Dateline: June 16, 2020 Mapo anything, but with tofu this time!

I have been hankering for spicy food lately, I think to off-set the heat.  So, I have some tofu, and some ground pork, so it will be mapo tofu.

I really liked the Lucas Sin recipe and will use that one again.  Here it is again, Mapo Tofu.

I originally followed what he did in the video cast on YouTube.  I downloaded the recipe and realized that it did not match exactly what he did on video.  

Mapo Tofu/Mabo Dofu by Lucas Sin, altered by Clarissa Coffey

12 oz tofu, cut into cubes (soft tofu preferred, but firm is fine too)
1/2 pound pork, beef, or mushrooms minced*
2 cloves garlic
1 teaspoon ginger, minced*
2 scallions or 1/2 medium onion
2 tablespoon doubanjiang or miso, or a combination
2 tablespoon chili oil*
1 tablespoon fermented black beans, washed and soaked*
1/2 cup stock or bone broth
1 tablespoon each mirin and Shaoxing wine.
1 tablespoon cornstarch
1 tablespoon water
neutral oil
salt
sugar
1 teaspoon Sichuan peppercorn or sansho, ground*
3 scallions or Chinese chives, sliced fine*

*optional ingredients

Directions

Boil tofu in salted water for 10 min. Carefully drain in a colander and set aside.

Over high heat, heat oil in a hot pan and scallions or onions. Stir-fry until fragrant. Add minced meat. Fry until brown and add garlic, fermented black beans, ginger, and doubanjiang and stir-fry until fragrant. Deglaze with wine and mirin.

Turn down to medium heat and add stock or bone broth. Bring to a boil, stirring frequently.

Make a slurry with cornstarch and water. Add boiled tofu to mix and mix until combined. Thicken sauce with the cornstarch slurry to desired consistency.

Taste and adjust seasoning.  Add a pinch of sugar if the spice level is too high for you.

Add scallions or chives and Sichuan peppercorn or sansho to garnish. Serve immediately with warm rice.

I was very happy with tonight's version.  It was super tasty, had the right amount of spice and was immensely satisfying when served with quinoa.  Along with a glass of nice riesling to temper the heat.  When I was browning the meat, I threw in a handful of green beans.  An inspired touch, I might add.  

Provided some color and vegetal interest as well.  I didn't have soft tofu, I had silken.....worked out ok, tasted delicious, but left a little something to be desired on the plate.  A bit baby-food-esque.

browning meat

boiled and draining silken tofu

I keep saying I will try it with beef, but just can't make myself do that!  Maybe some day.

Dateline: June 15, 2020 Ribs and Veg or is it Veg and Ribs?

rub components, minus cumin

I had a small rack of ribs perfect for 2, so out of the freezer it came and it was rubbed lovingly with worcestershire sauce, rib rub, burger rub, salt, pepper, and for good luck, cumin.

I had a ton of veggies in the fridge too, so out came broccoli crowns, broccolini, potatoes, and green beans.  All seasoned with salt and pepper and onto the grill.

All dressed for the prom

Veggies got prepped, oiled, salted and peppered, and onto the smoker, set to 250° F at first, then upped to 300° F because we needed to eat before midnight!

Ribs went onto grate around 3:30, with veggies following at 4:45.

Hopefully dinner will be ready in an hour, I am not so sure about that though.  May have to goose the temp up again in 30 minutes.  Adventures in cooking outdoors!

It was a miracle, everything came together at a reasonable hour.  The ribs were done and very tasty.  Bones coming clean after chewing off meat, veggies a lovely mix of crunchy browned bits and tender steamed bits and the potatoes were perfect.

Dateline: June 14, 2020 Chicken on the grill

I have a small whole chicken that is going to go onto the grill.  I am debating how to season it, and haven't made up my mind yet.  I am leaning toward Chinese spices and heat from ma la.  I will also grill up some veggies and make a salad.  

I am currently trying to edge out of my hangover.  I should know better, tequila, she does not mix well with wine.  I had my customary margarita pre-dinner, and then with last night's burgers started in with some red wine.  Oh boy, by 9 PM I was down for the count and sleeping fitfully.  Woke up around 9:15, hung over, and realized that I had yoga at 9:30, at 9:34.  Threw on yoga togs and did our hour session.  By the end of it I was feeling human again.  I guess I sweated out all the toxins!  (Or at least I am telling myself that.)

Our friend Phil dropped by for some social distancing chatting and stayed for a socially distant dinner.  I just salt and peppered the chicken and put it on the grill.  Added some asparagus and we called it a day.  

