Category Archives: Food

Cooking with chanterelles – an autumn luxury and privilege

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I love mushrooms. They are one of my favorite foods on earth. The more irregular and funny looking they are, the more likely I am enamored by them and just want to find ways to cook with them and get them in my belly. Over the years, I’ve had so many delicious varieties of mushrooms. In Asian cooking, shiitake and enoki mushrooms are extremely common. Since graduating from college, I’ve been buying king oyster and trumpet mushrooms more regularly. And while I am obsessed with morel mushrooms, they are almost impossible to find…and when you do, quite cost prohibitive.

One mushroom that had remained on the “out of reach” list for ages were chanterelles, a rare, delicate, and difficult to cultivate mushroom. They cannot be commercially cultivated and can only be grown wild, thriving on tree roots. Chanterelle mushrooms form symbiotic, mycorrhizal relationships with tree roots in a way that is so complex that humans still have not figured out how to reproduce this in a controlled farm environment. And thus, every chanterelle mushroom anyone buys has been foraged by hand in the wild and not farmed. They also have a very short season that is usually late summer to fall, and their yield heavily depends on rainfall, temperature, and soil quality being at optimal levels.

Given this, it’s been pretty usual that if I go to Whole Foods or a fancier grocery store (regular grocery stores will rarely have chanterelles!) around September to October each year that I will see chanterelles being sold for anywhere from $28-50 per pound. While I have loved them and have enjoyed them in a couple tasting menus we’d indulged in, I never had the pleasure of cooking with them myself until during the pandemic. In 2020, we spotted them at a Costco for about $12-13/pound, and I obviously pounced on it. And then once again during our Costco trip this past Sunday, I got two pounds of them for the same cost. Sure, they’re expensive and are priced like fancy meat even at this far-cheaper price, but to me, chanterelles are worth it as a rare autumn treat.

Today, I made my chanterelles two ways: I seared and tossed them into a cashew-cream based sauce with short pasta, along with cannellini beans and baby bella mushrooms for extra protein and mushroominess; and for something I hadn’t previously done but wanted to do, I seared them and tossed fresh green herbs into them, adding them atop crusty Breadivore bordelaise sourdough and a generous pat of salted French butter. It was simple, delicious goodness. But once I finished cooking my two pounds of chanterelles down and looked at my final dishes, I looked down and sadly noted how much they shrank down in volume, just like all my greens, into just a teeny tiny fraction of what I originally started with. This is often why when people ask me how I can possibly eat all of <name whatever squash, vegetable, bag of greens at Costco>, I tell them that it always cooks down to far, far less than what you’d think. So while it looks like we bought a lot, we”ll likely get through it in just two meals each!

Lyman Orchards Corn Maze and a bi-annual Costco pitstop

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I don’t recall ever doing a corn maze during the fall growing up. I remember going to pumpkin patches, but the only corn maze I ever remember going to was out in Long Island in 2011 with some friends — at night. That corn maze was supposed to be spooky and “haunted,” and the only lights we had were via flashlights we were given or our own phones. Chris brought us to Lyman Orchards today in Middlefield, CT, for a corn maze and an apple stop. The theme was very fitting for us given what we’d recently eaten: it was Connecticut pizza themed! Kaia loved running through the corn maze and insisted on always going ahead of us and being first. She would also always squeal with high pitched delight every time she saw a corn on the cob that had its kernels peeking out. It was a really fun fall activity, and made even more fun by watching how happy and engaged Kaia was the whole time. Although I didn’t have a “bad” childhood, when I look at her and see how happy she is with all the experiences we’ve given her, it almost makes me relive my own childhood again just seeing how much joy she is experiencing. I love seeing her get excited about the leaves, the different seasons, and the different seasonal activities.

And of course, one last stop before we headed back to New York was at Costco! I loved the Costco experience in South Windsor, CT. Even though it was a Sunday, it wasn’t even remotely crowded. It actually felt quite quiet. There were barely any lines at checkout. The sample stations were quiet and not bombarded by endless hoards. The restroom was an easy in and out for us. And when we had a little lunch at the Costco food court, Chris easily got us a table and seats.

Here are some of the biggest highlights of what we discovered today:

Tim Tams (Australian formulation — WITH GOLDEN SYRUP ): Chris was very excited to see these, and of course, he added it to our cart to “tide him over” longer until he gets his Arnott’s haul replenished.

