House of Annie is Moving

This isn’t the post I intended to write.

A few months back, I wrote a post about how our blog was growing and I was preparing to move to our own, hosted WordPress domain. Except for those times when we did the Foodbuzz 24, 24, 24 Ultimate Rib Showdown and the Ultimate Backyard Luau, I wasn’t posting much.  You may have noticed the last two weeks have been pretty quiet around here.

I wish I could say I was hard at work on the new site.  I wish this post would be the long-awaited announcement that the new domain was ready to roll.  But sadly, the House of Annie is not moving to a new domain (yet).

The House of Annie is literally moving to Malaysia.

The short version goes like this: In April, we got word that Annie had to fulfill her two-year homestay requirement as stipulated on her foreign exchange visa.  Decisions were made, and as a result, we will be leaving the US to live in Malaysia in August. (For those of you who want the long version, see my Xanga post on the subject.)

So, rather than migrating posts and tweaking templates, I have been busy making arrangements, getting rid of everything, and preparing to move our family.  We’ve also been trying to spend time with our friends before we leave.  It’s a lot to do in a short amount of time.

Just the Beginning

This doesn’t mean that the House of Annie blog is ending.  NO WAY! As the song says, “we’ve only just begun".”  We’ve so much more to share with you!

We have a lot of pictures and recipes queued up to post.  We have also been eating out at some of our favorite places, as well as new places we’ve been meaning to try.  All those merit blog posts as well.

Malaysia has some of the most fantastic food in the world.  Annie has been dying to savor the comfort foods of her youth, so you know we’ll be blogging a lot about eating out in Malaysia.  We’ll also be closer to her Mum and family, so there’s bound to be lots of home-cooked dishes as well as baking recipes.

I am excited about interacting with other food bloggers in that part of the world.  We have had lots of fun meeting and eating with floggers such as Bee from Rasa Malaysia, Carolyn Jung the FoodGal and Michael Chu of Cooking for Engineers.  I am looking forward to meeting up with folks like Robyn of EatingAsia, Babe_KL from Babe in the city KL, and Pablopabla from Hochiak! Delicious Asian Food.  Of course, I wouldn’t mind hooking up with other floggers in the region as well.

Give Us Some Time

As our move date looms ever closer, I think we’ll be hard pressed to keep up with the posts.  Especially after we move out of our place and lose our broadband connection.  I don’t know what the broadband Internet situation will be like when we move to Malaysia either.  Please bear with us! 

The best way to stay in touch with us is to subscribe to our blog either through the RSS feed or through email.  Once things get a little more settled, then we will figure out how much blogging we can do from there.

Aloha, Nate

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Marble Cake Recipe

I don’t really know what to call this marble cake. It’s not quite a pound cake and it’s not quite a butter cake. I guess the best way to describe it would be to say it’s my hybrid version of both (Marbuttle?)

When I was in Malaysia, I baked a lot of cakes using my Third Aunt’s Butter Cake recipe (and even that has been modified because I used to put in 8-10 eggs) but when I got to the US, I found that pound cakes were very popular. Even though I liked them, I found that the ones that I tried to bake up were too dry and too sweet for my Asian tastebuds.

After many trials, I’ve come up with this version that is a hybrid of both and every time I bake it, I never have any leftovers! As a matter of fact, someone who recently had some told me it’s the best marble cake she’s ever had, and I have to agree, it’s that good!

It’s All About the Ingredients

I’ve baked this marble cake so many times lately (3 times in a week) that I can tell you that it’s a very easy recipe (also super fattening so thankfully, I baked it for others all those times). It doesn’t take too much effort for such a delicious cake. The trick is to use good butter and also good chocolate. For those who are die-hard chocolate fans, stick to the good stuff. But even with Nestle chocolate chips, I’ve found it’s still good.

The other important ingredient is plain yogurt. That is what makes the whole cake so hard to resist! Somehow, it just complements the buttery flavors and kicks up the vanilla/chocolate tastes.

I find that a marble cake is best when the chocolate part doesn’t overwhelm the vanilla bit so unless you love your chocolate immensely, make sure to take out a bit more than half of the vanilla portion before mixing the chocolate to the rest of the batter.

For the chocolate part of this marble cake, I normally just eyeball the chocolate (so I decided to measure at the last bake and it’s roughly about 100g of chocolate) and put it in a microwave safe bowl and nuke it at 30-second intervals, stirring between intervals, till the chocolate is all melted. Also, do make sure that your bowl is completely dry as any water will cause the chocolate to seize up and never come together in a smooth paste. I have also sometimes added a tablespoon of cocoa powder (Dutch process cocoa powder or natural, doesn’t quite matter) to the chocolate portion along with the melted chocolate. And when I’m feeling naughty, I’ll sometimes add some Grand Marnier to it too!

