My love for Cantonese Cooking (contd)

Today my love for Cantonese Cooking has grown again! My favorite childhood pastry has always been the Pineapple Bun (菠萝包)! It's soft with a slightly crunchy crust and perfect sweetness, but if it has the custard, then its sometimes overly sweet. I adore the fact that this bun is so good! 

Now that I'm an adult and realized my passion for cooking is burning stronger than ever, I researched my childhood pastry and I came across this particular YouTube channel wantanmein. They have a good solid recipe for Pineapple Bun. I tried at this very day and they came out pretty good. 

Looks just like the Chinese bake Shops doesn't it??

For your information, I do NOT know how to use PhotoShop! All of the photos are REAL, there's no fake stuff here!

The result was a slightly crunchy exterior with a very soft yeasty dough. It's perfect sweetened, so I wouldn't change the recipe at all. The recipe made 12. I currently my family ate 4 already. 8 Left =( 

Please feel free to comment what you see. I'd like to know what you think. 

Xmas Gift Giving

The Xmas Season has ended but it's never too late to think about gift giving for the next year. Try my gift giving idea next year. Give homemade edible gifts to your friends and family. This year one of my best friends and myself collaborated to make wonderfully sweet chocolate truffles. Unfortunately I didn't get a chance to take a photo of the chocolate truffles, but my version were dusted in cocoa powder. powdered sugar, and bittersweet chocolate coating with a white chocolate drizzle. My best friend said it looked like they came from fancy candy stores that sell fancy chocolates. DARN I wished I took a photo of them. I want to show how easy making fancy-looking chocolate truffles are. Sighhhh...

Since I don't have photos, I will provide the recipe for the chocolate truffles. 

Easy Decadent Truffles

My suggestions for this recipe is to add a touch of salt when you start whipping the cream cheese. In addition to that, Add about 1/2 - 1 cup less powdered sugar because when I added the chocolate coating and the drizzle it became it bit too sweet for my friend's tastes. 

In addition to the gift giving, I gave more things like 

The picture above are the most FUGDY and slightly CREAMY BROWNIES! They are called Cream Cheese Brownies. For the recipe, please click below:

Cream Cheese Brownies

I took small cellophane bags and I bagged 2 pieces with a small parchment paper liners. When I was cutting these up, I couldn't stop taking small bites of the brownies. I feel like I ate about a quarter of the brownies. They are really good. 

I was in the gift giving feeling even more so I made one of my well known products that most of my family and family friends LOVE! Last year it was requested a few times. The recipe is so easy and it was from the very popular (in the YouTube cooking channels) Laura Vitale. She also has a blog here. 

I tried her recipe for easy homemade cheesecake and it was DELICIOUS! It was light, soft and creamy! I used a pound cake crust instead of a graham cracker crust because I'm not a fan of the sandy quality the crushed graham cracker provide in cheesecakes. 

Oh I almost forgot. I was explaining how it tasted and my alternative to the recipe and I forgot to post the picture.

Here it is!

Unfortunately there is a gigantic CRACK! AHH! By looking at the crack, this is not a professional cheesecake. A professional cheesecake is cooked in a water bath which I think is an annoying part any recipe and also I don't have a larger roasting pan that fits my springform pan. 

So to hide the crack, add a Sexy Mound of Whipped Cream to the top, then no one will notice what so ever. Since its the holidays, having a bit more whipped cream wouldn't hurt. 

I hope these ideas will help with next year's gift giving because nothing say more than I LOVE YOU or I was thinking about you than something that you've made with your own hands. I think its sweet. So let the edible gift giving continue! 

Realizing my love for cantonese cooking

This is my first post so I will introduce myself. My name is Andy. I have a huge passion for food and dining. I usually post pictures of foods that I create at home, but I think I will be posting dining experiences that I have in New York City. This city is strong and great for its different cuisines, so me and my friend (who will be unnamed for the foreseeable future) try different restaurants and critic for our personal collection.

Just a heads up, all my photos are taken using an iPad 2, so they might be blurry.

I am of Chinese decent, so I grew up with all the Chinese style dishes that I will be posting in the future. Since it was christmas day, I thought i could make something for my grandma. And I knew she would like it. It was what we called "ma lai go" or Chinese steamed sponge cake. You usually get the steamed cakes in dim sum restaurants and sometimes they can be rolls as well. My finished product looked something like the photo attached to this post.

The result was a lovely soft texture with very good sweetness but not overpowering.
A tip before making this cake, please use the best ingredients you can find. The cake is so simple that using the best tasting eggs will make a difference.