Kirkland Signature Belgian Chocolate Biscuit Cookie Tin: Chris’s favorite and present to himself each fall Costco trip we go on. 🙂

A WHOLE DUCK: For just over $16 grown at a farm in Indiana. I may finally use those duck class skills I learned a few years ago and get to work!

Wild chanterelle mushrooms: We haven’t scored these since the pandemic era. Chanterelles tend to grow in the fall and have a subtle but delicious earthy flavor. When they are in peak, they can go for anywhere from $28-50/pound, which is too much for me to stomach. I got two pounds of these babies today for $12.99/pound weeeee.

Nielsen Massey Vanilla Bean Paste: This brand always comes up in food forums I’m in where professional pastry chefs discuss products they love and absolutely need. I figured I’d never buy it because it was so expensive. But then Chris spotted it at Costco next to the vanilla extract and vanilla beans. I initially skimmed it over because I didn’t see the brand name. But when I did, I did a double take and scrutinized it to death, then Googled it to make sure this was the same product. A 10-ounce bottle of this magic was $19.99. For pricing reference, if you buy an 8-ounce bottle on Williams-Sonoma, it’s currently going for $47.95. What a deal! It’s best to use this product for baked goods where the vanilla flavor really needs to shine… and where you want to “see” the vanilla bean flecks.

Mrs. Meyers Hand Soap Combo Pack: Okay, so I’m kind of like Martha Stewart in that I do really like certain hand soaps over others, and Mrs. Meyers never fails. I almost got the same holiday scented set as last year until we came across the pack that includes the Tomato Vine scent, which I’d been curious about for a while because I’d read it had a near cult following!

We also got some good deals for clothes for Pookster, including a four-piece rainbow top and bottom set, a Minnie Mouse sweater, top, and pants set. And as the clothing section at Costco just keeps getting better and better, we also found some nice onesies that were Winnie the Pooh and Simba themed for some recent babies who have joined the family. It was a massive Costco haul this time, but I have zero doubt everything we got will go into good use (or into our bellies!).

Japanese milk bread, take two

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During the height of the pandemic, I saw so many recipes that either were for Japanese milk bread or included Japanese milk bread that I decided to try to make it. Unfortunately, lines at the grocery stores were long, and almost all milk bread recipes require bread flour for increased protein and gluten formation. I had only all-purpose flour and didn’t really want to line up just to get bread flour, so I tried my hand at making this with just all-purpose flour. Well, it didn’t turn out great: the dough got over proofed, it looked lopsided, and finally, the texture, while good, was nothing like the feathery, airy-light poofiness that makes Japanese (or Hokkaido) milk bread so famous. I had made a bread loaf, but it certainly was not anything that resembled a real Japanese milk bread loaf. I felt sad and decided I’d revisit it later when I got my hands on bread flour.

Then fast forward about five years (long wait, but a lot happened since then, including IVF and Kaia Pookie!). Earlier this year, I was able to get King Arthur bread flour on sale at Whole Foods, which I originally used to make two batches of hot cross buns. I knew another recipe I wanted to try out again was Hokkaido milk bread. And this time, I was properly equipped: I had the bread flour, the instant yeast (versus the dry active yeast, which would require an annoying extra step of scalding the milk), plus milk powder (which I originally bought and used to make gulab jamun nut bread). On Sunday night, I made the dough with the tangzhong, which is an Asian (people argue whether it was Japanese or Taiwanese first) bread making technique where a small portion of the flour and liquid (usually milk and water) is cooked into a paste before being added to the main dough. This pre-gelantinizes the flour’s startches, which then allows them to absorb more water. This ultimately results in a softer, more tender dough and bread that stays fresh, light, and fluffy for a longer time compared to bread without the tangzhong method. I proofed it overnight in the fridge. Then in the morning, I rolled it out and into my bread pan. I wasn’t sure if it rose enough or why it didn’t seem to rise at all in the fridge, but the recipe did note that this dough would not double (like most yeast doughs) when rising. When I checked the dough in the pan after an hour, I did see that it filled out the pan, so that was good news that my yeast was doing its job. I brushed it with milk, then baked it for about 32 minutes, and out came this gorgeous, poofy, lightly golden brown milk bread loaf. It already looked and smelled so much better than the one I attempted five years ago.

