Peanut Soup, Senegalese Style (HCEV)

• 3/4 cup roasted and shelled peanuts
• 2 tablespoons peanut or neutral oil, like grapeseed or corn
• 1 medium red onion, halved and thinly sliced
• 1 tablespoon peeled and minced ginger
• 1 tablespoon minced garlic
• Pinch cayenne or more or less to taste
• Salt and freshly ground black pepper
• 6 cups vegetable stock or water [I had 3 cups of chicken stock that was about to go bad]
• 2 (about 1 pound) sweet potatoes or yams, peeled and cut into thick slices
• 8 to 12 plum tomatoes, cored and halved (canned are fine; drain and reserve liquid for another use)
• 1/2 pound collards or kale, washed thoroughly and cut into wide ribbons
• 1/4 cup chunky peanut butter
  

Figured it was worth shelling the peanuts myself instead of buying canned ones. I apologize for the Yankees logo on the bag.


Roughly chopped in my mini food processor.


Mise en place.


Onion, ginger, and garlic sauteed until stuff.


Add 2/3's of the peanuts. The rest will be employed as garnish.
The seasonings also come into play here.


3 cups chicken broth I had open in the fridge and 3 cups water.


Tomato, peanut butter, and kale filled the pot to the very brim. Ooh, Mark Bittman, we're playing a risky business with this medium saucepan you said was sufficient.


Filling, warm, colorful. I doubt I'll come back to it again but I don't regret making it.

Bacon: Part 2

The amount of liquid I poured off the pork belly after the first 24 hours of curing.
An impressive amount at nearly 1 cup, but then it only came in trickles afterward.


I appear to have tagged this photo as "moisture 3" which must mean this is what was left when I cured it the third time on Saturday night. The second time was on Thursday. Tom Mylan never mentions that you should recure the belly throughout the process though searching blogs for help listed different techniques. One of them didn't even bother with a DIY-smoker (only the real thing works?) and all of them only directed 3 hours of smoking rather than the nearly 7 hours Mylan prefers though his range is 4-7 hours.
I got nowhere near my target amount of moisture loss (none of the blogs talked about this) Tom Mylan suggests but I think I would have to recure every single night to reach that. People do say the resulting bacon is salty but also "intense" and "it feels like I just ate a steak dinner." Ha, after only 3 slices.

Anyway, here are the initial weights of the pork belly, their calculated target weight of a loss of 18-25%, and what I eventually got to achieve:

Pork Belly #1
Initial: 456 g
Target: 373.92-342
Final: 412

Pork Belly #2
Initial: 580
Target: 475.6-435
Final: 529

Pork Belly #3
Initial: 512
Target: 419.84-384
Final: 476

Pork Belly #4
Initial: 434
Target: 355.88-325.5
Final: 422

The numbers would probably lead one to believe that I sucked at this, but I can always do it again until it becomes really chilly out. It'd be nice to see how being so precise improves the quality of the finished product.


Putting all the pieces together. Stupid me didn't remember soak the first batch of chips.


Close-up of the wood chips and my electric range. I think I was trying to capture the first whiffs of smoke.
In terms of what wood I smoked, I had a small bag of mesquite I bought from the Brooklyn Kitchen way back in the days I lived in NYC and I bought a big bag of hickory at the TAG's in Porter Square.


Ooh, smokey...


Cured and rinsed pork belly. Looks dramatically different than Bacon: Part 1 I'm sure.


Throwing it in the smoker. Maybe I can go with ten pounds of pork belly next time. Heh, if I can afford it.


For the first two-third's of the process, you smoke the meat side because it'll take the color better than the fat. I'm sure a silly amount of fat would render out as well.
Then you flip them over for the rest of the smoking.


Resulting in this awesomeness! Cool completely before you slice.


The ash and chips.


Mmm, my electric burner smells like bacon.


Fried up the bacon that I goddamn made.



Though I feel it has mellowed out since then, the smoke hit me and my roommate Adam like a hurricane. I have never had bacon quite like this before.
That probably is the case for anything I cook.

