Fish Tacos!

Beer-battered Fish Tacos with Calamansi Cream

I'm back, it's been a while!!! Living in NYC and going to culinary school has given me tools and a lot of brilliant ideas for more kitchen experiments.  Experiments, I suppose, are born out of need, and what better need to have than some wild hankering for fish tacos!

Homemade Flour Tortillas ( adapted from: http://www.food.com/recipe/flour-tortilla-recipe-204109)
1 1/2  cups    All Purpose Flour
1/2 cup          Whole Wheat Flour
1/2 teaspoon    Salt
1/4 cup            vegetable oil
1 teaspoon      Baking Powder
1/2 cup           Warm Milk

1.  Sift the dry ingredients together.   Add vegetable oil into the dry ingredients and with your fingertips or a pastry cutter, mix until resembling course cornmeal.

2. Add milk slowly just until dough becomes sticky.
3.  Wrap in plastic and let sit (30 mins)
4.  Divide dough into balls , depending on what size tortillas you want.
5.  Lightly dust surface with flour and roll out tortillas to about 1/4" thick.  Let rolled tortillas sit, covered in a damp towel to avoid drying out.
6.  Grill tortillas over high heat for about 30 seconds on each side until cooked.  Again, let sit with a damp towel covering them until ready to use.

Beer Battered Fish (adapted from: http://kitchenetteblog.com/2012/09/beer-battered-fish-tacos-with-cilantro-crema/)

White Fish Fillets ( I used cream dory)
1 cup                  All Purpose Flour
1 teaspoon         Baking Powder
1 teaspoon         Paprika
1 teaspoon         Oregano* (whichever dried herbs you'd like, I happened to have only oregano)
Salt and ground pepper to taste
12 oz                 Beer
lemon or calamansi
vegetable oil for light pan frying.

Procedure:
1.  Mix flour, baking powder, herbs, salt, pepper.   Whisk in beer and let sit in fridge for at least 20 minutes.

2.  Squeeze lemon or lime or calamansi over both sides of fish fillet.  Lightly season with salt and pepper on both sides.

3.  When batter is ready, prepare pan for frying.  Put enough vegetable oil in a pan to cover fish about halfway.

4.  Dip fish and coat in batter, shaking off any excess.  Fry for 3-4 mins on each side.  Drain on paper towels and sprinkle a little sea salt if desired.   Let sit before cutting into smaller pieces for tacos.


Calamansi Cream 
1 pack  Nestle All Purpose Cream
chopped cilantro
green or red chilis, deseeded and chopped
lemon or lime juice
salt and pepper to taste

Mix all ingredients together and serve over fish tacos, along with red or green cabbage, finely chopped.

2.  S

Vegan-ish Chocolate Chip Cookies

What I miss most about living in NYC is the ease with which you can get "special" ingredients for making say, vegan chocolate chip cookies.  However, no matter where I look for soy butter (unless I make it), I don't think I will ever find it where I am living.  That doesn't stop me though, from trying to make a healthier option for my family, who lately has been trying to make better food choices.

I chanced upon this recipe on this vegan website, but added chopped almonds to the mix.  Because I had no soy butter, I used regular butter instead, and it was amazing.   Reminds me a little of the Famous Amos cookies we always buy in Singapore.  Can't wait to make my family try this! It's the best chocolate chip cookie recipe I have ever encountered.   I like that it uses flax seeds as an egg replacer.  This is what I love about vegan baking and cooking-- you'll realize that there are always healthier options :)

Veganizing Red Velvet Cupcakes

The other day, I randomly decided to  make my own vegan red velvet cupcakes.  The inspiration though, came long before I took action.  It was a couple of months ago when I first had that experience that delicious vegan desserts were possible-- that moment when I first bit into that red velvet cupcake from Cocoa V in NYC.

Now, I'm not really vegan, but on most days,  I follow a vegan-ish diet.   And from how good I feel on these days, I don't need a lot of convincing that a vegan diet works wonders.  It is not a lifestyle choice for everyone, but I think  everyone will benefit from it by going vegan from time to time.  

And this is why these cupcakes excited me.  I did a quick search for a recipe I can follow, and found something on this website, from the book, Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World.  

Now this recipe is already vegan, which means it already is healthier than the normal cupcake.  But I wanted to go further:

1.)  I wanted to see if I could omit sugar entirely and use a healthier alternative (agave nectar)

2.)   I wanted to see if I could add some fiber to this (substituting part whole wheat flour)

3.)  And finally, I wanted to try if carob powder  (supposedly healthier than cocoa) would give the same wondrous effects as chocolate. 

And so the challenge begins.  

After researching on how to make the proper substitutions for sugar and whole wheat flour, I came up with the following recipe, based on the original recipe from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World.  My notes on the recipe, and photos of my quest, follow immediately after. 

