MooMooFoodie

Cook and Share A Pot of Curry From MooMooFoodie's Kitchen! :)

Tom Yam Curry Chicken from MooMooFoodie's Kitchen! :)

Participate in this meaningful event and spread the importance of intercultural understanding between countries and also between the different races and nationalities within one country!

For background info:

http://www.facebook.com/#!/event.php?eid=254441147918239

This is a Facebook Page created by a group of Singaporeans after a report came about that a mainland Chinese family (from China) told a local Indian Family not to eat curry and not to cook curry. The appointed mediator - a certain Madam Giam facilitated the case in such a way that : the Indian family could cook curry only when the mainland Chinese family is not at home. (mediation agreement).

So far, more than 60,000 around the world (mostly Singaporeans!) are joining in. Cook a pot of curry or buy a take-out from a restaurant (if you can't cook or too busy to do so).

===

Excerpt from Facebook Page:

http://www.todayonline.com/Singapore/EDC110808-0000102/Number-of-neighbour-disputes-hit-high (this is the link)

and this is the clarification to the case:
http://app2.mlaw.gov.sg/Highlights/tabid/168/Default.aspx?ItemId=568

and 16th Aug 2011 (The Law Minister's clarification)
http://news.asiaone.com/News/AsiaOne%2BNews/Singapore/Story/A1Story20110816-294757/2.html

How we feel
------------------------------
How could a appointed mediator facilitate the case in such a way that restricts the lifestyle and cooking norms of the Indian family? Or any other local family who practices a cultural lifestyle that we have all made our own? In this case, Curry has always been part of our culture since the 1800s. It can be anything else that you or I hold dear.

There is a native Malay proverb "Di mana bumi dipijak, di situ langit dijunjung" ("You should hold up the sky of the land where you live") - ie one should respect the country in which you choose to live in. ( ie blend/ assimilate/ understand/ tolerate / integrate into the community of your chosen choice)

What we wish for
-----------------------------
When the new immigrants arrive here, we wish for them to respect / embrace the cultural / lifestyle and linguistic norms of this nation. We wish for all new immigrants and citizens to understand and appreciate the various and diverse cultural aspects of the various ethnic-minority groups we have here.

This is Singapore and we are part of Malayan culture. Our hinterland previously was Malaysia and the Indonesian archipelago. Our ancestors came, met and mingled and through an adventurous and open mindset, created something unique and beautiful... (thus our local culture as such- curries/ spices/ a vast melting pot of people and mixed heritages)

* A message to all new citizens: We sincerely hope you integrate into our local culture and make attempts to assimilate and embrace/ appreciate the various multi-ethnic cultures we had built up so painstakingly over the decades. Because at the same time, we are definitely open to taking the best that you have to offer, and to create new and beautiful Singaporean things.

*We Singaporeans are basically nice and tolerant people. We will accept you as new citizens and hope you blend in and integrate with us well.


Upset with CMC
-----------------------
We are mainly upset with the "Community Mediation Centre's" mediation action of actually facilitating such a mediation agreement. It is the inalienable right of the Indian family to cook curry at any time they wish to within the four walls of their home. (having said that, let us all- natives, new citizens or otherwise, embrace the multi-cultural aspects of our nation)

Every Singaporean should just cook a pot of curry and eat it (regardless of race / language / religion). We are Singaporeans and we LOVE our curries - be it chicken curry / fish curry / lamb curry / beef curry / beef rendang / lontong / mee siam/ laksa / Petai sambal belachan / ayam buah keluak etc

Thank You Very Much for supporting "Cook A Pot of Curry" Event!

- from the Admin Group

ST: The tart side of life

Lifestyle

Home > Lifestyle > Taste > Story

Apr 3, 2011

The tart side of life

Black vinegar has a complex, nuanced flavour, is simple to make and goes well with chicken

By Tan Hsueh Yun, Hunger Management

Perfect combination: Black vinegar dressing goes well with the chicken chunks, cucumber cubes, coriander and sliced chilli padi (above).

 

All around me, in the last couple of weeks, has been a sea of black. Black vinegar.

It was in the braised pig trotters I had at two eateries, Le Chasseur at New Bridge Road and Old Hong Kong Legend in Raffles City.

So thick, sweet and tart - I drank the sauces like soup and longed for more. And the eggs that had been stewed with the vinegar, they were a special treat.

Then there was the Japanese bento box dinner of black vinegar sweet and sour pork from Tampopo Deli in Liang Court. The vinegary tang was quite mellow but so good nonetheless.

One afternoon, a friend and I had lunch at one of my favourite coffeeshops, Cheng's Delicacies in Tiong Bahru, and I had to order their steamed Hainanese pork, a dish of sliced, tender pork belly with black vinegar dressing.

My friend took one slice and declared it too sour for him.

Good. More for me.

Anyone who has read my columns will know I cannot resist sour foods. Lemon, yuzu, lime, vinegar, they wake up my palate, make my eyes go wide, add zip to any meal.

My potato chip of choice is salt and vinegar, always. The classic recipe for a vinaigrette is one part vinegar, three parts oil. I like half and half.

I could go on and on about the vinegary foods I like. Crunchy pickles with a devilish sting. Fish and chips with lashings of malt vinegar. The pungent garlic, chilli and vinegar dip that is the first thing all Teochew restaurants set on the table when you sit down. And when you dip a piece of steamed pomfret into it, well, it's like dying and going to heaven.

Some people drink vinegar for health. There was a time where I would drink Korean pomegranate vinegar every day. I'm not at all sure about the benefits - but it tasted so good, especially with ice.

What is more important, to me at least, is how vinegar complements food.

Black vinegar, like balsamic vinegar, has a complex, nuanced flavour that is more than just one-note sour. It can be made from rice, wheat, millet or sorghum, or a combination of these grains.

