New Ideas for Recipe Design

Check out this amazing contest from the folks over at GOOD Magazine:

http://www.good.is/post/project-redesign-the-recipe

They want recipes designed in a new, graphic format, submitted only as a .jpg!  I'm working on mine right now, inspired by Carl Kleiner and his beautiful photos for the Ikea Cookbook.  Here, I'll throw you a bone:

Carl Kleiner/ Ikea / Styling Evelina Bratell / Vaniljhorn

Say It With Me: "Broo-SKATE-ta"

As overdone as bruschetta is, it's still one of the best and cheapest go-to dinners del mundo, especially if you eliminate tomato and basil from the equation.  In this version, I opted for:

Seared Beef + Blood Orange Sour Cream + Dill

My method for searing beef requires a powerful exhaust fan and a resistance to teasing ("my eyes are burning, are you cooking again?").  First of all, you'll need a sheet of plastic wrap and a heavy object.  Place each piece of steak on the plastic wrap, fold to cover, and smack the living hell out of it in the name of tenderization.  Get a cast iron skillet, turn that sucker up to full whack on the stove, let it get HOT, add a bit of oil and throw the pounded steak pieces on in.  I'm talking 30 seconds per side at most.  Let it rest for a good 10 minutes, then slice on the diagonal.

Mix some sour cream with the juice and zest of 2 blood oranges, olive oil, salt and pepper to taste.  If you've got fresh nutmeg, grate a tiny bit in as well, it will give you some complexity.  Make sure to add enough salt so that it doesn't taste like dessert.  

Take your excellent loaf of french bread and slice it.  Grease it up and toast it in the oven for about 5 minutes.  Slather on some sour cream, then the beef and the dill.  I've taken naps that required more effort.

Weeknight Kid Bait

So 5 year-old Ms. Thang says she would like chicken 'n' dumplins for dinner.

I check the kitchen.  I am confident I can oblige, not with the typical Southern-style flat-dough-noodle-clear-broth kid bait that worked me over as a child (sorry, Gramommy), but with a new spontaneously iron-cheffed version based around the limited stock involved in my Tuesday night fridge situation.

In said fridge I find...

+ 3 skinless chicken thighs  + self-rising flour  + half a bunch of dill  + eggs  + 2% milk  + whipped cream cheese  + 1 Spanish onion

I decide to work up something I've never tried before, which is my own version of a knedlach, just like the ones I was completely obsessed over when I studied in Vienna.  Quicker than my G-mommy's flat dough noodles but less time consuming and equally impressive.  

First I chop the onion and fry it up in some olive oil in a smallish stock pot.  I add the chicken thighs, salt and pepper and give'em 5 minutes to brown before adding water to cover, bringing it to the boil and then lowering the heat to poach the chicken and develop a broth. 

4 cups of the self-rising flour go into a large mixing bowl with a healthy shaking of sea salt and white pepper in addition to the finely chopped half bunch of fresh dill.  I heat 1.5 cups of milk and the small tub of whipped cream cheese on the stove until melted, then I stir the hot mixture into the flour.  At this point it should still be a bit dry.  Beat 2 eggs very well with a fork and then add them to the dough and stir a bit to combine.  Turn the dough onto a floured board and work it a teensy bit but NOT TOO MUCH.  I rolled dough chunks into long "snakes" and then cut the "snakes" into equal pieces.  There ya go.  Boil the dumplins (knedumps?  dumplachs?) in salted water and drain. 

By now those chicken thighs should be broken down and the broth should have luscious schmaltz pooling on its surface.  Try and spear a whole thigh, break it up into pieces in a bowl, throw out the bone and add some dumplins.  Ladle some of the broth on top.  Kids will run from down the street to accost you and steal your dinner.

Technique: The Mushroom Fry-Up

The most essential part of a mushroom fry-up in my book is the combination of lard and a rich deglazing agent with a lot of depth.  One in particular that I've been futzing about with lately is

A combo of 3 parts soy sauce, 1 part fish sauce

First fry your chosen mushrooms in lard and keep yourself from adding salt by whatever means necessary.  Once your mushrooms have a beautiful mahogany crust, douse them in the aforementioned ratio of soy and fish sauce.  Give them a toss and wait for all the liquid to evaporate.  Uuuuumami. 

This Magical Genie Sandwich Will Get You a Raise/Date/Better Rate on Your Mortgage

This sandwich is certifiably insane.  Consider using it instead of a ring to propose to your significant other.

