen to my brother next year....

Shanghai Pan Fried Buns (Sheng Jian Bao)

What is Sheng Jian Bao??? This is a very famous Taiwan street snack. It is pork bun fried with water! Yes, with water. Here is my first batch of SJB. It is a combination of soft, crunchy, and juicy. Very tasty....mmmmmmmmm....

Banh Tam (Steamed Tapioca)

Banh tam is one of my favorite Vietnamese snack. It is chewy and soft at the same time...mmmm. I made it a little different than the store bought one. Mine are more on the soft and sweet side. To my sis, here is the recipe. This recipe should feed at least 4 adults. Just double the ingredients if you want to make more. I made double ingredients so I can eat this for 2-3 days...LOL



Ingredients:

400 grm grated tapioca/cassava (or 1 bag)
65 grm sugar (about 1/2 cup)
2 tbsp tapioca starch
125 ml water
1 pinch of salt
1/2 tsp vanilla (powder is better)
1/2 bag of grated coconut

1/2 tsp pandan paste (optional)

1. Steam grated coconut for 10 minutes and set aside to cool.
2. In a bowl, add in grated tapioca, sugar, tapioca starch, pinch of salt, and water. Mix well.
3. Divide the ingredient mixture into 2 and then add food coloring to each. Optional (for green, use pandan flavor. For purple, use red and blue food coloring.)
4. Grease the pans with some cooking oil. Pour in the mixture into the pans and steam for 25 minutes.
5. Let the cake cool a little before cutting. Cut the cake into strips and roll them in the grated coconut one by one.
6. Cover leftover and put it in the refrigerator. Just microwave when you want to eat again the next day.

(Note: You can serve with ground peanut + sugar mixture. Also, if you want the cake to be harder and chewier then use less water.)

Chicken Scallion Pancakes

I've been watching the Taiwanese Travel channel. They have a lot of street food and when they show the pancakes I was like drooling. So I decided to make some. I didn't have any ground pork so I used chicken breast instead. Very easy and very simple to make. Still tastes great after 2 days...:)

Blueberry Soft Cheesecake

I feel like eating cheesecake! This is my first blueberry soft cheesecake. I baked the whole thing and no one eat it with me. So I had to put the leftover in the freezer. This cake came out pretty well. Except for the blueberry part...a little messy when trying to put it in between the cake. The cake is so soft that it melt in your mouth....mmmm

Banh Beo (Steamed Rice Cakes)

My mom feels like eating banh beo knot. So as her good daughter I made her some. The brown colored rice cake is sweet and the white is regular. This was served with fish sauce and coconut milk. The cakes are made out rice flour, tapioca starch, water, salt, and oil. Topping is the cooked mung bean with scallions. This is very much like the one in Vietnam....yummy! My mom ate it every morning for breakfast.

Mix Nuts Mooncakes

I was hungry for mooncakes since I didn't get to eat any this Autumn Festival. The one at the market is too sweet so I decided to make my own. Not too hard to make but kinda tough to make the dough. This is my first batch and it tastes pretty good...except the skin was a bit hard after cooling. But after leaving it for a couple days, the skin got softer. :) I'll have to try out other recipes to get the right skin.

Spring Rolls

So I feel like eating spring rolls. It took some time to cook the meat, shrimps, clean veggies, and make the sauce. Very easy to wrap and eat. I ate four spring rolls and they were delicious! Make everything ahead of time. This recipe feed up to 6 adults. You can leave the leftover food in the refrigerator and eat again the next day.



Ingredients:

1/2 bag rice vermicelli
1 lb lean pork
1 box rice wrappers (8.5 inch diameter)(You do not need to use all wrappers at once.)
1/2 lb large cooked shrimps
1 bag fresh Thai basil
1 bag fresh mint leaves
1 bunch fresh cilantro
1 whole lettuce
1 bag thinh (roasted rice powder)

Hoisin sauce:

65 ml water boiled
1/2 fresh lime juiced
2-3 pieces of garlic, minced
1 tablespoons white sugar
2 chili chopped
4 tablespoons hoisin sauce
1 teaspoon peanut butter (optional)
1/4 cup peanuts (put in the toaster over and roast at 350 F until golden brown. Remove skins and ground.)

Method:

1. Boil pork in hot water until cooked, about 30 minutes. After cooking, slice in thin slices and add in a dash of salt and sugar for taste. Then add in thinh, roasted rice powder.
2. Boil rice vermicelli in hot water for about 5 minutes or until cook. Do not over cook.
3. Boil shrimps in hot water until color changes and add in some salt. Then rinse in cold water, peeled, deveined and cut in half.
4. Clean all vegetables and let drain.

5. Boil water and add in hoisin sauce and peanut butter, stir until dissolved. Let this cool and then at in sugar, lime juice, garlic, and chili. Stir and taste. If too sweet, add in some fish sauce.

6. Use a big bowl to put warm hot water in. Dip one rice wrapper in quickly and then place on plate.
7. Fold in the two sides and place lettuce, basil, mint, and cilantro at one end. Now add on vermicelli, sliced pork and line the shrimps in the middle. Now roll inward from ingredient side to end.
8. Serve with hoisin sauce with some grounded peanuts.

Pak Tong Koh (Steamed rice cake)

For a while now that I've been trying to make this pak tong koh. All atempts with other recipes failed miserably, except for this time. Finally I'm successful! Thanks to Aunty Yochana for sharing her recipe. The fermentation took 3 days and the result was great. Below is the picture of the result. I did tried a second batch and tried to cut it down to 2 days. I also added coconut powder to get the coconut taste. After 2 days, I took a little out to steam to see if there is honeycomb or not. It didn't have any, so I waited another day before steaming. I think the longer the fermentation the more honeycombs in the cake. After waiting for another day, there were lots of honeycombs, but the taste was not as great as the first batch. Don't add too much lye water or it will make the cake brownish and taste weird. My next atempt will be to make this cake more springy. I want it to be more chewy.

What I cooked this weekend

This weekend I feel like eating Vietnamese appetizers. I made a couple dishes and they were yummy. I used some recipes from other friendly blogs as guide and adjusted the flavors and increased the portion to feed more hungry members. My family were very please with the food. :) All recipes can be found at My Blog List.

Banh it tran (Naked rice cake)
This rice cake is made of rice flour, mung bean, ground pork, ground shrimp, and green onions. This is good to eat it with homemade fish sauce.

Stir-fried silver needle noodles
The noodle is made out of wheat starch, tapioca starch, salt, oil, and water. Stir-fried with ground pork, shrimps, celery, and green onion. Seasoned with salt, sugar, fish sauce, and oyster sauce.

Banh bot loc (chewy tapioca cake)
The flour is mainly made out of tapioca starch, rice flour, salt, and water. The fillings is made out of diced shrimps, onion, and green onion. Eat this with homemade fish sauce.