When I have the time one day, I'll boil down a bottle of it, reduce it to a glaze. I bet it would make whatever it comes in contact with taste wonderful.

Since I could not get the steamed pork out of my mind, I decided I would experiment and make my own dressing out of black vinegar.

Much as I love pork belly, it is not something I can, or should, eat every day.

A leaner cut of pork might work, but let's face it, it would probably be dry.

Chicken is an acceptable substitute, I think. Breast meat is lean and if poached or steamed properly, will remain moist. I prefer drumsticks and thighs, and have used them in this recipe.

After trying various combinations of this and that, I settled on black vinegar, honey, soy and oil for the dressing.

It is dead simple to make. Of course, it is very tart, so add more or less of whatever ingredient to make it right for you.

I wish I could say that my black vinegar dressing was just like the one at Cheng's Delicacies. It is not, but it will do.

The tender chicken, crunchy cubes of cucumber, aromatic coriander and sliced chilli padi, all doused in the dressing, come together so well. I get a pleasant little jolt each time I bite into a bit of chilli.

Make the dressing first, so the flavours meld properly, and this salad should be eaten at room temperature.

And when everything is gone, maybe dunk some bread into the dressing. Do not waste a drop. Black is gold.

hsueh@sph.com.sg

www.facebook.com/tanhsuehyun

---

MAKE IT YOURSELF: CHICKEN SALAD

INGREDIENTS

4 Tbs black vinegar

1 tsp light soy sauce

1 Tbs canola oil

3 Tbs honey

1 medium cucumber, about 400g

1 bunch coriander leaves

3-4 chilli padi

4 chicken thighs and 4 chicken drumsticks, poached or steamed

METHOD

1. Pour the vinegar, soya sauce, oil and honey into a glass jar with a screw-top lid. Cover and shake. Have a taste and add more soy sauce or honey if needed. Set aside.

2. Wash and pat dry the cucumber, skin it, cut it into quarters lengthwise. Scrape out the seeds, cut each quarter lengthwise in half and then dice into cubes crosswise. Spread the cucumber out onto a serving plate.

3. Rinse and pat dry the coriander, cut off and discard most of the stem, leaving only the leaves. Set aside.

4. Slice the chilli padi, set aside.

5. Debone the chicken into large chunks, discard the skin, pile the meat on top of the cucumber.

6. Spoon all the dressing over it, and top with the coriander and chilli. Serve immediately.

Serves four to six.

WSJ: A Warming Dish for a Cold Winter's Night

FOOD & DRINK
DECEMBER 4, 2010

A Warming Dish for a Cold Winter's Night

This one-pot chicken recipe is a tried-and-true classic (sauce-mopping bread highly recommended)

By DORIE GREENSPAN

Chicken in a Pot is more some things than others: more arts and crafts than chemistry, more loosey-goosey than do-this, do-that and more flavorful than anything so easy has any right to be.

View Full Image

lan Richardson/Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

Rustic Enchantment Dorie Greenspan's chicken is cooked with vegetables and topped off with a crown of baked dough.

At its heart, it's a bird bathed in white wine and broth, put in a pot with vegetables and herbs, sealed with a circle of dough and roasted in the oven. It's simple in every way and yet it was hard for me to commit the recipe to paper. In trying to pin down a favorite version of this dish I'd made hundreds of times, I was haunted by the memory of so many chickens past.

I had my first chicken in a pot more than 30 years ago in Paris, where I've had so many dishes that have changed my life. Every time I make this dish, I think of that bird. It was made for me by a woman I'd met in a café earlier in the day, and it was served to me in her apartment on the chic Île Saint-Louis, in a room dominated by a view of the Seine and a carousel horse that reared on its hind legs and almost touched the ceiling. The chicken was in a close-fitting copper pot and a few bits of the root vegetables that had been roasted along with it were visible around its burnished breast.

Was it the best chicken I'd ever had? Nope. But it was beautiful in a warm come-to-the-table-and-dig-in kind of way and I left Madame's apartment knowing that this was the way I wanted my food to always look. The next day I bought a copper pot.

It was only later that I learned that while I think of the Île Saint-Louis dish as the "chicken in a pot," that name belongs to a specific recipe associated with Henri IV. The true dish, called "poule-au-pot," or hen in a pot, is a luxurious one in which a hen is stuffed with sausage and liver, onions and ham and herbs, and then poached in a rich broth. I've had ritzy versions of it in which the liver has been foie gras and a bunch of black truffles have been slid under the chicken's skin, and simple versions in which the stuffing was meager and the broth more like my grandmother's chicken soup. They were both good, but they didn't sing to me.

The dish that I came to love and to call my own was built mostly on a recipe made famous in the 1970s by Richard Olney, an American in Provence. His Chicken with 40 Cloves of Garlic was just that, a chicken roasted in a sealed pot with more garlic than anyone would deem conscionable. It was a marvel of a dish—the unpeeled cloves of garlic lost their punch in the oven, softened until they were spreadable and became almost sweet—and it had that come-hither warmth of that original Paris dinner. It also begged to be played with, and so I did. I used whatever vegetables I had at hand. Ditto herbs. When the season was right, I added apples and chestnuts. I made whole chickens and chicken pieces. And I used every pot in the house, including my now slightly battered copper pot, an enameled cast-iron casserole, a clay pot (without the dough seal) and an old-school speckled enamel roaster (not great for this).

And then, I discovered that Anton Westermann, a Michelin-starred chef from Alsace, was making chicken in a pot with preserved lemons and sweet potatoes. I started playing all over again.

With so many years of chickens in pots behind me, you can see why I hesitated to send one definitive version out into the world. But I did, at last—although I'm sending it off with lots of suggestions for tweaks to make it your own.

