Salt & Fat

Last year, with the help from our friends at Mule Radio, we started our very own podcast. It’s...

jimray — Wed, 16 Jan 2013 14:44:00 -0800

Last year, with the help from our friends at Mule Radio, we started our very own podcast. It’s been great fun, we’ve learned a lot, and hopefully our listeners did, too.

We’ve got other ideas for Salt & Fat, so we’re going to be winding the podcast down. Today’s episode, fittingly, is all about starting fresh, and it will be the penultimate one. We want our last episode, in 2 weeks, to be all about our listeners, so if you’ve been holding off on asking a question or just saying hi, now’s the time to call (260-225-7258) or email.

We love Salt & Fat and want it to be the best it can be — the first thing you’ll notice is we’re going to be writing here more. We’re thankful for everyone who tuned in, especially thankful to Mule Radio for giving us a chance to try out our radio voices, and can’t wait for what’s next.

Double-corn tortillas

mrgan — Thu, 03 Jan 2013 07:31:15 -0800

Freshly made tortillas have the potential to completely change your cooking game, taking you from the playground of bland, store-bought, flour flats to the big leagues of big corn flavors and wonderfully soft dough textures. What follows is a basic corn-tortilla recipe with a shocking twist: the use of corn stock instead of water. If you don’t already have corn stock in the freezer (we wrote up a mock recipe a while ago) just use water and you’ll be making regular corn tortillas. Those are still great, though I really dig the roasty, sweet, hyper-corny flavor of the stock-based ones. Whenever I have extra corn stock, I’ll be saving a few cups for them.

Ingredients

2 cups masa harina (such as Maseca)
2 cups corn stock (or water)
2 tsp salt

Makes ~16 tortillas

Directions

Place the masa harina and the salt in a large mixing bowl and stir with a fork to combine. Add about 1 cup of the stock while folding/mixing with a spatula. Once the dough is sort of coming together (it’ll still be very dry and rough) switch to kneading with your hands. Mash, fold, and punch the dough.

Add more stock slowly, 1/4 cup at a time. Depending on your masa harina, you may need anywhere from 1 1/2 cups of stock to the full 2 cups. Masa dough doesn’t really mind if you overwork it, so feel free to add more masa harina or liquid to balance it out. Make sure the dough is even, with no dry pockets.

The final product should take no more than 5 minutes of kneading, and it’ll feel like putty: flexible, moist, but not wet or sticky. Nothing should be sticking to the sides of the bowl or pooled at the bottom of it. Shape the dough into a rough ball, cover the bowl with a towel, and let rest for 15 minutes up to an hour. You may need to moisten it slightly with water if it feels dry after resting.

In the meantime, prepare the following hardware:

Two nonstick pans, teflon or cast iron or similar. You can also use one long griddle over two burners.
Tortilla press. If you don’t have one—and they’re pretty cheap and small, really—you can press your tortillas with a round, see-through pie pan. Press straight down and look through to make sure it stays even. But do consider getting a press, ok?
One gallon-size ziplock bag, cut open into two plastic covers large enough to cover the two sides of your tortilla press.
Tortilla warmer, or, a large, clean towel, slightly moistened and folded in half.

Set one pan (or one end of the griddle) over medium-low heat. Set the other pan over medium-high. Make sure they preheat for at least 3 minutes.

The flow of your hardware should be: masa bowl > tortilla press > medium-low pan > medium-high pan > tortilla warmer. Arrange these in a way that makes sense to you and fits your kitchen space.

Break off a golf-ball-size piece of the dough and shape it into a rough ball. Don’t worry too much about making it perfect; the dough should cooperate willingly. Cover the bowl with the towel again.

Press it gently onto the first piece of plastic on the bottom side of the tortilla press, just enough to flatten it a bit. Again, don’t worry about the shape too much, as long as it stays together.

Cover it with the second piece of plastic and work the press: press down. Open the press and rotate the tortilla 180º. I don’t mean flip it; rotate it while flat against the bottom and press down again to make sure it’s even.

Open the press again and lift the plastic-sandwiched tortilla. Remove the top piece of plastic carefully and place back on the press. Now transfer the tortilla, dough side down, onto your other hand, then peel off the second piece of plastic from the top. Always peel the plastic from the tortilla, not the other way around.

Gently place the tortilla onto the first, medium-low-heat pan. You can flip it over carefully, or touch the end of the tortilla by the bottom of your palm to the pan, then move your hand out of the way and let it drape over the pan.

Give it 30 seconds on this side, then flip it over. You can use a spatula, but as the tortilla won’t really stick to the pan, it’s easier to just do this using your fingers. Give it another 30 seconds.

Now flip the tortilla back onto the first side onto the second, medium-high-heat pan. Press it down gently with the back of your hand or a flat spatula; this will help it really absorb the heat quickly, resulting in the crucial final step of puffing up. The tortilla should basically inflate over the next few seconds.

Once the tortilla puffs up—and if it doesn’t, press it down again, and consider perhaps boosting the heat a bit?—it’s ready to come out and go into your tortilla warmer.

So, 30 seconds on each side in the medium-low pan, then flip over again onto the medium-high pan and wait for it to pillow up. You’ll get into the rhythm of it eventually, rolling and pressing tortillas while waiting for the previous batch to heat and puff up.

Your tortillas should stay warm for up to an hour in a proper warming dish, 15-20 minutes in a towel. Stored in a bag in the fridge, they will keep for up to a week. To reheat them, microwave for 1-2 minutes in a moistened towel.

Serving suggestion: tacos filled with our mole.

Notes

You’ll find masa harina in the Hispanic section of your supermarket. (Please note that this is not the same as cornmeal, corn starch, or other ground corn products.) The Maseca brand is ubiquitous and cheap. For extra credit, consider asking your local Mexican taqueria if they’ll sell you some fresh masa, in which case you can skip the mixing steps and go straight to the press. Masa is the stuff that gets dried and packaged for commercial sale as masa harina; it tastes better fresh, but it’s extremely inconvenient to grind and nixtamalize your own masa at home.

Depending on your corn, how much of it you use, and how much you let it reduce, your corn stock may be anywhere from a refreshingly fragrant water to a thick, sticky syrup. I reduce mine quite a bit, until it resembles unfiltered apple cider or rich chicken soup.

The two-pan method of grilling tortillas, described by your most trustworthy source on Mexican cooking, Rick Bayless, is essential; I made about 150 tortillas using the single-pan method and never got them to puff up as nicely as when I added the second, high-heat pan. What happens is that the first pan seals the sides of the tortilla, and the high heat of the second pan makes it expand quickly the only way it can: by separating the two outside layers and inflating from the inside. It is this double-layer nature of properly puffed tortillas that gives them their soft, never-cracking texture and fresh taste.

Instead of counting to 30 every time you add a tortilla to the pan, consider placing a big analog clock near your stove. I pulled up the big clock display on my iPad and set it on the counter.

Whether you use corn stock or water, these will be so much better than anything you can buy in the store. Don’t be surprised if you find yourself eating them plain—but what am I saying, there’s nothing plain about these tortillas!

Stock & Larder

jimray — Fri, 30 Nov 2012 10:15:31 -0800

Stock & Larder:

One of the most frequently asked questions we get is “what _____ should I buy?” and, over the years, we’ve amassed opinions about all sorts of cooking gear. We figured it was about time to compile them all in one place, organized from essential to ideal, with a handful of cookbooks.

We’re calling it Stock & Larder and it’s here just in time for the holidays. We personally vouch for everything there and try our best to avoid the overpriced and unnecessary.

Everything is also an Amazon affiliate link, which means you’ll get a square deal, awesome service, and fast shipping, while we get a little kickback. It’s a great way to equip your kitchen and support Salt & Fat at the same time.

We hope you find it helpful, be sure to follow @stockandlarder on Twitter for updates.

Neven's mole

mrgan — Thu, 25 Oct 2012 20:53:28 -0700

Mexican mole is a contentious dish, subject to endless debate over authenticity and correct preparation. The king of moles, mole poblano, deserves all this attention: made the traditional, long way, it’s a symphony of flavors. However, it’s also an investment of many hours (possibly days) of work, starting with 26 different ingredients.

