Here's what I was craving today: broth. I really just wanted a deeply flavorful, satisfying bowl to slurp. It did not come to pass at lunchtime, so I went home and made it. Fortuitously, I had everything I needed for this already in my fridge and pantry (although there were a few ingredients I would have liked to add).
This dish is pretty much the essence of comfort food, and yet, when I was growing up, this would have seemed like such an exotic, weird dish. In no way is this particular comfort food part of my heritage.* I had probably never had anything like it until the last, say, three or four years. But this is the kind of thing I make when I have a bit of time and just want something to satisfy.
And satisfy it did. I wish I'd had some fresh cilantro, Thai basil, and bean sprouts to complete it, but it was pretty spectacular as is, given my craving.
* And yes, I realize that this vaguely Asian dish combines several different cuisines, and is therefore part of no one's heritage, but first of all, it's primarily Japanese with a bunch of Thai stuff thrown in, second, this was comfort food made with whatever stuff I had on hand, third, suck it, fourth, I wanted a bunch of extra shit in my dashi, so refer back to number three.
Broth:
- 1 red onion, sliced, then sauteed on very high heat without moving much to brown, then stirred around a bit to sweat and break down
- 2 sticks lemongrass, bottoms halves only, pounded and sliced
- Smoked, barbecued pulled pork, a hunk a little larger than my fist (it was in the fridge, and it was time to use it or toss it)
- 3 cloves red garlic
- 1 head fermented black garlic
- a few bay leaves
- five or six dried kaffir lime leaves
- six little Bird's Eye chilis
- small amounts of various spices, including coriander, black pepper, fennel seed, dried basil
- All boiled for an hour or so with a bunch of water, then 3 strips kombu added, boiled for five minutes
- Strain and discard all the solids
- Added about 1/2 cup of 6x concentrated shiitake broth
- Soy sauce to taste
Garnishes
- Pork belly, brined, then sous vide 36 hours @ 61.1C (142F), then pressed with something flat and heavy, and chilled. When ready to use, open pouch and remove pork belly, cut off skin and crosshatch fat underneath. Place in a pan fat side down and weight down with something heavy and flat, like a cast iron skillet, and cook over medium heat for fifteen minutes or so, until fat cap has rendered and gotten very crispy. Take it out and let it rest for a couple minutes, then slice and serve immediately.
- Poached Soul Food Farms egg (their eggs are awesome).
- Shiitake mushrooms, stems removed, caps sliced into 1/8"-1/4" slices. Added to bowls before pouring broth in.
- Chinese Broccoli, stems blanched for two or three minutes while still attached to florets, but with the florets out of the water. Then reserve and put into the hot broth just before serving.
- Shanghai Bok Choy, separated, added to bowls before hot broth poured in. Also, stems sliced thinly and added at the end for crunch.
- Sliced red onion added at the end.
- Lime wedges served on the side.
- Sambal oelek, served on the side.
Posted by Barzelay on 2009/01/12 @ 23:03 | Comments (7) | Meat, Veggies, Fruit, Grain, Cheese
Comments
That sounds awesome. If I owned a pan I would try it.
Did you know your RSS feed doesn't include a "more" link for extended entries? I didn't realize posts were cut off until I saw this one.
And I'm kidding, I do own pans.
Posted by: Jacob at January 13, 2009 10:12 AM
Thanks! Indeed I did not know that. I haven't changed my RSS feed in ages, so that means you and the other person who are subscribed to it have missed tens of continued posts. Tragic!
Posted by: Barzelay at January 13, 2009 10:55 AM
This sounds amazing and very rich. I just have a few questions:
1. Where do you get black garlic (Le-Santuaire?) and how long does it keep?
2. You just happened to have the following in your pantry: lemongrass, black garlic, red garlic (?), kaffir lime leaves, bbq pork ...?
3. Where did you get 6x concentrated shitake broth?
4. What did you do with the skin from the pork belly? Why did you remove it?
Thanks!
