Burnt Milk Fudge

leche quemada: burnt milk fudge with fruits and nuts

One of the sweets I cooked for New Year's Eve was a Mexican-style fudge called leche quemada which means burnt milk. The mixture of fresh milk and sugar is cooked for more than half an hour while constantly stirring to avoid burning the bottom. I actually burnt mine a little bit which made the candies all the more yummy. Butter, candied fruits and chopped nuts are added after cooking and the candy block is chilled for 8 hours or air-dried overnight on the kitchen counter before cutting into 1-inch squares. I combined the recipes from the December 2008 issue of Saveur magazine called Jamoncillos and from gourmetsleuth using hazelnuts in place of pecans. Making the candies is labor intensive but it was well worth all the time I spent making them. These tiny candies are so delicious and super addictive. I love the hint of cinnamon and the combination of hazelnuts and pine nuts is perfect.

Leche Quemada

3 cups sugar

2 cups whole milk

1 cinnamon stick

½ cup light corn syrup

1 teaspoon salt

6 tablespoons unsalted butter

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

1 cup candied fruits, cut into ¼ inch pieces

1 cup chopped skinned and toasted hazelnuts (or pecans)

½ cup chopped toasted pine nuts

• Butter bottom and all sides of an 8-inch square baking pan, line with parchment paper, butter paper. Set aside.
• In a large saucepan, stir together sugar, milk, corn syrup, and salt. Add the cinnamon stick. Bring to a simmer over medium-high heat. Simmer on medium heat until the mixture thickens and a candy thermometer registers 240 degrees, stirring bottom to prevent burning. This will take about 40 to 45 minutes.
• Remove pan from heat. Remove and discard cinnamon stick. Add butter and vanilla, do not stir. Let mixture cool to 180 degrees.
• Stir mixture with wooden spoon until no longer glossy. Add fruits and nuts, stir to combine. Transfer into the prepared baking pan, smooth surface with a rubber spatula. Chill until set, about 8 hours, or leave on the counter overnight.
• Turn fudge out onto a cutting board and cut into sixty-four 1 inch squares.

For a little bit of useless information. The word leche (milk) in the Spanish speaking world and in the Philippines is used as a mild oath or an insult, depending on context or inflection. In the Philippines people say the word leche when they are angry, frustrated, surprised, and sometimes as a greeting. If someone says with an angry intonation "ah leche ka", he/she is annoyed and dismissive, "naku, na-leche na" could mean something went wrong and he'll be in deep s**t. My mother-in-law told us a "leche" story involving my husband when he was a toddler. She was at home chatting with someone when he started saying mama leche, mama leche, mama leche. The woman she was chatting with asked my MIL why she was allowing her son to disrespect her. My MIL explained that he just got hungry and was simply asking for milk. Both my husband and I have no idea how the benign word leche became a cuss word in the Philippines, Spain, and South America. Anyone knows?:-)

Lasang Pinoy Sundays: Steamed

One of my dad's and now my own family's favorite dishes is steamed fish seasoned with fermented black beans (salted soy beans called tausi), sliced ginger, scallions, sesame seed oil, and salty Chinese ham. This is one Chinese dish we never get tired of and always regard as something special. I love tausi whole when adding to dishes to savor its salty goodness.

Lasang Pinoy, Sunday Edition is a weekly photography meme hosted by SpiCes. Enjoy other "steamy" entries here.

Hot! Hot! Hot!

hot sauce: hot peppers, sweet pepper, vinegar, and salt

It's actually cold cold cold. The 2 inches of snow that fell Monday night and all day Tuesday is gone but thick patches of slippery ice still have to thaw. And there is a 20% chance of more snow showers tomorrow.

During very cold days we turn to Filipino comfort food like siopao and noodle soup. We had 2 pieces of store-bought siopao labeled Pork Asado filling (more like Mystery Meat Plus Loads Of Flour Filler filling). I made siopao but was disappointed with the hot sauces we have in the house. For siopao I prefer Tabasco style made with only three ingredients: hot peppers, vinegar, and salt. In addition to Tabasco we have numerous tiny and large bottles of hot sauce from Thai sriracha to Malaysian Sos Cili to Mexican styles. The Tabasco is just too vinegary for me and the rest too garlicky. I know, I'm very picky. I nearly gagged when I smelled the Mexican Cholula brand because of the added spices, I think one of them is cumin. I love cumin in most cuisines that use it but not in hot sauce to drizzle on my siopao. They just don't go very well together IMHO.

