Feeding Hong Kong One Step at a Time

             As a way to spread healthy eating and cooking, we need to start young and I believe that many families in such a fast paced city do not focus enough on the importance of doing it at home.  There are more ways to contribute for a cause than just buying a ticket to an Equestrian Event at the Longines Masters Grand Slam that occurred at the Asia World Expo this past February. 
               I had the opportunity to work with Feeding Hong Kong 樂餉社,  to host a healthy cooking demo for young kids who attended the Grand Slam with their parents.  Feeding Hong Kong is the food bank in Hong Kong that redistributes surplus food to people in need. There are so many times that I have taken my food for granted and do not think twice how many people are starving in this city and in other places around the world. Working with a charity like this one, helps the first world connect with the third as they work to raise awareness about poverty and food insecurity in Hong Kong as well as promote healthy eating and nutrition education to the most vulnerable groups in the city. 
        We created vegetable summer rolls together with a asian peanut dipping sauce. 
The ingredients were colorful and easy to identify. The kids were very excited to play with their own share. 

        I always love to have each and every participant have a chance to make their own so they were encouraged to come up closer to me to have a better chance to interact with me and each other. 
        With the help of our amazing volunteers, we were able to make sure everyone had their share of creating a fun, colorful and delicious summer roll for themselves. 
     My favorite part was watching these kids eat their summer rolls. I had so much fun teaching them! I hopefully gave them motivation to initiate helping in the kitchen more often in their homes. Through this experience, we successfully provided a fun-filled nutritional education afternoon to 12 individuals of the future generation. Changes happen one step at a time!

Merry Christmas From My Kitchen to Yours!

      I love the Holiday Season where everyone wants to get together and share joys, laughter and food. Why not organize a cooking gathering with your peers and colleagues? That's exactly what happened with the Hong Kong chapter of the American Overseas Dietetic Association this year. We had loads of fun and the theme was Holiday Treats: Gluten-Free Baking. I was pretty excited to see what we could do all together and also have dinner on time, since we only rented the venue for 3 hours. It was a pretty action-packed night, we had to finish the gingerbread decorating at home but at least we had a chance to exchange presents! I was honored that they asked me to lead an evening of cooking with dietitians! 

           This event was afterwork on a weeknight and I knew we needed some healthy snacks for dietitians to munch on while we cooked and baked together. I prepared a veggie crudité platter with a hummus dip and a mixed green salad with tomatoes, cucumbers and red kidney means. We can never overdose on vegetables! 

           Who doesn't like pizza and cookies?! Since the main food trend nowadays is a gluten-free one, I have gathered, tested and tweaked some of the more interesting pizza crust recipes that incorporated a lot of veggies into our meal that night. I can't wait to share these with you in my upcoming posts! I have revealed some insights of going gluten-free and whether of not you need to adapt to this diet in a previous post, please refer to:" The Gluten-Free Fad Has Landed On The Pearl!"

         While we waited for the gluten-free pizza crusts to bake I demonstrated how I prepared the crusts and also we had a gingerbread men making session. This was my favorite part of the night where we all participated. I am sure the dietitians loved getting their hands dirty with a slight aroma gingerbread in the air. 

                Just as we were about to finish with cutting the cookies, the pizza crusts were ready to be dressed with the number of toppings I have prepared ahead of time. There were two different types of crusts with different toppings. I was happy to have a more traditional pizza flavor on the zucchini crust and one that was not so traditional on the cauliflower crust. 

        My fellow dietitians were so enthusiastic and helpful, I enjoyed every moment of this too. They helped me spread the tomato sauce, mushrooms, pepperoni, red peppers and shredded cheese onto the zucchini crust. I was also aided when it came to adding BBQ sauce, chicken, onions and cheese to the one with the cauliflower crust. They both turned out so delicious, it was difficult to choose a favorite!

                                                     

       After both lovely pizzas came out of the oven, another 2 went in. We then shared an intimate dinner together devouring those delights we just made while waiting for the gingerbread men to bake. 

 

          The gingerbread was baked and cooled in no time and gave us a chance to do a little decoration before our dessert was served.  Our gluten-free black bean brownie is also available as a recipe in a previous post of mine. You must try this at home, I am not kidding and you would be surprised. 

          There's nothing better than a little sweet ending to a holiday party. I was amazed at how quickly the dessert was eaten and then we finally moved onto our last activity of the night, exchanging of holiday gifts!

               I hope everybody had as much fun as I did. Wendy Wu, the #HappyDietitian was so sweet to have compiled a few precious moments of our event into a short movie, which you can view by clicking here! 
                Brown Rice Meets the Pearl wishes you a Merry Merry Christmas! Happy Cooking, happy eating and happy exercising! 

A Boozy Sunday Brunch Cooking Class

         The last Sunday of October was another sold out event by Brown Rice Meets the Pearl. 22 lucky participants were so keen to learn the art of making gravlax, a perfect poached egg and pumpkin macarons with me. With the help of HK liquor Store, 3 different tailor made beverage pairings were carefully selected for my dishes. I am so grateful for that! Again, I had the privilege to use Rachel's Kitchen as a venue where there is a workshop full of gadgets, from bread proofers and sous vide machines to smoke guns, so I tried to utilize what was available to my advantage. 
        The first thing that I had my guests work on was the shaping of the multigrain bread rolls for the bottom of our eggs florentine for later. I already mixed the dough in advance and gave it a first rise. Each person had 2 rolls, one to take home and one for here. Adding multigrain flour to regular bread flour adds fiber, color and flavour to the bread and provides an added level of complexity. You can also try to substitute 1/3 of you regular white bread recipe with any multigrain flour to give it an extra boost the next time you make bread, but keep it mind that it may require a little more water and extra rising time. The key is to be patient. after a second rise, our bread was baked and ready to be served. 

