Biko, Suman, or Whatever It's Called

This was the first weekend in a long time when I did absolutely nothing.  There was no chauffeuring to do.  There was no program to attend.  There was nothing.

I started out the weekend with a Friday night get-together at a coworker's pad.  Unfortunately, most of my pals weren't able to make it.  theKeeper was in Honolulu and OllieMama had a piercing headache.  I'm not sure where everyone else was.  Bummer.  But I still had a nice time, and it was very generous of my coworker to invite us over.   Maybe everyone can come over here next time.

But that was it.  There was nothing else.

If I had been thinking ahead, I could've made suman.  It's been months since 3M has made some for me.  3M is really nice...whenever she makes it, she slides me a few ginormous pieces.  She says she often makes it for potlucks too, so the Friday get-together might have been a good time to make it. 

I am really not a fan of Filipino desserts.  I don't care for flan, and I don't like puto (steamed cakes).  But suman is different.  It has just the right amount of sweetness, and I love the flavor of coconut.

I wish I could write more for this post, but I'm mentally drained.  I spent the last two days of last week at workshops, doing my best to play nicely. 

click on recipe title for printable recipe

Suman

     6 c sweet (glutinous) rice, rice cooker cup size

     water

     1 can coconut milk

     1 can coconut cream (not cream of coconut)

     2 c brown sugar, packed, divided

     1 jar macapuno (coconut sport or strings)

Wash rice and soak for 3 hours.  Drain.  Place rice in rice cooker.  Add coconut milk.  Add water to make liquid to just over 6 cups line.  Add 1 cup brown sugar and stir.  Cook rice.  Let steam an additional 20 minutes after cooking time is done.  Meanwhile, grease bottom and sides of a 9 x 13" pan.  Pour coconut cream into a small saucepan.  Add remaining cup of brown sugar.  Heat on medium-low until mixture thickens.  Keep warm until rice is ready.  Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Stir cooked rice to distribute brown sugar, which has likely settled to bottom.  Add macapuno and 3/4s of coconut cream mixture.  Stir to distribute macapuno evenly.  Spread evenly in greased pan.  Pour reserved coconut cream mixture over top.  Bake 30 minutes.  Switch oven to broil and broil 3-5 minutes.  Do not allow topping to burn.  Cool completely and cut into pieces.

Amaretto Custard Bread Pudding

OMG!  This past week was brutal.  The kids in school were awful.  I'm certain they were high on Halloween candy all week.  They were hyper and difficult to settle.  I called several parents, and I came very close to submitting a disciplinary referral.  It would have been my first for the school year.  But I decided I could deal with the infraction in a different way.  I made a call home and the kid caught heat when he got home. . .or so he told me.

I also spoke with several students about respecting personal space.  Some students think nothing about going right up to others (both minors and adults) and sitting so close they are practically on the lap of the other person.  Other students persist in trying to grab items from others, perhaps not realizing that at some point, their hands or ON the other person's body.  They needed to be sent the message that "no means no".  I don't think they take "no" seriously when they hear it, erroneously always assuming that an acquaintance won't see their invasion of space as assault/attempted assault.

A few years ago, there was a similar incident with another student.  Several teachers made excuses for the student, saying "___ is just like that.  ___ means no harm."  I considered not saying anything then, but what jarred me was the thought that if my own child had been the victim, would I want a teacher to turn away, rationalizing their inaction at attempting to curtail the inappropriate behavior?  The answer was clear, and that is why I decided to make sure the perpetrator received consequences for his/her actions.  I hope any teacher who has my child in class will apply the same principle.

What I find most bothersome is that some students see nothing wrong with their own behavior and say, "oh, dats my friend.  They don't mind."  That kind of delusion will bite them in the ass one day.

Speaking of biting, my jaw seems much better, but now a different pain has replaced the achy jaw.  I think I have another cracked tooth.  I don't know how it happened.  Oh, never mind.  I know how.  I will need to wait until late November to see my dentist.  Anyway, until I can get a dental appointment to repair my tooth, I'm trying to eat soft things (no Cape Cod potato chips for me)

With the weather getting cooler, I find the luscious custard texture of bread pudding very comforting.  It's also soft enough that I'm not wincing when I chew.  The rich sauce makes this an extra decadent dessert.  Who would've thought stale bread could taste so good.

Now to prepare myself for another week of kids high on OLD Halloween candy. . .

click on recipe title for printable recipe

Amaretto Custard Bread Pudding

     1 lb bread, cubed (about 10-12 cups of cubes)

     1 qt milk

     6 eggs, reserve 1 yolk for sauce

     1/2 c sugar

     1 c cranberries

     1 tbsp vanilla

     7 tbsp amaretto, divided

     1/2 c butter

     1 c powdered sugar

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.  Grease a 9 x 13" baking dish.  In a large bowl, pour milk over bread cubes.  Beat eggs (except for 1 yolk) and add to bread cubes.  Add sugar, cranberries, vanilla, and 3 tbsp amaretto.  Stir gently.  Pour into prepared pan and bake for 45 minutes.  Begin preparing sauce 5 minutes before bread pudding is done.  Heat butter and powdered sugar in a small saucepan over low heat.  Stir constantly until butter is completely melted.  Add 4 tbsp amaretto and reserved egg yolk.  Cook for 2 minutes, stirring constantly.  When bread pudding is done, poke holes all over bread pudding.  Pour sauce over and let soak in. 

Bread Pudding

Well, we voted on a bell schedule.  It was one our school developed which is quite similar to the current bell schedule.  Now we need to hope it passes muster (some brass has to approve it).  If it passes, I'm going to be happy.  I think it's a sound schedule, and it really is workable.

