Spring happiness!

I love the concept of nurturing little oxygen-dispensing, photosynthesizing bundles of happiness. I think that love of gardening was passed down to me by my gampa. But what to do, when one lives in a condo with no lawn in sight?

One sets up a scary number of potting containers and soil, plants anything she can get her hands on, and hopes that the downstairs resident bunny-in-a-cage doesn't get too wet from the stray water that dribbles down through the slats in the wood deck. I've invested in irises from two vendors. One US-based vendor came through with a small smattering of tiny, dried-up looking bulbs that produced a similarly weak turnout of about 50% of the bulbs even sprouting leaves... and which have died within the past few weeks. Ugh.

No matter, though, because these gorgeous, well-priced bulbous beauties from Holland-based Brecks more than made up for it, with an outstanding showing of health and colorful variety!

 

300

I'll probably be the only female writing this, but after gushing about 300 on two other (male-written) blog entries, I decided to capture my awe of it here as well.

I loved it.

I loved it so much, it's now one of my top movies of all time, along with (in chronological order):

• Tron
• Neverending Story
• My Best Friends Wedding
• Pirates of the Caribbean I
• The Devil Wears Prada

I saw it at an IMAX theatre (if you were to see any movie on an IMAX screen, this would have to be it) with my bf, not expecting much, but hoping that I'd at least be able to watch half of the movie. I'm a total wuss when it comes to graphic violence. My entire body ached after seeing Matrix I because it was curled tightly in tension the entire time, and more recently, I saw what seemed like less than half of Pan's Labyrinth - burrowing myself into my bf's side - because I couldn't stomach the details.

But 300 had me staring at the screen in wide-eyed fascination as scene after scene of majestic, fantastical, horribly tragic beauty rushed by. Unlike the oppressive blacks and heavy-toned greys with slashes of white and lurid smears of red that defined Sin City, 300 reveled in its deep burgundy and rich ocher color palette. So many of the movie's screenshots could easily be mistaken for Renaissance-styled oil paintings, with their fine detail, hazy glow of light, and statuesque figures. That was much of the magic of the movie to me. That such images of death and war could be made artistic and glorified with a combination of arresting camera angles, oversaturated color filters, and dramatic use of light sources.

Accented with slow-motion scenes that drew out the breath-taking moments (such as an arrow's shadow floating across the abstract lines of a stair's profile) and combined with perfectly synchronized, high-energy, defiant strains of rock music, it was all magnificent. If you are a dancer, athlete, or artist, you will especially appreciate the choreography and motion of movement. The narration, too, was inventive and bound the storyline together seamlessly. The lines of pride, anguish, triumph, and humor... coalesced to define spirit and humanity, and they had me spellbound the entire way through.

This movie is pure immersive pleasure, that being the highest compliment I can offer to an experience that I admire. It is the opposite side of the spectrum from the seductive, enviable eye candy of NY Prada fashion, yet the two movies left me equally exhilarated and energized. Ah, but there is plenty of eye candy... for the females, in a slight role-reversal. :) And perhaps inspiration for the male audience. Nevertheless, that is not what grabbed my attention and took my breath away for two hours straight.

It was the magic of being presented with pure beauty in every visual and auditory sense. In a world where one oftentimes has to search out the beauty, this movie spills over... aches... bleeds... with it. I could not have asked for more.

Coming into my own

This past weekend, I spent a record amount of time in the kitchen, cooking my most elaborate meal yet, for my parents, grandmother, and aunt, all of whom I owe much of my childhood development to. This was my gesture of appreciation... and I can say it was very much appreciated.

Saturday, January 27th, 2007
Dinner Tasting Menu

Appetizers 
(not pictured below; they got to it before I could capture pics!)
Edamame
Edamame in the pod, glazed with sesame oil and black sesame seeds

Singapore-style Satay
Chicken satay dipped in a coconut milk-peanut sauce with a dash of chili

First Course
Caviar Parfait
Caviar, smoked salmon, whipped crème fraiche, and egg salad layered atop a crispy potato cake

Second Course
Shark’s Fin Soup
Artificial shark’s fin, chicken, and Chinese ham in chicken broth

Third Course
Lychee Pecan Prawns
Fried black tiger prawns coated with a creamy lychee sauce, served over a butter lettuce salad with asian apple-pear and green tea vinaigrette

Fourth Course
Salmon Two Ways
Salmon broiled with a garlic-creamy herb coating and smoky herb rub with red onions, atop Thai jasmine rice and accompanied by baked napa cabbage with dried shrimp

Dessert
Creamy Caramel and Chocolate
Caramel pot de crème with caramelized sugar, paired with Russian tea cakes and Godiva dark hot chocolate






The first recipe I've tried from the Michael Mina cookbook that my bf got for me.  It's the easiest(!) recipe in the book. *gulp*  But it was sooooo wonderful, both in presentation and texture, it was totally worth it.  Just to give you an idea of the nuances in the cookbook, he says to push the hard-boiled eggs through a fine strainer, versus mashing them with a utensil.  The resulting mixture was unbelivably fluffy and light; I was amazed!  It's definitely the little touches like that that make the meal (you don't want to know how many hours of prep work I did for each course).