I sliced a couple pieces off my milk bread loaf for lunch for Chris and me, and I had mine with guava jam. To be totally honest, I felt so self satisfied when cutting into the loaf and seeing the crumb, and even more so when I took my first bite. It was like the perfect milk bread: feathery, airy, light, a tiny bit sweet, and pillowy. And even better: it was 100 percent homemade with no artificial ingredients or preservatives. And when I think about it, it really wasn’t that tedious to make at all, especially when you factor in doing the first proof (rise) overnight in the fridge. Making bread always gives me a high level of satisfaction, and even more so when it’s a bread that has been a challenge in the past. I will definitely be making this again soon!

Pumpkin spiced creamer

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After I had my fun with my newfound love of mace (the spice, NOT the spray!) yesterday, I added a bit of my ground mace to my freshly blended pumpkin spice blend. I always make this every autumn for pumpkin spiced treats through winter, just that this time, it’s particularly special (with a hint of citrus!) from the mace addition.

The first thing I wanted to make with my pumpkin spice blend was pumpkin spiced creamer. A few years ago, I’d made pumpkin spiced lattes at home that used not just pumpkin spice, but also real pumpkin puree. The issue with that recipe I used was that it required you to blend the milk/pumpkin/spice mixture every time, which didn’t seem practical as a regular activity to do when you just wanted some pumpkin spice flavor in your coffee or tea latte. So I found a pumpkin spice “creamer” idea where you’d whisk all the spices, pumpkin puree, and milks (I used coconut and oat), along with a little sugar and vanilla extract on the stove until boiling, simmer, and then let it cool. Each time you take some creamer out of the jar from the fridge, you just need to remember to shake it a bit before adding to your coffee.

I added the pumpkin spice creamer to my cold brew glass with ice cubes, then added bit more oat milk to top it off. I mixed it up, tasted it, and was quite satisfied. It really did taste very creamy and autumn-like. I could even get the hint of citrus flavor from the tiny bit of mace in the pumpkin spice blend.

Ube pandesal at home does not resemble ube pandesal at the Filipino bakery

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Earlier this year on a Saturday, we went back to my original New York City neighborhood, Elmhurst, and stopped by a Filipino bakery called Kape’t Torta. They opened in 2019 just blocks away from my old apartment on Queens Boulevard. They’re known for their ube desserts, such as their ube layered cake, ube custard layered cake, and of course, their halo halo crushed ice drink/dessert. We picked up a couple of their ube pandesals, which I had heard of before but had never tried. I’d previously made a plain sweet pandesal bread roll before, but I’d never had an ube one. This was was extremely electric purple with a light, melty cheese filling on the inside. I figured I could try to make it at home at some point, so I made a mental note of it and moved on.

In May, I stopped by a Filipino grocery store in Staten Island, and I finally stumbled across 100 percent dehydrated ube powder imported from the Philippines – no artificial coloring, flavorings, or preservatives. I knew this was my opportunity to finally make ube pandesal, so I bought the packet.

Fast forward to this last week, and I was testing to see if a packet of dry active yeast was still active. Luckily for me, it was, so I decided this was my week to finally try making ube pandesal. I picked a random food blog and used their recipe, but unfortunately, my result was nothing like the photo. For one, the recipe blogger says that ube extract is “optional,” but when I see the color of my dough, it’s clear that the ube extract was needed for that electric purple color. My pale purple tinted dough didn’t come close to the blog pictures or the ube pandesal from Kape’t Torta. Plus, when I did some searches, I found out that ube extract did not just have artificial coloring, but it also had an enhanced “ube” flavor from artificial and “natural” flavorings, meaning that it wasn’t 100 pure, natural ube flavor. What I perceive to be “ube flavor” may in reality just be a bunch of artificial flavors made up in a lab. Then, my dough was much softer and wetter than it was supposed to be, so to compensate, I had to keep adding flour until the dough was kneadable. This resulted to a watering down of the overall ube and sweet flavor. So in the end, while the rise of the dough was beautiful, and while the pandesal rolls were light, fluffy, airy, and spongy, they did not have a bright electric purple color. They were also not filled with kaya jam as I originally hoped because the dough was just too soft to withstand a filling.

