Healthy(ish) Orange Chicken

Healthy Orange Chicken - made July 13, 2013 from Eat Well Living Thin

Okay, first, let me say this is an easy recipe to make.  Second, despite that, I still screwed it up.  Sigh.  Look at the directions.  Honestly, how hard could it be?  The answer is not hard at all....unless you don't use enough orange juice, don't have enough liquid for the sauce and adding cornstarch doesn't thicken the little sauce you have so much as makes it clumpy.  Seriously, it's not false modesty that makes me say I can't really cook.  It's just honesty.

Regardless of my screw up (note to self: 1 orange doesn't make 3/4 cup of orange juice, no matter how big or juicy the orange is), this dish was pretty tasty.  It just could've used more sauce.  Or I didn't need to use as much chicken as I did. Or both.  And since I'm admitting my failings, let me also throw in that I didn't have the patience to coat all of the chicken pieces in cornstarch. I gave up halfway through and just tossed in the rest of the chicken and stir-fried them. Yes, I have the patience to sift through a bag of M&Ms to find all the red and blue ones and line them up to make a flag decoration but I didn't have the patience to coat some chicken pieces in cornstarch.  Oh well.  I think that means I deserve to eat what I cook.

Marinade:
1/2 cup orange juice
1 teaspoon orange zest
2 teaspoons low-sodium soy sauce
1/4 teaspoon sesame seed oil
1/2 teaspoon salt

1 pound chicken breast tenders, cut into 1-inch chunks
1/2 cup cornstarch

Sauce:
3/4 cup orange juice
1 teaspoon orange zest
1/2 cup low-sodium chicken broth
5 teaspoons Splenda granular
4 teaspoons sugar-free OR regular honey OR Agave
1 tablespoon low-sodium soy sauce
2 teaspoons vegetable oil
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 teaspoons apple cider vinegar
Pinch red pepper flakes
2 teaspoons cornstarch
Kosher salt
Sliced green onions
Sesame seeds, optional

1. Marinade: In a medium bowl combine orange juice, orange zest, soy sauce, sesame oil, and salt. Add chicken tenders and stir to coat. Allow to marinate for 25-30 minutes.
2. Sauce: In a small saucepan combine orange juice, orange zest, chicken broth, Splenda, honey, soy sauce, oil, garlic, and apple cider vinegar. Bring to a boil; lower heat to a simmer and cook until liquid is reduced by 1/4. Season with salt to taste. Stir the 2 teaspoons cornstarch with a small amount of cold water and add to the sauce. Bring back to a boil and cook for 1-2 minutes, or until thickened. Set aside, but keep warm.
3. In a large bowl or ziploc bag add the 1/2 cup of cornstarch. Drain the chicken and toss with the cornstarch, shaking off excess. In a large skillet heat 2 tablespoons vegetable oil over medium-high. Add chicken and cook until golden and meat is cooked through. Gently toss cooked chicken with the sauce and sesame seeds, if using, and serve. Makes 4 servings.  (About 1/2 cup each.)

Bakery Review: Paris Baguette

Paris Baguette - July 12, 2013

I'm continuing my mini quest to try all the local, small business bakeries I can go to and assess their offerings. Next in the lineup is Paris Baguette.  They're not as small business as the mom-and-pop places I try to patronize; in the US, they have 15-22 locations in California, New Jersey, New York and Pennsylvania and they're actually a subdivision of a much larger food and food services company based in Korea.  But they were nearby and they got good reviews on yelp so I decided to throw them on the list.

Like many Asian bakeries, they're set up in a self-service style where you take a tray and a pair of long-handled tongs and walk through the bakeshop which has trays of individual-sized baked goods lining the shelves and atop the table in the middle of the shop.  You choose which ones you want and place them on your tray, using the tongs (please don't use your fingers to fondle the baked goods) then you end up at the cashier where you pay for your purchases and the cashier bags them for you. Ironically, the first time I was exposed to that type of setup was at a Chinese bakery in Melbourne, Australia.  Yes, I had to travel halfway across the world to experience a layout that was in every Asian bakery within walking and easy driving distance of my home.  Go figure.

