Durian sticky rice recipe

Here’s a dessert I like to make, but I don’t make often as most people do not tolerate durian. However, I recently made it for a family potluck – my extended family all (almost all) love durian! 🙂

Durian Sticky Rice

Durian Sticky Rice

Ingredients:

  • Around 5-6 durian pods
  • 3 cups sticky/glutinous rice
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 2/3 cup sugar
  • 2 cups coconut milk
  • Toasted sesame seeds (optional)

Note: You can decrease the rice to 2 or 2.5 cups if you prefer a greater durian topping to sticky rice ratio

Instructions:

  1. Soak the rice for 6 hours or more. Afterwards, rinse several times until clear. (If you forgot to soak the rice, check out these instructions for fast soaking.
  2. Steam the rice for 25-30 minutes.
  3. While steaming the rice, you can make the coconut sauce. Heat 2 cups of coconut milk, and add salt and sugar. Mix to dissolve.
  4. After the rice is done, transfer to bowl and pour half of the coconut mixture into the rice. Mix well.
  5. Return the other half of the coconut mixture to the stovetop and heat. Add the durian pods (remove the seeds) and cook on low heat for about 5-10 minutes.
  6. Put rice in serving plate/container, and pour the coconut durian mixture on top.
  7. Sprinkle sesame seeds (optional)

Enjoy! 🙂

Grandma

(Written earlier this year of 2020, with my family in mind, when I traveled for my Grandma’s funeral)

Grandma was an amazing person with an amazing life. I always wished I knew the TeoChew dialect better so that I could talk with her more and ask her questions about her family, what life was like for her, what she felt, and about her experiences. She lived through so much. Born in China in 1926, she didn’t get the education my generation has been able to receive, or actually any schooling at all. (Education had costs, and most girls where/when she lived didn’t get to go to school.) She lived through much political instability, hardships, and wars. She and Grandpa left China for a better life and settled in Cambodia, where they enjoyed peaceful living for a little while. She gave birth to twelve children, though four were not able to survive (likely due to illnesses that can be easily prevented/treated today.) Then in the 1970’s, the family lived through one of the darkest times in history in Cambodia. But Grandma and Grandpa tried to keep the family together and watch out for each other, and somehow after making it out alive after four years, they eventually made it to a refugee camp and were able to come to the United States. (Though the family could only come separately and the Kho family ended up in three different states.) 

We have an amazing family. I was so glad to be with the family to remember and celebrate Grandma’s life together. I remember when I was a kid, and 2nd uncle, 2nd aunt, 3rd uncle, 3rd aunt, and their kids lived down the street. I found out Grandma, Grandpa, and the rest of the extended family were going to move to Georgia and live on our street! That was so exciting. Soon after, 4th uncle and aunt joined us in our neighborhood too. I’m so thankful for the richness of our great big family growing up. Many of my friends didn’t have that experience. It was and continues to be so wonderful. I’m so thankful for Grandma and Grandpa’s sacrifice and leadership to grow our family and help shape us to be the tight knit group we are. It helped them to survive Cambodia, and helped us to survive and thrive here in the United States. 

Grandma would sometimes take care of me, if my mom had to go out or had something to do. One reason I loved going to Grandma’s house was that Grandma would offer me chocolate chip cookies, which were not allowed in my house. I think those cookies may have belonged to Little Uncle or maybe someone else.  I remember one particular day when I was hanging out with Grandma. We were sitting on the deck, and I was trying to figure out where we came from, why we exist. So I asked Grandma where she came from, and she said her mom. And so I responded and asked where her mom came from, and she said her mom’s mom. And so I asked where did her mom’s mom’s mom come from. Guess what she said? She came from her mom. Eventually I could see our discussion wasn’t going to get me the answer I wanted, and so I moved on. But the fact that Grandma patiently listened to me, a child, and responded instead of dismissing me, that meant a lot to me.

Grandma was also very protective of me. And because of that, I didn’t get to do a lot of things my older cousins got to do. But she slowly let go. I’m guessing she was the same with many of her kids and grandkids. She cherished us all.

