I had to call my mother-in-law for the recipe this week. It was one of those family recipes that hasn’t really been documented. Technically, she does have her notes jotted down somewhere, and I’m sure it was based on someone else’s recipe once upon a time, but my MIL does this savoury pie with her eyes closed nowadays. I hope I can do it justice and transport my husband if only briefly to his mother’s dinner table tonight.

For the pastry

You could always buy pastry shells from your local grocer, but for me and my family, Christmas is about making everything from scratch!

• 5 cups all-purpose flour, unsifted
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 3 tablespoons brown sugar
• 1 lb of (Tenderflake) lard, very cold
• 1 whole egg
• 1 tablespoon white vinegar
• 2 cups ice cold water

Mix first 4 ingredients above in a large bowl. Integrate the lard using a pastry cutter.

Using a cup measure, break in 1 whole egg and add in 1 tablespoon of vinegar. Add enough ice cold water to make 3/4 cup liquid. Sprinkle this liquid over the lard mixture and toss together.

Divide into 5 equal pieces. For each pie you’ll make, roll out 2 pieces large enough for your pie plate. Shape remaining pieces into flattened discs and wrap in wax paper. You can freeze these in a large freezer bag for 3-6 months.

For the filling

• 2 lbs lean ground pork
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 teaspoon pepper (generous grind)
• 1/2 teaspoon each of thyme, savoury, sage (optional)
• 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon (1/3 teaspoon adding optional spices)
• 1/2 teaspoon cloves
• 1 large onion, diced
• 2 cloves garlic (optional)
• 1 cup boiling water (kettle)
• 1/4 cup fresh bread crumbs

On medium to high heat, crumble pork into frying pan. Add water, garlic, onion, and spices. Cook uncovered for 10 minutes.

Cover and simmer for another 20 minutes. If there’s more than a 1/2 cup of fat in the pan, take out all but a 1/4 cup.

Mix in 1/4 cup of fresh bread crumbs and let cool completely.

Final Assembly

Lay one piece of your rolled out dough into pie pan. Fill to the brim with the meat mixture.

Lay the second piece of rolled dough over the pie. Press edges down with tines of a fork and cut excess off with a knife. Make Christmasy shapes to top pie with the excess dough. My mother-in-law does holly berries and leaves.

Brush top of pie with heavy cream or egg mixture (1 egg and 1 tablespoon water, beaten together). Lay down pasty dough decorations. Brush decorations very lightly with the cream or egg mixture.

Bake in oven at 375F for 30-40 minutes . You know it’s ready when dough is golden brown and sticking a knife into the very centre of the pie comes out piping hot.

Making ahead

If all you want to do on Christmas Eve is pop a pie into the oven, you can prepare everything in advance. As mentioned above, the pastry dough will keep 3-6 months in the freezer. You can make the filling up to a week in advance and assemble the final pie for the freezer.

To do so, wrap your uncooked pie in 2 layers of saran wrap and a layer of foil and place in your freezer. Thaw in the fridge the morning that you plan to serve your tourtière at dinner.

Bon appétit and have a wonderful Christmas Eve!

A few notes about how I prepared the final soup for my tasters:

• I had trouble sourcing certain ingredients from my immediate grocers, so not all of the garniture matches the recommendations from Rouxbe. Bruce helped me to find substitutions to create a “poor man’s pho” – re-purposing of the broth meat instead of getting sliced tenderloin, bean thread (glass noodle?) vermicelli that proved too difficult to find at H-Mart, and a abstinence from the recommended serrano chilies, since they were nowhere to be found.
• Because I made the broth last night and finished it this afternoon moments before heading to the Workspace, I didn’t do the extra step of chilling the broth in order to remove most of the oils and fat. This makes my broth oilier than it should probably be; I will update you on any differences once my husband and I complete this step for the broth that remains in our kitchen.

Feedback from my fellow Blogathoners

Four Blogathon participants that neighbour me here at The Workspace have this to say about my pho attempt:

Victor, in support of the Developmental Disabilities Association:

The pho was great. The broth was lighter than the usual pho I’ve had, but the flavor was a little bit different.  It was a bit oilier, but didn’t have the MSG flavor to it (a good thing). Unlike other pho, I didn’t feel very thirsty immediately after drinking the broth.

The noodles were different than regular pho, but I actually liked the difference. It was a refreshing change.

Only thing I would change is a little bit more flavor to the broth, but overall it was very yummy!

