Serious Eats: binlu's Profile

I only know the name in Shanghai-nese, and I guess the transliteration would be xiao long bao, small dumplings that are steamed and fried; the bottoms are super-crispy, there's scalding hot "soup" inside along with a meat filling, plus the normal bun wrapper on the top half - everything you could ever experience in a dumpling!

binlu at 2:07AM on 08/02/08

From Talk

How do I get salt to stick to edamame?

I've never cooked edamame before, but have you considered giving the cooking water a good dose of salt before you put them in? Perhaps also salting them while they're still at least a little tacky so that the salt has something to help it adhere.

binlu at 11:50AM on 06/07/08

From Talk

SE users: please introduce yourselves.

My name's Binhong Lu. I'm about to graduate from the University of Virginia with a degree in history. After repeatedly doing independent research on various topics in food history, I realized that I was probably going to end up working in food somewhere. I'm planning to spend the next year doing the grunt work for a local fine dining restaurant, after which I'm going to either attend a culinary school or hope to find an apprenticeship somewhere. I'm located in Charlottesville, which is in itself a great food town, but am always looking for gems nearby. There's also a lot of other stuff I do, but who knows if any of it would interest anyone here?

binlu at 7:27PM on 04/27/08

From Serious Eats

Cook the Book: The River Cottage Cookbook

Herbs, Limes, Blueberries, Tomatoes

binlu at 5:17PM on 04/16/08

From Serious Eats

Serious Easter Artisanal Chocolate Egg Giveaway

a whole white chocolate bunny I can spend alllll day eating!

binlu at 4:21PM on 03/20/08

From Serious Eats

Serious Easter Artisanal Chocolate Egg Giveaway

A solid white chocolate easter bunny that I can spend all day working on!

binlu at 3:05PM on 03/19/08

From Serious Eats

Weekend Book Giveaway: 'The Fortune Cookie Chronicles'

"Smile if you like this fortune" - and it came true.

binlu at 12:32PM on 03/10/08

From Talk

Calling all athletes! Energy-boosting foods needed

@LoCo, that would mean, then, that legumes we don't normally eat in a fully cooked state, such as peanuts and bean dips would still be sources for these lectins and other potentially harmful compounds. As they are rich in carbs, cooking can often make these carbohydrates easily digestible, resulting in an insulin spike (also bad as an energy food). Compared to other sources, they are also relatively low in vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants.

Also, the argument that people have been eating cultivated items such as legumes for ages isn't exactly sound, as it's been widely accepted for a while that human nutrition declined with the advent of agriculture. Hunter-gatherer societies enjoyed better health, less disease, and spent roughly half the amount of time that agricultural societies had to in order to get their food, which is also the reason current dietary research is looking into existing hunter-gatherers and why they still have less health problems such as diabetes, arthritis, and heart disease than our supposedly advanced culture. The cultivation of legumes and grains meant that we could easily produce more quantity in calories, not necessarily quality. (sorry deepitbhatia for stealing the thread)

binlu at 6:01PM on 02/26/08

From Talk

I could eat my weight in ____

Frozen acai, avocados, and sausage, but not mixed together.

binlu at 11:33PM on 02/25/08

From Talk

Calling all athletes! Energy-boosting foods needed

Also in terms of general health I would actually recommend against legumes (beans and peanuts). There's a lot of research, but:

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0999/is_7190_318/ai_54561205

And an analysis of the zone diet vs. the contemporary diet:

http://www.thepaleodiet.com/articles/JANA%20final.pdf

binlu at 10:38PM on 02/25/08

From Talk

Calling all athletes! Energy-boosting foods needed

Hey, if you have time, go to www.crossfit.com They give much more info there, but basically their recommendation is a zone diet for the athlete, where increased calories come from increased consumption of fats (good ones, of course). Crossfit happens to be the strength and conditioning program of military, law enforcement, fire & rescue, and athletes as well, and the zone diet has proven the most effective for them, by and large. I and a lot of athletes I train with have converted to crossfit and its diet, and it's something I sincerely wish I had known about in high school. I know this is a "long answer," in a sense, but I can tell you the effort is well worth it. The "conventional" knowledge that circulates popularly is well behind newer research in fitness, and it's usually up to the individual athlete to find out what's really known out there. Go to the main site and poke around: www.crossfit.com, then read this: http://www.crossfit.com/cf-info/start-diet.html, and then read this: http://www.crossfit.com/cf-download/CFJ-trial.pdf

That should give you a basic idea of what I'm talking about, and why I think it's absolutely effective.

binlu at 10:25PM on 02/25/08

From Serious Eats

Fresh Food on TV: Weekend Edition

Did anyone watch the ICA with Flay and the Rathburns? Did anyone notice that one of the Rathburns' sous chefs was a certain chef from another cooking contest who was cut way too soon?

binlu at 1:24AM on 02/25/08

From Serious Eats

Cook the Book: Win a Copy of 'Cook with Jamie'

A combination reading, testing, and rotting my brain in front of the tube!

binlu at 10:06PM on 02/20/08

From Talk

What to do with 24 leftover egg yolks?

Aged eggnog!

http://www.chow.com/recipes/10758

binlu at 11:30PM on 02/09/08

From Serious Eats

Seriously Delicious Holiday Giveaway: Southside Market Sausage

Kreuz Market in Lockhart!

binlu at 12:42AM on 12/31/07

From Talk

Where should I eat in Charlottesville?

In the "Corner" district of Charlottesville (anyone can tell you how to get there) there is a sandwich restaurant called Little John's. If you walk around behind this restaurant, there's a place called "Just Curry" that serves great vegetable, chicken, and beef curries; the owner is from Guyana and so has slightly different curry recipes than what you would normally think. I think right now they have goat and lamb too. A little hidden, but great food. Cheap as well.

On the downtown mall, towards one end (the end where the post office is located) there is a restaurant called Bashir's Taverna. They're only open for lunch from Tuesday through Friday for lunch (11-2) and dinner on Friday and Saturday night. They serve Mediterranean cuisine (the owner, Bashir, is from Algeria, and his wife is from Brazil, so their influences are pretty varied), with a focus on North Africa. The food is absolutely GREAT, a very different place from the other restaurants in Charlottesville. On Saturday nights there is almost always a belly dancer as well.

Farther north on route 29, there is a restaurant called Kyoto in a shopping center called Rio Hill. Though both Japanese and Chinese cuisines are served, their Chinese food has to be some of the most authentic I've ever had; nowhere nearly as greasy and sweet as most Chinese restaurants are. They also serve up dim sum items throughout the day, although the dim sum rarely lasts past mid-day.

If you want ice cream, just across from Rio Hill, there's a place called Kohr Brothers that serves froze custard, great as an alternative to ice cream.

Also, if you're willing to make a short drive, just outside Charlottesville there's a place called Blue Mountain Brewery (just search online for it). It was just opened by the ex-Master Brewer of a brewpub in Charlottesville, who also took his award winning beers with him. They serve up all their artisanal beers along with a nice bistro menu made from local ingredients. Well worth the drive.

Hope you read this in time!

binlu at 11:07AM on 12/30/07

From Serious Eats