I was a curious child and I had some interests that some people might consider odd. And someone pointed that out specifically to Grandma. I remember being a little nervous as I overheard that conversation. I don’t remember what she said in response exactly, but something about how these things are normal for a kid to do and it’s totally fine. I breathed a sigh of relief. Grandma didn’t make me feel like I was weird or odd or that anything was wrong with me. And so I felt more secure in exploring my interests. That’s something I’ve carried on with me into my adulthood.

When someone has lived through so much, you know they have a lot of strength and grit in them. Two years ago, she was in the hospital, and then in hospice care. We thought we’d lose her then, but somehow we got two more bonus years with her. I don’t know how she survived these last two years operating on just 2% function of her kidneys. I got to chat with her some while she was in hospice care. I understood that she felt the purpose of her life was to take care of us. She just wished to take care of the family. She couldn’t do it anymore because she was older and weaker; she had taken care of us as much as she could. She was at peace with it being her time to go soon.

I think Grandma gave the best hugs in the family. She’d grip me tight and I could really feel it. There is nothing like a grandmother’s hug. We had a bit of a language barrier, but some of the things we didn’t express in words were expressed in the gift of presence, in actions, in food, and in hugs. The last time we hugged was when I visited her at her house this past December. I think she was watching Judge Judy or MacGyver or something when I visited. I wish I could have held on a little longer or could turn that hug into something physical that I could carry with me. While I was there, Grandma gave me some advice- don’t get old. I’m not sure how I can do that. But I do hope I can live with the same strength, and with the same love and care she had for us all.

Thank you Grandma, for your sacrifice, leadership, chocolate chip cookies, for your attention, for your hugs, and for your love. We will try to take care of each other. We will all miss you so very much. 

Coconut jello recipe

Coconut jello with strawberries

One dessert I often like to make is coconut jello. I’ve always been a big fan of jello – with its interesting properties and endless creative possibilities. Coconut jello is also an easy dessert to make. So, here’s my recipe.

Note: Tweak the ratio of water to coconut milk to your preferences. If you like it more rich, use a 1:1 water to coconut milk ratio. A 2:1 ratio works well too (4 cups water, 2 cups coconut milk.) My husband prefers 100% coconut milk. 🙂  Also, add more sugar if you like things sweeter.

Ingredients:

  • 3 cups water
  • 3 cups coconut milk – Use a good quality coconut milk. I use the Aroy-D coconut milk that comes in cartons. It’s creamy and I don’t have to worry about BPA in cans: https://amzn.to/32LnIWt I have found it at Asian grocery stores, but any coconut milk will work.
  • 1.25 cups sugar
  • 6 Tablespoons gelatin (Basically one tablespoon per cup of liquid.) I use Vital Proteins Beef Gelatin: https://amzn.to/2ZgV78g. If you’re using Knox, use 6 packets. https://amzn.to/2JSIs7k
  • (Optional) A pinch of salt
  • (Optional) A dash of vanilla extract
  • (Optional) Strawberries

Instructions:

  1. Pour 1.5 cups of cold water in a pot.
  2. Slowly sprinkle the gelatin on top of the cold water one tablespoon at a time. Let it sit for a few minutes to let it “bloom.” It will become apple sauce-like.
  3. Turn on the heat and stir.
  4. Add sugar and stir until dissolved.
  5. Add coconut milk and stir. You don’t need to boil it – just make sure it is combined well.
  6. (Optional) Add in the salt and/or vanilla extract and mix.
  7. Stir in the remaining cold water (1.5 cups.) This helps cool it down
  8. Pour into your container/mold/pan. If you’d like to make sure it is really smooth and to remove some bubbles, pour through a mesh strainer.
  9. (Optional) Add thin-sliced strawberries. They will float. Or to make it easier, skip this step and serve the strawberries alongside the coconut gelatin.
  10. If you would like your jello to have two layers (as you can kind of see in the photo), let it sit on the counter for at least 30 minutes and it will separate.
  11. When the separation gets close to half-half, put it in the fridge. Chill for a few hours or until set. Cut into whatever shapes you like.

To make a matcha coconut jello, use 1 tsp of matcha powder for every cup of liquid. In this recipe, you would use 6 tsp.

