Tuesday, January 4, 2011

German-inspired Roasted Pork Trotters



About 2 weeks ago, my friend and I went to Berlin for the authentic German Christmas market experience. It was a crazy idea seriously, considering we were already freezing in London (we traveled smack in the middle of the cold spell). My toes turned black from the cold on the first day, not kidding, and by the last day, I was wearing all the clothes I brought so my carry-on was conveniently light. But it was great fun! One sip of a mug of hot Bailey's and one (ok much more than one) bite of sizzling bratwurst are all we needed to make us forget about the cold. And then that massive German pork knuckle at Augustiner. We ate so much pork there I was convinced I had enough pork to last me the rest of the year.

But it's 2011! (yes I knew that when I said "rest of the year") So I started to think about the pork knuckle again. It's that power combination of crispy outside and soft and gelatinous inside, the fat/collagen (I don't know which I was eating after a while) and tender meat underneath that crack!-ling. So I googled recipes and decided to try this very basic Shweinshaxe recipe out.

Then at the butcher's, I stupidly got pork trotters instead. Ahhh :( Knuckles are above the trotters, which are the actual feet?hooves? of the pig, so there's a lot more meat. Trotter= Knuckle - meat= Skin+gelatin+fat. BUT who says I must give up all hope? I went for it anyway, not knowing how it'll turn out! I slow-cooked the pieces of trotter with soup vegetables first, then once I got them soft and tender, I chucked them into the oven at a very very high temperature for 40 minutes to crisp up the skin.

UPDATE: Doesn't turn out crackling this way... ):

German-inspired Roasted Pork Trotters
Ingredients
1 pork knuckle, chopped into large chunks
1 large onion
1 carrot
1 celery stick
1 leek
salt, black peppercorns
pinch of cumin
beer/stock/water
1 tbsp of oil, preferably lard
1 tbsp of butter
pinch of cumin (or if you have caraway seeds, a tsp of that would be better!)
pinch of sugar

Method
1. Boil the pork knuckle in rapidly boiling water for 10 min or so first to clean it. You'll see alot of disgusting scum floating to the top of the water. Drain and discard the water.

Pork trotter, after the boiling/cleaning process. Piece the puzzle? ;)
2. Chop vegetables and combine with pork totters, salt and black peppercorns in a large pot filled with just enough beer/water (I used water/stock, but I wished I had beer)to cover. Bring to boil and simmer gently for 3h or so until tender.
3. Preheat oven to 220 degrees celsius. (HOT.)
4. Oil the base of a roasting tray, then arrange the pork trotter pieces on the tray, skin side up. Try to make sure there's no overlapping so all the skin will get exposed to the heat! Arrange the vegetables around the trotter pieces. Moisten everything with a ladle or so of the cooking liquid. I dotted the trotters and vegetable with a bit of butter, and sprinkled a pinch of salt, black pepper, cumin and sugar (just in case;) too.
5. Bake for 30-40 min, moistening frequently with more cooking liquid.
6. Traditionally served with sauerkraut, red cabbage, potato dumplings and a huge dollop of mustard. I served mine with Mustard-mashed Potatoes, and Braised Red Cabbage with Apples.

Verdict: You know when you eat a pork knuckle and you get bits (ok chunks) where you have to abandon your knife and just bite and puuulllll to rip the skin? That's what you get all the time while eating it! It made it a lot of fun to eat. I ended up eating twice the amount in the photo, but eh, it's mostly bones ;) and since it's an uncommon and unpopular cut, it was so cheap too! But it's NOT crackling. I've learnt that crackling has to be made with skin that's very dry, hence you don't slow cook a pork belly then chuck into the oven. This was more like pork-gnawing not pork-crackling, mouth-action/sound effect wise.

Here's some food porn:
I humbly admit it doesn't match up to that impressive pork knuckle we had in Berlin. I still want my pork knuckle! I promise I will revisit this, stay tuned.

Braised Red Cabbage with Apples



With cabbage, the general rule is not to overcook, else it gives off a very strong sulfurous smell that puts people off. But with red cabbage, this long-cooking slow-braising method with the sweet apple and spices bring out the flavours better! There are many variations, I tweaked a few versions I came across, combining this that based on what I liked, and er, what I had in the kitchen.

Braised Red Cabbage with Apples
Ingredients
1 medium red cabbage, sliced thinly
1 large onion, peeled and sliced
1 large eating apple, chopped (I don't find cooking apples very justified. They give a tartness, but you need to add extra sugar to balance out its lack of sweetness. I find a normal apple sweet and although not that sour, hey there's vinegar added! But maybe I'm being simplistic.)
1/4 cup apple cider vinegar (I've seen recipes with white/red wine vinegar instead, but I like the idea of using apple cider vinegar in a dish with apples. )
1/4 cup balsamic vinegar (oomph up the sweetness!)
2 whole cloves
2 bay leaves
pinch of nutmeg, cinammon (if you've got whole ones, use those!)
knob of butter

Method
1. Melt butter in a large pot. Add the whole spices first.
2. Add the onions, and let it cook until golden.
3. Add the apples and the ground spices, and cook for 2 min or so.
4. Add in all the cabbage, plus the vinegar.
5. Put the lid on and let it slowly cook for about 1 h., stirring once in a while.

