Buta No Kakuni or Japanese Braised Pork Belly

Main:  Pork Dish

Aside from filling soups, fall means heavy stews for our family.

Autumn sights & sounds in our part of the world.

The original recipe for this Japanese stew dish calls for the use of pork belly. In our quest for "healthier" meals, I used instead boneless pork leg.  You can use pork shoulder too.  The success of this dish is a little fat, sorry.  

You can use a regular pot or Dutch oven (better; keeps the meat moisture in).  I used instead a slow cooker.  I just plonked everything in and left it slow cooking for 6 hours.

Ingredients and Process (enough for 2 meals for 4 people)

• Grease bottom and sides of slow cooker.
• Cut 3 pounds of pork into cubes. Place them at the bottom of cooker.
  

• Add 10 slices of ginger and 3 stalks of chopped scallions on top of pork cubes.
  

• In one go, pour in: 

1/2 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup soy sauce,

1/3 cup sake (or dry sherry)

2 tablespoons sriracha

1/2 cup water

Slow cook for 6 hours until meat is REALLY tender.

• If using regular pot or Dutch oven, add more water to barely cover the meat.  Boil then simmer until meat is tender. Regularly check to see if you have to add more water.  Bring up to boil each time then simmer.  This would take 1 1/2 to 2 hours.
• When the pork is close to done, hard boil eggs. Once eggs are cooked, rinse under cool water and remove shells.  Slice eggs in half.
  

• Using a slotted spoon, transfer the tender pork to another container.
  

• Pour the liquid in a big enough pot.  Boil to reduce and thicken the liquid for 10 minutes.
• Add the eggs to the braising liquid so it will absorb some of the flavour.  Boil 5 more minutes.  
  

• Then add the pork.  Gently mix (you want the eggs intact) and transfer to serving dishes.

• If using Dutch oven or regular pot, just leave the braising liquid in pot to boil and reduce.
• Top meat dish with freshly chopped scallions.
  

• Serve with either rice or ramen noodles. Oishi!!!!
  

Leche Flan con Cream Cheese

Dessert

If you think the Leche Flan you've been consuming all these years is rich, this recipe will surely make you reconsider.  The creator is Celia Fisher and was shared by +Chef Ron Bilaro.  After my first attempt, the following recipe has some minor fine-tuning.  It is a wee bit more dense than your regular leche flan, practically like a cheesecake.  Who can say no to that??!? Definitely not my family.

Celia Fisher, the creator of this crazy good recipe.

Ingredients & Process (for a 9 1/2 inch baking tin; sorry, we want our custards big & thick so I don't use the typical, dainty llanera)

• Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees.
• Make the caramel in a small pot by gently heating 1/3 cup water, 1 cup brown sugar and 1/2 teaspoon vanilla. This would take about 6 minutes until sugar is melted and golden brown. Per the original recipe, you can prepare the caramel directly on the pan.  Unfortunately, cack hands and induction cooktops don't go safely together :p
• Pour the caramel onto the pan.  Submerge the bottom of the pan on ice water to stop the cooking process ie, you don't want the sugar to harden.
  
• You can do the following in a blender or if you're lazy to set up and wash too many things, just bring out your hand blender. In a big bowl with spout, hand-blend the following.  Make sure there are no cream cheese clumps hiding in the mixture. Believe me, the cream cheese is tricky.

1. 5 eggs - room temperature
2. 1 can evaporated milk
3. 1 can condensed milk 
4. 4 oz cream cheese (that would be half a tub)
5. 1 teaspoon cinnamon
6. 2 tablespoons vanilla

• Carefully pour mixture into the pan.  That's why you need a spout on your bowl because you don't want the caramel and custard to mix - you want them as separate layers.
• Cover pan with tin foil and bake for 1 hour and 10 minutes in a bain marie.
• When done, dispose of tin foil and chill flan in the refrigerator to set.
• Run the dull side of a thin knife around the edge before inverting on serving plate.

Chicken Any Noodles Soup

Main or Side:  Chicken Noodle Soup

Mornings are getting nippier our side of the world.  It's time once again to whip out heavy stews and filling soups.

 

To start things off, am sharing with you this Chicken Noodle Soup recipe.  It will surely warm you up - both tummy and heart because memories of childhood start flooding back with each rich mouthful. So flexible too. You can use any type of noodle you have in your pantry: macaroni, elbow, flat egg noodles, gnocchi, etc. and will still deliver the same satisfying result.  You can clear out your refrigerator with left over veggies and meat bones.  I added a left-over pork bone for this batch.

Procedure and Ingredients (serves four people as the only dish plus a little extra for snack or breakfast)

The ingredients.

• Get a gallon bag, place 2/3 cup flour, season with salt and pepper.  Place 1.5 - 1.8 pounds of boneless chicken breasts. Toss a little so all parts of the chicken are coated with the flour mixture.  You can use bone-in but it's just a bother to remove the bones when you shred the cooked meat. 
• Heat a pan with 3 tablespoons of cooking oil then brown the chicken breasts.  You're not frying them so 3 minutes per side would suffice.  
  

ISIS Ladies and Nutella!!?!!!

I'm having a cognitive dissonance here, ISIS ladies continuing on loving Nutella??!??!!!!  Notwithstanding?!!?

ISIS ladies and Nutella