Drying Persimmons (Hoshigaki) - A Japanese Tradition

Let me say that I am not a food expert. I wish I were, but I really just post here about things I've heard or read from what I think are legitimate sources. For example, for this post on dried persimmons, I'm not going to do much research because I just wanted to share how my family used to make dried persimmons. These pictured here my parents bought because we no longer dry them ourselves.

Anyway, Pinch My Salt posted about persimmons here and made me think about dried persimmons. I LOVE persimmons, or "kaki" (pronounced "kah-kee") in Japanese. Fresh ones and also when they're baked into persimmon cookies. One thing of which I'm not particularly fond are dried persimmons, although now that I've thought about it, they would be good chopped up and put in salads or something. So how did my mom's parents make them? It's kinda funny: You skin Hachiya (the acorn-shaped ones; not the pumpkin-shaped Fuyu ones) persimmons, tie them to strings, and hang them up to dry for days and days, "massaging" them every few days (that's my mom's term; they explain why here). Just on their own they turn ashy.  Too bad I didn't take pictures when I was little. I saw those weird things hanging in the garage (not where cars were parked) often and didn't think much about them except for the fact that I used to like them and then started disliking them. Go here for another description and pictures of the drying process. I'm guessing that Grandpa dried them out in the sun during the day and then left them in the garage overnight.

So...what do they taste like? Depending on how long they've been drying and how long they've been dried, they are usually firm but slightly soft (some, like these here, are very hard), dry (obviously), dense, sweet, slightly cinnamon-y, chewy, and almost grainy with those thin strands of fibrous stuff that's naturally in the persimmon.

Pineapple Upside-Down Cupcakes w/ Sour Cream Frosting

I was watching The Food Network's show, The Best Thing I Ever Ate, and one Food Network star talked about a pineapple upside-down cupcake topped with a passion fruit frosting. This got my attention because my brother loves pineapple. Anyway, the show revealed a little about how the cupcake is made, and it seemed pretty easy (the pineapple & sugar part, anyway), so I figured I could make a vanilla cupcake and put some pineapple and brown sugar on the bottom, and I did!

They were good, but at the same time I have high expectations for food, so I'm thinking I'll use fresh pineapple instead of frozen next time and put more pineapple and more brown sugar at the bottom...and I'll use either a different cake recipe or use this same Hummingbird Cafe one but with whole milk (I only had non-fat!! BOO!!). I'm all about using REAL butter and real whole milk, heavy whipping cream, etc. usually. Oh well. Next time! Anyway, these came out pretty yellow and almost had the flavor and texture of cornbread--minus the grainy bits, of course (according to my mom and me). Interesting.

I knew that my uncle and little cousin were coming over, so I thought I should add a frosting to make it look prettier and taste better overall. I blindly mixed powdered sugar, one tablespoon of unsalted butter, & sour cream because I wanted to get rid of my sour cream leftovers. It ended up tasting like cream cheese frosting...only it was watery while mixing. Yumm.

RECIPES:

Sour Cream Frosting (Recipe by me. I was just experimenting 'cause I had never made sour cream frosting before)
* Note: This only makes a little bit of frosting (not enough to cover all 12 cupcakes) because I only wanted it on some of the cupcakes.

1 tablespoon of unsalted butter
some leftover sour cream (about 1/4 of a cup)
powdered sugar (didn't measure...just kept adding...probably about two cups)

Directions:
(1) Mix the butter & sour cream together with a hand mixer.
(2) Add powdered sugar until it has your desired consistency.

