Baked Char Siu Bao

Earlier this weekend I had a Char Siu Bao, which is simply a steamed pork bun. It is so delicious. Pacific Rim in Kalamazoo gets pastries and baked goods from Chiu Quon Bakery and man I have never been disappointed.

Char Siu Bao

And because I loved it so much I am making baked Char Siu Bao! Last night I put all the ingredients for the filling in the crockpot and simmered on low. I am doing it a little different then the recipes I have read for traditional Char Siu. I put the marinade and the cooking liquid in the crockpot and it will be more shredded, while traditionally the pork is finely diced. Here is what it looks like now:

Not the most appetizing picture, but that is the Char Siu

I am letting it cook a couple more hours in the crockpot while I work on the dough.... I will return later tonight or tomorrow with the finished product!

My New Favorite Grilled Cheese

So since I was sick last week/weekend I ate a lot of soup. Saturday I was in the mood for something a little bit more substantial so I started rooting around my refrigerator. I was so sad because I found some salami, artichokes, and olives in back that had gone bad :( Granted these were foods I already rescued from getting thrown away at work, but still.

I then found two white packages in the back of the fridge (really I need to clean that thing out), low and behold it was brie and soppressata from a wonderful cheese shop in Bay City called Artigiano! For Kalamazooligans think of The Cheese Lady but smaller.

Well, I had brie and sopresseta and bread.... Guess like it was going to be grilled cheese for lunch!

This was so good, but super rich and decadent! Truthfully, I typically wouldn't do this, because I think both ingredients in the sandwich do better to stand alone. However, the fear that these ingredients might go bad in my fridge made me go for it and I am a total convert! 

This Week in Food

So this week has been a little boring on the food front, mainly because I have spent the last 5 days sick! But on Tuesday I made an amazing loaf of bread! The pictures do not do it justice!

Top

Side... guess I didn't smooth it out enough!

Here it is with some Zuppa Toscana

I have struggled with bread for many years! My loaves were always small and dense. I ate them, but never enjoyed them. Part of the problem is that I always followed recipes for cheap, simple bread. Then around Thanksgiving I bought some yeast to make bread. I went back and forth on which recipe I would use. Then I noticed the packet had a recipe so I decided to go with that. 

The first time I made it the loaf turned out small, but tasty. Then I made it again and really paid attention to the fact that it called for 5-8 minutes of knead time. I don't own a mixer, because I try to stay away from gadgets as much as possible, so for 10 minutes I beat up that ball of dough. And you know what it worked! The bread was perfect. So it is now my go to recipe! 

Sarah Sk - Dan-Zai Noodle Soup at Hunan Gardens

When you don't feel good, a steaming hot bowl of noodle soup can be soooo comforting! This one has hor fun noodles, minced pork, shrimp, marinated hard boiled egg, and bok choy. This dish is from Hunan Gardens, my favorite Chinese restaurant in Kalamazoo!

Leftover Zuppa Toscana

Well it is winter here in the Midwest and we have snow and cold. BRRRRR! So to keep myself warm I like to make soup and bake bread. Unfortunately, I am all out of yeast so I had to settle on the soup.

When you make soup I am a firm believer that you should use as many leftovers as possible. So I scrounged around and here is what I came up with:

1 limp carrot stick
3 limp celery pieces
1 onion
1 prebaked potato (that I forgot about in the fridge)
1 raw potato
1/2 pack of spinach that was starting to yellow
Some breakfast sausage in the back of the freezer
Better than bouillon low sodium chicken base
Butter
Oil
Salt
Pepper
Red pepper flakes
Flour
Parmesan Cheese
1/2 and 1/2 (I rather use heavy whipping cream in soup because of the better fat content, but some times ya gotta do what you gotta do!)

I sauteed the celery, onion, carrot, and potato in a mix of oil and butter until the onions started to become translucent. Add water, chicken base, salt, pepper, and red pepper flakes and start to simmer.

