58 posts tagged “grilling”
Yeah, yeah — that is mashed, garlic potatoes, heheh. And plain sliced tomatoes with salt, pepper and basil, grilled summer squash and cucumber (with salt, pepper and peanut oil). I think I'll call it the UN platter.
I started out by making a simple marinade with Thai ingredients (for the amber-colored chicken pieces on the right): red Thai curry paste and fish sauce. That ended up a little too liquid, and smelled very strong (basically, I used too much fish sauce) so I tried diluting and thickening it with some sour cream. That mellowed it out a bit, but I also left the marinate stand for a bit, which helped too. At that point, my "simple marinade" idea went out the window completely, and I added a lot of stuff, because I was still unhappy with how it smelled (and tasted)... I added a mild chili powder, cumin seeds, a touch of soy sauce, salt, pepper, and due to a last moment's inspiration, torn kaffir lime leaves and a little lemon juice. The kaffir lime leaves were definitely a good idea, but then those things are always great.
The marinade seemed much better, but I was still worried about the result, so I decided to do only half of the chicken with that, and make a simple (and actually keep it simple this time around!) Indian marinade for the rest. A sweet curry powder and a very small touch of cayenne pepper for a bit of kick (I used too little; it had no noticeable effect), salt and some more sour cream. Here, I made the mistake of using too much sour cream, and when I added the curry powder, the marinade's color barely changed. So I kept pouring curry powder in until I got the color I wanted — which meant I used way too much curry powder. To the point where the sour cream started lumping up. And of course, the curry taste was completely overwhelming.
The Thai style chicken actually turned out very well, though. Which I thought was funny... I think I might try to do another Thai style thing like this, but without pre-made things like the curry paste. Kaffir lime leaves, fish sauce, lime juice, cayenne pepper — I don't know, but should be worth experimenting with.
Oh and one thing I liked about this meal, is using two different marinades. It's not a lot of extra work, and having the same meat being served with two different flavors makes for a more interesting and varied meal. Plus, if you're experimenting, you'll get experience from two different experiments at the same time. And with two, if one turns out bad, there's always a chance the other one might be good.
Now, I ain't Heston Blumenthal, so this sort of blatant self-confidence doesn't always work out too good for me... It goes in cycles: when I screw something up, I humbly admit defeat and return to the well. But when I do get things right, I get excited, and try to expand and experiment, and generally do things that I'm not all that confident about. On this occasion, the success I had with my Crispy Thai Fish Cakes turbo-charged my self-confidence right into the field of abject, blinkered arrogance.
This sort of exuberance normally leads to — well, if not disaster, I'd at least call it questionable results... But I do learn from my mistakes, so I figure it's worth it. In this instance, though, it wasn't a disaster at all. It was actually pretty damn nice...
What I did was, I stuffed some Cornish rock game hens with a mirepoix (finely chopped carrots, celery and onions on a 1:1:2 ratio), and rubbed them with salt and pepper. Then I rigged a charcoal grill for indirect heat, with some apple-wood smoke boxes and a drip pan with apple cider (between the coals, to ensure moistness). While they cooked, I basted them (well, brushed them) with some melted butter infused with garlic and rosemary. For starch and veggies, I added some potato wedges and zucchini (tossed in olive oil, salt and pepper). They all came out great. I am absolutely, positively stoked. My culinary ego is flying so high right now, if Bobby Flay were to challenge me to a throw-down, I'd dismiss him with a snicker and demand to face Ferran Adrià in the Iron Chef arena, with one arm tied behind my back. Hehehe...
Now, game hens are really interesting things. They're like miniature chickens, as far as size goes, but the similarities end there... Chickens have a single benefit over tofu: they have texture — but beyond that, it's pretty much the same deal: no taste (not that there's anything inherently wrong about that, though — you can add taste to it, no problem). But game hens have a taste of their own. I guess I just lucked out, because I think a mirepoix stuffing, a garlic and rosemary baste, and a steam of apple cider complemented it really well. The applewood smoke might have been a bit of an overkill, but I'm not sure about that, because I've probably eaten a thousand chickens for every game hen I've eaten, so I'm probably just unfamiliar with flavorful fowl, as sad as that sounds.
Well, good stuff.
I got great blackening, so this is definitely the way to go. But I put more of the blackening on these shrimp, than I did on the fish, and that, combined with a proper, dark blackening from the extreme heat created a sensation of extreme saltiness. So I've gotta remember to go lighter on the blackening.
