Lest you start smirking about how seasonally appropriate this next dish is, wipe those silly grins from your faces because it was actually inspired by a comment left by Larbo’s friend Dan (aka the Chocolate Man).

It wasn’t enough for me to make my own ‘nduja.  Nor was it sufficient to try my hand at combining it into ‘nduja burgers.  And even after all that, my ‘nduja chocolate truffles only served to stoke the fire of my curiousity.

Nope.  I had to reach further; I had to do more.

Larbo’s friend Dan succinctly reminded me that what had initially inspired me to make ‘nduja truffles in the first place was a bizarre chocolate and ‘nduja pasta recipe on an Italian food website I’d noticed through Foodgawker.  It seemed only fitting that I should further expand on that idea in my own unique way.

Ideas have been marinating for a couple of days now, but yesterday afternoon I finally came to a conclusion about what I wanted to do.

Rather than simply sprinkling pasta with cocoa nibs, I opted to make a bitter cocoa pasta dough instead, as Dan had suggested.  At one point in the not so distant past I vaguely recalled chocolate pasta being in fashion, but even then I think it was intended as a dessert course rather than an entree.  A chocolate ‘nduja pasta was firmly entrenched in experimental territory, indeed.

After I’d mixed up a loose dough of flour, eggs, cocoa powder, salt and olive oil, I decided to test the extruder mechanism on my stand mixer.  Once the dough had chilled for a little bit I fed it through the tube and waited for it to come shooting out of the linguine die.  Apparently a dough must be much stiffer in order to properly work through the pasta attachment, so with that lesson learned, I scraped up the remaining dough bits and rolled them out once more.  When I achieved an appropriate thinness, I began haphazardly cutting the dough with a ravioli wheel into a very loose representation of tagliatelle.

Tossing it with additional flour, I spread it out on a clean tea towel and continued working on the other components I envisioned for the dish.

Next I peeled, washed, sectioned and blanched a head of cauliflower.  At crisp tender stage, I skimmed it and doused with cold water, then dropped the pasta into the rolling boil in the pot.  2 and a half minutes later the pasta was al dente, so it got a cool shower too and was briefly set aside.  A large hunk of ‘nduja was melted into a “sauce” with some of the pasta water, at which point the cauliflower was tossed in the hot liquid to coat.  Then the delicate cocoa noodles were added and briefly dressed with the sauce as well.  A generous microplaning of parmagiano gave the dish the requisite umami-esque tang and dinner was ready.

Conceptually speaking, the flavours worked well, but the Everyman tells me I may have overdone it with the quantity of ‘nduja I added to the sauce.  Next time I’d probably err on the side of caution and cut the sauce with more dairy of some kind (creme fraiche, perhaps?) but as a first try I was relatively pleased.

And so the ‘nduja experimentation continues.

Until next time…

I’m going to preface this by saying that this post is probably not for everyone.  With that in mind, I suggest you read on at your own risk.

Just before Christmas, Larbo and I were discussing ‘nduja and fate happened to drop this on my lap.  Being that our combined aptitude for deciphering Italian is mediocre at best, the consensus we reached was that it was a recipe for an ‘nduja and cocoa nib pasta sauce, but at the time we were unable to tell whether it was actually a traditional recipe from the Calabrian region that ‘nduja hails from, or just some kind of joke or one off creation.  Both somewhat perplexed, the bizarre medley has been on my mind ever since.

Generally speaking, Larbo, Scott and I have been good-naturedly one upping each other with this ‘nduja stuff since we all started making it early last year.  It’s become somewhat of a common theme in our posts, and I’m pretty comfortable saying that it’s likely one of the top trafficked search terms that brings people to our individual sites (I know it is on mine).

But, I just couldn’t shake this chocolate/’nduja feeling, so after much deliberation I decided what direction I wanted to take it in – that which has always been near and dear to my heart; the truffle.

I began by melting down a variety of chocolate bar ends from some French chocolates my super-nice boss had brought me back after a recent business trip.

I used a 2:1 ratio of chocolate to cream to create a rich, decadent ganache with dark cocoa solids ranging from 99% to the low 80s.

Once the chocolate bits were melted, I heated and cooled the mixture until it was properly tempered.

Once the ganache was tempered, I slowly began scooping ‘nduja in by the tablespoonful.  After close to half a cup of the fiery spread was incorporated, I felt the ganache exhibited a palatable level of heat.  Because the truffles would be served cold, I seasoned a bit heavier than I would have otherwise, but the end result was a silky smooth mixture with a warming hint of spice as well as a glossiness on the tongue.

After chilling the ganache, it took on the robustly red colour of the spicy ‘nduja.  Scooping it into little balls and rolling with fast hands, I coated the ganache niblets in rich cocoa powder and chilled them once more.

After they’d firmed up again I took a moment to sample one.  For a first attempt at incorporating ‘nduja I thought they were quite good, though perhaps next time I would whip the ganache a little bit after adding the ‘nduja to give it a fluffier texture.  Overall, it certainly retained the main characteristics that I love about ‘nduja, while at the same time sitting firmly in dessert territory.

For those of you who think this is all quite strange, I will remind you of my chocolate guanciale toffee and roasted garlic caramel.

Clearly, I often deal in weird.

But it can’t be that off the mark.  I read recently that Toronto’s own Xococava is making chorizo truffles, so I don’t see why ‘nduja couldn’t be the next logical step.  People eat chili pepper chocolate all the time, after all.

Surely I’ll be revisiting this topic again soon, because it certainly merits further experimentation.  Who knows.  ‘Nduja truffles could be the new chocolate covered bacon!

Until next time…

Ever since I made ‘nduja back at the beginning of May I’ve been playing the waiting game while it fermented, cured and hung in my kitchen window, taunting me.

