If you have some of the above attributes but are not a geezer nor even approaching pre-geezerhood, thank God for that, press on regardless, and welcome.

In this Momofuku Era, Kimchi is Flying Off the Market Shelves
David Chang, chef/author of the best selling cookbook, Momofuku (see below), likes kimchi, and so too his readers.  Well . . ., the Koreans have been serving it most meals since the 16th century.  Kimchi is combination of cabbage, other veggies and bold seasonings pickled in vinegar and then fermented to produce a pungent spicy hot condiment.  It serves well also as the supporting ingredient to wok-prepared or stir fried meat and fish dishes. It likes rice.  Recipes for the stuff abound:  "winter" kimchi is hot, "summer" kimchi is more fresh and light.  In the West, it comes in glass jars and is often make with napa cabbage and spicy but not flaming hot peppers, ginger and garlic.  It keeps forever in the fridge.

So, while reading and thoroughly enjoying Momofuku, TLW found a kimchi and pork recipe there and also in the latest issue of Fine Cooking, (they read the book too).  "Let's have a couple over and make this in the wok fired on the Blue Star," said she.  Here we have the results inspired by the book and magazine recipes.  This dish is best prepared a la minute with guests watching the show. Have courage!  Do it. It takes about five minutes, if you have your mise en place.

Wok Stirred Pork and Kimchi 
For four
(See abbreviations, if needed)
1         pork tenderloin, cut in quarter inch slices and then into half inch strips
2 T       soy sauce
4 T       grapeseed oil or peanut oil
8 oz      fresh shiitake mushrooms, stemmed and hand-brokened into quarters
8          scallions cut in 1.5 inch lengths, white and green
16        broccoli, small flowerettes (not shown in photo--after thought)
1 T       garlic, pureed
3.5 C    kimchi, drained and coarsely chopped
4 T       mirin (sweetened sake) or white wine and some sugar
1/2 t     sesame oil (for aoma--not taste)
1/4 C   beef or chicken broth
2 T       white and black sesame seeds, toasted

1.  Prep pork, toss with a tablespoon of soy sauce and set aside
2.  Prep mushrooms and veggies and have them lined up ready to pop into the wok
3.  Add 2 T of oil to the wok, heat gently and swirl carefully up the sides
4.  Heat the oil to shiny hot and then add the marinated pork (don't splash)
5.  When pork strips break free of the bottom, stir or toss until pork is whitened but still rare
6.  Scoop out the pork and hold in a clean container (not the one used to marinate)
7.  Add 2 more tablespoons of oil and when very hot, add the scallions, mushroom, garlic and broccoli, 
     in that order--about three minutes for this step 
8.  Add the kimchi, another tablespoon of soy sauce, a few drops of sesame oil and toss or stir
9.  At this point, if the whole mess looks too dry (no sauce for the rice), add some broth and BTB
10.  Serve immediately in heated bowls over rice with maybe a side of Asian Cucumbers
11.  Garnish with the toasted sesame seeds

Notice that the eyes have a pattern to them that can be lined up to cut out, 3 or 4 at a time, with a sharp paring knife making v-shaped trench cuts. 

This method leaves more pineapple on the pineapple. 

Then quarter the fruit, trim off the hard part, dice and place in containers to cool.  A $4.75 pineapple yields two nice containers of chunks that go for $4.50 each at the market. 

Waste not, want not . . .

Here's a photo of the chicken and Spanish chorizo fixins for the paella

Read the whole thing here

A Brief Salad Amusement
For a Christmas Day dinner salad we wanted something light and amusing, since the entree was Osso Buco Milanaise with Butternut Squash Soup and mashed potatoes and  parsnips--all pretty heavy stuff.  So here we have fresh tender watercress simply dressed with sugared rice wine vinegar.  On top of that is one small just-sauteed crab cake,  piped with a spicy hot raspberry wasabi mustard dressing. Nice contrasts here:  bitter watercress, sweet rice vinegar, seasoned crab cake and spicy hot creamy dressing.

