Laksa (Malaysia)

This spicy and delicious dish is a mixture of Chinese and Malay styles, and comes in two main styles, curry laksa or asam laksa. The curry laska is the best and is a noodle soup made with coconut milk, chili paste, with options on beef, chicken, seafood or vegetables. The vegetarian laksa comes with the bonus of perfectly prepared tofu that is deep fried slightly before being added to the soup. Available as a mild or hot dish, if you like spice, you will love laksa. The asam laksa is a fish sauce based version and is worth a try for a bit of variety. Malaysia hotels all serve a great version though you should definitely get out and try a few different styles of this special dish.

Pho (Vietnam)

A noodle soup, this traditional dish has a fish sauce base and is usually made with beef or chicken. If you are vegetarian you are going to have to sit this one out. This tasty soup is a simple delicacy and is served with a plate of Vietnamese mint, basil and bean sprouts which you add yourself before eating. Extra fish sauce is often added at the table as well. Whether you are staying at one of the luxury Vietnam hotels or a cheap backpackers hostel, you will have no problem finding some good Pho.

Chinese Dumplings

This is a dish that is traditionally served on the New Year’s Eve at the stroke of midnight to mark and celebrate the New Year. Made of a basic flour and water dough, they are stuffed with beef, chicken, or vegetables and then boiled, before being served with soy sauce. A coin is usually added to one of the batch and the person who gets the coin is considered guaranteed to have a great year ahead.

Pad Thai (Thailand)

This Thai classic is a stir fried noodle dish consisting of egg, fish sauce, tamarind juice, hot sauce and either meat or vegetables depending on your preference. The vegetarian option usually comes with the most beautifully prepared tofu you will ever have tasted. If you are in Thailand and don’t know what to eat, no matter where you are staying, this is your best bet hands down.

Bibimbap (South Korea)

Despite being another noodle dish, this meal will definitely provide you with something different and is one of the few vegetarian options you’ll have here. Served in a bowl on a bed of white rice, Bibimbap consists of sauteed vegetables, beef or chicken, and like almost all food in Korea, red pepper paste. On top of all of this will be a raw egg which you mix in yourself before eating. No matter what part of the country you find yourself staying in, you’ll end up eating Bibimbap at least a couple of times.

Betaine, that is obtained from the roots can also be used industrially to improve both the color and the flavor of red sauces, tomato paste and even jams, desserts, jellies, ice cream and breakfast cereals.

However, the beetroot is mainly eaten either as a cooked vegetable, or served cold in a salad. In Eastern Europe, in Poland, people eat the beet soup called borscht, which is very popular and traditionally served, among other dishes on the Christmas Eve. I have a Polish friend, who has married an Englishman and lives in Liverpool now. During their first Christmas together she wanted to prepare borscht for the whole family, but her husband objected strongly and said that he would never, ever eat soup made of beetroot. So the next year my friend prepared borscht but told the husband she invented the recipe and made the soup on the basis of red wine. It actually worked! Her husband loved it.

So now let me present the recipe for the traditional Polish borscht. Try it! Not only it is tasty, with its sweet and sour flavors, but also very healthy.

Ingredients:

5-6 beetroots

2 carrots

1 parsley

½ celery

1 tiny leek

1 bay leaf
2 grains of pimiento

2 liters of broth

2 tablespoons of vinegar
2-3 cloves of garlic

2 tablespoons of sugar

salt, pepper

Preparation:

Cook all the vegetables in the broth: carrots (cut into tiny bits), parsley, celery, leek, garlic, pimiento and the bay leaf. Add diced beetroots and the vinegar, so that the color could stay intense. Flavor it with salt, pepper and sugar. Cook it until the beetroots are soft. Then, take all the vegetables and beetroots out of the soup. Serve it hot, with dumplings or croquettes.

Although the process of roasting coffee is quite elementary, it does take a bit of commitment on the part of the operator. Apart from the financial commitment, which can run about $200 for an entry level roaster, the process itself requires time. In order to have a continuous supply of fresh roasted coffee, the user must roast coffee on a regular basis. The roasting process itself can take between 10 and 30 minutes, depending upon the roaster being used. The results when done right, however, are simply outstanding.

