When I was a young lad in school, my mom would make this oxtail soup to pack for my lunch in a thermos mixed with rice. I was probably the only kid with a hot, homemade lunch, while most other kids ate sandwiches with PB&J. I was a lucky kid (despite most kids at school making fun of me for those lunches).

Whenever I think about this oxtail soup, I can only think of how yummy it is and that the only person who makes it just right is mom. (Jenny knows this too 😉) When we were young, we weren't rich and tried to save money where we could. Usually we didn't turn on the AC and depended on fans to stay cool. The soup itself takes several hours to make, and the boiling water would make the kitchen hot and humid, which was worse during the summer months—but mom would cook it for us anyway, simply because she knew we liked it a lot. There was a lot of love that went into this soup, and every time she makes it for us is a reminder of her love and care for us. When Jenny first had this soup, she said that it was "The perfect warm bowl of soup after a long, stressful day." 

This soup is stew like in that the ingredients are typical of what you might find in a stew. Carrots, onions, potatoes, tomatoes + beef (oxtail). The carrots and potatoes and beef give the soup a heartiness that warms and fills you up. Because we cook the soup for a long time, the oxtail is fall off the bone tender, soft and delicious. The onions provide depth and sweetness, while the tomatoes give a slight tang to the soup. Mom also puts in some chen pei 陳皮, or dried tangerine peel, which is popularly used as a seasoning in Chinese cooking, which adds an extra flavor to the soup that makes it really great. I can't pinpoint what it is, but without, the soup feels like it's missing something. Just that little something something.
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For a long time, we never knew how to make this soup, but for the sake of the WAI SIK blog, we got my Mom to show us! See recipe below. In terms of amounts, there's really no set amount of each ingredient that you have to have. It's based on personal preference. If you want more oxtail, add more oxtail. If you want more potatoes, go ahead. 

This soup is stew like in that the ingredients are typical of what you might find in a stew. Carrots, onions, potatoes, tomatoes + beef (oxtail). The carrots and potatoes and beef give the soup a heartiness that warms and fills you up. Because we cook the soup for a long time, the oxtail is fall off the bone tender, soft and delicious. The onions provide depth and sweetness, while the tomatoes give a slight tang to the soup. Mom also puts in some chen pei 陳皮, or dried tangerine peel, which is popularly used as a seasoning in Chinese cooking, which adds an extra flavor to the soup that makes it really great. I can't pinpoint what it is, but without, the soup feels like it's missing something. Just that little something something.
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For a long time, we never knew how to make this soup, but for the sake of the WAI SIK blog, we got my Mom to show us! See recipe below. In terms of amounts, there's really no set amount of each ingredient that you have to have. It's based on personal preference. If you want more oxtail, add more oxtail. If you want more potatoes, go ahead. 

INGREDIENTS:
• 2 packages oxtail
• 2 Carrots (chopped)
• 2 Onions (chopped)
• 3 Potatoes (chopped)
• 2 Tomatoes (chopped)
• 1 piece Dried Tangerine Peel 陳皮, chopped
• Salt
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DIRECTIONS:
1. Prepare the oxtail by trimming off any excess fat. Bring a large stock pot to boil and boil the oxtail to remove fat and bloody flavor. You'll know it's ready when the oxtail is no longer raw and the blood has boiled off the oxtail. Throughout this stage of boiling the oxtail, you'll want to be skimming the broth of any brown froth that bubbles up. Once all the blood is gone, you can drain and rinse the oxtail, scrub off any excess blood/residue off the bone.

2. Boil the tomato until the skin comes off easily with a knife. Remove the skin and chop up the tomato and set aside.

3. Now, you're ready to begin cooking the soup. In large pot, boil the cleaned oxtail for 1/2 hour.

4. After 30 minutes, add cut carrots.and boil for 15 minutes.

5. Add onion and boil 15 minutes, then add potato. Boil another 15 minutes, add tomato. 

6. Bring to high boil, then reduce heat to medium boil for 1 hour.

7. Season with salt to taste and serve as is, or with bread or rice.

Skim off any excess oil on the top, or refrigerate overnight and skim off the fat the next morning. It tastes light and warm! This soup has been in our family since I was a kid, and the work that goes into it is the epitome of love. We hope you enjoy it as much as I have growing up!

