#Instagram @annsmelange

Follow me on Instagram @annsmelange to get more frequent updates and quick dish ideas. 🍚🍴🍩🍤🍦🍜🍝🍲☕️🍵🍒🍅🍍🍆

Crab Leg Stew 게장찌게

Oh my, oh my, oh my….THIS WAS AAA-MMAA-Z-I-N-G!!!!  Not surprisingly, my partner made it—he’s such a great home cook!  It is times like these that I’m so happy that he’s my roomie!  I wish you could climb into the photos and smell it and eat it—it was THAT delicious!  It was the perfect stew to match the cooling weather here.  The first day of summer has ended a little chilly, so the comforting stew tasted that much better.

INGREDIENTS (in order of when you’ll need them):

• anchovies for stock
• Korean fermented bean paste
• Korean hot pepper paste
• crab legs
• garlic
• onions
• Thai chili peppers
• scallops
• green onions (we didn’t have them on hand, so this was omitted)

 

PREPARATION:

1. First, prepare fish stock to use as a base for the stew.  Fill a pot with filtered water and let it boil.  Add anchovies and let it boil for at least 15 minutes. Then take out and toss the anchovies.
2. In this step, a 5:1 ratio of bean paste to pepper paste is used. To the boiling stock, first add some bean paste and mix it well.  Allow it to come back up to a boil and then add the pepper paste.  Allow it to come back up to a boil again.
3. Add the sliced garlic and crab legs.  Boil.
4. Finally, add sliced onions and Thai chilies.  Boil.
5. Boil for at least 30 minutes more so all the flavors combine.  At this point, the stew is done and can be served later.
6. Before serving, add scallops (and green onions if you have them) to the boiling stew and cook just until the scallops are done.
7. Serve and ENJOY!!!

 

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Valentine’s Day 2014

Oops—I thought I already posted this a long time ago!  …..

I made close to 400 shortbread cookies this year for my work colleagues. Each person received a goodie bag (that I hand-cut and taped together one by one!), designed by Claudine Hellmuth (Thanks so much, Claudine!), with 3 biscuits: original, lemon and extra virgin olive oil & fresh rosemary. I used my tried and true Baking book by Dorie Greenspan for the original and lemon varieties. The olive oil and rosemary biscuit recipe is from the Blue Bottle Coffee book.

Measuring, scoring and cutting them took forever since I had to have enough for everyone!  I ended up making a second round of them the following week because so many people didn’t get any and I know I still missed some people.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

 

Apricot & Hazelnut Bars

These are so easy to make and SO TASTY, especially with a cup of coffee!

King Dumplings

Today’s a very rainy day here, so I thought this might be an appropriate meal to post: beef and pork dumplings in King-sized wrappers (made last year). These are way too big, but I didn’t have the option of getting the smaller-sized ones because I didn’t like the ingredients of the ones available. Wrappers should be made with rice flour or they won’t taste very good.

I made these too salty–OOPS!  But we tried to off-set that by making them into a soup (one of my comfort foods)….we had to keep it boiling a long time to pull out the salt! I’ve been discouraged to make them again, but I have two packages of wrappers in my freezer right now! I suppose I could make vegetarian taco cups with them…hhhmmm…

Speaking of…these can be vegetarian—just use whatever veggies you like, but also keep in mind that the water content of each will vary.  So you want to use something that will soak up some of the liquid while it’s in the wrapper. I used flour in mine. You’ll also want to keep in mind the different textures of the veggies when choosing the right combination.

My mom would make hundreds of them for New Year’s Day (she had a few helpers) and freeze them a little first on sheet pans or large plates and then throw them in a bag together. That way, they won’t stick to each other. If you live in a cold place, you can just place them outside in the garage during the winter months and they’ll freeze very quickly.