Lorraine, in support of the Federation of BC Writers:

The Pho was delicious, especially the broth, which was rich with subtle flavours without being heavy. I enjoyed the noodles too.

Raul, in support of the BC Cancer Foundation:

This Pho tastes a tad too delicate, almost too light. The flavors are smooth but not characteristic of a Vietnamese pho. My belief is that there is a lack of richness and complexity of flavor (something we would expect in a Vietnamese pho).

Karen, in support of the Vancouver Public Space Network:

The broth meat and sprouts added great texture. The soup was very tasty and rich with tendon taste, and the herbs perked up every bite.

Thank you all for your donation of your tastebuds and stomachs, and best of luck with your Blogathon efforts!

Giveaway time – 1 more annual Rouxbe premium membership

Another sponsored gift from Rouxbe for the Tiny Bites Blogathon effort, this time going to Raf A. (YaletownYuppie).  Congratulations, Raf!

Feel sad that you’re missing out on all of these giveaways? Donate to the Greater Vancouver Food Bank Society before 5:30am on July 26th to qualify for the $450 Tiny Bites Grand Prize. Every $10 you donate gets you one entry to the draw.

Of course, you can also go for the gold and top Dawn D.’s $175 donation to win Top Donor bragging rights and an incredible 3-restaurant progressive dinner for two.

You decide.

Lumpia is one of my favourite Filipino foods to eat in the summertime. There are several types of lumpia, ranging from the fresh lumpiang sariwa to the meat lover’s lumpiang Shanghai. I myself am partial to lumpiang prito, which typically comes in the format of vegetables (and optionally pork) stir-fried, stuffed, and deep-fried in large egg roll wrappers.

You can get creative with the vegetables you choose. Sometimes we put in potato matchsticks, diced water chestnuts, chopped celery, green beans sliced on the diagonal…but the recipe below is our standard base and the one that our guest prefer.

Ingredients

• 3 large carrots, peeled and cut into 1″ matchsticks
• 1 head of chinese cabbage, shredded
• 600g of bean sprouts
• 1 large onion, diced
• 6 cloves garlic, minced
• 1/4 cup soy sauce
• 30 large egg roll (wonton) wrappers, thawed
• Oil for frying (canola, grapeseed, sunflower)
• 1 lb of ground pork

Directions

1. In a large wok, sweat garlic and onions over low heat until fragrant.
2. Increase head to medium-high and sauté ground pork until meat is no longer pink.
3. Add soy sauce to taste.
4. Toss in carrots and stir-fry for at least  5 minutes or until slightly softened.
5. Add shredded cabbage and stir-fry for at least 5 minutes or until colour perks up.
6. Rinse and drain bean sprouts and add to wok, stirring until incorporated. Taste mixture and season with soy and/or fish sauce till you are satisfied with the flavour.
7. Drain mixture of excess moisture and transfer to a storage container. Refrigerate until cool. This will be the filling for the lumpia.
8. Wrap 1 tablespoon of cooled filling  in each egg roll wrapper. Place in a single layer on a large flat surface and let dry. If you are going to cook them right away, let them be; if you will keep them for later, store them in a single layer in the freezer until you’re ready to cook them up.
9. In a deep fryer or pot, heat oil to 180C and maintain at this temperature.
10. Drop a single layer of lumpia into the oil and cook 3 minutes on each side or until a very light golden brown (they will darken to golden brown as they dry).
11. Drain on a plate of paper towel and serve promptly.

Makes 25 – 30 lumpia.

Until Rouxbe stepped up to the plate, Tiny Bites contributor Bruce Nguyen had been my go-to person for learning how to cook Vietnamese fare. He guided me through the process of making rice paper rolls during April’s Social Bites dinner, and has described his preferred ratios for the ideal nuoc cham over many a meal together (one of these days, I must remember to write it down!).

Now that Bruce has shared his family’s pho recipe, let’s see whether Rouxbe’s version passes for the real deal. The guinea pigs: my husband, the Tiny Bites team, and the various blogathoners that volunteer their mouths here at The Workspace.

The Rouxbe recipe

Head on over to Rouxbe and take a gander at their pho recipe. Before you attempt either of the pho recipes we’ve presented, I highly suggest that you sign up for a trial run of Rouxbe’s cooking school and get yourself brushed up on stock and broth 101. Don’t worry – it’s free.