During that time my friends Larbo and Scott of This Little Piggy and The Sausage Debauchery (respectively) have been churning out all kinds of wondrous delights made with their versions of the piquant spread while I’ve been quietly biding my time.  In fact, Larbo’s probably been the most prolific, creating ‘nduja di bufala, ‘nduja pate and most recently an ‘nduja mortadella to make us all jealous and drooling.  Once I work through some of my own ‘nduja reserves I fully intend to build on his pate idea, but for now I’m holding those cards close to the chest.  Lest you think that Scott’s some sort of slouch, let me tip my hat to him for single-handedly starting up a mail order business to bring ‘nduja-making supplies (and other imported Italian goodies) to the masses.  As you can see, our combined aim is to completely blanket the planet in ‘nduja fever!

In an attempt to keep mine somewhat traditional, I’d let the ‘nduja hang for as close to the year I’d originally intended as I could possibly wait.  Some of it will surely see a 1 year anniversary since my first attempt was a double batch, leaving me with close to 6 kg of ‘nduja hanging around waiting for inconspicuous consumption and culinary inspiration to strike.

This very weekend was the first time since I stuffed the ‘nduja that I’d had an occasion to cut down a finished link and give a taste, and words cannot express how truly excited I was.

From the look of the casing, which was dried, brittle and shrivelled, I wasn’t expecting much, but once I sliced it open the hot Calabrian peppers immediately began their assault on my senses.  Prodding gently with my paring knife, I found the ‘nduja had indeed retained it’s semi-moist spreadability, and a tiny raw taste confirmed the assertively pleasant fire emanating from within.  10 minutes later I still wasn’t dead, so I ascertained that the folklore I’d been told about all of the salt and chilis warding off any chance of bacterial spoilage actually seemed to be true.

But, now that I had this wicked bounty to play with, what ever would I do with it?

For whatever strange reason, the first thing that popped into my mind was to make an ‘nduja burger.  I’ve heard tales of Larbo melting his into its own pasta sauce, or spreading it on the thin crust of a pizza, but I wanted to go somewhere a little bit different.  Given my extreme love of burger cuisine, I suppose it’s not much of a stretch.  In the future I’m thinking something with eggs might be fun, but as to what shape that might eventually take, I’m not quite sure yet.  So, for now a burger my ‘nduja would be.

To 8 ounces of organic grass-fed ground beef I added several heaping tablespoons of ‘nduja, erring slightly on the side of caution (just in case).

Next, I put on some disposable plastic gloves (recalling how burnt my palms had been the last time I mixed the moist Calabrian chillies by hand) and gently coaxed the spread and ground into a beefy suspension.  After heating a skillet to absolute blazing, I quickly seared both sides of the patties to a perfectly browned and crispy crust.  7 minutes in a 250* oven (occupied by the ever-melting lard project) was all it took to cook the burger the rest of the way to edible (because I wasn’t taking any chances on this one yet and shied away from my usual medium rare).

The finished burger got some love in the form of a homemade Red Fife infused burger bun I’d whipped up the other day, plus a side of my delicious gherkin pickles.

The first bite sung with the subtly increasing ‘nduja heat, and I commented to the Everyman that next time I’d probably be a little more generous with the ‘nduja.  By the end of the burger I felt my assessment was still correct, but the problem with ‘nduja is that the more you have it, the more you want it, so I doubt I’d ever truly have “enough” anyway.

At the very least, after my inaugural experiment with this incomparable spread, I’m looking forward to many other flights of fancy.  As soon as spot prawn season comes around (though to be honest I have no idea when that is) I’ll definitely be attempting something similar to Grant’s smoked spot prawn and ‘nduja dish that I enjoyed so much.  Yum!

Until next time…

As some of you may recall, late last year I embarked on an attempt to cure my own prosciutto.

And now, as the first stage of that nearly 2 year process draws to a close, we’ve come to one of the more time-consuming and arduous tasks.

Having been rested in a salt and herb coat for quite some time now, the prosciutto is nearly ready to be smeared with a mixture of lard and black pepper and hung to be aged until it’s magically delicious.

Of course, to get to that point, one has to have a fair amount of lard.

Lucky for me I bought half a pig last summer, which came with its own lion’s share of fat.  As you may know, fat can eventually be rendered down into lard.

Which is exactly why I spent most of my Saturday cooking down 10 (of approximately 30) pounds of pork fat I had in the freezer.  The prosciutto won’t require nearly that much, but if I’m going to the trouble, I might as well render some down for myself, too.

But, instead of using the stovetop approach recommended by our organic grocer Bob, I consulted Jennifer McLagan’s Fat and found that it suggested rendering large quantities with the consistent heat of an oven, which is a decidedly more laid back, hands-off approach that I could wholeheartedly get behind.

So, after nearly an hour spent cubing semi-frozen pork fat with a cleaver, I boffed the whole lot into the biggest oven-safe pot I have (my lovely ginormous stainless steel stockpot from Udeal) and settled in for a long afternoon, checking on the fat approximately once per hour and giving it a stir.

Nearly 5 hours later this is all the action that’s happened at 250*:

Now, because it’s all fat, there is a little bit of water in there (McLagan recommends about 1/3 cup per pound) that will evaporate as the fat slowly melts, and at the same time prevents it from burning.

Something tells me it’s going to be a long night.

Until next time…

That niggling chill in the air meant that yesterday morning I pulled the final mini slab of vanilla pink peppercorn bacon out of the freezer after I’d used the last thawed bits in a crockpot of fall-appropriate baked beans.

