Six to Start

1. Crazy about this new bamboo tea strainer from Lisa. It's so elegant and carefully crafted. Designed with aesthetics and not necessarily function in mind ;)

2. Can never resist the Earl Grey gelato from Il Laboratorio del Gelato. It's not often they have this flavor in stock, so when they do, a scoop (or pint!) is a must.

3. Oro Bakery and Bar. Forgot about this Broome St spot, but we went for sandwiches last weekend, and now I remember why I liked it here so much in the first place.

4. Sign me up for Coconut Eggnog at Donatella, yes please. There bourbon, rum, and coconut cream in this frothy elixir. Makes me all cozy inside, I love holiday drinks.

5. DavidsTea opened on Bleecker Street last week. This chain of tea shops come from Canada and it's one of the few places in NYC that stock milk oolong.

6. Steeping Earl Grey tea leaves into hot apple cider. Simple to assemble and a decidedly addictive combination. Will be drinking this all winter.

Tuesday Giveaway!

[Update: The lucky winner is K! Thanks for playing, hope to be doing another giveaway next week :)]

I'm excited to announce a giveaway from the girls at Aperio Natural today!

They recently sent over beauty products to try - think sugar scrubs, hand creams, and shower gels. Scents like Green Tea, Peony, and a fragrant Cherry Blossom. Aperio is based in Saratoga, California and create completely natural products...no parabens, mineral oil, animal ingredients or alcohol. They're popular in Asia - where they've been featured in Bazaar, Elle, Marie Claire, and are expanding in the US. I've worked my way (tough job, eh? ;) though all the products, and Green Tea Sugar Body Scrub is easily my favorite of the collection. The tea scent is clear, relaxing and there's olive oil blended directly into the sugar so that it's silky in all the right ways. Slather on your skin, massage gently, and wash off. Ahhh, just one more reason to pamper yourself.

Leave a comment below noting which scent you like best: Green Tea, Peony, or Cherry Blossom. Enter by 12/1. Winner will be chosen at random and will receive a line of products (the one you pick!) from Aperio Natural. Good luck ^_^

Scallops

Time for lunch.

There must be a million types of baby lettuce at the Union Square Greenmarket. Curly, straight, flat. Wild things. Earthy green, soft shades and darker colors. $10/pound. Don't settle on one type, mix and match five types. Just enough for lunch.

Two stalls down on Union Square West, you'll find PE & DD Seafood with fresh scallops. $17.95/pound. Eight pieces come out to just over a third of a pound. I take them home and pat the scallops dry. The three smallest scallops, I eat raw. Slice against the grain, two slices to a scallop. Squeeze a cut of lemon, then sprinkle on a bit salt. Eat standing up in the kitchen, best bites of the day.

The five larger ones I quickly sear. Melt butter, high heat, cook just 30 seconds on one side, maybe even less. 20 seconds? Plate with the lettuce. One crank of the pepper mill, a sprinkle of Maldon salt. Slice and devour. Only the outside is cooked, inside the scallops are rare and cool to the touch. Hope to be cooking lunches like this more often.

Haircut

Remember when I got my hair cut like this? That was back in the winter of 2008. I went from all plain long hair to short bob and blunt bangs. It was so much fun but far from low maintenance and impossible to take care of. All flat when you don't blow dry, and all puffy with wild frizz in summer heat. Hilarious. And then maintenance! Get it trimmed every three weeks or...

...risk bangs that dare to literally clip away at your vision!

After that cut, I grew both hair and bangs out. It got longer and longer. At my shoulders, past my shoulders. It wasn't until I looked in the mirror last week and realized that it was now elbow length. Time for a cut! I go to Sei-Tomoko on W4th St (Pierre goes to Sei-Tomoko on 13th St, but I like the W4th one better). I wanted a crazy cut, something adventurous like that bob. Let's do it! Shampoo and condition is included in the cut ($50), plus hot tea and shoulder massage. Heaven. The hairdresser took out scissors and just as she was about to make that first snip, I chickened out:

"Maybe just a trim instead?"

