"Country" Chicken with Unnecessary Quotes

 

 Suzie So

Serving size: 3-4

• your meat: 6-8 oz per person
• 2 cans of cream of chicken
• 1 can of cream of mushroom
• 10-12 oz mixed frozen veggies (diced carrots, peas, green beans, and corn)
• 1 teaspoon of garlic powder
• 1 can of pillsbury (flaky kind) biscuits (or rice)

you can prep it two ways

1, in the oven at 400 degrees, pour everything into a baking tray, and bake for 20-30 minutes

2. on the stove, medium-high, bring to a bubbling state and then simmer. making sure to stir so that the bottom doesn't burn

FOR THE CHICKEN:

you can use either chicken breast or chicken thigh.

IF YOU USE CHICKEN BREAST,

brine (1/4 kosher salt, 1/4 white sugar, 3 cups water) for 3 or more hours

butterfly the chicken breast

lightly flour, and cook on the pan with some butter at medium heat

serve either whole or large pieces

you can use a thermometer for chicken (supposed to be 150 final temp)

IF YOU USE CHICKEN THIGH,

you can salt the chicken thigh and either

lay on top of the mixture if you use the oven method

or cook on a pan.

口水雞 (mouth watering chicken a.k.a saliva chicken)

Chicken (prepared):

1 lbs chicken, prepared however you like it (traditionally steamed bone in skin on chicken breast cut into 1" cubes- chicken breast is preferred because it tastes like nothing and allows you to taste more of the sauce).  This might be a good place to use rotisserie chicken breast.

Preferred: sous vide, brined chicken breast cooked to 150F.  It will not need searing as it will be served cold and caramelization will interfere with the sauce flavor.

 Sauce:

2-3 tbsp chili oil (depending on strength of the oil/desired spiciness)

1 tbsp soy sauce (if serving with salted or brined chicken: add up to an additional 1 tbsp if using unsalted chicken for some strange reason, but I don't know why you would have cooked it that way...)

1 tbsp sugar (or the same amount as the soy sauce if you modify that to taste)

1 tsp rice wine

1 green onion, sliced paper thin

.5" grated ginger

1 garlic clove, crushed

t tsp sesame seeds

Optional: 1/2 tsp black vinegar

Optional: 1 tsp sesame paste

Optional: Cilantro to taste

Mix the soy sauce, rice wine, and sugar so that the sugar dissolves (cook lightly if you want to get rid of all the alcohol, or leave in the alcohol to give your tongue an interesting sensation).  Add the chili oil.  Mix in the green onion whites, ginger, and garlic.

Plate the chicken in a shallow vessel and pour the sauce over.  Garnish with the green onion greens and sesame seeds.  If using cilantro, add it now on top (i.e. don't soggify it with the sauce: that is t3h newbs)

If you want to add some acid to the dish, mix the vinegar in when you're mixing the soy sauce and rice wine.  If you want to use sesame paste (which makes this more like 棒棒雞 when combined with dark meat) mix it in at the same point as you add the chili oil.

dan dan noodles

8 oz fresh noodles

2 TB chili oil

1TB soy sauce

1 TB shao xing rice wine

1 cup broth (such as the blowtorched fish sauce broth or white bone broth or just use MSG)

1 t tahini sesame paste

1 t gochu jiang

2 cloves garlic

.5 inch ginger, minced

4 oz ground pork

optional:

2 stalks green onion, finely sliced for garnish

-Boil salted water for the noodles

-In a mixing bowl, whisk the chili oil, gochu jiang, and tahini to make an emulsified spicy death paste.  Add the garlic and ginger.

-Boil the 1 cup broth with the rice wine until you've boiled out the alcohol.  You may need to adjust the salt level depending on the sodium content of your specific rice wine/soy sauce (i.e. taste it and either dilute it with water or add salt).  The final total volume should be between .75-1 cup.

-Marinate the ground pork in the 1TB soy sauce for at least 15 minutes.  Stir fry it into meaty crispies.

When the noodles are done, mix into the spicy death paste directly out from the water.  Pour in the broth/wine mixture.  Top with ground pork and green onion.  Drizzle with additional chili oil if feeling like you want to nuke your face off.  Add noodle water if necessary- the consistency should be something a little richer than milk, but not as thin as soup.

If you want to make this vegan, skip the pork and use dried shitake broth.

Pork in milk

• Brine the pork loin for at least a day.  It needs all the help it can get.
• Preheat oven to 300F (or get your sous vide ready)
• Bring 4 cups whole milk to a boil and add .5 cup lemon juice (2 big lemons).  It will curdle, but you'll blend it together once the dish is finished.
• Wash the brine off of the pork and stick it in a cooking vessel with the curdly milk stuff.  Use a cooking vessel that is similar in shape to the loin.  Make sure the milk will cover the pork loin.  Add about 10 fresh tarragon leaves.  If using sous vide, stick all that junk in a bag and toss into the water bath.
• Cook until pork reaches 140F (or to whatever temperature you believe is safe.  If using sous vide, I'd have the temp at 138-148f)

After the pork is done, drain the liquid off.  Brown the pork loin with a blowtorch, grill, or under the broiler.  Take out the tarragon leaves and blend the remaining liquid until you get a creamy sauce.  If you sous vide the pork, you're going to have to take all the liquid out and boil at high heat until reduced to half, then blend it.  While the meat is easier to make in the sous vide without screwing up, you'll miss out on all the subtle caramelization of the milk proteins in the oven if you had braised it.

Cut the pork loin into chops, keeping the the slices somewhat together.  Pour half the sauce on a long plate and arrange the chops on the sauce.  Then pour the remaining sauce on top in an aesthetically pleasing fashion.  Garnish with parsley (or don't, whatever).

Marinara, again

-Recipe is per pound of pasta (8 light servings, 6 adult servings, or 4 big boy servings).

