Tuesday, June 3, 2014

Bolognese Meat Sauce



This recipe is modified from a cook book I got when we traveled to Italy. It's simple and straight forward and has been my favorite meat sauce ever since.

Ingredients:
1.5 lb ground beef
.5 lb un-somked bacon, chopped
2 brown diced onions
2 cups diced celery
2 cups diced carrots
4 cloves
1 cup chicken stock
2T tomato paste
1T black peppercorns

Directions:
Crisp the bacon in a dutch oven saucepan or pot. Scoop out the excess fat from the bacon. Add ground beef and cook until the meat turns a nice brown color. Add vegetables and cook for 5 minutes under medium heat. Add tomato paste, cloves, black peppercorns and just enough stock to cover the mixture. Bring up to boil then turn to low heat and simmer for 2 hours.

The secret is the more it cooks (without burning), the better it will be. Add more stock or water if it needs but without exaggerating. The sauce should be moist but not liquid.

I like to freeze half of it for when I don't have time to cook.


The Simplest BBQ Pork Ribs

Ingredients:
3lb  Pork spareribs or baby back ribs
1 bottle of any store bought BBQ sauce you like

Directions:
Put ribs in the slow cooker covered just enough cold water over them. Add 2-3T salt then cook for 4 hours in high temperature just as the meat is about to fall of the bones.

Finish cooking in the oven:
Preheat over at 400 F. Put the rib on baking sheet and generously apply bbq sauce on the ribs.  Bake for about 20 minutes. Flip the ribs twice and reapply sauce during cooking.

Finish cooking on the grill:
Generously apply bbq sauce on the ribs and cook them in the mid low heat for about 10 to 15 minutes. Flip the ribs twice and reapply sauce during grilling.







Saturday, April 26, 2014

Beef Noodle Soup

Phyllis, this is for you. I hope you like it. Thanks to you, this is the first post ever since we moved back to the US. Compared to my first attempt of beef noodle soup posted back in July 2007, the recipe definitely has improved over the years. I don't exactly measure everything... so it's all my estimate. You can adjust the spices/ flavor to your like. 

Bundles of Baby Boy Choy, Noodles, 2 lb Beef Shank , 1 large Onion, 1 can 28oz crushed Tomatoes (I use San Marzano - less acidy) , 1 lb Carrots, 2 T or more Hot bean past (taiwanese style), soy sauce to taste
 Cut the beef shank to chunks.
Bring a pot of water to boil and gently put beef into the boiling water for about 2 - 4 minutes. Get the beef out and set aside.
 Cut onions and carrots.
Brown/ caramelize onions in a soup pot in mid heat.
Add beef (not juice) and hot bean paste to the pot and stir together until the meat is coated evenly with the bean paste about 2 minutes.
 Add tomato, carrots, and 8 - 10 cups water.











Add spices bag (from Taiwan, I think 99 Ranch has it) and soy sauce to taste. Bring the soup to boil then turn to low heat for soup to simmer for 3 hours until the meats are tender.  Scoop foam up if there is any.






Side dish - sour mustard


Mice garlic and julian the sour muster vegetable.





Heat 2 T vegetable oil. Add chili flakes and garlic for half minute then add sliced sour mustard vegetable and 1 - 2 T brown sugar. Stir and cook for about 2 - 3 more minutes.