The RPS has been doing resoundingly well in school. Only her second semester back and her grade is less than 3% shy of perfect in every class, including her honors courses in nutrition and child development, with every indication she is going to end the semester with aplomb. She likes to send screencaps of her GPA to her parents/grandparents, and we usually get a reply that is something to the tune of 'Move back home/stop living in sin and we will pay for school :))).' So that's fun. I asked what she wanted to do to celebrate her good grades, she asked me to learn how to make cha siu bao because the frozen ones from the chinese grocery aren't quite the same as fresh. I'm watching a few videos and starting to sweat a bit. I'm a pretty competent cook but a baker I ain't. I'm gonna approach the bun-making process like Walter White as opposed to Julia Child I think. Baking requires too much precision to do otherwise. Semi-related, I was looking over my financial stuff on Monday and evidently I owe a ton less on my student loans than I ever thought, just looking at the balances on the accounts. I'm doing some digging to make sure, but it's not a far fetched idea to say that I could be student debt free in less than a decade. Fingers crossed that this is legit and not just an accounting mistake. We're going to spend a weekend at a lakeshore cabin with some friends to celebrate a birthday on Saturday. The plan is intoxication, Dominion and Mario Kart 8 and I'm looking forward to it a lot. I'm responsible for the omelette bar on Sunday and I'm excited to break out all the bougie fillings. Right now I'm leaning towards something like prosciutto, asparagus and caramelized onions with some kind of stinky cheese.
Cha siu bao is one of my favorite things, so she has good taste. I'll be interested to hear about the process once you find something that works. Mario Kart 8 is great.
Oh fuck dude she's got you learning humbow? SIGN ME UP So there's a shop off Pike Place called Mee Sum Pastry. They make humbow unlike anyone else on the planet. I first had them in '90 when I came up to visit as a wee bairn and I immediately had like six. They're damn near legendary. And they do what they wanna do. I would argue that the goal is to make the RPS happy and the baked humbows at Mee Sum are about as far away from traditional Chinese cha siu bao as you can get. Do what works and iterate until you nail it. by the bye, goat cheese not stinky cheese. The thing about an omelet is it's supposed to be light. It doesn't take much to overpower eggs. This is why you typically don't see anything more hardcore than gruyere. You also rarely see the good ones with more than two ingredients (prosciutto and goat cheese, asparagus and gruyere, carmelized onions and bacon). If you really wanna get decadent, go mouselline. And grab a cheap bottle of bubbly and some orange or grapefruit juice because somehow mimosas make people think they're the fucking queen or some shit.
That's the goal. I think the filling should be pretty easy to nail except for the color, which I found out comes from a metric fuck ton of nitrate salt. Maybe I'll just use Sriracha instead. Also I have the same problem with bao that you do. I can't order them at restaurants because I get them, devour them, get my entree and wish that I had more bao isntead. I have done in the past, I'm not opposed to the idea. The gruyere is an inspired touch, maybe I'll go that route. What white cheese goes with prosciutto other than fresh mozz? Definitely doing more than two ingredients though, I'm feeling decadent. Booze has already been covered or I would have been the first one to suggest the bubbly. I'm learning to stay in my wheelhouse and not over prepare for things. There is a certain amount of grace in allowing other people to host I think.Do what works and iterate until you nail it.
goat cheese
Different takes on traditional white cheeses are Beecher's Flagship, and Cougar Gold. Both are deeeeee-lish, local, and enough different from store-bought mass-produced cheesefoodproduct, that you'll feel like a white-cheese-eating toff. And supporting local producers.
The fact that there's a Beecher's in SeaTac reinforces that being my favorite continental airport to-date.
Mee Sum does four or five different fillings and they're all bomb.com. One of them is basically stewed pork in sweet and sour sauce. The color comes from FD&C Red. One of them is curry chicken. It's fuckin' curry chicken. One of them is beef stew. It could be goddamn Dinty Moore. I think their success comes from (A) the fact that they're softball big so you can get a proper amount of filling in (B) they do egg wash on the outside, and also some butter type stuff, and definitely sugar, and I'm not sure what else but by howdy they sweat the tops (C) the pastry is light. Hawaiian roll light. Hawaiian roll sweet, too, which allows you to contrast the filling. I've done prosciutto in omelets and I gotta say I'd rather saute some black forest ham. It isn't as salty. But goat cheese goes with prosciutto, mozz goes with prosciutto, an aged cheddar goes with prosciutto, havarti sure as shit goes with prosciutto, iberico goes with prosciutto. I mean, it's basically pretense bacon once you cook it.