14.1.12

Send My Friend to China!

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This is Courtney.
You should help her get to China.


Not that I don't want her here or anything like that.
I mean, I like her being here...
Hence, she's my friend.
You know, someone I don't want around wouldn't really be my friend...
And she's my friend, so I like her being around...
Because she is happy and fun and makes life better....



So that's not why I'm saying you should send her to China.
yeah.
Actually, it's because she wants to go to China.
To teach English to cute children at a summer camp.
Which is a worthy cause, you know?
Besides, she's cute.
Look at her thinking of China.


Anyway, she is saving and trying to raise money to go this next summer, so I took photos of her this afternoon to make prayer cards with and stuff. And so I had these photos and thought I'd introduce you to her in case you want to help her by giving her money, or by telling other people about her, or by praying for her lots and lots.
(because in my opinion, praying is even better than moneys. Strange, I know.)



She even has a blog of her own so that you can hear straight from her what she is doing and why! Here it is:
http://sendmetochina.blogspot.com/

So go read it, and love her, and pray for her, and send her to China!!!

10.1.12

Curry Chicken

1 comment:

As most of you know, I spent a fair portion of my childhood in an Indian community in Fiji. Now, what you may not know, is that from these Indian people comes pretty much the best food in the entire world.
Curry really should be its own food group. The one at the bottom of the pyramid, that you need the most of.
Also, I must warn you that the "curry" I grew up with and am giving you the recipe for here is very, very different from "curry chicken" that is made here in the States, which has a creamy sauce and is served with raisins and coconut and that stuff. That curry much more closely resembles curries from the more upper-class food of India, using cream or yoghurt. It is quite delicious itself, but it is not the curry I grew up eating, and which I make at home.

This particular recipe I got from a friend from Fiji, who is now living in the States.
While it does not take too many "exotic" spices, it does call for a few. I'm not sure if Walmart carries this stuff... I get them from my local Indian grocery store. Probably a spice store or an herb store might carry them? I'm not sure...


Ingredients
About 2-3 pounds of chicken, cubed
 1 chopped onion
2 curry leaves
2 cinnamon sticks, or about a teaspoon of cinnamon
chili powder to taste (depending on how hot you like your food)
salt to taste
1 tsp tumeric
2 tsp curry powder
4 tsp meat masala
cooking oil
cilantro (optional... I don't usually have it on hand, so I don't usually put it in)
thumb-sized piece of ginger (best if fresh, but you can used 1/4 tsp powdered)
8-10 cloves of garlic (yes, that much)
serrano peppers (also to taste, depending on how hot you like your food. I actually usually just omit them)
1 tsp cumin
1/2 tsp mustard seed


Method:
Crush together ginger, garlic, peppers, cumin, and mustard seed.
Heat just enough oil to cover the bottom of your pot.
Add onion and curry leaves, and brown.  
Add crushed spices, and brown.
Add all the rest of the spices and the cinnamon sticks, keep stirring so this does not burn. You will have a spicy, yummy smelling paste.
Add chicken and salt. Stir to just cook the outside of the chicken, then add enough water to cover the chicken about 3/4 the way.
Cover with a lid and cook on low to medium, checking on it and stirring occasionally until done. The chicken will be done and the liquid will have cooked down to about half of what it was.
Taste and add salt if needed. 
Add cilantro and let cook just a little.
Turn off heat and serve with rice, roti, and chutney.
(If you like. Or just eat it with a spoon, from the pan. I might have done that before.)  


Roti is the flat bread, somewhat similar to a tortilla, that is normally eaten with curry. You actually can use the roti instead of silverware to eat the curry (it tastes better that way, promise). You tear off a little piece of roti and use it to pick up your curry and rice. How do you make roti, you might ask? Well, it's very simple, here let me help you:



In a large bowl, mix flour and a little bit of salt. I also add some garlic powder, just for extra flavour and because I like garlic. Add boiling (or very very hot) water, enough to make a somewhat stiff dough, and stir together. Knead for a very, very long time until it is soft and elastic. Pinch off small balls of dough and roll out with flour to keep them from sticking to the counter. You want basically the size and shape of a tortilla.
Heat a non-stick pan to medium heat, and put a roti on it. (I cook them without oil, I find they cook better that way for me.) Cook until both sides are done (some brown spots, but not burnt). I usually flip them three times, that seems to work well. They should puff up as they cook. Pop them and squish the bubbles, or they can get kind of crispy, which is not what we are going for. When the roti is done, place it in a pan and brush some melted butter on it. I put some garlic in the butter, too. Brush melted butter on each roti as they come off the pan. This keeps them soft and yummy. And buttery.


There you go!
This is pretty much about my favorite meal of all time, and I am giving you the recipe.
I know, I'm awesome.  
Thanks.

2.1.12

Tea Bags

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Look at that little tea bag. Isn't it adorable?
Ok, perhaps I'm biased, because I made that tea bag with my own little hands, but still.

