Year of the Tiger

My dad's version of Cay Mai (it blooms only during this time of year).

Happy (Lunar) New Year! I think this year will be a good one... what do you think?!

"The San Francisco Treat"

Thinking we were hard core, Michael, Chi Quan, Derek and I took an impetuously planned road trip to San Francisco. But the "hard core" part was when someone (ahem) thought of the bright idea of driving overnight to save time (OK so it was my bright idea). Ten hours each way! I must have thought I was 22 years old again. Every time I got behind the wheel, it rained. No, let me correct myself - it poured. I don't know why it is, but every time I drive long distances, no matter the season, it rains! And not just the normal drizzle you get in the city. The kind of rain that comes down in buckets, where your head feels like it's gonna' explode and your eyes wanna' pop out of its sockets from concentrating hard on the road, and even then, you're hydro-planing - scary!!! Then every time Derek got behind the wheel, it snowed. LOL The drive through Mt. Shasta was at times treacherous, forcing us to slow to to 40MPH for a few hours... but the trip was well worth it! I hadn't been to SF for over five years. It's still as lovely as ever. Here are some pictures - enjoy!

Getting ready to pay our toll to cross the first bridge!View of downtown from the Golden Gate Bridge

We road on this cable car - the Rice-A-Roni train!

We love our In-N-Out Burger

Michael's dream job :P

Ghirardelli Square! Yep, the chocolates!
Lombard Street - the world's curviest street!

Taking a break from our crazy uphill climb!

We want that rooftop and the view from it (below)
Mission Street - where the mission-style burrito was born!

Christmas in a Blur

Christmas this year went by in a blur. No seriously. I always thought Christmas always flew by, but this year literally zipped right past me. I think in the past, the anticipation of coming home for Christmas (from wherever I was) usually starts a month or two before I get to fly home and when I finally get home, I really work at savoring each moment. This year, with so many gatherings and celebrations starting immediately after Thanksgiving, I didn't get to sit back and enjoy the lights and scenery as much as I would have liked. It just came and went, almost like any other day :( but pictures here remind me of how much (more festive and) fun it was nonetheless!

As an only child with usually quieter Christmases, it's really fun to experience present-opening-mayhem at Michael's family's party. Sooo many presents! So many kids! It's a wonderful vibe.

We even attempted (as an unwilling team :) to make gingerbread men for the kids, although I don't think they got to participate or taste any (since Chu Hung, Chi Quan & I took over) but that might have been a blessing for them in disguise :)


Then Christmas morning at my house... "not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse. The stockings were hung, by the chimney with care, in hope that St. Nicholas soon would be there..." except St. Nick didn't come and my mom made sure Michael was the only one that got anything in his stocking!!! Wth? I didn't even get coal!



I tried my hand at sewing (for the first time in my life) a pal (gray monster on the left) for Pookie (brown monster on the right), a gift Michael had given me 3 years ago.



P.S. Our blog turned 1 year old this week too!

Turkey Day

Growing up, my folks always made an effort to ensure I had the experience of a turkey on Thanksgiving and even at times, on Christmas as well. But something happened as the years went on (I think everyone in my family would fighting over the turkey legs) and so one year, my aunt decided to just make turkey legs! A whole platter of turkey legs! Something about that practice turned me off of turkey from that moment on. Yech.

But that was probably a relief for my parents since they never had to worry about making me turkey ever again. And once I moved away, turkey was last thing I wanted to eat when I came home to visit. I didn't care what holiday it was - all I wanted was Vietnamese food! Vietnamese food for dinner. Vietnamese food for lunch. Vietnamese for breakfast! I had resolved that I was simply not a fan of turkey, no matter the occasion, no matter the form - I didn't even care for turkey deli meat... until I met Michael. He waits all year to eat his uncle's turkey and thought it was pretty ludicrous that my family didn't have turkey at all on Thanksgiving.

This year, I finally had my first taste of his family's renowned turkey... and man, it was deeeee-lish!!! Now I know why he rants and raves about it all the time! Not surprisingly, there were no leftovers. The meal was accompanied with a honey baked ham (from Chi Chau), stuffing, scalloped potatoes (from Kathy), mash potatoes (from Kim), gravy and variety of other side dishes, topped off with a pumpkin creme brulee (from Anh Minh). I looooooooooooove creme brulee - it's my favorite dessert!