I’ve been cutting the ube “pandesal” rolls in half this week, warming them up lightly, and then filling them with kaya jam. I have grown to like these slightly yeasted, spongy glorified and enriched “pandesal” bread rolls that are lightly tinted purple. They are definitely light, airy, and fluffy. But they lack that “ube” flavor I know… from that ube extract that I never realized was always used. I thought about it and realized that what I romanticize as authentic “ube pandesal” may actually be authentic with dehydrated ube powder AND ube extract. The artificial coloring and flavoring from ube extract may be artificial, but that’s probably what contributes to the “authenticity” of these types of rolls in the Philippines. And that’s not necessarily a bad thing — it just is what it is.

Ferry Building Farmers Market and the whining and whinging in the background

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On Saturday morning, we decided to take a Waymo out to the Ferry Building for the famous Saturday morning farmers market there. I love that farmers market; it’s likely my very favorite one in all of the U.S. that I’ve visited. As a native San Franciscan, I quietly feel a lot of pride and joy when I walk through the endless fresh produce stalls there. Every time we walk by the stalls, whether they are selling various (all labeled by variety!) heirloom tomatoes, eggplants, strawberries, or peaches, it’s as though the perfume of these fresh fruits and veggies beckon to us. I have yet to visit any farmers market in the U.S. that has such rich fragrance coming from the fresh produce all around. If my parents’ house weren’t as cluttered and dirty, I’d be tempted to buy a bunch of the produce there to prepare simply and eat at home, but I guess that is not to be.

While I enjoyed seeing, sampling, and inhaling all the deliciousness around me, it felt like there was someone whining in the background every time I reveled in a tasty piece of tomato or local Valencia orange. No, it was not my toddler. It was actually my mom, mulling in the background, complaining that this peach or that strawberry was too expensive. Seemingly every stall we visited, she’d remark how expensive something was and how could anyone pay so much for any of this produce. It almost dampened my experience of the market. Unlike her, these people take pride and joy in the produce they grow and sell, and they should be charging what is a reasonable price to make a living and continue to sustain themselves. Not everyone has the luxury to not work and have several paychecks come in every month. But she is so out of touch that she never thinks about this.

My mom said she wanted to come with us to spend time with Kaia. But I think we all know there was no quality time spent together. The one moment I actually stopped to pay for a small basket of sun gold tomatoes, I asked my mom to watch Kaia. That didn’t work out. She held her hand for maybe five seconds, and then Kaia ran off. My mom ended up luring her back with candy, which I explicitly told her not to give. If it’s not one thing, it’s always something else that is going wrong.

A friend of mine, who also has a dysfunctional relationship with her mom, reminded me that our parents will never change who they are, and we’re incapable of changing them. The only thing we should be focused on is making sure we are an improvement from them and try to be better parents to our children than they were to us. Each generation should be “better” than the previous. I hope I am achieving that — I hope.

Quick 24-hour trip to Raleigh, North Carolina

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I booked a relatively last minute trip to come down to Raleigh, North Carolina, to do a customer meeting and also host a customer happy hour. Our customer chose the happy hour spot, which was a new, upscale restaurant in downtown Raleigh. It had high ceilings, textured murals on the walls, beautiful, modern chandeliers, a large bar that actually sparkled, and a level of service that really blew me away. We had a group of about 15 people in total. Somehow, our server was able to remember every single person’s drink when offering to top them up, as she asked them specifically if they would like a second (fill in the name of the specific drink) when coming around. It was really impressive to see her in action; she was like a wizard! In addition, we ordered a number of appetizers for the happy hour event, which included a pull-apart bread served in a cast iron pan with scallion butter, beef sliders with horseradish boursin, arugula, and caramelized onion jam, amongst other things. The sliders were delicious, but what really impressed me was the pull-apart bread. It was a little crisp on the outside (from being baked in a cast iron pan), and super warm, fluffy, soft, and tender on the inside, with a subtle sweetness that reminded me of Portuguese sweet bread. I think I got a third portion of the bread because it was truly that good.

