Hummus

Here's how the conversation transpired 9 years ago:

Friend: Do you want to get some hummus for dinner?
Me: Err, what's a hummus?
Friend: It is a Middle Eastern dish made with chickpeas.
Me: What is chickpeas, does it has anything to do with chicken?
Friend: No, it is a kind of legume.
Me: What do you eat it with?
Friend: Just pita bread.
Me: This is like going to a restaurant and ordering just plain rice for dinner.

Alas, that was 9 years ago!

Some of you might be having the same conversation in your head - "what's hummus"?



Hummus is made of chickpeas, a.k.a. garbanzo beans, that are boiled and then ground to smooth paste. It is like making peanut butter, except, chickpeas are low in fat and high in protein. Making chickpeas/hummus a very healthy food. Hummus is either served as an appetizer or itself could be the main course. So I was wrong when I compared eating hummus to eating rice because hummus is much more nutritious than rice.

You can either use canned/cooked chickpeas or raw chickpeas, which require slightly more prep work but well worth the effort. The other key ingredient of making delicious hummus is tahini sauce, which is white sesame paste. Tahini sauce cost too much in the grocery so I decided to make my own tahini sauce.



Ingredients: (yield about 1 large bowl)
0.5lb raw chickpeas (about 1 cup)
Quater cup of raw white sesame seeds
1 clove of garlic, chopped/crushed into small pieces
1 lemon, juiced
salt to taste
olive oil

Instructions:
Prepping the chickpeas
1. Soak chickpeas in water overnight for a few hours or overnight.
2. Drain the water and replace with just enough water to cover the chickpeas.
3. Cook the chickpeas either by steaming or in a pot on the stove top (KEEP THE COOKING JUICE).
4. Set aside.

Prepping the tahini sauce
1. Toast the sesame seed on a pan until it turns slightly golden brown.
2. Transfer the sesame seed to a mortar and add some olive oil. Beat the sesame paste with a pestle until it becomes a paste. Add more oil when the paste is too dry.



Putting all together:
1. Transfer the cooked chickpeas into the blender, add some olive oil and beat the chickpeas until it becomes a paste. Add some cooking juice when the paste becomes too dry.
2. Add the tahini sauce, lemon juice, garlic and salt and blend again.
3. Adjust the consistency and taste with more oil, cooking juice, lemon juice and salt until you reach the consistency and taste that you like. (Apologize to folks who have never tried hummus since you won't know what's the "right" consistency or taste, or you can just wing it)



I have made 3 batches of hummus within a short period of 1 month and I have learned a few things that I would like to share with you

1. Toasted and crushed white sesame seeds smell heavenly. The aroma is like nothing I have smell before.

2. Make sure you use a cylindrical blender, not a conical blender. This is key to making smooth hummus as cylindrical blender ensures more even blending than a conical blender.

3. Do not skimp on the lemon juice. The tanginess of the lemon juice adds complexity to the hummus.

4. You might read in certain blogs that recommend removing the skin of the chickpeas after cooking to ensure a smooth hummus. I did not do this because it requires a lot of effort (try peeling 50 chickpeas), and that coarse chickpeas adds texture, besides I am sure there are some nutritious value in chickpeans skin.

So there you go, a snack as healthy as it gets, rich in protein, low in fat and easy to make! A spoonful of this keeps you going for a while.

Restaurant Review: Coliseum Steakhouse

                                                                                         (source: some random dude's facebook photo)

Coliseum is a steakhouse/western restaurant situated in Jaya33. The original location is in KL and this is their first branch.

I am going to keep this review simple by going along with this simple format : the good, the bad, the ugly.

The good:
I like my steak medium rare and that's how I ordered it. To my SURPRISE, my ribeye came out exactly medium rare. A dinner companion ordered the crab cake, which was served on a piece of crab shell. Points for being "interesting". I didn't try it but was told that it tasted good.

The bad:
Where do I began, another companion ordered roasted chicken and it was too dry and lack the tenderness and juiciness of a good roasted chicken. "Interestingly", the roasted chicken was overlaid with a piece of crispy chicken skin. Hmmmm......ok, I will take that. The "special" salad was standard fair without anything "special", then again, this is salad we are talking about.

The ugly:
The fries. This was the first thing I put in my mouth and it completely threw me off my grid. Cold fries. COLD FRIES. HOW DARE YOU??????? My dinner companion had a different kind of fries and that too was COLD!!!  Come on....

That's not all.

Through out the whole dinner, I wasn't ask, for once, if I wanted anything to drink. Okay, maybe I am too spoiled by certain experience where water is the first thing you get when you sit down. Maybe I shouldn't whine about this. Just raise your hand and ask for your water.

