I have seen plenty recipes with toasted coconut. What I meant is that I have never seen a rendand with only (toasted) descicated coconut and no coconut milk
Unless, of course, if the descicated coconut is used to make coconut milk
Phil's Cookbook Reads of 2021
161 - 178 of 178 Posts
Unless, of course, if the descicated coconut is used to make coconut milk
Mooncakes and Milkbread by Kristina Cho
A book focusing mostly on baked goods, or more accurately, that could be found in a Chinese Bakery this is a bit of an oddity, but a good one. When I hear milkbread, I think of Japan for no other reason than Mike Chen's videos on youtube. Apparently it was wider application.
There's a short discussion of a few different types of Chinese Bakery. She calls them Grab & Go, Specialty Shops--specializing in one or a small set of related items, Takeaway, and Sit Down Cafes. This variety gets you into some steamed, griddled and a few other non-baked goods that cross over with dim sum somewhat. Along the way through the book, she highlights different bakeries in different cities, I suppose like flavor text in modern card games.
As she then discusses baking ingredients you might not think you're reading an Asian cookbook at all. The evaporated and condensed milk entries begin to tip the hand though. Equipment wise, the only new things are the pineapple cake molds and the mooncake molds.
There are a few doughs that get introduced early on and used repeatedly for different applications. A technique new to me was
She includes a sausage and cilantro pancake that is a variation on scallion pancakes. I think of this as a street-food item, not a bakery item, but I'm no authority. She prefers the sausage to the scallion version. No you su in her version. She has a technique for rolling them out thinly based on an oiled wooden cutting board. She claims this offers better grip on the dough. I've seem similar things for roti on oiled steel and stone counter tops. And Sarah Moulton does it for her sheetpan pizza. So I'm not convinced it's the wood that makes the difference. I've never succeeded with this technique for roti. I'll have to give it a try for scallion pancakes.
She does her Mo bread all in the skillet. Most versions I've seen combine skillet and oven. I'll have to try her all skillet method. She offers the cumin lamb filling recipe. I've only tried the pork filling version before and that's quite good.
There's an important diagram on page 48 that gets linked a few times. The diagram is for various folds for different bun styles. As an epub, there is no page 48 of course so I think the editing for the epub version was pretty quick. And the link is to the topic heading rather than the diagram. Some of the other linking I encountered was to the end of the referenced recipe.
Another strange reference was to make a particular dough through step 2. No recipe is labeled in steps. The closest I can figure is the second paragraph of the instructions where the dough goes into the first rest. I guess I'm critizing the functional editing of the book. There are some mistakes or problematic vagueness there.
I was probaly least interested in the semi-sweet buns. Most of these aren't too my taste. Sweetened red beans for example just hit my palate wrong. It hits me like it should be savory Mexican refried beans, but loaded with sugar. Pineapple buns are also not something I choose. She does include custard buns in this section and I do like those.
Some good bao options, including a chicken and chives I want to try. The Hot Dog Flower buns are the impetus that took this content from her blog to cookbook.
Next up are cakes and tarts but no steamed yellow cake. I'm still workingwith a Grace Young recipe for that and would appreciate some other perspective. A number of swiss cake roll styles that are quite common in Chinese Buffets. I do like those too. And egg tarts. Mooncakes too of course, though I've only sampled the commercial kind. Then cookies.
The last few chapters seemed out of place, but i don't frequent Chinese bakeries to be an authority. A breakfast chapter and a drinks chapter. Some steamed dumplings, some jook and Jian Bing. I've only seen these cooked by Mike Chen and Chinese Cooking Demystified. I'm sure you could find these by plenty of others, those are just where I've encountered this. Those two sources both stress the millet flour/mungbean flour as essential. She instead uses rice flour. She uses a 12" non-stick skillet instead of a large specialty griddle. She uses doubanjiang instead of tianmianjiang. I've wanted to make these for a while but now I've got some different versions to try and see what works at home.
They also do a Taco Bell fusion version for giggles, but it looks interesting.
Mike Chen's version
Her fusion pan fried bun of sausage egg and cheese looks pretty good too.
The drinks, mostly tea variations.
I like it. There's plenty of tempting ideas with pretty clear instructions and very few specialty ingredients on a topic that is only sparsely covered before. Until now.
A book focusing mostly on baked goods, or more accurately, that could be found in a Chinese Bakery this is a bit of an oddity, but a good one. When I hear milkbread, I think of Japan for no other reason than Mike Chen's videos on youtube. Apparently it was wider application.
