#150 How to cook Quinoa, the mother of all grains

Post #150. Today is the first day of September. I haven't blogged in 2 months! Cooking is time consuming, taking pics and editing then blogging takes A LOT more time than cooking. 215 dishes more to cook! That's a lot. :)

So where have I been for the last 2 months? LOL. Many things happened. We moved back to San Jose, California in early June. BVS is a beautiful place with 4 seasons, we love it there and we miss it, but it was time to leave to go back to Silicon Valley for work. A week later after moving back to SJ, I started training for a new position, and then after that, just got so busy day after day.  All summer, I drove atleast 150 miles every day for work, 200 + some days. I talk non-stop all day, and by the time the day ends, all I wanted to do was just rest and spend time with my daughter before I complete more paperwork. I worked 6 days a week, so cooking really was not something enjoyable with all the changes going on. So did I cook anything within the two months? Once in a while, yes. But we ate mostly take out..Ugh!. BUT, I also had good food made for us by my friend's Mom, we were invited to their dinners several times :), and we were blessed to receive home cooked meal almost every day from my dear friend A. But I do feel so guilty for not cooking, and blogging! I caved in to my busy schedule instead of rising above it!

Thank goodness, now I am well adjusted to my new routine. For me, driving all these miles everyday is  really, okay. I love what I do and have been doing it for almost 3 years now.  I like going to bed every night knowing that I am making money by  helping the environment and many homeowners save money drastically and live healthier. I must say, it has been a phenomenal summer filled with  changes, many challenges and many successes. All settled in, with most of our stuff organized in our new place, I now have all the space and time and excitement to finish my project.

Today I am blogging about Quinoa, a grain like crop  grown primarily for it's edible seeds. It was first domesticated by the Andean peoples around 3,000 years ago, and was considered holy as the  "mother of all grains" by the Incas. Today, it plays a huge role in global food security.  I wanted to share because I really love it, and hopefully you will check it out as well because it is very easy to cook, it tastes good and goes well with anything. I eat as a side dish much like how I eat rice. But I like it better than rice because it is highly nutritious, and considered a superfood. It is a source of complete protein, fiber, phosphorus, magnesium, iron, calcium and is gluten-free. Read more

HOW TO COOK QUINOA

Ingredients:

1 cup quinoa

2 cups of water

Directions:

1. Place 1 cup Quinoa and 2 cups of water in a 1 1/2 quart saucepan and bring to a boil. Reduce to a simmer, cover and cook until all water is absorbed, for about 10 to 15 minutes. When done, the grain appears soft and translucent, and the germ ring will be visible along the outside edge of the grain.

My big thank you to the Andean peoples for preserving Quinoa for us and the future generations to enjoy. I have a similar mission in life as the Andeans, and it is why I am passionate about energy efficiency and renewables: to preserve our  natural resources and live in harmony with nature, for the present and the future.

2013 is declared as the "International Year of Quinoa" by the United Nations General Assembly. The objective is to draw the world’s attention on the role that quinoa plays in providing food security, nutrition and poverty eradication, in support of achieving Millennium Development Goals. Source: fao.org

"Faced with the challenge of increasing the production of quality food to feed the world's population in the context of climate change, quinoa offers an alternative for those countries suffering from food insecurity" - Fao.org

#149 Vietnam's phở Sài Gòn

Saturday is here, after a crazy busy week. It's time to rechannel my energy and connect to home, where the heart is. Time to relax, and gives lots of hugs to the ones I love that's near, thoughts and prayers to a dear love who is thousands of miles away, and praise to the Almighty who makes things okay in the end. And it's the time I make my plans on what to make for the next week, do some grocery shopping and go the farmers market. Ingredient hunting has become one of my favorite things to do. Cooking so many different dishes introduced me to a new perspective in life, I feel more connected to nature. Now each ingredient is no longer viewed as just a spice, meat, or a vegetable, but each has it's own character and is special. I marvel at man's intelligence, how each of these ingredients were discovered, and I thank to God for being alive in this day and age, because everything is just so convenient to make, which makes it easy for everyone to forget how special every single living or non-living thing is, in this lifetime.

I made  phở Sài Gòn, or beef soup. And what a great dish it was. Soup brings me great comfort, and it is easy to feed to others who are hungry, especially the little ones, and simple to make too. :) I cannot get over how good this beef phở was. Unbelievable. I usually go to a nearby Vietnamese restaurant, there's lots of places to enjoy a good beef pho in this area, but this time, I wanted to learn how to make it.  I was introduced to many new ingredients and a special way to make soup using the recipe I found online. I've been planning to make this soup since the inception of herglobalkitchen.com, and I am so happy I finally did! Oh my, what took me so long? This is one of the best soups I have made in my entire life. In the Philippines, we make broth based beef soup also by boiling the meat with bones for long periods of time. It's a national favorite and it's really good, but what makes this beef phở better in my opinion, is the blend of the herbs, and the spices, absolutely amazing.