-Use spaghetti or thinner noodle- thinner pastas = more surface area for sauce.  Cook the pasta only once the sauce is ready, as you want to toss the hot pasta into the sauce immediately when ready (washing the pasta is the best way to guarantee your sauce slides off your noodles and onto your plate, so don't do it).  Undercook pasta slightly (al dente) because it will continue to cook and absorb liquid from the pasta sauce.  Doing these two things is probably as, if not more, important than having a decent tasting sauce.  The reason a lot of marinara cooked at home is bad is that you can't get any of it onto your noodles since there isn't any starch to stick to.  Or, the pasta is too thick or overcooked.

-1 x 28 oz can whole peeled tomato

-1 tbsp tomato paste

-1 tbsp balsamic vinegar

-.25 cup olive oil + 2tbsp for finishing(first cold pressed extra virgin- fruity and peppery leaning one is better)

-4 garlic cloves, whole

-salt, pepper, and more olive oil to taste

OPTIONAL: 2 tablespoons julienned sun dried tomatoes, packed in oil

OPTIONAL: 1 tablespoon fish sauce (instead of salt).  This will add the umami like anchovies do in some other people's recipes.  If you're not intentionally trying to make this vegan, this is recommended.  If you want to add vegan umami, try adding some kelp and dried mushroom to the tomato juice when it's reducing, but pull it out before you add the whole tomatoes.

OPTIONAL: basil leaves, as needed.  OR, just use 1 tablespoon of dried oregano, since dried basil tastes like nothing.

• Crush the cloves in the skin, then discard the skin
• Heat oil with garlic under low heat, getting the oil slightly foamy (but not browning the garlic).  Add freshly ground pepper at this stage if you want pepper flavor throughout the sauce.
• Add the juice from the tomatoes, the balsamic vinegar, and the tomato paste and allow to simmer for about 10 minutes to reduce on medium heat.   Add the oregano, if using, at this stage.  Add the fish sauce, if using, at this stage.  The oil should turn kind of orangeish, otherwise the final sauce may be very pale and unappetizing
• Add the whole tomatoes and simmer through for an additional 10 minutes
• Take off from heat.  Blend it all with a stick blender.  Salt and pepper to taste.  If you don't have a stick blender, you could have crushed the tomatoes by hand before adding in the previous step.
• Boil pasta.  When it has just the faintest amount of unpleasant bite to it, take the noodles out and put immediately in the sauce.  You stop cooking it not when it's the texture you want, but slightly before it's the texture you want, because it's going to keep cooking.
• Drizzle final dish with more olive oil.  Add grated parm if you want.

If using, add the sundried tomatoes after blending.  Also add basil at this point, if using.  I found out after visiting Milan that the reason most traditional recipes call for only a couple basil leaves is that Italian basil tastes like a deathstar laser of herby goodness.  American "Italian" basil will probably require x4 or x5 the quantity for the same effect.

[make]new Italian menu

Menu:

Salmorejo
Vegetarian Marinara
Basic Marinara + Meat Sauce
Roasted Broccoli
Gorgonzola Alfredo

Bread (?)


Salmorejo:

1 whole can San Marzano tomato (28 oz)
1 cup olive oil
.5 small white onion, diced
1 clove garlic
8 oz el cheapo white bread (if you can find vegan version, then this dish is vegan)
4 eggs, poached however you want
Optional: 4 oz bacon, crisped(ideally, some kind of cured, not cooked pork like jamon iberico, but that's okay... no meat it's fine)

-Combine liquid from tomatoes, olive oil, and white onion.  Bring to a simmer for about 5-10 minutes or until oil is tinged orange and onion is translucent.

-Add tomatoes, minced garlic, and bread and allow mixture to sit (ideally about an hour).  Blend thoroughly, pass through sieve to remove chunks if time allows for smoother final product.  Season with salt.

-If using, crisp the bacon to desired doneness.

-To serve, put a poached egg in 1/4 of the soup topped with pork product if using.


Basic Marinara:

1 lbs angel hair (or some other thinner noodle: spaghetti is maximum thickness pasta recomended)
8 oz spinach
1 can San Marzano tomatoes (28 oz)
.25 cup olive oil
1 tablespoon tomato paste
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
4 cloves garlic
Optional: 8-10 basil leaves
Optional: 1 tube-o-meat (supermarket sausage canister)

-Get lots of water boiling, salted.  You will both blanch the spinach and cook the pasta in this.

-Bring the tomatoes plus juices, olive oil, balsamic vinegar, and garlic to a boil.  Simmer for 15 minutes or until slightly reduced.  Add tomato paste and cook until thickened.  Blend thoroughly.

-If using meat, brown in a skillet or wok or whatever over medium/high heat.  Combine with marinara.  Add the fat: it helps make ppl full. 

-Meanwhile, blanch the spinach.  Combine with the sauce at the very end: do not overcook.

-Boil the pasta.  Note: if using angel hair, it will cook extremely quickly.  Have the sauce ready before the pasta is done so that you can strain it, then immediately combine with the sauce.  The reason for this is that the noodles are most receptive to sauce straight out of the sticky pasta water: especially for a marinara, you need all the help that you can get so that the sauce sticks to the pasta.

Gorgonzola Alfredo:
ute
1 lbs thicker pasta (fettuccine is ideal, linguine is okay, anything thinner will not work so great)

3 tablespoons butter
4 tablespoons flour, sifted (i.e. 3 packed tablespoons)
(OR if you want to do butter/flour by weight, since its more reliable, its 50 grams each butter and all purpose flour)
2 cups milk, warmed up in the microwave (lukewarm)
.5 lbs gorgonzola or roquefort cheese

-Make the roux.  While whisking, heat the butter and flour until it makes a very uniform, wet looking paste.  Do not brown it.

-As soon as the roux is combined, begin adding the milk while whisking.  Add it in incremental amounts, whisking thoroughly, otherwise the sauce will become clumpy and may burn.

