2 Errors -- No More Sports Coverage

Well, I messed up again.  Spain did not play England today.  Spain played France.  Reporting the soccer and how we are following with our food was fun for a while, but keeping track of it correctly is a lot harder than I thought, and the tournament is constraining our menu choices more than I want.

Tonight we did Hawaiian night and watched The Descendendants.  Good idea, Margaret!  (Hawaii does not play in the Euro, but we did it anyway!)  I kept the menu simple because too much cooking can be a drag especially when you are trying to fit in a movie.  Did not get many photos either.  Here is the teriyaki chicken before and after.

 

And I made tropical fruity drinks.

Correction

In my last post, I was wrong about the playoff structure for Euro 2012.  The winner of the Portugal-Czech Republic match (which is Portugal) will play the winner of England-Spain, not the winner of Germany-Greece as I stated in my last note.  And the winner of Germany-Greece (which is Germany) will play the winner of Italy-France.

Good.  I'm glad I got that fixed.  so many people come here for their sports news.

Sadly (and as everyone expected), Greece lost to Germany today.  I did not really cook for the game, and this did not help Greece.  In hindsight, I really blew it for Greece.   Here is the beautiful hamburger I cooked last night.

 

I was not thinking at all!  Hamburg is in Germany!  Of course Germany won!  Mea culpa!  Faux pas!

Euro 2012

That's the Greek salad with which I cheered Greece to 1-0 soccer victory over Russia on Saturday.  The win propelled Greece from last place in their group to second, advancing them into the quarter finals.  I want to use this Greek cuisine strategy again on Friday when Greece faces Germany.  This may take more than a salad.  Germany is ranked third in the world (second in Europe) and has won all 3 of their games in the tournament so far.  I hope Greece can achieve this victory, but if not, 3 more teams from countries with struggling economies and awesome cuisines could get their shot at their efficient northern neighbor.  Portugal will probably beat the czech republic and face the winner of the German-Greek showdown, so if Greece does not do it, Portugal will get their shot.  If Portugal cannot beat Germany, then Spain (or maybe Italy) probably will in the final match.  Every time, I'll be ready in the kitchen!

Standing Pork Rib Roast

I finally cooked a (standing) pork rib roast.  All the clues suggested this would be good and should be something I treat as a "go to" roast, but it took me a long time to get around to doing one.

First, I put the word "standing" in parentheses because it seems logically unnecessary, but is conventional for describing the analogous cut of beef -- "standing rib roast" (beef being the default meat).

This connection to the beef rib roast is the first clue that a pork rib roast would be good.  The beef rib roast is a famously decadent and delicious cut of beef.  It is usually called a standing rib roast and is sometimes called prime rib, which is technically correct when the beef is of prime grade (sufficiently high fat content).  Other than the tenderloin, the rib roast is the most premium roast-size cut of steer or pig.    In the case of beef, it is famous, esteemed, and pricey ($11 per pound at my grocery store, and that is for the conventional, corn-fed beef.  I've never even seen the rib roast of a fancier animal.).  So the pork rib roast is the pork version of this amazing roast.

The second clue is that the bone-in, pork rib chop is by far the best pork chop in the whole world!  I would trade you my beef rib steak for your beef t-bone, but I would not trade you one pork rib chip for 2 pork t-bones.  The pork rib chop is just so much more delicious.  I think it is the flavor from the fat and the bone oozing into the rest of the meat, but lots of chops have fat and bone, so there must be something particular about the pork rib chop.  Anyway, a pork rib roast is just a lot of pork rib chops still attached to each other before they have been cut into chops.  so a pork rib roast is a stack of the best pork chops.

Third, the pork rib chop is priced like it is just some plain old hunk of meat.  At my grocery store, it is $5 per pound when it is not on sale.  If I work at it, I should be able to get it at $3 per pound.  It is strange how prized the baby back ribs are (and the boneless pork loin roast) and how under-appreciated the pork rob roast is.  I had to ask for the pork rib roast.  They don't even display it at the butcher counter.  I understand why the store does not appreciate the pork rib roast.  They can cut the ribs off the rest of it and sell each part for more per pound than the original rib roast.   I agree that baby back ribs are great, but I don't think they are better because the loin has been removed.