While I’m aware that Raleigh has been growing in popularity with both companies opening offices and headquarters there (and thus more people moving into the area from all over the country, if not world), it didn’t really hit me exactly how “new” everything was until I walked the streets of its downtown area. Almost every building felt like it had just been constructed and had a new and shiny feel to it. All the restaurants seemed modern and spacious, with large open bars and extremely high ceilings. A bakery I visited that got rave reviews had creative pastries on the menu, like a baklava croissant and a “have a little faith in me” pull-apart croissant with brown sugar almond frangipane. I visited only three different food establishments today, but the quality of the food, drink, and service has been really astonishing. I suppose it’s partly the New York City snob in me to be skeptical, but I’ve traveled enough around the U.S. to know that delicious, truly hospitable places are really everywhere, and oftentimes in cities and neighborhoods where you’d never expect it. The other part of me, though, is more impressed because post-pandemic, overall it feels like quality of service has declined everywhere. So it’s given me good vibes to get really great service during my short time in Raleigh.

New trends, new pizza spots, and a different kind of waiting

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Ceres Pizza opened earlier this year just a couple blocks from Kaia’s school. Every time I’d pass it, I barely even knew what I was passing back in the winter months. It was really quiet, barely had anyone in it. And then suddenly, these crazy long lines started forming, and it became the pizza spot that was showing up on every “best of” list in New York City. A major pizza critic/YouTube influencer gave it a 9.2/10 rating, thus catapulting it into “pizza nirvana.” They used to sell slices, but now given their popularity, you have to commit to a full pie. When I’ve passed it in recent months, there was never NOT a line.

Today, I passed it around lunch time to find that there were at least 20 people in line, along with all the tables fully occupied inside. A person who had already taken her pizza to go told me that she actually only waited about 20 minutes in line before ordering, and her pizza came out pretty quickly. So at around 4pm, I went to Ceres to see if I could get a to-go pizza and bring it home for dinner. When I got up to the front, I got disheartened when I heard the cashier tell the woman in front of me that if she ordered now (4pm), her pizza would not be ready until 8:30!! The woman said that would be too late, and she left. I confirmed that I heard this correctly with the cashier, and she said I did. She suggested that in the future, if I wanted to order pickup for 5pm, I’d need to get in the same single pizza line, place my order and pay by 1-1:30pm, then the pizza would definitely be ready at 5pm. They have no phone line to call, no online ordering system. It almost felt like they were manufacturing demand. Then again, given that the small kitchen is fully open and in view from the front, I guess it wasn’t like they had endless manpower or ovens to get all these pizzas cooked that quickly.

So in this case, there would be two types of waiting to get this pizza: the first wait would be to get the order in by standing in line; the second is that I’d have to come back hours later to pick up the pizza, which would be in a “to-go pizza” queue. This would necessitate being in the area for at least half the day. Granted, since Kaia is in school down there, it would be easy for me to do this on a day I’m working from the co-working space office. But if this were any other situation, it would likely never work! I’ll probably just need to throw the towel in and wait until the hype dies down in six to twelve months, but I’ll continue keeping my eye out since I’m nearby often to see if this hype ends sooner.

An unexpectedly great dining experience in Midtown Manhattan tonight

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I had made a 6pm reservation for dinner with a female friend before our Summer for the City at Lincoln Center Festival Orchestra show. Our show was at 7:30pm, so I knew we were going to be tight on time for dinner given we would be about a 13-minute walk from David Geffen Hall. I arrived about two minutes before 6pm and checked in with the hostess, who asked me if I’d like to be seated at the table to wait for my friend. I perked up: wait, what? She was actually going to seat me before my “whole party was present”? I was already pleasantly surprised by this given that at most Manhattan restaurants, especially ones as new and trendy as this one, they refuse to seat you until your whole party was present. I got seated, and my friend came about two minutes later.

When our server came, he checked in to see if we wanted to order drinks. We said we needed a few minutes to review the menu. And unlike at other new, trendy Manhattan restaurants, he didn’t come check on us until we asked him to come over. We put in our full order, including drinks. They spaced out our starter from our mains. They didn’t bring my friend her drink until the food arrived, just as she requested. Our server came by and checked on us just once to see that the food and drinks were to our liking. The service was attentive without hovering, and they were not even remotely pushy to get us in and out at all. We had to cut our meal short given tight time to walk to Lincoln Center for our show, but I was just so surprised by how good the service was and how I never felt rushed at all.

