Home made Horchata and Soy Milk

Soy milk and horchata is kind of like mayonaisse. When asked where it comes from you respond "Obviously, it comes in a jar or container." It never really occurs to most people that these foods can be made at home. There's good reason why...it's a bit labor intensive for what you get. But, the results are fantastic.


For soy milk:

Step 1: Soak beans overnight by covering them with water so that there's 1/4 inch of water on top. About a cup of dry beans (50 cents!) will make well over a half gallon of milk depending on how "beany" you like your drink.
Step 2+3: Once the beans are soft, use a food processor to blend them. Boil blended beans in pot with 4-5 cups of water over medium heat. Make sure you don't burn the beans or you'll get a burnt flavor. Boil for 20-25 minutes. Strain mixture.
Step 4: Adjust flavor, dilute with water to the consistency you like and if you like add sugar 1 tsp at a time until you get it to the sweetness you like. I like my soy milk very beany with just barely a touch of sweetness.

How to make Horchata:

Step 1: Take 3/4 cup of white rice and pulse to break into small powdery pieces. In large pot, add blended rice, 1 cup of blanched or slivered almonds, 2 cinnamon sticks or cinnamon powder and cover mixture with 6 cups of water. Set for 3 hours. After 3 hours, remove cinnamon sticks, blend the mixture in a food processor and strain liquid.



Horchata is the perfect drink for a humid day.

Meyer Lemon Marmalade

Its citrus season and the meyer lemon tree out back has been a baby making machine =D, so we made some lemon marmalade with whole cloves based on this recipe. It's amazing how when sugar is heated it becomes syrupy and when you heat up fruit, it becomes jelly! Chemistry in action. Even if you're not into jam, making lemon clove marmalade just makes the kitchen smell so inviting.

Here's Aleister investigating our lemon marm-topped yogurt.

Spinach-Shitake mushroom Tofu Dumplings

A standby favorite recipe from my vegetarian soul-mate Yumi

Dumplings are such comfort food. Whatever form they take, perogis, wontons, potstickers, mandoo!, samosas, ravioli, etc, they will warm your heart and stomach. They're also great because it doesn't matter what you put in them. They will be good no matter what.

Does everyone get this much comfort from dumplings? Maybe it's the case especially for me because growing up, on Sundays, my dad and I would fold dumplings together. We'd compare how "neatly" pleated our dumpling folds were. "Like this--90 degrees, see? Like this?" My dad would say as if he had somehow engineered the perfect dumpling folding technique. Sometimes we'd make over a hundred to store in the freezer! As soon we got enough made to feel confident that we were making progress, my mom would run over, take our wrapped works of art and toss them into boiling water. We'd eat them just as quickly as we made them.

This particular dumpling is normal gyoza skins. The filling consists of shittake mushrooms, minced garlic and ginger, drained frozen chopped spinach, crumbled firm tofu, scallions, pepper and soy sauce. Sautee dumplings in a pan and for the dipping sauce try a 1 part soy sauce to one part water with a bit of lemon juice and minced ginger. I dare you to try saving some because they will disappear! One time Yumi and I made 60 of these and ate all of them in one sitting. This is why we are best friends.

Spanakopitas

A's part Greek and his family always makes this spinach pie over the holidays, so we make a point to make it every year---because honestly, NOBODY DOESN'T LIKE SPINACH PIE! He insists that we use the recipe that his grandma uses, even if this means sometimes making multiple long-distance phone calls because we forgot. But for now, a copy was given to us and now after 3 years its a well-creased, stained 8x11.5 sheet of paper-- well-loved no doubt.

This year, we made the traditional sheet spinach pie and with the extra phyllo made cupcake versions that was good to grab on the way out as a buttery breakfast. Let us know if you'd like the recipe!

Apples

This is a photo from November, when it was still apple season. Every fall, Berkeley Bowl carries near 12-15 different varieties of apples. Not only is that freaking amazing, but the checkout folks have to keep track of all of them too. So A and I started to wonder what's so different about them? Here's a sampling of 4 we set out to try from left to right: washington, granny smith, jazz, and golden delicious. Golden delicious and Jazz were my favorites from this batch. Aren't the colors just gorgeous?

Purple Bliss

This is from a recipe that appeared in the Health section of the New York Times. It became an instant favorite of this household, being both flavorful and healthy! Here's the link to the recipe:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/05/health/nutrition/05recipehealth.html?_r=1&em

Basically, it's a concoction of eggplant, basil, crushed tomato, chickpeas, onions and garlic. Served hot with whole wheat pita bread on the side, it's fantastic. I imagine cous cous with raisins and pine nuts would go well, too.

Next up on my list of recipes to attempt is jalapenos en escabeche (pickled jalapenos, carrots, and onions). It's one of those yummy things you find at taco trucks and I really want to have some here. This is the link to the recipe I'll be trying (stay tuned for results): http://www.mexconnect.com/articles/2386-pickled-jalapenos-jalapenos-en-escabeche

Dancing to a Curiously Hypnotic Beet

We cut into some beets and found this beautiful pattern underneath, it's like a LSD laden tie-dyed party in there.

Butternut Squash Savory Tart (with arugala, onions and gruyere)

This tart is wonderful anytime of year because it's got a whole host of intertwined flavors.

First make the dough- this is just your basic pastry dough you can find anywhere online. We used 1/2 whole wheat because it makes us feel better about eating this tart. It's fun to use your fingers to spread the dough into the pan.

Skin a butternut squash, cut into cubes, rub with olive oil, sprinkle salt pepper and a dusting of cayenne pepper, and roast in oven at 350 until tender but still firm, like 25 min?

Slice onions into thin slivers and sautee with salt, pepper and some thyme until soft.

Create layers of squash, onions, arugala and sliced swiss cheese and bake at 350 until cheese is melty and crust is crusty about 35 min?.

Voila! Just looking at these photos makes me crave some of this lovely pie.

A tale of Sugary Sweet love

Alan and I were making chocolate coated almonds one day and experimenting with making chocolate letters. Well known in our social circles for his knack of making cute tokens of affection, he made me this chocolate heart. Aww....shucks.

The Most Quintessential Raspberry Chocolate Cake

Presenting the world's most decadent 3-layer-rasberry filled chocolate cake. For my mom's birthday, she casually requested a chocolate raspberry cake. Let me say this---it did not disappoint. It was an epic tour-de-force of a cake because it is a 3-layer cake with a meringue-based buttercream frosting. I was handicapped though because my folks only had 1 cake pan and no electric beater. Whipping eggs by hand is brutal--but miraculously it all came together after.

Here's the recipe for the cake, the frosting was based on Martha stewart's buttercream frosting with added coco powder, and the raspberry filling.

To decorate, melt semisweet chocolate in a double boiler. Put into a frosting cuff or tough ziploc bag with a tiny hole. To create letters, write words with chocolate onto wax paper and cool in refrigerator.

You will love this cake!