Children get older, I'm getting older too

When I was growing up, dinnertime was always marked by the frying of vegetables. It was always something we did a la minute, right before serving. And it made sense. By dinnertime, everything else was already either done or set along its way. Meats were resting, soups were simmering, seafood steaming gently in the pan. When you smelled the unmistakable fragrance of garlic, or fried onions, that meant that it was time to get your butt down to the dinner table. Vegetables were always served piping hot, the steam rising furiously against the dim yellow lighting of our dining room. To this day, I prefer cooking my vegetables. Maybe it gives me closure to preparing a meal. Maybe it brings back associations from my childhood. I don't know.

I made a stir-fry of bok choy, shitake mushrooms and red cherry peppers last night, just for old times' sake. While it was cooking, I got my camera and snapped away, trying to find the perfect mix of flash, shutter speed, aperture and ISO settings. As I am rapidly learning, food photography is so difficult because you only have a limited time to get the perfect shot, before your food starts to decline in appearance. This was the best I could muster while it was in the pan.

By request

Michael asked for the short ribs recipe from a previous post, so here it is:

Barolo Braised Beef Short Ribs

3 lbs. bone-in beef short ribs
1 carrot, coarsely chopped
1 onion, coarsely chopped
2 stalks celery, coarsely chopped
1 leek, coarsely chopped
4 cloves garlic, coarsely chopped
4 vine tomatoes
1 bottle Barolo or any other full-bodied red wine
1 cup chicken stock
2 strips pancetta or bacon
Paprika
Worcestershire sauce
Balsamic vinegar
Honey
Brown sugar (optional)
2 bay leaves
2 sprigs rosemary

Pre-heat the oven to 400F.

Mix olive oil, salt, pepper, 1 tsp Worcestershire sauce, 2 tsp balsamic vinegar, 1 tsp paprika, and coat the short ribs with the mixture. Set aside for 15-20 minutes.

Put the chopped vegetables in a roasting pan, drizzle with olive oil, salt and pepper and then roast in the oven for 20 minutes, turning regularly to avoid crisping of the top layer. Roasting helps bring out the flavour of the vegetables and creates a stronger base when you use them later in the stew.

Meanwhile, in a large pot, fry the pancetta or bacon till crispy, then remove. Brown the ribs in batches, removing when done.

Transfer the vegetables to the pot and sauté further till caramelized, about 3-4 minutes. Add a tablespoon of brown sugar to aid the process. You should be able to smell a sweetness to the vegetables if you poke your nose into the pan.

Add 2 cups wine and chicken stock, scraping up any brown bits at the bottom of the pan, and then bring mixture to a simmer. Add the bay leaves, rosemary, then the short ribs and the pancetta or bacon. If the short ribs are not entirely covered, add more wine to do so.

At this point you can slow cook the short ribs one of three ways. You can bring it to a simmer and keep it on the stovetop for 4-5 hours. You can cover the pot with tin foil and transfer to the oven, and cook at 350F for 4-5 hours. Or, you can transfer the stew to a crockpot and cook it on low for 8 hours. I have achieved the best results with the crockpot, but time may restrict your choices.

When the short ribs are done, remove from the stew and set aside for plating. Take the remaining mixture and pour it through a colander into a fat separator. Once you have isolated the braising liquid, put it into a saucepan and bring to a simmer on the stovetop. Add honey and reduce until the liquid is a nappé consistency. This means that you should be able to coat the back of a spoon with it.

To plate, serve short ribs with a heavy starch (rice or potatoes work best), drizzle with sauce and voila!

A bad workman blames his tools

I made a grilled chicken frisee salad last night, and wanted to dot the plate with the white-wine and rosemary sauce that I had made. Unfortunately I do not own a squeezy bottle. I did it with a spoon, and then for the second plate used a ziploc bag with the corner cut off. The picture you see below is the first attempt, with the spoon. It didn't get any better with the ziploc bag.

Sometimes I wish I had all the kitchen implements in the world. But then I remember that I would have to clean them all, and then I don't wish that so much any more.

Tasting Notes 5/31/2008

I recently read In Defense of Food by Michael Pollan - great read, by the way - and I've started making changes to my diet. I've never been a huge fan of processed food and ingredients, I prefer to make things from scratch with what Pollan refers to as "whole foods". So I've got that much going for me already. What I need to incorporate a whole lot more are leafy greens, and maybe stop cooking so much of the vegetables that I do eat. I'm also trying to eat more fruit, so wish me luck! Good fruit is hard to find in the city.

I think it's funny how Western chefs are uniformly fascinated by the flavour profiles of Asian foods and spices. As someone who grew up with easy access to an entire range of Asian foods, I often take them for granted. I once watched a segment on TV where the chef was waxing lyrical about star anise, and my first reaction was to scoff. Kaffir lime leaves as a "secret" ingredient? You've got to be kidding me. But now that I know much more about cooking and have developed a greater appreciation for food in general, my reintroduction to all things Asian has been bittersweet - pardon the pun. It's almost like a light went off and I feel I can taste the distinction between flavours much better now. Harnessing the knowledge of these flavours in the preparation of classical Western cuisine, though, has proven a lot more difficult. There is so much more that I do not know; so much more, from a culinary perspective, for me to rediscover about the foods that I grew up eating. But at the very least, I now know why they taste the way they do.

