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Apple Tasting at Union Square Street Market in NYC

25 Nov

It’s apple season… and coming from the tropics, the only apples I am familiar with are the traditional Red Delicious, Golden Delicious, Granny Smiths and if you want to get exotic, some Galas once in a while.

From my local experience, I prefer to use Granny Smiths or Golden Delicious in most of my cooking applications – to make an apple crisp, to eat with Brie en Croute or Camembert Chaud and to enjoy in a picnic with the Laughing Cow’s cheese wedges…  I like their flavor and look much better than the Red Delicious. To me, the typical red-skinned apple tends to be too mealy and not very appetizing, although it tends to be ubiquitous in any local potato salad recipe.

Given I was going to be in apple country during apple season, why not expand my horizons to trying other types of apples, which I have certainly heard of but never ever tried before???

So during our 2 visits to Union Square Street Market, we visited a few stalls who concentrated in selling apples and apple cider and juices. There were sooooo many to choose from so we concentrated our efforts on a few types only:

Fuji Apples

Macoun Apples

Macintosh Apples

Sonata Apples

Cameo Apples

 

The results of our research derived the following conclusions:

  • The ones my mom and I kept trying over and over again were Fuji and Macoun. They were both sweet and crisp tasting.  They were both good!!!
  • I  think my tastebuds are not as developed in apple knowledge to detect much difference in most of the apples. Sonata, Macintosh and Cameos all blended in the mix. Maybe I needed to cleanse my palate in between tastings???
  • After tasting so many pieces of apples, they all kinda tasted very similar to me. An apple is an apple is an apple…
  • I was told that Macoun apples were particularly juicy, even much so that the juice would drip down my arm, but that was not the case with the apples we had. Maybe it was the 50F degree weather that kept all that juice trapped inside the fruit, but I’ve only had that “juice down the arm” experience with mangos, peaches and nectarines. Sorry apples…
  • I do love apple cider and I do not particularly care from what apple it’s made of.

So, after much deliberation I am glad to say that I can add Fuji and Macoun apples to the list of preferred apples in my domain. If I ever see them on sale here in Puerto Rico, most probably in Costco, I will gladly add them to my shopping cart.

Do you have a favorite apple???  Do you have a favorite apple recipe you would like to share???

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The Shape of Foods Help our Organs?? – SWEET POTATOES

23 Nov

This is part of a series on how our food can help certain organs that resemble their same shape. I already shared with you how carrots benefit the eyes, how tomatoes and grapes benefit the heart, how walnuts are essential for brain health, how celery and other stalky veggies are great for bone health and how beans are super beneficial for “kidneys”??? Yep…

Japanese Sweet Potatoes Photo Courtesy of AnniePickns's Blog

Sweet potatoes are a great source of beta carotene, due to its orange color. This means it’s great for keeping ourselves young. Because of its elongated shape its beneficial for our pancreas…

But what I really think it means is how some studies have shown that sweet potatoes can help stabilize blood sugar levels and lower insulin resistance. It actually helps the pancreas do its job… And steamed/cooked sweet potatoes seem to make more available these blood-sugar effect benefits.

Here are a few recipes with sweet potato you can try soon:

Sweet Potato Pastelón

Fried White Sweet Potato

Roasted Sweet Potatoes with Onions

Sweet Potato Flan

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Vegetarian Thanksgiving Ideas…

20 Nov

Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays… No, correction. It is MY FAVORITE HOLIDAY. Maybe because I was born on a Thanksgiving Day, but most of all because I love the fact it’s a holiday to be grateful for all the things we have…

There are sooo many things to feel thankful for… everything we have and even what we don’t have. Our family, our health, the fact we can walk, hear, speak, a roof over our heads, being able to work, that we have food on our tables and have every morning an opportunity to be a better person and forge for ourselves a better future… and for what we don’t have – sickness, that boyfriend that left before his time (in your opinion…), that former job that was making our stress so crazy…

And it’s a shame this holiday has become such a sad holiday for turkeys… I am sure each and every turkey would THANK YOU a lot if you can make Thanksgiving an even more positive holiday without the need to bring suffering to our turkey friends. There are so many more positive ways to demonstrate our gratitude…

Thanksgiving can be just a joyful experience and family-oriented holiday without a turkey at the center of the table. You can still make honor to the flavors of the season and make this holiday the most positive one ever!!

Here are a few of my favorite Thanksgiving recipes from years past:

Butternut Squash Mac and Cheese

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Wild Mushroom Lasagna

Pumpkin Risotto

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Arugula Red Onion and Orange Salad

Mashed Sweet Potatoes with Cranberry Sauce

Just boil or steam some sweet potatoes, mash them with butter and a little bit of milk and serve them alongside a delicious sweet and tangy Cranberry Preserves.

Vanilla Maple Carrots

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Vanilla Cinnamon Sweet Plantains

This is the traditional Latin side dish to any pasta dish… perfect with the Butternut Squash Mac and Cheese, the Mushroom Lasagna or even the Pumpkin Risotto. I have also made them to accompany Giada Di Laurentiis’ Butternut Squash Lasagna here…

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Sweet Potato Flan

Flans do not need to include any eggs if it has cream cheese… YUM!!!