The only things that are musts are a good chicken (preferably organic); a bit of theatrical flair—crack the pot's seal at the table (that way everyone gets a whiff of the first fragrant pouf of steam); and some friends who will willingly prop their elbows on the table and risk getting a little messy dipping bread into the wonderful sauce that comes from cooking so many good things together.

— Dorie Greenspan is a cookbook author based in New York.

The Recipe: Cooking Time: 1 hour 45 minutes; Serves 6

Ingredients
½ preserved lemon, rinsed well
1 cup water
¼ cup sugar
5 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
2 large sweet potatoes, peeled and each cut into 8 same-sized pieces (you can use white potatoes, if you prefer)
16 small white onions, yellow onions, or shallots
8 carrots, trimmed, peeled, and quartered
4 celery stalks, trimmed, peeled, and quartered
4 garlic heads, cloves separated but not peeled
Salt and freshly ground pepper
3 thyme sprigs
3 parsley sprigs
2 rosemary sprigs
1 chicken, about 4 pounds, preferably organic, whole or cut into 8 pieces, at room temperature
1 cup chicken broth
½ cup dry white wine
1½ cups all-purpose flour
¾ cup hot water

What to Do:

1. Center a rack in the oven and preheat to 450 degrees.

2. Using a paring knife, slice the peel from the preserved lemon and cut it into small squares. Discard the pulp.

3. Bring the water and sugar to a boil in a small saucepan, drop in the peel, and cook for 1 minute. Drain and set aside.

4. Heat 2 tablespoons of olive oil in a large skillet over high heat. Add the vegetables and garlic, season with salt and pepper and sauté until vegetables are brown on all sides. (If necessary, do this in 2 batches.) Spoon vegetables into a 4½- to 5-quart Dutch oven or other pot with a lid and stir in the herbs and the preserved lemon.

5. Return the skillet to the heat and add another tablespoon of olive oil. Brown the chicken on all sides, seasoning it with salt and pepper as it cooks.

6. Tuck chicken into the casserole, surrounding it with the vegetables.

7. Mix together the broth, wine, and the remaining olive oil and pour over the chicken and vegetables.

8. Put 1½ cups flour in a medium bowl and add enough hot water to make a malleable dough. Dust a work surface with a little flour, turn out the dough, and, working with your hands, roll the dough into a sausage.

9. Place the dough on the rim of the pot — if it breaks, just piece it back together — and press the lid onto the dough to seal the pot.

10. Slide the pot into the oven and bake for 55 minutes.

11. Now you have a choice — you can break the seal in the kitchen or do it at the table, where it's bound to make a mess, but where everyone will have the pleasure of sharing that first fragrant whiff as you lift the lid with a flourish. Whether at the table or in the kitchen, the best tool to break the seal is the least attractive: a screwdriver. Use the point of the screwdriver as a lever to separate the lid from the dough.

Depending on whether your chicken was whole or cut up, you might have to do some in-the-kitchen carving, but in the end, you want to make sure that the vegetables and the delicious broth are on the table with the chicken.

Serving

If the chicken is cut up, you can just serve it and the vegetables from the pot. If the chicken is whole, you can quarter it and return the pieces to the pot or arrange the chicken and vegetables on a serving platter. Either way, you don't need to serve anything else but some country bread, which is good for spreading with the sweet garlic popped from the skins and dunking into the cooking broth. A pot at the table is because it makes for easy dipping.

Storing

If you have any leftover chicken, vegetables, and broth (what we call "goop" in our house), they can be reheated gently in the top of a double boiler or in a microwave oven.

Bonne idée

Save yourself time by using store-bought pizza dough to seal the pot.

Adapted from "Around My French Table: More than 300 Recipes from My Home to Yours," Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

Printed in The Wall Street Journal, page D1

Copyright 2010 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved

NY Times: A Boost for Beer-Can Chicken

July 16, 2010

A Boost for Beer-Can Chicken

By MELISSA CLARK

A FEW years ago, I tried to make beer-can chicken. The recipe called for balancing a whole chicken on a half-empty can of beer, then grilling it over indirect heat. The steam generated from the beer was supposed to keep the chicken moist, while the indirect heat bronzed the skin without turning it black.

I’m an ardent fan of roast chickens, and this seemed like the perfect way to cook a chicken on a hot day when I didn’t want to turn on the oven and heat up the house. The bird could cook outside with the mosquitoes while I stayed inside with the air-conditioner.

But my grilling skills back then were sorely lacking. My chicken ended up a pale, rubbery mess, probably a result of not adding enough coals as they burned down.

It was so disappointing that I might never have tried beer-can chicken again. But then I got a gas grill, which can provide consistent heat, making the recipe less prone to human error.

So I picked up a can of beer and a chicken, game for another round.

One of the other problems I had last time was a very dry bird. I tried to think of a way to avoid relying on the steam from the beer to keep the chicken moist. I decided to bring out the big guns — a tub of mayonnaise, perfect for preventing the flesh from drying out. It could also act as a vehicle for adding spices (and color).

I could have used any spice mix, either purchased or homemade, but chose Madras curry because I love its earthy, intense flavor. A squirt of hot sauce gave the mixture a happy jolt. I slathered it all over the bird, including inside the cavity, and plopped it on the grill.

That wasn’t all I did. Usually, when I roast a chicken, I add potatoes and carrots to the pan, creating a one-pot meal. So I coated some fingerling potatoes with the spiced mayo, adding them to the grill about halfway through the cooking. Instead of carrots, I sliced up some orange bell peppers to grill over direct heat while the chicken was resting.

When I brought everything inside, the chicken was steaming, golden and succulent while the kitchen was pleasantly cool — and so was the cook.

