Category Archives: Cookery

Some Pleasant Post-Christmas Procrastination

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My loved ones have been quietly insisting (not quite nagging) that I continue to chronicle my adventures in the world of food, and for all of their rightness — I do so hate it when I’m not in the right, rare as it may be — I simply haven’t had the inclination.  I promised updates on DC Restaurant Week which, my lord, was back in August, and failed to deliver.  I apologize.  They will come… eventually.

I know I’ve commented on this before, but the most peculiar thing about writing, and probably most things in general, is that while I constantly want to write, I often never do unless the act itself is taking the place of something I don’t want to do.  As I write this, for example, I should really be fixing up my Georgetown applications (because I’m daft enough to want to go back to graduate school) or at the very least be preparing a new playlist for my iPod.  But here I am, blogging for you.

The year is almost over and I will, hopefully, have some things to talk about:  my thoughts on my food progress in 2010; my almost vulgar obsession with Nigella Lawson; experiments with my new camera; goals for 2011 (think: macarons!).  Until then, my peaches, fiddle with this recipe, which I created when Matt expressed a desire for turkey burgers or Indian food for dinner one night.

There is no picture to accompany it, and its title is pure kitsch and more than likely offensive; in any case, these do taste wonderful and are scrumptiously moist.

Bombay Bao Burger with Cucumber Raita Dressing
Serves 4.

For the Burgers:

1 onion, chopped
1, 1″-knob fresh ginger, peeled and minced
3 cloves garlic, minced
2 serrano peppers, seeded (optional) and minced
1 1/2 tbsp tomato paste
3 1/2 tsp garam masala, divided
1/2 tsp cumin, divided
1/4 tsp fenugreek
1 lb ground turkey
1/2 cup unseasoned bread crumbs
1 egg, lightly beaten
1 tbsp ketchup
1/2 tsp cornstarch
1 tbsp plain, non-fat yogurt
Kosher salt
Vegetable oil

For the Raita Dressing:

1 cucumber, peeled, seeded and chopped
1 cup plain, non-fat yogurt
1 tbsp mayonnaise
1/8 tsp garam masala
Kosher salt
1-2 tsp fresh chopped cilantro or parsley

4 crusty rolls, toasted
4 slices tomato
Romaine lettuce leaves

Place the chopped cucumber in a colander in the sink and liberally sprinkle with kosher salt.  Let stand for 20 minutes, until a fair amount of moisture has been drawn out from the cuke.

Heat 1 tbsp of vegetable oil in a nonstick skillet over medium-high heat until the oil is quite hot, almost shimmering.  Add the onion, ginger, garlic, and serrano pepper to the pan and saute, stirring occasionally to prevent serious burns, until the onions just begin to color.  Stir in tomato paste and cook for one to two minutes more (the tomato paste should lose its vivid redness and begin to brown).  Add 2 tsp garam masala, 1/4 tsp cumin, fenugreek, and 1/2 tsp of kosher salt to the pan and stir to coat the veg.  Cook for one to two minutes; it should look hideous and glumpy and be very fragrant.  Set aside to cool.

Meanwhile, make the raita.  Pat dry the cucumber to remove any salty overkill.  In a bowl, whisk together yogurt, mayo, garam masala.  Stir in the cucumber.  Check for seasoning:  as the cucumber was already quite heavily salted, you may not need that much salt.  Do it to taste:  you’ll know it’s properly salted when you can distinctly notice the sweetness of cucumber, the tanginess of yogurt, and the spicy undertones of garam masala.  Stir in parsley or cilantro to taste.

In a large bowl, combine ground turkey, cooled onion mixture, egg, bread crumbs, ketchup, cornstarch, yogurt, 1 1/2 tsp garam masala, cumin, and 1/2 tsp of kosher salt.  Do not overwork!  We want the mixture to be light.  Do a patty test:  in the pan you fried the onion mixture, place about a teaspoon of the meat mixture and fry until done.  Taste the patty and adjust for salt.

Divide the meat mixture into four patties (these are quarter-pounders, baby!).  I go for flatter (rather than thick) burgers.  They are quite large so, unless your pan is a king of surface area, you may have to do this in batches.  Heat a nonstick skillet over medium- to medium-high heat.  When the pan is very hot, add 1 tbsp vegetable oil and the patties.  They should sizzle.  Cook until the bottom of the patty is nice and browned, about 3-4 minutes.  Carefully flip patties and cook until the other side is brown.

With pot lid in hand, carefully pour 1/4 cup (you may need more depending on pan size) of the hottest tap water in the pan.  Careful!  It’ll sizzle and spit!  Clamp on the lid and cook over medium heat until most of the water has evaporated, about five minutes.  Remove lid, and continue cooking until the pan is pretty much dry, being careful not to let the burgers burn.

