Post-Hiatus, Now With More Kung Fu!

Its been a very long time since I've dedicated any sort of time to this blog. After losing a year to work and well, a guy (hereinafter "the lost year"), its time to brush off the snarky food writing skills and the creative food skills. Its a new year, a new start, a new kitchen, a new garden, my first go at a CSA (Community Assisted Agriculture - google it!), a whole slew of new food projects (from canning to brewing beer at home), and I actually have time to do it all. After posting pictures from this blog archive to my [insert name of popular social networking website page here] account, I was told I should (1) open a restaurant/brewery or (2) write a food blog. I also realized that 90% of my posts to said popular social networking website are about food.

Doh. Part of my apprehension in restarting this blog was in large part due to me thinking I would need to blog all of my amazing recipes from the lost year. Then I realized that I didn't have that many worth the time to hunt down my scribbles in notebooks splattered with oil, food, and coffee. Here goes nothing....

And so, unfortunately, my scribblings don't reveal much about how much of what I put in these amazing Chinese Shrimp Dumplings. Basically, I tried to let the shrimp shine through. The filling was some combination of raw jumbo shrimp (roughly chopped), minced ginger, bamboo, green onion, cornstarch, egg white, oyster sauce, cane sugar, sesame oil, and chinese rice wine. I made a basic egg wrapper with unbleached all purpose flour and an egg. Steam in a bamboo steamer atop napa cabbage leaves. Okay yea, I know, this post sucks. My notes also suck. Former kung fu glory will resume, seriously.

My latest love affair is with English Muffins. I don't think I can ever go back to the store bought kind. The only tweaks to this recipe (which I modified so I don't have to use buttermilk, which I never keep in stock) I think I will make in the future is to figure out how to integrate more whole wheat while maintaining the epic nooks and crannies I achieved. These freeze beautifully, but honestly, they never stay in my freezer very long. They also make for good bartering... I got myself some bunny poo compost, venison, sweet potato slips, and a variety of other good stuff by giving a small bag o' these away.

It is really key to know you are going to make english muffins. This isn't a fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants type of project. This is a firm commitment of time that is well worth the effort. The batch generally makes about 18-20 english muffins which can last quite a while. Think about it, this is like 3 packages of the english muffins you get in the store. This recipe can be parsed out into four project chunks:

First, you need to make a sourdough starter. This is a simple affair that can be done at night the day (or two) before you want to make the english muffins. Mix together the following in a large nonreactive bowl (I prefer glass) in the following order (this is where I want to play around with proportions of whole grain to non-whole grain... just remember, the more whole wheat flour you have, the more water you need as it absorbs more!). Leave this lightly covered with a dishtowl or ventilated top overnight or for at least 4 hours (also does well overnight or while you are at work):

• 2 cups of warm water (no greater than 105 F)
• 1 tsp yeast
• 1 cup of whole wheat flour
• 1.5 cups of unbleached all purpose flour

The second step is to make what bread makers call a "sponge." I dunno why they call it this, all I know is that it makes things delicious. At some point before you want to make the sponge, you need to scald 3/4 cups of milk and let it cool to room temperature. Basically, you need to bring the milk to just near boiling, and then cool it down. The fridge helps speed that process. You don't want the milk to be too cold though! Mix together in this order the following items to make the sponge and then let it rest at room temperature for 1 hour:

• 3/4 cups warm water
• 1 tsp yeast
• 2 cups of the sourdough starter
• 3/4 cups scalded milk at room temperature
• 2 cups of unbleached bread flour

The third chunk provides you with two paths. At this point, you add the rest of the sourdough starter to the sponge, add 4 TBSP honey, 2.5 tsp salt, 1 small container of yogurt, 2 TBSP cornmeal, and up to 4 cups of bread flour. If you add too much bread flour, you will not get epic nooks and crannies. Just remember that this dough should be pretty stick and almost like a very thick batter consistency. Although you need to knead the dough to develop the glutens, this is not going to feel nice and sproingy like other bread doughs. Once you knead it all together for about 5 to 8 minutes, you have a choice: (A) be impatient like I often am and let it rise an hour or (B) let the flavors develop by doing a slow 8 - 10 hour rise in the refridgerator and then letting it sit out at room temperature for an additional 2 hours. It does make a small difference. I sometimes use Plan B when I run out of time and need to push back another day.

The fourth and final step requires you to turn out the dough onto a sheet pan, cutting board, hard surface, be what it may, which has been liberally covered with corn meal. I cannot emphasize enough that there is no such thing as too much corn meal. This is what makes your sticky ooey gooey batter not stick to you, the hard surface, the pan, etc. Sprinkle lots o' corn meal on top, then use your fingers to pat it out to about a 3/4 inch thickness. Then, this is the hardest part. You need to use a cookie cutter (you can take the top and bottom off an old tuna can, or do what I did, and take a small tupperware and cut the lip off it carefully) to cut the dough into rounds. I actually dip my makeshift cookie cutter into corn meal in between each round to avoid sticking. Its really hard to maintain the shape so just do the best you can. Set each round carefully onto a corn meal covered cookie sheet or parchment paper where it will spend the next hour rising again. Once you have them all cut out, you need to pre-heat a cast iron griddle to medium, medium low. Its really important not have the heat too high or you'll scorch the cornmeal and your english muffins. Make sure you have lots of cornmeal on each dough round before you place on the ungreased cast iron griddle. Cook for about 5 minutes on each side and let cool on a rack. .

It is imperative that as soon as humanly possible after the muffins are cool enough to pick up, you take a fork and split the muffin open around the entire thing, toast it (the insides stay relatively moist, so toasting provides the proper crunch) and slather with some organic butter from a grassfed milk (ooh, that Irish cream butter is soooo good). These stay good for a couple days and can also be frozen. When you defrost, just set your toaster oven for like 200 F - 250 F and then let it defrost for about 5 minutes, then split open with a fork and toast it like you normally would.

And last, but certainly not least, Pork Shoulder Braised in Homemade BBQ Sauce. I actually still have a small tupperware of this in my freezer which I am saving as a rainy day meal. Nom nom nom. This is quite possibly the easiest most amazing thing I have ever made in a crockpot. The onions get carmelized and beautiful. The pork just comes apart. The juice is worth saving just to dip each bite into.

Are you ready? Take at least two pounds of pork shoulder, ribs, etc., trim off some of the fat (not all), and sear in an oiled cast iron skillet on all sides. Place in a crockpot. Slice an entire onion and layer the onions on top of the pork. Make a quick sauce of the following ingredients and pour over everything, then set the crockpot to low and let it go for 10 - 12 hours:

• 1/2 cup soy sauce
• 1/2 cup ketchup
• 1 TBSP dijon or coarse mustard
• 3 TBSP brown sugar
• Minced garlic (ain't no such than as too much)
• Liberal amounts of black pepper
• 2 TBSP apple cider vinegar
• 1 tsp celery salt

Seriously, this took me about 15-20 minutes in the morning to throw into the crockpot and when I came home, it was magical. MAGICAL. And it freezes really well for leftovers. It also tastes very delicious piled onto a homemade english muffin... just sayin'.