Taiwanese Breakfast Rice Rolls 飯糰

My mother first introduced us to these breakfast rolls on a chilly Saturday morning. The chewy texture of the glutinous rice and the flavorful fillings made this my instant favorite. Many years later, The Husband and I made a trip to NY where he tried it for the first time and was instantly hooked. 

If you are ever in Taiwan, you will find food carts with large wooden buckets of hot steamy rice and about 20 different fillings that you can choose from. I had to replicate these rice rolls at home and used this recipe as a guide. 

Ingredients

2 cups sweet rice

1 cup regular white rice

6 eggs, beaten

1 tsp, vegetable or canola oil

¾ cup chopped dried radish

¾ cup pork sung (dried shredded pork)

1 Chinese doughnut stick, cut into 6 pieces

Cilantro (optional)

Directions

1. Mix sweet rice with white rice and cook the grains with a ratio of 1 cup rice to 0.8 cups water in rice cooker. When the rice is done, allow it to simmer for another 20 minutes. * If you have a sweet rice setting on your rice cooker, use that setting.

2. Crack the eggs into a bowl and stir with a fork. Pour beaten egg mixture into wok or frying pan and make a pancake-like omelette.  When cool, slice into strips.

3. Heat 1 teaspoon of cooking oil and stir-fry the dried radish to bring out the fragrance. Add a little sugar to taste to reduce saltiness.

4. Bake the Chinese doughnut stick until crispy based on instructions on bad (if frozen).

5. Spread Saran wrap over an round flat plate. Place a single cup of rice onto the plastic wrap and spread the rice out into an thin, even layer. On top of the rice, place two tablespoons of dried pork sung and two tablespoons of radish, then add the egg and donut stick as well as cilantro if desired.

6. Use the plastic wrap to close the rice roll and shape the roll into a cylinder.

7. Press until firm and set.

8. Serve these rolls with the plastic wrap on.  Makes six servings.

These are perfect on-the-go breakfast snacks since they are portable. They are also great for kids! Now we can enjoy these treats at home until our next trip to Taiwan. 

Have a great Monday! We're off to Europe soon and can't wait to share with you our gastronomic adventures when we return. 

Dining In: NYC 2011 - Japanese Food Excursions

The Husband and I had our first amazing bowl of ramen at Samurai Noodle in the International District in Seattle. That was when we realized that similar to our unending search for the perfect pizza, we would be embarking on the unending search for the perfect ramen.

Naturally, we sought to continue this search in NYC. First, we and several (very patient) friends waited almost 2-3 hours for a table at Ippudo, one of the more famous ramen joints in NYC. We figured if we made the trip all the way out here we would need to give this place a try.

 Pork Belly Bun

 Akamaru Modern Ramen

Overall thoughts on Ippudo are that I am very glad we tried it, but I will not be returning again. The ramen is quite over-priced at $15 a bowl and while the flavors are quite amazing, they don't justify the price or the insanely long wait. Further, the pork belly bun is simply what I grew up eating at home with my momma's cooking. So while I am glad we tried it to see what the hype was about, I will likely head over to Totto Ramen on our next trip to NYC. 

The second location for our ramen search was at Mitsua, which is a Japanese supermarket in Fort Lee, NJ. Once entering the store, we saw a long line for a ramen stall in which they claimed to have flown in a ramen chef from Japan for "this weekend only." We of course bought into the marketing and had to try it.

Shio Ramen

Super clean, yet flavorful broth. Chewy noodles and great meat and egg pairings. I actually enjoyed this more than my bowl of ramen at Ippudo. 

Tonkatsu Ramen

From another ramen stall inside Mitsua. Compared to the shio ramen this broth was super enriched with fat and meaty flavor. The pork belly was a plus! 

Finally, The Husband chose over $30 worth of sashimi, which we devoured in less than 30 minutes. It was one of the most satisfying meals that we had on this trip. Fresh sashimi is nearly impossible to find in our area so we had to get our fill. 

Our ramen adventures will continue on as we try new places. I'd love to hear from you about the ramen places that you have enjoyed in different cities so we can start compiling a growing list of places to test out. 

Have a enjoyable Wednesday! 

Dining In: NYC 2011 - Flushing Food Tour

Since the Triangle area often feels like an ethnic food desert to us, the only requirement for our recent trip to NYC was Asian/Chinese/Taiwanese/Japanese food and a lot of it! Our friends, J&R, are huge fans of Flushing, NY and since this was where my family used to frequent during our Jersey days, I couldn't agree more. 

The NYTimes recently put together an interactive feature on the Flushing dining scene, which includes several places from our food tour. You can find the feature here. 

