Cozy Asian Pumpkin Recipes and Ideas

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October 22, 2013Cozy Asian Pumpkin Recipes and Ideas

If you live in the northern hemisphere, it’s hard to escapepumpkins and various hard fall/winter squashes these days. They’re displayed by thefront doors of grocery stores and end-caps in the produce section. Farmers arebringing them to our weekly markets and there are better and bigger selectionsat Asian grocers. Halloween-carved pumpkins and related holiday decor are frontand center in store ads and people’s lawns. Food magazines are loaded with photos and recipes for squash-centric dishes for Thanksgivingcelebrations. It's a food that screams autumn in color and evokes the coziness of the cooler weather ahead.

In Vietnamese, a generic term for squash is bi and one with red/orange/yellow flesh (e.g.,pumpkin, kabocha and butternut) is bi do.We bought a pumpkin to carve for Halloween a couple of weeks ago but instead ofthinking about cutting into it for decoration, I pondered hard squash andpumpkin recipes.

No, I’m not saying I cook with pumpkins raised for carving.They don’t taste good. We mistakenly bought a wedge of Cinderella pumpkin froma Mexican market last month and it looked gorgeous in the oven but tasted blahon the plate. At the store, I recognized it in its cut form as a decorativepumpkin but since it was sold under the auspices of being good for cooking, Itried it out. Don’t do it. It’s not worth it.

For cooking, I like kabocha (can’t lose with this Asianfavorite), butternut (sweet, creamy orange flesh), kuri (has a chestnut-liketexture and flavor), and banana (firm flesh, conveniently sold in sections atsupermarkets). I’ve been meaning to try baby cooking pumpkins as they’dprobably work well in recipes.

To prep fall and winter’s bounty of hard squash, I reach fora cleaver, vegetable peeler, and grapefruit knife. The cleaver is great forhacking into a big hard squash; if it’s an extra heavy one, use a rubber malletto help get the blade through. The peeler is good for removing the tough skinof butternut squash. A grapefruit knife’s curved blade is handy for scrapingout seeds and stringy fibers lingering in the center cavity; if you don’t havea grapefruit knife, use a spoon.

Several ways to cook up these orangey beauties and theirparts:

Fried Squash Blossomsare enjoyed at the Viet table as much as anywhere else. If you grow anykind of squash, you’ll have blossoms to pick and eat. Pumpkin and other hardsquashes tend to have larger flowers than summer squash like zucchini. But youcan treat them similarly, or select relatively small ones for this recipe.Large squash blossoms are great and easy to stuff and steam, an approach that I’veseen in older Vietnamese cookbooks. Deep-frying is so darn nice though.

Roasted squash withsoy sauce is combination that I gleaned from a friend in high school. Iwent over to her house one day and her mom was eating half a table queen squashthat had been roasted with a drizzle of soy sauce. Her mom said it was easy,nutritious and satisfying for a woman like her who was going through menopause.Lots of takeaways in that experience and since I’m not yet in that stage inlife, I’ll keep that tip in my back pocket while I simply enjoy my roastedsquash. Here’s an exampleof how to roast the squash and enjoy it with a Japanese vegan soy concentrate(soy sauce that you doctor up to be extra delicious).

Pumpkin and coconutmilk are a match made in heaven. Instead of regular or sweet potato, I cutup butternut or banana squash into thumbnail size cubes and drop them into asimmering pot of coconut-milk laden Thai curry; try it in place of potato in theThaiyellow curry with beef. The result is a great flavor and color contrast. Ifyou have Into the Vietnamese Kitchen,the winter squash simmered in coconut milk recipe on page 176 is terrific. Thevegan dish combines peanuts with banana squash and sweet potato in a creamysauce.

Pumpkin, lime leaf,and coconut soup (at the top of the post) plays off the idea of combiningpumpkin and coconut milk. The recipe was something I came up with for myhusband’s aunt who was basically on her deathbed and couldn’t eat solid food.She lived for two more years after I made the soup for one of the lastThanksgiving dinners with her. The recipeis easy and you can zip things up with chile oil, if you like.

