About

Modern Asian - fast, fresh and simple enough for tonight’s supper.

I could start off by telling a story of how I learnt cooking from my mother when I was a young girl…

but I didn’t.

In fact, quite opposite. My Mom’s a fantastic cook, it’s her passion, it’s her life. And when I was little, I wasn’t interested in cooking - I just wanted to eat! Plus, if I was anywhere near the kitchen when Mom was cooking, it never fails…

I’d always end up with the shit jobs!

Pinching the itty bitty tails off the mountain of beansprouts, shelling pounds and pounds of shrimp, washing the trapped dirt in bok choy. Of course, Mom would constantly spew out kitchen wisdom, but hey, I was young and didn’t care about cooking- I WANTED TO EAT!

So I really didn’t learn how to cook Asian well until about 6 years ago when I moved away from California (where my family lives) to a little town called Bradenton, Florida to start a family of my own with my husband, Scott. Suddenly, without easy access to good Asian markets, cheap Asian midnight eats and of course, my Mom’s kitchen, I was forced to learn via telephone calls while at the supermarket.

What a fine education it was. $448.63 in cell phone minutes later (which, by the way, is way cheaper than 3 years at a fancy culinary institute), I discovered that I was good. Real good at cooking and teaching others about Asian cooking.

SteamyKitchen.com is my playground - featuring recipes, beautiful food photography and my adventures in the kitchen. Most of the recipes are Modern Asian, however a sprinkling of non-Asian dishes can be found on the blog, as this also serves as my diary of what I cook at home for Scott, Andrew, my 4yr old and Nathan, my 3 year old.

I’m currently writing my first cookbook, called Steamy Kitchen’s Modern Asian to be released Fall ‘09, published by Periplus/Tuttle. Call me crazy, but I’m doing all the writing and photographing for the book myself - 100+ recipes and 150+ color photographs. I blog frequently about my book progress, just click on the category called “Cookbook” to read all about it (in sidebar to right).

My hands-on cooking classes are held at The Chef’s Table in Sarasota, Florida, The Rolling Pin in Brandon, Florida and at the Epicurean Culinary Academy in Los Angeles, California. Here’s the schedule for upcoming classes.

I have a weekly newspaper food column in The Tampa Tribune; and a monthly food column in the East County Observer. I also contribute the The WellFed Network and cook live on ABC News during morning news segments.

Email me at jaden@steamykitchen.com. Spammers will be dunked in a vat of fermented fish muck. Twice.

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Television/Radio

photo by John Revisky, Sarasota Magazine. I’m totally draping seductively over my Balinese Love Lounge (heehee!)

PBS - “Jack Perkins Gulf Coast Journal” (An Emmy Award winning show did a nice feature on me that aired on PBS)

For ABC videos, click on the “featured video” link)

ABC 7 - June 27, 2008 Mussels with Lemongrass Curry Broth

ABC 7 - June 03, 2008 Easy Thai Shrimp Curry

ABC 7 - May 12, 2008 Vietnamese Iced Coffee and Asian Nachos

ABC 7 - April 24, 2008 Citrus Soy Fish with Soba Noodles

ABC 7 - March 27, 2008 Korean Spiced Burgers

ABC 7 - March 24, 2008 Firecracker Shrimp with Sweet Chili Sauce

ABC 7 - Feburary 28, 2008 Steamed Spareribs in Black Bean Sauce

ABC 7 - January 22, 2008 Vietnamese Summer Rolls

ABC 7 - December 18, 2007 Coconut Frozen Yogurt

ABC 7 - November 27, 2007 Malaysian Coconut Prawns

Tampa Bay’s Mediacast -November 1, 2007

ABC 7 - October 2, 2007 (click on “video” link on page right above photo)