A pet peeve of mine: when I see dumplings being made on TV and on food blogs, people don’t make them with their hands…they always place a bunch on the cutting board and make a bunch at a time. Then they proceed to awkwardly fold them…still on the cutting board! These are to be made by hand, one-by-one and not factory style, taking care into folding and sealing them. I can’t say that I make mine pretty (as shown by the very chubby dumplings I made!), but my mom is my reference point. There’s a lot of TLC that goes into one dumpling—it’s the single most important ingredient to making home-cooked meals delicious (even if there’s too much salt!)!!!

Chicken & Pinot Noir

Another old draft….

I boiled this chicken in a water, soy sauce, ginger, garlic and sugar.  It’s possible I’m omitting some ingredients, though…..

It stunk up the whole house, but was worth it.  I rarely cook chicken and this was a home run.  Served with rice, you don’t even need any side dishes (well, except maybe a little kimchi) and a nice red wine.  I can’t remember what this Poppy Pinot Noir tasted like, but I bought it as an ode to an old pal. 😉

Tomato Beauties

Happy (almost) SPRING! I received these garden fresh tomatoes from a work colleague back when it was in season (I’m just catching up with my draft posts….). They were so sweet and juicy and it was a great excuse to break open my sort of fancy (local) Extra virgin olive oil.

Wild Mushroom Jook (Korean Risotto)

I made this in November 2012—its a good dish to eat during chilly winter months….

Tender Squash, Juicy and Sweet Cucumbers

Zucchini from my mom’s garden is one of the things I miss the most.  She grows the Korean variety (surprise, surprise).  So you can probably imagine my excitement when someone gave me some squash from their garden!  Oh—yes, they were just as tender cutting through them as I remembered!  There is NOTHING that comes close to homegrown veggies.

I *mandolined* the cucumbers to make the “salted cucumbers” that we always order extra on our bagels at Beauty’s Bagel in Oakland, mentioned here.  Since we don’t eat a lot of sandwiches at home, I eventually morphed it into a Korean side dish (post will come later).

I made this pasta dish the day I received these beauties….look how tender and juicy they look!

Ingredients:  avocado oil, green & yellow squash, pan-roasted garlic, clams & their juice, saffron, crushed red pepper, white wine, sea salt, butter, Parmigiano-Reggiano

Malaysian Rice Salad

I’ve been always interested in Southeast Asian foods, but never took the time to learn how to make anything.  I think the food is very sophisticated the way certain herbs are used with very French-like sauces and still be considered deeply-rooted Asian food.  I find the combination of Asian and European-influenced foods quite fascinating.  I should point out here that I am NOT one of those that likes exotic food, though—sashimi is about as exotic as it gets for me as long as it is not moving on the plate!

I made this DE-licious Grilled Vegetable and Rice Salad with Fish-Sauce Vinaigrette from bon appétit magazine.  I deviated from the recipe:

1. I couldn’t find the red chilies, so everything ended up being green for me instead of green with specks of red.
2. I also didn’t have any eggplant, which was a huge bummer, because we ended up using it for another dish the previous night.
3. Fresh okra was substituted for frozen okra because there weren’t any good fresh ones at the time I went grocery shopping.
4. The last thing is that I didn’t grill the corn on an open fire.  Instead, I baked the corn in the husk in the oven at 350 °F, directly on the oven rack, for 30 min.

Probably change #3 and 4 were fine, but the next time I make this, I will definitely get those red chilies and get extra eggplant.

I was a little hesitant to buy the fish sauce, but read the ingredient list and hoped that it was true.  The fish-sauce vinaigrette sounds pretty disgusting, and seemed like it would be once I opened that bottle of fish sauce!  Luckily my preconceptions were completely wrong—the sauce was SO delicious and even more so when the dish all came together.

(UPDATE—I MADE IT AGAIN AND IT WAS STILL REALLY TASTY!  HERE ARE THE PHOTOS FROM MY 2ND TRY.)

In hindsight, I think adding fresh tomatoes will make this dish even more lively and tastier (I am on a tomato kick right now—peak season for sweet tomatoes!  Post about this to come soon!).