Vanilla Cupcakes (recipe on Joy the Baker's site, but she got it from The Hummingbird Bakery Cookbook; I made this recipe for these cupcakes)

1 cup all-purpose flour
a scant 3/4 cup sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
pinch of salt
3 tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temperature
1/2 cup whole milk
1 egg
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

1) Put flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda & butter into the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment (or use handheld beater like I did) & beat on slow speed until mixture is a sandy consistency & everything is combined
2) Gradually pour in half of the milk & beat until milk is just incorporated
3) Whisk egg, vanilla, & remaining milk together in a separate bowl for a few seconds and then pour it into the flour mixture & continue beating until just incorporated
4) Scrape unmixed ingredients from side or the bottom of the bowl with a rubber spatula
5) Continue mixing until the batter is smooth. Just a few minutes to avoid overmixing.
6) Spoon batter into paper-lined muffin tins, dividing between the 12 cups (you should barely have enough for each cup)
7) Bake for 20-25 minutes or until light golden & a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean
8) Cool cupcakes slightly in the pan & put onto a wire rack to cool completely before frosting

Greek Fest 2010 Pics / Greek Fest 2011 Info - Fresno, CA

I know this is a year late, but it's actually a good time to feature this because this year's Greek Fest is coming up this weekend! My parents and I loved it so much that we're going back again this year.

This year's Fresno Greek Fest:
August 26th - August 28th (Fri, Sat, & Sun)
Website here.
St. George Greek Orthodox Church
Southwest corner of First & Clinton
$5 for adults; 65+ and children (under 12) = Free
Tickets at the gate or in advance: 559-233-0397

It's basically like the Japanese Buddhist Obon festivals I attend every year (see San Jose's, Parlier's, Fresno's, and Orange County's, & San Francisco's) but bigger (and Greek...lol).

I am a major fan of grape leaf-covered food. Like these dolmades pictured above and below and these Armenian yalanchi!

Loukoumades (see a description here). Like Greek honey donuts. Ohh my gosh. They're similar to gulab jamun, the honey balls (that ones I don't like) that you find in India, Pakistan, Nepal, & Bangladesh, but the loukoumades are smaller, lighter/less dense, and less overwhelmingly honey-tasting). I realized that I don't really like the typical donuts you find in American donut shops, but I do enjoy donut-like things from other cultures. These loukoumades are sooo good fresh and piping hot...churros are delicious...etc. There are some crazy non-traditional donuts in places like New York City that I want to try though. Anyway, seriously...these little guys below with coffee...perfect!

An iced coffee drink that wasn't too sweet! Awesome!

 This grainy coffee drink was sooo good in my opinion, but if you don't like having a grainy texture in your coffee, and if you don't like strong coffee, you probably won't like this:

After we ate food outside, we got boxes of food that you get inside the building. YUM!! I wanted to get boxes and boxes of everything!

I have to be honest though...some of the sweets we tried were just okay...or not so great. I am picky about my sweets! I don't like things that are too sweet, which I think was the problem with some of these (you know...like how baklava can be wayyy sweet sometimes). Some of them I remember were just too bland and nothing special. I almost always lie powdered sugar-covered cookies though!

Cupcakes: Vanilla with Fresh Strawberry Frosting & Chocolate-Filled Chocolate with Cream Cheese Frosting

I used five different from-scratch recipes for these cupcakes because I wanted to make something special for the kids at my volunteer place. Some of these kids really need something to look forward to in life. I feel like adopting all of them. Anyway, everything tasted amazing immediately after being made. I refrigerated both cupcakes because I was worried about the frosting getting melty (the strawberry one got melty fast), so I can't tell you how good they are out of the refrigerator. All I know is that you can't fail with real butter and fresh, good-quality ingredients.

OMG THIS STRAWBERRY FROSTING IS WONDERFUL (Thank you, Sprinkles. I've never been to your stores, but I've been meaning to)! You really have to love strawberries though. Like my mom said, when you taste the frosting, it's as if it hits you in the face and screams, "Hello! I'm strawberry!!" I can't decide which frosting I like better now--fresh strawberry or cream cheese! Anyway, see below for recipes.

