Recipe: Faux Fermented Tea Leaf Salad

I've ordered this dish every time I've gone to a Burmese restaurant...and I never get tired of it.  Fermented tea leaves have a distinct green and tart taste which borders on bitter -- the fried crunchy things and squeeze of lemon are a perfect foil.

However, I hate having to go out to get my tea salad fix.  After a lot of Googling, I came across Absolutely Monica's recipe for tea leaf salad, which I've tweaked to my own liking here.  It's a great facsimile for those who either 1) don't have access to Burmese restaurants; and 2) don't have access to fermented tea leaves.

WARNING:  This is NOT a quick salad to make, unless you've already prepped the tea leaves and toasted all the nuts and crunchy things in advance.

Burmese Tea Leaf Salad (with 'Faux Fermented' Tea Leaves)
Adapted from Absolutely Monica

Makes 2 huge portions or 4 smaller portions

For 'faux fermented' tea leaves (this makes more than you will need for this recipe):
1 cup white vinegar
1 cup water
1/4 cup plus 2 T green tea leaves
1/4 cup sesame oil
1/4 cup safflower oil (or other neutral-tasting oil)
1 T plus 1 t Maggi seasoning
1 T plus 1 t fish sauce (I used Red Boat brand; also like Flying Lion and Three Crabs brands)

For the rest of the salad:
1 romaine lettuce heart, sliced into ribbons
15 cherry tomatoes, quartered
8-10 cloves of garlic, sliced and then fried until light brown
2 T fried onions (yeah, I cheated and used the canned stuff)
1/2 cup roasted salted peanuts
1/3 cup roasted salted sunflower seeds
1/4 cup sesame seeds

Juice from 1/3 or 1/3 lemon (around 1/2 to 1 T, or to taste)

Special equipment:  Blender or food processor; strainer

For the tea leaves:
Bring the tea leaves, vinegar and water to a boil and simmer for 20-30 minutes or until soft.  Strain mixture and squeeze leaves to remove as much liquid as possible.  (You can line the strainer with cheesecloth or a coffee filter to make this easier.)

Set aside 2 T of tea leaves.  Place the remainder of the tea leaves along with the sesame oil, safflower oil, Maggi and fish sauce in a blender and blend over a low speed until leaves are finely minced.  Scrape out and mix back in reserved tea leaves for extra texture.

(NOTE:  I used a Vitamix and ended up making a tea leaf emulsion.  :/  Make sure to use a low speed to avoid this!  If you use a food processor, add tea leaves first, then add liquid in a slow stream while processing, and scrape the sides often.  Alternately, you could mince the tea leaves by hand; whisk the liquid ingredients by hand, then combine the liquid mixture with your tea leaves.)

For the salad:
OPTIONAL:  I bought pre-roasted peanuts and seeds, but re-roast them over dry heat to enhance the flavors.  To do this, heat a dry 6" pan (or a little smaller) to medium, then place peanuts on the pan.  Stir or toss intermittently, until fragrant and golden brown.  Remove from heat and repeat with sunflower seeds and sesame seeds.

To serve, make piles of each of the ingredients on a platter.  Spoon about half of the tea leaf mixture onto the platter; save the other half for later.

Just before serving, squeeze the lemon (or drizzle the lemon juice) over the salad and toss together, evenly distributing all the ingredients.  Enjoy!

NOTE:  You can customize this salad by adding any number of crunchy fried things.  Fried lentils and soybeans are also traditional but harder to find unless you are close to an Asian market.

Recipe: Grilled Romaine and Charred Scallion Salad

I got the idea for this salad after visiting one of my close friends in Seattle, where we had brunch at a Basque restaurant called The Harvest Vine.  We sat at the bar and watched the chefs and line cooks prepare each dish to order.  There was a salad (which we, unfortunately, were too full to order by the same we saw it being made) which started with throwing a head of lettuce onto an open grill with a roaring hot fire.  The lettuce was charred, chopped up, and then tossed with some sort of a vinaigrette.

The memory of the grilled lettuce came back as I was rummaging through the refrigerator and came across some wilting heads of lettuce.  I also had a bag of green onions from Trader Joe's which was starting to wilt.  My new cast iron pan was sitting on the stove.  Voila - a grilled salad was born!

