Turkish Delight.

"It is dull, Son of Adam, to drink without eating," said the Queen presently. "What would you like best to eat?"
"Turkish Delight, please, your Majesty," said Edmund.

The Queen let another drop fall from her bottle on to the snow, and instantly there appeared a round box, tied with green silk ribbon, which, when opened, turned out to contain several pounds of the best Turkish Delight. Each piece was sweet and light to the very center and Edmund had never tasted anything more delicious.

Nerd alert.
If you're like me, when you read (or even watched) The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, by C.S. Lewis, you were intrigued by this Turkish Delight.  Is it candy?  A baked good?  What does it taste like?  Is it real??

Well, friends, I have seen it with my very own eyes.  It is real.  And it's every bit amazing as Edmund said it was.

Now, I know that not everyone is lucky enough to have a friend who sends me goodies on her travels from Cambodia to Canada and this time, to Turkey.  But yes, I am that lucky.  Please refer to this old entry.

You're probably looking at the photo and thinking "Oh this is just like those macadamia nut jelly things that people bring back from Hawaii."  No - these are not just like those macadamia nut jelly things that people bring back from Hawaii.  This is even better.  The consistency is just right so that you don't have pieces of jelly stuck in your teeth for hours.  The sweetness of the pomegranate flavor is subtle so you know this isn't artificial.  And the bites of pistachio in between let you know that this is fancy pants.  

So thanks, E, for making my childhood book nerd dreams come true.  

At the risk of going down that path where I stray from good eats and talk about something a bit more personal, I must say this, not because I want you to take me seriously or because I want to inspire you to engage in some form of soul-searching, but because it's my blog and I can do whatever I want!  I don't want to undermine the literary and theological value of this book by reducing it to a story about nutty, fruity goodness. Because C.S. Lewis tells a beautiful story, in a way that only he can, that alludes to the Crucifixion and the redemption of all believers.  Writing this entry reminds me of that familiar childlike faith that I've been having trouble unearthing for some time now.  What I'm trying to say is this.  At some point, I have started to feel like I'm desperately aiming for nothing and trying to hold together something that is nothing.  

At last the Turkish Delight was all finished and Edmund was looking very hard at the empty box and wishing that she would ask him whether he would like some more. Probably the Queen knew quite well what he was thinking, for she knew, though Edmund did not, that this was enchanted Turkish Delight and that anyone who had once tasted it would want more and more of it, and would even, if they were allowed, go on eating it till they killed themselves. But she did not offer him any more.

Grease splashes and burns your skin.

It worked.  I woke up this morning to an email from my cousin, titled "Shin Ramen Pork Belly".  He told me to make edits, but no need - Cousin Paul delivers in a way that only he could.  Without further ado... ladies and gentlemen, my cousin Paul (insert applause and cheer):

Grease splashes and gets on your clothing.  Grease that splashes and gets on your clothes makes you smell like a fatty.  The grease that I am referring to comes from a part of a magical animal that produces the most delicious grease of all...PORK BELLY!  When I think of pork belly, better known as ssamgyupsal to our Korean readers, I vividly think of fried up ssamgyups (preferably crispy) alongside slices of fried garlic or even fried kimchi, stuffed it into dduk bosam or even lettuce wraps all served with an iced cold shot of soju (as I write this entry, I'm drooling...just sayin).  But after reading David Chang's Momofuku book, I was inspired. Inspired to take the pork belly to the next level. 

I've come up with some recipes before that's not worth mentioning but something about what I imagined was going to be special.  This must be how KanYe feels when he lays down a track.  At any rate, David Chang started his career by opening up a ramen shop in NYC.  In his ramen shop, Noodle Bar, he incorporates a lot of pork.  So as my wife was reading me some pages out of his book in bed, that's when I came up with this brilliant idea.

A slab of pork belly, dry rubbed with Shin Ramen flavoring.  That's it.  Simple, but extremely flavorful.

All you need is a slab of pork belly (2 1/2 lbs) and some Shin Ramen (4 packs).  serves 6.

• Rub the ramen seasoning, including the other vegetable packet (crush all dehydrated vegetables) all over our porky friend.  If your pork slab has pork skin on it, its simple to remove if the pork is still cold and you have a sharp knife.

• Cover the marinated pork belly and let sit in the refrigerator for at least an hour.
• Preheat your oven to 450 degrees.
• Place the pork, fat side up and let it cook for 30 minutes.  Then flip it over and cook it for another 30 minutes.
• Once its golden brown and crispy on both sides, turn the heat down to 250 degrees and cook it for another hour.
• Remove the pork and let it sit in the refrigerator until its cold.
• Once its cold, slice the pork belly into 1/2 inch thick cuts.
• Warm up a cast iron skillet and fry up the cuts of pork belly on each side.