Chicharones

When I roasted the pork belly in my Ramen entry, I wound up throwing out the skin I removed from the belly. I knew that I had an opportunity to make these for the event, but the hours were wearing on me in the kitchen and I didn't have the time to do all this.
I've largely stuck to the recipe in the Momofuku cookbook, but I didn't want to buy a food dehydrator just for this project when I could just set them in a low oven for three hours. Sorry, I'll wait for some other project to urge me along into buying one.
Hmm, the URL I used seems to have gone dead, but I'm pretty sure I had the pork rinds in the oven at about 250 degrees F for 3 hours. No, I didn't totally fail, David Chang.


Throw the pork belly in a pot and fill it nearly to the brim with cold water. Bring to a boil and boil hard for 1 1/2 hours.


At that point the water will look like this.


Draining them a bit. Notice that this process totally didn't remove the fat, but I assume this makes the next step easier.


One must remove all the fat from the pork belly or "they'll have the texture of soggy packing peanuts if fried." I think I had a few patches of fat, but I did make a good attempt and was fine.
Imagine scraping that down raw? Sounds gross and hard to do, but in my googling I didn't see another example of this technique.


Laid out and sprinkled with a little salt.


Three hours later. See the patches of fat? Overall though, good job.


Heating the fat to 390-400 degrees F.


And then you have chicharones. I think I enjoy ones made out of chicken skin better. Or maybe I should have gone ahead with Latin flavors (ground dried chipotle, lime, salt) rather than Asian (togarishi, a Japanese chili blend, and salt).
I suppose I'll figure that out next time.

Smoked-Tea Chili (HCEV)

• 3 tablespoons neutral oil, like grapeseed or corn
• 2 onions, chopped
• 2 tablespoons minced garlic
• 2 tablespoons chili powder (Neglected to make my own [That stuff in the store is full of salt and never quite as good. This goes for any spice mixes.] so I used straight-up ground chipotle.)
• 1/4 cup dark brown sugar or 3 tablespoons molasses (Haven't yet found a good reason yet to buy the latter)
• Salt and freshly ground pepper
• 1 tablespoon minced peeled fresh ginger
• 5-6 cups freshly brewed Lapsang Souchong or any smoked black tea (Bought this at Tealuxe)
• 1 teaspoon Sichuan peppercorns (Damn, forgot to get this and I'm not truly sure where in the city I can find them in the first place. Blog followers, help me out.)
• 1 pound dried soybeans, washed, picked over, and soaked if you like (I never really bother to soak.)
  

Mise en place.


Cook the onion until soft and the garlic until aromatic.


Cooking beans until tender. I probably wound up a bit under done though they seemed fine at the time.


For an unassuming looking dish, it smells fantastic. I was worried about the heat of the dish when I tasted a bean at the halfway mark, but it certainly mellowed out to something tolerable.
I loved playing with Lapsang Souchong in this dish though it was hard to detect under the heat.

Bacon: Part 1

I've never been that big a bacon fan, but since becoming a foodie and a cook I've developed a respect for it. The good stuff; the good, hardwood-smoked stuff or why bother? I've gone through phases of eating bacon with heirloom tomatoes, but 85% of the time I use bacon, it's an ingredient rather than a side dish. I've actually thrown out a fair amount of bacon simply because it's hard to eat it outside of a recipe.
What on Earth could possibly compel me to cure and smoke my own bacon then? Well, isn't respect is nearly as meaningful as addiction (Many addicts probably don't give a damn if the pork belly was smoked over applewood)? I run around dreaming of all the culinary feats I can accomplish (I wonder how long before I attempt a french macaroon), and eventually I think I'll follow through on all of them.
It doesn't hurt that I bought The Better Bacon Book: Make, Cook, and Eat Your Way to Cured Pork Greatness iPad app. Tom Mylan of The Meat Hook in Brooklyn (I think I bought pancetta there once when I needed it and I was shopping at the Brooklyn Kitchen anyway) writes several chapters and many videos about building a DIY-smoker and curing and smoking bacon. There is a totally bad-ass video of him butchering down the side of a pig down to the pork belly that I like to show practically everyone.
The app also has fantastic bacon-centric recipes for Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner, Dessert, Cocktails, and Side Dishes from great restaurants across the country (Harvard Square's own Russell House Tavern is featured in the Cocktails section).

