RESEP MASAKAN ORIENTAL

I just produced the chicken stir-fry recipe below as part of a contest Kraft is having on Youtube. You have to use one of 10 recipes they have listed and, of course, use the Kraft products described in the recipe. You've heard me countless times pleading with my viewers to make basic things like dressing, dry rubs, barbeques sauces, etc., at home. Better, cheaper, blah, blah…well, that was befor e I knew I could win $1,000. I'm now rethinking my whole "take down the corporate processed food industry" business plan. Well, maybe not, but I sure could use the money to help keep the site going. But seriously, as much as I'd like to think I'm changing my viewer's attitudes about buying and using these processed foods, I realize that there are times, and meals where they do make sense. This chicken stir-fry is a great example. It's super easy, tastes fine, and there's no overly complicated, multi-ingredient sauce to make. So, you foodies just simmer do...

Living in San Francisco, I’ve had more than my fair share of crab; prepared in more ways than I can remember, but I’ve never enjoyed it more than in this Singapore-style chili crabs recipe. Just be sure to have lots of napkins around. Lots of napkins. Apparently, this is the national dish of Singapore, and you can’t throw a rock without hitting someone eating a plate of it. By the way, that’s not something you’d want to try. Just ask Michael P. Fay. As far as I can tell, there’s no one standard way to make this. Besides the crab, and some kind of tomato product, I couldn’t find two recipes alike. What you see here is my take on this, but it does contain many of the most typical ingredients. Most are easy to find, except maybe the tamarind paste, although any high-end grocery chain should stock some in their international foods section. If you can’t find it, maybe add a little extra pinch of sugar, plus the juice and zest of one lemon. Obviously the most important ingredient is the cra...

If you’ve worked in restaurants before, you know that every night before service the staff sits down to what’s called the “family meal.” One of the younger cooks is usually charged with scraping together something filling and, more importantly, not expensive. I t was during one of these meals that I first had adobo. When I worked at the Carnelian Room in the late 80’s, much of the kitchen crew was Filipino, so chicken and pork adobo was a very common dinner. One of the dishwashers made a particularly great version, and I fell in love with the bold, simple flavors. I also remember being pretty annoyed that the dishwashers there were better cooks than I was at the time, but that’s another story. Anyway, I happened to have some duck legs around last week, and all it took was a well-timed email wishing for adobo to inspire this video. I understand that most of you will not use duck for this, but if you do, be sure to save the fat. Duck fat is prized by chefs, and more heart-healthy than pe...

I’m not sure when this relatively new tradition started, but for whatever reason, I like to come up with a new and interesting coleslaw to serve at Thanksgiving. With all the rich, heavy foods that the holiday table brings, I really enjoy the contrast these cold, crisp, bracing salads provide. I’ve been doing this for five or so years now, and this may be my favorite version. Just adding the always interesting Asian pear to a standard coleslaw would’ve been a nice enough touch, but what made this so special was the subtle heat from the pickled ginger. I can just imagine how great that piquant punch is going to work with roasted turkey, and while I still have weeks to wait for official verification, I’m pretty confident. I’m also confident you’ll be able to find some pickled ginger, especially if you have any sushi bars near you. By the way, this is not one of those “make the day before” coleslaws. You want everything fresh and crisp, and if you leave it overnight, not only will it get ...

Well, I'm back in lovely San Francisco after our whirlwind trip to New York City, and even though I have a serious case of jetlag, I wanted to post this highly simplified and quite Americanized version of Kung Pao chicken. Of course, I only mention the jetlag to explain any increase in the frequency of typos (I know you'll have my back as usual). If I ranked my top email requests, "an easy chicken stir-fry" is certainly in the top five. Of course, as I mention in the video, I don't even own a wok, so this isn't technically a "stir-fry," but it's close enough for the internet, so save your cards and letters. This fairly simple dish is loosely based on the spicy, Chinese take-out classic, Kung Pao chicken. The origins of the name, "Kung Pao" are difficult to trace, especially when you are too tired and lazy to do any research, but I assume the recipe's history is fascinating. I've pretty much stripped this down to the bare essenti...

