Exploring: A Shanghai Wet-Market

For any readers living in North American, Europe, Australia….I am extremely jealous. Each time I cook a meal or bake something, I end up spending a great deal of money on ingredients, especially on things like meat (ha!) , butter, cheese. I can’t even imagine EXPERIMENTING! To waste those precious ingredients!!! I have to admit though, ruined recipes still end up in my eager belly…it would just be rude to subject your loved ones to the failed attempt ; )

One thing we do have here in the East are the wonderfully stinky wet-markets. They carry the freshest produce, seafood, meat - all at the best prices. And what would be better than to be able to talk to the person who owns the farm your tomatoes are coming from? Any of you living close to a Farmers Market would know what I’m talking about. The pride and sense of ownership for each hand-picked food gives it so much more value when you’re cooking with it. What I absolutely can’t stand is that they smell AWFUL. All the orphaned bits of seafood, meat, rotten fruits and vegetables end up carpeting the weathered tiles.

Until last week when S. visited, I did everything possible to avoid entering wet-markets. It might have been the horror I saw as a little girl when I watched them pinch, choose, and pluck (also, dare I say, keeeeell aka kill) Chicken Little flanked by stalls with curtains of hanging Miss Piggys and Betsy the Cows. Luckily I had a terrible cold and wasn’t able to breathe through my nose, so I was able to follow S. to the wet-market for a little photo session.

Meet S...eating black rice steamed cake

I was surprised by how organized, and dare I say CLEAN the market was. D., my Shanghainese-Fujian-American-Philippino friend informed me that not too long ago, the city moved all of the wet-markets into covered buildings to further push the modernization of the city. On one side were the vegetable stalls, in another aisle was the seafood, and further down there was meat. At the far end of the building were dried goods like Chinese medicine ingredients for soups, dried mushrooms, nuts and beans. I didn’t buy anything that day (too busy with work recently to be able to cook anything), but I will definitely be doing my fresh-produce shopping there in the future – maybe…if S. is around to hold my hand as I walk by the caged chickens… and if my nose is stuffed to 90% breathe-ability.

By the way, this year was the first time I didn’t get to celebrate Thanksgiving with a turkey dinner and more importantly, getting together with my family. The clan was scattered around the globe making a get-together pretty much impossible (Skype Thanksgiving dinner?) – oh and also, I was working. I still have a lot to be thankful for though – something I thought about while I worked on a really sad and empty stomach. Already planning Christmas Dinner – proposed menu will be posted, and more likely changed quite frequently between now and C-Day. Any suggestions?

I'm a Vegetarian - seriously

We're going to settle this issue once and for all. I am a vegetarian and I really really enjoy it. If it wasn't for the fact that I would most likely alienate my family and friends, I'd probably even go for the raw vegan movement. My thoughts and reasons about being a vegetarian have really evolved since it first began - which I will now explain because I absolutely hate being asked! I find that most people ask me about my reasons because they want to prove me wrong, rather than just accept it as a lifestyle choice, but anyway...

I've been extremely lucky all my life - growing up with a wonderful family of two completely different cultures, being able to travel all over the world, taste different foods, attend wonderful schools etc... I decided a few years ago that I wanted to cut something out of my diet as a daily challenge, I wasn't going to do desserts because then life wouldn't be worth living (Sorry), so it ended up being meat and fish. I made my decision on a whim, so I schedule enough time to have a last meat-filled meal. A steak or lamb chops would have been nice...maybe even pork dumplings (if I can recall, that was what I wanted that day for lunch, but we ended up going to a vegetarian Indian buffet - obviously I didn't think too much about it!)

My vegetarianism has evolved, now its not simply about reminding myself of all that I have or even facing the challenge of saying no to meat/fish every day. I'm not actively trying to find more reasons to help me stay on track, but I frequently come more and more reasons for supporting this lifestyle, whether it is for animals or for the environment.

I apologize for that kind of long and undoubtedly boring explanation - just to make things clear, I will never preach about vegetarianism nor do I reject the idea of cooking meat (though it IS very difficult, I can't tell how it tastes or whether or not it is over-done, not fully cooked...). I'm doing this for my own reasons and I don't expect anyone else to feel the same way. Umm...also, I vow to never blab about this sort of stuff again!!

My bf on the other hand - he eats enough meat for three vegetarians. I'm not particularly proud of this, but I'm not going to deny that watching him cook and talk about meat adds more dimension to my understanding of food, I really have forgotten about the flavor and texture of meats but I can be sure that neither seitan nor oyster mushrooms are anywhere close!

Once a week, we visit this Japanese style BBQ place. I find the name of the restaurant really unappetizingly descriptive, "Black Hair and Cow" - black hair referring to a certain breed of cow I'm guessing - I've never asked the staff.

I finally brought the camera this time!!! Bf always allocates half to a quarter of the grilling space to me depending on his mood. Be warned, the following photos are the antithesis of vegetarianism, but seriously, look at the marbled meat...it really is beautiful, no?

They also have this delicious (yes, there ARE things at the restaurant without heads or hearts or moms - how ever it is you choose to define the foods I stay away from) minced green onion, yellow leek, garlic, and ponzu mixture that can be eaten with the grilled meat or mixed in with a bowl of steaming white rice - which omg is SO gorgeous I want to make a necklace and earring set out of the tiny, slightly translucent grains, the necklace would need to be steaming though. That's possible right?