Thus, it seemed like as good a time as any to get started on my next batch of bacon.  Since bacon requires a 7 to 10 day lead time before you have finished product, it was imperative that I get it curing, lest I run out of delectable home-cured porkiness.

While considering the next methods of flavouring, it occurred to me that I hadn’t yet gotten on Scott and Larbo’s choco-bacon train (though I’ve been meaning to).  Being a rabid consumer of my chocolate-covered guanciale toffee, I knew there was serious potential in the choco-bacon combo, but I wanted something more.  Leave it to me to prove that nothing exceeds like excess.  Recalling a dessert that I love at one of our favourite local haunts (Czehoski) formed the basis for this inspiration.  The chef there makes a rich and melty chocolate ganache flavoured with rosemary that is out of this world, so my mind immediately thought chocolate + bacon = good and chocolate + rosemary = also good, therefore chocolate + rosemary + bacon must = out of this world good.  And of course because I never do anything by half measures, it also occurred to me that a little pure Ontarian maple syrup might not be a bad idea either.

Which is how I ended up at my current juncture.  With another 2.5 pound slab of belly kicking around in the fridge, it was (as the French say) a fait accompli.

In 7 to 10 days I’ll have a better idea of how this turned out, but as of right now, my expectations are running pretty high.

Foodie’s Choco-Rosemary Maple Bacon

2.25 lb slab pork belly

28 g salt

19.5 g maple syrup

28 g cacao nibs, crushed or roughly ground

8 g fresh rosemary, chopped

Mix the last 4 ingredients into a sticky paste and massage into the slab of pork belly.  Place in a non-reactive dish, cover and refrigerate for 7 to 10 days, turning and basting daily.  At the end of 7 to 10 days, remove from cure, lightly rinse and pat dry and return to fridge for another 24 hours on an elevated rack to allow a pellicle to form on the meat.  Once dry and slightly tacky to the touch, smoke in a cold smoker for 1.5 to 2 hours.  Remove rind, cool and wrap tightly in heavy duty plastic wrap.  Refrigerate for up to 2 weeks or freeze immediately.

Until next time…

For weeks now I’ve been plotting, planning, calculating, formulating my next meaty project.

From the get-go I knew it would have to be a bacon.

The hard part was determining what sort of bacon it would be. The belly from my pig was around 15 pounds, and once I divided it up, I figured I could get around 6 batches of bacon out of it if I didn’t resort to roasting any for dinner.

Scott over at The Sausage Debauchery had turned me on to the possibility of a cocoa-laced bacon (and really, haven’t we combined chocolate and bacon enough to know that this would be really good?) but I hadn’t gotten around to procuring the necessary supplies that I thought would improve on his original attempt, so it was out.

I’d also been toying with the idea of incorporating fennel pollen or lavender somehow, but I hadn’t quite figured out a plan of attack on that one, either.

There was the possibility of chili’d bacon, but I changed my mind when I saw how much frozen jalapeño guanciale was still left in the freezer.

Then, last weekend at the farmer’s market everything suddenly started falling into place.

A chance sighting out of the corner of my eye unearthed an intriguing variety of honey from our local honey man.  The so-called “campfire honey” was a blend of both the honey and the comb that has been heated and concentrated until it was a nice, rich amber colour.  I knew that it would make the perfect honey for my first batch of bacon, so I picked up a small jar along with my regular purchases.

During the course of the next 7 days I defrosted the belly and portioned it out into more manageable-for-curing-sized pieces.  I was amazed at how accurate my portions turned out to be, running the gamut from 2.25 pounds to 2.75 pounds each, though I had been hoping for an even 2.5 per.  Once the slabs were sized, they were tightly wrapped and returned to the freezer, with the exception of one, which was left in the fridge to finish defrosting overnight.

After much deliberation (plus burning through the first of 2 spice grinders in the process), I settled on a cure comprised of the campfire honey, a bay leaf. some pink and Szechuan peppercorns, a tiny pinch of vanilla powder and a little salt.  Combining it together in a small bowl proved to be a challenge with honey that was so viscous and thick.  It was a cakewalk compared to the disaster I made of trying to rub the honey into the pork belly.  Apparently warm honey + cold pork = one sticky, wax-like mess.  Once my hands heated it up finally, the cure was applied and the easy part began.  You just let the meat sit for a week, flipping occasionally to distribute the cure.  At the end of next week we will rinse, smoke over wood and call it a day.

This is going to be some of the best bacon in the universe.  I can tell the Everyman is a little hesitant about my flavour profile, but I know it’s going to be absolutely amazing.

Until next time…

For a while now I’ve been meaning to get around to doing this.

Several of you have not let me forget that, either.

Thank you.

If it weren’t for your regular prodding reminders, this project would not have seen the light of day for several more weeks, at least.

And surprisingly enough, last night everything finally came together to begin day 1 of my 547 day homemade prosciutto adventure.

The impetus for kickstarting this project actually surfaced on Wednesday morning, when a trip to drop my kitten off at the vet persuaded me to pick up the mass quantities of salt required on my way home.  20 minutes later, I crossed the street and slowly made my way up the half a block to our house, painfully hauling 24 kg of sea salt in thin plastic bags that were mere moments away from bursting.  When I arrived at home, I dropped the bags in our front hallway and ran down to the basement to extract the coveted pork from our overstuffed freezer.  Selecting what I thought was the correct one of the two massive hunks of flesh, I carried it up to the kitchen and set it into a cool basin of water in the sink to begin defrosting.  12 hours later, I thought it was done so I drained away the water and ripped open the package.

Shit.

I’d just spent the day defrosting a giant bag of pork shoulder and trim that the butcher had assembled for miscellaneous sausage projects.  Fortunately, the meat was still frozen halfway through, so I hacked it into smaller portions and repackaged it for another day.