Also like many Asian bakeries, Paris Baguette is pretty cheap.  I got an apple pastry, a castella and a cannele - all for $5.60.  The castella was the most expensive at $2; the other two were $1.80 each.  First up on the taste test was the apple pastry since that's what I felt like having for breakfast that day.  It was really good, the pastry was flaky and the apples weren't too tart or too sweet.  They could've used a few more apple slices in there and I would've preferred it without raisins but for what it was, it was very good.  Certainly not something I'd go to the trouble of making myself when I can get a delicious one for $1.80. Not to mention laminated doughs are not my strength.

Apple Pastry - pretty good

Cannele - overbaked

The cannele was my post-lunch snack and that was the disappointment of the three things I bought.  I had some reservations about it based on how it looked because the bottom was burnt.  Canneles are supposed to be dark but this was beyond that to burnt.  I had to take a picture of the bottom so you can see what I mean.  Given that, it wasn't surprising that the cannele itself was overcooked.  The middle part had the right texture albeit a little too firm but the outer shell of the canele was hard.  I'd first had caneles from La Boulange bakery in San Francisco, based on a friend's recommendation, so I know what a good cannele tastes like.  It should be like a firm (but not too firm) custard that isn't too eggy-tasting or too sweet.  If you could have a dry custard verging on a dense cake, that's what this overcooked cannele was like.  The taste itself, minus the slight burnt aftertaste, was good but the texture was too hard for a cannele.

Fortunately, the taste test ended on a good note with the castella.  It was almost exactly like mamon (French sponge cake) that I've bought from Goldilocks, a Filipino bakery chain known for its mamon.  The castella was similar in taste and texture, very light and fluffy, lightly sweetened - think of it like a yellow chiffon cake.  It was only slightly more dense than a mamon which tends to be more chiffon-like but it wasn't a heavy denseness, just that there was less airiness and more cake fluff, if that makes sense.  In any case, I enjoyed it.  Of the three, I'd have to give the nod to the apple pastry as the winner though.

All in all, the things I tried were decent.  I'd go back to Paris Baguette to try more of their offerings.  They do a lot of croissants, both plain and filled, cream-filled custard buns and pastries filled with more Asian flavors like red bean, sesame, tapioca, etc.  If you don't want anything too exotic, they also have pain au chocolat and almond croissants.  Ironically, I forgot to look for baguettes.  Since it's in their name, I would assume they make a good one but I would need to try it to test that assumption.

Rolo-Stuffed Chocolate Chip Cookies

Rolo-Stuffed Chocolate Chip Cookies - made July 5, 2013, recipe adapted from Mon Cheri Cooking School

Since the Nutella-Stuffed Brown Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies turned out so well, I thought I'd try another chocolate chip cookie recipe and stuffing that too, this time with caramel and Rolos.  Sometimes when I have a chocolate chip cookie recipe I want to try, I make it as is and other times I dress it up a bit.  This recipe seemed so normal and typical of chocolate chip cookies that I decided it needed to be dressed up.  Hence the caramel stuffing.

By now I've become a cookie-stuffing expert.  Mini chocolate chips to make it easier to work with the dough, chilling the caramel and Rolos, and sealing the cookie dough tightly around the caramel so nothing leaks out during baking.  Except things didn't go as planned and the caramel leaked out anyway in most of the cookies, probably because they weren't as tightly sealed as I thought.  Not to be daunted, I cut around the cookies while they were still warm and peeled off the leaked, melted caramel.  That made the cookies a bit more presentable.  I brought these into work and people seemed to like them but I didn't get a chance to try them until a day later.  Normally I don't wait that long to taste test a cookie but I just didn't get a chance to eat this on the day I made it, probably because of the time of day/evening I baked them and I wasn't hungry then.  In any case, I wasn't impressed by these cookies.  They were okay but nothing out of the ordinary, even with their Rolo-caramel stuffing.  So these don't oust the Alton Brown recipe or the Nutella-Stuffed Brown Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies in my recipe hall of fame.