As our cuts of pork belly are getting a second treatment of frying, start boiling water in a large pot for the noodles.

For the sauce for the noodles you will need:

• a bunch of scallions
• a heaping table spoon of minced garlic
• a heaping table spoon of minced ginger
• a generous amount of soy sauce and sesame oil
• black pepper
• table spoon of sugar

Mix all this into a bowl and let it sit for a few minutes.

Since I had some onions and baby bok choy handy, i fried those up in a wok to put into my noodles.  You can put any type of veggies you like.

As soon as the noodles are done cooking, drain the liquid and throw the noodles into the veggies that you had cooked up.

Then throw in the ginger scallion sauce.

Toss together.  Place the crispy pork belly on top and there you have it.  Shin Ramen Pork.  I know, my buddy told me that I need a new name for this.

Thanks to Nary for sending me the Momofuku book, thanks to David Chang and his wild culinary imagination and thanks to the brave souls that tried my dish.  If it wasn't for all of you, this dish might have never been created.  Thanks to my wife for always being supportive in my weird culinary concoctions.  Hope you guys enjoyed this guest entry and I hope that you all try this dish out.  Feel free to send me feedback.  I've got thick skin.  Like pork skin.  

Love, peace and pork grease.

I totally love working out.

Confession: I was supposed to go to the gym after work today, but I didn't.  I even changed into my "workout clothes" (my raggedy law school tshirt and non-Lululemon pants) before I left the office so that I would have no excuses.  No excuses!  But I totally found an excuse.  So now I'm sitting here with a glass of Shiraz and updating my blog.  A much nobler objective, no?

This post is dedicated to my cousin, Paul.

That's him - in his '88 Seoul Olympics t-shirt.  If you can't tell, he's from the Republic of Korea.  And that's me next to him, with a wonky left eye, swollen from a bee sting.  The rest of this picture is actually pretty awesome.  And by the rest of this picture, I mean our other cousin (strategically cropped out to maintain his dignity) who is wearing his ultra cool overalls with an ultra huge pee stain.  Our cousin Boo who stands like Mama Bear behind us is the only normal person in the picture. This picture pretty much sums it up: We. Are. Awesome.

Paul and I live on opposite ends of the West coast but we make an effort to talk to each other regularly and keep each other posted on our culinary adventures.  His most recent culinary adventure involved ramen powder and a big slab of pork belly.  Intrigued, yes?  The deal was that he would try this recipe out and make his grand appearance on this blog as a guest blogger.  Oh so where can you find this amazing ramen powder and pork belly recipe?  Right here as soon as he sends it!  Yea that's right - I'm calling you out!  WHERE'S MY GUEST BLOGGER ENTRY, PAUL??

But in the meantime, here's what I've been cooking/ eating.

I love cookbooks.  Especially if the book has an equal ratio of photos to recipes.  David Chang's Momofuku cookbook falls into this category.  It goes without saying that both Chang and his recipes are amazing.  In fact, for Paul's birthday this year, after much pondering and consultation with his better half, I decided to get Paul the Momofuku cookbook and 4 lbs. of Benton's bacon.  He and his better half read Chang's beautiful prose on torching pig head hair before they go to bed at night.  Take notes, kids.  This is the key to an everlasting marriage.

Anyways, one weekend, I decided that I was going to try out a couple of his recipes.  I would start with a couple of the tamer recipes.  There would be no removing of animal hair or shaving of foie gras.  I decided on "Roasted Rice Cakes", made with his "Korean Red Dragon Sauce" and "Pan-roasted Bouchot Mussels with OS".  To my fellow Koreans and dduk-bok-gi (Korean rice cakes boiled in a bath of red pepper sauce) eaters in general, you will never be able to eat regular dduk-bok-gi again.

It was delicious and for the most part, I think it came out the way it was supposed to.  I definitely reduced the amount of sugar used for the Korean Red Dragon Sauce.  No disrespect, Mr. Chang, but no one needs to be eating that much sugar.

I know I said this was a dedication, but really, it was more of my unapologetic campaign to shame my cousin into sending his blog entry.  I hope it works.  But let me be sincere for a moment and say how thankful I am to have a cousin who shares my love for everything delicious and has a guest room for me in Seattle.  There is not enough Benton's bacon in this world to express how lucky I am to call you my cousin.  And as you guys begin this new chapter of your life, I know that you'll be fine.  And any time you feel like you're not, I want you to look at that picture and know that you're a bad ass mf.