This photographs like crap, but OMG, it tasted just like the restaurant shark fin soup!!! :O  I got the recipe from a Pei Mei cookbook (she's been referred to as the Julia Child of Chinese cooking), and I was so impressed, I want to buy all the rest of her books now!

The fried shrimp recipe also came from the Pei Mei cookbook.  The candied pecans were made from an Eileen Lo (another Chinese food authority) cookbook, and the green tea vinagerette is from Hiro of Terra (Napa) and Ame (SF).  The lychee creamy glaze... I'm proud to say is my invention. :)  The result of reducing lychee syrup, and then combining that with mayonaise, condensed milk, and lemon juice.  Mmmm~

Baked Napa cabbage casserole...  courtesy of Susanna Foo, an award-winning cookbook author who was trained in French cooking techniques, and then applies that knowledge to Chinese cooking.  The result?  Really delicious, unexpected preparations and presentations of Asian ingredients.  This was unbeliably rich, but elevated the lowly napa cabbage into a decadent dish.

The two rubs are some of my new favs!!!  Hand-picked from Pike's Market in Seattle, they are SO good. Unfortunately though, I don't know what went into them...  So when I run out, I'll have to return to Seattle to stock up on more seasonings and gorge myself some more on their amazing seafood.  (not such a problem) ;)

The caramel pot de creme is the brainchild of Emily Luchetti, pastry chef from Farallon in SF, and prolific dessert cookbook writer.  It took more work than I thought it would, but it was so rich and creamy, it was better than the pot de creme that I had at Town Hall a month ago(!)  The brulee (caramelized sugar) free-form sculpture embedded in it was my short-cut way of getting the fun of brulee to contrast with the soft cream pudding without going through the hassle of blow-torching each pudding.  Great trick that I'll definitely be using again!

Russian tea cakes are essentially buttery little shortbread balls of nutty flour..  in this case, ground walnuts.  They crumble into soft mounds in your mouth, and I made them to be fresh out-of-the-oven to contrast with the cooled puddings...  what a great pairing!


The dessert plating
On Sunday, I slept half the day (to make up for my lack of sleep the previous night due to late-night clubbing + my cooking frenzy), and then woke up, went shopping (bought two more cookbooks, and a bunch of groceries...) to make...  siaolongbao!!  I made the stock and gelatinized it, but the recipe said to make both the stock and the filling one day in advance and then to make the dough fresh the next day, so I can't actually make the recipe until tonight.  The filling smelled so good though, that last night I had to sneak a bit of the shrimp and pork filling to make some boiled dumplings.  I've made my fair share of dumplings before, but they always tasted..  "homemade".  Like, tasty, but they were nowhere near restaurant quality.  But this recipe..  or maybe it was the fact that I made sure my preparation was painstakingly accurate, such as making the most beautiful grated ginger EVER with a lovely new microplane grater (I got a set from my bf and his family for Christmas!), but this dumpling turned out as good as the restaurants.  

..

:O

I was so shocked, that after I took a bite, I called both my bf and my parents in excitement.  Haha, I'm a dork. :] 



It's just such a gratifying feeling...  somehow, by some miracle, this weekend, everything I made turned out so unbelivably well...  I'm really REALLY happy with how I've been growing in this regard.  My goal in college was to be able to cook gourmet foods well enough that I didn't have to go to a restaurant for them.  And now, for the first time, I can actually say that maybe that goal isn't such a far off fantasy as I originally thought it was. :)

Word of the Day

I've been dilly ever since my ninth birthday. I've had people come up and ask me if my nickname came from the more-recent song lyrics "what the dilly, yo?" (no, it didn't.)

But I never thought that I would be a real word! :O I get to be the word of the day for January 25, 2007, whee!

dilli or dilly: (DIL-ee) noun. Someone or something that is remarkable or unusual. [Shortening of delightful or delicious.]

Thanks to chutoy for providing me with a splash of delight, as he always does~!

Brian Chin fundraiser

Maybe you've heard through the news and blogsphere about Brian Chin, a young father who was senselessly stabbed to death outside of a club in LA's k-town when he was out celebrating the birth of his first son.

And this came just two months after the remaining members of his family experienced the heart-breaking sorrow of losing Brian's father to an extended illness that racked up enormous hospital bills. This means that Royce, Brian's surviving brother, is now struggling financially with Brian's burial. My bf, a friend of Royce, is having a fundraiser this Friday at SF's Club Rouge (thanks to the help of Beyond Entertainment), from which the entire price of admission ($15) will go to Royce and the Chin family.

I know that clubbing isn't for everyone, but it's certainly for a worthwhile cause; I would love to see you there. Please see the evite for details and to sign up on the guestlist. Also, please pass the word onto others, thank you.