These chickens are delicious.  Cooks Venture, they are out of Arkansas and allow slow growth in the chickens.  They are really, really great.  I won't buy any other chickens these days.  FreshDirect carries them and sometimes has them on sale, which is when I stock up!

 

Dateline: June 13, 2020. BURGER AWESOMENESS REVISITED AND TWEAKED

Hey Tammy and Cody, this one is for you to try on your pellet grill!

I made the burgers again, and found out some things that are important.  In the original post, I stated, that the Jamison recipe called for the cheapest grade of ground beef....

No, no, no, and another no.  The first time I made them, I had 80% ground angus beef, non-vacuum packed.  The burgers were truly spectacular.  The second time I made them, I used 80% ground beef, but vacuum packed.  The packaging is what made the big difference.  The vacuum pack of the second meat made the burgers more compact and less tender and juicy.  So yesterday, I went with the non-vacuum packed ground angus and my faith in the recipe is restored.

The tweak I made was that I did not have any canned green chilis, but I did have some chipotle adobo sauce left as I used the last pepper the night before.  Perfecto, I will use the sauce in the burgers.  I used about 3 T worth and kept the minced onion the same as the recipe.  I made more One-derful rub and coated the burgers as before.  I set the smoker up the same, and after an hour they came off the grill at the perfect temp for medium rare.  I had the second grill going for the corn, so I seared off the burgers for a bit of crust, toasted the buns, and was in heaven again.

Awesome burgers here is the link to the original posting.  That rub is good on anything, too!

Dateline: June 9, 2020 Holy Mole!

I had some turkey tenderloins in the freezer and decided to try to do something with them that was 

1) different than usual

2) tasty

3) quick and easy

I began my search with NYTCooking app and found inspiration with a turkey mole recipe. 

Ingredients

5 dried guajillo peppers

5 dried pasilla peppers

1 dried ancho pepper

1 large onion, quartered, but not peeled

4 cloves of garlic, not peeled

water

1.5 lbs turkey tenderloin, boneless breast, boneless thigh, whatever you have, cut up into chunks

salt and pepper

1 t ground coriander seed

1 t ground cumin seed

1/2 t Mexican oregano

1 c chicken stock

1 T unsweetened cocoa powder

2 t turbinado sugar

Method

1.  Stem and seed all the dried peppers.  Wear gloves if your hands are raw from sanitizer!

2.  In a cast iron skillet, toast the peppers on both sides over medium heat, but do not burn!

3.  Place in a bowl and cover with water and allow to soak until pliable

4.  In same cast iron skillet, put in onion quarters cut side down, and garlic cloves.  Toast until slightly blackened on all sides.

5.  Remove to a blender and pull the peppers from the water and add them to the blender.  Add about 1/2 cup soaking liquid to help get the blender going.  Reserve the remainder of the soaking liquid in case the dish needs thinning later on.  Blend until very smooth.

6.  Strain the contents of the blender through a fine sieve into the bowl where you soaked the peppers.  Make sure to scrape down the outside of the sieve and to try to extract as much pulp from what is inside the sieve.  Hold aside until step 8.

7.  Salt and pepper all sides of the turkey chunks.  Heat the same cast iron skill over medium heat, add neutral oil, and gently sear the turkey chunks until a light golden brown.  They will not be cooked all the way through.  Remove them to a clean plate.

8.  In the cast iron skillet cook the strained sauce.  As it bubbles up, add the chicken stock, coriander, cumin, oregano, cocoa and sugar.  Stir to combine all ingredients well.  Taste, adjust salt and pepper or sugar, etc.  Reduce slightly and add in the turkey chunks and any accumulated juices from the plate.  Rotate and spoon sauce all over the pieces.  Cover pan with foil or lid and reduce heat to a simmer.

9.  Check on the skillet every once in a while to be sure that nothing is sticking to the bottom.

10.  Serve with rice, quinoa, or other side dish of your choice and a salad.

From the tasting that I have been doing of the sauce, it has a bit of a bitter edge, (dried peppers) and the cocoa and sugar really balance that out.  Additional salt and pepper was needed as there was zero in the sauce until then.  I am looking forward to this, sorry I don't have tortillas as a go with.

This was outstanding.  The mole was wonderful, so wonderful, I may make a huge batch to give away and freeze!

Dateline: June 8, 2020 Chops and Greens

I defrosted 2 veal chops for our dinner tonight.  (Don't be a hater).  

I fired up the grill to about 500° F in order to get lovely crosshatch sear marks on the chops.  I seasoned them with salt and pepper.  Asparagus went onto the grill after the chops got turned over.

