Dateline: May 18, 2021 A Produce Drawer Goes to Korea

I had a lot of produce that needed to be used up.  Several bunches of collards and Tuscan Kale, as well as a couple of small beets and an unidentified root veggie that came with a Misfits box.

This was an experiment.  And it turned out great!  We both couldn't stop eating it.  There was a bit of heat, but not too much, just enough to satisfy and the crunchiness of the beets and scallions went a long way toward that end as well.

A definite keeper in the rotation!

Ingredients

2-3 bunches of collards and kale or any other leafy veggies, cut into ribbons

1 large red onion, cut into thin wedges through the root end

1 bell pepper, cut into bite-sized pieces

2 small yellow beets, peeled and sliced into thin half moons

1 bunch scallions, sliced into 3" pieces

3 cloves of garlic, sliced

2 inch piece of ginger, peeled and sliced thinly

1 jalapeno, halved, seeded, and sliced

2 T gochujang

2 T Korean soybean paste

1 heaping T Korean Chili flakes

1 T rice wine vinegar

1 T Mirin

2 T white wine

1/2 lb Korean rice cakes

Vegetable Stock, as needed

Method

1.  In a small bowl, put the gochujang, soybean paste, rice wine vinegar, mirin, and white wine.  Mix well.  Should have the consistency of oatmeal.  Add water or vegetable stock if necessary.  This is the sauce that will be added into the stir fry later.

2.  In a sauce pan, bring salted water to a boil.  Boil rice cakes for about 3-4 minutes, then drain and rinse.

3.  Heat a wok up, add some oil and fry the rice cakes until they have a few dark spots on them.  This will take longer than you think!  You need to evaporate the water off them before they will start to brown.  When browned to your liking, remove from wok and hold in a bowl.

4.  Add more oil to the wok, and add the garlic and ginger.  Then add beets and bell pepper and fry them until they soften up a bit and the beets lose their hard crunchiness. Add the onion and collards and coat with oil and cook until the collards wilt a bit.  Add the sauce and mix well.  If needed, add some of the vegetable stock to facilitate the coating of all the veggies in the sauce.  Add in the rice cakes and scallions.  Mix well.  When veggies are cooked to your liking and rice cakes are nicely coated in the sauce, serve.

 

Dateline: February 28, 2021 Orange Beef Redux

I had a package of beef strips in the freezer and decided to make orange beef again.  I used the NYTimes Sam Sifton recipe again, as a framework and riffed on it.   

The riffs this time were adding more vegetables, broccoli again, green bell peppers, onions, and red finger peppers and jalapeno.  The big change was kind of Koreanifying it but sauteeing until crispy some dduk rice cakes.  These are the finger thickness 2 inch round rice cakes that are sold in asian markets either vacuum packed or frozen.  These were vac packed.  I grabbed a couple of handfuls from the package and cut them into thirds so they would be these crispy nuggets coated in orange sauce.

I proceeded as the recipe says by making the sauce.  I did not make it very sweet, I used about a 1 inch chunk of rock sugar instead of 1/4 c of light brown sugar as I don't like it when chinese food is too sweet.  It did not totally dissolve, so there was even less sugar.  I added an ounce of shaoxing wine as well did not reduce it by half.

For the woking bits, I fried the rice cakes first until crispy and held them in a bowl lined with paper towels.  I then fried the beef strips in 2 batches until they were nicely colored and crisp on the outside.  I used 3 T of cornstarch 1/2 t baking soda, and 1/2 t of salt in the dredge.    As the meat cooked I removed it to the same bowl as the rice cakes.  

1 precooked the broccoli florets in the microwave for 2 minutes and left them in there until there were needed.

Next I stir fried some extra ginger slices, dried red peppers until fragrant and then I added the onions and bell peppers.  Stir frying them until they got a little bit of color.  Then in went the broccoli, beef, rice cakes they got all mixed together.  Lastly I dumped in the sauce and cooked until well coated and heated through.  Dinner is served.