Hong Kong Eats

I LOVE Hong Kong. It’s a beautiful place where you can run along the harbor, find some great views of the high rises, and eat phenomenal food of all cuisines! Here are some of my favorite eats in HKG.

Megabox is known for a great place to eat lunch. Once day we went on the 10th floor and found this restaurant. I had rice with eel, cheese, tomatoes, and of course a fried egg. LOVE

At Tiffany’s, they served Hainanese Chicken. This is basically succulent steamed chicken, served with 3 sauces: plum sauce, scallion oil, and a chili sauce. The dish was accompanied by bok choy, pickled veg, rice, and soup.

A good friend of mine took me to Discovery Bay, a quiet island where a lot of foreigners live. We sampled Korean BBQ at First Korean Restaurant! As our meal, we had a sample of marinated meats, scallops, and an assortment of sides (look at the kimchi)!

    

Per my boss’ recommendation, I went to Maxim’s Palace which is on the second floor of City Hall. This restaurant is one of the few places that still serves dim sum by the carts, and it is AMAZING. Look at these braised chickens feet, pork shumai, and rice noodle rolls filled with shrimp!

For my birthday, we went to Brotzeit German Bier Bar & Restaurant. My friend and I split the Cheese Spatzel (which I could eat every single day of my life). Imagine mac and cheese but with misshaped pasta and a gooey-er cheese sauce. What more could you want in life?!

Of course I had to have garlic sausage with sauerkraut.

There’s a horse race track right in the middle of a city in Hong Kong called happy Valley. It was a great place to bet as little as $1-2 USD per race, as well as eat fried potato wedges with sour cream, cheese and bacon. I ordered the rice, bbq pork, and bbq duck (when in Hong Kong, amiright)!

Now for the star of the show - real Hong Kong food where the servers do not speak English and the menu has pictures of the food. I would recommend going to Chung Chung Food Shop with someone who can speak the local language to help order. My recommendations: clams in the black bean sauce, fried squid, fried garlic tofu, and pigeon.

Yes, you read that correctly. Pigeon. Now I know this in the U.S. is considered a bird that eats the trash on the streets. But these pigeons are raised to be eaten. The meat is similar to duck but has more flavor. Promise me you’ll give it a chance, you won’t regret it!

Getting Fishy

Who doesn't love fish? Unless you're in a small office and someone reheated last night's salmon. But other than that, I really enjoy eating all different types! One of my favorites is the Palmburo fish, which was introduced to me by my dad. Although the fish isn't as well known as salmon or halibut, this fish should become a staple in your diet. It's readily available at Asian stores such as V Mart in Lowell, MA or H Mart in Burlington, MA.

It's a white fish with an amazing subtle but flavorful flesh. Here's a picture of it. I made two since I am SUCH an amazing little sister and made lunch for my older sister.

Inside, I stuffed it with scallions and fresh sliced ginger. I also added a little pinch of salt. I coated the outside with some olive oil so that the skin would not stick to the foil. 

Hipster side view

I baked the fish in a preheated oven at 350 degrees F for about an hour. I carefully flipped them over halfway to cook on the other side. And to crisp out the skin, I broiled them for 2-3 minutes. 

Drooling. 

Although it isn't a problem with this fish, I know some people have issues getting small fish bones stuck in their throat. One time it happened to me and I thought that it was just something I'd have to live with. Fortunately, my mother came to the rescue and told me to make a little ball of rice and swallow it whole. The rice dislodged the fish bone without ANY issues. What would we all do without moms??

Palmburo Fish

Ingredients:
1 palmburo fish per person (cleaned)
A thumb size piece of ginger, sliced
1/4 bunch of scallions, whole
Salt
Olive oil

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F
2. Cover a flat pan with foil and coat with olive oil
3. Place sliced ginger and scallion in the cavity 
4. Salt cavity and both sides of the fish
5. Bake fish for 30 minutes, and flip to the other side
6. Bake for another 30, or until the eyes have turned white and have popped out a little
7. Broil to crisp up skin for 2-3 minutes. Keep an eye out to ensure you do not burn the skin
8. Remove from the oven, set aside for 5 minutes to cool.
9. Serve and enjoy! 