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Thank you for your continued support and may your Thanksgiving Holiday be filled with lots of joy, family and love.

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My first Bánh Mì in NYC

18 Nov

I have been reading about Báhn Mì’s for about a year now… maybe even longer. These Vietnamese sandwiches are all the rage in the US.

I have heard about them during the first season of The Great Food Truck Race via the successful Nom Nom Truck from Los Angeles. They were selling these sandwiches like there was no tomorrow… And even in Serious Eats, Kenji went on a dissertation of what makes a Báhn Mì a Báhn Mì and he even went on a search for the best Báhn Mì in NYC.

Báhn Mì’s are a Vietnamese sandwich that originated as a fusion of cultures when Vietnam was under French rule… According to Kenji, the main aspects of a Báhn MI are:

  • Bread – French-baguette type bread usually made using rice flour for added crunch and lightness
  • Main Ingredient – we will concentrate on vegetarian, tofu-based Báhn Mì’s for the purposes of this vegetarian blog post
  • Sauce – the traditional Báhn Mì has a spreading of mayonnaise or butter cut with mayonnaise. These sandwiches are considered vegan, so there were no spread included. However, we should introduce these Báhn Mì people to Vegenaise. I think it would add a certain something- something closer to the traditional offerings.
  • Vegetable toppings – usually made of pickled daikon radishes, pickled carrots and cucumbers all cut into small thin sticks. Cilantro stems and some sort of spicy chili pepper. Some people put Sriracha sauce on theirs, but according to expert Kenji, this is neither typical nor respectable in the Báhn Mì world.

In the search for my first Bahn Mi, I deferred to Kenji, the expert in the matter and decided to head to Saigon Vietnamese Sandwich located at 369 Broome Street, New York NY; 212-219-8341. Saigon was rated third best sandwich in Manhattan so I knew it would be a good choice over all and was easily reachable by subway. Something I liked about them as well, they had 4 vegetarian options on their menu… so we had plenty to choose from.

Mom and I were super hungry and decided to try two of their tofu sandwiches – the Bánh mì chay đạc biêt – House Special Vegetarian (with tofu, mushroom, pickled carrots and radish) and a Bánh Mì Chay Đậu Hũ, Xả Ớt Rau  with Vegan chicken (tofu) with lemongrass.

I tried both versions… and my favorite was the House Special Vegetarian. Way more flavorful and interesting than the tofu lemongrass in my opinion. The House Special Vegetarian has a delicious sweet/salty peanut sauce that made the sandwich. As for the cilantro, I can certainly do without the stems. Only a few leaves on mine, please!!! I added a few drops, literally, 2-3 drops of sriracha to mine and the heat level was too much for me. I am still a spicy wimp… sorry!!!

The verdict… I loved the Báhn Mì. And if I have it again in Saigon Vietnamese Sandwich, I will order the House Special and not bother with anything else. I will try to bring some Vegenaise to use on mine… I will try to scope out other places to get a more complete sense of what a true Vietnamese báhn mì is… but for now, the intrigue is OVER!!!

Have you had a vegetarian báhn mì before??? Where are your favorite spots???

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Roberta’s Pizza and my debut on Online Radio…

16 Nov

Almost every October I visit NYC to participate in the Anniversary celebrations of our USA Devanand Yoga Center in Queens, NYC. I think we’ve been doing it for the last 5-6 years…

This time around I stayed a few days longer to take care of some other business – KarmaFree Cooking business to be exact. I was invited by Nicole Taylor, hostess of the online radio show Hot Grease to be part of her Halloween Day show. Hot Grease airs LIVE every Monday at 3:30PM Eastern Time.

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I was honored that Nicole was interested in a vegetarian topic… what would she be interested in talking about??? Well we spoke for about 15 minutes – a lot in radio time – on Puerto Rican Halloween traditions, what makes candy vegetarian, some of the candy ideas and recipes we have here on KarmaFree Cooking and a few other random Halloween things.

The Heritage Radio Station is located behind Roberta’s Restaurant in Bushwick, Brooklyn. You need to go inside de restaurant, across the dining room, outside into the indoor patio (if that makes any sense…) and out there, within 2 recycled shipping containers there is a radio station!!!!

I was accompanied that day by Luscious Lifestyle Diva Yolanda Shoshana a.k.a. “ShoShi” talking about how to make Halloween a tad sexier. It was definitely an educational experience for me… Here we all are waiting for the broadcast to start.

Here you can find a link to the radio Interview if you would like to listen over and over again… at least you can now put a voice to my writing, no???

Afterwards, like any respectable food oriented radio show housed within the premises of a restaurant, we were invited for a few slices of pizza. Actually, it was more like a pizza for every 2 people. My mom and I shared this Pizza Margherita… we kind of broke the rules a bit because this was made with white refined flour, but it was delicious!!!!! And it would seem rude to say no after Nicole had been so gracious to us.

I hope Nicole was happy with our participation on her show… we sure enjoyed ourselves. It reminded me of my days of being a spokesperson on personal care brands a few moons back. But different, because this time around I was talking about myself and our lifestyle, which is super cool. We are definitely open to the possibility of traveling again to NYC if she would like for us to visit her once again.

Hey, that pizza margherita at the end sure is worth it!!!

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