wordless wednesday

*moment of silence - shhh* :)

Foods that evoke memories and make me happy while eating them are the ones I treasure most. Even when I'm eating alone, there's always something that makes me smile after each bite - with or without you.

What foods make you happy?

-Sean

utage (athens, ga)

Asian food in this town always leaves me feeling empty. No stellar place to get a spicy Korean jjigae for hangovers, Chinese food is Mongolian Beef and Sesame Chicken and sushi is "express" $1 specials. ValPal and I went to Utage after a brutal PK test (class average of 60% with no curve - ouch!) to destress and find good food.

I'm not a big fan of writing negative reviews so I'll keep this short and just hit the main points. There's a plethora of crazy rolls, teriyaki meats, noodles, Japanese curry and sashimi/nigiri on the menu. Unfortunately, everything we ordered was below average but in all fairness - I came here expecting such results.

There are 2 main problems at Utage with respect to the sushi. Fishy fish (not fresh) and terrible rice. Aside from being thrown around like a rag and mistreated by the itamae, the quality of fish is low...which explains their low prices. Each fish is absolute mush when you bite into it and even before tasting it, it smells fishy. The rice is missing the vinegary/slightly sweet flavor and dry.

The Japanese curry tastes like it's made from a premade roux and although not stellar - it was the best thing we had at Utage. It comes packed with onions so I would avoid it if you don't like onions. Get the tonkatsu curry if you're gonna order this from Utage. The katsu is under the curry - promise!

My experience at Utage left me with more to be desired and a greater longing for good Asian food in my college town. I often think about investing in a place after graduation that will only serve awesome tonkotsu ramen and soondubu. Anyone want to beat me to it and open up shop? I swear I'll be there at least 4 times a week.

Tips:

• Check the local newspaper for daily/weekly specials

dubu jjim/두부찜 (steamed tofu)

Tofu.

So tasty and beautiful yet so, so misunderstood.

Tofu's kinda like the "unpopular, seemingly ugly" girl the starting quarterback falls in love with in those chick flicks. Once you dress it up a little bit, it's actually a beautiful thing food. And before you get any wrong ideas - no I don't like to watch that stuff. C'mon, every guy's been forced to watch a chick flick in agony at one point.

Good tofu has an inherent nuttiness that's often mistaken as "tasteless" by many people. And if you've had bad tofu (and there are a lot of badly made tofu out there in the grocery stores), I can see why people would see it as a bland, tasteless block of gray matter. But I'm here to tell you now that tofu does have flavor and it can be... delicious!

One of the simplest, easiest and most importantly - fastest - way to dress up tofu is to steam it and eat it with a spicy, garlic soy sauce. Because the sauce is so simple to make, it can be done while you're steaming the tofu or made in advance to pull out a quick weeknight meal. You do need some gochugaru (Korean red chili pepper) to make this and you should be able to find it in your Asian supermarkets. Look for vibrant, bright red flakes that's preferably made in Korea. And no matter what any website tells you - no you may not substitute for cayenne.

This sauce works well with fried tofu as well. Give it a try sometime this week!

Dubu Jjim/두부찜(Steamed Tofu)
"Recipe" from My Mother

Ingredients:

- 1 block of soft tofu

- 1 tablespoon of green onions, diced, white and light-green parts

- 2 cloves of garlic, minced

- 4 teaspoons of soy sauce

- 1 teaspoon of sesame oil

- 1/2 teaspoon of toasted sesame seeds

- 1 teaspoon of Korean gochugaru, or more to taste

- 1/2 teaspoon of fresh black pepper

- green part of green onions, diced for garnish

1) Remove excess liquid from the tofu and pat dry. Prepare a steamer and place the tofu on a plate that can go into the steamer. If you don't have a steamer, just put some water into a wok and place a plate with the tofu on top. Close with a lid and bam - you have a steamer.

2) Steam for 10 minutes until the tofu is soft and tender.

3) While the tofu is steaming, make the sauce by mixing together everything else besides the green part of the green onions which we'll use later as garnish. Or just throw it all in there - it's up to you.

4) Remove the steamed tofu after the 10 minutes and pour over the soy sauce mixture on top of the tofu.

5) Serve immediately with some fluffy, steamed rice and find new appreciation for the highly misunderstood tofu.

