Parking, Shopping,

You have read me moaning and groaning about hospital parking lot fees. Well, today we had to go for a doctor's appointment at one of the hospitals and unfortunately the gate machines had broken down so parking was free. Whooppee. Mind you we weren't there very long. But still....

Came home and had lunch then out to get the shopping. Had a prescription to get filled as well. When I got the shopping home I was annoyed to find a couple of things missing which I could swear I ordered, but maybe I didn't - onions and cabbage. I sure can't do without onions all week so will have to stop off there tomorrow.

Tomorrow, of course, is my free lunch at Mandarin. It is also Moon Festival which means they have specials including moon cakes which I like and seem to  be the only one who does. Of our group of friends anyway. I think I once posted a recipe for them too. They actually serve them sliced into small pieces in the restaurant. I'd like to get hold of a whole one. They aren't very big. Quite rich though.

Thanks to the management of the building, our water is going off yet again tomorrow morning. My cleaner was due to come in but no point if there is no water. She has agreed to come in around 3 in the afternoon. Nice of her. Matt and I will have to remember to get our showers in before 8 as well. Pain in the you know what.

I decided to find the Moon Cake recipe and post it again. Actually, they don't look that difficult to make.

Moon Cake

A step by step guide for making mooncake, a traditional Chinese dessert typically eaten during the Mid-Autumn Festival for good luck.

For the dough
100 g all purpose-flour
60 g Golden Syrup
1/2 tsp Alkaline water available at Asian grocers
18 g Vegetable oil

For the filling
420 g Lotus seed paste
6 Egg yolks salted
1 Tbs Rose-flavoured cooking wine available at Asian grocers

For the egg wash
1 Egg yolk
2 Tbs Egg white

1. FOR THE DOUGH 
2. To prepare the Chinese mooncake dough use a large bowl, mix the golden syrup, alkaline water and oil well. Sift in the flour. Use a spatula to combine all the ingredients. Don’t over–stir. Knead into a dough. Cover with film wrap and rest for 40 minutes.

3. Mix egg yolks with wine. If the salted egg yolks are homemade and freshly broken from the shells, you’ll see the egg whites turn opaque after mixing with the wine a few minutes later. Wipe the yolks dry with kitchen paper. Cut each into two halves. Set aside. Roll the lotus paste into a long tube.

4. Cut into 12 equal portions of 35 grams.

5. Roll each portion into a ball shape. Set aside and preheat the oven to 180°C.

6. FOR THE EGG WASH 
7. Whisk the egg yolk with the egg white. Sift through a fine sieve.

8. FOR THE FILLING 
9. Divide the dough into 12 equal portions. Roll each portion into a small ball shape. Cover a dough portion with a plastic film and roll into a thin disc. Then take a lotus paste ball and poke a hole in the middle with your finger.

10. Place the egg yolk inside and roll and shape into a ball. Wrap and seal the lotus paste ball with the dough disc.

11. Spray the mooncake mould and place the stuffed mooncake into the mould. Lightly press the mould handle, then remove the mooncake from the mould. Transfer the stuffed mooncake onto a lined baking tray.

12. Repeat this step to finish the remaining dough and lotus paste.

13. Bake in the preheated oven for about 10 to 12 minutes. Brush the mooncakes with egg wash, at about five minutes, before removing from the oven. Continue to bake until the pastry turns golden brown. Remove from oven and leave to cool on a wire rack. Store in an air–tight container. The pastry will become soft and shiny in one or two days: the mooncake recipe is ready to be enjoyed.

Source:  Fine Dining Lovers

Have a great day

Birthday, Moon Festival, Rosh Hashana, Renovations,

Today is the anniversary of the day I first came into the world. I celebrated on Saturday really as today is the beginning of our Winter Bowling League which is kind of a celebration anyway. On Saturday we had fillet steaks with Port Wine Sauce (one of my favourites) sautéed Portobella mushrooms - a baked potato for Matt - and then followed it up with some Crème Brulée which I had bought in our grocery store. The Crème Brulées were pretty good. You have to sprinkle the sugar (provided) on top of them and then either use a torch to melt the sugar or put them under the broiler. We used to have a torch but never having used it we got rid of it a while back. Under the broiler worked but usually the sugar is hard when you get to eat it, this wasn't. We also have two new ramekin dishes which I hadn't realised when I bought them. I also bought two boxes because I hadn't known there were two desserts in each box. Duuh.  Of course we drank wine, my favourite, Zinfatuation which is a really good, dark red Zinfandel. I looked it up on line and they described it as medium purple? Whoever wrote the description seems to like the word medium too. Uses it three times. Looks dark red to me.

