So a while ago, I purchased assam tea to make some desserts with, only for me to receive twice the amount I intended on ordering, and being stuck with more assam tea than I knew that to do with. For those unfamiliar with it, assam is a kind of black tea, popular in countries such…
Tag: recipe
Thai Tea Pumpkin Pie 2.0
A long, long time ago, I made a Thai tea pumpkin pie, and I loved it. Thai tea adds such a distinct, perfume-y flavor that just lifts the somewhat bland pumpkin puree, giving it spice, creaminess, and sweetness, all things that work in a pumpkin pie traditionally! This time around, I wanted to go with…
Creamed Corn Tortellini
I would be lying if I said I grew up on creamed corn. The main corn thing I ate as a kid was corn potage, which was a creamy corn soup with bits of egg floating in it. Actually, I’m not even sure if it was supposed to have those egg drop ribbons floating through…
Almond Butter Hummus with Cauliflower and Rainbow Carrots
This hummus recipe came about because I was trying to make hummus, but I ran out of tahini, and happened to have a jar of almond butter lying around. Fortunately, the almond butter worked in a pinch, and I ended up with a hummus that was exceptionally high in protein and nutrients(thank you, almond butter)….
Charred Brussels Sprouts with Bacon and Apple
When I was watching the most recent season of Top Chef, specifically Last Chance Kitchen, I saw chef Sara Bradley making this amazing cabbage dish, made from curing the cabbage with salt and sugar, and then “charring the sh*t out of it”. The end result was cabbage that was tender and soft on the inside,…
Loco Moco with Mushroom-Miso Gravy
This recipe was inspired by two different instances where I had really good loco moco. One was when I was in Hawaii, specifically at Moena Cafe in Oahu, and the other from Ryla restaurant in Redondo Beach! Moena Cafe had a short rib loco moco with this rich, deep demi glas gravy that made me…
Japanese Onion Soup
I came up with this because I needed to use up a lot of breadcrumbs, and one of the first things I thought about was doing a take on a French onion soup. Mostly because a few years ago on Masterchef season 10, my plating bestie Bri made one for a bread challenge, that while…
Maple-candied Pumpkin and Acorn Cake
This cake was inspired from when I was in Kyoto, admiring all of the autumn nature-themed artwork in several of the local museums there. I wanted to make this yellow-ish cake with pretty reds and oranges, indicative of autumnal colors, and flavors. And since I play Animal Crossing, I am fully aware that maple leaves…
Pumpkaboo Mousse Cake
Pumpkaboo is one of those Pokemon that made me fall in love with the otherwise incomplete games that were Pokemon X and Y. It is a cute little critter that resembles a Jack-o-Lantern, a bat, and a black cat, all in one, and it can come in 4 different sizes, with the super-sized one being…
Caramel Apple Naked Cake
This cake was a special request from my dear friend, Justina. She wanted an apple pie-inspired Milkbar naked cake for her birthday, and I just wanted to make sure it was 100% to her liking. She wanted there to be doughy, buttery bits, caramelized chunks of apples, and some sort of creamy component, all of…
Spheal Dango
Originally, these were just going to be ring seal dango(round mochi-type rice dumplings). However, that idea kind of shifted towards doing Spheals instead thanks to my dear friend, Justina, who straight up to me to do that. And I am (mostly) glad I listened to her, especially after seeing the end product! I say mostly…
Pink Peach and Calpico Cheesecake
This pink peach dessert came about because I was gifted with some white peaches from my mom, and whenever I have white peaches, making a pink peach dessert is a priority! I grew up with a white peach tree in my backyard, and I always equate those to pleasant summer memories, eating white peaches with…
Gulab Jamun Madeleines
Gulab (and angoori) jamun have quickly become one of my favorite Indian desserts. These little ghee-fried milk balls are soaked in a saffron-cardamom-rose syrup, causing them to have a soft, melt-in-the-mouth texture. However, I find that setting up all of that ghee to fry with takes forever, and it’s really expensive too. Ghee is far…
Chocolate-Rose Quartz-Pistachio Cookies
So I have made a version of these rose quartz cookies in the past, but I wanted to revisit the original recipe I made during my time at Milkbar, which featured a chocolate cookie embedded with Turkish delight(also called loukoumi, and they are like these sugary, pink rose-flavored jellies). The Turkish delight, which are primarily…
Fig Leaf Financier
For starters, this is a gluten-free and vegan recipe. I had to get that out of the way first and foremost. Secondly, you might be asking, what is fig leaf, and what does it taste like? As the name implies, a fig leaf is literally the leaf of a fig plant. It has an herbaceous,…
Pink Taiwanese Pineapple Cakes
Pineapple cakes, or in Chinese 鳳梨酥(feng-li-su), are these buttery, flaky pastries that are stuffed with a sweet pineapple jam. Honestly, I have never bothered to make them before, since it’s so easy to purchase them, and almost every Taiwanese household has them just lying around to snack on! However, I had leftover pink pineapple that…
Assam Tea Buttercream Cake
Growing up in a Taiwanese/Chinese-American household, almost all of our plateware was white and blue porcelain. To this day, I still don’t fully get why it was that color, but the pattern has really grown on me over the years. To the point where I really wanted to make a cake as an homage to…
Blood Moon: a petit gateau
For this year’s Mid-Autumn Festival, I wanted to do a few different kinds of moon cakes. Some more traditional, and some, a new interpretation of the term “moon cake”. In this case, I wanted to do not one, but two petit gateau, both moon-themed. One would be inspired by the full moon, but the other,…
Moonlight Delight: a petit gateau
When Mid-Autumn Festival rolls around, that means it’s moon cake season! And while I do love moon cakes, I wanted to make a new interpretation of them, by making petit gateau(mini mousse cakes) with moon motifs! I wanted there to be two, one inspired by a blood moon using dark and red colors, and one…
Miso Eggplant Onigiri
Miso eggplant is one of those flavor combinations that I really wanted to dislike, but actually loved from the get-go. For context, growing up, my mom would always serve bitter melon with miso paste, which caused me to develop a bit of a gag reflex towards vegetables served with miso for a long, long time….
Freddy's Harajuku 