Braise the Roof!

A recent snow day afforded us the opportunity to really put our slow cooker to the test, and braise some short ribs for over 8 hours.  The timing couldn't have been more perfect.  I've been a bit hesitant to leave the crock pot plugged in while Justin and I are both away at work, so being snowed in was the perfect time to let these babies braise.

I'd seen this recipe come through my email, and we merged it with a short rib recipe from Nom Nom Paleo.  Both recipes had similar ingredients in the braising liquids, so we thought it'd be easy to merge the two recipes.

We fired up the crock pot, and placed our seasoned short ribs inside.  To that, we added some roughly chopped carrots, celery, white onion, green onion, a handful of garlic cloves, and some ginger.  We also had some lemongrass on hand, so we added a bit of that to the crock pot too.  For some added sweetness, we tossed in some gula jawa, as well as a few cloves of fermented black garlic that we had on hand.

For the braising liquid, we combined about 1/2 cup soy sauce, a splash of fish sauce, a touch of apple cider vinegar, 1 cup beef broth, and enough water to cover the top of the ribs.  Then we just put the lid on, and let the ribs simmer the day away.

About halfway through, the aroma of the short ribs and braising liquid started to spread throughout the apartment, and it was hard to resist.  We let them cook for a solid 8 hours.  By the time we were ready to eat, the meat was so tender, it just fell off the bone and melted in your mouth.  Be sure to skim off as much fat from the braising liquid before spooning it over your short ribs.

To accompany our short ribs, we whipped up some rice, and snow pea greens sauteed with garlic.  The rice helped soak up some of the delicious braising liquid too, while the snow pea greens added a crisp, fresh component to the dish.  The short ribs were garnished with some toasted sesame seeds.  It was the perfect, hearty dinner for a wintery snow day.

Braised & Enthused

Sorry for the brief hiatus!  Between work, and the upcoming holidays, it's been a bit crazy around these parts.  We've mostly been cooking easy, standby recipes, so there haven't been many new recipes to post here.  However, we did receive some nice looking short ribs in a recent share and put those to good use, cooking them low and slow.  This method of cooking leaves the meat nice and tender, practically falling off the bone.

We're big fans of Top Chef, and Edward Lee, a contestant from the season based in Texas, just put out a cookbook combining his Korean roots and southern tradition called, Smoke & Pickles.  We followed his recipe for the short ribs, and it was quite delicious.

If there's a lot of excess fat, you'll want to trim some of it off.  Then parboil the ribs in a dutch oven for about 8 minutes, in about 4 cups of water.  Once they start to cook, pull them out of the water, and set them aside.  You'll want to skim some of the fat out of the liquid, and then reserve 2 cups of the cooking water.  The rest of the water can be dumped out, and you'll want to dry out your pot.

Once your pot is back on the stove, heat a couple tablespoons each of sesame oil and vegetable oil.  When it's nice and hot, drop in a few short ribs at a time.  You want to get a nice sear on all sides of each short rib, so you'll want to do them in batches.

Once all of the short ribs are seared, place all of them back in the pot, add your chopped onions, ginger and garlic, and let it cook for a few minutes.

Next, add your soy sauce, chicken stock, mirin, and the 2 cups of reserved cooking liquid and bring to a slow simmer.  To balance out the saltiness of the liquid, stir in some sugar and honey.

Then just let it simmer away, giving your short ribs a turn every now and then.  After an hour, add in your carrots, parsnips, and pine nuts.  The recipe also calls for raisins, but I'm not a huge fan, so we left them out.  There was enough sweetness already from the sugar and honey.

Let everything simmer until the short ribs are tender, and the liquid has thickened.  This will be about another hour or so.

While we were in the final stages of braising, we whipped up a side dish of roasted Brussels sprouts.  We halved the brussels sprouts and tossed them in a marinade of miso paste, ponzu, rice wine vinegar, and sesame oil.  We also stumbled upon some black garlic at Trader Joe's, so we sliced up a couple cloves and added them to the sprouts.

Black garlic gets it's color from being fermented for weeks.  It develops a nice sweet flavor, with hints of balsamic vinegar.  It may look a bit unappetizing, but it's quite delicious.  Once your sprouts are evenly coated, place them on a baking sheet and let them roast in the oven for about 20 minutes.  We topped them with some sesame seeds and bonito flakes, for a punch of umami.

Rice would be the traditional accompaniment for this dish, but Edward Lee pairs his short-ribs with edamame hummus. We went in a similar, but different direction, and  whipped up some roasted garlic mashed potatoes with some spuds we got in our share. They were a great way to soak up the delicious gravy.

The meat was super tender, and fell right off the bone.  The Asian flavors in the braising liquid really soaked into the meat, and was a nice balance of salty and sweet.  We will be making this recipe again if we get more short ribs, or if they're on sale at the market (if Justin gets his way!).

It's a Wrap!

On a cold, rainy night like tonight we were looking for a quick, easy, healthy, tasty, and comforting meal.  We were hungry for some delicious pot stickers like we had at Chinese New Year, but we wanted to keep it Paleo, and use some of our share ingredients, so decided to make some Asian lettuce wraps.

Essentially, we used the recipe for the pot sticker filling.  We started by mincing up some ginger, garlic, and scallions.  

That was all mixed with some ground pork, salt, white pepper, sesame oil, a little soy sauce, and a dash of Chinese cooking wine.  Next we chopped up our shitakes from the share, and tossed it all together.

We cooked the mixture in a pan with a bit of coconut oil, and it was ready in no time.  While that cooked, we julienned some carrots to wrap up in the lettuce, and chopped up a little more green onion, and some cilantro to garnish.

We tore the leaves from the head of bibb lettuce to use as our wraps, and set up a little station to build our wraps.  Just spoon in some pork and mushrooms, add a few carrot sticks, top with some green onion and cilantro, and you're good to go!

Homemade Kimchi

You've heard us talk about our homemade kimchi a few times (here and here), and we're finally spilling the beans on how we made it.

We used this recipe, given to us by my cousin, that came from The Lucky Peach.

We just had a head of regular green cabbage on hand, rather than the suggested napa cabbage, but from our previous experience, the green cabbage worked just as well.  Start by chopping your cabbage into big hunks.  You'll season liberally with salt and sugar, and let it sit in the fridge overnight.


Next, you'll want to whip up the seasonings.  In a food processor, puree the garlic, ginger, soy sauce, Korean chili flake, fish sauce, and brine shrimp.

Once that's formed a nice paste/sauce, dump it over your cabbage, carrots and green onion.  We also added some daikon to the mix.  Here's where you'll want to get in there with your hands to make sure the spice mixture gets into all the nooks and crannies of the cabbage.

Once everything is good and mixed, you'll want to stuff everything into a clean glass jar that can be sealed air tight.  We used the jars we picked up from Ikea, that we've also used for our sauerkraut.  Stuff as much of the cabbage as you can into the jar.  If you don't have a jar, you can also use a plastic container with a lid.  In our first attempt at making kimchi, we went this route, and it came out great!  The key is to make sure that the cabbage is packed in as tightly as possible, and no air can get in.

Then you just place it in the fridge and let it ferment.  After a week or so, it'll be ready to go!