Strips of pork, salty preserved vegetables, and crisp fresh bamboo is a light and quick dish that I’ve often used when I have to make a fast dinner. Aside from the slicing, the dish stir-fries up quickly, so make sure everything is ready before you heat the wok. You can buy pork already cut into strips at Chinese supermarkets or you can cut your own from pork loin (if you want it to be very lean) or pork shoulder (if you want it to be fattier). Both will work in this dish. I usually cut my own and freeze in 8oz portions because that’s how much my recipes usually call for. This recipe is frien ..read more

This is an amazing cornbread recipe! It’s super moist and crumbly, absolutely delicious, and vegan! I usually think of baking as something I have to do ahead of time but I can whip this one up last minute. It takes a few minutes to mix and just 25 minutes to bake. There’s no bringing butter to room temperature since it’s vegan. I also regularly do this one in my toaster oven which preheats in about 5 minutes which cuts down on the pre-planning and thinking too. Start to finish, this recipe takes less than 40 minutes. Eat it plain, with butter (or vegan butter), with chili, with pulled pork, a ..read more

Like everyone else during this pandemic, I’ve been baking bread. After months of it, I’m becoming pretty confident in my bread baking and that’s a plus I’ll always take away with me. I’ve been tweaking recipes a lot and thinking about them more which made me realize how robotic I was at times, pre-pandemic. Everything was rush rush rush…on autopilot. I had stopped blogging for a few years and stopped really connecting to the process. I didn’t see that before, but looking back, I do now. Full-time blogging isn’t in the cards, but when there’s something really worth sharing, I’m going to try to ..read more

I posted a Taiwanese Cucumber Salad recipe 10 years ago! It is one of my most loved dishes, meaning my kids love it, Lon loves it, all my guests love it. It’s such a great side dish that I use it very, very often and I get requests for the recipe every time. During the pandemic, I started looking at my recipes in a new way. I realized that the old recipe might deter some from trying it because the traditional method works best with Taiwanese cucumbers or Persian Cucumbers. They are slim, thin-skinned, and seedless cucumbers. But, those cucumbers are hard to find and not necessarily at everyon ..read more

Uncertainty. Is that the most accurate way to describe these times? I can’t even make up my mind on a day to day basis how to feel, how to proceed, and what my priorities are. It’s tough because I’m the kind of person that likes to have a plan. On top of that, I’ve been feeling guilty…about a month into the Covid shutdown, I posted that I was thinking about blogging again, after all these years. Yet, almost 3 months later, I’ve left you hanging. I am super sorry. Every time I start working on a recipe, I stop and wonder if I should be spending my time figuring out how to homeschool or partial ..read more

When the stay at home order started, we were already pretty well stocked and we only needed fresh fruits and veggies so we just ordered on Fresh Direct. I really didn’t want to go to stores and more importantly, I did not want my parents to. Their age puts them at high risk. Eventually, we all started missing Asian produce and I was running out of sauces and dry goods. Fresh Direct occasionally has napa cabbage, shanghai bok choy, and daikon radish but not regularly. A couple of my friends were still hitting Asian supermarkets but eventually, a lot of them started closing. (I hear some of them ..read more

So, I heard that some people throw out the broccoli stems. What? You only want the florets so you just chuck the whole stem? Promise me you’ll never do that again! Broccoli stems are delicious and crunchy and so amazing pickled! My kids love Quick-Pickled Broccoli Stems! I’ll admit that it takes a little bit of work because you have to peel the broccoli stems but I usually do this while I’m watching TV. I use a pairing knife and the skins usually peel pretty easily. Sometimes you’ll get extra woody stems and you’ll want to cut off a little more if you see fibrous parts. The rest is easy! Quic ..read more

At the risk of making this sound like a joke, Chinese people will “red cook” anything.  The thing is I’m serious. Whether it’s pork, beef, squid, tofu, or eggs, we can red cook it. On a basic level, that means cooking in a mix of soy sauce and a sweetener (sugar, rock candy, or honey). The recipes vary a little depending on what you are cooking. Sometimes you add ginger, garlic, scallions, orange peel, cilantro, chilies, or a combination of those things. While the ingredient list is so similar, many of these Red Cooked dishes come out tasting very different. (Try Red Cooked Pork Belly and ..read more

The Long Island City Restaurant Guide was originally published on January 23, 2013 and it seemed high time we update it with the slew of new restaurants! Take special note of Crescent Grill, Il Falco, and Jora….Sadly, we’ve also noted the closings of Malu, Chimney Cake, Cranky’s, and Lhawan2. (A few updates were added 7/29/15 and 10/16/15) We’ve been living in Long Island City for almost three years (almost five years by this 2nd publishing) now and we love it! The restaurant scene has really grown, although we could still use more. Naturally, whenever friends visit the area, they ask me for r ..read more

While I went to culinary school and have worked in restaurants, Lon is self-taught. For the most part, it’s the one thing he looks to me for guidance with. Lon is a great home cook though and loves to do it when he has the time, which is not often these days between two kids and a demanding job he loves. Yet, every once in a while on one of those days that Lon cooks, he totally blows my socks off. He makes something that tastes amazing and/or is just an idea that works so well that I never thought of. This dairy-free version (Lon can’t have any dairy) of Mexican Street Corn or Elotes is one of ..read more