dil·et·tante at heart

culinary cookoff

Dilettante at Heart — Tue, 06 Dec 2011 07:40:38 +0000

My friends and I are having a culinary cook-off this weekend and so I’ve been preparing for my dish. The idea is that each person masters a restaurant-quality gourmet course and on the day of they prepare that dish for the rest of the group. Lucky me, I drew the seafood main dish course. Therefore, I’ve been studying my “Flavor Bible” to come up with the perfect dish.

These were the first couple of scallops:

Round 1: 1) pancetta seared scallop with passionfruit/chardonnay reduction 2) truffled scallop with pomegranate reduction and blood orange gelee 3) truffled scallop with grapefruit, passionfruit/chardonnay reduction, cauliflower puree, and blood orange gelee

Round 2: 1) truffled scallop with grapefruit, passionfruit reduction, cauliflower puree, and pomegranates 2) scallop with caramelized cauliflower, grapefruit, pomegranates, and passionfruit reduction

And my final dish:

Scallop with caramelized cauliflower, grapefruit, pomegranate, micro greens, cauliflower puree and a passionfruit reduction.

Let’s hope everyone likes it. I’ll update more after this weekend.

pan seared sea scallops with carmelized apples and pomegranates

Dilettante at Heart — Sun, 27 Nov 2011 08:18:14 +0000

in preparation for a fancy schmancy 8 course cook-off that my friends and I have next month, I’ve been working on my seafood main dish. I’m playing around with a bunch of different ingredients from my “flavor bible” to figure out what works the best. take a look for yourself.

Ecookbook – Dilettante in the Kitchen

Dilettante at Heart — Sat, 22 Oct 2011 07:25:40 +0000

Dilettante in …

An illustrated coo…

By Michelle Ho

Book Preview

for all those tech savy apple users, my cookbook is now available as an iBOOK for iphones and ipads. If you’re interested in purchasing the book, contact me or use the other link as the fonts are different in the ibook for paper/hardback book.

Lawrence & Sophia

Dilettante at Heart — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 06:43:31 +0000

This wedding has been in the works for the past 2 months. After countless hours of planning and crafting, the big day finally arrived for Lawrence and Sophia. Thanks to Boris for the pictures.

the best part about this is I maximized my Michael’s & Joann Fabrics coupons in addition to the Dollar Tree store. I love the manzanita tree, so simple yet so elegant.

the beautiful wedding partyI made the flower balls with paper lanterns, tissue paper, tulle, and organza.

Vendors:

Quinlan Community Center in Cupertino

photographer: Boris

makeup: Sarah

tableware/centerpieces: Elizabeth

Dilettante in the Kitchen

Dilettante at Heart — Mon, 26 Sep 2011 05:54:06 +0000

It’s official. My two month project is finally complete. I just completed my first 80-page full color cookbook.

Unlike many cookbooks that only show the final product, Dilettante in the Kitchen illustrates the intermediary steps to achieving tantalizing dishes. Inside is a collection of my favorite recipes you can create at home. For the visual learner, use the pictures as a step-by-step guide. Have confidence cooking in the kitchen with my simple and fun recipes.

mini fruit tartlets (sweet foods)

and korean tacos (savory foods)

Here’s a sneak peak… get your copy today!

Dilettante in …

An illustrated cook…

By Michelle Ho

Book Preview

Ahi Tuna Tartare cones

Dilettante at Heart — Tue, 30 Aug 2011 02:19:20 +0000

Ahi Tuna tartare

fresh sushi-grade tuna, diced 1/4 inch cubes
2/3 soy sauce + 1/3 sesame oil
1 tsp chili oil

Mix and adjust to taste.

Sesame miso cones (adapted from wolfgang puck’s recipe)

1/8 stick + 1.5 tablespoons butter
1/2 cup corn syrup
1/8 cup miso paste
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon black pepper
1 tablespoon sesame oil
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 tablespoon powdered ginger
1/8 cup black sesame seeds

Decoration:

1 avocado, diced
2 tablespoons of lime juice
salt and pepper to taste
sour cream
cod roe masago
sprouts

Preheat oven to 350F. Melt butter and corn syrup in a saucepan on medium heat (make sure it doesn’t boil). Remove from heat and add miso paste and sesame oil. In a separate bowl, combine ginger, flour and sesame seeds. Then slowly stir in flour mixture into miso mixture, continuosly stirring.

On a silpat, add mixture 1 tablespoon at a time and allow to form circle. Separate at least 2 inches from each other. Allow to make for 10 minutes and then flip and allow to make for another 3 minutes. Remove from oven and shape into cone. Be extremely careful as these are very oily and hot. However note that cones must be formed shortly from removing from the oven as they will harden quickly.

To serve: add tuna to cone, top with avocado + lime juice (combine avocado with lime until smooth), sour cream, sprouts, and cod roe masago and enjoy.