This recipe does give you a really big cake and I’ve found that when I’m baking it in my fancy bundt pan (Nordic Ware Star bundt pan which has a 10-cup capacity), it will overflow. It works very well to put them into two loaf pans or use a bigger bundt (I have a cheaper, 12-cup one that works really well) so do plan accordingly.

Marble Cake Recipe

Ingredients
3 sticks (12 oz) unsalted butter, softened at room temperature (I’ve cheated by sticking it in the microwave and nuking at 10 second intervals when I had forgotten to take my butter out of the freezer)
scant 2 cups sugar (I’ve gotten away with as little as 1 3/4 cups)
6 extra-large (large will work too) eggs, at room temperature (but if you’ve forgotten to take it out of the fridge ahead of time, it’s ok, this recipe is pretty forgiving)
1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
3 cups (15 oz) bleached all-purpose flour
1/2 cup plain yogurt (if you can use full fat, do so)
scant 1/2 cup milk (whole is better—I know, this is not a fat-free cake ok?)
100g (3.5oz) semi-sweet chocolate (morsels are fine, but if you can use really good dark chocolate, do so—the chocolate flavor will be more pronounced)
1 Tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder (optional)
1 Tbsp Grand Marnier (optional)

Method
1. Preheat oven to 325 F.
2. Put chocolate in a dry, clean bowl and melt in microwave oven in 30-second intervals, stirring till you get a smooth paste. Remove and let cool a little.

Smooth, Melted Chocolate

3. In a stand mixer, or a hand mixer, cream together butter and sugar till mixture is fluffy and sugar has been cut in well. I normally use 5-6 speed on my Kitchen Aid for about 3-5 minutes.
4. Add eggs, one at a time. Beat on med-high speed for about 20 seconds after each egg, and scrape down before adding the next one.
5. Add the vanilla and mix to combine.

Creamed Cake Batter

6. Add dry ingredients (I normally add all the baking soda, baking powder and salt in the first go along with the first larger third portion of flour) in three portions, interspersing with the yogurt and milk and stir gently (use stir setting on Kitchen Aid or stir with a spatula). So basically, this means 1/3 dry ingredients, yogurt, 1/3 dry ingredients, milk, final third dry ingredient. Stir till all traces of flour is gone.
7. Take out half (or a bit more) of the vanilla cake batter and drop it around the bundt pan (I’m being lazy, you can just put it into another bowl and wait till the chocolate is done to put them together into the bundt to get a really nice even mix).

Vanilla Cake Batter in the Bundt

8. Add the melted chocolate and cocoa powder and Grand Marnier (if using) to the remaining batter and stir it in till there are no more streaks of white (or as much as possible, a few streaks will not hurt too much).
9. Interspersing globs of vanilla batter with chocolate batter, drop batter into bundt. In my case, I normally unevenly mound the vanilla in three spots around the bundt, then follow that up by placing the chocolate batter in between the vanilla.
10. Using your spatula, twirl the batter together using a figure-eight motion to mix the batter up to get that nice pretty marble design. Don’t overmix lest you get a light brown cake. The more practice you get doing this, the better your marble cakes begin to look. The flavor won’t be affected even if you don’t get it too right so don’t worry about it too much.

Swirling Chocolate and Vanilla Cake Batter in the Bundt

11. Smooth out the top of your bundt/loaf pan and put cake in oven to bake. If you’re using loaf pans, start to test the cake after about 40 minutes. If using your bundt, it will need about 1 hour (test after 55 minutes). Cake tester should come out clean when it’s done. I always know when it’s almost ready—the house will smell heavenly!

Finished Marble Bundt Cake

A note about using a bundt pan—do invest in a good quality, non-stick one. I really do like the Nordic Ware Pro versions, they are sturdy and work well (a little costly but if you look around, there are deals to be found—I got mine at Costco around Christmas time for under $20) AND they come in all these cool shapes and sizes.

It’s the most awful thing when your bundt pan fails on you and you have cake that doesn’t come out in one piece. Another good trick is to use a non-stick spray to ensure that the cake will come out well. Also, please don’t let the cake sit in the pan for too long (cool it for about 10 minutes and then invert). If you do, it will be much harder to take out.