    Next on the menu was a self-cured gravlax salmon with herbs. I made one before the guests arrive, which usually takes about 1-2 hours to finish curing and one with my guests to let them know how it's done. I then gave the fish a generous rubbing of fine herbs and added some smoke by utilizing a sexy smoke gun I had on hand. 
    This first round of smoked gravlax salmon was served along side a mixed green salad with a vinaigrette that I created with apples as a sweetener instead of added sugar, which also added body to this dressing. There is no better way to add whole fruits to your diet than adding it to sauces and dressings. 

        After everyone had their share of appetizers and sparkling wine, I continued on with the main course, which was our Eggs Benedict Florentine. The most important factor to this dish is of course the poached egg. We made 2 different style of eggs, one with the traditional method and the other with a sous vide slow cooker that held the whole eggs at a constant temperature for about an hour. 

             Then onto the Hollandaise sauce, which I made with 1/2 the butter that the original recipe calls for with added olive oil to decrease the cholesterol content. To add more excitement to the dish, I bought sweet potato greens instead of spinach for the Benedict and it paired really well with everything. 
          Everyone had a chance to make their own poached egg as well as cracking another slow cooked one for their own dish. They all seemed to have fun creating their own plate starting with toasting the bread, picking up sautéed sweet potatoes greens, layering on the gravlax salmon, then poaching their own eggs and ladling on the Hollandaise sauce on top. They each enjoyed their own creation with a glass of refreshing Rosé at the table. 
              Once we had a little break, we gathered once again to create the much anticipated pumpkin macarons. I really wanted the Halloween theme to kick in as there was only a few days to go until the real celebration. Macarons are so popular now around the world, but little did some people know, it was also an easy and fun process to make. 
         Everyone had a chance to pipe their own macarons and once these babies were in the oven, I carried on with the toasted pumpkin cream cheese filling. 
         When the pumpkin cream cheese filling and almond cookies came together, a beautiful macaron was created. To add even more Halloween spirit, I provided melted chocolate for participants to decorate their creations with scary faces. The final beverage pairing was a cocktail made from cranberry juice and creamy vanilla vodka. It was quite the star of the day! 

          At the end of the day, everyone had a happy face to bring home and we all had loads of fun cooking, eating and drinking together. It was another successful cooking class with Brown a Rice Meets The Pearl and I hope to see everyone again sooner rather than later! 

                Thank you  Zach, Wai and Rick from HK Liquorstore and Cecilia for being such a great helper. Last but not least, thanks for those participants who came out to Rachel's kitchen on a fine Sunday afternoon! 

A Cooking Class with Craft Beer: Healthy Summer Fun!

          This past Friday, Brown Rice Meets the Pearl had officially kicked off its first cooking class and it was a success. Details can be found here under the event of June 28th, 2013. All 24 participants completed the task of mixing and mingling while getting their hands dirty with building dishes from recipes provided. 
          The idea was to pair the food we made with the craft beer chosen by Americraft Imports. I wanted 3 beers that would represent me as well as complimenting the dishes that were on the menu that night. Guests were greeted with a tangerine wheat beer of Lost Coast Brewery from California, where I happily spent 5 years by the southern cliff sides embraced by the arms of my university. While people filed in, they got to form their own wholegrain mini burger buns made from Julian Hard Apple Cider with the dough that had already been risen once. We waited for a second rise before baking them in the oven for our herbed burgers later on that the evening. 

         4 groups of 6 people gathered around and each had a different task. A small demonstration began then one group was in charge of making the tomato salsa, a second was to make guacamole, another created the mango salsa and the last group mixed 2 different salads, which included a quinoa salad and a apple, carrot and cabbage slaw. These dips and salads paired well with the second beer, which was the Kona Big Wave Golden Ale and also with some of the whole wheat pita chips provided. The cabbage slaw is to be saved for eating with the fish tacos we all had a hand in making as well. I also whipped together a beer vinaigrette with reduced Anchor Steam amber ale. 

       After the appetizers, we had a chance to make our own thyme-rosemary mini burger patties topped with melted gruyere and beer caramelized onions as well as fresh chimichurri catfish tacos placed on skewers then baked before landing on tortillas with the cabbage apple and carrot slaw. 

      

         There was a period for the enjoyment of the food, meeting new friends and hanging out on the outdoor terrace while finishing the 2 beers we had so far. I gathered everyone together once more for the demonstration of the dessert and the presentation of the last beer of the night. The last beer was from New York, again a place where I was enveloped amongst the bustling food scene while finishing my graduate studies. The He'brew Genesis Dry Hopped Session Ale, I thought, would go well with a freshly made frozen yogurt of pineapple and kiwi served in a sugar ice cream cone. 

    

       The menus for this cooking class were based on the guidelines of the US Department of Agriculture's "My Plate" module and recipes will be given upon request if you were interested in receiving a copy. I hope everyone had fun and will stay tuned for other future events brought to you by Brown Rice Meets The Pearl. Thank you for all your support and see you soon at my next event. Many thanks to Spark Studios, Virginia and Yoshiko for the event space.