Sablés: Classic, Espresso Dark Chocolate and World Peace

These are the Valentine’s Day cookies I made for 2013 (I know, this posting is super late!).  All the recipes are from Dorie Greenspan’s Baking book. Unfortunately, my World Peace cookies did not turn out perfectly.  It was most likely due to the type of cocoa powder I used…..here’s what these World Peace Cookies should have looked like…

Japchae!

My housemate makes the BEST japchae (our moms don’t count, though *^^*).  This is a relatively simple dish, but takes a LOT of preparation and timing is crucial.  He washed and prepped everything from start to finish by himself.  I’m usually his sous chef for this dish, but I was out with a friend at the time! :p

Here’s how he makes it:

1.  PREP VEGGIES AND MEAT.

• All the veggies and fish cake should be sliced to similar sizes. Set these aside.
• Slice the beef lengthwise to bite-size pieces, so that they are somewhat similar to the veggies.  Add sliced garlic, soy sauce and sesame oil.  Mix well.  Set aside.

2.  PREP NOODLES.

• Bring a pot of water to a vigorous boil and drop in the sweet potato starch noodles (I’ve heard people call them “glassy” noodles) – follow cooking time on the package.
• Drain the noodles and place in a large bowl.
• Add sesame oil right away to coat the noodles.  This not only gives the noodles flavor, but it will also prevent it from sticking.
• Add soy sauce just before adding to the wok, otherwise, the noodles will soak it all up and will get too plump (imagine overcooking pasta).

3.  ASSEMBLE DISH.

• Heat a wok or large pan, place a generous amount of high heat oil (canola, safflower, grapeseed, vegetable) to sauté the ingredients.
• The ingredients should be added in the following order:  carrots, onions, beef, fish cake, green onions, sweet potato starch noodles (add soy sauce to noodles at this time, before adding to the wok), mushrooms, baby kale, spinach.  Each layer should be salted a little and sautéed before adding the next ingredient.
• Add some sugar at the end for a little sweetness.
• Mix everything really well.

4.  SERVE HOT OR AT ROOM TEMPERATURE.

TIPS:

• One can omit the fish cake and beef to make this a vegetarian dish.
• Add any vegetable you want.  We typically use carrots, onions, mushrooms, green onions and spinach.
• I recommend using wood ear, shitake and/or oyster mushrooms.  Avoid using crimini and button mushrooms—I don’t think the texture and taste would be right, BUT, to each his own, right?
• We used baby spinach and baby kale for this one, but just remember that it takes longer to cook the baby kale.
• Toasted sesame seeds are also optional — it can look a little “messy” if you use it, though, so it has been omitted here.
• To make it spicy, you can add any of the following or any combination thereof:  spicy peppers, red pepper powder, spicy pepper oil.

NOTE:  You probably noticed that I have no specific amounts listed and this was not to be annoying, but I genuinely don’t know how much.  We just “add enough to make it taste good”.  The key is to taste the food at various stages to suit your taste buds and to follow your intuition.  That’s typically the answer one would get from a Korean mother. *^^*

WARNING:  YOUR MOUTH WILL BE WATERING WHEN LOOKING AT THESE PHOTOS!!!

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Voilà! Vegetarian AND Meat Lovers!

Pancetta, Peas, Caramelized Garlic & Saffron Tagliatelle in White Wine Sauce

The title pretty much says it all, except that the garlic was a cheater’s version of slow-roasted garlic.  Basically, on low heat, I placed garlic in a lot of extra virgin olive oil for several minutes.  Melissa Clark from the New York Times Dining section has a short video on how to do this.  I’m sure I’m breaking all kinds of rules when I make pasta and Italians might be horrified by my methods, but it was still tasty and my housemate asked for seconds! 🙂

Grilled Cheese w/o the Cheese!

This was super simple and packed a punch in the taste department.  Since the roomie is not as fond of grilled cheese sandwiches like I am AND he was craving his mom’s sandwich (grilled bread, eggs, tomatoes), I put my own spin on it.

