Soupy love: A Recipe

On some days, all you need is a mug full of hot, thick tomato soup to make you feel loved, comfortable, cared for and superbly cozy. And the best bit? The soup keeps well as well - so you can enjoy the soupy goodness day after day!

For days like those, here is my favourite tomato soup recipe -

Ingredients

• 4 big ripe tomatoes
• 2 big onions, chopped
• 2 medium size carrots, chopped
• 2 sticks of celery, chopped
• 2 bay leaf
• Salt, as per your liking
• Pepper
• 1 tablespoon butter
• Low fat fresh cream
• Water
• A pinch of sugar
• 1 1/2 tablespoon olive oil

Preparation

• Blanche tomatoes in boiling water
• To blanche tomatoes, bring a pot full of water to a rolling boil and drop the whole tomatoes into it, cover
• After 20 minutes, remove the lid, pour out the water and run under cold water
• Peel the tomatoes, the peel should already be shrinking off the tomatoes by now  
• Heat 1 tablespoon of the olive oil in a pan and on medium heat, saute onions, carrots, celery till onions are brown and veggies are soft
• Add bay leaf
• Chop the tomatoes into chunks and to the pan with veggies and let cook till they shrink in the pan and the juice flows
• Let cool
• Once sufficiently cooled, remove bay leaf and blend in a mixer till it becomes a smooth paste
• Add the paste back to pan

• Add water and make it as thick or thin as you like your soup to be
• Bring to a boil
• Add butter and cream
• Add pinch of sugar

• Let boil and bubble for a minute and turn off gas
• Serve hot with croutons

Enjoy soupy love!! :)

Recipe Alert: Homemade Caesar salad

Best thing abt home cookiing? Can customise it!

Of late, I have developed a fondness for Caesar salad but the anchovies and chunks of chicken really do put me off (very difficult to get veggie Caesar salad in HK for some reason!). And the time had come to address my craving with some efforts at home.

It's surprising how simple it is to put together a good Caesar salad without using anchovies,  chicken, raw eggs and mayonnaise!

Ingredients

• Caeser romaine leaves
• Croutons
• Crushed garlic
• Salt 
• Pepper 
• Olive oil 
• 2 spoons Greek yogurt
• Lemon and lime juice
• Grated Parmesan cheese (optional)

Preparation
Wash and put the salad leaves in a large bowl 

For the dressing - combine all the other ingredients, except croutons, in a bowl and mix well. Let sit for an hour or so.

Add croutons to the salad leaves just before eating.

And pour the dressing on the leaves, mix well. Sprinkle Parmesan cheese on top, if desired.

Your healthy, yummy, low calorie salad is ready! Eat immediately after preparing else the leaves will lose their fresh crunchiness.

Do let me know of other low calorie substitutes for salad dressings! Hope you liked the recipe and will try it out sometime soon! :)

Slow Sunday breakfasts

Sunday - breakfast in bed day.

This week's Sunday breakfast required zero effort - it was a combination of all the food made over the week! :)

Tzatziki and hummus were made way in advance and stored in the fridge - a strategic move to prevent myself from snacking on junk food, and from bingeing on my favourite Doritos. The baby carrots were bought keeping in mind the ease of access and to assure my lazy self that low calorie food was within easy reach!

Tomato soup was a mid-week left over, the remnant of a healthy soup and Ceasar salad (with Greek yogurt dressing) dinner.

Soup, vegetables and dips - the perfect, low calorie, healthy start to a cold and lazy Sunday, spent under covers, watching F.R.I.E.N.D.S.!

Eating around HK

Hong Kong Park

We've had some interesting experiences, and some delicious food in the past couple of weeks.

Somebody told us about a hole-in-the-wall in TST (Tsim Sha Tsui) which claimed to have the best Indian food in the city. We rushed there the very next weekend (with images of Crystal, Marine Drive, in our heads) and had some super strawberry ice cream soda. The food on the other hand was nothing much to write home about though. I walked out wondering, "if this is the best Indian food available then there's not much hope for other places in HK".

Ice cream soda at Branto's, TST

After the heavy lunch at Branto's we decided to walk around TST and ended up exploring Kowloon Park. As the dark and gloomy weather did nothing to improve our mood, we soon moved on to Elements Mall and to the beautiful Civic Square for an early dinner. Had some absolutely gorgeous mussels and a couple of delicate cocktails.

Mussels at Grand Central Bar & Grill, Elements Mall

After making it a point to cook at home throughout the work week, we decided to bring in the weekend with some super spicy crab on Friday night.

Crab at Under the Bridge Spicy Crab, Causeway Bay

Saturday was spent walking around Mid-Levels, visiting the Zoological and Botanical Gardens, Cheung Kong Park followed by the gorgeous Hong Kong Park right in the middle of the busy busy city. A visit to the Tea museum at Flagstaff House obviously brought around a thirst for some fragrant fairy flowering orchid tea and vegetable dimsums.

 Tea and vegetable dimsums at Lok Cha Tea House, Hong Kong Park

A Saturday morning spent walking led to a visit to the Peak and dinner and intense conversations with clients visiting from Shanghai.

 Austrian handmade pasta at Lily and Bloom, LKF Hotel, Wyndham Street

Sunday saw the husband in office for the better part of the day and ended with cricket (India v South Africa) and dinner/ drinks at one of the few places which show cricket in HK.

 My favouritest carrot cake at The Globe, SoHo

Monday saw a lunch overlooking the Wanchai Harbour with visiting clients and ended on a sweet note with a few bites of chocolate puffs from my colleague's plate (do note the will power here - I ordered for coffee and ate her dessert. Ha!)

