Skip to content

Posts from the ‘Goodie Obsession’ Category

Festival of Bites

Mithai make my teeth hurt and my tongue happy. I’ve always been a sucker for hyper pigmented foods, sweets in particular. But I’m more familiar with tiny S.E. Asian style snacks than these Indian counterparts. Where Malaysian/Singaporean kueh, Thai kanom and Vietnamese banh tend to be variations on glutinous rice, rice flour, coconut milk, agar-agar and mung beans (it’s amazing the mileage you can get out of small repertoire), mithai revolve around evaporated milk, ghee, chickpea flour, nuts and spices (often cardamom and saffron). Dairy definitely looms larger and creates a richness that coconut milk can’t.

I’ve come to know and love the fudgey-textured burfi (sometimes called barfi, but I prefer the more appetizing spelling) and syrup soaked galub jamun. The high sugar content isn’t what causes the tooth ache—my sweet tooth knows no bounds—it’s the sometimes used edible silver leaf that’s the culprit. I have the feeling that if these goodies were all whites and neutrals I would be less enamored of them than in their magenta and chartreuse glory. That is their beauty. Americans (of a certain type) tend to be down on the unnatural and artificial, but how do you argue with tradition? But then, I also like the fake green pistachio gelato better than the dull toned purist version.

There are quite a few places around the city to pick up some mithai. Sukhadia’s and Rajbhog are both chains, but there are also smaller shops and branches of these two biggies in neighborhoods like Jackson Heights and Richmond Hill, Queens (not to mention my new favorite New Jersey locale, Edison). Buying these gems is almost an old fashioned candy counter experience, they are tucked on trays in glass cases, come by the pound and are placed in a little box tied with string.

Having a limited knowledge of mithai, I only a vague idea what any particular item is since they’re not labeled or described in any fashion. And being NYC, there’s always a crowd around the counter so I feel pressured to move it along and pick and point quickly and without questions. But then, I’m overly sensitive to this sort of thing, holding up lines, looking dumb, when I see inquisitive, indecisive folks all the time.

I recently stopped by a storefront whose name I can’t recall on 74th St. in Jackson Heights. My interest had been rekindled while reading a recent New York Times article on mithai, but I waited until the weekend after Diwali to beat the holiday hordes. I indulged in the sweets pictured below, and I’m not sure how long six pieces are meant to last, but I purchased them Saturday afternoon and had eaten them all by Sunday evening. That’s exactly why I can’t have candy sitting around the house.

Mithai

Pista (pistachio) burfi and something Rajbhog calls sweet cutlet, though I suspect that’s not its proper name.

Chicken Soup for the Office Worker’s Soul

I’m afraid I won’t be having my favorite lunch, chicken udon from Yagura on 41st St., for much longer. I sense a new job on the horizon (just a feeling—I don’t want to jinx anything) which will put me in a different part of midtown (really, I could do without midtown altogether). I suppose a new job is better than Japanese chicken noodle soup, but I’ll still miss my $4.88 plastic tub full from around the corner.

I don’t fully understand the whole umami concept, but I think this soup is rife with it. There’s an extra taste in there and it’s not simply salt. Supposedly, the konbu and bonito flakes which create dashi, the broth that is the basis for many Japanese soups, are an umami powerhouse when combined.

The noodles are fat and chewy and just filling enough. I’ve tried it with soba before, and while adequate, the overall effect was mealy and nibbly rather than teeth chompingly satisfying.

I would almost say the soup is healthy if it weren’t for the chicken. They include a handful of thick hacked up skin-on slices that I’m sure ooze fat all through the liquid. And the skin is browned and still crisp in parts, which implies that it hasn’t been stewed to death. That might be the clincher, the poultry is a separate entity and not a stock component either. Most chicken soups seem over cooked and dreary by comparison. I’ve never had any last long enough to refrigerate for later, but I’ve been curious if a white lardy layer would form atop the surface. There are some things you just don’t need to know.

Sometimes they forget to sprinkle the scallion slices on top, and you wouldn’t think it’d matter but it does. You need that tiny crisp onion contrast. I also keep a little bottle of Japanese chili powder in my drawer to spruce up the already flavorful soup. Three good shakes usually does the trick.