I used anchovy oil and butter to grill the bread slices; placed farm fresh eggs, slices of tomato and cucumbers inside—THAT’S IT.  I served it with a side of half of an avocado and grilled brussels sprouts (anchovy fillets, fresh garlic, crushed red pepper, salt, fresh cracked black pepper).

coffee gallery

This is a collection of photos from one of our favorite coffee shops—Pizzaiolo (post here)—well, really, its a restaurant, but serves a delectable selection of freshly baked pastries in the morning with fantastic coffee.  They use Blue Bottle Coffee beans and my favorite is the cappuccino.  The quad americano is my roommate’s fav.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Kimchi Fried Rice

This is what I make when I have very old kimchi and I am short on time (mentioned here).  This time I made it with beef hot links for added protein and bulk, but these can be left out and be just as tasty.  In general, when I make fried rice, I found the best way to make it is to fry the rice separately from the kimchi and then combine it at the end.

1. Fry rice.
   • Using a large pan or wok, fry old slightly dried rice over high heat in sesame oil (can use a mix of vegetable or canola oil with sesame oil to cut calories).
   • Add freshly grated black pepper and roasted sesame seeds.  Do not add salt—kimchi liquid will be used for this later.
   • Transfer the rice to a large plate.
2. Fry kimchi.
   • Squeeze the kimchi until most of the liquid has been collected.  Set the liquid aside for later.
   • Using the same wok, fry the kimchi in a liberal amount of high heat oil (e.g.  vegetable, canola, safflower, grapeseed).
   • Add kimchi liquid and let most of the liquid evaporate.  Keep some on reserve for later.
3. Add the hot links to the kimchi and cook until hot.
4. Add the fried rice to the wok and mix well.  Add more kimchi liquid to help combine all the flavors together (this is like adding pasta water to the sauce and pasta to combine all the flavors).

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

THE B.E.S.T. SASHIMI E.V.E.R!!!

This is the best sashimi I ever had (my earlier experiences while in college with sashimi don’t count since I was a newbie then) was on an island near Busan, Korea (거제도).  This place is only known by word-of-mouth and the menu is dependent on whatever fish is caught that morning (I think the ones we ate were all line-caught).  They also serve other fresh seafood; and by fresh, I mean that some are still MOVING on the plate!

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

{ leftover fish and fish bones (yes, of course including the head) made in a tasty, spicy stew and served after the sashimi }

{ 2nd plate of sashimi (another kind of fish) / ditto for these middle guys, too! }

{ 1st plate of sashimi (one kind of fish) / middle portion was still squirming! }

FUN.

One of my recent music obsessions—ENJOY!

We Are Young (music only with no commercials) – from their official MySpace page

We Are Young feat. Janelle Monáe (official music video with a 15-sec commercial) – from YouTube

Dashima and dumplings…..

THIS is one of my COMFORT FOODS:  dumpling soup!  I grew up eating a variation of this once every New Year’s Day.  My mom would make hundreds of dumplings and turn it into soup, make the deep-fried kind and have each household and family member be able to take home at least another few meals’ worth of dumplings.

My mom makes it with a beef-based broth, but my M-I-L makes a seafood-based broth.  I’ve adapted the latter since its much easier to boil some anchovies or dashima or a combination of both.  The dumplings here are pork, but can be easily interchanged with vegetarian ones.  So on a chilly day, a nice bowl of this soup really hits the spot!