I needed to make this right the first time so I made sure I also bought the  cheese cloth. It is very important, because it is what you use to wrap the spices before adding it in the water to cook with the meat. I also made sure  I bought star anise also (pictured below).  Illicium verum, commonly called Star anise, star aniseed, or Chinese star anise is a spice that closely resembles anise in flavor, obtained from the star-shaped pericarp of Illicium verum, a medium-sized native evergreen tree of northeast Vietnam and southwest China. The star shaped fruits are harvested just before ripening.Star anise is grown in four provinces in China and harvested between March and May. It is also found in the south of New South Wales. It has been used in a tea as a traditional remedy for rheumatism, and the seeds are sometimes chewed after meals to aid digestion, in traditional Chinese Medicine,  star anise, as a warm and moving herb, is used to assist in relieving cold-stagnation in the middle jiao, which refers  to the midsection of the body and includes the Spleen, Stomach, Gall Bladder and Liver organs. Read more

Cinnamon, I love it's scent, and little did I know  what great flavor it brings when added to soup. Fragrant, it is referred to as the "real cinnamon", most cinnamon in international commerce is derived from related species, which are also referred to as "cassia" to distinguish them from "true cinnamon". It was so highly prized among ancient nations that it was regarded as a gift fit for monarchs and even for a god: a fine inscription records the gift of cinnamon and cassia to the temple of Apollo at Miletus. Though its source was kept mysterious in the Mediterranean world for centuries by the middlemen who handled the spice trade, to protect their monopoly as suppliers, cinnamon is native to Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Malabar Coast of India and Burma.

Allspice berries are the dried fruit of the Pimenta dioica plant. The fruit are picked when green and unripe and are traditionally dried in the sun. When dry, the fruit are brown and resemble large brown peppercorns. The plant is dioecious, meaning plants are either male or female, hence male and female plants must be kept in proximity to allow fruit to develop. Read more

I read many recipes for  beef phở before I even bought the ingredients, I was confused which beef cut to use, and got all the more confused because there are so many variations and recipes you can find online! After going back and forth, and asking myself out loud at the grocery store "Why is oxtail so expensive?", my little girl said: "but Mom, the more expensive it is, the better the quality"...LOL. She's right on that, and.. there's only 1 oxtail in 1 cow, I took that long to figure it out? duh..basic economics!  I am such a natural bargain hunter, and my brain does not operate like that in stores.  I don't know if her knowing that this early is good or bad?! :) So after I bought the oxtail, I was $14 poorer, it is a highly priced commodity for making beef broth. I learned that in the past, the price for oxtails was nowhere near this expensive, it is when a chef extraordinaire like Anthony Bourdain let out secrets of whipping up great food made of oxtails that the price started soaring high. I tried not to visualize a live cow, which was hard because oxtail does not look like a regular meat, this is a body part of a cow that moves, and I always notice it when I look at cows...and  then peeled, and cut. But guess what, if I got over that stage and cooked it, and enjoyed it, you can too! :) And now I know why it's expensive. The broth was delicious, and not as fatty as the regular cuts. My best friend A came over and saw this too, and he said "holy cow, I did not think oxtail had that much meat?!" :)

Daikon radish is a great vegetable for clear broth based soups. They're  huge, so I just used half of it, and half of which I sliced thinly and snacked on it.

Purple stemmed basil? Yes and with flowers too! This is Thai basil, tastes very much like the regular basil, but it's prettier don't you think? Also called  Asian basil (húng quế in Vietnamese) is a type of sweet basil native to Southeast Asia that has been cultivated to provide distinctive traits. Its flavor is more stable under high or extended cooking temperatures than that of sweet basil. Thai basil exhibits small, narrow leaves and purple stems, with a mauve (pink-purple) flower. One cultivar commonly grown in the United States is 'Queen of Siam'. Read more

I bought this mint from the Asian market, and not only did I notice the bigger leaves compared to ones sold at whole foods, trader joes or nob hill, the packets are also much bigger! for a fraction of the price!

So can you imagine this soup's flavor with all the spices and herbs pictured above? Hard to explain, but once you taste it...you will know what I am trying to say. And that beautiful blend of flavor? Fresh cilantro ties them all together. When I ate it without Cilantro, it was great. But a generous amount of it added to the soup, made it perfect!

