A clean toothpick.

So I bought the baking soda and the loaf pan, and I baked the banana nut bread.


This almost didn't happen.

I couldn't find the electric beater. But I somehow convinced myself to cream the butter and sugar with a wooden spoon, by hand.

While I was mixing the wet ingredients and the dry ingredients, I realized that my loaf pan was 9x5, not 9x9 as specified in the recipe. But I continued to pour the batter into the pan.

As I placed the pan into the oven, I realized that I had pre-heated the oven to 450 degrees, not 350 like I was supposed to. I quickly lowered the temperature and crossed my fingers that the bread would still turn out alright.

5 minutes past the requisite 50 minute baking time, the toothpick was still not coming out clean. I continued to wait, praying that there was still hope for my banana nut bread. Eventually, the toothpick came out clean.

I'm back at home now. And despite all evidence to the contrary, I'm praying that there is still hope for me.

Brb.

As reflected in the recent depletion of inspiration and, let's be honest here - lack of effort in the past few entries, it seems that I've lost sight of... whatever it was that gave birth to this blog. It all started with my aunt's banana nut bread recipe. I had everything that I needed to make this bread. Bananas, flour, baking powder, sugar, butter, even walnuts. I just needed to buy some baking soda and a loaf pan. This was about a month ago. I oscillated between "to bake" or "not to bake" about a dozen times. And that's when I realized it: I really didn't care to make this banana nut bread.

I flipped on the Food Network channel to see if any of my favorites were on. They were, but I didn't want to watch. I wanted to watch "The Real Housewives of New Jersey" instead.

I think I've hit a dead-end. And hopefully soon, I'll turn around and take a detour. And hopefully soon, I'll find new recipes to try and new occasions to cook. But for now, I think I just want to hang around here for a while.

Bake cake.

Leave it to our generation to make cupcakes trendy. I must admit - I'm no cupcake expert. (Savory over sweet, remember?) But I have tried the obligatory Sprinkles cupcakes and Crumbs cupcakes. Eh. It's basically a cake in a cup, right? Big whoop.

I had read about Big Man Bakes before, but I just assumed that it would be like every other overpriced cupcake shop: "moist" from being made with a few dozen sticks of butter. I had an occasion to cater desserts to, and having recently adopted downtown LA as my new habitat, I decided to check it out.

Sure enough, there was the Big Man sitting in front of his dainty cupcake shop on Main Street. Guesstimate? 275 pounds? BIG man. I bought 3 mini carrot cupcakes, 3 mini red velvet cupcakes, 1 "XL" coconut cupcake, and 1 "XL" rum raisin cupcake, the special of the day. I only got to try a quarter section of the rum raisin, but that was enough to compel me to blog about it. Like any other quintessentially American dessert, there was plenty of sugar and plenty of buttercream. But the difference here was that though moist, the cupcake didn't leave a giant grease print in my napkin. Big man bakes.

For a long time now, rumors have swirled about downtown LA's aspirations of becoming the next NYC. Doubtful. But, to its credit, downtown has noticeably changed and the different neighborhoods within the City have really started to develop character and charm. I recently took the subway from Union Station to the 7th St/Metro Center station. That familiar smell of the subway tracks transported me back to Tokyo and made me feel like I was in a big city again. I still haven't been able to shake off that persistent itch to go back to Tokyo or to move to a non-LA metropolis, but maybe downtown LA's about to change my mind.

Growing up.

Sunday nights are filled with dread.
My day cannot begin without my cup of coffee.
I say that I'll do things, but I'd really rather not.
I say that it's ok, but it's really not.

I am officially a grown-up.
Talk about things not being all that it's cracked up to be.
By the end of the day, I don't want to do anything.
I don't want to play.
I don't want to talk.
And much to the chagrin of my loyal followers, I don't want to cook.
But because I'm a grown-up, I cooked.

Italian Baked Chicken and Pastina
(courtesy of Giada de Laurentiis)















It was good. Not amazing. But good.
The glass of Zinfandel helped.
I guess enjoying my drink more than my meal was very grown-up of me.

牛丼。

Gyuu-don. (Syn. beef bowl, Yoshinoya)

Dear Yoshinoya patrons in the U.S. of A, you are being gypped.

As anybody who has ever eaten at a Yoshinoya in Japan will tell you, Yoshinoya in America sucks. There's more fat than beef; it's more salty than savory. But the droves of people waiting in line would have you believe otherwise. At C's request, I decided to take another shot at making gyuu-don. (For my first attempt a couple years back, I had made the tragic mistake of making it too salty.)

