Wonton Soup, Kulfi, and Lamb Stirfry

Last week I made a big batch of spaghetti sauce and ate spaghetti pretty much all week. I’ll post a recipe for the sauce when I have time to write it up. Until then, summaries of what I’ve been making:

Wonton Soup

I used homemade chicken/pork stock I made a while back and froze as the base. I usually make chicken stock from chicken backs and necks ($1/lb at Whole Foods) and don’t season it until I make the soup. This time I threw in some pork soup bones. I badly need a bigger stockpot. Homemade stock freezes beautifully for several months.

To that I added crushed lemongrass and garlic and slices of ginger, some mirin (I don’t have any Shaoxing wine, which would be more appropriate), and salt. I used prefrozen shrimp/pork wontons (they were kind of bland and salty; next time I will make my own or look harder for the good frozen kind) and shreds of pork (which should have been barbequed first, but oh well.

It was decent and enjoyable–it didn’t really taste like restaurant wonton soup, and I overdid it a bit on the ginger (this is probably the only time you will ever hear me say that)–but not worth posting a proper recipe for.

Rosewater-Cardamom Kulfi

Kulfi is a kind of Indian ice cream based on reduced milk rather than an egg custard. Traditionally, one would simmer down the milk to thicken it over a period of several hours. I used condensed milk because (a) I had it for some inexplicable reason, and (b) I would never ever use it for anything else because condensed milk tastes nasty. I mixed it with heavy cream, rosewater, cardamom, and sugar and froze it in disposable muffin tins. It’s pretty nice, although I suspect it would be better with simmered rather than condensed milk. I may post the recipe later once I decide how much I like it.

Lamb Stirfry with Asparagus and Sugar Snap Peas

The Asian market in Broomfield sells super-thinly pre-sliced lamb shoulder for $4 US/lb. I can’t cut it that thin myself and it’s hard to beat the price, so I had Kevin pick some up on his way down last weekend.

I made a slightly modified version of Meena’s Stir Fried Asparagus and Lamb at Tigers and Strawberries, as follows:

Chicken with Peanut Sauce

I made loads of peanut sauce a while back, since it freezes and refreezes quite well. Since I haven’t yet found the appropriate fuel for my tabletop grill, I haven’t made satay yet, but I have been eating it on stirfry.

Broccoli would also work well as a vegetable.

Lemon Poppyseed Cake with Cardamom and Dried Blueberries

Yesterday I made a lemon poppyseed cake with cardamom and dried blueberries. I used a buttermilk batter, since cakes dry out very easily at this altitude. It was quite delicious, although the blueberries all settled to the bottom of the pan (the top of the cake) because I forgot to flour them and it could probably use some more lemon flavor. It was also a little dry for my tastes (I like very moist cakes). I wonder if one could mix lemon curd into the batter? I think I must also try making a cake with kefir sometime; after all, you can make cakes with yogurt.

This is based on “Buttermilk Layer Cake” in the new Joy of Cooking, p. 939 of the hardbound edition.

Lemon Poppyseed Cake with Cardamom and Dried Blueberries

Ingredients:

2 1/3 c. cake flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
Pinch of salt
1 tsp cardamom

12 tbl (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
1 1/3 c. sugar

3 large eggs
1 tsp vanilla
1 tsp lemon zest
Juice of 1/2 lemon
2 tbl poppyseeds

1 c. buttermilk

1/4 c. or more dried blueberries

Instructions:

1. Sift together dry ingredients in a bowl. Set aside.

2. In another bowl, cream together softened butter and sugar.

3. Beat in eggs, vanilla, lemon zest and juice, and poppyseeds.

4. Add the flour mixture in three parts, alternating with the buttermilk mixture in 2 parts.

5. Dredge the dried blueberries in flour (this will, in theory, prevent them from settling). Gently fold the dried blueberries into the batter with a spatula.

6. Grease a large bundt pan or two 9 x 2-inch or 8 x 2-inch round pans. Preheat oven to 350 ºF.

7. Bake for 25-35 minutes for round pans, or 45-55 minutes for the bundt pan. Cake is done when a toothpick or knife inserted in the center comes out clean.

Altitude adjustments: For over 6000 feet, decrease baking powder by 1/4 tsp and sugar by 1 tbl. Be sure to use extra-large eggs. The cooking time may be shorter.

Cherry Cardamom Pancakes with Cherry “Syrup”

Every now and then, I like to do a serious breakfast. This takes a few hours, so by “now and then” I mean “every month or two.” This started with pancakes, and then we fried up some excellent Italian sausage from the farmers’ market and a bunch of potatoes. We used the leftover cherries to make a “syrup” for the pancakes. The pancakes are also good with honey if you don’t want to make syrup.

This is the same as the Vanilla Buttermilk Pancakes, but with flavoring.

Cherry Cardamom Pancakes

Ingredients:

2 c. buttermilk
1 c. all-purposes flour
2 tbl sugar
1 tsp baking powder
2 eggs

1 tsp vanilla
3/4 tsp ground cardamom (1 tsp if it’s old)
1/2 tsp rosewater

1/2 c. cherries, cut into fourths or so

Instructions:

1. Cut up cherries. If using frozen cherries, they’re easier to cut before thawing.

2. Mix all other ingredients together in a bowl, whisking or beating vigorously to remove lumps.

3. Carefully mix in cherries.

4. Fry in a nonstick pan OR a cast-iron or regular frying pan (with fat, oil, or cooking spray). I assume pancake cooking is pretty self-explanatory.

