Mapo Tofu with Ground Pork [Attempt 2]

I recently discovered that Whole Foods carries Sichuan peppercorns. The last time I tried to make mapo tofu, this was the key ingredient that I was missing, so I decided it's time to revisit this dish. This time around, I searched for a recipe more authentic than the one in my big book o' Chinese food, which a friend told me was relatively legit. Something about the first recipe's use of chicken broth made me somewhat skeptical, though.

Sichuan pepper doesn't give heat like red chili pepper does. It's more of a cooling, tingling sensation on the tongue, and increased salivation. This kid agrees with me (watch his other videos, I really hope my future kids will be as adventurous and curious about weird foods at such an early age!).

About Sichuan Pepper
Doing a little research, I learned that Sichuan peppercorns are actually the outer husk of the dried berries of several kinds of Asian trees of the genus Zanthoxylum. In cooking, its flavor is often described as slightly citrusy, and it creates a buzzing numbness on the tongue. That numbness is due to the berry's bioactive component Hydroxy-alpha sanshool, which excites the sensory neurons that are responsible for our response to capsaicin (spicy heat, like in a chili pepper).

Did you know that Sichuan peppercorns were banned in the USA from 1968 to 2005? Not for health reasons, like with the ban on unpasteurized milk products, but because the peppercorns were capable of carrying the citrus canker bacteria that could have wrecked our citrus crops. Enforcement stopped in 2002, then the ban was lifted in 2005 when they were proven safe as long as the peppercorns were heated to 160˚F to kill the bacteria before import.

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Braising

A few weeks ago, my friend Alex sent me an e-mail, wanting to connect me with his friend Rich who had just started up a food blog of his own. Of Feasts and Yeasts is some really interesting stuff, featuring not only recipes and chronicling home-brewing, but also discussing food science. So Alex saw potential for some good collaboration between Rich and myself.

So some time in the near future, expect to see either some cross-posting, or one of us experimenting with the other's recipes. Reading Rich's posts on the science behind marinades and capsaicin inspired me to do a little research of my own.

About Braising

Ever since I started trying to re-create my mom's Haitian dishes, I've loved the technique of braising. Simply put, braising is slow-cooking something partially submerged in liquid, covered and at lower temperatures. When done right, you could end up with the tenderest and most flavorful meat, the epitome of "falling off the bone."

One of the best applications of braising is with tough cuts of meat with a good amount of fat and connective tissue. I'm talking about briskets, chuck roasts, and pork or lamb shoulder.

Beef chuck top blade steak

Think about if you were to take some chuck top blade, with that strip of gristle right down the center, and just pan-sear or grill it. That gristle isn't going anywhere, and it's not going to feel very good in your mouth. Braising, however, not only helps to break down the gristle, but it also uses that connective tissue to keep the meat succulent.

Succulent

According to Cooks Illustrated's explanation of braising, once meat reaches 150˚F, the muscle tissue becomes fully tightened and releases its moisture and juices into the cooking liquid. So the liquid will be nice and flavorful, but if you were to pull out the meat, it would be tough. However, keeping it in the liquid longer and raising the temperature some more will break down the connective tissue, which is primarily made of collagen.

At 200˚F, collagen completely becomes soft gelatin and the tightened muscle fibres begin to separate a little, drawing moisture back into the meat. In the end, your tough and chewy cut of meat can be cut with a spoon. And it only gets better with more time in the pot.

Easy Pad Thai

I was inspired to try a pad thai recipe recently. Could it be because I spotted a jar of tamarind juice at Central Market, and my mind was flooded with memories of past Indian/Thai recipes that involved tamarind and failed miserably? Probably, yes.

Store-bought tamarind comes in many forms. There's whole fruit that you can pick up from the Hispanic markets, or the pre-packaged fruit pulp. And then there are the containers of tamarind juice that come in all sorts of concentrations. I've tried a couple of recipes with tamarind, and they were annoyingly vague about how much tamarind to utilize.

Imagine my disappointment the first time I tried tamarind with a scratch Vindaloo curry recipe. The tamarind juice I bought was so concentrated that it wasn't quite compatible with the original recipe. My first indication of failure was that the curry was dark as night and thick as sludge. The first taste was beyond sour, and borderline inedible.

After that, tamarind was dead to me. Fast-forward about 3 years, I've been on a Thai stir-fry kick lately, and I saw this guy on the market shelf.

Tamarind Juice Concentrate

Add some sugar, fish sauce, and a dash of soy, and you've got the main ingredients for the sauce in pad thai. After a few iterations, I've managed to get the procedure down to where the noodles weren't practically disintegrating on me, and the finished product wasn't a dried out mess at the end. And fortunately, I diluted the tamarind enough that you can pick up its signature tangy flavor but not be horribly overwhelmed by it, like I've had in the past.

I can't believe I forgot the wedge of lime

Hot Salade Niçoise

A year or 2 ago, there was a show on PBS that I loved, Spain: On the Road Again. Celebrity chef Mario Batali, NY Times food columnist Mark Bittman, super hot actress from Barcelona Claudia Bassols, and Gwyneth Paltrow went on an epic road trip around Spain. They took in architecture in Barcelona, rugged landscapes in Asturias, Moorish history in Andalusia, and so on. And all along the way, they gorged themselves on each location's specialties, top restaurants, and the best wines.