Luckily, I make no claim to authenticity with my mole; I can only say that it’s tasty, rich, complex, and not grossly out of line with traditional Mexican cooking. It’s based on other non-canonical dark moles I’ve had, and it features “only” 13 ingredients and takes 2-3 hours to make.

Ingredients

7 dried pasilla chiles
3 dried ancho chiles (or substitute mulato or New Mexico chiles)
1/2 cup pumpkin seeds, peeled, unsalted
1/3 cup raisins
1/4 cup sesame seeds
1/2 medium onion, sliced thick
6 cloves garlic, peeled
1.5 oz unsweetened chocolate (preferably Mexican)
~10 black peppercorns
~6 cloves
2-3 segments star anise (not whole stars)
1.5” cinnamon stick (or 2 tsp ground)
3 cups chicken stock, unsalted (preferably homemade)

Directions

Put on your kitchen gloves and remove the stems from your dried chiles, then slice into them and pull out the seeds and any dried pith. Reserve 1 tbsp seeds. Tear the chiles in half and flatten them a bit. Discard the gloves.

Fill a large bowl with about 2 cups of hot water. Heat 1 tbsp neutral oil (grapeseed, corn, or canola) in a large Dutch oven or saucepan over medium heat. Add the chiles and fold once to coat with oil, then press against the bottom for a few seconds to fry. After 1-2 minutes the chiles should be fragrant; as soon as you see any smoke, drip them off, pull them out onto a paper-towel-lined plate, and pat dry. Place in the hot-water bowl and cover with a plate to keep them submerged. Rehydrate them like this for 15 minutes up to an hour.

Add the raisins and the reserved chile seeds to the same pot and fry for 1-2 minutes, until the raisins begin to inflate a bit. Add to the same water bowl with the chiles.

Next, add the pumpkin seeds to the pot and fry for 2-3 minutes, folding occasionally, until they’re browning just a bit; don’t let them burn or blacken. Place in a large mixing bowl which will eventually hold all your ingredients.

Add the chocolate to the mixing bowl.

Add another tbsp of oil to the pot if it’s dry and fry the whole garlic cloves and the sliced onions for about 5 minutes, until soft and slightly golden. Add to the large mixing bowl with the pumpkin seeds.

Heat a nonstick pan over medium heat and add the peppercorns, cloves, cinnamon, and star anise. Toast for 2 minutes or until fragrant, tossing occasionally. Give them a few minutes to cool down, then grind in a spice grinder, coffee grinder, or small food processor. Add to the mixing bowl.

Toast the sesame seeds in the same nonstick pan for 2-3 minutes, until slightly golden but not brown. Add to the mixing bowl.

Drain the chiles and raisins and add to the mixing bowl. Fold everything until evenly mixed; don’t do this step in the blender bowl from the next step as the blades will make mixing difficult.

When the mix has cooled down to no more than slightly warm (this should only take a few minutes) add it to the jar of your blender. Add 1/2 cup of chicken stock and begin to blend. If the mix is too dry to move smoothly in the blender, first try turning off the blender and mixing a bit more using a spatula; if that doesn’t work, add a bit more stock. (Avoid adding too much stock since liquids don’t get ground properly.) Blend for 1-3 minutes, pausing occasionally to scrape down the sides of the jar. The final blending time and the smoothness of the product will depend on your particular blender, but do your best to get it to a smoothie consistency. There should be no visible chunks, pieces, or seeds.

Run the mix through a chinois or a fine-mesh strainer, working in small batches to make the task of pushing the thick mass through easier. Set aside up to half an hour for this step; it’ll feel like real work. You can add a tbsp of chicken stock to the strainer to help things move, but don’t do this too much.

You’ll be left with up to a cup of unstrained solids. For extra credit, you can add this back to the blender with another 1/4 cup of stock, then blend and strain again. Don’t forget to scrape the outside of your strainer’s mesh with a clean spatula to get all the mix that has stuck to it.

Wipe the Dutch oven with a paper towel; just remove any solids you don’t want in the final, smooth mole, but don’t worry about the burnt coating on the bottom. Heat 1 tbsp of oil (or lard) in it over medium heat, then carefully add the smooth mix. As it heats up, it will bubble in strange ways. Adjust the heat to keep it moving, but not violently popping. Fold and fry for 5 minutes, scraping the sides of the pot, until the mix loses some of its moisture and darkens and thickens a bit.

Slowly pour in the remaining chicken stock and stir to form an even sauce. Add 2 pinches of salt. Turn the heat down to low (adjusting again to make sure it moves but doesn’t burn or roll) and simmer for 30 minutes, folding and scraping down the sides occasionally. It should thicken, darken, and developer a deeper, more savory flavor. This process will continue in the fridge over the next day or two, so feel free to make the mole ahead. Before you serve it, fold to make sure it’s even and, if needed, thin down with a bit more chicken stock. Salt to taste.

Mole is traditionally served over roasted turkey or chicken. When doing so, I prefer to cut up the de-boned meat into bite-size pieces, then fold it into the mole. (If you’re not serving all of the mole right away—and it keeps in the fridge quite well—combine and heat the meat and a smaller amount of mole in a different pot.) It’s a great way to dress up leftover roast chicken or Thanksgiving turkey.

This will feed 4-6. Serve on tacos or with a side of Mexican rice and black beans and our pickled onions. Sprinkle with sesame seeds for garnish, and keep a napkin handy—mole is one delicious mess.

Notes

Most decent supermarkets should carry dried Mexican chiles. If yours doesn’t, look for a Hispanic store. (Larger Asian markets often cater to the same community, so check there as well.) Look for leathery, slightly shiny peppers; avoid anything with a dusty or chalky appearance. Pasillas and anchos often get confused; pasillas are long and skinny, while anchos look more like dried versions of green bell peppers. Neither of these chiles is particularly hot, but I still recommend wearing gloves when handling them, as the seeds can sometimes be quite potent.

Toasting and grinding your own spices makes a noticeable difference in dishes where they shape the flavor so prominently. That said, if you have to use the ground stuff, go ahead.

If you don’t have a blender, you can use a food processor, though it may not work as well. It won’t affect the quality of the dish too much, but it’ll make straining more difficult. It’s still doable, however. Whichever tool you use, don’t overfill the jar/bowl.

Note that this recipe is almost vegan and can be made so by using vegetable stock if desired.

Coming soon, my recipe for a perfect companion to mole: corn tortillas.

Gumbo

mrgan — Tue, 16 Oct 2012 11:53:00 -0700

It’a shame that Cajun/Creole cooking, perhaps the most authentically American cuisine of all, gets so shortchanged in American restaurants, reduced to a paprika-covered chicken breast or fish sandwich. If it were up to me, families across the country would gather around for a feast of crawfish étouffée and bread pudding on Thanksgiving; oyster po’boys and maque choux every 4th of July; beignets and Sazeracs at Christmas. Until that dawn breaks, let’s start things off easy by making my favorite stew of them all—the one and only gumbo.

Ingredients

1/2 lb andouille sausage, sliced 1/4” thick
1 lb chicken thighs, boneless & skinless
1 catfish fillet, medium size
1 qt chicken stock, warm (preferably homemade)
4 oz neutral oil (vegetable, grapeseed, corn, or canola)
4 oz all-purpose flour
1 cup onion, diced (about 1/2 medium onion)
1/2 cup poblano pepper, diced (about 1/2 pepper; or sub green bell pepper)
1/2 cup leek, diced (white and light-green part only; or sub celery)
5 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 cup tomato, diced (1 medium tomato, or use canned)
2 bay leaves
~6 grinds black pepper
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
1 tsp thyme leaves, chopped (about 1 medium branch)
1 tbsp blackening seasoning (mock recipe below)
1 Tbsp filé powder

Makes 6-8 servings. Ready in about 2.5 hours.

