Junblog

September 15, 2010

How to Make Beef and Chorizo Empanadas

If you knew me when I was ten and offered me an empanada for merienda, the kind that’s deep-fried and stuffed with savory ground beef and sweet raisins, I probably wouldn’t eat it. If it were a slice of pineapple upside down cake, a Bavarian Crème doughnut, or even a simple hot pan de…

September 9, 2010

Top Pot Bavarian Crème Doughnut and an Ovaltine Latte

You won’t find a cardamom doughnut with dried apricots and currants. Nor a doughnut that’s frosted with cheesecake, topped with shortbread crumbs and filled with strawberry and rhubarb. Their chocolate doughnuts are glazed with chocolate and not with rose water. And you won’t find bacon on their doughnuts, either. Instead, what you will find in…

September 6, 2010

Fried Padrón Peppers

I can’t help but feel a bit crestfallen that summer is nearly over. Not too long ago I was making sour cherry baby pies while planning a trip to the Outer Banks and now it’s September. I had so many grand summer projects planned like pickling and preserving but summer just flew by so quickly.…

September 2, 2010

How to Catch and Cook Blue Crabs: Blue Crabbing in the Outer Banks

She was strong. Unrelenting. Her tenacity was to be admired. As soon as she emerged from the murky water in a loud splash that broke the peaceful channel, she held onto the net with her bright orange claws like her life depended on it. It may sound heartless but her life actually did. She was…

August 31, 2010

BLT, Frozen Yogurt with Carolina Peaches and a Road Trip to the Outer Banks

It was 94 degrees. Hot and sticky. It could be worse, I thought. It would have felt more like over a hundred if it weren’t for the blast of salty breeze blowing as we drove down on the highway on a shiny jet-black Jeep with the windows rolled all the way down. Six or so…

August 25, 2010

Medjool Dates with Goat Capricho and Walnuts

Deep reddish brown. Crinkled skin. Richly sweet. Its sweetness reminds me of caramel and subtle hints of wild honey. Medjool dates are one of my favorite things. My love affair with this Moroccan confection started not too long ago. Four, or maybe five Christmases ago. My friends, Scott and Francis, invited me to their annual…

August 23, 2010

Fried Chicken, Funnel Cakes and Food Entrepreneurs at the San Francisco Street Food Festival

It was huge. Four city blocks in the Mission with over fifty street food vendors. San Francisco chefs, restaurateurs, food entrepreneurs, street food purveyors, and street food aficionados converged in the Mission, Saturday, for La Cocina’s biggest San Francisco Street Food Festival. Like any huge food event there were lines, long ridiculous lines like the…

August 19, 2010

Five Favorite Filipino Street Eats

All this buzz around Saturday’s huge La Cocina San Francisco Street Food Festival is making me crave for street eats I grew up with back home. They aren’t plates of chicken adobo and sisig tacos but they aren’t fertilized duck eggs and grilled chicken feet either. I know, I’m such a big whimp. Street food…

August 17, 2010

How to Make Seafood Paella

The title of this post could very well have been How to Make Seafood Paella Three Times Before Finally Getting it Right. For weeks, I stressed and obsessed about making the perfect seafood paella. Some of our close friends were coming to dinner and we promised everyone an elegant Spanish-inspired meal — pimientos de Padrón,…

August 12, 2010

Photographing Hapa SF, William Pilz’s Modern Filipino Food

It was a typical gray San Francisco summer morning. I was walking down 24th Street in the Mission with my camera and lighting gear in tow. I was on my way to La Victoria to photograph Hapa SF, William Pilz’s popular Filipino food truck. I was looking forward to meeting and working with William, a…

August 4, 2010

How to Make Crème Fraiche and Summer Fruit Salad

Growing up back home, birthdays and holidays wouldn’t be complete without my mom’s delicious desserts. Of course, there would always be store-bought birthday cakes — moist yellow cakes frosted with chocolate, sometimes, mocha buttercream and studded with colorful sugar flower sculptures, but it was my mom’s homemade sweet treats that I excitedly looked forward to…

July 29, 2010

How to Make Pork Barbecue Skewers

Pork marinated in sweet barbecue sauce, threaded into bamboo skewers, and grilled over hot coals. Served hot and fresh from the grill with a plate of pancit and, of course, steaming hot rice, these handsome pork barbecue skewers are definitely another birthday staple and one of my childhood favorites. Whenever there’s a reason to celebrate,…

July 27, 2010

How to Make Pancit Bihon (Fried Rice Noodles)

Birthdays are always celebrated with plenty of food in my family. Lots of food. My mom, now in her seventies, still never fails to deliver a lavish spread, way more than our huge family could eat. In all these birthday gatherings, noodles are ever-present. The long strands of noodles signify long life, something that Filipinos…

July 22, 2010

Happy First Birthday, Jun-Blog!

Food triggers memories. Last weekend, I made my mom’s pancit and while I was shredding chicken breasts after boiling them to make chicken stock, I suddenly found myself transported back to our tiny kitchen in Manila, on a hot and humid afternoon with our old avocado green electric fan in full blast. I was doing…

July 16, 2010

Lechón, Max’s Fried Chicken and Bibingka, Filipino Comfort Food in the Bay Area

Every so often I still miss home, maybe not as much as I did twelve years ago when I first moved to California. But I still do. I remember my first few months at Stanford very well. I had never been away from home, which made going to school and starting over, all on my…

July 13, 2010

Pizza Margherita and Prather Ranch Hamburger in the Dogpatch

It’ll be exactly one year this Friday since we moved back to the city and settled in the Dogpatch. I’ve always wondered why it’s called the Dogpatch. It’s that rough far-flung city block in the middle of where-the-hell-are-we with three-legged dogs wandering around, a friend of mine used to tease. But that’s exactly why we…