Yeah!!!!!! Eggfest!!!!!! (Pork Tacos, Chinese Style Ribs)

As promised, here are the recipes for what I was serving at PA Eggfest 2014 earlier today.  I had a blast and thoroughly enjoyed cooking next to my friend Jim Markowski.  It was his first catering gig and he pulled it off like a champ. 

For those I met today, please continue to follow the blog.  Good stuff here. 

A long, hot day.  Now, it’s nap time, right after bourbon time.

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Chili Smoked Pork

4 pounds pork butt

3 tbs. chile powder (recipe below)

2 tbs. brown sugar

1 tbs. kosher salt

Mix the chile powder, brown sugar and salt in a separate bowl until well combined.  Rub the seasoning mix onto the pork butt.  Marinate covered in the refrigerator for at least 12 hours, turning occasionally to redistribute the seasonings.

Heat your smoker to 160°F.  Smoke the pork butt for about 6 hours, until the internal temperature reaches 160°F.  Remove from the heat, hold warm for 10 minutes before slicing.  Serve sliced on a grilled corn tortilla with sliced iceberg lettuce and salsa (recipe below).

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Chile Powder (about 3 cups)

6 Ancho dried chilies

6 Pasilla dried chilies

8 Guajillo dried chilies

1 tbs. cumin seed

1 tbs. black pepper, coarsely ground

2 tsp. kosher salt

In a large, heavy sauté pan, toast the cumin seeds over a medium heat for five minutes while stirring constantly.  The cumin will begin to brown and may pop.  Transfer the seeds to a food processor.  Add the salt and black pepper.  Process on high speed for am minute, until finely ground.

Using the same sauté pan on medium heat, toast the chilies in batches until they begin to color, only about a minute per side.  Press down on each of the chilies with the back of a spatula, so that most of their surface browns.  Move the toasted chilies to baking sheet to cool.

Carefully remove the stem and the seeds from the chilies.  It is unlikely that you will get all the seeds, but don’t worry.  Break the chilies into roughly 1 inch squares.  Put them into the food processor with the other seasonings.  Process until the chilies have powdered, at least 10 minutes.  Store in an airtight jar.  Shake before using to remix the chilies, cumin, salt and pepper.

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Salsa

1 28 oz. can of petite diced tomatoes

½ cup white or red onions, diced

½ cup scallions, sliced

½ cup green pepper, diced

½ cup fresh cilantro, chopped

2 tbs. canned chipotle chile in adobo sauce

2 tbs. red wine vinegar

3 tbs. olive oil

salt and pepper, to your taste

Combine all ingredients in a large mixing bowl.  Remove 1/3 of the salsa.  Puree it finely to thicken the sauce.  Return it to the mixing bowl.  Refrigerate it for at least an hour before serving.

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Chinese Style braised Ribs

2 racks of pork spare ribs

1 cup soy sauce

1 cup rice wine vinegar

1 cup water

2 tbs. salted black beans

1 tbs. chopped ginger

1 tbs. chopped garlic

1 tbs. sliced scallions

Ask you butcher to split the ribs lengthwise, then cut the meat between the ribs, making riblets about 1 1/2 inches long.

Preheat your egg or oven to275°F.  Combine all the ingredients except the pork in a large, heavy stockpot.  Place the pot in the oven until it just begins to boil, then add the ribs, cover and cook for 2 hours, stirring occasionally.

When the meat has softened, but is not falling off the bone, remove it from the pot of sauce and put it on a platter.  Drizzle the ribs with a few tablespoons of sauce and serve.

A Birthday and Old Dogs (Chili Powder, Chili and Lime Chicken)

Last Wednesday was my 54^th birthday and I had a bit of a revelation.  I suppose you could start the jokes about old dogs and new tricks.  You see, I’ve always insisted on blending my own spices.  When I need herbes de Provence, I go to the garden or in winter, blended the herbs we dried from Cathy’s summer plot.  Szechwan pepper salt was always around to season Chinese fried chicken.  For paté, duck confit and rillettes, we have a house blend of quatre épices.  Well then, why have I never made my own chili powder?   