Anyway, altogether, the pork rib roast would seem to be a situation of value awesomeness.  So I decided to ask about one at the butcher counter.  The guy said "sure, I can cut one for you now."  He pulled this enormous pig spine from the back room.  I saw that it was big in the store, but it was not until a day later that it hit me that that whole thing must fit INSIDE a pig.  I had been thinking of it like a ladder that you see on top of pickup truck, but that really is misleading.

Anyway, he cut me a 7 bone rib roast off the front.  That weighed 5 pounds.  overall, it was a beautiful roast, but the very front of it looks a little funny.  I think it is because at that point, it is running into the shoulder.  I think this is why "center-cut" is desirable.  Regardless, I detected no problem from this in the final cooked product.

The butcher cut a lot of fat off of the roast, and I got worried about diminished juiciness, so I also got 5 strips of bacon to wrap the roast in.

I made a rub of 1 tbsp salt, and 2 tbsp sugar and then some granulated garlic, some black pepper, and I think some dried parsley and some dried basil.  I let it sit a couple hours so the salt could diffuse and so the roast could come up toward room temperature.  I draped the bacon over it just before going into the cooker.  I removed the roast from the cooker when the internal temp had reached 140.  It was delicious, but there was none of that rosey pinkness inside.  by some standards, I overcooked it, but it still tasted great, maybe even better than it would have if I had cooked it correctly.

Well, I think those are the details.  Here are the photos, starting with my furry assistant.

 

 

 

Extra Thick Strip Steak

Yeah, it seems like I can't stop talking about steak, but this is the first time I've gotten and extra thick strip steak.  One advantage is that you might get more of that good flavor you get in a roast.  Another upside is that with this thick cut steak, you might only need one steak for the whole family (but in the end, I also cooked some sausages for Alex).

 

 

Salmon, Sausages, and Salad

I made a salad and grilled some sausages and a piece of salmon, but this was the best photo.

Portuguese Bean Stew

So I made this Hawaiian dish called "Portuguese bean stew."  I saw some nice looking linguica in the store and got some for Alex.  But then I started making little connections in my head, and I decided I wanted a couple of them for myself so that I could make Portuguese bean stew.

I started with some great northern beans.  Here they are pre- and post-soak.

 

Next, I browned 2 linguica and some onions too.  Then I added the cooking beans and some cut up potatoes, salt, dried oregano, and pimenton.

 

I got tired of cooking, so I did not finish cooking the stew the first night.  After a couple hours of cooking, I let it cool and the fridged it in its pot.

See, here it is the next day:

 

I put half of it away and used just half for this evening's stew.
I added tomatoes.

 

parsley

 

cayenne and more pimenton.

 

Farro Carbonara

I've been interested in farro because it basically wheat berries and because it is an old Italian food that predates Graham and Kellogg and the health food movement.  Wheat berries are appealing because they are whole grain wheat, but are not appealing because they seem to have no tradition in the foods I want to cook and eat.  If I substitute or add wheat berries to some dish, it really affects the dish.  It is really different from what it would have been otherwise.  Adding wheat berries seems to turn anything into whole grain breakfast porridge, which is nice sometimes, but not all the time.

But farro is the ancient Italian grain that has been cooked in whole form to make many (Italian) dishes.  So maybe I can use farro instead of pasta or arborio rice to make some Italian dishes that come out tasting right instead of like the breakfast of champions without salt.

So I thought I would try to make farro carbonara.  I've been all excited about carbonara.  Part of my interest in carbonara comes from my perception that people consider it more unhealthy than it is.  I've been swayed by Michael Pollan's claim that refined carbs are a bigger contributor to an unhealthy diet than moderate amounts of animal fat are.  Under this idea, whole wheat carbonara sounds pretty good.  Whole wheat pretty close to a balanced diet on it's own.  Adding a little bacon, eggs, cheese, and olive oil adjust it to a nearly perfect balance of macro nutrients.  Add some fruits and vegetables and you can live forever!

So, on with farro carbonara!

Ok.  I wanted appetizers, but I made the appetizer course healthy by shrinking the picture of the cheese.

 

Yes.  I just explained that this hundred-precent grass-fed sirloin steak is completely unnecessary and makes the meal decadent.  But I wanted some lean steak with our rich carbonara.
 

smeared with a little bacon fat.