This very delicious salmon video recipe features a classic flavor profile from Southeast Asia - garlic, ginger, and basil - all playing together in a slightly swe et, slightly spicy sauce. People are always looking for easy and quick salmon recipes, and this is both. As an added bonus, the fragrant sauce will scent your kitchen with more than the smell of seared salmon. There really isn’t anything to not like about this recipe…unless you are a food stylist. I can't think of a harder recipe to make look great in a photo. The chopped basil turns dark green a s soon as it hits the sauce, and against the coral fi sh, looks almost black. In fact, as I admit in the video, I almost skipped the basil knowing what dark horrors it would inflict on my beautiful sauce. Luckily, I didn’t succumb to such superficial concerns as the flavor the herb gives the salmon is critical. When cooking, the form verses function debate is always settled with a fork. By the way, you can make three equally del...

Some headlines just write themselves. So, there I was, wracking my brain trying to figure out the perfect gift for my Sushi-loving friend (you know… the one that’s always forgetting things in the oven), and then I saw it; a Sushi (Nigiri to be completely accurate) kitchen timer! How serendipitous! Okay, I’m sure this sounds like a fish tale, and it is. Well, at least the part about looking for a gift for a Sushi-loving friend. I ran across this very ironic gadget (raw fish on a timer for cooking things?) in the same shop I found the Mario Batali toy, WinkSF. I figured I would post this is case you actually do have to find a gift for a Sushi-loving friend (you know…the one that’s always forgetting things in the oven).

I don’t do a lot of copycat recipes; mostly because I don’t eat at the restaurants people are requesting the recipes from. I mean, unless they're going to throw in a couple bottles of wine, I’m not going to Olive Garden to figure out how they do their breadsticks. These chicken lettuce wraps however, are a delicious exception. When I go back to visit my mom, we usually make it to P.F. Chang’s at least once, and always start the meal with their very popular chicken lettuce wraps. Off the record, they do a good job with most of the dishes I’ve had, but the wraps are clearly my favorite. There’s an addictive quality to the contrasting combination of flavors and textures, and since this recipe has been requested many times, I decided I’d give it a go. Fair warning, I did almost no serious corporate espionage to find out what’s actually in these, but regardless, I loved how this came out, and it seems close enough. One key here is to use a very large, non-stick pan, so the braising liqu...

I've had a lot of requests lately for easy, but different, vegetable side dishes. So, today's video recipe is an extremely easy, yet unusual, carrot side dish using one of my favo rite "secret" ingredients; Chinese 5-spice. This spice mix was invented literally thousands of years ago, and is suppose to season food in perfect balance with the five elementary flavors of Chinese cuisine (and all cuisines for that matter); sweet, sour, bitter, salty and savory. The most common blend is equal parts ground cinnamon, star anise, fennel, cloves, and p epper. Some versions also use ground ginger and other spices. In fact, as you'll see (and hear…warning: gratuitous sound effects ahead) in the video clip when I looked at my 5-spice bottle's ingredient list I got 7 spices! It had the usual five, but I also got ginger and licorice. I actually could have called it 8-spice, but I only counted the two peppers as one ingredient in the clip. Seven is my lucky number, so th...

The first time I had a spicy, cold rice noodle salad, it wasn’t the bold flavors that caught me by surprise, but the strange and addictive texture. It was so different to any pasta salad I’d ever had before, that I was kind of bummed I hadn’t known about this stuff sooner. Makes me sad to think about all the time back I wasted on those stupid, tri-color fusilli salads. Anyway, this is pretty easy and delicious stuff. I’m not even sure these noodles are technically cooked, but simply softened in very hot water to your personal preference of tenderness. You can, and many do, boil this stuff like pasta for a couple minutes, and have what’s much closer to a proper al dente angel hair, but I much prefer the toothsomeness you get using the hot water method.  Unlike undercooked wheat flour pastas, this isn’t a gummy, crunch, but much more of a “pop” or “snap” as your teeth break through the almost tender noodles. Once soaked with the vibrant dressing, and topped with the optional, but hi...

