Cooking with the Momofuku cookbook

[Mallet]

Wow. Nothing for months -- but I definitely use my Momofuku cookbook regularly. This week, for example, I snooped around trying to find ideas for a pork rib marinade (more on that later) and made a few pickles (cuke, daikon, shiitake) using the basic pickle recipe.

But I found the topic in order to report that the watermelon rind pickle is to die for.

That's quite timely, since I've been eating massive quantities of watermelons for the past 2 weeks.

[Chris Amirault]

Very simple, uses something I usually toss out, and addictive to boot.

[slkinsey]

The roasted rice cakes are awesome.

Now that I have a chest freezer, I've been meaning to make a massive recipe of ramen broth to reduce and freeze. But I've also been wondering about perhaps attempting to make the ramen broth using techniques from Modernist Cuisine. This would mostly mean grinding the bones and meat, and cooking the whole thing in a pressure cooker (also meaning that I have to get around to buying a 5+ gallon pressure cooker.

[Zeemanb]

The "Ghetto Sous Vide" continues to impress in my household. When I tell people about "cooking steak in my sink", they think I'm insane. BUT when they bite into the just-seared buttery Wagyu flatiron or whatever else I'm using...they are believers. It took a little tinkering with the thermostat on my hot water heater, but I can generally keep the water right in that 123-125 degree range.

Getting a SVS in the near future, but I'll still go back and kick it old school from time to time....

[Tim Dolan]

Just ordered this cookbook after somebody dropped a Barnes and Noble giftcard on my desk this morning. We went to Ssam Bar at the beginning of the summer and totally loved it. Very excited to get into this thing. Anyone have any recent stories?

[Margaret Pilgrim]

I checked the book out of the library and scoured it for ideas. I was taken by its tongue-in-cheek attitude and delighted with his take on American ranch dressing. His pickled ramp dressing (sub cocktail onions and scallions if you must) is superb. Makes iceberg lettuce (or pork chops) almost "downtown"! I keep a pint in the fridge at all times.

[Tim Dolan]

I wanted to bump this thread because with Super Bowl Sunday coming up, it seems like the Bo Ssam would be a no-brainer. I'm going to a friend's house who has a wonky oven so I might not be able to do it, but I also wanted to see if anyone has attempted it recently. Any stories?

[ChrisTaylor]

I have started to open this book every week or two. Today I've got a couple of dishes lined up: I just portioned and brined the chicken for the fried chicken w/ octo vin. I'll also be making the fried cauliflower and dashi-braised daikon radish.

[TheTInCook]

I'm going to attempt the noodle dough recipe. I'm kinda worried because it has a really low dough hydration as written. Same with the MC recipe (did they just use his?)

[MikeHartnett]

Mmm... octo vin.

[Shalmanese]

I, too have struggled with low hydration. In Lucky Peach, there's an update from Harold McGee to deal with the low hydration by pulsing in the food processor until coarse crumbs are formed, letting it rest to get properly hydrated and then doing the majority of the kneading using a pasta machine. I haven't tried it but it seems like something that could work.

[TheTInCook]

shoot, no food processor. hopefully resting is enough.

[TheTInCook]

Ok, just finished kneading till combined and fairly smooth. Didn't want to overwork it since I'm planning on running it through the pasta machine.

I used the as printed amount of water and mixed by hand. 90-95% of the flour came together in a stiff ball. The rest were like cornmeal or bigger. Added >10ml addtional water to get them to aggregate.

Makes me remember that I always seem to be making my noodle doughs too slack, so they get too soft when cooked.

[TheTInCook]

Just checked my dough. I left it out, wrapped in plastic, at room temp for ~1.5 hours. Its got a nice texture, feels like it will roll well in the machine, BUT it's already starting to turn grey/green. Good thing this is a test batch.

[ChrisTaylor]

Just made the vinaigrettes (octo and fish sauce). I could see the octo working nicely with, say, some pork belly.

[TheTInCook]

Guess I'm going to have to try the octo vin.

So the dough turned out very very nice to roll. I rolled it number 5, and then cut it on the spegetti cutter. It didn't need flour at all when rolling, and it cut beautifully. The noodles stayed separate, though a very few seemed to break.

