BBQ pork ribs

BBQ ribs served over rice and proud presidents.

BBQ is a big deal.  Like most foods people war over the how tos, the origins and the superstitions.

There are dry rubs, blackenings, thick sweet sauces and thin firey ones.  My favorites are all of them.
Most BBQ is made with vinegar.  This is "the spice" acid on protein will always make food tastier.  You don't need it to make a good sauce, it is simply a no brainer.  Adding it is always easy and if you feel your food is unsavable - vinegar and a pinch of sugar is a good way to rescue food that is bound for the trashcan.  But to rely on vinegar or long hours of boiling is kind of a cheat.  When it really isn't doing as much as all your lovely spices will.  They add the complexity and depth.

I like complex rubs like Jamaican jerk spices.  You can go Asian with 5 spice.  Smear them in pepper pastes.

I cut my ribs into managable pieces 2 or 3 bones.  If you have a good cleaver then I recommend cutting the rib bone lengths into half.  They are easier to eat this way, but they also collect a lot more rub/sauce and herbs.  If you are entertaining and serving this I recommend splitting up eat rib to be really kind to your guests.  And if you are a sadist leave as many whole as possible.

This is raw, they have been browned in a pan then coated thoroughly in spices ready for the oven. (This batch has turmeric)

My recipe for this one was:

Brown the ribs in some pork fat, olive oil or a dry pan.  (sometimes the ribs have an excess of fat, this can be rendered and saved... you can also use a little to brown the ribs in - then no one person gets the bulk of the fatty bits)

Move to your oven pan coated lightly in olive oil.
Cover liberally with:
Sea salt
1 heaping TBSP Dry mustard (the powder made from mustard seed, this is really amazing stuff and a lovely full warmth)
Whatever hot peppers you like (I did dried thai and misc hot peppers plus their seeds) - mind the heat for guests.
Black pepper (or white)
lavender buds
Fresh Thyme sprigs
Fresh Rosemary
Fresh Sage  (This will impart a sausage-like taste that I really like so if you wouldn't then skip it)

Place into a 350 Degree oven and watch each 20 minutes to turn/coat or cover with foil as needed.  This can take an hour or more. The smaller the breakdown you may have done with the ribs, the faster they'll cook.  Mine were done AT one hour.  I like my meat to be JUST cooked and not really a hair over.  So use your discretion.

The herbs will get crispy... especially the sage which I leave whole and if it is nicely coated with pan drippings it is a powerhouse of delicious when served along side the ribs.

After cooking, everything glistens.

I really wing it on each bbq sauce.  I like sweet and hot and with oodles of color.
I used some home canned tomatoes, a large onion minced teeny tiny (major bbq flavor bringer), a handful of crushed garlic, dry mustard (yes more dry mustard - geez this stuff is heaven), 4 TBSP of aronia berry preserves (you can use any preserves you wish - raspberry and cherry are stars!), salt, pepper, more hot pepper flakes and seeds and simmered.  Taste throughout cooking your sauce!  No blind spice adding, and you can't go wrong.

With ribs I like the method of the dry spice rub/covering cooking and then the addition of the saucy bbq.  This isn't required, but it will double your efforts in keeping that lovely flavor sticking to every rib.

If you are achy try adding some turmeric it helps with inflammation as do hot peppers.  So load it up!

YUM!

Smoked beef jerky

Beef jerky is something that is a life-saver if you're a heavy camper, hiker, survivalist.  It, along with pemmican kept the American Indians fueled between foraging.  They'd dry berries, deer, turkey, bison, fish - knowing the journey could be rough.

All you need for good jerky is air flow, a fire (heat) and smoke (if outside, this keep flies and other pesky things at bay).

Slice your meat very thinly, use a sharp knife and sharp wits.

For large cuts of meat American Indian women would cut the thinnest butterfly you can imagine of the meat so it was near lace and then hang it over the fire, keeping it well above the flames but not well covered in the smoke.

• For my jerky I used sirloin (I recommend grass fed and grass finished - cows eat grass, everything else we make them eat to falsely {grains allow the cows to unnaturally throw on the saturated pounds} fatten them)- cut it thinly.
• On a baking sheet I laid it all out and sprinkled it with coarse sea salt and CRUSHED juniper berries (they don't release all their aroma until you crush them).

