Dinner Diaries

Hot and sour soup - Appropriately spicy, a bit more sour than usual, with big gobs of wood ear fungus.
Hunan family style tofu - Velveted tofu, served in a slighly overly salty braising sauce flavoed with jalapeno peppers, leeks, black bean and bits of pork.
Orange Beef - the cliche dish of the evening actually turned out very nicely, very crisply deep fried beef slices in relatively irregular shapes with just enough orange sauce, garlic and whole red chilies clinging to them to be delicious.

Brunch at the corner of El Camino and Rengstorff. In spite of the dowdy look of the outsides of this restaurant, as well as the floral country kitchen look of the inside, this place serves a really good breakfast. The pancakes are whole wheat hearty; the sunny side up eggs arrived sunny side up, whites just set and yellows appealingly runny. A breakfast place doesn't have to be gourmet, in fact, the only times I want to go out for breakfast are when I want something that is comforting. This place does have some twists on traditional fare - pumpkin pancakes stood out - but even the more innovative dishes showed an understanding of customers in search of the familiar.

Ingredients - Arugula, 1 large salad tomato, some salsa (I used Whole Foods Chile Morenita?) and 1 pork shoulder.
Apply a dry rub on the shoulder, (I used a mix of kosher salt, black pepper, cayenne pepper, thyme, coriander and cumin. And cinnamon, I think...) let it rest for a few hours. Then roast in a pan in a 250 F oven for about 8 hours. Then a few more if it isn't already extremely tender. I was hoping at this point that I would just be able to pull the pork off, but it wasn't that tender yet so I diced it pretty fine.
Assembly - I created a bed of arugula, then sprinked on the diced tomato, then the diced pork (not the whole shoulder, just a half pound for 2 people) then some salsa. Salt and Pepper.
Thoughts - Pork and arugula was just an inspired combination. I wish I could take credit for it - but it just so happened that we got arugula in our box and I bought a shoulder of pork...
A toast to my friend Chris, who told me about his pulled pork salad in Mississippi and inspired this dish.

Broccoli soup from the Monastery Soup book. It's interesting - at least my version of the soup didn't taste too strongly of - anything particular. But it did have a very interesting, warm flavor altogether. A soup that is greater than the sum of its parts? Nonetheless, I think next time I'm going to up the quantity of broccoli. We had it warm, with a little parmigiano shredded on top.
Garlic and Rosemary Roast Chicken, roughly based on the Cooks Illustrated Recipe. I butterflied the chicken, and then brined for an hour in a mixture roughly like the one suggested - salt, water, a few sprigs of rosemary and garlic. Except I added a few sprigs of lavender, some sugar, and a dash of vermouth.
Then I used a boning knife to get my fingers under the skin of the breast and thighs, and cleared a space for the flavoring. I added a mix of olive oil, garlic, rosemary (finely chopped) and salt. I sprinkled salt and pepper on the outside of the skin, and put the whole thing in our little convection oven. I cooked it at 400 for a while - possibly around 25 minutes? Then, as the skin was a golden brown, I pulled the chicken out, turned it, and returned it to the oven at 375. I let it cook at this temperature till the instant thermometer read 175 for the thigh. Unfortunately, at this time the breast read 175 as well, which is a bit high. But with the brining and the olive oil , it worked out ok.
Thoughts - the chicken skin crisped up nicely, with the oil on the inside and the salt on the outside. The brining could stand a little more punch and a little less herb. Possibly add herbs in the oven to try to protect the breast better?

Sauced up Mario Batali's Pomodoro Sauce with a cube of my seafood stock. Sauted some shrimp for a minute after marinating in garlic paste, chilli flakes and thyme. Added the sauce + stock, stir, let cook for a minute, then add the pasta (penne).
Thoughts - I thought the stock added some depth to the sauce, Connie couldn't taste it, but liked the sauce anyway. 2 minutes cooking might be on the long end of cooking time for shrimp, I should probably reduce that next time.

Better than Addis (the restaurant that is, not the place - the word is the Ethiopian food in Ethiopia can't be beat). At least to my untutored palate, the flavors just seem fresher, cleaner. I just wish they'd serve more collards in their vegetarian combination... The injira is the same pretty much everywhere - I have a feeling there's just one injira factory in the Bay Area. It's not quite as good as it could be - at its best it's silky smooth, with very fine bubbles are a rather strong tang.

Kirin, on Castro in Mountain View, has 4 tanks full of crabs. Their prices fluctuate, but last week, when we were there, the were selling them at 9.95 apiece or $16 for 2. We had one deep fried, with salt and pepper. I really liked it - the meat seemed juicier this way than the usual scallion ginger - Connie says Tandoori Crab is still her favorite.