Sides were saffron rice with scallions, and a salad of very thinly sliced (go gadget mandolin!) apple and English cucumber tossed in aged balsamic vinegar and lemon juice, and some black pepper. Very nice now that the weather is getting warmer.
There's just nothing better than collective cooking... When friends get together and cook together, that's the ticket, in my opinion. And if your friends happens to be better cooks than yourself, well, that doesn't hurt, either, heheheh.
This was another naan attempt by me. And they were quite decent. It seems that every time I make naan, I make some sort of mistake -- which is a good thing, since you only learn from mistakes. Like chess. But nevermind about the naan; the kebabs were the showpiece of this meal. These kind of minced meat kebabs are amazing. I encountered them first at Abdul's Takeaway in Manchester; as Seekh Kebabs -- that is, lamb.
Essentially, seekh kebabs are the equivalent of hamburgers -- uncomplicated, ground meat products. The only reason why us Westerners end up adoring foods like this, is because the equivalent food in our culture has become so commercialized, homogenized, trivialized and generally bastardized, that they no longer taste very good. (I mean, hell, I make hamburgers, and I'd put 'em up against any McTurdburger, any day of the week -- and I don't even think my burgers are all that spectacular, to be honest.)
The naan was -- as always -- very interesting. They tasted great. But the damn tile shattered. I initially did my naan on a pizza stone, in the weber kettle grill, but the poor ol' pizza stone eventually cracked. So I started doing them in the oven (on a much better pizza stone, that I didn't dare risk using on the grill). But as good as I thought my naan got in the oven, I still thought it'd be better over a genuine charcoal grill. So I went back to the grill, but using some cheap tiles.
The problem with a grill and a pizza stone/tile is, it heats up too fast, and cools down too fast -- and there's nothing much you can do about it. Or at least nothing that I've thought of, so far. I heat the coals up in a chimney, so when I spread those out and put the griddle on, and the tile/pizza stone, things get very hot, very fast. In an oven, the heating up process would be a lot slower. After the naan is cooked, I'd remove the tile/stone -- and that'd cool it down very rapidly also; much faster than what you'd get in an oven (the reason why I'd normally remove them, is because I'd cook something else on the grill, after the naan were done).
This time around, I learned two things about naan: you've gotta oil the dough before you rest it in the fridge. I read that the dough should be covered with oil so that it could expand without getting stuck to anything, but this sounded kinda dumb to me. I was right. But there is another reason why the dough should be covered with oil -- so that it won't develop a "skin." I rest my dough in a "tupperware" type container, which I figured would eliminate any coagulated skin problem -- I was wrong. Covering the dough with oil is important.
The second thing I learned was, there really is no need to do any fancy-pants hand-stretched forming of the dough. Roll the stuff out with a standard rolling-pin (or a freakin' wine bottle -- it makes no nevermind) -- if your dough is good, and it has had time to do its magic, you can roll it hard and rough, and it'll expand and puff up wonderfully. Even on shattered tiles. I'm getting a hang on this whole naan business, methinks. :)
Well a few years ago they apparently had a vote on the matter, and now Chicken Tikka Masala is their new national dish. This is pretty funny -- and sad -- in several different ways. Funny, because it's like Germany ending up with gefilte fish as their national dish after occupying Israel. And a little sad (but a funny kind of sad) because CTM has such an odd, and/or controversial origin.
CTM is the most popular Indian restaurant dish in the world. But the recipes I've found for this dish have always been a complete disappointment. The only way I've managed to create a CTM that I liked, is when I tried to recreate it the way it was supposedly invented: Ie., an angry (and ignorant) customer sent his Chicken Tikka back, demanding that the chef put some gravy on it... According to the story, the cook warmed up some tomato soup, slopped it on the plate, and sent it back out again. The customer was happy, and thus Chicken Tikka Masala was born. I've heard many variations on this story. One took place in England, one in Scotland (one of them even involved Swedish royalty, for some odd reason), and at least two that happened in India itself. The first time I heard of CTM, it was a British military officer who demanded gravy, and the second one was an all-Indian affair, with no British persons involved whatsoever -- but that bit just might be a tad influenced by nationalistic fervor. Not that I'd blame 'em: it must be a bit upsetting for a country such as India, with what is arguably the most amazing culinary heritage in the world to have an occupying force bastardize a dish of theirs, make it their own national dish -- and now, Marks & Spencer is actually selling microwave TV dinners with CTM to India. I think Gandhi woulda kicked Churchill in the bollocks over that kinda stunt.
