So I think I'm about five years late to this party. But I am newly, and really, obsessed with dates. They are so good. How are they so good? I don't know how I was so woefully misinformed, but up until a couple months ago I had this idea that dates were just a vague something to be nibbled on at your grandmother's house if all the cookies ...
celebrations & gatherings
bibim-bar! (a bibimbap party)
We had a bibimbap party this weekend! I don't know whether it's a function of living in frenetic New York, or having a lot of lawyer friends who are forever sucked back into the office on weekends or late nights, or even just being supposedly "grown-up," but sometimes it's startling how easy it is to blink and find that it's been months since ...
lavender goat cheese cheesecakes
Before these little cheesecakes, my cheesecake experience was solely and shamelessly limited to this -- the seven-ingredient recipe on the back of the Philadelphia cream cheese box. It was five ingredients if you bought the Keebler crust in its own ready-to-go tin, which my college self definitely did, it was easy, and it was good; sometimes I ...
coffee-candied macadamia nuts
It’s almost here! We’re actually, really, truly getting married this Saturday and I'm so excited I can't sit still. This is the last post in this series on our reception food, and after that I'll finally stop yammering to you about it -- in three days, we’ll be noshing on these caramelized onion & Boursin tartlets, this spicy ...
birthday malasadas with guava and lilikoi filling
It's the last installment in B2's birthday series! You can see parts one (hurricane popcorn!) and two (chicken katsu plate lunch!) here. These babes aren't something that B2 actually ever requested I make -- I think I mentioned homemade malasadas once, way back, and B2 chewed on the idea and said it just sounded like too much work to make at ...
budae jjigae
Guys! This is one of my favorite things ever. Okay, so I have a long list of "favorite things ever" -- mostly involving cheese, chocolate, or not leaving the house -- but seriously, this. This is a favorite of favorites. I first had budae jjigae in a little upstairs joint in K-town, underneath a sea of fairy lights and soju caps dangling from a ...
miniature olive oil, dark chocolate & rosemary cake + peppermint no-churn ice cream
It's a holiday birthday cake! One of my dearest friends and future bridesmaids (!) had her birthday over Thanksgiving a few weeks ago. As hallmates in law school, we bonded over a mutual love for Waffle House and thick-skinned potstickers. Instead of heated civil rights debates, we discussed the finer points of chicken versus pork ramen broths. ...
acorn squash & hazelnut frangipane galettes
Last week I woke up to find that all the leaves outside our window were gone. Now that the trees are mostly bare, we can see a little sliver of the East River from our dining table; it glints blue-green and looks deceptively peaceful on cold, sunny mornings like the ones we had a whole spate of last week. Lately it's been typical late fall, early ...
maple sweet potato casserole & thyme marshmallows + thanksgiving stuffing dinner rolls
Pinch dishes from The Fortynine Studio. We had a mini impromptu Friendsgiving last weekend! Even in miniature, it was my first time putting together anything remotely like a Thanksgiving meal on my own, and it was so much fun. For the main, I braised an abundance of chicken legs using Jamie Oliver’s milk chicken recipe, which was life-changing ...
hokkaido milk bread
This week, a new class of associates is starting at my firm. This is strange for a whole host of reasons (like, wait, I still don't know anything, how can anyone be junior to me?) but mostly because it doesn't feel like a whole year has passed since I started. Maybe the thing that stands out to me most about this new "grown" quotidian is that ...
