RogueChef

Bacon and Colcanon, Real Irish Food

It is early spring, and that means St. Patrick’s day. If I seem a little underwhelmed by the holiday, you will have to excuse me, it is not the holiday, it is all the trappings. Great rowdy, drunken crowds whose sole claim to to being Irish is that they wear a “Kiss Me I’m Irish” button on St. Patties day, and stand around on street corners swilling poor quality beer with green food coloring…

While the above is rather annoying, the true tragedy of Saint Patrick’s day is the crime of foisting American corned beef and cabbage off as being Irish.

The New England boiled dinner is a traditional New England meal, consisting of corned beef or a smoked “picnic ham” shoulder, with cabbage and added vegetable items, often including potato, rutabaga, parsnip, carrot, white turnip and onion. When using a beef roast, this meal is often known simply as corned beef and cabbage even with the addition of other vegetables.

Corned beef and cabbage is perhaps the most common form. Although not a traditional Irish meal, it has become a part of Irish-American culture and is often related (Mistakenly) to Irish holidays such as Saint Patrick’s Day. In Ireland, the closest traditional dish is Bacon and Cabbage (more akin to Canadian style bacon or ham). Corned beef and cabbage became popular in America after Irish immigrants in the eastern United States used corned beef instead of pork in their traditional dish.

Bacon and Cabbage seems to be associated with St. Patrick’s Day, I love the combination of potatoes, cabbage, onion and bacon all through the cooler months of Fall and Winter!

The dish consists of boiled or braised bacon (this refers to Back Bacon, almost a loin of bacon which is cured and/or smoked. It does not refer to sliced bacon or rashers which one might fry) served with boiled cabbage and potatoes.

The dish continues to be a very common meal in Ireland. There are many different variations on the theme of bacon and cabbage, but in general the dish tends to involve slicing the back bacon after it has been well cooked and serving it with whole boiled potatoes and boiled cabbage.

The dish usually calls for butter for the potatoes (which are often mashed with the cabbage). The potatoes and cabbage prepared in this manner are severed with a white sauce and are often called colcannon

The bacon used for the meal can vary somewhat depending on individual preference. Usually Back Bacon is used for the recipe, but other cuts of bacon are sometimes preferred. However, the bacon used is almost always cured.

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Hot Bacon Spinach Salad With Feta

Wandering out with a client yesterday, I found a wonderful little Italian restaurant. The polenta gnocchi, was quite good, and my dining companion had a wonderful pumpkin soup. The only downer was the Spinach salad with Feta and Pear, the pear was not quite ripe and one had to really search for the feta.

This of course, started quite the discussion on the nature of a good spinach salad. Should it be a cool sweet savory, with pear, washed spinach, feta and some form of olive oil / vinegar dressing, or should this be a warm salad of spinach leaves wilted with a bacon dressing and tossed with feta.

Considering I am need a meat as a flavor meal, I’ll do the bacon spinach and feta salad. I can add more bacon on the side to keep the carnivores at the lair from slathering me with BBQ sauce. As a supporting cast a good corn bread with butter.

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Szechuan Chicken Stir Fry

Back in the city, and having some folks over for a working tech-fest / dinner.

As a couple of the folks are on restricted diets, and I am trying to watch my calorie intake, we’ll do a techie favorite, Chinese Food, but in a way to boast the flavors and drop the sodium and sugar intake, while boasting intake of veggies, grains, and nuts with a bit of meat as a flavoring. I’ll reach for the poultry this time as I just did fish yesterday evening.

I’ll start with my Miso soup, followed by Asian Cole Slaw then a main course of Chicken Stir Fry Szechuan, and rice. And for desert, perhaps grilled pineapple.

Background
Stir frying is an umbrella term used to describe two techniques for cooking food in a wok while stirring it: chǎo (pronounced chow) and bào . The two techniques differ in their speed of execution, the amount of heat used, and the amount of tossing done to cook the food in the wok Cantonese restaurant patrons judge a chef’s ability to perform stir frying by the “wok hei” produced in the food.