Directions

Preheat the oven to 350ºF. Combine the flour and the oil in a large Dutch oven or heavy pot. Stir with a silicone spatula to combine until smooth and even. Bake the roux uncovered in the oven for 90 minutes until brick-brown, stirring every 20 minutes or so.

Meanwhile, chop your vegetables and combine the onion, poblano pepper, leek, and garlic in one bowl.

In another bowl, combine the tomato, bay leaf, the ground peppers, and the thyme.

After 90 minutes, move the roux from the oven to the stovetop set to medium-to-medium-high heat. Add the first bowl (with the onions, peppers, leek, and garlic) and stir constantly for 8 minutes until the vegetables are soft but not burnt.

Add the second bowl (with the tomato, bay leaf, and spices) and stir for another minute. Carefully and slowly pour in the warm chicken stock, stirring to form a smooth soup. When it begins to bubble again, turn the heat down to low, cover, and set a timer for 30 minutes.

Meanwhile, brown the andouille sausage slices in a large frying pan over medium heat for about 5 minutes. Scoop out with a slotted spatula or spoon, drip off, and add to the gumbo.

Pour off most of the sausage oil from the pan. Pat the chicken thighs dry and season with salt and pepper on both sides. Brown in the same pan, over medium heat, for about 5 minutes on each side. Drip off and place on a clean, heat-proof cutting board. Chop into bite-size pieces and add to the gumbo. Wash your knife and grab another cutting board.

Next, pat-dry the catfish fillet, salt on both sides, and dust liberally on both sides with the blackening seasoning. (It’s hard to use too much.) If the pan is dry, add just a bit more oil, and fry the catfish 2 minutes on each side. Use a metal spatula and a quick, decisive scraping motion to flip it. Move to the new, seafood-only cutting board and cut into bite-size pieces. Add to the gumbo.

Note that as with the chicken, the fish may not be fully cooked when it comes out of the pan. This is ok since it’ll continue cooking in the gumbo. Err on the side of undercooking it here so it doesn’t dry out.

By now, your 30-minute timer should be close to going off. When it does, turn off the heat, cover the pot, and leave it alone for another 15 minutes. Your gumbo will look a bit soupy and light at this point.

Before serving, scoop out about 2 tablespoons of the liquid and mix with the filé powder in a small bowl until smooth, then stir back into the gumbo. This should thicken and darken it (in addition to adding a unique earthy and herby flavor). Taste and add salt if needed.

You can eat it right away, though the flavors blend better in the fridge overnight. Serve over white rice, sprinkled with chopped green onions and however much simple hot sauce you prefer. Crystal is the original brand of choice.

Gumbo will keep in the fridge for about a week. It also reheats well from frozen.

Notes

Gumbo is often made without filé powder, but I find that it ends up lacking a certain herbal flavor and rich texture that way. You should be able to find filé in larger markets, or consult a local spice & herb store. You can sprinkle on and mix in more at the table if you like your gumbo thicker.

You can also make the roux on the stovetop in about 20-30 minutes, but you’ll have to whisk constantly to make sure it’s even and doesn’t burn. The oven method is slower but more consistent.

Packaged andouille sausage is available in most supermarkets these days. If you can’t find it, go with a simple pork or chicken sausage flavored with garlic and hot, dried peppers. Avoid herby or sweet sausage.

Green bell peppers are the authentic choice for Cajun mirepoix, but I substitute poblano peppers since I find them tastier in almost every case. They’re fairly easy to find.

Celery is also the authentic choice, but Jim is a fan of Thomas Keller’s substitution of leeks for celery, and I tend to agree. I like celery, but I love leeks.

Gumbo is made with just about any meat that’s available to you, from chicken and duck to rabbit and mussels. I like this combination, but you can try using shrimp, for instance. If you have access to good seafood/shrimp/fish stock, try that, too.

You’ll be working with both raw and half-cooked chicken and fish, so please observe food-safety protocol: use separate cutting boards for each meat, keep them away from other foods in case things go flying when you cut, wash your hands and wipe down all surfaces frequently.

I blacken my catfish before adding to the gumbo for added flavor and firmer pieces. You can buy pre-mixed blackening seasoning, but if you think you’ll blacken fish or chicken often, it’s worth it to make your own. Mine includes:

6x paprika
6x tomato powder (made by grinding extra dry pieces of sundried tomato)
2x cayenne pepper
2x onion powder
2x black pepper
1x coriander
1x cumin
1x celery seed
1x allspice

Use your taste and judgment for precise ratios. The seasoning will keep for a few months in a spice jar. Unlike most packaged mixes, this doesn’t include salt, so you can use quite a bit of it without oversalting the meat.

Cauliflower purée

mrgan — Sun, 22 Jul 2012 19:21:59 -0700

If you’re reading up on the low-carb diets that are in vogue right now, you might find this piece of advice: replace carb-heavy foods with healthier ones; for instance, instead of mashed potatoes, try mashed cauliflower! Technically, it’s true. But it sounds boring, right? Who’d ever choose cauliflower over mashed potatoes?

Try this super simple recipe and see if you’ll even care about dumb mashed potatoes ever again. This is a fluffy, creamy, rich, fragrant substance that plays ice cream to potato’s sponge cake, brandy to its lager, Mozart to its Salieri.

Ingredients

1 medium head cauliflower, ~24 oz
8 oz heavy cream
4 tbsp butter, sliced
1 tsp fumee de sel, plus more to taste

Serves 4-6.

Directions

Wash the cauliflower and clean it by pulling off any green leaves around the base. Cut off enough stalk to be able to rest the head flat on the table and discard the tough stalk. Quarter the head, cutting through the stalk, and break up into 2-3” pieces along the florets. If any larger pieces of the stalk remain, cut them into smaller pieces.

Combine the cauliflower, the cream, and the butter in a large saucepan. Heat over medium-high heat until the cream begins to bubble—about 2 minutes— then turn down to low and cover tightly. After about 5 minutes, check occasionally: you’ll want to see steam under the lid and a bit of movement in the cream, but not much active bubbling. Fold gently once or twice to distribute the butter and flip the florets. Cook for 30 minutes or until the cauliflower is bite-tender.

Transfer to a large bowl and allow to cool to room temperature. Season with the salt, then blend in a blender on the “smoothie” setting or similar until thickened and smooth, about 30-60 seconds total. Pause occasionally to scrape down the sides and the lid of the blender. Taste and add salt if needed. Return to a clean pan, cover, and keep warm until serving. It will also refrigerate and reheat well.

Notes

As always, you should cool down the mix before blending; you don’t want to blend hot liquids. It’s safe to do so right in the pan or bowl with an immersion blender, but this may not produce a perfectly even purée.

Feel free to use kosher salt instead of smoked; I like how the smoke plays with the floral smell of cauliflower, but it’s not crucial.

This pairs well with punchy red meats like steak or duck, and it loves deeply red wine.

Mexican pickled onions

mrgan — Fri, 13 Jul 2012 18:54:56 -0700

Episode #16 of our podcast included a quick audio-recipe for Mexican pickled onions. I figured I’d document it here as well since I don’t want to give you any excuses for not having a jar of this stuff in your fridge at all times. It’s super quick and tasty.

Ingredients

1 large red onion, peeled
1 clove garlic, peeled
1 cup white vinegar
1 cup water
~10 black peppercorns
2 cloves
1” cinnamon stick
1 small bay leaf
1 chile de arbol, whole
1 tsp salt

Directions

Cut the onion in half, then slice it 1/4” thick.

Combine all the ingredients in a saucepan and bring near a boil, then immediately remove from heat. Pour into a wide-mouth jar. Leave on a cooling rack until it’s down to room temperature, then put the lid on and refrigerate.

They’ll be ready to eat in 30 minutes, but they’re best after a day or two. They’ll keep for at least a month, after which they may go a bit limp. Enjoy on tacos, or with any savory, salty food in need of some acidic brightening.

Notes

This calls for whole spices instead of ground, as is always the case with pickling. Ground spices will make your pickle brine muddy and gritty.

This should fill a 24 oz jar, the kind pickles often come in. If your liquid doesn’t cover the onion completely, add a bit more water and vinegar.

