Taste vs. Original(Iron Chef won?!) --Beef Stroganoff

It was Battle Almond. I didn't watch the beginning ,not sure if Chef  Phan is from China, but from the ingredients he used and the way he cooked, I guess it was about Chinese cuisine. Very excited, it is not usual to see Chef playing with wok in 'Iron Chef America', I felt proud. When chefs presented their dishes, apparenly, judgers liked the Chef Phan's food more, But to my surprise, Chef Cora won. In face , in the taste aspect, Chef Phan was 6 points more, but he lost a lot in the original aspect, which leaded him lose the challenge.

Food is for eat after all,  the taste is the most important over all the other aspects, isn't it? 

I kinda think the competition is not very fair, it is unfair to assign each aspect equally 10 points, taste should account for more weights ( See, I am taking 'Data Mining' class right now :)

Yes, the classic Chinese cuisine is a little boring, it has been there thousands of years. But it comes from several centuries to today, but still mostly keep the orignal way, it means it is the BEST way to do it, it's not people don't want to be creative, but they can't find a better way to make replacement.

( My aha moments came....)

I kinda got to understand why SK likes the most orignal ways about food, becasue it is classic and nothing can be wrong with it. Although the world is rapidly changing every second, the definition about good taste still stay almost the same, I guess. ( I am not talking about the healthy issues here)

So maybe I should practice more on how to make perfect KongBao Chicken, instead of trying to start some adventure about Kongbao Chicken Lasagna.

Beef Stroganoff can be counted as a traditional dish from Russia . I checked several recipes and decided to make the roxy version. I browned the beef in the way borrowed from Chinese cuisine (medium heat ,wash with starch water ahead)and it turns out super tender! Also I like the idea of using dill to match the sour cream/ yogurt

Sauce
Basic roux plus yogurt and Dijon mustard brandy ( confession: I forgot nutmeg)

Beef
Rubbed with salt pepper Ginger powder brown sugar oregano. Washed with starch water before cooking under medium heat with ENOUGH oil, cooked it until 80% done.

Saute mushroom and onion .dill about 10mins, add beef,  add sauce.
One more declaration, it's not I wasn't cooking, I did make some interesting things but only for testing and of course my weekly squash soup, I have made four kinds so far:

1. Squash sage nutmeg maple syrup with white bean
2. Squash carrot Ginger
3. Squash curry
4. Squash apple cinnamon allspice white bean

I think I like No1 and No2 most.  And this beef stroganoff was a failure last weekend, so I made it again. Although I still took good pictures for it, I don't think I could post them, they were not good eats, it's a food blog but not a photograph blog.

Compromise Vs. 30min running rule--Tofu meatball makeover, 2 ways

I made myself a rule yesterday, I should run everyday, only 30mins, but not 1hr. Since an one-hour running plan is always intimating and I tend to postpone it and everything else that  looks like with higher priority jumps into the queue. So I thought what if I did  it only 30min each time, it  would be easy to keep it on and I would still have energy to run the next day , so  the rule is : No more than 30min!

But the reality is I was super cold, tired and hungry after school, then you can guess, I didn't go...

It is frustrating anyway.  I can easily break my rules without any guilty, how horrible it is! How about my dream about being a real chef? Will it also be compromised? Will it be able to survive from various complicated  factors in real life?

I do other art things as fun and I enjoy it, because I know I will never feed myself by art. But when things become serious, it also brings in more pressure. Is my dream realistic? Am I really talented enough?

Is it too late?

Maybe I should just stop worrying but keep this blog on.

It is kinda boring only have poached tofu meatball, so I worked on them a little bit and made them over in two ways- pan-fried and deep-fried(panko version), the dipping is hoisin sauce. And it is a nice match, I think.

Say Happy Bday in 'person'--Poached Tofu/shrimp meatball

Today (11/10) is XiaoDandan's birthday. I noticed that in facebook , then I decided to give her a call instead of writing the several words in facebook. And I did, she sounded very happy to hear that from me. We are close friends, we should TALK. Do you agree?

I also remember, the other day, my another friend's birthday, I pinged him to say happy B-day, he was so surprised that I knew his birthday , which I did appreciate facebook. And I am sure he was happier to get the wishes on IM. It was a communication between friends, which means an 'asking' will be followed by an 'answer'.

So if you can , make a call or an email,  at least an IM to your friends on their Bday. I guess your wishes will stand out, because it's specially from you in person

I know Xiaodandan likes steak, not sure she is also a fan of tofu, but should be, ( Chinese girls love Tofu~~)
But I am sure Cindy will like it, ' Hello,Cindy, how are you?'

This is something I learned from '天天饮食‘, very healthy but delicous.

