Thai-Korean Inspired Preserved Shrimp

I don't expect this will be the most popular concoction I've ever shared here. It is admittedly slightly hardcore and challenging stuff.

But it's the kind of stuff I grew up eating and loving as a little girl when they used to call me hahlmohni (Korean for grandmother) for my somewhat precocious inclination toward what were usually considered to be tastes acquired later in life.

And it was inspired by a dish we had at our dinner at Lers Ros with my friend Maria up in San Francisco, koong chae nam pla, which is a seasoned fish sauce brined raw shrimp with things like garlic, lemongrass, chilies, and fresh mint. 

When I took my first bite, it immediately reminded me of a Korean side dish called gaejahng (the preserved crab, not the dog soup), which is a similar soy sauce brined preparation, only made with raw blue crabs, eaten with steamed rice.

I left the heads on the shrimp because the stuff inside is similar to crab tomalley, and that stuff is the most prized element of Korean gaejahng.

Thai-Korean Inspired Preserved Raw Shrimp
(inspired by koong chae nam pla and gaejahng aka gejang)

- about 3/4 pounds raw head-on 31-40 count shrimp, body peeled and deveined, heads intact

Brine ingredients:

- 1 jalapeño, thinly sliced
- 1 habanero, thinly sliced
- 2 cloves garlic, thinly sliced
- 2 chiles de arbol, thinly sliced
- about 1.5" knob of ginger, peeled and finely julienned
- 1 teaspoon crushed chili flakes
- 2 dried Kaffir lime leaves, finely julienned (optional)
- the zest and juice of 1 Kaffir lime (about 2 tablespoons) If you don't have Kaffir lime, you can just the zest of 1 regular lime and about 1.5 Tablespoons regular lime juice
- 1/4 cup + 1 Tablespoon fish sauce
- 1 Tablespoon soy sauce
- 2 Tablespoons water
- 2 Tablespoons sugar

1) Combine all the brine ingredients and stir until the sugar is completely dissolved.

2) Lay the shrimp in a single layer in a bottle or plastic container and spoon enough brine over it to coat. Repeat the process until all the shrimp is layered and brined.

3) Store in the fridge for at least 4 hours before eating, redistributing the shrimp 2 or 3 times to ensure even seasoning.

I served it tonight over a bed of green cabbage and chopped fresh mint and cilantro with some extra brine spooned over the greens so we could squeeze some fresh lime juice on top and make a salad of it.

And that went perfectly with our dinner of Coconut Coconut Curry and steamed jasmine rice washed down with a fat mug of mint limeade. :)

shinae

Sweet & Spicy Thai Inspired Maple Glazed Salmon

While I've had the luxury to indulge in all kinds of leisurely cooking for the past couple of years, I realize that that will likely come to a temporary moratorium once the Pod hatches. And also that lots of peeps here already have very compelling reasons to find quicker and easier recipes than some of the recipes I post.

And when it comes to proteins, nothing says quick and easy like seafood or chicken breast. And while I'm not a huge fan of chicken breast, I could eat proteins from the water all day.

So when The Man asked me to make something Asian inspired, sweet, and spicy, and with a kick for dinner last night, I came up with this salmon recipe to serve with some jasmine rice and slaw with which I am REALLY pleased. 

And the entree itself only takes 20 minutes.

SWEET & SPICY THAI INSPIRED MAPLE GLAZED SALMON
Serves 3 to 4

- a roughly 1.5 pound salmon fillet
- salt & pepper to season
- 1 Tablespoon oil for searing salmon

- 1 large clove garlic, minced (just under a Tablespoon)
- 2 Tablespoons shallots, thinly sliced
- 5 to 7 stems cilantro, chopped (stems and leaves)
- 1/2 a jalapeno, thinly sliced (or if you like hotter chilies, you can certainly use another kind)
- 1 Tablespoon oil for the glaze
- 3 Tablespoons maple syrup
- 2 teaspoons chili garlic paste (I use Huy Fong.)
- the zest of half a lime
- 1 Tablespoon lime juice
- 1.5 teaspoons fish sauce

1) Preheat the oven to 400F and prepare an oven safe dish or baking sheet in which to bake the salmon. I like to line the dish or sheet with foil for easy cleanup.

