Korean BBQ

And another delay… So about two weeks ago, I was out getting things for Noelle’s baby shower when Jesse texted me and said, “i can cook us korean bbq tonight if you want we have all the ingredients except 1 onion and flank steak.” (That was quoted verbatim from his text, too…also note that whenever you read blue text from this point on in this blog, that’s just Jesse talking and adding key points). I was thinking, “That sounds awesome!” So I called him to discuss what else we needed and then headed to Kroger. I like our Ingles, but let’s be honest here, if you want good steaks, Ingles is not the place to go.

And we have two really nice Krogers not terribly far from us. So I grabbed what we needed at Kroger and found a really yummy-looking flank steak. I then went home, tired from all of my errands, but excited about a super-awesome meal. Not to mention the fact that the only thing I needed to make was the rice. And we have a rice cooker for that.

Well, I came home and unloaded the grocery bags with Jesse’s help when all of a sudden he looked at me and said, “Where’s the soy sauce? I can’t make this without the soy sauce!” Ugh, that meant I had to go out again, something I REALLY didn’t want to do. I had already been out for several hours and was pooped! Oh well, this recipe really did need the soy sauce. So this time I just went to Ingles, grabbed two bottles of soy sauce, a Pibb Xtra and went home. Jesse took one bottle of soy sauce and put the other one in the pantry. We were finally ready to make the marinade and let the steak soak for a little bit. Here’s the recipe Jesse found and used:

http://www.cooks.com/rec/view/0,1818,142164-234200,00.html

And here is it written out:

Ingredients:

2 cups water

2 cups low-sodium soy sauce

2 cups sugar

6 garlic cloves, minced

4 tablespoons sesame seed oil

3 tablespoons black pepper

1 white onion, grated

Mix everything together and let the steak sit in the marinade for at least 30 minutes.

Jesse’s favorite part was grating the onion… He thought that was so cool! Just kidding, he said that was the worst part. In fact, I do believe I remember him saying something along these lines, “The only thing worse than cutting an onion? Grating an onion.” I felt bad for him, but seriously was glad I wasn’t doing it. Yeah, this was really the worst part…it just makes me so sad….the plight of onions, I just cry every time...

Once the marinade was completed we put the steak in. And boy, did it all smell REALLY good. I was starting to get super excited. We put the bag of marinade and steak back in the fridge and let it sit there to rest. Of course, though, something typically goes wrong while we cook. I had already run back to the store once. But no, this was even better. The extra bottle of soy sauce in the pantry? Well, it fell off the shelf, shattering on the floor and pouring soy sauce all over the pantry floor and out into the kitchen. Awesome! I leaned down and started to pick up all of the glass bits while Jesse shooed the animals away and got some towels from the garage. We then removed everything that was sitting on the floor of the pantry and he proceeded to clean it up. In all honesty, I was pretty glad that happened. The bottom of the pantry was filthy and cluttered, and we hadn’t cleaned it in awhile because that’s where we keep the two bins of pet food, so it’s kind of out of sight, out of mind. But now it’s clean, albeit with a faint hue and scent of soy sauce… Sadly, we have no pictures from this ordeal, we were too busy cleaning it and making sure there wasn’t any glass on the floor for the pets to step on, or play with, or eat.

Once the steak had been marinating for awhile, I made the rice in the rice cooker (I highly recommend getting one of these if you eat a lot of rice like we do!).

Then I got out the brand new salad spinner Jesse bought me for my birthday and cleaned the salad.

Jesse turned the burner on high to get the pan really, really hot, so he could sear the steak. We both like our steak medium-rare, so we have to make sure we don’t overdo it. Right before he placed the steak on the pan, he said, “I hope this doesn’t set off the smoke detector.” Famous last words.

Sure enough, our obnoxious smoke detector started beeping (actually, it’s a very nice smoke detector, loud and linked with the other one outside our room. But still it’s loud and talks to you.). Yoda, with his tail between his legs ran away from the kitchen, and Jesse grabbed the thing off the wall and set it on the coffee table while I opened the kitchen window. Annoyance had been diverted. This is really the best part about our smoke detectors…they are actually just fastened to a ring that’s attached to the wall. So when there’s an influx of non-house-burning-down-fire/smoke in the kitchen, you can just twist them off the wall and throw them under a pillow instead of wafting a towel in your kitchen with the windows open like a moron.

