These Shrimps Were Made For Wokin: Shrimp Stirfry with Brown Rice October 10, 2008
Posted by sicatmeow in Recipes.Tags: bok choy, brown rice, carrot, ginger, hot pepper, scallion, sesame oil, shrimp, tamari
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I am foreal sweatin this wok. You should def get one. And now that I’m getting the hang of it, I am woking up something major. Here is my weekly wok tip of the day (huh?): Cook fast and cook hot. Make sure your ingredients are ready to throw in cause when the wok calls, you answer gotdamnit.
Chinese Shrimp Stirfry with Ginger and Brown Rice
1/4 cup of fresh ginger (thin strips)
4 small hot, red peppers, sliced (add more or less depending on your fire mouth)
2 scallions, sliced, keep the bottom half separate from the top half, but you will be using both
1 carrot julienned
1 bunch of baby bok choy (can’t find baby bok choy? 1/2 of a mama), chop the stems, slice the greens and keep each pile separate
1/2 lb of medium-sized shrimp, peeled and de-shitted
1/8 cup of tamari (have I mentioned that tamari is the same as soy?)
2 cups of cooked brown rice
veg or peanut oil for frying
sesame oil for garnish
marinade for the shrimp:
1 tsp of chinese 5 spice
1 tbs of tamari
1 tbs of tomato paste
This serves 2 with 20 minutes of prep (if you’re peeling your own shrimp), and 10 minutes of cooking. (That’s 30 minutes total. der.)
First, prepare your shreemps. Peel and do what you gotta do. Mix the chinese spice, 1 tbs of tamari and tomato paste. Coat the shrimp and let it site while you chop the veg. When you’re all prepped, you’re ready to heat the wok.
Heat your wok, add the veg or peanut oil and heat till it smokes. Add the ginger and stir furiously. 30 seconds later, add the hot peppers (this may make you cough). 30 seconds later, add the whites of the bok choy. Your wok’s heat may have reduced a bit, so make sure it is as hot as it was when you started. When it is, add the carrots. 1 minute later, add the whites of the scallions. Now, add your cooked rice. Make sure your wok is hot, the rice should be crisping in some areas, but because you are stirring like mad, it won’t stick. Add the green of the bok choy and when wilted, create a whole in the middle of the grub and add the shrimp.
Stir the shrimp in the middle while it cooks. As soon as the shrimp is done (about 3 minutes), stir everything together, add the remaining tamari and dish up. Garnish with greens of the scallions and sesame oil. Eat with cold cold beer.
Dumpling For You, Dumpling For Me October 8, 2008
Posted by sicatmeow in Recipes.Tags: basil, beef, cabbage, carrot, cilantro, dumplings, ginger, pork, rice paper, scallion, sesame oil, shitake, sirachi, tamari, wanton wrappers, wasabi
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What do you get when you combine homemade dumplings and spring rolls, wine flowage, and tequila shots to boot? Our house on Saturday night. Oh. Yeah. And I’m not going to lie to you people, the food was banging. Even C said the food seemed easy enough to make at home and her culinary skills peak at choosing a stinky cheese and a dope wine – not that thats anything to laugh about. I can’t taste the difference between merlot and shiraz but give me a blind pork test and I’ll school you. Anyway, make these things at your house to impress your friends.
Steamed Pork and Scallion Dumplings
1/2 lb of ground pork
2 scallions, sliced
1/4 cup of tamari
3 tbs of sesame oil
dash of vinegar
fresh pepper
wanton wrappers
Makes about 12.
Mix the first 6 ingredients together. Drop a spoonful of mixture on to the center of the wrapper. Wet the exposed edges with water. Grab all the corners, bring to the middle and scrunch together. Steam for 20 minutes. Dipping sauces below.
Steamed Ginger and Beef Dumplings
1/2 lb of ground beef
1/4 cup of finely chopped ginger
1/4 cup of tamari
salt and fresh pepper
wanton wrappers
Makes about 12.
Mix all ingredients together. Drop a spoonful of mixture on to the center of the wrapper. Wet the exposed edges with water. Grab all the corners, bring to the middle and scrunch together. Steam for 20 minutes. Dipping sauces below.
Fried Cabbage, Shitake and Carrot Dumplings
1 carrot, diced
1/4 cup of white cabbage, shredded
1/4 cup of shitake mushrooms, diced
wanton wrappers
veg oil for frying
1/2 cup of water
Makes about 12.