Serve on a crusty roll with a slice of tomato, a romaine leaf, and the raita.

Breakfast of Champions (Now with More Meat)

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I wake up every morning dreading the inevitable:  Matt’s daily utterance of the phrase, “Bao has to blog today.”  He’s right, but sometimes I find it very hard to sit down and write without an incentive, such as a deadline, a glass of wine, or the gift of a unicorn.  Oftentimes, and I’m sure most people experience this as well, when I know I have to write something, I’d rather write something else.

So Restaurant Week reviews are still forthcoming, but this morning I created a zesty recipe, and that’s what I’ll post.  Take that, Mattie!

Japanese-style Hamburger with Citrus Soy and Shichimi Glaze
Serves 4.

For the Burgers:

1 small onion, finely diced
3/4 cup panko (Japanese bread crumbs), or fresh bread crumbs
1/2 cup whole milk
1 clove garlic, peeled
1 lb ground beef
1/4 tsp lime zest
1 tsp salt
1 egg, beaten
2 tsp ketchup
2 tbsp butter
2-4 tbsp vegetable oil, for frying

For the Sauce:

6 tbsp soy sauce
6 tbsp sake (Japanese cooking wine)
4 tbsp mirin
4 tsp fresh lime juice
2 tsp honey
1/2 tsp shichimi-togarashi*
1 tbsp butter, for finishing

Combine the panko, milk, and whole clove of garlic in a small bowl and set aside  for 15 minutes.  Meanwhile, heat 2 tablespoons of butter over medium-low heat in a small saucepan and saute the onions until soft and translucent, about 5 to 7 minutes.  Do not let the onions brown.  Set aside and let cool.

Place the ground meat in a large mixing bowl.  Remove the garlic clove and squeeze the excess milk out of the bread crumbs, which should almost be like a paste by now, and add them to the meat.  Add the cooled onions, lime zest, salt, egg, and ketchup and mix everything lightly with your hands until the mixture comes together.  Divide the mixture into four portions, and tossing each portion between your hands, form hamburger patties.  Tossing them back and forth and letting them go THWACK! against your hands will make your burgers fluffy.

Whisk together the ingredients for the sauce.

Heat 2 tbsp of vegetable oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat until the oil begins to shimmer.  (Do not crowd the pan; if you cannot fit all the patties in, cook them two at a time, adding more oil as necessary.)  Add patties and cook until the bottoms are nice and browned, about 2-3 minutes.  Flip patties and cook for 1 to 2 more minutes, until the bottom is browned and delicious.

With the pot lid in one hand, carefully pour in 1/2 cup of very hot tap water, so that the water reaches about 1/4th of the patties’ height (you may need more or less water).  Clamp the lid on the pan, turn the heat down to just over medium, and steam the burgers until most of the water has evaporated, 3 to 5 minutes.  Remove lid, and cook until the water is all evaporated. Remove burgers and set aside.

Drain any excess oil from the pan, and return it to high heat.  Add the sauce and cook over high heat, swirling the pan, until it reduces to a loose syrup.  Add the patties, swirling the sauce around them to cover the bottom, and then flip patties and repeat.  Remove patties to individual plates.  Cook the sauce a little longer until it thickens just a bit more, and then remove from heat.  Swirl in 1 tbsp of butter to finish, and drizzle sauce over hamburgers.  Sprinkle a little extra shichimi on the side of the plates for those who want it and garnish with lime.

Serve with white rice, miso soup, and Japanese pickles.

*Shichimi-togarashi (or shichimi pepper, or just shichimi) is a Japanese spice blend.  It can be found in any Asian grocer.

Give Us Your Tired, Your Poor, or Your Very Hungover

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I’m not a huge breakfast fan, so I often start cooking lunch around 10:30 or 11 am.  I eat a lot of pasta, especially for my first meal of the day, because (1) I’m far too lazy to go to the grocer for fresh ingredients, and (2) I prefer it (and think it’s healthier) to say, processed food and frozen meals.

My house always has dried pasta and the staples to make a basic marinara sauce, so this dish is usually my go-to when I’m feeling especially lethargic (like today) or just plain hungover.  It’s super easy, and more importantly, super CHEAP!   My good buddy Charlaine, who (in addition to trying out the dishes on my blog) gives me great photography tips, has requested some easy recipes, and who am I to disappoint my fans?  Read on for my quick marinara.

Bao's hangover marinara.

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Demystifying the East: The Japanese Holy Trinity

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I’m fairly certain that over the course of my illustrious career, I’ve written, read, and laughed at at least one hundred papers that began with “Demystifying the East” and ended with bullshit.  Misery loves company, so here’s one on cookery.

