Microwave vs Oven: Tony Luke's Cheesesteak

All the locals would tell me that the best Philly cheesesteak is actually not found in Pat's or Geno's, but in Tony Lukes. Pat's and Geno's are more popular among the tourists.

I hadn't had the chance to visit Tony Luke's, so when I went to Target I found this frozen Tony Luke's cheesesteak. Okay, we all know that frozen food is never as good as the real thing, but I'd like to give it a try.

When I got home, I expected the cheesesteak to be prepared by oven because this Tony Luke's brand makes the cheesesteak more... "premium" and thus I had the perception that it cannot be prepared using microwave. But no, I was wrong. I had two options: oven preparation ("the best method", as described on the packaging) or microwave preparation.

It's a perfect setup for an experiment: 2 frozen Italian breads and 2 packets of vacuum packed sliced beef and cheese. I tried both preparation methods at the same time.

 I was supposed to microwave the meat and cheese packet into the microwave without opening the package. At first I was a little skeptical about what will happen to the packet. It simply inflated.

I guess this way the moisture from the meat won't be lost so the meat remains juicy. On a side note, it was also written in the instruction that you can pour whatever "meat juice" left in the bag onto the cheesesteak to make it more... delicious (beef broth and beef fats? Hell yes).

The other option of reheating the meat was to submerge the meat packet into boiling water. The texture of the meat prepared in boiling water wasn't that different from the microwaved one.

As for the bread, I can either microwave it for 2 minutes, or bake it in a preheated oven for 3 minutes or so. The results were so obvious.

The left one was microwaved and the right one was oven baked. The oven baked one was more "expanded". You can't really tell from the picture but the microwaved bread was rubbery and tough. The oven baked bread was light and crispy on the outside. And a little more dried.

So you can't really tell the difference in the meat, but you definitely can tell the difference in the bread texture.

The first one you see above is microwaved. And the one below was oven-prepared.

The bread matters a lot when it comes to appearance.

My verdict? I'll go with microwave method when I only have 5 minutes for dinner. I definitely prefer the oven-prepared cheesesteak over the microwaved one.

I think the new trend nowadays is to involve consumers in some sort of food preparation to make them think like "they can cook", but in the end everything is instant if you really think about it. This kind of frozen food definitely seems more premium than instant meals on the shelves.

When I prepared the cheesesteak, I didn't feel like I was cooking. I was just re-assembling everything into one piece. Kind of like building a GUNDAM plastic model: you have the parts ready, you just have to put an extra step of putting everything into a complete piece of work.

I felt like "I didn't make the cheesesteak".

At the end of the "experiment" I felt really guilty. Look at the calories. 590? Holy crap, I ate two of them, so I had 1180 Calories that night. Boohoo.

And 80% of saturated fat intake, and 126% of sodium intake. What the hell.

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Chicago, Once Again

I'm not really a city person, so when I was in college I didn't really bother going as far as Chicago for dining or shopping unless someone asked me to come along. I know I have a preference like a grandmother. I'm just looking for a quiet, peaceful place to live. The wild squirrels around the campus were more than enough for my self-entertainment.

Once again, I was back to Chicago for Thanksgiving. It was actually a very different experience. I have never been outside past midnight.

I took a pretty good photo with my 4-year-old point-and-shoot neon-green colored camera. Maybe I still don't need an SLR after all. True, it takes more effort to stand still and take a really good night photos with this camera, but when there is a will, there is a way.

I revisited The Bean. It was crowded with tourists.

I'm always amazed at whoever built The Bean. The concept was very elegant. You can actually capture Chicago scenery through The Bean, and each angle gives a different face of Chicago. When I came during the 4th of July last year, The Bean was very clean and shiny. Now it has been plastered in fingerprints.

Meanwhile, I took a little stroll towards a crowd at Millenium Park, which was just next to The Bean. It was a rare sight: boys playing tricks with soccer balls. I hate to call it "soccer" and prefer to call it "football" instead. However, when you say "football" in the US, people will immediately refer to "American football".

Honestly, I'm not a big fan of American football just because there are way too many breaks/intermissions throughout the game. Once I lost focus, I can't get back into the hype. 

I didn't mean to bitch about American football, but somehow the flow of this post leads me to talk about American football. LOL. 

I like Chicago more than I like NYC. NYC is a good place to roam but not to live. At least to me it's that way..

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Milk Alternatives

Before I came to the US, my stomach used to get uncomfortable when I drink fresh milk because I was lactose intolerant. I was okay drinking UHT, powdered or condensed milk. Now I'm used to drinking fresh, unflavored milk. Apparently, there are a lot of people who still can't drink milk. In that case, they can drink Lactaid (milk with added enzyme to break down lactose). 

But I guess having other non-dairy alternatives is good for vegetarians and vegans.

I tried a bunch of different non-dairy milks:

1) Coconut milk

When I first saw it, I had a really bad impression on its taste. I grow up knowing that coconut milk is used in savory cooking and cakes. It's never meant to be consumed straight. Before I tried this I had the impression that it's going to be greasy and disgusting. My family don't buy processed coconut milk for cooking; we squeeze the milk out of fresh, grated coconut meat. That's how coconut milk is supposed to be: greasy.