Tomorrow I'm doing a ramen class at this place I volunteer at. We're going to do the Momofuku menma there, as well as go over some basic veggie cookery (Kholrabi, kabocha, and yu choy. I wanted them to taste some of the 'exotic' stuff while still learning how to make 'normal' veggies), and how to boil an egg. Not doing to the full momofuko broth. Instead, it's gonna be chicken stock and dashi, with mushroom stem. onion, and ginger. For the meats, I braised a beef shank in master sauce. That'll get either sliced or pulled ala Momofuku pork shoulder. Instead of pork belly, were doing some Chinese style char sui. I'm going to take a look at the book tommorrow to see if we have any easy pickles to make.

I forgot to add, that since I was frying stuff for dinner, I might as well give my noodle nest a fry and see if I can make my own instant ramen. I think my oil might have been too hot for that process, since it started coloring before it was tottally dry in the center. It's drying uncovered on my counter.

Edited April 4, 2012 by TheTInCook (log)

[Shalmanese]

Just checked my dough. I left it out, wrapped in plastic, at room temp for ~1.5 hours. Its got a nice texture, feels like it will roll well in the machine, BUT it's already starting to turn grey/green. Good thing this is a test batch.

Odd, definitely shouldn't be green. When you first rolled it, was it yellow? What flour are you using?

[ChrisTaylor]

The fried chicken is good but, honestly, I don't know how good it'd be (and I used a good bird) without the octo vin. The octo vin really lifts it to the next level in the way I don't think a spiced brine/coating/etc could or would. Ever. I think next time, tho', I might not buy a whole chicken: maybe a bundle of legs would be better.

[TheTInCook]

Odd, definitely shouldn't be green. When you first rolled it, was it yellow? What flour are you using?

The color change happened before I rolled it. It was a nice shade of yellow for while after I mixed it. The flour is ConAgra All Purpose.

While it was a bit disconcerting to see that grayish lump of dough, it didn't look so bad once I rolled and cut it. (Forgot to take a pic of the dough lump)

[TheTInCook]

The momofuku noodle dough turned out great. One of the students added extra water when I wasn't looking, but we sopped it up with extra flour. It was still a little moister then ideal, but with a little skill it was manageable. It was pretty cool teaching them how to use a pasta machine. Before trying to teach someone how to do it, I hadn't realized how much nuance there is to using one. Here's a pick of three of them doing their first solo run. The table had a weird little lip to it, so it made clamping it almost impossible and you needed an extra hand to hold it down. I either gotta bring a bigger clamp, or some spacer blocks.

They cooked fast, only took a minute or 2. Not the five in the book.

I was going to make the pickled shitake mushrooms, but I forgot to pack the vinegar, so we did them nimono style. Still good.

[Shalmanese]

I've found alkaline noodles to be pretty bulletproof. As a test, I boiled one batch for 20 minutes and it still have quite a bit of bite although nearly all the flavor had leached into the water. Try making a 2 minute batch and 5 minute batch side by side and comparing.

[Shalmanese]

Just checked my dough. I left it out, wrapped in plastic, at room temp for ~1.5 hours. Its got a nice texture, feels like it will roll well in the machine, BUT it's already starting to turn grey/green. Good thing this is a test batch.

Odd, definitely shouldn't be green. When you first rolled it, was it yellow? What flour are you using?

Just reading something on Udon production where it says:

Too low a protein level results in noodles with a poor cooking performance while too high results in undesirable brightness loss in both the raw and cooked noodle.

...

Starch damage during milling increases water uptake during mixing,decreases the breaking strength of the dried noodle and produces an undesirable darkening of the noodle.

. Edited April 6, 2012 by Shalmanese (log)

[TheTInCook]

Interesting, nice find. I'd never connected starch damage to dough color before. I know that millers have a certain target for starch damage since it makes doughs hydrate faster, and provides easy food for yeast. Maybe the flours in the US have a higher level of starch damage then Japanese flours.

[ChrisTaylor]

Steak saam tonight with one significant difference. When I poked around the shops the lettuce was all very sad-looking. I opted to forgo the lettuce in favour of some homemade flour tortillas, playing with Chang's constant comparisons between the early days of saam bar and a buritto bar.

[Simon_S]

I think I may have to order this book. Quick question: is the recipe for the Momofuku Ssam Bar sprouts dish included? I've been telling people about that dish since I first sampled it, and I'd love to be able to show them what I'm talking about.