Over the weekend, my parents went to Flushings and brought back an array of Asian eateries. Included was a 6 pack of freshly baked banh baos! Oy, I saw them on the table and had to have one despite trying to eat healthier. But I figured, one banh bao won’t set me back… too much… =P

A girl has to have some treats!

Of all the Vietnamese savory eats, these pork buns are one of my favorites. I loveeeeee the fluffy sweet white dough! During my younger years, I would beg my mother to make them from scratch (but to be honest, they weren’t that good compared to bakery bought ones, shhh).

Here is a shot one bite in… the minced pork filling was very yummy and there was also a tiny chinese sausage stub inside.

Not the best of shot, but I wanted to show the little quail egg that is in each banh bao. I love these little eggs, although it seems to make a few non-Asians gag when I mention it!

Last week, I was craving tunafish but still wanted to make something healthy. So here’s my low-calorie & low-fat version:

Aside from using one can of light tuna in water, I bulk up the tuna with chopped up cucumber and red peppers (whatever was available in my fridge):

Then, instead of mayonnaise, I use Hellman’s dijonnaise (5 calories per tsp) instead. It has a creamy texture which holds the tuna together well and also gives a little kick in taste.

I forgot to get light bread at the grocery store so used Pepperridge Farm’s Rye bread (80 cals per slice) instead.

I ate the remainder leftover cucumber + peppers on the side, sprinkled with salt + pepper. Delicious, healthy, and very filling lunch!

Last Thursday, I stumbled upon a steak marinade recipe titled “Best Steak Marinade in Existence” which piqued my curiosity because it had a ton of great reviews. I had never marinaded any type of meats since I usually just like a simple brush of olive oil, salt + pepper. But it’s always fun to try new things… and I had to find out if it was truly the best steak marinade in existence!

(The recipe/link will be posted below)

Most of the ingredients — I forgot to include the lemons in the photo!

A picture of the steak right before I put it on the grill. I marinaded the steak Friday afternoon but we didn’t grill it until Saturday evening — so that was a little over 24 hours sitting in the sauce (I used a gallion sized zip lock bag). I could definitely see how the acid from the lemon juice soaked and cooked the meat a bit.

Right off the grill! I did about 4 minutes on each side (turning the steak halfway through each time for the grill marks) so that it would be medium-well since the love does not like too much pink in his steaks. I was hoping to not overcook because every website said the flank steak would turn very chewy otherwise!

And a shot of the plate! It worked out in both our favors, since one side of the steak was slightly thicker and had more red. Whereas the thinner end did not have much pink in it at all. Best of both worlds! I paired the steak with Uncle Ben’s country wild rice and steamed Asian veggies.

As for the marinade itself, I could definitely taste the soy sauce in the meat. Very flavourful, but perhaps just a tad too bold for me. I prefer more subtle flavors…. but my love thought it was fantastic! I would make this recipe again, especially for BBQs.

Best Steak Marinade in Existence

INGREDIENTS
* 1/3 cup soy sauce
* 1/2 cup olive oil
* 1/3 cup fresh lemon juice
* 1/4 cup Worcestershire sauce
* 1 1/2 tablespoons garlic powder
* 3 tablespoons dried basil
* 1 1/2 tablespoons dried parsley flakes
* 1 teaspoon ground white pepper

DIRECTIONS
1. Place the soy sauce, olive oil, lemon juice, Worcestershire sauce, garlic powder, basil, parsley, and pepper in a blender. Add hot pepper sauce and garlic, if desired. Blend on high speed for 30 seconds until thoroughly mixed.
2. Pour marinade over desired type of meat. Cover, and refrigerate for up to 8 hours. Cook meat as desired.

Aside from visiting family, we had planned our trip to Vietnam to coincide with an uncle’s wedding. We traveled to the city of Hue, which is centrally located in Vietnam. Holy cow, it was the hottest city ever. I thought I was miserable in Saigon with the heat, but it was incomparable in Hue!!

