Soy-Ginger Pot Roast

Leaves are falling fast in my backyard and we basically have two choices, one is to rake them into piles; the other one is to let them sit for a while and pray that somehow they'll turn to compost magically.  The joy of leaving next to a park is that we always have lots of trees to shade us from the heat of summer, but, comes fall, we complain miserably about the leaves those trees dump on the yard.  Sigh.  

I know what will cheer up my family after a hard weekend chore is this soy-ginger pot roast.  It's a hearty dish with tons of flavor like ginger, soy sauce, onion, garlic, and mushrooms.  I like to buy a good quality of chuck roast for a dish like this because the beef stays moist and fork-tender.  Now, we don't have a tradition like Sunday roast supper, but this surely qualifies it for when the weather starts to get cooler.

Maybe if I cook something like this every weekend, my family would not be so grumpy of doing yard work for hours :)

Soy-Ginger Pot Roast

Serves 4

3 pounds beef chuck pot roast

½ teaspoon salt

¼ teaspoon ground black pepper

2 tablespoons olive oil
1 ½ cups coarsely chopped onion
3 cloves garlic, minced
2 tablespoons grated fresh ginger
16 ounces button mushrooms
1 (14-½ ounce) can reduced sodium beef broth
¼ cup soy sauce
¼ cup snipped fresh cilantro
2 red sweet peppers, cut into 2-inch pieces
Snipped fresh cilantro
Hot cooked egg noodles

Preheat oven to 325F.  Trim fat from meat; season with salt and pepper.  In a large Dutch oven, brown roast on all sides in hot oil over medium-high heat.  Transfer to a plate.

Add onion, garlic and ginger to Dutch oven.  Cook and stir for 5 minutes, or until onion is softened.  Add mushrooms, broth, soy sauce, and the ¼ cup of cilantro.  Return roast to Dutch oven.  Bring to boil, cover, transfer to oven.  Bake for 2 hours.  Add sweet peppers.  Cover; bake for 30 minutes more or until meat and vegetables are tender.

Transfer meat and vegetables to a platter; cover to keep warm.  Bring liquid in Dutch oven to boiling; reduce heat.  Simmer, uncovered, for 10 to 15 minutes, or until slightly thickened.  Serve sauce with meat and vegetables.  Sprinkle with additional cilantro and cooked noodles.


Source:  Better Homes and Gardens

Mu-Shu Chicken and Shrimp

Mu-shu dish is one of my son's favorite dishes to order in a Chinese restaurant.  The idea of eating a spoonful of stir-fried morsels of meat, egg, and veggies and drizzled with hoisin sauce wrapped in mandarin pancakes, really delights his taste bud.  It's a tasty dish, no doubt about it, and there's some variations on how to include in the dish.

In a more traditional way, the dish is most often comprised of pork, dried daylily flowers or golden needles, and wood ear mushrooms, along with eggs, ginger, garlic, soy sauce, rice wine and scallions.  The less authentic way would be to omit the dried daylily flowers and wood ear mushrooms but to add some vegetables, for example, cabbage, bell pepper, celery, or snow peas.  

Rice is the traditional way to serve the dish, but here in America, mandarin pancake is served as the medium to eat the dish.  And let's not forget about hoisin sauce which is used to drizzle the dish as it goes in the pancake.

The way I cook it is by combining the best of the two ways.  I grew up eating daylily flowers and wood ear mushrooms, so those two ingredients would be present in the dish.  My family prefers chicken and/or shrimp instead of pork and I'm happy to substitute that.  As with adding vegetables in it, my philosophy is that there's nothing wrong of eating more vegetables in a dish :)  I use whatever is available, in this case, I used green cabbage.

No matter what your preferred protein/vegetable choice to include in the dish, just remember that if you cook it the right way, it'll come out delicious anyway!