Things that could go either way:
The oxtail soup: heavily peppered soup, and served with two pieces of oxtail. Definitely for sharing between 2 people. Not my favorite oxtail soup. My favorite is this oxtail soup.

I don't like any sauce on my steak and this is the de facto way of serving steak in this part of the world. I should've known better and asked them for the sauce on the side.

The decor/ambiance: Paint a huge room white, put lots of tables, covered them with white table clothes and you got yourself a steakhouse. This is not a "fancy" place by any means although they priced themselves as a fancy steakhouse. I won't recommend this place for a romantic dinner date unless eating steak while wearing sandals and shorts is your thing.

Crowd: You definitely need to make a reservation and make them in advance. This place gets really crowded on weekends! Not sure about weekdays.

Miscellaneous tips: If you do come here, make sure you park your car in the multi-level car park unless you are willing to pay RM15 for the parking spots directly in front of the restaurant.

My verdict: I think it is clear that I won't be coming back here EVER. If I want a good piece of steak, I'd go somewhere else although I am not sure, at this point, where to go.

Homemade Nutrition Bar

I am not sure if you can call this nutrition bar because I failed to make "bars". Instead, I made nutrition lumps

The energy/protein/nutrition bars that I tried in the past taste either "funny/artificial" or "too sweet". I don't know what it is but these bars did not make me say "I want more". I eat it because "I just came back from the gym" or "I am hungry, what's convenient?".



I looked into my pantry and quickly put together a recipe for some homemade nutrition bars. You can put anything you want into making energy bars. All you need are two items - dry ingredients (nuts, dried fruits, M&Ms, chocolate chips, seeds, etc) and wet ingredients (oil, honey, caramel, etc)



In this recipe: 
Dry ingredients are: almonds, walnuts, hazelnuts (crushed), sunflower seed, black and white sesame seeds, raisins (chopped).



Wet ingredients: coconut oil and honey.

(I intentionally do not tell you the amount because it is more like "however much you want")

Making nutrition bars is easy:
1. Toss everything together.
2. Press it flat on a large baking tray over a wax paper.
3. Refrigerate for a couple of hours to allow the honey bind the dry ingredients together.



My recipe and techniques are not perfect. I did not use enough honey to bind everything together in a solid form to make bars since I do not want to over-sweetened my bars. I don't know how do people make nutrition bars that's a piece of solid chunk. Lots of sugar, I suppose.



You can't go wrong with this set of ingredients because the crunchiness of the nuts provides a good texture for the naturally sweet raisins and honey. The sunflower and sesame seeds are like icing on the cake, and coconut oil provides a perfumery fragrance.



Overall, this is a good snack for anytime of the day.

Restaurant review: "My Burger Lab"

When you ask a local foodie where to get the best burger in the Klang Valley, all fingers point to -- "My Burger Lab".  

                                                                                       (image source: unknown)

Now, I was "baptized" at Shake Shack and I have had burger at Burger Joint, Corner Bistro, JG Melon, 5 guys, 5 napkins, all so-called burger meccas in NYC (I had In and Out burger, which is a West Coast burger chain; "Dear Minetta Tavern, you and I shall formally meet one day"). Needless to say, my bar is set pretty high and I was intrigued by "My Burger Lab".

                                                                                                                                                                              (wikipedia)

                           THE original Shake Shack burger stand in Madison Square Park

                                                                                                                                    (seriouseats.com)

                                                                        Shake Shack Burger

Before I give you my verdict, here are some random observations:

1. The average waiting time (from getting in line until taking the first bite), based on my own experience, is 45 minutes. 

2. The yuppiest of the yuppies in the Klang Valley can be found here, which ties in curiously to number 3.

3. The average age of the customers is 22 (totally non-scientific estimation).

4. Lots of camera phone photo-ops. (4square, Facebook, Instagram, "dear dairy").

5. People travel far away to eat here. People at the table next to us traveled 45 minutes .  

6. This place serves about 10-15 different kinds of burgers.

                                                                                                                                  (seriouseats.com)

                                               Minetta Tavern's legendary $25 burger that I yet to try

   

Whenever I visit a burger place, I always order the most basic burger on the menu. All I want are the buns, beef patty, lettuce, tomato, cheese and whatever secret sauce they put. As a side, the fries. 

I was asked the most important question at the end of my meal -- "is it better than Shake Shack?". I said "no" but I said "It is almost as good as Shake Shack". That is as high a compliment as I can give to a burger place and it is based mainly on "burger vs. burger" comparison. 

This is the My Burger Lab burger but it was not my order. The brown fried thing is fried portabella mushroom. The yellowy piece of thing bellow the beef patty is a piece of hardened parmesan cheese. Not sure how they made it but I get the same product when I microwave cheese and let it cool down. It is created by melting and hardening the cheese.