-Once all the milk is added, simmer until it thickens, about 15 minutes.

-Turn the heat off the sauce.  Add the cheese and whisk in thoroughly.  Try not to destroy all the delicate flavors (this is why this should be done off heat).

-Meanwhile, boil the pasta.  As soon as it is done, combine it with the ready sauce


Roasted Broccoli:

Cut broccoli into bite sized pieces.  Saute on oiled skillets until charred on all sides.  Salt to taste.

[make]new Friday Meal for 2017.08.25

For 50 people:

Coffee braised pork:

25 lbs boneless pork shoulder meat (30 lbs bone in)

1.25 cup instant coffee

80 cloves garlic, smashed (do the metal bowl trick to peel!)

2.5 cups pack dark brown sugar

Collard Greens:

3 lbs bacon

6 TB apple cider vinegar

12 lbs collard greens

12 cloves garlic, minced

Cauliflower:

12 heads

-have someone make 25 cups of rice.  Brown or long grain preferred.

-Preheat oven to 500F

-Combine insant coffee, smashed garlic, and some water in pressure cooker

-If necessary, debone pork

-Cube pork to 1.5" pieces.  Salt and let rest

-When pork has absorbed salt, add to pressure cooker.  Add hot water until almost covering.  Lock lid and pressurize.  Pork should be cooked at high pressure for 20 minutes, natural release.

-Meanwhile, quarter cauliflower and remove the thick stem, trimming to edible pieces.  Put in a single layer in a baking tray and salt.  Drizzle with vegetable oil

-Roast for 30-45 minutes at 500 or until spotty and tender

-When cauliflower is done, switch oven to broiler, maximum heat

-Meanwhile, cut bacon into 1/8" matchsticks.  Render in a large pot on medium low heat.

-Twist off the thick stalk of the collard greens and discard.  Chop the leaves into fourths, (about 2" segments.)

-When bacon is completely rendered, turn heat to high and add all the greens

-When liquid has boiled off, deglaze the bottom of the pan with apple cider vinegar.

-After deglazing, cook on low-medium heat, covered, until tender.  Adjust salt.

-After pressure cooker is depressurized, strain liquid into a pan on the stove top, add dark brown sugar, and reduce until very thick and coats back of spoon.

-Meanwhile, arrange pork in a single layer in a tray.  Place under broiler until crispy and sizzling.

-When sauce is reduced, drizzle over the pork and put back under broiler to glaze.  Blow torch if necessary.

Ma Po 2.0

Ma Po Tofu mass-consumption version

• 1 brick of silken tofu (16-20oz), cubed into 10mm (see below).  Firmer tofu is for n00bs
• .5C  dried shiitake broth made with 4 sliced shiitakes.  For extra flavor, use rice wine instead of water as the liquid base.
• 1TB cornstarch
• 2 TB oil
• 1TB crushed red chili flakes
• 2t sichuan peppercorns, toasted and finely ground
• 2TB soy sauce
• 1t fish sauce
• 1TB 辣豆瓣醬 (Chinese spicy chili broad bean paste, recommend donkey sauce)
• 1TB korean red pepper paste (substitute 1 TB red miso + 1 TB dark brown sugar if less spicy version desired)
• 1TB fermented black beans, rinsed of grit
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 2 green onions, whites and greens separated
• .5" minced ginger

The tofu
To cut the tofu: first cut the top plastic film off using scissors.  Then , cut off one of the bottom corners of the tofu box.  Place a small cutting board on top of the tofu box and then invert: now that you've just cut a vent, you should be able to pull the box off of the tofu without breaking the brick (save the box).  You'll probably need to do two cuts parallel to the cutting board plane to split it into thirds: this is the most annoying part: if you find it too annoying, just do one cut to split it in half (newb).  Then, cut the tofu from the top into 10mm squares: err on the side of smaller, being careful to keep all the pieces together.  Get that box you saved and put it back on top of the now cubed tofu, invert, and now your tofu will be MUCH easier to work with now that it's in a vented box.

The rest
-Mix 1 tablespoon soy sauce and 1 tablespoon cornstarch with the ground pork and rehydrated mushrooms.

 -Heat the oil with the peppercorns on medium high heat.  After 30 seconds or when fragrant, add the chili flakes and cook until the oil is red and the chili flakes are darkened but not burnt (this can be tricky...).  When the chili flakes look done, scoop all the solids out with a strainer and set them aside: don't worry about being too thorough.

-Add the garlic, green onion whites, black beans, and chili bean paste and cook until fragrant, about 30 seconds to a minute.

-Add the mushroom broth, rest of the soy sauce, ginger, fish sauce, and korean pepper paste and stir until uniform.  Heat through until thick, then gently add the tofu which should be easy now that it's in that neat little box and should drop without too much effort because of that vent.  Using a broad, flat, soft object (i.e. wooden spatula) very gently stir the tofu into the sauce and simmer for 1 or 2 minutes.

-Meanwhile, stir fry the marinated pork in a lightly oiled wok, breaking it up into tiny pieces.  You should fry the junk out of them into meaty crispies.

To serve, pour tofu mixture into serving vessel (or serve out of your cooking pot) and put the super meaty crispies on top- don't mix them in so they stay crispy.  Finish off with sliced green onion greens.

Toasted Twinkie Shake del Diablo! (666 Calories!)

The twinkie may be replaced with 1/8 nations pie (banana cream, lemon meringue recommended) to transform the shake into the Dino Ultra Megazord.  I mean pie shake.

8 oz vanilla ice cream (456)
4 oz (weight) whole milk (68)
1 toasted twinkie (135)
.5 tsp vanilla extract (6)

OPTIONAL: .25c Whipped cream (32)

Good thing we're not superstitious here, as the calorie count is exactly 666 kcal according to fatsecret.com.  Be sure to add the whipped cream to avoid random curses.  Add another 4ml whipped cream to bring the kcal count up to a nice, Biblical 700.

