Freddy's Harajuku

Momotaro Tomato and Bacon Pasta

I love Momotaro tomatoes. They are this pinkish-red Japanese tomato that has a mild sweetness to them. While eating them fresh is usually the way to go, I wanted to try cooking them, and I definitely was not disappointed in the end product: I made a tomato sauce with some of the Momotaro tomatoes, and…

Hot Milk Funfetti Cupcakes

I feel like almost any American can recall a time in their lives when they go to a birthday party and are presented with plain vanilla cupcakes with rainbow sprinkles, either baked into the cake, or speckled on top of a vanilla or chocolate frosting. It is honestly such a basic thing, cake, frosting, sprinkles,…

Chocolate Decadence Layer Cake

I am a firm believer that there is a chocolate cake for every occasion. The best occasion for this kind of recipe is if you want a chocolate cake that tastes like baked fudge. Now I have been mentioning the Ms. Trunchbull Chocolate cake a bunch of times on this blog, but this is very,…

Pork Loin with Pommes Aligot and French Onion Jus

This dish was in my to-make list for almost 8 months – I wanted to try my hand at making a French technique-driven dish, featuring a French onion jus and pommes aligot, and this is what came about from that. For those who are unfamiliar with where I was going with, a French onion jus…

Chocolate-Miso-Apple Tart

This recipe was inspired by an old episode of the Japanese Iron Chef, where the challenge was to make desserts with apples and chocolate. I love the idea of combining chocolate, something sweet, bitter, and creamy, with apples, which can take on a lot of spice, bitterness, and are naturally sweet and tart. I just…

Momotaro Tomato Sourdough Tartine

So I have made an extremely similar iteration of this recipe not too long ago using black mission figs – this recipe uses the same bread dough and the sweet and savory miso-ricotta spread, which I am obsessed with. But this time around, I wanted to use Momotaro tomatoes. Momotaro tomatoes are these light pink…

Jalapeno Pork Ribs with Jalapeno-Cheese Cornbread Madelines

Ribs and cornbread is a classic childhood pairing of mine whenever we would go to Chicago For Ribs in Redondo Beach growing up. It’s unfortunate because Chicago For Ribs is closed now, but it featured a variety of barbecued ribs, barbecue or steakhouse dishes, and steakhouse sides like mac n’ cheese, baked potatoes, waffle fries,…

Strawberry-Soy Milk Phyllo Pie

This phyllo pie is a variation on the apricot one I made a bit ago, this one featuring flaky homemade phyllo, Strawberry Inspiration coating, soy milk custard, strawberry gelee, and glazed strawberries on top. I have really fallen in love with the flaky phyllo fruit pies, because the filling is so interchangeable, as is the…

Asparagus-Sesame Gazpacho

I purchased some asparagus with no real idea on what I was going to do with them – usually when I think of asparagus, I think of it as a side to a steak or a piece of fish. I did make an asparagus and ricotta pita years ago with my friend Ann, but I…

Ricotta Pancakes with White Nectarines

When I was trying to figure out what to do with my leftover ricotta cheese, one thing that Google listed was ricotta pancakes. I hilariously did a poll on Instagram on what to use that leftover ricotta for, with the top voted pick being ravioli. I already made the ravioli, but I somehow still had…

Sourdough Savarian with Strawberries and White Nectarines

Since I have been shackled to my sourdough starter, I wanted to find creative ways to use the discard. Since starter can be used in lieu of yeast, I wanted to use the starter in a yeast-leavened dessert, in this case, a savarin. Savarin is similar to a baba in that they are both yeast-leavened…

Mamey and Thai Tea Popsicles

I am personally quite surprised that I have not made popsicles since 2022, nor have I worked with mamey sapote since 2020! It has been a minute since I last utilized my popsicle molds, and since I wanted to make a mamey dessert, it just all fell into place to make these mamey popsicles! In…

Baymax Sourdough Loaves

I have been seeing videos of people enjoying these adorable Baymax sourdough loaves at Disneyland’s San Fransokyo, and I just had to take a swing at making these myself. I will be honest, I felt a bit read when I saw the first Big Hero 6 trailer, mostly because Hiro Hamada totally ripped off my…

Sylveon Strawberry-Vanilla Mousse Cakes

This was one of two desserts I got to create for The Pokemon Company when they contacted me for an opportunity to make dessert content for them to promote the Pokemon Scarlet and Violet World Championship series for 2024! This was a total dream come true for me, between having done Pokemon content in the…

Oreo Mille Crepe Cake

I have been wanting to make this specific recipe since May of 2023. But back then, I was still on a two-month sugar fast, and I learned very quickly that May is an exhausting month to try to do anything – between Mother’s Day and my dad’s birthday, there’s already a lot of cakes that…

Sourdough Crostini with Figs and Ricotta

This recipe was the byproduct of me needing to use up a tub of ricotta cheese, having sourdough bread already made, and me purchasing figs from the farmers market on an impulse buy. Hilariously enough, it all worked out in the sense that I have three things, being bread, figs, and cheese, that go gorgeously…

Palm Sugar Iced Mugicha(Barley Tea)

Growing up, one of my favorite beverages was iced barley tea. It would be lightly sweetened, and it was a very refreshing beverage, especially during the winter. I happened to purchase a large amount of mugicha(barley tea) bags from my local Japanese grocery store a while ago, and while I love having mugicha around to…

Midnight Snack: a petit gateau

I was craving a Hostess cake, and that literally was what inspired me making these. I specifically wanted a chocolate cake stuffed with a marshmallow, with a chocolate ganache glaze. So I figured, especially since I had a lot of spare egg whites lying around, that I could use one of the egg whites to…

Pinwheel Lasagna Rosettes

When I was looking up potential Italian restaurants for when I was visiting NYC(we settled on Lilia, which was solid), I did come across a restaurant called Don Angie, which featured this really cool looking lasagna. When I think of lasagna, I think of layers of pasta, bechamel, and red sauce, stacked up in a…

Potato Gnocchi with Kimchi-Bacon Bolognese

When I initially wrote this recipe, I wanted to make a kimchi-bacon bolognese for a tagliatelle or pappardelle pasta. Basically, I envisioned long noodles with this hearty meat sauce. I was inspired by these Asian-fusion pasta dishes that you could find in a cafe in Japan or Korea, and that was what I intended when…