Want to celebrate the Year of the Ox in proper fashion? The BBC has a simple guide to the Chinese New Year, which begins today. Traditional foods - which vary greatly depending on the region - include Northern Chinese dumplings resembling gold ingots, said to bring wealth for the coming year; big family meals called "poo choi," in which everyone eats out of the same giant bowl to promote togetherness; Southern Chinese turnip cakes given as a sign of respect and honor; and glutinous rice cakes whose sticky nature is said to help families stick together in the new year.
Plus, there's a link to a bunch of the BBC Food's Chinese recipes - think red-cooked pork belly, ginger fish, stir-fried salt and pepper prawns.
For many Americans, the idea of Chinese beer may seem as far-out as Chinese democracy (the movement or the Guns N' Roses album). Some countries -- Ireland and Germany, for example -- we heavily associate with beer drinking, and others, like China, we do not. Even at Asian restaurants, less discriminating drinkers can be hard-pressed to determine the country of origin of different Eastern beers on the menu. Maybe I was just a "dumb American," but when I was younger, I didn't put much thought into the difference between my Sapporos and my Tsingtaos.
Well, for the record, Tsingtao is by far the most prevalent Chinese beer in the U.S., (Sapporo, of course, is from Japan) and the marketing minds down at the Tsingtao Brewery believe they've found the perfect event to help hammer that point home: Chinese New Year, which begins today.
To celebrate the "Year of the Ox," Tsingtao enlisted the help of certified Chinese Master Chef Martin Yan to create four Chinese dishes that utilize either Tsingtao Lager or Tsingtao Pure Draft as an ingredient. Personally, though, I'm more about drinking beer than cooking with it, so I was happy to see Chef Yan also took a crack at two beer cocktails.
You can see all of the recipes (as well as some additional Chinese New Year celebration tips) on Tsingtao's website here or find the mixing instructions for Chef Yan's Ginger Beer Fizz beer mixed drink after the jump...
The first Monday of 2009 is upon us: The first day reality sets in.
Was it just me or did the holidays fall in a very precarious position this year? Both Christmas and New Year's landed on Thursdays, leaving their respective Eves to precede on Wednesdays, resulting in anemic two-day work weeks barely worth thinking about, causing almost an entire 16 day period to be a wash, thus making getting back to any sort of actual life that much more difficult.
But here I am. My point: None.
However, I am building to a larger sentiment that New Year's Eve 2009 has come and passed without but a squeak from me on the beer blog -- begging the question: "How did Slashfood's resident beer snob kick off 2009 (beer-wise of course)?" Well, I'm not so proud to admit that after the requisite champagne toast, my first beer of 2009 was... drum roll please... a Budweiser!
Yikes! Equally requisite explanation: NYE09 was spent at a house party with but one keg to satisfy all beer drinkers' tastes, so I swallowed my snobbery and kicked off the new year with a Bud draft out of the barrel.
My beer expertise did come in handy though when someone was needed to tap said keg. So there: my knowledge did pay off after all.
We're now five days and one full weekend into 2009. What was your first beer of the year? Or fill me in on any interesting NYE beer drinking tales. Otherwise it's going to be a long, boring year, people!
Many of us know that here in the US, it is traditionally thought to be good luck to eat beans, ham and greens around the New Year, to ensure prosperity and abundance in the year to come (check out Kat's post on Hoppin' John for more details on this auspicious combo).
This year, the blogger behind the site I'm Mad and I Eat decided to approach the traditional New Year's meal from a new angle. She cooked up a slab of Spam and made herself some Hawaiian-style Spam musubi. She served it up with a side of steamed edamame and kimchi. Beans, ham, rice and greens for a nice little New Year's meal.
New Year doesn't just mark a clean page on a new calendar -- it evokes nostalgia for the times that led to that point. For many, New Year's Eve is a clash of impressions of confetti, champagne corks, standing in the freezing cold (18 degrees in Times Square this year) in hopes of jockeying for a couple of seconds of nationwide camera time. But for some, the best New Year's Eve is not on the streets but in a swank nightclub several stories above, where matrons in furs peer disdainfully at doxies in sequins, where a gentleman's black tie is correctly understood to be quite enough sartorial splendor for his role as escort, where the jewelry is platinum and the hair is marcelled, and where, although champagne is popped at midnight for an obligatory sip, the drink of the evening is the martini.
Into the world of chic, artisinal gins, enter New Amsterdam. Like the pre-code New York of its name, this gin bypasses the cheap sentiment of retro to be outright old-fashioned, without the speakeasy sting of bathtub gin. Soft citrus notes open the palate much as happens with a good sauvignon blanc, but then a strident bite of juniper marches forward, lockstepping like a Busby Berkeley kickline. As a pure sip, the juniper mid-note lingers on the palate; with vermouth or lime, a final spicy note surfaces, very lightly crowned with waft of minerality.
Confession time: what's the wine you buy on autopilot, the wine you know inside and out like a wife of many years, the one that's reliable, trustworthy, and has stood by you through thick and thin?
