New Year's Role Call

This is what Nicole and I were up to on New Year's Eve. 

Devin visits for graduation

It's been awhile. Some things have changed; others have not. Terren, Nicole, Livy, and I moved into our new apartment, and Yooni is subletting Livy's room for the summer. Devin came to visit for graduation. I had missed all of us being together. I wish she could've stayed longer amidst the chaos of moving out, moving in, family visits, etc. I love all of you very much. Sappiness aside, here are some pictures from that time:

Beet time

Dinner tonight:

Tried a new way of making beets: bake them in tin foil with olive oil and balsamic vinegar (for ~45 mins).  Then I made Israeli couscous with oregano, garlic, and agave toasted almonds.  Saute some kale for a minute and add it all together with goat cheese. 

Terr's Room

Some photos of Terren's very lovely room. 

We also just bought some goods for the storm. 

Egg in a hole

instagramcracker

Left: lovely red velvet cake Nicole baked. Right: my view of the homecoming game (crowd) from the front row. 

Left and right: our lovely CSAs. 

happy birthday, CPK!

CPK's birthday was last weekend! terren found a few recipes for cake, but this tin roof ice cream cake looked best. we made it together at my place after work ("work"—our internships) one day. i made the peanut butter ice cream from the perfect scoop's recipe, and we made a few alterations to the original recipe to get our own version, a very delicious and successful attempt at our first ice cream cake.

tin roof ice cream cake

(adapted from aida mollenkamp)

ingredients

for the crust:

7 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted

parchment or waxed paper

1 package oreos

for the ganache:

8 ounces bittersweet chocolate, coarsely chopped

1 cup heavy cream

2 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into small pieces

for the assembly:

2 quarts (double recipe below) of peanut butter ice cream, softened

1 cup chilled heavy cream, for garnish

a few handfuls of roasted almonds, roughly chopped, for garnish

a few handfuls bittersweet chocolate, chopped, for garnish

1 tablespoon powdered sugar

instructions

for the crust:

coat the inside of two 9-inch pans with ½ tablespoon of the melted butter each. cut parchment or waxed paper into two circles the same size as the base of the pan and place them in the bases.

place oreos in the bowl of a food processor and pulse until ground; add remaining 6 tablespoons melted butter and pulse until mixture is moistened. (or, we just placed oreos in a ziploc bag and pulverized them, then mixed in the melted butter with them in the pan.) divide and press mixture evenly and firmly into the bottom of the two pans and freeze until they’re set, about 30 minutes. meanwhile, take the ice cream out of the freezer to soften and make the ganache.

for the ganache:

place chocolate in a medium heatproof bowl; set aside. place cream in a small saucepan over medium heat and bring to a simmer. pour cream over chocolate and let stand until chocolate has melted, about 5 minutes.

stir gently until smooth, then stir in butter until completely incorporated; let cool slightly before using. meanwhile, let the ice cream soften, for another about 15 minutes, or until soft enough to spread like room temperature butter but not melted.

for the assembly:

when ice cream is softened, transfer to a mixing bowl. using a rubber spatula mix until spreadable. divide and spread the ice cream over each of the cookie crusts and smooth the top. in one pan (this will be the top layer), pour half of the ganache over the top and smooth, saving the rest of the ganache for later. place pans back in the freezer until firm, at least 30 minutes. place the remaining ice cream back in the freezer as well.

remove pans from the freezer, then remove the cakes from the pans (i ran hot water around the outer rim of each, and they popped out pretty easily when overturned). spread the rest of the ganache over the bottom layer, then add the top layer and put the whole cake back in the freezer to let it set, at least 3 hours and up to one day.

to serve:

roughly chop and roast almonds in the oven, and sprinkle with some cinnamon and sugar if desired. place whipped cream and powdered sugar in a clean, large bowl and whip with a whisk until soft peaks form. meanwhile, remove cake from the freezer and let sit at a few minutes at room temperature before cutting. top cake with whipped cream, almonds, and chocolate. to cut the cake, it’s easiest to have a cup of hot water nearby to dip a knife into, wipe off, and cut each slice.

peanut butter ice cream (adapted from the perfect scoop)

(makes about 1 quart)

3/4 cup smooth peanut butter

1/4 cup sugar (original recipe calls for 3/4 cup but peanut butter is already very sweet. sweeten to your taste)

2 2/3 cups half-and-half

pinch of salt

1/8 teaspoon vanilla extract

purée all ingredients in a blender or food processor (or bowl with a stick blender!) until smooth. chill the mixture thoroughly in the refrigerator, then freeze it in your ice cream maker according to the manufacturer's instructions. (wasn't that easy??)

The most important thing

I wonder what Olympic athletes actually eat during competition. All the Kellogg and McDonald commercials that try to connect their products with athleticism is really strange.

Anyways, this is one of my imagined breakfast of champions: grapes, greens, frittata and a yogurt smoothie.