By process of elimination, that meant that the other gigantic bag of pig in the freezer was the piece waiting to become a prosciutto, so once again I set a cool basin of water out for defrosting, then went to bed.  When I awoke in the morning, I could tell the meat still hadn’t completely thawed, but I had no intention of leaving it out for another full day so I wrapped it up and put it in the fridge.  Thursday evening found me too tired to do much of anything, so on Friday morning I promised myself I would close the loop.

After work on Friday night, I began grinding coarse sea salt into fine powder in my Cuisinart mini prep, mashing up my fingers grating garlic on a ceramic rasp, pulverizing peppercorns in a tea towel with a mallet, and stripping fresh herbs off of all of my tiny trees.  Once the mixture was assembled, I added enough water to form a moistened paste, then began vigorously applying it to the meat’s supple flesh.  Every square inch was coated and massaged until the salty mess completely adhered. It should rest for a few more days in this manner and then be repeated before sealing the whole thing up in a bin full of sea salt for a month.

Even looking at the prosciutto in its raw state is intoxicating, and I can already see the Everyman greedily plotting all the wonderful things he intends to eat with it.

Though it isn’t so much a steadfast recipe that I’m using rather than a collection of general instructions, I am fairly confident that I know enough about the matter to prevent any possible illness.  As I’ve mentioned before, the larger issue will be trying to find some place to hang the thing once the time comes.  For now, I’m just going to bask in the glow of a potentially fantastic project getting underway, and generally just hope for the best.

By December 2010 we should know whether this homemade prosciutto is worth its weight in gold or not even fit for the dogs.

I’ll continue to keep you posted as the months progress.

Until next time…

A post over at Porkosity (The Star’s food critic Corey Mintz’ personal blog) reminded me of a Minimalist podcast I’d downloaded last year for pork shoulder (that I mistakenly remembered as being cochinita pibil, but upon researching found to be pernil).  Between what I recalled of the Minimalist recipe, and Corey’s version below (which has strangely disappeared from his website), I decided to mimic the flavours as a marinade for more chops, throwing in a little tomfoolery along the way.

I don’t like orange juice, which features prominently in both versions (truthfully, I despise it), so I decided that switching it out for lime juice sounded like a fair compromise.  I also zested my lime for some extra pungency, traded in the white vinegar for cider vinegar, and ground up the annatto seeds (which make up achiote) by hand.  The garlic and salt added, I tasted a fingerful and decided I wanted something more.  Into the bowl went a handful of epazote, (which has such a pleasant ring next to achiote) and a sprinkling of ancho powder.  After it was all done, I slathered it on the chops, then left them to marinate for an hour.

Firing up the grill an hour later, the chops were sauced, seared, flipped and done in no time at all.  They were sided with some argan oil-doused baby grilled bok choy, as seen above.  The marriage of flavours was just about right, though the next time I’d probably reduce the lime juice a tad, as it overpowered the rest of the seasonings.  Not bad considering it was born of a memory/recipe mash-up.  Special thanks to Mr. Mintz for inadvertently reminding me of pernil, too!

Foodie’s Bastard Pibil/Pernil

2 bone-in pork chops

juice and zest of 1 lime

2 tbsp ground annatto seeds

1 tbsp cider vinegar

1 tbsp epazote

2 large grated garlic cloves

0.5 tbsp ancho powder

0.5 tsp salt

Combine all ingredients in a non-reactive bowl and rub into the pork chops.  Allow to marinate for at least 1 hour.  Preheat the barbecue to medium high indirect heat, and grill for approximately 5-7 minutes per side.  Remove to a platter and allow to rest for several minutes before serving.  This would also work well sliced thinly and slid into some lovely warmed corn tortillas.

Makes 2 chops.

Until next time…

While I’ve been cognisant of pomegranate molasses since at least 2001 (thanks to Christine Cushing harping about it every chance she got) it was never an ingredient I rushed to experiment with.

Examining my habits, I’ve found that my cooking experimentation and infatuation with ingredients tends to be rather transient.  When I hone in on something that intrigues me, I work with it obsessively until I get bored and then move on.  In essence, I’m trying to “master” the ingredient in a way that I find palatable (not in every way, because that would take a lifetime) before I take my next step.  In some ways I suppose you could say that I have culinary ADD (attention deficit disorder) because I jump around so much to ensure I keep those synapses popping.

As I mentioned in a previous post, while I was visiting The Spice Trader on the weekend, I happened to grab a bottle of the aforementioned pomegranate molasses, along with some argan oil (more on that later), more coffee olive oil, and some white balsamic.

I first read about argan oil back in 2007, in a book called In Bad Taste?: The Adventures And Science Behind Food Delicacies by Dr. Massimo Marcone.  Argan oil comes from the argan tree.  In Morocco, goats climb these trees and eat the argan nuts, and then dispose of the rest.  What’s left when they’re done eating is collected and oil is extracted from the remnants.  When I saw it on the shelf at The Spice Trader, I knew I couldn’t resist picking up a flask of this highly unusual oil.

Looking for a captivating way to use the pomegranate molasses, I came across this.  We didn’t have any lamb in the house, but we certainly had a shitload of pig, so I made an executive decision and pulled out 4 chops.  Mixing up the marinade fairly similarly to the original recipe, I boosted the spices a little bit and reduced the olive oil by half, because the quantity sounded excessive.  Into the fridge to soak for a few hours and I went on with concocting dinner.

To accompany the pork, I wanted tender roasted beets, so I washed and stemmed a bunch, coated them with argan oil, salt and pepper, then put them in a baking dish with a small splash of water and covered it with foil.  50 minutes later, the beets were soft and amenable to being peeled.  Slicing them into quarters, I tossed them in a vinaigrette of lime juice, more argan oil, a splash of pomegranate molasses, salt, pepper and some pickled rosemary shallot rings.  Left to marinate for a half hour, the flavours melded and everything (including my palms) was stained a lovely, rosy pink.

