tasty nom nom an exception to the daily meal

Chinese New Year

新年快樂
Xin Nian Kuai Le

恭喜發財
Kung Hei Fat Choy

In Mandarin and Cantonese.

With the epic snow and ice storm last week, my work at home time stretched endlessly to Friday evening, I didn't think about menu until Friday night. After conferring with you to make sure you will be able to leave your house, I searched the web and my usual suspect of food blogs for some New Year dishes. Chinese food is tricky. By which I mean I am sensitive to the food preferences of G (and N), and still want to hold on to a little heritage. Last year, I run into trouble with the chicken. I tried to step around some of those issues and attempted a more friendly menu.

• Red braised yuba skin and ribs Serious Eats
• Shrimp and chives dumplings Rasa Malaysia
• Ginger scallion fish Rasa Malaysia
• Claypot chicken rice, without claypot Rasa Malaysia
• Long Beans Washington Post 

Really, these recipes are all guidelines, it was all free form cooking.

grocery,  home at 1:30 pm

I had a feeling grocery shopping Saturday morning would be madness. Snowed in for days, with Chinese New Year to shop for, I was anticipating chaos at Asian markets. So I gave myself some incentive and stopped at Tofu 101, for hot brunch items. Mmm. I was also thinking taro pastry for dessert. Buns yes, but no pastry and very small selection of tofu. Yikes.

Then off to Jing Jing Market. Where I stared wide eye and honked at the lady who decided to back up in the middle of the busy parking lot. "Inches", the parking attendant said. According to him, 'Happens a lot'. Sigh. Automobile adventure aside, I came home with the last package of long beans.

all prepped, at 5pm

Lots of prepping - clean shrimp, remove string from snow peas, trim ends from long beans, soak and chop shitake mushrooms and yuba skin, chop up chicken & fish & tofu & ribs, make dumplings, julienne ginger and scallions. After starting the braise and  all the prep, I had just enough time to take the fuzzies on a walk, shower, and start cooking.

phew! at the table

This particular Saturday, I felt like I was racing the clock all day! Phew. I tried to avoid cook-last-minute-dishes, but ended up with two stir frys and one pan fry. Stir fry is almost fool proof with a hot pan and same size ingredients. Keep the ingredients moving in the pan and take it off the heat just before it is done. For greens, I add some water (or broth) to steam for a few minutes.

The dishes turned out ok, no major disaster, just minor ones  like losing track of my utensils. The sauce set up oddly in the long beans. I did not overcook the fish. The braised ribs texture was off.  The shrimp dumplings was good. And well, the giant pot of rice was tasty, but it would be tastier with the claypot. (Yes, I really should get a claypot. I have no good reason not to have one.)

G, holding up a snow pea,  "don't these have peas inside them?"

I think he confused them with sugar snap peas. Heh. So sad N does not like shitake mushrooms. Did he mind the taste in the rice? or does he just not like eating them?

where are all the females?

After dinner, I was too lazy to take out new games, even thought I've had Forbidden Island, If Wishes were Fishes, and Coloretto for a while now. I need to copy and distribute those rules ahead. So we played one of our favorite - Castle. Wow. I had the very crappy hand, totally blocked by no Queen, no Princess ...

We wrapped up the evening with Mama Mia. Go you who made all your pizzas. Happy Year of the Dragon.

Look, Bright Shinny Object

Hi J -

Merry Christmas! This has been a busy December for me. I planned on shipping a project in mid-December then coast through the holidaze at Old Job. However, New Boss at New Job had a different idea. So I found myself with only miscellaneous thoughts; no menu, no grocery list, and distinct lack of plan, two days before Christmas dinner.

• Roasted Beef with Yorkshire Pudding, with fresh grated horseradish
• Tuscan Kale Slaw
• Brussels Sprouts Gratin, a cross between this and that
• ... all that talk about Yule Log, turned into butter cookies
• and eggnog, of course

N kicked off the evening with RedBreast, 12yr with some eggnog. Was this really the first time he tried eggnog? I think he liked it. A good start to the evening.

I am going to distract you from the too rare beef with some gremlota

The beef turned out too rare. Although I didn't kill anyone, the dish didn't win any fans. The kale slaw was pretty good. I tried to add some crunch with crumbled crouton bits, but it needed more.

all pretty before tossing

Was it painfully obvious my strategy on this meal was mitigation? Meat and two sides are new and untested  So in the event the beef didn't turn out,  have a different protein (eggs!). If you do not like vegetables, have some cheese to go with that (gratin!). And in case one vegetable side doesn't turn out, well try the other vegetable dish (Brussel Sprouts or Kale!).  Or was it distraction? burn your face off with fresh horseradish, or hey, look at the cute dishes!

Poor G, the combination of rare beef, soft boiled eggs, and kale almost put him over the edge. No matter, he drank his dinner. (booze!)