And beef  phở is not perfect without mung bean sprouts as part of the garnish. Great flavor! You see,  making this soup was not just plain cooking for me, it was a discovery, a great adventure to the unknown, and a great joy.

Pho is a Vietnamese noodle soup consisting of broth, linguine-shaped rice noodles, a few herbs, and meat. It is a popular street food in Vietnam and the specialty of a number of restaurant chains around the world. Pho is primarily served with either beef or chicken. The Hanoi and Saigon styles of pho differ by noodle width, sweetness of broth, and choice of herbs. The origin of pho and its name is a subject of scholarly debate.  The style in which we made ours is called, phở Sài Gòn,  a variation of pho that originated from the Southern part of vietnam. The several regional variants of pho in Vietnam, particularly divided between northern (Hanoi, are called phở bắc or "northern pho"), and southern pho (Saigon, called phở Sài Gòn). Northern pho tends to use somewhat wider noodles and much more green onion, and garnishes offered generally include only vinegar, fish sauce and chili sauce. On the other hand, southern Vietnamese pho broth is slightly sweeter and has bean sprouts and a greater variety of fresh herbs. The variations in meat, broth, and additional garnishes such as lime, bean sprouts, ngò gai (Eryngium foetidum), húng quế (Thai/Asian basil), and tương đen (bean sauce/hoisin sauce), tương ớt (hot chili garlic sauce, e.g., Rooster Sauce) appear to be innovations made by or introduced to the south,also called Pho Sai Gon ("Saigon Style" Pho). read more from source.

Are you ready to make yours? Here's how:

Yield: serves 6

phở Sài Gòn 

Ingredients:

5 pounds beef knuckle, with meat

2 pounds beef oxtail

1 white (daikon) radish, sliced

2 onions, chopped

2 ounces whole star anise pods

2 cinnamon sticks

2 whole cloves

1 teaspoon allspice berries

1 teaspoon black peppercorns

1 slice fresh ginger root

1 tablespoon white sugar

1 tablespoon salt

1 tablespoon fish sauce

1 1/2 pounds dried flat rice noodles

1/2 pound frozen beef sirloin

TOPPINGS:

chili pepper sauce or chili pepper paste

hoisin sauce

thinly sliced onion

chopped fresh cilantro

bean sprouts (mung beans)

sweet Thai basil

thinly sliced green onion

limes, quartered

Directions:

1. Place the beef knuckle in a very large (9 quart or more) pot. Season with salt, and fill pot with 2 gallons of water. Bring to a boil, and cook for about 2 hours.
2. Skim the fat from the surface of the soup, and add the oxtail, radish and onions. Tie the anise pods, cinnamon stick, cloves, allspice berries, peppercorns and ginger in a cheesecloth or place in a spice bad; add to the soup. Stir in sugar, salt and fish sauce. Simmer over medium-low hear for atleast 4 more hours (the longer, the better). At the end of cooking, taste, and add salt as need. Strain broth, and return to the pot to keep at a simmer. Discard spices and bones. Reserve meat from the beef knuckle for other uses if desired.
3. Bring a large pot of lightly salted water to a boil. Soak the rice noodles in water for about 20 minutes, then cook in boiling water until soft, but not mushy, about 5 minutes. Slice the frozen beef paper thin. The meat must be thin enough to cook instantly.
4. Ladle soup and meat in a bowl, and add toppings to your desired amount. Squeeze limes in soup before serving. 

Recipe adapted from here

Add freshly squeezed juice of lime, it's heaven on Earth!

#148 Flank steak with Bok choi

Bok choi (one of the vegetables pictured below) is a green leafy vegetable,  it has white succulent stalks and is highly nutritious. It is also called chinese cabbage, pak choi, or bokchoy. You can find plenty in Asian markets and in the leafy green section of your favorite grocery store. We grow it also in the Philippines and we call it Pechay, or Petsay. It is really easy to grow, my Mom has a garden full of it. Ever wonder what you can make with bok choi leaves?  There are many ways to enjoy it! We add it in clear soups and stir fries. This recipe by Lisa Bell that I found years ago in a Cooking Light magazine is just one of many dishes that you can make using bokchoy, she added shiitake mushrooms, but I omitted it. You can add about a cup of sliced shiitake, and cook it with the bell peppers and onions, it tastes great! I have tried making it with shiitake many times, I just did not have any on that day. What I love about this recipe? It's quick cooking and inexpensive, low in fat since very little oil is required, and the use of a leaner cut of beef: the flank steak. Bok choi contains just 13 calories per 100g. It's a delicious dish that will allow extra calories to consume for the day. :)

