k43
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Posts posted by k43
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Even after long cooking, it's hard to get those infernal bony tendons out of a turkey drumstick. If you cut off the ankle knob, you also cut through the tendons and have to yank them out with pliers. You can leave the knob on and strip off the meat from the top, but it's messy pulling it off from the tendons. And after it all, there's still lots of connective tissue and bits of meat that trail off into gristly ligaments.
Strangely, turkey wings, which look bony, have consistent texture and lots of wonderful, next-to-the-bone meat. Thighs are even easier.
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I've had Chartreuse that had been at the back of my parents' liquor cabinet for at least 30 years, and it was indistinguishable from the fresh.
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Fascinating! Thanks for that tidbit!
Just last night I was watching Julia Child demonstrate what constitutes a pinch vs. a large pinch. I don't think she gave equivalent measurements, though.
The Sainted Julia said that a "pinch" is the maximum amount you can pick up between your thumb and forefinger. I think of this is nearly a teaspoon, particularly if the call is for a "good pinch."
I think of a "small pinch" as 1/4 teaspoon or a bit less.
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Chinese Oxtail Stew
Serves 4 as Main Dish.
Here's my super-simple favorite, which I got from an old friend. It perfumes the whole house.
- 2 medium oxtails (3 to 4 lb.) cut in 2" pieces and well trimmed
- 6 whole sticks cinnamon, broken into 2" pieces
- 1 handful (1/3 to 1/2 cup) whole star anise
- 4 T dark soy sauce
- 2-1/2 T sugar
- 1/4 tsp MSG (optional)
1. Put the meat in a kettle with water to cover, heat to a boil and cook 5 minutes. Drain and rinse the meat and the kettle.
2. Return the meat to the kettle with water to cover, add the cinnamon and star anise and MSG, if using. Heat to a boil and cook uncovered for 45 minutes over medium heat, occasionally skimming off any scum.
3. Add the soy sauce and sugar, reduce the heat to a slow simmer, cover and cook until the meat is falling off the bones (2 to 3 hours).
4. Remove the meat to a platter. When it's cool enough to handle, remove the fat and bones. Refrigerate the meat and sauce separately overnight.
5. The next day, skim the fat from the sauce and reduce it in a non-stick frying pan. When it starts to thicken, strain out the solids. Continue reducing until thick, almost a syrup (1/2 to 2/3 cup).
6. Reheat the meat, plate over white rice and pour the sauce around and over.
Keywords: Main Dish, Easy, Beef, Dinner, Chinese
( RG1439 )
- 2 medium oxtails (3 to 4 lb.) cut in 2" pieces and well trimmed
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Here's my super-simple favorite, which I got from an old friend. It perfumes the whole house.
Chinese Oxtail Stew
2 medium oxtails (3 to 4 lb.) cut in 2" pieces and well trimmed
6 whole sticks cinnamon, broken into 2" pieces
a handful (1/3 to 1/2 cup) whole star anise
4 to 5 tablespoons dark soy sauce
2-1/2 tablespoons sugar
1. Put the meat in a kettle with water to cover, heat to a boil and cook 5 minutes. Drain and rinse the meat and the kettle.
2. Return the meat to the kettle with water to cover, add the cinnamon and star anise, heat to a boil and cook uncovered for 45 minutes over medium heat, occasionally skimming off any scum.
3. Add the soy sauce and sugar, reduce the heat to a slow simmer, cover and cook until the meat is falling off the bones (2 to 3 hours).
4. Remove the meat to a platter. When it's cool enough to handle, remove the fat and bones. Refrigerate the meat and sauce separately overnight.
5. The next day, skim the fat from the sauce and reduce it in a non-stick frying pan. When it starts to thicken, strain out the solids. Continue reducing until thick, almost a syrup (1/2 to 2/3 cup).
Serve over rice.
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A great reason to pay $45 for a full year’s access (100 items per month) to the New York Times archive is Molly O’Neill’s wonderful long article with recipes from January 5, 1997 called “The Clue to a Stew.”
Boiled down, her ideas (in my words) are:
-- Browning is essential for caramelizing, which adds color and flavor. Dust the meat with seasoned flour for better browning plus thickening.
-- With today’s extra-lean meats, use stock rather than water as cooking liquid.
-- The flavor foundation is caramelized onions and carrots, plus balancing acidity from tomatoes, wine, vinegar or mustard, and mushrooms to balance the sweetness. A couple of anchovies also work magic.
-- Lighten the final texture with crunch from a vegetable added late. Just before serving, add a little lemon juice and a garnish of oregano, parsley or basil.