My recipe is a combination of various recipes, including that of Kurihara Harumi (Japan's answer to pre-ankle-bracelet Martha Stewart). As it is with most Japanese dishes, the ingredients are simple: soy sauce, sugar, mirin, sake, dashi stock, onion and of course, beef. But the simpler the recipe, the more important it is to use quality ingredients. For today's star ingredient - beef, I had to settle for whatever happened to be thinly sliced and packaged at the local market, but Japanese markets usually carry very good beef, tender and appropriately sliced for shabu-shabu, sukiyaki and the like.

Although I can't remember every moment that I enjoyed in Japan, I can recall certain sights, scents, sounds and emotions, even now after all this time. Walking home at night and catching a glimpse of Tokyo Tower peeping from behind my apartment building. The smell of fresh melon-pan from Kobeya Kitchen every morning at the Ebisu JR Station. Barely making it onto the train, only to be standing too close for comfort between a sweaty salaryman and a yamanba adjusting her fake lashes. Exploring the nooks and crannies of Shimokitazawa, while listening to M-flo on my iPod.

If you haven't picked up on it yet, I love Japan.
More specifically, I love Tokyo.
More honestly, I miss Tokyo.
A lot.

김치.

Kimchi - it's what Koreans are made of.

There are many different types of kimchi: bae-chu kimchi (napa cabbage), o-ee so bae gee (cucumber), kkak doo gee (radish/ daikon), and the list goes on. This week, I learned to make bu-chu kimchi (chives) and dong chi mi (radish in water). According to my mom, these two are the easiest to make; minimal discretion involved as far as salting and seasoning are concerned. As much as my mom tries to instill an independent spirit in me, she tries to hand her recipes down to me whenever she has the chance. I think she wants to believe that I will feed my own family homemade kimchi rather than one of the many packaged ones at the Korean markets. Whilst maintaining a full-time professional career, of course.

Washing the chives...

The finished product:
Waiting for the salt to settle in...

The finished product:
And now we wait for it to ferment into smelly, pungent, potent goodness...

Fancy pants.

My mom and her 3 sisters are culinary masters, but with different specialties. I'm obviously biased towards my mom's cooking, which is hard to categorize as she likes to color outside of the lines and concoct her own creations. My 1st aunt is the master of Korean traditional dishes, like various sorts of na-mul (seasonal vegetable side dishes) and dduk mandoo gook (rice cake and dumpling soup); hence, we always have New Year's breakfast at her house. My 2nd aunt is the master of American comfort foods - she lived a long time in Middle America. Her meatloaf, spaghetti sauce and prime rib are all-time popular requests. Christmas dinner is always at her house. My 3rd aunt is my Food Network soul mate. We love the same chefs and swap favorite recipes. She is a master baker: German chocolate cake and banana black walnut loaf, which I intend to make as soon as I get back. She also makes an amazing roasted turkey and an equally amazing roasted veggies. As you may have already guessed, Thanksgiving is always at her place. She, however, has a severe aversion to cilantro and mangoes; that's where we part ways. But for tonight, we decided to join forces to create our fancy pants dinner.

Sliced baguette with honey-butter.

Au gratin potatoes.

Roasted sweet white corn.

Grilled rib-eye steaks, courtesy of my uncle - master of the grill.

Warm spinach salad with a citrus vinaigrette. (My contribution.)

Strawberries with cottage cheese and honey for dessert.

I have read Amy Tan's The Joy Luck Club at least a dozen times. I loved it so much that I went on to read all of Tan's other novels, but none of them would move me as much as The Joy Luck Club did. The novel centers around 4 friends who put aside their sorrows and sufferings momentarily to gather around a redwood table and play mahjong while feasting on delicious delicacies. My mom, 2 of my aunts and my uncle hold their very own version of the Joy Luck Club every week. Using my grandpa's old mahjong set, they play for quarters. Once they've collected enough, they use it to pay for a fancy pants meal. This week's fancy pants meal was in honor of my brother and myself as our visit came to a close.

"Each week we could forget past wrongs done to us. We weren't allowed to think a bad thought. We feasted, we laughed, we played games, lost and won, we told the best stories. And each week, we could hope to be lucky. That hope was our only joy. And that's how we came to call our little parties Joy Luck."

Hokey pokey.

My sincerest apologies for the recent drought in culinary experimentation. But please bear with me for a little while longer as it is that time of the year again when my meals consist of leftovers from the previous night, and I start using, dare I say it - the microwave oven.

This one, however, doesn't require any sort of radiation: ICE CREAM.

