you-food.net

… although I’m actually a fan of eating ribs at all times of the year.  I just needed to give this post a title.

Wassup y’all?!  C Ting is back.   Sorry for the long hiatus.  I was  working quite hard (yes believe it) on a project that frankly took a lot of time and mental energy so I just didn’t have much to give back to you-food. Sorry, you-food and all you three readers of the site.  It’s been too long.  But you can thank the unemployment gods for kicking in and making sure I have ample time to to get back to basics: cooking, eating and thinking about food. You-food.net is back in effect!

Alright  the weekend before last I went to the Big Apple BBQ Festival with the intention of gorging myself on delicious BBQ from pitmasters around the country where bbq reigns supreme. Instead, I was met with ridiculous, meandering lines of people waiting for God knows how long for what were probably delicious but undoubtedly skimpy servings of bbq meat. Perhaps it was worth it and the meat was truly delicious.  I will never know because I didn’t have the patience to wait in line as the rain came pouring down.  But all the smells of sizzling, smoked meat and seeing people nosh on pulled pork, brisquet, sausages and ribs did put me in the mood to bbq some of my own ribs.  So I hight-tailed it to Chinatown, fortified myself with some tasty dumplings (I hadn’t eaten - remember, I was expecting to be filled my stomach with bbq) and went to the Chinese butchers hop where I bought myself a nice two pound rack of pork spare ribs. A couple days later, I went up to the rooftop deck of our apt building and cooked me up some ribs! And then I ate ‘em.  Click on the photo below for the full story and recipe.

eating is believing

Once again, I must ask forgiveness for the long lag.  I am unexplectedly (over) employed so I haven’t had much time to devote to the ol’ blog.  But more on this job later when I figure out how to merge the experience of working on this medical show to food - hmm, we are what we eat?

Anyway three weeks ago, I found myself jobless and in Hong Kong.  It happened like this:  My parents and my sister and her family had long been planning on going to HK to visit my grandmother.  I’d just been back in October so I should spend the time “looking” for work.  However in a quick conversation with my mom, she told me they were planning on getting a formal family portrait while in Hong Kong and maybe I should just check for cheap tickets.  So, being the impulse buyer that I am I ended up getting a rather cheap ticket and convinced Shef to cancel her winter trip to Cali and come join the fam in HK.  So there you have it.  While it was a short trip, it was a sweet trip. In fact, it was pretty succulent and delicious.  Check out the full story/ photo essay.

Night time view of the skyline from the peak.

Okay maybe I should rename this site “Cooking with Matt”.   What can I say?  He’s a great cook, he makes preparing food easy and accessible and he always lets me shoot him cooking.  See that’s all you need to do to be a star on this amazing blog. Alright so we already know Matt’s the Dumpling King.  And in the last post I dubbed him The Earl of Sourdough.  Now I must give him another alias: Pizza Maestro.  Read on for the full story.

This is how it was done back in the old country

Alright you all.  This post is decidedly anti “zone diet“.  Don’t get me wrong, I adore protein and delicious meat, but this post and page is all about the carbs.  Last month, I went back to the Bay for the holidays and came back to NYC bearing a very special gift.  The gift of sourdough starter bequeathed to me so generously from Matt aka Dumpling King (though now I would also dub him The Earl of Sourdough).  And since then, it’s fair to say I’ve been a little bit obsessed - obsessed with maintaining and tending the starter and baking the perfect sourdough loaf.  I’m happy to say the maintenance of the starter is going pretty well, because I’m a nurturing kind of guy.  The bread?  Well I’m still working on that.  Click on the image below for the full story behind the starter and my obsession with sourdough.

this is how much Matt loves his starter

Happy Western Calendar New Year and Happy Lunar New Year!  It’s good to be back.  And now that I’m again part of the 7.8% of the nation’s unemployed, I’ll have more time to do more you-food stuff. Lucky you! Alright, so as usual, I wanted to get this post out earlier closer to the new year, but owing to work (don’t have to worry about that now) and that it takes me way to much time by blog standards to write these these things, I present it to you now.

In honor of 2009, I present to you now, Tamales!
(A Chinese New Year Post is in the works)

Click on the image below for the whole enchilada (get it?):

pork tamales are awesome!

You’re cold. You’re hungry. You want soup. But maybe you want a soup that’s a little sweet, one that will fool your tastebuds into thinking that they’re getting away with something. That something, my friends, is butternut squash and apple soup. Cutting up the squash takes a bit of time, but this recipe is easy and delicious. Fruit and gourds together. What could be better?

Check out the full recipe.

And we’re back and with a recipe to boot! It has been a while. I know. Right now winter is quickly descending upon us in the northern hemisphere and for those of us who live in areas like NYC that means, winter jackets, hats, gloves and lots of roasted root vegetables, soups and if you’re me, heavy meaty stew type dishes. Well here’s a dish that will take you back to summer with it’s light vibrant flavors and fresh ingredients.  Also, I shot this video a few months ago when it was summer.  All good things taken time.  Isn’t that what they say? So really, it’s not so much a seasonal dish so much as a delicious one. If you can get eggplant, you can make baigan burtha.   This is Shefali’s take on it. By the way, this is also Shef’s you-food debut as a contributing cook - she’s been seen as a contributing eater several times.  So, I hope you enjoy the full video and the recipe.

So first there was ‘shabu shabu’ and now there is ‘tum tum cheng’. Don’t you just love onomatopoeia!! Tum Tum Cheng relates to the sound of the drums and cymbals Lao monks use during worship. It is also the name of the restaurant and cooking school in beautiful Luang Prabrang where I spent one summer day learning the art of Lao cooking!

Click on the spices for the full story!

Alright you all. You’re in for a treat.  My friends Simon and Jen recently went to Italy where they soaked in the old world culture and charm and basically engorged themselves with some of the most delicious food known to man and woman.  But don’t take my word for it.  Take theirs.  Follow their gastronomic chronicles on their excellent travel blog.  For a taste of what I’m talking about, click on this charming photo of Simon and Jen living la dolce vita for a riveting account of Simon’s interactions with some top grade Italian meat.

buono appetito!

-C. Ting

Alright here’s another post from a fellow lover of travel and food, Michelle L. who this summer did what everybody should do at least once in their lives: traveled to Southeast Asia and ate like mofo.  Actually after the first time you do this, you will be hooked probably and go several more times.  Expect more delicious posts from her in the future.
-C. Ting

Bangkok Food Court Fanatics

For those of you who love travel as much as I do, let me divulge to you the secrets of budget dining in Bangkok, Thailand. No, no you can skip the red plastic seating and no longer have to turn your head as dishes are being washed in unknown sources of water. As much as we all love to eat with the locals, I will tell you where the other locals are eating; that’s right people, they are eating in the food courts!

Click on the mango sticky rice for the full story!