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Here’s how we make it (ingredient list in purple):

1. Boil pot of water, enough for the meal and a some extra due to evaporation.  The extra amount depends on how much you plan to boil the anchovies and dashima.
2. Add the anchovies (we have a stainless steel container with holes that we use to place them in—kind of like a much larger version of a loose tea strainer) and several pieces of dashima.  If you don’t have dashima, then skip it.
3. Keep boiling them and watch the water level.  If it condenses down too much, then add some boiling water to it (I have a separate electric water boiler).
4. While the broth is boiling away, mix 2 eggs, salt, dashima and a tiny splash of Korean soy sauce in a bowl, but be careful to not add too much of these salty ingredients—its better to under-salt.  Set the bowl aside.
5. Clean and slice 3-4 stalks of green onions. 
6. Slice some garlic, ~3-5 cloves.
7. The rest of the ingredients are layed out on the counter beforehand because everything must be added quickly or the dumplings will overcook and turn into mush:  dumplings, salt, seafood dashida, Korean soy sauce (again, this is for soup—DO NOT substitute for soy sauce used for dipping), unseasoned dried seaweed sheets.
8. After at least 20 minutes of boiling, I drop in about 18-22 dumplings (for 2 very hungry people) and the garlic.  Let it come to boil again.
9. Then quickly add the egg mixture by pouring it over the the fork or chopsticks (whatever you used to mix the eggs), simultaneously moving across the pot.  The point of this is to spread out the egg and get them into thin “strips”.  If you just dump the mixture in the hot water, it will cook into one large egg ball.
10. Add the green onions on top, cover the pot with the lid.  Once it starts to come to a boil, turn off the flame, making sure the eggs are steamed/boiled, but not too much.  The key is to keep the eggs light and fluffy, so you don’t want to cook them too much.
11. Heat 2 sheets of seaweed over an open flame (or a dry pan) by quickly moving it around the flame.  The sheets will krinkle up.  Then crumble it all over the top of the dumpling soup.  If you don’t have seaweed sheets, then skip this step.
12. Serve immediately (minimally with kimchi, of course!).

Note:  Dashi-MA and dashi-DA are different.  Dashida is the powder spice that I mentioned in an earlier post. Dashima is another type of dried seaweed.  I’ve seen some labels  that read “kelp” and others as “sea tangle”.  Honestly, I have no idea what the difference is, so hopefully my photos will help.  This is also used to flavor broth.  It gives the broth a depth of flavor that is hard to explain and gives the soup a clean, refreshing taste.  Once you try it, then you’ll know what I mean.

How to use it:  Its very easy to use—all you do is take a few pieces (~6 pieces for a medium-sized pot) out and drop them in when the broth is boiling.  Since its used to flavor the base, use it at the beginning, before you add your main ingredients and let it boil at least 10 minutes.

Extra Tips:  Dashima can be added to seaweed soup (seen in my birthday post here), spicy Korean rice cakes (which we do add) and there are a ton more, but I just can’t think of any at the moment.

Request: “something good with eggplant”

Although I love eggplant, I never cook with it because it can be a little tricky to bring out the flavor without it tasting like one big pile of mush (which is what I did once about 6 years ago!).  This one seemed to turn out pretty good, though.  My official taste tester gave it a thumbs up, but even better, said he would eat it again if I made it!

Here’s my eggplant side dish {I used medium heat to cook this}.

1.  To heated canola oil, I added garlic and shallots to perfume the oil.  Cooked until starting to get translucent.

2.  Then added eggplant and salted right away to draw out some moisture.  A few splashes of soy sauce (the Korean kind, which is used for soups, so the flavor is much more concentrated and saltier than the Kikkoman variety).  Some red pepper powder was also added.

3.  When eggplant is tender, bias-sliced green onions were added to finish the dish.

Extra tip:  To soy sauce or not to soy sauce?  I would NOT substitute any other kind of soy sauce for this dish.  However, you can add some seafood dashida instead.

Dashida is a powder mix, similar to chicken or beef boullion.  So it is very salty and a little goes a long way.  You can get a seafood or beef-flavored dashida.   The one pictured below is a seafood-based dashida that is “all natural” with no preservatives.  Sometimes I use this to flavor soup even if the soup is not seafood-based (e.g. Korean-style egg drop soup).  It is simply to provide an extra layer of flavor.  This doesn’t mean you should use it until you can actually taste it—it is only supposed to enhance the flavors that are already present in the dish.