I was drinking jasmine tea this morning with my breakfast (which happened to be homemade yoghurt and chai spice granola). The jasmine tea I have is loose-leaf tea, and is very good. However, I was having some trouble with my little tea strainer... it is a bit handle-heavy to sit on my tea cup like a good little strainer, so it tends to flop out, catapulting wet tea leaves along the way. This situation does not lend itself to a happy, relaxing breakfast.

I saw homemade fabric tea bags on pintrest the other day, and I decided that now is the time to make some. Guess what? I'll even show you how I did it! Alternatively, you could just buy them in my etsy shop. =D

Ok, first of all, I found a really lightweight cotton and cut a rectangle out of it, about twice the length of a tea bag. I stitched a heart on it, where the middle of the front of the bag is going to be. You can put whatever you like on the front of your tea bag... or just leave it plain... up to you!


Isn't it a cute little heart???



Then I folded my little rectangle in half, right sides together, and stitched up both sides to make a bag. I double stitched it, for extra awesomeness.


Still inside out, I folded over the top for the place where the drawstring is going to be.


I put the drawstring in the fold to make sure it was going to fit, and then stitched around the bottom of the fold. Make sure not to catch the drawstring in your stitches! It doesn't work then....

Also, leave a hole for the string to come out of.


I sewed one end of my drawstring down then, so that I only have one string coming off my bag. See the little end of string peeking out there?


Turn the bag right side out now.


I tied a button on the end of my string, for extra cuteness, and so that the string doesn't follow my tea bag into my cup of tea.


And there you have it! An adorable, reusable, eco-friendly tea bag! Put your loose-leaf tea in it, pull the drawstring tight, and you are ready for your cup of tea.

To clean it, just pull open the drawstring top (you might have to work it a little since it will be wet at that point), turn it inside out, and rinse it. Hang it up to dry.

And, you know, if you don't want to make one but you are just dying to get your hands on one, then they are in my etsy shop here: http://www.etsy.com/listing/89620062/reusable-tea-bag-stiched-heart-on-cotton

Happy tea-bag-making!

1.1.12

Peking Duck

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My family has a traditional Christmas dinner that is rather un-traditional...

Peking Duck... happens to be Chinese for "AMAZING NOMS."  (Caps included in translation).
This Chinese dish takes a really long time to make, hence we really only eat it at Christmas, but boy is it worth the work!
It is good stuff.
Now, I must apologize in advance... I don't have too many pictures of the process and all, I kept getting distracted, and it is only by very good luck that I have any pictures at all of the finished product... We had devoured the entire meal, and Morgan was quickly consuming the very last piece when I suddenly remembered that I had no pictures of the finished duck.
He wasn't too thrilled to stop eating his last piece of duck so that I could take pictures of it, but he did, so you do get to see what the duck looks like not raw.
Ok, here we go, Peking Duck as my mommy taught me how to make it:

I. Marinate Him:

1) Make a paste mixture of Chinese 5 Spice and oil
2) Rub the inside of the duck with the paste
3) Rub the outside of the duck with the paste
4) Wrap him up with plastic wrap and refrigerate over night

II. Pop His Skin Out:

1) boil a kettle of water
2) hang the duck (over the sink or outside where it can drip) using wires
3) pour boiling water over the duck until the skin pops away from the meat
4) Let Him dry

III. Make the Paint:

1) caramelize about 1/2 c sugar in a skillet until it's liquid
2) add just enough water to cause it to sizzle up and then turn back into liquid
3) add some soy sauce and Chinese 5 spice
4) Cook till it just starts to thicken up, but not so thick as syrup

IV. Paint Him

1) Using a pastry brush or small paint brush, paint the duck
2) Let him dry and paint it over again every time it dries every 30 minutes or so until you have a good coating - 6 times or so
3) Let the final coating dry on him for several hours

V. Cook Him

1) Heat to oven to 350
2) Roast Him till he is done - depending on how fat he is… maybe  1-1.5 hours? Check to make sure there is no pink liquid… kind of like a chicken. If you can cook him on a roasting rack, that will keep the fat from pooling around his skin.

VI. While he is cooking, prepare the pancakes and fillings

1) Make little round rotis (flour + boiling water, knead well), rolled very very thin (it seems to work best to keep the dough on the soft side for this)
2) cut green onions into strips - some restaurants use cucumbers too, cut into very thin strips
3) Hoisin Sauce (find at your local chinese grocery)


VII. Eat Him

1) Carve Him into thin slices/strips. If the skin separates, that's ok, just set it on one side of the dish and be sure everyone gets a piece of skin in their pancake
2) Serve with onion strips, cucumber strips, Hoisin sauce and Duck in the Pancakes.


To do this, take the pancake and put it on your plate. Take a spoonful of Hoisin sauce and spread it over the pancake. Take strips of duck, duck skin, and onions, and lay them on the pancake. Roll it up. NOM NOM NOM.