Everyday Yumminess: Perfect Sous Vide Mayo

Hello, there.  It's been a while since I've posted here.  I've still been having fun in the kitchen, but things have changed such that I now have a partner-in-crime who distracts me from taking pictures and noting changes I make to recipes...  I've been more about enjoying the cooking than documenting the cooking, which anyone who loves cooking knows isn't a bad thing... Anyway, this is something I came across a few months back in Modernist Cuisine at Home that totally rocked my world: Modernist Mayo.  It's rich, decadent, bullet-proof (emulsion-wise), and actually easy...  Things start with 75g of egg yolks (5 or so...).

Those are vacuum-sealed and cooked sous vide for 35 minutes at 67°C.  (Reading the recipe now, I was apparently supposed to blend them first, but in 5 times making this I've never done that and it's always turned out perfectly, so...) The yolks get all smushified, anyway, when you vacuum seal them, and come out pretty well mixed anyway...

Meanwhile, you'll stir together some (45g) water and Dijon (25g) in a mixing container.  When the yolks are ready, you immersion-blend them to smoothness, then start drizzling in about 300g of neutral oil in (while running your immersion blender.

I made this little immersion-blending-lid after one too many experiences making traditional mayo, when it ended up sprayed halfway across my kitchen...  It turns out this lid is completely superfluous with Modernist Mayo, given the thick texture... When the oil has been emulsified, you can season to taste (I like a little lemon juice and salt), and you have on your hands a batch of perfect mayo...

(This also happens to be the perfect base for Fry Sauce and Sriracha Mayo... but we'll talk abou that later...)  Back soon with more yumminess...  

Everyday Yumminess: Carnitas Hash with Eggs

This is one of those meals where I started with a recipe... but then failed to follow any part of that recipe and still ended up with something super-yummy.  In the end, I suppose the recipe just stuck an idea in my head: "Carnitas Hash is probably delicious."  A few weeks later, when I had some carnitas vacuum-sealed in the freezer and found myself with extra Yukon Gold potatoes, it seemed like the best possible way to remedy those two situations...

Happy Birthday To Me!

A couple weeks ago I had a kick-ass group of friends over for my annual birthday dinner.  It's the first time I've been able to do it at my own place since moving back to Portland, and I don't think it's a stretch to say it was one of my most delicious birthday menus ever...

For the trio of plated appetizers, we had Shrimp Mosaic with Avocado-Melon Salsa, Super-Crispy Calamari, and Vodka-Spiked Grape Tomatoes...

The two dishes on the sides are old favorites, but the calamari was a new recipe.  The batter is made with vodka and soda water, and crisps up beautifully when it fries...  Next up was another old favorite, Creamy Asparagus Soup with Lemon Dumplings.

These little dumplings are filled with super-bright homemade lemon "jello," which melts when the dumplings cook and then explodes into the soup when you take a bite.  I wanted the guests to get to see what was hiding under their soup, so we poured the soup tableside...

The salad course came from Zak Pelaccio's "Eat With Your Hands" cookbook: a Crispy Pork Belly and Watermelon Salad.

I went ahead and compressed the watermelon, since I love the texture and it's so much prettier, but other than that this was just as written.  The pickled watermelon rind was beautifully spicy and was perfect with the crispy pork...  Mmm....  Because I'm addicted to scallops, I added a seafood course this year in the form of a Seared Diver Scallop with Ginger-Carrot Emulsion.

The sauce is from Thomas Keller's Peas and Carrots, but I passed it through a whipping siphon so that I could make it in advance.  The siphon re-emulsifies the sauce when you reheat it, and also adds a crazy-awesome texture...  The main course was a Horseradish-Crusted Rib-Eye with Red Wine Jus and Crispy Potato Ruffles...

And, finally, the meal finished up with Thomas Keller's take on Strawberry Shortcake...

This plated up way prettier the first time I made it (see below), but was delicious even when ugly...  

By the time we got home from some late-night post-dinner karaoke, I have to say this was one of my best birthdays ever... A super-fun evening with totally awesome company and fantastic food...  It will be hard to top it next year, but I'll see what I can do...

Recipe Revisited: Seared Spring Salmon with Melted Leeks and Herbed Beurre Blanc

This is a recipe I've made (and loved) before, but I had to post again because it was even more mind-blowing this time with three small changes.  I don't like to make many alterations to Thomas Keller's recipes, because he's pretty much always right... but I feel like my leeks turned out better (and infinitely easier) by switching up the technique a little.  The recipe for this amazing dish is here, and I highly recommend trying it out next time you get your hands on some beautiful salmon...

Everyday Yumminess: Chicken Divan Casserole

My mom tells me that she sometimes made Chicken Divan Casserole for us when we were growing up. I am not about to call my mother a liar, but somehow the food memory didn't dig itself very far into my brain, so this isn't a dish I would have thought to seek out a recipe for and make... A couple weeks ago, though, a friend mentioned some pangs of nostalgia for the Chicken Divan his mom had made for him when he was young...and what kind of friend would I be if I didn't try to make a version of this classic for him? (I know the pictures of the finished dish are a little scrappy, but it's comfort food so I wasn't about to mess around with fancy plating...)