Udon_1

Sarawakian Experiment

Laksapaste_4Sarawak Laksa

300g Sarawak laksa paste (I'm keeping this metric because that's how the paste comes packaged)

8 cups chicken stock

1 cup thick coconut milk

16 oz thick rice vermicelli (I couldn't’t figure out how thick they meant, so I opted for the thicker of the two types I had in the pantry. I'm pretty sure Sarawak laksa doesn't use the round rice noodles, which are next to impossible to find in NYC anyway)

Toppings

¼ cup beansprouts (you’re supposed to blanch, but I didn’t bother)

3 1/2 oz. chicken (half a medium breast) poached and shredded
5 large prawns cooked and shelled (I used half a pound of smaller prawns because I needed to use them up. Consider this an American adaptation, heavier on the protein)

Ricenoodles_2Garnish

2 eggs, cooked into an omelet and cut into strips
¼ cup cilantro leaves, chopped

3 calimansi, halved (I lucked out in finding these at the Elmhurst Hong Kong Supermarket, as opposed to my usual Sunset Park location. Lime wedges would also be fine)

Boil laksa paste and chicken stock together for 15 minutes. Strain into a pot. Add coconut milk and mix well. Season to taste with sugar and salt.

Briefly boil dried noodles to soften. Drain, and divide into serving bowls. Add toppings in order listed. Ladle laksa gravy on top.

Garnish with omelet strips and cilantro.

Calimansi_4 Serve with sambal and lime halves.

Sambal
5 cloves garlic

2 shallots

Half a medium onion
¼ cup dried chiles, soaked in hot water
2 tablespoons dried shrimp, soaked and drained

5 tablespoons oil (the original calls for 6-8 tablespoons, but that felt excessive—hopefully, I didn’t ruin the flavor)
3 ½ tablespoons chile paste (I used sambal oelek)
1 tablespoon tamarind paste mixed with 3 tablespoons water

1 tablespoon sugar

½ teaspoon salt

Pound garlic, shallots, onion, dried chiles and dried shrimp into a paste using a mortar and pestle. Or alternatively, use a food processor. I usually go for the mortar and pestle (it's easier to clean, and of course more traditional) but I don't have the patience to break down the dried chiles properly.

Heat oil and fry the sambal ingredients until brown and aromatic. Add chile paste and tamarind liquid and season to taste with sugar and salt. Continue cooking over low heat for 25 minutes.

Serves four.

Adapted from Savouring Sarawak, Flavours, July-August 2005.

Sarawaklaksa_3 
I'm definitely neither food stylist nor photographer, but you get the gist.

I was lucky enough to be given a package of Double Red Swallow Sarawak laksa paste as a gift when in Kuala Lumpur. This is the good stuff, straight from Kuching. It's hard to find even in Malaysia, never mind the U.S. I hope I did it proud. As I've never had Sarawak style laksa before, it's hard to gauge how close my version comes to the original.

I do think I my sambal turned out hotter than what I'd tasted in Malaysia. I have a high heat tolerance and it still burnt the taste out of my tongue (I just ate some with chicken and rice for lunch and my mouth is now numb). I was trying to measure the dried chiles with a food scale, using the metrics from the original recipe, but I don't think the calibration is sensitive enough–no matter how many chiles I piled on, the needle barely budged. My 1/4 cup suggestion  is less than what I used, and probably wiser.

Rangoon Run

Ok, I just went outside for the first time today (well, technically I was in the hall earlier for about 15 min. barefooted and wet-haired answering census bureau questions about crime) to get Chinese take out (I’m too cheap to have it delivered. I’ve always had a thrifty streak but I fear it’s getting worse. The other day at work they had all these pastries and fresh fruit set up in a common area as a reward for everyone moving offices [my office wasn’t moving] so of course I had to get some. But the truly miserly librarian-ish behavior came out after the food was all gone. I actually went out and saw all the plastic cutlery that hadn’t been used, grabbed a bunch and stashed it in my drawer. Jesus. And when I recently visited the swanky bathroom at Yumcha for my birthday dinner I was completely wowed by the almost cotton towel quality of their nicely folded paper towels and crammed a handful in my purse because I figured they’d make better subway sweat mops than the Kleenex I’d been using that sticks to my face and that I’m unaware of until hours later when I look in a mirror).

I don’t do the ubiquitous NYC hole-in-the-wall Chinese thing very often, but when I do I’m always shocked at the insane amount of food. Even as a penny-pincher and glutton, I’m a little appalled. No wonder they’re so popular. All I really wanted were crab rangoon, a mild guilty pleasure that I only seem to eat when I’m alone. But I figured I’d get one of those combos too to not look like a total freak (that’s the other reason I didn’t do delivery—the 10 for $3.25 rangoons don’t meet the minimum).