-Toast twinkie at 400F for 10 minutes, flat side down.
-Meanwhile, in a wide mouth mason jar, blend milk, ice cream, and vanilla extract with a stick blender or egg beater.  Make sure to beat in some air so that it's fluffy.
-Insert toasted twinkie into the milkshake.  Blend with one pass on low speed so as not to completely puree the twinkie- it ought to be a little chunky
-Top with whipped cream, if using, and serve out of the jar with a long spoon.  PS Don't tell the sisters.

Pork Adobo (beta)

Requires pressure cooker!

2 lbs pork shoulder meat, 1.5-2" cubes.  More fat is better.  Pork belly also works if you want to die in a fatty blaze of glory.

1 whole head garlic, peeled and smashed (use the super cool metal bowl trick to do this in 30 sec)
.25 cup soy sauce
.5 cup rice vinegar
2 tablespoons fish sauce
.25 cup dark brown sugar
2 bay leaves
1 teaspoon whole black peppercorn

OPTIONAL: 4 peeled soft boiled eggs

-Salt the pork cubes
-Toast bay leaves and peppercorns lightly in the dry pressure cooker.
-Add vinegar, soy sauce, fish sauce, and sugar and bring to a boil.
-Add the garlic and pork.  Bring up to 15 psi for 20 minutes
-Relieve pressure and transfer the pork and garlic to something that works under the broiler.  Heat broiler on high and crisp the pork under the broiler until just charring, 5-10 minutes
-While pork and garlic are crisping,  reduce the braising liquid in until very thick and coats the back of a spoon
-Coat pork/garlic in thickened sauce, and blowtorch or broil again until crisp
IF USING EGGS- roll them around in the sauce after glazing the pork.

Serve with rice.  This should feed about 4 people as a protein component of a multi-course meal.  Or it could be a morbidly obese dude's appetizer.

How to roast beef

¹⁰ For whoever keeps the whole law but fails in one point has become accountable for all of it. ¹¹ For he who said, “Do not commit adultery,” also said, “Do not murder.” If you do not commit adultery but do murder, you have become a transgressor of the law.
-James 2:10-11

I like this verse first of all because it's important in ministering to people to convict them of their sin and need for the cross.

Second, it is illustrative of how you are to follow recipes.  Anyone who breaks one part of the recipe is guilty of breaking it all!

The Beef Roasting Recipe Laws
-You shall not buy meat of lower quality than sirloin tip for dry-roasting.  You shall not purchase a chuck roast, a 7 bone roast, or a cross rib and attempt to use "this Korean marinade from my mom" that can make said unpalatable roasts chewable and try to use the rest of the recipe.
-You shall not use any salt other than diamond crystal kosher salt, for diamond crystal kosher salt is consistent and tasty
-You shall not roast the meat at a temperature other than specified
-You shall not cut into the meat until it has rested at least 15 minutes bare minimum
-You shall not roast meat in bricks larger than 6 pounds, ideally 5.  For greater quantities of meat, you shall simply divide the roast into smaller sections, giving each roast at least 2 inches of breathing space in the oven, and using multiple ovens should this not be possible.
-You shall not roast without a digital instant read thermometer
-You shall not ask me how long to roast X piece of meat at Y temperature if its Z pounds

Now, here is the recipe for a 5 pound roast, which ought to feed 8-12 ish people.  My favorite meat to roast (not that I can eat it...) is sirloin, since it has a good balance of flavor and tenderness for the price.  If you are filthy rich, this technique works for a prime rib roast.

At least 30 minutes ahead of time, but ideally 24 hours ahead of time, salt the meat generously with kosher salt.  It should be something like 5 grams per pound a.k.a a teaspoon of DCK salt.  Using a lot of salt way before does two things- evenly distributing seasoning, and decreasing cook time from increased thermal conductivity of the meat.  You can leave the meat out at room temperature- this will decrease cooking time dramatically.

Preheat oven to 275F.  This will ensure a very, very uniform color in the meat.

Blow-torch the meat.  You don't need it to get brown, you just need it to start rendering out some of its own fat.  Alternatively, you can sear in a pan with 50% butter and oil, but I don't like doing that because it's messy.  I don't mess with high heat oven searing- too unpredictable.

Stick the sucker in the oven.  At around the 1.5 hour mark, start checking the temperature using a digital instant read thermometer.  Try to aim for the center and find the coldest spot.  Be warned- once the roast gets to the 100 degree mark it finishes pretty fast (i.e. internal temperature does not go up linearly with time).

When the instant read says 120 for bleu/rare, 128 for medium rare (recommended), or 135 for medium done, take the meat out and loosely cover with a bit of foil.  OR, if you're feeling extra special, lather buerre monte all over the meat.

Once the meat has rested, ideally for around 30 minutes, slice against the grain and serve however you like.  Note: if your slicer takes more than one forward and back stroke to cut the meat, your slicer needs sharpening.

Olive oil mashed potatoes

Use unflavored boxed potato flakes such as Idaho spuds.  They don't taste like potatoes, they taste like nothing- this is why they are the perfect vehicle for eating absurd amounts of good quality olive oil.

~14oz box of potato flakes
1x bottle good olive oil (I use Berkeley Bowl extra virgin organic)
2 tablespoons diamond crystal kosher salt
OPTIONAL: 2 tablespoons toasted oregano

Boil about half gallon of water.  Mix 4 cups water with the salt and add to the entire package of potato flakes.  Mix it together- it should make a kind of crumbly paste.  Mix in about 2 cups of olive oil or until the potatoes taste as much like olive oil as you feel comfortable (I will sometimes put in 90% of a bottle).  If it still looks lumpy, add more boiling water a little at a time until the consistency is satisfactory- probably about an additional 2 cups depending on how much olive oil you did or did not use.  Adjust seasoning with more salt.

