Flesh Products from the IFT Expo

Am I surprised that there weren't many animal flesh products at the IFT Expo? Most of the samples were attempts to make cereal/candy/chocolate/desserts more "healthy". However, there were some snacks that showcased the lastest in animal flesh preservation technology. There was also a booth that was giving out plates of cooked animal flesh which was extremely delicious, but their marketing seems to have failed because everyone was standing in line obtaining a plate of grilled meat, disregarding the company name, and not signing deals. Or maybe I didn't notice because I'm ignorant.

1. Plate of Scrumptious Grilled Animal Flesh

2. Beef Sticks

These were very flavourful but had a peculiar texture. The casing was typically chewy, but the filling can be described as a combination of sawdust, tuna, and pork floss. This may have been due to the oleoresin? I would've expected a more cohesive or gelatinous texture. Despite this, they were delicious.

3. Teriyaki Jerky

This was unusually sweet and rectangular. It had an arid texture that warranted reluctant chewing.

Australian Meat Pie...

...sort of.

I highly doubt I could make an authentic Australian meat pie. Even if I did, I wouldn't be able to eat it. Though, I guess if/when I go to Australia (That shop at Penrith Plaza, particularly), I'd probably actually eat (*gasp*) the beefy concoction enclosed in a crusty pastry shell.

The first step towards making a nice Australian meat pie would be to obtain a neat, authentic recipe. I'm not really sure whether this is an authentic recipe, but I chose it because Vegemite was one of the ingredients and everything was in metric units. So, at least I know it's from someone from the other-ish side of the world.

I didn't use prefrozen crust though (I made a whole-wheat short crust instead), and I did use different ingredients...but I don't feel like delving into this subject since HFCS and other random ingredients are involved. The filling smelled just like Australian meat pies (AHHHHH :D) which brought back a shock of nostalgia. When I smell the filling, I think about breezy Saturdays at Penrith Plaza, or at the public library, or walking down the lawn, or running up and down the hills at Nepean River. Carefree days. Unfortunately, I made too little pastry. Unlike the standard sized pies, I made small ones that fit into egg tart shells. Why? Er, I don't have any other containers for these pies...

Although it appeared that my filling was too runny, after baking the pies in the oven (430 degrees F for 10 minutes, 375 degrees F for 7 minutes, and... sit in the oven for half an hour), the texture and moist-ness was perfect!

Marinade

Since I'm pretty much doing half the cooking in the family now (to give my mum less housework and more rest time), I figured I should learn how to cook animals. So, I've been browsing through the Costco cookbook since I figured, hey, let's just get the gist of cooking animals, right? I personally find cookbooks more useful than the internet when I'm a complete neophyte at cooking something (in this case, animal flesh). They're not for me to follow, though. They're just kinda... there. As a guideline. Something for me to manipulate.

I've never made any marinades before. Today, however, I made dinner and I made some sort of stove-top grilled tofu with this sweet and sour fruity marinade. To appease the rest of the family, I also made stove-top grilled pig flesh (pork chops) with the same marinade. Apparently, 1 cm-thick pork chops cook pretty quickly, and I overcooked the first three chunks (I mean, how was I supposed to know whether they were cooked or not? I can't taste test them...), but they were still edible. The rest of the chops turned out fine, though.

My mum and brother definitely liked the marinade. Although my brother didn't comment much (he did say they were "juicy" though, and he couldn't figure out what sort of marinade it was), I felt really pleased because his fork kept transporting chunks of pork chop to his bowl. My sister responded to this new dish by saying "Eww", which is the norm. The only comment from my dad was that it needed more salt. Meh. I wonder how it's like when I'm not at home. *Here comes the bitter snide comment* I wonder if my dad would cook dinner if I hadn't been home today. My mum had to take my sister to a party today, and didn't get back until 8 pm (which is literally when I finished stir frying the bak choi - I started making dinner around 7), and my dad was just watching TV, and he'd been home for half an hour. I mean, would everyone wait until 9 for dinner?

Anyway. To get the general gist of a marinade, I read the recipe from page 105 of Favorite Recipes The Costco Way 2007. It's a recipe by Paula Deen called "Pork Chops with Ragout" which isn't that great of a title in my opinion because in translation it's "Pork Chops in Sauce". My marinade is extremely loosely based off of Paula Deen's recipe, there is no butter in it. At all. Funny, huh?

INGREDIENTS

A.

Small clove of garlic

60 g onion

100 g (~1.5 stalks) of celery

4 leaves fresh basil!

B.

1 tbsp oregano

1 tbsp coriander

5 cut dried juniper berries

1 tsp nutmeg

Salt

Pepper

C.

150 ml apple juice

70 ml balsamic vinegar

2 tbsp vinegar

2-3 tbsp olive oil

Juice of one lime

D.

1 kg marinade-able objects (in this case, half tofu and half boneless pork chops in two separate containers)

E.

1 tbsp all purpose flour

METHOD

1. Finely chop stuff in Group A.

2. Mix stuff in Group A, B, and C together, in a container with a lid. It will be liquidy.

3. Cut marinade-able objects into pieces that are about 1 cm thick. For tofu, a thickness of 0.5 cm is better. Stick objects into marinade.

