Category Archives: Homemade

Chicken and lentil soup, majorly improvised from NYT Cooking

Posted on by
Reply

Because we have The New York Times app, we also have access to their cooking app. I don’t actually make the recipes from here that frequently, but I do browse it a decent amount and bookmark recipes for inspiration. I had recently bookmarked lots of soup recipes (it’s soup season, remember?), including one for red lentil and chicken soup. As soon as I read through the recipe, though, I knew I would need to improvise a lot from the original: the soup uses no stock at all, just water. It also has one spice other than pepper: turmeric. If you cook with spices at all, you know that turmeric is never used for its flavor, but rather its color and health properties. If you want to “flavor” something with just turmeric, you are basically saying you want to taste dirt, which to me, is not that tasty (to each their own, though…). I like the idea of using lentils and chicken together in an autumn soup, so I used the base and immediately started doctoring it: I used my chicken/duck stock. I added coriander, cumin, paprika, and my self-blended Madras curry powder for additional flavor. I also added spinach at the end, along with a generous sprinkle of minced cilantro for freshness. I also like it with a squirt of lemon when I’m too lazy to add the lemony yogurt to the top. It really hit the spot… after all the changes I made. If I made it as is, I definitely would not be giving it the 5-star rating it currently has! And if you read the recipe comments, you’ll see many people make the same changes I did… but likely still gave the recipe five stars! They are far more generous than I am. I would never give a recipe five stars unless I followed it to the T and found it absolutely perfect!

The scary “C6L” error on the Instant Pot

Posted on by
Reply

The “error” music of an Instant Pot is unusually perky. At first, you want to think it’s something positive, but when you turn to look at it, all you see is “ERR” flashing on its little screen, along with another message. That could be “BURN,” which I’ve lost count of the number of times that has happened to me (this means the bottom of the inner lid has too much food encrusted on it, and thus it cannot continue cooking properly. Unfortunately, it’s a very common one to get with BIRYANI!). But I know how to handle that error, and I know nothing is intrinsically wrong with the device. However, after making soy milk in the Instant Pot for the fourth time this morning, I came back to open it to then hear that miserable little music again, with an error I did not recognize: C6L.

Oh, crap. And I had a feeling I knew what this was about. Four weeks ago, I made soy milk in the Instant Pot for the first time. I got the “burn” error because I did not use a steamer rack to keep the soy bean solids from sticking to the bottom of the pot. So I tried to compensate by ensuring the soy milk was cooked fully by putting the pot on “saute” mode. Well, I didn’t realize how much quicker soy milk boils over than cow milk (wow, this will give cow milk a run for its money for boiling over the quickest!), and so the soy milk not only spilled down the sides, but into the inner pot of the Instant Pot. I tried my best to dry it out and scrape every last piece out that I could over the course of three messy days. For the most part, I thought I was successful. But I had this little dread in the back of my mind that something else could be wrong because several subsequent Instant Pot uses (especially with pressure cooking), Chris and I could smell a strong, unpleasant burning smell when the pot was on. It gave me no error, and it was cooking just fine, so I thought at some point, the burning smell might just stop?

Wrong. I made soy milk today, and the burning smell lingered. C6L is an error that means that the left sensor to detect pressure cooking either has debris, liquid, or something stuck in it that is preventing it from sensing properly. I went down a rabbit hole this morning of referencing Gemini, Claude, YouTube, and multiple websites to see if I could fix this myself. I unscrewed the bottom of the main device, cleaned out all the soy milk crud that had gotten stuck on it, and reached the sensors. I had to use toothpicks, toothbrushes, tiny pieces of damp tissue, and my bare fingers to get all this crap out. The YouTube video I watched suggested removing these thick white glue pieces on top of the sensors, so I did that. But then, I didn’t know how to put them back without them falling off. So I found out I had to buy this special heat-proof, sensor-sensitive glue (obviously… on Amazon!) to ensure the white glue pieces that ensure the sensors are reading pressure correctly was glued back on (doesn’t that sound weird?). So I am waiting for the glue to arrive.

