Frugal Cuisine

Lettuce Wraps with Amazing Sauce

2009-08-19T00:34:00.001-07:00

Lately I've been making an effort to eat more at home, which has been a challenge. It's tough for home cooking to compete with the cheap and delicious food that can be picked up and eaten anywhere without messing up the kitchen. Having the fixings for these lettuce wraps in the fridge makes me look forward to coming home for lunch. They also pack nicely, if you have a fridge at work. Poach half

Never Throw Out Chicken Fat

2009-08-18T23:50:00.001-07:00

After making a batch of chicken stock from a whole bird I skimmed nearly a cup of fat from the top, planning to save it and try to find a way to sub it for expensive butter. A few days later at the market I picked up a pound of shredded potatoes. At home, I melted a tablespoon of chicken fat into the potatoes with half a teaspoon of salt, until I could toss everything together. I spread the

White Fungus Soup

2009-08-04T19:29:00.001-07:00

Many servers at local restaurants these days recommend their white fungus soup (银耳汤), which I never had the habit of eating before coming to China. It has a cooling effect on the body which makes it perfect for summer, and many other health benefits. I started ordering it a lot because I found it delicious. The fungus itself has an extremely mild flavour, but the texture is quite interesting and

Grape Crisp

2009-07-23T06:08:00.001-07:00

One of the easiest and best tasting ways of enjoying fruit in the summer is to make a crisp. They are also good for using up less than perfect fruit. I've been making at least one crisp a week this summer, starting with apricots, then sunset coloured mixes of apricots and plums, then peaches. The latest amazing local fruit to turn up at the markets has been bunches of very round and purple

White Beans and Tomatoes

2009-06-25T04:21:00.000-07:00

One of the great things about Italian cooking is there are so many simple methods and combinations that result in something amazing. I made these beans twice in a week, once for company with the stuffed peppers. I didn't have any sage, which is traditional, so I used oregano. Warm two to four cloves of crushed garlic in three tablespoons of olive oil (can use less if you want) until garlic is

Stuffed Peppers

2009-06-17T00:12:00.001-07:00

This recipe eliminates everything I disliked about stuffed peppers as a kid. Instead of large, bland bell peppers the smaller, spicy green chilies (like a hatch chili) are used, which have a chance to soften and char in the oven. Milk soaked bread crumbs instead of rice round out the filling. Ground pork is used instead of ground beef, which is cheaper where I am. These peppers are are a great

Chunky Apricot Sauce

2009-05-27T07:25:00.000-07:00

A few apricots on my counter were getting soft - I'd bought them dead ripe - so I made them into a sauce to eat with my morning oatmeal. The flavour of apricots is very distinct, but they pick up other seasonings well. A couple of slices of fresh ginger would work really well in this sauce. The flavour of cinnamon would have been great, but I only had powdered and wanted a seasoning that would

Mini Brownies

2009-05-14T03:41:00.000-07:00

I recently taught a Chinese friend to make these brownies. She was very excited to watch them bake through the door of my little toaster oven. "They're expanding, and giving off the most amazing smell! So wondrous!" I asked her why Chinese people don't often eat sweet things. She told me that people are concerned about weight problems, but added sweet things make people feel happy. It's

Fresh Soybean Dip

2009-04-26T23:32:00.000-07:00

This is a thick, spreadable dip with a great mild colour and flavour. It is very good with chips, bread, vegetables, and crackers. I used to make a version with feta, but feta is really expensive here and I thought I would try a similar recipe using cream cheese.Bring 1 1/2 cups fresh shelled soybeans to a boil with 3 cloves garlic. Boil together til mostly tender and pour drained soybeans and

Spring VI: Watercress Sandwiches

2009-03-15T07:45:00.000-07:00

In the E.B. White novel Trumpet of the Swan, a swan named Louis stays at the Ritz hotel and orders watercress sandwiches. He eats them without the bread, but since reading that book I've always associated watercress sandwiches with luxury even though it is as affordable as any other green this time of year. Somehow I got talked into buying an enormous bunch of watercress today at the market, and

Spring V: Tatsoi Salad with Ketchup and Mustard Dressing

2009-03-07T06:16:00.000-08:00

Tatsoi is a fantastic vegetable to eat raw. It has a strong flavour without being bitter, tough, stringy, or tooth-coating like spinach. Mixing up a salad dressing from whatever is in the cupboard is a great way to enjoy spring greens, and I wanted something a spicy and a little sweet - something that could stand up to the tatsoi.I tried using Chinese tahini in the dressing, but it seized up

Spring IV: Ginger, Carrot and Fava Bean Salad

2009-03-03T23:45:00.000-08:00

While walking by a table of preserved food at the market, I saw a cold dish that combined carrots and fava beans in a spicy, sour dressing. It was simple but very bright and appealing, and I decided to try carrots and favas in a salad together. My market sells the fava beans already shelled and peeled, but you can leave the peel on if desired (the cold dish in the market had whole beans). Grate

Spring III: Mixed Noodles and Mushrooms

2009-03-03T22:54:00.000-08:00

Had a very frustrating morning trying to make a dressing for tatsoi salad. Got a surprise carrot and bean salad out of the experience, which will be appearing soon, and then made myself this for lunch - oven roasted mushrooms on top of fresh noodles mixed with herbs and seasoning. The sauces are black Chinese vinegar and tian mian jiang (sweet wheat paste, or sweet Beijing sauce), and sesame oil.