===

Spice-Rubbed Beer-Can Chicken with Potatoes and Sweet Peppers

Time: 20 minutes plus 75 minutes cooking

1 3 1/2- to 4-pound chicken

Kosher salt and ground black pepper

1 cup mayonnaise

1 1/2 tablespoons madras curry powder or your favorite spice mix

Hot sauce, to taste

1 can beer

1 pound fingerling potatoes, halved lengthwise

2 large red, orange or yellow bell peppers, quartered and deseeded

Olive oil

Lime wedges, for serving

Chopped basil, for serving.

1. Prepare grill for indirect heat: if using gas, heat one side to medium high for 10 minutes, leaving other side off. If using charcoal, mound and light coals on one side.

2. Season chicken generously inside and out with salt and pepper. Mix mayonnaise with spices and hot sauce to taste. Slather all but 2 tablespoons of mayonnaise mixture over chicken, including cavity.

3. Open beer and drink or pour out half. Lower chicken over can so that can is inside chicken cavity. Chicken should be upright. Place chicken on unlit side and cover grill. Cook for 30 minutes. Meanwhile, toss potatoes with remaining mayonnaise and a pinch of salt. Toss peppers with olive oil, salt and pepper.

4. When chicken has cooked for 30 minutes, set potatoes on grill, also on unlit side. If using charcoal, add more coals. Let both cook for 30 minutes more. When done, potatoes should be soft and golden; chicken skin should be brown (around 75 minutes, depending on your grill). If necessary, move both to lighted side to brown further.

5. When chicken is done, very carefully remove can (hold chicken with tongs and use an oven mitt to pull out can). Let chicken rest for 5 minutes. Meanwhile, grill peppers for about 2 to 3 minutes each side.

6. Carve chicken and garnish with lime wedges and basil before serving with potatoes and peppers.

Yield: 4 servings.

FT: When cream rises to the top

When cream rises to the top

By Rowley Leigh

Published: July 17 2010 00:33 | Last updated: July 17 2010 00:33

The client is perturbed. He expresses the hope that “the cream is there merely to convey the flavour of the mushrooms and that the chicken will not be smothered in a heavy cream sauce”. One knows what he means. Nobody wants heavy cream sauces any more. Not only do they mask the flavour of the ingredients but everybody knows that they are absolutely wicked, being full of calories and cholesterol and, therefore, to be avoided at all times.

Thirty years ago it was slightly different. With the advent of nouvelle cuisine, nobody wanted thick, heavy floury sauces. Cream was OK. Trawl through the books of celebrated chefs Michel Guérard, the Troisgros brothers and Alain Chapel and you will find a fair dollop of cream, usually in the form of crème fraîche as they could not get double or “heavy” cream very easily in those days. French chefs coming over to England could not believe their luck when they saw our product and they practically fell into a vat of luscious double cream.

Thirty years before that, in the bad old 1950s, food was covered in thick sauces. You could go to Wheelers in London and order sole 30 different ways and 28 of them were the same sauce in different variations. Cream was a great luxury that you put on your strawberries rather than on your fish. It is still a great luxury and if we treated it as such, we would use it sparingly rather than not at all.

That does not mean that I do not think twice these days before I deploy cream in a sauce. It should certainly count for something. I still put a little cream in a steak au poivre – only a dash, mind – and am partial to a silky fish sauce when sole or turbot bones have been stewed with shallots, white wine and cream. Similarly, I cannot resist a splash of cream when the luxurious combination of chicken and morels hoves into view. When it comes to chicken with tarragon I have tried to be good. I have stuffed a mixture of fromage frais, shallots and tarragon under the breast of a chicken before roasting it and I have infused a light jus with a little chopped tarragon and tarragon vinegar. I have made a chasseur sauce with tomatoes, mushrooms and tarragon. All these have been good – I wouldn’t repeat the fromage frais effort, though – but none of them comes close to the marriage of chicken, tarragon and cream. To be avoided perhaps, but not at all times.

Rowley Leigh is the chef at Le Café Anglais

rowley.leigh@ft.com

More columns at www.ft.com/leigh

...............................

Recipe: Chicken fricassee with tarragon

Not really a dinner party dish and not quite enough for four: perhaps, unusually, a dish for three.

Ingredients

1 chicken, weighing about 1.8kg

50g unsalted butter

Cooking oil

3tsp very finely chopped shallot

2tsp chopped fresh tarragon

2tbsp tarragon vinegar

1 glass of white wine

100ml chicken stock

200ml double cream

Sea salt, pepper

Method

● Cut the chicken into eight pieces, leaving some bone attached to the breast pieces. Season them well. Heat half the butter with an equal quantity of cooking oil in a heavy bottomed sauté dish or casserole big enough to take all the chicken. Put the pieces in skin side down. Adjust the heat: the idea is to slowly colour and cook the chicken without letting it, or the fat, burn. Turn after a minimum of 10 minutes. Cook for another five minutes by which time the breast pieces should be cooked: remove them and finish cooking the thighs and drumsticks – it’s perfectly permissible to pop the whole pan in a hot oven to finish them off for five minutes at this stage.

● When all the chicken is cooked, transfer it to a dish and pour all the fat out of the pan in which it is cooked. Put it back on the heat, add the rest of the butter and the chopped shallot. Stew this gently and, when softened, add the tarragon and the tarragon vinegar. Let this evaporate completely and then add the white wine. Using a wooden spoon, scrape up all the caramelised juices from the pan and let them blend with the wine.

● Add the chicken stock and let this boil vigorously until reduced by half and then add the cream all at once. Season with salt and pepper, bring back to the boil and simmer until the cream has thickened a little and reduced to a sauce like consistency. Put the chicken pieces back in the pan with the sauce and warm them gently.

● Taste the sauce: it will probably need more seasoning and a small jigger of the tarragon vinegar (or a squeeze of lemon) may be necessary to cut the richness of the cream. Serve with rice pilaf and a salad of lettuce hearts.

Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2010.