First up, Nan Shiang Dumpling House. This place is a treasure trove for soup dumpling and Taiwanese breakfast lovers. We loved it so much we ate here 3 times over the course of our week-long trip. 

Salted Soy Milk

Scallion Pancakes

so buttery, flaky, and crispy

Crab Soup Dumplings

definitely one of my favorite foods ever

Second place on our food tour was White Bear, an unassuming little food spot, that served killer handmade wontons with red oil sauce (number 6). They were so amazing. With limited seating, you might as well buy a box and eat them on the sidewalk, which is what we did. (A small price to pay for great food). 

Third food locale can be found at the Golden Shopping Mall, which contains one of the locations for Xi'an Famous Foods. However, inside there were up to 4 different food vendors from hand-pulled noodles to lamb noodle soups. If we hadn't been so stuffed, I would have tried it all. This location has a definite night-market feel so if you are really picky about ambience, you may consider another Xi'an location. (We even watched a lady feed her Pekingese noodles with chopsticks while we ate our noodles).

A1. Liang Pi "Cold Skin Noodles"

spicy kick and great noodle texture

B2. Spicy Cumin Lamb Burger

not a huge fan of cumin, but good texture of meat and bread

Hand-pulled Lamb Cumin Noodles 

 nuclear spicy level, but super tasty

This concludes part 1 of the NYC Food Tour, which given the sheer amount of food we ate, I've divided into 3 parts to be posted this week. Thanks for reading and hope you get to try these amazing places the next time you're in NYC. 

Have a great Monday! 

#durhamtweetup 2011

Sometimes blogging can feel like an isolating activity. And while cooking and writing is extremely therapeutic for me, it can be fun to meet up with like-minded folk and just talk media and food. I had heard about "tweetups" before, but never attended any for fear that I would be an odd duck in the midst of writers, photographers, and other creative minds. However, yesterday evening was the durhamtweetup hosted by @durhamfoodie and @designkompany and I'm so glad I went! It was fun to put faces to twitter handles and actually meet the movers and shakers of the Durham media and food scene. 

Of course where there are foodies, there are food trucks! Welcome to the scene, @ChirbaChirba, Durham's first dumpling truck. Didn't have a chance to try them because of the long line, but will definitely be tracking them down in the future. 

Also caught sighting of @WillandPops, which makes locally-sourced food. Had their Mango Lemonade, which hit the spot on a hot evening. Also in attendance and not shown, but previously featured: @piepushers and @parlourdurham. 

I'd been looking for @KoKyuBBQ for a long time and finally had a chance to try them. 

Thai-Ko. 

Short Rib Slider. 

Duckfat Tots. 

The Thai-Ko had a super flavorful relish/salsa that was delicious with hints of sweetness and spice. The Short Rib Slider had marinated daikon and cucumbers, yum yum. The duck fat tots were what you would expect - fried tots, but with a creamy dip (that might contain duck fat?). I can see why KoKyu has received a following. Layers of flavor and combinations of salt, sweet, and spice. Keep in mind that food truck food is not always cheap - definitely a quality over quantity thing here. 

Overall, durhamtweetup was a laid back and inviting event to meet people who appreciate a vibrant food, media, and creative scene in Durham. Looking forward to seeing how this evolves in the next few years. 

A followup thought to the success of this tweetup. Anyone interested in a similar gathering for young (and old) women entrepreneurs and self-employed folk in Durham? Imagine the wisdom and synergy that could be generated at an event like that! Find me on twitter if interested: @spoonraider. 

Have a great weekend everyone! 

Durham Food Trucks: Part 3

The Husband found a deal for Slippin Sliders, which is a food truck that occasionally parks in Durham near Fullsteam and MotorCo on Rigsbee. We found them on a hot afternoon next to Fullsteam, just as they were opening for the night. 

We got everything on the menu except the Teriyaki: 4 sliders for $10.

The Diablo. 

The West Coast. 

The Texas. 

The Turkey Apple Jack. 

Overall consensus was that the sliders with bacon were quite good. They also had some pretty tasty aiolis and remoulades. The bun is quite soft and the meat is thin so every bite is a little mushy with all of the sauces and veggies. My favorite was the Texas (naturally) and the West Coast had a great sauce. 

While I understand that sliders are "mini" burgers, I'm just not quite a fan yet because if I wanted to eat a great burger, why would I want it to be "petite-sized"? At $10 for 4 sliders, it's not a bad deal if you find a coupon or a daily deal. Unfortunately, I'm still not quite convinced that the genre of sliders is a bona fide food category. 

I hope Durham continues to attract food trucks, as it's great to see this movement growing in the midst of the locavore, foodie crowd in the area. 

May your food truck trekking continue this week! 

