Thai coconut chicken soup

I knew Thai coconut chicken soup from my friend, and after that I tried this soup in a Thai restaurant,but I prefer the taste of my friend made it. This soup tastes different from Chinese soup and western soup, which tastes a little bit acid and spicy, and my taste-bud was refreshed. So I began to make this soup.

Here is the recipe below:
1 lb.boneless and skinless chicken breast, dice or slices
1 L chicken broth
2 cans (800ml) of coconut milk
1 can of straw mushroom
3 limes, zest and juice
15 g ginger, minced
2 cloves of garlic (optional)
3 tbsp fish sauce
1 tbsp sugar
some red pepper flakes
a bunch of coriander, leaves, as garnish

1. Heat up the chicken broth.

2. Add the chicken breast into boiling broth.

3.Add 2 cans of coconut milk, and let it boil.

4. While the same time, slice the straw mushroom, if you like the whole mushroom, you don't need to slice.

5. Add the mushroom slices

6.Add fish sauce, minced ginger,sugar and pepper flakes (you can add minced garlic if you like). And bring the soup to boil.

7.When it was boiling again, it's done. And serve in a bowl and garnish with coriander leaves.

I cooked the noodles, the ate with the soup, and the noodles adsorbed the soup. It was gorgeous, and the soup was richly. This was the most wonderful soup I've ever made.

This recipe is so easy, hope you can make your soup by following it.

Homemade pickle--Papaya

I like eat pickle, there are not taste salty but acidic and sugary. I remember the first time I saw the pickle cucumber in Canada, I thought its taste would be sweet and acidic. However, it wasn't. I tried to buy some pickle in supermarket, but there were not what I want. So, i wanted make by myself.

I decided to make pickle papaya, and the recipe is very easy. There are papaya, white vinegar, sugar and a pinch of salt.  

Let's begin.
The first step is to boil the vinegar(600ml) and sugar(285g), and turn off the heat when it is boiling.

While the same time, peel off the skin off papaya, and slice it. Then add a pinch of salt and mix it well.

When the vinegar is cooled down, put the papaya into it, and mix well.

During pickling, it's better to stir it so that the papaya can equally absorb the acid. 

Two hours later, it's done.

This recipe is so easy, and I cannot wait to try it. 

Fruit Hunter--Bartlett Pear

Compare to the shopping mall, I prefer to hang out in the market. I've been to Stouffville Country Market, St. Jacobs Farmer's Market, and St. Lawrence Market. However, I like St. Lawrence Market because it's near by my school and I can buy the fresh food in there. And the people in there are friendly as well.

This time I went there because I wanted to explore the fruit I've never tried. I bought some figs and strawberry in there. They were fresh and tasty.

Finally, I also bought some pears but I've never tried this variety, which called bartlett pear. Before I bought these pears, I thought kinds of pears are the same taste, and just the differences in the appearance, and I rarely buy pears.

When I tried it, the first impression for me was that this wasn't a pear, but an apple. That was so weird for me, and I didn't know if I bought a pear or not.  Nonetheless, this pear give me a new knowledge of the taste and texture, which were fruity, unique flavor, taste sweet and juicy. Then I searched online, I found there were so many different varieties of pears I never know. Moreover, I knew this kind of pear are rich in August to December, and this variety of pears are in the U.S. and Canada. That why I've never seen bartlett pear in my hometown.

Chinese cuisine is different from western countries' cuisine, we rarely use fruit for cooking, the first time I knew it, I felt so weird about that. Although I don't know how to cook with fruit, I know a method to keep the pears fresh after the pears are cut, which is putting the lemon juice on the surface of the pear, and you can also use this method to the apples.

The food in Waterloo

Yesterday, I had a trip to Waterloo with my friends, and we bought some fruit in the St. Jacob Market, such as grapes and peaches. After shopping in the market, we went to a German restaurant which was located nearby the village of St. Jacob, called The Olde Heidelberg Restaurant.

We arrived there at 4pm, and there were not too much people in there at that time, so we could have a quiet atmosphere for the meal. I took a order as Ribs & Pigtail Combination dinner with Sauerkraut, French fires and Cole Slaw.

About 20min later, the waitress came and passed me the plate with the food, I was shocked because I couldn't image that the portion was so big, and I might not finish all about it.

First of all, I tasted the Cole Slaw, which was a little cold but sweet, and stimulated my appetite. The Sauerkraut also yummy but it tasted sour. I've tried the pigtail soup in my country, but this was the first time to eat the smoked pigtail like this. The pigtail was sooooo tender, not to salty, and it melted in my mouth immediately. It was the different from the style I've tried before. Even though the pork ribs were tender also, I don't like it because it tasted flavorless.

I also tried some of Smoked Pork Hock, I like the smoky from the surface of the pork hock.

I'm really recommend you to go and try the food in there, and I will come again next time and try different food. Moreover, as a reminder, it is best for you to reserve the table or you need to wait for a quite long time.

My introduction

Hello, everyone.

I'm Meixin Yin. I'm the freshman of this blog.

I want to share some cooking experiences and questions while cooking, that why I use this blog. 

I want to be a chef because I like to cook, and I want to cook some delicious food for my family. Be able to cook for the people who you love, it's the most happiness thing I can do.

Now, I'm not doing the job about culinary industry, but before I came to Canada, I worked in a restaurant and I've learnt some cooking skills from the chef.  Although working in the kitchen is not an easy job,  I can get some life skills from the kitchen and that make me be more successful in the future.

I think the mood can be affected by the food, so I hope I'm able to cook a magical food to make people feel happiness. That's my philosophy of cooking.

I'm looking forward to making more new friends and learning how to be a successful chef from my college and my teachers. 

GO! GO! GO!