Extra Healthy Vegan Red Velvet Cupcakes

Makes 6 cupcakes

Ingredients:

1/2 cup    unsweetened Soy Milk

1/2 tsp     Apple Cider Vinegar

1/2 cup    All Purpose Flour

1/8 cup    Whole wheat Flour*

1/3 cup    Agave Nectar**  (i ran out so i used 3 tablespoons agave + 2 tablespoons maple syrup)

1 Tbsp     Carob Powder

1/4 tsp      baking powder

1/4 tsp      baking soda

1/4 tsp      salt

3 Tbsps   Canola oil

1 Tbsp     red food coloring***

1/2 tsp     Vanilla extract

 Notes on Ingredients:

* Whole wheat flour has the same nutrients as all-purpose flour but it has more fiber.  It may be substituted for all purpose flour but never more than half of what is required as it makes baked goods denser and heavier (I guess chewy?)

**According to my research, when substituting agave nectar for sugar in a recipe, add the total amount of sugar called for in your recipe and multiply by 2/3, and then you get your agave nectar amount (since it is sweeter than sugar,  you definitely need less of this)

*** A lot of people are opposed to using food coloring because of the chemicals, but I found this brand at whole foods called India Tree (photo below), and it's all natural food coloring all derived from vegetables (red is derived from beets), which I think is really good.  A bit pricey but better to be safe than sorry!

Method:

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F (usually, it's 350 degrees but since I'm using agave instead of sugar, which browns easily, my research says that I have to bake at 25 degrees lower for 6 percent longer).

In a bowl, combine soymilk and apple cider vinegar to imitate buttermilk and set aside. 

In another bowl, mix flour, carob, baking powder, baking soda and salt.  Set aside.

Add canola oil, food coloring and vanilla extract to buttermilk and whisk to combine.  Sift dry ingredients into the wet and fold just until combined.  All cupcake recipes warn of overmixing, so I would watch out for that. 

Pour onto cupcake liners until 1/2 to 2/3 full and bake for 20-22 minutes. (again with the time, depending on your oven,  I would check at the minimum cooking time to avoid overcooking).  

 Cool before frosting.  

Cream Cheese Frosting:

2 Tbsps   Earth Balance vegan butter spread

2 Tbsps   Tofutti Cream Cheese 

1 tsp         vanilla extract

1 Cup      Raw turbinado sugar, pulverized in the blender  (traditionally uses confectioner's or powdered sugar, but I can never bring myself to buy it so I always just substitute pulverized brown sugar.  I think most of the time it works pretty well.)

Make sure all ingredients are at room temperature.  Cream together butter and cream cheese until combined.  Add powdered sugar in batches and whip until combined.  

India Tree Natural Food Color

Love these cupcake liners! 

Spooning the batter on each cupcake liner

Before they go into the oven

They've puffed up nicely!

Frosted cupcakes.. I think it was too runny

Yummy and moist!

My conclusion:


I rate this venture a success overall.  The cupcakes were moist and the frosting delicious, however it wasn't as light and fluffy as I expected, due perhaps to the cooking time (not sure if that whole equation of cooking at 25 degrees lower at 6% longer worked for this), or due to the presence of whole wheat flour.  This is a good recipe but I think it needs to be tweaked a little to come up with better results that are light, fluffy, moist and super delicious. :)

Vegan Chocolate Truffles

Since I'm on this ongoing quest to expand my vegan recipe repertoire, I decided to give these vegan chocolate truffles a shot.  Now truffles are traditionally made with cream and butter, and this recipe was obviously going to have some kind of non-dairy substitute.  But when I saw that this recipe had literally 3 ingredients and that the "cream" was going to come from raw cashews + water  to make cashew cream,  I fell instantly in love.  Could it really be true that cashew cream was that simple?  I remember eating at this vegan restaurant a couple of weeks ago that had an entree with cashew cream.  I thought it was absolutely divine, and for some reason I thought it would be difficult to make by myself.   


But if this recipe was true, it really wasn't.   Still high from my DIY almond milk experience  a couple of weeks ago, I knew this recipe had the potential to teach me something valuable on my quest to improve my vegan cooking.  Can you imagine unleashing the potential of creams made from nuts? I was giddy at the thought.


So then I jumped right in and made it, using this recipe.  I didn't have enough baking chocolate in the house, so I decided to divide the recipe accordingly.  Also I used carob powder instead of cocoa powder.  This is what I did:


(the amounts are my own amounts but the steps/procedure come from the original recipe given above.  I just put my own comments in blue :