If using the oregano, toast it in a dry skillet and add immediately to the potatoes.  I usually only do this if I am short on olive oil and need more flavor (i.e. it's too expensive to buy as much olive oil as I want)

Put an oven rack at the top and preheat the broiler.
Line a halfsheet pan with aluminum foil.  Spread the mashed potato mixture into the pan.  Use a fork to create troughs and valleys to expose more surface area (this is so it develops a crispier texture).  Drizzle the whole thing with more olive oil.  Broil until the whole thing is golden brown at the peaks.  You may have to adjust your oven rack height or broiler temperature if the peaks burn before the rest of the potatoes get golden.  If broiling doesn't seem to be working for you, you can put in a 500F oven until it looks delicious (dark brown peaks, golden brown surface, sizzling and delicious looking).  To serve, sprinkle finely minced Italian parsley over the thing and drizzle with yet more olive oil.

Another name for this dish could be "stupid big pile of olive oil."  Yes, it's not that cheap.

潑辣魚 (1,000 chili fish soup)

This is the dish at China Village with some modifications to make it tastier according to me.  I'm including instructions on how I get my white, opaque chicken broth which is the key ingredient to this dish.

Stuff
+1.5-2 lbs swai fillet (or rex sole)
+1 TB cornstarch
+1 x 7 oz package of shirataki, drained and rinsed (the real stuff, not the tofu noodles at Safeway)
+1 cup of dried Sichuan red chilis
+2 green onions cut into 4" strips
+.5 inch ginger cut into discs
+2 cloves garlic, smashed
+4 cups of opaque white chicken broth, recipe follows
+.25 cups white rice wine

Process
In a large claypot, heat one tablespoon of canola oil with the green onions, ginger, and garlic until all are browned and the vegetables are very fragrant, about 1-2 minutes.  Add the broth and rice wine and boil for 15 minutes.

While the broth is boiling, cut the fish into thin slices (about 3mm)following the angle of the segments and cutting with the grain.  Salt the fish.  Once the salt is absorbed, coat in 1 TB of cornstarch

Strain out the aromatics from the broth.  Season with salt (probably need about 1 TB of DCK).  Add the shirataki and boil for another 5 minutes.  Add the fish and turn the heat to low, stirring until the fish has just turned color.  Be mindful of the mass of your cooking vessel and estimate how much carry over cooking is going to occur.

Meanwhile, dry toast the dried chilis until all are blistered, darkened, and extremely aromatic (this may hurt).  Add the chilis on top of the soup and close the lid of the claypot.  Wait for about 5 minutes.*

To serve, bring to the table, remove the lid, and using chopsticks and a ladle, remove the chilis to the lid.

Soup should have the fragrance of chilis and a slight, back of the throat spice.

*I'm still figuring this part out.  I know if you boil them with the soup, it gets nuclear hot.  I also know that if you steep them in the finished soup for less than 2 minutes, none of the fragrance enters the soup.  This is the difficult part that requires secret kitchen kung fu.  If you figure it out, let me know.

To make the chicken broth:

-at least 1 chicken carcass and any skin you don't want
-crapload of water

Roast the bones in an oven proof pot at 450 degrees for 1 hour.  Cover in water and bring to a boil for 5 minutes- take this stock, strain, skim, reduce, and use for something else (this is closer to a French stock that is clear and roasty in flavor).  If you don't mind your 潑辣魚 tasting like that, you can just keep boiling and follow directions below.

Add water to the bones again and boil them for an hour.  Strain and skim this broth and reduce it on its own.  Add more water to the bones and repeat.  This lets you get opaque broth faster, as the rate of reaction slows down when you approach super-saturated stock.  Combine both of the opaque stocks and reduce together- it should be very milky and taste very rich.  You'll end up with about 1 quart of stock per carcass.

宮保雞丁 1.1 (Kung Pao Chicken 1.1)

You can have fun going crazy figuring out what's different- I've probably made this dish with another 30 pounds of chicken and am putting some fine adjustments on it now.  I've tried using peanut butter, whole chilis, crushed chilis, toasted and non-toasted spices, etc.

I think this is as good as its going to get without a revolution in my approach.

The stuff

• 1-1.5 pound boneless skinless chicken breast, cubed to L = 15mm, brined.  If you're not sure what 15mm looks like, get a ruler.  This dish works with pieces up to 1" cube in size.
• 1/3c coarse crushed peanuts, roasted (see below)

 Sauce stuff

• 2 green onions, whites thinly sliced oblique and greens reserved for garnish
• 2 garlic cloves minced
• .5" ginger, grated
• 2 TB soy
• 2 TB 紹興酒 Shao xing rice wine
• 2 TB dark brown sugar, packed
• 1+1 TB lemon juice, divided (Using a sour grapefruit also works)
• 2 TB crushed red chilis
• 1 TB 花椒 (Sichuan peppercorns)
• OPTIONAL: zest of a half a lemon (or grapefruit zest if using for the acid)

-To get peanuts roasted, dry toast in a wok or skillet on medium heat until fragrant.  Or, put in a 350F oven, stirring every 5 minutes, for a total of 15 minutes, or until fragrant.

-Dry toast the peppercorns until fragrant, then remove.  Do the same to the crushed chilis.  Take both and grind in a spice grinder until very fine.  Warning: this step may make you want to die from the volatile fumes.

-Once chicken is brined, thoroughly wash chicken and drain.  Mix with just enough cornstarch that the chicken starts sticking to itself, probably 2 to 3 tablespoons.  You should err on the side of too much starch- during this step, you really need a "batter" as opposed to a coating so that the pancake maintains its integrity for flipping.  This allows an otherwise impossible thing to do without sauteing the breast whole- establishing a flavorful crust.