Enjoy! And please don’t blame me for the hit it’ll take on your hips…I’ve been there myself and have to now restrain myself to baking it for other people and stealing a slice if I happen to be around to share in it (or sometimes, I save a little bit of the batter and bake a cupcake or two to save for myself).

Cheers, Annie

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Hungry for more cakes? Click below:

Strawberry Shortcake Recipe

Marble Cream Cheese Cake Recipe

Malaysian Honeycomb Cake Recipe

Easy Green Tea Tiramisu Recipe

Third Aunt's Butter Cake

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Lomi Lomi Salmon

Updated June 17, 2009

Originally posted November 23, 2007

Lomi Lomi Salmon

We made this lomi lomi salmon recipe for our recent “Ultimate Backyard Lu’au”. "Lomi lomi" means "massage" in Hawaiian, and it refers to the way the ingredients for this dish are massaged together. I don't really know how salmon came to be the fish of choice for this style of dish but it's all good.

We got our salmon from (who else?) our favorite fish monger, Pat from Mission Fresh Fish. He’s the same guy who supplied us with the ahi for the Ahi Limu Poke, all the seafood for our Cioppino Hot Pot meal, and the salmon bones for our Wild Salmon Cakes. We bought the salmon on Thursday at the San Carlos Farmer’s Market . That night, I skinned the fillets, pulled out the pin bones, and salted them with some Hawaiian sea salt before putting them in the fridge.

Salting the Salmon Fillets for Lomi Lomi Salmon

On Friday night, I took the salmon fillets out of the fridge and rinsed off the salt, then patted the fillets dry. Annie cut the fillets into 1/2 inch-wide strips, then diced the salmon up. The diced salmon went back into the fridge.

Dicing Salmon for Lomi Lomi Salmon

We had purchased over 10 pounds of Roma tomatoes at the San Carlos Farmer’s Market. Since we didn’t want to carry the box around while we shopped the rest of the market, we left the box with the vendor. There must have been a mixup, because when we came home, we found our box full of less-than-ripe globe tomatoes!

Since this was early June, these tomatoes didn’t have nearly the flavor of the Romas, let alone fully ripened heirloom tomatoes from our own garden. But what could we do? I cut each tomato in half and seeded them.

Halved and Seeded Tomatoes for Lomi Lomi Salmon

The Tomato Dicing Expert

Now began the arduous task of dicing up the tomatoes. I am not as skilled with the knife as Annie is. I was cutting each halved tomato into slices, then strips and finally dice. I wasn’t getting very far when Annie came up.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m trying to dice the tomatoes.”

“You call this a dice?” She held up an irregularly shaped piece of tomato.

“Well, how can I dice this tomato so it looks uniform?”

“Why don’t you slice the tomato in half, then make strips one way and then cut perpendicular to make the dice?”

“I’m doing that but the stupid knife isn’t sharp enough and the tomato keeps slipping.”

“Oh, so it’s the knife that’s stupid, huh?”

“Well, uh…”

“Look, don’t use a sawing motion. Let the knife do the work for you. Just lay the point of the knife on the board, and cut the tomato with the back of the knife using a rocking motion.”

“A rocking motion? How…?”

“MOVE!” (slice, chop chop chop chop, chop chop chop chop) “There, see? Was that so hard? Hand me another one.”

Before I knew it, she had diced all the tomatoes as well as a red onion. She handed me back the knife so I could chop up some green onion. “By the way, a-you’re welcome!”

Diced Tomatoes and Red Onion for Lomi Lomi Salmon

(Note: I have taken creative license with the previous story. The real Annie is nothing like a “Nick Burns of the kitchen”. Love you, honey!)

After adding the chopped green onions to the tomatoes and red onions, I poured the whole pile into a large aluminum tray, then added the diced salmon. Here’s where the “lomi lomi” massage technique comes in. With both hands, I gently mixed the ingredients together until everything was well distributed. As a final touch, I squeezed some lemon juice onto the lomi lomi salmon to brighten up the flavors.

Lomi lomi salmon needs to be served chilled, so I put some ice in another aluminum tray, and put the salmon-filled tray on top of the ice.

Tray of Lomi Lomi Salmon

The lomi lomi salmon was a very popular dish at our lu’au. The saltiness of the salmon was tempered by the sweetness of the tomato. The red onion’s crunch and bite stood out against the salmon and tomatoes’ softness.

Lomi Lomi Salmon

Back in Hawai’i, the lomi lomi salmon served at lu’aus often was more tomato than salmon, and those tomatoes were usually hard and mealy. Our lomi salmon was better because it had a higher ratio of salmon to tomato. The best lomi lomi salmon recipe, though, would be if we used some of Annie’s own homegrown heirloom tomatoes instead of under-ripe globes.

