Cooking with Asia

Filling Ingredients:

3 red potatoes, peeled and diced

½ c. cheese, grated

Salt and pepper to taste

Filling Preparation:

1. Boil potatoes until soft.

2. Mash the potatoes with the grated cheese, adding salt and pepper to take.

3. You can also add some fresh parsley, bacon bits, chives, or other enhancements if you desire.

4. Let the potato mixture cool and refrigerate.

5. The next day, form the dough into 1” balls.

Dough Ingredients:

2 c. flour (approximately)

1 c. full fat sour cream

Dough Preparation:

1. Mix together the flour and sour cream and work until the dough loses most of its stickiness (about 5-7 minutes)

2. Wrap the dough in plastic and refrigerate.

3. Using your hands, roll the dough into the shape of a log.

4. Roll out the dough on a floured countertop until 1/8” thick. Cut circles of dough with a cookie cutter or drinking glass. OR Roll the dough into a log. Slice the log into 12 equal pieces. Mold each piece into a circle using your hands.

5. Place a ball of filling onto the circle, fold the circle in half, and pinch the edges closed with your fingers.

6. Boil the pierogies a few at a time in a large pot of water.

7. Pierogies are done when they float to the top (about 8 – 10 minutes)

8. Remove the pierogies from the water using a slotted spoon. Place in strainer for a few minutes.

9. Place piergies in a bowl and cover with sauted onions to prevent the pierogies from sticking to each other.

Source: Miller Cafeteria

I was so excited to make these perogies because i've never made my own before. I really enjoy the taste of perogies and i’m glad now that I know how to make them. When we were making these I had a good time. I think we did pretty good because they tasted awesome and we worked good together. I think the best thing we did was making the perogies and shaping them. When I was sauteing the pierogies in butter I put the whole batch in and that was a mistake. Since I put them all in it was hard to turn and cook them properly and when I was struggling to move them around a couple of pierogies broke open. It was a mess but they still ended up tasting great. I used the knowledge that I learned in class to help me through this lab. The lesson that I applied to this cooking lab was how to tell if potatoes are cooked thoroughly enough. I want to make these at home over summer break since i'll have a lot of time on my hands I may as well put it to good use. I know my mom would like these, she likes pierogies like me and really enjoyed these so I think she would too. This time when I make them at home i'm going to make sure to be more delicate and careful with with the pierogies so that they don't break open.

Prep Time: 15 Minutes

Cook Time: 30 Minutes

Ready In: 45 Minutes

Servings: 4

Ingredients:

1 cup enriched white rice

2 cups water

1/3 cup chopped baby carrots

1/4 cup frozen green peas

1 tablespoon vegetable oil

1 egg

soy sauce to taste

sesame oil, to taste (optional)

Directions:

1. In a saucepan, combine rice and water. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat, cover, and simmer for 20 minutes.

2. In a small saucepan, boil carrots in water about 3 to 5 minutes. Drop peas into boiling water, and drain.

3. Heat wok over high heat.

4. Pour in oil, then stir in carrots and peas; cook about 30 seconds.

5. Crack in eggs, stirring quickly to scramble eggs with vegetables.

6. Stir in cooked rice. Shake in soy sauce, and toss rice to coat.

7. Drizzle with sesame oil, and toss again.

Source: Allrecipes

I have always enjoyed fried rice from some asian restaurants in town. When we were making this I was very excited because I really enjoy fried rice. I'm glad this was an eating lab but at first when we finished sauteing the rice it was really plain. We needed to add a lot of soy sauce afterwards and then it was perfect. When making this, we cooked the rice perfectly and it had the right amount of vegetables. It was nicely browned and everything together tasted amazing. A setback that we came across was that when we boiled the rice some water boiled over the top because it was at too high of a temperature and we weren't watching it. That was easily fixed though because all that we had to do was turn down the heat. In this lab I knew what to do and I don't think that anything in class helped me with this lab. Everything we did in the lab was something that I already knew. I really like fried rice so I think that I would make this at home for my mom. Except this time I think that I will add in some shrimp or maybe chicken chunks to give it more flavour and be more filling.

Makes about 4 sandwiches

Ingredients:

6 eggs

1/3 cup mayonnaise

¾ teaspoon prepared yellow mustard

3 tbsp. chopped onion

2 tbsp. chopped celery

Salt and pepper to taste

Directions:

Place egg in a saucepan and cover with cold water. Bring water to a boil and immediately remove from heat. Cover and let eggs stand in hot water for 10 to 12 minutes. Remove from hot water. Place eggs in ice bath to cool the eggs quickly.

Peel and chop eggs.

Place the chopped eggs in a bowl, and stir in the mayonnaise, mustard, onion and celery.

Season with salt and pepper – more pepper than salt. Stir.

