Sweet N Sour Textured Soy Protein

This Sweet N Sour Textured Soy Protein was featured during a live cooking presentation last month.

Colorful and Flavorful Vegan Dish

INGREDIENTS

• 12 pc Textured Soy Protein
• 3 Bell Peppers (preferably different colors)
• 2 tbsp Corn Starch
• 1/4 cup Water
• 1 tbsp Ketchup
• 1/2 tbsp Sugar
• 1/2 tsp Garlic Powder
• 1/2 tsp Onion Powder
• 2 tbsp Cooking Oil
• 1 tbsp Soy Sauce

DIRECTION:

1. Soak Textured Soy Protein pieces in boiling hot water until soft, about 1 hour.
2. Rinse them with cold water. Repeat the soaking process twice.
3. Cut up bell peppers and set aside.
4. Cut up soaked Textured Soy Protein in halves and set aside.
5. In a wok, pour cooking oil until heated at high heat.
6. Pour cut up bell peppers into the wok and stir frying constantly.
7. Cook until bell peppers have fragrance (browning) but not burned. Sprinkle garlic powder and onion powder while stirring.
8. Put Textured Soy Protein into the wok.
9. Pour soy sauce into the wok and keep stirring.
10. Put sugar and ketchup into the wok.
11. Stir in corn starch water until liquid thickens.
12. Ready to plate.

Option:

You can add cut up onions with the bell peppers

Video https://youtu.be/lhm8y9mZHaE

Veggie soup with quinoa

Trying to duplicate my love with the soup at Season's Harvest Cafe in Cypress.

The only difference was the price.

Ingredients:
1/2 cup cooked quinoa
1 cup zucchini, sliced
1 cup broccoli
1/4 cup red bell pepper, cubed

Direction:

1. Cook your broth with my Chicken Broth recipe or open a can of beef broth. 
2. Boil the ingredients until zucchini and broccoli are tender.
3. Remove from heat and season with sea salt.
4. Ready to serve.

My version is good as their version.

Twist'n Shout Rolls

Dinner rolls are the essential item at a Thanksgiving dinner. I hate to buy the ones in the grocery store that have been prepared weeks ago. One day, out of nowhere, I thought to make our own rolls by hand. It was a lot of fun. But so much work. The benefit of baking my own bread is that I can control what goes on top and how it shows.

Ingredients:

Proofing:
1 envelope Fleischmann's Active Dry Yeast
1/2 cup warm water
1 tbsp sugar

Dough:
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 tbsp sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 cup milk
2 tbsp butter, softened

Topping:

Egg White, Sesame Seeds, Coarse Sea Salt

Directions:

Proofing & Mixing:

1. Dissolve Active Dry yeast in warm water with sugar in a small bowl. Let stand until the foam doubles the size
2. In a large mixing bowl, add 1 cup flour, sugar, salt, milk and butter. 
3. Beat 2 min at medium speed of electric mixer. 
4. Add proofed yeast liquid and 1 more cup flour gradually; beat on high speed of mixer for 2 min. 
5. Add in additional flour to make a soft dough. 
6. Knead the dough in the bowl to form the correct consistence.

Rising:

1. Place dough in the greased pans, turning once to coat. 
2. Cover and let rise in a warm, draft-free place for 30 minutes or until doubled.
3. Punch dough down and divide dough into 12 equal pieces. 
4. Shape into balls. Place in greased 8-inch round pan. Cover with moist warm towels.
5. Leave the dough on a cooking stove near a heated source. (not touching the dough).
6. Let rise 30 minutes or until doubled for the last time.

French Curl:

1. Prepare 2 equal amount of dough and form the dough into string shape of 8 inch length.
2. On a lightly floured surface, pinch 1 end of both strings together and twist them into a zigzag. Pinch the other end.
3. Brush egg white and sprinkle raw sesame seeds and salt crystals.

Baking:

1. Preheat oven to 375°F. 
2. Bake rolls for 20 to 25 minutes, or until done. 
3. Remove from pan. Serve warm.

Adopted from Fleischmann's Recipe #662

Originally posted December 26, 2013.

Chinese Summer Tonic Soup

All dried ingredients lined up neatly

This is a lazy way to cook a pot of 桂圓紅棗枸杞白木耳甜湯 red dates longan goji snow fungus soup with Midea Pressure Cooker. Why summer? Because of its ingredients are suitable for hot summer days. But it can be consumed any time of the year. There are several locations sell these ingredients in Chinatown: Hong Kong Seafood City, Yin Wall City, Viet Hoa Market.

Ingredients:

1 cup lotus seeds 蓮子
1 cup split jujubes, dried 紅棗
2 tbs goji berries, dried 枸杞
3 tbs longan meat, dried 桂圓
1 head snow fungus 銀耳

2 oz rock sugar or brown sugar

Directions:

1. Soak white fungus in warm water until expanded. Trim off yellow part on the base. This may be bitter or sour.
2. Rinse all ingredients well. 
3. Place in the pot. 
4. Add water to level 6.
5. Set to SOUP in Midea Pressure Cooker for 30 minutes. 
6. When done, add desired sweetness to the soup. I prefer plain because longan is naturally sweet.
7. Remove from pot and store in a gallon container.
8. Try to consume the soup in a week at any temperature. 