• Sign up for an extended 60-day free trial care of Tiny Bites
• Brush up on your stock basics
• Learn how to make an outstanding broth
• Skip straight to the recipe

My cooking commentary

I posted all my live cooking notes on Twitter, so here it is for your reviewing pleasure:

1. Tossed beef bones, beef ribs, and oxtail into a 20 quart stock pot. Covered in cold water to blanch over med-high heat.
2. Wow, this aluminum stock pot gets super hot! Definitely need oven mitts before touching those handles again.
3. 1hr later: stock pot still hasn’t come to a boil. Upped the temp to maximum heat. Started on onion, ginger prep while I wait. 
4. Water at a boil. Transferring meat to next size pot in order to pour blanching water out. Trying not to burn myself.
5. Stock pot insides lined with goop. Husband donned oven mitts to scrub it out in sink before we start the proper broth. 
6. 10″ of ginger peeled. 4 large onions peeled and quartered. Put under broiler on high to char. 
7. Meat returned to cleaned stock pot and filled with ~12 quarts of cold water. Bringing back up to a simmer.
8. Cut off blackened bits of broiled onions + ginger and sliced ‘em. Setting out cinnamon, cloves, garlic, peppercorn, star anise.
9. 12 quarts of water in stock pot. That means correct salt ratio would be 1/4 tsp x 12 quarts water = 3 teaspoons.
10. Broth made ~10qts. Seasoned 8 quarts of it with 8 tablespoons of fish sauce, 4 teaspoons of sugar, tasting after every 2 tablespoon / 1 teaspoon addition, respectively.
11. The broth is most of the work – adding the garnish and putting the pho together is almost an afterthought.

In short: the recipe was easy to follow, required little babysitting, and makes a ton for your freezer if you’re willing to dedicate an evening for broth-making every now and then.

The verdict? Keep an eye out for Part 2!

Check back later to see what our taste testers at The Workspace say about this pho.

Giveaway alert: premium access to Rouxbe.com

Anyone that has donated to our fundraiser to date was entered for this unannounced prize: a 1-year premium membership to Rouxbe’s online cooking school.

Please help us congratulate Mojgan  for winning this sponsored membership from Rouxbe!

Are you sad that you didn’t win? Don’t worry – we have one more Rouxbe membership to give away tonight and another is part of the Tiny Bites Grand Prize. If you haven’t donated yet, you still have time to earn chances to win.

From fuzzy memories supplemented by experimentation, we have a new family pho recipe which is a good approximation of its inspiration and, dare I say, may even improve on it in certain areas.

With the Rouxbe cooking school offering up their own pho recipe, I thought it time to share our family recipe for pho broth, largely pioneered by my brother, Tom.

Ingredients

• Beef bones
• 1 lb stewing beef
• 1 roasted chicken or package of chicken bones
• 1 large onion
• 2 five inch pieces of ginger, peeled and crushed
• 3 carrots
• 5 stalks of celery with leaves
• 1 six inch cinnamon stick
• 1 teaspoon of pepper corn
• 7 cloves
• 7 star anise
• 1 tablespoon of sugar
• 1 tablespoon of salt
• 1 tablespoon of patis (fish sauce)

Directions

1. Charbroil beef bones for about 3 minutes. Rinse and remove marrow.
2. Bring 7 litres of water to boil.
3. Add the bones (again), stewing beef, roasted chicken / chicken bones, onion, ginger, carrots, celery, and cinnamon.
4. Also add in a tea strainer ball: pepper corn, cloves, star anise.
5. Once it boils again, bring down to a simmer (minimum) and cook.
6. Remove the stewing beef (as much of it as you can) after 1 hour
7. After (at least) 3-4 hours, remove broth from the ingredients and bring to a boil again.
8. Add sugar, salt, and patis (fish sauce).
9. Let it cool on its own, then refrigerate overnight and skim off fat in the morning.

Now that Karen has her hands on the family recipe, keep an eye out for her ‘fun with pho’ series as she pits pho recipes in a no-holds-barred showdown (pho-down?).

Now if only I could teach her how to pronounce pho correctly…

This article contains the second of several Early Bird Blogathon 2009 prize giveaways.

Don’t miss this opportunity to support the Greater Vancouver Food Bank Society. Read on or skip to the contest details.