I always use ring molds to shape crab cakes.  You will find 80mm and 60mm stainless steel rings molds in good kitchen supply stores.  Both sizes too big for our purposes here.  So at the hardware store, buy a length of PVC pipe with an ID of 40mm.  Take it home and cut it into rings about an inch high.  One pound of crab meat prepared as crab cakes yields four 80's or six 60's or twelve 40's. 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Tilapia Stuffed With Crabmeat
We had a little canned crabmeat left over from Thanksgiving and an unfinished container of tabbouleh, both of which we got at Costco.  Though vacuum sealed, the crabmeat had to be used soon. Tabbouleh is a tasty low fat Middle Eastern spread made with bulgur wheat and finely diced tomato, onion, cilantro, mint and lemon in EVOO. It goes great at room temperature on taco chips, crackers or bread points.   So what to do?  Make a fish dish.

Tilapia is a major food fish, farm raised. It is fine textured and low fat, a bit more so than flounder. Cheaper too.  So we seasoned the crabmeat with a few ingredients from our crab cake recipe and layered it onto one tilapia fillet and topped it with another and tied them off, as shown. The fillets were seasoned with S/P and EVOO.  I then dumped the tabbouleh into a buttered dish, plopped the tied fish fillets on top and baked the whole mess in a 400F oven for about 30 minutes.   The fillets were 3 inches thick stuffed and tied.  So, using the ten minutes an inch rule, 30 minutes was right on.

How'd it come out?  The tabbouleh got a little too crispy in the baking process and lost the individual tastes present when served uncooked.  But it was OK. The crabmeat did not come through, as distinct from the talapia, as I had hoped.  Recipes abound for crab stuffed sole with the crabmeat usually fattened up with cream or mayo, which I didn't do.  Since the cost of the lump crabmeat is greater than fish, there are better uses for it. Why not do crab cakes one day and fillet of tender sweet fish the next? 

But we're talking leftovers here.  We agreed that it was a nice dish and an interesting use of tabbouleh, but we would not brag about it at the bazaar in Marrakash.

New Waffle Maker
After 30 years of faithful service, batter stuck to the plates of TLW's old waffle maker unless they were bathed with a lot of oil, which made the unit really messy over time.  So we got a new 2 square Belgian waffle maker by All-Clad and took it for a test drive Sunday morning. 

We turned the thing on:  It has a seven heat levels, a light that indicates when its ready and another that flashes and beeps when the waffles are done.  It has a clever overflow tray.  The box included a nice buttermilk waffle recipe featuring whipped egg whites folded into the batter. They came off the un-oiled plates cleanly.  Even the recipe was good, producing a light and lofty waffle.  This is not your mom's waffle iron. 

A young fellow named David Chang is a "hot chef" these days according to the foodie media. An early review of his forthcoming cookbook caught my attention because a) he's grounded in French technique, b) combines Asian with American, c) likes pork, d) hasn't dumbed down his recipes for a book contract and e) is a restaurant chef versed in that world's grueling work and not a TV star where line cooks do the mise off camera. (His penchant for profanity might  save him from TV fame.) 

He's cooked in Japan and in NYC where he opened his first restaurant, Momofuku Noodle Bar. Since, Momofuku Ssäm Bar and Momofuku Ko both high end restaurants have opened, with rave reviews.  Chang and his cookbook, of course named Momofuku,  got a nice enough review in the Wall Street Journal to prompt me to order it.  It's due out next week. 

So wait, there's more... 
------------------------------------------
Got the book today, here's the photo (new camera: Canon G-11).  At second glance:  well edited, good photography on coffee table grade paper, heavy on commentary regarding the art of cooking and the trauma of making it pay, with recipes at the margin--all very well written and nicely presented.  Awful introduction. Contents are organized by Chang's restaurants:  Noodle Bar, Ssäm Bar and Ko. 