And to make things even worse, the family luncheon that my uncle and his fiancee had planned was held in a restaurant that had no AC at all. There were a few standing rotating fans that only gave us a few seconds of momentary relief every minute.

At least the food was good….

1st dish…Nem Ran (spring rolls): These were crunchy and very good. Surrounding the spring rolls are cubed processed meats.. I have no idea how to describe them in English, but my parents occasionally got rolls of these from Asian markets here every so often.

2nd dish… the Vietnamese version of fried calamari. The batter on the calimari was light and it didn’t taste too greasy/oily.

3rd dish is ‘Goi’ which is kind of like a Vietnamese slaw with meat. This dish had chicken in it. I normally don’t like goi too much but the fresh herbs (mint!!) in this dish made it exceptional.

4th dish… nothing too fancy, just white rice with dried fried onions.

Aside from beer, there were canned fruit drinks. This winter melon tea was my absolute favorite!! In fact, it was so good that I packed a couple cans back with me to the states! Subtly sweet and very refreshing. I really need to check the Asian markets around here to see if they sell them…

For dessert, the waiters brought out dishes of these little green boxes. Inside was some kind of weird gelatin thingy. The texture was so iffy and the taste was even worse. I gagged and spat it out into a napkin =|

One of my favorite healthy and easy to make breakfast:

Light multi-grain English muffin with a fried egg, ketchup + salt + pepper.

And of course, a banana for extra protein to get my day going!

In my continuing Vietnam trip photos…

These LOVELY and DELICIOUS mangosteens are featured in my top banner. I had never seen or tasted these exotic fruits until my aunt brought out a plate for dessert. She had brought them fresh from the market…and oh my gosh, it was like a bite of heaven. If I had to make a list of some of the things that I missed about Vietnam, this fruit would likely be in the top five!

Below is a small bowl of ‘bun bo hue’ which is pretty much a beef noodle soup with fermented fish paste. The taste and aroma is very strong! It’s an acquired taste, but since I had grown up eating it even in the states… I was not turned off at all. This was yummy!

I’m not sure about this picture below. It’s fried tofu with fresh greens on the side… but problem is, I can’t remember where or when it was eaten. It looks like a dish served at a restaurant, but at which city… I am not too sure!

Late last night, I was having a munch attack but did not want to eat anything unhealthy. I kept poking around the kitchen and finally settled upon tomato slices sprinkled with sea salt + fresh cracked black pepper. It hit the spot!

For Father’s Day this past Sunday, I picked up four lobsters to steam for dinner. Waldbaum’s was having a really good sale that I could not pass! Figured that aside from a couple of presents, I would also treat my parents to a little something yummy + different for dinner. I can’t recall the last time we’ve had lobster (much less a full one)… so this was a real treat for them!

An up close shot:

I was a little afraid that the lobsters might not be that good because I got them for a really good price and feared that it might be too good a deal to be true. But luckily, my fears were put to rest because everything tasted great!

We put the lobsters in a double boiler and simply steamed them for 20-25 minutes. Mmmmm, the meat was sweet and succulent!! Yum. It was a total mess eating it all, but it was thoroughly enjoyed!

My parents used salt + pepper w/ a squeeze of lemon juice for their dipping sauce. They’re not accustomed to the western style of using clarified butter. But for myself and my lovey, I melted a stick of butter and then scooped the foamy top layer. (Don’t worry, we didn’t consume the whole stick!!)

While at TJ’s last week, we also picked up a couple of the frozen chicken burritos for lunch the following day. Two thumbs down for them! VERY bland, chicken had odd texture, and at 280 calories (for 1/2 the burrito)… not worth it!

Saturday, we dug up the frozen rib eye steaks that were purchased last weekend but did not grill because of the rain. Well, the rain never let up and it was once again drizzling this entire weekend. So we decided to broil the steaks in the oven.