Mu-Shu Chicken and Shrimp

Serves 6

½ ounce wood ear mushrooms, reconstituted

1 ounce dried daylily flowers or golden needles, reconstituted

10 to 12 ounces of boneless, skinless chicken breast

6 ounces raw peeled, deveined, medium-sized shrimp

4 eggs

8 tablespoons canola oil

½ teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon soy sauce

¼ teaspoon sugar

3 to 4 large scallions, sliced diagonally, white and green parts separated

1 tablespoon Shaohsing wine

2 teaspoons sesame oil

For the marinade:

¼ teaspoon salt

½ teaspoon sugar

2 teaspoon soy sauce

Pinch of white pepper

1 teaspoon Shaohsing wine

1 teaspoon potato flour--can substitute with cornstarch

1 tablespoon water

1 tablespoon canola oil

Mandarin pancakes 

Hoisin sauce

To reconstitute wood ear and daylily flowers, soak each thing in a separate bowl with boiling water, enough to cover it, for 20 to 30 minutes.  Drain and squeeze excess water but leave damp.  Split daylily flowers one lengthwise and if it's quite long, cut in half.

Slice the chicken into thin, even-sized rectangular pieces.  Put it into a bowl with the shrimp.

Add the salt, sugar, soy sauce, pepper, wine, potato flour or cornstarch, and water to chicken and shrimp.  Let marinate for 20 minutes.  Stir in the oil.

Beat the eggs lightly with 1 tablespoon of the oil and ¼ teaspoon of the salt.

Heat a wok over high heat.  Add 2 tablespoons of the oil and swirl it around.  Add wood ear mushrooms and stir for about 30 seconds, lowering the heat if necessary.  Add daylily flowers and continue to stir and turn until very hot.  Season with ¼ teaspoon of salt, the soy sauce and the sugar.  Transfer to a warm dish and set aside.

Wipe the wok and reheat until hot.  Add 2 tablespoons of the oil and swirl it around.  Pour in the egg, and sliding the wok spatula to the bottom of the wok, fold and turn until the egg forms into lumps.  Transfer to a warm plate and set aside.  Wash and dry the wok.

Reheat the wok over high heat.  Add the remaining oil and swirl it around.  Add the white parts of scallions, stir and let them sizzle for a few seconds.  Add the chicken and shrimp and turn and toss quickly for about 1 minute or until partially cooked and turning opaque.  Splash in the wine around the side of the wok, continuing to stir and turn as it sizzles.  Return all the ingredients to the wok.  Stir and mix for another minute, so that the chicken it thoroughly cooked, the egg firmer and all the ingredients piping hot.  Add the green parts of scallions.  Transfer to a serving dish.  Sprinkle with sesame oil and serve with the pancakes and hoisin sauce.

Source:  adapted from Yan-Kit's Classic Chinese Cookbook

Baked French Toast with Nutella

Every Sunday I try to make special breakfast for my family because Sunday morning tends to be the most relaxed morning of all mornings.  Usually there's nothing going on that we have to wake up so early, making it the perfect day to have a more elaborate breakfast dish.  Our favorites are pancakes (blueberry, banana, chocolate chip flavors are on the top list), waffles, cinnamon rolls, sticky buns, crepes, omelet, well, the list can go on.  I actually enjoy making these type of breakfast items, it seems to set the day in a good mood.  

Even though my son likes most of my breakfast dishes, he is still reluctant to eat French toast.  His reasoning is that it's weird to eat bread with syrup.  Syrup is for pancakes and waffles according to his taste.  But he likes this baked French toast (yay!).  Powdered sugar is a good enough topping for him.  I didn't use store bought white bread because I happen to have made homemade bread earlier in the week.  My bread is usually quite sturdy and didn't fall apart when the filling was spread.   It's not a fancy breakfast and I just have to serve this alongside a cold glass of chocolate milk and everyone is happy with a full tummy.

A variation of this French toast is to use jam instead of Nutella with the cream cheese.  I haven't tried it yet, but will do since Sunday is coming soon! :)

Baked French Toast with Nutella 

Makes 4 to 8 servings

Toast:

4 ounces cream cheese, at room temperature

6 tablespoons Nutella, at room temperature

8 slices white bread

Custard:

4 eggs

1 cup milk

2 tablespoons granulated sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

¼ teaspoon ground nutmeg

Powdered sugar

Maple syrup

To make sandwich:  Mix cream cheese and Nutella until combined.  Spoon mixture on 4 bread slices and spread all the way to outside edges, then top with remaining slices to make sandwiches.  Place in resealable plastic bag and refrigerate until ready to bake.