Today I finally managed to figure out how to use this electric drill I bought to cut necessary holes into a galvanized steel trash can. I also went and spent $31 on pork belly and prepped it. Next week I expect to smoke it and write a corresponding entry, but here goes Part 1:


Aha! I have finally created a hole big enough for my electric range.
By the way, Tom Mylan made this process look incredibly easy and cheap. While it still may be a lot cheaper than buying prefabricated smoker, I had to buy an electric drill and several larger drill bits to accomplish this.


Tom Mylan's trash can doesn't really look all that different from mine, but I couldn't for the life of me find a grill grate that didn't just fall to the bottom of the trashcan. Its sides are straight and either I had to go with one that was too small or too large. I reasoned I could work with too small.
In any case I spent some time thinking about how I could rig the grate to a certain stabilized heights and my thoughts were running to wood or pipe. So here's the hole I drilled closer to the top of the trashcan. I'll have drilled three more by the time I'm ready to smoke.


The hardware I finally decided to use. I don't know why I only bought two of them. I'll have to buy another pair before the weekend.


Installation.


This is ALMOST all good.


5 1/4 lbs of pork belly. I said I'd skin it myself since I sort of want to make chicharones soon (the Spanish word for utterly great, fresh pork rinds), but I kind of butchered the process a bit and might let them do it next time.
I do need the practice, but I might not always want to bother with making chicharones. Also returning to the concept of practice, I feel pressure to teach myself how to butcher. I don't even cut up whole chickens for recipes, and any respectable chef knows how to butcher... Not that I want to be a chef... Just yet.


Felt like I was wasting the fat cap.


The second half looked worse? Or perhaps just as bad but in a different way?


The pork skin with plenty of fat on it I'm sure. I'll have to remove all of it to prep chicharones. More on this in a future entry.


So one pound each of kosher salt and dark brown sugar seems a bit much for the amount of pork belly I'm using, but I still went with it.


Mixed together by hand. Please don some latex gloves here because you don't want to get this under your fingernails.


Applied to the fat side.


Then applied to the reverse.


Oh gee, I guess there's enough cure left over for another round. Next time I'll stick with a combination of a 1/2 pound of each salt and sugar.


The point of a cure is to draw moisture out of meat in order to preserve it. This photograph are my notes of how much each particular piece of pork belly weighs and the range at which is should weigh before smoking (18-25% less). Tom Mylan says that this could happen within 4 days, but I'm certainly not going to smoke the bacon for 7 hours until at least Saturday.

Ropa Vieja (BRW)

Shredded Stewed Beef from Cuba.  Ropa Vieja is Spanish for old clothes.

• 2 tablespoons corn, grapeseed, or other neutral oil
• 2 to 3 pounds flak steaks, split in half lengthwise (with the knife held parallel to the cutting board)
• salt and black pepper to taste
• 1 yellow onion, halved (unpeeled), each half stuck with a clove
• 5 garlic cloves
• 1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
• 1 tablespoon cumin seeds
• 1 cinnamon stick or 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 2 large yellow or white onions, thinly sliced
• 1 or 2 red bell peppers, stemmed, seed, and cut into 1/2-inch strips
• 4 plum tomatoes, coarsely chopped, or one 8-ounce can whole tomatoes, drained and chopped
• 3 tablespoons capers, soaked if salted, drained if in vinegar
• Lime wedges for serving
• Tabasco or other hot sauce for serving

 

Mise en place.

Onions stuck with cloves.

Onions thinly sliced on the mandoline and the ground cinnamon.

Browning the steaks.

Braised for 2 hours.

Setting them aside to build the sauce in the pan.

Cook the garlic paste and cumin seeds until fragrant and lightly colored.  Then add the onions and cook until they are deeply golden.

The cinnamon stick is added with the first group of ingredients and the ground cinnamon with the latter.

Add the bell pepper and cook until they soften slightly.

Add the strained braising liquid and tomatoes and reduce.

Shredded beef.

Beef warmed through in sauce and served over brown rice.  The capers were a very nice touch.