Christmas Treats

.... I am backlogged. I am just going to work from the current ones and work back. It seems much easier that way. So this time my sister and I decided to make treats to bring to coworkers and friends. Lets see whats inside! (Oh, and I'm also trying out the left alignment, but I'm not liking it too much) .

Surprise Cake balls!!

First, I'll start off with the red velvet cake. Red velvet seems like a lot of work and with so little time we decided to go with the box. Luckily we found that Duncan Hines has a boxed red velvet cake. Hooray! It was much easier than using the Betty Crocker version with red food coloring. For the frosting we used a simple cream cheese frosting.

I was having difficulty making equally sized balls. We usually make them much smaller so we were trying to decide on size.

These are the balls dipped in chocolate with three snowflakes on top. We used the red aluminum foil to wrap them in.

All wrapped up and ready to go!

Next, we have this rich chocolate cake we found on http://inncuisine.com/decadent-desserts/have-your-cake-and-eat-it-too-recipe-deep-dark-chocolate-cake/
This cake was extremely good with the frosting all by itself. That's why we kept some as cake, but we still made plenty of balls.

This time we put one snowflake on each ball. Aren't they cute?

The chocolate balls were wrapped in sliver.

Time for some pumpkin balls.

Pumpkin Cake Recipe:

• 2 cups all purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons baking soda
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• 1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
• 1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
• 4 eggs
• 1 cup vegetable oil
• 2 cups sugar
• 2 cups canned or fresh pumpkin puree

Directions:

1. Spray a 9 x 13 inch pan with vegetable spray and dust with all purpose flour. Tap out excess.
2. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
3. Combine flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, and cloves in medium bowl and set aside.
4. In another bowl combine eggs, oil, and sugar and beat until smooth, approximately 1 minute. Add pumpkin puree and mix again.
5. Add dry ingredients 1 cup at a time and mix until blended, smooth and lump free.
6. Pour into baking pan.
7. Bake at 350 degrees F for 35-45 minutes or until pick comes out clean.

Cream Cheese Cinnamon Frosting:

• 8 oz cream cheese, softened
• 2 tablespoons butter, softened
• 2 cups confectioner's sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1/4 tsp cinnamon
• water as needed

Directions:

1. Beat cream cheese and butter until creamy.
2. Add confectioner's sugar 1/2 cup at a time.
3. Add vanilla and cinnamon.
4. If the frosting is stiff add a tsp of water at a time until you get a nice consistency.

To make the balls we broke up the cake in the food processor and mixed in the cream cheese frosting. Then, from there you can roll in to balls.

The line up (This time the balls were more uniform in size)

We dipped these first in chocolate and then half way in white chocolate.

Of course we needed gold wrapping for these balls.

Won tons continued..

So it was a success!! Hooray! I followed the basic recipe below, but I omitted the msg. I added a couple of things to spice it up. I have mushrooms and whole shrimp. Let's take a look.. So it's either really dark or bad flash.. Can't find a good spot to take pics yet.

Cooked Won tons

When I wrap I put a little meat, shrimp and mushroom.

These skins weren't the best. It would break easily while I was wrapping.. I only take one pack out at a time because exposure to the air will make the skins dry out and harder to wrap.

Won Ton

It has been a busy quarter at school.. I totally forgot about this blog.. Oops.. However, I'll try and keep this up and working next year. So this is my parent's won ton. Yummy! I plan to try this out for myself this week. Let's see how that goes.

Ingredients:

• 2 lbs of boneless pork leg (ground)
• half a bag of dried black fungus strips (cloud ears)
• 3 stalks of celery
• shrimp
  
• Dried shitake mushrooms
• 2 packages of won ton skins
• 3 chicken bouillon cubes
• Chinese broccoli
• Fried tofu
• Egg white won ton noodles
  

Directions:
Soak the mushrooms and fungus so they soften.

Peel shrimp and marinate with MSG and salt. Allow it to sit and marinate. Later, chop into small bits to be wrapped. You can omit the MSG if you want.

Chop celery and fungus.

Mix meat, celery, and fungus together. Sprinkle MSG (less than a teaspoon, and add pepper and garlic powder (Add enough so that you can smell it). Next, add about a tablespoon of corn starch and 3 tablespoons of fish sauce. Mix together and then at the top put a small spoon of oil. Let marinate for 2 hours.

