Matsutake Kaiseki

When a friend of ours passed us a batch of freshly picked Matsutake mushrooms from Yunnan, I decided to turn that into a feast of mushrooms for six people, Iron-chef style. 

Coq au Blue Nun

I bought this bottle of Blue Nun as part of a prank for a few wine-loving friends who were around long enough to remember the brand being the de facto standard bearer of German wines in the late 70s and early 80s – no, I still wasn’t legally allowed to drink then but I did remember having a sip or two when I was a kid. We ended up not opening that bottle to drink that evening – rightfully so – and it’s been sitting around at home since. Guess the joke was on me. 

Chef Vs (Paella) Pan

I did say it would be a long while before I will even consider doing the “chef gig” thing again since my “debut” at PMQ Taste Kitchen a few months ago. But when Chef Alex Fargas and his team approached me to be the guest chef for the weekend brunch menu at his restaurant La Paloma, it seems like a project having too much fun to say no to. The restaurant in Sai Ying Pun, with the promise of serving “Sexy Tapas”, has been doing this “Chef Vs Pan” series for a while, in which once a month one outside chef would come in to deliver his/her version of paella (using the giant 40-inch pan) and roast suckling pig as part of their weekend brunch menu.

Super Fancy Potluck

I was scratching my head over what to make when I went to a potluck meal recently. A few friends came over to our place to eat previously with each bringing a dish over to share, and this time, we went for a repeat at a different venue with a few others to join for good fun, with no others than the culinary team of Caprice with the meal held over at the private room at the back of the restaurant after their lunch service.

Chef Dan's Masterclass

After calling Chef Dan Calvert’s roast chicken the best in town, I have always wanted to know more how the dish was done at his restaurant Belon. And I got my chance of learning when he’s hosting the “masterclass” as part of the Gaggenau Culinary Artisan program sponsored by the home appliance maker Gaggenau and its local distributor Kitchen Infinity.

PMQ Taste Kitchen Experience: After

"Will you do it again?" is the question I was asked most often after my brief stint at the PMQ Taste Kitchen was dusted and over. For the first few times I thought about that, feeling totally shattered after consecutive days of clocking 18 hours standing in the kitchen or running around, I was like… "no freaking way!" and I was just happy to play my old role of judging and criticizing chefs instead of being one.

PMQ Taste Kitchen Experience: During

"Service!"… midway through the PMQ Taste Kitchen pop-up event I was still getting used to the notion that someone would come to assist (almost) immediately in the kitchen once the dishes were plated and ready to serve - sometimes I wish it's like that at home. Rewinding a few days back, as the dates of the pop-up approached, I began to feel the pressure as the seats starting to fill up even before we posted the menu and other details online. At the same time, everything else appears to be on schedule - that gave me some sense of comfort until the "real fun" began (or all hell broke loose, depends on how you see it) when we opened for business.

PMQ Taste Kitchen Experience: Before

"Food is so good that you should open your own restaurant!" – any amateur cook who hosted dinner party at home must have heard compliments like this from time to time. While I believe in my case many of those comments were made only out of appreciation for the effort rather than merits, it does made me wonder what it is like working in a kitchen in a real restaurant other than my own home's. And that random thought, plus an unplanned meet-up and chat with my friends J and D one afternoon led to myself taking over a pop-up restaurant for a few days in May.

Festive Baos

We were hosting breakfast at church for about 70 people for a second time at the end of February and this time I experimented with a new recipe – or rather, a traditional one with a slight twist. I always prefer a hot breakfast over the usual cold pastries, especially during winter and the first time we did a steamed gua-bao with pork belly with some success (at least I think most people seem to like it), so I thought we would do an encore, except this time I am going to make one in red color, something I called the “Chinese New Year Special Edition”.

