2022 Summer Food Photo Journal - Anything from Tempura, Fried Fish, Flan, Waffled Potatoes, DANGO, TAJIN, ARANCINI, etc

 It was a fun summer.  It was exceptionally hotter than any other year.  My garden plants were stressed from the heat.  Scorched and sun burned.  

But, food is good as always in  the kitchen.  Testing this and that and still making the best of the COVID-19 aftermath is what I really wanted to say, but the COVID-19 didn't go away.  We managed to control it with the vaccine and booster shots and thanks to our staff in medical field fighting them daily.  We get to move onto the next steps to live kind of side-by-side with it.  My favorite of the time is cooking at home.  Craving for good fried fish and chips or coming up with creative cooking, testing old recipes.  So, here is my photo journal of summer 2022.

Waffled Potatoes for breakfast.

I hate this blogger app not doing what it used to do.  Uploading pictures in reversed order.  Anyways, you get it.

Fresh Green Onions are plenty all year around my garden.  Green Onion pancakes are so delicious.

 

Bell Peppers with ZA'TSAI - preserved vegetable and pork

 

Stir fried Ketchup Shrimp

Good Old Fashion French Fries in oil.

Blanched 1st.

Then, fried again.

Fried fish and tempura vegetables

Batter

Thinking of Asparagus Festival...

ZARUSOBA

FLAN tenderness testing.

Making perfect ANKO.

Making DAIFUKUMOCHI - microwave method

Making MITARASHI DANGO

Testing SOBA ZA JIANG MIEN

More FLAN testing.

Trying Omeletto Rice like the Omeletto Guy...  I think it has way too much rice goodies.

Poor presentation.   More testing.

Yummy TAJIN cooking.

Would it ripen better upside down?

MATCHA CHIFFON Cake.

POTSTICKERS

Stir fried Bitter Melons

Lemon Drop Cookies - Perfect taste.

Trying to make a homemade energy snack.

Green Onion Pancake

Matcha cookies

Pandan Chiffon Cake.  Testing Pandan powder.  Result?  my fresh squeeze Pandan is better.

 

More DANGO

Muffins with homemade raisins

And Cookies

Power loaded Chiffon Cake

As usual, I do not use Baking Powder - It's powered by Meringue.

Testing with MarthaWhite Self-Rising Flour.  Wished they have one that is unbleached.

Nice home grown limes.

ZA JIANG CUCUMBER NOODEL

Trying to make thin crackers, but I guess the batter is not thin enough.

Fig Jam

Making ARANCINI.

Frying over Induction Stove.

Testing MOZZARELLA's Pull length.

Passed!

2 egg Chiffon Muffins for Breakfast

Shepherd's Pie my way.

Salted eggs over ground pork pie.  Tying to make one of the dish commonly served while in S. Viet-Nam.

Hmmm.... does not look the same.  Back to drawing board.

1 egg Chiffon Cake

to be continued.

Homemade Raisins from the Homegrown Seedless Grapes

 Made another good use of the Dehydrator and sun... 

The grapes grew great this year - seedless green Thompson.  Just enough to enjoy them without becoming overwhelmed with them.

After a good washing with Salted water and several good rinse to assure all natural residents were moved out.  Removed the end stem from each and every single grape and placed on the dehydrator tray.  The initial dehydration started around 10 pm.  2 days it ran at 350'F.  During the weekday's peak hours, I shut it down to save energy and to keep the room cool.  Then, turn it back on close to midnight.   The whole process took about 3 days plus natural air dry.   I also had a 2nd crop from a different grape vine that produced red grapes, but it has seeds.  I sun dried the red grapes under the sun for a few hours twice.  The outside temperature were around 106'F, so why not.  Then, I used the Dehydrator to do the rest of the drying.

Result - Seedless grapes turned out to be a great raisins.  I sprinkled some Fruit-Fresh ascorbic acid to mix with raisin in a jar. 

After 4+ weeks(?), it started to turn translucent/ripe.

When they started to show translucency and birds started to eat them, it's time to bag them.

After waiting patiently for them to reach the sweetness - about 2+ months?

Time to Spray wash. Then, dunk wash in salted water to get rid of the hiding residents.

Not bad looking bunch.

 

 

The only greatest thing about homemade raisin - no sulfur that makes me itchy.

But sure took many hours to dehydrate.  I will try drying the next time by leaving them hanging until they turn or look shriveled a bit before picking to dry them in the dehydrator?  but then, they won't be clean unless I wash them as they hang on the vine. 

These are the red with seeds.  They did not grow in a uniform bunch ways as the green grapes did.  They grew erratically here and there.  Interesting.  It just grew here and there in a single or twosies - not as a bunch.  This is the only one that look like a bunch.  The raisins turned out crunchy!  LOL.