That is what I wish I could be paid to do for the rest of my life.

Then again, maybe I wouldn't necessarily want to do it with that exact crew.

1. Mark's accent annoys the hell out of me. Yes, I was born and raised on Long Island, and I'm no stranger to NYC/LI accents. But sometimes it just feels like a cheese grater on my eardrum. "Smwall," "sauwalt," (small, salt). Gawd.

2. Mario's a bit of hefty fellow. He seems like an absolutely nice and fun guy, but I tend to walk lots of long distances when I'm abroad, and I can see him slowing me down.

Last, and certainly not least

3. Gwyneth is one of those "ethical eaters." She's not vegetarian, but she won't eat animals that walked on 4 legs. So no pork, beef, etc. So for a bunch of episodes, I couldn't help but think of how much it would suck to travel with a picky eater.

But I realized that she has a pretty good palate. And then imagine my surprise when I learned she's an active, and skilled home cook. I stumbled upon this recipe on Food + Wine Magazine's site, and I'll admit I was impressed. It's a fast and simple one-pot dish, and it's an interesting take on a classic salad. Plus it's nice and light for this oppressive summer heat.

Hot Niçoise Salad

Ingredients:

- Extra virgin olive oil

- 1/2 lb tuna steak, ~1-inch thick

- 1/2 lb haricot verts (or green beans), stem ends chopped off

- 1/2 cup Niçoise olives (or kalmata, if Niçoise are unavailable), pitted and sliced

- 10-12 filets of anchovy (packed in olive oil)

- 1 cup grape tomatoes, halved

- 2 eggs

- salt and black pepper

- salad greens of your choice (I prefer baby spring mix)

Procedure:

1. Blanch the green beans in boiling water for 4 minutes, then drain them and set them aside. Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 400 degF.

2. Rub all sides of the tuna steak with olive oil, and season it with salt and pepper.

3. Coat the insides of 2 ramekins with olive oil, then crack 1 egg into each one. Drizzle a little bit more olive oil on top.

4. In a large, heavy-bottom, oven-ready sauté pan, put in the green beans, olives, anchovies, and grape tomatoes (lightly squeezed first). Toss it all with 2 Tbsp of olive oil and spread it around the pan. Put the tuna steak in the center, and place the ramekins of egg in the pan, too.

5. Put the pan, uncovered, on the center rack of the oven, and let it roast for 10 minutes, or however long it takes to let the egg whites set and leave the yolk somewhat liquid. The tuna steak should be whitened on the outside, but still slightly pink and not fully cooked at its core.

6. Flake up the tuna steak, and toss the salad in a light vinaigrette of your choice. I make a vinaigrette from 2 Tbsp lemon juice, 2 Tbsp olive oil, and 1/2 tsp of dijon mustard. Serve on top of salad greens.

Yields 2 servings, best served still warm.

Chinese Lemon Chicken

Source: The Food of China by Deh-Ta Hsiung and Nina Simonds

I've been on a mission for the past year, to find the best General Tso's Chicken or Orange Chicken in Austin. For the most part, I'm really a healthy eater. I try to have fresh vegetables with most meals. I've switched from cooking long-grain white rice and jasmine rice to the more nutritious brown or wild rice.

But every now and then, I just crave some cheap, shitty Americanized Chinese food. And few dishes epitomize cheap, shitty Americanized Chinese food like General Tso's Chicken. There's something about that unique breaded texture of the meat, the thickness of the sauce, and that combination of sweet and savory flavors that has me hooked.

Or maybe it's my body saying "you need to eat more greasy stuff and restore balance." I don't know.

At any rate, I've been trying random Chinese restaurants around Austin and seeing how each one's General Tso's Chicken (a.k.a. Orange Chicken) stacks up against the others'. This is all excluding Panda Express, of course. Not to get all Hipster about Chinese food, but they're too mainstream, they lack soul.

Not too long ago, I realized that cooking it on my own isn't very complex. All it takes is a nonstick pan and oil that's hot enough. Plus I already had a semi-authentic Lemon Chicken recipe to work with from my big Chinese cookbook. The final result wasn't quite restaurant quality, but it was surprisingly satisfying.

Ingredients for chicken:

- 2 boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cut into 1-inch pieces

- 1 Tbsp light soy sauce

- 1 Tbsp Shaoxing rice wine

- 1 scallion, chopped finely

- 1 clove of garlic, minced

- 1 Tbsp ginger, minced

- 1 egg, lightly beaten

- 1/2 cup corn starch, or more

- Enough cooking oil for frying

Ingredients for sauce:

- 2 Tbsp juice from a lemon or orange

- 2 tsp sugar

- 1/2 tsp salt

- 1/2 tsp toasted sesame oil (I used chili sesame oil)

- 3 Tbsp chicken broth

- 1/2 tsp corn starch

Procedure:

1. In a large bowl, combine the soy sauce, Shaoxing, chopped scallion, garlic, and ginger. Add the pieces of chicken and toss them to coat it all in the marinade. Cover the bowl, and let the chicken marinate in the refrigerator for at least 1 hour.