Saute mushrooms adding some garlic powder to flavor, and then dice.

Peel the won ton skins. Take a spoonful of meat, mushroom, and shrimp.

Boil water and toss in the wan ton. Do not over fill the pot. You may have to cook them in batches. When the wontons float take them out. If there is extra meat left over, throw in to make meat balls.

To make broth, boil 3 bouillon cubes in a small pot with water. When they have totally disintegrated strain out black particles with a cheese cloth. Pour into a larger pot and add water. While the soup is cooking any left over shrimp or mushrooms throw in. Cook the chinese broccoli and warm tofu in soup. When these are all warmed or cooked place on top of the noodles.

Now to make won ton noodles you must cook each bowl separately. Separate the amount of noodles per person while at the same time opening up the noodles. Bring a small pot of water to a boil, while boiling throw in noodles. Allow to cook for 25 seconds or so and quickly strain out noodles.

Place tofu, won tons, broccoli, and any extra items in bowl and pour soup once it has boiled.

* To make the dip for the won ton, mix soy sauce and red vinegar together.

Won ton noodles

Won ton skin

Mixture of meat

Uncooked wrapped won tons

All done and ready to be served!

Teriyaki Chicken Thighs

So this is a really quick and easy dish that my sister made for me. It was really good and flavorful. The corn was provided by Green Giant, but still good.

Ingredients:

• Chicken thighs
• Chicken Marinade Teriyaki Flavor

Directions:

1. Place chicken thighs in container
2. Pour chicken marinade over meat
3. Refrigerate over night
4. In the morning flip chicken to marinate other side
5. Preheat oven to 400 degrees
6. Place chicken in oven safe pan and cook for 1 hour or until chicken is cooked

MINTS!!!

So I heard that mints are pretty easy to grow and instead of always going to the market to buy some I decided to try this myself. From what I've read online, mints grow really well. If you do not grow them in a pot or separate them from the rest of the garden they will take over! So I grew my mints from cuttings. Basically, I bought mints at the store, used them and stuck the stems in a cup.

At first I wasn't getting any roots. I also noticed that the roots looked a little dead so I thought since they have been cut for who knows how long, so I cut them to give them fresh ends so the mints could absorb the water. In a couple of weeks I got roots!!!!!!

So this isn't the best picture(because my camera just can't do it), but I wanted to show the roots that grew. I let them grow a good amount before planting them in the soil.

Now my mints are planted and i am waiting for more to grow!

Steamed Fish (Chue Heu)

This is one of my favorite dishes. This time we had rock fish. It looks like a mess but the fish was too big for the plate so it was cut in half. But let me tell you, it was a delicious!

Rock Fish

Ingredients:

• Fish (Rock fish in this case, but you can also use catfish)
• Ginger
• Green onions
• Soy sauce

Directions:
Clean fish and marinate with salt. Bring a pot of water to a boil with a rack inside. When it is boiling place fish and cap. Let cook for 30 minutes and then check. Slice ginger and green onions at an angle to get thin strips. Once the fish is cooked place them on top. Boil oil in a small pot. Listen for the pops of the bubbles and when they stop pour the oil over the fish, ginger and green onions. Make sure to pour it all over. Tilt the plate to pour the oil back in to the pot. Add soy sauce and allow to boil. Once you hear the bubbles pour over fish.

Lotus Root Sweet and Sour Salad

It's been awhile, but school started and things are starting to get busy! So I remember I had this dish for the first time when my fourth aunt came from Vietnam. It's been awhile, so I asked my mom to make it. It is a nice and light meal.

Ingredients:

• Pickled lotus rootlets (1 jar)
• Cucumbers
• Mints (green one, purple one, and the spade leaf)
• Shrimp
• Green onion
• Red onion
  

Lotus Root

Directions:
Wash the lotus roots. Slice thinly by angling knife and rotating the root as you slice. Pour a spoon of white vinegar and let marinate. Boil water and cook shrimp (add some salt to flavor), peel and then slice in half. Slice cucumbers into strips. Cut up mints. Slice green and red onions.

Mix together and serve with Niet mam (fish sauce).