As my loyal followers know, I tend to lean more towards the savory than the sweet. I rarely bake a cake and I don't do chocolate. But ice cream... ice cream makes me weak in the knees. (Except chocolate ice cream, of course.) Once in a while, I come across an ice cream flavor that is inexplicably, indescribably, wonderfully, epically mind-blowing. A few years ago, it was the ever-elusive Green Tea from Häagen-Dazs. This time, it was Hokey Pokey from New Zealand Natural at L.A. Live. (Both flavors which my VONS now carries. I love VONS!) So how do I even begin to describe this to you? There are crystallized balls of butterscotch (yes, CRYSTALS of BUTTERSCOTCH) folded into a honeycomb-flavored ice cream that is thick and creamy and good.

I know, right?

This is probably a good time to say that I also love caramel, butterscotch, toffee and everything else in the "sugar + cream + crack" category. I get that from my dad. And he loves to remind me every time he finds a new pint of ice cream in the freezer, courtesy of yours truly. He doesn't know it, but we actually have much more in common than that, as much as it pains me to admit it. He reads the Korea Times, CNN, the Wall Street Journal and msnbc on a daily basis. I check the Los Angeles Times, the New York Times, and BBC during my study breaks. (This is the basis of our conversations: health care reform, Sarah Palin, Dokdo island, etc.) We're both cynics, critics and conspiracy theorists at heart. He hurts easily, but he's quick to forgive. I'm always on the verge of tears, but I'm just as ready to swallow them. And most importantly, we both appreciate a scoop of honeycomb-flavored ice cream with crystallized balls of butterscotch. I just can't get over it...

Food for thought (courtesy of wikipedia.org): "Before the invention of ice cream cones, ice cream was often sold wrapped in waxed paper and known as a hokey-pokey (possibly a corruption of the Italian ecco un poco - 'here is a little') An Italian ice cream street vendor was called a hokey-pokey man."

Crabs.

My food cravings are very specific. My friends will attest to this. They can range from hard-shell tacos to fried green onion pancakes from Earthen Restaurant. (http://www.yelp.com/biz/earthen-restaurants-hacienda-heights) On this particular Saturday, I was craving steamed Dungeness crab. As evidenced by the existence of my blog alone, I'm not particularly reluctant to make what I want to eat. If I'm craving something, I'll make it or find a restaurant that will make it for me. Even as a party of 1. (I overcame the fear of eating alone in public long ago while living in Tokyo.) So naturally, I made the trek out to the nearest Chinese market for a live Dungeness crab. ($2.99/ lb.!)

In the kitchen is where I find my solace. Not just in the food that I make, but the process - whether it's de-veining shrimp or zesting a lemon. There is something uniquely therapeutic about de-shelling a crab and something inexplicably fulfilling about retrieving a perfectly intact lump of crab meat.

The aftermath:
I obviously didn't think this one through. Usually when I take pictures of my creations, I attempt to create the illusion of a professionally taken photograph with my now-endangered Canon Powershot SD430 (5.0 megapixels!). And usually, I take a picture of the dish before I devour it. I failed on both accounts. Regardless, this party of 1 thoroughly enjoyed the Dungeness crab, along with a glass of Moscato.

The Luck of the Irish.

At the risk of being branded as lush, I dedicate this entry to yet another alcoholic beverage.

Sometimes, grilled cheese and moules frites are just not what I need. Sometimes, what I need is a BJ's Irish Root Beer.
A what? A BJ's Irish Root Beer.

Jameson whiskey + Bailey's Irish Cream + Bols Butterscotch Schnapps + BJ's handcrafted root beer
=
liquid cure for a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day

I have a hard time dealing with disappointment. Whether it's finding out that I didn't do as well as I had hoped on an exam. Or my neighborhood's Blockbuster not carrying that obscure foreign film that I wanted to watch. The floodgates open wide and I feel my world shattering into a million pieces as the tears continue to flow in an endless stream. I couldn't explain this phenomenon before, but I'm beginning to think that it has something to do with the fact that I live in a constant state of anxiety, frustration, and anger. Even the slightest disappointment or the smallest departure from my expectations causes all of those emotions to surface.

Today, BP made me mad. Real mad. And all those emotions surfaced again. To make me feel better, BP took me to BJ's for dinner. I ordered the BJ's Irish Root Beer. And everything did become better.

At least for now.

Eiswein. (A tribute to E.)