Growing up, my grandmother loved to cook fish, normally steamed as she enjoyed simple, healthy foods. Her dishes were never complicated, and her style of cooking often simply let the main ingredients shine without a fuss. Whether it was dried salted fish or fresh fish from the market, she would skillfully prepare it and steam the whole fish to perfection, topping it with ginger, scallions and my favorite seafood soy sauce.

​Now when I eat Chinese style steamed fish, it brings back memories of my grandmother scooping a steamy bowl of fluffy white rice from her clay pot and spooning the seafood soy sauce from the side of the steamed fish dish onto my bowl of rice before handing it to me. The slightly sweet seafood soy sauce mixed with the freshly steamed juices of the fish was incredibly aromatic and was SO GOOD over rice. Honestly, I enjoyed eating plain white rice with the steamed fish sauce more than eating the fish itself as a kid. It was simple, but delicious.

Another favorite part about steamed fish? Eating the cheek of the fish, right below the eye. It was always the most tender piece of fish meat and something my grandmother and father always dug out for me or my sister to enjoy. It made me feel loved and special to be given the best part of the fish.

Wilson and I recently visited Shan Shan Noodles on Route 46 in Parsippany, NJ and we had ordered a steamed fish dish with chili peppers off their specials menu. Despite how full we were from our usual noodle orders, we somehow were able to try and eat the fish dish, and boy were we glad that we did. Immediately, we fell in love with the authentic, fresh flavors and the ease in eating the smooth, velvety flounder fish fillets without worrying about bones or skin. We loved that every bite was fish, and I especially loved the hint of heat from the chili peppers. The dish itself is not spicy so you could easily remove the chili peppers as well.

This recipe that I am sharing today is my take on the dish from Shan Shan Noodles, with some influence from my grandmother's cooking of steamed fish as well. Topped with chili peppers, ginger, scallion, shiitake mushrooms, fried garlic bits, prickly ash oil, seafood soy sauce and mirin, the steamed marinaded flounder filets are sweet with a slight kick from the chili pepper and mild "numbing" from the prickly ash oil. The shiitake mushrooms then add a bit of earthiness to the dish while the fried garlic bits provide a bit of texture and umami flavor boost.

INGREDIENTS
Serves 2-3
• 2 fillets of flounder, cut into pieces
• 2 teaspoons white pepper
• 2 teaspoons salt
• 1 tablespoon cornstarch
• 2 inch knob of ginger, slices thinly and julienned
• 2 scallions stalks, sliced finely
• 2 teaspoons sesame oil
• 2 teaspoons prickly ash oil
• 1 long chili pepper
• 1 tablespoon mirin
• 1 tablespoon of the seafood soy sauce
 
DIRECTIONS
1. Slice the flounder fillets into sashimi sliced cuts, round 2-3 inches per slice. The should resemble small chicken tenders in size.

2. Place sliced flounder into a mixing bowl and add salt, white pepper, sesame oil, mirin, and cornstarch. Mix well until flounder is well coated.

3. Slice up the ginger and scallion into fine thin strips. Chop up the chili pepper and place half of the sliced ginger and scallion on a plate for the fish to steam on.

4. Place the fish slices onto the steam plate, feel free to sprinkle some ginger, scallion and chili pepper in between layers of fish if you are piling the fish into a smaller steaming plate or bowl. Lastly, place the steam fish plate into the steamer rack and steam for 15 minutes. The fish should be completely white and opaque, and easily forked apart to be cooked through.

5. When the fish is done steaming, remove from the steamer and top the fish with the seafood soy sauce, prickly ash oil and sprinkling of fried garlic bits. And that's it! Enjoy over a bowl of white rice and you're good to go!​​

​I hope you enjoy this dish as much as we do. It's fresh, healthy, and also a great dish to serve to young ones (minus the chili pepper and prickly ash oil) because you don't have to worry about fish bones, and they'll enjoy the fish sauce over rice too!

On my quest to be a little more healthy, (and I say this very loosely), I was looking at my fridge and pantry with skepticism in trying to figure out how to make something healthy, yummy and satisfying. Sure, I know the healthiest way to eat is steaming lean proteins and vegetables, but doing so results in taking a trip down bland avenue and straight into flavorless town, and then subsequently me flipping a table from being h-angry.​

I looked at a piece of fresh salmon in the fridge and thought, "Dear Salmon, how should you enter my belly?" How about a salmon rice bowl?

