Author Archives: sodabay

About sodabay

A cook, a book, a blog.

Christmas Dinner Ideas

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It’s nearly December and very soon it will be Christmas!  If there is one thing I love about Christmas, apart from celebrating Christ’s birth, it’s my childhood stocking that withstood the test of time.  I still remember my surprise and delight when on Christmas morning I found Kisses and a 5-dollar bill in it.

However, my fondest memory of Christmas isn’t really the chocolates or dollar bills, instead it’s the sumptuous Christmas dinners my Mom painstakingly prepared for the whole family.

Mom always made sure that her Christmas dinner was the year’s crème de la crème.  As I watched her prepare the family’s Christmas dinners for over the past 24 years, before I moved out and started my own family, I realized that my Mom had no special recipe, but each Christmas dinner turned out special because she mixed her love into it.

My Mom’s Christmas Dinners:

Poultry.  There’s no cooking etiquette against serving Turkey twice in a year’s time, is there?  Thanksgiving turkey is different from a Christmas turkey, although they can taste the same.  Mom always insisted on a turkey because of the size of our family however, if your own family objects, chicken or duck can make a tasty substitute.  You can try some garlic hot sauce with it.

Quick Tip:  To cook meat faster, use meat tenderizing marinade.

Bread and Pastries.  Cookies, cakes, and all those yummy treats that children love were on Mom’s table and should be on your Christmas dinner table, too.

Ham.  Cooked or sweet ham is an ideal Christmas dinner treat; in fact, Christmas is never complete without it.

Fruit.  Mom is half-Asian, and as most Asians believe, fruit on the dinner table during Christmas, especially on New Year’s Eve, ushers in good luck.  We never challenged her beliefs because fruit and salads are perfect for any occasion anyway.

Christmas Dishes From Around the World

For countries celebrating Christmas, Christmas dinners are never complete without a dish or two of the following:

Australia = roast turkey, grilled chicken in barbeque salsa, ham; cake, pudding, gingerbread, salads

Canada = roast turkey, fruitcake, gingerbread, candy canes

Finland = ham, mustard, casserole (vegetables, liver)

France = smoked salmon, oysters, roasted chicken

Germany = potato salad, ham (smoked or corned), sausages, baked apples

Hungary = roast goose, roast duck or turkey, stuffed cabbage

Jamaica = ham, chicken, goat in curry sauce, fruit cake, rice, peas

Philippines = roasted pig or chicken, pasta, fruits, salads

UK = roasted turkey, potatoes, brussel sprouts, pudding pie.

Italy = preferably fish (Most Italians abstain from eating red meat on Christmas).

So what will be on your table this Christmas?  Regardless of the menu you’ll whip up, just make sure you have enough love and food to go around. Happy Holidays.

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How to Make the Juiciest BBQ and Burger Patties

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Making meat tender is a crucial element in cooking perfect BBQ and burger patties that barbecue fanatics, as well as burger lovers, should master before boasting their real “chef” potential.  Premium meats do not always guarantee the best BBQ.  Even with cheaper meats, one can toss and flip the juiciest BBQ with these tips in tenderizing meat:

First, decide how you are going to tenderize the meat.  I used to tenderize meat using my Mom’s kitchen tips, but I now rely solely on my handy kitchen mate, a Jaccard Supertendermatic knife to cut not just the meat, but also the prepping time.  However, I still recommend that you learn traditional methods on how to make meat tender, in case you misplace your tenderizing knife.

  1. Marinating meat in vinegar, pineapple juice, lemon or lime juice for at least 4 to 6 hours before cooking or grilling is one of the most common traditional methods to tenderize meat.  Minced garlic and dabs of salt add to the flavor.  Salt, by itself, is also a natural tenderizer. Wine may also be used as a marinade, albeit a bit of a costly marinade.
  2. Salt does not only add flavor; it is also nature’s meat tenderizer – if used properly.  To use salt as a tenderizer, use it as a coating on meat, with few dabs of lemon juice to heighten flavor.  You may also rub on crushed garlic before you coat the meat with salt.
  3. Commercially-available meat tenderizer in powder form may also be used.  Just sprinkling powdered tenderizer on both sides of the meat may take a while to make it tender. You should pierce meat with a fork or a small knife and sprinkle powdered tenderizer through the inside portions of the meat, to speed up the tenderizing process.
  4. Crude materials, such as a piece of wood or metal may also be used to break down tough connective tissues in the meat, however I don’t approve of this practice.  It’s messy, and splatters of meat pieces, as well as blood residue on the meat, add up to your cleaning chores. 

With my tenderizing knife, I save time, effort and money.  I don’t wait hours or overnight for meat to become tender before I grill it, or make a sumptuous burger.  It requires no pounding on the meat that distorts its form, and no need to re-stock my cupboard, like I used to with other methods of tenderizing meat.  Its sharp edges cut through the meat allowing seasonings to penetrate deep into the mea, which is the secret of the juiciest BBQ, steaks and burgers.

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Practical Tips for Freezing and Thawing Food in Less Time

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Freezing food saves time, effort and money.  This is the principle behind non-stop innovations for freezers and refrigerators. With a botched economy, a few dollars you can save by buying bulk, and freezing food can add up to more money in your pocket to buy a few more necessities.

However, there is more to freezing foods than just lumping things inside the freezer. In fact, freezing can reduce the quality of food if you fail to follow some sensible guidelines of proper food storage.

Here are three practical tips on how you can freeze, and later thaw-out food all in less time, without losing any quality or flavor.

01. How to wrap food.  “Moisture out freshness in,” this is the rule of thumb when wrapping food for freezing.  Food should be tightly sealed or wrapped up well, so as to eliminate “freezer burns” that will diminish the taste and quality of foods, especially for meat and fish.

02.  Zip lock bags or vacuum sealers?  Some Moms still insist on using foil wrappers, while others give their thumb of approval to zip lock bags.  Lately however, more and more Moms are shifting gears to vacuum sealers or to vacuum containers for longer freezing time duration, and fewer incidences of freezer burn.

Read More:  Five Reasons Why Vacuum Sealers are Better than Zip Lock Bags

03. First In First Out.  Freezing food will not halt its inevitable decay. It can help you ascertain which foods should be consumed first if you indicate dates on every container you have inside the freezer, including its contents.  This will speed up the whole process of deciding what to cook and when.  

A Tip on Thawing Food

As important as learning how to freeze food is, knowing how to thaw them properly is just as important. Food poisoning often results from the mishandling of frozen foods, especially meat, during the thawing process.

Ideally, you should not freeze, thaw, and then re-freeze food.  Each time you thaw food, you expose it to bacteria that may cause food contamination.  It is therefore sensible to plan your menu ahead of time and apportion food accordingly before you wrap or seal them.  When it’s time to cook, only take out and thaw the portions of meat you need for the meal.

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