E and I met freshman year of high school, in Mr. Knox's Geometry class. We were seated, one behind the other; her last name is "Shih" and mine is "Shin." After four years of high school together, our friendship reached new heights when we decided to dorm together during our first year of college. We became closer upon realization that we shared not only OCD tendencies, but also an interest in everything foreign, which is why we both decided to study abroad for the duration of our senior year.

It has only been four years since our days of carefree living (she in Hong Kong and yours truly in Tokyo) and backpacking (she in various parts of Southeast Asia and yours truly in Japan). But we've come a long way since then. She is now in Ann Arbor, Michigan, working on a Master's degree to change the world, one underdeveloped nation at a time. I am now in Los Angeles, California, working on a law degree to change the world, one wronged person at a time.

Last Christmas, E brought me a bottle of Peller Estate Vidal Icewine from her trip to Niagara Falls. I was so excited to try it, but just as reluctant to pop the cork. Only a very special occasion could justify the devirginization. This past weekend was my mom's birthday, so in honor of her birthday, I brought out the good stuff. For those of you who have not had icewine before, icewine is a dessert wine that is made by fermenting grapes that froze on the vine. The sugars of the grapes are extremely concentrated, producing a very sweet wine, but in small amounts. E let me know that you're supposed to pour modest servings and enjoy the wine in small sips. Needless to say, we finished the entire bottle in one sitting. (I'm noticing that I have a habit of doing this.) A very happy birthday to me.

If any of you are traveling to the Niagara Falls any time soon, please let me know.

Grilled cheese.

This is not your average grilled cheese sandwich:


None of that Kraft Singles crap. We're talking about quality ingredients: caramelized shallots, hand-sliced country French bread, and EMMENTALER cheese. Toasted in butter, then broiled in the oven. Golden brown on the outside. Bubbly and gooey on the inside. Served with a side of arugula tossed in a lemon vinaigrette.

Months ago, I had found this recipe in the L.A. Times. I knew that my brother would love it. (Like his sister, he, too, is pretentious and loves Gruyère cheese.) I could not wait to make it for him. And today, I finally got my chance - my brother came home for spring break.

The original recipe calls for Cantal cheese. But with no luck at both Vons or Trader Joe's, I have concluded that one can only find Cantal cheese in France. So it came down to a coin toss between Emmentaler and Gruyère. It was an excruciating decision, but let me just say that Gruyère is good, but Emmentaler is goooooood.

My brother loved it. I am so happy that my brother is home.

Goldilocks and the 3 Bears.

One of the best feelings in the world, including fortuitously finding cash in your pants pocket, is receiving an email with the header: "CLASS CANCELLED."

To celebrate this joyous occasion, my roommate and I took Eleanor for a morning stroll and had some breakfast at Le Pain Quotidien on Larchmont. Le Pain Quotidien is our new favorite place on Larchmont, along with Larchmont Village Wine & Cheese (their sandwiches are amazing), Village Pizzeria (think NY, not Chicago), and Girasole (great pasta, bad service). If Ina Garten ever came to Larchmont, she would eat at Le Pain Quotidien; everything is organic and everything sounds French. So it only makes sense that I would love this place.

Their coffee is perfect.


We ordered something sweet (Porridge with farro, almond milk, walnuts, cranberries, and sliced strawberries on top; hence, the title)...


and something savory (Croissant with Paris ham and Gruyere cheese, served with 3 different types of mustard) to share. C and I always say that we'd make the perfect lesbian couple. We really would. (Sorry, HKT and BP.)


For the past 2 years, I have been trying to fall in love with LA, as I did with NY. It just hasn't been working out; West LA reeks of silicone, Downtown reeks of piss, Koreatown reeks of Marlboro lights, Little Tokyo reeks of tourists and Los Feliz reeks like an antique store. But Larchmont - Larchmont, I love.

United Colors of Benetton.

Cooking Korean food is the culinary equivalent of Chinese water torture. Traditional Korean dishes require a lot of drying, reconstituting, squeezing-dry, pickling, fermenting, mixing, simmering and stirring - all demanding the utmost patience and attention. The result is a cuisine that is a complex of flavors and textures that is all at once, heartwarming and enticing, but also, a real pain in the ass.

That being said, I invited my favorite group of future attorneys to my place for a potluck night, asking all the guests to bring something representative of their own (or favorite) culture. Naturally, this meant that I would have to torture myself (see above), but I decided to keep it relatively simple, and make dduk-bok-ee and kimchi jun.

