Category Archives: By Cuisine

Chicken with Black Fungus

Try this simple and delicious recipe with healthy black (wood ear) fungus, and you’ll be sold on it too!

Chicken with Black Fungus

Have I told you that I’m a pretty easy sell? I totally believe in sales gimmicks and this is why I never let those Kirby people in unless Nate is there at home with me. If I was alone, I’d be the proud owner of a really expensive vacuum cleaner (and I hate vacuuming). Why do I even let them in? Because I’m pake, see, and they always offer to clean one room for free! ^_^

I was at the market the other day buying vegetables and the vendor lifted this packet of black fungus to me. At first I didn’t know what it was she was trying to sell me but once I understood, I was tempted to get it. It’s not often that I can find fresh black fungus here.

Turns out, this vegetable vendor was a pretty good salesperson. “It’s very good for your health,” she said, “and it’s my last big pack.” She went on to convince me that it was really tasty and I would enjoy it. She could see that I was sold before I even nodded and, with a big grin, added it to my bag of other vegetables. Thankfully, in this case, it was just a pack of wood ear fungus that make for delicious eating and thus, totally justifiable. Right honey?

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Breakfast Strata

I’ve been making breakfast strata for several years now but I’ve never blogged about it. The first time I made them was for Nate’s birthday brunch party. It became a staple in our house after that.

Breakfast Strata

Anytime we had leftover bread, it was either breakfast strata or bread pudding. The beauty of this dish is that you can put it all together the night before, then the next morning, all you need to do is preheat the oven and pop it in. This is especially useful when you’re planning a brunch party (a tradition in this house for Nate’s birthday).

This will be the first year that I’m not planning to throw Nate a brunch for his birthday. Yup, his birthday is coming around again soon. Can you guess when it is? I’ll give you a hint: He came home from the hospital in a stocking the year he was born.

I recently found out that what I called a strata can also be called a casserole. Oh well…to me a strata sounds more appealing than a casserole. Anywho… casserole, strata…what does it matta? All I know is that this is good eats.

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Turkey Jook

I hope you save that turkey carcass from Thanksgiving dinner, because you can use it to make turkey jook (“rice congee”, porridge… ahhh, just call it “jook“). And because I’m making it, you know the recipe has to be easy!

Turkey Jook

turkey jook

Originally posted 1 Dec 2008
Updated 25 Nov 2010

The Thanksgiving feast is done. Much of the remaining turkey meat has been cut off the carcass and saved for making sandwiches later. Now you’ve got a bare carcass sitting on your counter. You’re not going to throw that away are you?

Oh, heck no!

One of the best ways to deal with the turkey carcass is to make a big pot of turkey jook the next day. Making turkey jook takes relatively little work, especially compared to the culinary acrobatics that normally take place in the kitchen on Thanksgiving. Here’s what you do:

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Buttery Dinner Rolls Recipe

Updated 20 Nov 2010
Originally posted 20 April 2009

There’s nothing better than fresh, homemade bread. Here are two easy recipes for how to make the best, pillowy-soft dinner rolls from scratch. Perfect for your Thanksgiving and holiday meals.

Buttery Dinner Rolls

buttery dinner rolls

Have you ever wanted to look for a recipe for something and then ended up with so many choices that you are paralyzed on which one to try? Or even more crazily, you try to incorporate a bunch of them into one recipe?

That’s how I was recently while looking for the ultimate dinner rolls. I’ve tried baking buttery dinner rolls using Rose Levy Beranbaum’s recipe from “The Bread Bible” before. They’ve turned out really well but I want something that will knock my socks off and make me want to keep eating them (even though with each buttery bite, more fat makes its way to my hips). That’s what I’m looking for baby!

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