Blue Water Cafe has always been one of those restaurants that I love going to if I’m not footing the bill. Terrific seafood, yummy wines, lovely surroundings…but at a price tag that my husband and I usually have to save up for. I’ve been lucky these past few years to have been privy to several jaunts at Blue Water – nibbles of dessert and drinks whenever my husband’s yearly tax party comes along and a couple of invites to special events, such as the annual Red Cross fundraiser and the launch of Blue Water’s seafood cookbook.

The cookbook launch was a swank affair. We were ushered into the Wine Room that flanks the main dining room. Under the blue glass ceiling that evoked a sea of undulating waves, we snacked on towers of oysters and clinked glasses of wine as we milled around a table groaning with the weight of dozens of the new book.

Executive Chef and cookbook author Frank Pabst and Raw Bar Chef Yoshi Tabo joined us in due time for an autograph session. Each guest picked up a book from the table and lined up for a chat and signing; some even had the presence of mind to find the pages with Pabst and Tabo’s photographs in order to get their dedications in an appropriate spot. (For your reference, they are pages 3 and 165, respectively.)

Following the autographs, I focussed myself on the tasting spoons that were being served to the crowd: samples of the recipes to be found in the cookbook.

Everything tasted divine, as to be expected of Blue Water, but I was still skeptical of my ability to replicate these results at home.

Blue Water Cafe chez nous

Back home, staring at the two copies of the cookbook on my shelf: the signed one for one of you, and an unsigned one for my personal use. Staring at them with dread, to be completely honest.

Why the anxiety? Perhaps it’s because I’m a perfectionist. Perhaps it’s because I’ve eaten the fare at Blue Water and know just how far my cooking can fall from that benchmark. But most likely, it’s because I’ve seen how most cookbooks hailing from professional kitchens go. They’re involved; they use exotic ingredients; they use expensive ingredients; they almost always require impeccable culinary techniques, assuming (usually incorrectly) that you don’t need to be taught it. Don’t believe me? Trawl through the archives of French Laundry at Home and prove that you can do better than Carol.

Now, I am not saying that the Blue Water cookbook necessarily subscribes to an impossible standard. I’m merely stating that most restaurant cookbooks are not for the beginner cook. Foodists would probably love the challenge of these recipes, of sourcing the more unusual of ingredients, and of putting their cooking skills to the test. Just don’t expect to buy your first set of kitchenware on the same day that you pick up a cookbook like this.

Putting a recipe to the test

Despite my perfomance anxiety, I selected a recipe to try out in our kitchen and serve to our foursome of dinner guinea pigs: halibut cheeks poached in olive oil with bouillabaisse and saffron potatoes (page 26).

This recipe had instructions for 5 separate components: the bouillabaisse, the halibut cheeks, the saffron potatoes, garlic croutons, and a smidgeon of rouille that worked off the listed bouillabaisse. After I read the 16 ingredients required for the bouillabaisse and determining that halibut trim and 12 cups of fish stock was out of my budget and timeframe, I scratched off it plus the rouille from my list of to-dos and decided to cut down the dish just to the fish and potatoes.

Once I did that, the rest of the recipe became reasonably affordable for a gourmet dinner at home. As much as the halibut cheeks were difficult to source, even when halibut was in season, we paid less than I expected to for it: just under $5/lb to provide 2-3 cheeks per person. We already had saffron on hand – another pricey ingredient – but the meal calls for just over a tablespoon (and if you exclude what we excluded, you only actually use just a pinch).

And cooking it was even easier. The halibut is poached for 6 minutes in olive oil infused with less than a dozen ingredients found in a typical pantry. The potatoes are sliced like you would scalloped potatoes, and this was the hardest part of its process. The rest of the cooking is a simmer in another handful of spices, with saffron and star anise being the only atypical ingredients. And I suppose if you cheated a little and picked up some bouillabaisse from Granville Island, you could have the full deal, with a quick whip of rouille, for a total timeframe of 1-2 hours. Closer to 1 if you are better organized than I!

The verdict at the dinner table

I did cut corners with this recipe, but my guests didn’t notice a thing. I just made sure that they didn’t see the gorgeous photo on page 25 of the cookbook so they didn’t know about the bouillabaisse and rouille that they were missing out on.

My husband and I were personally quite pleased with the results and the minimal mess it had made in our kitchen. Our guests wolfed down their plates and commented on the lovely seasoning – curing the halibut cheeks in salt for 10 minutes did a lot to battle the blandness of white fish, it seems. They told us with enthusiasm that this recipe  should be marked as a keeper…so our personal variation was noted down in our Hamilton family cookbook for future use.