1 cup light brown sugar, solidly packed

½ cup granulated sugar

½ cup vegetable shortening, such as Crisco

½ cup (4 ounces) unsalted butter, room temperature

2 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

3 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

12 ounces semisweet chocolate chips

1. Using the paddle attachment of an electric mixer, beat both sugars with the shortening and butter until light and fluffy.  Beat in eggs and vanilla extract.  Mix flour, soda, and salt in a large bowl.  Add dry ingredients to the butter mixture and mix until blended.  Stir in the mini chocolate chips by hand.
2. Flatten 1 1/2 tablespoons of dough in the palm of your hand and drop a dollop of caramel in the middle.  Add a Rolo in the center and wrap the cookie dough around the filling, sealing the edges tightly.  Patch any "holes" with a bit of cookie dough.  Chill or freeze until firm.
3. When ready to bake, preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Place chilled dough balls onto parchment-lined baking sheets, spacing 2 inches apart.  Bake until golden brown, about 12 minutes until edges are brown and the middle is just barely no longer raw looking or doughy.  Keep cookies on baking sheets 5 minutes before transferring cookies to a wire rack to cool completely.  If any caramel has leaked out during baking, cut neatly around the cookie with a small sharp knife while still warm.

Bakery Review: Frost Cupcake Factory

Frost Cupcake Factory - visited July 1, 2013

I've been writing my blog for several years now - unbelievably, it'll be 4 years this September; my, how time flies when you're baking.  I feel like I've been doing much the same thing for awhile lately: try a new recipe, taste it, take a picture, write it up and post.  Nothing wrong with that but I feel the need to mix things up a bit.  So, with that in mind, I'm going to do a series of "bakery reviews" in the upcoming months.  I want to try local bakeries and eateries and do an honest assessment of what I think of them and how I find their products.  I've pretty much started that with my write up of Stan's Donut Shop and, to a lesser extent, Tartine.  I'm just formalizing it into my summer project. Which could also bleed into fall, winter and spring because I'm fortunate enough to live in a food mecca and it's hard to run out of new places to try.  The only theme I'm going to try focusing on is patronizing and writing about small businesses as much as possible, not just to help promote them but to encourage everyone to try out the small businesses in their own local area - you never know what hidden gems you'll find in your neighborhood.

Remember Cookie Palooza and the dozens of baked goods I made for my coworkers for our volunteer event last month?  After we volunteered at RAFT, we did a team lunch at an Indian buffet restaurant nearby.  Although there were 16 of us who made it to the lunch, we got seated at 3 different tables.  At my table of 6, we discovered an affinity for good food and sweets; recommendations of places to try started flying around the conversation.  Which morphed into "hey we should take a field trip to some of these places and check them out."  See why I like my coworkers?

Our first field trip was to Frost Cupcake Factory. Since I have a tendency to watch Cupcake Wars like a sugar-starved maniac in a candy store, I knew Frost had been a winner on Cupcake Wars (the Space Shuttle Endeavor episode) and I'd always wanted to try them.  So a few of us packed ourselves into my car during lunch one day and set out. Frost is located in a cute little shop in downtown Campbell and the first thing that strikes you when you walk into the cupcake shop is it smells divine.  Like I almost didn't need to eat a cupcake because my olfactory senses were so fulfilled.  Fortunately, almost is the operative word here.

Left to right, top to bottom: Banana, Salt 'n Sweet, Rose Velvet, Coffee Toffee Crunch

We were fortunate that we happened to go in on a Monday because it turns out that on Mondays, you can buy mini cupcakes 3 for $5.  Regular-size cupcakes are $3.25 each.  They have some amazing flavors listed and I wish I had taken a picture of their display cases with mouthwatering-looking cupcakes but at the time, I hadn't planned on writing up this post.  Anyway, after some dithering, I chose a regular-size cupcake of their Salt 'n Sweet which was a chocolate cupcake filled with salted caramel topped with chocolate ganache and drizzled with caramel. I also bought 3 minis: Coffee Toffee Crunch (chocolate cupcake frosted with chocolate buttercream which was covered with chocolate-covered toffee bits), Rose Velvet (red velvet with cream cheese frosting) and a banana cupcake topped with frosting and a banana chip.  4 cupcakes might seem like a lot to consume, albeit 3 of them were "mini" size but the sacrifices my waistline, running shoes, treadmill and I make in the name of research....