Thai food – mango sticky rice

Dilettante at Heart — Mon, 29 Aug 2011 19:49:56 +0000

continuation of my last post. So I learned that the key to mango sticky rice is actually coconut sugar. I’m not sure how easy it is to get it in the states, but if you can…definitely replace the granulated sugar in the curry recipe with coconut sugar and use it for this recipe as well.

Mango Sticky Rice

- 1 cups of sweet rice

- 1 3/4 cup of water

- 3/4 cup of condensed milk

-1/4 cup of granulated sugar (use coconut sugar if possible)

- 1/2 cup of coconut cream powder + 1 cup of water (if unable to find powder than use 1 cup of coconut milk, but powder preferred)

Wash and then soak the sweet rice in water for at least 30 mins. Add rice, water, condensed milk, coconut cream powder mixture, and sugar to a pot and bring to gentle boil. Stir mixture (carefully it may burn because of the sugar) and then partially cover the pot with a lid so that the steam has somewhere to escape. Turn down to medium heat and allow mixture to simmer for about 20 minutes or until there is no more water. Stir mixture again and then remove pot from heat. Cover pot completely and allow to steam inside pot for 5-10 minutes. Taste test before serving. If too sweet, add coconut cream powder + water. If not sweet enough, add more condensed milk.

Serve with sliced mangoes and enjoy

Note: I didn’t make an extra coconut sauce here because the rice was sweet enough for me.

Thai food – thai green curry

Dilettante at Heart — Mon, 29 Aug 2011 18:25:28 +0000

A couple of months ago, I went on a trip to Thailand. It was absolutely fabulous. The local food and culture is definitely worth revisiting again one day. While there, I took advantage of checking out the local grocery stores to see how to make some of the awesome Thai food that I was eating. Here’s a recipe that I brought back.

Thai green curry with pork (serving size:2)

-1 package (1.2 ounces) of curry paste (saves a lot of time then making it yourself and per my tour guide, most locals buy the curry paste from the store too)

- 1 Tbsp vegetable oil

-3/8 cup coconut cream powder

- 1 cup hot water

-8 ounces of lean meat, sliced (in this case I used pork)

-1/2 can of pineapple, or 3.5 ounces of fresh pineapple

-10 mini cherry totatoes, diced

-1/2 a green bell pepper, diced

-3-4 leaves of fresh thai basil

-2 pieces of dried kauffir lime (optional)

-1 Tbsp granulated sugar

-1 Tbsp of fish sauce (this is key!)

In a bowl, add coconut cream powder to 1 cup of hot water and let dissolve. Put coconut mixture aside.

In a saucepan on medium heat, add 1 Tbsp of vegetable oil and curry paste. Stir fry paste until an aroma develops, then lower the heat. Then add coconut mixture and bring to a boil. Add meat, pineapple, tomatoes, pepper, thai basil, and kauffir lime and stir. Then add fish sauce and sugar. Simmer until thoroughly cooked. Service with rice and enjoy!

Note: curry paste is salty, so you may not required the full tablespoon of fish sauce.

Note2: For less spicy curry, add only half of the curry paste.

tuna tartare

Dilettante at Heart — Mon, 29 Aug 2011 03:25:15 +0000

Cooked this up for a party a while ago. Somehow I managed to find truffle oil, which definitely gave the dish an extra kick.

Ingredients:

8 ounces fresh grade tuna, sliced into 1/4 inch cubes + sesame oil + soy sauce + 1 tsp chili oil + 1 tsp chili pepper

fresh mangoes, diced

1 whole avocado, depitted and diced + 1 tsp wasabi + salt to taste + lime juice

to serve: basalmic vinegar + truffle oil + green seaweed

here’s another version of it.

Coming soon: my cookbook with photo illustrated pictures on how to make this

Fun with Flowers

Dilettante at Heart — Sat, 09 Jul 2011 07:00:47 +0000

I’ve gotten back into arranging flowers and all that fun recently. Here’s a lil glimpse of what I’ve been up to.

I love freesia. Its such a simple fragrant flower but soo pretty. Plus I think the white and yellow together say a lot. Its such happy colors… like the sun . These are hydrangea, freesia and roses with some greens. Made this for mother’s day. Don’t forget to tie the bow on the bottom of the vase to top it off. Makes it look a lil more fancy.

I’ve been admiring manzanita trees for a long time. A couple of months ago I was planning an event, so I decided..why not… let’s make one. It took me a while to find all the right materials, but I was pretty happy with the results in the end. It looks even better when I turn on the lights in the lil lanterns.

I bought those submersible lights and put them in there.. no fire hazard and some awesome lighting. When I get a chance, I’m going to change the crystals on the bottom to a tanzanite color.

One night I was out to dinner with my friend sean and I was telling him how cool it would be to make this. Can you see the puppy? I had seen a similar version of it earlier that day. Next day… I went out and bought whatever materials I thought would make it all come together. (You can imagine it takes me HOURS at the stores to pick out the perfect pieces… I think the people at Joann’s and Michaels must think I’m nuts)

That’s all for now.