” A whopping 85% hydration… transforms into a gorgeously glossy and almost fluid blob of a dough that spreads willingly, and yields elastic translucent crumbs and a terrain of air bubbles. “
I am no master baker. But dude, you listen to me on this one.
Been to Florence? No? Well, okay… sorry I guess. But this message is no less urgently relevant to you than those who have, particularly, those who have visited what is rumored to be the greatest sandwich shop in the world, All’antico Vinaio right in the center of Florence. But what makes their sandwiches good you ask, some even say the best? One could certainly make a convincing case for its market-style array of every single charcuteries, cheeses, vegetables and spreads that the great region of Tuscany has to offer. But if you ask me, as it usually turns out in the subject of sandwiches, it is the bread. More specifically, schiacciata.
What is schiacciata? And do not mistaken it with focaccia don’t you dare. Schiacciata is a Florentine flatbread that characteristically is closer to, I’d say, a pizza bianca than anything else. Ever since my visit to All’antico Vinaio years ago, it wasn’t their truffle cream or fennel salami that haunted my restless keto dreams. It was the carbs. It was the fucking carbs. So last week, I finally decided enough is enough.
In a few days, we are going to pack our bags and head to Paris then Marrakech for our holiday vacation. I probably won’t see you much on this blog during that time, which is why I’m throwing you a fat-bomb now to sustain your optimal winter-time figure all the way untill a new year comes. What a new year if one can’t make a diet resolution to fail utterly at?
This is what I call, the Crazy Rich Asian Panettone, lubed up with 12 egg yolks, coconut milk, and an ungodly amount unsalted butter and unrefined coconut oil. This indecent level of fat not only keeps the crumbs sinfully moist, but also provides a backdrop of coconuty aroma where it pairs beautifully with speckles of dried mango and persimmons tinged with orange zests. It could serve as an awesome “self-enrichment” during the holiday seasons but also, as we all secretly desire, as an ill-intended gift for our frenemies whom we would like to see de-shaped on that first depressing day back to the office. Either way, we win.
So see you next year, my friend. You’ve been lovely.
SWEET GIRL BIALY, WHO CARRIES SOMETHING WITHIN HER HEART WHEREAS IN A BAGEL, IT’S JUST AN UTTERLY HOLLOW HOLE
What’s a bialy, if you don’t already know?
I’d like to think of bialy as the ugly sister of bagel, who comes without the shiny crust nor a robust PR campaign, but, in my opinion, ultimately wins hearts and minds through slow and quiet diplomacy. Or at least it should, if only in your kitchen. Think about it. Bialy and bagel practically shares the same dough, which isn’t a difficult one if I might add, but that’s about as much sameness as bagel’s gonna tolerate from her sibling. Not a fault of her own, but bagel, being held to her finicky New Yorker status and all, is somewhat of a… hm what’s that word… right, bitch.
You didn’t “retard” the dough in the fridge for 2 days, not a bagel. You didn’t boil it, not a bagel. Didn’t boil it long enough, not a bagel. Boiled in the wrong water, not a bagel. Can’t use her crust as a mirror, not a bagel. Too soft, not a bagel. Too hard, not a bagel. Lives in Montreal, definitely not a bagel.
But you see, bialy on the other hand, ah, sweet girl bialy… whether by virtue or as a necessary strategy for unpopularity, is very low maintenance. Without exuding much judgements, she doesn’t mind being taken on a speed date, from kneading to baking, all under as short as 4 hours of your time (well, a bit longer if you live somewhere dry and cold, I mean, a lady’s gotta keep warm). And surprising to whom care to look beyond the lack of a glamorous shine, her lightly browned exterior is thin but not without character, in fact, delicately crusty if you cherish it warm out of the oven as one should. Then you’ll notice that her soft but chewy crumbs remind you so much of a bagel that you wonder if it’s really worth pursuing the other. But perhaps the most heart-winning gesture from bialy is that she does, actually, carry something within her heart, a filled crater in the center whereas in a bagel, it’s an utterly hollow hole. —- OK.. usually some sort of onions with poppy seeds kind of stuff and let’s admit that none of it is very chic and if anybody needs a before/after it’s this poor girl —- In this case, I say why not, honey and butter coated sweet dates bedded within softly whipped cream cheese. Right, you may think that’s rather odd against that whiff of onion powder being mixed into the dough which gives the bread a hint of savoriness, but no, it’s not. That’s what’s surprising about this bialy, sweet and creamy but not without her savory core, soft to the touch but playfully chewy throughout, a bit of confliction but just the right amount.