Roasted kabocha and vegetabledumplings is a terrific way to use leftover roasted winter squash. It’ssavory-sweet and loaded with color and texture. I made it in response to a fewso-so renditions of pumpkin dumplings I had at Asian restaurants. As shown in the above photo, this vegan recipecan be cooked in many ways.

So what are yourpumpkin tips and tricks for the season?

Related posts:

Friedsquash blossomsThaiyellow curry with beefJapanesevegan soy concentratePumpkin,lime leaf and coconut soupRoastedkabocha and vegetable dumplingsPosted in Asian Dumplings, Asian Ingredients, Recipes: All, Recipes: Appetizer and Snack, Recipes: Banh (Crepes, dumplings, cakes, bread) Recipes, Recipes: dairy-free, Recipes: Deep-Fried, Recipes: Dipping Sauces, Recipes: Dumplings, Recipes: Fast and Easy, Recipes: Gluten-Free , Recipes: Gluten-Free Adaptable, Recipes: Japanese, Recipes: Soup, Recipes: Vegan, Recipes: Vegetable Sides and Pickles, Recipes: Vegetarian | Permalink

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Comments Cozy Asian Pumpkin Recipes and Ideas

If you live in the northern hemisphere, it’s hard to escapepumpkins and various hard fall/winter squashes these days. They’re displayed by thefront doors of grocery stores and end-caps in the produce section. Farmers arebringing them to our weekly markets and there are better and bigger selectionsat Asian grocers. Halloween-carved pumpkins and related holiday decor are frontand center in store ads and people’s lawns. Food magazines are loaded with photos and recipes for squash-centric dishes for Thanksgivingcelebrations. It's a food that screams autumn in color and evokes the coziness of the cooler weather ahead.

In Vietnamese, a generic term for squash is bi and one with red/orange/yellow flesh (e.g.,pumpkin, kabocha and butternut) is bi do.We bought a pumpkin to carve for Halloween a couple of weeks ago but instead ofthinking about cutting into it for decoration, I pondered hard squash andpumpkin recipes.

No, I’m not saying I cook with pumpkins raised for carving.They don’t taste good. We mistakenly bought a wedge of Cinderella pumpkin froma Mexican market last month and it looked gorgeous in the oven but tasted blahon the plate. At the store, I recognized it in its cut form as a decorativepumpkin but since it was sold under the auspices of being good for cooking, Itried it out. Don’t do it. It’s not worth it.

For cooking, I like kabocha (can’t lose with this Asianfavorite), butternut (sweet, creamy orange flesh), kuri (has a chestnut-liketexture and flavor), and banana (firm flesh, conveniently sold in sections atsupermarkets). I’ve been meaning to try baby cooking pumpkins as they’dprobably work well in recipes.

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Sichuan Wontons, plus 20 Recipe Ideas for Chinese New Year

As a kid, I looked forward to Chinese New Year for just one reason: cash, dressed in red evelopes. Like other kids in my extended family, I didn't get much of an allowance, much less Christmas or birthday money. So Chinese New Year income, about $200 to $300 if you have a large family within a 50-mile radius, was junk food and cassette money for an entire year. 

The younger me was much less interested in all the food that came with Chinese New Year. My parents normally went out for dim sum at least 2 to 3 times a month, so going out for dim sum and long banquet dinners for a week straight just seemed tedious at best, torture by the 7th night.

I would never have guessed that as an adult, I would actually look forward to the orgy of food at New Year's. When my parents still lived in Boston, I rode the bus every year to spend at least a long weekend there, and eating meal at the same restaurants I dreaded 10 years before. During my two years in China, I braved exhobirtant plane fares and a crippling blizzard just to spend Chinese New Year in Hong Kong. You rarely receive red envelopes as a grown-up, but the 5 or 6 dim sum outings, banquets with roast duck and fish and suckling pig, and lavish homemade meals more than makes up for it.

Taking money out of the picture really does allow you to focus on the more important things in life. 

Alas, this year I'm not in Hong Kong. Or Boston. My parents are retired and living in southern China. The times when I don't have family nearby, I still like to make a lot of food over the two week period just to celebrate in my own little way. Like noodles, or turnip cake, or red-cooked pork. And especially dumplings, because it's not too hard to churn out a hundred in an afternoon and save any extras for the end of the New Year period.