A recent Nielsen survey commissioned by Constellation Brands divides wine consumers into six broad categories. Fourteen percent are Satisfied Sippers, who tend to always buy the same brand, and twenty-three percent (the largest category) are Overwhelmed, staring down the endless wine aisles and not knowing what to get. It's easy to draw the next conclusion--these buyers end up getting the tried and true as well.
I don't advocate tossing the wife, but this month what about banning the house wine? (If you drink beer or cocktails or even soda, read on--you can do this, too.)
At restaurants, house wine tastes somewhere between boring and wretched. At home, house wine is good for many things--you already know you like it and can serve a bottle to unexpected guests, or just when you yourself are tired and don't have the energy to try anything new.
But January is the time for new beginnings. Instead of buying the same-old wine, fill a case with 12 wines you've never seen in your life (you'll get a 10-20 percent discount on a case, so there's even more incentive). There may be some duds in the dozen, but life is short, and wine is fun, when you're willing to branch out a bit.
Down South, New Year's Day means greens, black-eyed peas, cornbread, and pork. Eating the greens and peas augurs well for the New Year, according to Southern superstition, as Marisa explained last year. The cornbread and pork? Those just happen to taste divine with the lucky dishes.
This year, my family opted for a pork loin roast. Instead of roasting it, though, we fired up the grill. Using a recipe from Weber's Real Grilling by Jamie Purviance as a model, I first rubbed a simple dry rub all over the roast and let it cure in the fridge for a few hours.
Then came the glaze. I was eager to use a bottle of small-batch cane syrup produced by and named for a man named Robert E. Long who used to work with my grandfather. He makes and sells it in a tiny northern Florida town called--no joke--Two Egg. The liquor of the syrup is the clearest amber, and I had a feeling it would caramelize beautifully on the pork. I was right. The recipe, and a picture of the syrup bottle, follow the jump.
I had a really mellow New Year's Eve this year. A couple of friends came over for cheese fondue (with roasted potatoes, sausage, brussels sprouts and broccolini, in addition to the tradition bread cubes, for dipping) before the early They Might Be Giants show at Philly's TLA. Afterwards, we came back and ate vanilla ice cream drizzled with Kahlua. Of course, there was some bubbly to toast 2009.
How did the rest of you celebrate? Did you eat our or make a special meal at home? Do you have New Year's Eve traditions?
Happy New Year, all! Hope everyone had a warm, festive Eve and is relatively headache-free and rested post-revelry. Now, there are as many ways to prepare the cowpea and rice concoction of Hoppin' John as there are squares on a calendar, but in many parts of the American South, the definitive date to simmer up a big ol' pot of it is New Year's Day. While the name's origin is still the subject of some debate -- some scholars asserting that it's a corruption of "pois a pigeon," a Carribean dish enjoyed by Southern slaves while still in their native land, and others claiming it's derived from a 13th century Iraqi dish called "bhat kachang" -- the dish's fans maintain that eating it ensures good luck for the coming year. This may well be superstition, but I'm inclined toward any angle that's gonna get a bowlful of it in front of me on a chilly January 1st.
My grand revelation of the day (though likely hardly news to many of you) is that cowpeas are the genus for the group that contains blackeye peas (most commonly used in Hoppin' John), catjang, and yardlong beans. They're also called crowder peas.
Some recipes for Hoppin' John contain tomatoes or okra, and the swap in of okra for the beans makes it a Limpin' Susie.
Got a favorite variation? Share it below, and peruse my favorite recipe after the jump.
I do most of my cocktail inventing around the holidays. The reason for this is twofold. One, I always visit my parents and they possess a liquor cabinet that shames some bars, not only in actual number of bottles, but also in the array of top-shelf and/or rare liquors. Two, when does one find oneself in need of a drink more than the holidays?
Whether it's the merriment of celebration, the release of stress, or simply the desire to take a breather from all the socializing by indulging in a brief respite behind the bar, December is the time for mixing. And also for giving, so allow me to give you my two newly-invented cocktails for 2008: the Ginger-Pear Cocktail and the Nihilist.
Everyone knows that on New Year's Eve, New York City drops a glittery ball over Times Square. However, there are a number of other cities around the country that also drop objects as a way to welcome the new year and, in Pennsylvania, they all seem to be food related.
In Bethlehem, a specially rigged crane lowers an enormous, illuminated Peep (Just Born, the company that makes the marshmallow confections, is located in Bethlehem) at midnight. In Lebanon, PA, the local fire department lowers a 7 and a half foot long bologna (but what do they do with it afterwards?). Pottsville raises a giant bottle of Yuengling (pronounced Ying-Ling), the city of Hershey lowers a huge, foil-wrapped Kiss and Elizabethtown drops a oversized M&M.
It certainly makes Philly's fireworks and day-long Mummer's Parade pale in comparison! Next year, I think we should drop a gargantuan cheesesteak.