This is a French Laundry type cookbook that takes the reader into the head of another innovative chef  and his crew.  In the book at least, these concepts drive Chang: 

• "Serve food with integrity at an affordable price.  That is, undersell, over deliver. 
• ...do not subscribe to the idea that there's one set of blueprints that everyone should follow.
• . . . you take it, cook it, make it delicious . . . elevate it, honor it, lavish it with care and attention.
• when you start to cook on autopilot, when you stop paying attention to details--not to mention big things like seasoning--no amount of press will make up for it. What is the point of cooking at all if you're not gonna do it right?" 

This cookbook is an important addition to the literature and it's a fun read.

PS:  A reader asked where "Momofuku" came from?  Chang says that one of the most important events in the history of food was the invention of instant ramen by "Momofuku Ando."  Best read the book for the origins of  Ssäm and Ko.

Ah, but now scroll forward to 2009, the flu season and H1N1.  Bottles of hand sanitizers are to be found on every counter from supermarkets to flower stores.  Sales of the stuff are through the roof. 

We have, of late, spent a lot of time at the National Institute of Health (NIH) in Washington DC. At the door frame of every room there is a racked bottle of hand sanitizer. At other clinics, the stuff is ever more present than a couple of years ago.

According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, hand washing is the single most important means of preventing the spread of infection.  Food inspectors spend a lot of time assessing the effectiveness of kitchen staff hand hygiene practices because data show that a very high percentage of foodborne illnesses are hand transmitted.  They also know that properly washed hands are as germ free as any other ‘tools’ in the kitchen. 

But keeping hands clean is difficult.  Cooks know to wash their hands before leaving the bathroom and also are trained to wash-up between tasks.  Easier said than enforced, however.  How many times have you worked with food in the kitchen, then went off to change the channel on the TV, do something for the baby or go down to the pantry to get a box of Japanese bread crumbs, then return to the task at hand in the kitchen without washing up again?  The problem is time and availability.

There is another hand wash media out there that you should consider adding to your daily routine. Instant hand sanitizers.  They are nothing more complicated than ethyl alcohol in a squeeze bottle—a big one on the counter, a little one in your pocket, chef's toolbox, car glove compartment, purse, backpack, wherever.  It solves the time and availability problem with flying colors since it's ready-at-hand and takes five seconds to use.  This stuff is available in all drugstores and supermarkets.  Purell is market leader with some soap manufacturers offering products as well. We now favor 3M's Avagard D which NIH uses by the truck load.  Maybe that's why we can't find it the drug stores.  Google or Amazon it and buy it online. It's more pricey then Purell.

Here is how it works:  Hand sanitizer fluid is 62% ethyl alcohol and added moisturizers.  You squirt a quarter size dollop in the palm of the hand and wash thoroughly with it.  Purell claims that, before it completely evaporates, the stuff kills 99.9% of the germs that may cause illness.  It kills good ones too, but so does soap and water.  (A fringe of the wellness-hypochondriacs has a problem with that.  But scientists state that their concern is misdirected in that ethyl alcohol is not among the anti-bacterial products that remain on the hands with theoretical adverse affect.)  Ethyl alcohol had been used for a 100 years.  Alcohol-based hand sanitizers have been around in one form or another for 15 years.  I'm never without it.

Let's hope that, with the passing of the flu season, folks will continue to use hand sanitizers.

Try it, you'll like it. 

Its refreshing too.

In school we were instructed to look for a trace of browning around the edge of the cookie. Corriher says the same thing.  Reichl says 'until golden.'  I'm now convinced that waiting for evidence of browning results in an over baked cookie:  one that dries when cooled and gets hard when stored.  The 'until golden' works better for white sugar than brown sugar'd cookies. The conundrum is compounded in a convection oven, which shortens baking time by 20%, for sure, and maybe more.  Which also means that the time to take out the cookies comes sooner and passes faster. 

So . . .

I just baked a batch of Pantry Cookies and a batch of my new Nut, Coconut and Health Bar Cookies.  I took them out when they appeared set.  That is, when they were fully shaped, with a dry surface top and with edges sharply defined and not clinging to the silicone pad.  No evidence of browning.  The result:  moist, chewy cookies!

This is heavy...but a change is required on all my cookie recipes.  Got to do it.