I mixed 'meatball' with what I had by hand: parsley, minced garlic, shrimp, sausage, water chestnut, tofu (medium firm one, pre-processing: boil it so that it will get rid of some water, but still not recommend to use firm tofu)

Use blender to mix them, add a little bit starch, egg( which I think is optional), if too dry, add unsweetened soymilk(or milk or chicken broth)----don't worry , it won't get apart, adding water into meatball is the sercret to make it juicy, season it with white pepper, salt.

Prepare a bowl of startch water, while heating a pot of water or chicken broth.

When water is lukewarm, wash meatball with startch water , then put it into the pot. When the water just starts to boil, turn the heat down to medium , let it simmer.

when meatball are floating in the pot, they are done.
I like the cruching surprise from water chestnuts  : P

Brighten your day by doing outdoor workout --Slow Cooked Salmon with Creamy Broccoli Sauce(soup)

Yesterday, I talked with a friend, he told me he started  a weigh loss plan, including  a swimming in the morning and the change in diet. I can see he is very serious, since he did a lot of research in the mechanism  about weight loss and  food nutrition. I like seeing people working on their the weight loss plan in a scientific way, it means they are serious and determined , which predicts success. He said it felt so good to drive to the pool in the early morning, I said ' then your whole day is brightened, you feel proud of yourself from the most beginning of the day' 'yeah, exactly' he was so excited.  It was his excitement that reminded me the  amazing pleasure from running outside, and I confessed that I had been cheating myself by playing in gym and I knew I didn't enjoy it very much.

So... I ran, today!  And it felt unbelievably  wonderful. I guess it is so impressive that will drive me miss the feeling so much , thus I will run more often .It is not winter yet, it is fall, the most beautiful season in Boston, go out and enjoy it as much as you can...

I learned this slow cooked salmon from steamy kitchen and the sauce is created by myself. Slow cooked salmon is to bake salmon at 200F about 25min, and it will be as pink as before it is put into the oven, but it is cooked and warm. And you will never overcook it unless you leave it in the oven for several days. I guess smoke salmon is made in the similar way. I love it to the death, seriously.

The sauce is from a soup I created, it is a no-dairy creamy broccoli soup, ( dairy is kinda banned in my diet , it is such a pain!) I used Tofu and unsweetened soymilk instead of milk and a LOT of cheese. It comes out  very good, HAPPY. Use starch to adjust the thickness.

Slow cook salmon:

Rubbed salmon with brown sugar, garlic powder, salt, lay the ginger slice on top, about 30min

( you will find out how wonderful it is when brown sugar meets ginger..)

200F  baked about 30 min, test it using a folk.

Tofu Creamy broccoli soup

Garlic

Broccoli

Silken tofu

Unsweetened soymilk

chicken bouillon paste

Starch water

Parmesan(optional)

 Saute garlic , add broccoli,  then add siken tofu, soymilk, chicken bouillon paste, boil until broccoli is tender.

Use starch water to adjust the thickness

Use blender to make a soup, melt a small piece of butter at the end~~

A close look at the silky salmon

Try to do a real project--Honey, Ginger,Pear, Lemon tea

'There is no undo in real life,we have heard it hundreds of times,but I wouldn't understand it so much without playing with my new toy.

My new toy is a set of buckyballs, which are all magnet, so that they can be attached together to make different shapes. It is so fun , as well as a good stress reliever. But it is also annoying , since the magnet is so strong, it is easy to make them jammed together and all my work is destroyed.

Once, when my delicate 'flower' jammed together, and became a mess, to my surprise,  the first thought came to my mind was 'I want to undo'. Then I suddenly realized that there was no 'undo' button here. Yeah,  maybe I spent too much time with computer and I so enjoyed working with those virtual projects, where I can always regret for my choices and make new decisions.

Well, in real life, there is no 'UNDO' button , we all know that, but I still suggest you to try to do some real projects. I am not indoctrinating you how cruel the real life is, the point is even though we screw up and it moves into another direction, it will still have unexpected surprise. We never know, never can make a comparision:

 'Life is weird'

This is the beauty of life, I guess...

Honey, Pear, Ginger,Lemon Tea

A kind of light color tea: green tea or jasmine tea or mate;

Asian Pear

Lemon

Ginger

Honey

It is a wonderful stuff that can warm you in the cold season.

Legend of Fall Series II (Squash)-- Green day meets Special K

Super Super Super Happy, eventually finished the whole project , and I am so surprised that 'green day' pumpkin can stay longer than I thought to meet Special K . Congratualtion ,  You made it!

Inspiration:

I think when green day meets Special K,  somehting magical must happen. So some imags came to my mind: red grenade jumps out the guitar and the guitar is about to fly!

------Under constructon ------

  

------Finish it up------

------The guard of my house------

------"Hello ,World !" ------

  

------When Green Day meets Special K...