Dduk-bok-ee

Typically, dduk-bok-ee consists of long pieces of rice cakes with onions, fish cake and sometimes ramen noodles in a thick, spicy red pepper paste sauce. Unsure of my guests' tolerance for spiciness and fish cake, I opted for the non-spicy, soy sauce-based, beef-instead-of-fish-cake kind: "goong-joong" (royal) dduk-bok-ee. Only the best for my friends.

Kimchi jun

I prefer kimchi when it's cooked, whether it's being grilled on the side of the barbecue grill or boiled in kimchi chigae; any of which requires the kimchi to be sufficiently fermented. The smell of "sufficiently fermented" kimchi is... well, there's no real comparison - it's pretty potent. But mixed with some Korean "pancake mix" and water, and then pan fried, it's delicious - the Korean equivalent of latkes. Crispy on the outside, but hot and chewy on the inside.

Our international potluck was a success. There were dolmas, honey walnut shrimp, KFC, Beard Papa's cream puffs, a cherry-custard tart, cookies, ice cream and sangria. Lots of sangria. Everyone loved the food and more importantly, had a fun night. But for now, I return the torch to the masters: my mom, my aunts and the ladies at my go-to restaurant in LA's Koreatown for some home cooking away from home. (See: http://www.yelp.com/biz/mapo-kkak-doo-gee-restaurant-los-angeles)

Like pudding.

Gye-ran jjim

Translation: steamed eggs

There is an art to making gye-ran jjim. The ratio of eggs to water. The temperature at which you steam it. The bain-marie used to cook the eggs to the right consistency. The patience and the will power to not open the lid to check.

So did I figure out all of this on my own? Of course not. This all started with a recipe published in The Korea Times (English version). Do I read The Korea Times regularly? Of course not. I am the Queen of web browsing, and while researching on my health care law paper topic, I ended up in The Korea Times. (Food for thought: Apparently, South Korea is banking on the highly-anticipated boom of the medical tourism industry.)

Gye-ran jjim is comfort food, Korean-style. The truth is: I'm not a big fan. The way I feel about gye-ran jjim is the way I feel about chocolate. I don't care for it, but I'll eat it. For my dad, however, gye-ran jjim is laced with nostalgia for his childhood in Korea, along with sausages (the Korean kind - processed with more fillers, like flour, than meat), Samyang Ramen and Hershey's chocolate. It's all very post-Korean-War/GIs-handing-out-American-candies sort of thing.

Anyways, I made it. The ingredients are simple: eggs, water and salt. I just wanted to achieve the right consistency - more pudding/custard-like than just overcooked/ coddled eggs. The result? "Tastes just like pudding," said my dad.

Moules frites.

I have never been to Paris.
I have never been to Europe, for that matter.
But I love Paris.
I love films made in French and films set in France.
I love Edith Piaf.
I love the mini Eiffel Tower on my desk.
Paris, je t'aime.

So what better way to transport me to Paris than to make French food? Le menu du jour: Moules frites.
With the help of Michael Chiarello, I steamed mussels in a white wine broth of garlic, shallots, fennel and of course, le beurre.


Now, you might have been expecting me to say that I hand-cut potatoes to fry up some homemade French fries. I appreciate gourmet cuisine, but I'm not that crazy. 4 words: Trader Joe's Garlic Fries. So good. And baked, not fried. :)

Bon appétit!

But I forgot one thing: la bière. Fail.

Be happy.

Every Thursday night at 8 PM, after my last class, I drive back home to my parents' house. It's for my own peace of mind, as much as it is for my dad to know that there's another person in the house. Some weekends, we get to share 3 meals together, sometimes 2, sometimes 1, and sometimes none. Whatever the case, and whether or not he shows it, I know that he appreciates having me at home, and having someone to talk to.

And as much as I like spending time with my dad or going out with my friends, I appreciate my alone time. I like shopping alone. Eating alone. Traveling alone. My name is Nary and I am a loner.

So on this Friday evening, while my dad is at his weekly Bible study, I have my feet up, with a glass of Chenin Blanc and a dinner of leftovers from last night's dinner at Roy's in downtown with 3 of my sardonic soul mates. (See? I have friends.) DineLA is back and I indulged myself in a 3-course dinner of rock shrimp tempura, tender braised beef short ribs, and a warm strawberry-guava tart to finish. I didn't get to take pictures last night, but I did make sure to capture the encore.

(The green beans are my addition. Blanched green beans tossed in oil and minced garlic. I always need a little bit of crunch and green with everything I eat.)

One of my resolutions this year was to wake up each day and be happy. I admit that I have broken that resolution more than once already. And it's not even February yet. There always seems to be something - mom, dad, brother, BP, school, PMS. But for now, right at this moment, I am happy.