Quick & Easy Apple Crisp

These past few days had been so hot and humid, you can probably die getting fried under the sun. Yes, it's summer, but it's freakin' hot.

I have a cake in mind that I want to try, but the summer heat is just so unbearable in the kitchen even in the mornings. Here's to hoping that I get to go home early this Friday so that I can do my baking experiment at dawn when there's no sun. That's something you can look forward to this weekend.

But then again, dessert is dessert. The quicker it can be done, the better. And I will literally do anything (yes, that includes waking up earlier than the usual) to make one just enough to satisfy the sweet cravings. Although the easiest way is to buy myself something from the nearby stores, I still prefer something home-baked (and use up our hoarded blood oranges), just like a good serving of apple crisp I've been craving since the birthday weekend that goes well with the Arce Dairy's Caramel ice cream I bought in the grocery.

The apple filling was still warm, thus instantly melting the caramel ice-cream seconds before I snapped a photo.

Chicken Marbella

Before anything else, I want to share that my post for the Grilled Cajun Chicken Pasta weeks ago was selected as one of the top 5 blogs for the McCormick Grill Nation Blog Contest. Thank you, Nuffnang and McCormick! I get 5 free passes to the McCormick Grill Nation Event today at 4PM which will be held in Bonifacio High Street and earn the chance to win a charcoal grill on the event itself. I didn't really expect to win for the mere reason that this blog just came about two months ago and I was thinking that being a newbie, there are better bloggers than me out there. I guess this blog is turning out better than what I had originally thought it would be.

I really didn't get to plan my day right today as I only received the email from Nuffnang late Wednesday. As most of you know, today is my birthday. Traditionally, a weekend birthday always comes with a lunch or dinner here at home and the whole day is spent with the family. Since I have to leave in the afternoon (and 5 tickets are not enough to bring the whole family with me), I just have to postpone the actual celebration at a later date. Honestly, it's no big deal. My celebration with my dear friends won't be until May 5th just to make way for the tight schedules of those who are tied up with the audit deadline on April 15th, and since we are postponing it anyway, we coincided it on a weekend when our bride-to-be friend from London will be in town. So, yeah, my birthday celebration this year won't definitely be just a one-day event.

For those who know me that well, I will not settle to let the day pass without preparing anything at all. I made the Chicken Marbella recipe I found in one of the blogs I regularly check. Turns out that this dish was known back in the days by the former specialty food shop The Silver Palate in NYC that later on launched its cookbook in the early 80s and known as a classic chicken recipe for parties and entertaining.

The ingredients can be commonly found in the supermarket. I have most of the ingredients the recipe requires in our pantry and fridge, but I have to make a quick trip for the prunes and fresh chicken thighs. The dish essentially has to be marinated overnight anyway so preparing it a night before gives you more time to prepare something else in the morning (or sleep longer in my case), and all that needs to be done the next day is to heat the oven, add the sugar and wine, wait for the food to bake and serve with parsley just in time for lunch. It's a dish that is sweet, salty and tangy altogether. Don't get intimidated by the unique combination of prunes, olives and capers. The dish turned out really well - it's really easy to prepare and it has a classy vibe in it.

Salad On the Go with Raspberry Balsamic Vinaigrette

It's business day 3 and it's usually my busiest day at work. There's not much restaurant around our area that is convenient enough to get salad on the go that I would happily eat at my desk. Although there's Pancake House and Tully's downstairs that have salads on their menu, I still prefer bringing my own salad fix from home - it's way much cheaper and I can be creative.

My salad preference is simple: there should be nice greens, fruits, nuts, cheese and a bit of meat or fish. And of course the dressing should be appetizing enough to complement these.

Today, my salad box includes leafy green lettuce, blood oranges, dried tomatoes from Cambodia, Sahale Snack Valdosta Pecans, prosciutto ham and blue cheese crumble. I made raspberry balsamic vinaigrette to go along with these.

Since I'm on-the-go, I have to settle with the photo taken by my trusty iPhone. Not bad.

Raspberry Balsamic Vinaigrette
1 tablespoon raspberry preserves
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1/4 teaspoon garlic powder
salt and ground pepper

Put in all the ingredients in a sealable container then just shake it until combined. Store this in the fridge if you won't be using it yet. Shake well before pouring it into your salad.