-Heat a well seasoned wok with about 1 tablespoon of cooking oil until shimmering.  Add the garlic and green onion whites and cook until fragrant, about 30 seconds.  Add the chicken and spread out into a single layered "pancake" (if your wok is small, divide the chicken into appropriate sized batches).  Cook for about 2 minutes or until you can see the chicken start turning white from cooking up to about a third of the thickness.  Shake the wok to make sure the pancake is loose- if it isn't, gently use the spatula to loosen trouble spots until the whole thing is sliding around your wok like a giant puck. Flip the pancake (or slide the chicken out onto a plate and flip the whole assembly back into the wok uncooked side down).  Cook another 2 minutes or until this side starts showing white coming up the sides of the chicken as well.  Break the pancake with the spatula and then wait for another 30 seconds for the freshly exposed starch to set.  Toss in the wok until the chicken is just tinged pink in most areas, about another minute or two.  Reserve chicken.  You want it slightly undercooked (90% ish) so that rolling it around in the extremely hot kung pao caramel will bring it to perfectly cooked.

-Heat the sauce ingredients excluding the 1 reserved tablespoon of lemon juice on high until it turns into a very thick, dark caramel with lots of small bubbles forming.  Add the ground chilis/peppercorns.  You want this to be REALLY thick because the juices and oil on the exterior of the chicken will dilute the sauce when you mix it.  Add the chicken, half of the peanuts, and remaining lemon juice and coat the chicken and finish cooking it, about another 30 seconds to a minute.  Plate the chicken, sprinkle with remaining roasted peanuts and green onion greens and serve immediately.

Basic Gumbo, Beta v0.1

There's a part of me that chuckles slightly when I see a "gumbo" without any roux.  Funny thing is you make gumbo pretty much the same way you make Japanese curry from scratch- this is an area that is under development.  Warning: this is even more labor intensive than the other dishes I make that people complain about, though if you have students with you a lot of the labor is unskilled.

Protein:
1 x whole chicken, about 6-ish lbs. prepared*
1 lbs andouille sausage or other smokey, cheap sausage

Roux:
Generous .5 cup APF, (or 75g)
Oil as necessary (will combine with sausage drippings: total should be .5c)

Other:
2 celery ribs
1 medium yellow onion
.5 green bell pepper
1-2 quart stock**
1 tsp dried thyme
.5 tsp dried basil
1 tsp cayenne
 2 green onions sliced thin
Salt
Blackpepper


Chicken: *Preferably the day before: Brine the chicken. and poach OR pressure cook the thing until its done: breast should be at 155 final temp, so you want to pull out at 145.  If you are pressure cooking, do under high pressure for about 15 minutes- the brine increases the internal heat transfer coefficients.

Once the chicken is cooked, reserve the skin and shred the meat (don't turn it into sawdust, just pull it apart so it's not giant bricks).  If you get some undercooked pieces near the dark meat that's fine- just set them aside for now.  If you like (I do), roast the bones and make chicken stock for the rest of the gumbo (if you're lazy use this).  Take the skin and cook it under low heat to make chicken skin cracklings for garnish.  Yes, you can use a Costco rotisserie chicken in a pinch and this dish becomes a lot more manageable, but it's not going to taste like mine.

Roux: Dice the onions, bell pepper, and celery (we're going to blend this gravy eventually so don't worry about making it look nice).  Get your stock boiling.  Slice the sausages into .25" discs and fry them under medium-low to render the delicious smoky fat. Reserve sausages.  Add enough oil so that you will have .5c oil in the pan.  Heat it until it smokes, then add the flour and whisk together.  Cook while continuously whisking until you get a very dark roux: I prefer to take it off heat when it looks like melted chocolate so that the carry over cooking takes it to very, very dark red-brown.  If you're not sure on this part you can look it up online somewhere- you can do it faster under higher heat but the risk of burning it is higher.  BTW you should realize at this point that if you use teflon pans this dish isn't possible to make.

As soon as the roux is the right color, including carry over, add the onion and dried spices and return to medium heat until the onions caramelize.  Add the bell pepper and celery and cook until everything is soft.  Remove from heat and allow to cool.  Use an immersion blender or food mill to puree the gravy.  Add 1 quart of stock slowly while blending, (or whisking if you used a food mill) so that you get a nice smooth texture.
**Depending on whether you want a thick gumbo that's more like a sauce or a thinner one more like a soup, add up to an additional quart of stock.

Return the sausage to the gravy and heat through.  Salt and pepper to taste.

To serve: put some steamed long grain rice in a bowl and then invert this bowl into a shallow dish to get a neat mound of rice in the middle.  Pour the gumbo all around the rice.  Add the shredded chicken all around the plate, mixing white and dark meat.  Garnish with the sliced green onion and chicken skin cracklings.  Serve with Tobasco or Frank's (or some other sour hot sauce- it's to offset the fat).

You can stretch this out further by adding a poached or fried egg on top of the rice sprinkled with some salt and/or a small pat of butter.

Baconara 2.0 (cheeseless carbonara, no cheese carbonara)

While it's mainly a technique update, the sauce texture is so much *reliably* improved from the previous iteration I think it merits an uprev.  My last version is good and all, but it was extremely difficult to get the appropriate level of "sauciness" out of the eggs- even when I was testing the old recipe regularly, I would have something like a 75% success rate.  

Inspired by, of all things, a cheesecake recipe involving tofu.  I'm also working on a vegetarian version using this emulsion technique with olive oil in place of bacon grease.  Don't worry, this dish doesn't use tofu, nor is it vegetarian.  It uses a pound of bacon and you eat all of the fat.  YES!

As to "why?" I say, "why not?"  No cheese in this carbonara spin off lets you taste the bacon and eggs all the more clearly.  Parmigiano, while extremely delicious, gets in the way of tasting that all-time classic smoky + yolky + mapley taste that any marvelously obese American knows about from the breakfast table.

