In the chaotic kitchen of a recipe developer, you get a food blog called FoodMayhem.
I'm Jessica, an Asian-American, born and raised in NYC, and that's Lon, my Jewish, white husband. While professionally trained as a French culinary- and pastry chef, many of FoodMayhem recipes are my attempt to preserve and share authentic Chinese and Taiwanese recipes learned from my mom. We don't eat Chinese food every day, so you'll get a little bit of anything we find delicious enough to share: from our Eastern European side; recipes and techniques learned from my restaurant days; restaurant reviews, food travel tips; and a few other juicy bits along the way. Welcome to FoodMayhem!
There are so many versions of fried rice. I’m not even going to try and guess how many there are. Yet, what makes it a fried rice? My mom once told me that the very basic Chinese version is just scallion, egg, and rice. That’s all you need for fried rice and any other additions are your choice.
This week’s Weekend Shout out is to Sara at Sara’s Kitchen. I’ve had her post on Chickpea Fries bookmarked since February (at least it’s from this year). The fancy name for these is Panisses, and I spotted a recipe on David Lebovtiz’s blog as well. Since I love fries, you can get me to try anything related to, similar to, or just called a fry. What’s awesome about this recipe is that the hardest part is finding the chickpea flour. I’ve heard that some Whole Foods carry it, but I got mine for $2.49 per pound at Ninth Avenue International Grocer.
These little seafood pancakes were inspired by a recipe I saw Jacques Pepin cook up; if you didn’t know already, that guy is my cooking hero. I put a bit of an Oriental spin on them and they came out almost like Korean seafood pancakes, which we love. I’m not sure this is a perfect recipe, but it’s pretty good!
I saw these quail eggs at the Chinese supermarket and they were so cute, I couldn’t resist. You can treat them similarly to chicken eggs. Just adjust cooking time because they’re much smaller. To hard-boil the quail eggs (without getting the green tinge), dunk them in boiling water for 3 minutes, rinse with cold water, then peel.
This morning I smelled some bacon cooking down the hall and knew I had to have a savory breakfast. However, our fridge just wasn’t complying with me, there was not much to work with except two big containers of strawberries; but as I said, my heart was set on savory. Down to the freezer I went, where I saw our bag of amazing, frozen shrimp — bingo.
Lon doesn’t really like cauliflower so I tried to make a not so cauliflower-like dish. It ended up being a yummy curry soup and Lon liked it. Yay! It tastes creamy without any dairy and has very little fat.
2 cubes chicken bouillon
2 teaspoons olive oil
1 medium onion, sliced
1 small head of cauliflower, cut into florets
8 red potatoes, quartered
1 1/2 tablespoons curry powder
1/2 teaspoon turmeric
*you can also use russet potatoes, red potatoes just happened to be what I had
1. Dissolve the bouillon cubes in 3 cups of boiling water. Set aside.
2. Heat the oil in a 3 1/2 quart pot.
3. Add the onions and saute for 2 minutes on medium heat.
4. Add cauliflower and saute for another 2 minutes.
5. Add chicken bouillon liquid and potatoes. Bring to a boil.
6. Add curry powder and turmeric and return to medium heat.
7. Continue cooking, uncovered, for 20 minutes, stirring occasionally.
8. Puree in a blender until very smooth. You will need to do it in two batches.
9. Serve or store.