I really, really want to say these were the best cupcakes ever and it was no wonder they won Cupcake Wars.  Unfortunately.....I can't.  I cringe to even write those words because I really want to be supportive.  But I also have to be honest.  The regular-size Salt 'n Sweet cupcake was dry.  The caramel was good but the chocolate cupcake itself was dry and I wasn't hit with a lot of chocolate flavor.  The Coffee Toffee Crunch in the mini size was more moist but again, not a lot of chocolate punch.  I'm not fond of a lot of frosting on my cupcakes so I scraped off most of the frosting (it was light and airy so if you're a frosting person, I'm sure you'd enjoy it) and ate the toffee crunch bits which were the best part of the cupcake.  The Rose Velvet wasn't very moist either although it wasn't as dry as the Salt 'n Sweet.  The banana cupcake was "okay", not quite moist but not quite dry.  Instead, the texture was a bit tough, like it had been overmixed.  I honestly don't know if I just tried Frost on an off day but in my defense, my coworkers who came with me and got other cupcakes in different flavors had the same view of their cupcakes: most were on the dry side and nothing really stood out in terms of flavor.

After that road trip, I went home that night and re-watched their episode on Cupcake Wars.  I discovered 2 of the flavors they had on the show were also in their display case that day: Tear-I-Miss-You (presumably a tiramisu cupcake) and Peanut Butter Moon Pie.  It was too bad I hadn't tried either of those cupcakes, just in case those were really knockouts.  I'm willing to give Frost another try and see if they do have cupcakes that would blow me away because I want to like them and promote them but they're a bit of a drive so I don't know if I would go there just for the express purpose of getting a cupcake.  It'll have to be when I'm there "someday" for another reason.

Oh, and in case anyone does want to try them out, they just published their summer flavor calendar.  Similar to Sprinkles, they have certain flavors they make every day and some flavors they only make on certain days of the week.

In-Love-With-Chocolate Coconut Cake

In-Love-With-Chocolate Coconut Cake - made July 4, 2013 from Baking by Flavor by Lisa Yockelson

I'm trying to get back to my baking books and the recipes I've been meaning to make for literally years but never got around to before.  This is one of them.  I love Baking by Flavor where this recipe comes from.  The paperback version is was on sale at amazon for $10 when I first linked it but now that sale price is gone.  Too bad because that's a steal.  I paid more than twice that for the hardback version and have more than gotten my money's worth from the recipes I've already tried from it.

This was another good recipe from it - the cake was soft and moist and the frosting was delicious. It was the first time I had made a frosting with egg yolks in it so I was leery but it turned out pretty well.  Just make sure you temper in the eggs or too much heat too quickly will scramble them and that's not what you want. While this is a good-tasting cake, be warned, however, that it doesn't cut neatly.  The cake is almost too soft to slice cleanly and the frosting sticks to the knife which also makes it difficult to get a clean cut.  It's also easier to eat this cake with a spoon rather than a fork.

2 cups unsifted bleached cake flour

¼ cup unsifted bleached all-purpose flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