There may be a number of valid reasons.  You could put it off to laziness.  That’s where my daughter would go first and she might be right.  I tend towards sloth unless properly motivated.  I’d prefer to treat myself more charitably and suggest that commercial chili powders can be quite good when fresh.  It’s when they sit around that they get a funky, acrid, flat flavor.  Part of the excuse is that only in the past few years have high quality dried chilies become affordable and easily obtained.  Most likely, I just never thought of it.  Lots of stuff slips by these days.

What happened is that I am preparing to teach a Mexican cooking class.  After looking back on all the Mexican food that I’ve enjoyed over the years and remembering the lessons that I learned from innumerable Latino colleagues, after going back to Rick and Deann Bayless’ encyclopedic Authentic Mexican, after a shot of really cheap tequila to forget Rachael Ray’s cheddar ranch waffles with spicy chicken, I realized that I needed play with spices in a different way if I wanted to cook respectable Mexican food.  In that type of cooking, flavors are built by marination, searing and complex spicing, something that I am used to as a French chef, but the techniques are different enough that I’d have to pay attention to get authentic results.

The first step would be to do what every good cook does, try to control every variable in the preparation.  Making chili powder, an individualistic batch of seasoning, would be essential.  I settled on a reasonably uncomplicated mix of three chilies with black pepper, salt and cumin.  As always, there is a bit of technique to pay attention to, but beyond that, this is an easy recipe that results in a chili powder that has bright, vibrant flavor, mild aromatics and a rich complex chili hit that is not so spicy that it will overwhelm your food.  This is the stuff that certainly would have set Cool Hand Luke on the road to freedom.  And an old dog has learned a new trick.

Chili Powder (about 3 cups)

6 Ancho dried chilies

6 Pasilla dried chilies

8 Guajillo dried chilies

1 tbs. cumin seed

1 tbs. black pepper, coarsely ground

2 tsp. kosher salt

In a large, heavy sauté pan, toast the cumin seeds over a medium heat for five minutes while stirring constantly.  The cumin will begin to brown and may pop.  Transfer the seeds to a food processor.  Add the salt and black pepper.  Process on high speed for am minute, until finely ground.

Using the same sauté pan on medium heat, toast the chilies in batches until they begin to color, only about a minute per side.  Press down on each of the chilies with the back of a spatula, so that most of their surface browns.  Move the toasted chilies to baking sheet to cool.

Carefully remove the stem and the seeds from the chilies.  It is unlikely that you will get all the seeds, but don’t worry.  Break the chilies into roughly 1 inch squares.  Put them into the food processor with the other seasonings.  Process until the chilies have powdered, at least 10 minutes.  Store in an airtight jar.  Shake before using to remix the chilies, cumin, salt and pepper.

*This method will not produce chili powder that is as fine as the commercial variety.  If you want finer chili powder, sift the processed mixture through a fine strainer, and then return the coarse chilies to the processor for more chopping.

Try this easy recipe.  Cut up a frying chicken into 8 pieces.  Marinate the chicken for 1 hour in the juice of 2 limes, 2 chopped garlic cloves, 4 tbs. of olive oil and  3 tbs. of your freshly made chili powder.  Broil or grill the chicken pieces as usual.

A Cold Day In Ol' Mexico (Pork Chili meat, winter salsa)

With this cold weather hitting the East Coast hard, we need to think of the kind of food that will warm the soul and warm the family that is out doing the difficult work that needs doing.   I hate it that it is still dark out when the dog wakes you up, expecting you to get outta bed and take him for a walk.  Rufus will not sleep in, although he does spend most of the day crashed out on the couch, the floor, the bed…

Breakfast recently has been a simple dish of yogurt and some walnuts or dried fruit.  The fruit comes from the bins at Giant.  Cheap and since they do such a big business, the stuff is always fresh.  I tend not to buy foods stored in the bottom row, since I once saw a little kid sample a mango slice and put it back after a bite, apparently not liking the flavor.  Even the best children are pretty gross most of the time, ours included.