Spring II: Teeth

2009-03-02T22:20:00.000-08:00

The market project is proving a little more challenging than I thought. I figured I could pick something out, ask the vendor what it is and how to prepare it, then go home and try to find the characters and a simple recipe. However, in order to find out what things are I have to translate the vendors' Sichuanese into standard Chinese (change F to H, L to N, fourth tone to second tone, and

Spring I: Fresh Noodles and Pea Shoots with Butter

2009-02-22T23:33:00.000-08:00

Spring farmer's markets are full of young new vegetables and greens that are only available for a few weeks. FC is pleased to present a series of spring market recipes that will appear from now til the end of March. This mix of fresh noodles, pea shoots,and butter is very quick and easy to eat. My market has these green tinged 'vegetable' wheat noodles that are supposed to be extra healthy, but

Roasted Winter Tomatoes with Penne and Feta

2009-02-10T04:50:00.000-08:00

Winter tomatoes don't really satisfy in salads and sandwiches but cooking them brings out their best. Tomatoes are very handy for quick meals like the always great Fried Eggs and Tomatoes (the pre-China version on my blog looks hilarious to me now, but the recipe still works.) Another way to get flavour out of stiff winter tomatoes is to roast them. Cut two tomatoes into wedges and place on

Ma La Bacon and Apple Compote

2009-02-10T03:57:00.001-08:00

Bacon is one of the easiest things to make and eat in the morning, especially if you cook it in the oven in two stages - par cooked in advance and then finished off crispy the next day. I've been experimenting a lot with ma la seasoned bacon lately. Ma la (麻辣) is a characteristic flavour of Sichuan cuisine - Ma means numbing, from Sichuan pepper and La is heat from ground red pepper. Adding all

Roasted Greens

2009-01-25T08:30:00.000-08:00

The method is not new to FC, but the vegetable is (so new, I am still not sure what the stuff is.) Last Thursday I hit the farmer's market late, already hungry and looking for something to throw together for dinner. I hadn't eaten any vegetables all day and a pile of feathery leafed precut and washed greens caught my eye.Pepper: "Hey, what is this stuff?"Vendor: [incomprehensible sichuanese]

Eggs In the Middle

2009-01-16T19:56:00.000-08:00

Since moving to a kitchen without a flat bottomed frying pan, I don't make Eggs Cooked On Top of Things that often. I've switched to Eggs in the Middle, which lends itself much more easily to the wok.On the bottom is home fries, or leftover cabbage and lentils, or sauteed celery and tomatoes, or in this case a buckwheat, caramelized onion, and mushroom concoction that didn't quite make the blog (

Potato, Cheese, and Onion Perogies (well, just the filling)

2009-01-12T03:21:00.000-08:00

Perogies have been on my mind for a while, since they have comfort food status in my area of Canada (Edmonton through Northern Alberta), and I knew I would have to make them if I wanted to eat them. I can't remember ever making them at home - we always bought them frozen or had them homemade by an amazing neighbour. I decided to try a basic filling of potato with onion and fresh white cheese (

Apple Dumplings

2009-01-06T06:50:00.000-08:00

With a bulk box of puff pastry I had lots of material for experiments, and tried a few different treats using apple. My favourite ended up being the simplest - pieces of apple with a sprinkle of sugar and cinnamon, wrapped in the pastry and baked. These are an ideal project for kids.Take two squares of puff pastry, about 15 cm square, cut into quarters, and roll thin. Peel, core, and quarter two

New Year, New Look, New Focus

2008-12-31T21:44:00.000-08:00

Whew, renos are nearly done - hope you enjoy the new space as much as I do! To all regular readers (especially those who have been with me long enough to remember the last major overhaul), thank you for your continued attention and support. There will be a few other changes to Frugal Cuisine as well. Over the past two years I've been posting occasionally here about Chinese snacks and street food.

Lentils and Cabbage

2008-12-25T18:51:00.000-08:00

My kitchen is not in a heated area of my house, so since it has been cold I tend to dash in, cook, and dash out again. This mess of cabbage and lentils came together in 20 minutes and tasted fantastic. A more elaborate (and healthier) recipe from NYT was the inspiration - the cabbage and lentils sounded amazing together, but I wanted a quicker recipe and decided to use Sichuan hot and numbing

Garlic Mushroom Greens over Roasted Potatoes

2008-12-08T20:45:00.000-08:00

One sweltering summer evening I watched a young couple in a restaurant order and share a single plate of kong xin cai, stir fried with garlic. What a perfect dinner, I thought. This is the same idea, fortified a bit with potatoes for winter. When I lived in Canada and used to come home and need to eat in a hurry, I would slice a potato and layer it on a baking sheet, drizzle with butter, and

Dan Hong Gao (Mini filled crepes)

2008-11-22T07:43:00.001-08:00

This is one of my favourite street foods. The vendor keeps two small metal pans going, and customers line up and choose their fillings. (These little snacks don't score very high on the Street Food Safety Index, however. I look for a clean cart and ingredients that are not all mixed up with each other, plus a batter with beautiful yellow colour from lots of eggs.)The little filled crepes are