Let the meat and salt sit and the salt will draw water from the meat.  Pour off any water.  You can let it sit for 4-8 hours or overnight for this.  The meat will feel firmer to the touch - that means the salt did it's job.  I then rinsed the meat well and reserved plenty of juniper berries crushed and ready for mixing back into the meat.  You can cut up the crushed berries to really get them all over.

I smoked the meat for 5 hours shifting them around.  The heat wasn't quite high so usually I would think it could be done in 3 in a grill smoking situation.
You also don't HAVE to smoke it, it is just more flavor punchy!  You also can control the kind of overtones the meat will have with the kind of wood you use.  You can buy (or chop) the chips you like.  This time I used cherry.

Woods for smoking:
Hickory - Has a very distinct wood flavor.  Good for BBQ meats. May need very little to get the job done otherwise it can overpower.
Mesquite - Has a very distinct wood flavor.  Good for BBQ meats. May need very little to get the job done otherwise it can overpower.
Alder - makes AMAZING smoked salt, also good for all meats, but best on fish (Salmon!).  A clean lovely round wood smoke.
Apple - beautiful for fish (Salmon!), good for all meat.
Cherry - pretty straight smoke even though many call it sweet or fruity, I found it to not be as destinct or as powerful as Mesquite ad Hickory.
Maple - Sweet smoke, good on birds and ham.
Oak - Used for larger cuts of meat that need long smoking times.  Strong smoke flavor.
Pecan - "Colder" smoking wood, good for larger cuts of meat - partly since the smoke alone wont cook the meat.

I'd just make sure what kind of wood you end up with and be careful since wood from some conifers can be resinous and make your meat inedible and other the resinous quality is pleasant and will be subtle.  Other woods are bad for you, so look them up!  Know what you're using.

Craigslist sometimes has orchard prunings for free.  I've gone and picked up a truck load of applewood.  Of course we then had to painfully chip chip chip all of it down into smokable chunks.

After the meat is smoked I move it to a 250-275 degree oven with the door cracked (this is important! you want air).  You simply check your meat and turn it over.  At this point it is like cooking bacon.  If you like flimsy bacon, you may like your jerky this way.  If you plan on a long shelf life then you want it pretty dry.

After it is done I move it to a surface to cool and then double baggie a few servings worth (enough for Jason and I - be generous to the family members!) and place into the freezer.  As long as you've packaged them well they'll keep a good long while. 6-8 months

When you go fishing, hunting, hiking, camping, climbing, driving, biking, walking - grab a baggie and put it into your pack.  This will keep for three days at least so you can feed yourself over the weekend or long car trip.  Granola is a great accompaniment.

Small Successes

So I had been on the lookout for an exciting job in a professional kitchen for a long while now.  It was only recently that I found an ad that seemed like people that actually love food were looking for other people that love food.  I figured "Why the hell not?" and applied with a tender cover letter and a few potlicker photos... I didn't know who would be seeing the application and I figured it wasn't standard procedure to send images of food along with my resume' but again - Why the hell not?

I sort of figured either I had sent food pictures to the wrong email, technology gave me the bump or they looked at my lack of professional experienced and printed my info so they could then shred it, burn it and urinate on my resume and photos ashes.  Or something like that.  A week or two later I got a call.  I got an interview with the Executive Chef and Sous Chef.  By the end of the hour they disappeared to collect another fellow who they introduced me to as Prep Chef he would potentially be my most direct boss.  My go-to-overseer.  He was the friendliest of the three and beamed with the most openness (none of the three being unfriendly at all - just this fellow seemed far more cheerful, he revealed he had a newborn at home so perhaps some of his cheer can be chocked up to weeks of sleeplessness that is turning his insanity into euphoria as a coping mechanism)... it seemed like they were at least interested.  After spending this much time with me and they also seemed like serious people - serious people aren't into wasting time - so then were they interested?  I had a lot of strikes against me.  The only thing I had going for me was kitchen comfort, eagerness and the willingness to apply.  As S Chef mentioned ...a downside was that they couldn't ask me to make 6 qts of hollandaise and leave me to it.  They'd have to show me.  I told him, yes... yes they would.  I don't understand things like that in my current world. 

So two days I had to wait after leaving the interview and I tried to focus on other duties... like the ducklings in the incubator.  Is this a blob?  Is this a dead duckling?  Or is this a healthy red-squishy-soon-to-hatch duckling?  There was plenty to worry about without worrying over the job.  I wanted it so badly... I wanted their secrets... and there are three of them!  Three trained chefs to greedily soak up everything they are willing to let go of.  I managed to fit in plenty of time to worry I wouldn't get it.