This year I decided to start off CNY with Sichuan wontons instead of my usual dumplings. The name in Mandarin, chao shou, literally means "crossed hands".  The wontons themselves are folded in a way in which the tips cross each other like arms. 

In Sichuan, I've seen the wontons folded two ways. In the first one, you start by folding the wrapper into a triangle and then crossing the tips ("arms") over the belly of the wonton. The second method, the "boat" method is to fold the wrapper into a rectangle; then, crunching the belly a little, you overlap the bottom edges of the two sides, as shown in the photo above. The second method is trickier at first, but more impressive once you get the hang of it. 

Unlike with Cantonese wontons, which usually goes into a soup with noodles or bok choy, you boil the wontons and drizzle a chili oil mixture over them. I adore this sauce: chili oil (store-bought or homemade), dark or balsamic vinegar, soy sauce, sugar, Sichuan pepper, and garlic, just mixed together.  It's spicy and numbing and tart and sweet. And you can easily make a big batch to share with family and friends, should they happen to stop by. 

______________________

Sichuan Wontons

Serves 4 to 6 as appetizers

½ pound ground pork
2 teaspoons sesame oil
½ teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon black pepper
2 scallions, thinly sliced
1 egg, beaten
½ package wonton skins

Sauce:
1 tablespoon minced garlic
2 tablespoons soy sauce
½ tablespoon sugar
1 tablespoon chili oil
2 teaspoons Chinese black vinegar or good-quality balsamic vinegar
¼ teaspoon ground Sichuan pepper

1. In a large bowl, combine the pork, sesame oil, salt, and pepper and mix until everything is well-incorporated. The filling should be sticky and slightly wet.

2. Crack the egg into a small bowl and beat lightly with a fork. This egg wash will be used for sealing the wonton wrappers. 

3. Angle a wonton wrapper so that it faces you like a diamond. With a pastry brush, spread a thin layer of egg wash along the top two edges of the wrapper. (Keep the extra wrappers covered with a barely damp towel until ready to use, to prevent them from drying out.) Place one heaping teaspoon of filling in the center of the wrapper.

a. One easy way to wrap is to form a triangle by folding the bottom tip to the top tip and pinching out as much air as possible. Add a dab of egg wash to the inside of the left tip, fold it over the right tip to overlap (as shown in the picture above) and press together. b. For the "boat" version, start by folding the wrapper in half to form a rectangle. Add a dab of egg wash to the bottom edge of the left side and and fold it over the bottom edge of the ridge side, so that one overlaps the other. The end result should resemble a boat, with two tips cradling a puff of filling in the middle.

4. Place the finished wonton on a plate. Keep the finished wontons covered with a barely damp towel while you repeat the process with the remaining wontons.

5. In a medium bowl, mix together the garlic, soy sauce, sugar, chili oil, black vinegar, and Sichuan pepper. Stir until the sugar is fully dissolved and set aside.

6. Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Put in the wontons and boil for 3 to 4 minutes, until the wontons float to the top. Remove them with a slotted spoon and transfer to a serving dish. Drizzle the chili sauce over the wontons and sprinkle the sliced scallions on top.

___________________

If you're looking for more Chinese New Year's recipes  (including dumplings) see my recommendations below. Also check out my recipe index for more ideas. 

 

Snacks and Appetizers

Noodles

Dumplings

Seafood

Braised Poultry and Red Meat

Vegetable Sides

View the original article here

Sichuan Wontons, plus 20 Recipe Ideas for Chinese New Year

As a kid, I looked forward to Chinese New Year for just one reason: cash, dressed in red evelopes. Like other kids in my extended family, I didn't get much of an allowance, much less Christmas or birthday money. So Chinese New Year income, about $200 to $300 if you have a large family within a 50-mile radius, was junk food and cassette money for an entire year. 

The younger me was much less interested in all the food that came with Chinese New Year. My parents normally went out for dim sum at least 2 to 3 times a month, so going out for dim sum and long banquet dinners for a week straight just seemed tedious at best, torture by the 7th night.