Dice your carrot, cabbage and shrooms and combine in a bowl. Drop a tablespoon or so (you’ll begin to feel it out) onto the wrapper. Guess what you do here. That’s right. Wet the edges, grab the corners, bring together, scrunchy scrunchy. Here is what is different. Heat a frying pan and add a bit of veg oil for frying. When very hot, place your dumpling to fry for 5 minutes. When they have a nice crispy brown bottom, pour in a 1/2 cup of water and cover immediately to finish cooking through with a nice steam bath. Let it do its thing for 5 minutes. Should be ready at this time. Dipping sauces below.
Fresh Spring Rolls
1/2 carrot, julienned (that means cut into thin strips at about 3 inches)
2 scallions, cut down the middle middle and cut at about 3 inches
1/2 bunch of cilantro
1/2 bunch of chinese or (uh, american? or italian?.. dunno) basil
rice paper rolls
Cut your veggies and clean and dry your herbals. Add the rice paper to a bowl of very warm water and let it soften for about 30 seconds. Make sure you get all the edges under the water so it doesn’t roll up and crack. When the paper is soft, very gently pull it out and lay flat on a cutting board. Throw a bit of each of your ingredients into the center towards the bottom of the wrapper. Begin to roll the fatty towards the center. Halfway up, grab the right and the left and fold over the rolled half. Then continue to roll up. As soon as the paper dries, it will stick to itself. To serve, use a very sharp knife to cut 2 or 4 slices and stand up if possible.
Dippin Sauces
sirachi
wasabi paste with tamari
chopped ginger in tamari
sesame oil with red pepper flakes (or without)
Let me mention that I particularly like the wasabi with the beef and the sesame oil with the spring rolls. Let me also mention that these are damn easy to do, cheap as all get out and fun to eat. I am not afraid to cater your next dumpling affair. Gimme a date and a time and I’ll be there. You provide the tequila.
Turning A House Into a Home With Homemade Sausage July 22, 2008
Posted by sicatmeow in Fun Gadgets, Projects, Recipes.Tags: BBQ, cheddar, chicken, jerk, pork, sausage, scallion, spicy
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As a home-warming gift to ourselves, R and I got a sausage making attachment for my fancy mixer. We’ve done it twice now, the first time taking about 3 hours longer than our second attempt. What resulted were recipes for the following: Sun-dried Tomato and Jalapeño Chicken, Southwestern Pepper Pork, Scallion and English Cheddar Pork, Jerk Pork, and Bloody Mary Pork. Our second batch was good ol fashioned, Spicy Pork.
We bought chicken breast and pork butt from my second home, Los Paisanos. Cut them in large 2″ chunks and froze the meat, which makes it much easier to grind. Freezing the pork is most important because grinding fat, which is all up in the pork butt, is tough on the machine unless it’s as cold as possible.
We used all natural hog casing preserved in salt. The casings need to soak in cold water for 30 minutes prior to sliding onto the stuffer. The only part of this process that grossed me the hell out was using the casing. For some reason, the smell of the rawness, which is not strong at all, stuck in my nostrils for days. I washed my hands 72 times, but I would still wake up in the middle of the night smelling hog intestines. Will this stop me from becoming the Snausy queen of NY? No.
I don’t have explicit amounts cause we didn’t do it like that. We just perused the fridge, grabbed, chopped or grinded, and threw that shiv together. Here’s the list:
Chicken Sausage: Chicken breast, fresh jalapeño, oil-marinaded sun-dried tomatoes, lots of fresh garlic. All ingredients went through the grinder, pureing it all. No extra fat was added. This caused for a healthy, but crumbly sausage.
Southwestern Pepper Pork: B’s sis came through after her trip through the southwest. She brought a very spicy, sweet, and delish pepper relish. We folded tons of this stuff to the pork and a fresh chopped jalopeno.
Scallion and English Cheddar Pork: This was B’s idea and it was inspired by a traditional sour cream and onion dip. We grinded the scallion and cut the cheese in chunks so that when it cooked, the cheese would be gooey and melty. This was inspired by those crappy cheese stuffed hotdogs.
Jerk Pork: This was my second favorite sausage. But I’m not going to lie to you. The reason why I can’t claim it to be my fave is cause we used a jarred jerk. BUT, I’ll tell you why. This jerk seasoning is so damn delish, it’s the whole don’t fix-it-if-aint-broke thing. Do your self a favor and go buy Grace Jerk Seasoning. Anyway, we added a whole bunch of this spicy goodness to the pork, and damn, all jerked out.