PREPARE THE DOUGH: In a stand-mixer with dough-hook, knead bread flour, water, sea salt, light brown sugar, instant dry yeast and onion powder on low speed until the dough comes together. Turn to high speed and knead for another 8 minutes until the dough is very elastic and smooth. The dough should feel soft, moist and slightly tacky, light a baby's bottom, but pulls away cleanly from the bowl when the machine is running. If the dough feels tough and rubbery, add a tbsp more water and knead until smooth.
Cover the bowl and let the dough rise until fully doubled, about 2 ~ 4 hours (this largely depends on how warm and humid the environment is). Scrape the dough onto a lightly dusted working surface and divide into 5 equal portions, then keep tucking each dough under and into itself until the surface is smooth and round. Coat each dough with cornmeals or semolina flour, then place onto a baking-sheet with at least 4" of space in between each. Loosely cover with plastic wrap and let rise again until almost doubled, about 2 hours. Try dipping your finger gently into the dough, and if the indentation stays without springing back, the dough is ready.
When the dough is almost ready, preheat the oven on 450 F/230 C, then place a cake pan filled halfway with hot water DIRECTLY on the bottom of the oven (this creates a moist environment that helps form a crust).
SHAPE AND BAKE: Halve the dates and remove the pits, then mix the dates evenly with honey and melted butter, set aside. Dust the surface of each dough with more cornmeal or semolina. Slightly flatten each dough, then use the knuckles of your fingers to gently press and create a wide and deep crater in the center of each dough (kind of like making a fat mini pizza). To make sure that the crater doesn't spring back during baking, I highly recommend poking a few holes inside the crater with your fingers (as pictured).
Now, smear 1 tbsp of cream cheese into each craters, then press about 1.5 dates into the cream cheese (avoid tips sticking out in the air to prevent burning), and sprinkle a little white sesame seeds over the top. If you have a spray bottle that forms fine mists, thoroughly mist the enter surface of the bialy until wet. This helps create a crust as well.
Transfer the baking sheet into the oven, closing it as fast as you can to avoid losing steam, and bake for 10~15 min until the surface is lightly browned. Let them cool slightly on a cooling-rack but they are best when warm and crusty right out of the oven.
I apologize before I say this simply because it’s gross and stuff, but yesterday somebody, two days in a row, decided to leave a hot steamy pile of poop right in the middle of our “aged” leather sofa… I’m sorry, I told you, it’s gross. But more importantly, why? What could possibly be the reason for this deeply punishing act? Hey beats me. Just to fuck with the word motherhood, I guess.
I recognize the weirdness in the usage of such word, motherhood, I get it, so let’s talk about it for a sec. Some swear by it. Some avoid it. And some get offended when it’s used in this context of, well, dogs. But for the convenience of making a conversation, I struggle to find a better word. Some say, “dog owner” is the more accurate phrase. Hey, I hear ya, but, it’s just that… I don’t own dogs, just like nobody owns children. They are mine, but not properties. If someday my dogs tell me that they wants to leave the nest to go to Amsterdam and smoke pot for the rest of their lives, hey, fair game, I would just lock them up and take away all their food-money like any discerning parents. Doesn’t make me an owner, just makes me a mother. So for the lack of a better word, last month, or 20 days ago to be exact, I became a mother again, for the fifth and sixth time. Yes, twin girls, two rescued Rottweiler-mix puppies.
Rottweilers × 2!? You must be thinking I’m crazy. And I’m starting to think you’re right.
How big do Rottweilers get? Please don’t tell me because I have no freaking clue. But the the fact that they are growing exponentially against our best wishes, seems to be one. To put it into perspective, our maltese Dumpling was what, 3 kilo? So by optimistic estimation, each of them would grow to be about 12 Dumplings, and together, 24 Dumplings. That’s 70 kilos of pure muscles powered by the spirit of a trampoline. We named them Sesame (芝麻), and Sticky Rice Ball (湯圓) or SRB for short, though the petiteness of their names is starting to sound more ironic than cute.