TIME: Organic Eggs - More Expensive, but No Heathier

Thursday, Jul. 08, 2010

Organic Eggs: More Expensive, but No Healthier

By Jeffrey Kluger

This year, like every year, has been a busy one for America's chickens. What the birds lack in smarts they make up for in work ethic, laying about 78 billion eggs annually (or 6.5 billion dozen), supplying a $7 billion industry. GM should be doing so well.

Like any other workers, hens turn out economy, premium and luxury products — known as factory, cage-free and organic eggs — and consumers pay accordingly. A recent survey conducted in one random city — Athens, Ga. — found factory eggs going for $1.69 per dozen, cage-free for $2.99 to $3.59, and organic for $3.99 to a whopping $5.38.

But it's worth it to pay more because you're getting a healthier product, right? Wrong. Most of the time, according to a just-released study by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), the eggs are indistinguishable. When there is a difference, it's often the factory eggs that are safer. (See pictures of chefs at work in the fields where their food is grown.)

The study, led by food technologist Deana Jones, was not designed to explore the question of which egg-laying conditions are best for the hens themselves — simply because there is no question. Factory hens are confined in what are known as battery cages, which leave them crowded and all but immobilized, reduced to little more than egg-laying machines. Free-range and organic chickens have different degrees of freedom to move and are raised on varying levels of higher-quality feed. There's no question what kind of life the birds prefer.

What Jones and her colleagues wanted to learn is whether a happy hen in fact produces a better product. To do that, they relied principally on something known as the Haugh unit — a highly specialized egg-quality metric developed by food technologist Raymond Haugh in 1937. The white of an egg is where all its protein is found; it's made of both thin albumen — the watery fluid that runs farthest from the yolk when the egg is cracked into a cold pan — and thick albumen, the more viscous fluid that stays closer to the middle. The greater the amount of thick albumen, the more nutritious the egg. (See TIME's special report on food labels.)

"The Haugh unit factors together the weight of the egg and the thickness of the albumen layer at the center," says Jones. And that number, she found in her study, is not affected a whit by how a hen is raised. "We found no meaningful differences at all," she says. "We sampled eggs from a number of stores and kept getting the same results over and over. For shoppers, the decision comes down to your ethical and moral choices."

That, at least, is all that's involved when it comes to egg nutrition. But what about safety? Don't organic eggs have the edge in terms of antibiotics and other contaminants? Surprisingly, the USDA has not devoted a great deal of study to the antibiotic question, mostly because the drugs are used sparingly in the egg-laying industry — at least compared with the cattle industry, in which even healthy animals are kept dosed to prevent infections. (See pictures of what makes you eat more food.)

"There's just very little research I've seen on this," says USDA immunologist and microbiologist Peter Holt. "Hens are not routinely treated with antibiotics, though they may be if they're sick." In those cases, the eggs the birds produce lose their organic designation temporarily, until the drugs have cleared their systems.

The bigger problem comes with the environmental contaminants, and here the factory eggs have the edge. Research in both the U.S. and the E.U. has shown that free-range chickens have higher levels of PCBs, simply because they get out more and can peck almost anywhere. "There was a study in California of a free-range or organic farm with a wood-processing facility nearby," says Holt. "The chickens there had 100 times the PCB level of battery-cage chickens." A Brazilian study found something similar with DDT, even though the pesticide, which is slow to degrade, hadn't been used in the area in nine years. "You really have to know the history of the land before you can be sure it's safe," Holt says.(Comment on this story.)

Another mistake some health-conscious consumers make — though it doesn't take the new USDA study to reveal it — is believing that the color of an egg makes a difference and that brown shells are somehow better than white ones. They're not. Color is determined entirely by the breed of chicken laying it, and the fact that brown eggs often cost a little more has nothing to do with quality. "It simply takes more feed to get a brown-shell species to lay," says Jones. "You're paying that additional production cost." As in any other industry, when the workers get a raise — even if it's chickenfeed — you'll see it on the price tag.

Find this article at:
http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,2002334,00.html

FT: The best roast duck in the world

I'm a foodie but not an influential one :D I've tried the roast duck at Four Seasons but I must say there are better ones in Hong Kong, and even in sunny island Singapore. They may have the best roast duck in London but definitely not in the world. For those who disagree, pardon me! :)

===

The best roast duck in the world

By Nicholas Lander

Published: February 13 2010 00:48 | Last updated: February 13 2010 00:48

The west London branch of Four Seasons restaurant

On my fifth visit to the Four Seasons restaurant in London’s Chinatown, I was granted a glimpse of its famed barbecue kitchen. Here, chefs use a secret recipe to make what many believe to be the best roast duck in the world.

As we climbed to the fourth floor of this narrow building on Gerrard Street, Joe, the genial manager, asked me to hold tight to the handrail. “The floor gets very greasy from roasting so many ducks and we have to wash it down regularly,” he explained.

Two chefs greeted me in the kitchen, where ducks and sides of pork were hanging from hooks close to the open window. Various bowls, sitting on a large table, contained the ingredients for the marinade and the sauce that is known only to the roasting chef. There were two metal roasting ovens, each of which could hold a dozen ducks.

The reputation of this dish, here and at the original branch in Queensway, west London, has spread globally. My initial visit was prompted by a tip-off from a Hong Kong hotelier who said it was the best roast duck she had eaten anywhere, including Asia.

My several meals here have persuaded me of this opinion. Furthermore, the prices are extremely reasonable. At one lunch, the bill for a large bowl of spine-tingling hot and sour soup followed by roast duck, Chinese vegetables and rice for four was £57. Fans of the restaurant begged me to keep it a secret and not to write about it.

At another meal I dined with Peter Tsui, the company secretary and spokesman for the two restaurants, which are jointly owned by several Chinese families. Tsui was born in Hong Kong but grew up in England, where he washed dishes in his mother’s restaurant. He uses Chinese astrology as the basis for his wide-ranging views on the restaurant business, football and the stock markets.