Some dipping sauces that I enjoy with this fish is some soy sauce mixed with Tabasco

Using Up Those Thanksgiving Leftovers (NOT Sandwiches)

Who doesn’t love having leftovers from Thanksgiving? With pounds of turkey, stuffing, vegetables, and mashed potatoes, you won’t go hungry for DAYS. Sometimes, I like to shake things up a bit with my leftover dishes instead of making turkey sandwiches.

I was inspired by one of my favorite Colombian restaurants that has the most amazing empanadas and aji picante (think a spicy and flavorful sauce). Typically, the empanadas are made with ground pork or beef. However, with turkey being bountiful, that will be my protein of choice!

Also, for a fun Thanksgiving twist, I made two versions of aji picante, one regular and one with chopped up cranberries! As side dishes, I made fried plantains and baked french fries. All of the carbs! Now onto the cooking!

I made the empanadas using Erica’s recipe: http://www.mycolombianrecipes.com/colombian-empanadas-empanadas-colombianas. What I did differently was use turkey instead of ground pork and beef,  and used mashed potatoes with some watered down chicken bouillon cube. I also baked some of the empanadas and fried a handful to see the difference. To bake the empanadas, I preheated the oven to 400 degrees F, and oiled the pan heavily before baking the empanadas. I left them in the oven for about 40 minutes, and flipped them half-way. Note, they will not be as brown as if they were fried.

Results

The aji picante definitely is the best accompaniment to the empanadas. It provided a spicy yet zesty flavor to cut the heavy mashed potato/turkey combination.

Fried empanadas will always be better, but baked is not bad at all. Just make sure you oil the pan well enough before placing the empanadas on it.

For the aji picante, I wanted to make sure it had time to let the flavors fully combine. So, I made the aji picante yesterday. I used a recipe from Erica Dinho, a wonderful blog writer who shares her authentic Colombian recipes with the world. http://www.mycolombianrecipes.com/colombian-hot-sauce-aji-picante

I gathered my ingredients: cilantro, parsley, scallions, a tomato, lime, jalapenos, vinegar, water, salt and sugar and starting mixing!

I used a mini blender to blend the jalapeno, water, and white vinegar. Can anyone say jalapeno smoothie?!

In the meantime, I chopped up the other ingredients and put them in a mason jar. I didn’t want to have to dirty a bowl to then transfer the aji into a jar.

The jalapeno "smoothie" is on the right, mason jar was filled with the remaining ingredients. 

Once the jalapeno combo was done, I added it to my jar and shook it well. For the cranberry aji picante, I used the same recipe and just added a handful of finely chopped cranberries. Next time, I am going to omit the sugar in the cranberry version as they were sweet enough.

From left to right: cranberry aji picante, regular aji picante

Carb heavy dinner!

Aji Picante Recipe

Ingredients:

1 seeded jalapeno
½ cup white vinegar
¼ cup water
¼ teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon sugar
1 tablespoon lime juice
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
½ cup chopped fresh cilantro
¼ cup chopped fresh parsley
½ cup chopped scallions
½ cup chopped tomato

For the cranberry version, use all of the same ingredients, but omit the sugar and add a handful of finely chopped cranberries.

Instructions:

1. Combine the jalapeno, vinegar, and water in a blender and blend until the jalapeno is finely chopped. There should not be large chunks of jalapeno.
2. Place the remaining ingredients into a mason jar. Add the jalapeno mixture.
3. Close the jar and shake to combine. Keep refrigerated for 10 days.

A Very Vietnamese Thanksgiving Pt. 2 of 3

Pictures of making Banh Hoi followed by a recipe for fish sauce

One of my FAVORITE Vietnamese dishes that I eat at any family gathering is Banh Hoi. The last time my mom made this dish, I ate a whole plate in one day #sorrynotsorry. Banh Hoi is a traditional Vietnamese dish that is made out of steamed vermicelli noodles, topped with scallion oil, and served with fish sauce *recipe given later on). It is SUPER easy to make. And now that my mom has taught me, she expects me to make it on my own any time I want it (although food is always better prepared by your parents.. it's a fact).

My mom and I made a makeshift steamer by boiling water, topping it with a flat strainer, and covering with a lid. We can get pretty crafty in the kitchen when we need to be. My mom and I are pretty similar in being ingenuitive and finding all the ways to make multitaskers out of ordinary items; I definitely was NOT adopted, as much as my sister used to tell me when we were younger.

