Holiday special--Cranpeapple sauce

Cranberry is called the ruby of north America. Not only because of its shining crystal red color, but also for its rich nutrition. Ocean spray has a lot of info on their products wrap, so I would rather not bother babbling all of those commercial cliche. But anyway, cranberry is good for your health and also, given the sourness, it's a good "kick" for those palate who are spoiled by those over-sweet American dessert.

Today, I will share with you my own cranberry sauce recipe which is mingled with a touch of apple and pear. This combination gives the sauce a more creamy texture, and mellow aroma. The most important thing is I can decreased the sugar in half compare to traditional recipe but still get a reasonable sweetness. If you are concerned about the 'jamming' reaction which calls certain amount of sugar to extract enough pectin, by no means add more sugar please. But since it's called "SAUCE" instead of jam...You know what I mean:)


Materials:

1 medium pear (any kind)

1 medium apple (any kind)

1 12oz cranberry

0.5 cup sugar in the raw (or to taste)

0.5 teaspoon pie spice mix (mainly cinnamon, ginger and nutmeg)

A few words before the steps:

For apple kind, I recommend aromatic variety like Jonathon, Jonagold or Gala (at least not Granny smith, I also not recommend Fuji) because the texture here is not important, all I need is the fragrant scent and "apple sauce-like" creaminess from the apple. So it would take too long to cook those too crisp apples but with no bonus to the flavor at all.

For sugar kind, I used sugar in the raw because it is a medium browned sugar. So it has a slight caramel taste in it which matched really well with the pie spice. This will give the whole sauce a more warm and mellow overall taste note.


Steps:

Peel and core the apple and pear, cut into small chunks;

Rinse the cranberry under tap water briefly;

Add around half cup of water into a sauce pan, pour everything into the pan, stir and stir;

Bring to a boil and then turn down into low heat and simmer for about 15min with the lid covered.

You may need to add a little more water in between until get the desired consistency.

When it reaches a relatively consistent texture with no obvious apple/pear chunks, it's done and you can store them in jar, Pyrex or any kind of glass/ceramic container. The acid in the sauce is too harsh for metal. As for plastic ware, they are too low-end OK?

NOTE: The cranberry will "pop" while the heat going on, when the sauce is getting thicker, it also tends to splash. These two things can be extremely dangerous. So be careful, always keep the lid around you or just cover the pan as a shield.


The sauce has the most gorgeous reddish color I have ever seen in the world! Also, my recipe is kind of tart, so taste it before done, if it is too sour for you, add another tablespoon of sugar.

Have fun! Let me know what do you think and happy holiday season!

Visiting the new FANCY dining place in IUPUI--INdulgent weekend

Tower Dining--Visiting the new dining place in IUPUI

Finally!!! I am very glad to share with you this new dining place in my campus in IUPUI called "Tower dining". I heard about this on a student activity meeting earlier this semester and the rumor said it was pretty GOOD. And here I come! 

It features "all you care to eat" buffet type service. I think the price is relatively reasonable. 

$6.49 for breakfast and LATE NIGHT. (This is kind of impressive! So they opened until 11pm during week days which would good to have a little fuel-up after hard studying)

$7.49 for lunch, dinner and BRUNCH. (This is also kind of interesting! Maybe I will try that out sometime in the future.)

Here is the link for the "Official information" and their "Weekly menu". 

I came this Friday for dinner around 6:30pm. So $7.49.

Here starts the trip!

The atmosphere and environment:

It was definitely decorated towards contemporary and modern feel. Instead of just arranging lines, rows of single kind of dining furniture, there are lots of "sub-area" with different decorations and types of chairs. Here are some examples:

This type of chair is really comfy! But maybe a little showy because there is no table...

I like the ceiling design because I will show you later that here is also where the fresh salads located. So pretty match the "colorful variety of choices" theme around here.

The overall lighting is OK but I probably would prefer just a little bit brighter.

There were not so many dinners this time so it didn't feel crowded but the table spaces is quite spacious anyway.

Overall rating for the environment: 4.5 stars!

The choices/menu selection: 

There are basically 5 parts:

Fresh market: Greens (mainly salads)

The kitchen: routinely changed everyday and every meal based on the menu. Mainly variety of American, Mexican, European et al. 

Baker's Crust: traditional American meal including burger and pizza. Minor changes.

Eat, Learn and Live:  routinely changed based on the menu. Mainly stir fry or grill style like Mongolian beef, Greek Gyro type stuff

Pantry: all day long "breakfast" choices including bagels, sandwich breads, cereal, milk, juice, coffee and ICE CREAM with cone (not waffle, just "card board type")! 

The Pantry and Baker's Crust will open all day long with only small changes; 

Eat, Learn and Live will provide special breakfast, lunch and dinner also based on the menu;

The other 2 will only open for lunch and dinner.

Some snapshots:

First comes the greens:

There are lots lots of salads items in fresh market to choose from which is great!