Does this qualify as vegetable?

cute dinnerware
nevermind what's on (or not) my plate

The Yorkshire pudding bombed. They burnt in the muffin tin and didn't puff. I have not had trouble with popovers, Dutch babies, or any of the poofy pancake like dishes. These were total fail.

But ... You rescued us with a sweet finish of Pecan Pie (and coffee pot).

mmm pie, and hi I see you Butter Cookies

The food was fine, but your company is awesome. Merry Christmas and best wishes to the New Year! And Happy anniversary to TNN.

-E, G, W & K

P.S. The sticky pecan rolls are from this recipe.

Dinner, courtesy of grocery stores

Hi J -

Last week, I wanted a Saturday off and proposed we go out. Sadly, the evening out was a bit of let down, due to all sorts of reasons. So last weekend, I resolved to find a bit of energy to cobble a dinner together.

• Oven roasted turkey breast
• Gravy, with N's homemade broth
• Boxed stuffing
• Sauteed kale
• Can of cranberry jelly

As G described it, it was a Grocery Store Dinner.

Grocery store dinner on college era plates
saved by your cranberries

I defrosted the frozen turkey breast in the fridge for a couple of days, then brine in chicken broth with aromatics for a few days. I took it out of the fridge to let it warm up, pat dry the skin, drizzled with a bit olive oil, and seasoned with salt and pepper. It went in the oven 450° F for about 20 minutes, then reduced the temperature to 350°F until internal temperature of 158°F . See how nicely that schedule works out for grocery shopping on the weekend before, prepare & brine during a weeknight, then cooking it the on the following Saturday. I make the boxed stuffing while the poultry rested.This simple turkey breast recipe is a stable for us and rarely fails me.

On the other hand, gravy ... I have never made gravy before. Gravy has always intimated me. Not sure if you noticed, but I quizzed N extensively on T-day, looking for tips and tricks.  I started with N's turducken broth, reduced the giant container by half,  1.5QT. Then melted 4TBP of butter and made a roux. It took a few minutes to darken, then I whisked in the broth slowly ... my heart skipped a few beats while whisking briskly to try to avoid lumps.

While I was intently whisking and cooking the roux, I was burning the kale in the other pan. But even the crispy kale couldn't take away the glory of canned cranberry jelly.

perfection

After dinner, with the coffee pot kaput, and one small backup french press, I downsized the coffee cups and rationed the coffee. Even with less coffee, we managed a game of Acquire and without too heated of arguments.

start of Acquire

Next up, Christmas ...

Dinner of Excess

Hello E!

Thanksgiving is truly a meal of excess. With just the four of us, I tried to pare things back... but it was still quite excessive!

For starters, we had:

• cheese, crackers, and onion jam


• Khai Luk Koei, Son-In-Law (quail!) eggs


son-in-law quail eggs

• roasted garlic soup, documented here

N found the recipe for the Son-In-Law eggs when he was researching the turducken and he traced it back to a Thai recipe. It was an interesting dish and I think he will make it again.

When it came to the protein portion of the meal, N did not want to make a boring old turkey. He wanted to make something much more complicated and interesting. He decided on a turducken. I expected the deboning portion of the process to be very difficult, but N got it done quickly and tidily. Impressive!

Assembling was a bit more difficult. Between each bird there was a layer of stuffing. Cornbread stuffing was inside the chicken, sage sausage stuffing in the duck and turkey. Metal skewers were used to hold the chicken inside the duck inside the turkey. Then it came time to wrap it all up.

1. before wrapping, 2. wrapping,
3. assembling, 4. assembling,
5. hillbilly ingenuity, 6. Turducken cooking... looks just like a regular turkey, hmmmm

The chicken fit snugly within the duck, but the duck just seemed too large for the turkey. It required some tugging and pulling and after fighting with it for a while N turned and asked me a question.

N, "do you have a needle that this kitchen twine will fit through?"

Like any good yarn crafter, I have a plethora of yarn needles. However, like many yarn crafters, I'm always misplacing my chibis. I dug through no fewer than five containers of knitting notions before I found a metal needle.

N used the needle to seam up the turkey with the duck and chicken inside. "Redneck ingenuity," he declared. It wasn't the prettiest stitchery, but it held everything inside without a problem!

As for the main course, we had:

plated

• turducken with two types of stuffing


• mushroom gravy, N's recipe


• leeks vinaigrette, I love leeks.


• plain ol' steamed broccoli


• chipotle scalloped sweet potatoes


• mashed sweet potatoes


• cranberries -- two types! spiced and plain ol'. I don't think anyone liked the spiced, not even over-spice-loving me. The plain cranberries is my mother's recipe, minus walnuts and with added cointreau.


• buttermilk dinner rolls from The Bread Baker's Apprentice - I love this recipe, but my kitchen aid mixer gets sad mixing it for so long

Pumpkin pie and egg nog via you!

pumpkin pie

Egg nog in coffee not shown -- yum!