To make custard:  In flat container with an airtight lid large enough to hold a bread slice, beat together eggs, milk, sugar, vanilla, and nutmeg.  Cover and refrigerate until ready to use.

To assemble:  Preheat oven to 350F.  Mist a 9-by-13-inch baking pan with sides with nonstick cooking spray.  Dip sandwiches into custard, turning once, for 2 minutes on first side and 1 on the second to soak up as much of the custard as possible.  Lay drained slices on pan and bake for 15 minutes, then turn them over and bake for 20 minutes more, or until toast is golden brown on both sides.  Sprinkle lightly with sifted powdered sugar and serve with syrup.  Recipe can easily be doubled.

Source:  FoodDay The Oregonian

Blueberry-Coconut Crumb Bars

Here's another post about blueberries but don't look away because these bars are so good that you'll want to make it now, especially when the blueberries season will end soon.  

I sneaked in some coconut in the bar because I wanted to have extra texture in the crumb, and also because I had leftover coconut in the fridge.  I think I made the best decision to include coconut in the recipe.  The bars have a hint of coconut, sweet and lemony blueberry taste with buttery crunch top and bottom.  They are good warm, straight after baking, but also delicious cold.  Make sure to store bars in the refrigerator to keep the texture crisp.  They will keep for a few days.  

Blueberry-Coconut Crumb Bars

Makes 24

Bars:

3 cups all-purpose flour

¾ cup granulated sugar

1 teaspoon baking powder

¼ teaspoon salt

2 teaspoons grated lemon zest (from 1 lemon)

½ cup sweetened grated coconut

1 cup (2 sticks) cold unsalted butter, cut into chunks, plus more for pan

1 large egg

Filling:

¼ cup granulated sugar

1 tablespoon cornstarch

3 cups fresh blueberries (about 12 ounces)

1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice

Preheat oven to 375.  Line a 9-by-13-inch baking pan with foil or parchment paper, overhanging edges to serve as handles.  Lightly butter foil.

For bars:  In a food processor, pulse flour, sugar, baking powder, salt, lemon zest, and coconut until combined.  Add butter pieces and egg; pulse until dough resembles crumbly wet sand.  Pat half of dough into the prepared pan.

For filling:  In a medium bowl, stir together sugar and cornstarch.  Gently fold in berries and lemon juice.  Spread blueberry mixture evenly over crust, leaving a ½-inch border around the edges.  Crumble remaining dough over berries.

Bake for 40 minutes, until top is golden brown and crust is firm.  Transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.  Use foil handles to lift bars from pan.  Sprinkle with powdered sugar.  Cover and store in refrigerator.

Source:  adapted from Debbie Macomber's Christmas Cookbook

Peach Melba Shortcakes

I had a great day yesterday.  It's my birthday and I got to spend it with my favorite people in the world: my family.  I received two candles from my son, who obviously picked the gifts with his dad since dad knew about  it.  I didn't know how they pulled it off this year, bought gifts without my knowledge and completely surprised me.  Next year my son suggested that I give him a list of gifts I'd like to get so he'll know what to buy for me.  Great idea!

And I want to declare that I absolutely will have peaches every time my birthday comes around.  The peaches this year are plentiful, flavorful, and super juicy.  Twice I bought peaches from my son's friend's orchard.  His parents own a peach orchard in Canby and they grow great peaches.  Early in July I bought a handful which we ate and ate.  Just last weekend I bought some more, this time I poached some, froze some, and left a bunch in the fridge to eat fresh.  