While I was prepping the salad, I’d tasked the Everyman with grilling the chops since I was otherwise indisposed.  After a few minutes on the barbecue, he came downstairs slightly distraught, thinking that he’d accidentally ruined them.  I had faith in him and told him it was fine, so he returned to the barbecue, hoping for the best.  Due to the high fat content in both the pork and the accompanying marinade, the chops were flaring up substantially, plus the sugary nature of the pomegranate molasses meant that everything was starting to look a little charred from the caramelization.

Luckily, as you can see above, everything turned out just fine.  The chops had a great sweet, smoky, tanginess to them, and the only complaint I had with the dish was that it seemed to need heat.  If I made it again I’d probably add a little bit of chili powder or chipotle adobo to the marinade to give it some tingle.  All in all though, a decent dish, and with the beet salad, a powerfully tasty summer supper.  Here’s the beet salad recipe, for those who might be interested.

Foodie’s Roasty Beets

4 – 5 medium beets, scrubbed, with taproots and stems removed

argan oil (or any other flavourful fat)

water

1 lime, juiced

1 tbsp pomegranate molasses

1 tbsp argan oil

pickled shallot rings or fresh chopped shallots

Place beets in the bottom of a shallow baking dish and toss with argan oil, salt and pepper to coat.  Add approximately 1/4 cup of water to the bottom of the pan, then cover with tin foil.  Roast in a 400* oven for 50 minutes, or until a knife can easily pierce the centre.  Remove from oven and allow to cool slightly.  Peel beets and slice into segments.  In another bowl, combine lime juice, pomegranate molasses, argan oil, salt, pepper and shallots and whisk briefly to combine.  Drizzle over the beets, toss well and allow to rest for half an hour.  Serve.

Makes 4 servings.

Until next time…

There are probably less than a handful of people reading this blog who will get the titular reference, but to those that do, I salute you

After a slight delivery snafu on my part last weekend, I finally took possession of my side of pork on Wednesday night from Bob, our friendly organic grocer.

Well, most of it.

It turns out that the slaughter weight of my particular hog was slightly larger than the average I’d been quoted (80-100 lbs) so my fridge, freezer and all available space is now crammed full of 147.5 pounds of high quality porkiness.  That includes one completely intact belly side, which I’ve been lusting after since I saw it and intend to use for a half dozen preparations of bacon, a whole boned out shoulder for grinding into various forms of charcuterie, a couple slabs of ribs, a bone in leg that I’m deliberating over turning into prosciutto (I’m not sure I’m experienced enough for that), plus a shitload of meat packaged into chops.  There was also a full third box that did not get dropped off containing the fat from the animal to be used for charcuterie and rendering into lard.  Luckily, Bob offered to hold it at his store for us for a few weeks while we get busy making some room, because after I put away what he did deliver, we are completely and totally full.  And that includes the large upright second freezer that we keep in the basement just for things such as this.

Ah, but what a nice feeling of fullness it is.  My mind is whirring full speed (no, it really isn’t just the godawful noise from the Indy cars) with all of the potential and possibilities ahead of me with this cache full of meat.  Just this morning I stopped off at The Spice Trader to pick up supplies for other projects and was inspired to purchase some fennel pollen with the intent to use it on one of the versions of bacon, plus some grains of paradise, vanilla powder and exotic Saigon cinnamon that I thought would be fun to experiment with, aside from my regularly scheduled purchases.  I always love going there because I come home with so many unique and interesting things to keep myself busy in the kitchen.

Stay tuned for more tales of pork possibilities.

Until next time…

I’ve been working on a lot of meat-based projects lately.

It’s beyond long overdue, but I finally got around to hanging my ‘nduja and csabai this past weekend.  They were both smoked a few weeks ago, but the lack of opportune curing space in our condo has had me stymied for some time.  Up until this point both were sitting in the fridge, contaminating my other foodstuffs with their pungent, smoky aromas.  If it weren’t for our household of kitties I would have had the perfect environment for curing in the basement, but unfortunately I’m almost certain that the ammonia smell from their litterboxes would eventually permeate (and ruin) perfectly good meat.  After all the work I’ve put into these projects that was not a risk I was willing to take.

In the end I decided to jerry rig a few suspension apparatuses around my kitchen that will (hopefully) be able to withstand the job.  So far they seem to be holding up just fine, and the way I figure it, it’s only going to get lighter anyway, as the meat begins to lose it’s moisture.

My apologies for the general crappiness of these pictures; I doubt you’ll be able to discern what it is I was doing.  It’s difficult to properly capture ‘nduja hanging suspended from a broomstick just outside the top of a kitchen windowsill.  It’s also just below the air conditioning register in the ceiling, which should keep it nicely cooled, I think.  Despite the rather bad lighting, I can assure you that after several days of smoking these salamis have taken on a burnished mahogany cast and slightly firmer (but squishier) texture.  I originally intended to hang them for about a year, but now that they’re out in the open in my kitchen I may have to rethink that strategy.  At the very least I’ll do 6 months, but in the end it’s going to be something I play by ear.

The other coil of meat (csabai) is hanging in the broom closet that previously housed my homemade guanciale.  You probably can’t tell, but this Len Poli sausage is hanging from a wire baker’s cooling rack that is attached to 2 hanging hooks on the back wall of the closet.  A crinkle of foil is crumpled underneath in order to catch any drips.  This one only has to hang for 30 days.  I have a bad feeling that as soon as the csabai is ready, it’s going to disappear before I have a chance to make more.  It’s lighter in color and has a more resilient texture through the casing, though a few hours after hanging it had expelled a large amount of fluorescent orange oil into the tinfoil cup.

