Tag: recipe

He Said, She Said, They Did

Is it a controversial statement that I think she-crab soup is unnecessarily gendered? Yes, it’s true that traditionally, this coastal delicacy employed only female crabs for their rich vermilion roe, giving it the edge over comparatively lean he-crab soup. In the current modern era, however, when we’re talking about a vegan version that uses neither sex, the designation makes no sense. They-Crab Soup is the only fitting moniker for this southern staple, if you ask me.

Originally created for President William Howard Taft who was a known fan of turtle soup, an even more antiquated dish that has mercifully disappeared from menus since, this crabby variation has a lot in common with what we would recognize today as a chowder or bisque. What sets it apart is the use of white rice as a thickening agent, creating a voluptuous texture without the need to hammer in the heavy cream. There’s a hint of tomato for ample umami, the warmth of smoked paprika for depth, and the standard sort of mirepoix to hold down the fort. It’s a fool-proof combination that’s an easy win for any diner, even a president.

Specifically for my recipe renovation, shredded oyster mushrooms replace crabs of any gender with ease. When pulled apart by hand, they mimic the delicate strands of shellfish remarkably well, soaking up the briny broth like they were born for the task. A touch of kelp granules and capers lends an unmistakable oceanic briny kiss to complete the effect. What emerges is a soup that honors the spirit of the original without clinging to its baggage. Built on technique and balance, not biology, it succeeds for the same reason the original did: it’s deeply comforting and undeniably delicious. Call it what you like, but once you taste it, the argument feels beside the point.

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Hannah (BitterSweet)2 Comments

Easy Bake Sushi

Sushi, though truly timeless and everlasting, isn’t typically thought of as a wintry dish. It’s a common misconception that it’s a dish best served cold, but unlike revenge, it’s still better with slightly warm, not chilled, rice. Regardless, when the thermometer outside is tracking single digits and warmer, heartier fare is top of mind, sushi doesn’t exactly make the cut. Perhaps, we’ve just been thinking of the wrong kind of sushi.

Hot Dish, Hot Off the Presses

Originally pitched as a “sushi casserole” roughly 15 years go, the concept really got hot when it was rebranded as a “sushi bake” during the height of the COVID19 pandemic. In the era of feta pasta and dalgona coffee, it fit right into the conversation about accessible global cuisine, comfort food, and culinary escapes. Familiar yet novel, easily adaptable to suit any available ingredients; looking back on it now, it made perfect sense. What I don’t understand is why it seems to have disappeared just as quickly.

Sushi for the People

Consider the sushi bake as sushi with training wheels, both for the cook and eater. No patience for hand-shaping individual rectangles of rice? Zero skill for rolling with sheets of nori? Throw everything in a pan and call it a day! Those of the most voracious appetites can finally satisfy the urge to eat an entire family platter of nigiri without being seen as gluttonous, and everyone can walk away from the table fulfilled. Especially during the colder months of the year, I can’t imagine a better way indulge in homemade sushi.

Layered with seasoned sushi rice, umami furikake, surprisingly convincing spicy crab made from shredded tofu, and a battery of crisp cucumbers, buttery avocado, and lashings of more savory sauces, it’s the complete package in every bite. You could easily double it and bake it off in an 8 x 8-inch pan for the whole family, or even quadruple it with a 9 x 13-inch pan for a genuine sushi party.

Serves You Right

Served warm, straight from the oven, a sushi bake is meant to be spooned, scooped, and shared with abandon. A brief rest on the counter allows the layers to settle into a more sliceable strata, but it should still arrive at the table hot, the rice plush and fragrant beneath its generous toppings. Set out stacks of toasted nori sheets or seaweed snacks and let everyone build their own bites, folding heaping spoonfuls into crisp wrappers that crackle against the creamy filling. It’s informal and tactile in a way traditional sushi rarely allows, encouraging seconds, and thirds, without ceremony or apology.

While I wouldn’t reheat it once topped, any leftover sushi bake is still just as delicious the next day, served cold. After winter relinquishes its grip and cooler cravings return, perhaps it can be a summertime staple, too.