Easy peasy! I just finished eating my salad and now I'm going back to work (off to a meeting actually).

Flourless Chocolate Cake

At the start of the year, I have decided to lessen my chocolate intake by setting limits. I am born with a sweet tooth, and being a homebaker totally complements this as I can whip up a sweet treat anytime I feel like doing so just to satisfy my craving. Working at ungodly hours doesn't help either so there should be something that I should consciously do to stop the weight gain like my chocolate intake. The chocolates that I am allowing myself to eat should be:

1. Artisan like Theo & Philo
2. Organic like Green & Black's or those sold in stores like Healthy Options (or Whole Foods Market in the US)
3. A gift or a present, and should not be commonly sold which I can buy for myself on a whim (In January, a friend who went home from London for a couple weeks hand-carried a small pack of Thornton's which I definitely ate)

Whether I am consistent with these limits or not is an entirely different story and I have noble reasons in deviating from these limitations which rarely happened. And before anyone asks, it's not even a New Year's resolution. I believe that regardless of the occasion, one's will to do such changes should be because one wants to do it and not merely for the reason of having New Year's resolutions just like almost everybody. Kudos to those who have kept their resolutions three months down the road. For those who didn't, hey, you don't have to wait for next year. You can still work on it, no one's keeping score but you.

I'm pretty much on track with this considering that we have boxes of truffles and Royce chocolates in the fridge still waiting to be consumed. I used up some of these truffles to make a flourless cake which we had at midnight after we came home from the Easter vigil mass. It is rich and decadent, but not that overwhelming. One slice is just not enough.

Hummus: Quick Chickpea Spread

For most nights that I get home from work, I would usually check the fridge if there's anything quick to eat. I normally leave the office by midnight at the earliest and by then, everyone at home, except my chihuahua, is asleep. It's always convenient to have something quick to grab and eat in my case without having to bother anyone and spending a lot of time preparing food. I usually eat my dinner (either sandwich, salad or soup) in my desk while reading my emails just so that I can finish off the never-ending pile of work. I know this is not a good habit but do feel free to sue me that I just want to finish as much as I can in a day's work (since I turned off my office emails in my iPhone for about half a year already) and go home as early as I can (factoring in the queue of our car service). By the time I get home and depending on the dinner I had, I would likely have a light snack while reading anything non-work related before I call it a day.

I love hummus. Bring me to any restaurant that has hummus in its menu and I'll definitely order one to try. I can't recall how Cyma's was (and I'm sad that the ATC branch has closed down because I won't have my Roka Salata fix every weekend anymore), but I love Cafe Mediterranean's and Don Limone's because they taste like they are freshly made. I have tried those that seemed like canned or store-bought, and fresh ones always prevail. It is normal in our family that we try to replicate recipes and have the same done at home.

I found Tahini sold at Santi's but it's quite expensive so I tried to make an alternative from scratch since we also have a big bag of sesame seeds at home. Here's my version of homemade hummus. It makes for a healthy snack for summer or a nice appetizer if you have someone dropping by. For me, this is a good midnight snack.

Good Ol' Plain Waffles

It all started with a deal. On the Saturday when I was still sick, we were jam-packed at home. It was only half past two in the afternoon, barely two hours since we had our Korean barbecue lunch, when we were talking about what to have for snacks. I can't remember who brought up the idea of pancakes which eventually became waffles when mom mentioned we have a waffle-maker. We do??? I can only remember the sandwich maker which made the best melted cheese sandwiches ever when we were still kids more than 20 years ago. I never knew we have a waffle maker, so I asked mom to bring it out just to make sure it's for real. So there goes the deal - I have to make waffles if she finds the waffle maker. And she did. As it was really scorching hot and no one wants to lose his/her place in the air-conditioned room, I asked if it's okay to use a pancake mix. They agreed, as long as the waffles are crisp on the outside. Then mom threw in the idea that since we still have the sugar rock crystals we bought in Vietnam, we can have our version of Belgian waffles.