Spread butter on both pieces of bread

Source: Miller Cafeteria

When I knew we were going to egg salad sandwiches I wasn't too pleased. I never liked egg salad sandwiches and I really don't like boiled eggs. I was glad that it wasn't an eating lab because I know I wouldn't have eaten any of it. I did have a little sample of it though hoping that I might like it since I helped make it but I still didn't like it. When we were making the egg salad we all worked individually and we all knew what to do. We were able to work efficiently and completely finish our tasks on time without stopping the flow of our work. I feel that we didn’t have any complications because there wasn't much to do in this lab anyways. Since we had Jackson and Filip in our group we worked very fast and it was an easy cooking lab. When I transferred the eggs from the boiling water to the ice water I used my prior knowledge I learned in class. The knowledge that I used to help in this lab was that you should use a slotted spoon to safely take things out of water. I know I wouldn’t make this recipe at home but if I did I would make sure that I chopped the celery smaller and the egg chunks would be smaller too.

Tex-Mex Fajitas

beef, cut in strips

Marinade: 2 tablespoons vegetable oil

2 tablespoons distilled white vinegar

2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce

2 tablespoons water

1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice

1 tablespoon fresh lime juice

1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper

1/8 teaspoon garlic powder

Toppings: Onion slices, sauteed

Green pepper strips, sautéed

Red pepper strips, sauteed

Shredded lettuce

Sour cream

Salsa

4 Tortillas

Directions:

1. Combine marinade ingredients in a shallow casserole.

2. Cut beef into thin strips; add to marinade.

3. Cover and refrigerate for several hours.

4. Put 2 tbsp. oil in bottom of skillet.

5. Saute onion, red and green pepper.

6. In separate pan, cook marinated beef strips.

7. Add beef to sautéed vegetables.

8. Wrap in warm tortillas with onions and peppers and any desired toppings.

When making the fajitas I was excited because i've never tried them before and I was also excited because we got to eat them. They tasted really good but when we ate a beef it had a weird after taste to it. But when the beef was combined into a tortilla wrap with the veggies it was very good. In this lab I think that we sauteed the vegetables and meat perfectly. At least in my opinion I think they were cooked good because the veggies weren't too soggy or too firm, and the beef wasn't hard, it was soft but cooked well. I really enjoyed the fajitas but it was a bit spicy, perhaps it was just the salsa. I don't think we really messed up but the only thing I could think of is that I cut the beef strips too big but I fixed that when I cut them smaller. When I was sauteing the vegetables I remembered that you need to watch them carefully or they'd overcook and you need to constantly stir it. I think I would make these at home because when I mentioned to my mom she thought it was cool I made these in class. I told her how good they tasted and now I think she expects me to make them sometime. I wouldn't do anything different than what we did in this cooking lab because they came out perfect.

Garlic Croutons

1 ½ tbsp. oil

½ tsp. minced garlic

½ tsp. salt

¼ tsp. black pepper

3 slices firm white bread, cubed

Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Combine first 4 ingredients in large bowl. Add bread and toss to coat. Spread on 15 x 10 x 1 inch pan and bake 10 minutes until golden brown, stirring halfway through.

Caesar Dressing

1 clove garlic

½ c. oil

1 egg

2 tbsp. lemon

½ c. grated Parmesan cheese

1 tsp. anchovy paste

½ tsp. hot sauce

1 tsp. Dijon mustard

½ tsp. salt

¼ tsp. pepper

Blend for 10 seconds on medium speed in blender.

Romaine Lettuce

Fill sink with water (about ¼ full)

Add lettuce leaves and wash

Gently remove leaves BEFORE draining the water from the sink.

Pat leaves dry with paper towel.

TEAR (do not cut) leaves into bite-sized pieces

DO NOT COMBINE THE CROUTONS, DRESSING and LETTUCE as this salad will be served tomorrow!

Source: Mr. Turcotte

So when we made this Caesar salad it was pretty fun. Even though we didn’t get to have some Caesar salad I had a little sample of the dressing and I was surprised it tasted good. Since we put anchovy paste in it I was a bit skeptical on trying it but when I did it was delicious. I never knew that you put hot sauce and Dijon mustard into a Caesar salad dressing, I thought it was a weird combination of ingredients. When we made this we really did well when we made the dressing. We didn’t waste any time finishing this lab and we all worked on our own things while working productively. The only thing that I think we might have done wrong was that I blended the dressing for longer than was needed but I don’t think it changed it all that much. The knowledge that I learned in class before was how to use the blender and the safety precautions I needed to take. I was the only one working with the blender in this lab so it was good that I had the knowledge on how to use it properly. I would make this at home because my mom likes caesar salad and she's pretty picky with how the caesar salad dressing tastes like but I think this is one that she'd like. Plus it is also super easy to make this and I think this would impress my mom.