Cherry “Syrup”

Ingredients:

1/2-3/4 c. cherries
Honey
1/2 tsp cornstarch

Instructions:

1. Puree cherries in a food processor with a little water.

2. Put cherry puree, honey to taste, and a little more water in a small saucepan. Bring to a simmer over medium heat and slowly add the cornstarch, whisking vigorously.

Ming Dynasty Stirfried Sheep Tripe (or Lamb)

As a member of the Society for Creative Anachronism, a medieval recreation group (not to be confused with reenactment groups, who are more serious and more authentic), I’m interested in medieval food as well as modern, particular medieval Asian and Middle Eastern food. “SCA period” encompasses approximately 476 to 1601 C.E. (Fall of the Roman Empire to death of Elizabeth I), but individual members often put the cutoff date at a time appropriate to their persona. I personally end “SCA period” with the end of the Ming dynasty, 1644 C.E.

Chinese food presents a particular challenge to the aspiring period cook, not because there are no recipes but because while the Chinese wrote copious recipe books starting in at least the 11th century, few of these have been translated into English or even into modern Chinese. A Soup for the Qan (trans. and annotated by Paul D. Buell) is the only complete dietary manual/cookbook that I’ve read in English (I’ve heard rumors of another Yuan cookbook), and it is somewhat unusual in that it strongly reflects the tastes of the Mongol Yuan dynasty rather than of native Chinese cuisine. It presents an interesting hybrid of Mongol, Persian, Turkic, and Chinese cooking (heavy on the boiled mutton soups), and I’ll be trying some recipes from it later, but it is not “typical” of Chinese food thought throughout history.

The closest I’ve been able to find to Ming dynasty (1368-1644 C.E.) recipes are in Chinese Imperial Cuisines and Eating Secrets (trans. Zhang Tingquan), a rather disorganized little book that focuses primarily on the following Qing dynasty. It’s not an ideal source by any means, but it’s possible to create some plausible dishes from the descriptions. The Ming Dynasty chapter can be found online, but here are the two “recipes” I’ve based this stirfry on:

Quick Stir – Fried Sheep Tripe: Wash the sheep stomach until it is clean and then cut it into small strips. Heat water to boiling in a soup pot and heat oil in a wok. Put the tripe into the boiling pot, scald it, remove it with a wire strainer, wring it dry in a piece of coarse cloth, and stir – fry it in the wok. Add cut onion, sliced garlic, Chinese prickly ash, aniseed, soy sauce, rice wine, and vinegar. Stir – fry it quickly until it become crisp and delicious. If it is fried slowly, it will become moist and difficult to eat. (Eight Commentaries on How to Live)

Stir – Fried Sheep Tripe: Cut the cleaned sheep stomach into small pieces. Place them in a heated wok with chicken fat, soy sauce, wine, ginger, and onion and stir them quickly. Or, cut the stomach into long strips, boil them quickly in boiling water, and wring them in a piece of cloth. Stir the pieces in heated oil until they become slightly yellow. Add wine, soy sauce, and onion, and stir them again. (Collection of Making Adjustments to Tripods)

The first recipe here is a strict redaction of the first recipe, which I haven’t tried as such (I’m a little afraid of tripe and I didn’t have any on hand). Below the cut is what I actually made, which uses essentially the same sauce, but beef and snowpeas for the substance.

Chinese prickly ash is another name for Szechuan pepper (Zanthoxylon simulans); the best substitutes are Japanese sansho or Tasmanian pepper berries, but since both are actually harder to obtain, black pepper is okay. Tripe is intestine, and is often available at Asian markets and sometimes from friendly butchers. Lamb would be excellent, if tripe is too weird for you. Shaoxing wine is a dry rice wine; sake is the best substitute, but a sweet rice wine like mirin is okay in a pinch, and you can use sherry if nothing else is available. Rapeseed (canola) and sesame oil seem to be the most commonly used oils in period Chinese cooking. I would use canola oil with a dash of sesame or the chicken fat mentioned in the second recipe for frying the meat.

Ming Dynasty Stirfried Sheep Tripe

Serves 3

1 lb sheep tripe, cut into small strips

Canola oil for frying

1 small onion, cut however pleases you
2-3 cloves sliced garlic

1/2 c. soy sauce
1/4 c. Shaoxing wine (dry rice wine)
2 tbl rice vinegar
Dash of sesame oil

1/2 tsp aniseed (anise)
Ground Szechuan pepper to taste

1. Boil water in a large saucepan. Quickly dunk the tripe in the water (scald it). Pat dry with a cloth or paper towels.

2. Heat some canola oil in a wok. Add garlic, onion, tripe, soy sauce, rice wine, rice vinegar, sesame oil, aniseed, and pepper. Stirfry quickly over high heat until tripe is “crispy and delicious.”

Serve with steamed rice.