Tomorrow I get to go the Mandarin, our favourite Chinese restaurant, and have a free birthday meal on them. Also on the 1st of October, they are allowing all 65 yr olds, and older, 50% off their meal. Right now it's Moon Festival time and so I will be able to have some of their moon cake which I enjoy but nobody else I know seems to do. I am not sure just how authentic the recipe is, it may be altered somewhat for Western tastes. A friend's daughter was living and working in China a few years ago and I remember she hated moon cakes so it's possible they are not the same here at all. Short of taking a trip to China myself, not sure how I can taste test. Not that I wouldn't like to go to China, but not possible.

I forgot to mention that it is Rosh Hashanah today too. so to my Jewish friends Shana Tova or a Happy New Year. I know one particular friend has been cooking herself silly, for the celebration, as she does every year.

It occurs to me I haven't mentioned that the owner of this apartment building has decided to replace

all the tiles in the lobbies by each elevator entrance, i.e. all 9 floors. Thanks be that there are only 9, it is dreadful. When they were doing our floor the noise was appalling. They have removed all the tiles on both the floor and walls as well as removing some of the carpet which led into the corridors. When they were doing our floor I ended up with a migraine and a half. Of course whilst they did each floor we couldn't access the elevators so had to walk down to the next floor to get on. To get back to our apartment, I rode up to the floor above us and walked down rather than walking up. Not good at stairs. I am now wondering what kind of tiles they are going to put in. The original were little tiny ones. I was speculating that they would come in sheets rather than having to lay individual tiny tiles. I will be interested to see what we get. These don't look so small now although they did when I googled. There were different colours on some floors. One floor had a deep red which I personally did not like at all. Ours were a creamy yellow. They could use wallpaper changes in a few corridors too and maybe new carpet. They were probably fine when first laid or papered, but today they are somewhat out of date. Of course, I didn't even mention the dust, Oy vey!

Talk about coincidence, on Friday I talked about our local restaurant and how I had eaten Mantu which were Afghani beef dumplings. Now in the mail I get Turkish Manti which is a slightly different recipe, but essentially, beef dumplings. This came in an email from Food & Wine. I rather like the sound of the Tomato Butter Sauce.

Manti with Tomato Butter and Yogurt

Contributed by Scott Conant

Servings: 6

These classic boiled Turkish dumplings are filled with tasty ground beef and served with generous amounts of smoky tomato-butter sauce and garlicky yogurt sauce.

Ingredients

Dough

1. 1 cup plus 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour, plus more for dusting
2. 1 large egg
3. 1/8 teaspoon kosher salt

Meat Filling

1. 1/2 pound ground beef
2. 1 small onion, grated
3. 3 tablespoons minced parsley
4. 1 teaspoon kosher salt
5. 1/4 teaspoon pepper

Yogurt Sauce

1. 1 cup Greek yogurt
2. 1/2 teaspoon finely grated garlic
3.  Kosher salt

Tomato-Butter Sauce

1. 4 tablespoons unsalted butter
2. 2 tablespoons tomato sauce
3. 1 teaspoon paprika
4. Dried mint and Aleppo pepper, for garnish

1. Make the dough In a medium bowl, combine all of the ingredients with 5 tablespoons of water and mix with a wooden spoon until a dough forms. On a lightly floured work surface, knead the dough until smooth, about 5 minutes. Clean the bowl and return the dough to it. Cover with plastic wrap and let rest for 1 1/2 hours.
2. Make the meat filling In a medium bowl, combine all of the ingredients and mix well.
3. Make the yogurt sauce In a small bowl, combine the yogurt and garlic and season with salt. Mix well and refrigerate.
4. Make the tomato-butter sauce In a small saucepan, melt the butter over low heat. Stir in the tomato sauce 
and paprika and keep warm.
5. Lightly dust a baking sheet with flour. Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil.
6. On a lightly floured work surface, using a lightly floured rolling pin, roll out the dough 1/16 inch thick. Cut the dough into 2-inch squares. Spoon 
1/2 teaspoon of the filling in the center of each square. To form the manti, fold the dough over the filling to form a triangle; press the edges together to seal. Transfer the manti to the prepared baking sheet.
7. In a large pot of boiling water, boil the manti until tender and cooked through, about 5 minutes. Using a slotted spoon, transfer to bowls. Top with the yogurt sauce and warm butter sauce, sprinkle with dried mint and Aleppo pepper and serve.