Steaks in the oven… the oven got so hot that a corner of the sheet pan bent upwards! Yes, a regular pan was used because we did not have a broiler pan.

For a side, we used Trader Joe’s frozen Steakside Creamed Corn. The corn was mixed with cream and Asiago cheese. It was very sweet! A convenient side dish to our dinner.

My dish… unfortunately my steak out overcooked and was too tough for my liking. I mostly ate the bits around the bone. The beef was very flavorful and tender there!

The other plate, lovingly charred and enjoyed:

The problem with cooking the steaks in the broiler was not using the broiler itself… but that the steaks had not completely thawed out…thus rendering it difficult to gauge the doneness of the meats.

While browsing Trader Joe’s yesterday, we picked up a block of Havarti (w/ dill) cheese and a stick of salami. After finishing the purchase, there was a liquor store a few stores down… so we completed a yummy appetizer with Pindar’s Sweet Scarlett red wine.

The wine is deliciously flavored!! Not too dry nor overly sweet. It had a subtle sweet flavor which tasted great. Instead of my usual one glass, I downed two….and got a little tipsy because I banged my camera against the wall while walking upstairs. =(

The wine was definitely a great accompaniment to the cheese, salami, and cracked pepper crackers! The salami was probably one of the best ones I’ve ever tasted. We got the kind that had been infused with red wine.

An upclose shot of my mini-app. By the way, the crackers at TJ’s were only 99 cents which is sooooo a bargain. They’re total knockoffs of Carr’s Tablewater crackers but taste exactly the same, and so much cheaper.

Before heading into work yesterday, I made a quick stop at King Kullen to pick up some frozen meals for lunch/dinner. While I was in the cold aisle, I spotted trays of jumbo lobster NY ravioli which looked realllly good. They were so plump and fresh looking. I decided to grab a tray for the weekend, and then on a whim also picked up another tray of the spinach ravioli and a container of vodka sauce.

So for lunch today, we had a mixture of lobster and spinach ravioli (3 of each):

An up close shot of the lobster ravioli. It was actually a mixure of lobster and crab meat, but still overall very good.

The filling was ample in size which was awesome. I once bought a pack of lobster ravioli from Trader Joe’s that was super disappointing because there was barely any filling inside at all.

Two thumbs up to New York Ravioli & Pasta Company!

Ever attempted to cook a frozen egg before? Hehe, we encountered a frozen egg in the carton this morning and were stunned as to how it got that way. All the other eggs in the tray were fine, but this one particular egg was frozen solid.

Well, we tried cooking it anyway…

It started to melt… then we flipped it over…

No picture of the end result, but it tasted gross and wound up in the garbage!

Tonight’s dinner was tacos! We were craving them since it’s been awhile since they were last made. The tacos were prepared with 93% lean ground turkey, reduced fat sour cream, lettuce, and extra sharp cheddar cheese.

The ground turkey w/ spicy taco seasoning:

Chopping up the lettuce:

My plate. I had two tacos stuffed with the ground turkey, a bit of cheese, and a ton of lettuce as a filler.

Turtle’s double decker tacos:

Yay, the weather cleared up and we were able to go strawberry picking today! Our farm of choice was Lewin Farms because it was closer and got good reviews on Yelp. Plus, it was inexpensive — only $1.75 per lb!

Since the sky was still slightly overcast, there weren’t that many people out today which was good. The strawberry fields were not overly crowded at all.

My brother with his box of strawberries:

My 8lb box of strawberries (came out ot be $14):

Afterwards, we drove 8 miles up the road and went to Briermere Farms for their locally well known pies. My brother had suggested the strawberry cream pie, but after seeing how HUGE it was in the display counter… I opted for the smaller strawberry rhubarb instead.

The pie:

The pie, minus a slice:

Slice of pie with some Reddi-Wip and the strawberries (that were picked earlier):

Mmm, it was delicious. The crust was buttery and flakey and the filling tasted fresh. Definitely a treat (and a very high calorie one too, I might add).