Who’s freaking out? I’m just sayin’.
So how did this happen? Couldn’t we just try a single Rottweiler on for size and good reason first? Well, the way we see it, we had no choice amidst a very complicated situation.
There was this adoption day thing at our local pet supply store that we simply wanted to “just check it out”, and there they were, two puppies inside the same crate. No harm in asking a question is there? So are they boys or girls? “Both girls, sisters!”, answered the staff. Hmm, girls, we’ve been wanting a girl. This one on the right seem to be nice and calm. Can I hold her? “Yes, of course! She’s the younger one.” Awww look at her just relaxing on my lap! Jason, Jason! Are you seeing this?! Wait, why is the other one acting all nervous and shit? “The sisters are very attached to each other.” What is this, woman? You trying to make me feel bad? Fine, Jason, can you just hold the other one so she’s doesn’t feel left out?
Yup. …………………..
Oh wait you’re waiting for more complicatedness to come? No, no, that’s it. Yup. The beginning of the end. Put me on your friends-who-got-a-kid-and-gone-missing list. Likewise, I’ll resurface the earth in 10+ years.
But on the bright side, the food side that is, giant wall-eating babies are putting me in a whole new perspective. I never understood this “easy home cooking” business. I mean if you like cooking, what’s the problem? And if you don’t like cooking, why you cooking? Golfers don’t complain why is it 18 holes and not 4 holes. But now, ehhh… I sort of get it. The other day I allowed myself to spend a little obsession on homemade ramen, and someone ate my chair. Literally, ate my chair. It’s not that I don’t enjoy spending time in the kitchen anymore, but the stakes for negligence are higher these days if you know what I mean.
Look beyond the soul-sucking-ly beautiful photographs by the hands of Karen Mordechai, there is also the answer to the prayers of all bone-crushingly exhausted parents. Take this elegant rye bread for example, which she calls “half day rye bread”, which really turned out to be “quarter day rye bread” in the warmer month that is May. It was a cinch to put together, so much so that I was able to test two loafs at once even with two flying trapeze-artists demolishing my apartment (and Shrimpy) in the background. I’m not an expert in the political correctness of a proper rye bread, but a smear of good room-temperature butter and a thin slice of fennel salami from Tuscany, I melted in a moment of relaxation and satisfaction, a rare one these days no doubt…
So thank you, Karen, but I simply must go because I just stepped into a puddle of pee.
WHILE MY BRAIN WAS ANTICIPATING TYPICAL BREAD, CAME THESE POPS OF DEEPLY SAVORY AND UNMISTAKABLY CARNIVOROUS STIMULANTS.
Working mothers, I don’t know how you do it.
Those of you who follow our Instagram will know that recently, two toddlers have joined this family. Not just some harmlessly drooling, homo sapien nuggets that crawl inside your neatly confined perimeters sucking on a bottle. But two wall-eating… wood-shredding, (stuffed) animal-hunting, flying and flipping and cirque du soleil-style acrobats that, quite literally, ate and pooped the entire past week away, and then some. Hi Internet, please meet 芝麻 (Sesame), and 湯圓 (Sticky Rice Ball. SRB for short), the two Rottie-mix that we newly adopted over the past weekend.
So long, sleep. Hello, stress.
I have so much to say about them, how we met, how we overcame fear, how we took an oath. But this type of story deserves clarity and mindfulness, both not what my sleep-deprived head of glue can provide as we speak. So I’m just going to leave you today with a Tuscany-inspired country bread, speckled with salty bits of porky fatness. You heard right, a delightful discovery made in a motherly restaurant named Trattoria Dardano, nestled inside a tiny yet historical town named Cortona where we stayed. The conversation we were having without suspicion was upended by my first bite of the unexpected burst of flavors. While my brain was anticipating typical bread, came these pops of deeply savory and unmistakably carnivorous stimulants. WHAT was that!? I investigated immediately, to realized that this seemingly unremarkable bread was relentlessly laced with specks of salty fatty cured pork-bits which, I assumed, not only created these sparks of salivating porkiness, but also spread their gospel aromas into the neighboring bread-tissues when their fat was rendered during baking.