SOS Cuisine

2008-11-13T02:08:00.000-08:00

The Food Value section on my sidebar has a new link: SOS Cuisine, a service that helps you plan one week's shopping and cooking for weeknight dinners. When I lived in Canada I used to spend an hour or so each week going to the websites of our local grocery chains to see what was on special, scrolling through multi page pdf documents and thinking that some central website should be doing this for

Tomato Egg Noodles

2008-11-05T21:56:00.001-08:00

A broken yolk, edges browned to a crisp, covered with grease and sludge from the wok - in what universe would this be the correct way to cook an egg? But it's one of the best things I've ever tasted on top of a bowl of tomato egg noodles or added to an order of bedspread noodles. Chengdu's famous tomato egg noodle house on downtown Huaxi street will reportedly soon be lost to redevelopment. There

Congee III: Turkey, Pressed Tofu, and Shiitake

2008-10-29T07:50:00.000-07:00

A search for congee recipes yielded many versions, from single ingredient to head-scratching combinations like watermelon rind and dried shrimp to sweet and savoury versions of the famous Eight Treasure (ba bao) congee. (Though 'Eight Treasure' anything on a Chinese menu is often whatever eight things happen to be lying around the kitchen.) I noticed that dried seafood, dried fruit, and dried

Roasted Squash and Mushrooms

2008-10-29T06:42:00.000-07:00

I've been going a little crazy making this lately; you can get nan gua (pumpkin) all year here but it feels so appropriate to eat it as the fall weather comes and south China is one of the most amazing places in the world to eat mushrooms. Shiitake, 'chicken leg' mushrooms, and the big ones with caps like inside-out umbrellas (shown) are readily available and very inexpensive here. I love them

Congee II: Squash

2008-09-28T18:03:00.000-07:00

In the mornings street vendors stand with huge pots full of different kinds of congee. You grab a cup (that doubles as a hand warmer) equipped with a big straw for your morning commute, and it is the perfect thing on a cool day.Nan gua is usually translated into English as 'pumpkin' but they are enormous, sweet, orange fleshed squash (they look most like big Hubbard squash to me) with a flavour

Congee I : Pepper Beef and Bean Sprout

2008-09-26T19:57:00.000-07:00

Congee is something I used to see as bland and boring, but now see as a kind of miracle food - simple and comforting but infinitely variable and nourishing. It can be as simple as rice and water or it can showcase luxury ingredients. I've wanted to post about congee for a long, long time but my attempts to make it never turned out right - no matter how long I cooked the rice, it just got soggy

Chinese Breakfast

2008-09-25T19:45:00.000-07:00

Most people when travelling like to eat a familiar breakfast, but breakfast food everywhere is basic, comforting, and economical. Brunch for less than a dollar: soymilk, vegetable dumplings, an over-easy egg, and pao cai (pickles).The mighty you tiao (long doughnut, not sweet). Dip it into your warm soy milk or congee. Twenty cents for you tiao and soy milk at this place. A plate of yumi dou bing

Summer Wild Berries

2008-08-24T17:59:00.000-07:00

Hi all - back after a hiatus that covered more travel in Canada during one month than I had previously done in several years. People who have grown up in rural Western Canada often become animated and begin talking about their childhood wild berry memories when they are served these summer treats. Alberta wild strawberries, small this year because of the drought: Saskatchewan wild blueberries:I

Vegetable Mixed Grill

2008-07-07T04:07:00.001-07:00

Shopping in ethnic markets is an inexpensive way to add variety to your diet and food shopping routine, but many people are hesitant to try cooking the unfamiliar but cheap vegetables in their local oriental market. The myriad tofu options there can be confusing, too - actually, I still find them confusing. You don't necessarily need Asian techniques or equipment to cook them, though, and

Leftover Vegetable Plate Soup and Grilled Cheese

2008-06-29T23:48:00.000-07:00

The soup is so named since I always seem to make it when we have lots of leftover vegetables from a plate of raw vegetables and dip at a party. (Could also be a 'clean out the vegetable drawer' soup.) The vegetables I used this time were carrot, cauliflower, luo bo (lo bok or daikon), and zucchini but they can easily be varied according to what you have on hand. I used a pork broth that I also

A Couple of Salads

2008-06-25T03:23:00.001-07:00

My favourite kind of salad to make and eat is the kind that takes just a few minutes' worth of chopping and mixing and will then keep in the fridge for a while. Both these recipes make a pile of salad, enough for a meal with 4-5 guests or to have on hand for a few days' worth of refreshment for the singles.This white bean and tomato salad I've been trying to blog for a week and a half; I've made

Grilled Eggplant with Sesame and Green Onions

2008-06-13T00:57:00.000-07:00

These days are oppressively humid and I feel especially lazy. I've been eating a lot of grilled vegetables, either the street barbecue known as shaokao （烧烤）or done on a cast iron stovetop grill pan. If you have great vegetables a little oil and salt can transform a potato and half an eggplant into something really satisfying. After eating vast quantities of plain grilled eggplant, however, I was