You get a great chuntey-style sweet cabbage dish, very good with pork of course, like with my German-inspired Roasted Pork Trotters, and supposedly game meat and goose too, though I haven't tried that out before. This dish keeps well, the flavours actually intensify after they spend some time together in the fridge. (oh then it becomes really sort of like a pickle/chutney huh)

I've seen recipes calling for added red wine/cider, please try that if you have them!
I've also seen a Jamie Oliver recipe with bacon and fennel, please try too!

Cheezburger of the Day

new look on lookbook

Food Writer's Diary readers like local ingredients, burgers not so much

January 4

Well reader, you spoke loud and clear about the trends you liked in 2010 and what you’d like to see less of in 2011.

You like local and seasonal ingredients and you’ve had enough of burgers and sliders.
The results are pasted below. If you’d like to see what a news story about the poll looks like, click here.

This is a big year at Nation’s Restaurant News. We were just sold to Penton Media, and we’ll be moving offices later this month, leaving Midtown East for Chelsea (17th Street between Seventh and Eight avenues, closer to Eighth Avenue — lunch recommendations are welcome).

This blog will be moving, too, and will be hosted at nrn.com. I'll probably be cross-posting at both sites for awhile, and of course I’ll let you know as all of that develops. It should mean that I’ll be updating this blog more regularly from now on, and I hope that’s good news for you.

Below, please find the results of the latest poll.

My favorite food trend in 2010 was:

local/seasonal: 38 (58%)
small plates: 12 (18%)
comfort food: 7 (10%)
pork: 7 (10%)
burgers/sliders: 1 (1%)

Total votes: 65

The 2010 food trend I hope to see less of in 2011 is:
local/seasonal: 3 (6%)
small plate: 3 (6%)
comfort food: 4 (8%)
pork: 8 (17%)
burgers/sliders: 29 (61%)

Total votes: 47 

Big Anenome

Another tidbit from my Point Loma tidepool filming expedition. I still need to blog my lessons learned from this trip, but that will have to wait. The Catican is cold this morning and I need to get going off to do other things. In the meantime, enjoy a little anenome action! There's an HD version, so if you can handle the download, you can watch it in 720p.

it keeps me going.

assalamualaikum. how has 2011 been treating u so far? I have to confess, i was crying on 1st January 2011. and now i'm crying again today, all day long. I wonder, WHAT A YEAR? WHAT's COMING NEXT?

but then i saw this on my dearie Shafinaz Maruai FB.


"Dont think of the things you didnt get after praying, think of the countless blessings God gave you without asking and He never stops giving."



I remind myself, Sabar Aqilah. Sabar. This is only a small kick-start of ur life. As most of ur people knows, I managed to involve in internet business. Yar, a small one, and I decided to created RAINBOW SHAWLS by last April 2010. It went well, as my friends & relatives as a loyal customer, and all those support from mama abah, namin, BFF and so on.

As time passed by, I met more and more customer including those from neighborhood countries such as Singapore & Indonesia. Well, it's true --- JAUH PERJALANAN, LUAS PEMANDANGAN. You will never believe how weird, variety people could be, well from the inner side that i am focusing about.

Customer is always right. That is true. They have their rights to make choice, to talk and to complain. But the thing is... Did you ever remind urself, we're human too, with feelings. It hurt me sometime, but I keep it cool, remind myself that i am educated enough to use my mind rationally, not to be emotional.

As I have spent almost a year developing Rainbow Shawls, i can't imagine how a successful entrepreneur has step up on their way of success. it must been really hard. There is no point of being rich from what you have gain from your family, esp your father and mother. somehow they will die, they will leave you, and if you did not know how to spend & gain money, it is useless.

In certain point of view, i am proud to be Malaysian. my 1st reason would be - no earthquake, no bad weather or natural disaster, and most of us is free to follow our own religion. but then, these past few years, we're no longer that peaceful country anymore. People start to kill, rape, being heartless. And the other thing which I totally hate is PhD. --- perasaan hasrat dengki.

can't we just keep supporting each other? think before u talk. but owh, if only everyone could ever think the way i do...