All of this is giving me anxiety because this isn’t the first time my Instant Pot has suffered. In early 2022 in my postpartum and breastfeeding chaos days, I accidentally left my first Instant Pot lid too close to the stove when I had the oven on. The heat rising from the oven melted a key part of the lid that prevented it from latching properly onto the main device. After going onto Instant Pot’s official website and learning they do not sell replacement lids, and then chatting with their support team, I lamented that my pot was no longer usable. So I ended up tossing it (this really hurt) and buying a new one. It made me both angry and sad because I hate waste, and I loved my Instant Pot so much. I really hope this glue works with fixing my pressure sensors. Otherwise, worse case scenario, I may need to be that terrible person and buy a THIRD Instant Pot. My kitchen is just not complete without an Instant Pot; I do so, so much with it and use it at minimum 1-2 times per week! PLEASE DO NOT LET THIS BE ME!

Fall is soup season

Posted on by
Reply

Every September, as the temperatures start dipping and the leaves begin falling, most of my food social media starts going crazy because everyone loves autumn cooking. “It’s SOUP SEASON!” many recipe developers, food influencers, and food publications will write. And with soup season comes the need for an endless supply of delicious bone broth or stock that you can use as a base for all the amazing soups we want to make at home. As far as I am concerned, I can have soup every day, regardless of what the temperature is. But I do start actively thinking about soup a lot more in the colder months.

Since we just went to Costco about a week ago, our freezer is quite stuffed with supplies. So my bone bag (that I always refill whenever I roast/cook bone-in meat) was getting a bit squished. Chris was lightly scolding me about this yesterday since he always gets mad about certain items being placed in ominous situations in the freezer. I decided to finally throw the contents into my Instant Pot this morning with water to pressure cook while I went to the gym and got some morning calls done. Once lunch came, the bone broth was ready. When I shut it off and opened the lid, I inhaled the stock: it smelled so good, and a bit different than my usual chicken stock! And then I suddenly remembered: this bag had not just a lot of chicken bones, but also my entire duck carcass from my whole roasted duck last month! I was even more excited to strain it and let it cool!

My duck carcass is like the gift that keeps giving: I’m looking forward to using it for soups this and next week and seeing what different flavor profile it brings!

Cooking with my Costco and local Vermont goodies

Posted on by
Reply

Every time we come back from a road trip, we always make a stop by Costco on our way back to take advantage of having a car. So of course, we come back with the car fully loaded, and I always tell Chris when we get back, “We’re rich!” It feels that way because when your fridge, freezer, and pantry are stocked to the point of nearly overflowing, it really does make you feel rich: you have plenty in a house of plenty in a land of plenty, and that feels very full. It also makes me grateful that we can actually afford to stock up on our staples, as I am very well aware that not everyone has the ability to do this.

In addition to the Costco stocking up we did, we also got way more consumable items in Vermont than I originally imagined: this includes a bottle of local whisky, a bottle of local bourbon, orange wine, chocolate raspberry wine from New Hampshire, and honey mead. The whisky and bourbon we tasted and purchased at the Burlington Farmers Market, the orange wine is from the Shelburne Farmers Market, and the last two bottles are from the fine food and drink marquee at the Stowe Foliage Arts Festival. In addition, we also got local organic chestnut and lion’s mane mushrooms and a Barn First Creamery brie-style goat cheese at the Burlington Farmers Market, a quart of Green’s Sugarhouse Very Dark maple syrup and maple balsamic vinaigrette, fancy marshmallows, and a couple chocolate bars from Adagio Chocolate shop in Middlebury. It was quite a local Vermont food haul! If it wasn’t already clear, I love Vermont!