Creamy Potato and Fresh Soybean Salad

2008-06-07T22:41:00.000-07:00

I enjoy the early morning farmer's market scene as much as anyone, but locally one of the best ways to get deals is by going late, just when people are packing things up. In particular the vendors selling semi prepared food such as peeled potatoes, shelled peas, and husked corn are most willing to give you a deal. Once a lady emptied out a whole basket of greens for me when I asked for one yuan's

Creamed Corn with Onion and Pepper

2008-05-30T02:51:00.000-07:00

My early experiences cooking and eating corn in China were very disappointing - the stuff was not sweet at all. 'Feed corn! - at home we'd give this to animals, not people', I thought. I had forgotten the principle of extreme freshness - with corn, the sugars turn to starches once picked. If you have corn in your garden, for example, it's best to start water boiling and then go out to pick the

Bedspread Noodles

2008-05-24T03:10:00.000-07:00

My friends and I were extremely lucky that nobody was hurt or inconvenienced more than a few nights' worth of open air sleeping, but it's been a rough couple of weeks since the earthquake and we are still wobbled by aftershocks. (The water in the water cooler is moving as I type.)Bedspread noodles are comfort food for after a disaster - wide sheets of noodle dough in broth with the usual suspects

Winter Melon and Fire Leg

2008-05-16T07:03:00.000-07:00

Winter melon has become one of my favourite vegetables since moving to China. It has very little colour or flavour but the texture is amazing. It is one of the best things to cook in a hot pot, and I always find myself scanning the menu for winter melon dishes. A couple of weeks ago I ordered a dish of winter melon and ham (火腿, literally 'fire leg') but the ham ended up being a spam like

Kendeji Style Corn Salad

2008-04-21T23:49:00.000-07:00

In China, the K in KF-Chicken product stands for Kendeji. The meal combos don't come with a default side of fries (though you can swap them in) but with a little cup of corn salad - corn with carrots and cucumbers in a creamy dressing. Salads here are usually pretty grim, at least as depressing as the 'chicken juice potato mud' (mashed spuds and gravy) offered by the same chain, but I tried the

Guo Kui

2008-04-15T08:11:00.000-07:00

Guo Kui is the name given either to flat breads that are baked, then split and filled like sandwiches or stuffed with meat or sweet things and then pan fried.The fried kind are my favourite. The stuffed kind are expensive and messy to eat, and it's harder to find safe specimens. However, there is one place by the Sichuan opera house downtown that has amazingly good guo kui; shown below. Guo Kui

Millet Porridge and Other Convenience Foods

2008-03-24T08:10:00.000-07:00

A couple of posts ago I mentioned that convenience is a good measure of food value. Many of the least expensive and healthiest foods take work - fresh vegetables need washing and peeling, beans need soaking and long cooking, grains ditto. The great thing is that a lot of this work can be done ahead of time so that when mealtime or random hunger strikes the prep and cleanup is minimal. Last Sunday

Noodles V: Ran Mian (燃面)

2008-03-08T16:29:00.000-08:00

We finish up the noodle series with a snacks post. Left front is the star of this post - a bowl of ran mian. In the rear is a slightly more expensive bowl of dan dan mian. In front is a little dish of pao cai and peeking in the far left is a bowl of noodle water to drink. Dan dan mian is one of the only things I could read on a menu when I first got to China so I ended up ordering it a lot and

Noodles IV: Rotini and Bleu

2008-02-22T00:57:00.000-08:00

Many people think of cost per volume or cost per weight when looking for a good grocery buy. This is easy to figure because this is how many foodstuffs are sold. There are other ways to look at food value, however. Cost per usable weight often comes out differently than the cost of what you buy, for example - about one third of a banana's weight is skin. Considering cost per nutrition leads the

Noodles III: Loch Ness Noodles

2008-02-10T06:39:00.001-08:00

My homemade noodles always morph into something monster-like - larger than life and not too pretty. They take more work than I usually do for one meal too, so I don't make them very often. I really love how they taste, however, and they satisfy my childhood wish to have bigger noodles, and more noodles, in my soup. This is a good recipe for a day when you can put off all your outside tasks and

Noodles II: Chap Chae

2008-01-31T23:36:00.000-08:00

Once I presented this Korean dish at a party with many Chinese guests, and was told that it is actually very Chinese. The star is sweet potato noodles - I love their elasticity and affinity for flavours and how their translucence lets the bright vegetables shine through. (I don't love how they like to clump together in a big mass, but manoeuvering them is part of the fun.) Carrot, mushroom,

Noodles I : Ants Climbing a Tree

2008-01-23T21:26:00.000-08:00

This is the first in a series of noodle themed posts that will appear over the next month. Enjoy!One of the better known Sichuan dishes is 蚂蚁上树 (ma3yi3 shang4shu4 - ants climbing a tree). Highly seasoned ground pork is cooked with bean thread noodles so that as you lift your chopsticks, bits of meat cling to the noodles like ants climbing up a tree. My attempts at Chinese cooking often turn out

Rou Jia Mo

2008-01-08T05:53:00.000-08:00

A street food guide I read once recommended patronizing places where more than one family member works - a sign that their little business is popular enough to support a household. This couple works in perfect tandem - he shapes and bakes the bread and she chops up stewed chunks of pork with green pepper and stuffs it inside the round of bread, then moistens the sandwich with a ladle of dark