Some store-bought sauces and condiments make sense. Ketchup, mayo, and mustard can all be made, but in general, for your average home cook, the price and convenience of these prepared foods doesn't usually justify making them from scratch. The danger with grabbing a jar of relatively harmless Dijon is that just down that aisle you're going to pass by the "Asian" section, and be tempted by a colorful array of barbecue sauces and marinades. The names are so exotic and enticing. The picture on the label shows glistening ribs, dripping with juice. The instructions say "just pour over meat and grill" - hey, that sounds easy! And then, you look at the ingredient list. The only words you recognize are "high fructose corn syrup," and "dehydrated garlic." But, it's already in your hand, and that meat in the picture sure does look tasty, so in the cart it goes. Hopefully, when you see this video recipe for my basic Asian barbecue sauce/marinade...

Michele and I had a nice dinner tonight at the Jasmine Garden, a Vietnamese restaurant a few blocks from our flat. In case you've never been, ma ny Vietnamese dishes are served with a side plate of garnishes, including lots of mint and basil. I brought home some of the mint, since I've never seen it before, and I'm hoping that someone out there can tell me what it is. The waiter said it was a mint they get from Thailand. I didn't want to press him on it, but do they really fly in mint from Thailand? It almost looked like regular mint, except that each bunch had a couple freakishly big leaves. The other odd thing was the leaves are dark green on one side and purple on the other. The taste was minty, with basil-ish undertones. Can anyone help enlighten me?

I was calling this green coconut chicken recipe a curry all the way up until I started writing the post. The problem with calling something a curry is that people expect it to taste like a curry, and that could mean a whole bunch of things, not all of them good. So, I decided to call it something that wouldn’t necessarily recall a strong taste memory. While there is a nice dose of red curry powder in the braise, it's certainly not the dominate flavor. For something that may seem quite exotic and boldly spiced, this a surprisingly mellow dish. If you've never cooked with coconut milk, this would be a nice recipe to change that. The coconut milk adds a subtle sweetness and richness that makes it a great vehicle for moving around all kinds of tastes and textures. I've used this same exact procedure for countless versions using beef, pork, lamb, duck, and seafood, with great results. It's not low in fat, but my s ources deep inside the coconut industry tell me the fat is qu...

For this weekend’s filler clip I’m posting this very amusing bit of video from the David Letterman show, featuring Jamie Oliver. I’m a big Jamie Oliver fan. I like his simple approach and real enthusiasm (unlike many TV Chef’s who just turn on the passion for the camera). Famous Chefs have been going on Letterman for years to plug books, shows, new restaurants, etc., and they all have basically the same experience; as they are trying to cook their signature dish, Mr. Letterman is goofing around, asking bizarre questions to distract them, drinking olive oil, pretending to burn or cut himself, and generally doing everything possible to prevent the poor Chef from finishing his or her dish properly. It’s basically a running gag by now, and several Chefs will no longer appear on the show for fear of being made to look like a fool again. Well, Jamie Oliver does a great job in this clip of holding it all together. He actually keeps Letterman under control (sort of), finishes the dish (wh...

I just returned from dinner at a place here in San Francisco called Shanghai Dumpling King, where Michele and I enjoyed their famous Xiao Long Bao, or, as it’s also known, Shanghai soup dumplings. I got the tip from my friend, Amy Sherman, from Cooking with Amy , and she was not kidding. They were so incredibly good. The photo is of some crab and pork dumplings I just posted on Instagram (btw, if you want to follow my foodie adventures in all their photographic glory, you should get that app). When I got home, I went to YouTube to try and find a how-to video for it, and lo and behold, there was a great one…shot in the exact same restaurant we had just left! I love when that happens. Anyway, this comes from the fine folks at Chow.com , and features chef Andrea Nguyen , author of the celebrated cookbook, Asian Dumplings, and Shanghai Dumpling King’s chef and owner Lu Kuang. Enjoy!