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Hannah (BitterSweet)5 Comments

Kreplach with Chutzpah

Pronounced with enough force, kreplach sounds like a Yiddish curse at best, and an old man hacking up a lung at worst. Say it with your chest and really draw out the “ach” to hear what I mean, and possibly scare your neighbors while you’re at it. Resolutely the stuff of Old World sustenance, they’ve slowly faded into obscurity, overtaken by myriad adjacent dishes.

Some take offense to the comparisons, indignant that such a righteous and deeply meaningful food could be lumped into the same category as most generic frozen meals, but let’s be real: they are like Jewish wontons, pierogi, ravioli, manti, pelmeni, or just about any other dumpling that springs to mind first. Take a thin sheet of flour dough, wrap it around a basic filling of chicken, potatoes, mushrooms, or beef, simmer it in soup or pan-fry, and you have your holy kreplach.

Stuffed With Meaning

Symbolism is almost as important as flavor when you talk about the history of kreplach. Reserved for special occasions, they’re most likely to reemerge for Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, and Purim. In accordance with the former two holidays, the filling is sealed, just as our fates are said to be sealed in the book of life, or possibly shielded from judgment. Purim, viewed by some as a Jewish version of Halloween, is where things get more interesting.

Triangulated Trials

Just as Esther concealed her identity, and children today don costumes and disguises, the filling is hidden between the thin layers of dough. On this day, kreplach are folded into triangles, mirroring the shape of hamantaschen which also mimic the three cornered hat worn by Haman. They’re little pockets of joy made from the most humble stuff, finding beauty in the commonplace, the mundane, the everyday. It’s the time and labor that make them truly special.

Labor of Love

To that end, yes, you could make shortcut kreplach by using wonton skins instead of homemade dough, but that rather defeats the purpose to me. You might as well buy any old ready-made dumplings at that point. The dough, rolled out thinly, has a more distinctive bite, more resistance and weight, which can’t be replicated by anything other than the genuine article. Traditional renditions are egg-heavy, though that’s nothing a little aquafaba can’t fix. Feel free to prep this well in advance, since it can keep for up to a week in the fridge. It’s easy, not quick.

Souped or Sautéed

When I think of kreplach, I think of gleaming little triangles swimming languidly through light, golden broth, intermingled with a few coins of tender carrots. They can also be served dry, pan-fried, often laced with caramelized onions. If you were to take the potato stuffing route, you know how well that works for pierogi; I’d be sorely tempted to serve them with a side of vegan sour cream to complete the picture.

Today’s Kreplach Legacy

Don’t let kreplach die out. Yes, there are plenty of close cousins hailing from Europe and Asia alike. Perhaps no one would even realize if they make an Irish exit. My favorite foods, however, come with stories. Tradition, intention, and symbolism have branded kreplach as their own unique, wholly irreplaceable entry to the culinary canon of all dough-swaddled savory morsels. There’s never been a better time to try a taste of history than the present day.

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Hannah (BitterSweet)3 Comments

Mumbo Gumbo

No matter what I have to say about gumbo, I’m going to be wrong. This isn’t just my continuous threads of self-doubt pulling my words into misshapen, unsteady forms, but a genuine fact. I did not grow up with gumbo coursing through my veins, learning its ways from my elders, steeped in time-honored traditions. I never had to before going vegan, impossibly picky eater that I was, unswayed by the heavy mix of chicken, sausage, and shrimp. My Yankee roots cultivated no appreciation or basic awareness for the art of gumbo, only a vague impression of it as something thick, dark, and intimidatingly meaty, best left to esteemed bayou-born experts.

What is Gumbo?

Like a game of culinary telephone, my knowledge comes only from stories and photos, books and movies. All that I can say with conviction is that it starts with a roux. That, and the “Holy Trinity” of onions, celery, bell peppers, AKA Creole mirepoix. Blending the traditional foodways of Africa, France, Spain, and Native Americans alike, what you do next depends on your heritage. Some may reach for okra or filé powder for additional thickening capacity, some go straight for the proteins and load it up with everything from seafood to sausage, while still others simply hammer in the spices as if they were trying to kindle an edible inferno. The most succinct explanation for gumbo is that it’s a thick stew; choose your own adventure.

Don’t Fumble the Gumbo!

With that tenuous understanding, I proceeded to make a mockery of this beloved staple. Not intentionally, mind you, but I have a feeling that anyone hailing from New Orleans wouldn’t even glance in the direction of this Frankenstein melting pot. Using vegan sausage is probably the least controversial part of it, and that’s saying something. Swapping olive oil for butter in the roux could very well get me run out of town.

