Fish Fragrant Eggplant

I'm pretty sure that fish doesn't smell like this. Heck, this dish doesn't even have any sort of fish essences in it. But, as the origin goes, these are the same Szechuan (Sichuan) flavorings used for preparing fish so that it is sweet, sour, and spicy. I added a step to this by baking the eggplant before frying to shorten the fry time of cooking the eggplant since I didn't want to deep fry the eggplant in a lot of oil. Maybe when I do this recipe again, I should cook it with fish instead of eggplant and see how it tastes.

Fish Fragrant Eggplant

Sauce Ingredients

1 tbsp chili bean sauce
1 tbsp Shaoxing rice wine
2 tbsp light soy sauce
1 tbsp mirin
1 tbsp rice wine vinegar
1/2 tsp organic granulated sugar
1 tsp cornstarch dissolved in 1/4 c water

Ingredients

1 1/2 lb Japanese eggplants, cut into 2" pieces and quartered
1 tbsp chili black bean sauce
2 stalks green onions, sliced into 1" pieces
1 tbsp fresh ginger, peeled and thinly sliced
3 garlic cloves, chopped
2 tbsp olive oil

Directions

In a 9" x 13" baking dish, add sliced eggplant and bake for 15 minutes at 350 degrees F; or bake for 25 minutes if you don't want to wait for the oven to preheat.

1. In a large frying pan or wok, heat oil and add garlic and ginger. Lightly brown the garlic before adding the eggplant. Fry for 5 minutes.

2. Next, add the sauce, cornstarch and water. Fry until all the eggplant is coated. Add the green onions last.

3. Remove from heat and serve with steamed rice.

Steamed Black Bean Chicken

I don't know why I haven't tried steaming chicken before. The meat turned out very tender and delicious. This could just be one of those 30-minute meals. I imagine that a slightly longer cook time would be needed for thicker cuts of chicken, such as the thighs. For this attempt, I used chicken drumsticks (1 lb 7 oz).

Ingredients

1 1/2 lbs chicken parts
2 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp fresh garlic, minced
1 tbsp fresh ginger, peeled and minced
1 tbsp cornstarch
1 tbsp chili black bean sauce -or- 2 tbsp fermented black beans

Directions

0. Remove chicken from package and rinse with cold water. Place it in a heat-proof bowl that is large enough to accommodate the chicken. Pour boiling water on the chicken and blanch for 1 minute. Discard the water in the bowl.

1. To the chicken: add garlic, ginger, cornstarch, soy sauce, and chili black bean sauce. Mix thoroughly so that the chicken is coated with everything.

2.  Bring a large pot of water to boil, large enough to fit both a steamer basket and the heatproof bowl.

3. Cover the pot and steam chicken for 30 minutes, until the juice runs clear when the meat is pierced with a knife, or the meat thermometer reads 165 degrees F. Let rest, covered, for 10 minutes.

For this amount of meat and time, the thick part of the drumsticks measured between 175 F and 185 F (a bit overcooked, oops).

Canning 2015

I picked Bartlett pears Gravenstein apples for the first time with the Portland Fruit Tree Project at a farm in Hillsboro, OR. That was a fun experience. Volunteers are allowed to take 10# of each type of fruit picked, but is an excessive amount for me to process into something tastier. Gravensteins are eating apples and might be good for cooking, but they are rather sour -- like they're a cross between a honeycrisp for size and water content and a granny smith on the sour and hard texture side.

This year I tried to can hatch chilies. If you keep them in a closed plastic bag in the refrigerator door (warmer part of the fridge), the fresh chilies keep for a few weeks. I made a really good tomato-based salsa with half as many pounds of tomatoes as last year's batch and the same amount of jalapenos; so, extra kick and less added salt. I ate a quart of it before canning.

Here's what I made this year:

6 pints spicy tomato salsa (no onion, no red jalapeno, 2 tbsp less salt)
6.5 pints Gravenstein apple sauce (slightly sour)
4 half pints organic no-sugar added applesauce, yellow delicious - homegrown apples
8 pints apple butter - red winesap apples
Four 4 oz jars green hatch chilies
2 half pints dill pickles

And for the fridge because I ran out of pint jars:

1 quart dill pickles
1 quart organic dill carrots

Stuffed Shitake Mushrooms

This is one of my mom's recipes and it came out looking and tasting quite nice.

Ready to eat: Stuffed Shitake Mushrooms

Ingredients

1 lb fresh shitake mushrooms
1/2 lb ground pork
8 large raw shrimp, peeled and de-veined
1 tbsp cornstarch
1 tbsp olive oil
1/2 tbsp soy sauce
1/2 tbsp Shaoxing red rice wine
3 stalks green onions, minced
1 tsp fresh ginger, peeled and minced

Directions

Preheat oven to 425 F.

0. Wash and remove stems from the shitake mushrooms. Reserve stems for later.

1. Chop raw shrimp into small pieces. Mix together with ground pork, green onions, ginger, cornstarch, Shaoxing rice wine, and soy sauce.

2. Fill each mushroom cap with a tablespoon of the mixture.

3. Bake for 5 minutes. Remove from heat and drizzle some olive oil on top, and return to the oven for another 3 minutes.

Stovetop Popcorn

When I think about kitchen appliances, I still don't own nor use a microwave for cooking; mostly because microwaves (and dishwashers) are energy hogs. Making popcorn this way is not any healthier than preparing that microwavable stuff. A quarter cup of coconut oil has roughly 470 calories. This recipe ratio makes about 5 quarts of popped corn.

Stovetop Popcorn: what you see is what you get

I used an 8 quart stockpot with its lid to make this. I suppose you could use Alton Brown's method and use two heavy gauge metal mixing bowls instead.

Ingredients

1/4 c organic coconut oil
2/3 c organic popping corn kernels

Directions

0. Add coconut oil and 3 corn kernels to a stockpot and cover with its lid. Heat on stove over medium-high heat until the kernels pop.

1. Remove popped corn from pot. Add remainder of corn kernels. Cover with lid. Occasionally shake the pot (side-to-side, or in a swirl motion) as the kernels are popping.

2. Turn off heat as soon as the kernels slow down to one or two pops. Use a measuring cup or shake popped corn out into a serving bowl.

Kitchen Notes:

• the popcorn has a lightly greasy feel to it (from the coconut oil)
• eaten plain, popcorn can make you feel hungrier
• there are 1-2 tablespoons of unpopped kernels leftover