We compromised. She knocked off a good three inches. And now I feel a little less like a shaggy dog. The only problem is that it's too short to put in a proper bun! Ponytails and hair down for now. Perhaps we'll bob it back the next time around ;)

Magret de Canard

Pierre was ready to attack this plate this minute it reached the table, so no pretty plating for today. A bit messy, but one of the best lunch dishes I've made in a while. I've been craving duck in all forms recently - legs, foie gras, gizzards, breast. Anything duck! These cravings get particularly expensive so I figured I better learn how to cook a few dishes myself. First up, Magret de Canard. We rarely cook anything fancy at home...so if I can do it, you sure can. Three components to this dish:

1. Sautéed Pears
2. Haricot Verts
2. Magret de Canard

1. For the Sautéed Pears, peel and core a bosc pear. Cut into 8 pieces. Melt a pat of butter over medium heat and cook the pears for five minutes, until golden brown on both sides. I like to add a bit of sugar while cooking to caramelize it just a bit.

2. Trim the Haricot Verts. Blanch in boiling water 3 minutes. Drain and shock in cold water. Sauté with olive oil and salt for a few minutes. Add a handful of slivered almonds. Continue cooking until the almonds turn light brown, remove from heat.

3. I bought the Magret de Canard from our neighborhood Citarella on 9th Street and 6th Avenue. It's $12.99/pound, and each breast piece is approximately a pound, give or take a few ounces. The duck comes from Hudson Valley Foie Gras & Duck Products - top notch products. They also sell all their products online, very convenient.

Using a sharp knife, make a tight crosshatch pattern going across the entire skin/fat side of the duck breast. Salt and pepper both sides.

Place skin side down, medium-high heat, and start cooking off all that fat. A ton of fat will start to pool at the bottom of the pan. Keep a bowl on the side so you can drain or spoon off the fat every few minutes. Continue cooking like this for about 10 minutes until the bulk of the fat has rendered off, and the remaining fat is crisp, golden.

Note: some people save this duck fat for cooking, but I dump it out. The fat has essentially 'burned' off and won't be nearly as good as "clean" duck fat. Hudson Valley Foie Gras also carried duck fat by the 2-pound bucket for $12.50.

Then turn over and cook meat side down for a minute - it should be rare at the center. Remove to a cutting board. Pierre usually comes to the kitchen after around this time and takes care of the slicing. And I use that bonus time (always helpful!) to finish the haricot verts and plate it with the sautéed pears.

30-minutes, start to finish. Perfect timing, and a pretty balanced meal ;) Bon appétit!

Tea Pairings with Le Palais des Thés and Melanie Franks

The other week I attended a tea tasting class co-hosted by Francois-Xavier Delmas of Le Palais des Thés (who flew in from France just for the occasion!) and Melanie Franks from the French Culinary Institute. Does Melanie's name sound familiar? It should! She prepared this entire six-course tea dinner at In Pursuit of Tea earlier this year. When it comes to culinary tea/cooking with tea, two names pop up most often.

First, Cynthia Gold, author of the Culinary Tea cookbook. I first met Cynthia at the World Tea East when I attend her Culinary Tea Seminar. It was a class for small business owners (cafes, tea shops) who wish to incorporate tea into their menu. And not just for drinking. But for salads, soups, pastas, etc. The class was literally like her book come to life - and that is a good thing. I saw Cynthia again at a tea event hosted by The Meaning of Tea where she made a variety of tea-infused hors d'oeuvres. She's based in Boston and is the Tea Sommelier at Boston Park Plaza Hotel.

Here in NYC, Melanie Franks' name is much more familiar. She's the go-to gal for tea-inspired cooking. In addition to being a chef-instructor at the FCI, she's also a tea chef consultant with In Pursuit of Tea, and a certified tea specialist with the STI. You can literally ask Melanie any question about pairing tea with food. Or how to infuse a certain type of tea into anything from fish to bread, and which tea brings out the flavor of which cookie, and she can answer you in a second. That is serious talent.

The first half of this tea class was conducted by Francois-Xavier Delmas - the founder of Le Palais des Thés, one of my favorite French tea companies. They've been around since 1987 and all their teas come directly from the source/grower, so no third party or wholesaler is ever involved. And though it seems like this is how it always should be...you'd be surprised to learn how many companies purchase teas in bulk from the same wholesalers. A little disturbing actually, but we'll save that talk for another day. Every industry has a dirty underbelly, tea included. Which is why when you find a good company you can trust, stick with it!

