Friends and often tell me this is the first recipe they make a beeline for in The Chinese Takeout Cookbook.
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A delicious, vegan Kung Pao dish that is filling and packed with smoky heat.
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These thick and toothsome noodles are loaded with vegetables and a spicy sweet sauce.
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Sichuan mapo tofu traditionally has pork for flavoring, but there is a lesser-known vegetarian version called mala tofu.
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It's a spicier, smokier take on your traditional hummus, but not so spicy that your tongue is scorched afterwards.
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If I had to make a list of my top favorite comfort foods of all time, mapo tofu would be among the top 10.
Read MoreIf you're a big fan of tangy chicken, give this vinegar-glazed chicken a try. I first made this Hunan dish about a year ago from Grace Young's Stir-frying to the Sky's Edge and found it positively addictive. I still come back to it again and again for its wonderful combination of smoky, tart, and spicy flavors.
There's a big bottle of Chinese black vinegar on my counter that I've had for well over a year, surviving at least two apartment moves. I use it every week, from making dumpling dipping sauces to stir-frying dishes like kung pao chicken, but in a year (through intensive recipe testing, no less) it's only about two-thirds done. Bottles of soy sauce, hoisin sauce, sesame oil, and other pantry staples have been replaced, but somehow this bottle of black vinegar seems bottomless.
I realized the other day that I haven't talk too much on this blog about Chinese black vinegar and its uses. If you've never had the chance to try it, and live near a big Chinese supermarket, I highly recommend you go to the vinegar aisle and buy yourself a bottle. The one to look for is called Chinkiang Black Vinegar from the Gold Plum brand label, and it looks like this is what it looks like:
Read MoreWhat a week! I had forgotten how good it feels to finally sit down.
Not only are we smack dab in the middle of a frantic holiday season, my cookbook was officially released on Tuesday! And in the days leading up to the book release party in Brooklyn, I was scrambling hard to get everything ready. There were arrangements to be made, groceries and supplies to buy, and plenty of food to make. Fortunately, decorations were easy enough, after a trip to The Container Store and a paper/craft supply store.
I had the party at 61 Local, a fantastic bar in Carroll Gardens with a gorgeous wide open interior. And for food, I made a big batch of dumplings, Sichuan cucumber salad, and Chinese almond cookies, all recipes straight from the cookbook. For extra fun, there was a raffle for a copy of the book plus a Kung Pao Chicken recipe kit from GrubKit, founded by my friends Max and Barb.
Read MoreThis beer-braised chicken with Sriracha is my Asian take on a French classic, coq à la bière. In Alsace, chicken and onions gets braised in a nutty brown ale until meltingly tender; I decided to apply the same cooking methods for this dish. Adding Sriracha hot sauce, hoisin sauce, and sesame oil enhances the mild sweetness and nuttiness of the braising liquid. This is perfect hearty dish for cold winter nights!
One of the first dinners I made in my first Park Slope apartment two years ago was this beer-braised chicken. It was November, and unseasonably frigid weather and cold gusts of wind outside made I crave something meaty, hearty, and comforting. Spiciness was a bonus.
Inspired both by coq à la bière and a Martin Yan recipe for beer-braised duck, I wanted to make a braised chicken with brown ale and Sriracha. I needed a robust sort of beer to withstand the Sriracha that will go in my sauce, so I stopped in Biercraft on 5th Ave., a little wonderland of craft beers. The guy behind the counter recommended Avery Brewing Co.'s Ellie's Brown Ale, which has a lot of nuttiness, sweetness, and chocolate malt character. And, he added, it won't become bitter when boiled down like some other brown ales. Turns out, it's also great for sipping while you prepare the chicken.
Read MoreAlong with butter, ketchup, and chili sauce, one of the key items I have in my fridge at all times is a jar of kimchi. This addiction started a few years ago. I had been a casual fan for a while, eating it periodically in Korean restaurants. But after a one-week trip to Seoul in 2008, where kimchi and an assortment of other banchan (side dishes) are given to you with every restaurant entree, I became hooked.
Since then, other than during periods of moving and lengthy traveling, a jar of kimchi has been a kitchen staple. I top off noodle dishes with it. Serve it on the side with Korean braised short ribs and other beef dishes. Top off fried eggs with it. Or just eat it straight from the jar as a (very healthy!) snack.
Another favorite dish I like to use kimchi in is a stir-fry with pork belly or thickly-cut bacon. (My version is very similar to the Korean buta kimchi but uses regular chili sauce instead of gochujang, or sweetened Korean chili sauce.) To make it, you simply stir-fry the pork until it's nice and crispy, then cook the onions, garlic, scallions, and kimchi before adding the spicy sesame-scented sauce. It's easy to prepare but will look very impressive when you set it on the dinner table. It also tastes incredible, like the pork, kimchi, and sauce were just meant to go together.
When I teach cooking classes, one of the questions students ask most frequently is what is my favorite dish to cook again and again. Talk about hard questions! I'm constantly testing so many new recipes for this blog and other projects that I don't get to go back to old favorites as often as I should.
But of course, there are recipes I frequently crave and try to work in on nights when I'm not testing out new recipes. One is buttermilk roast chicken, a delicious standby for when friends come by for dinner. Another is chicken adobo and its coconut variation, which I frequently daydream about and could make in my sleep. And yet another is anything kung pao.
Kung pao chicken is such a standby in my kitchen because of both its mouthwatering sauce and its ease of preparation. But from time to time, I also make kung pao shrimp as a variation. The prep time is roughly the same, or even faster if you buy your shrimp already cleaned and deveined.
Read MoreIt's hard to get enough of chicken wings, especially in the summer, and especially when there's some major sporting event on. For as long as I can remember I've followed the Olympics religiously. Swimming, track, gymnastics, tennis, diving, you name it. I'll follow prelims as well as finals and ooh and aah over all the heartwarming background stories of athletes I had never heard of two weeks prior.
(And being in Beijing for the 2008 games, in the center of all the action, was such a fun experience!)
This time around I'm watching everything from my couch in Brooklyn. And for watching any kind of sports action from your couch, spicy chicken wings is practically a must-have. It's an easy and filling appetizer or, depending on portion size, full on-dinner. And they're downright delicious.
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This shrimp with spicy garlic sauce recipe is super quick and easy. Because this dish is all about the garlicky flavor, nothing beats freshly sautéed garlic.
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This recipe for Sichuan Kung Pao Chicken is super easy, much better than takeout, and will become a go-to entree for your dinner table.
Read MoreHappy Leap Day!
This morning, I had planned get up and to try cooking something totally new. I mean, isn't this supposed to be the magical day for trying things you normally wouldn't do? (Or maybe, just maybe, I watch too much TV.) I racked my brain. Haggis? Squab? Jello mold? Croquembouche? By the time I had gone through a list of possibilities, it was that iffy time between breakfast and lunch. I was getting hungry, and finally settled on adding a twist to something I make about 10 times a month.
Fried eggs. Or more specifically, fried eggs with oyster sauce. It's pure comfort food, and something I've raved about periodically on this blog but have never formalized into a recipe. I fry up the eggs until the whites are all set but the yolks are still runny, transfer them to a bowl with rice or noodles, add an oyster sauce/soy sauce combo, and mix everything up. It's incredibly addictive, either as a slightly hedonistic weekday breakfast or a super-fast lunch or dinner.
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