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Adjusting for Taste

My in-laws have been visiting for a few days, so we’ve been cooking for a larger array of palates than usual.  Holiday cooking for a large group is a little like being on a game show — can you feed all of these people in a way that makes everyone happy?  Can you do it for three meals in a row?  How about for three days in a row?  (They did go out for brunch yesterday, which helped!)

It’s already somewhat challenging cooking for just me, Kevin, and the kids — Kev and I both love spicy food, but he doesn’t eat mushrooms (sad) or fish (tragic).  The kids mostly don’t eat spicy food, though we’re working on that, and their appreciation for vegetables is still fairly limited (but improving).  With the addition of the relatives came more restrictions — my mother-in-law doesn’t like beets or cilantro (but my father-in-law does), my sister-in-law doesn’t do spicy, and her daughters aren’t big fans of spicy either.  Etc. and so on.

All of which means that we could just stick to mac-and-cheese to feed everyone, but after three days of that, I just can’t take it anymore.  I like pasta as much as the next person, but before too long, I start to crave South Asian food.  So last night, we did our best to cook South Asian food that everyone would eat.

Having several dishes meant that we could expect people to skip one or two and still have plenty to eat.  I left out the chili powder on the ginger-garlic chicken, and that went well; I left out the mustard and cumin seeds on the vegetables, because I wasn’t sure the kids wouldn’t find them suspicious, and I used onion powder instead of onions, because various people don’t like pieces of onion.  We just put one jalapeño in the cabbage, instead of three Thai green chilies,  and we reduced the chilies in the beets similarly.  And I made a cucumber raita, just in case it was still too spicy!

I wouldn’t say it was a complete success — despite my children’s urgings that the chicken was really good, their cousins refused to try it!  But I think the adults were mostly fine, at least, and everyone was fed sufficiently, and I got a little of the food I love and need — the flavors were milder than normal, but still in the right continent, at least.  Good enough!

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Hawaii: Crack Seed

I had never heard of crack seed, but when Jed saw the sign for the Crack Seed Store, he guided me inside, to a wonderland of Chinese snacks.

“Crack seed is a category of snacks that originated in China. It is highly popular in many regions, such as Hawaii. Crack seed are basically preserved fruits that have been cracked or split with the seed or kernel partially exposed as a flavor enhancement. This type of snack is commonly referred to in Chinese language as see mui (西梅; [siː muːi]); it arrived in Hawaii during the 19th century, when Cantonese immigrants were brought to work on the plantations.

 

The flavors are varied, ranging from extremely sweet and salty to sour flavors. Flavors can include rock salt plum, honey mango, licorice peach, or any kind of combination of fruits, flavors and type of preservatives used. What originally was a preserved fruit has become a favorite snack in Hawaii and a sample of a cultural food.

 

Crack seed stores also sell candies such as gummi bears, and Sour Patch Kids, coated with Li Hing Mui powder.

Some types of crack seed found in Hawaii and Asia are dry and chewy types of li hing mui, dried persimmons, preserved mandarin peels, and salted Chinese and Thai olives, also known as nam liap in Thai.” – Wikipedia

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Hawaii: Local neighborhood + malasadas @ Pipeline

After brunch at Koko Head Cafe yesterday, we did a little Christmas shopping in that neighborhood, which has a bunch of small mom-and-pop stores. We hit up two separate comic book stores, where I found a Goku action figure for Anand, and a compendium of Amethyst, Princess of Gemworld comics for Kavya, score! I hope she likes it; Amethyst was my introduction to comic books, found flipping through bins at my local library. It’s a shame that it’s only been reprinted in black and white, though — a lot of what was appealing about it to ten-year-old me was all the PINK, which showed up shockingly well amidst all the dark-toned Batman, etc. comics.

We also found several small holiday gifts (like Hawaii-themed hair ties) at Sugarcane (https://www.facebook.com/sugarcanehawaii/), an adorable little gift shop with a mix of local-made, vintage, and other items.

When we had a little more room in our tummies, we walked over to Pipeline (all of these were within a few blocks) where we had PERFECT malasadas, light and airy and made fresh to your order. Jed went for the classic sugar-coated one; I reveled in the li hing sugar-coated one, which had a slightly tangy-salty flavor, which contrasted beautifully with the haupia (coconut) vegan ice cream, made with straight up coconut milk, and you could totally tell; nothing like any coconut ice cream I’ve had on the mainland. So good.

