Over the past year, koji became one of my favorite ingredients. For those unfamiliar with it, koji is a type of bacteria or fungus that grows on rice or grains. It is used as a culture in Japanese cooking to ferment soybeans into miso paste. Because it is a fungus, koji contains natural umami in…
Tag: chicken
Karaage lollipops with mole colorado and yuzu sunomono
When it came to parts of the chicken you would find in an upscale restaurant, I found that almost nobody felt that a chicken wing was fine-dining worthy. So I wanted to tackle that, and try to class up chicken wings a little bit. Mostly because they are delicious, have tons of flavor, and need…
“Lazy mornings”: a plated dish
This dish was inspired by a Hong Kong breakfast classic, being macaroni soup. Macaroni soup consists of a creamy chicken stock, macaroni noodles, and ham. It is a Cantonese breakfast staple, and I found it to be the perfect inspiration for a fun dish! For my take on a macaroni soup, I went with a…
Shoyu-koji chicken under a brick
I literally came up with this recipe when I was shopping at my local Japanese market, and found rice koji. For those unfamiliar with the product, koji is a bacteria found on rice or grains that can be mixed with soy beans to create miso. It has a ton of umami, and it can be…
Want to: a plated dish
I really love to take classic and rustic dishes and breathing new life into them. For some odd season, I have always been attracted to Southern food, despite never really visiting the South. There’s just something about biscuits, barbecue, buttermilk, and corn that just really, really appeals to me. So I wanted to do a…
Game bird congee with Chinese krueller (youtiao)
I really came up with this concept out of a necessity of not wanting to waste produce. I happened to purchase a lot of different game birds, ranging from quails to Cornish hens to duck, and I also made stocks out of each and every one of those birds, and reserved the carcass meats as…
“Chicken and dumplings” wontons
I wanted to create a play on chicken and dumplings, but using wonton soup as the inspiration. Mostly because I had half of a leftover chicken that I needed to get rid of, so I figured, why not just grind up the wing and leg meat and turn that into a dumpling filling? I also…
Phoenix in the Hawker Stall: a plated dish
So continuing on with my experiences in the lovely, most amazing MasterChef Kitchen (I hope I had enough adjectives there), there was actually a challenge where we had to cook with chicken. This challenge, not to brag, would have been a cakewalk for me, because I practiced breaking down chickens regularly in college (mostly because…
Roasted silkie chicken leg with polenta
When I was butchering black chicken, I decided to make a full-on chicken dinner out of the legs and wings! Taking the contrasting color of the chicken, and making a bright yellow polenta, a purple-ish sauce, and these colorful radishes. So with the legs and wings, I decided to roast those and pair them with…
Fried chicken sandwich with brown butter pretzel bun, furikake corn, and sesame slaw
I’ve seen spicy fried chicken sandwiches popping up since last year when I was watching Top Chef: California, where my favorite contestant, Marjorie Meek-Bradley, prepared one for a quickfire challenge. Since then, it has resurfaced with Shake Shack, and is a favorite guilty pleasure of my older sister’s. Now personally, I’m a big wuss the…
Freddy's Harajuku 