Happy early Chinese New Year! This year I’m unable to make it home to Boston, but I’m still planning on celebrating in two ways: 1) Gathering a big group of friends for dim sum here in New York, and 2) hosting a Chinese New Year Virtual Potluck here with the online food community. I’ve never [...]
Zucchini Bread
Weekday breakfasts are a complicated matter. I am not the sort of person who can have cereal, oatmeal, or toast every single day of the year, as great as they are for folks like me who are married to their computers. Sure, I’ll go through week-long spells of eating one of the aforementioned foods. But [...]
Partnership with Soy Vay®
I’m happy to announce that starting this month I’m partnering with Soy Vay® as a brand ambassador. I started using Soy Vay products in college over a decade ago, after discovering them at the nearby Trader Joe’s. I wouldn’t endorse products unless I’m quite familiar with them, so let me just start off with this: the Veri Veri Teriyaki sauce [...]
Red-Cooked Beef
Red-cooked beef is one of those dishes that is just made for the winter. This Chinese beef stew — made by simmering well-marbled beef in a combination of soy sauce, cinnamon, star anise, tangerine peel, and chilies — is as aromatic and delicious as it sounds. Plus, the bubbling action and warmth in the kitchen while you [...]
Orange-Scented Lentil Soup
I was born in July, dead-smack in the middle of summer, and frequently use it as an excuse for absolutely hating cold weather. “But you’re from Boston,” my friends would remark, “You should be used to the cold.” Well, it’s the one part of me that never got New England-ified (that and total disinterest in [...]
Country Captain
Regular readers of this blog may know that I make braised chicken as often as I can. Fortunately most cuisines around the world — including some of my favorites like Chinese, Vietnamese, Filipino — have at least one or two braised chicken dishes that have starring roles. Today we’ll look at Country Captain, a southern braised [...]
Taiwanese-Style Pork Belly Buns
The cookbook tour continues! As some of you may know, last week I held a cooking demo and signing at the fantastic BookCourt in Brooklyn and had a great showing and audience discussion. This week started off with an onsite interview with Cathy Erway on Heritage Radio Network, and ended with today’s wonderful class at [...]
Matcha (Green Tea) Pound Cake
As an over-consumer of food magazines and Pinterest images, I’ve come to miss the cookie and cake pictures this month. Now that the holidays are over, it seems like many of us have taken a hiatus from baking. January is supposedly the time for salads and soups and juice cleanses, right? At least, that’s what [...]
Appetite for China is all about fresh and simple Asian cooking. Welcome and bon appetit!