String beans and pork seemed mildly healthy, at least there would be some vegetables and nothing else breaded and/or fried. I picked the $7 dinner for one, which ended up also including a shitload of fried rice (the default, I was fine with plain white), fried wontons, wonton soup, sweet and sour spareribs and “chicken fingers.” Oh, and a can of soda, which I turned down because I’m not pop person. But they were all “it’s free,” which I realized, and then felt bad for saying no and got a ginger ale. Easily dinner for three, or two hungry people. I don’t know whether I should be impressed with how much food I got for around ten bucks or disturbed. Self-imposed portion control, I guess (for the record, I only ate half the rangoons and all the spareribs). So, I might be a pathetic Sat. night Chinese take out food orderer, but I draw the line at watching Ghost Dad on the PAX Network. Who knew it was directed by Sidney Poitier?

I think rangoons are best enjoyed with Thai sweet chile sauce, but dammit if I wasn’t out. I improvised using rooster sauce mixed with one of those orange duck sauce plastic packets. Nice emergency substitution.

Rangoon

Sidewalk Score

Despite not being terribly collectible, I persist in collecting that late ‘60s/early ‘70s Time Life Foods of the World series. I’m certain that these books are gathering dust in corners of thrift stores and crannies of basements around the nation. But NYC is no second-hand paradise, no matter what natives will boast. I rely on my mom to send any (there are picture-filled hardbacks and accompanying spiral-bound recipe soft covers) she scores out west my way. She’s inexplicably started an Amazon.com hobby-business selling used books, not a bad Portland proposition since the city’s roaming with cast offs at prices you’d never find here.

I was walking home from work, just a block away on 3rd Pl. when I noticed a hearty, manly roast beef photograph staring up from the sidewalk at me. What the heck? It was the British Isles volume, one I was lacking. Now all the secrets of Yorkshire pudding, toad-in-the-hole and cockaleekie, illustrated in creepy-cool still life, are all mine.

Roastbeef

Fishchips

Haggis
Haggis fanfare

The Three Faces of Mazzola

First I started out on a highbrow roll with this heirloom tomato white anchovy salad I’d made last week out of the current Food and Wine. It was a little wet from sitting around a few days, but all the better to soak up with a nice slice of crusty French country bread. Cheesebread But then I broke into the cheese bread (I stopped in the local bakery Mazzola only to pick up a loaf of French bread, but then went crazy when the girl asked “anything else?” Oh, the pressure, the upselling) which is insane and pure fat. The loaf is so stuffed with aged provolone that it soaks through the paper bag with oil. And I’ve eaten almost half the damn thing in the three hours I’ve been home from work.

At least I refrained from also picking a lard bread. Yes, lard bread. I’m not sure that it’s laced with actual lard (ok, it is), but there are big chunks of salami strewn throughout. Funny, I just found a reference to this bread from this exact bakery on a librarian’s blog from Eugene, OR. And it must be good because based upon the stuff this person seems to usually eat they verge on vegan.  At least by NYC standards. Organic, animal product shunning is way more mainstream in Oregon.

Mazzola1

Mazzola3

Mazzola2
I don't know why they have so many different bags.

Lotsa Laksa

Laksa is a many-splendored soup. Practically very nook and cranny on the Malay Peninsula claims a regional variation. I wonder how many types I’ll be able to try during my upcoming Singapore and Malaysia trip? Here’s a Wiki take on the topic.

Dim Sum Redux

New York City does all right in the food department, but sometimes I long for the west coast. Daly City, CA has it all: In-N-Out Burger, Filipino chain restaurants and Koi Palace, which I’ve heard has some of the best dim sum in the U.S. Koi Palace also has pretty dim sum pictures and a seriously comprehensive menu. (Now that I think about it, I have family in Daly City that I haven’t seen in over twenty years, but it’s doubtful they partake in the multitude of Asian goodies available.)

Despite loving dim sum, it’s very rare that I actually get out and eat any. It might have something to with not possessing the breakfast/brunch gene. Weekends are for sleeping in, it takes effort to transform into an early bird eater (though I more than make up for it throughout the day). My most recent foray into the realm of rolling carts and tiny treats was at World Tong, which is currently one of the better NYC choices. Don’t be scared of Bensonhurst.

Crab Rangoon (half-assed & trashy version)

Purists (as if there could be such a thing) will cringe at my tinkering with a classic. Maybe I’ve just been skimming too many whack mom-ish food publications like Weight Watchers and Kraft Food & Family. I ended up using reduced fat cream cheese (though I’d never advocate fat free for any purpose, except maybe spackling) so I wouldn’t feel guilty (no, I’m not one of those types who drinks Diet Coke with candy) and fake crab because I’m cheap and actually like the taste. If I were making a smaller batch or trying to impress strangers outside of a Super Bowl party, I’d certainly use real crab meat. At least I didn’t use garlic powder.

More musings on this unlikely delicacy can be found here.

