Ulrich's Albondigas

A very long time ago I had a very good friend that I hung out with a lot. It was student times, and we cooked a lot for each other, nothing fancy, but mostly good. My favorite of his foods is still one of my staples - his Albondigas. Albondigas is nothing else but a fancy way of saying meatballs. But these are soooo good. And they get better!

Emptying out the freezer and getting it ready for the arrival of the quarter pig, I found some oven roasted tomatoes and garlic that I had made at the end of the last tomato season. Perfect starting point for the albondigas.

The trick is to put all the seasonings in the meatballs, and leave the tomatoes fairly unseasoned. And then cook everything until the tomato sauce comes together in a very thick sauce, at least an hour, if you have time better two. And if you have more time let it cool down, and reheat it the next day for perfect flavor!

The seasoning is mostly garlic (yes, that's one pound of meat and probably 6 garlic cloves), and your favorite chile. I like a combination of Ancho and Chipotle, but you probably have your own ideas. Make little meatball, less than an inch in diameter.

In the meantime get the tomatoes heated. I used my oven roasted tomatoes, and a small can of high quality canned tomatoes. In the summer I use fresh tomatoes, I'll just have to let it simmer longer, but the taste is out of this world. When the tomatoes are simmering, carefully add the meatballs to the sauce, bring back to a light simmer, put a lid on, and go on with life.

This is at the beginning of the process, two hours later it's very thick and very red and very yummy! (Note to self: next time pick out the tomato skins before freezing them.) And duh, of course, I forgot to take a photo of the finished product, I was hungry! I promise to take a photo of the whole goodness the next time.

Recipes:
Ulrich's Albondigas


2 lbs tomatoes, fresh or roasted (see below)
- or -
28 oz can of good quality canned tomatoes, e.g. fire roasted Muir Woods
- or -
any mixture thereof
1 lb ground beef
6 garlic cloves
1 chipotle in adobo sauce, minced, or 1 fresh chili
salt - very little if using canned tomoatoes, a bit more if using real tomatoes.

Heat tomatoes in a medium pot. Chop garlic and chili, add to ground beef, form little 1" diameter meatballs. When the tomatoes are heated, carefully add the meatballs, stirring as little as possible until they have firmed up. Leave on stove at low heat for at least 2 hours, stirring every once in a while, until the sauce has thickened.

Serve with fresh crusty bread.

Oven Roasted Tomatoes


When you see a good deal on tomatoes (I usually find them on the Farmers Market late in the season when people are sick of tomatoes) buy as many as you can handle / afford / stick in your freezer. Or, if you are lucky enough to be a good gardener, use your own (and watch me turn green with envy!) Wash, cut in half, put them on cookie sheets, cut side up, slightly salt, pepper, add some garlic cloves or herbs if you have, and stick in the oven at 300 with convection. Convection helps dry out the tomatoes, and you can pack your oven with several sheets at once. Timing? I've had them in there anywhere between 30 minutes and 1 1/2 hours, depending on the tomatoes, the humidity, the amount of tomatoes, just keep an eye on them. When they start shriveling up, take out and let cool down, take off the skins (!), then freeze. You'll thank me in the winter!

Stuffed Cabbage Rolls - with an Asian Twist

I mentioned that there is a lot of ground beef that comes with the quarter cow, did I not? Something like 17 lbs. Which is probably fine for most people, but it's certainly a challenge for me, I'm just not that much of a ground meat person.... So what to do today? Cabbage rolls? Urgh, I used to hate them when I grew up. Boring tastes, cabbagy and with a slimy sauce. Not mine.

What to do? Adapting the filling for the egg dumplings sounded like a good idea. And then steaming instead of sauteing. Let's go for it!

Start with a head of cabbage, put it in a big pot of boiling water, take it out after 10 minutes, peel off the outermost layers, carefully so they don't break, put back in the boiling water, repeat. I had a very small cabbage, and it yielded about 20 leaves.

Next: The filling. About a half pound of ground beef, finely chopped mint, a shallot, a teaspoon of oyster sauce and some salt. Wrap it into your softened cabbage leaves, and put them in the steamer for 20 minutes.

 

I had another half pound of meat, which I tried to use as a stuffing for tofu, which miserably failed, so I ended up stir frying everything: Tofu, beef, ginger, a half jalapeno, ginger, garlic, a handful peanuts, some Sichuan pepper, some asparagus. There are two tricks to stir frying:

• Heat up your wok to the point that it smokes. Then lower the heat and add oil. Not the other way around....
• Once you have stir fried everything, add your flavoring - in my case black bean sauce - and a bit of water, then put the lid on and wait 30 seconds to a minute for the flavors to mingle. Now you have a wonderful sauce, and no need for cornstarch.

This pretty much guarantees perfect results no matter what you put in, in the easiest case you take some garlic, some leafy greens, some soy sauce, and you have a great side dish.

