I think that being able to bake and cook for your own self is very liberating. You are no longer restricted by the nearby restaurants or the frozen food in the grocery store—the world of cuisine is your figurative oyster. This ‘romanticism’ of cooking is probably why I jump into multiple kinds of ethnic foods and genres of cuisine. But being self-sufficient in the kitchen also serves another purpose: it allows you to make a lot of the staple foods from scratch, which are almost always easier to make than you think (and tastier than the store versions).

Pickles easily qualify for both categories and more—they are extremely easy to make and more delicious when freshly made. There are no preservatives floating around in your jar with those crunchy slices. And best of all—when you take the jar out of the fridge and present it as a side dish at a meal, you can mention that you made the pickles yourself. In this day and age, your guests will be impressed. You can comment on how it’s nothing praiseworthy, and that anyone can do it. And you wouldn’t be lying for the sake of humility, either. It really is that easy.

The most important part of making pickles is patience. In order to ensure that signature crunch in every pickle slice, a large amount of the water content in the cucumbers needs to be pulled out of each slice before you combine the cucumbers with the pickling juice. The initial recipe I used mentioned that you needed to check the cucumbers every once in a while and mix them to ensure a maximum amount of crunch, but I left them undisturbed in the fridge for a few hours and still had successful results. Also, the recipe was for canning the pickles—I simply reused a jar of spaghetti sauce that has an air-tight lid. If you don’t have a jar, Tupperware will still do the job of keeping your pickles crispy. (It just won’t look as pretty or old-fashioned.)

Lastly, the amount of red pepper flakes in the recipe is up to you and your taste buds. The original recipe only called for ¼ teaspoon of the stuff, which is way too mild for James and me. For those of you that are squeamish about heat, then go with ¼ teaspoon—it’s a harmless amount, but still gives enough of a kick to balance out the sweetness of the pickles.

Go forth, my friends, and pickle!

Recipe adapted from Martha Stewart Living.

My first memorable experience with scallion pancakes (蔥油餅, cōng yóu bǐng) was with James at his family’s restaurant six years ago. I remember being initially enchanted by the aroma of sesame oil and the scallion-flecked surface of its golden crust. Once I took a big, crispy bite, the crunch was then followed by chewy layers of green onion and dough. Whether I chose to dip each slice into the sauce provided or not, I was in heaven. Delicious, fried doughy heaven.

We’ve since moved to Los Angeles and have a veritable gold mine of authentic Chinese/Taiwanese food at our fingertips (hello, San Gabriel Valley!) but whenever we feel too lazy to make the drive out east, we make whatever we feel like eating at home. I’ve slowly increased my repertoire to include three-cup chicken (三杯雞, sān bēi jī) and mapo tofu (麻婆豆腐, má pó dòu fu), but only recently tried my hand at scallion pancakes. I’ll be honest—the first few attempts were less than fruitful. Too crispy, not enough layers, not enough flavor, not enough scallions… I was especially frustrated at my inability to capture the crispiness of the outside compared to the doughy, chewy layers on the inside.

Eventually I found a way to make scallion pancakes that satisfied my cravings and earned a thumbs-up from James (which meant a lot to me since he grew up making them after all!). It’s a little more time-consuming because it involves brushing layers of sesame oil and re-rolling the dough for each individual pancake—but getting the consistency just right was a triumph in itself for me.  I would never claim that these could trump the restaurants here in Los Angeles that have been doing their amazing scallion pancake thing for years– I’m looking at you, Sin Bala and Earthen Restaurant—but you’ll be pretty darn close for a first-time attempt. And for those of you that don’t have the convenience of living 20 minutes away from Chinatown—this will be a delicious, authentic discovery.

A few notes (as always):

• Do you like onions? I do, so I included the white part of the green onions in the recipe. If you would prefer a more subtle flavor, just use the green part of the onions and compensate by using 4 stalks instead of 3.
• Boiling water is necessary for the initial mixture of flour, salt and scallions because it encourages the dough to stick together much faster than cold water.
• Be careful after your dough comes together! Poke it first after you initially turn it onto a work surface to knead. If it’s too hot, give it a minute to cool and try again.
• The dough will be extremely sticky to work with, but try to be as sparing with flour as possible. Using too much flour will dry out the dough and will make the final product more like a cracker than chewy.
• If you want to try for more flaky, chewy layers you can add more layers of sesame oil after the initial two that I list in the recipe—I found that two was sufficient enough to get the consistency I wanted.
• Scallion pancakes are oily. I know, I sound like Captain Obvious, but seriously—you can place them on paper towels after pan frying, but don’t press the oil out of them or blot them of oil. Otherwise, you’ll get scallion crackers.  Yes, I am (unfortunately) speaking from experience.

Isn’t this great? I make the mistakes so you don’t have to! May your scallion pancakes be crispy, chewy and delectable…