Blueberry Waffles

The blueberries are in season in Michigan right now, my happiest time of year! O(∩_∩)O~  There are many blueberry farms around town.  One of the must do things in summer is to go blueberry picking.  

Besides from eating fresh blueberries, I also make tasty desserts and snacks with them.

Blueberry corn bread: http://www.yankitchen.com/blog/gszloxao30lv199lbn61q1tjofpn59

Blueberry crisp：http://www.yankitchen.com/blog/2014/10/18/-blueberry-crisp

Blueberry jam：http://www.yankitchen.com/blog/81serm5m06h5n016u8uvmf1x5t29j7

Blueberry yogurt：http://www.yankitchen.com/blog/homemade-blueberry-yogurt

Or, you can make blueberry waffles！O(∩_∩)O~

 

Ingredients:

1 cup all purpose flour
1/4 cup whole wheat flour
3/4 to 1 cup buttermilk
2 eggs
2/3 teaspoon vanilla exact
3 tablespoon oil
2 baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 to 2 cups fresh blueberries
oil for greasing waffle machine
honey

Directions：

In a medium bowl, combine all purpose flour, whole wheat flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt; shift together.

In another big glass cup or bowl, combine eggs, oil, vanilla and buttermilk.  Whisk until it is smooth.

Add shifted flour to egg mixture.  Whisk together just until the flour is folded in.  Don’t over mix; otherwise you are going to end up with gooey chewy waffles.

With a spatula, fold in blueberries. 

Preheat the waffle machine.

Spray both sides with oil.

Add blueberry batter.

Cover and turn it upside down, or just follow your own waffle machine menu instruction.  Wait for the ready signal from the machine.

There it is, a freshly made blueberry waffle, crispy on the outside, soft and fluffy on the inside!

Top it with fresh berries and honey.  O(∩_∩)O~

Pumpkin Sweet Rice Cakes

中文：南瓜糯米饼

I have some leftover steamed pumpkin in the refrigerator.  I decide to make some Asian sweet rice cakes with it.  Pumpkin and sweet rice are also a perfect combination.  Sweet rice flour has a very mild nutty flavor, and pumpkin adds a delicate refreshing and rich flavor to the cakes.

Ingredients：

1/4 steamed mini pumpkin
1 cup sweet rice flour (adjust the amount according the pumpkin flesh)
3 to 4 tablespoons sugar
1 teaspoon oil
2/3 cup sesame seeds
oil for pan frying sweet rice cakes

 

Directions：

Remove skin from pumpkin, cut into small pieces and place them in a mini food processor.   

Process until you have pumpkin puree. A fork will do the work just fine if you don’t want to use a food processor here.

 

In a bowl, combine sweet rice flour, sugar, oil and pumpkin puree.  

Whisk with a pair of chopsticks until most dry flour is gone.  Transfer to a well-dusted wooden board and knead into dough.

Divide the dough evenly into 12 pieces.  Roll each piece into a small round smooth ball.  

Quickly dip the balls into water and roll over in the pan filled with white sesame seeds. 

Gently press them down.

Heat a cast iron skillet over medium low heat.  Add oil, and then add sweet rice cakes.  Cover and each side cooks for 4 to 5 minutes. 

 

They go well with coffee or tea. Enjoy!  O(∩_∩)O~

Stir-fried spicy pork and daikon

Pork belly and daikon, two of my favorite ingredients, can create such a wonderful flavor when they are stir fried together.  I air dry the daikon first, and then rehydrate it with water.  The dehydration and rehydration process makes daikon more al dente and chewy.  The daikon flavor is also more intense by doing so. 

Ingredients：

1 piece of pork belly (about 1 1/2pound)
1 1/2 cup dried daikon (also available in Asian grocery store)
2/3 cup dried red chili peppers
2 teaspoons Sichuan pepper corns
3 cloves of garlic, peeled and sliced
2 to 3 tablespoons soy sauce
1 tablespoon rice cooking wine
1 to 2 teaspoons oyster sauce
3 to 4 tablespoon chicken stock/ water
1/8 to 1/4 teaspoon sugar
freshly ground black pepper
chopped onion
2 to 3 tablespoons oil for cooking
salt to taste

 

Directions：

Dried daikon is available in Asian grocery store.  You can also make it at home.  It is very easy.  All you need to do is to peel the daikon, cut it into string cheese size pieces and then air dry in a food dehydrator and under the sun.  I prefer to air dry daikon pieces under the hot summer sun.  It takes two to three days to get dried inside and out.

