Long weekends equals BBQ gatherings

The three of us love BBQs.

Out of love and a need to compensate for the previous lack of opportunities while in NorCal, we take up any opportunity to participate in the SoCal BBQ culture. People in SoCal love to host BBQ gatherings on a nice summer day! Particularly on a long three-day weekend (like Memorial Day, July 4th, or Labor Day), the fragrant scent of plump hot dogs and freshly formed burger patties on the grill pleasantly permeates the SoCal air.

This weekend, local friends hosted a BBQ gathering. The food spread was replete with meats: carne asada tacos, sausage hot dogs, jalapeno jack burgers. Guests brought a variety of delicious complementary eats such as Chinese chicken salad.

Tender Carne Asada for tacos.

The three of us contributed snacks and dessert. One such snack was Muddy Buddies, a summertime classic that for Denise conjures up childhood memories living in the South. It is also called Puppy Chow or Monkey Munch, and I bet you know which name I favor.

Betty Crocker’s tried and true Chex Muddy Buddies, with our slight procedural tweaks

Total time: less than the quoted 15 minutes

Ingredients

• 9 cups Corn Chex
• 1 cup semisweet chocolate chips
• 1/2 cup peanut butter
• 1/4 cup butter/margarine
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 1/2 cups powdered sugar

Directions

1. Measure out Chex cereal and set aside in big mixing bowl.
2. Melt chocolate chips, peanut butter, and butter in saucepan over stove while mixing. Once melted, mix in vanilla.
3. Pour mixture from 2. over cereal in 1. Gently stir/fold until cereal is evenly coated. Careful not to crush the buddies.
4. Add powdered sugar, cover bowl and shake/mix until evenly coated.
5. Spread everything out on wax paper or a large baking tray to cool.
6. Store in an airtight container in the fridge.
7. Enjoy alongside a battle of the sexes on Xbox Kinect.

I love you monkey fist pumping and powered up by Muddy Buddies.

While digging up the recipe for standard Muddy Buddies, we also found interesting variants: Orange Creamsicle, Cake Batter, or White Chocolate, anyone?

The glorious steak

Denise and Patrick share many common interests, among which is a shared love for steaks.

In fact, a favorite activity of theirs is visiting local steakhouses to enjoy their favorite cuts. As part of what they dub “the steakhouse challenge”, they will order their usual ribeye and filet mignon (sometimes straying from this usual to evaluate restaurant specialties). While enjoying dinner and conversation, they will also evaluate the quality, flavor, and presentation of their steaks relative to preparation at other steakhouses.

The steakhouse challenge started when they started dating 6 years ago and has continued ever since. So they have really cultivated a shared appreciation for great steaks and good memories…and instilled this love in me also.

Their friends are completely aware of our steak love. One friend just sent us a shipment from Omaha Steaks of four 5 ounce filet mignons to enjoy and evaluate.

I love you monkey smiling, not preparing to smile, with the package of steaks.

Well, the first day the package arrived, Patrick distractedly spent the evening playing with the dried ice that accompanied the steaks.

The second and third day, the steaks were slow-thawed in the fridge.

The fourth day, Patrick prepared the steaks for dinner! He is our in-house steak preparation expert, and the steaks were prepared according to his proprietary techniques.

I love you monkey with entree of filet mignon and sides of baked white button mushrooms and asparagus.

The size of each 5 ounce filet was perfect for a mid-week dinner portion. The aging process gave these steaks a really great natural flavor while not overwhelming the trademark experience of a filet’s tenderness. The appearance of the meat was uniform and beautiful and each slice had good texture as it dissolved on our palates.

In short, we were quite impressed by the quality of these mail-order steaks and would definitely order from Omaha in the future.

But before I depart, here is one more photo featuring the perfectly achieved medium rare – doneness of my filet.

Mmmm.

Happy Lunar New Year!

Only in Irvine with its heavy Asian population will you see a lion dance right outside your local bakery and coffee joint to celebrate the Lunar New Year. Happy year of the Dragon, everyone!

Since the Dragon sign is associated with the mystical, powerful, and strong, many Asian couples aim to give birth in the Dragon year. Practical translation: 2012 will definitely be a “baby boomer” year.

However, Denise and Patrick opted for a Dragon marriage! If one is to believe in the Dragon qualities, Denise was stating that a strong marriage is far more important than a strong child!

And to ring in the new year, on Saturday night, the three of us enjoyed a three-person tasty hot pot dinner. On Sunday, we visited Denise and Patrick’s families and share dinner with them. It seems to be a universal idea that holidays are always celebrated by gathering over meals.

I love you monkey with garland chrysanthemum (tung ho, organically home-grown by Patrick’s mom), napa cabbage, daikon, tempura, fish balls, enoki mushrooms, organic tofu, wagyu thin-sliced beef, and the must-have Bullhead brand of satay dipping sauce.

Merry Christmas everyone!

Merry Christmas, what a year 2011 has been!

Christmas wreath adorning our doorway. Denise claims the wreath was inspired by me. I contend that I’m much more handsome than the sock monkey.

Christmas as a time of traditions.