Francois-Xavier walked us through a tasting of the following five teas:
1. Long Jing - Also known as "Dragon Well." From Zhejiang, China.
2. Tamaryokucha Imperial - Japanese green tea from the island of Kyushu.
3. Dong Ding - Oolong from Taiwan (this tea also pairs well with quiche)
4. Darjeeling Thurbo - Darjeeling from India
5. Qimen Imperial - Comes from Huangshan in the Anhui province (where we went just this summer!)

I wish I had a photo capturing the different colors of the tea liquors all at once - they varied tremendously, and it was crazy to think that all these varieties essentially come from the same plant, Camellia sinensis. I also appreciated the fact that we tasted only pure teas (and not blends), which gave a better sense of the quality of tea alone without many interferences.

After the five teas, Melanie did a demo on how to prepare this dish of Tea-Cured Trout with Tea-Smoked Yogurt. It was actually the exact same dish as the one she served at the tea dinner, only plated a little different. This was actually my favorite dish from the dinner, so learning how to make it was a real treat. Here are the components:

1. Tea-Cured Arctic Char. She used trout for the dinner and arctic char this time around. You can use any white fish or salmon. Cure the fish in a 2:1:1 ratio mix of salt:brown sugar: lapsang souchong.
2. Tea-Smoked Yogurt. Make a tea-infused oil first by heating up a neutral oil (corn, grapeseed, canola), adding the loose leaf lapsang souchong. Remove from heat immediately and then let infuse for 15 minutes before straining out the tea leaves. Blend a bit of the oil with Greek yogurt.
3. Niçoise Olives
4. Cippolini Onions
5. Micro Greens
6. Citrus Segments (orange, lemon)
7. Garlic Chips

Plan to recreate this dish at home soon, so will make sure to do a step by step post.

Finishing on sweets and cheese of course. A wedge of Fontina and Humbolt Fog to pair with cups of Sencha. The cookie is a Chocolate-Hojicha Cookie. When most people do tea cookies, it's usually a matcha cookie, so this was a very fun change. Melanie grinds up hojicha in a spice grinder and uses the ground hojicha to replace most of the flour in this recipe. It's impossible to not get excited about infusing tea into everything from salads, meats, sweets, and soup...the possibilities are endless!

Sugar Rush'ed...

Happy Friday! I write the 'Sugar Rush' column + other sweet stuff for Serious Eats.

Indulgences from this week include:
Brown Butter Plum Tart at L.A. Burdick
Payard's Raspberry Verrine at Butterfield Market
Pumpkin Tart at City Bakery
Sugar Pie at Bouchon Bakery

Pied de Coq

Hope everyone had a good Thanksgiving! Pierre and I celebrated with friends (same wonderful hosts as last year), only this time we replaced turkey with roast beef, potato gratin, haricot verts, and a mushroom saute. One couple bought homemade ravioli - truly incredible, miniature in size and half stuffed with spinach/ricotta mix, and half with pumpkin/amaretti. They prepared it on the spot and served with sage-brown butter and Parmesan. Sanu made bourekas with plenty of ground lamb, and we snacked on an excellent carprese salad with burrata all afternoon. For dessert: cannolis from Villabate, coconut-custard and pumpkin pies from Veniero's. A success.

But now, back to reality...one stuffed with macarons. Ladurée just introduced a new box creation, the 'Pied de Coq'. How chic is that? This one is the blue/orange/pink hounds tooth pattern. They have three other color combinations, including a black/white/blue, yellow/purple/green, and green/orange. Serious shocks of color.

I ate the pistachio and raspberry ones first...

...then Pierre came home and we devoured the rest. Flavors top to bottom, left to right:
- Vanilla, Raspberry, Coconut, Cinnamon-Raisin (NYC-only flavor)
- Pistachio, Coffee, Black Forest (new this month), and Chocolate

Another box for the set. Piled in the corner. Halloween boxes, green boxes, rectangles and squares and shiny gold tubes for macarons. I can't decide whether I buy these Ladurée macarons for the boxes or macarons themselves...ahh perhaps a bit of both ;)

Ovando

A little sunshine for this rainy day. In the West Village, there's a beautiful flower shop on the corner of Christopher and Bleecker Street. It's called Ovando and the walls are painted black, fresh flowers and arrangements provide all the colors in the world.

This place is officially a flower shop/design company and they've done work for brands ranging from MoMA to the Four Seasons and Saks.

