28 things to do with the Dragon

the dragon welcomes you

I do resolutions. Well, let me correct myself. I make resolutions. “Doing” a resolution would imply that I actually have completed and crossed off said resolution. So, although I don’t do resolutions, I enjoy making them [I know, it’s a conundrum]. Every year, while the rest of the world is joining a gym or starting a diet at the beginning of January, I am creating a list for lunar new year with new and old resolutions. It’s a private tradition I do every year where I make goals, plans, and dreams for the year. Some I reach, many I don’t. But I still love to do it. Something about sitting down and evaluating the past year, and then figuring what I want to do in the year to come is exciting for me. It feels like growth, new adventures and discovery, and I love that.

This year, I’ve decided to do something different and share my list with you all. I’ve been inspired to do this by one of my friends, who is an amazing writer and has a travel blog called Flip Flop Caravan. At the end of the year, she talks about her goals for the past year and the ones that she has crossed off. She calls it her life list. Her journey is amazing to read and her ability to meet so many of the things on her bucket list are inspiring. So, because of her work, I’m making a list of 28 things that I want to accomplish this year.

This post was a little difficult for me to write. I’m not a person who is comfortable to be public about things, which is strange for a blogger. This is especially the case with a list of resolutions. I usually write the list on some scrap of paper that I hide in my dresser drawer so I see it randomly throughout the year. No one has ever seen my lists. They usually range anywhere from something that has to do with a personality or private matter to cooking a dish or having a travel/food show. So clearly, some goals are lofty, some more realistic and some that only belong in my underwear drawer while others can be shouted from the top of the world. But they help me see the direction that I want to take my life for the year and how I have grown as a person in interest, profession, and personality.

I’ve rewritten the post different ways and different times. I’m not entirely sure I’m settling on this format, or even the way it looks. But the problem is, I will never be happy with this post because it will always be changing. But here it goes.

My resolutions for the Year of the Dragon:

1. Be able to do Parshvottanasana “intense side stretch”
2. Make Zhong Zi (Taiwanese Tamales)
3. Travel to Taiwan
4. Complete the Run4Kelly
5. Star in a travel show/cooking show
6. Start a successful sake program at work
7. Write 54 posts
8. Make pizza from scratch
9. Make kimchee
10. Learn to shuck an oyster
11. Snorkel in Australia or Hawaii
12. Build a garden on the roof
13. Buy a plant and keep it alive
14. Build a home bar
15. Visit a winery
16. Read and understand a Chinese version of Doraemon
17. Make Fu Qi Fei Pian
18. Make white sugar cake
19. Create a video post for www.brb-eating.com
20. Make Taiwanese sausage
21. Visit the food network offices
22. Try Durian
23. Host a dumpling making party
24. Buy a new tv
25. Enjoy a bottle of rare wine
26. Eat a meal at ABC Kitchen
27. Send 6 postcards from 6 different places
28. Take a knife skills class

feliz cinco de mayo

It’s Cinco De Mayo.   Time for Americans all across the country to come together at their local “Mexican” restaurant/bar and do tequila shot, drink lots of margaritas, and eat chips and salsa to celebrate a holiday they know little about.

Some people seem to think that Cinco De Mayo is to celebrate Mexican independence.  Not so.  Instead it is the day that the Mexican army had successfully fought the French army in the Battle of Puebla.  So, while everyone is taking shots of Tequila to Mexican independence, which is September 16^th by the way, I will be doing a shot of tequila (drinking a michelada) in honor of the infamous day that the city of Puebla was not conquered by the French.

In honor of the Americanized holiday, I have put together some of my past posts that I feel are fitting for today.  Enjoy and salud!

roasted jalapeno guacamole

smokey black beans

enchiladas con salsa verde

mango salsa

calamansi margarita

soy braised daikon

 

...see all that umami deliciousness floating around in there...

I’m not the best person when it comes to explanations.  Ask most of my friends and family.  I tend to start to explain something, but then I start to trail off onto another tangent or I am vague enough to force my audience to be confused even more . Sometimes I’m both, which really infuriates my family and friends.  It’s usually the most obscure concepts that are the most confusing for me to explain.  Usually I understand it crystal clear, however putting it into words is usually difficult.  Umami is one of those concepts.

I love umami.  It’s a pretty amazing flavor. For folks who aren’t familiar with umami:  no, it is not a new concept and no, it is not Japanese for “delicious” as the Kikkoman commericial implies.  Umami has been classified as the fifth taste.  It is a taste that goes beyond the four tastes.  Now, I’m going to try my hardest to break it down for you in this post, but please bear with me if I lose you.  And if I do lose you, just go down to the recipe…it’s Kikkoman’s definition of “umami”, delicious.

So we have our four tastes that we all learned in grade school: sweet, salty, bitter, and sour.  Right?  All of them exists in almost every dish we eat now either on its own or in some sort of combination.  Now, there is a fifth taste that we were never taught as children and it is “umami”.  Essentially what umami is trying to describe is “savory”.  We all have been taught that if something is not sweet than it is savory.  However, this is not true.  If something is not sweet, then it just isn’t sweet.  Savory/umami is a layer of taste that is slight salty, with a tinge of bitterness and a lasting flavor in the back of the tongue.  All right, I lost you right?