I have nothing against boxed mixes as they are supposed to be convenient, especially if you want to prepare something safe, quick and easy and all you have to do is to be creative with the add-ins. But after checking every shelf of our pantry, we actually ran out of boxes of pancake mix. Oh no... Everyone is set to have waffles for snacks. So, there's no other choice but to make waffles from scratch. Good thing I always have stocks of baking needs in case I have cupcake or cake orders to make.

Again, thanks to Feastie, searching for good waffle recipes wasn't a hassle. The one from Mother Thyme caught my eye (and my tastebuds are also imagining how the waffle will taste based on the ingredients). I just tweaked it a bit as I want to use the makeshift buttermilk instead of plain whole milk.

The First Attempt: Pistachio Macarons

It's hard to be coherent if you have the sniffles. No thanks to the funky weather we had this past week - too hot  and too humid at one point, then it rains minutes later! It's been a looooong work week, tiring enough that even if I was able to finally make macarons this past Wednesday when I got home from work, the itchy throat and the countless sneezing had gotten into me that I'd rather sleep instead of dealing with the annoying sniffles. Until now, I can barely recognize my own voice. Tsk.

Wednesday, March 20, 2013. Did you know that March 20th is the official annual macaron day? I didn't, but I've made my first attempt of macarons on the same day. What a coincidence! [Geek alert!] It was a tradition started in Paris by Pierre Hermé back in 2005 known as the Jour du Macaron where patisseries give away macarons during this day every year to the patrons who make a small donation to support the cure for cystic fibrosis. A sweet treat for a noble cause indeed. The same tradition was then carried on in New York by François Payard (I love his sophisticated cakes similar to that of Bizu's from his Upper East Side patisserie that I got to try years ago) since 2010 supporting another charity dedicated to feed the hungry in NYC.

I've been wanting to try this fragile sweet little cookie for quite sometime that I pinned the macaron recipe I stumbled upon in my Pinterest personal account knowing that I'll make it one day. I happen to have leftover egg whites from a cake my friend and I made over the other weekend which required egg yolks, and knowing that days have passed since then, I was hoping that the egg whites would already qualify as "aged" that the recipe called for. We never run out of nuts in our fridge, and I just have enough almonds and pistachios that I can use.

I've read that given the delicate conditions of this French cookie, the first try can be a disaster. I've already done quite a number of meringue bases for my pavlovas before, but there are just days when the meringue won't just turn out right. I have somehow managed my expectations that it can pretty much turn into a disaster given the humidity and knowing that at the back of my mind, nuts don't come out cheap so it's a double woe for me. But, just like any recipe attempt, whether if it didn't work out the first time around or if has gone well, there are more kitchen adventures to come. So… this is my first attempt to make macarons and luckily it turned out way better than what I was expecting.

Take your grilling FLAVOR to the next level!

It is no secret I love weekends. The ungodly hours that I spend at work are enough for me to set a personal rule - i will never spend a minute on anything related to my work during the weekends since investment banks are never open on Saturdays and Sundays; the only exception to the rule is the urgent need that is on a do-or-die basis which happened only once last year.

My weekends are mine to spend with family and friends who happen to love house gatherings and home-cooked food; all these factors combined is a no-fail formula for a time very much well-spent with people who matter the most. It is through these gatherings that I get to do my thing in the kitchen - I get to try recipes that have been running in my head for meals at home (and now sharing it here in my blog) and turn my dreams of being a home-baker into reality by whipping up desserts for most of our family gatherings that became the testing ground of the sweet treats I occasionally sell if I have the time to bake. Simple Sunday lunches are no different. Even if there's no occasion to celebrate, weekend lunches with family are in itself simple gatherings over good food and being thankful for the blessings we have in life.

Over the years, I have come to appreciate that good food doesn't necessarily mean it has to be complicated. Although there are dishes that would require me to hunt down and spend on specific ingredients for special occasions, I also love the fact that there are quick wins in cooking with the help of readily available and affordable mixes from the grocery like McCormick Grill Mates. Each pack of McCormick Grill Mates Seasoning Mixes (Pepper Steak, Hickory Smoked, Cajun, Steak a la Pobre, and Korean BBQ) gives you a wonderful blend of authentic McCormick herbs and spices. I've always been inclined to Southern dishes, so I guess it's a given that my favorite among them is the Cajun Seasoning Mix.