I was around five years old the first time I had a steamed artichoke for dinner. They were a favorite of my parents' and so we'd often eat them for dinner, dipping the leaves in melted butter and then finishing the meal up with some salad. However, sometime around my high school years, they fell out of favor (I think my mother couldn't handle the volume of butter our family of four required to make them palatable).
While I was in Portland last week, I picked up three nice looking artichokes and took them back to my parents' house, in order to re-live old times and satisfy a longtime craving. We steamed them for about forty-five minutes, until they were fork-tender at the stem. While they cooked, I stirred a few tablespoons of Best Foods (Hellman's on the east coast) Mayonnaise together with a pressed garlic clove and some lemon juice, in place of our traditional butter dip.
Sitting around the dining room table, we quietly ate our artichokes, scraping the tender bits at the bottom of the leaves off with our lower front teeth and commenting occasionally on how good they tasted (we all determined that the mayo sauce was far tastier than the old butter dip). My parents both reminisced about their first artichokes (my mom was in high school, while my dad grew up eating them) and we ate them down to the stem (scraping out the prickly bristle under the leaves).
I've been thinking about artichokes since I got back to Philly and I do believe that they'd make a perfect starter to a mellow New Year's Eve meal. They're easy (steam in a pot with a couple of inches of water until they're tender), they're delicious and you get to eat with your hands. Add some bread, a light soup or salad and a simple dessert and your dinner is complete.
A few responses to my post yesterday anticipated the spirit of my second resolution, to perfect that classic of classics, Roast Chicken. My fellow slashfoodie Kat Kinsman plans to master The Biscuit, while a reader named Michael has set his sights on Bouillabaisse. Both worthy goals.
Roast chicken has always flummoxed me. Various recipes pull me in every direction. Do I butter? Rub with some kind of spice concoction? Do I truss? What about basting? Chicken stock at the bottom of the pan, or poured over the bird, or none at all? What, if anything, ought I stuff into the cavity? At what temperature shall I roast it? Pan sauce? Au jus? Somehow, my Thanksgiving turkey has always turned out quite nicely no matter which way I go, but I've never roasted a chicken--never--that I've been terribly proud of.
Am I cursed? This year, I will find out. I plan to try every variation and, perhaps more importantly, take notes. Periodically throughout the year, I'll share those notes, and accompanying photos, so we can all roast chickens to crispy golden tender moist perfection. Then again, you probably already do that, so please don't hesitate to share your tips. I might try your method first! Oh, and to keep the experiment semi-constant, I plan to use high quality but readily available Bell and Evans chickens every time. I'd also welcome suggestions for creative uses for leftover roast chicken. Or, if chicken's not your thing, what will you perfect this year?
It's out of my hands to call it a resolution, but more than anything, I want a bigger kitchen. Then my close friend won't get that look of pain every time she sees me trying to juggle my towers of pots and pans, and tell me how she wishes she could buy me a bigger kitchen. But since that resolution rests on a lot more than my own motivation, I'm looking to other tasks to accomplish in the New Year.
Top on the list: Improve my knife skills. I'm about to get the most gorgeous set of Shun Kajis, and it'd be utterly ridiculous to pull them out and use them improperly. Better yet, I want to roast something to carve, grab something to debone, and basically tackle all of the things my super cheapo knives never could. (Sorry, $5 beloved Santoku.)
After that, there's so much that it's hard to pick which take precedence. Do I tackle my new Jacques Pepin's Complete Techniques Alinea at Home-style? (Without the skinning and preparing of the rabbit. That will never happen.) I definitely need to perfect my homemade pasta and tackle the world of homemade ravioli. I need to move beyond marzipan figures on the cakes I make. (Flowers?) I really must bake more bread. And I still haven't found the perfect madelline recipe. It'd also be great to learn how to make sushi, and I really need to whip up more Indian foods.
But what's important is to keep moving forward and keep improving, no matter what I choose to do. Help me choose, and share the kitchen hurdles that you yearn to tackle in the New Year below!
For many Americans, the idea of Chinese beer may seem as far-out as Chinese democracy (the movement or the Guns N' Roses album). Some countries -- Ireland and Germany, for example -- we heavily associate with beer drinking, and others, like China, we do not. Even at Asian restaurants, less discriminating drinkers can be hard-pressed to determine the country of origin of different Eastern beers on the menu. Maybe I was just a "dumb American," but when I was younger, I didn't put much thought into the difference between my Sapporos and my Tsingtaos.
New Year doesn't just mark a clean page on a new calendar -- it evokes nostalgia for the times that led to that point. For many, New Year's Eve is a clash of impressions of confetti, champagne corks, standing in the freezing cold (
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It's out of my hands to call it a resolution, but more than anything, I want a bigger kitchen. Then my close friend won't get that look of pain every time she sees me trying to juggle my towers of pots and pans, and tell me how she wishes she could buy me a bigger kitchen. But since that resolution rests on a lot more than my own motivation, I'm looking to other tasks to accomplish in the New Year.
What Can I Get You Folks? - Server Revenge
Reality-Show Celebrities Serve Up Chef Curtis Stone's 'Hundred-Dollar Burger'
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