(upbeat music)
- Hey guys, it's me, Jasmine.
Lately I've been, as a lot of people do,
scrolling through TikTok for hours on end.
I personally watch a lot of food videos
and I just keep saving them as if I'm gonna do
every single recipe and I just don't have the time.
But today, we are making the time.
We're gonna try three vegan Asian recipes
that have gone viral on TikTok.
They look absolutely delicious.
So first, we're gonna be doing the bubble potato pillows.
Then we're gonna look at the vegan unagi don.
Then the salt and pepper flower mushrooms.
Let's get started.
So these are the bubble potatoes from Miss She and Mr He.
This video has 63.7 million views.
That is insane.
Okay, let's watch it.
Okay, they look beautifully crispy
and soft and fluffy on the inside.
Oh, fun hack, okay.
Oh, that looks so satisfying,
so we're definitely gonna do that.
Okay, garlic press to press the potatoes.
Okay, now it's looking like gnocchi.
Ooh, that looks so good, really yummy.
Yes, some cayenne.
Okay, let's make it, I'm ready.
All right, so first we're starting
with the crunchy bubble potato pillows.
I have all the ingredients here.
Let's get started.
We're gonna start with these two potatoes.
These are Russet potatoes.
She did this really cool hack
where she very slightly cut down the waist of the potato,
not all the way through.
This is supposed to help it peel better,
so that's what I am doing here.
Guess that's good.
Okay, one more.
I'm really excited to see how this hack turns out.
Okay, so now to my pot of water.
We're just gonna bring this to a boil.
(stove top clicking)
Come on, you're embarrassing me!
Ah, there we go.
Once this comes to a boil, we're gonna drop our potatoes in
and then cook them for about 30 minutes
until they're fork tender.
Our potatoes are soft!
Okay, so I prepared our ice bath here.
We're gonna pop it in there.
Let's see!
(Jasmine gasps)
That was satisfying!
That's a good hack.
Okay, so I'm gonna finish peeling these
and then we're going to cut them.
I'm gonna quarter all of these
so it can fit into my garlic press.
I literally bought it just for this
because I usually just mash potatoes with my fork
and I think it's really interesting
that she mashes it with a garlic press, so let's do it.
I'm gonna put a piece of potato in there.
Wow, that is so satisfying and so much easier
than actually pressing garlic.
Next time I'm stressed,
I'm gonna just be making these potato pillows,
pressing these taters through my garlic press.
It's so fluffy.
I have finished pressing all of my potatoes
through my garlic press.
Look at it, it looks so much like hash browns.
We could easily take a detour right now, but we won't.
I'm adding two tablespoons of glutinous rice flour,
which actually doesn't contain gluten.
Glutinous is in that name to describe the texture.
Now we're gonna add in one tablespoon of cornstarch,
a third teaspoon of salt, a third teaspoon of black pepper.
I'm mixing everything together with my hands.
You can feel how well everything integrates together.
I'm gonna transfer it onto my surface.
So I'm gonna continue kneading this until it's smooth.
All right, our potato dough is ready.
It is so smooth.
Okay, so what she does is she shapes it.
She says you can do whatever shape you want,
but I'm just gonna do what she did.
So I'm gonna cut a piece off here.
I'm gonna roll it into a little log.
To lengthen my dough whenever I'm rolling it out like that,
I'll start with my palms flat,
and then as I roll, I'll start spreading my fingers.
Section off my dough.
I'm gonna take my fork, just gonna press it
and I'm gonna continue pressing out
the rest of my potato pillows.
I got the hang of it.
More pressure up top, less pressure at the bottom.
Ta-da, gorgeous.
So I have my first batch done here.
I'm gonna press down on the rest of these
until I've used up all my dough.
So I've heated up some oil.
Here's a hack I like to use.
I know when my oil is ready
when I stick a chopstick in there and it starts to bubble.
Do you see that?
It's ready for frying.
Gonna put a few potatoes on my, this.
So we're gonna add our potatoes into our oil.
Once your oil hits 350,
we're gonna fry for about five minutes
until they're lightly golden.
I'm gonna fry it in batches,
because it looks like they are in love with each other
and they can't keep their hands off each other,
so I don't want that to happen.
All right, these are looking nice and light golden
so I'm gonna take them out.
I just lined one of my baking sheets with paper towels
so the excess oil can drain.
We're gonna do a double fry,
so we're gonna add all of our potato pillows
back into the pan and fry for another 30 seconds
and take them back out.
Voila!
Shall we do a crunch test?
Nice and crispy!