Imagine you are about dine on some amazing beef stew.  The meat has been marrying and melting and infusing with the broth, root vegetables, onions, and herbs for almost the whole day. Now you sit down and take a huge whiff of the amazing warm meal you are about to partake in.  The first spoonful is put in your mouth and you chew the morsels and mix the flavors around in your mouth.  The sweetness of the vegetables is marrying well with the flavors of the herbs.  You swallow that first bite, regretfully wanting more.  You look down to scoop the next bite and the bowl of stew is gone.  Someone has taken it and you realize that the flavor is your mouth still exists and will not go away.  Unfortunately you want more because you can still taste a flavor on your tongue.  It’s not a distinct herb or vegetable taste.  But it’s something amazing.  That lingering taste that is in the back of your tongue and almost in your throat.  That is “umami”.

My mom always cooked with umami before I think she knew what umami was.  She, like many Asian folks, used MSG to achieve that taste.  Not knowing what the affects where, it was sold as a flavor enhancer.  Essentially it created the umami flavor we where all looking for.  For our household, it always came naturally to the cooking process:  stir fry or braise, add salt, and then add MSG.  After my mom realized what the health dangers to MSG were, she stopped using MSG and the umami flavor disappeared.  Sometimes she would use dashi powder for vegetable stir fries, but that was it.  I miss those MSG induced comas and throat swelling days.  Only a small price for awesome flavor.

I’ve learned since then that cooking with some ingredients provides great umami flavor.  A small look into that list are things like shitake mushrooms, soy sauce, ripe tomatoes, fish, and beef.  The recipe that follows is the most umami filled thing that I have ever made.  Besides the ginger and the daikon, everything in this will create the umami flavor.  Enjoy it and savor the flavor and realize that you have always tasted the fifth taste.  It’s probably easier than me trying to explain it.

~stuff

6 1 inch pieces dried kombu

3 cups water (3¼  cup if using regular sodium soy sauce)

1/3 cup mirin

1/3 cup low sodium soy sauce (1/4 cup if regular sodium)

¼ cup bonito flakes

1 tsp grated ginger

3 whole dried shitake (don’t need to soak)

1 large daikon peeled and cut into 1 ½ to 2 inch coins

~steps

combine the first seven ingredients in a large sauce pan and bring to simmer on medium heat for 30 minutes.

remove all ginger and bonito flakes from the broth and discard

add daikon to the broth and cover and simmer on low until daikon is fork tender, about 30 minutes

-serves 4-6-

espresso 101

photo courtesy of wikipedia

I went to my first foodie training today.  It was pretty awesome.  I had the opportunity in the past to go to cooking demos and what not (thanks J.W. and D.Z) but this was my first hands on teaching experience.  It was pretty awesome, especially when it was related to a new drug and addiction that I may have to pursue.  Coffee.

Well, more specifically espresso.  Man, I’m just jonesing for some of that beautiful substance now.  I’ve never been into coffee.  It’s never really been my thing.  Although my parents and my brother drink it daily, I never found the enjoyment in it.  I never really understood the hype and excitement around it.  My parents always drank drip coffee and it was usually Folgers in a giant tin.  That’s all, nothing special.

I now understand what the hype is and why I didn’t like it then.  It wasn’t good.  The can was from Costco and had probably sat out for a couple of months.  The automated coffee maker was just pouring overly hot water over the pre ground, stale, commercial beans and then it just sat there over a hot plate for way too long.  See!  Even as an 8 year old I had the complex and refined palate of a 60-year-old Italian.  Just call me Andolini Corleone.  Go ahead, kiss my hand and respect me as a Godfather, I won’t let it go to my head.

So this training opportunity was 3 hour session on the basics of creating the perfect double shot of espresso.  Yes.  I spent three full hours in Brooklyn hanging out with a chain smoking coffee roaster from Australia and a young Filipina; the time flew.  The orientation was done with Kitten Coffee.  They don’t do the orientation/training for folks in the public, but through outside and personal things in my life, I was able to attend.   I learned about the intricacies of both the outside and inside of an espresso machine. I learned about the importance of heat, grind, water, and light when it comes to espresso.  I learned about the things to look for to visually tell if the espresso is good.  And I learned that espresso tastes good.  So, here I come with some tips and things to look out for the next time you go to your local coffee shop or Starbucks.  Hopefully the former.

Sound- There needs to be an Orchestral Symphony of grinding, clicking, hissing and banging.  If you don’t hear these sounds after you order your drink, then there is something missing.  If you don’t hear grinding then your beans may not be fresh (the flavor begins to turn rancid after 5-10 minutes of grinding).  If there isn’t a loud click or a lot of them, then there aren’t enough coffee grounds being used, which will lead to a bitter, watery mess.  The hissing noise is what you should hear to make sure your milk is being perfectly steamed.  No gurgle from it being super immersed until I hear some hissing first.  Also, the steaming process should be not too quick or too long.  I don’t need burnt milk in my coffee nor do I need just a layer of foam that refuses to mix when I stir and you don’t need that either.  And finally, bubbles should not exist on the top of my milk and the only way to get rid of them is loud banging on the counter.  If I don’t hear any loud banging, then my milk has bubbles and then it won’t mix well with the espresso.

Crema- So, I’m so used to drip coffee or chain/big box espresso that I never see or notice anything special with my drinks.  But, I’ve discovered that a real good shot of espresso has a layer of thick, foamy, light brown goodness from the oils in the beans.  If there isn’t one, and you will see it even if there is milk on top, then the espresso wasn’t made very well.  The temperature is off, the beans are bad, or the barista sucks.

There are other things that you can look for when making the espresso to know if it is good, but I wrote this for the intention of someone who is ordering it at a café.  I’m not sure how realistic it is to ask my readers to go behind the counter and see what the pressure gauge is on the water.   But now that you are more informed, what are your favorite espresso drinks and where do you like to get them?  My newfound addiction do this brown goodness may lead me there sometime soon.  Now I’m off to fix my newfound addiction.