Day 50 - Pages 172-173 - Pork Belly Ssam & Mustard Seed Sauce Page 84 - Chicken and Egg (w/o egg & w/ ramen) + Cereal Milk, again

*FINAL POST*

This past week has been a mad dash to the finish line and I'm happy to report that for today's lunch with Andrea and Janet I made the two recipes that will complete my project to cook the Momofuku cookbook.

I roasted a 2-pound piece of pork belly for the ssäm. By now I've done this a few times but today I tried cooking it on the barbeque. Unfortunately, the temperature in the Weber was either too hot or too low and the meat was either burning or not cooking. A Momofuku pork belly should cook at a temperature that melts the fat, browns the meat, and does it relatively quickly so the meat stays juicy and tender.Today's roast was not my best. omg! I'm critiqueing a pork belly like I know what I'm doing!?

Well, I went ahead and let it chill in the fridge, then sliced and grilled it.

 The Mustard Sauce used Pickled Mustard Seeds, a preparation Chang "copped" from cooking at Craft and "a staple of Tom Colicchio's cooking." I boiled the seeds in rice vinegar and sugar until they plumped up and softened.

I mixed the pickled seeds, cucumber pickles, Kewpie Mayo, Dijon and hot Chinese mustards together. The sauce was just a little spicy (i.e. next time I'll use a hotter Chinese mustard) and the seeds gave it a lightly bitter flavor and crunchy texture.

 Here is the assembled ssäm:

Chicken and Egg was inspired by oyako-don, a type of donburi, in which chicken and other ingredients are piled on top of a bowl of rice. I made only the chicken as a topping for ramen. First I deboned some chicken legs. Not a difficult thing to do when the chicken is fresh and the meat is firm. The rest of the recipe is identical to the confit with chicken wings that I described in in the first part of this previous post.
After I removed the drumsticks and thighs from the pork lard, I browned them outside in smoking hot cast iron over the Big Kahuna burner until the skin was nice and crispy.

The alkaline noodles that I had made yesterday were in packets in the fridge.When we were ready to eat the ramen I boiled the noodles, spooned broth over them, and arranged chicken, garden peas, pickled cucumbers, and scallions on top. The chicken was tender, juicy, and not surprisingly, everyone thought it was pork.

Because it was so good the first time, I made Bill Corbett's Cereal Milk Ice Cream for dessert. But instead of using walnuts in the frosted flakes I toasted pecans. I beat brown sugar into egg whites together and folded in cornflakes and the nuts. The mixture baked in a slow oven while I turned it every few minutes until it was dry and crispy. Tip: with milk, this makes a great breakfast.

 

 

Thus concludes Mi Momofuku. There are a handful of recipes that I didn't attempt and I'll get to them when I get the right ingredients (e.g. Benton's country ham, Maine Jonah crab claws). For now, I'm happy to have learned how to make - and eat - foie gras, pig's head and skin, ssäm, sous vide, and sashimi and to have shared it with my family and friends. It's been fun and delicious!