Butter Twist

This is a by-product from the cheesecake. The egg white left from the baking is required in this butter twist recipe. While the cheesecake was in the oven, I make those buttery twist. They are cute in shape, but not satisfy my taste. I didn't mean they are bad, but for me they lack the depth in flavor. Simply buttery and sweet is less than enough for me.

Lemon Cheesecake with Lemon Curd Topping

This cake was baked because my friend can't eat chocolate. For me, dessert without chocolate is impossible. So I had to search Internet and find something doable. Luckily, my friend does love cheesecake, so I came across this recipe and believe it's the perfect fit. The picture on the site caught my eyes first and I hope to have my cake as pretty as it. However, you can see the picture here, not pretty at all, even messy. But the taste is good. I did twist a bit to use a tart crust rather than the graham cracker bottom.

7/22/2011

In the bento: tomato fried egg with woodear, kelp with mushrooms, tuna salad, cucumber, quinoa.

7/21/2011

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In the bento: baby bok choy, cherry tomato, butternut squash wonton, burger, cucumber, kelp with mushrooms, quinoa.

Lime Cornmeal Biscotti

Even though biscotti is not quite my kind of food, this recipe looks interesting enough to try. The baked biscotti has the crunch texture because of the cornmeal. Not like most biscotti made entirely by flour, the cornmeal does make it crispy but not too hard to bite. The lime gives a fresh taste which I like a lot. My only complain about this recipe is that I can definitely taste the baking soda. Next time I might try to use egg white as the leavening. 

7/6/2011

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In this bento: quinoa, carrots with shiitake, falafel, kelp with assorted mushroom, cherry tomato, fake burger (iceberg lettuce, burger, parrano cheese)

Wonton with Boiled Burger

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The Fourth of July weekend was busy, in a fun way. This was filled with hiking, party, movie, church and of course, eating. This is a quick lunch I put together using the bento stash. I made a big batch of wonto ravioli and burger the other day and froze some. In this way, a healthy and flavorful meal can be cooked in no time. I served the side with some boiled baby bok choy. And to give more color, the burger was topped with some sesame oil marinade green onion.

Woodear with Pineapple

I love fungus (woodear or 木耳). There is no way not trying this dish when I passed by the recipe one day. The combination of pineapple and woodear is not what I grow up eating so I was curious how this dish will taste like. I made this dish at the Independence weekend. Well...it was an okay dish. My issue with it is that because woodear doesn't absorb flavor from others, it doesn't go well with pineapple. I have much better way of eating woodear,  probably this is my first but also the last time of cooking the dish.

Bean Noodle with Ground Pork

I have been cooking this dish a lot recently. It's simple and quick to make. A time saver without sacrificing the taste. The bean noodle is available from most Asian markets. All I need to do is to stir-fry the ground pork until it releases the juice. Then, add the soaked noodle with broth, soysauce, sugar and chili flakes into the pot mixing together with the ground meat. The noodle will continue absorbing the liquid until done. To finalize the dish, sprinkle some green onion on the top to garnish.

Maple Yogurt Pound Cake

This is the cake I baked for the 4th of July hiking. Regardless the taste, the house smells sweet like maple while the cake was baked in the oven. The cake recipe is from here. Though it says this is a pound cake, the texture isn't. And if you read the recipe, the oil was added in the last and mixed in a non-typical way, which results the separate of oil and cake batter. The taste is not bad though. 

7/1/2011

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In the bento: kelp with assorted mushroom, strifried cabbage, beet soybean hummus, duck, quinoa.

6/30/2011

In the bento: quinoa, strifried cabbage, duck, beet soybean hummus, kale.

6/29/2011

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In the bento: brown rice, strifried cabbage and zucchini, duck.

6/28/2011

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In this bento: brown rice, kelp with shiitake, beet soybean hummus, stirfried cabbage, stirfried zucchini.

Zucchini Lemon Bread

Another zucchini bread highlighted with lemon zest. It's common to have cinnamon when baking this type of bread but I do like the freshness by adding lemon instead cinnamon. The extra lemon juice somehow lights the taste of the bread. If you like zucchini bread, this is a good one. 

Beet Soybean Hummus

                                                                                                  I posted before about the beet hummus. This is a similar one but did add 1/2 cup of pureed soybean. Compare with the pure beet hummus, the soybean milds the flavor a bit while the hummus still keeps the sweetness from the beet. And the color is more pinky than the pungent red. If I don't forget to soak the soybean before making the hummus, this will be my go to version of beet hummus.

Wonton Style Ravioli

Wonton (or 餛飩) is the specialty of Shanghai. My mom is especially good at making it. It is the only dumping we eat at home long before we strat to make gyoza (or Jiaozi or 餃子). I made these wontons only because I wanted some ravioli this weekend but don't want to be labored of making the pasta dough. So the wonton wrap is a big time saver. And it doesn't make sense to me not making wonton since I have this square shape wrap available.
The filling is squash with cream cheese. I roasted a kabocha and mixed 4oz of cream cheese with pinch of salt and black pepper. The are quickly cooked in the boiling water. These wontons are light and fluffy with a subtle sweetness from the squash. The only thing I will change next time is to use the Shanghai style wrap which can hold the shape better than these Hongkong style wraps.

6/27/2011

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In the bento: brown rice, green beans, stirfried cabbage with shiitake, burger, kelp with shiitake.

Beet Soybean Hummus w/ Oyster Mushroom

A quick breakfast made with dinner leftover. 

6/25/2011

In the bento: quinoa with green beans, kelp with shiitake, stirfried cabbage, carrots, braised beef, stirfried oyster mushroom. 

6/24/2011

In the bento: quinoa with lima beans, kelp with shiitake, green beans, teriyaki chicken.

Beet Soybean Hummus w/ Avocado and Cheese

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I am addicted to homemade soybean hummus. This time, roasted beets were added to give the sweetness from nature sugar. I made this sandwich simply for the color combination. The beets don't look so vibrant after being mixed into soybean but shows a lovely hint of pink. With the green from avocado, it's like biting into spring!

6/21/2011

In the bento: pasta with baby lima beans, teriyaki chicken, green beans, stir-fried cabbage, catfish. 

6/20/2011

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In the bento: pasta with beet soybean hummus, baby lima bean with pecorino, chicken ham, balsamic glazed beets, green bean.

6/17/2011

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In the bento: chicken sandwich with beet hummus and basil, bokchoy with oyster mushroom, caramelized onion with egg, catfish, kelp.