Still, I kept stirring. Once you start making a roux, you have to fully commit, whether or not you know exactly what you’re doing. The color deepens slowly, then more decisively, taking on a toasted, nutty smell that’s even more encouraging than the hue. By the time the broth was in and bubbling away, all the initially disparate pieces seemed to fit together. I don’t expect this version to resonate with anyone who was raised on the real thing, and that’s okay. Ending up with something comforting, hearty, and richly spiced is only part of the goal; paying homage to a dish that holds more history than I can speak for fills me up in a much more meaningful, lasting way.

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Hannah (BitterSweet)7 Comments

Emerald Anniversary: 20 Years of BitterSweet

Twenty years. Two decades. I’ve already said it again and again, out loud and in my own head, and the numbers still don’t make sense. True, I was never any good at math, but I just don’t understand. How could it possibly be twenty years since BitterSweet began? I’ve been blogging longer than I haven’t, more than half of my life, a constant thread tethering me back to the world when I felt I could just as easily disappear. Looking back, I’m not entirely sure if it’s the blog that shaped my life, or my life that developed around the blog. They’re simply too deeply enmeshed, impossibly intertwined, to pick apart.

How it all started; the earliest form of BitterSweet

I never went into this with any bigger picture in mind. The only goal was to share the things I loved, and hopefully use that as a conduit to connect with more people of like minds. While the golden era of blogging is long past, as evidenced by the rarity of finding a dinosaur of a twenty year-old blog, I’d say I’ve been wildly successful in that regard. When publishers shot down my pitches, when brands turned me down for TikTokers who sing and dance, I still had this space that encouraged my creativity, supported my madness, and kept me going when the world at large told me to stop.

I’ve spent the better part of the past six months agonizing over how to commemorate such a huge milestone. The big two-oh only rolls around once, and I can’t begin to imagine if blogs will even exist another twenty years from now. Watching the date drawing ever closer, there was no idea grand enough, nor reasonably attainable, to do my beloved BitterSweet proper justice. Maybe it was time to make a mini cookbook, the Best of BitterSweet, available in print, or at least a zine? Or just an e-book? Barring that, perhaps a twenty-layer cake?

Emeralds Aren’t Forever, But Potentially Delicious

Finally, in the eleventh hour, it came to me: I was taking this entirely too seriously. The reason that I’ve been able to sustain this living archive, feeding it thrice weekly, every week, is that I just do whatever I want. I don’t do SEO properly, I don’t monetize it enough, I don’t use social media to its full potential, but you know what? That’s not what feeds my soul. I just need this to be my creative outlet, full of weird, wild, sometimes off-putting things. To that end, I strongly considered making an Emerald Salad Ring to honor the traditional 20-year anniversary gemstone, but ultimately, something sweet (and less repugnant) felt more fitting.

Edible Gems

Pandan candy emeralds, a stylized take on Japanese kohakutou, are essential shards of sweetened agar that are aged until sugar crystallizes on the outside. The interior remains soft like jelly for a crave-worthy textural contrast. Using pandan flavoring means the green color is already built in, bringing the ingredients list to a grand total of three, water and edible glitter not included. Brilliantly simple, recklessly creative, unconventionally delightful; Sounds like BitterSweet, alright.

I’m not one for grand gestures so I leave you with this, at least until the next regularly scheduled post. I’m sure as hell not stopping here. Twenty years is just another chapter in the larger story. There’s still a lot left to this story, even if no one knows how it will end, including the author.

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Hannah (BitterSweet)24 Comments

Address to a Vegan Haggis

If there can only be one woefully misunderstood and unfairly vilified dish in our collective culinary canon, my vote would go to haggis. Yes, I’m prepared to defend the savory Scottish pudding that takes all forms of organ meat stuffed inside of a sheep’s bladder or stomach. Like any good controversy, there’s much more to it than flashy headlines, and far greater nuance than just excess organs and entrails.

Criminally Misconstrued

As of 1971, it is in fact illegal to import or produce traditional haggis in the US. Concerns stemmed from the use of sheep’s lungs, which were deemed particularly susceptible to contamination, which could in turn spread disease. While this ban still stands, more contemporary versions of haggis, made without the offending offal, are permitted. The easiest way to bypass the restriction is to simply leave the entrails in the past.