¾ teaspoon salt

10 tablespoons (1 stick plus 2 tablespoons) unsalted butter, softened

1 ¾ cups plus 2 tablespoons granulated sugar

2 large eggs

2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract

4 ounces unsweetened chocolate, melted and cooled

1 cup milk blended with 1/3 cup light (table) cream

1 cup lightly packed sweetened flaked coconut

Coconut Frosting for topping the baked cake

1. Preheat the oven to 350°F.  Film the inside of a 9 x 13” baking pan with nonstick cooking spray; set aside.
2. Sift the cake flour, all-purpose flour, baking powder and salt onto a sheet of waxed paper.
3. Cream the butter in the large bowl of a freestanding electric mixer on moderate speed for 2 minutes.  Add half of the granulated sugar and beat for 1 minute; add the balance of the granulated sugar and beat for 1 to 2 minutes longer.  Beat in the eggs, one at a time, mixing for 45 seconds to 1 minute after each addition.  Blend in the vanilla extract and melted unsweetened chocolate.  Scrape down the sides of the mixing bowl frequently with a rubber spatula to keep the batter even-textured.
4. On low speed, alternately add the sifted mixture in three additions with the milk-table cream blend in two additions, beginning and ending with the sifted mixture.  The batter will be creamy and lightly thickened.  Mix in the coconut. 
5. Spoon the batter into the prepared baking pan.  Gently shake the pan from side to side, two or three times, to level the top or smooth over the top lightly with a rubber spatula.
6. Bake the cake in the preheated oven for 40 minutes, or until risen, set, and a wooden pick inserted in the cake withdraws clean.  The baked cake will pull away slightly from the sides of the baking pan.  Let the cake stand in the pan on a cooling rack.  Cool completely.
7. Frost the cake: Place large spoonfuls of the frosting on top of the cooled cake and, using a flexible palette knife, spread the frosting over the surface of the cake.  Cool completely.

Freshly baked, the cake keeps for 2 days.

Coconut Frosting

¾ cup heavy cream

¾ cup plus 2 tablespoon firmly packed light brown sugar, sieved if lumpy

¼ cup granulated sugar

3 large egg yolks, lightly beaten

large pinch of salt

2 cups lightly packed sweetened flaked coconut

1 ½ cups coarsely chopped walnuts, lightly toasted and cooled

7 tablespoons (1 stick less 1 tablespoon) unsalted butter, cut into tablespoon chunks

1 ½ teaspoons pure vanilla extract

1. Combine the heavy cream, light brown sugar, granulated sugar, egg yolks, salt, coconut and walnuts in a heavy, medium-size saucepan (preferably enameled cast iron).  Add the butter chunks.  Set over moderately high heat and cook, stirring frequently with a wooden spoon or flat paddle, until the butter melts down entirely and the mixture comes to a low boil.  Cook the frosting mixture at a low boil for 8 to 10 minutes, or until thickened, stirring continually.  The thickened frosting will be somewhat shiny.
2. Remove the saucepan from the heat.  Stir in the vanilla extract.  Carefully spoon the frosting into a large heatproof bowl.  Cool for 15 to 20 minutes, stirring occasionally.  The frosting is now ready to be used.

Butter Mochi

Butter Mochi - made June 29, 2013 from Miss Mochi's Adventures

I had a hankering for bibingka one day but I didn't make it myself because my mom always makes it when my niece comes for the weekend to visit.  Except the one time I really wanted some and my niece came over, my mom didn't make it because she thought we would be sick of it.  Um. No.  So that left me hanging and bibingka-less. Now I suppose I could have made it myself since I have my mom's recipe and I've made it before.  But somehow it's never as good as when my mom makes it.  So I thought I would try something similar but different with this recipe I found on pinterest.  The ingredients are similar although not exactly the same and I knew the rice flour would give it a chewy texture like bibingka.

It was just as easy to make as well.  I sprinkled the coconut on top before baking but some of it sank into the batter.  The picture makes it seem like this would have a fluffy, cakey texture but because it uses rice flour instead of wheat flour, it actually isn't cakey but more chewy and dense, similar to mochi if you've ever had it (or gummy bears if you haven't).  To be honest, I couldn't decide if I liked this or not.  On the one hand, it was similar to bibingka and I always like coconut.  But it was way too sweet which wasn't surprising given the amount of sugar in it.  I'm not well-versed enough in working with rice flour or coconut milk to experiment with the effect of cutting back on the sugar but I wish I had. I liked the texture and the coconut but the sweetness was too much, even for me.  I think I need to stick to bibingka after all.