Posted by: sygyzy at January 13, 2009 11:22 AM
You mentioned a couple of posts back that you were going to tell us about your acquisition of an immersion circulator, but I haven't seen the story in more recent posts. Did I miss it? Or have you not yet told the tale? Mainly, I'm wondering if you shelled out $1,000 or if you might have some leads on lower-priced means of acquisition. I've just ordered a FoodSaver vacuum sealer, which I realize is not of the same quality as the type of vacuum chamber used by pros . . . but I'm hoping it'll enable me to dip my toes in the water of sous vide cooking with a thermometer and a pot of water.
Also, I noticed that your sous vide cook time for the pork was 36 hours at 142F . . . and I know you're using TK's Under Pressure . . . so I'm wondering what you think of his general safety rule of no "danger zone" temps for vacuum sealed foods for more than 4 hours. I'm just beginning to reseach the food safety issues related to sous vide . . . and I know you always do your homework . . . so I'm wondering what you think about it all. Cheers.
Posted by: Food Rockz Man at January 13, 2009 12:15 PM
1) I got black garlic from Le-Sanctuaire.com. I've ordered it three times now, and it's had a wildly different longevity each time. Once it all got moldy within a week and a half. Once it lasted two months until I used it all up. I've had this batch for about two weeks and it shows no sign of damage. The time it didn't last long was the first time I got it, and it was when they first started offering it. They may have improved their storage method now, as it comes in a different kind of bag.
2) I always keep lemongrass in the fridge. It keeps a long, long time, as long as you're only using it to flavor things (as opposed to chopping it up and leaving it in the finished dish, for which you don't want to use slightly dry lemongrass). I got some red garlic from the farmer's market, and it's awesomely potent, sweet garlic. I had some dried kaffir lime leaves because my ex-neighbor had a tree. I smoked and barbecued the pork last weekend for a party. The pork belly was also leftover from a batch I made for something else (that post is coming up).
3) I can't remember whether it was from the Berkeley Bowl supermarket, or from an Asian grocery. But it's pretty awesome stuff.
4) I removed the skin because I don't find it particularly pleasant to eat in this context. I was going to say that it inhibits fat rendering and crisping, but now that I think about it that may not be the case, especially if I'm scoring it anyway. I should have saved it for pork rinds or something, but I didn't. I threw it out.
Posted by: Barzelay at January 13, 2009 12:35 PM
FoodRockzMan, you didn't miss it. I just keep putting off the post. I spent $250. Post to come.
I'm also using a Foodsaver, but I got their highest end model, the Gamesaver Turbo Plus, which has two of the higher-powered Gamesaver Plus motors. It's nothing like a chamber-sealer, but it does the trick. With some practice, I've even gotten the hang of sealing liquids. It still can't really compress anything. I've got lots of tips for how to use the thing for sous vide, though.
TK actually recommended some number of hours (8? 12?) @ 182F for pork belly, which is also the temp at which he does almost all braises. That sounded unnecessarily high to me, and I've definitely had pork belly meat dry out a bit when braised. So I looked around a bit more. Heston Blumenthal recommended 36 hours @ 140F. I bumped it up 2 degrees to get it a little further away from the danger zone. It turned out very well. I'll go into more detail in a later post about the pork belly.
I'm actually in the process of doing some research about bacteria and food safety. In the meantime, I'm treating the safety section of Under Pressure as being best practices. I won't sous vide anything for more than a couple hours under 140. But it can't be as simple as 139F = danger, 140F = safe. There is a lot more complexity underlying those recommendations, and I'm trying to find out more about it.
Posted by: Barzelay at January 13, 2009 12:49 PM
Barzelay,
Thanks for taking the time to answer questions. And please do post your findings about SV and safety ... a safety for layman cooks if you will.
Posted by: sygyzy at January 13, 2009 9:11 PM