Feel free to experiment with herbs and spices. This is my favorite combination, but you can do anything from skipping all of them to also adding star anise and oregano. Let your tastebuds guide you.

Coconut-lime corn

mrgan — Mon, 09 Jul 2012 11:23:00 -0700

Of all the gifts grilling season brings, it’s not the burgers or brats or grill-oven pizza I look forward to the most. Those are all great and definitely better on the grill than off it, but you can do them serviceably indoors, and their ingredients aren’t particularly seasonal. No, my #1 grill pick is corn on the cob.

I’m here to share with you the best corn I’ve had: brushed with seasoned coconut milk, with a few squeezes of lime on top. You’ll probably want to serve this as a side, but it’s good enough to fire up the ol’ Weber just for it. Let’s break it down.

Ingredients

4 ears corn
1/2 cup + 1 tsp salt
1 gallon lukewarm water
6 oz coconut milk
3-4 grinds black pepper
1 lime
4 pieces of aluminum foil, 12” x 12”

Directions

Remove all the husk and silk from your corn, leaving about 2” of the stalk. (This will be a good place to grab when flipping the ears.) In a large, square container, dissolve the 1/2 cup salt in the lukewarm tap water. Add the corn, cover, refrigerate, and brine for 2-4 hours. Discard the brine.

Shake the coconut-milk can vigorously since the cream will have separated in it. Pour the milk into a small bowl and stir the 1 tsp salt into it. Prepare a basting brush.

Wrap each cob in aluminum foil individually, getting a tight seal all around. Grill for 6-10 minutes on the cooler side of your grill, turning occasionally. Remove from the grill and unwrap carefully; the corn should be bright, steamy, and fragrant. Place the corn on the hot side of your grill now. Turn a few times to get some charring on each side; this should take 2-4 minutes total. There should be some surface blackening going on, though not so much that the kernels are fully dried out or burned.

Holding by the stalk, brush the cobs with the coconut milk, turning to get all the sides. Squeeze fresh lime juice over them. After about a minute, the milk will soak in and pool at the bottom, so give each cob one more brush with the milk on top, and squeeze some more lime juice over it. Eat hastily.

Notes

If you’re in a hurry, you don’t have to brine your corn, but I’ve found that it helps season it and plump it up.

Some people recommend grilling your corn in its own husk; you’d peel it back and remove the silk first. I’m not convinced that this adds any additional flavor, and I’ve always find it a royal pain to husk searingly hot corn. Plus, if I did this I couldn’t use the husk to make corn stock.

I strongly recommend using full-fat coconut milk; go with a Thai brand like Chaokoh or Aroy-D.

(And hey, did you notice something about this recipe? Surprise—It’s Vegan!™)

Khao man gai burger

mrgan — Sun, 06 May 2012 09:29:00 -0700

Khao man gai is my favorite Thai dish, a careful balance of boiled capon (chicken), rice cooked in the resulting broth, a crucial garnish of cucumber and cilantro, and the miracle ingredient: the sauce, oh dear lord the sauce. You should definitely make the whole thing from Leela’s recipe at She Simmers, but that’s not what we’re doing here today. What we’re doing here is an insult to culinary tradition, albeit a delicious insult. We’re going to pun on the dish and make it into a burger.

Note that my name for this concoction makes no sense; we’re using neither khao (rice) nor gai (chicken). However, the original name doesn’t capture the key ingredient either (the sauce, the sauce!) so I’ll let it slide.

Ingredients

Burgers:

2/3 lb ground beef, 10% fat or more
4 tbsp khao man gai sauce (see below)
2 nice burger buns (brioche buns if possible)

Sauce:

1/3 cup ginger, peeled and roughly chopped
5-6 cloves garlic
4 bird’s eye chilis (“Thai chilis”)
1/2 cup yellow soybean sauce (there is no substitute for this, sorry)
1/4 cup usukuchi (light soy sauce) or Thai white soy sauce
1/4 cup Thai sweet chili sauce
1/2 cup sugar
1/3 cup white vinegar (yes, the cheap stuff)

(Makes more than you need, but it’s hard to make less, and yay, you’ll have leftover sauce. Cook the full khao man gai spread the next day, or top the burger with extra sauce if you like yours punchy with the umami.)

Cilantro mayo:

3 tbsp mayo, Kewpie brand or homemade
3 tbsp cilantro, finely chopped

Quick pickles:

2 small or 1 medium pickling (“Kirby”) cucumber
salt and sugar

Serves 2.

Directions

Combine all the sauce ingredients in your food processor and chop until they make a coarse, wet mix, no more than 5-10 seconds. Move to a small saucepot and bring to a near boil, then immediately take off heat and let come to room temperature (30-40 minutes).

While you wait, read Jim Ray’s post on grilling burgers. Start your grill and come back into the kitchen to make the rest.

Combine the cilantro and the mayo and refrigerate.

Toss the cucumbers in a small bowl with a few generous pinches of equal parts salt and sugar and let rest until you’re ready to top the burger; yes, this is all it takes to semi-pickle them.

Slice your buns while your hands are still free of meat juices.

In a large and cold glass or metal bowl, combine the meat and the khao man gai sauce. Use your (extremely clean) hands, and don’t overwork the meat. Just handle it enough to fold the sauce in. Shape two dimpled patties. Grill the burgers according to Jim’s method and don’t forget to quickly toast your buns.

To serve, spread cilantro mayo on the bun, top with the burger, then the pickles. Goes great with a beer or a drinking vinegar.

A bastardized recipe like this would deservedly roll the eyes of fusion-restaurant goers, but as an experiment in food-punning in your home kitchen, it’s fun and instructive. My apologies to Thai grandmothers everywhere.

P.S. I should note that the best ground meat is the meat you grind yourself. If you decide to go this route, I recommend a 50/50 mix of brisket and short rib (save the bones for stock). And remember: don’t overwork it after it’s ground!

Fennel Drinking Vinegar

mrgan — Thu, 05 Apr 2012 17:51:26 -0700

I understand - you probably think the idea of drinking vinegar is weird. But vinegar is just an acid, and every good soda has an acidic component. (In Coke, it’s phosphoric acid. I’m not saying that’s bad, I’m just saying it sounds even weirder than vinegar.) Here in Portland, Pok Pok Som makes great drinking vinegars in some obvious fruity flavors, and some unexpected ones (celery, honey). As mentioned in episode 6 of the Salt & Fat podcast, I figured I’d play with flavors I haven’t yet seen or tried.

So today, I bring you fennel drinking vinegar. It combines the aromas of fennel and star anise - the most obvious pairing there is. Once you make the syrup, mix it 1:4 with soda water over ice, or use as an ingredient in cocktails and desserts. Heck, you could make milkshakes with it.

Ingredients

2 medium-large bulbs fennel, with fronds
~1/2 quart coconut vinegar
6 star anise, whole
2 cups sugar

Directions

Heat a nonstick pan over medium heat and toast the star anise in it for 2 minutes until fragrant.

Chop the fennel bulbs into 1-2” chunks and place in a tall, narrow container large enough to hold them, but not much larger. (We want to minimize exposure to air.) Add the star anise and cover with enough coconut vinegar to submerge all the fennel; weigh it down with a heavy can if needed. Make sure the container is closed airtight and store in a cabinet, or in another dark, room-temperature place, for 3 days. Check it occasionally to make sure none of is exposed to air. If it is, stir the fennel.

After 3 days, remove and save the star anise; remove and discard as many fronds (herby green bits) as you can. Pour the fennel-vinegar mix into a blender or food processor and blend until smooth. Move to a stock pot and add the star anise back in. Start the pot on medium-high heat until it begins to bubble, then turn down to medium-low and cook, uncovered, for 15 minutes.

Strain the mix through a fine-mesh strainer and discard the fennel solids. Wash out the stock pot and add the mix back in. Stir in the sugar. Bring to a light bubbling over medium-high heat, then turn down to medium-low and cook for 15 minutes, stirring occasionally. You’re essentially making syrup at this point.

