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#7 Bean Curd Wrap

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I love this dish in dim sums. Dim sums usually either have this version steamed or deep fried. Of course, I prefer the steam version and that's the version I made here. Easiness: 3/5 Tastiness: 3/5 Verdict: There's definitely extra effort in wrapping the bean curd, but this effort wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. The bean curd sheet is also pretty durable. In the end, what I made didn't taste as good as the dim sum version. Maybe because it has meat in it. Also also it was way too salty. Recipe Link Ingredients: 12 Shitake mushrooms 5 oz bamboo 3.5 oz enoki (aka golden needle mushroom) 2 tbsp sesame seeds 1 tspn veggie oyster sauce (I accidentally added too much on this one so use a spoon) pepper to taste 1 tspn soy sauce 1 tspn black vinegar 1 pinch sugar 1/2 tspn chili pepper flakes dash of lemon juice Chop the mushroom and bamboo shoots.  I use roasted sesame seeds. I think the Japanese here says sushi goma. Is that right?  Stir fry the sesame, mushroom,
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#6 Spicy Vegetarian Meat with Mushroom

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Hello again! I love trying dishes with new ingredients; it's highly rewarding because a new ingredient can end up being really tasty. But it can also be really disappointing when it tastes like crap. This time it tastes like crap.  Tonight I made vegetarian meat with mushroom. If there is one thing I learned from this adventure, it's that monkeyhead mushrooms do not taste good! The recipe is pretty simple if you skip the deep frying part. Like I said in my first blog post, there's no way I'm going to deep fry. I just can't get myself to do it. Once you start deep frying one thing, other things won't sound as bad and before you know it you just dropped a batter-covered Twinkie into a sizzling bath of oil.  Easiness: 4/5 (although in reality, it felt like 2/5) Tastiness: 1/5  Verdict: I wouldn't make this dish ever again. Granted, anything deep fried usually tastes better, so I didn't stay true to the recipe. But monkeyhead mushrooms taste terrible! May
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Sidetrack: Veggie Ham and Vegetable Stir Fry

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Well I'm starting to collect some leftover ingredients pretty quickly. What can I do but use them! So I'm going to give you a sidetrack of my own impromptu cooking. It's quick and basic (were talking carrots and peas);  it's tasty and I'm lazy. Also since it's a sidetrack, I won't provide rating/verdict on this one. The prepared dish is still vegetarian if you are wondering but not exactly Buddhist kosher because I added onion and garlic. Fun fact: Buddhists do not eat onion and garlic because 1) it smells and 2) it causes lust and desire. That's a shame because I love love love onion and garlic and in my own experience, whether I abstain from it or not, my insides are just as fiery. Haha. Yes. I said fiery. Anyways, I love garlic and onion so in it goes too. Here's how to make it:  Ingredients for stir fry: leftover veggie ham leftover carrots some frozen peas 1 medium onion 1 tspn ginger 1 tspn garlic 1 tspn veggie oyster sauce 1 tspn soy sauce 1
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#5 Soup of Bundles

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Yum yum. This is the first soup in this food blogging adventure. I love a good hearty soup. And just so you, the reader, know every fifth recipe I blog about will be a soup. So if you are into soups check out #5, #10, #15, #20 and so forth as they come. This dish should really be called "Soup of Unbundles" because I was lazy and didn't tie those bundles up. So much for that, but I have things to do, ok? Also, I didn't have the strings. Easiness: 4/5 (if you leave them unbundled) Tastiness: 4/5 Verdict: I like soups and how easy this one is. If you have this as a stand alone dish, you can easily add noodles to give it more substance. I didn't have the dried gourd strings so I couldn't get a taste of every ingredient in each bite. This  would have  been nice but tying up all the bundles with gourd strings would probably put the easiness rating down to a 2.  To tie or not to tie that's up to you. I didn't tie.   Recipe Link Ingredients: 2 small handfu
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#4 Cauliflower in Red Sauce

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Holy moly! There's only two ingredients in this one: cauliflower and carrot seasoning oil. Carrot seasoning whaa? Yes. Carrot seasoning oil? Is there such a thing? Apparently, but I could not find this in Ranch 99. In fact, I didn't even use cauliflower, but a cousin of the cauliflower: romanesco. I found this beautifully patterned vegetable in the farmer's market. It has a distinct natural fractal pattern to it. There's me and my conch-like vegetable on the day I found it.  According to the ever dependable  wikipedia , romanesco is first documented in Italy in the 16th century. Personally, it has a very similar taste and texture to cauliflower. I'm also not a big fan of cauliflower because it I find it very bland, so my rating on this is already biased. If you love cauliflower, like my friend Alex does, you may disagree. Easiness: 5/5  Tastiness: 2/5 Verdict: It's an average taste: pretty one-dimensional since it's really only one main ingredient. I add
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#3 Stuffed Tofu

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My mom has a very similar dish in her cooking repertoire. In her version, she uses tofus and eggplants as the vessels for the filling which is primarily fish paste. I'm not really a fan of fish paste so her version never grew on me. On the other hand this dish doesn't have any fish paste so it's very tasty. On the down side, it was long and difficult to prepare; I didn't even finish making the final product! Easiness: 1/5  Tastiness: 5/5 Verdict: Really tasty. But the effort of mincing 5 things and then steaming and frying fragile tofu is way too much for the average busy person. I felt a bit on the overwhelmed side for this one. This recipe would be better if you were making for a larger crowd and had a proper machine to do the mincing for you. I also recommend skipping the frying part. A steamed-only version of the dish is pretty darn good already. Recipe Link Ingredients: 4 oz veggie ham 6 baby carrots 3 shitake mushrooms 2 oz pi
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