This post is dedicated to the aging Allen Fang, who has a love hate relationship with vegetarians.

1/4 Cup-sized Oatmeal Raisin Cookies - not a health food

This morning I awoke to the sad cries of the Chocolate Cake sitting in my refrigerator - only a quarter of it eaten by myself and my dear friend Sherri - with very very strict plans to end up in the trash sometime between my morning cup of Earl Grey and sliced apple....if only I had the strength.

I live alone, and anyone who knows me would understand that it is complete madness to leave me alone with chocolate cake, no one is getting out alive, not a single crumb, things are pretty much over. On Saturday morning I was woken by little Miss Holland, my sweet as pie canine. I had been dreaming about eating four cakes, with my hands, all at the same time. Needless to say, I was upset, woke my bf up with cries of despair, begging whoever would listen to let me go back to sleep. It didn't happen, so I rolled around the bed trying to recall every last detail to bf. So anyway, when I got home later in the day, I was greeted with the aforementioned talking Cake brought to me in the arms of my loving bf.

So thats how it happened, thats how I discovered cakes actually talk. It wouldn't shut up so I had to eat it.

I figure this Oatmeal Raisin Cookie recipe (definitely wolf in sheep's clothing, albeit a tight fitting one..teeheee! too much buttaaaahhhh) would help balance out the chocolate-morning.

I went through tons of recipes and this is a pretty good combo of ingredients - chewy, buttery (duh), raisin-y...food writing encourages the creation of new words.

177C / Baking Sheet

3/4 unsalted butter (room temperature)

1 cup brown sugar - packed

1 egg (room temperature)

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

3/4 cup all purpose flour (I use whole wheat flour)

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

3 cups old fashioned rolled oats

AND OF COURSE

1 cup raisins/chocolate chips/dried cranberries...anything!

1. Cream together butter and brown sugar for 2-3 minutes until smooth.
2. Add egg and vanilla extract to mixture, beat to combine. This is when it begins to smell like the sweet fragrance of danger!!
3. 
   In a separate bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon.
4. Slowly add dry ingredients into mixture.
5. Stir in rolled oats and raisins
6. For large cookies, use 1/4 cup batter/ice cream scoop (it might sound daunting but it really is the perfect size! I promise you'll be wishing they were 1/2 cup cookies)
7. 
   Place 5 cm apart and flatten slightly so they are around 1/2 inch thick.
8. Bake 12-13 minutes or until golden brown around the edges, the center should still be a bit wet.

Each time I make these cookies, it takes me around 3 hours...my oven is SO tiny I can only bake 3 at a time - I refuse to compromise the size of the cookies.

mmm lemon cookies

I posted this on nibbledish a few months ago, but for some reason recently my recipes with photoshopped images have been rejected! I didn't have that many on there to begin with (okay...5...FIVE - the number looks much bigger when I spell out the word?) but when I wrote in to get an explanation for my REJECTIONS, none of them would go through....so alas, I have arrived in the feared and web-blocked (I currently live in a country that *sigh...blocks most blog-based sites, but thanks to my techy bf, I have wormed my way through. HA! I laugh in the face of whomever is keeping me from reading foodie blogs...) land of blogger.

I made these cookies a while back, but I wanted to start off by posting something, anything...unfortunately my hobbit-sized oven fails miserably when it comes to baking cakes (or any baked-goods that are ambitious enough to rise higher than 3 cm). Let's stop now with the complaints and get on with the lemon cookies!

All you need is:

2 3/4 cups All Purpose Flour
1 teaspoon Baking Soda
1/2 teaspoon Baking Powder
1/2 teaspoon Salt
1 cup butter, softened (if your butter has been in the refrigerator, cut into cubes, that will help the butter soften faster)
1 1/2 cups White Sugar
1 Egg (room temperature)
1/2 teaspoon Vanilla Extract
1 - 1 1/2 teaspoons lemon extract (I used lemon juice...so it wasn't as fragrant as the lemon extract would be)
1 tablespoon lemon peel
And to make them pretty...
2 tablespoon lemon peel
1 tablespoon sugar

1. Preheat oven to 175C. Line cookie sheets with parchment paper.
2. In a small bowl, stir together flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt. Set aside.
3. Using a mixer, beat together the butter and sugar until smooth and very fluffy.
4. Beat in egg, vanilla extract, lemon extract/juice and lemon peel.
5. Gradually blend in the dry ingredients.
6. Roll rounded teaspoonfuls of dough into balls. Place on lined cookie sheets about 1 1/2 inches apart. Mix together the 2 tbsp of lemon peel and sugar and press a tiny bit of the mixture onto the top of each cookie.
7. Bake 8 to 10 minutes in the oven or until lightly browned.
8. Let stand on cookie sheet a few minutes before removing to cool on wire racks.

Notes:

I used Kosher Salt and I don't think I mixed it that well with the dry ingredients, so some of them came out a bit salty - not to the point of being unbearable, it was actually kind of good that way, and yes, i ate enough of them to be able to make comparisons between cookies of the same batch. No shame, no shame ( I have no one to donate my goods to).

Try these, they're simple, buttery, lemony, but may possibly send you straight to the dentist.