Down with soulless tomatoes!

Aloha, Nate

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Links to Hawaiian Lu’au Food recipes

Huli Chicken Recipe

Kalua Pig with Cabbage Recipe

Ahi Limu Poke Recipe

Huli Chicken Recipe

Chocolate Haupia Pie Recipe

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Ahi Limu Poke

This Ahi Limu Poke dish was part of our Ultimate Backyard Lu’au that we threw a few weeks back. Ahi or yellowfin tuna, is one of Hawai’i’s favorite fishes to eat. We like them in sashimi (especially around New Years), smoked, or in poke (“POH-kay”). Limu is the Hawaiian word for algae or seaweed. Poke simply means “cut into small pieces” in Hawaiian. Ahi Limu Poke, then, calls for ahi to be cut into small pieces, then mixed with seaweed and other seasonings.

For Starters

First off, we start with sashimi-grade ahi. You can find them in higher-end markets, but we like to go to our favorite fishmonger, Pat from Mission Fresh Fish. You can find him at many Bay Area farmer’s markets. We bought our frozen ahi steaks from him at the San Carlos Farmer’s Market.

Frozen Ahi Steaks from Mission Fresh Fish

We brought the fish home and kept them frozen until the day of the lu’au. I took them out of the fridge while the steaks were still stiff. I cut the steaks into 3/4 inch-thick slabs, then cut the slabs into 3/4 inch wide strips.

Cutting Ahi Into Strips for Poke

Finally, I cubed the ahi and set it aside.

Looking for Limu

I wanted to use a specific type of limu, called ogo, for this poke. In Hawai’i, it’s easy to find it fresh in the supermarkets. Not so easy to find it here in the Bay Area. I tried calling around to various supermarkets in the South Bay (Santo, Imahara) that bring in Hawaiian products but they didn’t have fresh ogo in stock that day.

Fortunately, I was able to find another store in Cupertino that stocks Hawaiian products: Marukai on Stevens Creek Blvd. Lucky thing, this store is open to the general public, as most of their other stores are members only. They sell a “poke mix” by Noh Foods that comes with dried ogo, Hawaiian salt, and chili pepper flakes. I bought four packages.

Noh Brand Poke Mix with Dried Ogo

The recipe for Ahi Limu Poke is really easy. You just have to reconstitute the dried ogo in water for a few minutes, chop it up into bite-size bits, and mix it in with the fish, some sesame oil, and the salt and chili pepper.

Ogo and Seasonings for Ahi Poke

I used all the ogo, but ended up using only about 3 packets’ worth of salt, which was just right. Hawaiian salt (called alae) is a coarse sea salt that is very salty. Too much could ruin a dish.

After mixing, I let it chill in the fridge for the flavors to combine.

Ahi Limu Poke

It’s not everyday that one gets to enjoy fresh, sashimi-grade tuna. The combination of salt, sesame oil, seaweed, and sashimi is a winner. The crunchy ogo plays off against the soft fish, and the slight chili heat adds spark to the cool dish. Everyone enjoed our ahi limu poke, going back for seconds, thirds, and more.

For me, this dish takes me back to my home. I can imagine driving along Kamehameha Highway, past Kualoa Ranch, with Ka’a’awa Valley on the left and the azure Pacific on the right. The ocean breeze carries an intoxicatingly fresh scent of the sea. I can’t stop breathing it in… Ahhhh…

Leftovers

We actually did have some leftovers after the party was done. The next day, we decided to make some fried poke for dinner. Simply heat a non-stick pan on medium-high, add a little sesame oil in the pan, and toss the ahi poke in. Quickly brown the fish on all sides, cooking it just a couple of minutes.

Making Fried Ahi Poke

We took some salad greens, including some mizuna, from the CSA share we got from our friend J (thanks again, J!). Put the fried poke on top and then drizzle with some Shiitake & Sesame dressing from Annie’s Naturals. Excellent meal!

Fried Poke Salad

Aloha, Nate

This post was entered into the June 22 edition of Weekend Herb Blogging, managed by Haalo and hosted by Erbe in Cucina - Cooking with Herbs

Links to Hawaiian Lu’au Food recipes

"Huli Chicken" recipe

Kalua Pig with Cabbage Recipe

Lomi Lomi Salmon Recipe

Huli Chicken Recipe

Chocolate Haupia Pie Recipe

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Of Facebook and a Thai Recipe

I have a love-hate relationship with Facebook. I love how it has allowed me to be connected with many friends that I’ve lost touch with over the years. It’s amazing how many old high school/college friends I’ve come to know again just from looking up different connections. And Facebook also allows me to keep up with all these friends via their status bars. In a time when we barely have time to shoot emails to each other, this little status updates have helped me to find out which friends are having children, which friends are travelling, which ones have just broken up with their significant others or gotten engaged. It’s amazing how much we can know from that little status bar!