Maturation is a funny thing, eh. It doesn't always come easy, and it doesn't always come quickly, but in some form or another it comes to us all whether we expect it or not.

I was totally manipulated into making dinner this past Saturday but I guess I didn't have anything better to do, and we all have to eat, don't we? I tried to incorporate some form of "Asian influence" in my dishes but am sorry to report that it didn't come off quite the way I wanted it to. The food still came out tasting ok, but the Asian influence was muted and not used particularly well.

To start I made a watercress and frisee salad with avocado and parmigiano-reggiano - a pretty standard classical preparation. I made a soy, lime and ginger vinaigrette to go with it, which - apart from adding a tang to the dish - didn't really add much else.

I also made Barolo-braised shortribs, which I usually love, but this time added five spice powder and kaffir lime leaves. Unfortunately, I couldn't taste them in the final product because the wine overpowered everything. Also, I usually use celery in the braising liquid but did not have any handy this time round - and I could taste its absence. It was still pretty delicious, and I was particularly happy with the sauce. I had reduced the braising liquid further and added sugar and honey for a sweet note to round out the savoury, and I thought it worked remarkably well.

Dessert was a spectacular failure. I had planned to make strawberry napoleons but my custard did not solidify in time and I had bought the wrong kind of phyllo dough. When you go into battle you should always know your weapons and in this case I did not. I found out later that using the egg-whites along with the yolks in making custard helps the custard solidify. You learn something new every time, so I guess this failure was not for naught. Next time, I'm also using heavy cream instead of milk. Bah.

Throw another shrimp on the barbie!

I love shrimp. We call them prawns back home, but hey - a rose by any other name, right? I don't think I have ever had shrimp that I didn't like, and I have had shrimp prepared many different ways. One of my favourites is a dish called drunken shrimp. In Singapore what they do is literally drown the live shrimp in a strong liquor (bai jiu), then steam them and serve them with ginger, scallions, and a sauce made from the liquor. The way the dish originated, you are not even supposed to steam them but rather eat them raw and, sometimes, alive. What they do is serve the shrimp swimming in bai jiu, and what you do is pick them out of the bowl, rip their heads off, peel them as quickly as possible and throw them in your mouth. Quite an experience.

I also like shrimp simply grilled - like so:


The colour of grilled shrimp is just so appetising, I don't know what to say.

Throw them on some spaghetti carbonara, et voila!*

*In case you are wondering why there is a sudden proliferation of pictures on this website, it is because I recently purchased a new camera, and the novelty has not yet worn off.

Couscous a la puttanesca

People ask me all the time what I cook for myself. I do a lot of couscous, because it's easy, because it keeps pretty well, and because it is kind of like puttanesca where you can throw in whatever you want or have left, and have it taste good. I made one the other day with roasted tomatoes and asparagus, then decided to throw in some leftover sausage that I had from a cookout the previous day.

Di Fara Pizza

Di Fara Pizza
1424 Ave. J, Midwood, Brooklyn

Many visitors to my fair city never leave the island of Manhattan. I myself had never set foot in Brooklyn before I moved to New York. More is the pity, more is the pity. If there's one thing I've discovered it’s that the city holds untold riches for anyone adventurous enough to ride the subway or the EL for a while, sometimes a long while. Brooklyn alone has enough fabulous food destinations to last for years, and who can plumb the untold depths of Queens and the Bronx? So much to eat and drink, so little time.

Much has been made of Di Fara's pizza on Avenue J in a little-known or visited neighborhood called Midwood: it has been called the best pizza in New York by dozens of publications. Having eaten at Roberta's in Bushwick, Lombardi's in Manhattan, and Franny's down the block, it seemed like it was about time to check out this Brooklyn legend. I was joined in my quest by Buckley, a fellow cook at Stonehome and gourmand. She and I primed the pump with a few potent potables and got on the Q train.

Part of what's so great about Di Fara's is its total lack of pretension. The place is basically a dive. It has a very unassuming facade, and looks, as Jason would say, as though it was last cleaned on the 5th of never. There were probably about 20 people waiting when we arrived at 9:20. We put in our order for a half Di Fara special, half regular pie and then began the waiting game. Happily we were prepared for the famously slow pace of production: we brought with us a six pack to suck on. The man behind the pizza is Domenic "Dom" De Marco, an elderly, stooping gentleman who has been stretching the pies for 44 years. I said to Buckley, as we watched him stretch the pie to paper thin, grate the cheese to order and slowly ladle his special tomato sauce, that if anybody worked that slowly at Stonehome, they would quickly be shown the door. Either way, he was deliberate in his movements: sprinkling cheese, drizzling extra virgin olive oil and slowly snipping bunches of fresh basil to finish each pie. I loved the fact that his every movement seemed to say "I could do this faster, but after 44 years, I'm not about to change now."