There's a short discussion of a few different types of Chinese Bakery. She calls them Grab & Go, Specialty Shops--specializing in one or a small set of related items, Takeaway, and Sit Down Cafes. This variety gets you into some steamed, griddled and a few other non-baked goods that cross over with dim sum somewhat. Along the way through the book, she highlights different bakeries in different cities, I suppose like flavor text in modern card games.
As she then discusses baking ingredients you might not think you're reading an Asian cookbook at all. The evaporated and condensed milk entries begin to tip the hand though. Equipment wise, the only new things are the pineapple cake molds and the mooncake molds.
There are a few doughs that get introduced early on and used repeatedly for different applications. A technique new to me was
She doesn't use a lot of it in the dough but it's use is something I've not encountered. Note though that I'm not much of a baker at all.
She includes a sausage and cilantro pancake that is a variation on scallion pancakes. I think of this as a street-food item, not a bakery item, but I'm no authority. She prefers the sausage to the scallion version. No you su in her version. She has a technique for rolling them out thinly based on an oiled wooden cutting board. She claims this offers better grip on the dough. I've seem similar things for roti on oiled steel and stone counter tops. And Sarah Moulton does it for her sheetpan pizza. So I'm not convinced it's the wood that makes the difference. I've never succeeded with this technique for roti. I'll have to give it a try for scallion pancakes.
She does her Mo bread all in the skillet. Most versions I've seen combine skillet and oven. I'll have to try her all skillet method. She offers the cumin lamb filling recipe. I've only tried the pork filling version before and that's quite good.
There's an important diagram on page 48 that gets linked a few times. The diagram is for various folds for different bun styles. As an epub, there is no page 48 of course so I think the editing for the epub version was pretty quick. And the link is to the topic heading rather than the diagram. Some of the other linking I encountered was to the end of the referenced recipe.
Another strange reference was to make a particular dough through step 2. No recipe is labeled in steps. The closest I can figure is the second paragraph of the instructions where the dough goes into the first rest. I guess I'm critizing the functional editing of the book. There are some mistakes or problematic vagueness there.
I was probaly least interested in the semi-sweet buns. Most of these aren't too my taste. Sweetened red beans for example just hit my palate wrong. It hits me like it should be savory Mexican refried beans, but loaded with sugar. Pineapple buns are also not something I choose. She does include custard buns in this section and I do like those.
Some good bao options, including a chicken and chives I want to try. The Hot Dog Flower buns are the impetus that took this content from her blog to cookbook.
Next up are cakes and tarts but no steamed yellow cake. I'm still workingwith a Grace Young recipe for that and would appreciate some other perspective. A number of swiss cake roll styles that are quite common in Chinese Buffets. I do like those too. And egg tarts. Mooncakes too of course, though I've only sampled the commercial kind. Then cookies.
The last few chapters seemed out of place, but i don't frequent Chinese bakeries to be an authority. A breakfast chapter and a drinks chapter. Some steamed dumplings, some jook and Jian Bing. I've only seen these cooked by Mike Chen and Chinese Cooking Demystified. I'm sure you could find these by plenty of others, those are just where I've encountered this. Those two sources both stress the millet flour/mungbean flour as essential. She instead uses rice flour. She uses a 12" non-stick skillet instead of a large specialty griddle. She uses doubanjiang instead of tianmianjiang. I've wanted to make these for a while but now I've got some different versions to try and see what works at home.
Jianbing You Can Actually Make at Home
![image]()
I still have dreams about the jianbing stall a few blocks from my apartment in Beijing. I didn't go there nearly as much as I should have (there was so much new food I needed to try), but when I stopped by for breakfast, I couldn't imagine starting my day any other way. Jianbing are Chinese-style crepes, similar to French crepes, made on a big, hot flat top. The street vendor cracks an egg over the top and marbles the golden yolk and whites around the surface like a Jackson Pollock painting, sprinkling on chopped green onions and sesame seeds. When the eggs are set, he effortlessly flips the huge crepe without losing a single green onion, smears on a salty, funky, spicy fermented bean sauce (doubanjiang), and layers on crisp lettuce, crunchy bao cui (a fried cracker), and whatever other filling options he has handy. He folds it up into a neat package and hands you breakfast. It takes about five seconds to devour.