Naked and afraid

I took the temp of the chops several times, and pulled when they reached 145°F and hoped that I hadn't exceeded medium by too much.  The chops were perfect, as were the asparagus.  I have a copper grill mat that I use for veggies and smaller items that may fall thru the grates.  I had the chops positioned at the rear of the grate, and after I turned them over, I put the grill mat down at the front part of the grate and let it hang over the edge of the grill.  They were dressed with only cooking spray and salt and pepper.  They came off the grill when I picked them up with the tongs and they were very floppy!

Off the grill

Plate now fully dressed

bones got saved for stock

The chop was heavenly

It tasted as good as it looks!  This was a definite keeper!  Now, veal chops need to go on sale again!  When they are on sale, they are cheaper than rib eye and more delicious.

Dateline: June 4, 2020 Smoked Lamb

 

I have heard a lot about Owensboro, Kentucky and the signature dish, smoked mutton.  I have a little 2 lb lamb chuck roast that I smothered in a mixture of garlic paste, harissa, olive oil, tamarind, salt and pepper.

It went into the smoker at 3:30 pm, hopefully, dinner will be ready by 7.  I also threw in some corn on the cob.  I can quickly put together a salad, and we are done for tonight.  Which is a good thing, because we have another zoom call at 7.

I am looking forward to the smoky, crispy, exterior and the gamy interior of this cook.

Now it's just a waiting game.  Probes have been set, corn strategically placed and the rally for George Floyd's funeral is proceeding peacefully across the street.

Well, this was a noble experiment.  I took the roast to 147° F, but should have let it go much longer.  Way too rare for me.  There was nothing interesting about this.  I had such high hopes, and may try again and take the temp up to my usual 190 - 200 for succulent well done lamb.  I much prefer lamb braised until it is falling off the bone.  To add insult to ego injury, the corn was pretty dismal too!  All in all, not a great result tonight!  Sigh.

just off the grill waiting for slicing

If you like it rare, then you would be happy

Another issue was that there was a HUGE vein of fat running through the middle of the chuck roll, which, I had no idea was there.  Perhaps next time I should roll my own, hell maybe even slaughter the beast myself.  Just kidding, the neighbors already think we are heretics!  

Dateline: June 3, 2020 It Is Raining, so Plan B -- Spicy Pork, Gangnam Style

Marinaded pork hunks

In browsing recipes today for the pork shoulder that I had, I came across this one from Melissa Clark,

Instant Pot Spicy Pork.  I had an 8 lb piece of pork that I cut into a 3 lb and a 5 lb hunk.  Froze the 3 lb one and cut the 5 lb one up into 4 or 5 chunks as recommended in the recipe.

The pork (below) browned up quite nicely because of the sugar.  

Thickened spicy pork sauce, yum!

The sauce has a lovely zip to it owing to the gochujang. The recipe did not specified what kind of soy sauce, and I thought that regular Kikkoman would make it too salty, so I opted for Chinese dark soy, same 1/4 c measure. I also used agave syrup instead of honey and turbinado sugar for the brown sugar. Those were the only swaps I made. Oops, not true, I added some Shao Xing rice wine to deglaze the pot as well as water and 2 glugs of an open bottle of red wine.

The sauce (right) is very dark because of the dark soy sauce.  I used it for 2 reasons, 1)  it is not as salty as light or regular soy sauce, and 2) it also adds a bit of sweetness.  There is a saying in Chinese cooking, dark soy for color, light soy for flavor.

The meat is in the pressure cooker for 90 minutes.  Should be wonderfully soft and unctuous.

Then the decision to broil or not needs to be made.  There is something to be said for crispy edges but do I want to go thru heating up the oven?  Dunno yet.

I opted for broiling.  This was a keeper!  Husband unit gave it 2 opposable thumbs up!  And a snorted, "keep it in the rotation, honey"!

I had pulled out 2 individual bowls of sauce before broiling so that we could add, or not, more sauce.  It's the sauce!

Cucumber salad was also quite tasty.  It had the cooling effect that it was designed to have by Ms. Clark.  In the future, I'd eliminate the sugar, and amp up the vinegar.  I know that the sugar is to dampen the heat, but it also removes the tanginess that you'd want in a salad after a spicy meal.

cuke salad

This bottle of Cab Franc is amazing...just perfect with something a bit spicy!

Dateline: June 1, 2020 It's Brisket, Baby!

I had a big hunk of brisket, packer's cut, in the freezer.  Took it out and put it into the fridge a couple of days ago to thaw.  In reviewing my options of cooking it, today seemed like the best choice.

Went at it with a sharp knife to trim it up; removing excess fat, and any weird bits that were hanging on.  I follow Franklin Barbecue and season only with salt and pepper, in a 50-50 mixture.