Then, the traditional parts:

Baker's Crust is not so impressive if multiple choices for Burger could count...And i am surprised that this section will open all day long especially LATE NIGHT which means if you study hard late and came here with full of craving and hope. Except for a super early "breakfast", all you can choose is burger and pizza...Be healthier please...

(Sorry I didn't have time to take pictures of the Kitchen because they closed toward 7pm and I arrived pretty late this time. But basically nothing really special. This time they had a taco bar with some grilled veggies.) 

Eat, Learn and Live:

Stir fry type section! Looks pretty good and delicious!

The last but not least, Pantry!

There is also several jars of bagels which I didn't have pictures here.

See that toaster there? I hear they will also have INN type waffle in the morning.

The choices are plenty but I have to say remember to toast your bread because they are dry out. Probably because it was nearly the end of the day.

Overall rating for the selection: 4 stars

The food:

Smart me...when I finished taking pictures, other than the pantry and pizza, everything else were closed. So I paid the dinner price but got a LATE NIGHT food (although I did get some salads)...Anyway...

Other than the ice cream, everything else were still pretty "cafeteria". Not so impressive. I can clearly tell the ingredients are exactly the same from Reliy and Simon cancer center. Just a little bit more choices. 

Also, I found it's interesting since I volunteered twice at hospitality position for national swimming championship contest last and this year (in the Natatorium). The bagels tastes exactly the same (I can even tell the brand!) which means the whole mass scale catering system in IUPUI is the same one. I guess it's for economic consideration which is understandable.

Overall rating for the food: 3.5 stars

Other observations:

Since they advocate this dining place with an "all you care to eat" theme. They do have healthy flyers stick everywhere and nutrition fact for every dish. They also have a pretty cool dirty dishes recycling window.

These little considerations win me back maybe 0.5 stars maybe from... the food part.

So, as a summary:

Environment: 4.5 

Selection: 4

Food: 3.5

Others: 4.5

I would give them 4 for overall rating. 

Buzzing afterwards:

When I first heard about this place, I was quite excited and full of hope that this may be a pioneer for an upscale, healthy yet reasonable priced dinning choice in a school context. I am not very disappointed but I guess it's still a "cafeteria" and how fantastic you can expect from a cafeteria? 

But listen Jaguars, this place is still really cool and worth checking out!

Leave comments please if you have any thoughts or tried their breakfast and brunch!

Dare Connoisseur--First post! Cow and goat yogurt from Kroger

Dare Connoisseur--First post!

Since this is the very first post in my "Dare Connoisseur" category, I want to explain a little about the "rules" I plan to follow from now on. I think this will keep the posts well-arranged and easy to follow.

Every "Dare connoisseur" post will review one or more products. It contains mainly 3 parts:

1. Fundamental Info including prices, nutritional facts and places where I purchased etc. 

2. In-depth analysis including comments on flavor, texture, wrapping design etc.

3. Summary at a glance. I will give "stars" out of 5 to:

Overall value;

Flavor/taste;

Worth of the money;

Then some highlights including both positive and negative. I will keep this as succinct as possible.

At last, the bottom  line that whether I would buy it again or not.

So, if you are kinda "in rush", just read the first part and scroll all way down. 

I hope you enjoy the coming food adventures in this category!

OK, today I want to share a yogurt product I found recently.

Cow and Goat Nonfat Greek yogurt from Kroger

I like browsing around the "Nature's market" food aisles in Kroger so much! It's like exploring treasures buried in the mine. 

As a Diary lover (Maybe prone to fermented side a little bit more like yogurt and cheese), it 's impossible to miss the diary fridge. And this passing weekend, I found this kinda interesting Greek yogurt which is a mixture of Cow and Goat milk.

For cheeses, I usually don't like goat cheese or those made with sheep milk that much. But I am quite OK with mixed cheese so I thought why not give this guy a try.

Firstly with some fundamental info:

Flavors choice: Peach; Strawberry; Black cherry; Blueberry and pomegranate; Honey

Price: $1.39 without any sale ($1 on sale if you are lucky)

Weight: 150g

Calories: 150, 180 for the honey flavor (with the jam/honey I assume. But it's not very professional for it didn't give separated nutrition fact reference. You will know why I particularly pointed this out later.)

OK here we go! I bought the only "mixed" flavor which is Blueberry and pomegranate because that sounds fancier...

   

It comes with the typical "Mix as you like" type container and aluminum foil seal.

The image looks pretty fresh, clean and "organic". 

Open it!

Without adding the jam, the taste is already pretty balanced. A little bit tangy-ness from the sheep milk but not too much. Honestly it's almost covered by the cow milk but you can tell the difference from regular greek yogurt. As for the sourness, I would say it's within a reasonable range. Not too sour but maybe still need some sweet to pleasant it up.

