Goldilocks - it's not just a fairy tale character anymore

A few of the things I smuggled in my suitcase from California the other day were goodies from the brand-spanking new and glistening 99 Ranch in Rancho Cucamonga. 99 Ranch is the Chinese-American West Coast equivalent to our Korean-American H Mart here on the East Coast. One item that I bought that stood above the rest was a delicious, soft and sweet-but-not-too-sweet bread made my the baked goods and Filipino cuisine company Goldilocks. Goldilocks, my friend Gil tells me, is massively popular with Southern California's Filipino community. It offers baked goods of all varieties, specifically but not exclusively Filipino baked goods. Originally opened in 1966 in Makati, Philippines, it has now spread throughout much of the western US and Canada as well.

Ahem, the bread... A little smooshed after 7 hours and one transfer in my luggage but just as edible, flanked by a package of their little hopia bean (yellow bean) buns

Back to the bread: this soft and delicious sweet bread is Goldilocks' ube loaf bread (about $4.50 at 99 Ranch). The ube loaf is a soft purple yam bread that you pull apart into individual pieces. Hopefully, you can make it last, which is not likely. I've been eating mine with Irish butter. If only they had this stuff on the East Coast I would probably buy this a lot more often.

Snacking State-by-State Mashup 3: Berbere Ricotta Dessert Lumpia with Key Lime-Poi Sauce

For my third mashup post, I had to find a way to combine leftover ingredients and dishes from Hawaii, Georgia, Florida (north and south) and the District into one unified recipe. The resulting recipe seemed all throughout as if it was going to bomb big time, but in the end it turned out to be pretty interesting, in a good way.

The mash-up recipe: Berbere Ricotta Dessert Lumpia with Key Lime-Poi Sauce


Serves 4

Ingredients (state flag indicates State-by-State post where ingredient was featured. Ingredients with no flag were not specifically used for any one post):

15 - 20 boiled peanuts (ground)

180 mL (1/2 glass bottle) pure sugar ("Mexican") Coca-Cola

1/2 teaspoon Ethiopian berbere spice

1 package lumpia wrappers

Sugar to taste

1 cup ricotta cheese

1/4 cup grits (prepared)

1/2 snack box (about 1 tablespoon) raisins

Dipping Sauce:

1/3 poi

Key lime juice to taste

1 - 3 tablespoons Kewpie mayonnaise (DC)

Sugar to taste

You also see cocoa powder in the ingredients photo. Along the way I decided not to use it, for reasons that will become clear.


Reduce half a bottle of Mexican Coca-Cola in a pan until you have s thin syrup. Though you may also want to add sugar to taste, the boiled-down Coke will serve as the main source of sweetness for the lumpia mixture.

Coke Minus?

While boiling down the Coke, mix the ricotta, grits, raisins, ground down boiled peanuts (make sure you wash off the peanuts before you crush them) and berbere spice mix. Please make sure you don't use too much berbere because it will overpower your ricotta-grits mixture. I found that 1 teaspoon was more than enough to leave a strong berbere flavor, and a little kick, but to the point that I couldn't taste the Coke. Half the berbere will still give the flavor and some of the kick without overpowering everything else.


Here I added the Coca-Cola before everything else. Really, it doesn't matter exactly what order you add the Coke to the other ingredients.

One-finger ricotta-grits-Coke lumpia mixture!

Put your ricotta-grits mixture in the freezer for about 15 to 30 minutes to firm up if it is too loose, and in the meanwhile make your dipping sauce. Put the poi in the blender and slowly add your Key lime juice and Kewpie mayonnaise. You will want to add sugar to taste. Trust me on this. Please.


When ready to make your lumpia, put a hefty spoonful on a lumpia wrapper and fold as you would any other lumpia. Fry until golden brown in 350°F vegetable, peanut or canola oil. Serve with dipping sauce.



All the while I was making this recipe, it had the makings of "I know this is not going to work. I know that this is simply not going to work." But of the three mashup recipes I've done, this one by far turned out the best. The filling was not overpowering and was sweet, spicy and tangy all at once. The dipping sauce gave a very nice sweet and sour contrast all its own. If I had to do it over again, I would probably skip the grits, double the amount of reduced-down Coke and halve the amount of berbere I put in the recipe. A little powdered sugar on the lumpia wouldn't hurt either.

Snacking State-by-State: Hawaii II - Oh the things one can do with Spam

Mind you, Hawaiian cuisine is not just poi and sweet potatoes, pineapples and seafood. Hawaiian cuisine today is very much a fusion cuisine, specifically in terms of its Asian-American population (Asian-Americans are the largest demographic group in Hawaii). Japanese, Chinese, Filipino, Korean and other influences are strong throughout the Hawaiian islands, and it has led to both delicious Pan-Asian foods but also to fusion foods, such as the uniquely Hawaiian Spam musubi, a type of maki roll with Spam in the middle.