But then again, do I really need to know what is going on with everyone? And do I need to get “cyber hugged” and gifted dimsum, or flowers, or good morning wishes or any other “cyber” thing in the one million and one applications that can be found on Facebook? And then, there are all these polls—which city/country/continent should you live on, what superhero are you, what does your color say about you, etc. (many of which are surprisingly accurate, but not so grammatically).

And then there are causes. The (Lil) Green Patch that donates money to save the rainforest (has anyone really confirmed this?), the charities that we can support (I support one called LSV-an orphanage in China that takes in handicapped children). Though a great way to showcase some charities, others are more likely time-wasters.

And the games on Facebook! Like quick trends, some start off really fun and after a while, they get tedious or lose their following. And again, a real time-waster as well as something that will cause your eyes to strain too much and your wrists to get carpal tunnel. I speak from experience. Yes, I’m as addicted as most of you out there to these games. Every so often I tell myself that I’m only going to play one game…yeah, you see where I’m going already right? WHO plays only ONE GAME?!?! C’mon, you know who you are…just for five minutes, you say and the next thing you know, it’s a whole hour that has gone by. Time wasting device at its greatest.

And what do you do when you receive a note in your email saying so-and-so wants to befriend you and you don’t even know who on earth they are? Or even worse, you know who they are but you don’t really care to know them that well and indecision grips you…should you not dis them and accept them as a friend and then they will know everything about you and what is happening in your life OR should you ignore them and hope they have forgotten that they asked to be your friend?

I’ve done both, and now I have too many friends to know what to do with. It makes it hard to be really honest in my status bar so most times I end up talking about what I cooked that day (safe, shouldn’t offend anyone). And I don’t really know how I feel either about those friends that have befriended me and then somehow didn’t think I was worthy and defriended me. Yup, Facebook doesn’t tell you when that happens, but you find out eventually. Ah well…do unto others…(yup, done that too). Sorry if that was you and you’re reading this.

So, why am I going on about Facebook and what does this have to do with House of Annie? Nothing I guess, except this is a blog after all and I have the right to talk about something non-food related right? To make it relevant, I will say that I won’t give up Facebook because of the fact that I can indeed get connected with people I haven’t been in touch with for a while. Case in point, I just reconnected with another old friend from my days in the graduate dorm in Hawaii and I couldn’t be happier. The reconnection helped me to remember the good times we shared in the kitchen and how she shared this Thai dish with me.

So here it is, Nat’s Pumpkin with Egg and Green Onion recipe. It’s a simple homey recipe which calls for kabocha squash (I’m sure butternut will work just as well). Like most Thai dishes, it has that interplay of sweet, salty and savory working. Unlike most Thai dishes, this one doesn’t have any heat to it (which isn’t to say you can’t go ahead and add some).

Pumpkin with Egg and Green Onion

Ingredients
2 Tbsp vegetable oil
half a kabocha squash (or other similar squash or pumpkin), cut into 1 inch cubes
2-3 garlic cloves, minced
1/3 cup water
1 1/2 Tbsp sugar, or more to taste
2 eggs, beaten
2 tsp fishsauce, or more to taste
3-4 green onions, cut into 1 1/2 inch length pieces

Method
1. In a frying pan, heat up vegetable oil over medium heat. Add garlic and lightly brown for a minute.
2. Add kabocha squash to pan and add water. Partially cover pan and cook till squash is just tender.
3. Add sugar to dish and mix it in.
4. Add in beaten eggs and a little bit more water if it looks like it’s too dry.
5. Season with fishsauce and taste. The pumpkin should have absorbed the flavors of the sugar and fishsauce nicely and the eggs should have a nice savory flavor.
6. Add in green onions and allow to wilt.

Serve over rice and enjoy!

(Sorry, no pics. Next time I make it, I’ll put the pics up.)

Cheers, Annie.

So…Facebook…are you glad for it or mad at its amazing ability to suck up all your time? Share your stories with us!

Hungry for more Facebook games to waste your time on? Click below:

Hell’s Kitchen

Bejeweled Blitz

ChainRxn

GeoChallenge

WordChallenge

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