Tropical Influenced Fruit Salad (major hit with no added sugar!)

Maybe I shouldn’t even tell you about this. When I served this, I saw my friends taking seconds and THIRDS. No lie!
The major work of this consists of the chopping, chopping, chopping. And removing the pith and peel from the oranges takes quite a while. Or maybe I’m just slow with the motor skills. And [...]

Clam Rice

The content for this post (photos and recipe below) arrives courtesy of a guest blogger: my father. He calls this dish “Clam Rice.” And I agree that it is. But what about a name that includes the green peas? See, mame gohan refers to green peas and rice. And gomoku takikomi gohan refer to putting [...]

Taking corn soup beyond the package

It’s easy to prettify a 32 oz package of soup. The Pacific Natural Foods Buttery Sweet Corn soup was only $1.00 at some food outlet.
Minced two stalks of celery. Had some sauteed onions in the fridge, so threw in 1/2 cup of that. Found a stray sweet potato. Wrapped it in some cling film and [...]

Junk food, and the salvation of Turkey Jook (a.k.a., rice porridge, xifan, congee, juk, okayu)

Question: is it wise to eat pizza, chocolate-covered rice crispy bars, spicy blue corn chips and other junk food exemplars for days and days on end…even if you feel like being lazy? Answer: No! My concern for all I’ve ingested leads me to attempt some salvation. Traditionally restorative, I am hoping that six thousand years [...]

Parsley Pesto: the magic of hacking

One of my friends told me that you can make a nice pesto with parsley – good to know when basil is not available or is overly pricey – like, in the winter! Swapping the one herb for another is an easy hack that still yields good results: a beautiful, tasty sauce.
More than anything else, [...]