After ordering Chinese broccoli, rice and a mixed plate of duck, chicken cooked in soy and pork with excellent crackling (the skin had been pricked to allow the marinade to penetrate the meat over 24 hours), Tsui revealed a few of the secrets behind his barbecue section’s continued success.

“Between the two restaurants, we prepare about 700 ducks a week,” he said. They come from Ireland and they have to have a certain amount of fat on them. The fat is important because a lot of our business is takeaway and the flavour has to survive being reheated.”

The ducks are stuffed with herbs and spices and then submerged in a mixture of vinegar and maltose syrup before roasting at a very high temperature for 45-60 minutes. When they come out of the oven they smell, according to Tsui, “as sweet as freshly baked bread”. And because the restaurant is so popular and the takeaway business so busy, the ducks never linger.

Only the roasting chef knows the precise amounts of the ingredients in the marinade and, more importantly, in the sauce, which he only prepares when he is on his own. I can reveal, however, that it involves soy sauce, a sweetener, herbs and spices.

“We have managed to keep it a secret,” said Tsui, “not just from the rest of the staff but also from a number of people who have offered to work here for nothing to find out how we make it.”

Finally, there is Tsui’s contribution. “Part of my job is to go round and taste the competition, the other part is to ensure we never let our standards slip.”

I have only a few caveats. Although it shares the name, the restaurant has no connection with the Four Seasons hotel chain, which could be confusing; while the food is excellent, the decor is functional; and, although bookings are taken, they will always be for when a table becomes available rather than a specific time.

But, for lovers of roast duck, this is a price well worth paying.

Four Seasons, 12 Gerrard Street, Chinatown, London W1, tel: +44 (0)20 7494 0870 and 84 Queensway, London W2, tel: +44 (0)20 7229 4320. Both open 7 days.

nicholas.lander@ft.com
More columns at www.ft.com/lander

Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2010

Baked chicken with kimchi

My aunt gave us a pack of kimchi which my mom wanted me to "get rid of its because of its strong smell. Instead of the usual stir-fried, I thought I will have baked chicken instead. It turned out quite well :)

You can replace the chicken with beef or pork. If you prefer vegetables, you can use mushrooms, zucchini, bell peppers etc. Just let your imagination and preferences take charge :)

===

Ingredients:

1) 4 chicken leg

2) 1 small red onion (cut into slices)

3) Kimchi

4) 1 packet of enoki mushrooms

5) 1 carrot (cut into slices)

6) Butter

7) Parsley (I used dried parsley because I don't have fresh one in my fridge)

8) Pepper

Sauce:

A mix of the korean red pepper paste, sesame oil, chinese cooking wine and mirin. I did not have the precise measurements as I am still experimenting. But I think it should be as follows:

1) 2 tablespoons each of korean red pepper paste

2) 4 tablespoons of mirin

3) 1 tablespoon each of sesame oil and chinese cooking wine (Shaoxing wine)

Method:

1) Pre-heat oven to 175 deg C.

2) 4 pieces of aluminium foil (measuring about 20cm x 20com)

3) Put a few slices of onion, a teaspoon of butter and kimchi as the base, followed by the chicken.

4) Put the enoki mushrooms, carrots and more kimchi with some sauce on top. Finish off with parsley and blackpepper. 

5) Fold it into a parcel and baked for 60 min. When it is done, you can unwrap it and turn on the grill to give it a nice brown finishing.

6) Serve hot with rice.

NY Times: Recipe - Korean Fried Chicken (Yangnyeom Dak)

October 7, 2009

Recipe

Korean Fried Chicken (Yangnyeom Dak)

Adapted from “Quick and Easy Korean Cooking” by Cecilia Hae-Jin Lee (Chronicle Books, 2009)

Time: 30 minutes, plus one hour’s marinating

1 small yellow onion, coarsely grated

2 cloves garlic, minced

1/2 teaspoon salt, plus more for coating

1/4 teaspoon black pepper, plus more for coating

8 to 10 boneless, skinless chicken thighs, quartered, or 24 wings

3 tablespoons Korean chili paste (gojuchang)

3 tablespoons ketchup

1/4 cup sugar

2 tablespoons toasted sesame seeds, more for garnish

Juice of 1/2 lemon

Oil for deep frying

1/2 cup all-purpose flour

2/3 cup cornstarch.

1. In a medium-size bowl, combine grated onion, garlic, salt and pepper. Add chicken and toss to coat well. Cover and set aside to marinate for about 1 hour.

2. In a large bowl, stir together chili paste, ketchup, sugar, sesame seeds and lemon juice. Taste and adjust flavors to get a spicy-sweet-tangy finish. Set aside.

3. Pour oil into a large heavy pot to a depth of 1 1/2 inches. Heat to 350 degrees. Combine flour and cornstarch in a shallow bowl and season with salt and pepper.

4. Working in batches to avoid crowding, lift chicken from marinade, dredge lightly in seasoned flour and cornstarch, gently drop into oil and fry for 5 to 7 minutes, turning occasionally, until golden brown and crisp. Drain on paper towels. Repeat with remaining chicken, checking oil temperature between batches.

5. For wings only, when all pieces are done, increase oil temperature to 375 degrees and refry in batches for 30 to 60 seconds, until very crisp. Drain once more on paper towels. While chicken is still hot, brush thickly with chili sauce. Serve hot, sprinkled with sesame seeds.

Yield: 4 to 6 servings.

Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

NY Times: Fried Chicken - A Migratory Bird

October 7, 2009

Fried Chicken: A Migratory Bird

 

 

Evan Sung for The New York Times

CRUNCH. CRUNCH. CRUNCH. Clockwise from top left: a platter of Old Bay seasoned and Korean style chicken at Momofuku Noodle Bar; Tebaya; Tebaya’s karaage chicken; Momofuku; Tebaya’s sesame wings; Koji Okamoto of Tebaya. More Photos

By JULIA MOSKIN

 

THE religion of Southern fried chicken is spreading fast in New York City, with pilgrims making stops at the Redhead in the East Village, Locanda Verde in TriBeCa and Buttermilk Channel in Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn.

But while adherents may argue about buttermilk or brine, batter or dredge and shallow fry or deep fry, dissenters say there’s a more fundamental question — is Southern fried chicken ever that inspiring?

“Without seasoning it, without chopping it, fried chicken has no flavor at all,” said Eddie Yee, the manager of the Congee Village restaurant in Chinatown, where the hacked crispy garlic chicken is suffused with spice, crunch and sweetness.

At the two Fatty Crab restaurants, Corwin Kave’s fried chicken with Thai chilies, an occasional special, is a thin-crusted, spice-rubbed project that takes five days, begins in a steam oven and ends in a wok, and is flavored with turmeric, fennel seed, ginger, fish sauce and smoked simple syrup. Of the thick-crusted genre, Mr. Kave, the restaurants’ chef, said, “That’s just junk food.”

Southern fried chicken is usually seasoned with nothing more than salt and pepper. Once that fabulous crust is gone, it’s hard to ignore that the big hunks of breast are often as dry and woolly as fiberglass insulation, and the moister parts have a caul of flabby skin under the crust.

But around the city, from Creole kitchens to Japanese wing joints to carbon copies of Korean fast food, there’s far more to taste in fried chicken than just crust. (Warning: MSG ahead.)

At Congee Village, Mr. Yee and the chef Yong Quan Yang have spent years developing their recipe, which now involves rubbing a whole chicken with white vinegar and malt syrup; seasoning the inside of the bird — this, Mr. Yee says, is essential — with five-spice powder, poultry seasoning, ginger and garlic; then hanging it in front of a fan to dry the skin (as is done for Peking duck), for about five hours. Then it’s deep-fried whole, while a glaze of sugar, Thai fish sauce, sesame oil, white pepper and soy sauce is combined with slices of deep-fried garlic. The whole bird is hacked into pieces and the garlic glaze poured on top, where it slides off the crisp skin and saturates the meat.

That Congee Village chicken is one of the birds that inspired the chef David Chang to pose a challenge to all the cooks in his empire last summer: come up with a fried chicken dinner worthy of the Momofuku name.

“It was a long, arduous month,” said Kevin Pemoulie, chef at Momofuku Noodle Bar, whose dark-meat double-fried pieces, brushed with a spicy Korean-influenced glaze, was one of two winners. “It gave me new insight into the deep fryer.”

Mr. Pemoulie said the chefs tried various types of flour, multiple fryings, turning the batter into foam, and adding vodka to it (that idea stuck). Sean Gray of Ssam Bar tried to even out the cooking time between light meat and dark by resting a whole bird, legs down, in a pot half-filled with bubbling oil (“Jacuzzi style,” Mr. Pemoulie said).

The final meal — available by reservation only, a few times daily, at Noodle Bar — is a vast feed that includes Mr. Pemoulie’s chicken and one by Peter Serpico, chef at Momofuku Ko, a relatively traditional American fried chicken with a bit of rice flour in the batter and a big salty shot of Old Bay seasoning. (Celery seed and paprika dominate the flavors.) The mountain of chicken is accompanied to the table by four sauces; house-made Chinese-style mu shu pancakes for wrapping; and a bowl of raw vegetables like baby carrots, radishes and fushimi peppers, plus leaves of shiso, basil and mint.

Others have taken a more direct route to packing flavor into fried chicken.

“Fried chicken is completely traditional to our generation,” said Koji Okamoto, the 39-year-old chef and owner of Tebaya, a Japanese chicken-wing specialist in Chelsea. Although Japan’s culinary lexicon did not include deep frying until the Portuguese introduced it in the 16th century, the country now has at least three distinct fried chicken styles: katsu, with super-crisp panko or bread crumbs, is used for pounded breasts; karaage, ginger-and-garlic-marinated thighs in a light, puffy crust of sweet-potato starch; and Nagoya-style tebasaki, or wings.

That’s Mr. Okamoto’s specialty. His are tossed in a bath of soy sauce, mirin (sweet rice wine), black pepper and sesame seeds, after not one but two trips to the deep fryer. “The first frying seals the flavors in,” Mr. Okamoto said. “And the second one makes it crisp outside.”

Mr. Okamoto is from Nagoya, but his family is Korean, and his super-peppered wings recipe bears a distinct resemblance to the spicy Korean fried chicken that has become popular in New York since it was introduced around 2006.

Cecilia Hae-Jin Lee, the author of “Quick and Easy Korean Cooking,” said fried chicken became popular in Korea when fast-food places opened there after the war. “It fit into the family of Korean food called anju — specifically, something you eat with alcohol,” she said Monday in an interview from Seoul.

The original American formula has been altered to good effect, with less breading and the addition of spicy and sweet glazes that season the crisp skin. There are countless chicken chains and neighborhood places in Seoul, she said, each with fans that support the extra garlic here, the chili heat there, and extra sesame seeds across town. In New York, a great place to try it is Kyochon, in Flushing, where the skin is potato-chip-crisp and the sauces not too sweet.

American fried chicken has also been reworked in the Philippines, and exported back to New York. King Phojanakong, the chef at Kuma Inn and the new Umi Nom, in Brooklyn, serves fried wings tossed with roasted salt and lots of black pepper, sprinkled with fish sauce and thin slices of fresh green chili.

Mr. Phojanakong, a native New Yorker, has been spending summers with family in the Philippines since he was a child. He says that the region around Silay City is known for its birds, which are all, by default, free range and organic. The traditional marinade for them includes garlic, fermented fish sauce, lemon grass and palm vinegar, and the Umi Nom wings recall that balance of funky, salty and sweet.

