Advanced cooking class: Vegan day

Last week, our advanced cooking class was an all vegan challenge. We were given mystery baskets and only allowed to cook under vegan guidelines. My team, also known as team 1, was given daikon, firm tofu, bean thread, shitake mushrooms, dried Chinese shitake's, Vietnamese spring roll wrappers, popcorn shoots, carrots and baby bok choy. This mystery basket made me really happy that I did my externship at Buddakan. Here is what we came up with. 

The dumpling folding process. Filling on the right, raw finished product on the left. We filled the dumplings with seared mushroom, bean thread and firm tofu, plus garlic, scallion and mushroom soy

A take on Liang Pi or "cold skin" noodles from xi'an, China. We made these noodles out of the vietnamese fresh spring roll wrapper. The sauce was made with a chinese shitake broth, sesame oil, chopped cilantro, fresh thai bird chili, mushoom soy, sugar and lemon juice. Its fresh, spicy, umami all in one package. These were quite tasty!

The steamed dumpling over some bok choy, sauteed in shao shing wine, garlic and shallots. 

The final plate. Down at the end is a vinegary slaw made with pickled daikon, carrots and popcorn shoots. All vegan, all delicious. 

First product review!!: Pork Grinds Hawaii

Thanks to the lovely folks over at Pork Grinds Hawaii, I got to do my first Product review! I want to start out by saying that these are not your run of the mill, gas station pork rinds. As a graduate of the Culinary Institute of America, I give this product my very own seal of approval as being a "gourmet pork rind". I was really intrigued by the concept for this product which is, essentially, pork rinds with very interesting flavors. Being an Asian food nerd myself, I requested to try the kim chee flavored, char siu, furikake and then just for fun, sea salt and vinegar. I know sea salt and vinegar is not Asian but it is delicious. A couple of my culinary friends and I had a tasting of this product and the results were unanimous. Everyone's favorite flavor was the char siu. If you aren't familiar with char siu, It is just the Chinese word for roast pork, Chinese style. Think about the flavor of those sticky red spare ribs you got from your local Chinese restaurant growing up. This is a flavor I know most of us can relate to because, 1), everyone loves ribs and 2),  every mediocre Chinese food restaurant in America is sharing the same recipe book, I'm sure of it. I loved this flavor because it actually tastes as though you are eating a crispy spare rib. Second place in the flavor contest was given to the sea salt and vinegar pork rinds. These were just as addicting as any sea salt and vinegar chip and it really worked well with the pork rind flavor. They were light, crispy, vinegary and delicious. I was really excited to try the kim chee flavor because I love the skunky, fermented saltiness that is kim chee. Also, these pork rinds had that fiery red color that kim chee gets. It wasn't skunky smelling like the real stuff, but it did have that taste of Korea. I really enjoyed the flavor of the Korean chili pepper in the kim chee flavor. It was very mild but with more chili flavor than heat. Last but not exactly least was the furkikake. If you have never heard of it before, furikake is also known as the salt and pepper of Japan. Often sprinkled on top of rice, it is a Japanese seasoning that can be made with a number of spices and ingredients. It can include dried seaweed, sesame seeds and sometimes dried shrimp. Even though it was my least favorite of the bunch, I still enjoyed the experience. It had a flavor profile similar to sushi because of the seaweed. Overall, I really liked this product. I cant say enough good things about that char siu flavor especially. It really tasted like it had been roasted in a Chinese roasting oven. Mmmmmm, good stuff.  Thanks again to Pork Grinds Hawaii, Mahalo Y'all

These were only four of the many flavors the company has to offer.
If you are interested in getting some of these gourmet pork rinds for yourself, check out their website at porkgrindshawaii.com