The main advantages to roasting your own beans are that you will always have a fresh supply of coffee and you can roast to the level you prefer. Not everyone likes a dark French Roast, which is what the majority of store bought whole beans are roasted to. With your own roaster you can roast your beans light, dark or anywhere in between. Through the roasting process you will be able to discover flavors in your coffee that you never knew existed including flavors of fruit, chocolate and spice.

In the end, whether or not it’s worth it to roast your own beans depends on your level of commitment toward achieving coffee greatness. For people that have experienced the difference that fresh roasted coffee can provide, the answer is an obvious and resounding yes.

There are a lot of things that go into making a great meal for a group of people and many of those things happen to be kitchen appliances. It seems like there are so many kitchen appliances these days that its any wonder we can navigate preparing a meal. Knowing how to operate all the appliances can be a tall order but thank goodness there are people who know

Among all the kitchen appliances available to us there is one that traditionally gets a bad rap. That is the microwave oven. These small defenseless kitchen appliances are mired with a stigma of fast, cheap and fattening… though some wouldn’t call that a bad thing it definitely is.

I’m here to say that microwave ovens have been poorly used from the beginning. They have been taken advantage of by companies wanting to make a quick million by selling their cheap and easy frozen dinners that are so bad for your body. I suggest that there are not only practical ways to use the microwave oven but also healthy ways to use them.

Lets take a convection microwave oven specifically. These wonders are like small sq feet wonders. They can crisp and warm and simmer and cook! My favorite use for these is to reheat leftovers to a ‘like-new’ state using the convection feature. Whether its home made pizza, lasagna or stir fry the convection microwave oven has the gumption to make it steaming like it was just cooked. So before you pronounce quick judgment on the purveyor of fattening foods think again and be more creative!  Think microwave ovens!

Cooking magic does not happen by mistake.  It does not come out of a box nor does it come dehydrated.  No my friends, cooking magic can normally be attributed to a disciplined and willing attitude to cook the very best food.

The best cooking guide will help lead you in the right direction in the kitchen.  Most people are not aware of the proper pairing of food and wine.  They do not realize that certain ingredients mix well at certain temperatures.  So it is the job of the cooking guide to lead you on your culinary journey.

Cooking quests are normally reserved for the top chefs.  They experiment and discover new ways of bringing forth old recipes.  And what do you think they do with these newly found recipes and techniques?  Exactly!  They put them in a new cooking guide with a nice bright picture on the cover and sell it to the masses.  There is nothing wrong with that.  Everybody has to make a living. 

Now we have celebrity chefs and each and everyone of them have their own easy cooking guide on the bookshelves of the big box bookstores.  The Food Network or Food Channel that is shown on food tv is more or less a commercial for the chef’s to show off their skills and help influence the consumer towards a purchase of their latest guide.

Who hasn’t heard of: 

• Rachael Ray
• Paula Deen
• Sandra Lee 
• Giada De Laurentiis
• Bobby Flay
• Ina Garten
• Guy Fieri
• Alton Brown

Each one of these chefs have their own program on TV.  Each one of these chefs have mastered a cooking level that has made them deserving of prominence.  And each one of these chefs have a easy cooking cooking guide in the bookstore. 

What is a bit funny is that cooks are starting to get nicknames.  One of my favorite nicknames is Ina Garten’s.  Her stage name is “The Barefoot Contessa”.  When cooking best recipes she really does live up to her name.

How about a microwave cooking guide? Yep there are cooking guides for every type of cooking style you can think of.  I’m not a big believer in cooking entire meals in a microwave.  But to help with prep work, quick warm ups, and ready to eat foods they are indispensable.  Microwave cookbooks can be found in abundance.

A good meat cooking guide is a must in every kitchen.  At least in every kitchen that isn’t a vegetarian kitchen.  But in reality a beef cooking guide will be used in most household kitchens more often than just about any other book in the kitchen.

If your a fisherman or just love seafood you also are in luck.  There is a great fishing cooking guide for every taste.  Seafood must be cooked correctly or it is worthless.  Half good just isn’t good enough when it comes to seafood.

In the end, a cooking guide is as important as the good intentions of the cook.  You need to build a solid foundation for every meal and it is the cooking guide that will help you accomplish that.