Is it fall yet?

Once in a while, I'll order a cup of clam chowder if the restaurant's homage to New England or San Francisco is particularly convincing, but usually, I feel like soups at restaurants taste like it's been poured out of a can.  This one was not.

Tyler Florence's Roasted Tomato Soup with a Parmesan Crostini.  The recipe calls for a mix of heirloom tomatoes and plum tomatoes, and for that reason, I think, the soup is less tart than the watered-down ketchup that they (the soup industry) try to pawn off as tomato soup.  Oh and that shine?  That's from a chunk of butter.  And you thought Paula Deen was the only culprit responsible for America's losing battle to type 2 diabetes.

There's just something warm and inviting about a bowl of soup.  Like cashmere sweaters, hot apple cider (or chocolate for you weirdos), and a crackling fireplace.  Alex, I'll take "Things That Make Us Nostalgic For Fall" for $200.  Too bad it was 100 degrees today.  I definitely picked the wrong day to roast tomatoes in a 450-degree oven.  

On that note, I love fall.  I love the subdued colors, the forecast of rain and gloom, and the sound of my boots on the wet concrete.  Plus, it's perfect for some more roasted tomato soup.  Can't wait for it to be fall.  

Oh, the Swedes.

I freaking love Ikea.  

Coffee tables for under $10?  Check.  Ready-made Swedish meatballs and mashed potatoes for a dinner party of 4 for $9.99?  Check.  Robyn's "Call Your Girlfriend" playing in the background?  Check!!!

So I have an "herb garden."  It's hardly a garden.  And my herbs can hardly be considered alive.  Regardless, I make an attempt to resuscitate them back to life every 6 months.  Today was that day.  Admittedly, today was made possible only because some Swede decided to design a super-cute plant stand (sold here: http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/70186113/)  that would look even cuter with potted herbs in it.  So I followed the 7-step instruction manual and built my plant stand.  Look Ma, no screws left!

Yes, I know.  My thyme plant is out of control and is in desperate need of pruning and hydration.  But my parsley and basil plants are still going strong.  Resilient little bastards.  

I'm hoping to bring these back to life as I bring my blog back to life.  It's been over 2 years since my last entry.  I wish I could say that life got so busy that I just couldn't get around to updating my blog.  But there have been many recipes tried and many Instagram photos uploaded.  There has also been a shitload of bloggers clogging up the blogosphere with self-important, egomaniacal... well, shit (non-profane synonym suggestions welcome).  I blame Facebook, but that's going to have to be a whole separate entry.  Anyways, I was inspired by some blogs that I recently discovered that are just honest and amusing ramblings, coupled with non-DSLR photos that made me think, "Totally."  Bloggers!  They're just like us!  So here's my little hope that you'll be amused.

A clean toothpick.

So I bought the baking soda and the loaf pan, and I baked the banana nut bread.


This almost didn't happen.

I couldn't find the electric beater. But I somehow convinced myself to cream the butter and sugar with a wooden spoon, by hand.

While I was mixing the wet ingredients and the dry ingredients, I realized that my loaf pan was 9x5, not 9x9 as specified in the recipe. But I continued to pour the batter into the pan.

As I placed the pan into the oven, I realized that I had pre-heated the oven to 450 degrees, not 350 like I was supposed to. I quickly lowered the temperature and crossed my fingers that the bread would still turn out alright.

5 minutes past the requisite 50 minute baking time, the toothpick was still not coming out clean. I continued to wait, praying that there was still hope for my banana nut bread. Eventually, the toothpick came out clean.

I'm back at home now. And despite all evidence to the contrary, I'm praying that there is still hope for me.

Brb.

As reflected in the recent depletion of inspiration and, let's be honest here - lack of effort in the past few entries, it seems that I've lost sight of... whatever it was that gave birth to this blog. It all started with my aunt's banana nut bread recipe. I had everything that I needed to make this bread. Bananas, flour, baking powder, sugar, butter, even walnuts. I just needed to buy some baking soda and a loaf pan. This was about a month ago. I oscillated between "to bake" or "not to bake" about a dozen times. And that's when I realized it: I really didn't care to make this banana nut bread.

I flipped on the Food Network channel to see if any of my favorites were on. They were, but I didn't want to watch. I wanted to watch "The Real Housewives of New Jersey" instead.

I think I've hit a dead-end. And hopefully soon, I'll turn around and take a detour. And hopefully soon, I'll find new recipes to try and new occasions to cook. But for now, I think I just want to hang around here for a while.