It seems soy sauce (and other stuff) manufacturers Amoy have pretty much lost the plot on Facebook.
No. No. No. No. NOOOOOOO!!!!
When I came across The Kitchn’s Holiday Gift Guide: 15 Small Luxuries for Home Cooks, I immediately thought of this gift of truffle salt I received on my recent trip to San Francisco. We were at the Far West Fungi shop in the Ferry Building, and I tasted my first sample of truffle salt. C later surprised me with the salt, saying that she had to buy it for me after seeing the look on my face. I would have never bought this for myself, which makes it my favorite kind of gift.
By the way, truffle salt is AWESOME. In scrambled eggs, roasted potatoes, french fries, plain popcorn, pasta, and many more yet to be tried or discovered. If you have some suggestions, drop me a line.
I’ve been making my own yogurt off and on for almost two years now. The impetus grew out of the fact that I like yogurt, but mostly out of my hatred for accumulating those number five yogurt containers. (I do reuse them for freezing stocks, beans, and other storage, but the piles get big fast. Also, this was before you could bring them to Whole Foods.) I use a yogurt maker* that I got as a Christmas present, but it isn’t necessary. [See Heavy Table’s post on making a gallon of yogurt, to which I say, a GALLON? Are you crazy?]
The Good Things About Making Yogurt:
- It’s cheaper. (I buy quarts of organic whole milk in a glass bottle, which makes me happy. They’re $2, and most organic yogurts cost about $5.
- It solves that pesky container problem. (To a point, see below.)
- It’s good! You can eat it with granola, or make biscuits, or use it as a replacement for sour cream! Or use it to make face masks!
The Bad Things About Making Yogurt:
- To make yogurt, you need yogurt, which means you need to have an ever cycling supply of yogurt around constantly. And really, the yogurt you use as a starter shouldn’t be much more than about a week old, and you can only continue this yogurt cycle for so long before things start to get funky (in my experience). So that means unless you and whomever lives with you can eat a quart of yogurt every week, at some point you’ll need to get grocery store yogurt, which slightly lessens the container advantage.
- Although it is technically easy, waiting around for milk to cool is a pain. Watched milk never cools, apparently.
By the way, yogurt sauce is good. Add it to vegetables and sandwiches and things that just need a little something.
Spicy Yogurt Sauce
- 1/2 cup yogurt
- small glove of minced garlic
- lemon juice, salt, pepper, and crushed red pepper to taste
There you are. A lot of information if you ever thought about making your own yogurt. Also, * - that yogurt maker cost $15 when I got it - I don’t know why it’s only available for $150 now! Bottom line, if you have to spend more than $20 on a yogurt maker, you should really try making it without one first.
Taba ng Talangka
In many Filipino families, relatives regularly travel back and forth between the Philippines and the States for holidays and extended vacations. Upon return, it is customary to bring back pasalubong, or gifts, for your loved ones. Many kids eagerly watch the unpacking of the 50-lb balikbayan box that is sure to contain cellophane wrapped boxes of candies that can only be found “back home.” Pastillas, polvoron, cashew tarts, garlic corn nuts, watermelon seeds. Yes, those were all distributed to and enjoyed by my many family members.
But for me, candies and snacks were not the main attraction. My day, no my month, was made when I saw that my aunts and uncles brought back a jar (or two) of precious crab fat - taba ng talangka. Back in the day, my aunts and cousins would obtain the fat from these tiny stone crabs all by hand. The season for the crabs is short and the process of sime-ing laborious and time consuming (aside: I cannot for the life of me think of the English word for this process of taking out the fat by hand), so whenever my titas would send a jar to me, I felt very loved. These days, the stuff is sold by the jar, which is easier on my titas’ hands, and the puro (pure, no filler) stuff tastes just as good.
When my brother visited, I was excited that my mother had sent a jar of taba ng talangka that one of my aunts brought back for me. Oooh, what precious, fatty gold! The taba is best enjoyed when you cook it with lots of smashed garlic, oil, and fresh lemon juice (when the native citrus calamansi is unavailable). I am rationing this out because of its scarcity and because it is quite the cholesterol-fest. My dad always laughs at how little I eat at a time and how I go so far as to scrape up the crunchy bits in the pan with a ball of white rice. He always says, “Paka tipid mo?!” or “How come so frugal?!” I always answer, “Because I want it to last!!!”
And so it is with my little jar. I usually prefer to eat this plain with white rice. As you can see in my picture, there was no white rice on hand, so I mixed it up with some couscous. Not bad. I then broke off bits of the talangka to eat with my various roasted vegetables during the week. Mmm, I’ll take taba ng talangka as my condiment of choice, thanks.
homemade ketchup
when i hosted brunch during the hermano visited a couple of weeks ago (post to follow), i realized that i didn’t have any ketchup. a while back, i was about to buy some from my co-op, but i just couldn’t bring myself to pay over $3 a bottle. then i realized - hey, this bottle of organic ketchup is all natural…i wrote down the ingredients and made it at home! you can vary the spices and seasonings (curry ketchup! jalapeno-lime ketchup!), but here are the basics:
seriously, that’s it. the flavor can be much more intense than the bottled stuff, so use sparingly. go ketchup crazy!
Homemade grainy brewhouse mustard.
how awesome!!! i never thought to make my own mustard. i have, however, made my own ketchup.
