Holy Mole Poblano!

Apparently there's a Mexican tradition to cook a really heavy stew called mole (pronounced mole-ay) and then bring it to picnics, where you feed it to your relatives on a hot day and then they pass out from all of the blood rushing to their stomachs trying to digest it.  I think this is a tradition many of us can get behind, so I present you with a recipe for mole.

Mole is like a Mexican version of chili, or curry.  It's got a whole bunch of varieties, and it's more of a type of dish than a particular recipe.  There are all kinds of interesting versions, many of which I was able to sample at Red Iguana in Salt Lake City, UT of all places - a strawberry mole, an almond-based mole, pumpkin seed-based, red, green, pink, cream-colored, whatever you can imagine.  However, if you ask most people who have had it, they'll tell you that even the most iconic mole - a mole poblano - contains some very interesting ingredients, such as nuts, chocolate, chile peppers, and then some kind of protein.  It does not, contrary to popular belief, contain any moles.

Mole poblano - enough to fell a bull elephant

WARNING: this is another labor of love dish.  Do not attempt this if you're just bored and curious.  You will need time, energy, a few strange ingredients, a big kitchen, and a food processor to do it right.  What?  You're still going to attempt?  Fine, but I tried to stop you.

I will mention before presenting the recipe that I scaled this up by a factor of 5, to feed 9 people.  We ate half of what I made, and still felt full.  I ended up using less than 5x the olive oil (maybe 6 tbsp total), and only about 6 cups of stock to make it the appropriate thickness.  So keep that in mind as you make...

Mole Poblano de Pollo (Chicken in a Poblano pepper Mole sauce)

from: I have no idea where, somewhere on the internet

• 3 tbsp olive oil
• 4 chicken pieces, about 6 oz each
• 1 onion, chopped
• 2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
• 1 hot dried red chili such as chipotle, or 2 milder dried chiles such as ancho, reconstituted & finely chopped
• 1 tbsp sesame seeds, toasted, plus extra for garnish
• 1 tbsp chopped almonds
• ¼ tsp ground cinnamon
• ¼ tsp ground cumin
• ¼ tsp ground cloves
• 3 tomatoes, peeled & chopped
• 2 tbsp raisins
• 1½ cups chicken stock
• 1 tbsp peanut butter
• 1 oz/25 g semisweet chocolate with a high cocoa content, grated, plus extra for garnish

So you want to make mole, huh?  Well too bad, you have to spend an hour prepping first.  If you're crazy like me, you started with whole spices, fresh tomatoes and whole chickens, and toasted and ground / peeled / cut them up, respectively.  To see how to peel a tomato, check my other post on chili here.  While you're doing that, soak your chiles in boiling water, then take off the stem and scoop out the seeds, and chop coarsely.  This will ultimately go in the food processor, so feel free to slack on the precision a bit with your chopping.

All of the more interesting ingredients, ready to go.  Chocolate and peanut butter are among them - my cousin said the kitchen smelled like Reese's peanut butter cups

Blanching the tomatoes to remove the skin

Peeled tomatoes, ready for action.  This was surprisingly simple.

Now you're ready to start actually doing things.  Heat 2 tbsp oil in a large skillet.  Add the chicken and cook until browned on all sides.  Really brown it, don't just make it yellow.  And certainly not black, either.  Be sure to have enough fat in the pan, and don't overcrowd.  I did mine in two pans, over about 3 batches each, but I also had 27 pieces of chicken to deal with.  Remove chicken pieces with a slotted spoon and set aside.

Browning the chicken in multiple pans keeps things moving without you overcrowding.  Cast iron is far superior here.

Add the onion, garlic, and chilies and cook for 5 minutes, or until softened.  Add the sesame seeds, almonds, and spices and cook, stirring, for 2 minutes.  Add the tomatoes, raisins, stock, peanut butter, and chocolate and stir well.  Add only as much stock as you think will be necessary for stewing the meat you're using - you don't want soup, this should be more like a curry consistency after you blend.  I found that placing each round of ingredients into separate areas helped to idiot-proof my throwing things casually into the pan without double-checking the recipe.  And, if you are hasty and didn't think to chop them up before adding, chop up the tomatoes somewhat with a knife or spoon while they're in the pan.  Season to taste with salt and pepper and let simmer for 5 minutes.

After cooking the onions, garlic and peppers, add the spices and nuts

Then things get really crazy - add the chocolate and peanut butter

Tomatoes could have gone in chopped, but I didn't think this through

Be sure to fill your pan dangerously full, so that stirring is nearly impossible and you make a huge mess.  Or don't.