  

Then we drove over to South Shore Market to finish our holiday shopping; several nice stores selling fairly standard gift-y things, but many made by smaller local businesses.

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Hawaii: Koko Head Redux

Second meal at Koko Head Cafe as good as the first! I had the delectably creamy poke omelette: fried local poke, masago aioli (SO GOOD), salad, with rice, along with a KHC Sunrise – tequila, bell pepper, orange-pineapple, chili. (I couldn’t really taste the chili, but it was still good.) Jed got a special, the vegetarian luau, I think it was called, a terrific combination of ‘ulu (breadfruit), taro, yam, with a yummy green sauce, a fried egg, and rice, topped with pickles and fried onion. So good.

 

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Hawaii: Farmer’s Market Bread and Fruit

Last night we ended up swinging by the farmer’s market set up in the mall across the street and making our dinner out of what was on offer — basically sweet breads and fruit. Works for me. The apple bananas continue delicious, but the big find was a Spanish sweet bread by way of the Philippines, ensaimada, which I am now madly in love with.
 
It reminds me of SOMETHING else that I really like, but I can’t place it. Is there some Sri Lankan baked good like this? I don’t think so, so what am I forgetting? Well, regardless, delicious. Butter + sugar = can’t go wrong, really.
Here’s a little article about it:

“The ensemada has absolutely no nutritional value, unless you consider happiness to be good for the health.

Light, buttery and full of sugar, it is the ultimate empty carb. But you only live once, right?
For those unfamiliar with this fabulous pastry, an ensemada — sometimes spelled ensamada or ensaimada — has Spanish origins, but is best known in Hawaii in its Filipino version, a large, coiled bun spread with a butter and sugar topping.”
   
 
 
  
 
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Hawaii: Loco & Apple

I tried the classic loco moco (white rice, burger patty, eggs, brown gravy), and while I can see that it could easily be comfort food for many, it is not for me. I think I’m just not so much of a brown gravy person. The apple bananas, on the other hand, are addictive, and I would gladly eat many more of them. They are small and cute and apple-y.
 
 
I didn’t try the sandwiches on taro bread, but I had to take a picture because they were so delightfully purple. I did like the warm banana-taro bread pudding with a warm haupia (coconut milk-based) sauce.  Yum.
 
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Hawaii: Koko Head Fish and Eggs

Big thanks to Kavita for the recommendation for Koko Head Cafe — we *loved* it. Had brunch there yesterday, got a scone and muffin to take away for later, and are going back for brunch today because there were just too many delectable-looking things on the menu, and it was too hard to pick.

I got the ‘fish and eggs,’ which is an unassuming name for one of the best dishes I’ve ever had. Sweet miso marinated local fresh fish, soft scrambled eggs, ong choy (water spinach), ocean rice, house made pickles. So, so good. (Also very filling, only finished half of it, but am saving the rest for another meal.)

 

Jed got the volcano eggs (baked eggs, spicy tomato based sauce, cheddar cheese, choice of daily north shore vegetables or diced Portugese sausage), also yummy, in a more comfort food kind of way.

 

Kimchi bacon cheddar scone (v. intense flavors, delicious and spicy-salty, but does need juice or tea to cut it, IMHO) & black sesame yuzu muffin (good, complex flavors).

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Hawaii: Loco Moco Benedict

A little travel food blogging while I’m on vacation and not cooking!

Yesterday’s breakfast at Tango Cafe, which is a Swedish place recommended by a local. I bypassed all the Swedish fare and went for a loco moco benedict — a cross between a traditional Hawaiian loco moco and eggs benedict. A big stack of fried rice with plenty of meat in it, then braised beef on top, then a poached egg and hollandaise sauce. Two of them! It was delicious, but a *lot* of rich food — I ate just one of the pair of them, and then rolled out the door. (Maybe it was unwise asking the probably 20-year-old young Hawaiian man serving us what he liked on the menu — I’m guessing he consumes twice as many calories in a day as I can manage. 🙂 )

