Writing With My Mouth Full

Braised Ham Hock with Fennel

I woke up early to stop by the farmers’ market before work on Wednesday. I wanted some fresh bacon so I said hello to Mike from Tamarack Hollow Farm. He still remembers me as the girl who ordered half a suckling pig and a whole goose almost two years ago, and for that I remain loyal. With my nice slab of bacon, he also introduced me to a healthy-sized ham hock and rattled a recipe. I didn’t write it down but four days later, I made up a recipe using the three words I still remembered: fennel, tarragon and braise.

Braising is something I love to do during the colder months. Even though I used potatoes and beans in this recipe, the fennel and the tarragon made it more spring than winter. Instead of red wine, I splashed half a cup of the Austrian Gruner Veltliner I picked up from the store because of its beer cap and chubby bottle. The combination made a warm yet bright dish perfect for spring.

Ingredients:
1 fresh ham hock
1 bulb fennel, sliced thinly
3 sprigs of tarragon, stemmed
1 1/2 cup of white beans, soaked overnight
1 leek, chopped
a handful of baby carrots
4 white potatoes, peeled, quartered
1/2 cup of white wine
salt, pepper

1. Preheat oven to 350º. Meanwhile, in a heated large Dutch oven, brown all sides of the ham hock until it has a nice golden color. Remove to a plate.
2. You should have some oil rendered from the ham hock. If there’s not a lot, add some oil and heat it up. Sauté the leeks until soft. Add the potatoes and cook until slightly brown. Add the tarragon, fennel and baby carrots and cook for 5 minutes. Season with salt and pepper.
3. Add the wine and the beans. Let simmer until the liquid evaporates a little. Add the ham hock in the middle of the vegetables. Cover and braise in the oven for 1 hour. After an hour, turn the ham hock, cover again and braised for another 30 minutes. Remove from the oven and let the pot rest, half-covered. When ready to serve, slice off the meat from the bone and serve with the vegetables.

Fette Sau

354 Metropolitan Avenue near Havemeyer Street, Williamsburg, Brooklyn
718/963.3404
about $60 for four, with a gallon of beer, without tip
♥ ♥

In case it hasn’t been obvious, I love pork. I was having a bad day and all I wanted was to get a couple of drinks where I can sit outside and enjoy the warm weather. I wanted to forget, even for just a few hours, that a family member was in the hospital. I wanted good food so that I can feel happy in my stomach and then stronger in my heart to accept whatever bad news that may come next. I was even willing to take the L to Brooklyn to find that kind of comfort, as far away from Bellevue Hospital as I could.

I was with great company including Scott Gold, the author of The Shameless Carnivore: A Manifesto for Meat Lovers, and we talked about the experiences he wrote in his book during his quest to eat 31 kinds of meat. (I don’t want to ruin the book for you but among my favorites are the hunting for squirrels, salivating for the caribou and spitting out the bull’s penis.)

He shared his stories as we picked on the oh-so-moist and fatty brisket, spicy and snappy pork sausages and the perfectly cooked pulled pork. We couldn’t deal without some veggies so we also ordered the broccoli and the potato salad–both helped cut the fattiness on our palates. The baked beans were barely touched but I saw through the empty glass gallon of beer by the time we wiped our hands clean with Wet-Naps.

German for “greasy sow”, Fette Sau not only provided a great place to enjoy the warm night air, it also gave me a chance to appreciate and enjoy what was around and in front of me: enjoyable company and a happiness-inducing plate of pork.

Tomatillo Sauce

I’ve made salsa verde before using different kinds of greens: parsley, mint, basil and capers. This version fits its Spanish name more because it uses tomatillos, those green tomatoes you see in your grocery store covered in an onion-skin husk.

Ingredients:
8 tomatillos, thoroughly washed, halved
1 medium red onion, chopped
1 bunch cilantro, chopped
2 Jalapeño peppers, stemmed, seeded, chopped
1/4 tsp sugar
juice from half a lemon
salt

1. Place tomatillos cut side down on a baking sheet. Place in broiler for about 8 minutes to lightly blacken the skin.
2. When done, pulse together all ingredients in a food processor. Season to taste with lemon juice and salt. Transfer to a large container with a seal. Let cool to room temperature before storing in refrigerator.

Pickled Ramps

In a week’s time, New York City has gone from spring to summer. Temperature was up 76 last week and I wore shorts to work. Good thing the produce at the farmers’ market was still in spring mode because I couldn’t have celebrated the warm weather without having my first ramps of the season. I got my early batch from Whole Foods for $19.99 a pound. F that! A bigger bunch in Union Square was $2.50 each when I stopped by the next morning. Because I was able to afford a few bunches, I decided to pickle them.

Make sure you wash and clean the ramps thoroughly. From the farmers’ market, the roots were intact. I cut them off and washed them with the water running; the onion skin from the stalks easily came off. I cut off and only left about an inch of the greens. I set the leaves aside for another recipe. Shichimi togarashi is a Japanese spice mix used to flavor soups and noodle dishes. You can buy a small bottle from Sunrise Mart if you’re in Manhattan, or else make your own.

Ingredients:
4 bunches of ramps
2 cups rice-wine vinegar
1 cup white sugar
salt

For the shichimi togarashi:
1 tsp red chili flakes
1 tsp sesame seeds
3 curls of orange peel
a very small knob of ginger, peeled, crushed
1 sheet of nori

1. Bring all the ingredients, except the ramps, to a full boil in 3 cups of water until sugar dissolves.
2. In a pickling jar, place cleaned ramps and pour in the pickling juice. Using a small tea cup as weight, make sure that the ramps are completely submerged. Let cool to room temperature.
3. Seal jar and store in the refrigerator for about 5 days.

Stir-Fried Black-Eyed Peas

The ginger-garlic paste I made three weeks ago is proving to be very useful. I first made it for dilled vegetables when I started cooking for some of my co-workers. I have since used the batch I stored in the freezer for two kinds of kimchi and now for this dish. It’s so much easier than peeling and chopping garlic and ginger all the time. And because they’ve been puréed together, the paste is much more fragrant. I love snapping a frozen sheet of it and just waiting for a few minutes before throwing it in a pot of vegetables.

This is the first time I’ve cooked with black-eyed peas. I’m only familiar with it from Cameron’s traditional New Year’s dish. She made it for our group when we welcomed 2007 in Florida and again in Austin last January. This take is more northern than southern; in fact it’s a northern Indian specialty in Punjab, Kashmir, Uttar Pradesh and Delhi according to Monisha Bharadwaj’s India’s Vegetarian Cooking.

Ingredients:
3 cups of black-eyed peas, soaked in water overnight then drained
1 onion, finely chopped
2 tomatoes, chopped
1 tbsp ginger-garlic paste
a handful of cilantro, finely chopped
1 tsp cumin seeds
1 tsp chili powder
1 tsp turmeric
1 tsp garam masala
1/2 tsp sugar
oil, salt

1. Heat some oil in a large Dutch oven. Toast the cumin seeds until fragrant. Stir in ginger-garlic paste and cook for 1 minute.
2. Add the black-eyed peas and sprinkle in the chili powder, turmeric and garam masala. Cook for another minute. Add the tomatoes and sugar and season with salt. Mix and add 3/4 cup of water, cover and bring to a boil.
3. Reduce the heat and simmer until the peas are tender. Mash some of them to add thickness to the sauce. Turn off the heat and mix in cilantro before serving.