Dessert selection part of the buffet lunch at Assaggio, Hong Kong Arts Centre, Wanchai

Here's looking to another great week in Hong Kong! As somebody said, Monday is just another day closer to Friday! :)

P.S. - Besides eating, I also managed to walk an average of 5kms per day over the week and around 13 kms over the weekend so rest assured, the calories are getting burnt too!

Recipe inside: Pasta with corn

I haven't got some cooking done in a while now and the kitchen seems to be beckoning. So yesterday, I decided to get some grocery shopping done and put together a meal. Infact, like I was telling the husband, it was one of those rare days when I was feeling very efficient - bought groceries on the way back from work, set the house straight, cooked a meal, finished off some work work and went to sleep before 11pm too!

The fridge was full of drying vegetables bought two weeks back while the family was in town and it was time to put them to good use. On the menu was angel hair pasta with spicy aubergine topped with lemon pepper corn.

Recipe:

Lemon pepper corn

Ingredients:

• Corn kernels
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• Juice of 1 small lemon or 1/2 a lime
• Salt
• Pinch of nutmeg powder
• Chilli flakes
• Oregano
• Pepper
• Basil
• Parsley
• Ketchup

To make:

• Heat olive oil on a frying pan and add the herbs (oregano, chilli flakes, basil, parsley) to the hot oil for a slightly smoked flavour
• Stir for 5-10 seconds and add in the corn kernels
  
• Mix the kernels well with the herbs, add salt and nutmeg powder
• Once the corn starts turning golden, cover the pan with a lid and let cook for 2-3 minutes, uncover and stir occasionally.
• Uncover it and pierce with a fork to see if it's slightly mushy and juicy inside, the corn should have also let off some water. Don't drain the water.
• Add some ketchup for a slightly thick consistency and for added flavour. Mix well.
  
• Add lemon juice just before turning off the heat and stir.
• Your spicy, juicy, lemon pepper corn is ready in less than 20 minutes!
  

Husband's rating: 4/5
My rating: 3.75/5

Hope you like the corn recipe. I would love to know how it turns out if you do make it... Angel hair aubergine pasta recipe coming up in the next post!

Delicate and delicious Japanese!

Relished some amazing Japanese food recently at Gogyo. Super super ramen, lotus flower and cheese dip and excellent skewers. 

Gogyo kogashi miso (burnt miso)... smoky, oily and not for everyone!

 Lotus flowers with cheese dip, named boringly but visually stunning

 Skewers... delish!

 Food that appeals to sense of smell, sense of sight and sense of taste 

- got to hand it to the Japanese

 Nice and hot and garlicy and flavourful 'kuro' with chewy noodles

Definitely an experience worth repeating!!

Gogyo,
3020 International Finance Centre,
8 Finance Street
Central, Hong Kong

Nuts about peanut butter

My latest foodession (portmanteau)? Peanut butter!

Peanut butter makes everything taste better - every possible thing! Peanut butter on a spoon, peanut butter on apples, peanut butter on crackers.. yum yum yum!!

What is your most recent foodession??

Amazing February

What a month February has been! 

The month of the Spring Festival (Chinese New Year) was full of holidays, celebration, activity, crazy race against time to meet deadlines, family, friends, travel, sleep deficit, unpredictable weather and of course, good food! If this is an indication of what the rest of the year is going to be like then all I can say is, bring-it-on!

The month started with a long weekend and we celebrated our first Spring Festival, trying to do all things local. It was amazing. We felt like tourists as we moved from one activity to another and explored parts of Hong Kong we hadn't even heard of earlier. It felt like a real holiday and home felt like a hotel - just a place to take a shower and sleep.

Super spicy numbing peanuts

Vegetarian chicken at the 10,000 Buddhas monastery  

Relaxing after a long day with some wine and spicy lemon prawns at Enoteca

The month ended with a week long holiday when Vishal's family visited 'Asia's World City'. It was awesome. Finally, after 14 months of marrying into the family, I had a chance to spend time with everybody, and show them my city. Although it's a bit of a cliche, I really don't know how the week went by.

Coconut ice cream in a coconut at The Venetian, Macau

Salmon salad at Main Street USA, Stanley Promenade

The month ended with a work trip to Singapore - a city I've been in love with ever since I visited it in 2005. It was so nice to finally see and feel the sun, coming from the dull and grey HK winter! The trip allowed me time to walk around the city and revive old memories and also to meet friends. I met a friend after eight years and she mentioned how she enjoyed reading my blog posts - hence this post right after coming back home. Thank you Bharti - this post is for you. 

 A fruity welcome at the Sheraton, Singapore

Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf after months, Orchard Road, Singapore

When I had last visited Singapore, I was not particularly impressed by Little India and wondered why Indians in Singapore wax eloquent about it. This time around, I could truly appreciate the place when I saw row upon row of Indian restaurants offering up every sort of Indian cuisine from every region possible. Now, I can't wait to go back to Singapore to go to Komala or Jaggi's or Murugan for their super soft idlis (never thought I would be looking forward to Indian food at a foreign destination but as they say, never say never!).

Chutneys ready and waiting for some of the softest idlis I've ever eaten, Murugan Idli

Little India!!

Action packed February was a month with many many learnings; key of which were - I can do anything I set my mind on doing, no matter how challenging it might seem at the face of it and, while I'm out there, doing the things that I am doing, the thing that keeps me going is the thought of coming back home to my best friend.