Lunch at Yan Can. I overthought the ordering process - assuming that since this is a multi-cuisine asian place the best stuff would be from the cultures that are inherently multi-cuisine - singaporean and malay cuisine. That might be so (I'm still somewhat interested in trying the Singaporean Noodles, or the Balinese Fried Rice - which are only available at dinner) but the Firecracker Beef was a disappointment - a chop sui like sauce with beef and rice, with a little fresh tomato thrown in for ... freshness? The more traditional fare - Beef Chow Fun, Mongolian Beef, Sweet and Sour Pork... seem to be better choices. The meat is better quality than your average hole in the wall style asian joint. The advantage with this is you never end up with a mouthful of gristle. The disadvantage is that if overcooked (as was the case with a couple of dishes) the meat becomes rather dry. The prices are somewhat higher than hole in the wall as well... On the plus side, the signs are Mondrianized. And there's a TV screen with Yan, showing that he can.

From Twelve Months of Monastery Soups - a complex, flavorful soup. I started off with a bunch of olive oil, and added shallots and a can of diced tomato, strained. I sauted till it started smelling sweet, then added spinach and the leftover turkey broth (from boiling the turkey carcass from thanksgiving). That mixture simmered for 15 minutes, then I added salt and pepper. I added the ravioli 5 minutes later, because they were already cooked (I used a 3 cheese ravioli, by Cafferata). Finally, a handful of chopped parsley took the place of the chervil, and I let the soup rest (as directed) for 5 minutes.
Served with a dollop of sour cream.
Thoughts - I'm always amazed at how well Cafferata always turns out. Recommended without reservations, almost better than home made... Actually, the ravioli (I'm sad to say) is better than my home made ravioli. More forgiving too. And they're just beautiful.

Except it wasn't chow fun. Ranch 99 and Marina were both out of it, so Hugh ended up experimenting with "Vietnamese Rice Noodles" - similar in color and texture to Chow Fun noodles, but shaped like udon. He used the recipe for beef with black bean paste chow fun from The Wisdom of the Chinese Kitchen, which involves less total grease consumption than your average chinese restaurant version of the dish, and also more overall flavor. Connie's trick for the noodles - don't futz with them. Just let them do their thing (at the right temperature, of course) and eventually they'll become crispy, without soaking up too much oil...
Side dish - long beans with red bell peppers. A simple accompaniment (also from The Wisdom of the Chinese Kitchen) long beans, in 2 inch pieces, sauted, then steam cooked for 3 minutes, then tossed with the bell peppers for a minute.
Thoughts - the rice noodles were definitely an acceptable substitute. Getting the pan a little hotter before adding the noodles might help get the noodles crisp quicker, leaving them more intact. The long beans could use a little more searing. And my show off flip needs a little work - I sent a few pieces of long bean flying from the stove...

Tomatina serves a decent pizza. It's not fancy, it's not "Pizza Antica" more rustic than thou... they come very close to the real thing. The crust isn't made with 00 Italian flour (I asked - they said Gold Super Leavened?), and is a bit more robust than your average Italian pizza. It's nicely blistered, with high edges, beatifully browned and with flavor to match. The dough's not crisp, either. The sauce is simple and nicely tomatoey. The only thing wrong with it? The cheese. First - add the Parmagiano *after* it comes out of the oven. Otherwise it just becomes a salty oily mess. Secondly, the odd buttery smell that accompanied the pizza - we thought it was the mozzarella.
Thoughts - next time, we're going to ask them to put only fresh mozzarella on the pizza. We know they have it - it's in one of the bruschettas... I'll update it if works.
Still - a very good pizza at a very reasonable price.

This is best with the leftovers from the leg and wing parts, darker meat and with more skin/meat ratio.
Dice coarse- turkey, parsnips. Dice fine - garlic, ginger. Slice fine - green onion. Mix sauce - 1/2 tbsp dark soy, 1/2 tbsp light soy, 1/2 tbsp sugar, 2 large pinches of salt. 2 eggs, beaten. 2 cups rice. A few shrimp, marinated in oil, salt, pepper and a little lemon.
Cook the rice with a little less water than usual to yield a drier product.
Heat a wok, on high heat, to beyond smoking point of your oil.
Add 2 tbsp oil, shrimp. Stir and remove shrimp to a holding area after 30 sec.
Add garlic, ginger, stir, then add eggs. Stir to break up eggs, letting them form a light crumb. Add green onions. Add mixture to the shrimp in holding area.
Add turkey, parsnips. Cover and let cook for a minute to let the parsnips just soften.
Add rice, stir.
Add sauce, stir.
Add shrimp/egg mixture, add a touch of sesame oil, black pepper, white pepper, szechuan pepper, salt to taste.
Stir, serve.
Thoughts - turkey and parsnips work really well in fried rice.
Somehow, I cooked the shrimp too long (about 1.5 min?) 30 seconds should be about right, since it will continue to cook in the holding area.

After a little hiatus for homework, I'm back to blogging. Some backlog from the past many weeks... Thanksgiving turkey, of course. Chard and feta pie that Connie made... Superbowl and Pho To Chau, new Pho places (at least, new to me). Crab crab crab, mango ice cream. And from last night - Turkey Fried Rice.