Sauerkraut, Pork, and Mashed Potato Fried Rice

2007-12-15T21:03:00.000-08:00

Another lost in translation version of fried rice, based on some takeout leftovers - the Chinese version of sauerkraut, suan cai, cooked with strips of pork and also the Chinese version of mashed potatoes - tu dou ni, or potato 'mud'. (If you go to a Western restaurant in China, this is how they translate mashed potatoes on the menu but it is a very different dish from the Western version.) Tu

Crossing the Bridge Noodles

2007-12-02T00:34:00.000-08:00

Crossing the bridge noodles 过桥米线 (guò qiáo mĭxiàn) is an elaborate chicken noodle soup which hails from the southern province of Yunnan. There are many stories of how the dish originated, but the most common describes a scholar who once isolated himself on an island to prepare for an important examination. His wife would bring him rice noodles and other morsels in a rich chicken broth, with a

Sweet Potato and Green Pepper Fried Rice, for Weekend Cookbook Challenge #22

2007-11-08T21:39:00.000-08:00

My current location makes following other blogs much more difficult than in the past, so I haven't been participating in as many events. This months' Weekend Cookbook Challenge, hosted by fellow budget blogger $40 a Week and with an eponymous theme, is my first in a few months. In China, you could eat at nice restaurants several times a day on that budget, but this recipe would also fit the

Chao Shou

2007-10-27T16:54:00.000-07:00

Chao shou is a signature Chengdu xiaochi, or snack. This is a basic, classic bowl of chao shou – delicate pork dumplings with a whiff of ginger folded into a hat shapes and floating in a bowl of nearly opaque broth. The broth's whiteness comes from long simmering of bones, and it is often broth that distinguishes a good bowl of chao shou from the lesser versions. On the side is a bowl of plain

Calabacita over Croutons

2007-10-16T22:30:00.000-07:00

A little butter and garlic has the power to transform the most humble of foods, like potatoes, into something luxurious. The starring vegetable here is something I never saw back home but my Mexican friends call it calabacita - summer squash that look like ball-shaped zucchini and are similar in texture but have a yellowish flesh. This is something that you can make in a few minutes for one

Dry-Fried Green Beans

2007-09-29T23:11:00.000-07:00

One of my favourite things to order in a Sichuan restaurant is gan bian si ji dou - green beans that have been 'dry-fried' in aromatic oil til their skins are slightly blackened and insides are tender. A plate of these with a bowl of rice and a beer is a perfect late lunch. A couple tablespoons of ya cai are added just as the beans finish cooking, or are sometimes simply sprinkled on top of the

Swedish Potato Dumplings

2007-09-24T21:12:00.000-07:00

There are many foods that I associate with my grandmother, whom my family lost recently, but none more than potato dumplings. I had these more at my grandparents’ house than at any other place, and we often made them on occasions when a lot of the family was together. I remember helping to make softball sized dumplings when I was little (or maybe they just seemed bigger back then). In my family

Vegetarian Nachos

2007-09-15T06:21:00.000-07:00

Topping nachos with corn, zucchini, peppers, and celery maximizes brightness, flavour and crunch while keeping the cost down. You can also use leftover carrots, eggplant, or other vegetables on hand as long as they do not have too much moisture. The cheese is, of course, vital - I love using a mixture of mozzarella for its texture with another harder and more pungent cheese for flavour. You can

Spicy Cucumber Salad

2007-09-08T20:20:00.000-07:00

Cucumbers are very refreshing when it is really hot, and here in Sichuan spicy foods are seen as a source of relief from the humidity. Most spicy cucumber salad recipes that I run into are very sweet, and I wanted to get away from sweetness and make a salad that was clean, sharp, and spicy. A Uighur restaurant in town serves a little plate of something very similar

Jiaozi

2007-08-03T10:47:00.000-07:00

Jiaozi are small filled dumplings that can be eaten at any time of day and are usually served boiled. Sometimes they are steamed or fried. Like many kinds of noodles here, they are usually sold by weight. Two liang is a good sized serving; order three if you are really hungry. My favourite is egg jiaozi, filled with seasoned egg and chives. Most are filled with pork and something else – chives,

Onion Rings

2007-07-16T21:45:00.000-07:00

Deep frying is something I seldom do at home - maybe once or twice a year. For these onion rings, I used beer for the batter and added some Tabasco sauce and salt for flavour. I cooked them in corn oil in a pan that had been used to fry several batches of hamburgers. I would have liked to fry them in beef fat, but wasn't sure how to go about finding and rendering beef fat in China so using the

Potato and Green Vegetable Stew

2007-07-01T06:48:00.001-07:00

This stew began as another recipe, stopped before the last step – it was going to be a version of the spinach soup, but using xue pi cai instead of spinach. (The name of the plant means ‘snow skin vegetable’ and I know I have seen it back home but could not find an English name; it has many leaves radiating out of a base with pale stems and dark green leaves.) I was trying to make the soup