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I've watched the entire staff of my favorite Chinese restaurant make wontons during mid-afternoon. They stick a chopstick into the stuffing mix and take up about a teaspoon, lay it in the center of the wonton skin with the end of the chopstick toward a corner, roll the stick a full turn and pull it out, bend the opposite corners 1/2 turn, dab a bit of water/egg-yolk wash on them and squeeze them between thumb and forefinger.
Some variety of this should work, using a water/egg-yolk adhesive -- perhaps dipping your fingertip in the wash and running it around the edge of the pasta sheet, putting the filling on with a chopstick, bending the sides up and squeezing the seam 2/3 of the way around, pulling the chopstick out, folding up the remaining side and squeezing that seam.
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I make my mother's Mock Stroganoff (ground beef, Lawrey's, lots of pepper and paprika, served over rice). She added sour cream near the end, but I mix it 50% with yogurt, or all yogurt. The yogurt tends to break over heat, so I let the dish cool as I dish up the rice and then stir in the yogurt. Sometimes I put the yogurt on as a topping to each plate, so each person can stir it in.
This should work with your curry, too.
Labni will be even better.
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I do recall an incident several years ago, where several people became sick from canned potato soup and there was a national recall of the product. It was one of the unusual brands that is quite expensive, however I can't recall the name at the moment.
It was Bon Vivant vichyssoise, and several people died of botulism. The company quickly went out of business.
Kapchunka, a/k/a Ribyetz (whole, uneviscerated salted whitefish) was one of the great East-European Jewish delicacies. Russ & Daughters still lists it along the old painted boards above the shelves. However, in 1987, a couple died from botulism in Kapchunka, and suddenly it was outlawed. See this page from the Centers for Disease Control
Before we get too far off topic, there's a good thread on The Sickest a Meal Has Made You, where I just told my mushroom story.
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The link above left out the "www." Go to Capeherb Rubs
The ingredient list for Bed of Roses is:
ginger, roasted garlic, sea salt, caraway seeds, sugar, roasted sesame seeds, cumin, paprika, cassia, chillies, coriander, blackpepper, turmeric, mint, nutmeg, grains of paradise, rose petals, saffron
A nice if perhaps overly complex mix of savory and sweet, which should work beautifully on chicken and even better on pork.
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Interesting tidbit on botulinum toxin: it is by far the most poisonous of all known poisons. The rat LD50 for pure botulinum toxin (the unit dose per body weight which kills half the subjects) is 5-50 ng/kg, while that for arsenic is about 700 mg/kg. Since 700mg divided by 50ng equals 14,000,000, botulinum toxin is about 14,000,000 times more potent a poison than aresenic.
Maybe 40 years ago there was a Scientific American article on poisons, which, being male, I read with great fascination. I was particularly impressed by a photo of a small, heavily sealed flask containing about a cup of crystals. The caption was "Purified botulinum toxin sufficient to kill about half the world's population."
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My Beautiful Doufeu
I broke down and got a 7-1/4 Le Creuset Doufou at the LeC outset store in Kittery, Maine. It weighs about 2 tons, the cover takes 2 hands to lift, and it barely fits on the stove-top. A small design problem is that the top gets too hot to lift without potholders, and there's not quite enough room to get fingers and potholders in between the sets of handles. They should have moved the handles on the pot down a bit, or bent the handles on the top up a little more. Also, the top is tricky to lift with water in it.
But HOO BOY, how it brasies. I browned a big slab of short ribs, put them in the doufeu, deglazed the browning pan with a couple of cups of beef broth, threw in an onion, a carrot and a parsnip, adjusted the heat, filled the top with water, and went away. I got it started at a little after midnight and stopped it when I got up early the next morning. The ribs were in their original shape, but were like butter, and beyond delicious.
It didn't need to be in the oven. The entire pot radiated heat. Besides, the water will evaporate out of the top if it's in the oven. Also, the interior is white, which gets around the dark interior problem with some of the other LeC pots.
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I've frequently read that pouring a layer of oil over the top of condiments in half-used jars will preserve them in the refrigerator. There's no reason why this wouldn't work on after taking a single chipotle in adobo out of the jar. If they're in a can, I guess you should put them in a well-scalded jar that sels tight.
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The following "wet" method melts out all the fat, so you don't have to prick the skin. It works wonderfully on even a very fat goose, let alone a duck.