In Japanese, donburi, or more popularly known as "don" is essentially a bowl of rice topped with simmered veggies and or meat. It could be fish, pork, beef, chicken etc. Donburi is one of the easiest things to make as long as you have rice, and then you can top it with virtually anything—you can even use leftovers.

For this simple salmon brown rice bowl, the flavor profile is Asian (surprise!) and can be made in 15 minutes or less, including microwaving the packet of Seeds of Change Quinoa & Brown Rice with Garlic. And here you've got yourself a quick, healthy and yummy meal. I first tried this brand of brown rice and quinoa during a Costco trip, where they were giving out free samples. I'm a sucker for free samples. Or free stuff. Yay~

Anyhow, I was so happy with how it came out! Plus, it's healthy and could be microwaved in 90 seconds, so I'm all for it. A package is two servings, so it was perfect for a dinner between myself and Wilson. It's so easy because this recipe just needs you to chop up the ingredients, mix in the flavors, sauté til cooked, and top off on rice. The sweet soy sauce in the dish makes it similar to salmon teriyaki, while the sweet thai chili sauce gives it a little extra spice and tang that reminds me of Thai fish dishes. Top it off with a poached egg yolk and some tobiko (Japanese word for flying fish roe) and it's ready to go. The texture of the rice and quinoa, along with the little salty tobiko popping in your mouth is fun and tasty, while the smooth egg yolk glosses and coats the salmon with a delicious richness that only eggs can do.

​There's also something simple and comforting in eating rice with a runny egg and sweet soy sauce. My grandmother used to make that for me to eat and the egg yolk would envelope each and every grain of rice, while the sweet soy sauce gave the rice even more addictive, yummy flavor. It was a simple dish that didn't require much money or work, and my grandmother always made it with love.
So without further ado...Here's what you gotta do..

INGREDIENTS:
• 4-6 oz salmon fillet, cubed
• 1 tbsp chopped parsley
• 1 chopped scallions (about 1 tbsp)
• 1/2 tsp white pepper powder
• 1/2 tsp ginger powder
• 1/2 tbsp mirin
• 2 tbsp sweet soy sauce (I used Yoshida's Gourmet Sauce)
• 1 tbsp sesame oil
• 1 tbsp olive oil for cooking
• 1 tbsp Sweet Thai Chili Sauce
• 1 egg yolk
• tobiko (flying fish roe)
• Seeds of Change Garlic & Brown Rice Quinoa Packet

To be honest, my experience with Indian cuisine goes only so far as dishes that are popular in America--Chicken Tikka Masala, Butter Chicken, Tandoori meats, Roti, Naan bread, Curry, etc. I definitely can't claim to be very knowledgeable when it comes to Indian cuisine, and I have to admit that because of my inexperience with it, I've been scared to try new dishes in authentic Indian restaurants because I like to stay in my comfort zone of what I do know and recognize on the menu. That being said, I am very blessed to work with people from different cultures and my coworker Urvi brought in this tasty Indian snack called Sev Puri, or Chaat to share with us at work. The second I put the Puri chip into my mouth, I knew I had to get my hands on the recipe! The moment I swallowed, I put my hand on Urvi's arm and said, 'Please teach me how to make this!!'
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It was so delicious that I wanted to learn to make it at home too, like all the time. The flavors of this Sev Puri Chaat recipe are incredibly fresh and simply bursting with flavors and textures. Crispy, tangy, sweet and has a hint of spice (dependent on how much pepper powder you put in it). From the first bite, this snack will take you on an adventure through flavor town and *sings* a whole new world...a new fantastic point of view...

​If you've never had Chaat, the only way I know how to describe it is an Indian version of nachos topped with salsa. However, because there is no cheese, the dish is much more light, and therefore so very easy to eat lots of! (Not that you should eat too much of anything, but it's not as heavy and greasy as nachos with cheese and all the fixings). Urvi graciously welcomed me into her home and allowed me to film her showing me how to make the Sev Puri. I was happy to learn that the ingredients were all relatively inexpensive and are easy to find in any Indian supermarket. (I look forward to making a trip to an Indian supermarket soon!) Furthermore, the recipe was mostly assembly work so it was pretty quick to put together.
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She also explained the different kinds of spices typically found in Indian kitchens and even showed me her expansive spice cabinet! It was very impressive, and definitely something I need to take notes on in organizing my own spice cabinets!