I was not going to drive through the snow to look for a good bottle of hot sauce, I made my own with cayenne peppers, sweet bell pepper, brown coconut vinegar, and salt. Aaah, much better...reminds me of the hot sauce and siopao back in the Philippines. And the sauce is really hot!

Hot Sauce
5 cayenne peppers, more if you prefer it hotter
1 small red bell pepper
¼ cup brown coconut vinegar or cider vinegar + more to taste
1 teaspoon salt

• Blanch, or sear peppers on stove until skin is charred. With gloved hands, remove skin and seeds from peppers. Put in a blender, add vinegar and puree. Transfer into a stainless steel pan. Add salt and cook on low heat until just heated through, about 2 minutes. Taste and adjust vinegar and salt. Transfer into a sterilized bottle or jar. Let cool before storing in the refrigerator. May be used right away but tastes better after a few days.

yummy together: bola-bola (seasoned minced pork) siopao and hot sauce

Hopia

sweet yellow mungbean paste in flaky pastry shell

I mentioned in my Chinese New Year's post the Vietnamese flaky pastry filled with sweet yellow mungbean paste. In the Philippines this small pastry is called hopia. Two recipes for hopia have been bookmarked for over a year already but I never had the energy or motivation to make them. Simply reading the procedure exhausts me and because these snacks are available from the Filipino grocery, I always thought it would be a waste of time to make them. I finally baked some yesterday since I was also baking a loaf of purple yam (ube) bread to save on gas. I am so glad I decided to make them. They came out very flaky and not greasy, the mungbean filling is very smooth [but could have been sweeter]. The hopias are closer in color (whiter) and texture to the Vietnamese hopia than to the Filipino hopia which has a thinner more tender and delicate pastry. I think using a combination of pork lard and solid shortening is the key to the most tender flaky crust but I don't like to use lard except for ensaimada.

The shell is surprisingly very easy to prepare, roll, and shape. The dough has lots of vegetable oil and therefore very pliable and does not stick on the counter or rolling pin. I made really big ones, almost double the size suggested in the recipe, and piled the filling up high because I love sweet mungbeans. It was not a waste of time after all and will make them again perhaps with other flavors like pandan and matcha and other fillings such as sweet azuki beans. Or maybe I'll try making mooncakes if I find the plastic molds/presses with Chinese characters and designs.

Hopia
filling
16 ounces dried peeled split yellow mungbean
water
1½ cups sugar or to taste
½ teaspoon salt

Dough 1
1 cup all purpose flour
¼ cup + 1 tablespoon grapeseed or extra light olive oil

Dough 2
2 cups all-purpose flour
1/3 cup + 1 tablespoon grapeseed or extra light olive oil
1/3 cup + 1 tablespoon water

Egg wash
1 egg beaten with 1 tablespoon water

• Prepare the filling: Place mungbeans in a bowl. Rinse with cold water, drain, and transfer into a medium nonstick saucepan. Add enough water to top about 1 inch of the beans, bring to a boil. Skim off top, reduce heat to medium, and continue cooking into a paste, stirring often with a silicone spatula to prevent burning. Use a wooden spoon to mash down the beans in the saucepan. Sprinkle the salt and add 1 cup sugar, adding more to taste. Spread paste into an even layer on a shallow rectangular dish and microwave on high for 5 minutes to dry it out. Set aside to cool. When cooled, form 3 tablespoons into a ball and flatten into 2-inch rounds. While paste is cooling, prepare the doughs.
• Dough 1: Mix flour and oil with a fork in a small bowl until crumbly. Divide into 4 parts. Set aside.
• Dough 2: In another bowl, mix flour, oil, and water with a fork. Knead lightly on the counter until it forms into a ball. Divide into 4 equal pieces.
• Flatten one Dough 2 into a 1/8 inch thin square. Crumble a quarter of Dough 1 all over the flattened Dough 2. Roll as jelly roll, pinch both ends and roll gently back and forth to form into a 1 inch thick log. Set on a small sheet pan lined with paper towel. Repeat with the rest of the doughs. Refrigerate for no more and no less than 30 minutes.
• Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Divide the chilled logs into 5 pieces. Roll out one piece into a 1/16 inch thin square or round. Place a mungbean round on top of dough and bring the edges together. Pinch edges and turn upside down so that the seam is at the bottom. Place on an ungreased baking sheet. Repeat with the rest of the dough. Brush tops with egg wash and bake for 20 to 30 minutes. Cool completely on a wire rack before serving.

for the square shaped ones, I used a scalloped square cookie cutter as mold