Spicy Pumpkin and Miso Soup

This soup is hearty with just a hint of miso, and a nice spicy kick as it goes down. I used this recipe, but didn't put nearly as much basil as it called for, and used water instead of the soy milk.

To accompany this pumpkin miso soup, I made a dish reminiscent of my childhood, stuffed cabbage rolls. Click here for the recipe. I used brown rice instead of white, and made my own tomato sauce from scratch.  Next time, I want to double wrap the cabbage rolls (in two cabbage leaves instead of one) since I love cabbage so much.

Hunger Games Dinner: Katniss's Lamb Stew with Dried Prunes

This recipe is a winner. It took about 4 hours from start to finish (most of it is down time while it simmers on the stove top) but it was just outstanding.

It took me 3 days (actually, 3 sleepless nights) to read the entire Hunger Games trilogy. I couldn't help it--the story was so intense that I couldn't put the books down! Obsessed with all things Hunger Games, I scoured the internet for recipes from the book until I found this one. The Vancouver Sun had the brilliant idea of having a recipe contest for Hunger Games-inspired meals. This was the winner in the "Capitol foods" division. Being Katniss's favorite dish, I knew I had to try it. It's comforting and luxurious at the same time.

Even Better Oven Fried Chicken

I made oven fried chicken again, but this time dipped the drum sticks in buttermilk first, then a seasoned flour/breadcrumb mixture (flour, paprika, salt, pepper, breadcrumbs). I baked them in pyrex dishes containing a pat of melted butter on the bottom of the dish and then turned them half way through the cooking process. The breadcrumbs made them crunchier, and Brad declared them better than the other night's drumsticks.

Provencal Rack of Lamb

Tonight I made Provencal Rack of Lamb, but instead of potatoes I used parsnips that I picked up at the Farmers Market. It reminded me of a rustic meal that Katniss of the Hunger Games would enjoy.

Caprese Salad, Oven Fried Chicken and The Barefoot Contessa's Granola Bars

 I have two weeks off because my students are on Spring Break, and one of my goals for these two weeks is to cook something new every day.  I made a simple Caprese salad, Oven Fried Chicken and Ina Garten's Granola Bars.

With a 5/5 star rating on the Food Network's website, I had high expectations for the bars. I loved the flavor, but the bars kind of fell apart--they weren't packed enough. Maybe that was my fault and I didn't pack it well enough in the pan (although I did press down pretty hard with my spatula). Still, the taste was definitely there. I want to try more Barefoot Contessa recipes soon!

Inn of the Seventh Ray, Topanga Canyon

My plate

Some call the Inn of the Seventh Ray the "most romantic restaurant in L.A.". I've been coming here for years, but this was my first time trying their weekend brunch. For $18 you can go through their brunch buffet once. For some higher price (I don't remember what) you can go back for more. We opted for the once-through and carefully constructed our plates to maximize the amount of food we took back to our table.

I was pleasantly surprised by the buffet. $18 was a bit steep, but it came with a beverage (we got the ginger mint drinks, but they also had mimosas and juice. The only disappointment was the dessert... All of their dessert options tasted very "healthy," and not in a good way. Next time I'm skipping dessert and piling on more quiche, crab and smoked salmon.

Brad's plate

Petrossian, West Hollywood

beef tartar with caviar. egg salad sandwich with caviar in the background

We went with some friends to Brad's favorite L.A. restaurant for his birthday. Everything was amazing, as expected, but if I had to choose my favorites, they would be the beef tartar and the mushroom soup. I am in love with Petrossian's soups! Their vanilla panna cotta with espresso "caviar" was a delicious and inventive way to end the meal.

Petrossian

the soup I have been waiting my entire life for

flatbread. caviar blinis in the background

burger

vanilla panna cotta with espresso "caviar"

Merry Christmas! And another short list...

Wishing everyone in cyberworld a safe and merry Christmas! Keeping with the list theme, here's more "Best Of 2010"

Best Hawaii Restaurant: Sushi Izakaya Gaku I fell in love with their tofu with dashi jelly, spicy tuna tartar, and homemade tamagoyaki. And If you thought salmon couldn't get any more fatty and melt in your mouth, you gotta try their toro salmon sushi.

Best foodie book: Ruth Reichl's Garlic and Sapphires. I love this book. It details her life as a food critic for the New York Times, and her adventures going incognito so as not to be recognized by the restaurant staff. It was fascinating reading about the special treatment she got dressed as a hot blonde, and the nonchalant service she received dressed as an old lady. She drops recipes here and there throughout the book like breadcrumbs leading you from one chapter to the next.

Recipe you must try: Pumpkin stuffed with everything good. This recipe is from KCRW. This dish is testament to the fact that you really cant go wrong with cheese, cream and bacon. Click here for the recipe.

Market of the year: Nijiya. I was perusing my year in food, and I laughed remembering that crazy long obsession I had with Asian food the first half of the year. I have Nijiya to thank for supplying me with the ingredients to make okonomiyaki, beef tendon soup, and congee. Plus, I love how it's open till midnight.