I would never have guessed that as an adult, I would actually look forward to the orgy of food at New Year's. When my parents still lived in Boston, I rode the bus every year to spend at least a long weekend there, and eating meal at the same restaurants I dreaded 10 years before. During my two years in China, I braved exhobirtant plane fares and a crippling blizzard just to spend Chinese New Year in Hong Kong. You rarely receive red envelopes as a grown-up, but the 5 or 6 dim sum outings, banquets with roast duck and fish and suckling pig, and lavish homemade meals more than makes up for it.

Taking money out of the picture really does allow you to focus on the more important things in life. 

Alas, this year I'm not in Hong Kong. Or Boston. My parents are retired and living in southern China. The times when I don't have family nearby, I still like to make a lot of food over the two week period just to celebrate in my own little way. Like noodles, or turnip cake, or red-cooked pork. And especially dumplings, because it's not too hard to churn out a hundred in an afternoon and save any extras for the end of the New Year period.

This year I decided to start off CNY with Sichuan wontons instead of my usual dumplings. The name in Mandarin, chao shou, literally means "crossed hands".  The wontons themselves are folded in a way in which the tips cross each other like arms. 

In Sichuan, I've seen the wontons folded two ways. In the first one, you start by folding the wrapper into a triangle and then crossing the tips ("arms") over the belly of the wonton. The second method, the "boat" method is to fold the wrapper into a rectangle; then, crunching the belly a little, you overlap the bottom edges of the two sides, as shown in the photo above. The second method is trickier at first, but more impressive once you get the hang of it. 

Unlike with Cantonese wontons, which usually goes into a soup with noodles or bok choy, you boil the wontons and drizzle a chili oil mixture over them. I adore this sauce: chili oil (store-bought or homemade), dark or balsamic vinegar, soy sauce, sugar, Sichuan pepper, and garlic, just mixed together.  It's spicy and numbing and tart and sweet. And you can easily make a big batch to share with family and friends, should they happen to stop by. 

______________________

Sichuan Wontons

Serves 4 to 6 as appetizers

½ pound ground pork
2 teaspoons sesame oil
½ teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon black pepper
2 scallions, thinly sliced
1 egg, beaten
½ package wonton skins

Sauce:
1 tablespoon minced garlic
2 tablespoons soy sauce
½ tablespoon sugar
1 tablespoon chili oil
2 teaspoons Chinese black vinegar or good-quality balsamic vinegar
¼ teaspoon ground Sichuan pepper

1. In a large bowl, combine the pork, sesame oil, salt, and pepper and mix until everything is well-incorporated. The filling should be sticky and slightly wet.

2. Crack the egg into a small bowl and beat lightly with a fork. This egg wash will be used for sealing the wonton wrappers. 

3. Angle a wonton wrapper so that it faces you like a diamond. With a pastry brush, spread a thin layer of egg wash along the top two edges of the wrapper. (Keep the extra wrappers covered with a barely damp towel until ready to use, to prevent them from drying out.) Place one heaping teaspoon of filling in the center of the wrapper.

a. One easy way to wrap is to form a triangle by folding the bottom tip to the top tip and pinching out as much air as possible. Add a dab of egg wash to the inside of the left tip, fold it over the right tip to overlap (as shown in the picture above) and press together. b. For the "boat" version, start by folding the wrapper in half to form a rectangle. Add a dab of egg wash to the bottom edge of the left side and and fold it over the bottom edge of the ridge side, so that one overlaps the other. The end result should resemble a boat, with two tips cradling a puff of filling in the middle.

4. Place the finished wonton on a plate. Keep the finished wontons covered with a barely damp towel while you repeat the process with the remaining wontons.

5. In a medium bowl, mix together the garlic, soy sauce, sugar, chili oil, black vinegar, and Sichuan pepper. Stir until the sugar is fully dissolved and set aside.

6. Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Put in the wontons and boil for 3 to 4 minutes, until the wontons float to the top. Remove them with a slotted spoon and transfer to a serving dish. Drizzle the chili sauce over the wontons and sprinkle the sliced scallions on top.

___________________

If you're looking for more Chinese New Year's recipes  (including dumplings) see my recommendations below. Also check out my recipe index for more ideas. 

