Tag: main course
Boerewors
Boerewors
Boerewors is a popular South African sausage. The sausage is made up of 2/3 beef, 1/3 pork; with coriander, salt, black pepper, nutmeg, allspice, cloves, and malt vinegar, with gives the sausage a particular taste that is specific to South Africa. The malt vinegar also acts as a preservative. The sausage is typically grilled in an untwisted single coil link. But you can definitely twist it into links and eat it on a bun. If you don’t have a grill, you can pan fry the sausage, or even broil it.
Equipment
- grinder
- sausage stuffer
Ingredients
- 3 lbs beef chuck
- 1 1/2 lbs pork shoulder
- 2 tbsp ground coriander seeds
- 1 tsp allspice
- 1 tsp black pepper
- 1/2 tsp ground nutmeg
- 1/4 tsp ground cloves
- 1/3 cup malt vinegar
- hog casings
Instructions
- Mix all of the spices together.
- Grind the chuck and pork shoulder on a medium grind plate 1 time through. Mix in all of the spices and the malt vinegar.
- Let rest for an hour before stuffing to let the ingredients meld.
- Pipe the sausage through a sausage stuffer. I like to use the KitchenAde grinder and sausage stuffer attachments when it’s time to work the beef hammers.
- You can leave the sausage untwisted in a single coil, or you can twist them into 6” links. Let rest for a good 4 hours before cooking.
- Heat up a sauté pan with a tbsp of olive oil over medium high heat. Add in the sausages.
- Sauté for 12-14 minutes, flipping every few minutes to cook evenly.
Teriyaki Salmon
Teriyaki Salmon
When you go to an American grocery store, you will see countless varieties of pretty horrible tasting bottled teriyaki sauces on the shelves. Honestly, because of this, teriyaki has always been a huge turnoff for me. They all have too much salt and extra ingredients that you don’t need. Puke. In a Japanese grocery store, you won’t find any. Why? Because every household in Japan makes their own. The best part is, real Japanese teriyaki only has 4 ingredients: mirin, sake, soy sauce, and sugar. It’s simple with a proper balance of sweet and salty.Japanese-style teriyaki Salmon is so much more complex than putting a sauce on salmon. The Japanese fillet their salmon at a 30 degree angle 1/2”-1” thick with the skin on instead of cutting a straight on 90 degrees portion out of the fillet. Cutting the salmon this way will do several things. It gives the salmon a wider spread of the flesh, allowing it to absorb the teriyaki. That also means that the fillets won’t require marination. Since the fillets are thinner, the salmon fillets will cook a lot faster and more evenly. It is highly important to leave the skin on the salmon while cooking. I feel that I have to repeat this again because of all the recipes I see out there removing the skin before cooking salmon. IT IS HIGHLY IMPORTANT TO LEAVE THE SKIN ON THE SALMON WHILE COOKING. For several reasons…The skin holds the fillets together. If I were to remove the skin before cooking this salmon, you’d have flaked salmon in teriyaki sauce…Between the flesh and the skin is a nice layer of fat where you get your omega 3 fatty acids. You are throwing away essential nutrients by removing the skin…It also keeps your salmon moist…Nobody said you have to eat the skin. LEAVE IT ON! I bet the same people that remove the salmon skin eat boneless skinless chicken breasts with their snotty children, Cooper and Emily.End of angry rant.
Ingredients
- 1 lb salmon fillet head end of fillet
- 1/2 tsp salt
- cracked black pepper
- 3 tbsp flour
- 2 tbsp butter
- 1 tbsp sake or rice wine
Teriyaki Sauce
- 2 tbsp soy sauce
- 1 tbsp mirin
- 1 tbsp sake
- 1 tbsp sugar
Instructions
How to fillet salmon Japanese-style
- Instead of straight on cutting smaller portioned fillets out of the whole one, the Japanese will cut the fillets 1” thick at a 30 degree angle.
- Thinly cutting the salmon this way gives a wider spread of the flesh, allowing to absorb more of the teriyaki.
- Cut the entire fillet.
Teriyaki Salmon
- Season each fillet with salt and pepper. Dust the fillets in flour. Shake off any excess.
- Melt the butter in a sauté pan over medium heat. Add in the salmon fillets skin side down. Sear for 3 minutes.
- Flip over. Add the saki and cover, cooking for another 3 minutes. Remove from the pan.