My sausages were frozen so I put them in a pan with some water until browned and then chopped the breakfast sausage and added to the soup mix.

In another pan I took more butter and flour and made a light roux and then added that to the soup mix.

Then I let the soup mix simmer for an hour or so. Added the spinach, Parmesan cheese, and 1/2 and 1/2 and brought it to a simmer. Unfortunately, my 1/2 and 1/2 broke slightly... that is why I prefer whipping cream, but hey watcha gonna do. Topped with a little more Parmesan cheese and in my belly it went :)

Sarah SK: Shoyu Ramen Wrap Up!

All right! So last night I promised a wrap up for my shoyu ramen experiment! I'm basing my work in a recipe from Takashi Yagihashi's book, "Takashi's Noodles" that I picked up at the library. After doing a little research on Mr. Takashi today, I'm pleased to discover that he created the restaurant in Chicago where Bitha and I had our first shared ramen experience! Happy coincidence!

I'm still in the learning phase, so I had a couple of interesting bumps, but nothing too crazy. Takashi's recipe for shoyu base called for 1.5 cups of katsuoboshi (dried bonito flakes). I didn't have katsuoboshi, but I do have some concentrated bonito stock granules, so I substituted those.


As I mentioned last night, I already have quite a bit of homemade chicken bone broth made up, so I simmered that with a bit of kombu and crushed ginger and set it aside. Then I started on the shoyu base, which called for Japanese soy sauce, shiro (white soy sauce), sea salt, water, kombu, and the aforementioned concentrated bonito. I combined everything in a small pot, brought just to a boil, and simmered for 10 minutes. If you're making this dish at home, be sure to take a moment to appreciate how amazing this smells !

Shoyu is the Japanese word for soy sauce and we are definitely using *a lot* of it in this dish! Between the marinade for the eggs and the shoyu base, we used a full bottle of the Japanese soy sauce and almost the whole bottle of the white soy sauce, which is called shiro. I did, however, make enough shoyu base to do second full batch of shoyu ramen. So yay! The hubbo and I can look forward to another comforting bowl later this week!

The next steps toward completion were pretty simple! I just combined the chicken stock with the shoyu base, heated until steaming, and threw in the noodles for a few minutes until they were cooked through. Then Mr. SK and I arranged our toppings and went to slurp town!

Today's toppings: narutomaki (thinly sliced fish cake), spinach, shredded chicken, scallions, and the ajitsuke tamago (marinated eggs) that I made last night. I wanted to include the marinated bamboo and the nori garnish, but didn't have them on hand, so I'll have to try them another time!

Sarah SK: Marinated Eggs for Shoyu Ramen

Hokay. So I have to admit that I've been a bit noodle-obsessed these days! Bitha and I have been having a lot of fun familiarizing ourselves with our local Asian grocery, Pacific Rim. Until today, I've mostly been experimenting with various random ingredients for my noodle bowls. But this moment finds me on a mission... I want to understand all of the nuances that go into making a good bowl of ramen! So I've been reading every cookbook, listening to every podcast, and watching every Youtube video I can get my hands on. Now, it seems that every ramen chef has their own secret recipe, but I can see a common structure emerging. Broth +  base + toppings = yummo!  I've been making homemade chicken bone broth for the past several months. So my plan is to start with what I've already got on hand, perhaps adding a bit of ginger and kombu to complete the flavor profile. I'll share my Shoyu base experiences tomorrow, but tonight I got started on marinating hard boiled eggs so they can sit overnight for extra noms factor! Look forward to another post in the morning!

The process is super simple: put 4-6 eggs in the bottom of a pot and cover with cold water. Bring to a boil. Cover with a lid, remove from heat, and let sit for 12 minutes. Then run cold water over the eggs to cool off enough to peel. Combine 2 cups cold water, 1 cup Japanese soy sauce, 3/4 cup sugar (I only had coconut sugar on hand), a cinnamon stick, chopped ginger, star anise, and peppercorns. Put peeled eggs back into (empty) pot and pour marinade over the top. Bring pot *just* to a boil and then remove from heat. Let sit until ready to serve... overnight is best!