“My favorite place is called Manukan Country, or Chicken Country,” he said. “No one finds it strange that there are 30 chicken vendors under one roof.” The dish is so popular that it has its own slang — “PAL” is the word for chicken wings, because it’s the acronym for Philippine Airlines; “Adidas” is used for chicken feet, a popular street snack.

The global question when it comes to fried chicken is: how to deal with the skin? Chicken skin is full of collagen and fat, both of which hug moisture that keeps it from getting, and staying, crisp.

“The skin should be absolutely dry and taut to the flesh before you fry it,” Mr. Kave said. “The best way to keep chicken skin crisp is to not put anything on it at all,” said Harold McGee, the food scientist. “But that wouldn’t fit many people’s idea of good fried chicken.”

Batters add moisture; sweet potato, cornstarch and rice flour look similar but create different effects in the fryer.

“The most important variable we found wasn’t ingredients but temperature,” said Mr. Pemoulie: a few degrees each way in the fryer substantially changed the result. In other words, fried chicken is a highly complex amalgamation of muscle and bone, fat and flour. It’s no wonder that chefs like Andrew Carmellini and Jean-Georges Vongerichten are stooping to conquer it.

But restaurants that plume themselves on pristine, freshly fried chicken are missing the point: the stuff tastes best at least an hour out of the fryer. Find a place where the chicken is fried in batches but there’s plenty of turnover, like Mambí, a 24-hour Dominican cafe near the Broadway stanchions of the George Washington Bridge.

(Mambí is the kind of place where the toilet paper dispenser is padlocked, but the counter ladies nonetheless call everyone “amor.”)

One of the cooks, Carina Mejía, marinates chicken pieces — none bigger than a handball — in garlic, lime juice, black pepper and sazón Goya, the all-purpose Latin-Caribbean mix of MSG, cumin, coriander seed and annatto. Savory and crunchy, with a warm brown-and-burnt-orange crust, it could give rise to its own religion — with a cult of lime wedges and pink pickled onion rings on the side.

Finding Crunch Beyond Kentucky

Some of New York’s best (non-Southern) fried chicken dishes:

CONGEE VILLAGE 100 Allen Street (Delancey Street), (212) 941-1818, congeevillagerestaurants.com. House special crispy garlic chicken: whole, $18; half, $9.

FATTY CRAB UPPER WEST SIDE 2170 Broadway (76th and 77th Street), (212) 496-2722, fattycrab.com. Fried chicken with Thai chilies and smoked palm sugar is an occasional special, $22 to $25, depending on the kind of chicken.

KYOCHON 156-50 Northern Boulevard (157th Street), Flushing, Queens, (718) 939-9292. Original and spicy versions; $19.59 for a whole chicken.

MAMBí 4181 Broadway (177th Street), Washington Heights, (212) 928-9796. Pollo frito, served with rice and beans; $9.35.

MOMOFUKU NOODLE BAR 171 First Avenue (10th Street), East Village, (212) 777-7773, momofuku.com. Fried chicken dinner, by online reservation; two chickens and unlimited sides, $100.

TEBAYA 144 West 19th Street (Seventh Avenue), Chelsea, (212) 924-3335. Fried wings in black-pepper soy sauce; $5.75 for eight.

UMI NOM 433 DeKalb Avenue (Classon Avenue), Clinton Hill, Brooklyn, (718) 789-8806, uminom.com. Salt-and-pepper wings with Anaheim chilies; $10.

===

Koji Okamoto, the 39-year-old chef and owner of Tebaya, a Japanese chicken-wing specialist in Chelsea. With Southern-style fried chicken on every menu around town, Tebaya is one of the restaurants that are doing fried chicken differently, with more spice and flavor.

 

His wings are tossed in a bath of soy sauce, mirin (sweet rice wine), black pepper and sesame seeds, after two trips to the deep fryer. "The first frying seals the flavors in," he said. "And the second one makes it crisp outside."

Mr. Okamoto's karaage, ginger-and-garlic-marinated thighs in a light, puffy crust of sweet-potato starch

"Without seasoning it, without chopping it, fried chicken has no flavor at all," said Eddie Yee, the manager of the Congee Village restaurant in Chinatown. At left, diners reach for the restaurant's garlic fried chicken.

 

At Congee Village, a whole chicken is rubbed with white vinegar and malt syrup, seasoned inside with five-spice powder, poultry seasoning, ginger and garlic, and then hung in front of a fan to dry the skin, for about five hours. Then it's deep-fried whole.

After deep-frying, the chicken is then hacked into pieces. A garlic glaze is poured on top, where it slides off the crisp skin and saturates the meat.

The result is a fried chicken suffused with spice, crunch and sweetness.

Momofuku Noodle Bar offers a fried chicken dinner -- available by reservation only -- that includes a relatively traditional American fried chicken with a bit of rice flour in the batter and a big salty shot of Old Bay seasoning, seen here on the left side of the platter. Dark-meat, double-fried pieces, brushed with a spicy Korean-influenced glaze, round out the rest of the plate.

The mountain of Momofuku chicken is accompanied to the table by four sauces, house-made Chinese-style mu shu pancakes for wrapping, and a bowl of raw vegetables like radishes and fushimi peppers, plus leaves of shiso, basil and mint.

At The two Fatty Crab restaurants, the chef Corwin Kave's fried chicken is a thin-crusted, spice-rubbed project that takes five days to make.

Mr. Kave's chicken begins in a steam oven and ends in a wok, and is flavored with turmeric, fennel seed, ginger, fish sauce and smoked simple syrup.

Of the Southern, thick-crusted genre of fried chicken that's spreading fast in New York City, Mr. Kave, at left, said, "That's just junk food."

Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company