Keep any extra dried daikon in Ziplock bag and store in the refrigerator.  It should be able to last a really long time. 

Two hours before cooking, soak dried dakai in water.  After it is totally rehydrate, rinse a couple times under running water.

Thinly slice the pork belly.

Dried red chili peppers are sometimes covered in dust.  I like to rinse and drain them and then cut into pieces.

Heat a wok over high heat.  Add oil, and then add sliced pork belly.  Sprinkle with freshly ground black pepper.  Stir fry over high heat until the pork turns slightly golden brown.  Add garlic, Sichuan peppercorns.  Stir fry until the spices are toasted with pork fat.  Add daikon; stir fry for another couple minutes; add chicken stock/ water, oyster sauce, rice cooking wine and salt.  Continue to stir fry until all the liquid is absorbed by pork and daikon.  Sprinkle with chopped green onion and transfer to a big bowl or plate.  Serve immediately. 

It is the perfect combination. O(∩_∩)O~

Zucchini Dumplings: the Taste of Summer

Finally, it is summer time!  Summer in Michigan means lots of fresh local produces in farmer’s market.  I get so excited that I always automatically wake up earlier on Wednesday and Saturday morning, so that I can go to our local farmer’s market to see what good eats are available today. To me, summer is the best time of the year.  Yes, it is way better than the holiday season!

Among the produce I am so looking forward to is zucchini.  They are fresh, sweet, tender and refreshing.  There are many ways to cook with zucchini and each and every way is good.  I use them in stir-fries, soup, savory pancakes and dumplings.

Making dumplings is really a good use of zucchini.  But I don’t just chop it up and use it like that.  I dehydrate the zucchini first, so that the flavor is more intense, and zucchini won’t be mushy when cooked.  

For whole-wheat dumpling wraps:

3 cups bread flour
1 cup whole-wheat flour
1 1/4 cup water
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon oil

 

For dumpling filling：

1 1/2 pound ground pork
3 large zucchinis
1/4 teaspoon ground white pepper
2 rice cooking wine
2 to 3 tablespoons soy sauce
1/2 ground ginger
1 teaspoon oyster sauce
1 teaspoon sesame oil
salt to taste
1/4 to 1/2 cup water/ chicken stock

Directions：

Rinse the zucchinis under running water.  Pat dry and slice them thinly with a mandoline slicer. Spread zucchini chips on one or several racks. Dehydrate them under the sun or in a food dehydrator until zucchinis are half way dry.  

 

In a large bowl, add bread flour, whole wheat flour, oil and salt.  Whisk while gradually adding water to the bowl.  When flour starts to come together, knead with hands until smooth and elastic dough forms. 

Cover and let the dough rest for at least 30 minutes. 

In another large bowl, add ground pork, ground white pepper, sesame oil, soy sauce, oyster sauce, ground ginger and salt.  Whisk with a pair of chopsticks.  If you whisk hard enough, the ground pork, just like the flour, is going to come together and develop some kind of gluten.  Add water/ chicken broth, little by little; and keep whisking.

Add dehydrated zucchinis to a food processor.  

In seconds, zucchinis are evenly and finely chopped. I love my newly bought cuisinart 14 cups food processor.  It can be so helpful in the kitchen.

 

Add finely chopped zucchinis to the ground pork.

Whisk until the whole pork filling is well combined.  Add salt to taste.

Run the dough through stand mixer pasta roller several times.  

 

Set the thickness to 5, and run it one more time.

With a round cookie cutter, cut out round dumpling wraps. 

 

He is working on the dough and wraps; while I am working on dumplings. O(∩_∩)O~

Put 1 1/2 to 2 tablespoon pork filling in the center of one wrap.

Fold the wrap over.  Press the sides together and make a couple creases on the each side.

That is how you make a authentic Chinese dumpling.

Line up the dumplings on a well-flour-dusted board.

I like to make dozens of dumplings at a time and freeze the extra and keep them in large Ziploc bags.  They are so much better than the dumplings you find in grocery store freezer.

