This lovely pink fish can be cooked in many different ways. My favorite way to cook salmon is to pan-fry it. Pan-Fried Salmon is simple and fast, with beautifully crusted skin that seals in the fish's flavor.

Hello Kitty! If you haven't heard of Cake Pops yet I'd be quite surprised. It has been one of the hottest things in the baking world since cupcakes suddenly became all the rage. Thanks to Ms Angie Dudley of the blog Bakerella, these cute little desserts on a stick are now everywhere. You can get them in most cake shops, and even at your nearest starbucks.

• Cake (any type)
• Frosting (as binding agent, you can also use nutella or cream cheese)
• White Chocolate Melt (as coat and glue)
  
• Lollipop Sticks.
• White chocolate drops (for the ears)
• Black icing tube (for eyes)
• Yellow and Red confectioners confetti  (for nose and bow)

Preparation:
 
1.Crumble the cake and mix in a 1-2 teaspoon of frosting.

2. Put the mixture in the fridge for at least 1 hour to make them harder.


3. Take small chunks of the dough and roll them into balls.

4. Dip lollipop sticks in chocolate melt and stick one into the end of each ball.  (chocolate drops) on with melted chocolate. Wait for the chocolate on the stick to harden., you can speed this up by putting them in the fridge .

4.Once the melted chocolate "glue" for the ears and stick is hardened and everything is secured, dip the entire ball into the melted white chocolate until it is totally covered. Wait for it to harden.

5.To decorate, draw eyes with black icing from a tube. Use a yellow confetti as a nose.


6. Use 2 pieces of red confetti as bow. All done! Daw! So cute!

In February,  I blogged about how much fun we had at Queens Swap. To say that i got really into it is an under-statement. I enjoyed the experience so much that me and my friend (and the husbands) traveled all the way to Brooklyn this weekend to attend another swap, this time it was oragnized by the BKSwappers.

After turning up with too much food and not knowing what to expect, at the first swap in Queens, I was much more prepared this time around. I started baking my Japanese rice crackers the day before. I packed them up in pretty cookie gift bags I picked up from Michael's Crafts. By the way I love Michael's Crafts, they have a huge selections of food packaging goodies at pretty good prices. If there isn't a Michael's near you, then your local craft shop could have what you're looking for.

How Swaps work: Everyone displays their homemade or home-grown goodies with swapping cards, if you are interested in an item, you write down your name and item of yours you want to swap with the goodie.


All the goods at the BKSwappers event were amazing, and I brought home a bag full of great stuff: Irish soda bread, banana bread dough, smoked papika walnuts, vanilla kimbucha, some granola bars, a pot of Brazilian brigadeiro and a bar of homemade soap!

I really enjoyed both the Queens Swap and the BKSwappers event. The energy, the passion and the spirit of community has totally inspired me and my friend. After the swap on Sunday, we got talking with one of the  host of BKSwappers,Jane. She was really friendly and very encouraging. She even gave us some of the swapping sheets, and suggested to us to start our own food swap!!!!

And that is exactly what we're going to do because we don't want to wait another two months! Me and my friend have decided to plan our own swap! I can't wait to spread the fun and  joy to more local like-minded foodies!

Tempura is considered to be one of the most well-loved and most popular of all Japanese dishes. In Japan, tempura is traditionally deep fried vegetables or seafood. However, not only battered, fried shrimp qualifies as tempura! Tempura does not use bread crumbs, only the lightly battered food is tempura. 

You can make tempura with almost any ingredient, I love all of them, but my favorite is definitely Tempura Shrimp. Who doesn't love crunchy deep fried Shrimps?

It's actually pretty easy to make tempura at home. All ingredients can be found easily at your local supermarket. Have fun making them! Don't forget to dip them in soy sauce and accompany them with a glass of warm sake!

Serves: 2 -3 

Estimated Cost: $20

Cook Time: 30 minutes 

Ingredients:

• 12 Large shrimp (if frozen need to thaw, the bigger the shrimp the better!)
• Flour to dust
• Oil for deep frying
For Tempura Batter
• 1 cup of all purpose flour
• 1 tablespoon of baking soda
• ¼ teaspoon. salt
• 2 egg white
• 1 cup ice water

Preparation:

Although I'm not a big dessert person, I do love citrus cake and lemons are perhaps my favorite baking fruit of all time. If you love lemon cake, I don't think you can find a more lemony lemon cake than this one. This cake has a wonderful mouthwatering flavor that comes from adding both lemon zest (skin) and juice to the batter. Lemon zest also adds color and a little extra kick of citrus. 

By using olive oil instead of butter, the cake is light yet moist and without the crumbly heaviness you get with butter. Don't get me wrong, its not like butter is not good! I just prefer it this way. We'll see what my husband says...he's a bit of a cake purest (aka fanatic).


Grab a hot cup of tea, coffee or milk and enjoy a slice of this rich lemon cake.