Loung Ung’s Story

I’ve been awaiting the release of this movie based on a memoir by Loung Ung, directed by Angelina Jolie. You can see it on Netflix now.

It is a gift to be able to read Loung Ung’s book First They Killed My Father: A Daughter of Cambodia Remembers. It helped me put together in a timeline the many separate stories I have heard. I also am not super fluent in Chinese and my parents aren’t super fluent in English – to be able to read Loung’s story in English was very helpful.

Having read the book and also knowing what has happened in Cambodia, I know there will be many scenes that will be difficult to watch. I wonder if my parents would watch this, or if it would be too hard, bringing up painful memories. I would love to hear more from them. Through the years, I’ve read and heard many stories from my parents and family. I tried to imagine it all, to picture the lush landscapes, the houses they built, the rice paddies they worked in, the rain which provided water to drink… every scene, and things not spoken of. It’ll be different actually seeing (and hearing) what I’ve tried to imagine so many times.

The movie premiered in Cambodia earlier this year. I hope it will help the country to remember, connect, heal, and grow.

I also recommend Loung’s second book Lucky Child: A Daughter of Cambodia Reunites with the Sister She Left Behind and her third book Lulu in the Sky: A Daughter of Cambodia Finds Love, Healing, and Double Happiness, both of which I greatly appreciated. The story does not end in Cambodia, and the healing/rebuilding process is not easy. It was during this part of my parents’ life (moving to a new country, rebuilding, and healing) in which I was born and grew up.

Recipes

I’ve been in the kitchen a bit recently.
In case I might lose them, and in case you might be interested, here are links to some of the recipes.

Overnight oats – Did you know you can soak oats overnight and eat them right out of the fridge the next morning? No heat required! (Supposedly they are more nutritious and more easily digestible too.) I haven’t had a microwave the last month and have been eating my oatmeal prepared this way. It’s fast, easy, and delicious. You can customize it anyway you want – I use a cup of oats (use regular, not instant), a cup of homemade soy milk, a few spoons of vanilla yogurt (I LOVE vanilla and the yogurt sweetens my oatmeal just enough), and some trail mix (with cranberries and various nuts) from Trader Joe’s. Sometimes I add fruit.

Jello pinwheels – These just look so fun and colorful! My niece and nephew had fun peeling them apart and eating them. I used parchment paper and didn’t need to use any oil or spray to keep the gelatin from sticking to the pan. As a result, I think the rolls held together better. With no microwave, I did everything over the stove. Sometime I want to try this with fruit juice and Knox instead of the flavored Jello gelatin mix. Check out this flower arrangement (made by someone else)!

Peasant’s bread – Only 5 ingredients needed! I’ve been wanting to make this for a while. It turned out great! I used 3 cups of unbleached all-purpose flour and 1 cup of wheat flour, and baked it all in a 2.5L Pyrex bowl (15 minutes at 425 degrees and 22 minutes at 375 degrees.) It takes a little time, as you have to wait for it to rise, but otherwise it’s quite an easy recipe. The sides were nice and crispy and inside very soft with just the right sponginess. Definitely a keeper bread recipe.

Coconut gelatin – Similar to what my mom used to make. I used Aroy-D coconut milk (from a carton, to avoid potential BPA in cans), Knox gelatin, and homemade soy milk. I like to take some of the liquid (before heating) and bloom the Knox in it first. It turned out well, and I’ll likely make this again, though I may experiment with making the two-layer Coconut gelatin (it has a translucent layer and a white layer.)

I’ll try to take pics next time. 🙂

A little security tune-up

I recently tweaked a few small things on my various sites, hopefully improving security at least a bit. In case any of you are involved in similar tasks and might be interested, here are a few things I changed.

Previously I had installed self-signed certificates for SSL/TLS use on my site (primarily for admin purposes.) This ensures that I have an encrypted connection with my server and do not send my password over the internet in plain text for people to see. I was excited to see that my web host Hawkhost now supports Let’s Encrypt. So, I got new certificates issued by Let’s Encrypt for my sites. Let’s Encrypt certificates are free and easier to manage.
(I noticed that not all images on my sites load successfully over https – I’ll eventually need to make some changes.)