So Jesse finished searing the steak and very quickly it was done and ready to eat. He also took the extra sauce and put it in a saucepan to heat up so we could pour it over our steak.

The sauce was actually quite easy. Already having a great marinade, I simply threw a small bit in a sauce pan and added some Wondra sauce/gravy flour to thicken it a little after bringing to a boil. It was pretty strong, so I’d either need to water it down a bit in the future, or just use it sparingly as a garnish-sauce…it was still very tasty though…and great on the rice.

All in all, a yummy looking meal.

Ratings:

Sarah:

Preparation: 5 out of 5, Jesse did all the hardwork, I just put the rice in the rice cooker and cleaned lettuce!

Taste: 4 out of 5. This meal has a LOT of potential. It involved a lot of my favorites types of foods. But, this was really peppery. I think next time we make this, we should marinate the steak overnight. Also, we could cut down a little bit on the pepper, made add something else to enhance spiceyness. But, overall, it was good. The flavour of the marinade was good, just sweet enough, but next time we agreed to use brown sugar and not white. I can’t wait until we try it again.

Pickiness: 3.5 out of 5. If you are sensitive to spicy things, you may not like this. As I mentioned before, the pepper was a little overwhelming. Also, some people don’t like steak, so obviously this would be fail for you. But if you like steak and Asian food, then you will like this!

Jesse:

Preparation: 4 out of 5 – pretty easy, just make the marinade. And then sear the flank steak to your choice of doneness. The worst part was cutting the onions…I even put them in the freezer for about 10min before hand and they were still horrible.

Taste: 4 out of 5 – I agree with Sarah…as much as I like pepper (and saltiness), this was a bit much. Next time, we’ll cut down on the pepper, but also switch to brown sugar as I think that would be a little richer and cut some of the pepper…and also create a better glaze. I could totally see Toasted Sesame See garnish on here too…with perhaps a pineapple ring on top? But even without these, this was one of my more favorite recipes for KBBQ that I’ve made. *note that we used regular (sodium) soy sauce instead of low-sodium…that stuff tastes like Jawa spit O.o

Cost: 5 out of 5 – super cheap and inexpensive…especially when you pretty much already have all of the ingredients. A lot of times, Flank or Skillet Steaks are a cheaper alternative to individual portioned steaks since you end up getting leftovers most of the time. It’s also great cold as leftovers or eve in sandwiches.

Overall Rating: 4.25

You Can Call Me Nannerpuss!

Hello. This post is a week overdue, sorry! But we’ve had a lot going on, I had Miss Virgnia for 2 days, we went to Huntsville for 2 days, and basically were lazy for the other days. :)

Last week Jesse and I decided to go on a grand adventure in the cooking world. We invited my parents over for dinner because they are awesome, and we wanted to thank them for being so. We also invited my brother John, his wife Sarah Beth, and their daughter Virginia over. Here’s a picture of our super-cute niece!!!

Last, our good friend Adam is in town from Japan, so he came over as well.

So what was on the menu you ask? We kept it nice and Southern: BBQ chicken sandwiches, snap beans, hushpuppies and banana pudding for dessert! I started out with making the BBQ chicken. That was the easiest one for tonight. Below is the recipe:

6 chicken breasts

1 bottle of BBQ sauce

That morning, I got out the crock pot and put the chicken inside. Then, I dumped in a bottle of the BBQ sauce and turned the crock pot on low. I have come to realize that Carolina BBQ sauce is one of my favorites, and even found this really delicious sauce at our local Ingles: Sticky Fingers. Sticky Fingers also has a few restaurants around the South. It turns out I’ve eaten at their Chattanooga restaurant with my friends Lindsey and Noelle. Here is their website: http://www.stickyfingers.com. They advertise themselves as Memphis BBQ, but their sauce I bought is their Carolina flavor…

Anyways, I let the chicken cook for the whole day, periodically helping the crock pot shred the chicken. That’s Jesse’s favorite part, and since that was his work from home day, he did a lot of the helping along. Below is a picture of the finished chicken:

The next easy thing on the menu for the night was the snap beans. I have fond memories of sitting in my grandmother’s kitchen and helping her or any of my aunts snap beans, so I decided we should actually buy the beans as opposed to cans of beans... It’s supposed to be healthier to do it that way. :) After snapping all the beans – something both Jesse and I took part in, we put them in a pot and covered them with water. We also added a beef bouillon cube or two and let the beans cook. I really wanted to find a hambone and add that and some brown sugar, but since I don’t really eat much pork, there was none to be had. Below are pictures of the progress with the beans:

Snapping them:

T

Ok, so the last two things weren’t as easy as the first two… We made the hushpuppies and banana pudding from scratch.

I started on the hushpuppies first because I could get the dry mix together early in the day. The hardest part was finding a recipe – but I did that a few weeks ago. Jesse and I developed a huge craving for hushpuppies last month when we had some down at the beach. I love sweet hushpuppies, and our favorite restaurant in Atlanta that served great hushpuppies – Dusty’s BBQ – sadly went out of business for multiple reasons. Needless to say, we’ve been feeling deprived of some good hushpuppies, so we resolved to make some. After searching the web for recipes, I settled on Paula Deen’s recipe, because really, who better to follow for a Southern treat then Paula Deen? Her recipe had 5 stars, but the only problem was that there was no sugar in the ingredient list. But, one thing I have learned from online recipes is this: read people’s reviews! They’ll give you tips on what to do to change things around, etc. Fortunately someone mentioned adding sugar to this one, unfortunately, they didn’t say how much. Anyways, here is the link for the recipe: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/paula-deen/hushpuppies-recipe/index.html. Below are the ingredients:

• 6 cups peanut oil
• 1 1/2 cups self-rising cornmeal
• 1/2 cup self-rising flour
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 small onion, chopped
• 1 cup buttermilk
• 1 egg, lightly beaten

So like I said, I mixed all of the dry ingredients first, and added in 2 tablespoons of sugar. Below is the mix:

Next, we borrowed a rather large pot from my mom so we could appropriately fry these, seeing as how we don’t have a fryer. Then, about an hour before we were to eat, I added in the onion, eggs and buttermilk. Jesse took over from there and formed little balls out of these while the oil heated to 350 degrees. Below are the pre-cooked hushpuppies:

Then, once our handy thermometer (thank you William-Sonoma) said the oil was 350, he dropped those puppies in to be fried.

Then, after a few test runs, we determined when they were done and took them out. They looked like hushpuppies!

And finally, on to the arguably best dessert ever – Banana Pudding. This is arguably once of the best Southern dishes ever. A good banana pudding can make any day a LOT better. And Jesse and I have been DYING to make banana pudding. So this meal seemed like a good time to do so. A year or so ago I found a recipe I wanted to try, so this is what we used. For the life of me, I can’t tell you where I found it, but it is from the internet. Here it is:

Banana Pudding
10 servings

Hands on: 25 minutes
Total time: 1 hour, 25 minutes or more for cooling

Feel free to use the full-fat versions of the sweetened condensed milk, if you prefer. The pudding can also be served in individual 1-cup ramekins.

1/3 cup all-purpose flour
Dash of salt
2 1/2 cups 1 percent low-fat milk
1 (14-ounce) can fat-free sweetened condensed milk
2 egg yolks, lightly beaten
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
3 cups sliced ripe bananas (about 5 to 6)
45 reduced-fat vanilla wafers
4 egg whites
1/4 cup granulated sugar

Preheat oven to 325 degrees.

Combine flour and salt in medium saucepan. Gradually stir in low-fat and condensed milks and yolks, and cook over medium heat, stirring constantly, for 8 minutes or until thickened. Remove from heat; stir in vanilla. Arrange 1 cup banana slices in a 2-quart baking dish. Spoon 1/3 pudding mixture over bananas; top with 15 vanilla wafers. Repeat layers once; top with remaining bananas and pudding. Arrange remaining 15 wafers around inside edge of dish. Gently push wafers into pudding. Beat egg whites at high speed with an electric mixer until foamy. Add sugar, 1 tablespoon at a time, beating until stiff peaks form and sugar is dissolved (2 to 4 minutes) Spread meringue over pudding, sealing to edge of dish. Bake for 25 minutes or until golden. Let cool at least 30 minutes.