Lunch has been leftovers.  I’ll make “clean out the fridge” pasta or soup made with chicken stock and leftover bits of vegetables, potatoes, ends of ham or chicken, maybe some noodles, all thickened up with the ends of bread going stale.  The noodles are easy.  I’ll just sauté some stuff in olive oil that’s hanging around, some bacon, shrimp, onions, zucchini, garlic, for example, then mix in whatever pasta didn’t get eaten last night.  Grate some good cheese over top.  This is actually a pretty popular dish at our house and probably why I never bother to cook less than the full box of noodles.  If it doesn’t get eaten that night, by noon the next day it’ll be gone.        

Evenings are less hectic now that the kids have all graduated high school and we don’t have to play taxi for football, soccer and all sorts of music lessons.  We tend to take our time and decompress around the stove, catching up on each other’s day and getting ready for the evening round of church meetings, clubs, a night of jazz or a movie.  I don’t want to sound like we lead a whirlwind life.  Just as often the night is spent vegging out on the couch watching the Walking Dead.  So, for a casual night, after a busy day, you might want to go for something tasty, but easy to prepare.

I am so happy that there are numerous Mexican groceries in our area.  It is easy to bang out a dinner of beans and rice with tacos and salsa if you can run into a place that stocks authentic Mexican foods.  Skip the El Paso brand stuff you see in the mega markets.  Go to a place like Alexa’s Mexican Market in Lansdale, right near the train station, or El Changarro in Norristown.  Both places have owners who are eager to help you get what you need to make an interesting meal.  Today, I’m presenting a recipe for crock pot chili pork and a red salsa that you can make in winter when the only tomatoes available come in cans.  You’ll be able to prepare both of these ahead of time.  The pork is prefect for tacos or rolling up with beans and cheese in burritos.  The salsa is good in the fridge for a couple of days, although it never lasts at our place and is great with eggs and a bit of the pork in breakfast tacos.

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Chili Pork

3# pork shoulder, a butt roast is best

1 cup onions, diced

3 dried guajillo chilies, seeded and chopped (or ancho, New Mexico, pasilla)

3 tbs. chili powder

1 tbs, cumin powder

4 cloves of garlic

2 bay leaves

salt and black pepper

Turn your crock pot on high.  Chop the meat into 1 inch chunks.  

Put the onions, garlic and bay leaf in the bottom of the crock pot.   

Add the chilies.

Layer the meat on top of the aromatics. 

Season with chili powder, cumin powder, salt and black pepper.  Do not add water.  The pork will be too soupy for tacos and burritos.

Cover the crock pot and allow it to cook on high for about 2 hours, until the meat begins to break down and grease begins to rise to the top.  Resist the urge to stir the pork.  Reduce the heat to low and allow it to cook for at least 3 more hours.

At the end of 5 hours total cooking time, skim the fat that has risen to the top.  Hardcore folks would save the fat to fry up eggs in the next day and while that would taste damn fine, and while I am a thrifty cook, my yoga teacher would freak if she heard of such behavior.  Better to just throw it out.

Break up the pork with a spoon or potato masher.  Keep hot until you are ready to serve it in tacos, with cheese, lettuce, tomatoes, radishes and salsa or rolled up in a bean burrito with cheese.

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Winter Salsa

1 28 oz. can of petite diced tomatoes

½ cup white or red onions, diced

½ cup scallions, sliced

½ cup green pepper, diced

½ cup fresh cilantro, chopped

2 tbs. canned chipotle chile in adobo sauce

2 tbs. red wine vinegar

3 tbs. olive oil

salt and pepper, to your taste

Combine all ingredients in a large mixing bowl.  Remove 1/3 of the salsa.  Puree it finely to thicken the sauce.  Return it to the mixing bowl.  Refrigerate it for at least an hour before serving.