Other items of note

Even if you aren’t a seafood fan and have picked up this cookbook simply to support this restaurant, I suggest that you keep this one on your coffee table rather than on your bookshelf. The photos are breathtaking, the recipes enticingly written and enhanced with wine pairing notes, and each section is prefaced with Ocean Wise notes on the various marine life that is featured in the book.

Other nice touches: organization of recipes from spring -> winter availability; Unsung Heroes section that suggests that you try sardines, mackerel, herring, and periwinkles; Raw Bar selection of quick amuses (even though some of the ingredients could be a challenge to source in your average grocery).

Win a signed copy of the Blue Water Cafe Seafood cookbook

Anyone that helps us give to the Greater Vancouver Food Bank Society for Blogathon 2009 has the opportunity to win the copy of the cookbook that I got Chefs Pabst and Tabo to sign at the launch. See full rules and eligibility below.

1. By day’s end on July 24, 2009, every $10 that you donate towards Tiny Bites’ Blogathon drive for the Greater Vancouver Food Bank Society grants you 1 entry to the draw. If you donate $50, that equals 5 entries for you and $50 x 3 = $150 worth of food for the people that the Food Bank helps. 
2. Please contact us about your donation and/or bookings before July 25th so that we can make sure you get all the entries that you deserve.
3. The winner will be announced at 7pm on July 25, 2009, while Degan is on shift for Blogathon 2009.

Good luck and happy cooking!

Our adventure didn’t disappoint. In fact, it was all we could do to narrow down the dish options to 3. (It would have been impossible to select just one to represent all the culinary delights that the South Pacific had to offer.) After several weeks of trial runs, I settled on the following Bites of Asia tasting menu, shown above from left to right:

• Vietnam: BC spot prawn rice paper rolls
• Philippines: sinigang na corned beef
• China: braised pork spare ribs in apricot preserve

Bruce, one of my truest Tiny Bites dining companions, was my sous-chef for the evening. Together, we served these dishes to 2 waves of appreciative guests, followed by much celebrating, wine-tasting, and elbow-rubbing at Yaletown Gallery.

Since Greedy Guts and Wine Bard have already recapped the Yaletown event from a diner’s perspective, let me run you through the experience I had as a Hobby Chef.

Step 1: Inspiration

This was the easiest part!

While I could have kept it simple and picked a recipe that I could serve with my eyes closed, I decided to watch for interesting dishes while we ate around in the Philippines, Macau, and Hong Kong. Meals that won us over were dutifully documented via notebook and camera. There were much too many to list, but here are a few that caught our attention: 

These starred items became our shortlist for the next part of the workflow: finalizing the menu.

Step 2: Menu Planning

Annika required Hobby Chefs to submit a high-level menu plan long before the event was promoted. The menu plan helped her to select the Hobby Chefs she would approach, and forced participants to work forethought into their cooking process.

I already knew that the Tiny Bites menu would be a trio. The trick was to select three from the catalogue above that provided breadth of regionality without flavours clashing.

As it turned out, that nixed dishes that were overly sweet, delicate, fishy, or exotic. Goodbye bangus; fare thee well pineapple bun.

The chosen ones were within similar parameters of weight and spice. Other influencers were level of difficulty, cost and sourcing of ingredients, ease of portioning, and ability to make components in advance. I certainly didn’t want to make three things that all required last-minute cooking!

Step 3: Trial Cookery

For me, this was the most enjoyable part of the planning. I probably cooked 10 meals and had several guinea pigs trusted gourmands over to provide feedback for the dishes I intended.

This iterative process commenced with recipes from our repertoire and from the world wide web. After each trial run, I returned to my dry-erase board, where I had scribbled the guidelines for each dish, and checkmarked the ratios that worked and starred items that needed improvement. Ingredients often required substitution due to seasonal availability or outrageous prices. Sometimes I returned to steps that I thought were a write-off and folded them back into the recipe.

It was tedious, grueling, frustrating and puzzling at times, and required a lot of legwork to source the right materials…but the eureka! moments and the oohs and aahs extracted from pilot dinner guests made it all worthwhile.

Step 4: Event Prep

With the recipes down pat, the days leading up to D-Day were filled with a hell of a lot of grocery shopping, advance ingredient prep, and cookery for components that could be made ahead of time. My kitchen must have exuded apricot and corned beef for a full week leading up to the event!