Every Christmas, Denise and Patrick’s families take a dual family trip. This is a tradition Denise and Patrick initiated 3 years ago and hope to carry into the years to come, so that no matter everyone’s individual paths in life, every family member will converge every Christmas to share new memories together. Denise absolutely loves traditions and being in the company of those she loves. She’s very excited at the prospect of watching these Christmas trips grow in number and size as our families enlarge with all the +1’s.

In the past, the dual family trip has taken us to Vegas, Mammoth, and San Diego. This year, given Denise’s potential surgery before year-end, the families stayed close to home for Christmas.

Christmas Eve

On Christmas Eve, Denise and Patrick hosted an afternoon gathering at our home. Denise and Patrick adorned various indoor shelves with strings of lights and put together festive floral arrangements. Denise even made some gingerbread men as snacks, which complemented the snacks everyone else brought.

‘lette macarons, Patrick’s brother’s contribution to our array of finger foods. Here is a brightly colored sampling of 6 (1 already eaten) macarons fresh from the Beverly Hills bakery. Chewy, almost mochi-like filling sandwiched in delicious lightly flaky crust.

Then, following another family tradition where one’s first paycheck at a new job is spent treating the families out to dinner, Patrick treated us all to a delicious Asian feast at Capital Seafood.

Five pounds of crab, prepared house-style, at Capital Seafood. We only really ever chow down on crab when eating out with Patrick’s brother, a true crab enthusiast.

Christmas Day

On Christmas, everyone gathered for a home-cooked Christmas dinner hosted at Patrick’s parents’ home. Patrick’s mom is an excellent cook, but Denise has been wanting to lighten Patrick’s mom’s cooking load and learn to cook some delectable group-friendly eats. So this year, Denise made a Christmas chicken, adapting a recipe from her friend Tiffany.

Adaptation of Ina Garten’s Perfect Roast Chicken recipe

Total time: ~2 1/2 hours (including 1 1/2 hours of chicken baking in oven)

Ingredients

• 1 (5 to 6 pound) roasting chicken
• Kosher salt
• Freshly ground black pepper
• 1 large bunch fresh thyme or rosemary, 20+ sprigs
• 1 lemon, quartered
• 1 head garlic, cut in half crosswise
• assorted veggies; example: 1 large yellow onion, thickly sliced, 4 carrots cut into 2-inch chunks, 2 zucchinis cut in 1-inch chunks, 2-3 medium sized russet potatoes cut into cubes, 6oz white button mushrooms cut in half
• Olive oil

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F.
2. Remove the chicken giblets. Rinse the chicken inside and out. Remove any excess fat and leftover pin feathers and pat the outside dry.
3. Liberally salt and pepper the inside of the chicken. Stuff the cavity with the bunch of thyme or rosemary, lemon quarters, all the garlic, and a few chunks of onion. Rub the outside of the chicken with olive oil and sprinkle liberally with salt and pepper. Tie the legs together with kitchen string/thick rubberband and tuck the wing tips under the body of the chicken.
4. Place the assorted veggies in a roasting pan (9×13 pyrex baking pan works well). Toss with salt, pepper, and olive oil. Spread around the bottom of the roasting pan and place the chicken on top, breast-side down (so the juices are drawn into the breasts as the chicken cooks).
5. Roast the chicken for 1 1/2 hours, flipping the chicken breast-side up after 45 minutes of cooking. After 1 1/2 hours, the juices should run clear when you cut between a leg and thigh. Remove the chicken and vegetables to a platter and cover with aluminum foil for about 20 minutes.
6. In the meantime, if desired, prepare a sauce with the chicken drippings. Pour 1/2 c white wine into pyrex baking pan and heat to a simmer on the stove, while scraping the burnt fond and drippings. Boil the liquid down to ~1c.
7. Strain the liquid into a sauce pan (so that the sauce will be nice and homogenous with no floating chunks). Boil off the liquid.
8. Add 1/2c water, 1/4c milk, 1 tsp flour and bring everything to a light simmer to dissolve the fond. Let liquid evaporate until the sauce is of desired thickness and consistency.
9. Serve sauce over sliced chicken and veggies and even over a side of rice.

Merry Christmas everyone, eat up your fill of delicious food and stay warm!

Pancakes for you, pancakes for me

Nothing expresses Denise’s love for Patrick (and me!) quite like a stack of hot fluffy pancakes made from scratch.

Good Old Fashioned Pancakes, recipe from allrecipes.com

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 3 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 tablespoon white sugar
• 1 1/4 cups milk
• 1 egg
• 3 tablespoons butter, melted

Directions

1. In a large bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, salt and sugar. Make a well in the center and pour in the milk, egg and melted butter; mix until smooth. (Helps to let milk and egg warm to room temperature on the counter beforehand.)
2. Heat a lightly oiled griddle or frying pan over medium high heat. Pour or scoop the batter onto the griddle, using approximately 1/4 cup for each pancake. Brown on both sides and serve hot. (Makes ~11 pancakes)

While Denise and I were out running errands in the afternoon, Patrick went ahead and devoured all the leftover pancakes as an afternoon snack.