1 stick of butter, melted and cooled (1/2 cup)
1-pound box of mochiko (3 cups, sweet rice flour)
1 12-13oz can of coconut milk
3 cups sugar
1/2 tablespoon vanilla extract
1 tablespoon baking powder
5 eggs
Coconut for top layer, if desired

1. Mix all the ingredients together and pour into 9x13 inch pan sprayed with nonstick cooking spray. Sprinkle with coconut if desired.
2. Bake for 1 hour at 375 degrees F or until toothpick comes out clean. Cut into squares after letting it cool slightly.

Nutella-Stuffed Brown Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies

Nutella-Stuffed Brown Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies - made June 29, 2013 from The Bite-Sized Baker

Back to the recipes....  I had made these cookies as the cookie layer of Fudgy Chocolate Chip Toffee Bars but that layer was so good I needed to make the cookies as standalone as they were meant to be. Stuffed with Nutella of course.  It was really hot when I made these and that actually makes working with cookie dough a little tricky, even when you're wont to freeze the dough before baking like I always do.  I never bother letting butter come to room temperature because by then it'll be too soft and greasy to work with and the cookies will spread.  Instead, I take it from refrigerator to stand mixer and beat it until it's creamy enough not to have any more lumps but not so well beaten that it's softened and warm.

If it's hot where you are, definitely chill your nutella before using it or it'll be hard to keep neat when "stuffing" inside the cookie dough.  Technically you're supposed to pat out the cookie dough to a disk, put a dollop of nutella in the middle then close/pinch the cookie dough around it, encasing the nutella completely.  But my kitchen was hot, the dough was warm, the nutella was liquid-y so I had the devil's own time trying to "stuff" the cookie dough properly without nutella leaking out all over the place.  Instead, I chilled the dough and the nutella briefly but since I didn't have a lot of time, I ended up using my mini cheesecake pan with removable bottoms to make these: I made a shell in each cavity of cookie dough, dropped a dollop of nutella in the middle then covered/sealed the top with more cookie dough.  Pushing up from the bottom of the pan meant the stuffed cookies came out easily and went straight to the freezer to chill before baking.  I ended up with bigger cookie dough "balls" than I was aiming for but I could live with that.  If you want to make them smaller, try using mini muffin tins: fill all the cavities then turn over and tap them out all at once.

One other tip for stuffed cookies is to use mini chocolate chips.  I used regular-size chips and they were harder to work with in the dough because they kept getting in the way of shaping and stuffing.  Mini chips would have been easier.  However, despite all of those logistics, the baked result was worth all the trouble. Crisp edges, gooey middle, excellent flavor. Be forewarned that these are rich cookies.  Almost too rich so making them small might not be a bad idea.  But if you like thick, chunky, decadently rich cookies, this is a winner.

2¼ cup all-purpose flour
1¼ teaspoons baking soda
¼ teaspoon of salt
2 sticks (1 cup) unsalted butter
1¼ cup packed dark brown sugar
¼ cup granulated sugar
1 large egg plus 1 egg yolk
1½ teaspoons vanilla extract
1 tablespoon plain greek yogurt (I substituted sour cream)
½ cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
½  cup chocolate chips (I recommend using mini chocolate chips)
1 jar of Nutella, chilled in refrigerator
Coarse sea salt for sprinkling, if desired

1. In a large bowl mix flour, baking soda, and salt until combined. In a saucepan over medium heat, brown butter and set aside to cool.
2. In the bowl of a stand mixer with the paddle attachment, beat together butter and sugars until light and fluffy. Mix in egg, yolk, vanilla, and yogurt (or sour cream) until incorporated. Gradually add the dry ingredients until combined. Fold in chocolate chips.
3. Place cookie dough in the refrigerator for 2 hours to let the flavors meld together.
4. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Roll 1½ tablespoons of dough and flatten the dough to make a flat circle. Place 1 teaspoon of chilled Nutella in the middle then place another flat circle of cookie dough on top. Crimp edges to seal.
5. Place dough balls on cookie sheet, 2 inches apart and bake 9-11 minutes or until the edges turn golden brown and middles no longer look raw.
6. Sprinkle with sea salt if desired and let cool on wire racks.