As if all of that wasn’t enough, I ordered myself a side of pork from our friendly organic grocer over at Clean Food Connection.  I have some big plans for this pork, let me tell you!  Not only will it provide all of the meat and fat I need to keep me in sausages for months to come (like more of that excellent roasted poblano sausage), I’m also expecting that it will provide me with a leg or two (a side is one full half of the animal, and Bob assures me that it amounts to about 80-100 pounds of usable product.  If I get a leg, I may try my hand at a prosciutto, which is something I’ve REALLY wanted to do for a long time, but I’ll need a real curing area for that one, I think.  Beyond that I’m looking forward to being able to smoke some of my own bacon, particularly this ginger, sage and garlic version from my friend Scott over at The Sausage Debauchery.

Somehow I get the impression this is about to become a very fatty summer.

Until next time…

I’m quickly becoming the undisputed barbecue queen in our household.

A few weeks ago while grilling some spice-rubbed chicken for dinner, the Everyman commented that it would be nice if we had a traditional southern accoutrement like baked beans to enjoy with our meal (I know, how nice of him to suggest I do more work when I was already making dinner, right?)

At any rate, this week I started thinking that baked beans actually sounded like a half decent idea, so I started scouring the tower of cookbooks for a base recipe to work off of.  Being that my track record with cooking beans is pretty awful, I wanted something that would take a lot of the guesswork out of the equation, but also make the process relatively easy.

This is where Beth Hensperger came to the rescue, with her enlightening tome, Not Your Mother’s Slow Cooker.  I don’t often use my slow cooker, but it does come in handy for  things like slow braises, jams, and the occasional pot of tostadas.  Skimming over the recipe, I was even more psyched that it was something I could throw together before work and find ready when I got home (or so I thought).  I set a bowl of dried beans to soak overnight and went on to bed, while visions of baked beans danced in my head.

The next morning I assembled all the necessary ingredients in the slow cooker and headed out for the day.  The recipe calls for an ingenious hour and a half boiling on high with a sprinkle of baking soda; supposedly to dismantle the gaseous compounds in the beans.  It sounded like malarkey to me, but I was game to try anything.  Once the baking soda boil is done, the beans are rinsed and drained and put back into the cooker with the remainder of the flavourings and set on low for 12 hours.  The intent is for the liquid to reduce to a syrupy paste during that time, but when I came home it was still exceptionally watery.  At that point I transferred the lot to my Dutch oven and set it to simmer on medium high for an hour.

When the hour was up, the beans and their braising liquid were the exact viscosity I was after.  A few quick tweaks of seasoning left me with a pot of legumes the Everyman lusted after.  He thought they were so delectable that the barbecue chicken legs I served them with soon played a distant second fiddle.  I had to agree too, these beans were pretty damn tasty to boot!

Perhaps you’d like to give them a go some time;

Foodie’s Tangy Baked Beans (adapted from Not Your Mother’s Slow Cooker)

1 lb of dried beans (I used a mix of white and kidney)

0.5 tsp baking soda

1 lb pork belly, cut into large cubes

0.5 c. molasses

0.5 c. brown sugar, packed

0.33 c. cider vinegar

2 tsp crushed mustard seeds

1.5 tbsp salt

0.5 tbsp pepper

1 onion, peeled, left whole and scored on the root end

~6 c. braising liquid (water or stock)

Rinse dried beans in a colander and drain.  Place beans in a bowl and cover with cool water, soak overnight.  The next morning, rinse and drain beans, then place in the slow cooker.  Cover the beans with 3 inches of water, add the baking soda and cover and cook on high for about 1 1/2 hours.  Rinse and drain again.  Combine the beans with the rest of the ingredients in the slow cooker, and stir to mix well.  Submerge the onion and pork cubes and add the braising liquid to cover.  Cover and cook on low for 12 hours.  At the end of 12 hours, transfer beans to a pot on the stove top and allow to simmer until they thicken to sticky perfection.  Adjust seasonings to taste.

Makes approximately 6 cups.  Enjoy!

Until next time…

It’s hard to make raw meat look sexy (doubly so when it happens to be sausage) but these juicy links of homemade smoky poblano and pork sausage are just crying out for a grill and some Mexican-inspired menus. Tequila anyone?

Making good use of my fresh and bursting heirloom cherry tomatoes, some mini foccacias perfectly sized for accompanying workday lunches.

Another coil of meat, this time in the form of a Hungarian csabai, which is something I’ve been meaning to test out for a few months now.  After a few hours in the smoker it’ll be hung for 30 long days of curing.

Lastly, my attempt at recreating the Everyman’s favorite strawberry lemon loaf from the Trinity Bellwoods farmer’s market.  Our glut of strawberries made this quick bread a breeze to whip up, with a fluffy, almost cakelike interior.

That’s pretty much it for now.  Detailed recipes to follow some time in the near future.

Until next time…

These pictures will probably horrify most of the Hebrew population, so view at your own risk.  A few observations on the ‘nduja-making process;

Pig liver is probably the most disgusting thing I’ve ever held in my two hands.  Really, truly foul.

I learned quite a few things after this salami-making experience, chief among them that you absolutely do not want to touch this stuff with bare hands.  It’s been a few days now and the skin on the tops of my hands is still stinging.  Note to self: next time wear gloves.

But, what matters is that it’s done now and it’ll hang for a week before I get to begin the smoking action.  Hurrah!

Until next time…

The time that’s elapsed since I first mentioned ‘nduja a few weeks ago has not flown by with frivolity at Foodie and the Everyman.