I'd love to hear your "Best Of 2010"s. Leave a comment with your favorite restaurant, foodie book, market or recipe of the year!

Best of 2010!

Ah, I love food lists. Here are my top picks for 2010!

Favorite Restaurant of 2010: Petrossian! This is a hands down pick for both me and Brad. Each time we've been there, we have had the best service, the most delicious food, and--strangely enough--the whole place to ourselves! I have no idea why this place is not more crowded than it is. Petrossian, by the way, is a caviar lover's dream. You must get the beef tartar, which is layers of beef tartar with loads of caviar stuffed between each layer. This is Brad's favorite dish. They also have egg salad sandwiches heaped with caviar, caviar tasting blinis, and even an espresso "caviar" panna cotta. The dish that I fell in love with, however, was not a caviar dish. It was their soup. Or soups to be exact. I have tried three of their soups (cauliflower, mushroom and borscht) and they were (I am not exaggerating) the best soups I have ever tasted.

Favorite Brunch Spot: LA Mill in Silver Lake. Sometimes I miss the east side, and a visit to LA Mill fixes that longing with an espresso shot of hipsters and well-crafted food. There is also no other brunch place that can come close to the stylish modern interior of LA Mill. Sitting there eating my little puffs of brioche dougnut holes, I feel both at home and in heaven.

Favorite "Slow Food" Restaurant: Rustic Canyon in Santa Monica. Everything at Rustic Canyon is wonderful in that "rustic" sort of way. Since their menu changes with the season, I would love to come back here again soon.

Favorite "Everyday Meal" Restaurant: Govindas! And by "everyday", I mean that I would eat there every day if I could. Govindas has been my 2010 restaurant obsession. I love their clean and healthy dining options, and their price of $8 for all you can eat food. Govindas is a part of the Hare Krishna Temple and all their cuisine is vegan/vegetarian.

Wedding Food!

Since wedding food stereotypically gets a bad rap, I naturally worried about the food at my wedding. I was so surprised when I took my first bite of my wedding dinner and it was actually delicious. Another bite of juicy mango chicken, and another of crispy-skinned pork bao confirmed that this was a fantastic wedding dinner. In addition to salads, misoyaki butterfish, and mango chicken, we also had two carving stations: a whole roasted pig which was carved for Chinese pork bao, and prime rib.

I didn't take any pictures of my meal (*gasp!*), but thankfully Brad's mom did! That's her artfully arranged plate above. Scroll down to see more wedding pics.

Our wedding favors were two chocolate dipped shortbread cookies

from Honolulu Cookie Company

We fed each other cupcakes from Hokulani Bakery. Then I fed myself some more!

Yakbap

Our friends Mike and Michelle gave us some yakbap! According to Mike, it's a Korean celebratory dish made with sweet sticky rice, brown sugar, and other goodies. It is absolutely heavenly. The richness of the coconut milk combined with the nuttiness of the sesame oil makes for a satisfying dessert. The sticky rice is so soft and fluffy, it melts on your tongue.

In Mike and Michelle's version of yakbap above, they included dried cherries from Trader Joes. Here is the recipe from Mike's uncle.

Yakbap

Cook: 5 cups of mochi rice.
Mix in well: 1/4 cup sesame oil while rice is still hot (less if you like)
Add: 12 oz. dark brown sugar (adjust to your taste)
Optional: a) 1 cup coconut milk b) prunes c) pine nuts d) cooked chessnuts
Form: into rectangular pans to 1.5" thick
Bake: 40 min @ 350F (check earlier to make sure the edges don't get hard)

Let cool, then cut with a plastic knife.

Our First Hanukkah Dinner!

Last Saturday was my first attempt at a Hanukkah dinner. Here's what was on the menu:

Truffle Pate, herb cheese, asian pear and crackers from Trader Joes

Pot Roast with caramelized onion and roasted carrots

Challah Bread from Trader Joes, served with cultured butter

Roasted Brussel Sprouts with thinly sliced onions

Potato Latkes with sour cream, apple sauce and chives (recipe courtesy of Brad's mom)

Peeling and grating all of those potatoes was the toughest part. I made the pot roast a day ahead so that the flavors could develop overnight. The brussel sprouts were roasted with just olive oil, pepper and salt. I bought them on the stem from Trader Joes, and it took a big knife to hack them all off. I felt like Indiana Jones.

The meal was a success! For dessert we had pumpkin ice cream and a raspberry tart that Ron and Fran brought. Delicious!

Potato Latkes

4 large potatoes

2 eggs

1 tsp salt

1 tsp pepper

1 tbsp flour or matzah meal

lots of grated onion (1-2 small ones)

Peel or wash the potatoes and grate on a medium grater. Pour off half of the liquid. Add beaten eggs and rest of ingredients. Fry on both sides. Serve hot with applesauce and sour cream.

Notes: Put the onions in first; it keeps the potatoes from turning. Also, soak the potatoes in water if you peel them.