Using a funnel, pour the syrup into bottles or jars. Leave it uncovered to cool down to room temperature, then cover and move to the fridge, where it will keep for many months.

Notes

You are unlikely to find coconut vinegar at your local all-purpose food store; instead journey over to your Asian supermarket and look for something like this:

Coconut vinegar is very mild, with no trace of coconut taste. It’s also usually pretty cheap (excepting New Agey domestic brands.) In a pinch, you could substitute cane vinegar (often available in stores that carry Filipino foods.) As for sugar, I use fine cane sugar, but anything that dissolves well should work.

Enjoy this refreshing, licorice-like drink all summer long!

We’re super happy to announce a brand new project: the...

mrgan — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 15:57:00 -0800

We’re super happy to announce a brand new project: the Salt & Fat Podcast. We hope to bring you 30 minutes of discussion about food and cooking once a week. You can listen to it on the new Mule Radio Syndicate website, or subscribe in iTunes. Let us know what you think and how we can make it better.

Tomato sauce with tuna and peas

mrgan — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 15:32:00 -0800

This is the first “recipe” I ever prepared myself. It all started when my mom saw me heating up jarred pasta sauce for a late-night dinner. (I could do that much without assistance.) She suggested it would be more interesting if I fried up some onions and canned tuna, then added the sauce. She was, as always, right: this was way more interesting. I now had options to choose from, ingredients to wrangle, steps to follow! I’ve tweaked the basic recipe back and forth many times, learning in the process the valuable lesson that adding more salt and fat improves the taste noticeably. This is the version I make today, some fifteen years later. (Recipe after the picture)

Ingredients

1 lb pasta - ideally penne or rigatoni, though spaghetti will also do
14 oz can crushed tomatoes
6 oz canned tuna, the good stuff
2 anchovy fillets, chopped
1/3 cup frozen peas
1 tbsp capers
3 cloves garlic, chopped roughly
1 medium sprig parsley
3 tbsp good olive oil
Salt, pepper, crushed red-pepper flakes to taste

Directions

Cook the pasta however the package instructs you to.

Meanwhile, quickly strain the tomatoes by pouring off the juice from the can - no need to user a strainer. (Save the juice for another use).

Heat 1 tbsp of olive oil over medium heat for 1 minute and add the anchovies, the garlic, and the red pepper (if using). Stir for no more than 1 minute, then add the tomatoes. After another 2-3 minutes, add the tuna and break it apart into bite-sized pieces using a wooden or silicone spatula. Also add the capers, reduce the heat to medium-low, and cook for 5-10 minutes to desired thickness. Add the peas and gently fold in to heat through when the sauce is nearly done. Salt liberally, pepper conservatively.

Your last step is to strain the pasta when cooked and add it back to the now-dry, off-heat pot into which you’ve poured the remaining 2 tbsp of olive oil. Add 2 tbsp of the sauce and toss to coat the pasta fully.

To serve, make a nest of pasta in a wide bowl, top with more sauce, and sprinkle with the parsley. I won’t stop you from grating on some Parmesan, but this already tastes very rich without it.

Notes

Muir Glen is a good domestic brand of canned tomatoes. For tuna and anchovy, I’m a big fan of Ortiz, or whatever is caught close to where you live. There should always be some peas in your freezer, and none in a can in your pantry. Capers? I buy them preserved in salt, then rinse them and adjust the salt levels; they taste brighter and less acidic that way.

You can play with this recipe by omitting the anchovies or capers, adding onions in step 1, or throwing in some olives for a faux puttanesca. Follow your heart, gut, and head.

Oven-dried Tomatoes

mrgan — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 17:13:40 -0800

It’s here again, tomato season. As we established in our tomato-butter sauce post, you’re best off eating tomatoes one of two ways:

Fresh when in season
Preserved when not in season

The sauce is one way to lock in their flavor, cooked down and frozen for later use: a bowl of fresh pappardelle in February.

My favorite method, though, is oven-drying tomatoes and storing them in olive oil.

Here’s the short-and-sweet recipe:

Ingredients

Fresh plum tomatoes
Salt
Olive oil

Directions

Pre-heat your oven to 200ºF.

Wash the tomatoes, remove the stems, and core out the stem piece at the top. Slice them in half and remove all seeds, water, and jelly-like insides; reduce them to just the meaty pieces. Drain well.

Line a large baking tray (with sides) with at least 1/4” of salt. Place the tomatoes on the salt bed, skin side down.

Slow-dry on the medium rack for about six hours, until slightly leathery. Store in jars in olive oil, refrigerated.

Use as a substitute for watery, flavorless, out-of-season tomatoes on sandwiches, in sauces, or as a winning antipasto.

Notes

If possible, use plum tomatoes - the long, pear-shaped ones. This is the best tomato to use for sauces, and it works best here as well. Varieties include Roma and San Marzano. Most other tomatoes should work, as long as they’re good - save heirlooms for sandwiches, though. (Oh and, while I’m a fan of canned tomatoes, don’t use them for this - they’re far too juicy and soft.)

Don’t splurge on the olive oil here. It should taste clean, but not too assertive. You’ll want the tomato flavor to shine, so go with a decent, cheap brand of oil.

When seeding tomatoes, work in a colander set over a large bowl. This way you’ll get to save all the delicious tomato water - a beverage that puts “tomato juice” (pureed tomatoes diluted with water) to absolute shame.

Make sure your jars are perfectly clean and the lids close snuggly. Cover the tomatoes with oil completely. This is the secret to preserving things in oil: start clean and make sure nothing is exposed to air. The oil will do the rest. The tomatoes will keep for months in the fridge, or a week or two unrefrigerated. What may happen in the fridge is, the jar will get cloudy as the oil congeals. This is perfectly natural and does not affect the taste of the oil or the tomatoes in any way; you can thaw out the jar in a bowl of hot water and refrigerate again over and over.

My back-of-the-envelope calculation shows that oven-dried tomatoes are approximately 500 times tastier than most fresh tomatoes. Here they are in action, topping a sandwich of chicken salad made with fish-sauce fried wings and kewpie mayo.

The clock is ticking - run to the market and grab all the tomatoes you can!

Preserved cherries

jimray — Thu, 15 Sep 2011 08:18:01 -0700

“Last week for cherries!” the fella at last weekend’s farmer’s market crowed, and I knew I had to do something. I ended up taking home six pounds of the last of the season’s Rainier and Bing cherries.

Here in Washington, we grow more sweet cherries than just about any place else. When I first moved up here, these things flummoxed me — they weren’t tart like the cherries I knew back east. And these white things that look kinda like over-ripened crabapples? You guys think they’re so special you named ‘em after the big mountain off in the distance?

Turns out Rainier cherries are worth moving to the west coast for. They’re pretty fragile as far as cherries go, more suspectible to big temperature swings, and farmers tend to lose a lot of fruit to birds. This makes them pretty spendy, even close to the orchards¹. At the start of the season, I’ll see Rainiers go for something like $5 a pound. When they hit their peak towards the end of July through early August, they’re a little cheaper. All of which is to say: these are premium fruits worth hanging on to for as long as you can as the season ends.

As luck would have it, it’s pretty easy to preserve cherries in syrup and alcohol — our friends at American Drink have a great primer on just that. I took my pal Albert’s advice and did a bit of experimenting. Here’s what I came up with.

Ingredients

2lbs of cherries - Bing, Van, Rainier, go nuts
1 cup of water
1 cup of sugar
1 cup of alcohol of your choice (rum, brandy, various liquers, bourbon, wine)
A few clean, wide mouth jars with new lids

When you’re picking a liquor, have fun, but keep it straightforward. Brandies and other distilled wines make a good choice. I matched bourbon with both Rainiers and Bings and they came out great. You could even do a white or a rosé wine with Rainiers to match their light color.

You’re probably going to want to invest in a cherry pitter because pitting more than a couple of cherries with a paring knife or screwdriver (seriously) is a pain in the ass. I like this one from Oxo.

Make sure your jars are clean. I like to run them through the diswasher without soap or boil for about 10 minutes, just to make sure.