Per Michael's request, I made spicy cheddar biscuits (from Martha's book) and non-spicy for the kids, which sadly, were not that spicy or cheesy :/ Everyone was nice enough to extend their compliments though :) At least they looked ok! haha I think it's time I steadily move on from looks to taste!

Pre-baked kids' cheddar biscuits.

We also made Rice Krispy treat turkey legs for the kiddies! I'd been planning to make something a little bit more special for them from my cousin My's book of recipes, but after running around town, I could not find all the ingredients for the finishing touches, so unfortunately, they will have to wait till next year!

Already, I am looking forward to my next turkey!

Halloween 09'

After changing our minds about four times in the span of one week (the week before Halloween), we finally decided to settle on a Sesame Street theme - just in time for its 40th Anniversary! Michael went as Oscar the Grouch (so appropriate :) and a bunch of his friends went as Elmo, Cookie Monster, Big Bird, Bert and Ernie (although Bert and Ernie decided a steak dinner was more important than Halloween and did not show - so lame)!

Have you ever noticed that most of the Sesame Street muppets are male!? There's only three (Rosita, Zoe, and Abby Cadabby) that are female and of course, none of those characters had adult costumes for Halloween, so I had to improvise! I chose to be Abby Cadabby - apparently, she's quite popular with girls these days, but if you haven't watched Sesame Street recently, you wouldn't know who she was (I had to Google her myself) and subsequently, no one knew who I was suppose to be (it's hard to be a muppet when you don't have pink fur)!!! But my costume had LED lights on it, so by the end of the night, I just went as an eclectic fairy (ec-lectic, not electric :) Who cares! I LOVE HALLOWEEN!

Elmo was the designated driver.

GDC: And the Winner Is...

Chi Quan & Derek!
... from Week 7

Good thing they decided to award 1st and 2nd place, because Michael and I got 2nd place. Woohoo! And by 0.03 of a point! ooOOoOoohhh, by a hair!!!

Congrats to Chi Quan and Derek for a job well done!

We held a pot luck gather (Chinese restaurant style) to count the votes. There was SOOO much GOOD food! Ever since we started GDC, casual family get-togethers are no longer the same. Everyone's standards are much higher, with each event requiring RSVP, formal invites, and an agenda of activities! Good times, good times!

Yen's 28th

I was way too pooped after Gourmet Dinner Club to plan anything for my birthday, so this year, I kept it low-key. Lunch with Charlie at Fire on the Mountain (I love my chicken wings)!!!


And dinner with my parents (it's my Mom's birthday too) at Michael's place!

GDC Week 8 (Finale): Michael & Yen

All pictures courtesy of Chi Chau & (the other) Yen

Michael and I had the great pleasure of hosting the last and final Gourmet Dinner Club for 2009.

The advantages of going last?... we could learn from everyone else's mistakes had plenty of time to plan.

The disadvantages of going last?... expectations were higher than ever and we had less ideas to play with.

Not only have Michael and I never hosted large dinner party, but Michael has little experience in cooking for more than two people at a time. And even when he does cook for just us two, there's barely enough for us since he's not big on leftovers! lol

So to make up for the areas we potentially were lacking in, we knew we needed something to differentiate ourselves.

As each week passed, the dinners got more impressive and our (my) confidence shaken! All I knew I wanted was a theme. Something that represented us! Something that we were both passionate in. Something close to our hearts! So we decided to host a

European Taste Tour!
With our move back to Portland, we often found ourselves reminiscing about Europe. This was the perfect occasion to share our experiences abroad with our family! Food and travel was the theme. We wanted to make everyone feel as if they were traveling from country to country with us. So I flipped through my online photo albums and chose some of our most memorable dishes from some of our favorite European countries. If our food and service risked not being as good as the others, let's at least get some brownie points for creativity!

So we started in Turkey, where Michael is a huge fan of hummus and Mediterranean meze. And my love for seafood led me to fall in love with Scotland and Spain. So for appetizers, we served:

Turkish Meze
Hummus, Tomato & Cucumber Salad, & Olives
Scottish Mussels

Spanish Shrimp

And since duck is Michael's favorite poultry, we chose a dish from Italy as a main course.

Papperdelle w/ Duck Ragu

Papperdelle is not easy to find! This dish took nearly 6 hours to make and was definitely made out a labor of love. The duck legs (all 11 of them) sat in a red wine, carrot, celery, and onion marinade overnight. In the morning, the legs were removed from the marinade and quickly seared only to then be tossed back into the marinade - this time, with some spices and tomato paste to braise for 3-4 hours. Once braised, each leg is carefully shredded, piece by piece, leg by leg! Honestly, I felt sorry watching him do it :) Finally, the shredded duck was placed back in the pan and cooked some more, for the marinade reduce to a ragu! Phew!

