Obama dumplings
Last year, around this time, I attempted to make soup dumplings…I’ve since dubbed them my “George Bush dumplings” because they were such a miserable failure. I was craving the porky/gingery delight so I figured I might as well try again. Since I’ve decided to follow recipes and I checked Barbara Tropp’s book, The Modern Art of Chinese Cooking out from the library. It’s a great book and I’m delighted I have it for four weeks…I can already bet I’ll put it on my list of books to buy. I read through the dumpling chapter and quickly saw how to make a good dumpling wrapper. It’s amazing how going with the facts can be so beneficial.
Because of the rousing success of these dumplings I’ve decided to call them the Obama dumplings…they’re already better than the last ones and even though there’s room for improvement it’s obvious that it’s a change for the better.
Shu Mai Dumplings aka Obama Dumplings
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Dumpling Wrapper
3 cups all purpose flour
1 teaspoon coarse kosher salt
2 large eggs
9 tablespoons water
cornstarch for dusting the dough as you roll them out
Put the flour and salt in the work bowl of a food processor. Buzz it around a couple of times and then add the eggs with the motor running. Pulse two or three times. With the motor running add the water slowly, pulsing and adding water until the dough forms a ball and moves around the bowl. Remove the dough from the bowl and divide it into 4 equal pieces. Let them rest for 10 minutes.
Press the dough segments out flat and feed them through a pasta machine, working through the numbers, dialing it thinner each pass through. I went to number 6 which is where I could see the shadow of my hand behind the dumpling sheet. Keep them covered until you’re ready to fill them.
Dumpling Filling
1 pound ground pork
2 inches of fresh ginger
2 tablespoons soy sauce
1 tablespoon rice wine
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons chinese sesame oil
black pepper
Put all of the ingredients in the bowl of food processor and pulse two or three times. Remove from the bowl and refrigerate until ready to fill the dumplings.
To fill the dumplings I used a 1 tablespoon scoop and instead of cutting the dumplings into circles I just used squares. Once filled, I drew the edges up with my fingers and cinched them with a pinch. I steamed them in a bamboo steamer over simmering water for 25 minutes. Serve them with a dipping sauce of soy sauce, sesame oil, chili oil, and rice wine vinegar.
GH and I came up with these this morning: a Hillary dumpling looks good but tastes like all the other store-bought dumplings. A Giuliani dumpling is filled with hot air. A Edwards dumpling is absolutely beautiful but falls apart in the steamer. A McCain dumpling is beefy yet has an odd texture/flavor, it’s served with a difficult vietnamese-flavored sauce. A Romney dumpling is shaped like the mormon underwear, served with a secret sauce and is really difficult to swallow. A Huckabee dumpling is lowfat but ultimately makes you nauseated and uncomfortable.
Fideo killed the radio star
The food blogosphere seems to be totally about cookies right now. I get it because I’ve been busy baking my own but right now I don’t feel compelled to contribute to the glut of cookie recipes. Instead I’ll offer you something quick, easy, economical, and deeply satisfying.
According to Wikipedia, fideo is the spanish word for a noodle of any type. I picked up a bag of fideo in the Mexican food section of Woodman’s and after checking out what the interwebs said about it, I decided to strike out on my own. I wanted a quick, easy dinner that everyone would eat and that wouldn’t turn the kitchen into a disaster area. My efforts yielded exactly that. Sure, it wasn’t very pretty, but it did have a robust spicy flavor, a comforting texture, and molten cheese….mmmm, molten cheese. I couldn’t help but think of it as the mostly organic, homemade version of hamburger helper. From start to finish it took less than 30 minutes, one pan, and no leftovers. What’s not to love?
Spicy fideos with ground beef and black beans
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1 pack age of fideos
1 pound ground beef
1 onion diced
¼ cup Penzeys spicy taco seasoning
½ teaspoon ground cumin
1 cup water
1 jar canned tomato puree
1 can black beans drained
8 ounces pepper jack cheese, shredded
Brown the ground beef in the skillet. Drain it if necessary. Add the onion and let it cook for a few minutes. Add the fideos and stir to combine. Add the seasonings, water and tomatoes and stir to mix it up. Let this bubble and cook for 10 minutes. The liquid should be mostly absorbed by the fideos. Add the black beans. Preheat the oven to broil. Top the fideos with the cheese and stick the pan under the broiler to melt and brown the cheese. Serve with a salad alongside.
Video Killed The Radio Star, The Buggles - 1979
Missing the lipless
Let’s begin with the lack of a post earlier this week. Because we have two teenage boys my priorities, cooking-wise, are often different than someone who doesn’t have to feed two hungry bears. But the boys are finicky bears. For instance, Dexter won’t eat pasta with red sauce and Alex used to eat leftovers…but now (as of Tuesday) refuses to. Monday I made a batch of pasta with my standard red sauce. Because it’s Alex’s favorite, I made a big batch so that he could eat it for a few days. Tuesday came and I was going to make some risotto (totally blogable) but I had to help Dexter clean out his locker at school (toxic waste…think superfund site) so it didn’t happen…we had falafels…Dexter’s favorite.
Wednesday found me pressed for time and obligated to make a batch of chocolate chip cookies (not very blogable). Since Alex wouldn’t eat leftover pasta, GH and I snarfed it down …it went really well with the 2007 Beaujolais. Delicious but still not much to blog about.
Somewhere along the way I realized that my ipod didn’t have my favorite sleepy music, Steve Reich’s Music For 18 Musicians. Then my ipod got all snarly and I had to reset it to it’s factory default settings. Since I switched to Ubuntu and the world of open-source I’ve been blissfully happy…all my software needs have been met to a point well beyond my expectations. Except for this issue…I just couldn’t get my music to show up on my ipod…and I really wanted to listen to The Shins. For two days I bravely battled this problem and then today GH swooped in, and as I made dinner (3 pizzas) he fixed it. Thank god…it’s now loaded with all my favorites from Ali Farka Toure to Wilco…and I’m so much happier because I can slip my ipod into my pocket, wedge the ebuds into my ears, and do whatever I want, to my own personal soundtrack.
The pizza was extra good this time. I heeded a reader’s tip and baked it at 450F and placed the parchment directly on the oven rack. I used the back of a cookie sheet to transfer it to the rack and it worked like a charm. So dear reader…you’re a genius.
Lastly, I must confess that I would feel so much better if I could get a fresh hit of The Daily Show…perhaps just a “moment of zen” or something schmaltzy. But I support the WGA one hundred percent.