Ingredients:

• Two hearts of romaine (or lettuce of your choice), washed and dried (don't detach the leaves)
• 8-10 scallions, washed and dried (remove any parts which are yellowing or look inedible)
• 2 plus 2 teaspoons of safflower, canola, or grapeseed oil (something with a high smoke point, NOT olive oil)
• Juice of 1 lemon (about 3 tablespoons, depending on how juicy your lemon is)
• 3-6 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
• 1/2 to 1 teaspoon kosher salt (I use Diamond brand)
• 1/4 cup grated Parmesan

Special Supplies:

• Cast iron grill pan (or a regular 10" cast iron pan)

In a large bowl, toss the heads of lettuce and scallions with 2 teaspoons of safflower oil to coat.  Brush the pan with the remaining 2 teaspoons of oil and heat pan to high heat.  Once the pan starts to smoke, place lettuce on pan.  Char the lettuce in batches until outside leaves have dark brown edges and the stems of the inside leaves look translucent.  This should take around 5-10 minutes, depending on how hot your pan is and how big your heads of lettuce are.  Then char the scallions until the greens are wilted and have spots of dark brown and whites are bright white (this will be very quick compared to the lettuce, around 2-3 minutes).  You will want to turn the heads of lettuce as well as the scallions to try to cook each side as evenly as possible.  Remove from heat.  Chop off the ends of the heads of lettuce to separate the leaves; then chop lettuce and scallions into 1" lengths.  Place back in bowl.

In a separate bowl, whisk lemon juice, olive oil, and 1/2 teaspoon of salt.  For a classic vinaigrette ratio, use a 1:3 ratio of lemon juice:olive oil.  I prefer a tart vinaigrette, so I usually use a 1:1 or 1:2 ratio (or sometimes a 1:1.5 ratio to split the difference!).  Taste the vinaigrette and add additional salt 1/8 to 1/4 teaspoon at a time to taste -- the salt is important to bring out the brightness of the lemon.

Toss lettuce and scallions with vinaigrette.  Toss with grated Parmesan.  Top with freshly ground black pepper.

Serves two as a side salad.  

NOTES:  If you are using iodized or table salt (e.g., Morton's brand), I would suggest starting with 1/4 teaspoon of salt rather than 1/2 teaspoon of salt; otherwise your vinaigrette may be too salty.  Re: Parmesan, I'm not terribly picky about having only freshly grated Parmesan (takes too long).  I usually pick up pre-grated Parmesan from Trader Joe's, Whole Foods, or an Italian market.  I encourage you to stay away from the stuff in the green cans -- nothing wrong with using it if that's all you have but it won't be nearly as flavorful.)

You, too, can cook at home.

It's intimidating to think you could ever make your own meals at home if you've never done it before, and if your only experience of cooking is watching TV food shows.  Those chefs are so fast, and they have so much fancy and shiny kitchen equipment!

My induction into the world of home cooking happened gradually, but one of my big influences was Jamie Oliver via his show the 'Naked Chef' on the Food Network.  One of my go-to cookbooks for home meals is Jamie's Dinners, for the great flavor profiles and the relative ease of the recipes.

HOWEVER:  When I first bought the book, I was a new, and relatively inexperienced home cook.  There's a section in the book called '10-Minute Meals', which are supposed to be meals you can prepare with a quick stop to the grocery store and within 10 minutes of getting home.  He even clocks in his own prep times so you can see how easy it is.  Ha!  Those meals easily used to take me 40+ minutes to get on the table.

Same goes for the much maligned Rachel Ray.  Love her or hate her, you still have to admit that her recipes are much more home-kitchen ready than most other celebrity chef recipes.  Even so...remember her show, "30 Minute Meals"?  Yeah, those used to take me 60+ minutes to get on the table.

I remember feeling extremely inadequate and discouraged that it took me 2-4 times longer than it was 'supposed to' take to make a decent meal.  The things that kept me going:

1.  I'm a glutton for punishment.
2.  I was only cooking for myself, so no one was starving as a consequence of my slowness (other than me).
3.  Related to #2, no one else was hovering around the kitchen with constant critiques, so I was free to make mistakes.  (Full disclosure:  I am guilty of hovering around the kitchen when others are cooking, with my own critiques -- but I am working on it!)
4.  I loved the feeling of accomplishment once the meal was finished, and it vaguely resembled the pictures of the recipes I'd seen either in the cookbook or online.  And - they tasted delicious.  Most of the time, anyway.