Today, I spent a good amount of time cooking some of our new foods and ingredients. I seared and sautéed my lion’s mane and chestnut mushrooms; they browned beautifully and have a delicious, earthy, almost nutty flavor. They are almost even a little sweet! We sampled a little of these (Kaia loved the chestnut mushrooms the most!), but I’m planning to use most of them for toast with our Vermont goat cheese. I sautéed half a pound of spinach from Costco, roasted a pound of brussel sprouts (Costco!), made a maple balsamic roasted salmon with my new vinaigrette from Greens Sugarhouse. I also cooked my last bag of Rancho Gordo Blue Goose Field Peas and some brown rice. And on top of all that, I made my third batch of fresh, homemade soy milk! I always feel good when I’m cooking with new and fresh ingredients. This meal felt like fall to me! Now, all I needed to add was some butternut squash to the mix!

Mid-Autumn Moon Picnic

Posted on by
Reply

Kaia’s current school does an annual Mid-Autumn Moon Family Picnic, which, weather permitting, is usually held outside at a nearby school’s playground. This year, they had to move it indoors into the school gym. They used the downstairs classrooms surrounding the gym for activities like face painting, moon cake making, beading, arts and crafts, visor making, ballon artistry, and temporary tattoos. While pizza is provided for all the kids, all the families are asked to bring food that can serve at least 12 other people, and they specifically asked for the food to be bite-sized.

My initial pause when I read this was around the “bite-sized” restriction. I originally wanted to do something savory, but what could possibly be “bite sized” I could make easily that would be savory? Then, I moved into the idea of an autumn bake (double baking weekend!), something simple like a mini pumpkin “donut” (really a mini muffin) rolled in cinnamon sugar. Our buddy family told us that last year, everyone over indexed on desserts, so there were too many desserts and not enough savories. I understood that completely given the “bite sized” description. But I figured it would be better to come with the homemade mini pumpkin donuts so I wouldn’t have to overthink things.

Something that I need to learn from, a mistake I make over and over again, is multitasking too much in the kitchen. The biggest case in point here: Chris gets mad at me whenever I multi task while double boiling chai, as chai boils over very quickly because of the milk. Today, I was doing the ultimate multi-tasking: I was making three different savory dishes for this week’s dinners, while at the same time trying to measure out all my wet and dry ingredients for these mini pumpkin muffins. When I popped the mini muffin tin into the oven, I couldn’t figure out why the batter wasn’t “evening” itself out the way it normally does given the high temperature bake. The batter can look a bit bumpy and not smooth on top, but that usually solves itself within the first five minutes in the oven. This didn’t happen this time. The muffins rose, but they didn’t rise the way I expected and still looked bumpy and lumpy when I took them out when the timer went off.

I went back to the recipe and scanned over every ingredient… and it immediately dawned on me that I NEVER ADDED THE BROWN SUGAR. I never even took out the brown sugar bag to measure it out! I essentially ended up making a pumpkin spiced whole wheat mini bun, not a real donut or muffin because there wasn’t even a granule of sugar in this!

I ate it, and it tasted fine, but nothing to get excited about. It tasted like… seasoned carbs. You could definitely taste the pumpkin spice. It has pumpkin puree, egg, and whole wheat, so it’s not like it’s nutritionally void. Kaia ate one and said she liked it (bless her heart, as they say down in the South). So I guess I’ll be packing these for her school snacks this week to prevent waste. I ended up re-making the entire recipe all over again — this time, with the brown sugar. I went over the full ingredient list one more time before I finished the batter, re-filled the mini muffin tin, and baked. Then I rolled each in butter and cinnamon sugar and packed them away to take to the indoor picnic. These tasted good, and they were quick and easy… well, easy as long as you read the damn recipe and measure out every ingredient properly and do not multitask.

Well, once again, the food spread had more desserts than savories. And the savories were definitely not all bite-sized: people brought everything from empanadas to platters of dumplings to various noodles. There was even fried chicken! As we all know, “noodle” dishes are certainly not “bite-sized.” I guess I took the “bite sized” suggestion too seriously. Maybe next year, I’ll do what I originally wanted to make and bring a savory dish. I could make a sticky rice, a tossed noodle, or if I am feeling really fancy, a scallion milk bread bao.