*Fried Tofu Version - use a firm tofu and pat dry with paper towel. Make sure it's dried well because if it's wet, it won't get that nice, brown color. Putting something heavy on top of the tofu to push out the excess liquid works wonders. Cut the tofu into slices. Add vegetable/canola oil to a hot pan over medium to medium-high heat and fry the tofu, in batches if you need to. Cook for 2 - 3 minutes on each side (this will depend on the thickness of your tofu) and remove to serving plate once golden brown. Spoon over the same soy sauce mixture and go into tofu bliss once more.

wordless wednesday

Dubu Jjim (steamed tofu) - coming soon...!

Two things...

1) I've yet to have good sushi in Athens, GA.

2) I wanted to cry after replacing the taste of my Bocado burger from earlier that week with picture #3.

Butt (pun intended - you'll see why later!)...that pork shoulder was so tender and moist. 

PS. For all the singles out there celebrating (??) today... - happy Black Day!?

chashu

I'm still alive..!

Miss me?

I guess I should start off by apologizing for my absence (sorry!) but I've been pretty busy. Life in general, school, family...and did I mention school? I have 11 tests in 14 days in my last 2 weeks of school. Yes - shoot me now.

I'm still in the kitchen everyday but I've been cooking a lot of my old favorites and improving my fundamentals. Cooking for the blog is great and all but I feel that you don't really get a feel for how the dish should really turn out by just making it once. Also, blogging was starting to feel like a job and that told me I needed to take a break. I hope everyone enjoyed the Wordless Wednesday posts while my mojo came back!

(Happy Food: tonkotsu ramen from Yakitori Jinbei in Smyrna, GA - consistently amazing. Go now!)

Aside from cooking old favorites, I've been eating out more than usual searching for "happy foods" (thanks C). You know - foods that make you happy while and after you eat them. One of my most favorite happy foods? Tonkotsu ramen. Good ramen can do wonders for the soul with its deep, complex, creamy broth and the succulent pork (chashu) that comes on top is better than icing on the cake (random full disclosure: I actually don't like icing).

Finding ramen - that's not from a packet - in my college town is, I want to say, impossible and while I'd like to make my own, I know it won't turn out the way I want the first time. Making the tonkotsu broth is an art and I don't have the time right now to give it the proper respect it needs. Maybe in the summer when I'm not drowning in school!

Unlike the ramen however, the chashu I can make at school. Chashu isn't like char siu which you may have seen in Chinese restaurants. Japanese chashu is actually braised instead of being barbecued so it's soft, tender and moist. I looked to my blog friend/Japanese cuisine master/knows every single ingredient on earth Em from Kitchen M for a recipe. Like most Asian recipes, there was no recipe but I got a rough outline from Em so I put it into action. I was pleased with how my pork belly turned out but it's something I'll have to make again and again to get it right. Practice makes perfect and as far as cooking goes - I'm far from it!

Chashu Recipe (as of 04/08/10)

Recipe Outline by Em from Kitchen M

Ingredients:

- 1 lb pork belly, skin off

- 1 cup soy sauce

- 3/4 cup sake

- 1/2 cup mirin

- 1/4 cup water

- 8 cloves of garlic

- 2 inch knob of ginger, peeled

- 1 tablespoon of sesame oil

1) Combine everything but the pork belly in a skillet/small pot. Bring up to a boil.

2) Add the pork belly into the braising liquid and turn the heat down until it's at a gentle simmer. Braise the pork belly for 45 - 50 minutes until cooked through. Flip the pork belly every once in awhile to make sure it gets braised evenly.

3) Remove to a plate and let it rest for 8 - 10 minutes if serving right away.

4) Slice against the grain and place on top of ramen or rice! I made a quick shoyu tamago using the leftover soy sauce liquid from the pork belly. Boil the egg for 4 minutes and then shock with cold water. Carefully remove the shell and poach the egg for 2 - 3 minutes in the soy sauce liquid until done.

Thanks for your help Em! And thanks to everyone out there who read/support this humble, little blog :)

-Sean

wordless wednesday

*speechless*

...truly do make me the happiest person in the world. &hearts ;

Also - new post tomorrow! Anybody excited? :)

-Sean

PS. pro handwriting Chef!!