Per serving: 334 calories (percent of calories from fat, 16), 9 grams protein, 61 grams carbohydrates, 2 grams fiber, 6 grams fat (2 grams saturated), 45 milligrams cholesterol, 186 milligrams sodium.

So Jesse and I embarked on this dish with anticipation. I started by making the custard on the stove. While I worked on that and kept stirring, Jesse peeled and sliced all of the bananas.

Then he took out the Nilla Wafers (cause let’s face it, anything other than Nabisco is an imposter!). He went on and lined the outside of the casserole dish with Nilla Wafers and then added bananas to the bottom.

Once the custard mixture was done, he spooned that on top.

Really, he followed the recipe as shown above. Next, he made the meringue out of the egg whites I had already separated. He then put the whole dish in the over and we waited for it to cook.

Then, he pulled it out of the oven, and for all intents and purposes, it looked like banana pudding should look!

Finally, our dinner was done, the table was set, chairs were found, and tummies were rumbling. It was time to eat!

Ratings:

Sarah:

Preparation:

BBQ Chicken: 5 out of 5. It’s so easy even a Caveman could do it! Wait, is that trademarked? Let me give a shout out to Geico, I don’t own that phrase, if anyone does, they do.

Snap Beans: 4 out of 5. Snapping the ends off is the only reason it’s not a 5.

Hushpuppies: 2 out of 5. These were fun to make, but not all that easy. Especially the frying part. They definitely take some time.

Banana Pudding: 2 out of 5. It was not easy to make, especially since it was all from scratch. Except the Nilla Wafers. I’ve never made a custard, and I always worry I won’t know how thick is thick enough. Of course, that’s pretty obvious once you’re there… I’ve never made meringue either, and still haven’t because Jesse did that part. I was nervous, but I’m determined to make the meringue next time. Meringue is really yummy!

Overall: 3.25 out of 5

Taste: I give the whole meal a 4.5 out of 5. The hushpuppies were, unfortunately, a little dry and I definitely didn’t add enough sugar. Next time, we’ll add a little more buttermilk and sugar to the mix to see if that works. Or, if anyone has any yummy hushpuppy recipes, send them over. The BBQ was good and the beans good, but what really sealed the deal was the Banana Pudding. It was irresistible. The whole meal could have been awful, but with the banana pudding it would still get a high score. It was so good that there were no leftovers. We all have second servings of it as witnessed by this picture:

Pickiness Factor: Hmmm… I think this deserves a 3.5 out of 5. While I liked this meal, a lot of people don’t like beans. I used to hate green beans when I was little and pretty much ate them under duress. And some people are picky about the type of BBQ sauce used, so if they didn’t like this one, then they wouldn’t have liked the meal. But if someone was picky about banana pudding, I don’t think I should know you. Banana pudding is the BOMB! Especially home-made, warm banana pudding. That instant crap you can buy at restaurants, that have whipped cream and not meringue, well, that’s probably just the Yankees trying to create banana pudding.

Special Yoda Factor: We decided to try out the hushpuppies on Yoda. I threw one at him and told him to HUSH PUPPY! It worked like magic. He gives those a 5 out of 5. Of course, once he was done eating them he decided he wanted more and started begging… My bad. :)

Jesse:

Preparation: I give this a 3 out of 5. It was pretty super easy, just a little time consuming. Snapping the beans probably took the longest, but it was fun. Nothing was too difficult, especially just letting the chicken sit in the crock all day. Easy Peasy!

Taste: I give this a 4 out of 5. The BBQ Chicken and Nanner Puddin’ was epic-ly awesome, too bad the Hush Puppies were a bit dry. And I’ve never been a huge fan of snap beans (but they are fun to make).

Cost: 4 out of 5. The entire meal was pretty much made from scratch. The only ready made portion were the Nilla Wafers, and well, there’s no excuse to not buy those…if you were born in the south, you know exactly what we mean. The total cost was pretty low, and we had left over sandwiches for a while…but unfortunately the Pudding was completely destroyed.

Overall Rating: 3.9