My Mom’s Favorite Recipes & What I Cooked Last Week
What my mom actually cooks at home, Aunt Susan’s BBQ ribs, grandpa’s eggy rice, summer cherry tomato bucatini
Hi everyone,
Hope you had a great week! My mom was just in town, and we packed so much cooking into three days. We’re really excited about the recipes we developed. Sometimes we have a harder time getting inspired. During her last visit, there were a couple of recipes that just didn’t turn out great. My mom likes to joke that if a recipe isn’t perfect, she never sees it again. (It’s true that I only share recipes I’m 100% confident will be delicious in your kitchen.) This time, though, everything was a hit.
We’ll often go out for dinner to change things up, but during this visit we mostly ate what we’d been making because it was all so good. On my mom’s last night, we treated ourselves to hot pot, our favorite way to celebrate.
Since I had my mom with me, I thought it would be fun to interview her about some of her favorite recipes. Today I’m sharing our conversation, including what she likes to cook for guests, what she brings to potlucks, and what she eats when she doesn’t feel like cooking.
First, here’s a recipe for a summer cherry tomato bucatini we made last week. It’s packed with shallot, lots of garlic, parsley, sweet cherry tomatoes, and a tablespoon of fish sauce, which brings out the tomatoes’ natural umami (I promise the final dish doesn’t taste fishy!). For that glossy sauce that clings to every strand of pasta, be sure to finish cooking the pasta in the skillet with some pasta water. The starches create a beautiful, silky sauce.
As always, my cookbook Maxi’s Kitchen is now available for purchase at your local bookstore or online:
Thank you so much for your support 🤍
What I Cooked Last Week! ↓
Summer Cherry Tomato Bucatini
The secret ingredient to this tomato-shallot-parsley pasta is a tablespoon of fish sauce. It brings out the umami in the tomatoes and doesn’t taste fishy at all!
You can download the PDF recipe above and watch the video here :)
Aunt Susan’s BBQ Ribs
My family swears by this method for the juiciest, most delicious ribs. They get coated in cumin and barbecue sauce, then bake in the oven until tender before finishing on the grill.
Grandpa’s Eggy Rice
A simple delicacy from my grandpa’s kitchen. Crack the eggs into steaming hot rice and sprinkle with furikake—it’s Korean comfort food!
Q&A With My Mom: Her Favorite Recipes for Every Occasion
Maxine: Mom, what are your favorite recipes to make for guests?
Ann: When we have people over, I love making lasagna, but then Dad doesn’t think we should serve pasta to guests. He thinks it’s not right. So we’ll often do steak, one of his favorites, and if we’re having steak, I end up making twice-baked potatoes and creamed spinach. Because I don’t want to serve steak with just a salad.
I always make appetizers, too. If steak is the main dish, I’ll serve baked egg rolls since they’re vegetarian. And we love wontons, of course. If it’s a special occasion, I’ll fry them, but if we have guests who are watching their weight, I’ll just boil them.
I also like making potstickers filled with chicken or pork. If I’m feeling ambitious, I’ll make the dough from scratch, but most of the time I use store-bought wrappers to keep things easy.
And I almost always make a big Caesar salad because Dad loves having that on the side. Usually he grills the steaks and I do everything else, including the dishes!
(Most of these recipes are in my cookbook! Wontons on page 192, lasagna on page 167, potstickers on page 172, and Caesar salad on page 239.)
Maxine: What’s your favorite recipe to bring to a potluck?
Ann: It depends on what people want. I normally bring appetizers because that’s what everyone asks for. Usually it’s similar to what I make when I’m hosting. I’ll bring boiled wontons and sauce them up when I get there with lots of scallions, ginger, and sesame oil. Then I stick toothpicks in them so they’re easy to pick up. That one’s always popular.
Sometimes I bring baked egg rolls because they travel well, or rice paper dumplings. I always give my friends a few options and ask what they’d like me to make.
If I have to bring a salad, it’s usually my Mediterranean chopped salad. That one is especially great in the summer and always a big hit.
Maxine: What about when you don’t feel like cooking?
Ann: I go to a restaurant. (laughs) Or we’ll order pizza. We’ll pick up a big pizza and reheat it on the pizza stone at 500ºF. Dad loves pizza so much that we probably do that once a week.
Maxine: What do you make when you want something cozy and comforting?
Ann: I love mapo tofu, jjigae (in my cookbook on page 68) ... but that’s not Dad’s comfort food. His is chicken cutlet or chicken Parmesan. If I ask him what he wants, he almost always says, “Well, if you don’t mind, I’d love chicken Parmesan.” I can mouth the words before he says them!
Maxine: Sometimes I’m on the phone with you and say, “I’m going to guess what Dad wants for dinner,” and I’m probably right 95% of the time.
Ann: Because if we’ve already had chicken Parm...
Maxine: Then he’s going to want meatloaf...
Ann: Or chicken pot pie (in my cookbook on page 70). He’s really into protein and not as many carbs, whereas I love carby things like pasta.
Maxine: Do you have a summer staple?
Ann: We all love the summer pasta.
Maxine: That one is so good! It reminds me of childhood.
Ann: It’s a fun one because it’s one of the few times Dad actually eats pasta.
Maxine: What about the recipes that taught me to cook? Which ones are your favorites?
Ann: The curry chicken (page 67), the potstickers (page 172), the wontons (page 192), and Nana’s broccoli and cheese stuffed chicken (page 79). Dad hasn’t asked for that one in a while. Maybe we need to remind him about it…
Maxine: I remember watching you make creamed spinach, and the béchamel sauce looked so intimidating. Then one day I stood beside you and you said, “It’s actually pretty easy!” You showed me exactly how to do it, and it really was easy.
That’s one reason I included QR codes throughout my cookbook for techniques that might seem intimidating but are actually very approachable. If you scan the code, you’ll get a step-by-step video tutorial.
Ann: Surprise, surprise, Dad loves creamed spinach. I guess we tend to eat a lot of things he loves. (laughs)
Maxine: Usually it’s you asking Dad what he wants for dinner. We joke that we’re personal chefs and our husbands are our clients. We’ll call each other and ask, “What does your client want to eat tonight?” Then we’ll respond, “My client requested this dish...”
Ann: And then we report back: “The client really loved dinner tonight!” or “The client requested chicken again.”
Maxine: We are not happy when our client isn’t thrilled.
Ann: They’re afraid to say anything that isn’t 100% complimentary.
Maxine: What’s your favorite thing that I cook?
Ann: (Silence.) I’m so bamboozled by everything we’ve been cooking this week! We’re always making the same recipes and trying new ones. Actually, the chicken red curry you made was so delicious, and it was something I’d never made before. (Recipe coming soon!)
Maxine: Thanks so much, Mom. I love you!
Wishing you all a relaxing and wonderful weekend!
Love,
Maxine