My advice to budding home cooks:

1.  It takes patience, time, and a lot of practice.  You might be slow now, but it gets easier.

2.  Start with a 'simple' recipe -- I mean really simple.  Limit recipes you'll tackle to those with no more than 5-10 ingredients, build your confidence, and then go from there.

3.  Don't be afraid to substitute other ingredients in your recipes.  This took me a long time to learn -- goes against my OCD and detail-oriented nature, to my detriment.  Substitution can give your dishes a unique flare, but it also saves time and helps you learn to use up what you have on hand.  It helps to follow the recipes exactly the first time, but if it's going to take a 40 minute trip to the grocery store because you don't have any lemons, use the limes in your refrigerator instead.  Or Google 'substitutions for lemon' and see if you've got any of the stuff that comes up in your cupboard.

4.  Have a high tolerance for failure.  Things will get scorched, burned, or taste horrible.  It's okay.  If you can't fix it, or it's entirely inedible, throw it out and eat something else.  Even if the dish is a failure, you are not a failure -- you're learning and building your skills!  You'll do better next time.

5.  You probably need a few foundational cookbooks.  The difference between having a cookbook and getting recipes off the Internet is that cookbooks often discuss basic cooking techniques, substitutions, and variations in the narrative in between recipes.  I'm a bit obsessive, but I got started by reading The Joy of Cooking from cover-to-cover.  Say what you will about the book being dated but there was a lot of great foundational information on cooking skills.

6.  You don't need to go out and buy a ton of equipment all at once.  Start cooking with what you have and build your arsenal piece-by-piece.  Figure out what kinds of food and recipes you like, and you'll figure out what you need.  If you think you really have nothing, or if you are set to go on a kitchen shopping spree, here's a good starting place courtesy of Mark Bittman and the New York Times:  A No-Frills Kitchen Still Cooks.

Get out there and start cooking.  And bon appetit!

P.S.  Here's more advice for getting started, more eloquently stated, from one of my favorite cookbook authors, Andrea Nguyen:  5 Essentials for Home Cooks.

What are Bib Gourmands?

From the Michelin Travel & Lifestyle website:
(http://www.michelintravel.com/michelin-selections/what-are-bib-gourmands/)

"The Bib Gourmand designation denotes good cuisine at a reasonable price in a variety of comfort categories. Defined as “Inspectors’ Favorites for Good Value,” Bib Gourmand restaurants offer two courses and a glass of wine or dessert for $40 or less (tax and gratuity not included), and are often of most value to a city’s residents, who regularly dine in neighborhood restaurants."

So what, then, is the aim of the bibgourmando blog, other than being a shameless rip-off of the 'Bib Gourmand' name?

1.  To promote awareness of tasty cuisine, at a reasonable price, in a variety of comfort categories.
2.  "Comfort categories," under my definition, span not only my favorite neighborhood restaurants but also my favorite make-at-home meals, which are usually an even better value.  :)

To calibrate you to my biases, my priorities as a restaurant patron are 1) taste; 2) innovativeness (e.g., I've never eaten anything like it before and/or I can't easily recreate the dish at home); and 3) value (though this is a moving target -- the higher a restaurant meal scores on 1 and 2, the more I'm willing to pay).  The qualify of food takes precedence over the dining experience for me (service and ambiance), though the more the food costs, the higher my expectations of service and ambiance.

My priorities as a home cook:  1) taste; 2) ease and quickness of preparation; 3) relative 'healthiness', though #3 is readily sacrificed if #1 and #2 score highly in my mind.

I'm an avid reader of restaurant reviews, food blogs, and cookbooks.  I'm a big fan of the Food Network and Top Chief.  As a consequence, my dining and cooking experiences draw on these resources.  Look for references to the original sources when I've 'borrowed' ideas or recipes.  My aim in this blog is not to promote any personal innovativeness or creativity on the culinary front but rather, to share my general enthusiasm for food, cooking, and all things food-related.

With that, allez cuisine!