V-day food love affair

Valentine's Day just passed and the holiday was chock full of young love in the air, people sporting chocolate bellies, and the local grocery store jam-packed full of people buying last minute candy-grams.

This year, I spent Valentine's hanging with four cute guys, including the diva shown above. Tumbleweed, or Bumblebutt, as MOH lovingly calls him, is one of our guinea pigs. He's quite the metro guy, and loves getting pampered in every way, whether it's getting an ear cleaning (you have no idea how much guinea pig wax collects in those cute ears) or having his hair specially blow-dried to perfection following a bath. 

For Valentine's, MOH and I decided to spend the night in and do a special dinner of things we love. 

MOH baked a dessert that I requested, and I would cook an entree that he requested. I requested double-chocolate cookies and MOH requested an authentic Thai dish called Kai palot. 

Kai palot is a pork and tofu sweet braised dish that has caramelized eggs. The sweetness of this dish lends itself to a five-spice blend mixture (contains cinnamon, fennel, sichuan pepper, cloves and anise). When I first tried this dish, it reminded me of a Vietnamese style dish, thit kho, normally sweet and salty and served with fermented mustard greens and pickled vegetables. Thit kho normally consists of pork belly and also features eggs submerged in a light brown broth that you eat over rice. 

MOH's request for kai palot couldn't have come at a better time. After the Vietnamese New Year, I got into a pickling craze.

It started off innocently at first. I saw mustard greens on sale at the grocery store and wanted to make fermented mustard greens to eat with rice porridge. Making pickled mustard greens was simple enough - you blanch the greens and submerge them in a salted water mixture for several days. Then, I saw napa cabbage on sale and was running low on my kimchi reserve. So I decided to up the ante and try my hand at kimchi. The results were pretty good and I was able to make a kimchi that was more forgiving with salt.

After kimchi, I decided to return to my Vietnamese roots and pickle some carrots and cauliflower. Pickled vegetables are a common side dish to eat during the new year. It goes great with just about anything - from thit kho to sticky rice cake to just popping the suckers into your mouth. I decided to make the kai palot and serve with the pickled vegetables I made. The results turned out pretty good and served for a nice V-day meal. It was also a win-win for us also, since our fridge has been loaded up with tons of pickling vegetables.

Hope everyone had a great Valentine's day! Also, it's a three day weekend, so hopefully you all have a great weekend and enjoy the Winter Olympics!

Ingredients for kai palot (modified from Temple of Thai's recipe):

- 4 eggs

- 1/2 pound of pork (belly preferable, but shoulder may do)

- 6 gloves of garlic, crushed

- 2 tablespoons of black pepper, coarsely grounded

- 1 package of bean curd, cut into square pieces (normally made with fried tofu)

- 5 tablespoons of soy sauce

- 5 tablespoons of sugar

- 3 tablespoons of chinese five-spice

- 1 tablespoon of vegetable oil

- 3 cups of water

Protocol:

1. Hard boil eggs - place eggs in water and boil for 15 minutes

2. Cut pork into square pieces 

3. Pound garlic and and place inside stock pot with pepper and oil - stir fry for about 1 minute until you can smell the mixture

4. Add in pork and stir fry until all sides browned

5. Add five-spice, soy sauce and water. Then add peeled boiled eggs into water. Simmer for at least 30 minutes.

6. Add sugar and bean curd pieces and continue to simmer for another 30 minutes.

7. When pork tender (depends on cut of meat), remove from heat and serve over rice with pickled vegetables.

Sure you want to eat that? You just did a run... visual appeal of food changes with exercise

For the past two weeks I started playing in an intramural league for soccer. It's a team made up of fellow grad friends and  has been more fun than I initially gave it credit for. It's a great form of release after a long day at work, and there's this great collegiality among your teammates in sharing the joys of a scored goal (we got 1 point last game, making our final score 1-5, 1 more point than we usually score!) or ragging on bad sportsmanship in a competing team.

Partly why our team is so awesome and we don't get totally slaughtered - we have an awesome goalie!

Another thing I didn't expect about playing outdoor soccer - the amount of soreness that I woke up to. I try to run regularly, but my body wasn't ready for the soccer match. Soccer, in my opinion is considered a high intensity exercise. There's bouts of sprinting down a field to catch a soccer ball, dodging to avoid getting hit in the shins by a stampede of competitive feet, and lots of quick movements to try to intercept balls. The day after our game, I couldn't move my thighs and had a 6 inch bruise and scratch running along my quad muscle, courtesy to the CogSci grad girl who decided to knee me during a play. You know how sore you are when in order to move your legs, you use your arms to pull up your legs... getting older, I tell you.

