Tried and Tested Recipe - Three Cup Chicken

I have always loved East Asian cuisine particularly Thai and Chinese. Their blend of flavors and combinations have always intrigued me and delighted my taste buds. I have been wanting to give a try to making both of these types of cuisine, but I have always felt intimidated by the ingredients required. Thank goodness for Cooking Channel's Ching-He Huang and her show Easy Chinese. She takes you through the process of making excellent Chinese food at home in a very comfortable manner and her recipes are great.

I found the recipe for Three Cup Chicken in Cooking Channel's website after watching the show and thought I should get out of my comfort zone and try it. This recipe was easy to follow and the results were absolutely delicious. I modified it slightly because I did not have a few ingredients and I also thought that sliced almonds would make a great addition to give it a little crunch. Here is what you will need for my modified version.

Three Cup Chicken

1 TBSP peanut oil
Garlic - 5 cloves finely chopped
Ginger - 1 inch piece, thinly sliced
1 pound boneless, skinless chicken thighs cut into 1/2 inch pieces
1/4 Cup Soy Sauce
1/4 Cup White Cooking Wine
1/4 Cup Toasted Sesame Oil
1 TBSP Brown Sugar
1/4 Sliced Almonds

Follow the link above to the recipe on Cooking Channel's website and follow the cooking instructions. Add the sliced almonds at the very end tossing them into the chicken to integrate them evenly through the chicken pieces. 

This is a great recipe to get into making Chinese food at home. Serve with either white or Jasmine rice and vegetables. Enjoy :)

Red Hook Does it Again - Baked = Bakers' Heaven

I don't know if it seems obvious yet, but I love a well made baked good. Today I would like to give some love to a place I have been infatuated with for almost a month. That place is Baked in the Red Hook area of Brooklyn. I first became aware of them through Cooking Channel's show Unique Sweets because everyone on the show was talking about their sweet treats, but in particular they were talking about the Brooksters (what you get when you marry one of Baked's brownies and one of their chocolate chip cookies). I thought this place needed to be checked out, so I decided to enlist my husband on the quest to keep an eye out for it since we are already going there to go shopping at the Fairway in Red Hook anyway.

Finding them was super easy, and so was falling in love with the wonderful food that they make. While it is mostly sweet treats that you will find here, there are some savory tidbits to be had and they are beautifully executed. I have tried the Brooksters and they are indeed good, but I think that my weak spot is for their PB Krispy Bar, because it is chocolatey, peanut buttery crispy goodness. Their brownies are what every brownie should seek to be, gooey chocolatey perfection, particularly the salted ones. Their coffee is also great so it is a winner in every sense. I recommend you try them if ever in NYC and, it does not matter what you have to do to get there, YOU MUST GO IF YOU LOVE BAKED GOODS. They will not let you down (unless you go when they are closed).

Baked storefront on Van Brunt Street

 A great array of sweets and drinks

 Salted brownie with a marshmallow on top

The PB Krispy Bar