Category Archives: By Ingredient

Malaysian, Noodles, Poultry, Shrimp, Thai, Tofu

Tom Yam Fried Beehoon

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Tom Yam Fried Beehoon

Elizabeth and I have been friends since high school. Our friendship was not the most immediate—she is naturally more suspicious and takes a long time to warm up to people. I, on the other hand, will talk to just about anyone who is near me. So the first time we met, I had come up to her to say hello and ask her name only to be met with a suspicious, “why do you want to know?” At least, this is what Elizabeth tells me. I don’t remember that at all. I only know that we’ve been good friends for a long time. We’ve been through years of sitting next to each other through high school, work (graduate school for me), and of course, FOOD.

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Fruit, Malaysian

Buah Tarap – Borneo’s Unique Tropical Fruit

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It smells like a burning tire but tastes like the sweetest custard apple.

opening a buah tarap

We are really happy to be living here in Sarawak. Time and again, the kindness and the generosity of the people here simply blow us away. Last month, when we invited our friend Paul and his family over for a big, home-cooked Japanese meal of miso soup, niku-jaga, kabocha no nimono, and sesame salad with chicken, they brought over a couple of these unique fruits called “buah tarap” to eat for dessert.

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American, Vegetables

Leek and Potato Soup Recipe

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An easy, healthy, hearty soup with extra oomph.

leek and potato soup

It’s only been in the past year or so that I’ve discovered leeks. Before that, I would use it if it was called for in a recipe, like the cioppino hot pot recipe, but otherwise, I did not know how to cook with it. But this past year, I visited the farmer’s market a lot more and tried to experiment a little bit more with unfamiliar ingredients.

Whenever I would see leeks on sale at the market, I would normally buy some and treat them like onions in several of my dishes, putting them in my quiches, soups or even in my stir-fries. But really, this humble soup is one of the most wonderful ways to showcase leeks.

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Chinese, Poultry

Chinese Lemon Chicken, 1st Try

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We’re looking for a Chinese Lemon Chicken recipe that can match the ones we’ve eaten at our favorite San Francisco Chinese restaurant.

Chinese Lemon Chicken

Whenever we go out to a Chinese restaurant to eat, almost always, my kids (including my BIG kid) will want to order Lemon Chicken. There’s just something about this dish that makes it so easy to eat—the tanginess of lemon, the sweetness of the sugar in the sauce and the crispy, fried chicken.

Now, I’ve eaten my share of Chinese lemon chicken. Some are really amazing and others just mediocre. The best one I ever had was at R & G Lounge in San Francisco. The lemon chicken there was amazing—the chicken was coated in an ethereally light batter and not greasy at all. And they served the really beautiful bright lemon sauce on the side so that the chicken wouldn’t get soggy. That was love on a plate! I don’t know how the lemon chicken is like these days there as I haven’t been in a long time but if it’s as good as that time when we had it (and who knows if my memory has elevated my experience), I would order it all the time!

On the other hand, the really bad restaurants would serve lemon chicken that was more batter than it was chicken. The chicken would be dried out and the batter would be thick and crusty. The sauce would hardly be called lemony, more like yellow coloring and LOTS of sugar which would also be gloppy in consistency. Now somewhere in between these two extremes are what you’d normally find in most restaurants.

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