Brown sugar will turn the soup dark.

The effects of rock sugar is purity.

References:

|  Recipe from Pixnet | Another Recipe & Nutrition in Chinese  | English Jujube Tea |

Nutritional Values:

蓮子 Lotus Seeds |
紅棗 Jujubes |
枸杞 Goji Berries |
桂圓 Longan |
銀耳 Snow Fungus 

Low GI Cookies

This is a recipe for healthy and delicious oatmeal raisin cookies with lots of fibers and very low sugar. Great for people watching their A1C and stay on the low Glycemic Index (GI).

The energy you get will be burned from chewing them. 

Ingredients:

7 tbsp soften butter
1 tbsp molasses
5/8 cup Splenda
1 egg
1/2 tsp Vanilla
3/4 cup all purpose flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1 1/2 cup Quaker oats
1/4 cup raisins
1/4 cup dried fruits (chopped dates, apricots, etc)

Directions:

1. Cream butter & Splenda in mixing bowl
2. Mix wet ingredients (molasses, egg, vanilla) into bowl
3. Mix dry ingredients (flour, baking soda, cinnamon) into bowl
4. Turn in oats, raisins & dried fruits into bowl
5. Form dough in 1 tbsp measuring spoon
6. Bake at 375° 10-12 min or until golden brown
7. Cool 5 minutes on cookie sheet, remove to cooling plate, after cooling, place in plastic container to store.

Yields 28 cookies @ 3 gram carbs & 6 gram fiber per cookie
Originally posted on Facebook 6/19/10

Fried Honeycomb Tofu

If you don't like the tofu texture, try this easy recipe. Fried frozen tofu with garlic, cilantro and sweet'n'hot dipping sauce makes your dinner appetizer so grand. The Chinese said: 美味無窮!

Fried Honeycombed Tofu adds excitement to your dinner table.

Ingredients:
1 pack hard tofu
3 cups oil for frying

Dipping Sauce:
3 cloves garlic, chopped
6 stems cilantro, chopped
1 cup low sodium soy sauce
Desirable amount of Sriracha

Direction:

1. Cut tofu into pieces of half inch thick.
2. Lay the slices on a clean plate and put them in the freezer overnight.
3. Next day, remove them from the freezer and soak in water.
4. Squeeze out excess water and lay on a layer of paper towel to let dry.
5. Heat oil on medium heat until ready for frying* (about 5 minutes). 
6. Carefully drop the slices into oil. Flip once to have even coverage.
7. Remove from heat when tofu pieces turned light brown.
8. Lay fried tofu on dry paper towel until surface is no longer greasy.
9. Mix the dipping sauce ingredients for dipping or serve with your favorite dipping sauce.

*Ready for Frying: Drop a small piece of tofu. If it dips to the bottom then come right up, it is ready to fry.

Originally posted on Instagram June 15, 2013

Low-Sodium Coleslaw

This is my instant slaw recipe - skipping the marinate.

Got to love it when it's fast. Faster than driving to KFC.

6 cup shredded cabbage
1 tbsp shredded carrot
1 cup mayo
2 tbsp vinegar (prefer apple cider vinegar)
2 tbsp oil
1 tbsp Splenda
1/2 tsp celery salt
Dash of ground pepper

1. Sprinkle celery salt on vegetables and rub until soft.
2. Stand for 10 min
3. Squeeze out excess liquid. (If too salty, rinse with drinking water and squeeze out the liquid.)
4. Mix in other ingredients.
5. Toss well.
6. Refrigerate for an hour or marinate overnight.

Cauliflower in Sundrenched Days

This is one simplest recipe and great for potluck. It doesn't cost much and everyone loves finger food and delicious vegetables with lots flavors and endless conversation.  Although Kraft stopped producing Sun Dried Tomato Dressing, you can use any oil-based salad dressings. The blanching technique is to keep cauliflower crunchy and retain the vitamins without over-boiling it.

Most of salad dressings can be used as marinate

Ingredients:
1 head Fresh Cauliflower
8 oz Oil-based Dressing (half bottle)
3 qt boiling water 
4 qt iced cold water

Directions:

1. Cut cauliflower into bite sizes.
2. Rinse well.
3. Bring a pot of water to boil, enough water to cover the entire head of cauliflower.
4. Dunk the vegetable and cover.
5. Remove from heat and soak for 10 minutes.
6. Drain and remove the vegetable immediately. 
7. Dunk them into the iced cold water.
8. Once the vegetable is cooled to room temperature, remove from cold water and drain well.
9. Pour salad dressing into the bowl. Toss cauliflower pieces until they are evenly coated. 
10. Ready to serve.

Miso Chicken Breast

Ingredients:
1 de-boned chicken breast
1/2 cup Zinfandel
3 tbsp miso paste
1 tbsp dark soy sauce
5 sliced jalapeno

Miso has extra aroma after cooking

Directions:
Marinate all ingredients overnight
Heat oven to 400 degrees.
Bake 20 minutes uncovered.