Now the good stuff about My Burger Lab's burger:

1. They replicated Shake Shack's "burger crust" to perfection. I observed the kitchen and noticed the same "smashed action". You need to have a Shake Shack burger to understand what I mean. 

2. The meat is cooked decently and it has the compulsory juicy shine.  

2. The secret sauce is quite good but nothing that special. "I heard mayo and thousand island"?

3. Bottomless soda.

4. Generous bun and patty size. About 20% larger than Shake Shack. 

5. They pay attention to details by placing staffs at the head of the line to explain their menu and to provide guidance, tables were cleaned and setup promptly, they provide free water to customers waiting in line.

6. Lots of seating space. 

My "bare bone" burger or as my friend said "anemic" burger.


And I took some points off for these reasons:

1. Fries: It was overly salted. I will let them slide this time since it could just be an anomaly but  I saw the "fries taster" gave a nodding acceptance to his colleague. They also seasoned the fries with rosemary. I can do without this.

2. It is lacking some of the "beef" flavor that shines in a Shake Shack burger. 

3. Price. It is reasonable if you earn USD, Sterling pound, or Euro. It is expensive by local standard but I had paid more money for worse food. I will unlikely visit My Burger Lab as frequently as I had visited Shake Shack.  

4. The wait.

Why is the bun black?  Black bamboo charcoal powder was added to the dough during the bun making process.

Is this a gimmick (look, we are different!!) or does it has any added value? I can't detect any distinct flavor. Between the meat flavor, secret sauce, onion, mushrooms, fried eggs, or ketchup, I highly doubt anyone can detect any special flavor in the bun. Take away the color, it is just a........bun.  

Lettuce "Chips"

                                                             This is not a lettuce, but a kale                
                                            http://thegrizzlykitchen.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/img_2980.jpg

I know the title of this post has caused some head-scratching. As far as I am aware this idea is as original as it can be (albeit borrowed and implemented differently). Most of the original ideas usually failed in its first attempt and this is no difference.

My lettuce "chips" experiment failed but I made some interesting discoveries, which I will tell you later but first:

What is this lettuce chips that I tried to make?

It is an alternative to kale chips that I try to invent.

Many of you might not know what kale chips are. Kale chips are made of kale that's baked in the oven until it becomes crunchy like chips.

I won't be surprise if many of you have not heard of kale, which is a kind of vegetable. I had kale long time ago and it gives off an interesting, and almost-bitter taste. Kale also turns gooey when it is cooked.



                                                                    Recognize this vegetable?

However, someone had a eureka moment when he/she decided to put kale in the oven, which turned kale into something magical and thus an entire industry of kale chips was born.  It is called chips because baked kale is crunchy like potato chips. Beats me.

Kale is so-called the most nutritious vegetable and since someone found a way to make it taste good, kale chip has become a billion dollar industry and has been for the last 3-4 years. It is normally found in organic/healthy-centric grocery stores.



                                                           Example of commercial kale chips

I had home-made kale chips twice in my life and I was blown away by the texture, the taste and the deliciousness. I have to make this my own.

Problem.

I can't seem to find any place that sells kale since moving to this part of the world. No one has heard of it. Maybe I didn't look hard enough, even if I did, it is probably too expensive.

That's when the idea of making "kale-substitution" chips idea germinated.

I locked on two features that I think are important to the "chip-ness" of kale: it has to be a sturdy vegetable (think lettuce, not spinach), and there needs to be many curls (think cabbage). I have a theory that the folds on kale increase its surface exposure to heat.

                                                                 Lettuce of unknown kind

So I went to the market looking for vegetable that has these two features and this particular kind of lettuce caught my eyes (I don't know the name of this lettuce). This could work!!

I followed the standard instructions of making kale chips, which is wash, dry, season, and bake.
(this blog has detail instructions: click on link kale chips)




                                                     The lettuce chips look promising

What did I learn?

Baked lettuce (this particular kind of lettuce) is crunchy as you can see from the angularity of the crumbs, but sadly, it tasted bitter. As it turns out, it is also bitter when eaten raw. I don't know if this is a unique feature of this kind of lettuce or an anomaly.


                                               Baked lettuce is crunchy but not very yummy

As a conclusion, I showed that other vegetables, selected carefully, can be crunchy what it is baked. It is not a kale-specific phenomenon. I just need to find the right kind of vegetable.

If you haven't had kale chips before and it is readily accessible, I encourage you to try it out. Even better if you make it at home.

Almond Milk

Almond milk is considered one of the healthiest "milks" compare to cow's milk, soy milk and rice milk. I won't rehash the health benefits of almond milk since a quick google search will reveal much more than I can summarized here. Suffice to say, open any health/fitness magazines and on top of the "most healthy food list' is almond, which is often ranked alongside blueberries.