Despite the soreness, there's this great adrenaline and natural buzz that you feel after doing something physical. It's no secret that exercise is good for you. Exercise promotes brain growth and development (Cotman and Berchtold, 2002). High intensity exercises also enhance metabolism, burning off more fat than alternative exercises (Irving et al., 2008). But how about the effects on food? In particular, does our perception of food or how good something looks, change after exercise? Would our favorite indulgences lose appeal after doing some circuit sprints on the court?

Your call: a chocolate-y delight, or too close in resemblance to something else...?

As it turns out, a recent article published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition investigated how subjects perceive food following high intensity exercises.* One of their findings showed that areas of the brain responsible for "craving" foods were activated more when seeing low-calorie foods than high-calorie foods. This means that after a hard spin session, kickboxing class, or cross-fit boot camp, there's some sort of cross-talk between your muscles with your brain, signaling a preference for you to reach for the apple other than the curly-string fries. One caveat to this study, however, is the subjects were all male, so it would be interesting if there are any sex differences to this finding (maybe evolution would favor women to always crave the higher calorie food to promote survival and childbearing - it could explain why after a long run, I like to reach for a bag of cheetos).

Last weekend was Vietnamese/Chinese New Years. Vietnamese New Year is all about good fortune and prosperity. It's customary to normally ring in the new lunar year by doing a food offering for your ancestors, often cooking many traditional meals (somewhat analogous to Day of the Dead). During this offering, you ask for forgiveness for the past year, ask for luck for an upcoming mysterious new year, and ask for hope for your loved ones to succeed. New Years really focuses on spending time with friends and family and giving well wishes to loved ones.

A traditional setting for New Years - a feast offering for ancestors. Photo courtesy of D. Dinh

This New Years (albeit my greeting comes a bit late), I'd like to wish everyone a happy new year filled with lots of luck and good eating. I'm sure many of us have made resolutions to study or work hard, try to be healthier, procrastinate less, etc., but maybe this year, we can squeeze in moments full of good food and good company.

Good company not always appreciated, apparently by bunny

*The mentioned study was conducted using 15 physically-fit men who did 60 minutes of running at 60% maximum aerobic capacity and a resting control. After each trial, imaging of the brain was done using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to see which areas of the brain were differentially activated. They found that neural areas known as the reward system (insula and putamen) had increased activation to low calorie compared to high calorie food following exercise. In accordance to other studies, researchers also found appetite suppression (lower grehlin concentrations) after exercise.

References:

Cotman CW and Berchtold NC. 2002. Exercise: a behavioral intervention to enhance brain health and plasticity. Trends in Neuroscience. Jun; 25(6): 295-301.

Irving BA et al., 2008. Effect of exercise training intensity on abdominal visceral fat and body composition. 2008. Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise. Nov; 40(11): 1863-72.

Crabtree DR et al., 2014. The effects of high-intensity exercise on neural responses to images of food. American Journal of Clinical Nutrition. Feb;99(2): 258-67.

Carrot cake bites - foolproof recipe

I don't bake often, but this weekend was a busy weekend for MOH, my resident baker extraordinaire.. and I was craving carrot cake. MOH has been swamped with graduate recruitment (first years normally host), and I felt like changing up the weekend routine by baking up some muffins. What resulted weren't muffins, but let's just call them carrot cake bites. They're really tasty, not too sweet, and have a great softness to them.

I did a modification from a recipe I found on a gluten-free website, but added some raisins and walnuts instead of macadamia nuts since I didn't have any macadamias.

I was multitasking while making these carrot cake bites, so I stumbled with getting the exact measurements for some ingredients - the good news though, is this is a recipe that is foolproof for all us non-bakers out there! Instead of 1/2 teaspoon of xantham gum, I ended up using 3/4 (I'm eyeballing because I accidentally did 1 teaspoon, realized my mistake, then tried to scoop out some xantham gum). The resulting carrot cake bites ended up having this jiggly appearance like Flubber (old Disney movie) when they initially came out, but since cooling, they have stiffened up, yet retained their moist texture.