I didn’t know anything about Hawaiian food when I arrived here, so Jed kindly forwarded me a nice Wikipedia page with fascinating info — it reminds me of Sri Lankan food in many ways, with the different European influences. But also wildly different:
 
“The cuisine of Hawaii incorporates five distinct styles of food reflecting the diverse food history of settlement and immigration in the Hawaiian Islands.[a] In the pre-contact period of Ancient Hawaii (300 AD–1778), Polynesian voyagers brought plants and animals to the Islands. As Native Hawaiians settled the area, they fished, raised taro for poi, planted coconuts, sugarcane, sweet potatoes and yams, and cooked meat and fish in earth ovens. After first contact in 1778, European and American cuisine arrived along with missionaries and whalers, who introduced their own foods and built large sugarcane plantations. Christian missionaries brought New England cuisine[1] while whalers introduced salted fish which eventually transformed into the side dish lomilomi salmon.
 
As pineapple and sugarcane plantations grew, so did the demand for labor, bringing many immigrant groups to the Islands between 1850 and 1930. Immigrant workers from China, Korea, Japan, the Philippines, Puerto Rico and Portugal arrived in Hawaii, introducing their new foods and influencing the region. The introduction of new ethnic foods, such as Chinese char siu bao (manapua), Portuguese sweet bread and malasadas, and the Japanese bento, combined with the existing indigenous, European, and American foods in the plantation working environments and in the local communities. This blend of cuisines formed a “local food” style unique to Hawaii, resulting in plantation foods like the plate lunch, snacks like Spam musubi, and dishes like the loco moco.”
 
And if you follow the link on the last: “Loco moco is a meal in the contemporary cuisine of Hawaii. There are many variations, but the traditional loco moco consists of white rice, topped with a hamburger patty, a fried egg, and brown gravy. “
 
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Seeni Sambol Appetizer Experiment #4: Patties!

And we have a winner — seeni sambol & egg patties.  They are so, so good.  I took our standard Sri Lankan patty dough, rolled it thin, cut circles, all the way you would for typical chicken patties.

I did some extra small, to see how they’d come out, and they were very cute when fried, and a nice little snack — I ate some on the flight today, and they were lovely with tea at room temperature.  (I also tried baking one, and it was, I’m afraid, pretty eh.  They want frying.)

But when they’re that small, there isn’t room for egg, and I wanted the unctuousness of the egg balancing the intensity of the seeni sambol.  So I went back up to typical patty size (which is just fine for a tea or cocktail party anyway), filled it with seeni sambol and a sixteenth of a boiled egg (you could do an eighth, but I wouldn’t recommend anything bigger), folded it and crimped it up.  (I tried making one that was round, which was a fun experiment, but I didn’t like it as well as the classic patty shape.)

Then, for a little added color and zing, I brushed it all with an egg wash, and then deep-fried it.  It. was. perfect.  I’ll write the recipe up properly the next time I make it; all the experimenting meant that I wasn’t up for measuring everything until I knew which was the winning approach.  Maybe for New Year’s!

But in the meantime, if you know how to make patties already, it’s very easy to adapt for seeni sambol.  Leave out the Maldive fish if you like, and your vegetarian friends will thank you for this delectable little snack.

 

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Seeni Sambol Appetizer Experiment #3: Pastry Cups

I knew I wanted more richness for my appetizer, and that suggested a nice, buttery pastry. So I asked Kevin to make up a batch of Sri Lankan patty pastry dough (he’s my bread guy), rolled it out fairly thinly, cut it small, and put the rounds into my mini muffin pan.

 

I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to just fill and bake, or blind bake a cup and then fill it, so I tried both. I forgot to dock the pie cups, so about half my blind-baked pastry cups puffed up to an unusable level. But some of them came out perfectly, so I was able to try both options.

 

I’m a little torn there, honestly, because I think it tastes just slightly better when you cook the seeni sambol in with the pastry — but the oil does discolor the pastry, so it doesn’t look quite as neat and party-ready. I think I would blind-bake and fill just before the party, if I were going to do these.

They’re quite good, even without the egg, and topped with hard-boiled egg, they’re delicious. This one was almost perfectly what I wanted it to be — but could it be just a little bit better? Yes, yes it could. Let’s give this an A- for now, and look to the next post for the winner…