When God Gives you Pork Belly…

I cook 2 ways… well maybe 3. Sometimes I follow recipes from cook books other times I open my refrigerator (and pantry) and basically just pull out a bunch of ingredients that I think will go together and make a dish. The third way I cook is if I am in a professional kitchen, although, I am not sure if that is considered cooking or following orders from a drill sergeant. I am not going to lie to you, many times when I pull a bunch of things from the refrigerator and create something the result is subpar. Tonight was not one of those nights; I threw together a fabulous dish that I don’t think I would modify.


One of my problems (that I am trying to fix) is feeling the necessity to use every ingredient that I initially select. But tonight I was (thankfully) able to restrain myself. Do you see that reddish beet in the above photo? I decided not to use it. Mind you, I have never cooked a beet in my life and after I sautéed it in some pork fat, I 86ed it for the night.


This dish was inspired by 3 things: my new favorite Asian market, David Chang’s left over Pork Belly (see Pork Buns post) and Kittichai which is the current (modern thai) restaurant that I work for. In addition to my three muses, I was very pleased to see some German beer in the refrigerator (My pops must have bought it).


The dish was pretty straight forward: Sautéed pork belly lardoons, with bok choy, white mushrooms and kimchi (thanks David Chang). The glaze consisted of about a tea spoon of ginger/garlic paste, Sambal, oyster sauce, a dash of soy sauce and a few drops of sesame oil. Oh yeah, remember that pork fat that I saved from the roasted pork belly? Yeah, that was used to sauté everything. No wonder, I enjoyed this dish so much!

Momofuku Pork Buns

So about a week and half ago I discovered the most amazing Asian market. Personally, I have always loved Asian markets because they are always open and their food is always 30-40% cheaper than conventional supermarkets. Another reason, this markets rocks is because they have lots of fresh fish and all sorts of pig parts. I found a bunch of beautiful looking pork bellies and just had to buy one. For those of you who are not familiar with pork belly, it is the same cut of meat that bacon and pancetta is made from. Bacon is usually cured in salt and then smoked, while pancetta is rolled up into a cylinder and simply cured with salt and other spices. David Chang’s pork bun recipe from the Momofuku cook book calls for a quick salt and sugar cure followed by slow roasting the belly. I have cooked many dishes from this cook book and was especially excited about this dish because it is considered one of Chang’s signature menu items. Inspiration for this recipe was not only found in Chang, one of my favorite blogs, momofukufor2 also made this dish.


Before getting started I had to take off the skin. To do this, I basically slid my knife between the skin and top layer of fat and tried to pull the skin away from the flesh in one continuous even slice. I have never done this before so my technique was far from perfect, but I managed to get the job done.

I let my belly sit in the refrigerator for about 10 hours with a salt and sugar mixture, then washed the mixture off and let it sit for about another 10 hours. In the morning, I roasted the belly for about 3 hours at 300 degrees and then finished it at 450 for about 15 minutes to give it some color. I saved the liquefied piggy fat in a pint container for future use. Pork fat, can be used in a variety of ways. It’s basically a meaty substitute for butter.

Once you roast the belly and make Chang's quickly salted Kirby pickles, the assembly is easy. I gathered my mies en plas together, rested my belly and steamed my buns. That’s right. I steamed my buns! I don’t own a steamer so I made a ghetto one. Basically, I put a pot of boiling water on the stove with a metal strainer on top and slapped a lid on it. Sometimes macgyvering it up in the kitchen is so satisfying.







The result was a pretty tasty lunch with my dad. The soft pillowy buns balanced out the salty fatty goodness of the pork. We saved half of the belly for another dish. I am thinking about pork belly Saam next!

Chorizo and Eggs

Leaving Binghamton really made me realize how lucky I had it and how expensive the world is. I had it all…. A great job (LDC), affordable restaurants to explore and a nice apartment that I could call my own. The hardest part about living at home is cooking in my parent’s kitchen. Don’t get me wrong, my folks are super cool and I love them (thanks mom!) but a kitchen is a very personal space. In my old kitchen, I knew where every pan, dish and spice tin was. I had them strategically arranged for optimal use… The curry cabinet on the right, the squeeze bottles of various oils above my stove and my dry goods to the left. I have fond memories in that space... Although, my parents have a dope stove and some nice cooking tools they don’t have many items that I have been accustom to using like an abundance of stainless steel mixing bowls and cast iron skillets. Regardless, I try to make it work.

I figured that I would post on something related to my trip to Europe given the fact that I can’t really review restaurants in Binghamton right now. When I was in la boqueria (Barcelona) I picked up about 150 grams of smoked Spanish paprika. This paprika is totally different from the stuff you buy at Wegmans or Whole Foods, it’s beautifully red in color and has an incredible strong aroma. It’s much smokier and aromatic then generic smoked paprika.

Paprika, especially Spanish paprika makes me think of chorizo. So I figured I’d make some chorizo and eggs for breakfast. I had made chorizo once before with a good friend of mine who cooks at a restaurant in Brooklyn called No7. We made a dish that I love from Bourdain’s, Les Halles cookbook called Moules a la Portugaise. It’s an easy dish that consists of mussels, herbs, chorizo, garlic and wine. It’s simple to prepare and usually a crowd pleaser.

Anyway, the Chorizo was pretty easy to make. I didn’t measure anything, but I’ll try to guestimate the proportions of ingredients in my chorizo…

1lb of ground pork
4tbls Smoked Paprika <-- By far the most important ingredient
1.5tsp cayenne
1tsp ancho chili powder
1tsp Turkish oregano
1tsp whole cumin seeds (ground)
1tsp whole green peppercorns (ground)
1tsp whole coriander seeds (ground)
1.5tsp red wine vinegar
Slash of white wine
And a little bit of the two saints (S & P)



Making the Chorizo is super easy. You just put all the ingredients into a mixing bowl. Wash your hands and mix and mix and mix. You should let the chorizo mixture set for at least an hour (in the fridge) so that the flavors marry together nicely. Then simply patty up and pan fry. As you can see, my patties are kind of crude and ugly but I was pretty hungry at the time and didn’t really care.


The verdict? They tasted like quality Chorizo! I was very pleased with myself. My pops liked them too. I served them with fried eggs and some bread that my mom made the night before. I was sure to slice the bread up and fry it in the chorizo juice. The bread was tasty and super unhealthy.








Has anyone else ever made sausage? I want to eventually start using casings for my chorizo, any suggestions?