Of course after this, blood was busy helping digest the meal in our stomachs and not flowing to our brains. We needed a no-thought necessary game. I pulled out Bohnanza [bgg] thinking of this but we only made it through one round before the complaint rose, "I need something with less brain work!" So Uno to end the night it was! I can't complain, as I am the Uno champion.

I've been thinking about some meals for the new year and can't wait until we get there.

In

Hi J -

Is pork belly the in food? The hip food establishment near work offers a Pork Belly Salad. The dish has more pork than vegetables. There are pork belly recipes on TV, in food magazines... I saw this Pork Belly Buster recipe from Bon Appétit. I am so tempted to make it.  I also read the really flattering article on Husk, where the Chef is breeding and raising his own heritage pigs.

I exercised some restraint (ha!) and opted for Red Cooked Pork Belly (红烧肉). Two recipes I like are from Rasa Malaysia and 80 Breakfasts. I asked G how everyone would feel about pork belly and he didn't seem to think anyone would mind the fat. But I noticed he left the tender fatty portions on his plate. Fail. I also read somewhere, on the Internets, that commercially available bacon has decreased from 80% to 50% fat in the last few decades. I forgot to take a pic of the "lean pork" sticker on my pork belly package. No really.

Friday evening, I cut up the pork belly and pork shoulder, browned the meat to a deep golden, tossed in ginger, Sichuan peppercorns, then deglazed with Shaoxing wine, sweet soy, yellow rock sugar, added a couple star anise & cinnamon, covered and cooked on the lowest simmer for a couple of hours. The meat / braise liquid cool overnight, and a lovely lay of fat floated to the top. Mmm. I skimmed the fat, reheat, and pour over store bought fried tofu.

with tofu, this dish is almost healthy

With all the root vegetables coming into season, I wanted to try an alternative to jasmine rice. I cubed a daikon, a few turnips, and half a celery root that I purchased for no particular reason last week, and tried to make a mash.

I love how the skin of the turnips are slightly purple.

Daikon, if I had though about it, has high water content. Turnip, is lower in starch than potatoes. And well, celery root, is just unknown to me. So needless to say, mash didn't work out.  I attempted a rescue with the immersion blender. The puree, seasoned with generous amount of salt and a splash of half and half, separated but there was not much I could do about that.

beige food on white plate

Everyone seems to like the puree okay. The surprise favorite was another backup dish, store bought dumplings from Tofu 101 Yelp. Tofu 101 is a tiny take out store front. They make tofu on premise and offer a selection of soy products, brunch items on Saturdays, and 'homemade' dumplings amongst other things.

dumplings, with spicy concoction

They had three dumpling flavors in stock that day. This one is pork with Chinese Chive, which, I think N really liked. I thought the filling was very tasty, but the skin was doughy. I would definitely try the other flavors.

After dinner, and all the Thanksgiving menu talk, we settled in with Mama Mia!

who was hoarding all the bell peppers?

N pulled a serious upset by making all his pizzas, two games in a roll. Which meant, yes, it was time to stop. I was asleep before you and N made it home with the midnight snack of the leftover dumplings.

P.S. Hail to the start of the indulgence season!

Lack of Imagination

Good evening, E!

I guess it is not so much a lack of imagination so much as lack of summer food imagination that carried this meal. I was daydreaming about making spinach soufflé, french onion soup and bread, but it simply wasn't seasonally appropriate. Soon, very soon!

Since I had a mid-day hockey practice, I handed over the meal planning to N. In turn he handed me the task of making a simple salad.

While I was out picking up a few things for the salad, I happened across some black figs. I've been craving figs recently (funny how that happens with the season change!) and decided on the simple but tasty appetizer of prosciutto wrapped figs stuffed with goat cheese, grilled quickly. I forgot to drizzle the honey on about half of the figs -- I'm not sure it made a difference.

yum, figs

I'm still wishing for more grilled figs, with or without the cheese and prosciutto. Yum.

Salad wise, I started at gorgeous tomatoes courtesy N's boss. I tossed the tomatoes with some artichoke hearts, romaine, and sautéed onions. I threw together a simple dijon vinaigrette. Easy peasy -- and there was no salad left!

quick salad

N took care of the rest of the meal. He made jerk chicken with a habanero + peach sauce. I made a less-spicy version of the sauce by mixing it with plain yogurt and cotija.

chicken and potatoes

N also made wrinkled potatoes. It is deceptive in how much salt it uses and how salty the potatoes end up. It reminds me of upstate/central New York's salt potatoes, though wrinkled potatoes use a bit less salt! In Syracuse you can actually buy a kit which is just bag of potatoes with the correct amount of salt and just dump the whole thing into a pot with some water.

For dessert, N popped open a bottle of Southern Tier's Crème Brûlée and served us each a few ounces. This is a beer that our favorite server at our favorite local restaurant introduced to us and we subsequently became a bit obsessed. We shared that obsessionhobby with you! Hooray, beer!

We played some mindless games instead of trying something new with the beer. Next week! We picked up a couple of potentially interesting games to try out.