I also now force WordPress logins and admin sessions to occur over SSL/TLS. (Sometimes I forget to use https when logging in.) Check out this page to learn more about it – you basically need to make a change in your wp-config.php file.
While I was in there, I also enabled “DISALLOW_FILE_EDIT” – I don’t use the editor that much anyway.

I’m also considering enabling reCAPTCHA or Duo for logins, to protect against people/robots trying to guess my password, log in, and do who knows what. From my logs, I can see tons of malicious login attempts and it’s sad to say that’s pretty common behavior on the internet.

Sunrise time lapse

My husband and I had the chance to visit Hawaii last year.

Though it was “vacation,” I woke up around 5:30 every morning because of the time zone change. One morning I tried some time lapse photography for the first time. I didn’t have much time to edit, but made a quick video.

I love seeing the colors, and I can just hear the ocean.

Juggling

I’m returning to one of my favorite hobbies for the month of September – juggling! My goal is spend at least 15 minutes a day juggling. I hope to pick up some new tricks! Would you like to join me – only 15 minutes a day! 🙂

Here are two things I’m working on:

3 ball chops

5 ball cascade

According to many various research studies, learning to juggle changes your brain structure, increasing the amount of white matter and gray matter in certain areas. Also, what seems to matter is not how “good” you are, but the fact that you are learning and practicing.

If juggling improves my hand-eye coordination, peripheral vision, reflexes, and other motor skills, I wonder if my game on the basketball court and in other sports might also improve!

My older brother

Born in 1978, towards the end of the rule of Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge, my older brother entered the world at one of its low points in history. The physical circumstances were unfavorable – my mom had already endured three years of malnutrition and sunrise-to-sunset forced labor. All “intelligent” persons, including doctors, had been killed three years ago and there were no hospitals or medicines. Sickness and death were well known.

My brother had trouble entering the world. (But then, who would want to enter the world at that time?) He was oriented the wrong way or something like that. There was no “professional” to help with the delivery. One woman was there to help my mom, but she was inexperienced. My mom had sent for an older, very experienced woman to come help, but she was at another delivery. Luckily, that delivery finished quickly and she was able to come afterwards, though late. She pushed and manipulated my mother’s body to make the baby come out. Giving birth was very dangerous, and my mom was just so relieved that she had survived the process. Many other women had died during childbirth.

But my brother did not make it.
He lived a day or so.
He didn’t eat.
He let out some cries.
He took in a limited number of breaths
…before he breathed his last.

….

In college, I wrote a family history paper for my American Women’s History class. I wrote about my family’s time in Cambodia and how, because of their family unity and strength, no one in my mom or dad’s immediate family had died. During one of my professor’s reviews, she wrote “except for the baby boy” in the margins. That caught me a bit, and I’ve thought about it often in the years since then.

I don’t know why I didn’t count my brother’s death as a death. I guess I was thinking of the “net” life. Entering into the rule of the Khymer Rouge, my family had X number of members and when the nightmare ended, the same X number survived. Simple math. Or perhaps in my young mind I thought my brother didn’t have much of a chance anyway given the conditions he was born in, so his death was not really a death as he really had no chance to begin with.

….

But his life counts. He was a person. And it has become clear to me that his death resulted from the rule of Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge. He would have had such better chances for living otherwise.

And I’ve come to realize that you can’t just simply think about “net” life based on the numbers before and after. In every generation there is growth (cultural, economic, population, etc). Any growth that would have taken place but was destroyed/kept from happening is a part of the damage that was done.

No written record of my brother’s life exists (the most is perhaps this blog entry.) No birth certificate, no birth announcement, no photo, no record of death. In those reported death tolls from the Cambodian Holocaust (estimated 2 million+, with an additional 60,000+ dying from starvation AFTERWARDS), I wonder whether those babies who were born and died or lost in miscarriages were also counted.

….

My mom says I looked a lot like my older brother when I was born. I asked my mom whether she gave her baby a name. “No.. we just called him Di Di.” “Di Di” means “little brother” in Chinese.

Di Di, you’ll always be my big brother.