Plus, the food was delicious. We ate at BKK, a “Bangkok meets New York” style fusion restaurant that had opened just a few months ago. Our drinks were perfect and well made. The papaya salad was truly “Thai spicy” as we asked for, and as the server and staff complied with. We shared two mains: the crab fried rice and the “brisket kee mao.” The crab tasted like it was freshly plucked out of the shell, and the brisket, so a fancy version of pad kee mao, was melt-in-your-mouth tender. Of course, the prices were elevated given the trendiness of the restaurant plus the location, but given the freshness of the food and the flavors, I think it was most definitely worth it.

Now, why can’t all post-pandemic Manhattan dining experiences be like this? After more than a handful of rushed experiences with servers who have put really obvious pressure on my dining partner (usually a female friend) to order, eat, and get the hell out while at many new-ish, trendy restaurants in Manhattan, this was a truly positive and delightful dining experience, especially given the location in midtown.

Visiting the equator line at Intinan Museum in Quito, and a sumptious modern Ecuadorian meal at Somos

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Today was our last full day in Quito before heading southwest to Guayaquil, the largest city in Ecuador, and our last stop on this trip before heading home. We got to have a bit of science education at the Museo de Sitio Intinan, which is actually situated almost exactly where the equator line is. Our admission included an interactive tour led in English by a guide. He discussed local indigenous cultures and old traditions (that are definitely not continuing on given how brutal they are…), explained the Coriolis Effect and how it influences everything that moves on the face of the earth, and also challenged us to a few activities, including balancing an egg (only a few people succeeded), keeping our feet straight on a single line with our eyes closed (here, we all failed. I tried to be as steady as I could, but alas, the earth’s rotation of course got to me, and I was even MORE off than I thought I’d be when I opened my eyes…), and tests of force on our arms. These all served as reminders to us that even when we think we are still, we are never, ever still: we live on a planet where we are constantly rotating.

We continued on after the visit to the equator line and enjoyed some local coffee, followed by a sumptuous lunch at the modern Ecuadorian restaurant Somos. It was so fancy that it even had a kids’ menu with very local touches, such as pasta with manaba cheese, a pizza option containing yucca sourdough, and a fruity, herby lemonade infused with local indigenous herbs. Kaia had the pasta deconstructed, and she ate all of the pasta, chicken, and sauce. She refused the cheese, though; she really does not seem interested in any cheese unless it’s stuck on a relatively plain pizza…

We started our meal with a complimentary tasting of canelazo, a panela (unrefined local cane sugar) drink that had multiple layers of flavor, including sweet, floral, and a bit of tart. I had the Amazonica beer, made with cassava, passion fruit, chonta fruit, and guayusa, while Chris had the Somos beer, a bitter style beer based on cacao husks. We had the lunch special options, which started with the corviche (green plantain and sal prietra patties filled with smoked Amazonian fish, served with slaw), and the ceviche tropical mestizo (local taxo fruit sauce with fish, cucumber, avocado, melon, served with green plantains. Our main courses were the raices del Amazonas, which was cassava puree, fried cassava, paiche fish battered in cassava flakes, chonta sango sauce, chili compote, and oregano oil; plus the chorizo ambateno — bean puree, pork belly, chistorra, avocado, tomato sauce, encurtido, potato, and egg. We ended with a banana cake served with a panela and coffee syrup, coffee butter, caramelized coffee, and banana and cacao nibs ice cream. They also gave us a last complimentary taste: three little freshly made brownie-style chocolates, which tasted particularly floraly like a lot of chocolate we’ve had in Peru and Ecuador thus far. Both starters were very fresh with lots of new flavors we were unfamiliar with. The paiche fish was definitely the highlight of the mains. And the banana cake was so unique — I doubt we’d ever have banana cake or bread served like that anywhere in the U.S. It tasted truly special and seemed very much a “modern Ecuadorian” fusion of flavors.

Somos itself was a beautiful restaurant with lots of natural light, plants, and murals inside, but what really tickled me were the bathroom signs. The women’s bathroom has a papaya hand painted on the door; the men’s bathroom door has a half-peeled banana. The papaya made me chuckle out loud.

The biodiversity of Ecuador is extremely high, and it was definitely on display here at Somos. This meal was definitely a highlight of our trip so far and how many other delicious plants (and animals!) we can eat in the world that we are not normally exposed to in the U.S. (or really, anywhere in the west).