WHAT: The new poster child of dim sum-scape in Hong Kong, the char siu pineapple buns, pull-apart style!
WHY: Do you need to reason to eat a soft, squishy bun stuffed with sweet char siu pork and topped with crunchy “pineapple” crusts? The entirety of happiness all in one bite, pillowy, crunchy, salty, sweet, gooey, porky and buttery? Do ya?
HOW: Burn all the other recipes that are dumbed down and one-dimensional. Here’s a thorough recipe to show you how to make them like a pro, either with fresh pork shoulders (my preference), or with store-bought char siu pork. But what really makes this recipe different is how the delicate balance of flavors are re-imagined. Instead of the typical, cornstarch-thickened sauce that screams boring, we are going to re-create the stickiness by mixing in honey, ground dates and dried strawberries. Not only do they provide a natural gooey-ness, they also bring a hidden fruity tone to the flavor-profile, making these sweet and salty buns unstoppably addictive.
By the way, most of the recipes in DIM SUM MONTH is designed to be prepared ahead of time. Make each items and store them in the freezer, and at the end of the month, we’re going to have a dim sum blowout party. See ya!
LIFE IS A GREAT ADVENTURE… ACCEPT IT IN SUCH A SPIRIT
–Theodore Roosevelt
OK, so I’m bald.
Wait, right, fine. Technically, not yet.
I just buzzed my hair off. Why?
Before you say it, this is not a Britney-style meltdown. Okay?
This is Jarhead. It’s war, and the enemy must be eliminated. But the enemy in this case – is myself. If you’re still interested, read on.
But before I start, I just want to apologize for making such a fuss in the past two weeks, sounding alarmingly distressed and melodramatic. That was me then. That is not me right now, as we speak. Now, in hindsight, even the idea of making a public display of my buzz feels acutely self-absorbed if not stupid, but having said that, I still owe you an explanation. So please know that whatever you read off of this, that it is in the context about hair, the nerve-less fibers that grow in ways without or without our consent and sometimes utter rudely. So if I sound like I’m being superficial anywhere in the story, I may have been. Well, here we go.
What has this world come to? Or, all along, this is how we always have been?
I know. This is a food blog, rainbows and marshmallows and summer noodle salads. Politics, world affairs… are not palatable, instead, I should be talking about pumpkin pies. But you see, this is the thing. Talking about foods, in a time like this. How can we, so at ease, not taste the irony between the bettering tolerance for flavours on our dining tables, and the boiling hostility on just about everything beyond? Food-wise, in the history of mankind, the world has never come so open-minded, so intimately close to sharing and tasting the very same beliefs that are being enjoyed from the other side of the map. We can all agree on the cold silkiness of a piece of raw fish on a small nub of tangy rice. The cool creaminess of hummus meandering around the sizzling spiced kebabs. The good funk of cheese melting into the chewiness of a hand-torn crusty baguette. A sip of wine. It registers the same. The contentment in common. The smile radiating from our torsos. Ah, yes, that wonder you’re tasting over there, I’m feeling it right here too, understanding, happy-ing, at the same time, over the same things. How is it that we could relate so much in happiness, and yet, empathise so little in suffering. Can we really talk about foods, without thinking about politics? Or is it, let’s eat now and kill each other later?
Really bad things happened in Paris. Here we all mourned, in shock, in disbelief, compassionate. Meanwhile, the exact same really bad things, just as bad, sometimes worse, happens not that far away almost every week on that side, perhaps your side, stacking up silently like morning pancakes. Beirut 3 days ago, Ankara last month, other cities of dwindling lights. But… that was just inks on newspapers, no hashtags in its grief. Has even my sympathy, where I decide to spare it, become part of the problems? Why is it only you and I, yours and mine, and nothing in between? We’re all micros teeming on a speck of dust in this universe, but somehow, we still manage to divide beyond our means, to sever what is better as one, to split the atoms. I don’t. Wanna. Exist like this.