Have a great day

Toyota Recall, Moon Festival, Stink Bugs.

Headline says Toyota are recalling 7.4 million cars because of a faulty power window switch. About 240,000 are being recalled in Canada. It is a voluntary recall so I guess if you don’t have the problem, no point going in. But it appears that Toyota have been having some quality control issues over the last few years which doesn’t augur well for what was once an excellent reputation. Maybe they are getting too big and spreading their manufacturing too thinly. I believe, but could be wrong, that they don’t have quality control issues with completely Japanese made vehicles. The article lists which years and models are, or could be, affected, there are quite a few of them.

We went to the Mandarin Restaurant for lunch yesterday and I had forgotten it was the Moon Festival this week. Supposed to be in the 10th month on the 8th. They had a number of items which were special to the celebration including a smoked fish in sweet and sour sauce which was delicious, an Oriental Salad, which I didn’t try and several desserts including Moon Cakes which I had always wanted to try, Pomelo, Black Sesame Ice Cream and something called Longan (I think) which I didn’t find, having googled I have discovered the other name is lychee which I have, of course, eaten many times. The daughter of a friend spent a year in China for her gap year and I always remember her describing Moon Cakes as disgusting. Assuming these were a genuine recipe and not changed for Western Tastes, I thought they were delicious. The Pomelo looked and tasted a bit like a grapefruit (probably because it is and I shouldn’t have eaten it because of meds) and the Black Sesame ice cream was delicious too. If it hadn’t been at the other end of the restaurant, I would have got some more, but my legs were tired of all the walking. Our lunch, by the way, was courtesy of a gift certificate we were given for our anniversary last month. Thanks guys.

What a terrible thought, the Brown Marmorated Stink Bug has travelled up from the States and is now in Hamilton, Ontario, which is only an hour from here. It is not dangerous to humans as such, but they attack crops and destroy them both with their eggs when they hatch, plus eating the crops themselves. Apparently this is an Asian bug which they think may have travelled to the States in containers and it is an inveterate traveller. It is to be hoped the cold weather will deal with it before it spreads too much here, but from reading the article, I don’t hold out too much hope. Not only that, if one gets squished the stink attracts more of its species.

Naturally I had to look up a recipe for Moon cakes, maybe later this week I will look for a black sesame recipe. I don’t have an ice cream maker unfortunately.

Mooncakes

By Rhonda Parkinson, About.com

Mooncakes are the highlight of China's annual Mid-Autumn Moon Festival

Mooncake recipe - A recipe for mooncakes, the Chinese snack traditionally served during the Moon or Mid-Autumn Festival.
Learn More about Mooncakes and the Mooncake Festival

Filling:

· 1 pound red azuki beans

· water

· 3/4 cup lard or oil

· 1-3/4 cups sugar

Water-Shortening Dough:

· 2 cups flour

· 5 tablespoons lard

· 10 tablespoons water

· 1/4 teaspoon salt

Flaky Dough:

· 1 cup flour

· 5 tablespoons lard

· red food coloring for design

Preparation:

Filling Instructions: Soak red beans in water to cover 2 hours. Drain and discard the water. Cover with 8 cups fresh water and bring to a boil, then simmer over low heat 1-1/2 hours or until skins open. Strain the beans and discard the skins. Place the strained beans in several layers of cheesecloth and squeeze out any excess water.
Place in a saucepan with the lard or oil and the sugar. Cook, stirring continuously, until almost all the moisture has evaporated. Let cool.
Dough Instructions: You will need 2 cups of filling for the mooncakes. Divide this into 20 portions and shape into balls.Mix ingredients for the water-shortening dough and the flaky dough separately until smooth. Divide each dough into 20 equal portions.
Wrap one portion of flaky dough inside each portion of water-shortening dough. Roll out each piece of dough, then fold in thirds to form three layers. Roll out again, and once more fold in thirds to form three layers.
Flatten each piece of dough with the palm of your hand to form a 3" circle. Place one portion of filling in the center. Gather the edges to enclose the filling and pinch to seal. Place the filled packet in the mold, gently pressing to fit. Invert and remove the mold.
Dilute red food coloring with water and pour onto a damp paper towel on a plate. Take some food coloring onto the cookie-design stamp, then press on top of the mooncake.
Repeat process for remaining mooncakes. Arrange mooncakes on a baking sheet. Bake 20 minutes at 350 degrees. Let cool before serving.

Have a great day