4. Leave container in a fridge for at least 4 hours.

5. FOR TOFU: Cook marinaded tofu in a frying pan on medium heat, uncovered, for 3-4 minutes on each side. If you like crunchy, burned exteriors, 5 minutes on each side is pretty nice too.

FOR PORK: Plop pieces onto the frying pan on medium heat, and cover for 1-2 minutes. Flip. Cover for 2-4 minutes. Keep uncovered and check frequently for doneness. This is quite difficult if one doesn't actually eat pork...

Remember: Sizzling is good.

6. Promptly remove marinated objects from frying pan, and scrape all the leftover marinade into the frying pan.

7. Stir (with the same spatula you've been using) on medium heat. When the marinade starts to bubble, add in E. (1 tbsp flour). Continue stirring until you end up with a thick sauce.

8. Pour sauce onto marinated objects and eat!!

I didn't take a picture of the pork chops but if I would say that they had neat grilled-ish exteriors and were squishy. They looked pretty fantastic on the inside too.

The marinated tofu tasted pretty good...it wasn't sweet enough for my liking, though. Still, I had leftover marinade so I marinated more tofu! :)

Turkey Meatballs

I don't eat turkey but I baked turkey meatballs. According to my brother, they were amazing (the best food I've made this August, apparently). They looked moist and flavourful too.

Unfortunately, I forgot to use metric.

Ingredients for 54 small turkey meatballs.

About 3 cups ground turkey

1 cup grated parmesan cheese

2 cups bread crumbs

0.5 cup (fat-free) milk (120 ml)

1 small onion

1 egg

1 tbsp oil

A few fresh basil leaves

Parsley flakes

Oregano

Lots of garlic cloves

Salt

Pepper

Method

1. Chop up stuff and mix everything

2. Clump into 54 balls, each about the size of a gumball. Since I'm so used to having baked items spread out, I left space between each meatball. I guess it wasn't that necessary and that I could've squished everything on to one baking sheet.

3. Bake at 375 degrees F for 10 minutes.

4. Take out, turn meatballs upside down.

5. Bake at 350 degrees F for 10 minutes.

6. Let sit in oven if you want, or just serve.

I'm sure I can do the same thing with firm tofu or chickpeas.

Dinner at China Chalet a.k.a. 天府 [Tian Fu]

My dad's birthday is around this time of year so we went out to eat dinner to celebrate it since I'm now a college kid and I can't come home much. Actually, I could if I had the money or the time. The truth is that college kids are poor. Well, most college kids are poor. There has to be some millionaires at Penn...

Anyway, my dad likes Chinese food [what a surprise! Not.] so we went to Tian Fu [天府] because that's where we used to go when we used to live in Florham Park in 2006. All I can say is, at least Niffy didn't yell out, "The food here isn't that good" because that's what she apparently said when my family went to the Greek restaurant a few weeks ago [without me, unfortunately]...

She nearly got hit by a car though, so I guess that's how karma works. It was a black SUV and it stopped for my brother and I as we were crossing the road. Then, it started to go again, and my sister decided to RUN across the road...

Then she proceeded to blame us for not warning her about the car. It was really crazy and confusing. It was like the time she was on the metro platform and I was on the metro and I was trying to keep the doors half open so that she could GET ON to the metro, and then the train started MOVING. Anyway, I keep digressing.

This was cow pieces with peanuts, water chestnuts, pepper, chilies, and oil.

Fish pieces with peppery batter and snow peas and oil. I am not condoning these acts of massacring animals. My mum did tell me that she apparently has had high cholesterol [ish] for the past 7 years, and she's finally decided to eat fewer animals now, instead of having to take meds [sigh. The U.S. and its pharmaddiction], which I support.

Three different animal pieces [chicken, pig and shrimp] with vegetables and, oh, yeah, oil. This one actually was supposed to have crunchy rice with it but there were only three chunks of crunchy rice, which I don't think counts as it being "crunchy rice with meat". It should be "meat with vegetables and a tiny side of crunchy rice". Whatever, it benefits them for advertising...

And there was rice vermicelli with vegetables and oil. Seriously. Why. Do. Chinese. Restaurants. Use. So. Much. Oil. Needless to say, I got pretty much zero protein but I did get all the unsaturated fat I need for the week.

Hunan Manor

Hello Doctor State, a.k.a MD, Maryland!
After being in the car from 3:45pm to 8:15pm, we finally arrived at my parents' friends' house. They then drove us to dinner at Hunan Manor, which - surprise surprise - is a Chinese restaurant. I personally didn't have a great impression of it when I went in, because of this:
Dude, it's nearly mid 2010. And, "dungenese" isn't that great to advertise to people who speak English.
They actually, though, had a ton of vegetarian stuff that was, well, DELICIOUS.
The weird fried flour thing:
Napkin roses; the one on the right is mine, the one on the left is my brother's:
Fried tofu with mushrooms:
Sweet and Sour "Pig" [a.k.a gluten]. Actually, I was gonna get Sweet and Sour "Chicken" [a.k.a gluten], but the waitress literally said, "That one doesn't taste good." Then again, the "pig" dish cost more, so I guess that was their marketing ploy. Either way, it looks like the real thing, and the sauce was really good! The "pig/gluten" part itself though was really dense so I suppose it depends on people's preferences. I don't think I really like dense stuff, except fudge and brownies and toffee [you get the picture].