Ingredients - enough for 12 cupcake sized bites:

Dry ingredients

1 cup Bob's Red Mill all purpose gluten free flour (or any gluten free all purpose you have on hand)

1/2 teaspoon xanthan gum 

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

3/4 teaspoons baking powder

1/4 teaspoon kosher salt

2 teaspoons ground cinnamon 

3/8 cup granulated sugar

1/4 cup dark brown sugar

Carrot filling

1 1/2 cups peeled and grated carrots

3/4 cup chopped walnuts

1/2 cup of raisins

Wet ingredients

1/4 cup vegetable oil

2 eggs

1/2 teaspoon apple cider vinegar

1/4 cup almond milk

Protocol:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F

2. Add in dry ingredients (flour, gum, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon, sugar)

3. In a separate bowl, add in carrots, raisins, and walnuts - use some of the dry ingredients to coat with this mixture

4. Mix together oil, eggs, vinegar and milk - mix this wet mixture in with the dry ingredients 

5. Add in carrot, raisin, and walnut mixture (carrot filling) 

6. Grease or line cupcake tins - then carefully pour mixture into tins

7. Bake for 18 minutes, making sure to check if bites are fully cooked through (the 'ol toothpick trick - stick a toothpick into the bites and pull the toothpick out. If nothing is clinging onto the toothpick, it's cooked!)

8. Take out carrot cake bites and cool on a rack, or scarf down with milk

Happy eating all!

Restaurant week and oyster ramblings

Restaurant Week has started in Southern California, and MOH and I spent our Saturday evening trying out an oyster bar in Newport Beach. Restaurant Week is a great opportunity to try out new cuisines at an affordable price. If you're looking for new places to eat with friends or family, but haven't quite had the opportunity to venture out, Restaurant Week is the best time to try. Most restaurants feature set menus for lunch or dinner and offer wide varieties for anyone's unique dietary needs.

This weekend, we went to Fly N Fish Oyster Bar, this great restaurant located right off the Newport Beach. This place offers a beautiful sunset view in addition to a wide selection of seafood items, such as their infamous fish n' chips. For my meal, I ordered an oyster sampler and the lunch special with fish n' chips. While my food was pretty good (who can resist salty, perfectly seasoned "chips?"), I couldn't help but compare Fly N Fish to my experience at another oyster bar in Costa Mesa, which remains my favorite place to gulp on raw oysters.

Shuck Oyster Bar is this great little "hole in the wall" that specializes in seafood dishes. If you're not into seafood, they also make a mean grilled cheese and seafood medley stew that is so delicious, you won't be jealous of your friends slurping on delicious oysters.

I think oysters have a bad rap. Many people will cite the texture of the oysters as too booger-like to want to try, but I think oysters deserve second chances. If your only experience of eating oysters is through the can, you're missing out on how infinitely better raw, chilled oysters taste. It's like eating the ocean in your mouth, similar to taking a bite of uni (into sushi? If so, try uni at least once - it's truly briny in nature and salt laden, but so creamy and rich against the rice background) . Not a fan of oysters? If courageous enough, try one and believe me, you won't look back. Fresh oysters slip and slide so smoothly down your throat, you'll down 6 before you know it (trust me, I have experience). Each oyster has a distinctive taste, whether it's more firm or cushiony in texture, or more tame or briny in taste (depending on the source), every oyster has a different tale to tell. Try it! Don't try it for the aphrodisiac qualities (I'm skeptical about this and the literature out there on this claim is a bit scarce) - try it for the burst of flavor.

Assortment of oysters (photo courtesy of Guillaume)

Haven't had enough experience to know what oyster types you like? Or not even sure how many oyster types there are? Not to worry - oyster bar staff are normally extremely nice and knowledgeable. Similar to wine connoisseurs, the staff explain each type of oyster they have on hand, ranging from location of origin, to texture, to "brininess."

After our Saturday dinner, MOH and I spent Sunday running errands, heading to the beach, and lazing about with our babies. We have slowly transitioned giving Lily, our rabbit, full access to the entire apartment and she seems to be enjoying her new found freedom. She's pretty mobile, but most of the time she likes to stare, scowl, or give us the stink-eye when we eat dinner or watch T.V.

Lily's trademark no nonsense look

While our little venture during Restaurant Week didn't quite meet up to our expectations, the weekend is still young, and has provided a much needed break from the hectic work week.

Here's looking at a better week to come! Until next time, happy eating all!

Got a "go-to" place that you have in your hometown? If so, let me know - MOH and I are always into trying new things. Doesn't matter if it's not in California!

Sick Sundays... in other news - blood oranges are back!