Taiwanese Meat Rounds 肉圓

This is the first of a series of Taiwanese food posts, as I was lucky enough to have my parents in town for the week. Given that The Husband and I are both Taiwanese and feel strongly that our children be immersed in the culture, it has always been top priority for me to learn how to cook Taiwanese cuisine.

For people who have no experience with Taiwanese food, these posts will hopefully tempt you to expand your palate or at least inspire you to try something new. For those who have had these dishes before, you can now add these recipes to your family cookbooks.

Taiwanese meat rounds are typically eaten as a Taiwanese street food aka 台灣小吃, but often can be incorporated as a lunch or dinner item as well. This dish consists of a filling and then an outer layer of rice wrapping. Please keep in mind that these recipes are estimates and every Taiwanese momma has her own recipe that they swear by - so go and test several out!

Taiwanese Meat Rounds
yields approximately 18-20 servings

For Rice Wrapping (yes, Taiwan is on the metric system - you can use a food scale to measure)

150 g Rice flour

1500 g cold water

410 g Tapioca flour

410 g Sweet potato flour

1. Combine rice flour and cold water and cook at medium high heat until thickened (similar texture to a roux). Allow to cool until body temperature to touch.

2. Once cooled, include the tapioca and sweet potato flours in small sections and whisk into rice flour and water "roux" mixture until smooth. 

3. Set aside until filling is ready. 

For Filling (approximate amounts, * indicates amount based on taste preference)

2 Bamboo shoots, thinly sliced

10 Dried shitake mushrooms, thinly sliced

2-3 Shallots, chopped

1 lb+ Pork tenderloin, thinly sliced – marinated with garlic, 5 spice, soy sauce, white pepper, rice wine (in advance)

*Vegetable hoisin

*Soy sauce

*White pepper

Fried shallots

Pinch of salt

1. Sauté shallots until fragrant. Add pork slices. Add mushrooms and then bamboo shoots.

2. Add the vegetable hoisin, soy sauce, salt, and white pepper to taste. At the end, add a sprinkle of fried shallots. 

Note: The rice wrappings have no salt or flavor. The majority of the flavor will come from the filling, which should be well-seasoned, but not overly salted. 

To Combine

There are actual meat circle platters that you can purchase in Taiwan or (if you are lucky) your local Asian store. Instead, we used some metal saucer-looking things that we typically use to make our mise en place. 

1. Prior to combining the rice wrapping and filling, lightly oil the surface of the metal saucer with vegetable oil to prevent sticking. 

2. Fill the saucers with a 1 cm layer of the rice wrapping and then add the filling in the middle. Top off with more of the rice wrapping. 

3.  Bring a steamer pot to a full boil and then steam the meat circles for 15 minutes. The rice wrapping should become almost translucent or clear rather than the original white. 

4. Let cool for a few minutes as the rice wrapping will at first be sticky and then become more firm. Once firmed, remove meat rounds from platters gently with your fingers. 

5. Serve with sweet chili sauce and garnish with cilantro. 

The great thing about these meat rounds is that they can be kept in the fridge or frozen. If reheated from the fridge, they can simply be microwaved or re-steamed. Otherwise from the freezer, you can re-steam them and they will be back to their original texture and flavor. 

I'd like to dedicate these next several posts to my momma. The best Taiwanese chef I know! 

May you have an adventurous Wednesday. :) 

Dining In: Puerto Rico

Puerto Rico provided much-needed R&R before I started the next phase of my professional life (no, the next phase is not full-time food blogging, which The Husband likes to helpfully remind me). The trip had absolutely no itinerary aside from reading on the beach and eating good food.

On our first night, we had dinner at the resort since it was too late to venture out for local food. Not bad for a resort burger - super juicy.

However, we vowed to avoid resort food for the rest of the trip since there were much tastier options available. Such as the local fare at Raices in Old San Juan: Shrimp Medley, Flank Steak Mofongo, Chicken Stew, and the Kan Kan Pork Chop.

  

  

Guava breakfast pastry at Isamar Bakery. 

Guava colada at Guava's in Luquillo, PR. 

Ceviche. This was yummy, but not as good as The Ceviche Hut along a strip of kiosks on Highway 3. 

Fried calamari. 

Conch with rice and beans. 

Octopus with mofongo.

Whole red snapper with mofongo and tangy sauce. 

Fish (chapin) Arepas Rellenos and Crab (jueyes) wrapped in fried plantains. 

Coco Frio! 

Overall, Puerto Rico was a gorgeous, lush island with tasty food and great beaches. I'd highly recommend taking a ferry or flying to Culebra for Flamenco Beach. It was beautiful! 

Hope you have a great Monday!