Stir Fried Greens and Bacon over Grits

2007-07-01T06:37:00.000-07:00

The variety of foodstuffs available in China is glorious and bewildering at the same time. Two more familiar things I am glad are available here are bacon and butter. The bacon here is very dense and does not shrink much when cooked, a quality I have come to appreciate. This dish relies on the contrast between chewy pieces of bacon, juicy cooked greens, and soft grits. It takes a little planning

Butter and Black Vinegar

2007-06-15T06:25:00.000-07:00

These made-in-China butter tarts gain a bit in translation – a sharpening shot of black vinegar. A passage from Nellie McClung I was reading a few months ago reminded me that people used to make pies out of not much more than vinegar, sugar, and eggs. I do love a tart element in pastry, though often this comes from fruit – lemon, lime, apples, or raspberries. I made these on a day when I was

San Da Pao (Three Big Cannons)

2007-06-05T06:03:00.000-07:00

This sweet snack usually turns up during local events or near attractions like Wen Shu Yuan (a temple just to the north east of downtown Chengdu). They are three balls of sweetened sticky rice thrown against a metal tray filled with ground sesame and toasted soy. Each ball makes a loud boom against the tray, hence the name. The vendor then douses them in a sweet syrup and hands you your treat.

Sopita

2007-06-03T02:04:00.000-07:00

This combination of rice and vegetables cooked in chicken stock is comforting, full flavoured, and perfect for when you are under the weather. I have no idea how authentic this version is; I made it from memory after watching someone else. The secret is to use a really good chicken stock. Saute 1 cup of rice in a little oil or butter in a thick bottomed pot until rice is toasty. Add one

La Mian (Hand Pulled Noodles)

2007-05-20T06:07:00.000-07:00

La mian is usually found in the Hui (Muslim) restaurants, which offer dishes quite different than the regular Chinese fare with its emphasis on pork. La mian is not technically street food, though many noodle makers are working practically on the sidewalk and can be found in most neighborhoods here in Chengdu.The noodles are pulled into strands and thrown into a pot where they cook quickly,

Watermelon and Tofu Salad with Mint

2007-05-19T23:53:00.000-07:00

I glumly mixed this salad together, mentally comparing the flavour void of tofu with the salty sharpness of the feta that I would be using to make a watermelon salad back home. (Note: if you really love cheese, don't move to China.) What got my attention about this salad was the texture - the cool, smooth tofu was really nice against the crispness of the watermelon. I am normally very partial

Roasted Eggplant, Tomato, and Red Pepper Dip

2007-05-09T21:39:00.000-07:00

Recently I tried a recipe billed as a pureed eggplant salad. It was very well received but I thought it needed work – the recipe contained bread, which gave the end product an odd texture and I thought dulled the flavours too much. It also called for some raw and some cooked vegetables. For the FC version I ended up roasting all the vegetables and getting rid of the bread, and the result was a

Cold Marinated Buckwheat Noodles

2007-05-06T23:38:00.000-07:00

My plans to cook stewed and roasted things evaporated in this week’s shimmering heat, and I searched for something to make that was cool but filling and energizing. The liang fen (cool seasoned bean starch noodles) from the street vendors are more like lukewarm fen right now. (I did make a fantastic mango lassi with dead ripe mangoes, sweet plain yogurt, and a little lemon juice, salt, and honey

Candid morning fridge shot

2007-05-06T08:24:00.000-07:00

This is in response to Sam's post. Not many of us look our best first thing in the morning, especially when the morning is several hours after a very excellent party. The fridge is about five cubic feet which I think is average for China, and is shared with my roommate. We hosted a jiaozi making party last night. The dumpling skins were bought for next to nothing at the grocery store and I lost

Dou hua (‘flower’ tofu)

2007-05-05T17:48:00.000-07:00

Dou hua is soft, warm tofu covered with toppings that add crunch and flavour. A dou hua vendor usually carries a pole across his or her shoulders with two large baskets attached. One of the baskets contains steaming soft tofu and the other contains the bowls and fixings. For a while I had avoided dou hua due to a mouth numbing, terrible version I’d bought on Dian Nao Cheng (Computer Street.

Cream of Amaranth Soup

2007-05-03T17:24:00.000-07:00

Amaranth is another vegetable that I noticed for the first time at my local market without being able to identify it. Thanks to the posts at Mahanandi I did not remain in the dark for long - check out the fantastic JFI roundup there. In Mandarin it is called hong xian cai but my market vendors, most of whom speak Sichuan dialect, all seem to call it hong han cai.I found amaranth a bit difficult

Kong Xin Cai (Water Spinach), for JFI - Green Leafy Vegetables

2007-04-29T02:52:00.000-07:00

Ever since learning the theme of this JFI I have been looking forward to joining in. Many have the view that eating healthy or eating a good vegetarian diet is difficult or expensive, but I find that fresh greens are great value and take no time at all to cook. Washed greens in the fridge are my favourite convenience food. I have never been a green salad person, but love to chop greens and stir

Cold Grits with Milk

2007-04-28T08:32:00.000-07:00

Currently I am having a where-have-you-been-all-my-life moment with the very coarsely ground dried corn that some know as grits and some call polenta. Although I use the same basic recipe as polenta, grits have two qualities that I wanted to highlight in their own post - first, their amazing texture when cooked; second, they love to be prepared in the rice cooker.Use a 1:4 ratio of grits to