Isn't this spice box pretty? Apparently it's very common in Indian kitchens. Almost looks like an artists' paint palette!

After we were done filming, and I got a belly full of delicious Sev Puri Chaat (along with a take home baggy for Wilson to try...and for me to ultimately eat all of...shhhh!), Urvi showed me the rest of her beautiful home and even showed me the personal praying temple in her room. I didn't take a picture of it, but she had pictures of all the different Gods that she and her husband worship in the Hindu religion. It was very interesting to learn about, and both the imagery, stories, and ornate details in the little praying temple's architecture was amazing to see. The experience of learning another culture's food and hearing Urvi's stories were so fascinating, and beautiful to say the least. I felt so lucky and grateful to Urvi for welcoming me into her home, her kitchen, and teaching me so much about herself and her culture!

In any case, here is the awesome recipe that you really have to try! There aren't any measurements for the toppings since it really depends on how much you yourself want to eat and your own preferences. So top away!

INGREDIENTS:

• Puri
• Chiwda
• Thin Sev
• Coriander Chutney
• Mint Chutney (optional)
• Tamarind & Date Chutney
• Chaat Masala spice powder
• Red Onion (chopped)
• Tomatoes (chopped)
• Red pepper powder (optional)
  
  

DIRECTIONS:

1. Spread the Puris out on the plate.
2. Top with chopped red onion.
3. Top with chopped tomatoes.
4. Add Chiwda (however much you like).
5. Add the Tamarind & Date Chutney, then add the Coriander Chutney (optional: add Mint Chutney).
6. Top with Thin Sev.
7. Add Chaat Masalad spice powder.
8. Add red pepper powder (optional).
9. Top with more Thin Sev. Enjoy!

I hope you enjoy this recipe as much as I do! I can't wait to make this again!

Over ripe bananas and don't know what to do with them? Try these delicious and healthy banana muffins!

This recipe is based on a recipe by Cookie+Kate, a great blog I stumbled upon when Pinteresting for ideas for using bananas, because I had a few bananas that were getting too ripe and I didn't want to waste them. I added in some dark chocolate cacao bits as well as candied walnuts to add texture and yumminess because I love dark chocolate. I didn't have whole wheat flour as the recipe asked for, and used white flour and added an extra 1/2 tablespoon of baking powder as well for foofiness.

​I rarely eat muffins because so often they end up being dry and just overly filling for my taste—but these are just the right portion! They're also very fluffy and naturally moist from the banana and coconut oil, which you can't even taste. Another great thing about her recipe is that it's a one pot recipe where you throw everything together, mix mix mix, bake, and devour.

YIELD: 12 muffins
INGREDIENTS
• ⅓ cup melted coconut oil
• ½ cup maple syrup
• 2 eggs
• 3 mashed large ripe bananas
• ¼ cup water
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• ½ tablespoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• ½ teaspoon salt
• ½ teaspoon cinnamon, plus more for sprinkling on top
• 1 ¾ cups white flour
• ⅓ cup old-fashioned oats, plus more for sprinkling on top
• 1 teaspoon granulated sugar for sprinkling on top

DIRECTIONS
1 Preheat the oven to 325 degrees Fahrenheit (165 degrees Celsius). Grease your muffin pans with butter or non-stick cooking spray, or you can be like me and use cupcake liners for no mess!

2 Mix together the coconut oil and maple syrup. Add the eggs, the mashed bananas and water, followed by the baking soda, baking powder, vanilla extract, salt and cinnamon.

3 Add the flour and oats to the bowl and mix until combined. Now add in your dark chocolate pieces, candied walnuts, or any other dried fruit, nuts etc that you love.

4 Divide the batter evenly between the muffin cupsz Sprinkle the tops of the muffins with a small amount of oats and some granulated sugar. Bake muffins for 22 to 25 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into a muffin comes out clean.
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5 Place the muffin tin on a cooling rack to cool. According to Cookie+Katec these muffins will keep at room temperature for up to 2 days, or in the refrigerator for up to 4 days, and will keep well in the freezer in a freezer-safe bag for up to 3 months (just defrost individual muffins as needed).

I hope you enjoy this great banana muffin recipe and big props to Cookie+Kate for coming up with it! Visit her blog for more deliciousness!