1 lbs pasta (recommend spaghetti.  Spoonable pastas make this interesting too: e.g. "macaroni without cheese" is possible)
1 lbs bacon
6 eggs, yolks and whites separated
.5 cup frozen peas*
4 cloves garlic, minced
1 TB coarse ground black pepper
1 TB kosher salt (tested using diamond crystal)
1 TB pure maple syrup
2 TB apple cider vinegar, divided


Get water for cooking pasta boiling salted at 2 TB DCKS per gallon.  You probably only really need a quart if you're trying to do this fast.

Cut your bacon into slivers, about 1/4" long.  Fry until fat is rendered and bacon is completely crisped.  Don't worry, the fat's getting added back to the sauce: it's more important for texture accent that the bacon be very crisp.

Meanwhile, put the egg whites into a metal bowl with the maple syrup, minced garlic, and 1 TB of the vinegar.

Reserve the bacon, add the black pepper and cook until fragrant.  Use the other 1 TB of vinegar to deglaze the pan and cook until acid is gone.

Pour the bacon fat mixture into the egg whites- don't worry if it cooks a little.  Put the pasta in the boiling water.  Set the metal bowl over the pasta water, turning it into a double boiler. Stir the eggs as the bowl heats until the white just starts to set, then remove from the heat.  You'll get a clumpy white mess of egg white and grease that should be just barely runny.  Take this mess and puree it until very smooth.  I prefer to use an immersion blender.  It should look something like mayonnaise when you're done.  If it's too liquidy, return it to the bain marie and reblend it.  If it's too thick, you can dilute with pasta water (so long as its not too hot).  I've recently been messing with a puree sieve and a tamis, which yield astoundingly good textures, but I'm guessing most of y'all don't have those: the immersion blender should be plenty good anyways.

Add the frozen peas to the egg white puree.

As soon as the pasta is done After letting the pasta cool down for a good two minutes such that it won't cook the egg white, toss the pasta with the egg white/bacon puree and the peas if using.  Add the yolks to the pasta.  Add pasta water a tablespoon at a time and toss until you get a smooth, velvety sauce (probably .25 cups total).  Plate the pasta and top with the bacon, tossing briefly just before serving.

If you want to serve with whole yolks: mix the egg white puree plus peas with the pasta and get that creamy with pasta water as above.  Plate individual servings, swirling the noodles in one direction if using a stringy pasta to make a little nest  in the center of the plate (or just piling the pasta with a crater in the middle if using non-stringy pasta).  Deposit yolk in the nest and sprinkle bacon all around the centered yolks.  Tip: I use Chinese soup spoons to store the yolks while I'm doing everything else- keeps them ready to deposit on the final dishes when plating.

*For those who hate peas: try using minced Italian parsley as a garnish, though I really think the crisp *pop* of properly cooked peas add a whole lot to this dish past the green color.

Coffee braised pork

Braise:
1.5-2 lbs pork shoulder cut to 1" cube
2 TB instant coffee
.25 cup dark brown sugar
1 head of garlic (8-10 cloves), peeled.
1 cup warm water

Creme Fraiche:
1 cup cream
2 TB buttermilk with active culture

Parsley Mint Oil:
1 bunch flat leaf parsley
1 bunch mint
~.5 to 1 cup oil

The flavor combo of coffee and mint comes from Philz.  The idea of putting pork in there comes from the higher-end dim sum places that typically offer coffee spare-ribs.  The overall structure of the recipe is heavily inspired by Charles Phan's claypot pork.

At least a day before, mix the cream and buttermilk and allow to sit in a non-reactive container somewhere until thick.  Salt and pepper the pork.  Dust the pork with flour.  Brown the pork in 50/50 butter oil (about 1 TB each in a normal sized pan).  Meanwhile, mix the coffee powder into the warm water.  Make a parchment lid that fits your cooking vessel.  Add the garlic to the pan once you are about 50% done with browning the pork and allow to fry as you finish browning.  Add the sugar to the pan and allow to caramelize into a very dark, very thick, not-quite-black sauce.  Immediately add the coffee mixture and deglaze the pan.  Put the parchment lid on the pan.  Simmer until tender, 30-45 minutes, turning the meat over halfway through cooking or put in the oven at 300F for about the same amount of time.  While the meat is braising, prepare the oil: twist off the thick stems of the parsley and mint.  Blend with .5 cup oil, adding just enough to allow the mixture to puree (depends on your blender: less oil is better).  Once the braise is tender, reduce the liquid if necessary until it coats the pork well without running off.

Serve with creme fraiche and garnish with the oil and puree.

蒜泥白肉 (Pork belly slices with garlic sauce)

Protein:
1 lbs pork belly

Sauce:
3 TB soy sauce
2-4 TB chili oil
6 cloves garlic, minced
.5 teaspoon Chinese black vinegar
.25 teaspoon raw rice wine
1 teaspoon Korean red pepper paste

-This dish is mainly about the sauce.  You can substitute a leaner meat and it will taste pretty good: I like using a roasted pork loin and calling the dish 蒜泥白人 (because of the western style meat preparation, not because it's made out of Caucasians).  Using pork belly is traditional, of course, and it adds a lot of chewy fatness.  The vinegar is there to help take the edge of the raw garlic and give just a bit of acid so that the fat feel from the oil and pork fat isn't so overwhelming.  The rice wine is present to help make the sauce pop- I have no idea why it does that, but it just kind of works.
 
-Prepare the pork belly.  You can brine it if you want the meat to be juicier.  Cook it however you like: traditionally it's boiled until medium done (about 150 degrees final temp) which is about 30 minutes for a 1 pound belly.  If it's not brined, boil it in salted water with a slice of ginger to help take off the porky smell.  I've been experimenting with a combo of tea smoking and then pressure steaming the meat: I'll update as more data becomes available.  Whatever cooking method you choose, make sure it's wet so that the fat and the skin become reasonably tender.  When the pork is done, chill it in the fridge to make it easier to slice.