The cabbage rolls were nice and crispy and fresh tasting, thanks to the mint, and the stir fry was a good contrast in textures, especially together with the cabbage rolls.

Orange Salad and Eye of Round

Finally meat again! One of the packages in my freezer read "Eye of Round". I had pushed it backwards and downwards, and finally everything in front and on top had disappeared, and there was no more excuse. Everything I found about it read "tough" and "marinate forever" and "really tough".

Hmmmm.... I took it out, and it was a beautiful piece of meat, though yes, it did feel tough. And no fat..... I decided to give it my mustard and salt treatment - lots of mustard, lots of salt, some pepper - and let it sit in the fridge for 24 hours before barbecuing it.

Fast forward to the next day. Inspired by the New York Times (do I sound like a broken record?) I decided a Moroccan orange salad would work great with it. In addition to oranges, a green and a red chile and black cured dried olives I put in some minced dates as well as coarsely chopped walnuts.

Add lime juice and good olive oil, toss, let the flavors mingle for a little, and then you're ready.

The meat was on the barbie until it reached 150F, mainly because I was nervous about it being too tough to eat less cooked. We should have probably taken it off once it reached 140, but it came out great, very very tasty, a tiny little tough, but great beef flavor.

What's the lesson of the day? If life hands you oranges turn them into a savory side salad, if you have meat you're afraid of tackle it.

That being said - I should rename the blog: I just bought a quarter heritage pig. We'll get it next week. I'm sharing a half with a friend, and we'll embark on a Prosciutto making adventure. And I'll keep you posted as to what's happening with the remainder of the pig of course!

My Brisket Recipe

When picking up my happy cow in January, I chatted with Joe Morris for a while about all the great food I'd made with it, and how it challenged me to try new meat cuts I'd never try otherwise. I had just made a brisket. No, not "a" brisket, but the first brisket of my life. I had a few friends over for dinner, and the meat pretty much evaporated off the plate - despite my hopes that there would be leftovers for hash the next day. So Joe asked me for the recipe, and I tried it again to be sure. And now it's in their newsletter! Here you go:

http://www.morrisgrassfed.com/newsletter/Morris%20Grassfed%20Beef%203.2010.pdf

Sadly I didn't take pictures.... Sorry, will do the next time.

Regarding pictures, I attained sudden fame! Ok, not quite. The NYT had an article about people that photograph all their meals (I'm not that obsessed, I only take photos of pretty food I made...). And they asked people to submit their pictures. So I'm happy to report that the picture of my watermelon radish and the cucumber salad actually made it on their website:
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2010/04/06/dining/eating-now.html?ref=dining#/40846/
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2010/04/06/dining/eating-now.html?ref=dining#/40844/

And since I think a blog entry without a photo is a boring blog entry: Here is my kitchen as of last week- utter chaos!

Since then we've had the plumber and the electrician in, and now the drywaller is working his magic... One more week till the furniture is coming. Yeah!

And while not related to food, I thought I'd share this picture of my cat - excellent taste in beer I must say!

The beans are soaking, so stay tuned for Tahini Soup!

Not Your Mother's Meatballs

There is a lot of very edible meat on every cow that isn't a steak or a roast. Morris's website says a typical split half consists of 15 lbs pounds steaks, 17 lbs roasts, 7 lbs stew meat, 11 lbs chuck and round steaks and 35 lbs pounds ground beef. That's a lot of ground beef. Being 2/3rds through my first quarter cow I've gotten pretty inventive. 


Today it's barbecued Asian meatballs. Or sliders in Romaine leaves. Call them what you want. Just look at them - pretty little jewels, and so yummy!

I start off with mixing the meat with onions, ginger, chile, garlic, some chopped peanuts, a few drops of fish sauce or Worcestershire sauce, an egg and some rolled oats. Mix it all together, carefully, not too much or they become tough.

    

While the meatballs go on the BBQ I mix up a little dipping sauce with more ginger, chile, a scallion and soy sauce. Serving is easy: Make little salad cups our of romaine or - preferably - buttercup lettuce leaves, or any other salad leaves, place the meatballs in the cups, drizzle a little of the dressing on it, and dig in. Makes a great appetizer, or as in my case today, a great lunch after having packed up the kitchen to get ready for the remodel. 

  

Recipe:
Chile Ginger Meatballs
1 lb ground beef
1/4 finely chopped onion
1 teaspoon chopped ginger
some chopped chile - how much depends on the chile, and how spicy you like it
2 cloves of garlic, chopped
1 handful of peanuts, chopped
2 tablespoons of rolled oats
1 egg
a few drops of Asian fish sauce or Worcestershire sauce
Mix carefully, form 1" diameter meatballs, barbecue or pan fry. 


Gingered Dipping Sauce
1 teaspoon chopped ginger
1 scallion, chopped
some chopped chile
3 tablespoons of soy sauce
Mix together. 