After I seasoned it on the bottom side, I managed to knock the rest of the salt and pepper mixture into the sink, and needed to make more!  D'Oh!

There was a lot of fat between the flat and the deckle.  In the photo at left, the deckle is the higher part at the top right of the picture.  It is also sometimes known as the "point" cut.  In the lower left, is the flat.  

I removed quite a bit of fat and decided to freeze it for when I make sausages, or need more fat in a ground beef concoction that I am making.  

The meat is well marbled, flexible, and looked to be of a high quality.  Why is flexible a good quality?  It is an unscientific theory that a tender raw brisket will be a tender smoked brisket.  I am not sure if this is prime or choice as I ordered it from Baldor and they said there were out, but the brisket arrived in the order anyway!  The markings on the package did not indicate one way or the other.

You can see the rise to the deckle in this photo better.  There is a large vein of fat that separates the deckle from the flat.  Care is necessary in digging it out for 2 reasons.  1)  That type of fat is not the kind that will melt away during the low and slow cooking.  2)  You do not want to accidentally slice off the deckle.

I started going at the meat around 7:30 this morning, hoping that if I could get it into the smoker around 8, it would be finished by dinner time!  Into smoker around 8:20 at 200°- 220° F.

I have 3 thermometers checking temps.  1) the build in one that came with the smoker,  2) in the far mid right you can see a short probe sticking out, that is for grill level temp, and 3) one in the meat which will go in around 10 am.  

I am so stoked for this.  I am using white oak pellets that came from bourbon barrels.  I am hoping that there will be some residual flavor left on the meat.

The meat was ready earlier than I thought it would.  I had a back up plan, but luckily I did not need it!

I wrapped the brisket at about 180° F.  I then replaced the brisket in the smoker and raised the temperature to 250° F until the meat was 190°, about another hour.  All told, the brisket was on the smoker for about 11 hours.  Pretty quick for a 13 pounder!

In the kitchen, the unwrapping

The house smelled great while the meat rested and as I got the salad and stuff ready.  We ate the meat on Martin's potato buns.  I put mustard (dijon) on mine, and was in absolute heaven.  The sharpness of the mustard cut through the fattiness of the meat wonderfully.  The salad was watermelon, onion, feta, cucumber and tomato salad, dressed with sherry vinegar and olive oil

Ready to slice

Servet's only request for a cocktail was my margarita.  I had an epic fail in trying to make a molecular cocktail.  The reverse spherification didn't work well.  The freezing wasn't complete so the little blobs did not form properly, it just ended up looking like snot.  Not appetizing!

MARGARITA RECIPE

1 oz lime juice

1 oz lemon juice

2 oz triple sec

4 oz blanco tequila

6 drops Fee Brothers Foaming Liquid

1/2 oz mezcal

Put first 5 ingredients in a cocktail shaker, add ice.  Put the top on the shaker and shake until the container feels "full".

Pour into a glass with or without ice and float the mezcal on top.

I took the meat off at 190° F so that I could slice it easily.  If I let it run up to 200-205° F, it would have shredded rather than cut and would have been drier.  Upside would have been a more pronounced bark.  I can live with what I got!

The three of us were in meat comas in no time flat.  I sliced the meat before the second margarita, because I knew that sharp knives and drunken hands are not a good mix.

I pronounce the meal a great eating success!

Dinner is ready

Dateline: May 29, 2020 It's Friday, It's Fish Day

I know, that statement makes me seem to be a devote Catholic, but Friday is Fish Day because that's when my weekly delivery from FreshDirect arrives and I want to eat the fish that I ordered on the day that it is delivered!

I have 2 lovely center cut salmon fillets that I am going to grill.  I also thawed some Italian hot sausages that need to be cooked as well.  And to top that all off are the lovely asparagus.

Easy quick meal.  Fire up the grill, let it get hot, add a grill mat, salt and pepper fish and asparagus, add food, watch for a bit, kick the asparagus around the mat, flip sausages, but don't flip fish.  A pleasant surprise was that the fat from the sausages allowed the skin of the salmon to crisp up beautifully and release from the mat easily.

Just put on the grill

Off the grill, on the table

Note the salmon skin "crackers"  Bill was in heaven!

As per usual, I was panicking that there would not be enough "greenery" with the meal.  So I opted to core a head of cabbage and slice into quarters.  Oiled, salted, and peppered the quarters and put it on the grill after the fish, asparagus and sausages were done. 

After charring the cabbage, I shredded it and added some sweet onion along with sherry vinegar and olive oil to produce the salad below.