Yield: serves 4

 

FLANK STEAK with BOK CHOI

Ingredients:

2 tablespoons grated fresh ginger
1 tablespoon minced fresh garlic
3 tablespoons low-sodium soy sauce
4 teaspoons cornstarch, divided
1 teaspoon toasted sesame oil
1/2 teaspoon crushed red pepper
1 pound flank steak, trimmed and thinly sliced
Cooking spray
1 cup thinly vertically sliced onion
1 cup red bell pepper strips
4 cups sliced bok choy (about 1 medium head)
1 cup less-sodium beef broth

Directions:

1. Combine ginger, garlic, soy sauce, 2 teaspoons cornstarch, oil, and crushed red pepper in a large zip-top bag; add steak to bag. Seal and marinate in refrigerator 20 minutes.
2. Heat a large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. Coat pan with cooking spray, and add onion, and bell pepper to pan. Cook 3 minutes or until crisp-tender; transfer to a large bowl. Add bok choy to pan; sauté 2 minutes or until slightly wilted; add to bowl; keep warm.
3. Recoat pan with cooking spray. Add half of steak mixture to pan; cook 3 minutes or until browned, stirring occasionally. Transfer to a large bowl; keep warm. Coat pan with cooking spray. Add remaining steak mixture to pan; cook 3 minutes or until browned, stirring occasionally. Add to bowl; keep warm.
4. Combine broth and remaining 2 teaspoons cornstarch, stirring with a whisk. Add to pan, scraping pan to loosen browned bits. Bring to a boil; cook 1 minute or until mixture thickens, stirring constantly. Return steak and vegetables to pan; toss gently to coat.

Recipe adapted from: Lisa Bell, Cooking Light, 2005

 

Flank steak is a lean, flavorful, boneless cut favored in Asian cuisines. This thin, flat steak comes from a well-exercised part of the cow, as evidenced by its striated muscle fibers and connective tissue.

Eat up your bokchoy!  Here are the nutritional benefits of this low calorie vegetable:

• Bok choy is one of the popular leafy-vegetables very low in calories. Nonetheless, it is very rich source of many vital phyto-nutrients, vitamins, minerals and health-benefiting anti-oxidants.
  
• 100 g of bok choy contains just 13 calories. It is one of the recommended vegetables in the zero calorie or negative calorie category of foods which when eaten would add no extra weight to the body but in-turn facilitate calorie burns and reduction of weight.
  
• As in other Brassica family vegetables, bok choy too contains certain anti-oxidant plant chemicals like thiocyanates, indole-3-carbinol, lutein, zea-xanthin, sulforaphane and isothiocyanates. Along with dietary fiber, vitamins these compounds help to protect against breast, colon, and prostate cancers and help reduce LDL or "bad cholesterol" levels in the blood.
  
• Fresh pak choi is an excellent source of water-soluble antioxidant, vitamin-C (ascorbic acid). 100 g provides 45 mg or 75 % of daily requirements of vitamin C. Regular consumption of foods rich in vitamin C helps the body develop resistance against infectious agents and scavenge harmful, pro-inflammatory free radicals.
  
• Bok-choy has more vitamin A, carotenes, and other flavonoid polyphenolic anti-oxidants than cabbage, cauliflower, etc. Just 100 g of fresh vegetable provides 4468 IU or 149% of daily-required levels vitamin A.
  
• Pak choi is a very good source of vitamin K, provides about 38% of RDA levels. Vitamin-K has a potential role in bone metabolism by promoting osteotrophic activity in bone cells. Therefore, enough vitamin K in the diet makes your bone stronger, healthier and delay osteoporosis. Further, vitamin-K also has established role in curing Alzheimer's disease patients by limiting neuronal damage in their brain.
  
•  Fresh bok choy has many vital B-complex vitamins such as pyridoxine (vitamin B6), riboflavin, pantothenic acid (vitamin B5), pyridoxine, and thiamin (vitamin B-1). These vitamins are essential in the sense that our body requires them from external sources to replenish.
  
• Further, this leafy vegetable is a moderate source of minerals, particularly calcium, phosphorous, potassium, manganese, iron and magnesium. Potassium is an important electrolyte in the cell and body fluids that helps regulate heart rate and blood pressure. Manganese is used by the body as a co-factor for the antioxidant enzyme, superoxide dismutase. Iron is required for the red blood cell formation.
  

   source: http://www.nutrition-and-you.com/bok-choy.html

Good food that is really easy to make!