This past week I got hit with some weird cold that just ate up my whole work week... and weekend. I'm sleeping 8+ hours (and still complaining about being tired), hack huge phlegm balls down the drain, and have been ejecting tidbits of soup all week long.

Soup has been an essential tool for a speedy recovery, with different variations circulating through our kitchen, as if like a strategy to make me not feel so grumpy about having soup day in and day out. MOH, ever the cheerleader, has been sucking it up and eating soup with me, but there's been a development in the current situation - he caved yesterday and gorged on fried honey-battered chicken wings and a plate of nachos, extra cheese please. We all have our vices though, right?

For the sick, our best healthy vices have to be oranges. These juicy, fleshy fruits are full of different nutrients that can aid towards a speedy recovery.  During this time of the year, two seasonal oranges can be found at your local grocery store or farmer's market - blood oranges and cara caras.

Imagine my excitement seeing both these oranges back at the Irvine farmer's market! My favorite oranges by far though, are blood oranges.

Blood oranges range from a blushful pink to deep red in color depending on the time of season, but taste like the love child of an orange and raspberry. Deep color, deep flavor. These oranges are not as sweet as the naval orange, but their flirtation with sour and tang leave you coming back for more. Blood oranges are also great for brain function. These oranges contain a rich antioxidant called anthocyanin, also found in blueberries, and have been shown to be important for enhancing memory and preventing cognitive decline.

These lovely oranges are in season for most of the wintry months until March, so there's still lots of time to check these oranges out and explore how to incorporate them into your recipes.

Just look for these oranges at your local produce store or farmer's market! Who knows, you may come across more seasonal treasures at your local market.

Photo courtesy of Jammmick 

Until next time, happy eating all!

Wintry treat for the soup lovers: simple sup mang cua (Vietnamese asparagus soup)

Soup is one of my favorite things to eat.

One of my favorite soups that MOH prepares is a simple napa cabbage soup with onions, tofu, grape tomatoes, cilantro, green onions and vermicelli. Whenever I eat this soup, I always think back on the time when I had food poisoning and MOH's soup was the only thing I could eat without vomiting.

If you like seafood type soups, you'll enjoy this Vietnamese asparagus soup, sup mang cua.

Sup mang cua was an essential "get better" soup during my childhood. Even this past holiday break, my mother prepared the soup as a way for my sister to combat a cold.  It's a light soup that contains crab, quail egg, asparagus, eggs, green onions, and cilantro. It has this great thickness, which lends to the cornstarch binding to the soup, and can be incredibly hearty with fresh stalks of asparagus, green onions, and crab loaded inside.

This soup is very simple to make and is so flexible with ingredient variation. I've seen this soup done with pork broth, chicken broth, crab stock, fish stock, so I think depending on what type of broth base you like, you can adjust accordingly. This is also a great soup to do once asparagus (white or green, depending on your preference) is in season!

Photo courtesy of Quadell

In addition, this soup is really light and serves for a great pick-me-up on a wintry day. One thing that is really unique about this soup are the quail eggs. Quail eggs are smaller than regular eggs, but packed with tons of flavor. They taste more rich and have this great creamy yolk - if you enjoy egg yolk as much as me, then you're in for a treat! 

Photo courtesy of Hisgett

 Ingredients for a standard pot of soup (6 quarts):

- 4 quarts of soup broth of your choice (chicken is preferable, though some people do pork broth for more flavor)

- 1 can of quail eggs (or fresh eggs, but you'll need to boil and painstakingly peel the shells!)

- Bundle of asparagus (white or green), sliced thinly or peeled in strips (can only peel if you first boil the asparagus separately)

- 2 cups fresh crab meat or canned (fresh tastes better, but canned can be done if on a tight budget or crunched for time!)

- 2 eggs, mixed like you're going to scramble them for breakfast

- 2 tbsp cornstarch for thickening agent

- 1 cup of chopped cilantro

- 1 cup of chopped green onions

- Salt, pepper, or fish sauce to season

Protocol: 

1. Put broth in pot and wait for boiling

2. Once broth is boiled, add in quail eggs

3. Add in asparagus (my mother likes to peel the asparagus into thin strips, but I'm super lazy so I just slice my asparagus) 

4. Add in crab meat, either fresh crab meat or crab meat from a can, your choice

5. While waiting for soup to boil, scramble 2 eggs and slowly add mixture into soup broth - this will create a stringy egg appearance in the soup, similar to an Egg Drop Soup

6. Season broth additionally with any salt and pepper, or fish sauce

7. Mix cornstarch with 1/4 cup of water and slowly add into the soup - the soup should thicken. If you want the soup to be thicker, add more cornstarch, but remember to first dissolve it into water - no one wants to eat clumpy cornstarch in their soup!