Okara crackers: a cooking experiment with leftovers

Posted on by
Reply

After making my soybean milk, I had the okara left over, which is the soybean pulp remaining from straining all the soy milk out. With soy beans because they are water soluble, the majority of the protein goes into the milk; the leftover pulp just has a little residual protein and a lot of leftover fiber. So I didn’t want to let this go to waste. Culturally in China and Japan, nothing goes to waste, so this leftover okara is usually blended into soups, stews, or even made into a batter or dough to make fritters or pancakes. I personally hate waste, so I wanted to use this up: so much good dietary fiber! I took some of the leftover okara and blended it into my breakfast smoothie one day. Another day, I spooned some into my yogurt with a little black sesame paste and fruit for a mid-afternoon treat. I still had about half a cup left, so I decided to try using it for homemade okara crackers. I initially thought it would be a good school snack to pack for Kaia.

The base recipe I put together based on a ChatGPT suggestion was the okara, a little whole wheat flour, corn meal, garlic powder, onion powder, paprika, freshly grated parmesan, a tablespoon of olive oil, and black pepper. I mixed and then kneaded it into a pliable dough, let it rest for 20 minutes. Then I rolled it out and cut it into 2mm thick 1.5-inch rounds (love my biscuit cutters!). I relied on ChatGPT too much, though, to put the recipe together for me; I didn’t really love the final result, as it needs a ton of tweaking. it told me not to add more salt on top of my grated parmesan, but the crackers were definitely under seasoned. I probably also under baked the crackers because Chris said that after cooling, the texture was more stale than crunchy. When I tried it fresh out of the oven, the texture was nice and crisp. But three hours later, they definitely seemed stale. I’m not sure if Kaia will like these, but I will pack them anyway and see what she thinks.

She saw them on the counter when she came home from school today and got excited. It was as though she was a little puppy with her ears perking up. Her eyes immediately went to it and she asked if she could smell them.

“Is this for me?” she asked me, her eyes sparkling. “Is this a special treat for me?”

Well… I hope she likes them, at least a little. I hope she isn’t too disappointed when she takes her first bite and thinks they are stale. But… she doesn’t even know what “stale” means, right, at least… not yet?

Homemade soybean milk: a bit of labor, a lot of love, and an unexpected crap ton of cleanup

Posted on by
Reply

I wasn’t really that thorough when researching how to make soy milk. I gave ChatGPT and Claude a few general prompts and decided I’d make the soy milk with the Instant Pot method. For traditional Chinese (or Asian) style soy milk, the process goes like this: soak the dried soybeans overnight, strain and rinse the beans the next day; then add the beans to a blender and grind with water until smooth. Then, you add this mixture into a big pot with some additional water, bring to a boil, then simmer for about 15-20 minutes. You strain it again, and voila! You have fresh soy milk. At this stage, you can choose to add some sugar to it if you’d like, but it’s pretty much done.

What is not written in this general instruction set is that during the boiling and simmering process, you have to stir the pot constantly. If you do not do this, the bean solids will stick to the bottom of the pan and burn. This could cause your soy milk to have an off or burnt flavor, which you don’t want. I thought I could avoid the need to stir constantly if I did this process in the Instant Pot. Well, I was wrong: I got the dreaded “burn” error, so I ended up having to boil it in the Instant Pot on the “saute” setting and let it simmer there. Sadly, no AI tool warned me that soy milk foams and boils over even quicker and more vigorously than cow milk. When I thought the soy milk was just heating up in the Instant Pot, it actually started bubbling over and onto my kitchen counter! It got everywhere, even inside the inner pot of my Instant Pot. This worried me because if too much liquid gets into the inner pot, it could actually malfunction. So I spent over an hour cleaning up this whole beany mess all over the inside and outside of my poor Instant Pot after the soy milk was finished cooking. I had to whip out sponges, towels of various sizes, chopsticks, brushes, Q-tips, and even toothpicks to get it all out! That was a lot more manual work than I had originally planned for. The Instant Pot base is now air drying, sitting on its side. This will remain until I am definitely in the clear two days from now.