Very white and opaque like expected, but maybe because it's been homogenized it doesn't taste too greasy. I mean, look at the nutrition facts. Look at how much saturated fat there is. 25% DV? That's a LOT. Drink 4 cups of this milk and you shouldn't have more fat intake.

Not to mention it has allergen warning too.

2) Hemp Milk
First I had to google what 'hemp' is. I'm not too familiar with it, but I guess they're sort of high protein seeds with omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hemp).

 It has a very grainy texture, and you can also see the brownish tiny specs dispersed in the milk. It has a slight nutty, beany taste. And it's far from being creamy.

 3) Hazelnut Milk
When I saw this, I imagined drinking a liquid Nutella.

NOPE. Nothing like Nutella. I was so disappointed LOL

The milk is a little brownish. It definitely has the hazelnut taste and smell, but not as strong as in Nutella. Maybe because it's not sweet enough. It's not too bad, though.

4) Oat Milk
I've seen rice milk before, but oat? Nope. Never imagined that you'll be DRINKING oat and not EATING oat.

Oh and by the way, speaking of packaging, green packaging seems to correlate a lot with organic food. Most organic food products I've seen on the shelves tend to have recyclable packaging, be made of recycled materials, or be degradable.

 First impression after drinking it? It truly smells like oat. It has a little off white color, slight tan. It felt the creamiest out of the other milk alternatives that I tried, but it might have been from the vanilla flavor. Adding vanilla doesn't increase the actual creaminess of the beverage, but it leaves the impression of creaminess.

Will I buy these milk alternatives in future? Maybe not, but these are definitely very interesting.

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Up in the air

As some of you have known, I skydived about 2 weeks ago. It was fun and I had to convince my parents and especially my brother that I was going to come back alive and kicking. And as you know, I did survive my first skydive. 

I have been on the plane several times, and most of the time I sat next to the window so I could see the sky and the ground below. One time, I saw countless stars and constellations. It was a brilliantly beautiful scenery.

However, skydiving gave me something else. Being in the sky with no barriers or walls to block your view was just indescribable. The wind blows against your whole body, you could see everything around you... brilliant. Simply brilliant. 

Being on the parachute was great but the harness made my thighs hurt a little (but hey, safety comes first!). But what's really nice about parachuting is the fact that you are descending pretty slowly. You can take your time to take a look at the scenery. When I jumped, half of the leaves were red, so it was like looking at a bunch of colors from the sky.

I really want to do it again but it's getting cold and I will be moving out of this area soon. It's expensive, though. Oh well, at least now I can tell people that I've done it once! :)

I got a video from the skydive.

YAY :)

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Philadelphia Food, Wine and Spirits Festival

It's late but I'll post some pictures from the event :)

Basically it's like the mini version of the Institute of Food Technologists Suppliers Night where people from different companies (in this case, restaurants and wine sellers as well) came to promote their products and give out free samples. Well, it's not really free since I had to pay $30 entrance fee.

Considering I'm not really good with alcohol, $30 is a little too much for me to pay. I came back home with a little sad story about me throwing up and fainting in the bathroom for a few minutes. I skipped the tipsy stage. And I didn't drink that much, other than the accidental Remi Martin and cognac that I tasted just because I didn't know how strong they were.

Here are some of the highlights:

1. Cheese Steak cookie

Who could have thought cheese steak cookie would be really delicious! I've had sea salt cookies and bacon chocolate chip cookies before, they're good, but they're okay. They're not really the kind of food I can crave for. But that cheese steak cookie was superb, I'm not kidding. Sriracha mango was okay, but not too bad.

2. "Life is too short to be crabby"

It's a pretty cute tag-line from a jumbo lump crab cake shop. 

3. Tomato basil soup with avocado

Normally you'd think everything would be tasty and innovative. Not THIS one. It's so weird. WEIRD. I mean, the avocado was like really cold and the texture is just so... wrong.

3. Jose Garces culinary demo

I paid an extra $10 for this. Actually, I felt kind of cheated. No recipes given, no details on temperatures, cooking time... nothing. It's like he's not willing to teach us anything.

Okay got to go on the plane. I'm leaving to Napoleon, Ohio for business trip. The flight was delayed for about 1 hour due to fog and I thought I would have more time to type. Haha.

NOT GONNA HAPPEN. OK BYE SEE YOU LATER <3

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iPod Touch apps

I just tried downloading Blogger app for my iPod Touch. I think it wasn't there before because I remembered searching for Blogger and there was no official app out from Google.

I can post pictures but I can't determine where the picture goes on the body.

Anyways, I miss taking purikura and a while ago my friend was talking about this purikura app on her Twitter.

It's pretty fun to use, but you have to pay to use the sparkly stuffs (which I really love when it comes to purikura). Otherwise, the free version of 楽画Cute is not too shabby ;)

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Anago Maker

http://anago.crap.jp/

Anago == garden eel.

I saw several of my Twitter peeps changing their profile pic simultaneously about last week with similar-style worm-like cute picture.

It's kind of like a simplified version of dressing up a character. Try it, it's fun, and you can save the anago design that you made. If you don't understand Japanese, try using logic and figure out what the buttons are for. They're much simpler than a purikura machine.

Here's mine!

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