Bring a large pot of water to boil.  Add dumplings.  When the water boils again, add one cup of cold water to the pot.  That should help to cook dumplings evenly inside and out. When the water boils again, add another cup of cold water to the pot.  Repeat it one more time and the dumplings should be ready. 

I like to serve my dumplings with garlic chili sauce.  This is the home version.  I post it before: http://www.yankitchen.com/blog/2k1o27b6fzy82wn0sphsah9oqd3hbo

Take a bite!

The dehydrated zucchini has more intense flavor.  I didn’t add any sugar to the filling, but it taste very sweet and refreshing, just like the way zucchini should be.  If you cook with zucchini before, you will know cooked zucchini are most likely to be mushy and watery.  But my version of zucchini dumplings are the very opposite of that.  It is sweet and tender, and well worthy of all the labor work. O(∩_∩)O~

Sweet Rice Balls with Brown Sugar Syrup

I have some left over squash and a small purple sweet potato.  I know I can do something to make them awesome.  So I turn them into sweet rice balls with brown sugar syrup.

Sweet rice, or glutinous rice, is very popular in Asian area.  It can be used in so many savory dishes, and it also can be found in many sweet desserts too.  I have been told that American people don’t like anything made from sweet rice or its flour.  Well, according to my prior experience, I agree it is very true.  

Squash sweet rice cake balls：

1 small slice of cooked Kabocha squash
1 cup of sweet rice flour
1/2 teaspoon oil
1 tablespoon sugar
milk (if needed)

Purple sweet potato sweet rice cake balls：

1 small cooked purple sweet potato
1 cup of sweet rice flour
1/2 teaspoon oil
1 tablespoon sugar
milk (if needed)

Sweet red bean paste：

1 package of red beans（6 oz, about 170 g）
1/2 cup oil
1 cup of packed brown sugar (use more if you prefer sweeter taste)
water for cooking red beans

* The red bean paste is available in any Asian grocery store.  The listed ingredients above can make 5 to 6 times of what is needed in this recipe.  I like to make red bean paste in a large batch and freeze the extra, so that I can just take as much as I need from the freezer and thaw it.

Brown sugar syrup：

2/3 cup packed brown sugar
2 to 3 tablespoon water
2/3 cup soy bean flour

 

Directions：

I love to cook with Kabocha squash.  It is sweeter and has better texture than other squashes. 

Peel the cooked Kabocha squash and purple sweet potato.  Use a fork to smash them.

In two separate bowls, add smashed squash and sweet potato, sweet rice flour, sugar, oil and milk.  Knead until they form two sweet rice doughs. 

For homemade version red bean paste, I soak the red beans in water overnight.  Cook them with enough water over medium low heat until beans get soft. Use a blender to blend the beans into fine smooth bean paste.  

Heat a nonstick pan over medium high heat.  Add red bean paste. You will have to keep stirring to prevent the bean paste sticking to the bottom of the pan.  Add oil and sugar in three batches.  Stir and wait until the red bean paste absorbs the sugar and oil before adding more.

Cook until the red bean paste feels firm to stir. Remove from heat and let it cool down. The whole process might take between 15 to 25 minutes.

I make one bowl of red bean paste.  I will divide and wrap up the extra and store it in freeze for later use. 

If you simply don’t want to go through all the trouble to make it from scratch, just pick up a couple bags of red bean paste in Asian grocery store.  They can come in handy when making many Asian desserts. 

Divide the sweet rice doughs into cherry size pieces and roll into small balls.  

Do the same to the red bean paste, just in smaller size.

With your thumb, push down each sweet rice cake balls, wrap in red bean paste and roll into a round smooth sweet rice cake ball again.  

Now it is time to prepare brown sugar syrup.

In a small pot, add both brown sugar and water.  Cook over medium heat until water evaporates and the syrup begins to bubble. Remove from heat and set aside. 

Bring a large pot of water to boil.  Add sweet rice cake balls.  Cook until they float. 

In a bowl, add 2/3 cup soy bean flour.

Add cooked sweet rice cake balls and shake the bowl so that they can be evenly coated with soy bean flour. 

Top with brown syrup and a pinch of white sesame.  It is time to enjoy! 

The brown sugar syrup adds ton of wonder flavor to these tiny sweet rice cake balls.

This one is made of squash.

Here is a purple sweet potato rice cake ball.