I didn't intentionally make this shortcake for my birthday but it might as well be my birthday cake since I have plentiful left.  I made a genoise cake base instead of using biscuits for shortcakes.  I then poached the peaches using sugar water and vanilla bean to give it a flavor.  Honestly, it's a bit of work poaching peaches because I had to peel them first.  The lazier method will be to just cut the peaches and macerate them with peach schnapps.  But in the end, those poached peaches taste so good that I didn't mind doing it again if I have to.  The raspberry sauce is simple; it's simply done by crushing fresh raspberries, which then got strained to remove the seeds.  I made just enough sugar water to incorporate the crushed raspberries with it; a little lemon juice is added to it to give a nice finish.  

To serve these shortcakes in Mason jars, I grabbed a few small and different size jars.  The components were layered until full;  these were ready right away or could be stored in the fridge for a few hours.  Everybody got his/her own serving of shortcake and it's sooo good!

Don't they look adorable in the jar like that?  Pretty enough to be a birthday cake!    

Peach Melba Shortcakes

Makes one 9- x 13-inch cake

2 sticks unsalted butter, melted and cooled slightly, plus more for buttering the dish

6 large eggs, at room temperature

2 tablespoons milk, at room temperature

1 ⅓ cups granulated sugar

2 cups all-purpose flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

¼ teaspoon salt

Poached peaches:

12 medium firm-ripe peaches

2 ⅔ cups sugar

4 cups water

1 piece vanilla bean

Raspberry sauce:

1 (12-oz.) package frozen raspberries (not in syrup), thawed

½ cup granulated sugar

⅓ cup water

2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice

1 cup heavy cream

½ cup confectioners' sugar

1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Make the shortcake:  Preheat the oven to 375F.  Generously butter a 9- x 13-inch glass baking dish.  Using an electric mixer, beat the eggs with the milk until frothy.  Add the 1 ⅓ cups of granulated sugar; beat at high speed until the mixture is thick and pale, 7 minutes.

In a bowl, sift the flour with the baking powder and salt.  Fold the dry ingredients into the egg mixture; fold in the melted butter until incorporated.  Spread the batter in the prepared dish; bake in the center of the oven for about 30 minutes, until golden.  Transfer to a rack and let cool.

Make the poached peaches:  Cut a shallow X in bottom of each peach with a sharp paring knife and immerse fruit in a 6-quart heavy pot (preferably wide) of boiling water 30 seconds, then transfer with a slotted spoon to a bowl of ice and cold water to stop cooking.  Transfer peaches to a cutting board and peel, starting with cut end, then cut in half, discarding pits.

Combined sugar and water in cleaned pot.  Halve vanilla bean lengthwise with a paring knife and scrape seeds into pot, then add pod and bring mixture to a boil, stirring until sugar is dissolved.  Add peaches, pitted sides down to sugar syrup, then reduce heat and poach, covered at a bare simmer 6 minutes.  Turn peaches over and continue to poach, covered, until tender, 5 to 6 minutes more.

Cool peaches in poaching liquid in pot, uncovered, 1 to 1 ½ hours.

Make the raspberry sauce (while peaches are cooling):  Force raspberries through a fine-mesh sieve into a bowl, pressing hard on solids.

Combine sugar and water in a small heavy saucepan.  Cover pan (so condensation will wash any sugar crystals down side of pan) and bring to a boil, then remove lid and boil 2 minutes.

Immediately stir sugar syrup into raspberry puree and cool to room temperature, about 1 hour.  Stir in lemon juice.

When ready to serve the shortcakes, whip the cream with confectioners' sugar and vanilla in a bowl until firm.  

To serve shortcakes in jars:   I used some 8-oz. and 4-oz. jars, but you can also use a bigger jar.   You just have to add more layer into it.  Cut the cake into small squares, enough so they can fit into the jars.  Cut the peaches the same size as the cake squares.  Add these on top of the cake.  Drizzle some raspberry sauce.  Spoon some whipped cream onto the sauce.  Repeat the process until you reach the top of jar.  Ideally, you'll want the whipped cream to be on the top layer.  Garnish with some diced or sliced peaches and drizzle more raspberry sauce.  This recipe will make quite a bit shortcakes in jars; I didn't use all for it, instead we ate the rest like regular shortcakes.  Simply cut the cake into bigger squares and serve with sliced peaches, whipped cream, and raspberry sauce.