You will need:

+2 strips of good thick bacon, fried until crispy  +1 TB of the bacon drippings mixed with the juice of 1 lemon and 3 TB of mayonaise with salt and pepper to taste  + 1 beefsteak or heirloom tomato, sliced and dressed with a bit of lemon juice, salt and pepper  +1 croissant

Spread the bacon/lemon mayo on both halves of the croissant.  Lay on the tomato and bacon.  Get anything you want from any living person.

Oxtail Dumplings for Non-Chinese New Year

As a life-long student of China and a former 4-year resident of Beijing, I like dumplings for New Year, both Western and lunar.  We know them here on the menus as "boiled dumplings", but what I'm really talking about are jiaozi (饺子), which, if I'm not mistaken, translates to English as "lengthy, drawn-out pain in the ass."

I decided to exacerbate the lengthiness of the dumpling-making process by making my own dough and filling them with braised oxtail, a 9-hour process in and of itself.  Ambition seems so much less daunting when it's basically inconsequential.  Funny that.

Here's the oxtail filling recipe, to be made 2 DAYS before you mean to serve the jiaozi:

Braised Oxtail

+ 2 lbs oxtail  + salt and pepper  + coconut oil  + 2 onions, preferably one red and one spanish, roughly chopped  + 10 cloves of garlic, peeled and halfed  + half a pint cherry or grape tomatoes  + 1 TB tomato paste  + 2 TB soy sauce  + 1 tp fish sauce  + 8 oz good wine, type unimportant  + 6 oz ketchup  + 16 oz/2 cups whole milk

Now's the time to break out your heaviest dutch oven.  Big ol' pot.  Start by seasoning your oxtail with salt and pepper and then searing it on high heat in the coconut oil; make sure to get a nice brown crust on each piece.  Set the pieces aside.

Add a bit more coconut oil to the pan and keep the heat high.  Toss in the onions and the tomatoes and let them fry up and brown for about 5 minutes.  Throw in the tomato paste, soy sauce and fish sauce; allow all the liquid to evaporate.  Once the liquid is gone and the vegetables are nicely glazed, do the same with the wine.  Once the liquid in the pan is viscous and syrupy, add the garlic, ketchup and milk and more salt and pepper.  Now, the pieces of oxtail go back into the pot and enough water needs to be added to cover the meat.  Bring the liquid to a boil, then turn the heat from high to low and put on the cover.

5 hours later, lift the lid and survey the scene.  You should be easily able to fish out the bones by this point, but if not, simply let it cook a bit longer until you can.  Once you have fished out the bones, let the tail cook uncovered until the liquid is thickened and no longer covering the meat, about another hour or 2.  Taste it, check the seasoning then adjust accordingly.  Then off with the heat, on with the lid and shove it into the fridge until you're ready to make the dumplings.

Jiaozi Dough

Now we're gonna have to discuss the difference in Asian cooking between hot water dough and cold water dough.  Generally dough made from cold water, thereby having less of an effect on the flour particles and holding up better to more aggressive cooking methods such as boiling, is used to make jiaozi.  However, I chose to make a hot water dough for these jiaozi because it is a little easier to work with and I find it holds up just fine to the boiling process.  I used a recipe from Chowhound that I found here that worked like a charm.

As an aside, here's a pretty good PDF that discusses the specifics of various flours and the effects of protein and starch content on water absorption when making dough. 



Assembling the Dumplings

After the dough is made and rested properly, get yourself set up on a nice big work surface with lots of room to spread out and to put your dumplings once you're finished wrapping them.

Bust that oxtail out of the fridge and behold all that solidified fatty tastiness.  I didn't really stir it before I started in on the process so that each dumpling would have its own unique concentration of elements. 

Dust your work surface and your rolling pin with flour.  Take a chunk of the dough, roll it into a "snake" and cut that snake into equal pieces sized according to how big you would like your finished dumplings to be.  Chances are you'll probably have to experiment a bit before you settle on the perfect size.

Roll each piece of the "snake" into a flat disk.  When you think it's thin enough, roll it a bit thinner, then place a small spoonful of the oxtail in the center.  Dontchya dare overfill that little %$#$!  You DO NOT want that savory beef fat leaking out into the boiling water and negating your entire previous day of cooking.  Fortunately I learned this from experience.

I choose simplicity when it comes to the folding part.  I simply fold the disk in half and seal.  Voilà.  I know my limits.

Now the real trick to this is recruiting every last person in your house/apartment/neighborhood/tri-state area to assist in the wrapping.  I ended up losing the support of my 5 year-old daughter to Dora and her wiles and was not finished prepping my little babies until (very literally) 6 hours later.  Work it.

Once you start boiling, taste-test them to find the perfect boiling time for your dumplings.  Should be around 5-6 minutes.  Serve'em right away on big platters in the middle of the table.  I leave the dipping sauce to you.