Sarah SK: Greetings and Salutations!

Heya! I'm the mysterious "Mrs. SK" that Bitha keeps referring to. I've been a major food nerd, for as long as I can remember. I had my own subscription to Bon Appetit at age 10! As a business owner, my lifestyle averages on hectic and one of my favorite ways to unwind is playing about in the kitchen. I love slow food, but am always on the search for healthy and easy meals to share with my hoosbund on busy work nights.

My world outside of the kitchen centers on belly dance. I am a studio owner, dance instructor, professional performer, troupe director, and event producer. But if there ever comes a day that I am unable to dance anymore, you can bet you'd find me working with food! My work often takes us on the road, so I hope to share some of our more exciting restaurant and market experiences with all of you!

Tabitha is my longtime food buddy. I can't wait to chronicle my experiments and funtimes with her here at Food Adventures!

Korean Foods!!!!!

This is fried mandu and spicy sauce. So delicious.

I forgot to take a picture until I had already started

eating so that is why the sauce is sloppy :)

Stone bowl Bibimbap with pork! 

We are so lucky to have The Korea SY House in Kalamazoo! I have never had Korean food before so Mrs. Sk and I took a trip there yesterday. Such delicious food.  I can't say enough good things. The mandu were basically a dumpling kind of like an empanada or pierogi.

The Bibimbap had noodles, vegetables, kimchi, pork, an egg, and rice on the bottom. It was served with many sides including: kimchi, fermented bean sprouts, fermented black beans, fermented radish and carrots, and fermented cucumbers. It was also served with a yummy spicy sauce.

The waitress came over and asked if we needed a box for our meals. I quickly piped up and said nope I am going to finish the whole thing. It was a mistake, a very delicious mistake. I was stuffed to the gills! So if you are in the area check this place out!

Shopping Score

I love my friday shopping excursions at the local Asian market! This week I got mushrooms, mandarins, long beans, eggplants, ginger, green onions, limes, noodles, and Bean snowballs from Feida Bakery in Chicago.

New Year's Ramen

Ahhh there is nothing more than a delicious bowl of ramen! So I was lucky enough to get invited to hang out with Mrs. SK with the sole purpose of procuring items to make a quick ramen. Not totally authentic but infinitely better than a package and a seasoning pack.

For the broth we used chicken stock, bonito flakes, ginger, scallions, and sesame oil. We put in some and the noodles as well at let it simmer. I was so excited when Mrs. SK found a big pack of ramen style noodles! The are NOT fried like the other ones and equally as tasty. Our toppers were rotisserie chicken from the store, pork fu, and lime. 

I Love Food

Hi my name is Tabitha and I love food and most things culinary! I have tried to ignore it for many years, but enough is enough. I love eating food, cooking food, reading about food, and sorting a my way through a world of fake food, sustainable food, and the affordable in between of the two.

2016 is about embracing the things I am good at, enjoying my life, and putting the effort into making it a great year! I will be researching products, making and sharing pictures of food, giving you my personal opinion of things that I love, and trying to make sense of all the food opinions out there.

I am am a struggling photographer, because I don't remember, don't want to wait for a photo, and am still learning my way around a camera. I am lucky enough to have a great friend who always takes photo's of our foods that we make and eat and have permission to share her photos. Mrs. SK is a wonderful person, has a similar love of food stuffs of mine, and I hope she will at least contribute posts, if not be a co-blogger on this site.

What do I do when I am not blogging? I work in a kitchen full time, am in the process in starting a food based business, and hopefully starting school for sustainable brewing soon. I love hanging with my little (80lbs) old man (13yrs) puppy and he loves food just as much as I do, but is in much better shape than me!

I look forward to sharing the adventures!