Umami Mart

I once saw a recipe on Tastespotting using rice flour instead of regular flour to make muffins. I tried making them and gave them all away, without even try one. The lucky person who tasted it told me I should sell them. A long time has passed since then, and I decided to make them […]

PREQUEL The Good: Ode to Jean-George’s Chocolate Molten Cake The Bad: Domino’s Lava Crunch Crapcakes Despite the occasional subpar specimen (Domino, I’m looking at you), my love of warm chocolate cake continues to run deep. So deep, in fact, that up until yesterday, I’d made a promise to myself that consumption of these cakes would remain […]

Remember my post about making a Japanese cheesecake? It’s a simple recipe, but very difficult to retain the fluffiness because of all the egg whites. Although it rises high during baking, but it shrinks down like an old person once you take it out of the oven. It’s like taking Viagra before baking: it performs […]

Sometimes store-bought trumps homemade. Mozzarella is definitely one. Peking duck is another. XLB, totally. You can make it all at home from scratch, which I’ve done, but it’s all readily available (especially in NYC), so why do I bother spending an entire day creating it? XLB at decent Chinese restaurants are not that expensive. The […]

As I mentioned in my last post, I pretty much fucked up my first attempt at making bread pudding- mostly due to my inability to follow directions. Surprise, surprise, I know. This time around, I followed the recipe as closely as I possibly could, given my ADD rebelliousness in the kitchen. And what happens when […]

I was a cake decorator last week, and I went out in drag this weekend. I needed to relax and do what I do the best, cooking and baking to calm my tired self. I found a recipe for lemon cookies, and went to a store to buy lemons, where I saw pretty orange colored […]

All right, y’all, I know this normally gets wrapped into the Umami Reader, but I thought this too fascinating to pass up. I’ve been making bread for a long time. I’ve made it with Kayoko. I’ve make it pre-1990. But I have never seen footage of this magnificent creature in the wild before. Check out […]

With my twisted ankle from last week, I took it easy this weekend. It was also 90 degrees outside, so I cranked up the air conditioner and baked all day. Mind you, my oven isn’t working properly yet, but the convection is the only dysfunctioning part, so I could still use it. I do bake […]

What do you think? I made raisin-wiches last night. These are quite famous in Japan. The cookie is almost similar to short bread, and cream consists of Italian meringue, butter, and plump raisins. Sandwich in the decadent cream, wait for a night, and it’s a damn good raisinwich. Because of its rectangular shape, I thought […]

After my unsuccessful trial to make “baked” doughnuts, it has been sitting on my head that I need to make edible doughnut. I have a tendency to keep trying until I succeed, as you can see from my Laduree battle. Speaking of macarons, I still make them for parties and when bored, and I have […]