Serve meatballs in lettuce cups, with some dipping sauce drizzled over. Hoisin Sauce also works well. 

Beef Pickup Day!

I'm ready - my mini-freezer compartment is cleaned up, ready to take on the next portion of my quarter of a cow. My cow lead its happy life in San Juan Bautista, which is about 45 minutes south of San Jose, at the farm of Morris Grassfed Beef. Rather than buying a freezer and taking the entire split half at once I opted for the CSA delivery, where I pick up the meat on 3 dates over the year.

How do I get the meat? Joe Morris drives it closer to me. At the appointed time I show up at Doerr Park in San Jose, where his refrigerated truck is parked. At the last pickup it was sunny, and lots of people were getting extras, so there was quite a happy line of waiting customers with their coolers. Today it's pouring rain, so no line. Yeah! Joe's truck is his little office, with a laptop with his customer's info on it. We chat a while - nice to know the people that are growing your food, and he's a keeper! And I'm all stoked, they'll put my recipe for brisket in their next newsletter! Yeah! Anyways, Joe's helper finds my box and loads it in my car, I pay, and the 3rd of the quarter cow is mine.

 

I get in the car and get my loot home as quickly as possible, I want it to stay frozen after all. Perhaps I should get a larger ice chest after all?

So what's really in the box? The Morrises give you a good rundown on their website - www.morrisgrassfed.com - but I thought it would be interesting to show it. So here it is. For a close-up view click on the pictures.

  

Top layer: Eye of Round, Short Ribs, Sirloin Steak (see my other post on how delicious that looks), Swiss Steak (???) and Beef Stew (no, the cats were not part of the deal....) 

Bottom layer: Two more sirloins, another Swiss Steak, two more Beef Stews, and a bunch of ground beef. I feel that I forgot something, but I can't recall.

Earlier shipments included more roasts, I think they are trying to split it up that you have more steaks in the summer, and the roasts in the winter. 

And yes, you see it correctly, it's all labeled NOT FOR SALE! It mainly means that it's not packaged for individual sale, and no, it's not bad for you (or cat food, as you may think from the pictures). Au contraire, it's good for you, much healthier than grain fed, and much better for the environment because the beef gets to graze the grass and isn't force fed corn. Their website has some neat aerial photos where you can see that their land is super healthy and green.

So now I'll have to plot what my last meal in the old kitchen will be.... A steak? A stew? Meatballs? Hmmmmm......

The Best Caesar Salad

One of the beauties of local, pasture raised eggs is that they are far less likely to have any problems with salmonella, so eating raw eggs isn't like playing Russian roulette... Caesar salad has long been my favorite salad, but since I developed my version of a dressing I'm usually underwhelmed in restaurants. So here's dinner tonight: Silke's Caesar with Sirloin slices.

How to make the perfect caesar dressing? Start with one raw egg, zest and juice of 1 lemon, some chipotle powder or fresh chiles or red pepper flakes, 1 teaspoon of sugar, and plenty of anchovies.

 

Slowly drizzle in about 1/2 cup of your favorite olive oil while whisking, especially the first few drops. (My favorite EVOO is either from California, or out of the backyard of my friends that live in Antibes in between beautiful olive trees.) Mix nicely until everything is emulsified and thickened.

 

Toss in romaine salad, cut up an avocado (shortcut: dice avocado while it's still in the skin, then scoop out with a spoon or the rounded side of a Santoku knife), grate Parmesan over the salad and add some fresh ground pepper, toss the salad, and voila, you'll never want to have caesar salad at a restaurant again!

San Francisco Chinatown followed by The Perfect Sirloin

What to do on a lazy Sunday? Lucky enough to live only an hour from San Francisco, it always seems a good idea to go there and spend the day walking and eating. The plan was to go to the Ferry Building's Farmers Market, but that's on Saturday - bummer. After a leisurely walk along the waterfront we dove into Chinatown - always good, but especially so on the verge of a China trip!

Rule #1: If you go to Chinatown, never eat in the tourist restaurants, but instead seek out the hole in the wall dim sum bakeries and noodle shops. We went for dim sum, and this was our $5 breakfast:

Fabulous shrimp, spinach and pork dumplings as well as some rice parcels with goodies in them. Strolling along Grant Street made my mouth water....

 

But alas, it all had to stay there, this blog is about my happy meat and I have a beautiful, happy sirloin steak waiting at home. It's been marinating in Teriyaki Sauce with a bit of Sriracha for kicks.

Notice how the grass fed beef doesn't have the marbled look, but the fat is in distinct areas? Much easier to cut off and hence better for you. And sooo yummy! Off to the BBQ it goes... And a little later it's at 130F internal temperature, gets a little rest, and here it is:

 

Spinach sauteed with some of the marinade as a side - voila, the perfect dinner!