-Slice the meat THIN.  If my knives are dull and I haven't had time to send them to the sharpener, I just don't make this until I do.  Don't bother trying without a good knife.  Practice.  This is the hardest part of the dish.  You can also chill the meat in the freezer for 20 minutes to make it firmer.  At fancier restaurants, the meat is sliced from a semi-frozen block so thin that it naturally curves into rolls, which is awesome, but it doesn't change the flavor of the dish.  I've also heard that if you have a good mandoline, you can run the meat through that, but I've never got that to work (I have a super benriner- maybe it would work if I got my blade sharpened professionally?).  Arrange the slices such that you can spoon the sauce over without too much of a hassle.

-Mix the garlic with the vinegar and rice wine.  Whisk in the korean pepper paste- it's main function here is as an emulsifier that blends in with the other ingredients, so if it bothers you to see it in a Sichuan dish you can take it out.  Whisk in the chili oil.  If you like the "browner" version, just use 2 TB of chili oil, but if you want the flaming red version that's spicier, use 4 TB.  Whisk in the soy sauce last.  If you brined the pork belly, you can omit the soy sauce or use less depending on how salty you want the dish.  Emulsifying the sauce is MUCH easier if the chili oil is chilled because the viscosity will be much higher.  Note: you probably want to serve this soon since the emulsion breaks quite readily at room temperature.

Korean influenced East Texas style BBQ sauce

Vinegar based sauce that turns all my BBQ bright, nuclear red.  Not for marinating or anything, but basted on for finishing touches at the very end or used as a sauce at the table.  This isn't salted since in Texas, we know how to salt and brine our meats right.

How I use it: I actually dislike using sauce at the table, but when whatever's in the smoker is almost done,  I'll brush this onto meat in layers until I get a kind of "crust" while finishing over some higher heat to set it.  You want it to turn crunchy but not burnt.

-.5 cup rice vinegar (or apple cider vinegar)
-.25 cup Korean red pepper paste
-.25 cup honey (or packed dark brown sugar in a pinch)
-2 tablespoons Korean coarse red pepper flakes
-1 teaspoon natural molasses

Put it all in a bowl, and whisk it together.  That's it.  If you want to, take some rendered fat from your BBQ (you save that, of course, right?) and pour it in: rendered meat fat from the smoker is my version of liquid smoke.  If you want it really spicy, try whisking in a few tablespoons of chili oil, or if you really want to nuke something, some ghost chili oil.

Thai(esque) curry

Some folks who visited Thailand once told me that what I call Thai curry has close to no resemblance to the real deal.  Whoops.

The Stuff
1 lbs meat (recommend brined chicken breast, pork shoulder, dark chicken meat, white fish, or 凍豆腐 or some combination of delicious mushrooms for vegan/vegetarian)
.5 lbs Chinese eggplant (about 1 fruit)
.25 lbs cherry tomatoes
~1 bunch of thai basil (or, "enough to be delicious")

The Curry
13.5-19 fl oz. coconut milk (creamy kind- mae ploy is best, chao koh is good enough) stored in the fridge.  Note, if using mae ploy, you can go up to 1.5 times all the other ingredients and have enough curry to flavor the stuff.  I like my curry extra-mega-filled with stuff and not so much leftover liquid, BTW.

1.5 TB-2TB curry paste (green, red, or yellow for vegetarian/vegans)
1.5 TB-2TB palm sugar (about half a 1" disc)
1.5TB-2TB fish sauce, pref. blow-torched
about half as much lime juice as sugar

Optional: zest of a half a lime (or several kaffir lime leaves if you can get them)

-Get your coconut milk out of the fridge and begin heating up just the solidified coconut fat.
-Preheat your broiler to high and get a rack ready to put some stuff about 2" away from the heating element
-Blowtorch the skin of the eggplant until blistered.  Cut into longitudinal quartered sections about 2" long.
-Broil the tomatoes and eggplant, cut side down.  When the tomatoes are just beginning to char they're done and so is the eggplant.
-When the coconut oil begins separating from the solids of the coconut fat, add the rest of the coconut liquid and 1.5TB each of the curry ingredients.  When each is incorporated, taste and adjust:

• Add curry paste to increase the spice/aroma
• Add fish sauce to increase salt/umami (flavor)
• Add sugar to negate saltiness/sourness/spiciness or add palm sugaryness
• Add lime juice to negate sweetness/add limeyness

I generally do it in that order, trying to be a little sparing on the sugar.  When everything's balanced, cook the simmered things (see below) if necessary.  Toss in the eggplant and tomatoes.  Once the eggplant is slightly softened and has a good texture (try a piece) add the basil and wilt.  Depending on your meat (or non-meat) of choice at some point in there you probably added your meat and your dish is now done.  Eat it with jasmine rice.

-Meats:

•  Pork shoulder: 1.5" cubes, then seasoned with salt and dusted with flour.   Cook by searing in some oil OR putting under the broiler and then simmering in the balanced curry until done (about 30 minutes)
• Brined chicken, prepare/cook just like kung pao chicken (the chicken pancake part, that is) and then add the stir-fried chicken to the balanced curry at the same time as adding the basil.
• Dark meat chicken, 1" cubes, salted, and dusted with flour.  Cook by searing in some oil OR putting under the broiler and then simmering in the balanced curry until done (about 10 minutes)
• Fish, cut into 1.5" segments and marinated with some grated ginger or curry paste or something to deal with the smell (or even lightly blow torched) and lightly coated with cornstarch, about 1 to 2 teaspoons until a light visible coasting is apparent.  Cook by stirring into the hot coconut milk at the very end after balancing the curry ingredients at the same time as adding the basil (see below).
• Tofu or mushrooms: no need to sear, just add to the balanced curry to simmer until appropriately tender.