Prior to this interview and trying out the goods, Scotch eggs would not have made this American’s list of Top 5 Delicious British Foods. I was initially suspicious of these eggs since they’re usually eaten cold or at room temperature — what’s the point of frying something if it’s not eaten right away?  But I was wrong. These things are delicious. And the Scotch egg has officially knocked meat pies off my list.

After a few tries in London, I was ready to show off my new British egg trick to friends back home. I made them for a potluck at Bettie’s in LA and people loved them. They also marveled at how exotic they seemed. So to my fellow Americans readers out there, here’s a quick primer to making a Scotch egg.

Boil an egg for seven minutes, then quickly immerse it in an ice bath. Carefully remove the shell.

Flatten about 90 grams of sausage meat (roughly a small link taken out of its casing) per egg into a circular shape. Massage the meat around the egg so that the egg is completely covered in the ground meat. Let the covered egg sit in the fridge for about ten minutes to set.

Dredge the meat-encased egg in flour, then in beaten egg and finally coat it in breadcrumbs. (I use panko.)

Then deep fry the whole darn thing, for about 5 minutes.

My flatmate and I had a little supper party and we served Scotch eggs as the starter, alongside with greens and crispy root vegetables.

YUM!

I play around with different kinds of seasonings for the ground pork whenever I make them: fennel, pasley, chives or for a lazy cook like me, whatever herbs and spices I had on hand.

It’s a bit time consuming but it’s a lot of fun to make and they’re worth the effort. While you can find a dodgy factory-made Scotch egg at every petrol station in England, it’s trickier to find them in the US. Totally worth making at home to take on a picnic.

November, when I went back to SGV for Thanksgiving, now feels like ages ago. My brother and his GF were in town for a week. They ate about five meals a day and one night I joined them, where we ate at four places in 2 hours: Don the Beachcomber for cocktails and pu pu platters, banh cuon in Westminster, chicken fried steak at Twoheys and one last place that I’ve now purged from memory.

It wasn’t until Christmas when I was able to have a decent appetite again. To be honest, it put me off food for a while. My stomach seemed to have been suffering a permanent fullness from Thanksgiving up unit about mid-December.

And dim sum. What is Chinese people’s obsession with dim sum? Being away for some time, the first thing relatives and my parents’ friends would want to do with me was take me for ‘yum cha.’ Then the first thing they would say when we’d sit down to dim sum was, “You can’t find this in London” or “You’ve lost weight because the food isn’t any good in London” or some kind of variation of that. Then I’d have to respond politely, yes there is dim sum in London but no it isn’t nearly as good as it is in LA (I think it would upset them to say that dim sum in SGV isn’t the best).

But it wasn’t dim sum that I missed the most about being away. I missed road trips, so I took one in January.

I drove from LA to Sacramento along the 5, hoping to go snowboarding in Tahoe. There was no snow. So I ate lots of ice cream (which I missed) with my nieces (also missed them loads). Vic’s is an old school ice cream parlour in Sacramento that would give Fosselman’s in Alhambra stiff competition were they in the same region. They share lots of similarities: family-owned, seasonal flavours and a high butterfat content in their ice cream.

We spent New Year’s Eve in San Francisco (but just before arriving there was the obligatory visit to Cheeseboard in Berkeley). And of course we ate and ate, including this lemon tart from Tartine. That’s me in the spoon there.

I took the 101 back down, which is the more humane route to take. We stopped in San Jose for massive omelettes at Flames Diner, across the street from the Winchester Mystery House. Have you ever been to the house? The heiress of the Winchester Rifle fortune built it for the spirits she was convinced were haunting her. She was told that if she built 24 hours a day, seven days a week, she would be safe from harm. I visited once as a kid and thought the place — which has staircases that go into ceilings, windows that face walls — was super cool. This last visit was a sad glimpse into the mind of a very disturbed, yet wealthy woman whose eccentricities and compulsions took over her life. I hope she also had a hand in building this diner because there’s nothing worse than a hungry ghost.

Next stop, Pismo Beach. We went bowling in this sleepy little beach town. We also had the best clam chowder ever at Splash Cafe.

The other Pismo Beach institution is the cinnamon roll place. Pismo Beach is really one of my favourite destinations. I appreciate it even more now that I live in foreign country. It’s like a perfect slice of beach life in California.

The road trip meal ended with a burger and fries from the Habit in Goleta. I like my burgers wrapped in paper, a sign of an unpretentious burger.

After more than 600 miles and seven days on the road, we were back in LA.

Fried lardons with creme fraiche mixed with Charlotte potatoes then baked with Reblochon cheese on top, with a green salad on the side to balance out the richness.

This will be my fourth winter and even though it’s technically not winter yet, I’ve been waiting for the weather to get cold enough to make it. And today, it was.

Since I’ll be in spending the next two months back in LA, I need to try to find a way to bring some of this raw-milk cheese back.

Question is, will it ever get cold enough in LA to eat tartiflette?

It had been years since I went to visit Berkeley and I got all nostalgic as soon as I stepped foot on campus. I felt so old! As I looked around me, the students had that fresh face and fluffy hair look that kids all seem to have at that age. As I walked through Sproul Plaza once again I was back in a safe and happy place (though this was daytime — I do remember it feeling a bit dodgy walking alone at night!).

Berkeley is also where I started being more curious about food. As a student I worked at the College of Chemistry office surrounded by older ladies who would bring cakes for special occasions and share recipes or would tell me where to go for the best wine. And when family came to visit we’d go to Chez Panisse — a perfectly laid-back and unintimidating place for a college student to discover good food. But Berkeley Bowl market is where I really became engaged with cooking and produce.