Shao Bing

2007-04-24T05:13:00.000-07:00

Shao bing are small flatbreads that the vendor rolls out with either a little sugar or chili paste inside and usually sesame on the outside. They are freshly baked in a hollow oven, a kind of portable tandoor. The oven makes them crispy on the outside and tender on the inside, and they are a perfect bite in the mornings or in colder weather. My neighborhood shao bing vendor sets up shop in the

Street Food Smarts

2007-04-18T05:50:00.000-07:00

Should food be cooked and sold out in the open, where the people are? Just today two articles crossed my screen. One is from Toronto, whose street food scene has been smothered inside a bun, so to speak, by a law that may now change. (See Food for Thought post for article and more links.) The other is a very thoughtful piece from the Times on how the chaat in Delhi is moving off the street and

Rice Cake

2007-04-14T19:58:00.000-07:00

Rice cake is called dok in Korean and nian gao in Mandarin. The savoury kind is formed into small tubes or ovals and sold either frozen or vacuum packed in the fridge section. It is used in soups, stir fries and a fiery, brick coloured Korean street food called dok-bokki (fried dok). There is an enormous variety of Korean sweet rice cake confections as well, some quite rustic and some

New This Season

2007-04-14T19:06:00.000-07:00

One of the great things about living in a different country is being surprised by whatever is newly in season. These yin tao (cherries) started appearing on Chengdu streets about a week ago. The first ones were so small I thought they were a new kind of berry but now larger ones are turning up. They have firm flesh and a small pit, and are very tangy and sweet.Everyone calls the little rough

Jiaozi Soup

2007-04-01T22:30:00.000-07:00

This vegetable based soup comes together quickly and is a great way to stretch your supply of jiaozi. Jiaozi are Chinese dumplings, usually stuffed with meat and some kind of vegetable. Korean mandu would be great eaten this way too. Jiaozi are fantastic things to have in the freezer, whether you make them or buy them. I love jiaozi eaten traditionally, boiled and dipped in black vinegar and

Canola as Vegetable

2007-03-24T20:06:00.000-07:00

Back in Canada I knew my way around a grocery store blind, but living in China is like being on another culinary planet - I can hardly identify many of the products, or read much of their labels. Many things I do recognize are used in completely new ways. Grape tomatoes, for example, are a fruit - they decorate pastries and take dips in chocolate fountains. This plant is another example. I was

Dumplings for Biscuit Mix Day

2007-03-14T17:45:00.000-07:00

The superb Mimi has a biscuit mix event going on and this is my entry. Dumplings cooked on top of stew or soup are very comforting and I love the economy of cooking them in the same pot and burner as your main course. They are very fast to make if you have the mix on hand. I made these to eat with a feeling-better chicken soup that I've been eating over the past few days.Start the stew heating,

Kidney Bean Sandwich Spread

2007-03-07T17:57:00.000-08:00

When I was taking Home Ec. in junior high back in Fairview, Alberta one of the most memorable cooking projects was a sandwich day. We made a sandwich filling out of carrots, peanut butter, and raisins and another out of mashed kidney beans, mayonnaise, and chopped onion. This is a leaner version of the kidney bean sandwich, sharpened with cumin. I also like using it as a dip with crackers.Mash

Noodles with Eggs and Peanut-Chili Oil (or Salsa!)

2007-03-03T19:25:00.000-08:00

When I was planning this post I realized I was doing three peanut featuring recipes in a row, and then veggie paparazzo reminded me that many people can't handle peanuts. So for the peanut avoiding, I am presenting an equally tasty alternative topping - salsa. If you have salsa made or in a jar, this takes five minutes to prepare.Frugal Cuisine is nearly a year old and, in reading my previous

Peanut Butter Cookies

2007-02-24T02:37:00.000-08:00

This has got to be the most ubiquitous cookie recipe in the world - equal parts peanut butter and sugar with an egg mixed in. It's on the Kr*ft peanut butter jars, if I remember correctly. This is with good reason though - it is easy, gluten free, and very, very good. The only tricky part is that the cookies are very tender when just baked, so they require careful handling to remove from the

Sausage and Root Vegetable Soup with Peanut Butter

2007-02-19T21:22:00.000-08:00

Moving to China has led to discovering lots of new foods, and recently I was given some local charcuterie including the cured sausage that many people have hanging in their windows this time of year. It was coarse textured and seasoned with the distinctive 麻辣 (ma2la4, hot and numbing) quality of Sichuan pepper. Cured meats are more often a luxury than frugal, but I like using them in small

Pigs in Blankets

2007-02-13T09:12:00.000-08:00

For now, I am without electronic eyes - I foolishly left my camera on the taxi and hope is fading that I will be able to recover it. I'll add a picture next time I make these little treats; feast your eyes on these meanwhile. Pigs in blankets are not much work if you have baking mix on hand, and not much more from scratch. The crescent roll approach is really popular but not really frugal. This

Celery with Noodles

2007-02-06T19:23:00.000-08:00

After moving I came down with a bad cold and wanted something easy to make, comforting, and restorative. This bowl contains three things: celery, chicken stock, and noodles. Celery I like to buy in sticks rather than bunches because I can pick out the inner stalks and leafy pieces where most of the flavour hides. The chicken stock should be quite concentrated, giving the dish its body. (Note to

Breakfast Cereal

2007-01-07T12:36:00.000-08:00

Don't laugh. This is as good, and light, as any other puffed grain cereal. (I usually eat two bowls.) Use plain popcorn and really overfill the bowl because it loses a lot of volume when you pour on the milk.