I spent the better part of the week agonizing over how to motivate the students to do better on schoolwide reading assessments.  I certainly don't want to be called the albatross of the language arts department!

My sweet tooth escalated this week, and I ended up making several desserts.  One thing I made was bread pudding.  For some reason, we always seem to have odds & ends bread pieces in the freezer.  Not wanting to waste, I think I'm the one who keeps throwing bread (still in the bag) into the freezer, thinking I'll eventually get around to making croutons.

I accumulated enough bread slices to make the volume requirement for this recipe.  But this recipe is so delicious that it wouldn't be a bad thing to buy bread just for a pan of bread pudding.  Of course, there was one occasion where I bought a loaf of French bread on the way home from work.  When I got home, I realized the bread was old and hard (perhaps this was the reason for the discounted price).

What to do?  Make bread pudding of course!

click on recipe title for printable recipe

Kikukat's Bread Pudding

     1 lb bread, cut or torn into 1/2" cubes (about 12 cups)

     1/2 c dried fruit

     6 eggs

     1 c sugar

     2 tsp vanilla extract

     1 block butter, melted and cooled

     1/2 tsp cinnamon

     1/4 tsp nutmeg

     4 c milk, heated in microwave for 1 minute

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Grease a 9 x 13" pan.  In a large bowl, toss bread cubes and fruit.  Combine eggs, sugar, vanilla, butter, cinnamon, and nutmeg using a whisk.  Gradually whisk in milk.  Stir egg-milk mixture into bread-fruit mixture.  Pour into prepared pan.  Bake for 40 minutes.

When I was younger, I liked eating cold bread pudding.  I liked the cool, creaminess of it.  But as I got older, a heated chunk of bread pudding with a generous pat of melting butter is my favorite way to eat it.

 

Hilo welcomed Chinese New Year this weekend with a festival at Kalakaua Park.  We arrived just after 10 am, and it was already crowded.  There were a handful of food booths and a whole bunch of craft fair type booths.  The only quasi-Chinese foods sold were shrimp chips and gao.  I was tempted to buy a bag of shrimp chips, but I changed my mind when I saw them sodomized with odd flavors like garlic and furikake.  The gao booth was another scene of corruption.  In addition to traditional gao, they had the audacity to sell green tea-flavored and chocolate-flavored gao.  Popo would've fainted! 

The Big Island Shaolin Arts Lion Dancers culminated their trek throughout downtown Hilo with a performance on Kalakaua Street (between the park and the East Hawaii Cultural Center).

I didn't buy anything at the festival, but on the way back to the car, I bought 2 Kendama from the Irie Smoke Shop (on the advice from one of my favorite students).

I remember taking the Ds to "feed the lion". . . feels like a thousand years ago!

Taro Cake

I have been extremely busy with work this year.  I was bombarded at the beginning of the year by calls from irate parents, nervous teachers & administrators, and a laundry list of trainings I had to do.  On top of that, our complex area is going through an On-Site School Review (OSSR) for all schools.  This entails a team of ragamuffin DOE employees be at the school from 7:30 am til 5:00 pm daily (except for Monday, when re-con time is 7:00).  And I almost forgot to mention the "optional" evening meeting on the Wednesday of the OSSR week.  The purpose of the meeting is to allow families to ask OSSR members questions about the review process.  But all of this bitching translates to a very late week.

When I have a late week, dinners become challenging.  Thats when I rely on food from my freezer to get us through dinners.  During my OSSR week, I raided the freezer and found a slab of taro cake.  I popped the slab in the microwave, then cut it into pieces.  Pan-frying the bottom of the pieces creates a crispy crust which is great dipped in shoyu.

For you people living in Honolulu or any large city, there is a good chance you can head to your nearby dimsum place and buy a few pieces of taro cake. . . no need to buss out the steamer.  But I live in Hilo, and there is nowhere to buy taro cake.  For us, taro cake is one of those things you buy from Honolulu as moonyagi*. Actually, I think my version is better than what you'd  get, and because you're making it yourself, you can use the "healthier" lup cheong that has chicken in it.  Even better . . . you can eat the whole dang pan yourself like I end up doing.

*Moonyagi is Weezee's word for omiyage (gifts in Japanese).

click on recipe title for printable recipe
Taro Cake

Meat Filling:

     1 tbsp oil

     2 lup cheong, diced

     2 tbsp chung choi, chopped fine

     1 tbsp rice wine

Taro Filling:

     1 tbsp oil

     2 c diced taro

     1/2 tsp chicken bouillon powder + enough water to 

          make 1/2 c

Cake:

     1 c cake flour, sifted

     1/4 c tapioca starch

     1 tsp chicken bouillon powder + enough water to 

          make 1 1/2 c

Garnish:

     1/4 c chopped green onions

     1 tbsp roasted sesame seeds

For meat filling, heat oil in wok and saute lup cheong until heated.  Add remaining meat filling ingredients and cook until liquid is reduced.  Set aside.  For taro filling, heat oil and stir-fry taro for 1 minute.  Add bouillon mixture and cook for 5 minutes or more until liquid is reduced.  Set aside.  Prepare a steamer.  Combine cake ingredients, whisking until smooth.  Grease a 9" round or square pan.  Scatter half of taro cubes evenly in pan.  Top with half of meat filling.  Pour all of cake mixture over.  Repeat taro and meat layers.  Steam for 30 minutes.  Remove from steamer and scatter garnishes.  Allow cake to cook before slicing.