Tampa Tribune podcast - October 13, 2007

ABC 7 August 23, 2007 Chinese Fried Rice

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My Food Columns

Links to my food columns in newspapers

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Shameless Self-Promotion

because even egos need to be fed…

Epicurious: Little Chef Andrew and No Knead Bread Revisited , Inquiring Food Bloggers
Slashfood: No Knead Bead Revisited, Food Porn, Fried Rice, Ginger Tips, Espresso, Jap Chae
ABC News: 8/23/07, 10/9/07, 11/27/07, 12/18/07, 1/22/08,
Tampa Tribune : Big-ass feature, New Orleans Charity Event, Podcast with Jeff Houck
Wall Street Journal
Chowhound: How to pick a fresh fish
SeriousEats: German Oven Pancakes, Furikake Fries , Killer Crawfish
Lifehacker: Gucci Steak
Tastespotting
Bon Appetit (related links section)
The Washington Post: Cooling off with hot food writers
Parents Magazine Blog
Chicagoist
Tampa Bay Times
Herald Tribune - Dining Magazine (page 13)
Creative Loafing: Best Blog
Well Fed Network
Blogs of the Day: Top Blogs: 5/2/07
SlashFood Food Porn: Baby Eggplant
Yum Sugar: Coconut Rice Vietnamese Chicken Noodle Soup Lobster Mac ‘n Cheese Ginger Tips
Apartment Therapy: Chicken Faux Gras, Rolo Turtle Pretzels
South Carolina Morning News
Sacramento Bee December 11, 2007, May 14, 2008
Eating Tampa: Best Blog
St. Petersburg Times
Tampa Bay’s CBS Channel 10

First place, tied: Food Photography DMBLGIT May 2007
Creative Loafing: Write Global, Eat Local
Blogher:H ow to Make the Perfect Rice
Blogher: Roll Your Own Sushi
Your Observer
Seattle Post Intelligencer
Sarasota Chamber of Commerce, Minority Business of the Year 2007
Delight.com - see my photo? that bite of vegetable fried rice!
Growing Blogs of the Day: 4/8/07
Blogs of the Day: Top Blog: 7/4/07
Blogs of the Day: Top Posts: 4/21/07, 5/22/07, 6/23/07, 6/29/07, 7/3/07, 7/4/07, 7/8/07, okokokok I’m going to stop counting now…..

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About the Photography

I take all the photos on the site. My camera is a Canon Rebel XT with a macro lens for the food porn shots. My style of food photography is clean, simple, and showcases the beauty of food without a lot of fancy props. All of the food created is real. Meaning, I don’t use food photography tricks like using Elmer’s glue to mimic milk, spray food with glycerin to make it look shiny, and I certainly don’t fluff and position each grain of rice. 93% of the dishes and recipes featured are created in my home kitchen and are eaten for dinner that night after a quick 2 minute photo-shoot. The other 7% of the food is still created in my home kitchen….but late at night when my kids are asleep and I don’t have to share any of it!

If you’re interested in food photography, click on the category called “Photography/Blog Tips” to the right –>

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Random Stuff

Confucius say:

1. One who has harmony in seasonings need no recipe. Know basic combinations of seasonings in types of cuisines Chinese: soy, sugar, wine, sesame oil Japanese: mirin, soy, sake

2. She who marinates meats – even a quick 10 minutes – will be rewarded with flavorful dish

3. Hot Wokky = No Stikky

4. Cooking not only taste. Use all 5 senses.

5. It is honorable to share your food with friends. Cook more than enough and bring to hungry neighbor.

Ok, ok, Confucious really didn’t say that. I made that shit up.

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Legal Blah-Blah

The contents of this website is protected under a Creative Commons License. You are welcome to share and republish my recipes or photos, as long as you give me credit, don’t draw a fake mustache on my face or alter any of my content. Please don’t pretend the content is yours, be nice and link back to me. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5 License . Violate this and forever be cursed by the food gods - your souffles will never rise and eggs will always be rotten.

About Gluten-Free: The great thing about Asian foods is that many of the dishes are gluten free. I don’t eat GF, however I know many of you do, so I’ve created a category “GF” calling out dishes that are GF or that can be easily adaptable to be GF. Please look at the ingredient list carefully and make your own substitutions if I haven’t suggested in the recipe!

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