Lumpia & the Disney Dream Cruise Ship

Below you'll find an easy recipe for Lumpia but... first, i'd like to spill a few thoughts on a cruise ship i'd like to check out some day...




I recall when the Disney Blog was just about to announce it, wondering what disney was up to this time... The new Disney Dream Cruise Ship is about to make its debut in 2011, and it combines 3 things i count as being kinda cool, into what to me is an ideal vacation: disney, a cruise & innovative technology you can mess with (it'd be 4 if it debuted as a european cruise)...

update Jan 4, 2011: Disney Dream Arives at Port Canaveral and is welcomed to its new home (along w/ a great Mac & Cheese recipe!)...



One of the fun looking things it's gonna introduce is a water ride, circling the whole ship, called the "AquaDuck"... here's a simulation of what it's gonna feel like to experience it:



It would've been kinda fun if our kids were pre-school'ish again, cuz it'd be real cool to see the expressions on their faces when they checkout the animated portholes in the staterooms:



Another cool thing on the ship is the @mousephere in the Animator's Palate restaurant, which transforms while you eat. Here's a walkthru of what it'll look like:



Some of the other fun new innovative technologies on the ship will include enchanted artwork (e.g. the pictures in the hallways come to life), an interactive play floor (you might've seen these in malls, at the Metreon, etc.) and other cool technological innovations with a disney context:



I'm not sure if/how teens will take to this but they even have a SPA, called "Chillax", just for them (college kids and ancients, like moi, will be jealous)...

and... i'm not a bet'n person but... if i were, i'd bet it's gonna have some killer shows too...

here's a link to all of the Disney Blog entries on the disney dream (so far)and here's another for the cruise line in general...

if you want to see how much it's gonna cost ya and/or want to book a cruise on it, click here... and... here's a link to more vids on it: click here

we always joke about about borrowing a younger niece/nephew (or grand-niece/nephew, uhg... getting old sucs), so we'd have an excuse to take a cruise like this thing's gonna provide... oh well...































now... back to the other unrelated thing in this post...

Lumpia Recipe

for those of you who don't know what lumpia is, it's a Filipino version of an egg roll (and if you don't know what an egg role is, haha... dude...).

my grandma used to make these things totally from scratch, even the wrappers (too much work 4 me) and all the grand kids use to just gobble 'em up (kinda sucs after all of her pain staking hard work :)...

Ingredients:

3 Packs of Lumpia Wrappers - You can usually find these at an Asian grocery store (do a google search to find a local one). You can also use wonton wrappers but... they don't taste as good (in my opine).

2 tbls oil
1/2 medium sized onion, minced
5 cloves garlic, minced
1 lb ground turkey (all right, all right, you can use hamburger if you want...)
1/2 cup soy sauce
Pepper to taste (can use cayenne too)
1 can garbanzo beans, drained
1 can sliced water chestnuts, drained & sliced into slivers(like almond slivers)
1 head cabbage, shredded (chopped up like "shreads", the shredded lettuce U use in tacos or... cold slaw, yeah, like cold slaw)
1 egg beated w/ 1 tbls water

How to Prepare the Filling:

in a big big pot, saute the onion and garlic in the oil
add the ground beef and cook until it's browned (chopping up w/ a spatula as it cooks, duh)
stir in the soy sauce and pepper, bring to a boil, then lower heat and let simmer for 15 mins
stir in the garbonzos and water chestnuts, then remove the pot from the heat
let cool for 30 mins
stir in the un-cooked shredded cabbage

now UR ready to wrap the buggers (other than the prep chopping, this part takes long... just think how much longer it would take when my grandma had to make the wrappers from scratch also)...

How to Wrap 'em:

if the packaged lumpia wrappers are frozen, make sure they're defrosted first... also, they'll be stuck together so... you'll need to separate them first (haha... my grandma used to say "see-por-rree-tim" with the "r's" rolled)... be careful while you do it, they rip kinda easy if UR not careful...

get the beaten egg ready in a small bowl or cup cuz you'll use it to seal 'em...

place a wrapper in front of you, positioned with one of the tips pointing at you (like a diamond)...

place about a tablespoon of filling right about below the middle of the wrapper...

take the tip closest to you and fold it over the filling, tucking that tip a little under the filling

now gently pull the tucked part of the wrapper towards you until the wrapped filling kinda gets shaped into a tube

now roll it away from you until it's rolled a little past the half way point of the wrapper

fold the exposed left & right tips of the wrapper towards the middle of the rolled part

now continue rolling away from you covering the tips you just folded, until about an inch of the last tip is still showing

dab some of the beaten egg on that tip and roll the lumpia the rest of the way...

the trick to wrapping them is to roll 'em as tight and compact as you can, w/o ripping the wrapper... otherwise, there'll be pockets of grease in 'em after you fry 'em (yuck)...

that's it (for the wrapping).

How to Cook 'em:

these are fried (haha... not baked) so... add enough oil to a frying pad so it's about 1/4 inch deep...

heat the oil until it's fry worthy then... lower to about a 4 setting (a little under the middle setting on a stove top burner)

fry until golden brown on one side then flip 'em over and fry until they're golden brown the other (about 7 mins per side, depending on the heat, more or less)

remove and place on a double paper toweled covered plate (to cool and let the excess oil drain)

How to Eat 'em:

depending on your tastes, you can use different types of dips w/ your lumpia...

our family used to crush a few garlic cloves and mix 'em with 2 tablespoons of vinegar and one tbls of soy sauce (we called this "sow-sow").

my current family likes that sweet-n-sour dipping sauce you can pick up at any supermarket in the asian food area.

some of my in-laws like dipping them in that spicy banana ketchup stuff which you can also find @ those asian stores...

How to Store 'em:

If UR gonna fry them up and eat 'em today, g'head & store 'em in the fridge...

Otherwise, store them uncooked in ziplocked bags in the freezer... they should keep for a couple of mos or so...

that's it! Enjoy!