A Short History of Haggis

To fully appreciate this medieval meal of subsistence, it’s important to understand how it came to be. Sheep outnumber the human population in Scotland, making them the obvious fodder for all sorts of traditional dishes. Waste not, want not; everything remotely edible would be chopped up and heavily seasoned to detract from the more gamey flavors, heavily salted to prevent spoilage, and stuffed into some sort of casing for easy transportation. Though sausage-like in construction, it has more in common with savory English pudding in practice. The stomach or bladder would be cut open and emptied after cooking and summarily discarded. So much for all that shock value.

Somewhere along the line, shepherds began to settle more into farming, and stretching their meat with grains. Oatmeal, specifically Scotch oats or porridge oats, became an equally iconic cultural touchstone, finding its way into this amalgamation. The earliest written record from 1430 CE lists sheep’s heart, liver, lungs, oatmeal, onion, suet, and stock as the key ingredients.

Burn’s Night: Address to a Haggis

Haggis is redeemed by the annual tradition of Burn’s Night, January 25th, marking the birthday of Scotland’s national poet, Robert “Rabbie” Burns. Mr. Burns immortalized haggis in his 1787 poem Address to a Haggis, a florid, passionate ode that elevates the humble pudding to near-mythic status. In it, he celebrates not only the hearty dish itself but the rugged self-reliance of Scottish culture. So exuberant and impassioned were his words that generations have since treated the poem as both sacred text and dinner entertainment.

A Modern Answer to an Ancient Problem

Like any other recipe that’s been around for a few centuries, endless variations have sprouted from that original seed of inspiration, and vegetarian haggis is no stranger in Caledonia. By the mid–20th century, more Scots were living in cities, fewer were butchering their own livestock, and a growing number of people were deciding, out of ethics, health, or pure squeamishness, that eating minced organs packed into a stomach wasn’t quite for them.

The earliest meatless versions began appearing in the 1960s and 70s, coinciding with the rise of the modern vegetarian movement in the UK. A wholesome amalgamation of oats, legumes, root vegetables, and aggressive seasoning, it was first commercially produced in 1984, and now makes up for 25% – 40% of all haggis sales.

Makar’s Mash Bar – Vegan Haggis Interior

Bringing Haggis Back Home

When I visited Scotland last year, the single best thing I ate was the vegan haggis at Makar’s Mash Bar. Incredibly rich, tender yet toothsome, the combination of chestnuts, seeds, lentils, and oats put it over the top. Combined with the traditional pairing of neeps and tatties (rutabaga and potatoes), plus decadent whisky cream sauce, I was hooked on haggis from the first bite. Since then, I’ve been dreaming of recreating that experience and finally, the time has come.

Skipping the questionable casing entirely, since it would only be scrapped anyway, I baked my haggis in ramekins for easier prep and serving alike. Make no mistake though, this is not a quick fix meal. Your best bet is to make the main in advance, and plan to reheat when you’re ready to serve. It’s an entree worthy of a celebration, and not just Burn’s Night; my original batch went to the Thanksgiving feast, and I can see this being right at home at a Christmas dinner or Hanukkah party, too.

Haggis for the Whole Herd

Warm, peppery, a little earthy, mushrooms lay down a savory foundation, all umami and bass, while chestnuts chime in with mellow sweetness. Beans, lentils, and steel-cut oats create the hearty core of the dish, punctuated by the toothsome bite of roughly chopped seeds. What truly ties everything together, though, is the seasoning. Warm, herbaceous, complex, tart, tangy; it’s a lot to take in at once, but still never too much.

I’ve plated it two ways, and I’m sure there are many more possible. You could even leave your haggis right inside the ramekin and call it a night. In a nod to the original inspiration, I made a little tower from my neeps and tatties, emulating fine dining flair with a bit of homemade rusticity. Of course, I do much prefer the simpler approach, spooning generous portions of each side onto the plate before drowning it all in whisky cream sauce. Regardless of the arrangement, I feel confident that this take could finally sway those on the fence about haggis. After all, it did for me.

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Hannah (BitterSweet)3 Comments