SO MUCH WORK!!! more on this later.

Since I was the brains behind this project (hahahahah!!!) and he's the talent (but only in this particular case :) my only job in the kitchen on the day of execution was to make dessert. The only problem is, I don't bake. Period. Yet my ambition led to go with two French desserts.

Mini Fruit Tarts with a Homemade Lemon Curd Mousse
&
Cream Puffs (stuffed with coffee ice cream instead of cream)

I used a cupcake pan instead of a tart pan so some of it broke as I dug them out of the pan!

For you non-believers out there, I actually made this lemon curd (mousse) from scratch!

I don't think they tasted that good (I can't stand tasting the food that I actually make - that's why I can never actually cook) but it turned out looking decent, if I might say so myself! hehehe

Now that judging is over, I can tell you a little story about the Cream Puffs :) I did a test run of the puff pastry a few weeks prior and they actually turned out looking great (see pic below)!.But on the day of the dinner (I must have accidentally used a modified recipe), they turned out looking like sweet buns! They tasted like puff pastries, but I made two batches of the batter and neither of them looked right, but I was running out of time (I swear, it was like Iron Chef that day) so I just had a quick meltdown, and decided that if I drenched it under enough chocolate syrup (also homemade btw :) no one would notice! Ha!

We served a variety of beers from Germany, Belgium, Ireland, and the Netherlands. I even tried my hand at making (red & white non-alcoholic) Sangria (from Spain)!

To build a little excitement and anticipation during the week leading up to our dinner, I hand-made and snail-mailed everyone invitations (who doesn't like getting things in the mail?!) crafted into U.S. passports highlighting our menu, with a course on each page and a few images of our real passport stamps :: figures crossed :: Like I said, brownie points for creativity!!!!

Special thanks to my dear friend Tram for tracing the passport logo cover on Illustrator. It took her hours! And a special thanks to ME for hand-cutting each page! hahaha! The stupid paper cutter at Kinkos sucked.

And (since I am unemployed) for the ultimate TOURIST experience, I painted an Eiffel Tower backdrop and set up a photo printer for INSTANT pictures! (I got the idea from all the school dances I use to attend :) I then created "Thank You" card picture templates! I am pretty proud of myself (as you can tell) since I'm not artistic at all!

Michael's cousin Kathy cautioned us that prepping and decorating would be a nightmare, but we both waved off her warnings. How hard could it be to put a few plates and wine glasses on a table?! RIGHT???


Though we were happy with the outcome (did you know tulips are from the Netherlands?), we had no idea what was in store for us. Cooking and entertaining 16 people (plus 6 kids) may not sound like a huge deal... but cooking, presenting, and serving 16 people who are actually judging you is a totally different story and utterly exhausting. There was SO much to do, it was beyond ridiculous. And I am (borderline OCD) organized! I had a timeline and check-off sheet of all the things we needed to do, but planning, prepping, cooking, baking, heating, plating, serving is a b*tch! Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed all the planning and prepping up until 2PM that day, when our guests were due to arrive in three hours.

Service was our hardest obstacle. It is not easy to serve 16 people + 6 kids! How come no one warned me of that?! Everyone made it look so easy!After dinner, all the boys pitched in to do the dishes! Hooray! We had heard nightmarish stories of people taking two days just to clean their kitchen after GDC. So I don't know if it's because they thought after 8 weeks, they'd take over some of the duties, or they just felt sorry for us. Either way, we were so grateful for them! I really wanted to be a gracious hostess and insist they stop washing, but honestly, I did not have the energy to stop them. I hope our scores weren't affected by it!

All in all, it was a wonderful experience. I had tons of fun planning and scheming :D The two days of prepping and cooking were worth the returns (although I really think our service could have been more seamless and our food could have been even more refined), but we were aiming for some creativity and meaning in our dinner and I think we accomplished that!

Were we happy to be a part of it all? Absolutely!

Would we do it again? Probably Not! :D

It really allowed me and Michael to step outside of our comfort zone and put our hidden talents to the test! It was also good to put my brain to use after all these months of unemployment ;) And now, cooking dinner for a group of friends is easy peasy!