De-stem, wash and pit your cherries. This will take a while. SAVE THE PITS. Seriously.

Add the cherry pits and the water to a pot and bring to a boil. The seeds will add some color and flavor to the syrup. You could add other flavors at this point — a cinnamon stick, lemon or orange zest, a vanilla bean, peppercorns — but go easy.

Once the water’s boiling, add the sugar, stir to dissolve, and leave on the heat only long enough to make sure all the sugar has dissolved. Remove the pot from the heat, then add your booze.

A word about the liquor here: you’re going to need to determine on your own how boozy you want these cherries to be. A full cup should do the trick; I wouldn’t recommend more than that. You can boil off some or all of the alcohol if you just want the flavor without the hooch. And you can skip the alcohol all together. You might need to double the amount of syrup you make.

Fill your jar with as many cherries as you can — I found it was best to do a few at a time so I didn’t end up with big gaps. Pour the syrup over the cherries, then let them cool to room temperature then refrigerate. They should last a few months in the fridge.

The obvious use for these is as cocktail cherries and I won’t stand in your way there. Spoon a few with a little syrup over a scoop of icecream to bring a little summer flavor back into fall.

Rumor has it that in Japan, where people tend to be rather perfectionist about their produce, Rainier cherries sell for as much as a dollar a piece. ↩

Summer squash 'pasta'

jimray — Fri, 09 Sep 2011 10:59:50 -0700

Chances are, you or someone near to you — a neighbor or a coworker, perhaps — has a garden full of yellow and green zucchini, the never-ending summer squash. And by now, you might be a bit tired of zucchini bread and grilled rings of squash that kind of turn to mush after five minutes.

One of my favorite ways to quickly cook these oft-maligned veggies is to turn them into a faux pasta, which requires little more than a vegetable peeler and a pot of water.

The idea is simple — peel the squash lengthwise to create ribbons of that resemble a wide fettuccine or pappardelle. Blanch them quickly then add a few accompaniments for flavor. Easy, right?

Ingredients

A mixture of green zucchini and yellow summer squash, about one of each per person
Thinly sliced shallot, about 1/4 per person (you could sub onion or sliced garlic here)
Cherry tomatoes, halved¹, I like to use a mix of cherry, grape, sungolds
Some olive oil
Freshly grated parmesan cheese

First things first, set a big pot of water to boil. While that’s going, set a small to medium frying pan on low to medium-low. Add a slick of olive oil to the pan, not much, and let it heat up for just a minute. Don’t let the oil get too hot or it will develop an off taste.

Add the sliced shallots to the oil in the frying pan to soften them a bit. The temperature should be low enough that they shouldn’t brown at all, only slightly simmer.

Now, peel your squash, lengthwise. You can usually get a few strips before you start to hit the seeds, at that point, rotate the vegetable and keep going until you’ve got a pile of squash ribbons. I haven’t found much use for the center core and usually just compost it.

The water should be at a full boil at this point. Add a few tablespoons of sea or kosher salt, let it come back to boil, then add a handful of the squash ribbons. Don’t overcrowd the pot, it’s ok to work in batches here. After one minute, the squash will be ready, fish them out with a set of tongs and let them drain in a colander while you work through the rest of the ribbons. Don’t let them overcook, you want to get them to be soft but not mushy — al dente.

When the squash are all done, add a serving’s worth to the frying pan with the oil and shallots, then toss just enough to coat in the oil. Add a healthy amount of parmesan cheese, then turn again to melt the cheese, then move the pasta to a bowl for serving. Again, it’s best to work in batches here.

Before serving, add a handful of the tomato halves, season with a three-finger pinch of grey or kosher salt and a few turns of the pepper mill. I’ll even throw in some prosciutto if I’ve got some.

If you’re looking to capture the end of the summer in a bowl, fresh and crisp, this should do the trick.

Here’s the thing about cherry tomatoes: they’re already bite sized. But do yourself and your guests a favor, slice them in half so you don’t spend half the meal chasing them around your bowl. ↩

Vegetable Confit

mrgan — Thu, 08 Sep 2011 09:32:00 -0700

Confit is a fancy food-word. If you’re eating confit, there’s probably Salad Périgourdine and beurre blanc on the plate, and a Côtes du Rhône or something on the table. And sure, confit is a high-point of fancy cooking, but its roots are humble. If European farmers could invent it and then use it for centuries, we fancy, modern people can use it in the fancy-free dishes we make in our fancy, modern kitchens. Let’s demystify!

The most traditional confit you’re likely to encounter today is duck confit; duck leg, fully submerged in duck fat, cooked at very low heat. This lack of air exposure and a constant, low heat assure that the meat won’t dry out or overcook - it will just get softer and tastier. Confit meats are the very definition of the word tender.

This process can be applied to many other foods. Just keep these two guidelines in mind:

Fully cover the food with fat (duck fat, olive oil, grapeseed oil, bacon fat…)
Cook at low heat for a long time (no higher than 250ºF, 2-10 hours)

A person of French heritage may grumble about this, but in my book, you’ll be justified calling any food made in this way a confit. Jim will write more about that duck confit I mentioned; for now, let’s look at vegetables, currently at their peak here in the Pacific Northwest.

Cherry Tomato Confit

Compared to their full-sized relatives, cherry tomatoes have an advantageous ratio of meat to juice. Slow-cooking a whole San Marzano tomato would produce a tasty bite, but it would ooze water. Cherry tomatoes just pop a little.

Find a market stand with bright, firm, sweet cherry tomatoes of whatever color appeals to you. Set aside any bruised, cracked, or otherwise compromised tomatoes for another use (such as immediate snacking). Remove the stems, wash the tomatoes well, then dry them thoroughly by tumbling gently in a clean kitchen towel.

Place them in a solid pot large enough so your tomatoes cover the whole bottom, but not in more than 2 or 3 layers. Sprinkle some salt over them - as much as you’d season fresh tomatoes with - then cover with enough cheap-and-clean olive oil to top every last tomato; any bits left sticking out will dry out.

Set the stove to medium heat for a minute or two (to speed up the initial heating process), then turn it down to low. Keep it there for about two hours, adjusting the heat so you get some tiny bubbles at the bottom of the pot, but the surface isn’t moving. Steady, quiet heat is what you’re after.

Side note: meat confit is usually done in the oven, where heat is gentler and more even. It’s a shame to fire up the whole oven for a small amount of vegetables, however, and the stovetop works fine. If you decide to make a huge batch in the oven, set the heat to 200ºF.

You’ll know the tomatoes are done when they’re slightly shriveled, the skin on some has lightly cracked, and they’re soft and juicy. (Don’t forget to let them cool a bit before you taste them. An important lesson it’s taken me many years to learn: oil can be furiously hot even when it looks perfectly still.)

Once it’s cooled down to room temp, store your tomato confit in a clean, tightly-sealing jar, making sure once again that the oil covers everything fully. It will keep in the fridge for months, improving your sandwiches and salads all winter long.

Garlic Confit

Garlic loves olive oil, and olive oil loves garlic. If the day ever comes when I have to name one flaw of garlic (and I hope that day never comes) I’d say that its flavor often lives in the shadow of its pungent power. The good news is, you can mellow garlic out quite a bit by cooking it over - you guessed it - low heat, for a long time.

Same basic principle as the cherry tomatoes: clean your garlic cloves, salt them a bit, cover with oil, cook on low heat for a few hours. You can turn up the heat a bit here, to maybe 1.5 or 2 out of 10, since garlic is pretty sturdy. A slightly shimmering oil is fine, as long as you stir now and then to make sure the bottoms of your cloves aren’t burning.

The garlic confit is done when it’s soft enough to mash with a fork. ~~Store in its oil.~~ (See note below.) Use in pasta dishes, on pizza, in rice bowls, as a robust side for roast chicken.

You know how I said olive oil loves garlic? Don’t dream of throwing out the oil once you eat your way through the veggies stored in it. People pay good money for flavored oils. Since introducing any additional foodstuffs into oil will shorten its shelf-life, keep it in the fridge. But, feel free to use it for cooking (where purity isn’t a must-have), salads, further confiting, etc.