Favourite prep moments:

• My husband and I peeling 2 pounds of BC spot prawns over the kitchen sink while chatting about our day
• Stealing hourly nibbles of Sebastian & Co. corned beef as it simmered for the entire day in tamarind broth
• Snapping off bits of chives, Thai basil, and pea sprouts with Bruce, eating them in different pairings until we found what combo worked best for the rice paper roll

Step 5: Game Time

With sittings at 6:15pm and 7:45pm, I put sous-chef Bruce to work as soon as he was able to come in at 4:30pm. With him came the chili soup bowls that cradled the sinigang on each plate, as well as a bottle of chili garlic sauce that our household was not equipped with.

I was a bundle of nerves for the first sitting. The rice rolls were taking longer to wrap than I anticipated and the oil for deep-frying the prawns kept getting too hot (resulting in at least one toss of the burning batch). Our first guests also entered 15 minutes earlier than we expected. Luckily, they were Karen the Wine Bard and her fiancé, whom I was able to leave to their own amusement until the kitchen was in better order. Once all the guests were seated and chatting each other up, Bruce and I bumped paths around the island as we figured out where each person was most efficient. Somehow, we managed to plate the three dishes by 6:20pm and sit down with our guests till 7. The rolls took too long to make for ourselves to eat so we picked at the soup and the ribs as we anxiously awaited some feedback about the meal. Positive remarks – so far, so good.

Till 7:30pm, when the next wave of diners were to be expected, Bruce and I fell into a rhythm. We got all the dishes washed, dried, and set for the next round. Folded a fresh set of napkins. Got a head start on the rice paper rolls. Popped in the random shuffle of Asia food photos in the digital frame by the table (which the first guests didn’t see).

The second sitting was far more relaxed. We again sat with our guests, remembering how welcoming it felt to have our hosts dine with us. Some of our guests left the rest of their wine at their first stop so we made them a pineapple spritzer with their meal. It was a special pleasure to cook for last event’s winners, Alex and Matt – hopefully they enjoyed our meal as much as my husband and I enjoyed theirs.

The Winners Revealed

With the second course done, the six of us walked 10 minutes to the Social Bites Hotspot for a wine tasting at Yaletown Gallery.

As all cooks and dinner guests converged over art, wine, and chocolate, Annika rounded up the votes from all sixteen tasters. The winners were none other than Belinda and Jason, the folks behind the Farmers’ Market theme. 

Belinda and Jason received a $200 gift certificate from Zipcar and a trophy in the form of a lovely wine brought in by Annika from Germany. All Hobby Chefs received a goodie bag from Social Bites for their efforts, which included 2 tickets to a future Social Bites event. I gave mine to Bruce so that he could experience the fun as a dinner guest, next time.

Pencil in the next Social Bites event in the West Side

Social Bites is such a fantastic way to meet other food enthusiasts in the city, whether it’s as a dinner guest or as a hobby chef. Annika is planning another one on May 30, 2009 as a special benefit for Relay for Life. Check out the menu lineup and grab your tickets. 

Recipe Centre

If you’d like to try your hand at the dishes we prepared that evening, have at the recipes below.

Sinigang na corned beef (corned beef in tamarind broth)

• 1 lb corned beef or regular brisket, uncut
• 1 lb Korean radish or turnip
• 1 bunch long bean or green bean
• 3 ripe medium-sized tomatoes, chunked
• 1 large onion, chunked
• 5 tablespoons tamarind paste
• 3 tablespoons fish sauce
• 1 tablespoon Tabasco or 1 jalapeno, whole

In a large stockpot, cover beef with enough cold water to completely submerge, leaving another 1-2 inches of water as margin. Add tamarind paste. Simmer for at least 6 hours or overnight.

2 hours before serving, add turnips, tomatoes, and onion. Simmer for 1 hour and taste. Is it too bland? Add fish sauce. Not sour enough? Add another tablespoon of tamarind paste. Want a kick? Add Tabasco / jalapeno to taste. Keep adjusting until you have the broth where you want it to be.

At least 15 minutes before serving, add long / green beans to soup and simmer until bright green (but still retain crunch).

Serve in a curved plate (one that can handle all the soup) over a bed of steamed white rice.

Braised pork spare ribs in apricot preserve

• 1 lb pork spareribs, cut into 1″ pieces
• Marinade (see below)
• 1-2 tablespoons rice powder
• 1 dozen dried apricots, halved

Marinade and braising liquid

Mix all of the ingredients below in a large bowl and marinate the spareribs for at least 30 minutes in the fridge.

