This particular experiment was inspired by not much more than a need to use some basil I had in the fridge before it wilted away. I had a couple of chicken pieces set aside for supper and I decided it would be nice to bake them with a nice pesto marinade. A little lemon zest, I thought, might add a nice little sparkle of flavor…

The Ingredients

• 1 ½ lbs. Chicken pieces;
• ½ cup chopped fresh Basil;
• ¼ cup chopped fresh Italian Flat-leafed Parsley;
• 1 tbsp. minced Garlic;
• 1 tbsp. finely minced Lemon Zest;
• ¾ tsp. Salt;
• ½ tsp. ground Black Pepper;
• 2 – 3 tbsp. Olive Oil;

The Method

Use a mortar and pestle to grind all the flavoring ingredients to a smooth paste, adding the olive oil a little at a time as you do so.

Slash the chicken pieces in several places to allow the marinade to penetrate and then rub the paste all over them, making sure to get some under the skin and deep into the slashes. Allow to sit and marinate in the fridge for at least 3 hours.

Bake the chicken on a wire rack at 325 degrees for 60 minutes or so.

The Verdict

A very simple little recipe, with a very pleasant result… I was a little surprised that the parsley turned out to be a little more assertive than the basil, but this actually worked nicely. The lemon zest gave only a hint of it’s presence and although I thought at first that I perhaps should have used a little more, by the end of he meal, I concluded that the subtlety of it was just right. I really enjoyed this supper…

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I first ate octopus aboard a Portuguese Navy Destroyer back in 1981 and I have loved it ever since. It is a shame, however, that, although I have eaten it many different times, and many different ways, I have yet to have had an opportunity to cook it in my own kitchen. I’d love to try my hand at it sometime as I gather that can be a bit of a challenge. Apparently, it is a delicacy that requires considerable preparation (such as prolonged pounding) to tenderize it before cooking.

One of my favorite ways to eat octopus is as sashimi as this really allows the delicate sweetness of the flesh to shine. Sashimi is generally associated with raw fish or shellfish (even meat occasionally), but there are a few specialties, such as octopus, that are exceptions. Octopus, I can only assume, would be far too tough and chewy to be eaten in its natural state, although, in the interests of culinary experimentation, I’d probably be willing to give it a try sometime…

The slices of octopus sashimi pictured above was served to me at Ken’s Japanese Restaurant in Ottawa a while ago. The knife work really wasn’t very expertly handled on this occasion (and this can make a surprising difference to almost all types of sashimi), but the flesh was still nicely tender and very sweet as well. Normally, in these ‘Notable Nosh’ posts, I just feature a single dish, but I thought that this time I might also share a couple of other octopus preparations as well…

I had this octopus appetizer at Restaurant E18teen in Ottawa back in March. I apologize that the picture couldn’t be a little better but I really wanted to share this dish as it was absolutely superb. The octopus tentacles were grilled to perfection, with just a little bit of charring in a few places, and it was lovely and fresh tasting. The pieces were served on a few splashes of a Romesco Sauce, and garnished with some caramelized onion, almond slices and a dusting of Espelette Pepper. Quite honestly, I could have made a full meal of this rather than just as a light appetizer.

I have tried quite a few canned octopus products but very few have impressed me very much. The canning process does not seem to favor octopus meat terribly well and I have found that most varieties come across with a texture a bit like soggy cardboard. The Portuguese product you see pictured above, however, is one of the better ones I have tried. It is packed with nothing but vegetable oil, a little salt and some garlic.

Here you can see the octopus out of the can. The chunks are quite nicely sized and they are very nicely chewy in comparison to other brands. I ate this plain, right out of the can, and didn’t bother with any additions, although a little hot sauce, or perhaps a little lemon juice would be nice as well. It also strikes me that, with a few other ingredients, the meat would make a nice cold salad and the oil, which has taken on the flavor of both the octopus and the garlic, could easily be adapted to make a dressing. Using the meat in hot dishes might also work in a pinch (although a very short cooking time would be mandated) and I think maybe a brief sauté in a spicy curry sauce might work very nicely in the absence of the real thing.