2) Season the salmon filllet lightly on both sides with salt and pepper.

3) In a bowl, combine the garlic, shallots, cilantro, jalapeño, and oil, and toss to thoroughly coat. The reason I do it in this order instead of just stirring all the glaze ingredients together is that coating the aromatics with the oil first gives them a toastier, more caramelized flavor when they're cooking in the oven on top of the fish.

4) Add the rest of the glaze ingredients together and stir to mix thoroughly.

5) In a non-stick pan, bring the cooking oil up to medium high temp, and sear the salmon fillet for 2 minutes per side.

6) Transfer the salmon to your oven-safe dish, pour the glaze evenly on top, as well as any remaining cooking oil from the pan.

7) Bake the salmon on the center rack for 6 minutes, then turn the oven onto broil and place the salmon so that the top of the salmon is about 5 inches away from the broiler heating element, and broil for another 4 to 5 minutes.

That's it!

Serve with steamed rice and slaw like we did, or atop a bed of salad greens dressed with some of the glaze and a squeeze of fresh lime, and it's a quick 30 Minutes (or fewer) meal!

Our slaw from last night: green cabbage,
white onion, cilantro, jalapeño, and red
bell pepper, tossed with some dressed up
nuoc cham, extra lime juice and zest, & oil.

P.S. I think this is probably a pretty good recipe to convert salmon haters. :)))


Here's another: "Miso" Salmon.

shinae

Swan Oyster Depot - Nob Hill, San Francisco

Our pre-lunch snack on Day 2 in SF.

"Somewhere, somehow, someone has determined that eating some types of fish may be bad, very bad. So watch what you eat because it may be eating you." ~ Swan Oyster Depot

I'll admit it.

We got Bourdained into going to this place, a little HITW oyster bar that was featured in his SF epi of The Layover.

And the oysters - Kumamotos, my faves, among them - were good and fresh, and I can totally see how a place like this might have appeal for a guy like we think Bourdain to be, what with the motley and mostly friendly crew of men behind the counter and fresh Anchor Steam on tap.

Other than that - it's raw oysters in a standing room only environment with about 20 stools max. (Luckily we got there early and didn't have to wait in line.) That is to say that if they're fresh, well shucked (which is to say that the oyster is whole, and the shell isn't in shards on the oyster itself when presented to you), and of the same variety, then it's pretty much the same wherever you go. 

As for the "half" Dungeness (i.e., claws and legs only) at $18, well, no further comment from the girl who usually pays $18 AT THE MOST for a whole LIVE one at 99 Ranch and gets the all the body meat and crab tomalley to boot. But such is the relative rip-off that is eating seafood out.

One of those places I don't need to visit twice, but am definitely glad to say I've been to once. :)

 

  

Swan Oyster Depot
1517 Polk St.
San Francisco, CA 94109
415.673.1101
www.swanoysterdepotsf.com

STRANGE GRUB - Stir-Fried Sand Fleas...

I probably should have started with the uni post, but this is the first post in what I *PLAN* (and to know me is to know that *plan* means something closer to *hope against my undisciplined behavior patterns*) to be a regular feature in which I eat what I know other people consider to be weird crap, and then write about it.

Though I am utterly humbled by things like Zimmern eating woodworms in the Philippines and Bourdain choking down poopy wildebeest poopchute in Namibia (I think it was wildebeest, anyway), I have always considered myself a fairly adventurous eater. I attribute a good deal of it to having been born in Korea and being introduced at an early age to a lot of food ideas and flavor profiles that most folks here in the US might consider challenging.