• 2 tablespoons soy sauce
• 1 tablespoon cooking sherry
• 1 tablespoon rice vinegar
• 1 tablespoon cider vinegar
• 1 tablespoon sugar
• 1 teaspoon finely cracked pepper
• 1 tablespoon quince paste or preserve (optional)

Fill a wok 1/3 full with cold water. Prop a deep plate, or a bamboo steamer with a plate inside it,  just above the water line. You can buy steamer stands at Asian stores but I used a very small steamer with its lid off as my makeshift stand. Make sure that the plate / steamer you use will allow the steam to circulate.

Line the plate with apricots and pour the spareribs and its marinate on top. Sprinkle or toss with the rice powder.

Steam / braise for at least 40 minutes or until the meat is fork tender and fully cooked through.

For better colour, drain and dry the wok, turn the heat up to high, splash a bit of oil in the pan and saute the spareribs until you get some caramelization on the dish.

BC spot prawn rice paper rolls

• 24 Spot Prawns, halved and peeled with tails left on (1 prawn per piece)
• 6 large round rice paper wrappers
• 1 bunch fresh chives
• 1 bunch fresh Thai basil
• Chili-lime sauce (based on this recipe from Epicurious)

Prawn batter (based on this recipe from Chowhound)

• 2 egg whites
• 1/4 cup cornstarch
• 1 teaspoon black pepper
• 1 teaspoon paprika
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon baking powder

Clean, peel, and halve the prawns and pat dry.

Beat egg whites to stiff peaks and add the rest of the ingredients for batter.

Dip each crab in batter and deep fry until golden (30 seconds – 1 minute). 

Place a large bowl of hot water on the table. Soften the rice paper wrappers in hot water and shake off any excess water. Lay the wrappers on a large flat surface and slice them into 4 strips.

On the edge of each strip, place several basil leaves, a few chive sprigs, and 2 prawn halves. Roll tightly into the rest of the rice paper strip. Serve with chili-lime dipping sauce.

My mother and I have had our differences over the past 29 years, but  I think most people can say that about family.  We’ve gotten to the point where life is too short to quibble, especially now that she lives so (relatively) far away in Everett, WA. Despite the distance, I am very happy that we are still able to share a love of cooking by phone and web.  So here’s a recipe that my mother taught me from her store of family winter meals, relayed to me one night over the phone. It’s a dish whose presence on my kitchen table is a source of nostalgia and a reminder of my mother’s larger-than-life influence on my cooking.

Happy birthday, Mom.

Sopas na Manok (chicken and macaroni soup)

Ingredients

• 1 lb chicken breast or thighs, bone-in
• 2 carrots, diced
• 2 sticks celery, diced
• 1 onion, diced
• 1/2 head chinese cabbage, shredded
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 tablespoon patis (fish sauce)
• 1 cup elbow macaroni, shell pasta, or other small-shape pasta

Directions

1. Place chicken in large stockpot and top with cold water in order to completely submerge the chicken. Bring to a gentle simmer and cook about 30 minutes.
2. Skim surface for fat / impurities and add the carrots, celery, and onion. Continue to simmer until chicken is tender, about another 60 minutes.
3. Take out chicken, leaving broth where it is, and shred meat by hand when it is cool enough to handle. Return shredded chicken to the pot.
4. Toss in macaroni and simmer until al dente.
5. Add the cabbage and cover for 5 minutes, off heat.
6. While the soup is sitting, toast the garlic in a small fry pan until golden and fragrant.
7. Serve soup topped with a pinch of garlic, with remaining garlic available on the table for those that want more.

My husband doesn’t care much for eggplant.  Unfortunately, this meant that one of my favourite vegetables became unwelcome in our home.  In the eight years that we’ve been together, the only times I could use it in the kitchen was during tax season (when my husband disappears into the void for 3 months) or on nights where I’m left to cook for myself.  What a terrible dietary restriction.

Since our trip to the Philippines, Kurt has happily relaxed his scorn.  His new interest in eggplant is thanks to a simple dish that most Filipinos know and love: tortang talong.   Below is a visual recipe of the dish that is no longer blacklisted from our household.

Tortang Talong (Eggplant Omelette)

Step 1 – Torch Eggplant

My favourite step. Using a gas stove, roast eggplant on all sides until skin is puffy and charred.  If you don’t have access to open flame (like our kitchen, sob) you can use your oven’s broiler, set on high. It’ll take a little longer to do.

