Bao

Here you see (a cross-section of) a steamed bun, filled with leftover tofu scramble, cabbage and mushroom. These were fun to make, and really tasty.

I used a recipe from Essentials of Asian Cuisine (but used regular white flour rather than cake flour, and canola oil in place of lard). You make a yeast dough with baking powder in it, let it rise until doubled, shape the buns and fill them, and then steam them for about 15 minutes. (I found that the water should be really boiling rapidly while you're steaming them -- it makes the buns rise better and get much fluffier.)

Biscotti

Food routines are funny. As a kid, I would eat the exact same thing in my sandwiches every day, until suddenly I would demand some other thing, and have that every single day. While you're in the middle of your obsession, it feels like it will never change, but it always does.

With that in mind, here's one of our current favourites: biscotti. We are steadily going through a batch a week, dunking them into our tea and coffee. Always almond, sometimes with some walnuts, and this time with some chocolate sprinkles (brought back from the Netherlands). (Recipe modified from the green tea and walnut biscotti from Vegan Cookies Invade Your Cookie Jar.)

One day we won't be obsessed with these; I don't really believe it.

Fenugreek

I am really only into gardening in so far as it involves things I can eat. At the moment I have a few herbs growing (lemongrass, basil, thyme, mint, oregano, and cilantro/coriander).

On a whim, and to fill in some of the empty pots -- where some casualties of my not so green thumb used to reside -- I raided my spice drawer and planted some fenugreek seeds. I half assumed that the seeds would have been irradiated, and hence wouldn't grow, but was pleasantly surprised:

It's sort of weird to realise that the seeds in your spice jars are actually, you know, seeds.

Carrots with peanut and coconut sauce

I must admit that I usually find carrots kind of boring, but this recipe from 660 Curries is a winner. It's Carrots with Wilted Spinach in a Peanut-Coconut Sauce. The peanut and coconut sauce is outstanding.

Bagels

Oh I love me some boiled-then-baked breads. Last time it was soft pretzels, this time: bagels.

I used the recipe for Montreal-style bagels from Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day, with a few changes (no egg, 1/4 of the white flour replaced with whole wheat, less sugar/honey). Now, I LOVE Montreal bagels (from Fairmount Bagel, please) but I was sort of aiming for a NYC-Montreal hybrid here, to satisfy the Long Islander.

This recipe is great. You can have fresh bagels out of the oven less than an hour after you wake up! The secret is that you mix up the dough a day or so (even up to a week) earlier, let it rise for a couple of hours and then stash it in the fridge. When you want bagels, you take the dough out, form it into balls, let them rise for 20 minutes, shape them, boil them, and then bake for about 25 minutes.

Pretzels

These were so good.

I used the soft whole wheat pretzels recipe from Papa Tofu, with a few small changes (halved the recipe, used half white flour and half atta flour, added a couple of tablespoons of lively sourdough starter, let them rise a bit longer than suggested, made 6 pretzels).

When it came time to twist the pretzels, I forgot how to shape them. Luckily it turned out that R's pretzel eating expertise extends to pretzel shaping.