As for the real thing, I actually came across frozen octopus in a small fish market in Ottawa’s Chinatown not long ago. Unfortunately, the logistics of storing and then transporting the frozen meat north will take a bit of planning and, I fear, will have to wait for the time being. Once I do manage it, and thus get to cook octopus myself for the first time… or even if I just try cooking with the canned variety… I will certainly post the results here.

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Does anyone care to take a stab at identifying the purpose of those rusted metal receptacles pictured above?

The picture was taken early this morning up in the remote community of Pangnirtung, which I have already featured in a couple of posts this year. I was up there, as always, for the regular thrice-yearly Court sittings and, while I usually enjoy these trips, this one was a bit dismal…

I had a fairly major trial scheduled on this circuit and was booked to fly up a day earlier than usual so I could interview a potential witness. As it happened though, over a week earlier I came down with a nasty stomach bug that just got worse as the days progressed and, come the Friday of departure, I re-booked for the following day and went to the hospital instead. I was given some medications that slowed my galloping diarrhea, at least, but I was still far too exhausted and sick to fly so I re-booked again and went up late on Monday, missing the first day of court, and arriving in an unhappy frame of mind and body indeed. Fortunately, I was on the mend at that point and, by the week’s end I was feeling myself again and, I am happy to report, my trial went very well indeed.

As for the metal receptacles? They are actually vats that were once used for rendering the oil out of whale blubber. Whale oil is not used much used these days but, at one time, it had a variety of uses, especially for oil lamps.

This picture shows an old whaling station that sits about a hundred yards from the hotel in Pangnirtung and you can just make out the rendering vats behind the buildings. There were a couple of whaling stations established not far from this site back in the 1850’s but this one was moved from it’s original location into the newly established hamlet of Pangnirtung back in 1925. I don’t know how long it continued to operate but it can’t have been for many years as the demand for whale oil would already have been almost dead at that point. In New Brunswick, where I grew up, many homes used oil lamps into the 1930’s but by the end of that decade, electric lighting was pretty much the norm.

Here is one of the old whalers. It’s a pretty forlorn sight now, and it is a bit sad to see the workmanship of the long-forgotten boat-wright decaying into nothing, but I would say that things have gone a bit to far for restoration to be realistic at this point. Sadly, in these days of steel and fiberglass construction, you just don’t see beautiful work like this anymore…

Anyway… I made it back home from ‘Pang’ early this afternoon and I am just killing time until my wife returns from work. Here in Canada it is a holiday week-end (Monday is Victoria Day), and so I have three lazy days to do absolutely nothing except perhaps a bit of cooking. Any interesting experiments will be duly recorded and posted, of course…

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I have published quite a number of posts featuring the Chinese dumplings commonly known as ‘Jiaozi’, all of which are comprised of fillings of one sort or another wrapped in a dough made simply of flour and water. The similar sounding ‘Baozi’, on the other hand, are formed with a leavened dough and are more ‘bun-like’ generally, although the steamed variety (as opposed to baked), are very like steamed or boiled jiaozi except in the texture of the skin.

I wanted to try using some of my Tienjin Pickled Vegetable in some sort of ‘bao’ after having used it with some pleasing results in jiaozi and I discovered, while doing a little research, that Tientsin is actually famous as the birthplace of a particular class of bao known as ‘Goubuli baozi’ (狗不理). The name has an interesting origin, which you can read at in more depth if you follow the preceding link, but it is commonly translated as ‘Dogs-will-ignore Dumplings’, and typically contains pork. For this experiment, I am not actually trying to reproduce any of the many varieties that exist (chiefly as I have never eaten them anywhere), and so I am simply calling this experiment ‘Tienjin Baozi’…

The Ingredients

• Simple Bread Dough (a lump about the size of a baby’s head will suffice);
• ¾ cup lean ground Pork, pre-cooked;
• ¼ cup Pork Belly, fried and cut into small dice;
• ½ cup Tienjin Pickled Vegetable (rinsed well to remove salt);
• 1 tbsp. minced Garlic mashed to a paste;

The Method

Mix together all the ingredients (except the dough, obviously) and set aside to let the flavors meld for a good 30 – 60 minutes.