I love making pasta for three reasons: (1) they are easy to make, (2) they are easy to eat and (3) there's an endless list of every possible combination of ingredients to come up with a good pasta dish. For my birthday lunch last year, I made the Cajun Chicken Pasta with the help of Grill Mates Cajun Seasoning Mix by McCormick. Since the summer heat was quite unbearable to bring out the charcoal grill at that time, the chicken strips were pan-fried instead which still turned out good as everyone had second (and more) servings until there's nothing left in the pasta bowl. Thanks to great Amazon deals and balikbayan boxes, I get to test-drive my new iron-cast grill pan by Lodge I've bought online while mom was in the US last year. So, coming up is my recipe for this pasta, from our home to yours. Happy Sunday!

Red Velvet White Chocolate Chip Cookies

December 2012 was really a busy one for me - busiest Christmas season ever. My love for baking became a cash cow for the season and I've made quite an overwhelming amount of boxes of orders of mini cheesecakes, red velvet mini cakes and cupcakes, carrot cupcakes, and the undisclosed chocolate cake I only made for dear family and friends. It was so overwhelming that every free space in our home became part of our quasi bakery - I got boxes towered for the final products in my room and ribbons that came with each box which I had to pre-cut, baking trays with cupcake liners and greased springform pans waiting for the raw stuff on our dining tables, recipes on the fridge held by magnets and the amount to be done for the day for the scheduled deliveries. Orders came in crazy that I had to turn down a couple of conflicting requests simply because the volume was just too much for what can be accommodated in a day. My body clock had gone haywire, only getting sleep as much as 3 hours at lunch time and waking up as I still had to be in the office for half day doing number-crunching work. Yes, I was that crazy but I never regretted getting myself into that challenge and beating up our very much loved KitchenAid.

I'm not part of the crowd who goes gaga over red velvet cupcakes, but don't get me wrong because I like making them. My affinity to anything red velvet is not similar to my preference of a perfect moist and decadent chocolate cake over complicated cakes, and not even close to me choosing a vanilla ice-cream over a chocolate one anytime. However, it fascinates me seeing people react positively to it when red velvet just has a mild chocolate flavor in an alluring deep red color topped with rich cream cheese frosting. As a home-baker, my red velvet mini cakes and cupcakes need to meet my requirement - it should be moist and you will still get to appreciate the hint of chocolate.

But I'm not making red velvet cupcakes here today. As long as it's still something that I sell, my signature recipe remains private, but I can probably share later on a recipe I liked for novice bakers to try. For now, following last week's gooey Rocky Road Toffee Chocolate Chip Cookies, I finally gave in to my curiosity and followed my instinct putting together my red velvet cake recipe with my go-to chocolate chip recipe to come up with red velvet cookies.

Cilantro Onion Dip

One of the many things I look forward during the Christmas holidays is the annual get-together with my UP friends. Despite the hectic menu-planning, grocery shopping and the actual kitchen work (thank God for our angels), I find genuine happiness in putting myself (and the whole household) into this stress. It is the playground of my wannabe career (sorry debits and credits, you are starting to be such a bore and a pain, haha) and nothing compares to the positive reviews and the contented smiles by these guys who stuff themselves with the food prepared every get-together at our home.

Photos by Sierra. 2012 Christmas Dinner.

Years ago, I've written a post about the concept of "small hours" which I picked up from Rob Thomas' Little Wonders. I believe that our lives are mainly made up of these "small hours" like all those meet ups over coffee and dessert, laughing over lunches and dinners while reminiscing our silly old days together, the overnights and the trips that become bonding moments, the friendly competitions as to who did the better case project, our booboo episodes, and merely anything that we still get to remember years later.  It is in these “small hours” that we are real, being our simple selves, and more than willing to take in every moment that leaves us happy deep down inside. It is because that they happen once, so unplanned, but so brief that you choose to recall them as accurately as possible, that they become so special because they will never happen again the same way they did but they are indeed worth reminiscing. With this group of friends, we probably have millions of "small hours" over the years that somehow defined us as to who we are today. Despite that almost half of the group are overseas, no amount of months apart makes us forget about these moments of our lives. So, with rare occasions like Christmas when most make it in town for the holidays, we just have to level it up from the usual restaurant meet-ups. In my world, home-cooked food prepared just for that occasion makes everything more special.