- Mix together all of the teriyaki ingredients.
- Pour in the pan.
- Once it starts to boil, add the salmon fillets back in.
- Toss and coat each side in the teriyaki sauce.
Mofongo
Mofongo
Mofongo is a popular Puerto Rican dish consisting of fried mashed plantains with bacon, garlic, and chicharons. There are numerous versions of this dish in Puerto Rico as well as the rest of the Caribbean. This version has the mofongo with a creole shrimp sauce. So shrimp and 2 types of pork. I’m sold. Just a heads up: this recipe isn’t for beginners. There are a lot of steps to making mofongo. It’s actually a huge pain in the ass. It creates a lot of dishes. But it is absolutely worth the time once once you try it. Patience.The shrimp sauce is fairly simple. Sauté the shrimp. Sauté the vegetables. Cook down the tomatoes. Add in chicken stock and simmer for 10 minutes. Take off the heat, then add the shrimp back in. Cook the bacon. Drain the grease, then add in olive oil and garlic. Cook for another minute, then set aside.When choosing plantains, you want to use unripened ones. They are more starchy and are closer to a potato in flavor and texture. Ripened plantains will be too sweet and taste closer to bananas. They will need to be fried in vegetable oil for 4 minutes a side until crispy. Drain the grease on paper towel and season with creole seasoning.To assemble, mash a little bit of the bacon, garlic, oil, and chicharon together in a mortar. Then add a couple of the plants. Start smashing them with the bacon mix. Slowly start incorporating layers of the plantains, garlic bacon, and chicharon; smashing them into oblivion. Press the mofongo to the mortar to mold it to shape. If you don’t have a mortar and pestle, you can add the ingredients to a food processor and pulse it a few times. Then you can press it into a small bowl to get the dome shape. You can make 1 large one like I did or 2 smaller ones if eating as a side dish. Place a large ladle of the shrimp sauce without any shrimp in the center of a plate. Flip the mofongo over on top of the sauce. Remove the mortar. Place a couple of the shrimp on top of the mofongo. Ladle the rest of the shrimp sauce around the mofongo. Garnish with chopped parsley.
Servings: 2
Equipment
- mortar and pestle or food processor
Ingredients
Shrimp Sauce
- 1/2 lb shrimp peeled and deveined
- 1/2 tsp creole seasoning
- 2 tbsp olive oil
- 1/4 large white onion diced
- 1/2 cup green and red bell pepper diced
- 5 garlic cloves minced
- 2 small tomatoes diced
- 1 tsp ground cumin
- 1 tsp smoked paprika
- 1/2 cup chicken stock
Mofongo
- 4 slices bacon diced
- 2 tbsp olive oil
- 4 garlic cloves chopped
- 3 plantains unripened
- vegetable oil for frying
- 1 tsp creole seasoning
- 1/4 cup chicharon
Garnish
- parsley chopped
Instructions
Shrimp Sauce
- Heat up 1 tbsp of olive oil in a sauté pan over medium high heat. Add in the shrimp. Season with creole seasoning. Sauté for 2 minutes a side. Remove from the pan.
- Add in the other tbsp of olive oil. Sauté the onions, bell peppers, and garlic for 5 minutes.
- Add in the tomatoes, cumin, and smoked paprika. Sauté for 5 minutes.
- Pour in the chicken stock. Bring to a boil. Reduce the heat to medium and simmer for 10 minutes.
- Take off the heat. Stir in the shrimp. Set aside.
Mofongo
- Sauté the bacon in a small skillet until crispy. Drain the grease.
- Pour in 2 tbsp of olive oil and the garlic. Cook for 1 more minute and set aside.
- Heat up 1/2” of vegetable oil in a pot over medium high heat. Fry the plantains in batches; 4 minutes a side.
- Drain the grease on paper towel. Season with creole seasoning.
- Take a 1/4 of the bacon and garlic and 1/4 of the chicharon and place in the bottom of a mortar.
- Give them a few smashes.
- Toss in a few of the fried plantains. Mash them with the bacon mix. Start adding in layers of the fried plantains, garlic bacon, and chicharon until they are all mashed together.
- Press the mofongo tight into the mortar to mold it’s shape. Alternatively, if you don’t have a mortar and pestle, you can pulse all of the ingredients in a food processor, then mold into a dome shape in a small bowl.
- Place a large scoop of the shrimp sauce in the center of a plate.