Vegan Truffles Recipe 1/4 cup raw cashews  1/4 cup cold water  .3 lb bittersweet chocolate  carob powder  1. Put cashews and cold water in a blender and blend at high speed for 1-2 minutes (yes a long time).  2. Scrape the sides down and blend again until the mixture is the consistency of heavy cream.  I don't know if it's because I have so little in that blender, but it didn't really puree the cashews as much as I thought they should.  It was absolutely delicious but I still got some cashew bits in it.  It did turn out to have the consistency of heavy cream, however, with cashew bits.  For next time I was thinking, maybe soak the cashews in water first, like I did with my almond milk, to sort of break them down and soften them so they'll blend right away in the blender.   3. Meanwhile, in a double boiler heat the chocolate until it's all melted.  I didn't have a double boiler so what I did was put the chocolate in a small saucepot and put it in a wok filled with water, on the stovetop.  I think it worked pretty well because the chocolate melted nice and fast.  The reason for doing it like this is because you don't want the chocolate to be on direct heat as it burns so easily.  The boiling water acts as a protective barrier between direct heat and the chocolate.   4. Cool the chocolate until it's comfortable to work with and fold in the cashew cream (making sure not to stir too fast or you'll create bubbles).    This step did not take long at all, aside from the cashew bits in my cashew cream, I think this turned out pretty well. 5. Cool in the fridge for 2 hours (to set).   This step made my chocolate too hard and almost impossible to work with.  I had to melt it a little bit so I can shape them into little balls.   6. Take out a small ball, roll in cocoa powder and store in fridge/freezer.    This turned out to be really easy once the chocolate mixture has melted a little bit.

This is what mine looked like after:

I thought they were delicious but I'm not satisfied with the consistency.  I have a feeling it is related to how I blended my cashew cream.  I'll keep that in mind for next time but this isn't bad for a first try.  ♥

DIY Almond Milk

I never realized it was this easy to make almond milk (or any kind of nut milk).   Although I've never really been interested in it before (the only non-dairy  milk I've ever gotten into was soymilk),  my plan to embark on this "detox cleanse" made it inevitable that I consider it.   I've been reading "Clean" by Alejandro Junger lately, and I saw his recipe for a basic nut milk.  Out of the blue, today, I decided to try it out.  Total preparation time was less than 10 minutes (excluding the 3 hour soaking) and I got really really excited about it.  Once again, endless possibilities! This made me look forward to detoxing more :)

The recipe:

Basic Nut Milk


1 cup of nuts, soaked for 3 hours in purified water  (I used leftover slivered almonds)
1 teaspoon vanilla powder or extract  ( I ran out, so I used equal amount of maple syrup)
1 to 2 teaspoons agave syrup or brown rice syrup
3 cups purified water


Drain nuts, discarding water.  Place in blender with vanilla powder/extract, sweeter and 3 cups purified water. Blend for about 3 minutes.  Strain through fine strainer or cheesecloth.  Store in refrigerator, Lasts for 2 days.


(Source: "Clean" by Alejandro Junger, M.D.)

I took a photo of my attempt at almond milk below.  Amazingly easy.:)

Shallots vs. Onions

I've always thought that shallots were just tiny onions---different, but interchangeable.  I never really looked into it;  whenever a recipe called for shallots and I don't have them (thing is, I usually don't have them), I just directly substitute onions.  For some reason though, today, I got curious.  Making this thai red curry, I decided to research the proper substitute for shallots.  I was surprised to find out that garlic was involved.  Apparently, the combination of 2 parts onions and 1 part garlic would mimic the taste of shallots.  I did not know that, and frankly, I was glad to learn that today.  :)

Dreaming of Tuscany : How to Make Tuscan Bread

Tuscany in December is unusual but still beautiful.  The days are shorter and it can get wet and chilly most days, but as with anything, you learn to cope, and discover a host of other things to enjoy.  In our case,  it's ribollita, a hearty Tuscan winter soup made with beans and good old Tuscan bread.

In this post, I will talk about my first attempt at making Tuscan bread, just because this cold, winter day in New York, bread seemed like a good idea, and seemed like a comfort to make.

I don't particularly like bread (I'm a rice person) but bread-making, I find therapeutic.  Something about creating something that looks nothing like the ingredients that you started with, inspires my motivation to create.  I found a recipe on Tuscan bread here, and basically followed that recipe except I substituted whole wheat flour for most of the flour requirements.  I read in a post that whole wheat flour will not yield the same results as regular flour, but in my case, I thought it worked out pretty well.

The thing I was most excited about in this recipe, is making the biga.   I know that in bread making, letting the yeast mixture stand is pretty standard, but I've never heard of letting it stand this long (close to 24 hours).  Apparently it is pretty standard in Italian bread making, and it makes your finished product deeper and more complex in flavor--something that I really wanted to do in recreating our Tuscan bread experience.

The first time I made the biga, it didn't rise at all.  I attribute that to the inaccurate measurement of the flour amounts in the mixture.   Without a kitchen scale, it is pretty tough to measure out flour in grams; according to my research there's no exact equivalent in cups.  It largely depends on a lot of environmental factors such as moisture content of your particular bag of flour,  so it took me a while to be at peace with the amounts that I put in.

My second attempt at the biga, I saw the difference.  The yeast mixture, after a couple of hours, really does come alive.  I put it in a plastic container with a lid, and a few hours in, it broke free of the container and was almost alive, crawling on the countertop of my kitchen in all its sticky goodness.    I went to bed that night hoping I won't wake up to a dough-covered apartment.

I made the bread about 18 hours after I let the biga stand, overnight.  It turned out to be almost exactly like the Tuscan bread we had in our vacation.  Drizzled with some good quality Italian olive oil (which we had just bought at the Italian store in Chelsea market), it was pure heaven.  :)