It goes to say that even if you move far away from home you still miss it on occasion. I think it’s that time of the year where I sorely miss home. Even my subconscious is telling me my heart longs for the sand and waves of my islands as it gives me dreams of one of my favorite people and I being pregnant together (looking at you Fathead). If you’re asking how is that a subconcious missing home thing, she’s in Hawaii.

Home. What do you do when you’re away from home and you get that pang of wanting familiarity? I used to listen to island music. Old and new. It didn’t matter. The sounds of island rhythms always helped. Eventually, it wasn’t as effective quite possibly because of the exponential distance between me and the islands or quite actually the fact that country music now holds first place in my heart. Either case I had to find a new way to be comforted of missing home.

Cue: ono kind grinds. In my Hawaii nei ono kind grinds is food that is so amazingly delicious that it’s to die for.

Lately things have been a struggle. I’ve been fighting my depression these last few weeks. I can feel it right at the tip of my heart waiting to engulf me in darkness. My husband has been great in reminding me to go to God and to trust Him with everything. And, we have. Even when things are pouring He’s been answering. While God has been blessing us through what seems like the war zone, comfort food is still needed. Mainly because I love food. If you haven’t figured it out yet, the recipe this week falls in the comfort food category.

The below recipe is a dish that I took to a bunco party last month. The theme of the dish was appetizers. This is definitely not really an appetizer. But, to be fair, in Hawaii appetizers really can’t be classified as the kind of food they have here in the mainland categorized as appetizers. In Hawaii pupus can quite literally be anything – the food is interchangeable. So, I figured keeping with my roots, I made cascaron. Cascaron is a Filipino dessert donut that is so ono it’s making my mouth water just thinking about it. Coconut, mochi, sugar and coconut milk. You can’t go wrong with that.

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Just a heads up, in Hawaii they use bamboo skewers and place the dipped donuts on the skewers like in the featured pic. Usually four donuts per stick. I didn’t do that. One because I was lazy. And two because I wasn’t sure if the ladies would actually like it.

I had my niece and nephews with me so they were so excited to help me out.

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Hoku, RyRy and RB3 giving some love to Buster

We rolled out the balls first. RyRy mostly helped on this part. The other two were too busy playing games to care. The lack of interest for this step was evident for them.

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Then it came down to dropping the balls into the oil. RB3 and Hoku were adamant they had to help as much as RyRy so they took turns passing the balls to me. Then we dipped them into the glaze.

I won’t lie and tell you I wasn’t shocked it turned out. Honestly, my Mama and Dad made the best cascarons and I didn’t think I could come close to following in their footsteps on this recipe.

But, Dad, look at me go! xoxo

Cascaron

Ingredients

Dough:
2 cups Mochiko sweet rice flour
2 cups sweetened flaked coconut
1 1/2 cups coconut milk
3 cups vegetable oil

Glaze:
1 cup light brown sugar
1/4 cup coconut milk

Directions
  1. In a mixing bowl, combine sweet rice flour, flaked coconut and coconut milk.
  2. Take two tablespoons of the dough and shape into a ball. Set aside.
  3. Heat up the oil in a wok or deep pan to medium-high heat. (Drop a small piece of dough into the oil, if the dough starts bubbling right away, then the oil is hot enough.

  4. Cook the balls for about 5 to 7 minutes or until golden brown.
  5. Remove from oil/heat onto a plate lined with paper towels to soak up oil. Set aside.
  6. In a medium sauce pan, combine brown sugar and coconut milk. Bring to a boil and then remove from heat.

  7. Dip fried balls in the brown sugar glaze until completely coated

  8. Serve immediately.