Official Name: State of Hawaii (Hawaiian: Mokuʻāina o Hawaiʻi - Hawaii has two official languages, English and Hawaiian)
State Nickname: The Aloha State
Admission to the US: August 21, 1959 (#50 - Ah, still has that new state smell)
Capital: Honolulu (largest city)
Other Important Cities: Hilo (2nd largest), Kailua (3rd), Kāne‘ohe (4th)
Region: West, Pacific; Pacific (US Census)
RAFT Nations: Taro
Bordered by: The Pacific Ocean (all sides)
Closest land mass: California, almost 2,500 miles away
Official State Foods and Edible Things: none
Some Famous & Typical Foods: poi & taro, pork, much local seafood (such as mahi mahi), macadamia nuts, tropical and "lu’au" foods (pineapple, coconut, etc), Asian and Native Hawaiian fusion cuisines, Spam and foods made from it (musubi, Spam stir fries, etc)

Did I forget to mention, by the way, that Spam is one of the most favorite foods of Hawaii? You can even find it in the form of Spam burgers at McDonald’s. For my next recipe, I wanted something a bit more original than a Spam burger, to reflect Hawaii’s strong Asian-American identity. The Hawai'i's Spam Cookbook by Ann Kondo Corum has many recipes to encourage me. The one that caught my eye was one for deep fried Spam lumpia.

The recipe: Spam Lumpia


The Spam lumpia recipe originally comes from Vicki Perry’s “prize winning recipe”, as the authors of Hawaii’s Spam Cookbook mention. This very Hawaiian twist on the pork-filled Filipino fried favorite calls for:

* Spam (I have not bought this stuff in ages, so I didn’t realize one can would set me back about $3.50)
* kamaboko (basically, a type of Alaskan pollock fish cake from Japan. I had less trouble finding exactly what I needed than I thought I would, since I found this in the “frozen fish cake” section of the H Mart for $4)
* chopped green onion (cheap at the farmers’ market)
* garlic salt (used garlic powder instead)
* 2 eggs, beaten (had them)
* chop suey mix, parboiled (this was what gave me the most trouble. At first I looked in every non-Asian supermarket thinking this would be some Americanized Chun King horror mix. Instead, I had my best luck in the Filipino section of the H Mart. Mama Sita is a particularly popular brand of chop suey/pancit seasoning mix for about $1.50)
* lumpia wrappers (much easier to find - about $3)
* frying oil (had that)
In addition, you will need a dipping sauce, which consists of catsup, vinegar, sugar, water and cornstarch.

To make the lumpia, grate the Spam and kamaboko.

Grating the kamaboko

This in itself is pretty unusual, but you need to do this to get a proper lumpia filling.

Ain't it purty?

Merely chopping it up with a knife isn’t going to cut it.

This became a tad bit grating

Mix the rest of the lumpia ingredients, except (of course) for the lumpia wrappers themselves. This includes parboiled chop suey mix. I could not quite figure out how to partially cook a packet of powdered chop suey mix. The best I could come up with was to quickly make it into a gravy and add it to the Spam-kamaboko mixture.

Pancit gravy?

Perhaps the recipe’s author meant something different than a powdered chop suey mix.

Now added to the Spam mixture

Next, prepare the lumpia. I have never made one before so it took a little practice. This video by YouTuber clarkonair shows how to make lumpia, including how to most effectively wrap it so that it doesn’t come apart in your deep frying oil or on your plate (this is about 2:30 into the video).

If the video doesn't work, here's a walkthrough.

Put about 1 to 2 tablespoons of Spam mixture above one corner of the wrapper, then fold up the corner to cover it.

Like so

And so

Next, fold over the two adjacent sides like an envelope,


wet the final exposed corner and then roll up the rest of the lumpia towards that wet corner.

What's Tagalog for "Voilà"?

You may need to wet it a bit more after you fold it up.


Finally, you need to fry the lumpia in oil until golden brown. Make sure the oil is around 350°F, and keep it there. The lumpia should get golden brown after about 3 to 5 minutes. Drain on paper towels, and dip in your dipping sauce.

Making the dipping sauce. Never got thick.

Mine never got thick at all, even though I added about two to three times the amount of cornstarch the recipe calls for.


This was not one of my favorite recipes. It’s not that I did it wrong (unless the chop suey mix really wasn’t meant to be just a powdered mix). I think it is because of all that Spam. It’s been so long since I had ever eaten it that it overwhelmed me. It even exacerbated the Crohn’s a little bit. Perhaps I might need to build up a better tolerance for Spam than I have now? Until then, my next lumpia will be the more traditional one with pork instead of Spam and kamaboko. I will say this: however this Spam lumpia agreed or disagreed with me, it did go well with the very simple Spam-pineapple fried rice I made to go along with it. It's just 1/2 a block of Spam, cut into strips, fried with pineapple chunks, green onions, an egg and about 2 cups of rice.