To begin, pinch of a walnut sized lump of dough and roll it out to a 3 – 4 inch diameter circle and place a heaped tablespoon of filling in the center.

The wrapping method here is very much like that used for my Shu Mai post, except that the end result will be closed rather than open at the top.  Start pleating at one side of the circle and continue all the way around. As you do this, you will see that the dough begins to gather up around the filling forming a natural pouch.

Once you have completed the pleating, pinch the edges together at the top. Repeat until all the dough is used up (you should get 15 – 20 finished baozi).

Finally, steam over high heat for 20 minutes and then serve with the dipping sauce of your choice.

The Verdict

Well, sadly, the best I can say about this effort is… Meh! These didn’t turn out nearly as well as I hoped and I can identify the failings as follows:

• I didn’t rinse the pickle well enough, resulting in too much saltiness;
• The ratio of filling to wrapper was way too low; and,
• The filling itself was too dry, too bland and lacked sparkle.

The first two flaws are easy to correct but the last one needs some thought. When I used the Tienjin pickle in jiaozi in the past, I used raw, rather than cooked, meat (resulting in a juicier result) and I also added some chili, which worked nicely. Some ginger, and maybe even a little sesame might help, but, as it was, this was just supremely uninteresting. A fail, I am afraid…

Anyway, if you are moved to try and improve on my results I would love to hear about it.

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This curious object, which looks for all the world like a little wooden apple, is yet another of those obscure culinary items that occasionally turn up in our local Co-op from time to time. They were identified as ‘Sharron Fruit’ on a hand lettered sign (a name which meant nothing to me), but each of the little fruit had a tiny sticky label on them bearing the name ‘Mangosteen’ (which was at least familiar). The appellation ‘Sharron Fruit’, it turned out, was actually the name of the Company from which the fruit had been purchased so it was obvious that the store employee stocking the shelves was not too familiar with the item either. In any event, whatever the name, I had never seen these before and naturally had to investigate…

Mangosteens (in this case, actually more properly known as ‘Purple Mangosteen’, in full), are native to Indonesia but are also grown in South America and, to a lesser extent in Florida. They are not very widely produced, however, and tend to be quite expensive outside their production areas. I paid $1.99 for the single one I purchased.

Having no idea what to do with the fruit, I simply sliced it open with a sharp knife. This was not easy as the thick outer covering is extremely woody and very tough, being more of a shell, rather than a rind. I probably should have researched first as I later read that the correct way to open the fruit is to score deeply all around the middle and then twist the halves apart. I don’t imagine, however, that this is a very easy process either.

Once the soft center is popped out, you can see that it has a similarity to a head of garlic, being formed into similar ‘cloves’.

In close-up, one can clearly see that the flesh is very soft and that each ‘clove’ contains a tiny little pit about the size of a grape seed. There wasn’t much of an aroma, really, but the taste was very pleasant being somewhat like a cross between a raisin and a slightly fermented grape with woody overtones. The texture was also very grape-like, being a little more fibrous in some places, while softer and more jelly-like in others.

Anyway, I like the taste and I am glad I tried it but there was barely a mouthful inside the thick covering so I can’t really say they are really worth the price. Interesting experience, though…

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Not a happy tale today….  Yesterday, one of our older cats had to be assisted in shuffling off this mortal coil. That’s a difficult thing at the best of times but, it was probably made a little easier in this case because it was something we had actually been expecting for quite a while.