Well, so the way I do this CTM is simply to do a Chicken Tikka -- marinated chicken grilled on skewers. It's traditionally done in a Tandoor oven, but a simple Weber kettle works just as well. The marinade uses yogurt, flavored with all sorts of goodies: garlic, ginger, cumin and coriander seeds, green cardamom pods, lime juice (and sliced up pieces from that lime), fenugreek seeds, panch puran and of course, turmeric. Chicken Tikka just means chicken pieces (I guess Murgh Tikka didn't fly, for some reason), and it can be done in lots of different ways. But the Chicken Tikka I saw first was very yellow, from the turmeric. So that's how I do it.
The rice was flavored with minced red onions, cumin and coriander seeds, curry leaves and a few, precious strains of saffron. The sauce -- well, it had a little of everything. It was like freakin' ragù alla bolognes -- simmered real slow, bits and pieces thrown in as it went, zapped with an Evinrude, pressed through a sieve, bit of cream added, bit of this, bit of that...
But the real star was the naan. This was the first time I used instant yeast, and I was worried about how it would work since I've been using active yeast up until now. I'm either on to something, or I got lucky -- because that was some fantastic naan. If I can reproduce it a couple of more times, I'll put a proper recipe up.
Bread making is the most challenging thing I've ever attempted. I'm not at all religious, but I was brought up a Christian -- and I remember that prayer about daily bread, and in particular the descriptions about how Jesus would break bread with people, as a sign of friendship. That always confused me -- why would Jesus break a loaf of bread, instead of slicing it up like a civilized person? The only people I'd ever seen who'd do such a thing, were drunken hoodlums who'd steal a loaf of bread and some sliced ham and then rip and tear at it, shoving the stuff down their throat, like -- well, like drunken hoodlums...
But with this kind of bread, I understand. I get it. Breaking bread with someone is a sign of friendship. I like that. This naan; this bread, it would make Jeebus and Judas best friends forever.
- For he today that breaks bread with me
- Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile,
- This act shall gentle his condition.
Rub them with whatever rub you like. Fire up the grill for medium, indirect heat (ie., coal moved to the sides, not directly in the middle). Get some smoke going. Place the ribs in the middle, meat side up on some heavy tin foil. Leave this for about 2 hours, adding a little coal every half hour or so. Then, move the coal into the center for direct heat, brush the ribs with whatever sauce you like and place them meat side down over the coals. Depending on how hot your coals are, you'll have a nice charring after 15 minute or so (this also depends on how much sugar your bbq sauce contains). Easy, lazy weekend meal.
The whole "Surf & Turf" thing was incidental -- I'm not really that vulgar. Besides, flank steak and shrimp won't set you back anywhere near as much as lobster and fillet mignon -- which is fitting, since Indian food can be so wonderfully inexpensive. Voilà: a boorish and extravagant dish has been reincarnated as an affordable and far tastier one. Is there a Nobel Prize for Cooking? I'd better make some space on my mantelpiece right away. Or perhaps not.
There's no such thing as a failed experiment -- I mean, you generally learn more from failure, than success (well, you have an opportunity to learn, I guess). But basically, the beef didn't turn out too good. In spite of being marinated overnight, the flavors of the paste couldn't really be tasted. I'm pretty puzzled by that. Perhaps the paste was too thick to penetrate into the meat. I honestly don't know.
The shrimp was good, though. It wasn't marinated in the paste at all -- it was just brushed with it prior to grilling. It was very nice, but not as good as the salmon I mentioned earlier. I guess I'll stick with using this paste just for sautéed fish fillets.
Sadly (or hilariously), the best part of the meal was the side dish: Aloo Mutter -- potatoes with peas. Aloo Gobi (potatoes and cauliflower) is a well known vegetarian dish that I like (perhaps because the director of "Bend It Like Beckham" included a segment where she cooks the dish with her mother and "auntie" in the Special Feature section of the DVD, heheh), but in my opinion, aloo mutter is even better. It's a simple and extremely good tasting side dish. And I'm glad I made it, for this little experiment.
One thing I love about cooking on the chimney, is that I cooked the beef one minute per side and the shrimp about a minute and a half per side. And I still got serious grill marks. I've gotta use this method a lot more...