You can't quite achieve the exact same product at home, because who has a 30-inch crepe pan stored in a kitchen cabinet? With a few tweaks and nuanced substitutions, however, you can make jianbing that's just as satisfying and full of textural delight. I don't own a crepe pan and I probably never will, but a 12-inch nonstick skillet works fine. The batter is loose enough that you can spread it into a thin layer by swirling the pan or spreading the batter with the back of a spoon. But first, make sure the pan is set on low heat. If it's any hotter, the batter will cook too quickly and won't spread. From that point on, the process of making jianbing at home is essentially the same as at street stalls. If you want to practice your crepe-flipping theatrics in the privacy of your kitchen, go right ahead. When you add your fillings, I suggest substituting pork rinds for the fried cracker. I've seen other recipes use fried dumpling wrappers, but I couldn't resist a reason to have pork rinds for breakfast.
MAKES 4
For the Crepes
345g (1 ½ cups) water
150g (1 ¼ cups) all-purpose flour
30g (¼ cup) rice flour
2 tablespoon canola or other neutral-flavored oil, for brushing
4 large eggs
3 green onions, chopped
2 teaspoons black sesame seeds
For the Filling
Spicy fermented bean sauce (doubanjiang)
Romaine lettuce, chopped
Pork rinds
Make the crepes: In a medium mixing bowl, whisk to combine the water, all-purpose flour, and rice flour until smooth. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and let the batter rest at room temperature for at least 1 hour (or refrigerate up to overnight).
Brush a little bit of canola oil onto a 12-inch nonstick skillet. Heat the pan over low until warm. Pour about ⅓ cup batter into the pan and gently swirl to cover the whole pan, or use the back of a spoon to quickly spread the batter into a thin even layer to cover the interior of the pan. Increase the heat to medium-high and continue to cook just until the batter looks set, 1 to 2 minutes. Crack one egg over the crepe and use a spatula to break the yolk and spread it over the crepe. Sprinkle 2 tablespoons green onions and ½ teaspoon black sesame seeds over the surface. Continue to cook until the egg is set and the edges of the crepe are crisp and starting to curl up, 3 minutes. Flip the crepe and cook the other side until the egg is golden brown and crisp, 3 minutes. (If you want a crispier crepe, flip it one more time and cook another 1 to 2 minutes.)
Transfer the crepe to a cutting board, egg side down, and spread 1 ½ teaspoons bean sauce over the top. Layer on the lettuce and pork rinds. Fold the crepe into thirds and cut in half.
Repeat with remaining batter and other ingredients to make four crepes, allowing time for the pan to cool and brushing with more oil between each. Serve immediately.
They also do a Taco Bell fusion version for giggles, but it looks interesting.
Mike Chen's version
Her fusion pan fried bun of sausage egg and cheese looks pretty good too.
The drinks, mostly tea variations.
I like it. There's plenty of tempting ideas with pretty clear instructions and very few specialty ingredients on a topic that is only sparsely covered before. Until now.
Damn Good Chinese Food by Chris Cheung
Lots of snow overnight so I made it through another one.
Chris has worked for Jean Georges Vongerichten and a number of other restaurants. He has also run his own snack shop. He's been a judge on Chopped. He definitely has his own take on things, and goes heavy on the sauce compared to most Chinese cookbooks that aren't Chinese-American. And his Chinese-American chapter really lays on the sauce.
He uses Soy Sauce somewhat differently than most other authors, combining thin (light), dark, mushroom, and sweet. Usually it's just light and dark-though the dark is often a mushroom dark soy--and that's my preference as well.
This book too references pages in the hypertext and the linking is also a touch off. There is a strange editing fail of asterisked ingredients that are available in Asian grocers, often stacking up five or six deep at the end of a recipe. I think there's been an effort at automated conversion of a print books source file into the epub, but the bugs aren't really worked out.
Lots of good dumpling content. Once you get to the Chinese-American Chapter, I struggled a bit with some of his technique. Velveting uses the whole egg and baking soda as well. The passing through oil is a faster higher heat affair than is usually described. These seem like shortcut restaurant behavior not good home technique. Also no mention of water blanching the velveted chicken or pork. Beef does need the oil pass. He seems unaware of these more common practices of velveting and passing through oil.
The second recipe was on topic for this month's challenge:
There are some interesting uses of dried fish. A fried fish addition to Mapo Tofu was a bit of a surprise. Also a Char Siu Black Cod. Things get more upscale and event oriented in the Birthday chapter with whole poultry cooking, whole fish, lobster and so on.
As to sweets, he shows a hotcake that was a waffle in Mooncakes and Milbread. It looks like it requires a specially shaped cookware, but neither shows the cookware. The description is more like a waffle iron.