To impart wok hei, the food must be cooked in a wok over a high flame while being stirred and tossed quickly. In practical terms, the flavor imparted by chemical compounds results from caramelization, Millard reactions, and the partial combustion of oil that come from charring and searing of the food at very high heat in excess of 200 °C (392 °F). Along with the flavor there is also the texture of the cooked items and smell involved that describes wok qi.
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Grilled Pineapple

Pineapple is basically made up of water and sugar and by grilling it you can concentrate the flavors by reducing the water and caramelizing the natural sugars, making it perfect for the grill.

Preparation is very simple, just sliced fruit, water, and butter to make the most basic grilled fruit as an appetizer, main course, side dish, or dessert.

A grilled fruit kabob can make an excellent side dish to chicken, pork or seafood. Rings of grilled pineapple stacked together can make a wonderful presentation for ice creams. Simple stonefruit, (peaches, nectarines, plums), split, pitted, and grilled, then stuffed with berries, (strawberry, blueberry, rasberry) or cherries are a desert by them selves. Peaches grilled with pork and tarragon become much more than the sum of the parts, the play of sweet, sour, bitter, salty mixed with the smokiness from the grill transcends all expectations

In the gallery shown here, I have a pineapple, that I have peeled and macerated in bourbon and spices, it is then grilled on a extremely hot griddle with butter. A shot of bourbon is added to flambe, (TAKE EXTRA CARE HERE), and produce a crisp glaze on the fruit.

It is then cored, sliced and served over frozen yogurt, for a no added sugar desert.

[View with PicLens]

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Meatless Monday – Gourmet Pizza

As I have spoken prior:

Some basic ideas, (stolen from may people and paraphrased), that I am sure will drive everyone crazy…

……..

Weekly:

• One day meatless

No, I’ve not gone total treehugger, but dropping the meat consumption by 15% (going meatless once a week) may reduce your risk of chronic preventable conditions like cancer, cardiovascular disease, diabetes and obesity.

Beans, peas, lentils, nuts and seeds contain little to no saturated fats. Reducing your intake of saturated fats can help keep your cholesterol low and reduce your risk of heart disease. A plant-based diet is a great source of fiber, which is absent in animal products.

Foods rich in fiber make you feel full with fewer calories, resulting in lower calorie intake and less overeating. On average, Americans get less than half the recommended daily quantity of fiber. Consuming dry beans or peas results in higher intakes of fiber, protein, folate, zinc, iron and magnesium with lower intakes of saturated fat and total fat.

So why not join the movement, it really has little or no impact on your tastebuds, had a great impact on your weight, which will be compensated for by the increase of money in your wallet.

From gourmet pizza, to a Pasta Primavea, to an mid eastern mezza, to a large number of Indian dishes, the options to have a hearty, tasty meal without animal fat are boundless.

Today I’ll use a whole wheat flour for the crust, some nice plum tomatoes, fresh mozzarella, aged cheddar, sea salt, some fresh garlic, fresh basil, oregano, parsley.

Plus my massive 3/4″ think pizza stones, one on a rack at the top of the oven, and one resting on some terra cotta saucers at the bottom of the oven. A good stone, properly heated is very key to a crisp crust, and a well browned toppings.

I’ll start by preheating the oven to it’s max, and let it sit there warming the stones, while I make the pizza dough.

If you’ve ever made French bread at home, you’ve made pizza dough. Traditional, pizza dough in Italy contains nothing but flour, salt, water, and yeast.

This dough contains a few more ingredients, fat in the guise of olive oil is added to make the dough more supple, (and to help satisfy the craving my craving for fat) and honey is added to feed the yeast and give the bread a touch of sweetness. I like a simple, versatile pizza dough recipe for home baking. After mastering this simple dough, I can feel free to experiment with extra add ins.

NOTE: A gallery is to be appended later tonight.

[View with PicLens]

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