At last, an hour and twenty five minutes later, at about 10:45, our pizza was anointed with basil, cheese and olive oil, sliced and passed to us on a giant salver. It was truly an experience. The crust was paper thin, but crunchy and chewy. The rich cheese was still a bubbling, salty lava. The tomato sauce was neither too sweet nor too copious. It was the perfect New York style pie. My one criticism, if I were to have one, would be that the toppings on the "special" half were not as transcendent as the rest of the pizza, they distracted from how incredible the plain half was. Between the ambiance, the food, and the BYOB, this might be the best possible way to spend a Saturday evening. Di Fara's proves once again, food made with love just tastes better.

Food porn

I made a steak recently and the sight of it stirred my loins. It was pretty much textbook - charred brown exterior and a warm, pink center. I had to get a picture of it and all I had was the camera on my phone.

This is how it looked after plating.

The secret to scrambled eggs is to cook them in a saucepan over low heat, gently beating them as you go, and removing them from heat ever so often. There is a video on Youtube of Gordon Ramsay making these (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C1SM73Qi1BQ) for breakfast. I typically add a little cream but otherwise do it the same way he does. The result is scrambled eggs just the way I like them: just a little runny, soft to the bite and meltingly delicious.

Tuna! Sup, Tuna. Gonna have some tuna for dinner? I bet you're sick of Tuna, right? Probably have Tuna every night. Tuna!

So long, and thanks for all the memories

Early on when I first moved to DC I discovered a watering-hole less than a block away from me that I quickly fell in love with. That place was the Townhouse Tavern, and it was the perfect dive bar - dimly lit interiors, a pool table with age-worn edges and scuffed felt, and not one but two jukeboxes chock full of classic rock and the odd Sinatra track. I began to frequent the establishment and became friends with the bartenders and waitstaff: Sarah, the struggling graduate student with that affected cynicism of intellectual endeavour, Yeta, the lesbian German waitress who looked like she never showered but was strangely hot anyway, Ed the David Carradine lookalike with all of the ponytail and none of the swagger, and many others. I grew to love the Townhouse because of its people and its proximity. Above all I grew to love the place because it was a great place to go to before starting the night, a great place to go to for the night, and a great place to go to wind the night down.

One night I was hanging out at the Townhouse with my friends Brooke and Chrissy, and Brooke's brother Tyler, who had lived in DC for the last 5 years. He was excited to be back at the Townhouse, and as he talked about the group of people who used to run the place and hang out there all those years ago - it was clear that had once had the same love that I had for the Townhouse and its people, what it stood for and what it meant. It was also clear that he didn't go there anymore. When I asked him why, he just smiled wanly at me and said, "Well, things change, you know?"

No, I didn't know, and looking back, it is clear that not only did I not know – but I also had absolutely no idea what he meant, until it started happening to me. Bit by bit, the Townhouse started changing. They repainted the interior walls. Yeta left to go back to Germany. Ed stopped working. Sarah took my mix CD out of the jukebox and then she, too, left. The clientele became a little preppier. The new bartenders were hip-hop fans and filled the jukeboxes accordingly. They replaced the old-school jukeboxes with those newfangled internet jukeboxes. Little by little, I began to enjoy the Townhouse a little less each time. I unconsciously decreased the frequency with which I went there, until I stopped going altogether. I missed it, sure, but a little less each day; until one day I walked by it and realised that I had not thought of it for months.

It is hard enough to make sense of this world we live in without having it, and its institutions, change on you every time you turn around. You want your local coffeeshop to always stay the same and serve the same great coffee and order their pastries from the same bakery, keep the same weathered old couches and the same scrawled menu on the blackboard. You want the New Yorker to keep writing in the same literary, yet engaging style, to keep its liberal bias, and to show up in your mailbox every Tuesday. We form habits. We create community. We choose the institutions we want to be part of, and we expect them to provide pillars of stability amidst the sham, the drudgery and the broken dreams of our world today. In a perverse way we almost expect the people around us to change and betray us, but we never expect the institutions we belong to, to change, to surprise, to betray us. Just because it is more likely than not, or just because we have so little control over it, doesn't make it any easier to accept. The delicious irony of the matter is that these institutions themselves exist solely through the grace of the people who run them, and so must change along with them.

I write this because I have now spent three years in DC, a city perhaps more transient than others, and one in which the bars, restaurants, even Houses of Parliament, change ever so often. Three years is a long time, long enough for these institutions to change, for my favourites to change. I still go to the Townhouse, for despite its changes it remains a charming place with an entirely different appeal altogether now. But I must now sadly say that I will no longer go back to a restaurant of which I have previously spoken fondly in these pages. Ever since Ann Cashion sold off Cashion’s Eat Place, it has just not been the same.