They also carry what I like to call "flower accompaniments," things like pots and trays, and these shiny gold and copper bowls. Gorgeous. I came with Diana a few weeks ago, and again with Lisa last week to select an arrangement for an event.

This is the one we picked! Orchids always make me think of Hawai'i.

The do mini-versions as well - $35 each compared to $120 for the larger one.

Packed into deep black bag and off we go!

One Weekend in Connecticut

Hello! Hope everyone had a good weekend. Pierre and I went to visit his cousins and their two little boys in Connecticut. Two and half hours north on the Amtrak, we left the computer at home and turned our phones off. First priority: relaxation.

It's important to get out of the city every now and then. Otherwise the speed and rush of things here will drive you crazy and insane. Perhaps a combination of both. We were gone for just two days but it seriously feels like we came back from a spa retreat. His cousins are amazing cooks and within the first few hours of our arrival we feasted on fingerling potatoes fried in duck fat, a light salad, and stunning côte de boeuf for four. There was a whole chocolate cake combining génoise, gavottes crumbled in nutella (will replicate this at home!), and chocolate mousse. And that was only lunch.

We drove to Fromage in Old Saybrook to pick out cheeses for dinner including a buttery Coupole and Stinking Bishop among many others. And then we stopped at Atlantic Seafood Market for a variety of oysters, monkfish, scallops, salmon, and shrimp while sampling cups of creamy haddock chowder. The scallops and shrimp was for dinner, simply seared - the main course to appetizers of raw oysters and warm buckwheat blinis (made from scratch!), fresh cream and smoked salmon. Cocktails too! I think we were all in heaven. Out of habit, we dine out/takeout/do delivery too often in the city - home cooked meals are rare and much appreciated treats.

The next morning, well rested (no sounds of drunken people yelling on the streets or cabs honking down Broadway) we had warm pancakes and baguettes with soft butter and jam. Hot tea? Yes please! A walk to the beach, rest and then lunch of monkfish and fried pancetta. Cheese plate and more of that divine chocolate cake to follow.

Then it was off to B.F. Clyde's Cider Mill in Mystic, a short 30-minute drive. Half a dozen fluffy sugar-dusted Apple Cider Doughnuts and hot Mulled Cider to match.

A look at the menu. They also sold jars of apple butter, applesauce, apple-everything!

Fresh batch. Beats the cider doughnuts from Union Square Greenmarket which are often stale by the time farmers bring them down to the Greenmarket. We drove around the Mystic river and back to the house. One last late afternoon hour by the fireplace with that October issue of Food & Wine, and one more pot of genmaicha. A train ride back to NYC, and somehow...it's Monday once again, surely much too fast.

Sugar Rush'ed...

Happy Friday! I write the 'Sugar Rush' column + other sweet stuff for Serious Eats.

Indulgences from this week include:
Pumpkin Madeleines at Épicerie Boulud
Coconut Pudding at Red Egg
More Pumpkin Gelato
Orange Blossom and Ricotta Babka at Abraço
4 Pistachio Milkshakes We Love in NYC
Rosewater and Tahini Fruit Salad at Public

Changes

You might have noticed a few changes here recently. Or actually, throughout the year.

More posts on tea, home, and lifestyle. And less on only food. To the point where I feel titling this blog "A Passion for Food" doesn't make as much sense anymore. Perhaps misleading for people who come expecting to find a straight-up food blog when food is just one of many things I'd love to share. I've decided to change this site to my name, plain and simple: Kathy YL Chan. The old address, www.apassionforfood.net will direct to www.kathyylchan.com. Both urls work, though do update to the new address when you get a chance. Thanks for sticking around guys - it means a lot to me :) Change feels good, and I'm excited to see what the future brings.

What does this mean for the blog? At the heart of it all, this is still the same blog, still the same me, but now posts on non-food subjects will feel more comfortable and at home. Hope you guys don't mind. And in fact, I hope you even like it.

P.S. A huge 'thank you' to D for this new header.

The Shelf

Gave the tea shelf a little lift this morning. I've been rotating the teas every other week, but this morning I literally saw gold and silver everywhere...in the folds of chocolate squares, in an open Ladurée case, jewelry piled on the nightstand and well...

Maybe we'll just turn this tea shelf into an inspiration shelf!

This is what looked like when we first got started ^-^