Pumpkin Stuffed With Everything Good

Brad and I heard an episode of Good Food on KCRW and they were talking about a pumpkin recipe called "Pumpkin Stuffed With Everything Good". Once we heard the words cream, cheese, bacon and pumpkin, we knew we had to try it. As expected, this was a spectacular dish. You can either serve it in the pumpkin (everyone spoons out their servings), or you can serve it cut up. We substituted sausage for bacon, and used Gruyere for the cheese.

We served the pumpkin with a side dish of brussel sprouts with cranberries, walnuts and bacon. Click here for the recipe.

Ingredients

1 pumpkin, 2½–3 lbs
Salt and freshly ground pepper
¼ lb stale bread, thinly sliced and cut into ½-inch chunks
¼ lb cheese, such as Gruyère, Emmenthal, cheddar, or a combination, cut into ½-inch chunks
2–4 garlic cloves (to taste), split, germ removed, and coarsely chopped
4 slices bacon, cooked until crisp, drained, and chopped (my addition)
About ¼ cup snipped fresh chives or sliced scallions (my addition)
1 Tablespoon minced fresh thyme (my addition)
About 1/3 cup heavy cream
Pinch of freshly grated nutmeg

Ruth Reichl's Sort-Of-Pad-Thai Noodles

I love Ruth Reichl's writing. She sprinkles recipes throughout her autobiographical books, which makes them all the more fun to read. In one of her books, she had a recipe for sweet, spicy noodles. She said it was sort of like pad thai, but better. I made it the other night for Brad and we agreed it was indeed better than the original! It is very simple to make.

Here is the recipe:

http://www.ruthreichl.com/2010/08/sharp-sweet-spicy-noodles.html

Mastros, Beverly Hills

You know that commercial where a couple go to a fancy schmancy restaurant and are served tiny portions of food? They have to have a second dinner at home because they were still hungry after dinner!

When I was at Gordon Ramsay's restaurant a while back, I felt like I was in that commercial. I ordered a mushroom soup and they brought out a pitcher the size of a coffee creamer and then poured the tiny amount of soup into my amusingly large soup bowl.

If you spend the same amount of money at Mastro's, however, you will eat like a sumo wrestler. We went here for a friend's birthday party and we got the private room with a window overlooking the kitchen. We ordered the rib eye (split), oysters on the shell, and all the trimmings (including lobster mashed potatoes, green beans, brussel sprouts, and shishito peppers). The lobster mashed potatoes definitely lived up to the hype. Every bite I took contained a meaty, buttery piece of lobster.

By the end of the meal, I was uncomfortably full. Everybody had leftovers, and our steak was just as good the next day!

Mastros

Helena's Hawaiian Food, Honolulu

This was my first time trying Helena's Hawaiian Food in Honolulu, and I fell in love with the place. I prefer Helena's to Ono's; Helena's is less salty, and I love their combos and side. We got take out to take to the beach. If you don't feel like paying for admission to a tourist-y luau, this is the place to come for authentic Hawaiian food. If you're not sure how much to get, just ask the waiter or cashier and he or she will set you up with the perfect amount of food!

(front to back) poi, chicken long rice, lomi lomi salmon

(front to back) squid laulau, ahi poke with opihi, lau lau, short ribs

haupia coconut dessert in the back

Patrick's Road House, Santa Monica

The Jessica Burrito

Brad raves about Patrick's Road House every time we drive past it on PCH. It's one of his favorite after-surf spots to refuel. The other weekend on our way up to Malibu, I finally got to taste it for myself. We got a breakfast croissant sandwich and the Jessica burrito (not on the menu), both with sides of fruit. The croissant sandwich was my favorite--the bread was perfectly flaky and toasted. Inside of it was an egg, avocado, tomato and bacon. The restaurant itself is so cozy and has a great "home-like" feel to it. They just opened for dinner as well, so I can't wait to come back.

Breakfast croissant sandwich

Oatmeal Two Ways

Brad made "oatmeal, two ways" as a midnight snack for us the other night. The first way is with brown sugar and cinnamon. The second way is with soy sauce, furikake and a fried egg on top. Don't knock it until you try it!

Hokulani Cupcakes, Honolulu

We had a cupcake tower for our wedding, and Hokulani Bakery provided the sweets. The two flavors we chose were strawberry guava with cream cheese frosting and lilikoi with lemon cream cheese frosting. The cupcake topper is from Etsy seller Melabo.

Hokulani Bakery

Uncle Bo's, Honolulu

We were so lucky to have Uncle Bo's cater our wedding rehearsal dinner! They have a room in the back of the restaurant for special events, and we were treated to plate after plate of delicious dishes, buffet style. We started with appetizers that included kalua pig nachos, clams in white wine, Hawaiian pizza and dynamite shrimp. Then they brought out salads (Caesar, spinach, and more), and then main courses. The prime rib and the garlic rib eyes were both amazingly tender and flavorful--I couldn't stop eating them! There was more food than space in our bellies, but we kept eating. Dessert arrived and we feasted on fried ice cream, chocolate cake and fresh pineapple. By the time we had finished, everyone was happily stuffed. Thank you Uncle Bo's (and Brad's parents) for a delicious and memorable rehearsal dinner!