Birthday Food *Late Post*

This post is extremely late, but I just wanna share all the food I cooked on my birthday. I had a small get together with my closest friends where I cooked all my favorite food. Yeah, I cooked on my birthday. It's my thing! 

Homemade chicken chowmein. Chowmein noodles with shredded chicken, carrots, celery, napa cabbage, cilantro, bean sprouts and lemon. See my recipe HERE. Try it. I promise it's easy to make. My friends went back for more! I'm assuming they really liked it!



Filipino Longganisa. It's not homemade, but I bought them at a local Filipino market and cooked it at home. I call them party Longganisa because they're a fav among my friends. Boiled in shallow water then I let carmalize in it's own fat. Sweet and savory. It's delicious!




Homemade Chicken Lumpia. A staple at any Filipino parties. My version has ground chicken and ground shrimp with chopped carrots, celery and yellow onion wrapped in Lumpia papper then deep fried until golden brown. My friends devoured these fast!



For dessert, My friend Lupe Cakes made her homemade Chocoflan. Chocolate cake on the bottom and clear flan on top. It's ridiculously good!




Playing games with my friends.








Thanks for stopping by!

Homemade Chowmein

Super easy and delicious Chicken Chowmein. It's better than you local Chinese food joint. I'm serious.

Recipe is inspired by Kelsey Nixon.

Ingredients

Sauce

• 1 chicken bullion cube
• 2 tbsp oyster sauce
• 3 tbsp soysauce
• 1 tbsp hoisin sauce
• 1 squirt of honey
• 1 tbsp sesame oil
• 1 tbsp chili sauce or siracha
• 1 and 3/4 cup of hot water

Chowmein

• 1 box of Chinese chowmein noodles of your choice. You can also use fresh or dry egg noodles
• minced garlic
• minced fresh ginger
• chopped green onion or scallions (green and white part)
• chopped celery
• shredded carrots
• shredded napa cabbage (you can aslo use whatever vegetables you have on hand -green beans, mushrooms, bean sprouts and etc...)
• 1 tbsp cornstarch diluted in a little bit of water
• shredded cooked chicken or shrimp or whatever meat you prefer.

Directions

• Cook noodles according to package direcition.
• While waiting for noodles to cook, combine the ingredients for the sauce in a large cup. Mix until everything is dissolved. It may seem like a lot of liquid but don't worry. The noodles will soak it all up.
• Heat wok or large pan over high heat. 
• Add sesame oil or canola oil. 
• Add minced garlic, giner and green onion. Sautee for 20 seconds until fragrant. 
• Add the celery, carrots, napa cabbage and the rest of your veggies. Sautee for 5 minutes until veggies are tender.
• Add sauce mixture to the pan.
• Add cornstarch mixture. Mix and bring to a simmer.
• Toss in the meat. 
• Toss in cooked noodles and mix. Let it sit until the noodles soak up the sauce. 
• Serve in a bowl or plate.
• Garnish with more green onions, cilantro and sesame seeds.
• Enjoy!

Don't sweat it if you don't have some of the ingredients. Here are some of the things you can substitute.

Chinsese noodles = Spaghetti noodles
sesame oil = Canola or vegetable oil
hoisin sauce = bbq sauce

And again, use whatever vegetables you have on hand.

Frito Chili Pie!

I had no idea chili was so easy to make after I saw Ree's Frito Chili Pie recipe. I've been using canned chili for the longest time. Gross. It was also a great idea to make in our mini cooking class at work. Who doesn't love frito chips, homemade chili and cheese?

My recipe is a bit different from Ree's. I didn't use Rotel diced tomatoes and kidney beans. Also, we eye ball the ingredients like always.

Ingredients

• ground beef
• tomato sauce
• ground oregano
• ground cumin
• ground chili powder
• salt and pepper
• pinto beans
• a little flour diluted in water
• shredded cheddar cheese
• frito corn chips
• diced yellow onion

Instructions

Brown ground chuck with garlic in a pot over medium-high heat. Add tomato sauce, salt, oregano, cumin, and chili powder. Cover and reduce heat to low. Simmer for 30 minutes.

Add drained and rinsed beans. Stir to combine, then cover and simmer for another 20 minutes.

Add flour diluted in water to the chili. Stir to combine and simmer for a final 10 to 15 minutes. Set aside.

Place corn chips on a plate, ladle chili on top, sprinkle cheese and yellow onion. Enjoy!