Emerita talpoida
aka sand crab
aka mole crab
aka sand flea
aka sea cicada
aka What's For Dinner :)

When I do eat things that make other people go *ewww*, it's out of sincere enjoyment or hope that I will find enjoyment, and not for sport or novelty. I won't eat things on a dare that I don't think have the potential to be delicious to me by whatever complex calculus I derive that it could. So while I have eaten hot vin lon (the Vietnamese version of balut) and enjoyed it, you probably won't find me eating dog soup because I'm pretty sure my emotional attachment to dogs will keep me from tasting whatever kind of yumminess is to be found in a morsel of canine.

I imagine these posts might really gross some people out, but I'm not writing them so much for the ick factor. I'm writing them because this is the truth, if an occasional one, of the way I eat. And because I think it a worthwhile endeavor to explore the idea that the edibility and deliciousness of a thing is very much a mental, social, and cultural construct.

a big'un - about an inch long

Why will I eat an unhatched baby duck but not a baby dog? Why am I more willing to eat these sand crabs that I'm writing about today, which are essentially the beetles or roaches of the sea, than grasshoppers and earthworms of land? Why do people who eat lips and assholes of cows stuffed into a casing think it's gross to eat chicken feet at a dim sum parlor? It is a strange logic indeed by which we decide which grub is too strange to eat, and which not.

If anything, I hope that this post (and hopefully the ones to follow in this series) serves to open minds, my own included, about the things people do or don't eat, will or won't eat, and why.

SPICY THAI CHILI GARLIC SAND FLEAS

Almost certain to be enough to serve the very limited number of people in your life who won't run away and retch at the thought of eating it.

When I first moved to Oceanside and found these critters washed up alive in the sand at the beach, I was reminded of something I had several years ago in Phuket that looked a lot like them. A couple weeks later, I watched Andrew Zimmern eating something very similar on a re-run of Bizarre Foods - Thailand and determined that if I were to find out these suckers were safely edible, which I did, I'd grab a handful the next time I could, and cook them up. Which I also did.

- a handful of sand fleas, soaked and rinsed thoroughly, 4 or 5 times, to get rid of all that sand
- 1 clove garlic, minced
- 2 teaspoons fish sauce
- 1 Tablespoon brown sugar

- 3 Tablespoons oil for frying

- 1 wedge of lime to squeeze over the sand crabs before eating

1) Rinse your handful of sand fleas well and thoroughly, several times, in order to get the sand off their little sand flea persons.

I think I changed the water about five times... 

...to get them this clean.

2) Put them in the fridge for about 20 minutes so they'll fall asleep. *Zzzzzzzzzzzzz...*

3) Make your chili garlic sauce by mixing the chili garlic paste, minced garlic, fish sauce and brown sugar in a small bowl.

4) Heat your oil in a wok over high heat until it's screamin/smokin hot and throw your fleas in.

5) Stir fry them critters 2 to 3 minutes, or until the shells turn completely orange and have been orange for 20 seconds or so.

6) Pour in your chili garlic sauce and toss them little roaches til they're evenly coated.

7) Serve with a healthy squeeze of lime juice and a lot of frosty cold Singha which most of your guests will likely need in order to be able to choke one of these suckers down.

In all seriousness, they taste a lot like little shrimp crossed with soft shell crab if they were deep fried with the shell on and didn't have a lot of meat. Sweet, spicy, sticky, crunchy. Pretty decent beer food if you're not too skeeved by the idea of it to reframe it as food.

Really, folks. It's just a crustacean. Try getting me to eat a cockroach, though, and that's a whole 'nother story.

shinae

Don't Know What You Got - Spicy Thai Seafood Stew...

Growing up in a culturally diverse place like Orange County (CA), one starts to take for granted the markets in Little Saigon and Koreatown, which are always brimming with fresh, if not live, seafood. One tends to forget what an incredible deal it is to find live Dungeness crab on sale for $3.99/lb or live Maine lobster for $8.99/lb. One forgets how hard it is generally to find fresh, live, seafood until one moves to a place in the desert where a lot of one kind of people move to escape from all the alien people of other kinds who eat weird things like fresh seafood. And also to find parking spaces big enough for their VERYBIG trucks.