2. When the chicken is done marinating, coat all the chicken with the beaten egg. Coat the chicken with the corn starch, shaking off any excess. I poured the dry corn starch into a sealable plastic bag, added the chicken, and shook it all until everything was coated.

3. Pour the frying oil into a wok or nonstick frying pan, and heat it to medium-high. When it's hot enough, a drop of the egg and corn starch should fry golden-brown within 10 seconds. Add a about 1/2 of the chicken, one piece at a time, and fry them while stirring constantly until they are golden-brown (~4 minutes). Remove the cooked chicken with tongs or a wire-sieve, and repeat with the remaining chicken. I lay out the cooked chicken on paper towels to absorb excess oil.

4. When all the chicken is done cooking, drain out the oil and carefully wipe the frying pan dry. Reduce the heat to medium and let the pan cool a little bit. Mix all the sauce ingredients very well, and add the mixture to the pan. Let it cook while constantly stirring until it's thickened. Return the chicken to the pan, and lightly toss it in the sauce.

Oh Snap [Vol 4]: Sambal

I suppose I have a thing for chili pastes. I've already done one of these posts for harissa. They're so versatile, as condiments, sauce components, or ingredients for a spicy marinade.

I know of sambal as the main flavoring in lots of Indonesian and Malaysian dishes, especially Sambal Udang (chili prawns). And Malaysian has to be my favorite cuisine, so when I was in the Asian market and spotted an assortment of sambals, I thought "why the hell not try it."

Out of the many varieties of sambal, I randomly chose sambal oelek, whose ingredients include: red chili, tomato, garlic, galangal, lemongrass, and tamarind. So, yes, sambal is quite pungent by itself. How would I use it?

I didn't look up any recipes, so I thought of the simplest way to feature the sambal. Whole Foods had a sale on fillets of barramundi, a flaky white fish comparable to red snapper or grouper. The end result was a quick and easy dinner with a good kick of spice, topped with a cool mango salsa.

Ingredients:

- 1 lb barramundi fillet, skin on and bones removed, and cut into 4 portions

- 1 tsp sambal oelek

- salt & black pepper to taste

- 1 Tbsp vegetable or peanut oil plus some sesame oil for taste

- 1 mango, peeled, seeded, and diced

- 1 medium-sized shallot, finely diced

- a handful of cilantro leaves, chopped

- 1 Tbsp lime juice

Procedure:

1. Season both sides of each portion of fish with salt and pepper, and spread 1/4 tsp of sambal on the flesh side. Let them sit for 20-30 minutes.

2. Heat up the cooking oil and a splash of sesame oil in a non-stick pan over medium-high heat. Doing 2 portions at a time (so you don't cool down the pan too much), fry the fillet portions, skin side first for 4-5 minutes or until the skin is browned. Flip it to the flesh side, and cook until it's just become opaque white. When they're done, set them aside.

3. The salsa is easy. Dice the mango, dice the shallots, chop the cilantro, and mix it all with the lime juice. If you let it sit in the fridge for an hour, it only gets better.

Pasta in Garlic Oil

I guess I haven't updated this thing for a bit. It's partly because I haven't been doing many new recipes of note for a while (not successfully, anyway). But I've developed a couple of good dishes in the past couple of weeks that are in queue for posting. In the meantime, here's a simple side dish.

Sometimes I really don't feel like spending any more than 30 to 45 minutes making dinner. But you don't see me cranking out some nasty Rachel Ray recipe. No.

God, no.

I prefer to get some quick-cooking fish, prepared simply, with some fresh vegetables and another easy item on the side. Most of the time, I'll make rice with my meal; but to mix it up, pasta with a basil- or garlic-flavored olive oil. The most important things to making the flavored oil are:

1. Use GOOD extra virgin olive oil. It doesn't have to be a $50 bottle, or anything that fancy. But just don't use your regular old Local Supermarket Brand oil, claiming to be straight from Tuscany, but actually being the dregs of the process from some less-than-stellar oil producer. Quality is essential.

2. Don't overheat your pan! Olive oil has a low smoke-point; so if you get your pan too hot, the oil will start to vaporize and ruin the flavor. Also, burning garlic makes any dish have a nasty, bitter, charred taste. Keep the heat low, or medium-low, just enough to barely sizzle the garlic in the oil and release the flavor.

So Simple!

I Miss Kyoto

A close friend of mine was on assignment in Japan for 3 months, and she was planning to spend a few days in Kyoto. So I recommended the same ryokan (traditional B&B) that I stayed at. That ryokan is right next door to the bar where I met some really cool people, including the owner, hostess, and head cook of the bar (Shingo, Shigeru, and Chika). Shingo gave me some sweet parting gifts, and I wanted to repay the favor, so I gave my friend a couple small things: a Thank You note, one of my better calligraphy brush drawings from that trip, and a Longhorns pennant (since Shingo is into American college football). He quite liked them :)

I need to go back. Soon. Badly.