For our 2012 Christmas dinner, the starters took the spotlight. Among the platters of tapas and cheese and chilli beef in wonton cups (recipe for this coming soon!), this simple dip was literally wiped out. They were even surprised how easy it is to make. I've picked this up from my aunt who served it a while back and since then I got hooked with this dip. Even if there's no occasion, I whip half of the recipe just so that I have something ready in the fridge.

Rocky Road Toffee Chocolate Chip Cookies

Pepperidge Farm is my peg for the best chewy, not commercialised tasting chocolate chip cookies. Even if it costs me more than twice as much as the other "blah" cookies out there, I'll definitely pick up a bag of Pepperidge Farm. Believe me, it's way much better than any bag of Chips Ahoy or Keebler that you see in the grocery stores here in Manila. Not all of their cookie selections are made available in our groceries, and that is a very sad fact for someone who had been to their bakery outlet store in Norwalk, CT with thousands of bags of irresistible cookies one could ever find in one place, all within reach, ready to be purchased and eaten heartily.

I've been searching for the best chocolate chip cookie recipe for the longest time and have tried each and every interesting recipe that came across saying they are chewy. Some had been too sweet, while some had been a tad bit dry and not chewy at all. After trying a number of recipes, I came across the one from Eat Yourself Skinny which I can guarantee as a no-fail and definitely sinfully satisfying. It's really easy that I don't even need the help of our trusty KitchenAid, and it uses egg whites (points for guilt-free here!). This is my go-to basic chocolate chip recipe, and from this, I've been tweaking it and coming up with different variations such as this Rocky Road Toffee version.

Fluffy Blueberry Pancakes

I am not a morning person. But I miss waking up early in the morning and have a normal day just like most of you. My job supports our New York Wall Street office and being in the world of finance, I deal with numbers, tight deadlines, auditors, and anything urgent needed by our New York counterparts. Luckily I don't have to work during the dawn and follow their time zone (a.k.a. graveyard shift), but working from early in the afternoon until midnight (or sometimes ungodly hours past it) doesn't make it more glamorous either. The only time I got to work normal hours were the months I was working in the London office back in 2008 and in the Wall Street office in 2011.

For those rare times that I can bring myself to wake up earlier than the usual on a weekend, I try to have a nice and happy breakfast different from what is usually served with the hopes that the weekend will bring in good vibes.

Thanks to Feastie, a photo of enticing pancakes one Thursday morning made me crave for fluffy blueberry ones. It was an agony waiting for the weekend to come, and even if I came home late on Friday, I still mustered myself in waking up early to make my long-awaited fluffy yet moist pancakes.

Baked Eggs with Fresh Herbs and Cheese

Butter. Eggs. Cheese. Back in the days when we were still kids, we always wanted our eggs, sunny side-up or scrambled, cooked in butter and loads of cheese. We usually have it for our afternoon snacks, but there were times when we would want it to be part of all our meals for the whole day on very rare instances. As years have gone by, I've outgrown having my butter-eggs-cheese fix the way we knew how it was done probably for the reason that my palate grew to like more mature and more cultured dishes and veer away from the usual fried or scrambled eggs. Since then, the urge has never resurrected while our eldest brother still raves for sunny side-ups with lots of butter and melted cheese to this day with the addition of finely chopped garlic that adds more class to the usual fried egg.

Then I came across this book by Samantha Sotto in August of 2011. Since this is not a blog about book reviews, I'm stopping myself from writing down how the story went. Let's just say it's somewhat Time Traveler's Wife but with more hope. Apart from how Shelley and Max have met through a European group tour and how their love story have gone in the book, Max's baked eggs and cheese played a major role how the mystery of immortality was laid down in the story. Check out the video teaser, too. Bottomline is that the book left me wanting to try Max's baked eggs and cheese just the way how I imagined it.