All we did was soak the vermicelli noodles, steam them for 3 minutes, and then topped it with the scallion oil. The scallion oil was composed of 1 cup of corn oil and one bunch of scallions, finely chopped. We boiled the oil for 2 minutes with the scallions to infuse the flavors together.

  

To accompany the Banh Hoi, we needed to make lam nuoc mam (loosely translated to prepared fish sauce). Although it doesn’t sound appetizing, fish sauce is the equivalent to ketchup in America. The Vietnamese use fish sauce with EV-ER-YTHING. We’ve used it with salads, meats, noodles, egg rolls, and everything in between. I’ve made fish sauce quite a few times now and have the recipe ingrained in my memory, although I always refer to my notes so that I don’t mess it up. Wouldn’t want to disappoint the family.

Here are the ingredients! (I almost forgot the chili garlic sauce).

You'll need to microwave the coconut soda first, then add the rest of the ingredients. Adding the sugar to the microwaved coconut soda. The warm soda helps to dissolve the sugar.

Then stir until the ingredients are well combined and all of the sugar has dissolved! Once the fish sauce has cooled down, you can taste it and see how it needs to be adjusted. It should be well balanced between salty, sweet, and sour. If you are interested in learning more about Vietnamese food and perfecting the recipes, you must have a balance between those flavors. It'll take some practice (asking some of your Vietnamese friends to be taste testers never hurts), but if you keep at it, you will learn our ways.

Ingredients:

2 cans of coconut soda

1 cup of sugar

1 cup of fish sauce (base of the “prepared fish sauce”)

2 garlic cloves. chopped

1 tbsp of chili garlic sauce

1 lime, cut into wedges

Instructions:

1. Microwave the coconut soda for 1.5 - 2 minutes on medium high heat
2. Add the sugar and stir to dissolve the sugar
3. Add in fish sauce, garlic, chili garlic sauce, and lime juice
4. Stir the sauce until everything is well combined
5. Let cool and taste to adjust any of the flavorings.
6. Store in the fridge for up to 1 month (although my family and I have kept it for up to 3)

A Very Vietnamese Thanksgiving Pt. 3 of 3

Making the Turkey

Since we made so much food on Thanksgiving, I had to share the recipes over several days.

The first dish on the list that needed to be prepped was the turkey (I started this the day before Thanksgiving). I quickened the thawing process of the turkey by following Alton Brown’s tip from his show, Good Eats. What you need to do is place the turkey in a bowl and run cool water over it, ensuring that you rotate the turkey throughout the thawing process. Cool running water is ideal because you are preventing the bacteria from growing (WPI taught me that bacteria love warm and moist places!).

Once the turkey was thawed out, I began the brining process for 12 hours. This process helps keep the meat moist when baking in the oven for extended periods of time. I always say, if you put time, attention, and love into your food, it will love you back (when you eat it, of course).

On Thanksgiving Day, I woke up on my own at 5:30 AM since I was SO excited to start cooking.

After 12 hours of brining, I dried the turkey, stuffed the cavity with carrots and celery, massaged it with a homemade herb butter, and put it in the preheated oven (350 degrees F) for 3 hours. The end result is B-EA- UTIFUL.

 

Brine Recipe (adapted from Alton Brown’s brine recipe http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/alton-brown/traditional-roast-turkey-recipe.html):

1 cup of salt

16 cups of chicken stock

1/2 c brown sugar (I used ½ c white sugar with 3 tbsp of molasses)

2 tbsp whole black peppercorns

2 slices of candied ginger

1 gallon of ice water + ice and water to cover the turkey

I small red apple, sliced

Turkey Butter Recipe:

¼ c unsalted butter, room temperature

3 cloves of garlic, chopped

1 tsp of dried thyme

1 tsp of adobo seasoning

1 tsp of Italian seasoning

Directions:

Brining:

1. Combine salt, chicken stock, sugar, whole black peppercorns, candied ginger, and apple in a stockpot big enough to hold the turkey. Place on high heat until it boils for 2 minutes.
2. Once it boils, remove from the heat and cool down with ice water.
3. Place turkey in brine, breast side down, cover, and place in fridge for at least 12 hours.
4. Once the time is up, remove from brine and dry the turkey.

For the butter:

Combine all ingredients until well combined.

For the Turkey:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
2. Place turkey on a roasting rack and carefully massage herb butter under and over the skin.
3. Roast in oven for 2-2.5 hours for an eleven pound turkey, until the juices run clear.
4. ENJOY!