UPDATE: A reader notes that garlic, due to its low acidity, is at risk for developing botulism when stored in an anaerobic (oxygen-free) environment. Commercially packaged garlic stored in oil is treated with acid first. To minimize your botulism risk, store the garlic separate from the oil and use it within a few weeks.

Bonus recipes: pearl onion confit and leek confit

Now that you have the general idea, try playing with it: confit some fresh (not frozen) pearl onions. Hint: peel them first.

Feel free to experiments with different kinds of oil or fat. Since the heat will be low, you can safely use butter, for instance. Leek confit calls for thinly sliced (up to 1/4”), lightly salted leeks cooked in butter, with the optional addition of a bit of water. If you’re after a texture closer to onion soubise, a rich and sweet marmalade, don’t cover the leeks completely. Just stir now and then, making sure they’re slowly cooking but never burning. Spread on toasted bread immediately, fold into eggs, or store in fat.

Like so many cooking methods, confit was originally a preservation method, child to necessity. Even in 2011, there’s nothing wrong with preserving in-season foods, especially when the preservation method transforms them into softer, sweeter, fancier versions of themselves.

Kajmak

mrgan — Sat, 20 Aug 2011 09:02:38 -0700

Growing up in Croatia and Bosnia, I ate a heck of a lot of kajmak (say it fast: kai-muck). Gallons and gallons of this rich, fatty, savory, goes-with-anything cream at the intersection of milk and cheese. It’s the region’s cream cheese, mayo, and ketchup all in one. I can’t think of a widely available US product that would serve as a workable substitute, so here’s a recipe for making your own.

Ethnic authenticity note: from town to town, from street to street, from family to family in Croatia, folks will prefer creamier versions to thicker, cheesier ones - and vice versa. This is the easiest version to make at home, and luckily, it’s my favorite.

You will need:

2 cups whole milk
1 cup heavy cream
1 tsp salt

That’s all, seriously. I would strongly recommend using the highest-quality milk and cream you can find: if it’s from a neighbor or a nearby farm, 5 points; if it comes in a glass bottle, 3 points; if it’s at the very least local and fresh, have a point. This will affect the tastiness of the final product, but it’s also not a bad idea for the purposes of food safety. Speaking of which, keep your pots very clean in the next step. Cool?

This recipe is best started in the evening. It’ll be edible in 36 hours or so. We’ll be heating the dairy in a double boiler; bain-marie in French, if you wish to impress your friends. Start with a large, wide pot filled about 1/4 to 1/3 of the way with water, then in the middle of it place a smaller pot - also wide, if possible. The idea is to heat the inner pot with the indirect heat of the water, which will prevent our milk from scorching. Make sure the inner pot is stable. If it has handles, hang them off the sides of the larger pot; if not, you could put a metal cookie cutter under the inner pot, thus lifting it off the bottom. (Obviously, don’t use anything metal to support a pot inside an enameled pot, as shown here.)

Add enough water to the outer pot to run up half way up the sides of the inner pot. With the smaller pot thus surrounded with water, pour the milk into it and set your heat to high until the water is at a light boil. Don’t let it roll violently or boil over. Stir the milk until it’s at something like a simmer, adjusting the heat as needed. The milk should be steamy and ever-so-slightly bubbly; anything harsher than that is too hot.

Pour in the cream and the salt and stir. Bring the milk up to a steamy simmer again, then turn the heat down to medium-low and keep it there for 90 minutes. Don’t stir past this point, no matter how tempted you are; we want to let the cream form on top.

After the 90 minutes, turn off the heat and leave everything as is overnight. No fridge, no moving, no stirring. You can cover the smaller pot after a few hours, but you’ll want to let the milk slowly evaporate for a while.

In the morning, set the stove to medium heat and warm everything up for 15 minutes or so, then turn it down to medium-low and keep it there for 30 minutes. You can now move the smaller pot to a cooling rack and bring it to room temperature, then cover it and move it to the fridge. Still no stirring!

The following morning, check how much kajmak has formed in the pot. If you’re lucky, almost all of it is now a dense substance the consistency of cream cheese. There could also be milk half an inch below the surface - if that’s the case, carefully skim the cheese from the surface, cutting around the edge of the pot with a knife to make sure you get all the cheesy goodness. Strain any pieces that break off and combine all the solid, curdy, or thick-and-creamy parts. Leave behind any milk or cream at the bottom of the pot.

With all the kajmak now in a fresh container, stir it with a fork to even it out. It may still be a bit chunky or curdy; this doesn’t bother me a bit. Taste and add salt if needed. It will thicken and smooth out if you leave it in the fridge a bit longer.

What to do with it? Oh boy, oh boy… Dollop it on savory pies, dip freshly fried fry-bread in it, spread it on bagels, pair it with raw onion if you’re tough enough to handle it. The cooling richness of kajmak pairs great with grilled meats; you should really be using it instead of sour cream in our Slavonian Burger recipe.

Here it is, topping a messy slice of Americanized burek. Could’ve fooled you into thinking it was ice cream, huh?

707 Fried Chicken

mrgan — Wed, 29 Jun 2011 11:33:00 -0700

This recipe is inspired by the extremely satisfying “808 fried chicken” at Portland’s 808 Grinds Hawaiian cart. Theirs is better because it’s battered and they serve it with the best mac salad in town, but mine is healthier (probably?) Cucumbers instead of mac salad - I mean, come on. Scroll down for a photo or trust me and read on.

You will need:

4 chicken thighs, boneless + skinless
1/2 cup usukuchi (light soy sauce; not “Lite soy sauce” or the low-sodium kinds.)
1/4 cup soy sauce
2 tsp freshly grated ginger
2 tsp sugar
2 cloves garlic, peeled and crushed (but kept whole)
Peanut oil and canola oil
2 cups sweet rice flour or cornstarch

1 cup Japanese rice (short grain, sometimes called “sushi rice”)

1 cucumber
white wine vinegar
sake, if you’ve got any

For a few of these things, you might need to make a run to your friendly neighborhood Asian market. No, really, some of the best foods you’ve never had are right there. In addition to the above ingredients, pick up some:

Nanami togarashi - a salty, spicy seasoning of chili and orange peel. It’s like salt, but better.
Kewpie mayo - the best mayo you didn’t make yourself. The one in the big squeezy bottle with the baby on it.

Who knows, maybe we’ll use these in another Salt & Fat recipe! I’m on a minor Asian kick right now.

Let’s start by making Japanese rice. (This is the generic Japanese method; a great thing to know.) Place your rice in a stock pot or a bowl and rinse it under running water, stirring it around with your hand. Drain the water 2-3 times, until it’s no longer milky. This gets rid of extra starch which would make your rice sticky and shapeless; Japanese rice is served with the grains perfectly outlined.

Drain the rice in a sieve for a few minutes while you prep the chicken. Then, place the rice back in the pot you’ll cook it in and add 1 cup and 1 tablespoon of water. The equation is, about 1.1 parts water to 1 part rice. Let the rice soak for a while; the longer, the better (up to a few hours.) To start cooking, bring it to a near-boil, then cover and turn the heat down to low. Keep it there for about 10-15 minutes or until the water is fully absorbed. Now, they always tell you not to peek, but you’re pretty much going to have to - how else would you know if it’s done? Just do it infrequently and quickly.

Take the rice off the heat and replace the lid with a clean towel. This will steam the rice further; you can keep it here for 10 minutes to an hour, however long it takes you to fry the chicken. Fluff it gently with a flat spatula and it’s ready for the bowl.

About an hour before you’re ready to fry, marinade the chicken. Start by cleaning up the chicken pieces - trim away any loose or large pieces of fat. These are tasty, but save them for another use. (No, really - I freeze mine, adding to the collection as I go, then fry them separately, as a topping.) Cut the chicken into 2-3” pieces, trying to keep them even. Mix the soy sauces, the ginger, sugar, and garlic in a bowl, then toss in the chicken. Grind in some black pepper if you like. Move the whole thing to a large zipper bag and close, removing as much air from the bag as you can. Refrigerate for half an hour (if you’re in a hurry) up to, say, 4 hours.