As promised, here’s the new and improved peanut dipping sauce recipe we just featured in the beef satay video. Of course, now I’m finding out that real beef satay is actually served with a sweet, spicy rice vinegar sauce, but that’s another video, and a rather easy one at that. Stay tuned. There are no great mysteries here – mix it up, and then taste, taste, and taste. Peanut sauces are like snowflakes, and you really should twist the formula to suit your palette. You can add all kinds of fun stuff like lemongrass, ginger, Thai basil just to name a few. If peanut allergies are a concern, I’ve had this done with almonds, and it’s not bad at all. One big tip if you make this ahead. It will harden up in the fridge, and you’ll need to get it back to room temp before serving. I usually just microwave for a couple seconds, and it will be back to its gorgeous, shiny, flowing self. I hope you give this delicious all-purpose dipping sauce a try soon. Enjoy! Makes about 1 1/2 cup Peanut Dippin...

Beef satay was the very first Thai food I ever tasted, and it was literally love at first bite. Ah, that sweet, spicy, salty, smoky, and slightly funky bite…I remember it like it was yesterday.  It helps that I ate this yesterday, but still. If you’ve never had satay before, its lightning bolt of flavor can be a bit of a shock to the system. A recipe for the subtle palate, this is not. By the way, I do know that satay was actually invented in Indonesia, but for the purposes of this blog post, we're going with that it's Thai. This will work on just about any meat, but beef is my favorite. There’s something about beef and these particular spices that just sings. Also, the magic that Asian fish sauce always adds is never more apparent than with beef, especially if that beef destined for the charcoal grill. The same goes for the lemongrass. If you look around the produce aisle at your town’s best (meaning most expensive) grocery store, you should find some lemongrass stalks. They...

Before I get into this recipe, and how it came to be, we have to talk about a somewhat shocking ingredient choice I made. Yes, in the middle of summer, I filmed an amazingly delicious sweet corn recipe…and used frozen corn! I already had the shiitake mushrooms and arugula for this dish, and was just about to go out and get some delicious fresh, just picked, sweet corn at the local produce market when I made the mistake of opening the freezer. There it was, a bag a sweet corn. It had been in there for a while, so I was sure it was freezer-burned and I would just chuck it out and go. Unfortunately, I checked it and it was fine. Damn. I thought I better taste it; it’s probably not sweet. It was really sweet. Damn. So I decided to be a good, frugal Chef and use it for this recipe. The good news for you is this was so delicious with frozen corn, I can only imagine how incredible it’s going to be with freshly shucked corn! I had this combo as a side vegetable recently and found it a very int...

Finally, after only five or six hundred requests, we’re posting a quinoa recipe! People love eating this “super food” for all the obvious nutritional reasons, but based on the emails I’ve received, they’re constantly searching for new and delicious ways to use it. Well, this was so tasty, so fast, and so easy, I’ll be shocked if it doesn’t make it into the regular rotation. And don’t think for a minute that we’ve simply overwhelmed the quinoa with a bunch of high-calorie, unhealthy ingredients, because that’s not the case. Not that I’m above such culinary shenanigans; but it just wasn’t necessary. I was really surprised how decadent and satisfying this seemed, and with only a tablespoon of vegetable oil, and a handful of very lean smoked ham. These tiny quinoa seeds (that’s right, now you can sound like a d-bag correcting your foodie friends at cocktail parties who call this a “grain”) really are sponges for flavor. I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I can’t wait to experiment with...

What’s my favorite kind of recipe to post on Food Wishes? Any recipe that I’ve never tried before, and this green tea mochi ice cream is a perfect example. In the kitchen, there’s nothing quite like the thrill of having no idea what you’re doing. I’ve had it many times in restaurants, and have always been fascinated by its unique combination of taste and texture, but I had absolutely no clue how it was done. I basically still don't, but regardless, this was my first attempt and I look forward to lots of criticism. I probably should've done a little more research, but I glanced at a few recipes, and decided to just go for it. Remember, these early experiments can yield a lot of great experience, especially if it’s a totally failure. Happily, this wasn’t. All in all, I think it came out very well. I went with green tea flavored mochi, and while I usually see it paired with green tea ice cream, I decided to go with plain vanilla, and really enjoyed how the subtle, aromatic bitter...