Cook Time: 1 hour 15 minutes
Estimated Cost: Around $8 (for perishables, assumes you have the basics!)
Ingredients

For the pound cake 

• 2 ½ cups all purpose flour
• 1 ½ cups sugar 
• 3 large eggs  
• 3 teaspoons baking powder 
• 1 cup lemon juice
• 1 cup olive oil
• 3 teaspoons water 
• 1 1/2 tablespoon of Lemon Zest

For the Icing

• Homemade or ready made icing (brand of choice)
•  1 teaspoon of lemon zest

 Preparation

1. Preheat oven to 350 F. Generously grease and flour a flute pan. 
2. In a electric mixer, mix all the ingredients on low until blended. Then beat for 1 minutes on high speed. 
3. Pour batter into pan. Bake  until cake tester comes out clean ( 50-60 minutes). 
4. Spread icing over the cake once the cake has cooled. Sprinkle Lemon zest on the top.

Husband Says: "Carmen was scared for me to try this one. She knows I'm crazy about cake and desserts. Like, I have an amazing sweet tooth. Its huge. It likes cake. The cake to me, is not a lie. This cake, this wonderful cake, is most definitely not a lie. I did not know it was made with no butter until I read this recipe. Bamboozled! It was moist with just the right amount of lemon flavor and not too crumbly. The icing was out of a can, but really, does icing ALWAYS have to be homemade? Its mixing sugar with water or juice. I mean c'mon. Even I could mix water and sugar. Moral of the story: Lemon cake made with olive oil instead of butter is good, and passed the sweet tooth test."

Japanese rice crackers, or Senbei, are usually  baked or grilled, traditionally over charcoal. They come in different sizes, shapes and flavors, mostly savory but sometimes sweet. they may also be flavored with salt, soy souce and seaweed.

Senbei are often eaten with green tea as a casual snack and offered to visiting house guests as refreshment. They are also a popular street food,  there is even a street in Asakusa devoted to making and selling Senbei.

I have been wanting to make Senbei for awhile, and when my wonderful mother-in-law sent us a food processor as a gift, I knew I had to put it to good use and make this lovely treat.

• 3/4 cup sweet rice flour
• 1/3 cup cooked sushi rice
• 3/4 teaspoon sea salt
• 2 tablespoons oil
• 4 tablespoons water
• 3 tablespoon furikake (Japanese rice seasoning, you can buy this in any Asian market)

1. Preheat oven to 400F. 
2. In a food processor, combine the rice flour, white rice, salt, and oil. Pulse-blend until finely ground. 
3. Add in water to the ground mix.
4. Transfer to a bowl, mix in the furikake,
5. Press  balls of the dough between cling-film into thin disks (The thinner the discs the crispier they will be). 
6. Bake on greased baking sheets for 6 minutes then flip the crackers with a spatula and continue to cook until they are dry and beginning to brown,  5-6 more minutes. Remove from oven.
7. Allow crackers to cool and crisp up before serving.

A Spanish Potato Omelet, or Tortilla Española, can easily be described as  the national dish of Spain. It has nothing to do with Mexican tortillas, the only thing these two have in common is their round shape. 

This is one of my all time favorite Spanish dishes, I love the simple combination of egg, potato and onions. It is incredibly tasty hot or cold, and makes a surprisingly good sandwich between two slices of baguette. You can eat it as a tapa, for breakfast or for dinner.

• 4 medium potatoes, peeled, thinly sliced
• 1 medium onion, sliced
• 5 large eggs, beaten
• Salt to taste
• Plenty of Olive Oil

Preparation:

1. Heat oil In a large frying pan, place the potato and onion mixture into the frying pan, spreading them evenly over the surface. The oil should almost cover the potatoes. Cook for 8-10 minutes on medium heat, please note they'll cook faster if the potato slices are thin.
2. Once cooked, place cooked potatoes and onion mixture in a large bowl, drain off excessive oil.
3. Pour beaten eggs onto the potato onion mixture. Lightly mix without breaking up potatoes. See the photo above for structure. The egg mixture should be evenly distributed throughout the potato layers. You can do this by separating bits of potato/onion and letting egg seep in around it.
4. Heat 2 tablespoons of oil into a small pan on medium heat. Once hot, pour potato, egg and onion mixture into a the frying pan and spread out evenly.
5. Reduce heat to low, and shake the pan often and run a spatula around the side and bottom to make sure the omelet is not sticking. After about 10 minutes, when the omelet is cooked 3/4  way through. Place a large plate over the pan and invert the omelet onto the plate.
6. Add 2 tablespoons oil to the hot pan. When the oil is hot, slide the omelet (cooked side up) back into the pan, let it cook for another 5 minutes. 
7. Serve hot or cool, with salad.

Husband Says: "Never had this before. Hola! Spanish Omelet! We ate ours cold with salad and fried mozzarella sticks for dinner, but could easily see this as breakfast or brunch as well. I'm not usually huge on cold dishes that are usually hot, but this one did the trick. It also isn't a difficult to make as it might sound! But damn, the kitchen looked, how shall I say it, well loved after Carmen was done with this one. Don't be afraid of a few messes to clean up, or just make your kid do it as part of their 'chores'. Heh. Heh. Heh. /Evil laugh."