Look at this! How can you not be blown away by the root vegetable section alone?

The town of Whitstable, off the Kent coast, has been an oyster haven since the Romans discovered it thousands of years ago. In July, the town hosts its annual Oyster Festival but we missed it by just a week!

Festival or not, the weather was great, so a couple of us took a train out from London and headed east to take in some sun for the day.

Oysters were still plentiful so we didn’t miss out.

Kathryn and I wandered off while the rest of the group napped on the pebble beach. We found this charming, old timey ice cream shop.

It was a great day but my one regret was that we didn’t eat fish & chips on the beach. I was determined to have some even after stuffing myself on a huge lunch upstairs of the Crab & Winkle.

Still, we managed to have fresh donuts before we left. They were delicious, especially topped with ice cream. Even Andrew Worrall Thompson said this place had “The best donuts on the Kent coast.”

The pop-up restaurant and bar. Like Meateasy at Goldsmiths Tavern that came and went. And now Frank’s Campari Bar that’s only open until the end of summer.

Haloumi. People in this town can’t seem to get enough of this cheese, grilled. I’ve seen it at every barbeque, traditional sandwich stands, swank gastropubs and corner shop.

Tea towels. They are everywhere, in every kind of store, appropriate to whatever they sell in the shop, be it screen printed imagery of London, kitschy designer art or the royal family. You would think that they were a nation of people obsessed with hand drying dishes.

Ginger beer. I can’t get enough of this non-alcoholic drink — it’s like ginger ale on caffeine (more on that in a future post). Could ginger beer be the secret ingredient to a Dark and Stormy?

I may be going out on a limb, but I’m putting shakshuka on this list. Nevermind my first taste of shakshuka was served to me as a heaping mess in a reheated Tupperware a few months ago. It was something I had never eaten before, something that was between a ratatouille and moussaka with baked egg. I was more impressed with saying the word shakshuka than actually eating it, but that’s probably why the word stuck. It’s just a fun word to say, shakshuka.

The second time I ate it was at Ottolenghi when my sister came to visit. As a contributor for the Guardian, chef Yotam Ottolenghi is well-known in these parts. His recipes in the paper are easy, accessible and best of all, veggie-centric. Much have been made about  his latest cookbook ‘Plenty;” even the LA Times reviewed it when it came out in the US. I think his recipes would be brilliant, using California produce.

Anyway back to the shakshuka. This had some of my favorite components: baked runny egg, crusty bread, tomato-basil Mediterranean flavors. All served on a breakfast griddle.Yum! And better yet, I can replicate it using Ottolenghi’s own recipe! Weee!

The only thing missing in my flat though, is an individual-sized griddle.

Unfortunately, I got a little carried away with the alcohol, but at least I left before they brought out the brandy!

Brighton is only a fifteen minute train ride away from Barcombe so it made sense that I spend the night at my friend Steph’s new flat up the road from the train station. Luckily, the futon was low to the ground so I had no problem getting into bed.

However, I could barely get up the next morning. Previous hangover cures have included ramen, toast, water and fizzy drinks. I tried all of the above. Steph suggested a Sunday roast but I could barely get out of the flat. So we had this instead:

I forgot about this dish, it being so long since I actually had a can of span in any of my kitchens in the last five years. Spam with scrambled eggs and sticky short grain rice is the Hawaiian breakfast of champions and comfort food to a lot of kids back home. I get a bit squeamish when I see it straight from the can, with its Franken-meat embryonic-aspic jelly, but when it’s soaked in soy sauce and sugar, then fried, I am taken back to my childhood: weekend spam fried rice lunch after Chinese school, making spam musubi (fried spam and rice rolled with nori) at highschool food fairs.

And now, as an adult, a late afternoon hangover cure.

… to inject into rolls suspended in mid-air.

In Paris last week, I had the lunch menu at La Gazzetta :

At another meal, I tried a Crozes-Hermitage for the first time. It reminded me of a Melville pinot noir, even though it’s mostly made of Syrah.

Back in London, Meateasy was back a new location at The Rye.  The onion rings and burgers perfect as ever. Everyone was pleased.

- Speculoos spread
- herbs de provence
- figue violette jam
- rillette de canard
- salted butter caramels
- lentils de Puy

Am I forgetting anything?

It’s salad season and I seem to be missing out. While I think California wins when it comes to making delicious, healthy and satisfying salads, my favorite thing in Paris was going to my weekly neighborhood farmers market. I looked forward to walking down to the market on Sundays and strolling up and down the different stalls.

I miss the noises, the colors and the smells. But above all, the variety. I miss all the variety of salad greens, olives and vegetables that I would find there. This was absolute joy for me. And I was just beginning to be able to identify most of the different leaves in French.

As much as I am enjoying London, food shopping here has not been nearly as exciting or fun. Salads leaves at the supermarket are usually pre-cut and pre-packaged and the closest farmers market in Peckham has a whopping two veggie stands. The vege is decent and the farmers are lovely but it’s just not the same. And Borough Market, I’ve discovered, is mostly a fancy (and yummy) food court. If you love cooking meat, it’s also a great place to find it. But I want my spring / summer salad fixings and not have to trek 2 miles to find it! Ou est le frisée? Batavia? Feuille de chêne!

The salade lyonnaise is from a resto in the 11eme. The best salad and overall meal I had last year in Paris. I’m keeping its name off the web as it doesn’t ever seem to get coverage, which I think is great. But if you want the address, you will have to email me for it!