Category Archives: Cooking

These brussels will convert anyone who can’t abide brussels. And the recipe today comes courtesy of the Mr., who discovered it and has made it a lot for us!

Here they are mid-fry:

And post-fry delicousness:

Fried Brussels Sprouts with Shallots, and Chilies, Posted by J. Kenji López-Alt, on Serious Eats.

Ingredients

serves serves 8 to 10, active time 20 minutes, total time 20 minutes

• 2 tablespoons fish sauce
• 2 tablespoons sugar
• 2 tablespoons fresh juice from 1 to 2 limes
• 3 to 4 Thai bird chilis, finely chopped (see note above)
• 3 medium cloves garlic, minced on a microplane grater (about 1 tablespoon)
• 1/4 cup minced fresh cilantro leaves
• 3 quarts vegetable, canola, or peanut oil
• 2 1/2 pounds brussels sprouts, stems trimmed, outer leaves removed, split in half
• 3 medium shallots, thinly sliced (about 1 cup)

Procedures

Combine fish sauce, sugar, lime juice, chilies, garlic, and cilantro in a small bowl. Whisk until sugar is dissolved.

Line a rimmed baking sheet with a triple layer of paper towels. In a large wok or Dutch oven, heat oil to 400°F. Add half of brussels sprouts and half of shallots. Oil temperature will drop to around 325°F. Adjust heat to maintain this temperature. Cook, stirring and agitating with a metal spider until brussels sprouts are deep golden brown, about 4 minutes. Transfer to paper towel-lined baking sheet. Reheat oil to 400°F and repeat with remaining sprouts and shallots.

Transfer sprouts and shallots to a large bowl and add dressing. Toss to combine and serve.

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New Year’s resolutions are only a few weeks off so I thought I’d share one of my life resolutions that, unlike so many, has actually been quite successful!

When I moved to Asia I resolved to learn how to cook Asian food. And it’s been very fun and inspring. It would also be a fun resolution if you’re unable to travel in the year ahead… so much of visiting a new place is about tasting the food, but there’s no reason you can’t do that at home, right?!

About a year ago I posted about Tonki’s in Tokyo, which is an amazing tonkatsu (fried pork) place. Donna, a HKHousewife reader, suggested I try out Everyday Harumi and she was right on; it’s a really great book because the recipes are very simple and she makes it easy to get into this new cuisine. Harumi is a Japanese housewife, Martha Stewart equivalent.

I prefer to really get into one type of Asian cuisine at a time… my first year here it was Thai and lately its been Japanese because you do need some staples particular to that type of cuisine so it doesn’t really make sense to only cook in that style once.

There are a lot of toasted sesame seeds and sesame oil for example in Japanese food. You also need lots of dashi (Japanese fish stock), miso, sake!, and mirin (Japanese rice wine), ginger and garlic.

It’s also nice to have lots of little dishes as the Japanese are all about little tastes of this and that. These dishes were re-used from my travel party. For this meal, I made Harumi’s pickled cauliflower, green beans with a sesame dressing, Japanese coleslaw salad and Harumi’s famous barbeque sauce.

Anyways, I think gifting an entirely new genre of cooking to someone is a great idea and I am thinking of giving several copies of Harumi to loved ones this year!

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