Kinmedai no Yuanyaki

It’s an impulse buy when I picked up a whole kinmedai (goldeneye snapper) at the Kagoshima Fish Market in the morning just before I was taking the return flight home that afternoon. I was there to check out the shokudo there for a quick breakfast early morning, then after the meal I saw this beautiful fish lying on the bench at one of the market stalls. Since I was going to cook something for the potluck dinner back home the same evening (“with any goodies I found from the trip”, as I told the host P and S), I bought the fish, asked the fishmonger to separate the head and tail from the body and wrap everything nicely in an icepack, and I then put it in a stainless steel box in my check-in luggage.

Feb-ulous Kyoto: Cooking at Our Temporary Home

One of the main reasons of renting a house rather than staying in a hotel was to have the opportunity to spend more time eating in rather than dining out all the time during our quick weekend getaway in Kyoto. I am always fascinated at the variety and quality of food ingredients found in the area, so I thought it will be interesting to actually cook with whatever I came across in the market at the time of our visit.

Dessert Masterclass

We have been nudging Chef Nicolas of Caprice to teach us how to make some of his amazing desserts, and we were super excited that he spared one Saturday morning last month doing just that at his kitchen for a few of us. Though the lunch service wouldn’t start until a few hours away, the kitchen at Caprice was already getting busy, with much of the preparation well underway.

Cooking Experiment #3: I am Team Steam

"Are you on Team Steam or Team Boil?" a food magazine raised this question in its recent issue about crabs - referring to the "right" way of cooking them. In my adopted home state of Maryland, famous for its crab dishes using Atlantic blue crabs from the nearby Chesapeake Bay, we are firm believers of Team Steam and the question was not even debatable, period.

Summer Produce: Young Ginger Roots

Ginger root might be available all year long in local wet markets and grocery stores, but you will only see the milder young ginger root (子薑) in early summer, beginning at around the time of Dragon Boat Festival until early August. It’s rather easy to distinguish them – the regular, mature ginger roots are often tougher with dark, thick skins; while the young ginger roots, though in the same size, her thinner and paler, almost translucent skin, looks juicier and more tender, with a pinkish tint towards the tip.

Thai Cooking Class

Knowing I love cooking at home from time to time, my friend M asked me to tag along to a special cooking class event organized by the local Thai consulate, instructed by Chef Nooror Somany Steppe and her daughter Sandra Steppe from Blue Elephant Cooking School and Restaurant in Bangkok.

Summer Recipe: Southern Style Corn Fritters

While spending late evenings watching the French Open on TV a few weeks ago, I was looking to fix up something quick to munch on. That's when I saw the cob of corns in the refrigerator, the one that I left behind by accident after getting a few of them in the weekend farmer's market for my bento lunches.

In Search of the Best Fried Chicken

Fried chicken was probably not what the doctor prescribed as I was still nursing a bit of a flu and recovering from a redeye flight home less than 24 hours ago, but I joined a few others at Jinjuu at Lan Kwai Fong earlier this week to judge at the "Winner Winner Chicken Dinner" and see who won the bragging right for having the "Best Fried Chicken in Hong Kong".

The Timeless Savarin

When our friends R and A asked us to bring a dessert to dinner at their place recently, I decided to do something simple yet classic, making use a small set of readily-available ingredients in the kitchen (hence saved me another trip to the supermarket in a cold winter day).

Early Morning at L'altro

A few Saturdays ago I was at the Italian restaurant L'altro in Central again to check out the new seasonal dishes by Chef Mauro. He also wanted to do a few bespoke dishes for us using seasonal ingredients, so we began early in the morning on a "field trip" to Graham Street Market, one of the oldest market in town and only a block away from the restaurant.

Caramel Icecream with Salted Egg Yolks

This recipe is based on a dessert I recently made when my friends came over for dinner, and was inspired by a similar version I had at a restaurant not long ago. Salted caramel has long been my flavor of choice when I want to fix up something quick and easy, and it's proved to be a crowd-pleaser time and time again. But this time I was serving this with a slight twist, putting grated salted egg yolks on top of the scoop of icecream.