8 ounces crab meat
8 ounces cream cheese, softened
2 garlic cloves, minced
dash of Worcestershire sauce
1 green onion, chopped (optional)
48 square wonton wrappers
salt and pepper
oil for frying

Mix cream cheese, crab meat (if using the fake stuff, it won’t flake nicely, so chop it instead), garlic, Worcestershire and onion, if using, until well combined. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

Spoon 1 teaspoon of filling onto wonton wrapper. The edges can be wet and folded simply in half for a diamond shape or continued by pinching the two corners and adhering to the center with another dab of water.

Heat oil to 375 degrees, deep-fry rangoons in batches (don’t overcrowd) for about 3 minutes, or until golden. Drain on paper towels.

Serve with hot mustard and/or sweet chile sauce. I highly recommend this Thai version.

Makes 48 crab rangoons, about five per person (unless you are feeding freaks, they will seriously all get eaten)

Crab Rangoon

I can’t believe that I spent most of my life oblivious to the charms of crab rangoon. Well, I did grow up occasionally eating cheese-filled won ton skins at American-Chinese restaurants. They came with combo platters that might also contain fried shrimp (which would always make me sick—there’s something about battered, fried seafood that’s hard to stomach—though it hasn’t put me off soft shell crabs), stir fries laden with corn starch and celery and those little dishes of ketchup, blobbed with a hot mustard streak and a sprinkling of sesame seeds. But we just called those golden, cheesy things won tons.

I’ve since discovered that in New York City parlance won ton, at least at the one-per-block chop suey joints, means those uninspired, thin strips of fried dough that come in greasy little transparent bags. Crispies, as I call them, aren’t good for much more than floating in hot and sour soup. Crab rangoon, as it turns out, is akin to my childhood notion of what a won ton is: a creation where the presence of crab is usually undetectable, though a wisp of scallion might make it into the filling.

To allay some confusion The Food Lover’s Companion defines won tons as “bite-size dumplings consisting of paper-thin dough pillows filled with a minced mixture of meat, seafood and/or vegetables” So really, rangoons are more won ton (though of course cream cheese was not part of that definition) than NYC crispies are (which isn’t surprising, the city tends to mangle foodstuffs. I’ll never get used to hearing gyro pronounced “jai ro”).

Ubiquitous on local take out menus, I was swayed by the description of cheese won tons one lonely evening in my Greenwood Heights basement apartment, an abysmal culinary no-man’s land (good food wasn’t the only thing lacking—banks, drug stores and Laundromats were all in short supply while copious strip clubs, adult bookstores and a federal prison dotted the next block). Creamy, crunchy, caloric…the three Cs seemed like the perfect greasy antidote to my glum surroundings (the only bright beacon being the White Castle mere steps away from Twin Lin, said Chinese storefront). It was a good decision, and only set me back $4.50 for ten rangoons with sweet and sour sauce (some restaurants just include packets of duck sauce).

And where the Rangoon descriptor comes in is anyone’s guess, there’s nothing remotely Burmese about the golden treats. It reeks of Polynesian invention, pu pu platters, mai tais, exotica. This line of reasoning was bolstered by a feature on Trader Vic’s in the December 2004 Saveur, “Crab Rangoon & Bongo Bongo Soup.” It included a delectable sounding rangoon recipe where the crustacean plays prominently in taste and texture—Trader Vic was no slouch. I have a couple of Trader Vic’s cookbooks in storage, unfortunately, on the opposite side of the country, I’d be curious to see crab rangoon is mentioned. I know the restaurant has had its heyday, but a visit to the granddad of tiki chic would be fun, nonetheless. Unfortunately, the nearest location is in Chicago, and that’s a bit of a haul.

On my recent maiden voyage to Stew Leonard’s I was most impressed by the big boxes of frozen crab Rangoon (the animatronic singing cows placed a close second). This was a score, and also a comfort during yet another despondent lull in my life. Despite currently dwelling in a nicer apartment and neighborhood, I still get bummed over my annual Christmas alone in NYC predicament. Crab rangoon to the rescue. I ended up eating the whole box over the course of that holiday week (and out of desperation turned to frozen jalepeno poppers when the rangoons ran dry) with sweet Thai chile sauce, the ultimate pairing if you ask me. But don’t get the impression that crab Rangoon is only meant to be enjoyed while sad and alone just because I turn to the fatty treat in times of need. Heavens no, what’s more social than warm cheese and fried dough? A plate of rangoons, a bottle of chile sauce, and thou.

Roll Your Own: Crab Rangoon Recipes

Gorton’s No, I wouldn’t trust food from a company that combines goldfish crackers and frozen fish sticks to make Fish on a Log, either.
Ming Tsai goes haute with cranberry chutney and a $50 Chardonnay pairing
Low carb (barf)