When my wife and I bought our farm in New Brunswick back in the late 90’s we inherited two cats who were abandoned there by the previous owners. These two cats were very much ‘barn cats’ and, although we left food out for them (to supplement their diet of mice) they didn’t come into the house very much at first and, accordingly, we simply named them ‘Barn Kitty 1’ and ‘Barn Kitty 2’.

Gradually though, the pair began to sleep inside the house and thereafter continued to hunt for amusement rather than sustenance. Over time, ‘BK1’ was transmogrified into ‘Big Fat Kitty’ as her girth increased with the soft life, while ‘BK2’, now immortalized in the above picture’ had her name changed to ‘Fluffy’. When we sold our farm in 2000 and moved north, the two old cats moved with us, and our family eventually included 5 cats in all… until yesterday, of course.

We have no idea how old Fluffy was as she was clearly a fully grown adult when we inherited her. She was with us for about 16 years and was, at our best guess, well over twenty. About two years ago, it became apparent that she was almost totally deaf and her eyesight was obviously beginning to fail as well. She was never a big solid cat like BFK, quite skinny in fact, but over the last year or so she became scrawnier and scrawnier and we got used to the fact that she probably wouldn’t be with us much longer.

At the end, Fluffy’s final decline was very rapid. A few days earlier, she began walking very awkwardly and it was obvious that, if she could see anything at all, her eyesight was just about gone. She was reluctant to lie down and would half stand, half crouch with her head almost resting on the floor, sometime panting, sometimes deathly still. It was, I recall thinking, disturbingly like the last days of Elizabeth I, who reputedly refused to take to her bed and remained on her feet for hours upon hours before finally giving out. It was obvious the poor cat was not having a happy time and thus we knew we had to make ‘the call’ to the vet.

Anyway, no moralizing or philosophical musings on euthanasia here… I just would like to say that we were very, very glad to be able to see our pet off more easily than she would have gone otherwise…

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Larb, or ‘Laab’ as it sometimes spelled, is a cold salad of meat, herbs and other seasonings that is not only reckoned to be the national dish of Laos but also quite common in Thailand as well. The meat is often beef or pork, sometimes raw, sometimes cooked, but fish and poultry version exist as well. As to the seasonings and other ingredients, the variations are endless but fish sauce, lime juice, chili, mint and basil make regular appearances, with some versions adding a host of spices including cumin, cloves, star anise, galangal, and others. Garnishes can be fried onions, peanuts, chopped chili, and various herbs and, in Laos especially roasted ground rice powder is commonly used as a flavoring agent and binder.

After seeing a number of recipes where the salad is served as a wrap in lettuce or other leafy herbs, I thought it might make an interesting appetizer if used as a filling for some endive leaves I happened to have leftover from a previous meal. For this experiment, I decided to use my homemade Sambal Terasi paste as part of the spice flavoring but you could substitute any commercial Thai curry or spice paste of your choosing…

The Ingredients

• 6 Endive leaves;
• ½ cup cooked ground Pork;
• 1 ½ tsp. Sambal Terasi;
• ½ tsp. minced Garlic;
• ½ tsp. minced Lemon Grass;
• 1 tbsp. chopped fresh Mint;
• 1 tbsp. chopped fresh Basil;
• 1 tsp. Fish Sauce (use a little more if using a substitute for the Sambal Terasi);
• ½ tsp. Sugar.
• 2 tbsp. chopped peanuts;
• 1 small red chili sliced thinly on the bias.

The Method

This really couldn’t be simpler. Mash the chopped garlic and lemongrass to a paste along with the sugar and then stir this into the meat and all the other ingredients except the peanuts and chili. Now fill the endive leaves, garnish the peanuts and chili slices and then serve.

The Verdict

This was really pretty good with the exception that the filling was a little too salty because of the Sambal Terasi. I think next time, I would just use plain chili paste, up the fish sauce a little, and maybe add a little Galanga as well. The mint was very nice but probably a little more basil would be an improvement as it barely came through in the small amount I chose here. Anyway… despite a little tweaking being in order, I like the basic idea here and will try it again.