I am quite proud of my final product, though: I ended up with about 5.5 cups of super fresh, thick, luscious, beany soy milk. I added a pinch of sea salt during the boiling process and a little less than 4 teaspoons of sugar at the end. The flavor was even beanier than I had imagined! The entire kitchen was so fragrant of fresh, hot soybean milk when it was cooking; I really enjoyed that smell and found it so comforting. When I smelled the milk, I knew it was successful. But I had another visible sign of success: when I let the hot soy milk sit after straining, it created this beautiful, thick layer of yuba on the top, the “skin” of the soy milk. This is a positive sign that the heat has caused the proteins and fats in the milk to rise to the surface and bind together into that delicious, cohesive layer of what is essentially paper-thin tofu!

There’s so much magic in just soybeans, water, and a pinch of salt. I have also learned my lessons for next time: use the steamer basket to hold the soybean solids during pressure cooking and keep them from the bottom of the pot. If this works, this will mean there will be no reason to worry about anything boiling over since the “saute” function would not be used.

I am looking forward to making this again and again. The process was so satisfying. I still have over 4.5 lb. of dried soybeans left!

Buy-Nothing strikes again with non-GMO dried soybeans!

Posted on by
Reply

I haven’t been very active on Buy-Nothing this year. Earlier in the year, I gave away a bunch of things on it. A handful of things I posted shockingly had zero interest, so I ended gathering a bunch of things to donate to some charity who was willing to pick up. But in terms of finding things to take, I haven’t seen much that would be relevant for us. Well, that was until two days ago, when a neighbor posted that she mistakenly got sent a 5-lb. bag of dried soybeans, though the label said “soybean seeds.” She said that if there was no interest by the end of the weekend, she would toss them.

I balked at this: she was planning to throw these out?! I could make quite a number of batches of fresh soy milk or tofu out of this! I raised my hand immediately! Only one other person was interested (also Asian), but she wasn’t able to pick up this weekend. So, I was the winner! Within hours, the original poster messaged me to say I could come pick it up on Sunday. So I walked out Sunday morning during this “Nor’easter” aka light drizzle and picked up my free dried soy bean haul. I was so, so excited. I have thought about making my own soy milk because I love it so much, but I wasn’t really sure if it would really be that cost effective if I bought organic / non-GMO dried soybeans. These beans are not organic, but they’re non-GMO, and that’s good enough for me for now. While I have settled on some western store-bought brands like the Trader Joe’s carton version (the ingredients are pure, just soybeans, water, and a little sea salt), I use them only for morning protein smoothies, not for their flavor or pure drinking. If I am drinking a soy milk straight, I want it to be Chinese style: luscious, smooth, creamy, a little thick, and beany. I strongly dislike that the western palate thinks “beany” is bad for soy milk. Soy is a bean, guys!! Plus, it’s a delicious one! Get with the program!

So, on my list of things to do this week is to make real, fresh, soybean milk from scratch in my Instant Pot. The first step is to soak the beans overnight. This will be my first time, and I’m really looking forward to it!

Tofu “noodles”

Posted on by
Reply

As someone who is half (Cantonese) Chinese, I have probably done the most experimentation with my vast country’s food in last ten years than I have at any other point of my life. For those in the know and who are interested, Chinese cuisine’s endless variety and regional cuisines have been spotlighted a lot more, and because of this, demand for those ingredients has increased. So while amazing online sites like Mala Market exist, even our local Hong Kong Supermarket in Manhattan Chinatown stocks a lot of these rarer ingredients now. I feel like a lot of my food experimenting in the kitchen has just begun!

Before we ended our daily double commutes to Chinatown for Kaia’s preschool years (still a little sad and wistful this has come to an end…), I started stocking up on a lot of freezer and pantry items since I knew the daily access would be gone soon. A few of the things I stocked up on for the freezer were pressed tofu and tofu “noodles.” The “noodles” are pressed tofu strips that have been wound up into flat balls, waiting to be unraveled, cut, and blanched. These are not only tasty with a nice springy texture, but they are also extremely high in protein; an 85-gram serving is already 23 grams of complete plant-based protein!