I’ve purposely been somewhat mum on the matter because while I’m waiting for my various ingredients to show up, I’ve been trying to formulate a recipe that will warm my own (often icy) heart.  You see, like most unique regional specialties (but especially, if not doubly so for ones of the Italian variety) there is rarely one ironclad, foolproof, universally accepted formulation.  Couple that with the fact that many traditional Italians are often notably tight-lipped when it comes to passing on recipes to someone outside of the family, and you have your own recipe for banging one’s head against the wall.

But, I’m nothing if not one stubborn cookie.  I persevered and after a few weeks and more evenings spent Google searching than I’d care to admit, I’ve come up with a ratio that my neophyte cured meat-making self feels good about.  I couldn’t find much of merit or substance on Google; I expect that if there are any more comprehensive recipes they were probably only available in Italian, but pieced together from the few sources and references I could find, I’ve formulated this eye-searing version.

Foodie’s Inferno ‘Nduja

680 g pork shoulder

680 g pork belly or fatback

450 g pork jowl

450 g pork liver

336 g pepperoncini

224 g sweet pepper (ground or paste)

60 g salt

beef middles, rinsed and drained

Freeze all meat for 15-20 minutes until the surface is slightly icy and stiff.  Remove meat from freezer and cube into 2 inch chunks.  Working quickly and keeping half the meat in the freezer at all times, grind the meat cubes coarsely using a meat grinder.  Once all meat is ground, return to freezer for 15-20 minutes to chill.  Grind meat a second time using a finer plate.  Return to freezer for 15-20 minutes to chill.  Combine ground meat with salt and spices, mix well and chill once more for 15-20 minutes.  Stuff chilled mixture into cleaned beef middles.   Hang salami to dry for one week.  After 7 days of hanging has elapsed, smoke daily for several hours a day for a total of 8 days.  Resume hanging the salami for a minimum of 6 months up to 1 year.

Makes 2.8 kg of spicy ‘nduja salami.

A few things to know about ‘nduja;

- this salami is punishingly hot if made correctly; the proportion of peppers to meat is a lofty 25%

- it’s meant to be soft and spreadable

- most recipes I came across seemed to suggest 250 g of pepper for every kilo of meat

- one reference I found said ‘nduja contained tripe, another recommended meat, lard, liver and lights (lungs)

- I’ll be forgoing the tripe and lungs this year

- according to the few reputable sources I spoke to, curing salts are not required due to the high concentration of hot peppers present that will act as a preserving agent

That’s all for now.  I’m planning on preparing my first batch within the next week, but since it needs to hang and cure for almost a year, it’ll be a long while before we find out how well my guesstimations worked out.  Unless I get too impatient and fry some up prior to hanging (always a possibility).

Until next time…

I’ve been feeling a bit under the weather these last few days, and consequently have spent less time messing around in the kitchen than I would have liked this weekend.

Since reading about my first Daring Bakers project on Friday, I’d been pondering the likelihood of accomplishing the task at hand.  From what I understand, the modus operandi is to constantly challenge yourself and work outside your limits.  I joined mostly because I think my baking skills are much poorer than my cooking technique, and I thought this would be a neat way to improve them (and also prove useful for monthly blog fodder).  Their website also hosts a monthly cooking challenge called Daring Cooks, and once I get a few of the baking challenges under my belt, I might just sign up for that one too, just for fun.  I can’t share with you the content of this month’s challenge right now (but please check back on May 27th to read all about it) but I can definitely say that had I not signed up for this, I never would have bothered to attempt the recipe at home.  I spent the better part of my afternoon today preparing it, and ever since, the Everyman has been rather greedily enjoying the spoils.

And since I was unable to gather all of the materials I needed to make my various cured meats this weekend (though an extremely generous offfer of supplies and help did come my way), I needed to find something else to occupy my time.  While Tastespotting from my sickbed yesterday I came across a photo posted by my favorite America’s Test Kitchen guru, Kenji Alt.  It was a beautiful picture of a homemade gyoza, one of my most favorite Asian delicacies.  Better still, it was a pork and ramp dumpling, and I just so happened to have a small container of sauteed ramp leaves left over from my previous tart-making adventure.  The only snag was that the Everyman pretty much wholeheartedly dislikes all Asian cuisine (which is why you never see any reviews of Asian restaurants on here) with the exception of his affinity for sweet and sour chicken balls.  I knew that if I wanted to make gyoza for dinner (and I did), I’d have to tweak the recipe a little bit, to account for his somewhat fussier tastes.

Starting by slicing up the sauteed ramps, I chopped in some leftover sweet and sour shallot confit I found hanging out in the fridge, along with a few of my recently pickled ramp stems (which turned out deliciously, by the way).  I sauteed a bit of ground pork in a pan with a splash of sesame oil, some oyster sauce and a tiny bit of nam pla.  Once cooked through, I stirred in the ramps and shallot confit, and a glug of homemade chicken stock to loosen everything up.  This was reduced down until the whole mixture was smooth and slightly sticky, then allowed to cool.  Once the stuffing could be handled, it got bundled into a plethora of wonton skins (35 in all) and I even got a bit fancy with it and turned them into pope’s caps (which is the English translation of a form of Italian stuffed pasta).

After heating up some oil in a skillet, the dumplings were put down and allowed to get crispy.  Once the bottoms were fairly well done, some water was added and the lid placed on.  Several minutes of steaming, then remove the lid to evaporate the remaining liquid and ensure everything is crisperific.  Then it’s time to nom!

I’m no Asian cooking master, but these are definitely a good time.  Served with a side of salad and some spicy chili dipping sauce, they make a perfect dinner for a lazy Sunday night.