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Panch Phoron, sometimes spelled ‘panchpuran’ along with a host of other variations, is a blend of whole spices (as opposed to ground) that is native to north-eastern India in general, and the state of Bengal in particular. Because it is typically composed of 5 different spices, it is often called ‘Bengali five-spice’ although, as we shall see, there are variations not only in the types of spice, but also the number…

The basic Panch Phoron (that is, the blend most commonly cited) essentially consists of equal amounts of:

• Cumin;
• Fennel Seed;
• Mustard Seed;
• Fenugreek Seed;
• Nigella (Kalonji).

Naturally, there are no absolute rules as to the proportions and they can be changed to suit personal tastes, or the requirements of a specific dish. Other spices are also used, with Chili, Ajowan, and Aniseed making appearances, sometimes replacing one of the more common spices, or else being added in addition to them.

In Bengal, mustard is often replaced by a spice called ‘Radhuni’. This is not widely used outside the region, however, and is not easy to find. A couple of years ago, when my wife was in Delhi, I asked her to try and find it for me but, although she scoured the spice bazaars, she was met with blank stares wherever she asked for it.

Quite a few sources assert that celery seed makes a good substitute (as does Ajowan to a lesser degree), and it is curious, then, why mustard seed seems to have become its replacement outside Bengal.

The blend you see in the first picture above is actually composed of six spices rather than five, but it is still a ‘panch phoron’ in spirit. You can easily by pre-mixed panch phoron in many Asian grocery stores but, if you wish to try your hand at this blend at home, mix together the following:

• 2 tbsp. Cumin;
• 2 tbsp. Fenugreek Seed;
• 2 tbsp. Nigella;
• 1 ½ tbsp. Mustard Seed (black, brown, white, or a combination thereof);
• 1 ½ tbsp.. Fennel Seed;
• 1 tbsp. Celery Seed.

By the way, in many preparations, the whole seeds can be quite crunchy, even gritty, in the finished dish, which may take a little getting used to for some, but this can be minimized a little…

Here you can see two varieties of Fenugreek seed. The larger ones can be very hard and, in dishes that don’t involve any braising or stewing, they will remain so in the final result. Accordingly, it is best to choose the smaller type, if possible, and this is also true when it comes to Fennel. I have two varieties in my kitchen and the seeds of one, from Lucknow, in India, are half the size of the other. Since there is little difference in taste between the two, I naturally chose the smaller ones for this blend.

Usage

Although one can certainly grind the spices for use, in Indian cuisine, whole spice blends like this are used in two ways. First, they are fried in oil (or ghee) at the beginning of the cooking process, with other ingredients (including other spices) being added later. In the second method, the spices are again fried in oil but then, in a process known as ‘tempering’, poured over a finished dish (sometimes being stirred in) just before service.

Panch Phoron is commonly used for cooking greens and other vegetables (it is very nice with potato) and, as a tempering agent, is frequently used in dals. In Bengal, it is employed to season fish but only rarely for meat. Tradition and ‘authenticity’ aside, though, it is actually a very useful seasoning for chicken and beef.

After blending my panch phoron for this post, I used a little with some ‘shell-on’ freshwater shrimp as a private snack for myself. I simply fried the spices briefly in a butter until they were toasty (but not overly browned) and then threw in the shrimp along with some chopped parsley. The result especially delicious with un-shelled shrimp as the process of removing the shells using ones teeth and tongue along with fingers really allows you to savor the aromatic pungency of the spice blend.