I think the food looks pretty good. It's more restaurantized than I tend to cook I think. And not all of his technique is as well rounded as I think it should be.
Lots of snow overnight so I made it through another one.
Chris has worked for Jean Georges Vongerichten and a number of other restaurants. He has also run his own snack shop. He's been a judge on Chopped. He definitely has his own take on things, and goes heavy on the sauce compared to most Chinese cookbooks that aren't Chinese-American. And his Chinese-American chapter really lays on the sauce.
He uses Soy Sauce somewhat differently than most other authors, combining thin (light), dark, mushroom, and sweet. Usually it's just light and dark-though the dark is often a mushroom dark soy--and that's my preference as well.
This book too references pages in the hypertext and the linking is also a touch off. There is a strange editing fail of asterisked ingredients that are available in Asian grocers, often stacking up five or six deep at the end of a recipe. I think there's been an effort at automated conversion of a print books source file into the epub, but the bugs aren't really worked out.
Lots of good dumpling content. Once you get to the Chinese-American Chapter, I struggled a bit with some of his technique. Velveting uses the whole egg and baking soda as well. The passing through oil is a faster higher heat affair than is usually described. These seem like shortcut restaurant behavior not good home technique. Also no mention of water blanching the velveted chicken or pork. Beef does need the oil pass. He seems unaware of these more common practices of velveting and passing through oil.
The second recipe was on topic for this month's challenge:
Variations on the steamed patty have been more common in cookbooks of late and on youtube as well. I tried one from Bon Appetit a year or so ago that was bland. That was my first attempt at this. These others have looked better. https://www.bonappetit.com/story/chinese-steamed-pork-patty![Food Tableware Dishware Ingredient Recipe]()
HOM DON YUK BANG (SALTED EGG MINCED PORK PIE)
This dish is an extremely popular dish in Chinese home cooking and has many different variations. It can be found on the Toisan table, Cantonese table, the Shanghainese table-we all love this dish. It's best steamed or panfried. Given its regional popularity, it can be compared to the American meat loaf, where almost every home has a different version sitting in its recipe box.
When I was kid, we would get hungry and very happy sitting at home, hearing the banging of the cleaver on the big wooden cutting board. It was a ten-minute constant rhythm of loud metal blows to wood, softened by chunks of perfect pork being chopped and prepared just to the right level of tenderness, where the texture after cooking holds in all the juiciness of the meat and yields just a touch of chewiness. Combined with water chestnuts, there is a particular snap on the first bite.
Traditionally, many love to top this dish with salted fish; others prefer mushrooms. The Toisanese, however, love their salted eggs.
1 PLATE, SERVES 6 | PREP TIME: 30 MINUTES | COOKING TIME: 30 MINUTES
INGREDIENTS
¾ pound pork belly, skin off
¼ pound pork butt
½ cup water chestnuts, peeled, washed, and small diced (fresh is preferred)
¼ cup thin soy sauce
3 tablespoons oyster sauce
½ tablespoon cornstarch
1½ egg whites, whipped to soft peaks
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
3 salted eggs*
1 tablespoon ginger, peeled and small diced
COOKING PROCEDURE
Hand chop the pork belly and pork butt, so it's finely minced. Mix the two meats together in a mixing bowl.
Next, incorporate the water chestnuts, the soy sauce, the oyster sauce, and the cornstarch, then fold in the egg whites.
Rub your hands with oil and mix all of the ingredients in the bowl, squeezing them together tightly until well combined. Place the meat mixture into a rimmed plate or very shallow bowl. Meanwhile, heat your Chinese steamer on high.
Separate the white and the yolks of the salted eggs, then cut the yolks in half and chop the whites. Put yolk halves and the chopped whites on the top of the pork and push into the meat slightly, then top with ginger.
Place in steamer for 30 minutes, or until done. You can stick a thermometer into the meat to make sure it's cooked through and 165°F.
Remove from the steamer and serve.
There are some interesting uses of dried fish. A fried fish addition to Mapo Tofu was a bit of a surprise. Also a Char Siu Black Cod. Things get more upscale and event oriented in the Birthday chapter with whole poultry cooking, whole fish, lobster and so on.
As to sweets, he shows a hotcake that was a waffle in Mooncakes and Milbread. It looks like it requires a specially shaped cookware, but neither shows the cookware. The description is more like a waffle iron.
I think the food looks pretty good. It's more restaurantized than I tend to cook I think. And not all of his technique is as well rounded as I think it should be.
161 - 178 of 178 Posts
