elsie – Page 21 – Elsie Hui

April 6, 2016

Homemade Steamed Spareribs 排骨

This month, I decided I was going to make one of my favourite dim sum dishes, Steamed Spareribs and I was excited about the way it turned out! It was fall off the bone tender, and still juicy and delicious!

Ingredients:
1 lb spareribs
1 tbsp black bean sauce (or fermented black beans smashed)
1 tbsp tapioca starch
1 tsp white pepper
1 tbsp cooking wine
1 tsp salt
1-2 cloves minced garlic

First, start by rinsing and drying your meat. I don’t know if it is necessary, but it’s a habit that I have for pork that I bring home from the store. Once you got the meat cleaned and dried, I put it in a steam proof dish where I will get the spare ribs marinated in.

Then, I put all the ingredients together and put some plastic wrap over the spareribs and let it sit for at least an hour in the fridge.

When I’m ready to steam, I prepare my steamer and put the spareribs in and cover without the saran wrap. This will steam for about 45 minutes on medium high.

After 45 minutes or more has elapsed, the spareribs are ready! Becareful as it’s really hot, but the meat will come off the bones nicely and it will be packed with flavour!

We enjoyed ours over rice for this meal and it was pretty tasty! Of course, you can add some green onions to garnish, or put some whole fermented black beans on top! I didn’t do anything and just served and enjoyed!

March 23, 2016

Homemade Har Gow (蝦餃)

Something a little different from the usual things I make, we made Har Gow from scratch! It tasted good but definitely doesn’t have the normal har gow look.

Ingredients: (makes about 15)
Skin:
1 1/2 Cup Wheat Starch
2 tbsp tapioca Starch
1 cup boiling water
1 tbsp oil
1 tsp salt

Filling:
800 gram of shrimp
2 tbsp tapioca starch
1 tbsp minced ginger
1 tbsp light soy sauce
salt and white pepper to taste

The first thing we do is mix together the tapioca starch and wheat starch with some salt. Once that has mixed in, I drizzled in the oil and started drizzling the boiling water.

Once the dough begins to form into a ball, pull the warm mixture out and knead until it’s putty texture. Mould the dough into a log and put plastic wrap or a wet cloth over it and let it sit for at least 30 minutes.

While the dough is resting, we can prepare the shrimp by chopping the shrimp and marinating it. I used about 800grams of shrimp for my recipe and it was the perfect amount! So, we just chopped and marinated the shrimp.

As the shrimp is marinating, we can prepare the steamer with cutting out vent holes in the parchment paper and setting it into the bamboo steamer.

Now the the dough and the shrimp is ready, we prepare the dough by cutting the log into smaller pieces. Taking a small rolling pin, roll out one of the cylinders of dough. I found an oval shape was actually easier than circular shape. However, I was not successful making the iconic ha gow shape.

Now, we stuff the har gow with about 1 tablespoon of filling, then trying your best to pinch upwards around the shrimp. My dough was a little stiffer than I would like it, so it tore easily. I just pressed down to seal right away. Then, we lined the prepared steamer with these har gows.

This was the interesting part, I wasn’t sure how long to steam these har gows that looks like dumplings. I put it on the steamer for about 10 minutes and it worked well. Everything was cooked and it tasted good too! The skin was relatively translucent, but I think it would be more clear if I got the skin thinner… however, the texture didn’t work properly for me on this try!

Overall, it was a fun meal to make and it was tricky and time consuming. Dim sum isn’t known to be easy but we enjoyed eating this delicious dim sum!

January 30, 2016

Bazille (Nordstrom) – Calgary, Alberta

I was doing some shopping one afternoon at Chinook Centre when I felt like stopping for a snack. I happened to be going towards Norstrom, so I went into their restaurant upstairs called Bazille

It wasn’t a big place, but it wasn’t too busy when we went, so it worked out well for us. The place had nice decor and it was really comfortable with tons of natural sunlight! It was an enjoyable afternoon!

We sat down and ordered their Margherita Pizza and it wasn’t as good as I’d hope. It’s a simple pizza, and it wasn’t too great… but, easiest thing can often be put to the test for perfection! The pizza dough was a tad doughy and the cheese wasn’t really melty… so it felt like it was under done in general. It tasted average.

We also go an order of their Jumbo Lump Crab Cakes as I was feeling brave when I had the menu. The crab cake wasn’t good. It left a fishy taste in my mouth, and I didn’t even finish it. I’m not sure what it was, but I didn’t enjoy it, so I left it.