Shortly, I will be using some more of the mixture to cook some greens as a side to a chicken dish I have in mind. Both recipes will be posted in due course…

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When I featured Chinese Preserved Pork-Belly  in a recent ‘Foodstuffs’ post, I said that I planned to use some of it in a very common way by steaming it over rice. This dish, which permits of countless variations, is a very ‘homey’ sort of preparation and many people add the pork, along with other ingredients, to rice in electric steamers to make a quick, simple meal. I am using a clay-pot to steam my rice and I am departing from the more standard method by using pre-cooked rice, thus necessitating a fairly short cooking time. In addition to the pork, I will be adding some greens and other flavorful ingredients…

The Ingredients

• 1 ½ cups cooked Rice;
• 1 slice Preserved Pork Belly cut into chunks (about 1 cup in all);
• 3 dried Black Mushrooms (Shiitake), reconstituted and sliced;
• 1 medium sized Baby Bok Choy;
• 2 Dried Scallops (conpoy);
• 2 Eggs;
• 2 Scallions, thinly sliced;
• 1 tbsp. Oyster Sauce;
• 1 tsp. Rice Wine;
• ¼ tsp. Sesame Oil;
• ½ tsp. each Salt and White Pepper.

The Method

First, cover the dried scallops with a quarter cup or so of boiling water and leave to soak for thirty minutes until softened. Afterwards, shred the scallops and save the soaking water.

Put the rice into a suitable steaming vessel (a clay-pot or the like) and stir in the sliced mushroom, oyster sauce and reserved soaking water from the scallops.

Beat the egg along with the shredded scallop, rice wine, sesame oil, slat and pepper and the white and light green parts of the scallion. Save the dark green parts for garnish.

Arrange the chunks of pork on top of the rice and then pour the egg mixture over it all.

Finally, place the bok choy around the edges of the dish and steam over high heat for about twenty minutes. When it is done, garnish with the remaining scallion and serve.

The Verdict

Well, it would be hard to mess up with such nice ingredients cooked so simply and my wife and I enjoyed a very nice lunch. I was a little disappointed that the egg didn’t form more of a topping for the rice as in some Japanese preparations but I guess the rice needs to be already hot so that the egg begins to cook when it is poured on rather than soak in. Still, it made the rice very nice tasting and gave it a pleasant, unexpected texture.

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From time to time, my explorations on the Internet yield serendipitous finds of interesting, not to mention bizarre, images that tickle my fancy for one reason or another and, like many other people, I squirrel them away and then (quite often) forget about them. The other day, I was re-organizing my hard-drive directories and I came across one such cache of oddities. It was a pretty eclectic mix (cartoons, amusing pictures of cats, etc.) but there were a surprising number that seemed to share a common theme of sorts. Perhaps the name ‘food porn’ is not the best way to describe that theme (indeed, the popular term generally means something else entirely), but I really couldn’t think of anything better.

By the way, I have had all the pictures in question for so long now that I couldn’t begin to recall where they came from so, if it happens that anything I reproduce here is subject to any particular restrictive copyright, please let me know. For the rest of you… those who are not too delicate to continue… I hope my gleanings will provide you all with a quick giggle or two…

This is probably the happiest tomato I have ever seen…

I saw a whole display of squash just like these while shopping yesterday. I looked through the whole lot in hoping to find one with as nice butt as this one but… not a shapely crack to be seen!

I never thought I would develop ‘carrot-envy’.

Someone could definitely use a trim…

Do you think this chili is hot?

A lemon with a really big nose… isn’t that what it reminds *you*  of?

Okay, come on, now… These have to be genetically engineered, or the result of careful pruning or something. They couldn’t just randomly grow like this… could they??

And… before we leave the plant Kingdom, let’s get really X-rated!

So that’s what they mean by ‘Happy as a Clam!’

Apparently, ‘Animal Crackers’ come in an adult variety as well…

I give up. Who would even conceive of such a picture, much less actually shoot it?

Stop playing with your food!

‘Nuff said…

And this… is my favorite. It looks like a couple of guys in the waiting room of a VD clinic doesn’t it? I don’t know who thought of making these but barbecue season is almost upon us and I want one!!

Anyway… I felt lazy today; hence the frivolity of this post. If you have better pictures I’d love to see them but (PLEASE) no more carrots with erections, okay?

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