I usually only use sprinkles to please kids:

These chocolate swirly things are fun for all ages though. You could try different recipes, but I just melted semi-sweet chocolate chips in a makeshift double boiler (a bowl on top of a pot of bowling water), put the melted chocolate in a Ziploc bag, and squeezed it out into little shapes onto wax paper through a hole I cut at an edge of the bag. Refrigerate for a few minutes...and then carefully pick off the shapes and stick 'em on top of the frosted cupcakes:

RECIPES:

* 1 * Sprinkles' Strawberry Frosting (recipe here) for 12 cupcakes:
        >> Note: I don't have a fancy food processor, so I just used a hand-held mixer

• 1/2 cup whole frozen strawberries, thawed
• 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, firm and slightly cold
• Pinch of coarse salt
• 3 1/2 cups confectioners' sugar, sifted
• 1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

1) Put strawberries in the bowl of a small food processor; process until pureed
2) In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, beat together butter & salt on medium speed until light & fluffy
3) Reduce mixer speed & slowly add confectioners' sugar; beat until well combined
4) Add vanilla & 3 tablespoons strawberry puree (save remaining strawberry puree for another use); mix until just blended
5) Do not overmix or it will incorporate too much air. Frosting should be dense & creamy like ice cream.

* 2 * 12 Vanilla Cupcakes (recipe on Joy the Baker's site, but she got it from The Hummingbird Bakery Cookbook

1 cup all-purpose flour
a scant 3/4 cup sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
pinch of salt
3 tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temperature
1/2 cup whole milk
1 egg
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

1) Put flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda & butter into the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment (or use handheld beater like I did) & beat on slow speed until mixture is a sandy consistency & everything is combined
2) Gradually pour in half of the milk & beat until milk is just incorporated
3) Whisk egg, vanilla, & remaining milk together in a separate bowl for a few seconds and then pour it into the flour mixture & continue beating until just incorporated
4) Scrape unmixed ingredients from side or the bottom of the bowl with a rubber spatula
5) Continue mixing until the batter is smooth. Just a few minutes to avoid overmixing.
6) Spoon batter into paper-lined muffin tins, dividing between the 12 cups (you should barely have enough for each cup)
7) Bake for 20-25 minutes or until light golden & a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean
8) Cool cupcakes slightly in the pan & put onto a wire rack to cool completely before frosting

* 3 * Cream Cheese Frosting
I used a recipe from Elinor Clivans' awesome book, Cupcakes!You could also use this one, which I've tried before. It tastes pretty much the same:

* 4 * Chocolate CupcakesAgain I used a recipe from Elinor Clivans' awesome book, Cupcakes!

* 5 * Chocolate Filling
I used the chocolate filling recipe from Cupcakes!, but I don't recommend using it as a filling if you're going to refrigerate your cupcakes 'cause the chocolate gets hard. It was mostly just heavy whipping cream, sugar, and unsweetened chocolate. I used Ghirardeli because it is sooo good.

Fish Tacos at BJ's Restaurant & Brewhouse - Fresno, CA

BJ's Restaurant & Brewhouse
715 E. Shaw
Fresno, CA 93710
Website here. Other locations too.

Ate with Stacy, Shari, and Andrea on 8/3/11.

Catherina used to work at BJ's and recommended their fish tacos when I wrote here about recently discovering that I love fish tacos. Now I just have to try the ones at Wahoo's! Thanks for the recommendations, Catherina! We need to eat together sometime...whenever we're both in the same town. haha

Anyway, these tacos are good! I liked the texture of the fried panko (pronounced "pawn-koh," by the way...had to throw that in there. lol), and the flavors of the sauces were good. One was creamy and the other was more liquidy saucy (I make up my own words and phrases sometimes). They have great lunch specials right now (delicious meals for around $10). They did not pay me to say that, although they should. hehe Here's their online menu's fish taco description: "Panko-crusted, lightly fried fish or chargrilled shrimp wrapped in our special tortilla with chipotle mayonnaise, Santa Fe dressing, Napa cabbage, carrots, red onions and cilantro. Served with tortilla chips, avocado cream sauce and fire-roasted tomato salsa."

