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Showing posts from April, 2009

Hop Li Seafood Restaurant: Dim Sum and Dinner! (CLOSED)

EDIT January 3, 2015: Hop Li has been replaced by China Red, a higher end dim sum and seafood restaurant with an emphasis on high quality ingredients and regional specialties-- review to come. I've written about Full House already in Arcadia. But what about it's competitor, Hop Li? It used to be full of people. The food was pretty good, and we pretty much frequently went there. Then, crowds diminished to almost an empty parking lot. And we left them alone for a while. Now, it's back again, with something GREAT. It's their fourth anniversary! And to celebrate, they are offering a dim sum special of 1.38 a plate, which is a very, very good deal. The only other place that has prices like this is at Yum Cha Cafe, which is all the way over in San Gabriel. However, the deals don't last all week- during weekends and holidays, the price costs more than Full House- almost 2.50. Just entering the door, you can notice some changes. The colors are now a bi

Fresh and Easy's Tomato and Basil Veggie Crisps

Last week, these crisps were available to sample at the Fresh and Easy "KitchenTable". And our whole entire party liked them. Well then, we got a bag of these chips. It cost 2.18 for a big but slender bag of these chips. An okay deal if you were talking to me! What I like about this packaging though is that they show you the product already when you look at the bag. It's not some edited picture that covers up the bag; instead it is the real product right in front of your eyes! I finally found a good spot to take photos of food! The taste of these obviously were fantastic. Tomatoey and a bit spicy with the black pepper. There was also a hint of basil flavor. Good texture in this potato chip actually- very light and crispy, not not thin. It kind of felt like eating the cassava crisps on Air New Zealand or the shrimp chips but more dense at a restaurant. This chip is a bit addicting. Once when you eat one, you want more. And there are several that are heavily seasoned- those

Green Onion Pancakes: A Learning Experience!

After reading the blog Use Real Butter on how to make green onion pancakes, as well as watching videos on making green onion pancakes , I decided to make a batch of green onion pancakes over the spring break. Result? Not what I expected! Well...there is no fault on the videos I watched or on Use Real Butter. The problem was me. I wasn't looking at the recipe on how to make the dough at all when making it. And guess what? I added 3 cups of hot water. Yes, three cups. Just because some thought in my mind was thinking the dough was a one to one ratio. NOT! It really was a one to four ratio of water to flour. So...with not a lot of flour left, I used 6 cups of bread flour to balance it out. Now it is a one to two ratio. It worked for the time being, but later on I had to add flour while rolling the dough and making the green onion pancake. Who was kneading and combining the flour and water together? Well...it wasn't me. It was our bread maker! Yes...it had the option of to just m

Homemade White Bread

Yes, we got ourselves a bread machine. More specifically, a CBK-200 bread machine from Cuisinart . It wasn't easy to find either. Some were for display and not to be sold, while others were damaged. Luckily though, we found one after driving, calling, and talking to the cash register people! We did several loaves of bread already with this machine, and not all of them were successful. Some had a very weird flavor. All of them had a way too hard crust. And so obviously, we implemented some different ways to change it. And now...it's a very fun machine to use, and plus, the bread is scrumptious. Watching the machine do its thing is very interesting. At the start, it just looks like pile of flour floating on liquid. But then, as the paddle mixes, the mixture of ingredients changes into a dough. The dough then bounces around, almost looking like it is fighting against the paddle because it stays on one corner of the pan until the paddle stops and then continues twirl around. After