Extended famiree

My baby brothers started a blog mostly to show off my mother's cooking. Take a peek at http://peculiarnest.blogspot.com

Friends in tasty places

My good friend Ehsan is interning at the famed Chez Panisse - which means that he needed to take a break from prepping squid and gem lettuce, and make a proper meal. Well, I obviously invited myself over for a tasty time. Below is a Thomas Keller style chicken, golden beet/dill/goat cheese salad and a salad with the most beautiful summer produce.

His mother offered us a rose-saffron-pistaccio ice cream and it was so very very amazing. I highly recommend it but I think you can only get it at Iranian markets.

midsummer night's update

hello everybody (or nobody) !

here is a mid-summer update.

my time in paris ended on a sweet note at breizh cafe with the amazing crepe briochine (sautéed banana, vanilla ice cream, and breizh's famous housemade caramel sauce). if you are ever in paris, for the love of god, GO (but you'll have to make a reservation first). oh and for pre-dessert get the gallette maraîchère, full of fresh market vegetables.

new york summer started with some fried octopedes because, well, when associated supermarket is selling many pounds' worth of baby octopedes for only $8, why not buy them?

next came the momofuku bo ssäm. i think the topic has been exhausted on this blog but let me just reiterate one more time in case you didn't get it: FATTY PORKY HEAVEN.

there was some excellent banh mi from banh mi saigon, which gives you pretty good bang for your buck. i have since been to v-name cafe on 1st & 1st, and it was equally cheap & delicious. recommend both.

then came a few rounds of dim sum at our fave 88 palace, the first better than the second, further reinforcing the fact that sunday mornings are the only real time to get dim sum so as to get the best selection. pictured here are two of my absolute favorites, jia leung and ham siu gok.

okay now i'm getting confused about the order of things. somewhere in here was a visit to the big gay ice cream shop, at which max & i shared the monday sundae and holy hell let me just say: why doesn't anyone else put nutella in their ice cream sundaes???

we made a berry pie for july 4th because this pie dough from david leibowitz is pretty fun / easy to make and also because fresh homemade whipped cream is da best. we were a little too eager though and decorated the pie before it cooled, which resulted in a melted cream berry crumble creation. still delicious.

after a long, long, long and arduous process of stephen + his friends trying to find an apartment to move into, we finally found a great place in the east village that has been fun to move into. it has also been fun to break in the kitchen with healthy dinners like this veggie mung dal thing i made that actually looked like the picture in the recipe (!)

aaand less healthy creations like homemade mint chocolate chip ice cream (there it is!), a favorite from last summer's ice cream endeavor.

last but certainly not least, i got a $5 stick blender off craigslist for stephen me, thus forever smoothies on the fire escape!!!

here's to many more before the summer's end.

battle of the toppings

How do you like your Mister Softee's?


On another note.

mo' momo

This is extremely belated but check out my winter bbq party spread --- and yes, we did that Momofuku bo ssam. I'm so excited to be coming back home for the summer and you know I'm going to get my grill on. All you babes in Caleee-four-knee-ya, be prepared for a deliciously meat-y summer because MOMMA'S COMING HOME!

Highlights of the winter BBQ: my mother did a soju love-shot with my old friend from highschool. 

Easter weekend in Brasil

Hi famiree! This weekend I went to Ouro Preto. It's an old mining town and most of the buildings are at least 300 years old. It was so so beautiful and cute - to the point of not being real. For easter they have a big celebration where they cover all the cobblestone streets with carpets made of colored sawdust with designs of saints and other fun things. Then on easter sunday there is a big parade with a bunch of bible characters. I took a lot of pictures of babies, but I decided to be serious and share these instead.

Fatih

Today Claire and I went on a mission to find some Byzantine churches in the old part of Istanbul called Fatih. Typically, we did not actually accomplish anything that we set out to do, but we had a good time anyway. Google needs to learn about Turkey. My top priorities for them are Turkish and the locations of things on maps.

We made it to an amazing restaurant called Eski Kafa where you go into the kitchen and point to what you want.

We each got a plate of different delicious vegetarian things including bulgur kofte balls, eggplant stuffed with pilav, potato börek, fasulye beans, and grape leaf dolma.

You can sit outside in camping chairs with a giant stone thingy as your table. The waiter let us try all of their juices that they make, I got hibiscus and Claire got plum.

It comes with yogurt and little pots of hot pepper flakes and mint. Then a friendly cat came to visit and sat next to our table.

Many tulips are in bloom in Istanbul now!

Then we stopped for a sarma from Fatih's famous sarmacısı, in operation for 4 generations, since the Ottoman time.

Sarma is a kind of spongey cake soaked in sweet syrup with apricot jam and coconut and pistachio on top.

We never made it inside a Byzantine building, but we did get to the Şeyzade Camii, built by Mimar Sinan in 1548.