Overall, not too impressed.. although I am aware I ordered things I shouldn’t have from a restaurant like this. I should have stuck to sandwiches and soups and what not, but I do not think I will be back to try more, unless it’s something more “common” for lunch

Bazille

2150 6455 Macleod Trail SW
Calgary, AB
(587) 291-2010

January 30, 2016April 3, 2016

3Q Teahouse – Calgary, Alberta

We decided to grab a snack/light dinner one evening and saw a new place called 3Q Teahouse which was recommended by some friends. They told us the owner was actually Taiwanese, so the drinks should be good. There was parking available as the time frame when we went, all the other businesses were closed, or not many opened – which makes it easier!

We ordered our drinks, and I had their Traditional Milk Tea with nothing in it. It wasn’t bad, it was quite decent. It’s not really much different from the milk tea that I’m use to, but neither good or bad is good!

My husband on the other hand ordered Jasmine Green Milk Tea with grass jelly in it. It’s his usual go to drink, so we’ve had it done before and he loves it. Here, I’m not sure what they did, but the drink became thick and slimy. It wasn’t a texture that we like or want to associate it with milk tea. Because of the texture, we couldn’t really decide if we enjoyed the flavours or not.

We ordered some Signauture Popcorn Chicken as one of our favourite snacks is popcorn chicken… it was really good here!

Something kind of different that we ordered was their Fried little buns with Condensed Milk and that was quite a delicious treat. I love condensed milk with regular buns, so with it being little and fried, I was able to eat tons of condensed milk with these buns! I kind of wished they give you an extra dish of condensed milk on the side as they just do a drizzle on the top of the buns. It was good regardless!

As it was our dinner, we ordered some of their rice boxes and we picked Taiwanese 3 Cup Style Chicken which is just chicken with ginger and garlic cooked with rice wine and soy sauce. It’s actually really simple, cheap and delicious!! So, that in mind, you can’t really goof it up! This rice box was pretty awesome!

We also had another rice box combo and this one was the Curry Chicken style one and this one wasn’t as flavourful as you would expect, but nothing wrong with it. They could either cook it a bit longer, or add more flavours to it. But, it was also tasty!

Overall, the food was decent, and most of the drinks was alright. The odd place about here was they have no idea what little bowls for sharing was… we had to ask a few times and they ended up giving us funny little plates. But, regardless, it was a fun night!

3Q Teahouse

323 Macleod Trail SW
Calgary, AB
(403) 287-8228

January 29, 2016January 29, 2016

Homemade Shumai – 烧卖

I’ve been trying to make some more homemade dim sum, and this time we’re in the kitchen making some Shu Mai, and I like using pork. You can substitute with chicken, or a mixture with shrimp as well. Today, we’re making all pork shu mai! This recipe makes about 20 shu mai, which is 2 large steamer baskets full.

Dough Ingredients:
1 cup All Purpose Flour
1/2 tsp salt
1 large egg
1/4 cup cold water

Filling Ingredients:
1/2lb ground pork
2 black shittake mushrooms
1/2 tbsp ginger
1/2 tbsp green onion (whites)
1/4 tsp seasame oil
1/2 tsp white pepper
1 tsp soy sauce
1/2 tbsp corn starch

First, we’ll make our dough for the skin of the shu mai. I’m using wonton skins. Since I earned a stand mixer, I will use it as much as possible from now on! So, in the stand mixer, I put all the dry ingredients in it and mix it briefly. Then, put the egg in and try to get it into a nice dough.

Once you start mixing it, add some cold water until it becomes a ball. Make sure the dough doesn’t get too wet. You just want a little bit sticky.

When you got your dough ball, wrap it up and let it rest in the fridge for at least 20 minutes. I got to attach the pasta maker attachment to my stand mixer and I roll out the dough to a level “5”, then we cut out circles. These wonton skins don’t last long as they don’t have preservatives in it, so expect it to be good for up to 3 days.

Now, we get the filling ready, and we mix all the filling ingredients together and make sure they’re chopped small, or minced. Let the meat marinade at least 30 minutes.

Once you got the meat ready, take about 1 tbsp of meat onto the center of the skin. Wet the edges of the skin so it can stick to each other. Pull the sides up around the dumpling leaving the top exposed. You can top the shu mai if you want, but I left mine as is because I forgot to purchase ingredients. Original idea was putting a shrimp up top… Once you got your shu mai made, you can put it in your lined steamer (steaming) or lined cookie tray (freezing).

If you’re freezing them, make sure you give them some space in between the shu mai so they don’t stick. Freeze them for about an hour before you put it in a ziploc bag. For us, we steamed ours right away and we steamed on med-high heat for 10 minutes. It was perfect!

Overall, this was quite a simple recipe, and there are tons of options for varieties, and even short cuts! You can get premade wonton wrappers, you can swap out meat, add other things or anything! This is a great base recipe! For me, this recipe made more skins than I needed, so adding stuff to the filing mixture will help even it out!