Until next time…

Having taken another stab at this whole charcuterie thing, I decided it was high time I started dabbling in a sausage I could call my own

As I mentioned before, there was a delicious baco noir sausage I wanted to recreate.  The problem being that aside from the baco noir, I had no recollection of what what was in it.  However, I do quite enjoy baco noir, so I decided that it would be the base for my sausage too.  For some reason I was drawn to the idea of dried blueberries and fresh thyme leaves.  To round it out, I threw in some leftover shallot confit from the Valentine’s dinner I made.  Once combined, it turned a bright purple in the bowl, so I left it in the fridge to give the flavors a chance to mellow out for a day.

The next day I piped the whole purple mess into some casings.  And I have to say, I was quite proud of myself.  I didn’t break the casing once, and I turned out some evenly sized, quite professional looking sausages.  Only time will tell whether they taste as delicious as they look.  Their faint, violet hue is both charming and slightly disturbing; I just have to keep reminding myself that they are not spoiled meat.

For those who want it, I’ll post a copy of the recipe too.

Foodie’s Violet Baco Sausage

3 lbs pork butt, cut into chunks

0.25 c. shallot confit (caramelized onions would make a fine substitution)

0.33 c. dried blueberries, rehydrated in water until plump

0.5 c. baco noir wine

leaves from a dozen thyme sprigs

salt and pepper to taste

Grind chunks of pork butt with the shallot confit and dried blueberries twice; refrigerate for half an hour between grindings to firm up the meat.  Combine all ingredients in a large bowl and mix until a slightly tacky paste is formed; mix thoroughly to ensure blueberries and shallot confit are evenly distributed throughout.  Refrigerate for 24 hours.  Stuff into casings and refrigerate sausages for an additional 24 hours to cure slightly.  Use within 3 days or freeze.

Makes 10-12 links.

Until next time…

The various recipes I’d consulted led me to believe that a single jowl would weigh in at nothing larger than 1.5 pounds or so.  Working with that rough estimate, I asked the butcher to order in 2 for me.  I figured that would be safe because it would leave me a spare if I messed up the first (highly unlikely) or a second to play with at a later date once I got the base flavor down.  Well… when I got to the butcher I found out that they’d put aside about $50 worth of jowls for me.  At approximately $4.99 per pound, you can do that math and figure out how much meat I ended up with.  I’d ordered it in though, so I took the meat and figured that at the very least, I was now set for jowls for the next year or so.

Getting the meat home, I began unwrapping my prize.  Lo and behold it turned out that I actually had 4 jowls.  I opted to freeze one whole package for later, and make a double batch with the other package for now.  As one of my recipes suggested, I began picking over my jowls for any errant glands; apparently these need to be removed prior to curing.  I didn’t see anything that looked like glands, but there were several sections of small, bubblewrap-like pockets, so for safety’s sake I pared those back.  Once that was done, I started to mix together the curing concoction.  It’s a pretty simple ratio; just use equal parts of salt and sugar, and whatever fresh spices you want your meat to take on the flavors of.  I’ve heard talk of people also using something called pink salt; I’m not 100% sure what that is, but I know it contains nitrites, so it’s not going in my food.  Next, you massage the mix into the meat, pressing it well into both sides and all the edges.  Place the thoroughly coated meat into a large freezer bag with any leftover mixture, close it and put it in the refrigerator.  Let it rest for 5-7 days, and make sure to flip the bag daily to evenly distribute the cure.

Once I was done with the basic guanciale, (which in addition to the salt, sugar and peppercorns also contains thyme) I decided I wanted to get a bit crazy with the next one.  Instead of using thyme, I opted for a healthy pinch of several types of chili flakes.  Once mixed, patted and put away, I started to feel a bit dejected.  All of the anticipation and excitement of the last few weeks was over in less than 20 minutes.  The next 7 days will be relatively boring, and the 21 after that absolutely excruciating.  If everything goes well after that, I’ll have guanciale instead of a thriving bacteria population eager to kill us all.  Obviously I’m sure you can tell which one I’m hoping for.  During the next month I’ll continue to post periodic updates on Project Guanciale, and if it turns out, I may even post a few pictures.  In the meantime, here are some recipes for cures you can use, since people always tell me I need to write this shit down.  Um, no, I don’t, but I’ll humor you this once nonetheless.

And as an aside, I also finally got to the bottom of the Everyman’s squeamishness regarding guanciale.  When he took a peek at the butcher package today, he remarked incredulously to me, “Hey, this is pork?”  Well of course it is, and I thought he knew that.  It turns out that the first time we had guanciale was at Cowbell, on one of those mixed beef nose to tail plates that the chef loves so much.  The Everyman didn’t care for it then, and ever since had wrongly assumed that the guanciale I keep talking about was also made with cow cheeks.  Now that he realizes that I’m using pigs, I think he’s alot more receptive to the idea of Roman bacon.  Success!  Now all I have to do is make sure it tastes good… hmmm… maybe I should ask Grant from The Black Hoof for some tips…

Plain Guanciale Cure (enough to cure one 2-2.5 pound jowl)

0.5 c. sugar

0.5 c. salt

16 peppercorns

8 sprigs of thyme, leaves removed

Combine in a large bowl and apply as directed above.

Foodie’s Spicy Guanciale Cure (also enough to cure one 2-2.5 pound jowl)

0.5 c. sugar

0.5 c. salt

16 peppercorns

0.5 tsp red pepper flakes

0.5 tsp jalapeno flakes (see The Spice Trader)

0.25 tsp aleppo pepper flakes (see The Spice Trader)

0.25 tsp marash pepper flakes (see The Spice Trader)

Combine in a large bowl and apply as directed above.

Until next time…