1 duck, giblets, neck and cavity fat removed
1 large peeled onion
salt and pepper
1 tablespoon caraway seeds
1. Preheat oven to 350.
2. Cut off the last two wing joints and spread them, the neck, heart and gizzard on the bottom of a roasting pan only slightly larger than the bird. Add 1 quart of water.
3. Rub the bird inside and outside with salt, pepper and caraway seeds, stuff the onion in the cavity and put the bird, untrussed and breast up, on the bed of giblets.
4. Cover and cook until done. Begin checking at 2-1/2 hours. It's done when you can pull the legs in opposite directions and they don't spring back.
5. Pour off the water and fat and return the pan, uncovered, to the oven for 10 minutes to dry and crisp the skin.
Put the fat you removed at the beginning with the poured-off liquid and boil it down down for other uses, including frying up the liver as a reward for the cook.
I'll also put this on the recipe forum.
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Wet-Roasted Goose or Duck
Serves 4 as Main Dish.
The following "wet" method melts out all the fat, so you don't have to prick the skin. It works wonderfully on even a very fat goose, let alone a duck.
Put the fat you removed at the beginning with the poured-off liquid and boil it down for other uses, including frying up the liver as a reward for the cook.
1 6-7 pound goose or large duck, giblets, neck and cavity fat removed
1 large peeled onion
1 tablespoon each salt and pepper
1 tablespoon caraway seeds
1. Preheat oven to 350.
2. Cut off the last two wing joints and spread them, the neck, heart and gizzard on the bottom of a roasting pan only slightly larger than the bird. Add 1 quart of water.
3. Rub the bird inside and outside with salt, pepper and caraway seeds, stuff the onion in the cavity and put the bird, untrussed and breast up, on the bed of giblets.
4. Cover and cook until done. Begin checking at 3-1/2 hours (2 hours for duck). It's done when you can pull the legs in opposite directions and they don't spring back.
5. Pour off the water and fat and return the pan, uncovered, to the oven for 10 minutes to dry and crisp the skin.
Keywords: Easy, Duck, Main Dish
( RG1421 )
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i am also looking for a good Cleaver for less then 20 bucks, any out there?
Bridge has nice Chinese cleavers, $24.95 for a big one and $42.95 for a really big one.
I have the smaller one, which works very well. However, I had to do a little alteration. The edge along the top is flat with sharp corners, which can draw blood from your cutting hand knuckle if you use the "chef's grip" with your thumb and index finger pinching the blade. This needs to be rounded over -- a relatively simple job with a fine metal file and various grades of fine sandpaper.
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It's a staple in Szechuan cooking. Try one of the Chinese supermarkets.
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Only the red outer husk is used, at least from what I've read. That means you need to pour them out on a plate, remove the twigs and rub the husk off the black seed in the middle. It's a pain in the ... fingertips to do this, but I've tried them without removing the seed, and it's very bitter.
I've never seen them ground up at, say, Grand Sichuan or Spicy & Tasty, where the husks are clearly visible.
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Mouhamara (Red Pepper, Pomegranate and Walnut Dip)
2½ lb. red bell peppers
1 small hot chili,
1½ cups (6 oz.) walnuts, coarsely ground
½ cup wheat crackers, crumbled
1 tablespoon lemon juice
2 tablespoons pomegranate molasses or more to taste
½ tsp ground cumin
¾ tsp salt
½ tsp sugar
2 tablespoon olive oil
2 teaspoons toasted pine nuts
A drizzle of olive oil
A good pinch of ground cumin
1. Make a day in advance. Roast the red bell peppers and the chili either over coals or a gas burner or under an electric broiler, turning frequently until blackened and blistered all over, about 12 minutes. Place in a covered bowl to steam 10 minutes (this loosens the skin). Rub off the skins, membranes, and seeds. Spread the bell peppers, smooth side up, on a paper towel and let drain 10 minutes.
2. In a food processor, grind the walnuts, crackers, lemon juice, molasses, cumin, salt, and sugar until smooth. Add the bell peppers; process until pureed and creamy. With the machine on, add the oil in a thin stream. Add the chili to taste. (If the paste is too thick, thin with 1-2 Tb water.) Refrigerate overnight to allow the flavors to mellow.
3. When ready to serve transfer to a serving dish. Sprinkle the pine nuts and cumin on top and drizzle with oil.
Red Pepper Puree - the perfect condiment/sauce
4 large red bell peppers (2 lb.)
salt
1/2 cup EVOO
1. Preheat oven to 475. Line a roasting pan with enough foil to fold over the top later. Put peppers in the pan and roast, turning every 10 minutes, until they collapse, about 40 min.