We’re done in the Aloha State. Next we head up to the Northwest and the country’s largest exporter of potatoes. A hui hou kakou*, and Westward Idaho! (collective groans from the readership...)

* Until we meet again, according to this website of Hawaiian phrases.

ADDENDUM: A month after posting this, I told my friend Gil in Fontana, California, about my Spam lumpia experiment. Gil, who is Filipino-American, developed a sudden and palpable look on his face that I can only describe as 50% disgust and 50% horror. Honestly, I cannot say I didn't feel the same when I ate this, though it was funny to see at the time. Next time, I am making actual, honest-to-God lumpia, punyeta!

Sources:

Anonymous eHow Food & Drink Editor. "How to Make Poi". eHow Food. Posted July 20, 2000.

Clark (clarkonair). "How to Make Lumpia". Posted on YouTube, December 27, 2007.

Kauai Menu. "The History of Hawaiian Food". Kauai Menu, author unknown. Copyright 2010 Kauai Menu.

Kondo Corum, Ann. Hawai'i's Spam Cookbook. Bess Press: Honolulu, 1987. Also available on Google Books.

Mark O. (Food.com user). "Poi Maoli (Taro Poi) Recipe". Food.com. Posted February 4, 2002.

Zia, Dana (The Go Lightly Gourmet). "History of Hawaii's Cuisine". The Go Lightly Gourmet, posted March 8, 2011.

Some information also obtained from Wikipedia's "Hawaii" page and other pages, and the Food Timeline State Foods link to "Hawaii".

Impromptu Road Trip to New York: 2 of 2

Again, photos are forthcoming.

Breakfast and Lunch?

I gave up on jogging for the morning – Central Park too far, don’t want to be bothered – and had breakfast at the little “natural foods” café called Naturally Yours. I almost walked out after waiting 10 minutes for the waiter to take my order. Turns out he had just forgotten to tell my waitress that I was over there, while she was all alone bussing tables on the other side of the place. Glad I didn’t leave. I got a low-carb (to make up for not jogging) egg white omelet with lox and onions in it, and tomato slices, which taste really good with a little salt on them. All this, with a horribly warm orange juice, was about $12.

I chatted with my bunkmates (one is Venezuelan – my Spanish is getting less rusty – and the other Québécois), checked out, and went out for lunch. And I got adventurous. On the previous advice of Charm City Cupcake, I hightailed it out to the Woodside section of Queens for some Thai food at Sripraphai. Whoever said that Queens is filled with lots of different ethnic eateries wasn’t kidding. There were so many nationalities and languages represented on a six-block stretch: Mexican, Colombian, Italian, Irish, Filipino, Paraguayan, Uruguayan, Chinese, Japanese, Cuban. I don’t think I saw a single hamburger between 61^st and 69^th St. But I wanted Thai so I headed to Sripraphai, on 39^th Ave.

Guess which Thai restaurant on 39^th Ave is closed on Wednesdays? Sorry CCC, I tried!

So I wandered around a bit more and wound up in a Uruguayan/Paraguayan bakery. Again, I flexed my Spanish muscles and ordered one large cookie and a Diet Pepsi for $2.50. That much for a coke and a cookie? Ah, but this was a big ass, double layer cookie, the top one dipped in chocolate, with a chocolate cream filling between them. Mmmm.

I then got lunch on a block featuring a solid line of Filipino restaurants. I set foot in the Perlas ng Silangan restaurant, only to be given a menu and then be ignored for ten minutes while the same waiter – one of four in the otherwise empty restaurant – instead helped a woman he knew and her two children who all came in after me. Maybe I was supposed to go up and order, but if so then why did he just go ahead and seat me? I don't know. I walked out and headed across the street to the Tipanan Restaurant, which had several full tables, from none of which was heard a word of anything but Tagalog. This time I just ordered at the counter, and got the most remarkable, fragrant pesang bangus fish soup with onion, ginger and whole peppercorns, served with a mountain of rice and a Diet Coke for all of $9. AND the waitress gave me a complimentary dessert, which was light and a little marshmallowy, and damn good. The tables, I must warn you, aren't the, um, cleanest, but it's something you just have to deal with if you want this good food.