I am impressed by the texture though. It is very creamy and smooth. Because remember this is a NON-fat GREEK yogurt. Usually this combination can make a quite grainy even crumbly yogurt. Plus the overpowered sourness. Unless you use it in recipes, it's really not for snacking. 

Actually regarding this, I couldn't help to babble a little bit more. I am sorry but the "big name" in Greek yogurt FXGX is kind of disappointing in this aspect for their nonfat variety. I admit the taste is outstanding yet the texture and overall sourness is...just...too much.

But this one did a really good job. I didn't taste pure sheep/goat yogurt before so I don't know whether it was because of that.

Then I added the jam. First of all, I would applause for the combination of blueberry and pomegranate which makes a mellow "berry-ish" flavor. But it is maybe a little too sweet and syrupy/runny. Of course, it is supposed to mix with the yogurt. Here you go!

  

As we can see, the texture of the jam is quite thin and there were few berries in the container. I end up with mixing in only about 1/3 of the jam which was already pretty sweet. But I would say the mixture tastes really good! Here speaks to the question I raised earlier. I believe there are people like me who don't like just dump in and mixing everything. So It would be nice if I can have an idea how does the nutrition facts look like only for the yogurt part.

Summary at a glance:

Overall value: 4 stars

Flavor/taste: 4 stars

Worth of the money: 4 stars

Highlight: kinda unique niche for its "mixed background" of cow and goat, and the yogurt has quite an outstanding texture as a nonfat player

Bottom line: I would buy it again but maybe only occasionally

Pumpkin special Sweet Teeth--"Pumpkin steam bun"

Pumpkin special Sweet Teeth-- 

"Pumpkin steam bun"（南瓜喜板）

OK. After a busy week, I sorted out this special SWEET TEETH post--Pumpkin!

Firstly, apologize for the kinda "creepy" color theme for this because this was initially made during Halloween weekend...Anyways.

I found this recipe in a bunch of Asian (probably Malaysian) food blogs. Here are some suggestions: (They are in Chinese though)

Xuanhong's Mom kitchen journal

Little umbrella's world

Actually this sweets's Chinese name wrote as "喜板" which is imitating the pronunciation of "Steam bun". This happens to lots of cases like "马芬/麦芬" to "Muffin", "司康" to "Scone", "慕斯"to "Mousse", "吐司" to "Toast" and "曲奇" to "Cookies". 

This bun has sweet glutinous rice flour in it. So it will be chewy and sticky which is actually fun to eat. I also used Osmanthus Fragrans flower infused honey(桂花蜜), also called sweet olive or sweet tea olive in English in this recipe which gives it a pleasant fragrant. If you ask me to describe the smell or taste of this flower, I would probably say between jasmine and green tea but with a hint of sweetness.

I hope you like this fall special recipe and really appreciate and enjoy this harvest season.

Here are a collection of the plant's picture, my dry sweet olive flower and infused honey I made by myself (just soak some of the dry flower into regular honey for couple of days)

Ingredients:
Sweet glutinous rice flour: 80g 
All purpose flour: 80g
Pumpkin puree: 80g
Sweet olive flower honey: 40g
Corn oil: 10g
Instant yeast: 1 tsp
water to adjust the consistency
Corn leaves/banana leaves/bamboo leaves 
(Just as a cloth under the buns to prevent sticking while steaming. You can substitute it with cheese cloth if it's hard to find those fancy authentic leaves. But they really give this sweets another layer of fragrance)

Steps:
Activate the yeast by mixing the yeast to a little bit warm water for about 5 min;
Mix everything;
Because the pumpkin puree has different water content if you purchased from supermarket or make your own. So add a little water at a time at last to adjust the consistency until it forms a soft but manageable dough.
Divide the dough and form them into little cute shapes as you like. (I divided them as 30g per bun)

Then, put them on those leaves in the steamer/steam pot with the heater off! For about 30min-1h until they rise a little bit. (Looked like puffed up cookies :-)

Turn on the burner and after observed the steam piping out, set timer as 15min.

After 15min, take them out immediately to prevent soggy surface. 

Serve warm or cold (it will become quite chewy after cold)

Few words after:

About sweet glutinous rice flour: 

This can be quite confusing if you browsing the international market. There are generally two kinds of rice flour: one is less sticky usually just called rice flour (粘米粉). The other one is more sticky which is this one I used here usually called sweet rice flour or glutinous rice flour （糯米粉）. Hope this will help! And I plan to have another separate "Food Lab" post discussing all kinds of "flour" which is available in supermarket. So stay tune!

About the outcome:

This is actually a 1:1:1 ratio recipe with 1 part pumpkin, 1 part rice flour and 1 part plain wheat flour. This works out fine but I found it tends to be a little too chewy. If I would make any change or improvement to this recipe next time. I would put less glutinous rice flour next time (maybe 2:3 for rice flour and wheat flour)

At last! Happy fall!

Let pumpkin rock!!!