                     Fitness magazine

Glamour magazine

                                      Men's Health magazine

It wasn't that long ago that I found out the existence of almond milk. I had no idea something as tough as an almond can be made into "milk". I tried a couple store-bought almond milk but these products left much to be desired (see my explanations at the end of the page).

As usual, I decided to give this a go in my own kitchen and I can safely proclaim that homemade raw almond milk is the BEST!

Making almond milk requires 2 ingredients (raw almond, water), 2 tools (blender, cheese cloth), and 3 Steps (soak, blend, filter).



I like the shape and the color contrast of the "veins" of almonds that appear after soaking 

Instructions:
1. Soak about 250g (close to 2 cups) of raw almonds in water. Do not skip this step. People recommend soaking overnight but I soaked it for a few hours in the morning and it is fine.

2. Transfer the soaked-almond (not the liquid) into a blender, add about 2.5-3 cups of water.

3. Blend until the almonds become fine powder and the liquid turns milky-white.



4. Separate the milky-liquid from the ground-almond with a cheese clothe.



5. Serve immediately or stored in the refrigerator. I noticed that the almond milk thickens to a very nice and smooth consistency after refrigeration.



Unlike soy milk, it is very easy to squeeze the "milk" from almond

After all these almonds and effort, it yielded a measly 2 cups of almond milk which were rapidly depleted within hours. The flavor of the almond milk is magnificent, the smoothness is refreshing, and that made my fellow tasters and I happy campers. I honestly feel that it is worth the effort and time in making homemade fresh almond milk.






Now, allow me to indulge myself in some technical analysis. What's a food-molecule blog without some excel spreadsheet?

As mentioned, I made a mere 2 cups of almond milk, which is very small, by volume, but very concentrated by weight/volume. I rummaged through the internet for some recipes and I came up with this table for your comparison.

As you can see, my almond milk's concentration is significantly more concentrated than others (column 5). In other words, 2 cups of almond milk that I made can go a long way.

A few words about store-bought almond milk. Remember I said that I am not a fan? I will illustrate my reasons in two pictures:

The amount of almond in each serving is at least 10x lower than other homemade almond milk and >20x lower than mine (refer to the column 6 of the table above). Commercial almond milk is uber-diluted. Yea, it is cheaper to buy commercial almond milk but it is less nutritious.

Which leads me to the next problem - diluted commercial almond milk is compensated with natural thickeners which leaves a very "funny" and unnatural taste/"feel" on my tongue.

Therefore, would you rather have store-bought almond milk or this:  ????

Sprinkled with some cinnamon powder

BONUS

There is no wastage in making almond milk. Although it has lost most of its flavor, ground almond is totally edible and it retains some very subtle almond taste. You can use it for baking, or add it into cereal/oatmeal.

Avocado

Sorry, I cheated in this post. I haven't cooked anything interesting lately and this post is more about eating than cooking. Thanks for reading even though I have short-changed you.

As many of my readers know, I recently moved to a different part of the world and I am taking small baby steps to discover places to get food products that I am used to eating.

Avocado is one of those food items.

My first exposure to avocado came in the form of this:

 
No, not the brand but avocado in shampoo. Back then, I have no idea it is called an avocado. I didn't even know it is something that you eat. All I knew was that it is something that you put  exclusively in the shampoo. Took me a while to embrace avocado as a food product, thanks to my Hispanic friends who eat avocado on a daily basis.

Initially, I didn't like the mushy consistency of an avocado and I shunt guacamole.

source: http://www.basilmagazine.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/Copy-of-Guac.puregoodness-com.jpg


It was much much later during my sojourn in NYC that I fell in love with avocado and guacamole, because it is everywhere due to a strong Hispanic presence in this city and it is a mainstream food item in NYC.  And quite frankly, avocado taste great!!

I walked by a store the other day and I saw avocados which were imported from Australia. I didn't know the Aussies eat avocado!! The Australia avocados are smaller than Haas avocado.

As I was searching for a picture of an avocado, I came across this. I kid you not, there are these many avocado varieties in Hawaii. Hard to believe.

  source: http://www.timothyarnoldroberts.com/space/Posters/Avocado.jpg

Then I found this picture:

source: http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_6kbhRdWrnDU/TULaTIe4I/AAAAAAAAAD0/DkBwDgLB34g/s1600/Week+16+Avocado.JPG

as well as photos of pregnant women.

Hey ladies, is it a common thing for doctors to compare the size of your fetus/baby to the size of an avocado???

Doctor: "Hmm...little Timmy is about the size of an almost-ripe avocado."

Told ya, this is a cop-out food blog post.