I'm gonna transfer my potatoes onto this plate.
You'll see that the towels
have helped soak up that excess oil.
I'm gonna add on a little bit of cayenne.
We're gonna give it a little toss.
Lastly, I'm just gonna serve it with some ketchup.
The bubble potatoes are done.
Potatoes that over 63 million people have seen.
Get some ketchup.
The outside is super crunchy
and the inside is super fluffy and creamy.
With the cayenne and dipped in ketchup,
that sweet and spicy just gives it that perfect kick.
For this recipe,
I'm just gonna have to give it a 10 out of 10.
So good.
Let's move on to the next one, the vegan unagi don.
Our second recipe is this vegan unagi don,
which is the eel made from eggplant.
I actually have made something similar
with my friend Merle over on Goodful.
It was absolutely delicious,
so I'm excited to try this recipe.
This vegan unagi don recipe is from Okonomi Kitchen.
Let's watch the video.
I mean, right off the bat,
it already straight up looks like eel.
Okay, I got my rice going already.
We're gonna steam our eggplant.
So it looks like she butterflied the eggplant,
spread it with her fingers.
I'm really excited about this one.
Let's get started.
So first, to make the eel,
which is made out of eggplant today,
we're gonna need three Japanese eggplants,
or two Chinese eggplants.
My eggplant today is extremely long,
and in this case, I would say size matters
and we'll only need one.
So we're gonna remove the tip.
I learned this tip from Merle.
You don't need to just cut off the tip.
We're wasting flesh here.
You just take that little leaf, peel it upwards.
Minimize the food waste.
And then now you only need to cut this part off.
I've definitely seen some videos
where people are cutting off this much eggplant,
and it's all good stuff in there.
I'm gonna cut this in half
and now we're just gonna steam it for five minutes,
flipping it halfway through.
All right, our eggplant has finished steaming.
Let's remove it.
We're going to butterfly the eggplant.
So we're gonna slice in but not all the way through
and we are going to peel it outwards.
Ooh, okay, this is working.
No, this was great.
Okay, perfect.
Now she flattens it.
Now we're gonna do the same thing with this guy here.
That looks great.
I kinda cut through that one,
but let's just pretend I didn't.
So now she creates little horizontal cuts.
This looks so good.
Our eggplant is ready,
and now we are going to dust it with some potato starch.
Now we are going to pan fry them.
I'm gonna do them one at a time.
About two to three minutes on each side
until there's a little bit of a char,
and then we're gonna make the sauce in the same pan.
There's an option to make the sauce on the side,
keep it real nice and neat, but I'm a one pan kinda gal.
Just keep it simple, do less dishes.
Me and eggplant have come a very long way.
I used to have such a strong hatred towards it.
I didn't like the flavor, the texture.
But then I had the Chinese garlic eggplant
and now I love it in everything.
I always say, if you don't like a food
and it's been three years, give it another try.
Our flavor palettes are always expanding.
All right, let's give this a flip.
Right now, the eggplant is sticking to the pot.
If you just let it sit and crispify,
you'll be able to move in just a couple minutes,
so I always recommend just leaving it once it's stuck.
And let's repeat it with the second one,
and we're just gonna do the same thing
and then we'll make the sauce.
To make the sauce, we're gonna add some sake,
some mirin and dashi powder.
So once that dashi is all dissolved,
gonna add in some cane sugar and some soy sauce.
I want this mixture to thicken to about this texture,
and now we're gonna add back in our eggplant,
get that beautifully coated up in the sauce.
And finally, we're just gonna add nori, rice,
sauce, our eggplant
and finally, topped with some toasted sesame seeds.
This looks so good.
Honestly, really looks a lot like eel.
Let's give this a try.
That is so effing good!
If you're at home and you're not gonna make any of these,
you gotta make this.
The moisture and the juice the eggplant gives off
is so complementary with the fluffy rice,
and also the eggplant has had that chance
to soak up all that sauce.
It's in perfect harmony.
10 out of 10.
Let's move on to the next one,
salt and pepper flower mushrooms.
So the next one we're moving on to
is the salt and pepper flower mushrooms from Woon Heng.
These look so cool.
It reminds me of popcorn chicken kind of,
but with mushrooms,
and texture heaven with all these crisscrosses.
Let's watch the video.
It looks so good.
A flower for me?
Thank you.
See, I just already can't wait to do that.
It looks so fun, and then coating it in the cornstarch.
All the crispy bits, my gosh.
Peppers all thrown together.
If you've ever had a dry pot, a dry hot pot,
it's dry seasonings, love, so good.
