Chop and Stir

Green Chili with Pork and Hominy

Another one-pot, week night wonder from Cheryl. Easy to make, easier to cleanup. A nice break from the tailgater style chili. Fire up the Le Creuset for this if you have one, so the sauce will reduce without burning.

The recipe comes from the dearly departed Gourmet Magazine via Epicurious.

Cheryl goes full bore on the jalapenos, seeds and all. You might want to dial that down, depending on how much the family likes heat.

Pictured on the right, served with a touch of sour cream, over brown rice. 

Recession Special

Once the commercial real estate market goes bust, we'll all be eating beans, but until then I'm game for the Heritage Foods recession special on porterhouse pork chops.

For 3 vacuum-sealed packs of 5 14-ounce pork chops, you pay $90 including shipping. That works out to about $6.85/pound. I recall that Bi-Rite was carrying the same exact chops from Heritage for $8/pound. So, I went for it. Apparently so did a lot of other people. Heritage is still running the promo, but they were so overwhelmed with orders that they became 2-3 weeks back-ordered.

I like having a bunch of quality beef and pork sitting in the deep freezer, for those occasions when you're feeling it, and just too lazy to go to the right store to buy the good stuff. Previously, we've purchased a 1/8 cow and 1/4 pig from Heritage, when they were running promos on those. The beef was from Hearst Ranch, the pork a Red Wattle. Both we just kind of ok, not great. Plus, you end up with a lot of random cuts in your freezer that you have to force yourself to cook.

These chops are worth it, though. I like them thick, so you can get a good sear or crust on the outside, while roasting them slowly to preserve the tenderness of the meat. Plus, the porterhouse cut has that nice bit of tenderloin on the small side of the bone. Love it!

I don't know which breed we got, probably Berkshire since that's more common than Red Wattle and Duroc. I think that you can specify which breed you want, and Heritage will try to match it for you.

Pictured here, in the house-made shake-and-bake style. All the juices are locked in the meat, pan roasted to 120, then allowed to rest for a few minutes. Just a slight touch of pink to let you know that you haven't overcooked the meat, and that you're in store for flavor, not particle board. Look at those juices, the golden crust, yum. It's no wonder that Alex gnawed his chop down to the bone.

In search of the perfect chicken

And in this corner, weighing in at 3.88 pounds, we have, uh, well, er, dinner!

Bi-Rite has dropped Fulton Valley Farms as a chicken provider. I am in a quandary: do I get the larger organic chicken or the smaller conventionally fed? Alex and I were eating our way through the Mission last Sunday, stopping in at Bi-Rite for what I thought would be no-brainer purchase of two small Fulton Valley chickens, about 2-2.5 pounds each.

What's this I see? Field to Family? Soul Food Farms? It was a choice between the smaller conventional Field to Family at $2.99/lb or the larger organic Field to Family at $4.99/lb. I ask the butcher for advice: "The organic one does have a sweeter taste." OK, sold.  One day I will have to splurge and try the Soul Food Farms at $7.99/lb.

Pictured at the left, is tonight's dinner, after roasting for about 40 minutes in 475 degree oven in a large cast iron pan. The thigh temperature has reached 155 degrees. Money! Time to pull it from the oven and let it rest. To let the juices pull back into the meat and the heat continue moving inward toward the core of the chicken.

Look at that skin! Cheryl calls dibs on the back skin. She is on fire.

The meat really does taste sweeter than the Fulton Valley, as best I can tell. It's melt-in-your mouth tender, but not flaky at all. Maybe this air-chilled process isn't just marketing hype. It does feel like the flavors are concentrated, not watered down.

If I could get these in the 2-2.5 pound format, this would be a clear winner for me. The conventional wisdom is to get a smaller chicken because the flavors are more concentrated, the meat more tender. They are sold at Molly Stones and Whole Foods according to the F2F website, so I'll have to check out the line up there.

For more details on roasting the perfect chicken, please see our earlier post on the best roast chicken.

Fried Chicken

Cheryl makes some of the best fried chicken I've ever had. Certainly the best I've had in San Francisco, even better than our friends at Farmer Brown and Little Skillet. Pictured here with some brocollini--my other new favorite vegetable--and Cheryl's potato gratin. All in all, one satisfying meal.

It's also really quick and easy. We're using our trusty Le Creuset for the deep frying. It's perfect for deep frying because its mass holds the heat, and the enameled inside makes it a snap to clean up. Afterward, I run the oil through a fine mesh sieve, and we re-use it a few times.

Naturally, you want to use some fresh, organic chicken. We're using some chicken legs from Trader Joe's, which are sweet, moist, and convenient. The legs from Fulton Valley are even better, if you can get them. Eat this stuff hot out of the fryer, with the juices of the chicken still steaming away inside the crispy, lightly battered skin.

There's not much to this recipe, it's just 1 egg, 6 oz, evaporated milk, 6 oz water in the batter, a bit of black pepper and kosher salt. Then, just do what Cheryl does!

By the way, that's Alex practicing piano in the background. No such thing as "quiet on the set" in our house.

You're probably wondering just what is the best fried chicken we've ever had? Honors go to Ad Hoc. Gotta get that Ad Hoc cookbook and try out TK's recipe.

My new favorite vegetable

I've never heard of or seen bok choy raab before last week, but I've been eating it nonstop since then. Alex loves it, too.

Poor Cheryl. Always in class, there's never any left over. 

Pictured below with tonight's dinner of la-Z-boy polenta--more on that soon--and another shake and bake chicken. More on that soon, too. I received Alex's highest compliment on the meal tonight, "This is a do-over!"

For whatever reason, the farmers cut the shoots off the bok choy plant before the bok choy has a chance to grow. It's extremely tender and lightly sweet. Don't waste any of these, because you know that a bok choy gave its life for each of these tender shoots.

I try to cook them as little as possible to let their vibrant green flavor and color come through. I just use my typical braising technique for greens but higher in the heat, shorter on the time. Put a heavy bottom pot like a le creuset over high heat for about two minutes. Add 2 tbs evo and a few cloves of lightly smashed and peeled garlic. Stir briefly then add your bok choy raab about 2 quarts loosely packed. Stir and cook over high heat for about 1 minute. Then add about 1/2 cup chicken or veg stock. Reduce heat to medium and cover fr about 5 minutes. Finish with kosher salt and black pepper and a splash of evo.

Today I found some at Happy Boy at the Galleria farmer's market in Union Square. Last wee, I first found them at the Tuesday Ferry plaza market.

Get some!