2. Remove pan from oven, fold foil over peppers, and allow to cool.
3. Working over a bowl to catch the liquid, remove and discard the core, seeds and skin.
4. Put the pepper pulp in a food processor with about 2 tablespoons of the liquid and 1/4 teaspoon salt. Turn on the processor and add the oil slowly through the feed tube. Taste and add more salt and oil as necessary.
Store in refrigerator for a few days. Freezes for about a month.
Uses and variations:
- sauce under roasted or grilled chicken, red meat or fish, with fresh herbs
- add cumin, chili powder, caramelized onion or chopped raw garlic
- add 2 T. to simmering liquid of rice or couscous
- add to tomato sauce at the end, or use instead of tomatoes
- add to omelets or scrambled eggs
- quick pesto with basil, grated Parmsan and garlic
- w/ lemon juice, salt and pepper for salad dressing
- on toast or pizza
- in stew or soup just before serving
- as an appetizer dip, with more oil, garlic, cracked pepper and salty cheese (feta, goat)
- finishing sauce for roast eggplant or zucchini
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Tapatio hot sauce. Tapatio. Slightly hotter than Tabasco, with a much fuller flavor and a less harsh vinegar note.
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Here are the winners in the 2005 Napa Valley Mustard Festival:
My favorite honey mustard -- IMHO, in a diferent league from the rest -- is Sable & Rosenfeld Russian Style.
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How about a pear Tarte Tatin?
Any changes fron the standard recipe, to avoid a woody texture and make up for the lower level of sweetness?
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I have an expensive Wusthof scalloped. When it was new, it felt like a multi-thousand $ Japanese vegetable slicer -- it just glided through bread without effort.
Unfortunately, as it got dull (over the course of a year or so), the performance declined greatly. It's possible to sharpen a bread knife with ordinary "teeth," but the reverse scallops of the Wusthof blade are impossible.
I also got an Oxo, with the handle pointing up, like Dizzy Gillespie's trumpet, but it puts a lot of torsion on my wrist, and it's hard to control.
My solution is the cheap, moderately offset Forschner. Just throw it away when it gets too dull.
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How about putting meat packed in cryovac directly in the bath? Really Nice! says several teaspoons of protein come out unless you add fat, but why can't I live with that.
Or is the fat essential for flavoring?
I suppose another problem is uneven shape and large cuts, but if I get a small cut, why should I unwrap it and then reseal it?
Would it be possible to open a small part of the cryovac seam, add liquids and reseal it?
I Adore My Griddle
in Kitchen Consumer
Posted
Here's stuff on griddles that I've collected over several years.
All-American Double-Burner Griddle (Wisconsin Aluminum Foundry) - needs seasoning and oil spray - no ridges, so no outdoor look
Bridge has its own $150 12¼ x 19 super heavy corrugated cast iron grill preferred by many pros - fits over two burners - heats slowly but holds heat very well
Burton Grill (Max Burton Enterprises) - the first and still the best - doesn't need preheating, like others - heats quickly - water-filled ring to avoid drying - inferior quality nonstick surface - must be sprayed with oil - domed surface makes it hard to cook, e.g., peppers, which roll off
Chef's Design Giant Reversible Rangetop Griddle (Wisconsin Aluminum Foundry) - 2-burner model - nonstick - cooks well but slowly - hard to clean
Peerless makes the standard for restaurants, 24" x 36" - maybe the best way to cook steaks
Stove-Top Grill (Amco Corp.) - cast iron - cooks quickly and well after preheating
Lodge Pro Logic Pre-Seasoned Cast Iron Grill Pan 12” x 12” - plenty big for normal uses - low, slanted sides that make flipping easy
Lodge Cast Iron Reversible Griddle, 17½ by 9½ inches - will fit whole lobsters and fish, big steaks and company-size portions. It uses two stove-top burners and turns into a griddle when reversed. Won't fit into standard sinks to soak.
The Le Creuset Round Grill - small, tiny handles, good looking but overpriced and doesn’t distribute heat well to the edges.
Look Cookware Superior Non-Stick Grill Pan - good but overpriced and high sides make flipping awkward. Cumbersome to store.
Staub Authentic Enameled Cast Iron Grill - poor performer with a flimsy handle.
The important thing is a heavy grill and thorough preheating, since the grill, not the flame, does the cooking - in fact, little or no flame should be visible, even with a gas grill - scrupulous scrubbing and seasoning are also essential - meat should be at room temperature - salt and pepper before cooking - let rest for 5 minutes after grilling.