The pay was not anything grand.  It was my usual cruddy pay except I wouldn't have the usual opportunity to work like a fiend and get tips, which in the past really made up the difference between paying rent and paying rent and eating.  So my pay will pay rent.  Just the rent.  It wont pay for the rent and my bus fair.  I ... uhm, can do this - right?  I have to.  They'll call me, at least to say thank you and be friendly.

So late in the day I've finally managed to forget that they were supposed to call and then Brrrriing!
They offered me the job.  I was syched and accepted and it all kind of rushed forward.  Now I am going to have to be spry and surrounded by people again.  I had sort of forgotten what a comfort I'd made of being a recluse.

As it turns out, Kitchen pants are not so different from the pants that Sinbad wears.

Well, here we go!

Still, I can't help but think I was at all their best possible choice for the job.

I will put little journal entries here about my days, things I learn, and anything else not top secret.
I'm going to have to hit the ground running.  So this could be at least a little entertaining.

The many gifts of the ocean

Pier's End in Garibaldi, courtesy of Panoramio (http://www.panoramio.com/photo/36025836)

The ocean has been called the world's oldest restaurant, and it really is.  The ocean's capability to feed you is astounding, even as it struggles with our impositions of progress, depleted fisheries and endless waves of waste.  Despite the bruises and black eyes we give it, the endless blue brine and rocky headlands never fail to deliver the most amazing and easily harvested delicacies.

Being in Oregon, we are gifted with an incredible wild coastline. From the northernmost jetties at the mouth of the Columbia River to the southern redwood-flanked basalt formations, the shore is littered with a vast variety of crustaceans, mollusks, fish and plants.  The bays are full of sand shrimp and clams at low tide.  The rocky shores are littered with tide pool teeming with life: urchins, anemones, crabs, fish, chitons, mussels, limpets, starfish and so much more.  Docks and jetties are perfect places to drop a crab pot and hoist up the most delectable Dungeness  and Red Rock crabs, as well as throw a line in the water for sea bass and other shore fish.  And, licenses for shellfish collecting are very reasonably priced at $7 for residents and $20.50 for nonresidents. 

So it was that we set out to the coast to take part in the bounty of the sea.  First, we did a lot of research on the rules, etiquette and technique of collecting shells, shrimp and crabs.  There is a great deal of information on the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife website, but we found the best general information on Washington's website. You absolutely MUST check to make sure harvesting is allowed before you collect shellfish, as there are regularly harmful algae blooms, red tides and other environmental factors that can make them toxic.  State websites are usually up to date with this information, but shellfish hotlines are reportedly more accurate.  In Oregon, the number is (503) 986-4728, and in Washington State it's (800) 562-5632.

The next step was to go to the outdoor store and get some supplies.  We got a shrimp gun, a clam tube and a couple of crab snares that attach to your fishing pole, and our shellfish licenses.   Then it was off to the coast!

We started out at the southern end of the mouth of the Necanicum River at low tide in search of razor clams.  In our first 10 minutes we finally spotted a promising hole and dug out a lovely fat clam.  Unfortunately our luck was not so good from that point on due to the prior day's heavy surf that sent the clams in a deep retreat.   We searched beach after beach with no real luck.

Finally, we headed south to the sleepy and wonderful port town of Garibaldi and the aptly-named Crab Harbor.  The 12th street pier juts out into the harbor to the old Pier's End Coast Guard station, an amazingly beautiful old building that a local told us had been there "forever."  While we were crabbing there a few days later, a well-dressed woman walked hurriedly up the pier sizing it up.  We made small talk, curious about her seemingly incongruous appearance on the pier and she mentioned she was the safety coordinator for a temporary agency and they were contracted to help with the pending demolition and dismantling of the building.  So much for history!


On our first trip, we managed to snare a few nice big crabs, but they kept falling off as they reached the surface of the water.  After that disappointment, we went into Tillamook and bought a crab ring which yielded a really nice big crab, just as the light was fading.  We caught several females and a couple undersize males as well which we put back in the water.   It was intoxicating waiting for the baskets to emerge every time.

A few days later, we made it back and managed to get a couple nice crabs, and we foraged for shellfish around the rocks of Barview Jetty.  We found a great supply of mussels, and some winkles and snails which we gleefully put in our mesh bag.  The mussels were particularly beautiful.