Back on the train

A few more excursions later, I found myself heading back to the hotel to collect my things – they’ll hold it for you after you check out. On the way I hit Little Korea and went into Woorijip, a little cafeteria-style restaurant featuring racks of freshly made dishes - fish, meat, hot, cold, veggies, kimchi and also Korean groceries. For $10 I got a box of sweets, a kimchi dinner to eat on the train, a rainbow colored rice cake and a small can of cinnamon-flavored punch. This last one was tasty and a little hot going down. Who would’ve thought? A cinnamon soft drink?

I am writing this on the train, by the way. It’s going ridiculously slow and, because of the pungent smell of the kimchi, I am now afraid to eat it until I get back to Baltimore.

UPDATE: I ate the stuff from Woorijip on the train. Nobody seemed to mind. And it was hot. And yummy.

Easter Sunday Eatin' Part 2: Max's of Manila

Jim had a "family thing" to go to, and because his family is a little weirded out by his gay friends, Gil and I were not invited (Jimbo's very irritated about this, actually). So Gil and I headed out towards LA to see what kind of trouble we could stir up. After the, ahem, proper stirring, we headed back to his place in Fontana, where I was parked.

It had been a while since brunch at the Castaway, and I started asking if we could stop somewhere for food. Gil, who is of Filipino ancestry, and I started talking about Filipino food, and so the light bulb went off in my head. "Hey, any good Filipino places around?"

Now Gil reminded me that Filipinos, who are uber-Catholic, would be extremely unlikely to open a restaurant on Easter Sunday of all days! But we decided to try and find one anyway. Gil drove me to the heart of Filipino Southern California - West Covina (How do I keep winding up here?).

We got to Manila Way, a short street with a large shopping complex on either side of it, and each caters to the local Filipino community. His jaw dropped (a difficult thing for the rarely perturbable Gil) when he saw that one restaurant very familiar to him was indeed open - the Manila-based chain of family-style restaurants called Max's.

Max's of Manila actually got its start with a crispy chicken recipe in Quezon City after World War II, and has since ballooned to 100 locations in the Philippines. It also has five locations in California and one in Hawaii. And the West Covina location was open until 9 pm today. Most of the American locations have a mostly-Filipino clientele. Occasionally, you'll see a white, black or Hispanic customer wander, but usually he or she is brought in by a Filipino friend. This was the case with me.

The waitress got our orders and Gil gave me a little insight into what he liked, and what his family (who live in Oklahoma) usually orders when he takes them there. I'm not unfamiliar with Filipino food, but let's just say I'm not an expert in it either, so the help was definitely needed. Gil told me it's kind of a mixture of American, Spanish, Chinese and indigenous foods, all congealing into one, big Filipino entity. While we perused the menu, Gil recommended the crispy chicken, the classic Max's dish. I wasn't in a chicken mood, though, so I asked about other things - a strange thing for a white guy or any non-Filipino to do in Max's, seeing as how fried chicken (which is more just coated in spices and fried, without any breading like we love in the US) is the most familiar to American palates. Their chicken comes with a healthy (and I mean healthy) dose of rice.

Before she came back, we had settled on the lumpiang shanghai - or Shanghai eggrolls. Gil got the crispy chicken, and I had settled on the sizzling boneless bangus (or milkfish, but it was only mostly boneless), with a side order of garlic fried rice - just fried white rice, but instead of eggs and veggies (like in Chinese fried rice) you put in garlic, lots of garlic. Why have I never seen this deliciousness anywhere before? The waitress, who was ridiculously helpful, assumed correctly that I really had no idea what half the stuff on the menu was. She seemed surprised when I ordered the milkfish - I guess most non-Filipinos order the chicken and leave it at that. Since they were closing the kitchen she asked for our dessert orders. Gil got the flan and I got a dulce de leche drink with a dollop of avocado ice cream.

I simply loved everything I ate, except for the dulce de leche drink, though the avocado ice cream was heavenly. Gil tells me his Mexican friends retch when he mentions the mere concept of avocado in an ice cream, which is not how it is used in Mexico or the US, as a fruit. In fact, Filipinos have lots of ice cream flavors that we would find odd, such as red bean, purple yam, and the dreaded corn and cheese. But our desserts are too damn sweet for them. This was reflected in the flan, which was not nearly as sweet as the flan I have had in so many Mexican restaurants.

As for the main course (yes, we did eat those first), Gil loved his chicken. I tried a small piece, and I must have gotten a tough part. But I take his word, everybody loves this chicken. My bangus was broiled and in a sea of some kind of gravy, with sliced chilis and spring onion bits on top. It tasted all charcoal-y and was just scrumptious. The waitress commented on how I must have really liked the fish, because there was hardly anything left of it save the blackened head and tail. The lumpiang were also tasty, though I struggled to eat many more of them with all the food in me from the day's travels.

All this was about $35. With a $5 tip, we left, full off the only Filipino food available in Southern California on Easter Sunday night.