 

Snacks and Appetizers

Noodles

Dumplings

Seafood

Braised Poultry and Red Meat

Vegetable Sides

View the original article here

Easy Holiday Gifts: Mini Vietnamese fruitcakes and other ideas

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December 23, 2010Easy Holiday Gifts: Mini Vietnamese fruitcakes and other ideas

I love to bake holiday sweets but this year, I unfortunately have little time to do it. I used to stay up late baking up to a dozen different kinds of cookies to gift friends and family. Given my current schedule and obligations, late-night baking sessions were not possible for 2010. I decided to revisit an old friend, the fruitcake, and scale it down.

You may not like fruitcakes but give them a second look. They’re great for the holidays because they keep well for a long time. Actually, they get better with age as the dried and preserved fruit soften and develop a slight boozy quality. Plus, fruitcakes allow you to use up bits of ingredients in the cupboard. I had dried fruit from the past 18 months and nuts in the freezer. I supplemented those things with a bag of mixed dried fruit (the one with blueberries, cherries, cranberries, etc.) at Trader Joe’s. 

The other thing that’s great about fruitcakes is the use of liquor to infuse the cake with flavor throughout. I chopped up all the solid ingredients and marinated them in Slivovitz, East European plum brandy that my dad gave me years ago.

My original Vietnamese fruitcake recipe called for 1 cup of mei kwei lu chiu (Chinese sorghum and rose petal liquot) or orange-flavored liquor, but I was out. The Slivovitz I used was made by Hungarian producer Zwack, which is widely available in the U.S. It tasted quite nice, like a lighter version of the Chinese liquor but not as aromatic. I could have gotten zwacked on it but had to keep chopping up my nuts and fruit!


From one recipe I got 9 minis – that’s roughly 8 gifts with 1 leftover for you. After aging, wrap each cake in plastic wrap and then parchment paper to ensure that it stays moist. Tie a ribbon around each one and you’ve got a great present. For extra sturdy protection, put the wrapped and ribboned fruitcake into the original disposable baking tin (we washed ours after removing the cakes). That’s what I did before sliding one into the mailbox for Karen, our letter carrier.

Loaf cakes like fruitcakes are perfect for scaling down into minis. They are cute, satisfying, and make a nice statement. You’ve still got time to bake a batch for the weekend gift giving opportunities. 

If you’re crammed for time, here are some more easy homemade holiday gifts:

Tangerine Meringue KissesChile Garlic Sauce – no canning, just put it into a jar and tell the recipient to refrigerate itThai Sweet Chile Sauce – same as aboveSriracha Chile Sauce - ditto but will take a few days so gift it for January 1 or Lunar New Year (Tet)

Got last-minute homemade holiday gift ideas? Don't keep them to yourself. Share them below!

Posted in Cooking Tips & Tools, Recipes: All, Recipes: Dessert and Sweets | Permalink

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Cranberry-orange port conserve (or Cranberry Cabernet/Shiraz/whatever wine I had on hand at the time) is what I used to make if I didn't have time to do anything else! Bag of cranberries, some sugar, one segmented orange, peel and all, and the wine. I remember lugging four jars of it to California for gifts one year not long after I graduated...

If I can't manage even that though - I'll write a short story or poem for each individual I plan on giving a present to (but that's not actually food...even if I write about it!)

Posted by:Shuku |December 25, 2010 at 07:12 AM

Your fruitcakes look yummy!

This year, I made jars of Chili Garlic Sauce for friends and family on Thanksgiving day.

http://vietspices.blogspot.com/2010/11/tuong-ot-toi-vietnamese-chili-garlic.html

As for Christmas gifts, I made frosted cranberries, candied orange peels and candied grapefruits peels.

http://vietspices.blogspot.com/2010/12/mut-vo-buoi-boc-chocolate-candied.html

http://vietspices.blogspot.com/2010/12/mut-cam-candied-orangeu.html

Posted by:Annette |December 26, 2010 at 11:36 PM

Shuku: The recipients of your gifts are surely quite fortunate!

Annette: Thanks for sharing your homemade gifts.

Posted by:Andrea Nguyen |December 28, 2010 at 09:21 PM

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