Spice it up. Not your regular watermelon soju

As most of my friend know, I am somewhat of an alcohol fanatic. I also want to experiment with cocktails but haven't stock up enough in my liquor cabinet to do that. But this cocktail I tried in Hong Kong was not a difficult mix at all.
Watermelon soju has been a popular thing among my friends especially during summer months. This cocktail is let's say a more complex version of it, flavor wise.

I don't really like to measure when it comes to alcohol. Be more free spirited and taste test while mixing it.

Ingredients:
watermelon juice (I used one mini watermelon and blend everything)
vodka/ soju
fresh lime juice
lemongrass (i didn't have fresh lemongrass so I used frozen ground lemongrass)
honey syrup
thai chili

With half of the watermelon juice, I mixed 2 shots of vodka, half a lime, a tsp of lemongrass, a squirt of honey syrup and half a thai chili.
Everyone likes this drink differently so you are in control of your own drink. Cheers and have a sweet hot spicy night ;)

Bring home to me. Shanghai Vegetable Rice

Home is far for me. Home cooked food is even further. My cravings are the motivation for me to cook these dishes and this shanghai vegetable rice one that I also crave and therefore always make. Although I have to admit that, my mom's rice is also unbeatable and the best I have ever had.

With the help of a rice cooker, everything is so much easier these days. This dish is the same.

Ingredients:
Shanghai bak choy (those with milky white stems)
Chinese sausage
Jasmine rice
Salt

First wash the rice and measure the amount of water. Put in a little less water than usual because there will be water in the vegetable and you don't want your rice to be soggy.

Then wash the bak choy and finely chop them. You would want at least a bag of vegetables. It will look like a lot but when you cook it they will shrink.
Heat the wok, add a little more oil than usual.  Put all of the chopped vegetables in. Add a handful of salt. Remember this will be mixed into the rice so you should definitely over salt them.
Water stored in the vegetable will be forced out when you cook it. Once the vegetables are all wilted, pour them into the rice cooker including the vegetable juice.

Start the rice cooker. Halfway through the cooking process, put in the Chinese sausage. This adds flavor to the rice. Let the rice cook through and your vegetable rice will be done!
Easy peasy :)

Hope all of you who are living far away from home can feel the love during the process of cooking some traditional homemade food you had at home.

Nothing beats homemade soymilk

Everyone buys soy milk at supermarket but the hard work you put in when you make your own changes the flavor of the ultimate product.
So here you go, homemade soy milk. Silky and delicious.

It's a two day process. First sock the soy beans overnight so they grow in size.

The next day pour the soy bean into the blender. 1:1 ratio. Start the blender until smooth. Strain the pulp and milk with a cloth bag. You can find these at asian supermarkets. People usually use them for making fish soup.


Use all of the strength you got to squeeze all the juice out of the bag. Then put the remaining pulp back into the blender. This time adding half the water. 1:.5 ratio. You don't want to put too much water because it will dilute the final product. Repeat the squeezing part.

Now all the liquid is in a pot, turn on the stove and give it a boil. THIS WILL SPILL so watch the fire. Let it cool and there you go. Homemade soy milk. You can make a batch and put them in small jars ready for your morning commute.

                 

     

Pickles

These days I have been obsessed with pickles. The process of pickling was used as a way to preserve food but then people enjoyed the resulting flavor and nowadays people from all over their world have their own style of pickling.
Koreans is one of the Asian country that has a lot of preserved food. This recipe is one of my favorite and also the easiest.
Chayote is a plant that belongs to the gourd family. In Chinese we call them "buddha's hand" since it has a shape of a close fist. I have also used it to make soup until I tried a pickle chayote at a Korean restaurant.
**One thing you need to know about this plant. It's slimy after you peel the skin off. The sap from the plant dries out the water on your fingers and your hands will be super dry. Some people will even have allergic reaction to it. Try to use gloves when you cut them**

For the pickle, we do not need to peel the skin, but we need to take out the center white part of the plant. Cut them into cubes and find a tight jar for you to store them.

Now the brine. It consists of 1:1:1 sugar, soy sauce and white vinegar. Put them all in a pot and bring it to a boil. Watch the fire because the brine will over boil very quickly.
Once it boils up, pour the brine into the jar of raw chayote.
They float so in order to let it soak up the brine, place a few rocks or something heavy to push them down. Seal the jar.

Let the jar sit in room temperature for  a day or two then you can put it in the fridge.

For a kick, put in a jalepeno (poke a few holes in the pepper). That should give you a sweet sour spicy delicious pickle. ENJOY!

**You can reuse the brine. Just add extra soy sauce and vinegar and give it a boil. Also use hot brine so the chayote cooks a little in the brine but remain crispy.**