A Very Vietnamese Thanksgiving Pt. 1 of 3

A recipe for rice noodle rolls and pictures of egg roll making with Mom

Sometimes, you gotta shake things up a bit. This year, my family is doing Vietnamese Thanksgiving as I partner with my mom to cook. This opportunity lets me practice making traditional Vietnamese dishes while trying a few new recipes on the fam as well! For the lunch, turkey, egg rolls, Banh Hoi, and rice noodle rolls were served. Oh and I’m also baking chocolate chip cookies. Very Vietnamese indeed.

My mom and I started working on the egg rolls early as it requires a lot of prep work. There was a lot of chopping, slicing, and mixing involved to get the egg rolls just right. As I watched my mom prepare it, I took down notes and suggestions. Next time, she wants me to make them on my own to start practicing and perfecting my own recipe (I’ll probably just continue to use hers… it’s amazing every time!). Unfortunately, I cannot share the recipe as it’s a family secret, but I’m sure there’s a ton out on the interwebs!

Once my sister arrived, it was time to start the hard work, rolling 100 egg rolls. The egg roll skins were dried out, which was NOT ideal for egg rolls, but we made do. I ended up rolling the majority of the egg rolls since I can be a bit of a perfectionist at times (and was fixing my sister’s egg rolls to make sure they were all a consistent size). But we both agreed that her rolling skills were hindered by the dry egg roll skins!

My mom was on frying duty, to ensure the egg rolls were golden, brown, and delicious!

My one experiment for Thanksgiving that I wanted to share the recipe for are rice noodle rolls. Typically, you can find these at any dim sum restaurant. I LOVE these things so much that the last time I went to Hong Kong, I went on a mission to find the ONE place nearby that served this wonderful dish all day (but that’s for another post).

I found a recipe for these homemade rolls and sauce and adapted it for my own use:

http://thewoksoflife.com/2015/01/cheung-fun-homemade-rice-noodles/.

I combined all of the ingredients for the rice noodle rolls and let the batter rest for 45 minutes.

When it came time to steam the rolls, my mom and I had to make another makeshift steamer. The key to making these rice noodle rolls is to use a NONstick pan, or use a lot of oil to coat the bottom of the pan.

Once the water was boiling in the steamer, I placed my pan on top of the steamer and poured a ladle full of batter. I picked up the pan and spread the batter to ensure it was in an even layer, about ⅛ inch thick. I covered the pan with a lid and and cooked the roll for 3 minutes.  

Once the batter was cooked through, I used a spatula to carefully roll the rice noodle onto itself. This process took me much practice, so do not worry if it takes a while to do it well.

I repeated the same process until all the batter was gone. As a tip, stir the batter before you ladle it into the pan, the rice flour has a tendency to sink to the bottom.

Once I had all of the rolls done, I slathered on the soy sauce and peanut butter sauce. Viola!

Ingredients

1 ½ c of rice flour

½ c + 2 tbsp of tapioca starch

½ tsp of salt

2 tbsp of oil

1 ½ c lukewarm water

1 c of boiling water

2 tbsp dark soy sauce

1 tbsp oyster sauce

1 tsp of molasses

½ c of water

1 tbsp of PB2

2 tbsp of water

Instructions:

Rice Noodles:

1. Combine the rice flour, tapioca starch, salt, lukewarm water, and oil.
2. Once well combined, stir in boiling water and let batter rest for 45 minutes.

Sauces:

Soy Sauce

1. Place water in a microwavable bowl and microwave for 2 minutes
2. Add in dark soy sauce, oyster sauce, and molasses
3. Combine well

Peanut Butter Sauce:

1. Combine water and PB2 in a small bowl (it should be a watery consistency, but still taste like peanut butter

After 45 minutes have passed:

3. Prepare the steaming pan and oil it generously.
4. Ladle in the batter and ensure that it coats the pan evenly.
5. Cover the pot and steam for 3 minutes, or until the rice noodle batter is firm and bubbling.
6. Carefully roll the noodle upon itself with a spatula. Remove and repeat steps 3-6 until the batter is gone.
7. Top the rice noodle rolls with the sauces and serve immediately

If you're interested in seeing some recipes of the dishes pictured below, keep on the lookout for my blog posts over the next two days!

Most of the dishes my mom and I made for Thanksgiving 2016