Baby Shower Pupusas

One of the perks of having a friend from El Salvador is I get to eat homemade, fresh pupusas everytime I come over. I was invited to my friend's baby shower where they had silly games and the most delicious pupupas I've ever had. Scroll down and be jelous o_O.



Homemade fresh Pupusa with chicharron (pork rinds) and cheese. It's so good!






My friend's god mother makes the best pupusas I've ever had. She's legit.






They also had chicken salad tostada. It has shredded chicekn, potatoes, corn and peas. So






I wish my friend Ingrid a safe delivery. She's having a boy and I couldn't be more excited for her!

Homemade Cilantro/Parsley Pesto

Homemade Cilantro and Parsley Pesto is what we made in cooking class. In case you didn't know, I hold a mini cooking class at work to kids with Autism. It's more for fun than an actual serious cooking class. The kids are able to help each other make simple and easy dishes and it really helps with their cognitive and motor skills.They seem to enjoy it, especially the eating part lol.

Ingredients: eyeball ingredients

• a bunch of parsely
• a bunch of cilantro
• 2 garlic cloves
• any kind of pasta noodle of your choice
• grated parmesan cheese
• salt and pepper
• lemon juice
• olive oil

Directions:

1. Combine a handful of parsely, cilanto, olive oil in a blender. Blend until smooth. 
2. Season with salt and pepper. Be careful with salt. The Parmesan cheese is salty already.
3. Pour on cooked pasta. Mix
4. Add grated parmesan cheese. Mix
5. Enjoy!

New Year's Eve Food!

Happy New Year, everyone!

Here's all the food we had on New Year's Eve. Just like Christmas Eve, we had a mix of Korean and Italian food. The kids loves Korean BBQ and my cousin always makes her delicious homemade shrimp pasta. Everything was delicious.



Fruit platter with pineapple, grapes, cherries, apples and oranges.



My homemade spinach and artichoke dip. Watch my video for the recipe.






My cousin's homemade baked Korean spare ribs. Sooo delicious!



My cousin's Prawns Buccatini in homemade Alfredo Sauce. She makes some kind of seafood pasta every year. This year, she used Buccatini, which is a
thick spaghetti like pasta with a hole running though the middle.



Seaweed salad to go with the Korean spare ribs.



A mix of Korean and Italian food? Sure, why not!



Our favorite, Claim Jumper Crumbled Apple Pie. Sooo good!



An assorted of desserts from Costco. I forgot the brand.



12 grapes = 12 wishes

New Year's Eve Food for HIM

Poor El Hubby Cakes worked on New Year's Eve. So, I prepared a mini spread of his favorite food and had our own mini celebration right before he went to work. I picked some sushi rolls from our favorite sushi spot in Torrance, shrimp sakes from S-Mart, a Korean Market, and his new favorite cream puffs from Costco. He loved it!

Haru Sushi 



Shrimp Cakes from a local Korean grocery store. It has lots of shrimp in it.

Happy New Year!!!

Christmas Eve Food!

Hey loves, I hope you had a wonderful Christmas for those who celebrate it, and for those who don't, I hope you had a great Holiday break. I spent Christmas Eve with my Cakes family in Los Angles. Went food shopping everywhere with my family and cleaned and organized the entire house. I was pooped, but extremely happy.

 We took it easy this year. Usually, Mommy Cakes, Abu Cakes and my cousin would slave in the kitchen and make a huge spread for Christmas eve dinner, but since most of them worked, we kept it simple, yet delicious, of course. Our spread was actually very odd. The kids requested Korean BBQ. My aunt and I bought sliced meat from the local Korean market along with a few banchan (Korean side dishes) that we like, Spiral Ham and Smoke Salmon from Costco, and my cousin, Marie Cakes made her homemade Lasagna that was out of this world!!!


So, we had Korean/America/Italian food all at the same time. That's how The Cakes family roll ^_^.







My aunt cooked thin slices of pork and beef (not shown) on the pan and placed it on a tray so we could juts pick it up.

Rice Paper

I think that's what they're called. You wrap the meat in it. 

Roasted Seaweed



Grape leaves kimchee

Very hot and spicy!



Spicy Squid

My favorite. They are chewy, spicy and a little sweet.



Seaweed Salad

Croisant and slices of Challah

Smoked Salmon with Dill sauce from Costco

Spiral Ham from Costco

Homemade Lasagna

She used San Marzano tomatoes and cream cheese along with the other usual ingredients.

Desserts from Magnolia Bakery

Banana Pudding from Magnolia Bakery

You haven't lived if you've never tried it.