Black Bean Soup with Coconut Rice

2007-01-01T13:15:00.000-08:00

These days I am getting ready for a major household move, so my cooking is very focused on using up what is in the cupboards. The bean soup and coconut rice were both pretty good, B-side recipes that became marvellous when paired. If you are preparing them together, start the rice first - it takes a few minutes longer to cook.For black bean soup: saute 1/4 head garlic (less if desired), and half

Cornbread with Maple Syrup, Cream, and Cranberry Sauce

2006-12-25T12:23:00.000-08:00

My grandpa gave me litre bags of wild Saskatchewan cranberries and blueberries when I drove east to visit last weekend. This was like getting bags of gold - wild cranberries have a deep, intense tartness. Due to car trouble I was a day late getting home and the berries were no longer frozen, so I've been eating blueberries and cranberry sauce daily. This is a dessert for breakfast: cornbread

Corn with Pimentón in Coconut Milk, for JFI-Coconut

2006-12-22T19:39:00.000-08:00

This dish was inspired by a recipe I was reading for curried corn in coconut milk, and by a beautiful new can of pimentón. Pimentón is an inexpensive seasoning that is well deserving of its growing popularity - it gives smokiness and depth to plain foods like cauliflower, potatos, and eggs; and takes dishes flavoured with cured meats into another dimension. I used bittersweet pimentón, but hot or

Apple and Lime Salad with Mint

2006-12-20T15:20:00.000-08:00

Last week I was tossing grated apples into a pool of lemon juice for a cabbage salad, and tasted some of them. The apple was inspiringly good soaked in lemon juice and made me want to try a salad with just apple and lime juice, since lime brings out apple flavour better than lemon. The mint adds a cool note but is mostly for colour. Don't skip this salad if you have no mint - use parsley, or, in

Book Review: Meals Made Easy from Real Simple

2006-12-14T10:57:00.000-08:00

Real Simple has always seemed to me like a periodical with more style than substance - pleasant to peruse in the doctor's office, but not a magazine you'd make time to read regularly. However, their Meals Made Easy cookbook author's name caught my eye - Renee Schettler. While she was at the Washington Post, their online food section was my favourite of any newspaper, and I still search for her

Cacio e Pepe, for The Spice is Right IX

2006-12-14T09:40:00.000-08:00

The Spice is Right is one of my favourite food blogging events to follow, and I am really glad to finally join in for the Warm me up baby! It's cold outside... episode, hosted this time around at Rosie's Kitchen. What warmer spice exists than pepper? And Pepper is my handle. So, perfect. What to make? I had picked up some grated Pecorino Romano at the Italian Centre for a really, really good

Spicy Tomato Lentil Soup

2006-12-12T09:50:00.000-08:00

This soup tastes as warming as it looks and smells fantastic. You need 1/2 cup of red lentils (masoor dal), one can of tomatoes, and something to make it spicy. You can use 3-4 fresh tomatoes if you can get good ones right now - I can't. If you don't have these seasonings, use your own - a teaspoon (or more, taste as you go) of chili powder or curry powder would work. Don't skip the toasting step

Rigatoni with Cauliflower Sauce and Paprika

2006-12-06T23:48:00.000-08:00

Edmonton had deep freeze weather last week, and I felt like eating something rich and comforting. I remembered a spaghetti recipe with sauce made from cauliflower and cream, and decided to do a less expensive version using chicken stock. An aged Piave was grated into the sauce, but you can use any deeply flavoured cheese that will go with the cauliflower - cheddar would be fine. Cauliflower also

Grocery Spending for November

2006-12-05T13:03:00.000-08:00

Since some visitors have been dropping in via J.D. Roth's excellent Get Rich Slowly blog, I thought I would post my grocery spending over the past month. (This is shopping for one person who eats out about once per week.) Recording spending like this is a great way to get it under control, with a bonus of information about your eating habits. For example, I thought I spent 75% of my food money

Avocado, Grapefruit, and Pomegranate Salad

2006-12-03T14:14:00.000-08:00

I wanted to do a salad with citrus and pomegranate again, because the sweet-tart elements replace the need for dressing. My roommate left for a long weekend and told me to use up all her perishables, which included some things I don't often buy like grape tomatoes and avocadoes. Avocado and grapefruit get along really well in salads, so this was the result. You want to use really sweet grapefruit

Cha zuke

2006-11-30T21:22:00.000-08:00

Here is episode two in this week's rice theme. Rice with tea is as natural as cereal and milk, and good for mornings when you want something less filling. All you really need is rice and green tea, but use a garnish if possible. I had some sheets of nori and tiny dried shrimp, but you could use things like furikake or gomashio or just sesame seeds.Mound leftover rice in a bowl and sprinkle with