For the time being, I live in just such a place.  And between the big box chains, a single Trader Joe’s and the Wednesday so-called farmer’s market, the only live fish I’m likely to find is swimming in a guppy bowl at Petco. And since I don’t eat those, I am SOL for fresh seafood during the week.

But on the weekends, we make the 90 minute drive to visit my parents in OC, and when we make a grocery run, I feel like a kid in a candy store perusing all the produce, spices, condiments and proteins - especially the ones from the sea – that I’ll never find at the Ralph’s or Super Walmart down the street.

Truth is, even if I still lived in OC, I wouldn’t buy the crab and lobster all that often. In my own quirky logic, I think there is a discipline to being easily pleased. And that such discipline is practiced in part by making an occasion of indulgence and a habit of restraint, even when it comes to the food about which I am so passionate. But occasions do arise, like Mother’s Day a couple weeks ago, and there seemed no better time to indulge in some seafood so fresh it was still breathing, crawling and pinching.

My mom had bought some baguettes from the boulangerie earlier in the morning, so a rich broth in which to dunk that crusty bread was definitely in order. I made a tom yum inspired soup as a base so I could ladle off a bowl for Joey, who loves tom yum but hates seafood (hopefully this is a temporary malfunction of an otherwise well developing young palate), and steamed the goods in the broth, making this Spicy Thai Seafood Stew.

I also made some Spicy Basil Fried Rice with Shrimp but forgot to take measurements. Oops.

SPICY THAI SEAFOOD STEW

For 4 adults, I used:

- 1 whole Dungeness crab, shelled and quartered for fast steaming

- 4 very large Cherrystone clams – Wash your clams well.  Sand in your food sucks bivalves.

- 16 medium sized Manila clams

- 2 pounds of crawfish (live ones are in season now, but a pound of good sized shrimp will work even better now that I think about it)

  

- 1 Tablespoon butter

- 1 teaspoon oil

- 1/2 cup chopped shallots (6 or 7)

- 1 garlic clove, smashed

- 6 or 7 thin slices of fresh ginger

- 2 or 3 Thai bird chilies, in 1/4-inch slices (or more if you like it XXX spicy like I do :))) )

- 2 to 3 stalks lemon grass pounded to release the oils and cut in 2 inch segments (If you can’t find lemongrass, a teaspoon of lime or lemon zest will work in a pinch.  Not quite the same, but a good approximation.)

- 6 or 7 stems cilantro, chopped in 1-inch pieces

- 1/2 teaspoon curry powder

- 4 cups unsalted chicken stock

- 2 tablespoons fish sauce

- 1 teaspoon sugar

- 2 tablespoons fresh squeezed lime juice

- 1 cup coconut milk

1) In a large pot, sautee shallots in butter and oil over medium high heat until they become translucent and some bits are golden brown.

2) Add in garlic, ginger, chilies, lemon grass, cilantro and curry powder, and sautee another 2 minutes or so to give those elements a roasted flavor.

3) Add in chicken stock, fish sauce, sugar, lime juice and coconut milk, and bring to a gentle boil. Then turn heat down to medium and simmer for about 5 minutes. At this point, the broth is ready to serve as a soup.

4) Add seafood, turn heat back up to medium high, and cover to steam, about 15 minutes, depending on what you're steaming and how much.  

When your clams are open, and the shellfish have just turned a bright red/orange color, you are good to go. Protein from the sea usually cooks very quickly and can go from tasty to rubber in no time.

Everything I photograph in my mom's kitchen looks
sooooo ORANGE.
And no, I don't want to Photoshop it. :)

You may find that you need to adjust the broth for the natural salt that will come from your seafood.  If so, try adding 1/4 cup of water and a pinch of sugar to mellow out the salt.

Serve with some crusty bread or some steamed jasmine rice or the fried rice I don't have a recipe for:  

Off to make tonight’s empanadas. :)

shinae