Yesterday, i cried because of 1 customer. yes only 1, but all these while, i keep on being patient and suddenly it all burst out yesterday. yar i know, it is a normal process when u step into this world, but sometimes i just lost my positive spirit and it all burst out like a volcano waiting for the right time to explode. T___T

and this morning, when i woke up, I logged in into my Rainbow Shawls FB, and guess what? I've been blocked by FB administration. which will only happened if there's anyone out there reported / blocked me. I can do nothing, except logging in, and see this white window with nothing, except verification form.They might reported me as using a fake profile or disturbing / abusing people. I did try to do the best i can, but it worth nothing.

Nothing except i've just lost my 3500 friends & customers there, and they don't even have any idea that I could not access to that FB account anymore. blog keeps going, but it ain't the same.

I asked myself... "I treat my customer very well, i tolerate, i even treat them just the same as i did to my friends. I manged to get some customers, i spent almost all of my time in front of the lappy, updating all those shawls, packaging all those parcel, asking some help from abah to post all those stuff, and mama to accompany me to get those stocks. It went smoothly, under control, u might met some people that think you are naive, but i do not forget, there are a lot of them who appreciate me and trust me and they are now my loyal customer. I keep it simple, not too famous, but still... why is this happening to me?"

I thank Allah for every single cent I earned. And i'm ashamed of myself for not being a good muslimah. When you do realize every great thing comes from Allah, you would be like... "Alhamdulilah, bersyukur sangat-sangat, walaupun kadang aku selalu lalai" It's like, He's the one who will always love you, no matter how selfish you are. Don't u just feel guilty and superrrr thankful for being lucky?

And now, i cried the whole day. lying in my bed, on the floor, wondering, did I ever hurt anyone while seeking for REZEKI HALAL. I did this just to gain some extra money, to be more independent, to make my mum and dad proud of having a single child as i am. I did this because i want too, i love too, but it seems like someone out there is feeling uncomfortable with me around. hurm...

everything happened for a reason. i believe it to be that way. and it keeps me going.


New Year in an Aegean Village (3)

Camel Wrestling


I have always been a sucker for camels so when neighbour Peter came back from Ayvacık market on Friday and said that he had seen seven of them, I was instantly interested. I had been to the same market  a couple of hours later and not seen one. Well, the startling news was that there was to be Deve Güreşi or Camel Wrestling in Ezine on Sunday starting at 11am.

Ezine is a pretty unremarkable town provincial in the extreme on the way to Çanakkale and ultimately Bandırma where we were bound anyway to catch our return fast ferry that day. Its claim to fame is that it is a centre of production of  its own type of beyaz peynir or white cheese.  We have explored the cheese shops and been to the market there on a Monday. But we were ignorant as to where camel wrestling could possibly be held. Not that we had much of an idea as to what an ideal venue would constitute anyway.

We closed up our house in Assos and set out at about 1pm. Luckily Peter was ahead of us and phoned us with instructions. We went through the mediocre part of Ezine and emerged the other side to a pretty landscape of rolling green hills. Then we saw parked cars and our first camels!



 I can't describe how exciting this was. We found a place for our own car and then proceeded on foot. All along we saw tethered camels: sitting, standing, surveying the scene disdainfully, all heavily decorated with evil eye beads, tapestries, blankets and woven saddle bags. We met a man who asked us if we had tickets which sounded quite surreal under the circumstances. No, we said so bought two for the nominal price of 10TL. I asked where the money was going and was told to the Camel Lovers Association or Deve Sevenler Derneği  who were actually going to contribute  the proceeds towards a new waterworks system in the town.  He added there were 130 camels  today many from as far away as Aydın near Izmir which increased the thrills running up and down my spine.

A few more paces took us to the top of the hill and what an extraordinary sight met our eyes. I doubt that I have ever witnessed a more colourful or vibrant spectacle in my life. There in a natural contour of the hillside shaped like an amphitheatre were hundreds and hundreds of spectators.


 These were mostly men.  There were a few women and children but I am pretty sure I was the only female foreigner in their midst but it wasn't threatening in any way. I could hardly contain myself with excitement especially when we found ourselves right beside the entrance to the arena where the camels majestically lumbered past to their fate. Close up, they are quite intimidating as they are huge.



colourful guys whose job was muzzling the camels



Then the drums started. Turkish drums are deep and resonant. You hear them in Ramazan, for example, when the drummers go round the streets to wake everybody up for sahur or the meal before sunrise. I love the sound. Here, they reminded me of the drums before going into battle which in a way they were. The reassuring thing about camel wrestling is that the fight is not till the death but just till one or the other beast is pushed over or out of the arena.

sucuk seller



  Many of the men had little tables with rakı 
and snacks. In particular they were relishing the sucuk that was on sale there. This is a special sausage made from beef and camel meat and heavily spiced.





a family enjoying a picnic in their truck with camel nearby

I could hardly bear to tear myself away from this riveting scene but we had a three hour journey ahead of us to Bandırma so with great reluctance we dragged ourselves away. An unforgettable experience.