Category Archives: Asian Recipes

Macy’s Cooking Demo: The Food Gal Makes Joong with Chef Alexander Ong

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Chef Alex Ong of Betelnut teaching me how to fold a joong rice tamale at Macy's. (Photo by Ben Seto)

Last Saturday afternoon at Macy’s Union Square in San Francisco, I wrapped my first Chinese rice tamale ever — before a standing room-only crowd.

I couldn’t have done it without the good cheer and great instruction from Executive Chef Alexander Ong of the popular Betelnut restaurant in San Francisco.

Though I’d grown up eating these glutinous rice tamales stuffed with pork belly, mung beans and salted duck egg yolks, I’d never made one myself.

But what better time to try my hand at it than last weekend, when the San Francisco International Dragon Boat Festival took place off the waters of Treasure Island.

The rice tamales (known as joong in Cantonese or zongzi in Mandarin) are the food most associated with the sport of dragon boating, which originated more than 2,000 years ago in Southern China.

All wrapped up and ready to be boiled for two hours. (Photo by Ben Seto)

The hidden filling of Chinese sausage and portobellos. (Photo by Carolyn Jung)

According to legend, a popular poet and statesman was wrongly accused of treason. So despondent was he that he committed suicide by jumping into a river. Local fishermen, who admired the statesman, paddled out in their boats to try to rescue him to no avail. They beat drums and threw rice dumplings into the water to try to scare away fish and sea dragons from his body.

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Steven Raichlen’s Chinatown Ribs

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Ribs to make you go "wow.''

These are the ribs of my Chinese-American childhood — only way better.

You’ll recognize them by their deep, shiny red color of candied apples. They’re the sweet, sticky ribs so often enjoyed on appetizer platters at Chinese restaurants. I remember them as the ribs my late-Dad would pick up by the pound at a Chinatown deli, wrapped still warm in a foil-lined bag, which he toted home to enjoy for our weeknight family dinners with plenty of fluffy steamed rice alongside.

Barbecue-meister Steven Raichlen one-ups those with this recipe for “Chinatown Ribs” from scratch in his “Raichlen on Ribs, Ribs, Outrageous Ribs” (Workman). Their flavor, reminiscent of char siu or Chinese barbecued pork, is so much more vibrant than the ribs you can buy in Asian delis. There’s a far deeper complexity, what with the notes of ginger, garlic and star anise, plus the bite of fresh scallions strewn over the top. They’re also far juicier.

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Food Gal’s Second Video: Extras From My Debut Cooking Demo at Macy’s Union Square

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For those who enjoyed my first video — which recapped my cooking demo debut at Macy’s Union Square San Francisco on June 11, 2011 — here’s an “extras” reel to kick back with.

In this second video, you’ll get to know me a little better, as I tell you about my family, how I got my start in food writing, and how I became known as the Food Gal.

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Steven Raichlen’s Thai Grilled Chicken

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Break out the grill for Thai-style chicken fragrant with lemongrass, ginger and curry powder.

The Aussies may love their shrimp on the barbie.

But we Americans can’t get enough of chicken on the grill.

After all, it’s economical, versatile and always a crowd-pleaser.

Especially when it’s tender, moist and flavored with a fragrant Thai paste like this one from “Steven Raichlen’s Planet Barbecue!” (Workman Publishing) by that master of the grill, Steven Raichlen. This book, of which I received a review copy,  is sure to whet your appetite with its more than 300 recipes inspired by the cuisines of six continents.

You marinate a quartered chicken (we used chicken thighs) with a paste of garlic, fresh ginger, lenongrass, cilantro, sugar, pepper, soy sauce and curry powder. Raichlen says to use a mortar and pestle, but a food processor will make easy work of it even quicker.  Let the paste do its magic on the chicken for at least four hours in the fridge or overnight.

The southern Thailand-style chicken grills up with nicely charred skin that takes on a golden hue from the curry powder. You can really taste the lemongrass and ginger, plus a warm earthiness from the curry powder.

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Digging Daikon

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Japanese radish in a thick, creamy sesame-mustard sauce.

The other day, I found myself with an extra daikon lying around the house.

Don’t you just hate it when that happens?

Oh, it’s not like I temporarily lost it in the wash or found it underneath a sofa pillow. It’s just that I had bought a couple of these white, carrot-shaped, 14-inch-long Japanese radishes for a braised dish, and was left with one remaining one that didn’t quite have a purpose yet.

The mild radish, which also comes in Chinese and Korean versions, can be enjoyed raw or cooked. My Japanese-American husband fondly remembers his late-Mom grating it and mixing it with shoyu for an easy dipping sauce. And anyone who’s ever eaten sashimi at at Japanese restaurant will recognize it immediately as the crisp, white strands that so often brace fanned slices of raw fish on a plate.

I was hankering to use it as an easy side dish of some sort when I found just what I was looking for in the cookbook, “At the Japanese Table” (Chronicle Books) by Lesley Downer, a cooking teacher and journalist fluent in Japanese who splits her time between London and Tokyo.

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