So, we’ll be deep-frying. Deep-frying at home kind of terrifies me. Or, it used to. Let me give you some tips, earned by oil burns on my hands and a lot of stovetop clean-up:

Use a good candy thermometer. What’s a good one? Honestly, I’ve never been super-impressed with any, but find one that’s rated up to at least 400ºF and has a clip. Set it up so the tip is near the side, but not touching anything.
Get the oil as close to 375ºF as you can when you start, resulting in the final temperature of about 325ºF. (Cold food will drop the temprature of the oil.) Any hotter, and it’ll boil violently; any cooler, and you’ll be eating soggy, greasy food.
Keep your friables very, very, very dry. Splatter is usually caused by cold water hitting hot oil. This is why we coat things in breading, by the way.
Use a splatter screen when possible. It does other things, too!

Heat a lot of oil - 4” at least - in a very big, deep pot, with the candy thermometer all set up. (Why “candy” thermometer? Candy is made at frighteningly high temperatures.) It’ll take a few minutes to reach 375, during which we’ll prep the chicken further. Remove the chicken pieces from the bag, reserving the marinade, and place them on a big plate lined with lots of paper towels. Pat the chicken dry; completely dry, please.

(If you hate to throw out that juicy marinade, bring it to a simmer in a saucepan, turn the heat down to low, and reduce to a glossy, thickened sauce.)

Next, pour the sweet rice flour into a wide, shallow pan. Grab the chicken pieces with tongs or a fork and press them gently into the flour on all sides until it’s covered; shake off any unsightly clumps. Once they’re all floured up, let them rest for a few minutes while you make the sides.

Quick-pickle some cucumbers; slice them thin and toss them with the white-wine vinegar, the sake, sugar, and salt. Hit them with a dash of the nanami togarashi. Chill.

Back to the chicken - hopefully by now your thermometer is at 360 or so; good, now turn the heat to medium-high or whatever will keep it at 375. Note that the temperature will keep climbing after you first see 360 on the thermometer. If it climbs over 380, move the pot off the heat for a bit. Basically, do whatever you can to hit that magic number, 375. Just keep in mind that hot oil never looks as dangerous as it really is; be careful.

Don’t worry, though, this will be a walk in the park. One by one, tong the chicken pieces into the oil, making sure they produce that satisfying tssssss sound. Do not cover the pot - this will trap moisture, resulting in more splatter. If some oil drops do jump out at you, grab that splatter screen; just make sure you don’t knock off the thermometer with it. You should notice a temperature drop when the cold chicken enters the pot - down to 325 or so - and that’s just what we want. Fry the chicken, mostly undisturbed, for about 10 minutes. (Work in batches if needed.) The finished chicken should look golden and irresistible. If you’re unsure, pull out a piece and check it - it should be done, with no sign of pink, but still juicy and springy.

Using tongs or a spider skimmer, remove the chicken from the pot and dry it on a wire rack placed over a large pan. If you don’t have a wire rack, line the pan with crumpled paper towels. Whatever you do, don’t just put freshly fried food on flat paper; it’ll end up sitting in its own grease. Let the chicken rest for a couple of minutes while you serve the rice, drain the cucumbers, and clean up the kitchen a little. (Watch out for those hot pots and utensils!)

If you made the marinade into a sauce, toss the chicken with it. If not, hey, still tasty!

Here’s how I served mine:

(Sorry about the Instagram filter; trust me, the photo looked worse before. Next time we design a kitchen, we’re putting in bright, even, shadow-free lighting everywhere.)

The chicken was hit with a deconstructed version (lol) of the Perfect Condiment: kewpie mayo and sriracha. That pink stuff at the sushi bar? That’s it.

This is chopstick-friendly food, so ditch the fork. Healthy! Maybe!

America is enjoying a minor food renaissance, and one of its...

mrgan — Mon, 20 Jun 2011 10:55:29 -0700

America is enjoying a minor food renaissance, and one of its masters is David Chang of Momofuku. He’s an outspoken and overachieving fella, so you may not be surprised that in addition to running five restaurants, he is starting a magazine called Lucky Peach.

You should also not be surprised to hear that it’s a completely wonderful publication. Published by McSweeney’s (but of course), it’s a 174-page exploration of food, cooking, and eating. No ads, no crazy gimmicks, just a bunch of writing and honest, person-to-person recipes.

The first issue is all about ramen (and poached eggs) so if you like ramen, eggs, Japanese food, or good writing, you’d be crazy not to pick this up. Highly recommended! (Duh.)

Sugar snap peas with mint

jimray — Wed, 20 Apr 2011 08:54:00 -0700

I tend to cook most nights and am fortunate to have one of the most supportive partners, in eating and life, one could hope for. She greets everything with wide eyes and an “Oh, baby!” before it even gets to the table, even the misfires like my ongoing trials with thai peanut sauce. It’s pretty rare that I get to genuinely surprise her, though, as was the case with this side dish of sugar snap peas with mint, which we now excitedly refer to as “minty peas”.

This is a side that was meant for spring, with the sweet peas lifted by fresh mint and a little lemon zest. You’ve probably been roasting gourds and root vegetables since October; it’s time to brighten up a bit.

There are two techniques, both quick and simple, to getting this right. The first is to chiffonade¹ the mint into fine strips. The easiest way to do this is to pick the mint leaves from the stem, stack 6-8 or so together, roll them tightly, and cut them across the rolled bundle. Pick out any of the center stems that stick out and you’ll have a nice nest of mint. This technique works well with most herbs and leafy things, like collards.

Blanching is the other, and it’s one of my favorites, especially this time of year. With fresh, green vegetables, I like to use the big-pot blanching technique championed by Thomas Keller in his wonderful Ad Hoc at Home — it keeps fresh vegetables crisp and forces a brilliant green color. The key is to use a big pot of very salty water (Keller recommends 1 cup of kosher salt to 1 gallon of water) at a rolling boil to cook the vegetable as quickly as possible. Using lots of water helps to keep the temperature of the water from dropping when you add the vegetables so that they cook quickly. Lastly, prep an ice bath to submerge the vegetables in once they’re done so that they don’t overcook.

I like to dress the peas, either in a flavorful oil like a fruity olive oil or something nutty like walnut or hazelnut, or mix a very simple vinaigrette.

1 pound of sugar snap peas
8-10 fresh mint leaves
1 tablespoon flavorful oil (fruity olive, walnut or hazelnut)
pinch of salt
1 teaspoon of fresh lemon juice (optional)
lemon zest (optional)

Set a big pot of water, at least a gallon, on high heat.
While the water’s coming to temperature, snap the stem ends off the peas and pull the attached “string” down the full length of the pea.
Chiffonade the mint leaves by stacking them on top of one another, rolling them tight, and slicing them into thin ribbons. Discard any tough-looking stems.
If using the lemon juice, mix a vinaigrette by slowly adding the oil to the juice and constantly whisking with a fork to create an emulsion. Add a pinch of salt and whisk some more.
Prepare an ice bath of equal parts water and ice (a full ice cube tray is about right).
When the water is at full boil, add a cup of kosher salt per gallon of water and stir. Waiting until the water is fully boiling will keep the salt from pitting your cookware.
Add the sugar snap peas and watch carefully for them to turn bright green, about 1-2 minutes in. Fish one out and taste it - it should be crisp and sweet but not raw.
Drain the peas and quickly submerge in the ice bath until they’ve cooled, about five minutes, then drain and dry on a paper towel.
Toss in a large bowl with the oil or vinaigrette. Add the mint chiffonade, a pinch of salt and lemon zest (if using) and stir to combine.

The French chiffon refers to either a delicate silk or, more simply, to rags. Chiffonade means literally “made from rags”, a reference to the appearance of the herbs after they’ve been cut. Technically, it’s improper grammar to use chiffonade as a verb, though it’s common enough in the parlance of the kitchen. ↩