Optional Step 1b – Steam Eggplant

If you are finding it difficult to peel the blackened skin off the eggplant, you can wrap said eggplant in foil and let steam a few minutes. The skin will peel off like panties at a Tom Jones concert.

Step 2 – Peel Eggplant

Remove the skin from your roasted eggplant. It should look like this.  Having trouble? Try Step 1b above.

Step 3 – Egg eggplant

Scramble an egg in a bowl and submerge your eggplant into it. Fan out the eggplant fully with a fork. Season with salt and pepper if desired.

Step 4 – Fry Eggplant

Heat a frying pan with a smidgeon of olive oil (low-med heat).  When the oil is ready, use the stem of your eggplant to lay it onto the pan. Make sure to fan the body of the eggplant out and use extra egg to fill in any gaps. Fry for 1-2 mins on each side or until each side is a toasty golden brown.

If you have extra egg left over, you can fry that up separately. It’ll taste like the eggplant omelette but without the veggie bits.

Step 5 – Eat Eggplant

Blot excess oil off the omelette with paper towel if desired and you are done!

In my family, these omelettes are served over steamed rice and accompanied with some sort of pork. I usually eat it with pork chops but have been known to eat it with (gasp) Spam as well. If you want to be truly Filipino about it, create a dipping sauce of equal parts bagoong and white vinegar and spoon a little over each bite.

I imagine this surprise was a thank you for the 3-course meal I slaved over the night before and have been planning for over a week.  Here are the recipes that inspired my menu along with the improvisations made along the way.

The Hamilton household’s Valentine’s Day menu for 2009

Crab meat, apple, and mango salad with cumin apple chips

• Salad recipe (Epicurious)
• Apple chips recipe (Epicurious)

I am not a fan of presentation that is difficult to eat.  The original recipe suggested a mille feuille layering of salad between giant slices of apple chip.  Instead, I opted to find the smallest red apples available on the market and stack the slices in a tower next to the salad (which were scooped into the half-shells of the mango used).  We ate our portions on a shared plate like we would nachos with salsa. An intimate way to kick-start a meal.

Beet-infused linguini with crab, grape tomatoes, garlic, and chili

• Original tagliatelle recipe (UKTV Food)

My hunt for a pasta roller in Vancouver did not produce results in time, so instead of making fresh tagliatelle stained scarlet with beet juice, I had to make do with “fresh” Olivieri linguini from the grocer downstairs.  Prelim tests with food colouring paste and gels prepped me for the fact that my pasta could only go pink with a 3 minute exposure.  When it was game time, I chopped up a beet and threw it into the salted pasta water rather than use non-natural dyes.  Besides, “beet-infused” sounds a hell of a lot better than “dyed with Spectrum Super Red 101210″.

I also had to give up the idea of tying the linguini into bundles of bows and cooking them that way.  Luckily, the pasta seemed amenable to being shaped into a heart – a pattern I replicated with the bits of Dungeness crab that I picked out from the finished pasta.  Pushed the grape tomatoes out to ring the dish, sprinkled parsley and squeezed the whole thing with some lemon, and a light, love-themed crab linguini was ready for consumption.

Red velvet cupcakes with cinnamon heart cookies

• Red velvet cupcake recipe (Epicurious)
• Cinnamon cookie recipe (Recipezaar)

I’m cutting it close for a submission to Nolwenn’s Cupcakes de l’amouuuur contest, but I hope this makes it in!  Car le concours à écrit en français au départ, voici un peu de français par hommage =)

This red velvet cupcake recipe is different from the one I used for my birthday cake last year, and I have to say that I prefer its lighter cocoa essence and more intense colour.  5 tablespoons of regular (watery) red food colouring was mixed with a few drops of Spectrum food colouring gel to achieve the scarlet I was going for.  The recipe makes just over 2 dozen cupcakes, so I baked the remainder in ramekins for the presentation I had in mind.

Cupcakes alone weren’t enough to finish this dessert; I also baked a dozen heart-shaped cinnamon cookies to spear into the ramekins. Replaced the typical vanilla frosting with softened french vanilla ice cream as requested by my husband.  The decadence of this dessert balanced the delicacy of the first two dishes nicely.

That was our Valentine’s Day.  Hope yours was just as lovely and sweet.