Bloody Mary Pork: Now, this is my ultimate fave, mostly cause the ingredients were most original. We just added the best of what you would add to a Bloody Mary, besides the tomato juice: prepared horseradish, Tabasco, worchester sauce, green olives with pimento, spicy pickled green beans, salt and pepper.
All in all, the sausages were pretty good but they need some improvement. Since they were all pretty cumbly, we decided we would add more fat to the next batch. Also, the flavors could have been a bit more strong, so we’ll double that next time.
Good ol’ Spicy Pork: Our second batch we did a traditional spicy pork sausage with more fat. This time the sausages were perfect in texture, but again, we still need to add more flavor crystals. We added onion powder, garlic powder, cayenne, thyme, mustard powder, salt and fresh black pepper.
In conclusion, making sausage is not all that hard. Making it good, thats another thing. But watch out Jimmy Dean. I’mma comin.
Meat Filled Weekend Leads To Fish Sunday: Sesame Salmon July 21, 2008
Posted by sicatmeow in Health, Recipes.Tags: BBQ, ginger, noodles, salmon, scallion, sesame, udon
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BBQ after BBQ, you start to realize how much meat you eat. So, on Sunday night I thought I would cook fish. I don’t remember where this recipe came from but I been doing it up for a minute now, and it’s one of my staples. It’s cheap, healthy, and scrumptious. Do it. Do it.
Sesame Salmon over Rice Noodles
2 servings of rice noodles, boiled al dente
2 servings of salmon fillet
sesame seeds, white or black or both
sesame oil, hot or not
tamari, or soy sauce
scallions, sliced thin
fresh ginger, chopped small
butter and olive oil
Coat the skin and the opposite side of the salmon in sesame seeds. Cook in a skillet with a little butter and a little olive oil till desired temperature. When the noodles are cooked, drain and throw into a deep bowl. Add one part sesame oil to three parts tamari and toss to coat noodles. Add scallion and ginger. Place salmon on top. Serve with pride.
She comes for the Beef, stays for the Yoke: Ramen July 6, 2008
Posted by sicatmeow in Recipes.Tags: beef, egg, kimchi, noodles, ramen, scallion, shitake, sirachi, soup, spicy, zucchini
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C came over for lunch cause I wanted to show her my Ramen. I promised her beef to trick her into eating kimchi – totally worked. My obsession for spicy noodles was launched about a year ago, and I still want to eat them all day long. This is also my favorite dish to cook because it is damn cheap (see the receipt below), quick, easy, filling, and CAN BE healthIER when adding fresh ingredients.
The fanciest part of this whole recipe is the poached egg, which for me, has become an absolute essential item. I learned this from David Chang, which I guess everyone knew except for me for the longest. Thanks guys.
Check it. Cook it. Eat it.
3 packets of original flavored Ramen, whichever brand
1 zucchini, thinly sliced
10ish dried shitake mushrooms
1/4 lb slices roast beef from the deli
kimchi (mine’s homemade, that’s for the next post, you can buy it at most specialty food shop these days)
2 scallions, thinly sliced
2 eggs
a dash of vinegar
optional:
snow peas, frozen greens of any kind, bean spouts, cubed uncooked tofu… um, anything you want really.
The longest part is reconstituting the mushrooms. Boil 2 cups of water, add to mushrooms and cover. Let sit for 20 minutes. When done, remove the mushrooms to slice, and reserve the newly created mushroom broth.
Cook the Ramen according to the packet’s directions. For 3 packets, you will need 6 cups of water. Additionally, add the 2 cups of reserved mushroom broth and bring to a boil. Add the Ramen noodles, mushrooms, zuccini and any of the optional ingredients you desire.
Simultaneously, bring a deep frying pan to boil with a dash of vinegar for poaching your eggs. At a soft boil, crack your eggs directly into the water. They should congeal and turn a solid white. After about 2 minutes, the eggs and noodles will be ready.
Add the noodles to a huge bowl for eating lots. With a slatted spoon, grab an egg for each bowl and float on top of the servings. Divide the sliced beef and add to the steaming bowl of noodles. Garnish with kimchi and scallion. For added spice, I recommend using Sirachi, not some vinegar-based hot sauce like Tobasco.
And?.. You’re welcome.