Ruth's Chris Steak House - Fresno, CA

Ruth's Chris Steak House
7844 N. Blackstone Ave.
Fresno, CA 93720
Website here.

* Update: Blake and I went back on 8/22/12 for our 2-year anniversary.

Like the rest of his family, Blake is a huge steak house fan. My college Nutritional Sciences & Toxicology and The Aging Brain professors drilled into my head that red meat is a big no-no, so I try to avoid it, although I know that it does taste good, and I love eating meat and potatoes. Anyway, I do indulge occasionally, and I ate at Ruth's Chris with Blake a few weeks ago.

The fried calamari appetizer is SOOO good. Here's their online menu description: "Our calamari is lightly fried and tossed with a sweet and spicy Asian chili sauce"

My petit fillet (cooked at 1800 degrees and topped with sizzling butter, of course):

This is so dark, but I didn't want to keep embarrassing poor Blake. Below is the Chocolate Explosion cake. For some reason it's not on their online menu. Also very good.

Steal the Glass at Eureka Burger! - Fresno & Redlands, CA

Steal the Glass - Every Tuesday night at both Eureka locations
Buy the weekly craft beer and keep the glass!

Eureka Burger (website here)
7775 N. Palm, # 106
Fresno, CA 93711
See some of their food here.

Redlands location:
345 Pearl Ave # 130
Redlands, CA 92374-3173

San Luis Obispo location opening November 2011 (soon!!)
1141 Chorro Street
San Luis Obispo, CA 93401

Last night's (Tuesday, 8/16) beer: Sierra Nevada. Kurtis, Patrick, Desiree, and I got light beers, and Michelle got a dark one, which was actually kinda good (I'm not a dark beer person). It had maple syrup in it. Weird...but good! I need to try that again. Not sure if I actually liked it or if I was just so surprised that it tasted like maple that I thought I liked it. Perception is a crazy thing.

Last week's (Tuesday, 8/9/11) beer: Firestone (went with Patrick after hearing from Dr. G. about the Steal the Glass night at the Redlands Eureka Burger):

I liked the Sierra Nevada one better than the Firestone, but I really don't know much about beer and haven't tried many kinds. I thought that the Firestone pale ale had a weirder aftertaste. Patrick preferred the Firestone though.

I love how the drinks look against the glowing yellow at the bar:

Other weekly deals:

Sweet Potato Fries from The Habit - Fresno, CA

The Habit Burger Grill
702 W. Shaw Ave.
Fresno, CA 93704
Website here.

I love sweet potato fries. The ones I've tried that I can remember came from Amanda's in Berkeley, The Habit in Fresno, and Eureka Burger in Fresno.

The ones I ate when I went to The Habit with Kurtis last week were sooo hot, fresh, and delicious. Slightly salty like the ones at Amanda's and unlike the Eureka Burger ones, which are drizzled with a thin, sweet honey sauce). Some pieces were really meaty (and by "meaty" I mean "potato-y"/thick from the potatoes), and some were small. I liked the diverse sizes. I'd get these again, and now I have to try their burgers...haha * I had already eaten lunch *

Notice anything funny about this door? There's no wall on the other side! Thought it was picture-worthy.

Pho at Paradise - Fresno, CA

Paradise Restaurant
1848 North 1st Street
Fresno, CA 93703-3108

(559) 264-9025

Oh, pho (pronounced kinda like "FUH"). So yummy. In my opinion, you just can't beat the pho at those places along McKinley Avenue in Fresno. That's where I had my first pho (with the coolest high school friends ever), and I think fondly about those places whenever I have a pho craving. I haven't had pho THAT many times around the country (I think the only times I had it outside of California were when I went to Wisconsin?? and when I went to Seattle, Washington), but these Fresno places are so fast and so delicious. I've had bland and salty pho...not good. Also, the prices in Fresno are AWESOME. At May's Cafe and another pho place on McKinley, you get pho for around $5, and it comes out within two minutes. I'm not joking. I should time it next time.