A crab ring is definitely the right tool for the job!

At the end of the day, it felt like we had a feast in the making.  And, we did, as you will see below.

Seafood Pasta

We put all of this over tagliatelle and had a side of bread with it.  It was amazing!  Recipes for those will be forthcoming.  For now, it's all about the sea bounty.

Preparing the shellfish:
I'll go into what we did with our shellfish, but your process may vary depending on your catch.  We had mussels, winkles and a few turban snails.  For mussels, you simply scrub the outsides of the shells.  You can remove the barnacles with a dull knife if they bother you, but they can cut you and they wont hurt anything if you leave them on.  You also want to remove the "beard" from each mussel by pulling it out.  It comes from the inside of the shell and is not exactly easy to get without a vigorous effort.  It's worth the effort though, because the beard is no fun to eat.  For clams, just scrub them clean and make sure they're not open.  If they are hanging open prior to any cooking, they are expired and need to be discarded.  This is only if they remain open.  They should, with a little probing, close up to "hide" from you if they are well.  If they do not open during cooking this is your second warning that this little guy is expired!

Winkles and Turban snails!

For snail and like critters, you should use a scrub brush and clean the outsides of the shells.  Next, soak them in salted tap water for 30 minutes prior to cooking them, making sure to change the water if it starts looking murky or cloudy -- and don't forget to re-salt it if you do.  Once they're looking good they're ready to be plonked into some boiling salted water.  For around 6 minutes.  Make sure you see a pink or white foot inside the shell and not a little claw.  It's easy to accidentally grab a hermit crab by accident!

Crabs, mussels, snail and a lonely razor clam

For crab, you need to "field clean" it.  I highly recommend this process for dispatching them.  If you clean your crab where you are crabbing it should be near time to cook them as game wardens check crab catches for females (which are illegal) and males and cleaning them can look like you're trying to obscure the gender of the animal. This is illegal in many places to have prepped crabs because of this.  So wait until you're all done before venturing into the cleaning. Once separated, you can wash the crab thoroughly in cool water, making sure all of the various inner bits and gills are gone.  Don't be startled if the crab legs continue to move for some time after the fact.  If he is in half and cleaned he is NOT alive.

I am salivating just writing this caption

Cooking the shellfish (clams/mussels):

In a cast iron frying pan (or your favorite skillet), add one finely minced medium sized sweet yellow onion and enough olive oil to coat the bits.   Turn up the heat to a medium simmer so the onions begin to cook.  Next, add a dash of freshly cracked black pepper and a pinch of coarse sea salt.  At the ready, you'll want a selection of freshly-chopped herbs.  We used garlic fronds and chives, but you could use any savory herb you wish.  Once the onions are clear, toss in the shellfish!  Next, add a 1/2 Cup of dry cooking sherry or vermouth slowly over the whole collection.  Shells should be starting to open at this point.  Cover the pan with a lid so they can steam, shaking it periodically so the shells get evenly cooked.  After most (hopefully all) the shells are opened, it's done.  It takes no longer than 4 minutes for them to open.  Any shells that stay closed after cooking should be discarded, as they were already headed to Davy Jones' Locker and not your stomach. 

Cooking the crab:

Crab is pretty straight forward, and the variations are infinite.  In the most basic sense, you want to boil it in salty water.  Since you're doing pieces in this version, the cook time is around 6 minutes.  But basically, you wait a full minute past when the crab carapace turns bright orange.  You definitely don't want to overcook it.  The brine can have everything from herbs to beer in it.  It's also great with nothing but sea salt, which is how we did it.

Winkles look amazing if you can get them out of their shell.  Note the custom tool to remove them.

Cooking Snails & Stuff:
Little shell mollusks like snails, limpets and winkles can be cooked much the same way as crab.   I do recommend a little seasoning in the water, as they can have a widely varying taste.  Some of the little guys tasted amazing, while others were... well, gamey.  Each part of the mollusk has a different taste, and I suggest a sampling of each part to decide which you like.  I will say that these creatures are not necessarily for the faint of heart, and removing them from the shell takes the construction of a special hook shape made from a large safety pin.  Unless you're really, really, really hungry, these may not be worth the trouble.

Last step is to throw all this goodness on top of your noodles and have a feast!  And, be sure and thank the ocean for all of the gifts it gives us.

The bounty!