I made them today using a Sichuanese method as a cold salad. The dish is known as “Three-Sliver Vegetable and Tofu Salad With Chili Oil Dressing” (Hóngyóu Sānsī, 红油三丝), which I got from Xueci Cheng, this Sichuanese recipe developer I’ve been following. It’s a really easy dish once you have the chili oil made. You mix a couple additional ingredients into the chili oil (soy sauce, sugar, sesame oil, a pinch of salt) and whisk it. Then you add it to a plate of finely julienned and salted carrot and cucumbers (drained of excess liquid from the salting) and the tofu strips. I didn’t have the patience to finely slice the tofu strips into tiny noodles, but maybe i will try again next time. Then you add more chili oil on top, toss, and finish with minced cilantro. It was a nice, crunchy, chewy, spicy salad!

I really enjoyed this tofu salad. I’ve already added these tofu “noodles” to my list of things to buy again when I am in Chinatown next!

The roasted duck is bubbling and scenting up the house

Posted on by
Reply

We are currently about 15 minutes away from a fully finished, whole roast duck. The entire house smells like a combination of five-spice blend and duck fat. I have already drained off over a cup of duck fat from the pan. From my office area, I can hear the duck’s fat bubbling off into the bottom of the roasting pan. I am eager to see how crispy my duck skin has gotten and how much of the fat has been rendered from the skin!

Assuming this is successful, I wonder if we will get lucky at our next Costco run (next month!) and score yet another reasonably priced whole duck to roast! Then I can really put my duck skills into repeat practice!

**Several hours later**

Okay, so I got the leg and thigh right: the skin was flavorful and crispy while the meat was juicy and tender. The breast is really where the challenge is. Even with two heat settings, 325 F for 75 minutes and a 425 F blast for 15 minutes, the breasts still had not rendered out enough fat to get crispy; they actually seemed annoyingly flabby. So I let the whole duck rest for about 30 minutes. Then I carved it… Okay, fine. I didn’t really carve it. I kind of butchered it and messed it up. A lot of the skin tore off. Rib bones got stuck to the breast. I am a pretty sloppy whole chicken carver, but this duck was even more challenging and frustrating! ChatGPT gave this explanation for why this was more frustrating: “Duck is trickier to carve than chicken because the breast sits tightly against a broad rib cage and the skin is thinner and more delicate. The easiest way to stop tearing it is to stop thinking of it as ‘slicing meat off the carcass’ and instead remove each breast as one whole piece first.” I guess I will have to heed that advice next time… If I decide to brave out a whole duck roasting experience again.

I still managed to have two separate and mostly in tact breast pieces with their skin on top. I took both pieces and laid them down in a hot, un-oiled carbon steel pan to render out more fat and crisp up the skin. The result was pretty good. But I have a feeling I would have done a better job if I had just carved up the duck into separate raw pieces to begin with, “confited” the legs, and seared the breasts the way we did in my duck cooking class Chris got me over three years ago. I’ll consider that for next time.

The cleanup was a little miserable to put it lightly. Duck grease got pretty much everywhere and made its way all over the stove, all the counters, on dishes that didn’t even have duck, all over the sink and faucets. Of course, it splattered in the oven, but luckily not as much as I had feared. I was able to clean most of it off easily with a mix of baking soda, soap, water, and elbow grease. I may try this one or two more times just for the experience and challenge, but I can see clearly now why duck is one of those dishes that people leave to the pros. Even if you do get it mostly right, like I did this time, the cleanup is so freaking annoying and time consuming. I am currently soaking my oven mitts now because the duck grease is caked on so badly!

The entire apartment also smells like duck fat; it doesn’t matter what room I am in. This may be okay for now, but tomorrow, I may change my mind.