New projection

I’m currently writing this entry using a new monitor I’ve acquired this year. It’s not a super nice monitor, but it is a nice 24″ IPS monitor.

I mainly got it because I do a lot of photo editing and printing. And my laptop screen wasn’t working out as well as I’d like. I would edit photos and they’d look great on my screen, but then when I printed the photo or looked at the photo on a different display, it would look slightly different.

So, finally I got a better monitor. I plan on getting a calibrator eventually, but what I have has been a great improvement. And because it’s IPS, I don’t have to worry about having it at the wrong angle. (With your non-IPS laptop, you may notice that when you tilt the screen a little, it will look slightly different. What a pain if you edited all your photos with the screen tilted at the wrong angle.)

It’s kind of astonishing to me to think that I could have gone through my entire life using my own computer/monitor, not knowing that the image was off… with all my photos looking great on my monitor, when they perhaps are actually not as bright, or of the wrong tint. If I never calibrated my screen, or if I never saw my photos displayed on other people’s monitors, I would have never noticed that they were slightly off/different than I expected.

Ukulele, again

Like many of my hobbies, I pick up the ukulele, and put it down, and then pick it up again later on. So I don’t practice regularly all the time. As a result, I don’t have many songs I’ve finished learning. I’m working on many songs at the same time (which I don’t mind.)

I wasn’t feeling well recently – nothing serious, but I don’t get sick often and it was pretty painful for a while. As I was getting better, I picked up my ukulele, and tried to soothe myself with music.

This time, I started learning “Blue Roses Falling” by Jake Shimabukuro. A beautiful piece…

The moon landing, TV, freezers, and rabbits…

The Apollo 11 moon landing in 1969.
“One small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.”
It was broadcast worldwide on live TV, with an estimated 500 million viewers, the largest TV audience for a live broadcast at the time.

Did my parents see it? One of my coworkers was curious, and so I asked my mom. Her response was something like this:

TV? Noooo. We didn’t have a TV. No one in our whole neighborhood had a TV. You had to be quite wealthy to have a TV. And electricity was also very expensive.

My uncle who was a businessman in Thailand had a black and white TV. When we visited his family, they turned on the TV for us to see. The store where they sold medicines – a pharmacy, which was pretty far from my house – also sold TVs.

Our family had a little fridge/freezer – about the size of a college dorm fridge. And that was a luxury – we were very lucky to be able to have that. We were one of the few families with one. We’d store our leftovers in it or use it to make ice. We would put the ice on our fruits to cool them down and then eat them. It was very hot in Cambodia and that was so refreshing. We thought about making ice and selling it, but Grandma said electricity was very expensive – we wouldn’t be making a profit.

We also used the freezer to make our own frozen dessert – we’d mix some coconut milk with sugar and mashed fruit, such as longan, put it in a plastic bowl, and freeze it.

..but everyone did know about Apollo and people were talking about it. It was in the newspaper. And people heard about it on the radio, which we did have. There are old Chinese stories about the moon (Chang’e, the Moon Festival, rabbit)… <laughing> but they didn’t find any rabbits up there…

Juicing

Juicing

The last time I visited my parents, I brought back their juicer, as they don’t use it very much…And I’ve been juicing! Not everyday, but maybe about 2-3 times a week. I’d like to get more veggies in.

Here’s what I’ve been juicing:
5-7 ribs of romaine lettuce
4 stalks of celery
1 carrot
1 apple
1 orange
A small piece of ginger
A slice of lime

It tastes so good and so fresh! To get the most amount of nutrition, it’s best to drink it soon after juicing, as oxidation will occur. But you can also store it in the fridge.

Adding carrots and fruits makes the juice sweeter and adds flavor. (Pure veggie juice can be a little hard to drink for most people.) However adding too much fruit can cause your blood sugar to spike. I’d like to slowly increase the percentage of vegetables in my juices as we get used to the taste – hopefully up to 70%.

In case you are curious, I’m using the Champion (Household) Juicer. It’s a pretty heavy duty juicer – you can even use it to make fruit “ice cream” and nut butters. There are many other smaller, less expensive juicers, such as the L’Equip Juicer, Omega Juicer, and Breville Juice Extractor.