8. When of right consistency, turn off the heat and garnish soup with cilantro and green onions - enjoy with extra pepper if desired!

This soup can be customized accordingly depending on your flavor preferences. My mom likes to sneak in shredded chicken sometimes instead of crab, and it tastes just as good. I think the two ingredients that are non-negotiable are the asparagus and quail eggs, but if you find a cool variation, please share!

Until next time, happy eating all!

Late night munchies and holiday gorging: sleep deprivation effects beyond the baggy eyes

Hello everyone,

Hope everyone's holidays went well and that things are winding down before we all hit the work grind.

I just came back from spending the Christmas break with my family and had the chance to spend New Year's with MOH. Though the time with my family was short, I had a great time catching up with everyone and eating great food.

The holidays, though fun-filled, also come at a cost. For me, it has been indulging on favorite childhood eats and tons of sweet treats.

Homemade brittle for the holidays!

Sure, I tried to combat all the eating with getting in some exercise, but you can only run so many miles before the endless nights of snacking finally catch up to you. During the holidays, my body just goes into overdrive with eating, snacking, munching, chewing, you name it - it also doesn't help my case much that I don't sleep too much while I'm on break (trying to make the most of my time with family you know!). I don't know why the holidays prompt so many of us to stuff ourselves, but after seeing a recent article in Nature Communications, I'm thinking my overindulgence for extra fatty foods may be linked to my lack of sleep.

If only we all looked this cute sleeping (courtesy of J. Pockele)

In the article, Greer and colleagues wanted to determine if sleep deprivation affects food intake. Using human imaging studies, they found that sleep deprived individuals had different brain regions being activated while subjects looked at different types of foods. The different brain regions activated or inactivated during this task have been well documented to be important for food decision choices and food regulation. *

Furthermore, they found that sleep deprived individuals consumed higher fat content foods and preferred higher fat foods than well-rested individuals. Though it's no surprise that higher fat foods tend to look and smell more appealing in general (who can argue with a burger as delicious looking as the one below?), being sleep deprived must make all us foodies lose total control over how much fatty food we should be consuming, like a kid running loose in a candy store.

MOH's infamous Slater's burger: The DOOT - a force to be reckoned with

In addition to increases in food intake, a more recent report shows that the sleep deprived also tend to spend more money on food (Chapman et al., 2013). Recalling back to my undergraduate years, I remember staying up late to study and making late night runs to the grocery store during midterms/finals week to stock up on my study essentials: ramen and Cheetos (I know they're unhealthy, but I still think they're delicious). I'm not sure if it's a compensatory mechanism, but there's just something about giving in to the "munchies" more when you're running on low energy, low sleep.

Cheetos in all their glory - my favorite: mix and match regular / flamin' hot Cheetos

Needless to say, I had a great holiday break. Yes, I was sleep deprived. Yes, I ate enough for three of me's to survive, and yes, I'm sporting a little more baggage than usual, but I had a great time doing so. Spending time with family is always a bonus, but having good company AND good food is a definite blessing.

And what better way to end the year than with a celebratory nature hike around one of Orange County's scenic trails?

We went to Aliso and Woods Canyon Park in Laguna Niguel - this trail is full of caves, rocky cliffs (scale at your own risk!), and beautiful little creeks. If you're into hiking and live around Orange County, definitely try this place.

For everyone who's reading, happy new year to all! May 2014 be a year full of new beginnings, rich memories, and delicious food.

Until next time, happy eating all!


*
Sleep deprived individuals showed increased activity in the amygdala while decreased activity was seen in the frontal lobe and insular cortex when viewing different food choices.

While it has been shown previously by many groups that sleep deprivation causes increase in food intake, this study points to the specific brain regions activated/deactivated following sleep deprivation, and shows that fat-rich foods in particular are preferably consumed by the sleep-deprived. The amygdala is known to contain different molecules (neuropeptides) that can modulate food intake, while the downregulated regions are more associated with regulation of appetite.

References:

1. Greer S.M. et al., 2013. The impact of sleep deprivation on food desire in the human brain. Nature Communications. 4:2259.

2. Chapman, C.D. et al., 2013. Acute sleep deprivation increases food purchasing in men. Obesity. 21(12)