Flower Buttercream Cake

 This is 6" Green Tea Chiffon Cake with Swiss Meringue Buttercream frosting. 

Mongolian Beef

Followed this recipe to make the traditional Chinese dish.  You can also add sliced onion and/or bell pepper .

Ingredients

Flank steak - 1 lb, sliced against the grain into 1/4-inch thick slices

Vegetable oil - 2 tsp for marinate + 1/2 cup for frying the beef
Soy sauce - 2 TBSP for marinate + 1/2 cup for cooking
Cornstarch - 2 TBSP for marinate + 1/2 cup for coating

Minced ginger - 1 tsp 

Dried red chili peppers - 5-10 (optional)

Chopped garlic - 4 cloves

Chicken stock or water - 1/2 cup
Brown sugar - 3-4 TBSP
Scallions - 2 stalks (cut into 1-inch long slices)
To thicken the sauce - 1 TBSP cornstarch + 1 TBSP water

Steps

1. Marinate sliced beef with oil, soy sauce, and cornstarch; let it sit for an hour. The beef should still be quite moist after it has marinated. If it looks too dry, add a tablespoon of water to it.

2. Dredge the marinated beef slices in cornstarch until lightly coated. Heat vegetable oil in the wok over high heat. Just before the oil starts to smoke, spread the flank steak pieces evenly in the wok, and let sear for 1 minute; Turn over and let the other side sear for another 30 seconds. The beef should be seared with a crusty coating. Set the beef aside.

3. Drain the oil from the wok, leaving 1 tablespoon behind, and turn the heat to medium-high. Add ginger and dried chili peppers, if using. After about 15 seconds, add the chopped garlic. Stir for another 10 seconds and add the 1/4 cup low sodium soy sauce and chicken stock (or water). Bring the sauce to a simmer, add the brown sugar, and stir until dissolved.
4. Let the sauce simmer for about 2 minutes and slowly stir in the cornstarch slurry mixture--until the sauce coats the back of a spoon.
5. Add the beef and scallions and toss everything together for another 30 seconds. There should be almost no liquid, as the sauce should be clinging to the beef. If you still have sauce, increase the heat slightly and stir until thickened.

Spare Ribs with Sweet and Sour Sauce(糖醋排骨)

This is another way to make sweet and sour spare ribs.  

Ingredients

Ginger - a few slices

Cooking wine - 2 TBSP

Soy sauce - 2 TBSP

Dark soy sauce - 2 TBSP

Dark vinegar - 3 TBSP

Sugar - 4 tsp

Salt - pinch

Green onion - chopped

Corn starch - 1 TBSP

Steps

1. Place the ribs in pot filled with water to cover the meet, boil for 5 minutes, drain and rinse off.

2. In a fry pan, under medium high heat, add oil and then ginger and spare ribs, fry until the ribs turn golden brown.

 3. Drain the oil, add soy sauce, dark soy sauce, vinegar, cooking wine, sugar and salt, broil for 5 minutes, then turn to low heat and slow cook for 45 minutes. Or to speed it up, I put the ribs with sauce in InstantPot and cooked under high pressure for 15 minutes. Add 1/2 TBSP of vinegar at the end if not sour enough.

4. In a small bowl, mix corn starch with 1 TBSP water, then add the starch water in the pot. The sauce should be sticky, stir to make sure the ribs are all coated with sauce. Sprinkle with green onion and serve.

12345 Spare Ribs

This is how my mom cooks sweet and sour spare ribs. I am using InstantPot to make it even easier. 12345 is the proportion of the ingredients. Depends on how much ribs to be cooked, you can increase the ingredients. 

Ingredients

Cooking Wine - 2 TBSP
Sugar - 4 TBSP
Dark Vinegar - 6 TBSP
Soy Sauce - 8 TBSP
Water - 10 TBSP

Spare ribs - about 1 lb chops

Steps

1. Put all ingredients in InstantPot.

2. Cook in InstantPot for 40 minutes with high pressure.

3. Fish out the ribs and serve.

Baked Donut

Old-fashioned doughnuts were deep-fried in hot fat; new-fashioned doughnuts are baked in a hot oven! 

Ingredients

Butter - 4 TBSP
Vegetable oil - 1/4 cup
Granulated sugar - 1/2 cup
Brown sugar - 1/3 cup, packed

Eggs - 2 large (replace with 1/2 cup apple sauce for egg-free)

Baking powder - 1 1/2 tsp

Baking soda - 1/4 tsp
Nutmeg - 1/2 to 1 tsp, to taste

Salt - 3/4 tsp
Vanilla extract - 1 tsp
Milk - 1 cup
All-Purpose Flour - 2 2/3 cups

Steps

1. Preheat the oven to 425°F. Lightly grease standard or mini doughnut pans.
2. In a medium-sized mixing bowl, beat together the butter, vegetable oil, and sugars until smooth.
3. Add the eggs (or egg replacement), beating to combine.
4. Stir in the baking powder, baking soda, nutmeg, salt, and vanilla.
5. Stir the flour into the butter mixture alternately with the milk, beginning and ending with the flour and making sure everything is thoroughly combined. The batter will be fairly thick; when you draw your spatula through the batter, it will leave a furrow.

6. Use a Ziploc bag with a corner cut at the bottom as piping bag to pipe batter into the lightly greased doughnut pans, filling the wells to about 1/4" shy of the rim.

7. Bake the doughnuts for 5-10 minutes. Remove them from the oven, and wait 5 to 7 minutes before turning them out of the pans onto a rack.

Cinnamon Sugar Doughnuts

Shake warm doughnuts in a plastic bag with about 1/4 to 1/3 cup cinnamon-sugar. 

Vanilla Glazed Doughnuts

Confectioners' sugar - 1.25 cup

Light corn syrup - 1 TBSP

Melted butter - 1 TBSP

Milk - 1 to 2 TBSP

Vanilla extract - 1/2 tsp

Mix all ingredients together and use to glaze the doughnuts.

Honey Garlic Shrimp

A quick dinner dish from Sally's. 

Ingredients

Honey - 1/3 cup
Soy sauce - 1/4 cup
Jarred minced garlic - 1 TBSP, or 2 teaspoons fresh
Minced fresh ginger - 1 tsp, optional
Medium uncooked shrimp - 1 lb, peeled & deveined
Olive oil - 2 tsp
optional garnish: chopped green onion

Steps

1. Whisk the honey, soy sauce, garlic, and ginger (if using) together in a medium bowl.
2. Place shrimp in a large zipped-top bag. Pour 1/2 of the marinade mixture on top, stir and then allow shrimp to marinate in the refrigerator for 15 minutes or for up to 8-12 hours. Cover and refrigerate the rest of the marinade for step 3. 
3. Heat olive oil in a skillet over medium-high heat. Place shrimp in the skillet. (Discard used marinade.) Cook shrimp on one side until pink– about 45 seconds– then flip shrimp over. Pour in remaining marinade and cook it all until shrimp is cooked through, about 1 minute more.
4. Serve shrimp with cooked marinade sauce and a garnish of green onion. The sauce is excellent on brown rice and steamed veggies on the side.

Matcha (Green Tea) Frappuccino

Ingredients

Ice cubes - about 10
Whole milk - 1 cup
Vanilla extract - 1tsp
Powdered sugar - 3 TBSP or to taste
Premium Japanese matcha-green tea powder - 1.5 TBSP

Whipped cream for topping (optional)

Steps

1. Blend all ingredients in Vitamix until smooth, creamy and even in color.

2. Serve with whipped cream topping