Prep Time: 10 Min

Cook Time: 20 Min

Ready In: 30 Min

Ingredients

1 cup uncooked spiral pasta

1/2 pound ground beef

1 tbsp. taco seasoning

1-1/2 cups shredded lettuce

1 chopped tomato

1/2 cup shredded Cheddar cheese

1/4 cup chopped onion

1/4 cup chopped green pepper

1/4 cup Catalina salad dressing

Tortilla chips

Directions

1. Cook pasta according to directions.

2. Meanwhile, in a skillet, cook beef over medium heat until no longer pink; drain. Stir in the taco seasoning; cool.

3. Drain pasta and rinse in cold water; stir into meat mixture.

4. Add the lettuce, tomatoes, cheese, onion, green pepper and dressing; toss to coat. Serve with tortilla chips.

Source: allrecipes.com

When I found out we were making taco pasta salad I wasn't that interested because it didn't sound very good. I'm kind of glad that it wasn't an eating lab because i'm not too sure that i'd actually try it. When I was cooking the beef though it smelt really good and mikayla and maricar agreed. I’m pretty sure that we cooked the pasta perfectly, it was al dente and was good. We also did really good time wise because we all worked on our own things. I worked on the pasta and the beef, Mikayla worked on cutting the vegetables and Maricar grabbed the rest of the ingredients. I don't really think we did anything wrong in this lab either. We did everything according to the recipe, but I guess I made a mistake when I was draining out the juices from the beef because a couple of beefs fell out of the pan into the sink. I think that I would make this at home, maybe just to try it out. I think my mom may like this recipe and my sister also. Except this time instead of pouring all of the seasoning into one spot i'll put the seasoning little by little and stir so it'll make it easier to spread it around. It's a good thing that we went over how to cook pasta correctly because I wouldn't know otherwise if I overcooked it or not.

Prep Time: 15 Min

Cook Time: 10 Min

Ready In: 25 Min

Servings: 9 - 10

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup margarine, softened

• 1/2 cup white sugar

• 1/2 cup brown sugar

• 1 egg

• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

• 1 cup all-purpose flour

• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda

• 1/2 teaspoon salt

• 2 tablespoons and 2 teaspoons unsweetened cocoa powder

• 1-1/2 cups semisweet chocolate chips

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C).

2. Line cookie sheet with parchment.

3. In a medium bowl, cream together the margarine, white sugar and brown sugar until smooth.

4. Beat in the egg, then stir in the vanilla.

5. Sift in the flour, baking soda, salt and cocoa powder; mix well.

6. Stir in the chocolate chips.

7. Use a scoop to drop cookies on the prepared cookie sheets.

8. Bake for 8 to 10 minutes in the preheated oven.

9. Allow cookies to cool on baking sheet for 2 minutes before removing to a wire rack to cool completely.

I chose to make the best double chocolate chip cookie recipe because I really enjoyed it when we made them before. When I was making these at home it was pretty easy because we've made these two times already before in class. I did pretty good while making these, and I think that they came out really nice. I was scared that I might have burnt them but to my surprise I made them perfectly. They were nice and soft in the middle and the edges were nice and crispy. I was proud of myself for making them all on my own because before this class I never really baked at home. When making these cookies and preparing the ingredients I made one mistake after baking the cookies. The only thing that I did wrong was that after I took out the second batch of cookies I left to let them cool and they were sitting on the sheet and I left them there for too long and they were moist. But my mistake was easily fixed when I transferred them to the cooling rack. When I was baking, I used my knowledge from our cooking class to help me through making these cookies. So I learned in class that if you don’t have a scoop the scoop out your dough then you can use two large spoons so that’s what I did to measure my cookies. I really like this cookie recipe so I'm pretty sure that I'm going to make these again. Next time I make these though I'm going to make sure that i don’t lose track of time or else the cookies could get moist.

Makes 3 dozen cookies

Ingredients:

1/2 cup (113 grams) unsalted butter, room temperature

1/2 cup (100 grams) white granulated sugar

1 large egg

3/4 teaspoons pure vanilla extract

1 1/3 cups (175 grams) all purpose flour

1/4 teaspoon baking powder

1/8 teaspoon salt

1/3 (75 ml) candied red cherries, chopped

Directions:

1. In the bowl of your mixer, beat the butter and sugar until light and fluffy (3-4 minutes).

2. Add the egg and vanilla extract and beat until incorporated.

3. In a separate bowl, sift or whisk together the flour, baking powder, and salt and then add to the butter and egg mixture. Mix just until a dough forms.

4. Stir in the cherries until evenly distributed throughout the dough.

5. Place dough on a large piece of parchment or wax paper. Smooth and shape the dough into an evenly shaped cylinder that is about 10 inches long. Then thoroughly wrap the shaped logs in the parchment or wax paper, twists the ends of the paper to seal the logs, and place in the refrigerator to chill for at least three hours, or up to three days. The logs can also be frozen for about one month. If freezing, it is best to let the logs stand at room temperature about 15-20 minutes before slicing.

6. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F with the rack in the center of the oven. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper.

7. Using a thin bladed knife, slice the logs into 1/4 inch (5 mm) thick slices. Place the cookies on the prepared baking sheets, spacing about 2 inches (5 cm) apart. Bake for about 10 minutes, or until lightly browned. Remove from oven and cool completely on a wire rack. Store at room temperature for about five days or baked cookies can be frozen for a couple of weeks.

When I went to have a cookie I was skeptical on how it would taste because all the guys said of how bad they tasted but when I did have one I enjoyed it. They were really sugary but overall I think they were pretty good. When we were making these it was really hard to roll the cookies into a cylinder shape. Whenever we'd get it to ten inches then I'd accidently roll it more to get it perfect and it got too long. Also another thing that didn’t go too well was that when we came back the next day to bake the cookies they were flattened on one side. So it was no longer a cylinder shape, so we just cut them and left them as that. We weren't sure if we needed to shape them into a circle because even the substitute didn’t know. They turned out as like half circles but they were still nice. When we were making these I think we did really good because we took them out at the perfect time. They came out with a light golden brown color and they weren't burnt so that’s good. When we were taking the cookies out of the oven they barely had a brown color to them but since I learned about carry over cooking we took them out early. Since they cooked after we took them out of the oven more they became a better golden brown color which was nice. I think these cookies were okay but I wouldn’t make them at home because I don’t think my mom would like these because they seemed a little dry. At least the ones I tried tasted were dry. If I were to make these at home I would roll them into balls and maybe they would come out as a circle cookie rather than a half circle cookie. 

Ingredients:

¾ c. margarine

1 c. white sugar

1 egg

¼ c. molasses

2 c. flour

1 tsp. baking soda

½ tsp. salt

1 tsp. cinnamon

½ tsp. cloves

1 tsp. ginger

Directions:

1. Cream margarine and sugar in a large bowl.

2. Add egg and molasses to creamed mixture.

3. In a medium bowl, combine flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, cloves, and ginger.

4. Add dry ingredients to creamed mixture and stir.

5. Roll dough into 24 balls.

6. Roll balls in sugar.

7. Refrigerate for a few minutes.

8. Bake 350 degrees for 10 minutes.

Source: A. Carnegie

Making these ginger sparklers were fun and easy. On the first day when we made the dough the molasses smelt bad but when I got used to it it started to smell like pumpkin. On the second day it was fun having the grade 8s with us while helping make the cookies. When the cookies came out of the oven they smelt so good and they tasted delicious too. I think they turned out pretty well because they came out with a bit of crunch, they were cracked at the top and they weren't too chewy in the middle. When I had one of the grade eights to put the cookies into the oven she accidently squished one of the cookies with the oven mitt but other than that I don’t think anything else wrong happened. While making the recipe I used my previous knowledge that I learned in class when I measured the butter. I remembered from when we made other things that you need to measure butter last and keep it in the original container and not transfer it too much or else you would leave a lot of it behind. I think that the cookies tasted good but I wouldn’t make them at home because I wouldn't be able to have more than two of these because they had a very strong taste to them. 

Prep time: 20 min. Cook Time : 8 min. Ready: 3 hours

Yield : 30 cookies

Ingredients

3/4 cup butter, softened

1 cup white sugar

2 eggs

½ teaspoon vanilla extract

2-1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

½ teaspoon salt

Directions

1. In a large bowl, cream together butter and sugar until smooth.

2. Beat in eggs and vanilla.

3. Stir in the flour, baking powder, and salt.

4. Cover, and chill dough for at least one hour (or overnight).

5. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F (200 degrees C).

6. Roll out dough on floured surface 1/4 to 1/2 inch thick.

7. Cut into shapes with any cookie cutter.

8. Place cookies 1 inch apart on ungreased cookie sheets.

9. Bake 6 to 8 minutes in preheated oven. Cool completely.

I don’t recall ever trying sugar cookies before so I was pretty excited to try these because my mom used to make these before but I don’t remember ever trying one. I liked making these because it was fun to decorate them and I did pretty good. I was pretty good at decorating them and it was fun using piping bags. The cookies came out tasting great and they were baked really nicely with a golden brown look. What didn’t go well though was that we kept rolling out the dough and we had to roll it over three times to get as much flower shapes as we could. I don’t think it affected the taste much because they still tasted good. Another thing we did wrong was that we didn’t put enough flour onto the counter so the flour really stuck to the counter which deformed the shapes when we tried to get them off. Without learning in class that the dough needs to be even throughout I wouldn’t have known to do that. I've never made cookies like these before by myself so this was a new thing to me. If I were to make these at home I would need to make sure that I flour the counter really well so that the lowers have a more appealing look to them.