I was craving Asian food something fierce last night, and came across this recipe for lettuce wraps, the kind one might drop thirteen buckeroos on at PF Chang’s, at the Food Network website.  While I greatly enjoy the combo of hot, intensely-flavored meat against the refreshing, crispy texture of a lettuce leaf I’m not very inclined to sell a kidney for it, especially when most Asian food can be created (or rather, most food can be made to taste Asian) at home for pennies, as long as you know the flavor profiles.  Easy-peasy, right?

Apparently not so for Sunny Anderson, who created the aforementioned lettuce wrap recipe above.  It was at once heavy (from the beef) and way too spicy; the sheer amount of heat from the garlic and red pepper flakes overpowered the sweetness of the hoisin, which should have been providing a foil against the saltiness of the soy and peanuts.  Inedible?  No, it was decent (I polished off leftovers for lunch), but I am an Asian food snob of the highest degree and this meal was definitely not a star (I’ve adapted Sunny’s recipe to be better; check it out here).

After dinner, I found myself asking the little voices in my head, “Do Americans really not know how to do light, tasty Asian?”

They don’t, really.  So let me teach you.

Soy sauce, mirin, and sake -- the Japanese holy trinity of cooking.

Behold the Japanese Holy Trinity of Flavor:  soy sauce, mirin, and sake.  With these three tools, you can make anything taste deliciously light and Asian with minimal effort.  Let’s take a moment and think about each in turn.

Soy Sauce. It’s the hooker of Asian cuisine; it’s cheap, gets you off in a hurry, and you can find it anywhere.  Total bang for your buck.  The pungency comes from the fermented soy beans used to make it, and the high levels of salt added to it during its creation make it a great base flavor to any dish, Asian or not.  This is where that new-fangled Japanese loanword “umami” comes in.

Lots of people get ‘low-sodium soy sauce,’ and these people need to be punched in the face.  Soy sauce is meant to be salty; it is salt for all intents and purposes.  If you’re using it in cooking, don’t add salt.  If you’re using it on the side, don’t drink the bottle.  If you’re worried about your sodium intake, stop eating so many goddamned processed foods.

A final note on soy:  buy Japanese, such as Kikkoman.  Chinese soy sauce is cheaper, but so is the flavor.

Mirin.  Ah, lovely, lovely mirin.  Mirin is a rice wine that has been sweetened with sugar (a great, great deal of sugar), which produces a velvety, almost syrupy consistency.  When you combine mirin and soy sauce with some sugar, you get teriyaki sauce (yes, it’s that easy).

Mirin comes in several forms nowadays; the two I use are “real” (hon) mirin, which is alcoholic, or “mirin-fu chomiryo” (みりん風調味料), which is actually pictured above.  The latter means “mirin-styled seasoning,” and this is because it tastes like mirin, but doesn’t have any alcohol.  Both are acceptable to use, and since I often add sake to my dishes anyway, I don’t miss the alcohol when using the fake stuff.

Sake.  You should all be pretty familiar with sake; it’s Japanese rice wine.  I buy cooking rice wine, though you could always substitute nicer sake if you have it to hand.  This gives any dish some earthy, astringent notes that beautifully mellows out the sweetness of mirin and the saltiness of soy.  It brings balance to the trinity.  (I sound like I’m doing a tarot card reading.)  I like to finish off stir-fries and sautes with sake, adding it at the end and letting it cook out for thirty seconds to a minute.

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So now you know the basics.  But what do you do with them?  Try these:

Teriyaki Sauce

3 tbsp soy sauce
3 tbsp mirin
3 tbsp sake
3 tbsp sugar

Whisk together.  You’ve got teriyaki sauce.  Cook anything you want in a pan — meatballs, burgers, chicken breast, fish, tofu, etc.  When cooked, remove said meat, pour in the sauce and reduce over high heat until it’s thickened nicely.  Return meat to the pan, until the goods are thoroughly coated and glossy (do not burn the glaze).  Voila.

Basic Soy Broth

2 cups dashi (Japanese fish or seaweed stock; I use instant)
2 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp mirin
1 tbsp sake

Combine ingredients and heat it up.  Can be used to simmer chicken meatballs or poach fish, or as a broth base for ramen.

Japanese Omelet

2 eggs
1 tsp soy sauce
1 tsp mirin

Whisk together and make cook the eggs into an omelet however you fancy.  You’ll have a lightly sweetened, delicious Japanese egg dish.

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So there are three super-quick recipes that create authentic Japanese results.  If you just feel like experimenting, play with one or a combination of the flavors at different ratios.  I add soy sauce to pasta sauces and chilis, use mirin in salad dressings, and deglaze with cooking sake instead of white wine.