Sous Vide Makes it Better: Two Curries

I haven't made a lot of "new" dishes lately, but something I do a lot of is re-making things I've made before, only switching the cooking method over to sous vide.  I tried this with two curries last week, and was incredibly happy (for different reasons) with both dishes...  The first dish was Beef Rendang with Roti Canai.

Everyday Yumminess: My Favorite Buttery Flatbread

As I mentioned when I made the Mission Street Food Buttery Flatbread, one of the reasons I was a little disappointed by that flatbread was my preexisting love of an easier version...  I first made these Roti Canai almost 5 years ago when I was still living in Australia.  (I have no idea where the original recipe came from anymore...) They're kind of fun to make, super-delicious, and super-buttery...  

Valentine's Feast (Alternate Title: My Mom is Awesome)

UPDATE: I've now uploaded the recipes here if anyone wants to recreate portions of this meal... The soup with lemon dumplings is here.

As I was enjoying an amazing 5-course dinner with my parents last night, I realized something: Nobody has ever cooked a dinner party for me.  I love to cook (obviously), and I love throwing dinner parties, but it was one of the nicest gifts my mom could have given me when she prepared everything for this feast and then brought the whole production over to my house so that she and my dad could share it with me.  There's sometimes a misconception about us people who are obsessed with food and cooking... an idea that, because we love to go crazy in the kitchen, we're going to be harsh critics of other people's cooking and thus are too intimidating to cook for... (When, in fact, I love very simple food, too... and even a grilled cheese sandwich is enough to rock my world if I didn't have to make it myself...) Even though this wasn't a cool restaurant or my own cooking, I wanted to share the meal my mom prepared for us...

Cookbook Adventures: Mission Street Food (Updated)

Mission Street Food is another one of those books that I couldn't wait to get my hands on, but then didn't manage to play with until now...  

Now that I've tried a few recipes, I think it may be a while before I break it out again... Everything was sort of in that "good... but not as great as I'd hoped..." category.

I love the philosophy of the book, and I love the ideas behind the recipes, but it may end up being one of those books that I turn to more for inspiration than for guidance...

Sous Vide Duck Confit

I've been meaning to make Duck Confit for a long time, but it took a while to decide I really wanted to stock up my freezer with duck legs and duck fat...  I finally took the plunge and picked up some gorgeous duck products a few months ago, and then it was on...

Pizza Fest: Playing with My New Baking Steel

After all the buzz on the interwebs, I couldn't resist spending some Christmas-present money on a new toy: the baking steel... It turns out all the hype is correct.  

(As you can see, I got the 1/2-inch version.) I tried three different crusts on my new steel, and every one of them blew me away with how amazing it turned out... 

Yum...

Another Sous Vide Trick: Über-Caramelized Onons

I love caramelized onions, and I love them super-duper caramelized.  When I did this for Thomas Keller's French Onion Soup, it took about 8 hours of caramelizing (stirring every 30-45 minutes) to get the onions as dark as I wanted.  That's not really an option these days.  I've heard a rumor (which I believe) that you can't caramelize onions from raw using sous vide because the gases released by the onions will make the bag explode... (I didn't want to test this...)  Instead I did a bit of a hybrid technique.  While I was putzing around in the kitchen, I threw the sliced onions in a pot with a bit of salt over medium-high heat, covered.  

(This is how I always start my onions, since it forces them to release their liquid early and thus allows faster caramelization later...)  After a good amount of liquid is rendered, you can uncover and let it cook off, stirring every now and then.  Because there is so much liquid at this stage, there's minimal risk of burning so you can totally ignore the onions for the most part...

Once the onions had given off their liquid and that liquid had mostly cooked off, I tossed them into a vacuum bag, closed the top with a bag clip, and plunged them into an ice bath to chill (since hot things do not vacuum-seal well...).  After sealing, the onions can go into a 180-degree water bath until they achieve the desired caramelization...  A couple hours for moderate...

or overnight for super-duper-crazy-caramelized... 

Pretty awesome, yeah?  Again, this is just (regular, not sweet) onions with a bit of salt... and this is totally how my onions are getting caramelized for my next batch of onion soup...

Everyday Yumminess: Sriracha Salt

I bought my food dehydrator back in the day because I wanted to use it as a yogurt-making incubator.  While that remains its primary purpose in my kitchen, I like finding other random uses for it (e.g., prosciutto-powder).  The most recent application was to streamline a recipe for Sriracha Salt.

Everyday Yumminess: Homemade Tonic Water

This is something I'd been wanting to try for a while so, once I got a soda siphon for Christmas, it shot to the top of my queue.  Homemade tonic water (or, more accurately, tonic concentrate that is mixed with soda water to make tonic water) isn't necessarily going to save you any money over generic-brand store-bought versions.  This is a case where the DIY version is superior because it lets you tweak the flavors to your palate.  (I, for example, hate how sweet store-bought tonic water often is... so when I made my own I cut back on the agave the recipe called for and it was perfect...)