It reminds me of chicken wings.
When you do a dry rub.
Spicy and peppery.
Salivating again.
I think I chose some really good recipes today.
Let's do it.
All right, so I have my king oyster mushrooms here.
I am obsessed with these.
These are so good.
We are just gonna cut the tips off.
I like to take any veggie scraps, put them in the freezer
and if I'm making a veggie stock,
I'll just combine all of those scraps I have
to make a really rich broth.
So cutting the last tips off here,
and what we're gonna do with these
is cut them into two and a half inch slices.
And last one.
So now is that cool trick that she did.
I've done this with potatoes once before
and it was really fun.
Okay, so what we're gonna do
is line chopsticks on either side of the mushroom,
like this.
We're going to cut,
(mushroom squelching)
until we hit the chopsticks,
so it doesn't go all the way through.
All right, so now we turn it around this way,
and same thing.
I'm being really careful not to cut any pieces off.
Wow, look at that.
Sorry if you have trypophobia,
I can see if this'll trigger you, but I think it looks cool.
I'm just gonna finish cutting these
and then we'll move on to the next step.
So I've cut all my mushrooms
and created my beautiful florets,
so I have, just kidding, it's not boiling.
(Jasmine laughs)
We are going to place our florets in there,
uncut side down.
And then we're just gonna cook them
for about three to five minutes
until it turns from white to a little grayish color.
Ooh, they're blossoming!
How cute!
The mushrooms look slightly gray.
I'm just gonna take them out
and we're gonna squeeze out any excess moisture.
I can already tell,
if I did it right now, I'd burn my fingers,
which I do often 'cause I don't have any patience.
But anyway, this isn't about me.
I've let the mushrooms chill a little bit.
Gently press on it to remove that extra moisture.
Because of all the little crevices we made with the slicing,
they're just gonna carry a lot of extra moisture
and you wanna get that out so it can be crispy.
So now we're gonna add our mushroom flowers
to our cornstarch mixture,
which just has some salt, black pepper and white pepper,
and I just mixed it all together.
Now we're gonna toss in the mushrooms.
Just gonna get that all coated.
Open it up, coat it in all the crevices.
Look at that.
Nice and coated.
Gonna dust off any excess cornstarch
and then place it in our oil.
Oh my gosh, beautiful.
I don't wanna do too many at a time,
'cause I'm scared they're gonna stick together.
Okay, so we're gonna fry these until they're golden brown.
Are you a mushroom person?
Please let me know in the comments,
because when I was in third grade,
my teacher, she was like,
"Okay, everyone's gonna come up here
"and tell us your favorite food."
I went up and said mushrooms and the whole class said, "Ew!"
But I remember that moment so clearly.
(Jasmine laughs)
These look great.
Gonna add some more.
Don't touch each other.
I'm like an RA at college.
Okay, these look done.
Look how pretty it is.
It literally looks like a flower.
Put it on my paper lined plate here
to drain that extra oil.
We're gonna make the dry rub, the dry seasonings.
I'm gonna add some oil to my pan here.
Oil's hot, let's toss in the garlic, red chile,
scallions, salt, white pepper and some black pepper.
The colors are so vibrant.
Let's toss in our mushrooms that we just fried.
So the best method is to toss it gently.
Okay, this is all done.
So last step is to just drizzle some sesame oil over it.
Don't overdo it.
If I was having movie night with my friends
and we were eating dinner and stuff,
this would be the perfect appetizer
or side dish of the meal.
The mushrooms are finally done.
They look beautiful.
I mean, they do straight up look like flowers,
which is very very impressive to me.
Let's get to eating.
You hear the crunch?
Just reminds me of popcorn chicken.
There's a lot of peppers in here.
It's not actually too spicy.
It's definitely more of a peppery kick.
The scallions and the sesame help neutralize everything
and the crisp of the mushroom, oh my gosh.
It tastes like chicken.
Honestly, there's nothing I would do to change this dish.
It is perfect as is.
The bubble potato pillows
were deliciously crispy on the outside,
creamy in the center.
The vegan unagi don, oh my gosh, the eggplant!
The juice from it, it was so so good.
Paired with the rice and he sauce, it was just chef's kiss.
And of course, the salt and pepper flower mushrooms.
Crispy, peppery, nutty.
So so good.
All right guys, thanks so much for watching.
All these dishes were so good, 10 out of 10 for all of them.
If you plan on making any of them,
the links are in the description.
Snap a picture, tag me on Instagram 'cause I wanna see.
Bye guys!
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