Transfer the mixture to a food processor or blender and process until smooth.  Try to put a towel over the top so you don't spray mole all over your kitchen - it is best taken internally, not through the skin and clothes.

Into the food processor for a quick spin

Return the mixture to the skillet, add the chicken, and bring to a boil.  Reduce the heat, cover, and let simmer for 1 hour, or until the chicken is very tender, adding more liquid if necessary.  If you're impatient, bust out the pressure cooker and cook for 20 minutes.

Serve garnished with sesame seeds and a little grated chocolate.  We served with homemade tostones and platanos (both plantain dishes), Mexican yellow rice, and tamales.  It was an excellent traditional feast, and well received by everyone.  Slightly sweet, nutty, rich, and just a little spicy.  I also had tons of sauce left over, which I froze to use next time I want to make this.  If that's the case, all you have to do is brown the chicken and then throw it into the ready-made sauce.  And don't forget to bring it to your next family gathering - especially if you are being taken against your will.

Spicy Poblano Burgers with Chipotle Cream and Pickled Red Onions

Well, after an overly long hiatus, I'm back.  Life is good, thanks for asking.  I mean, how bad could it be, considering that I was finally able to make a crazy hamburger recipe without my good friend and former housemate lamenting "why would you ever put something in a burger besides salt and pepper?!"  Because it's awesome, that's why.

Show me potato salad!

Tonight's post liberates and modifies a burger recipe from Cooking Light, wherein ground beef is augmented with spices and a roasted chile pepper.  To top it off, it calls for a chipotle cream, as well as pickled red onions.  For those of you who haven't had either of these things, a) I weep for you, and b) you need to try them.  Chipotle peppers, being jalapenos that have been smoked and either dried or preserved in a spicy sauce called adobo, are more than just the namesake of your favorite mission-style burrito.  They are also a small piece of heaven, and make for an incredible flavored mayonnaise that's very easy to whip up at home.  And pickled red onions are a garnish traditionally served in Latin cuisine, with a slight bit of tang and a crisp, refreshing bite.  The idea of throwing these things on a burger sounded too good to pass up, and I assure you, the combination is fairly impressive when you're done.

The chipotle - a smoked / dried jalapeno.  And you thought it was some kind of crazy mystery pepper!

Pickled red onions.  I use my own recipe, which is easy and fast, and requires about 4 things you have around the kitchen.

The recipe calls for roasted poblanos in the burger meat.  This is a simple process that can go horribly if you don't follow the directions.  Let's walk through the process quickly:

1. Take your peppers and char them over an open flame.  Do not bake them, don't put them in a pan and sear them.  Char them, over a gas burner, on a grill, or in a broiler.  Turn them regularly, to make sure they are well blackened.
2. Take the still hot peppers and put them in a bag.  You're trying to get the skin off, which you don't want to eat.  To do this, you want the steam coming from the peppers to work its way throughout the membrane keeping the skin attached, so that even the non-charred bits give up their fight and let go.  Translation: place in a sealed plastic zip-top bag, and let the peppers sit for 15 minutes.
3. Peel the skin off.  Try to get as much as possible removed, or the final product will both look and feel weird.

The mostly charred peppers.  I used cubanelle, because I'm lazy and couldn't find poblanos.  About the same heat level and flavor in a pinch.

The peppers, after steaming in a ziploc bag.

Look, the skin comes right off in sheets!

If you're lucky, you can get most of the skin off in one pull.

The finished product, peeled, seeds removed, and sliced open.

We all thought the burgers were great, although I would have cooked them slightly more rare on a better grill.  Regardless, the tart chipotle cream, the slightly sweet, slightly sour pickled onions, and the savory burger come together in what I thought was a well-rehearsed symphony of flavors.  Make sure you are sitting when you eat the hamburger, and please, remember to eat responsibly.

The recipe calls for making a few subassemblies, which need to be prepared in a certain order to get the flavors and consistency correct.  I will outline the recipe in the order in which you must complete everything for maximum awesomeness.  Besides changing the order of the recipe, I replaced white bread and milk with panko crumbs, which gives the burger just a bit more body and a less mushy meatloaf-y texture.

Spicy Poblano Burgers with Pickled Red Onions and Chipotle Cream

Adapted from Cooking Light, July 2010

• 2 poblano chiles
• 1 oz panko crumbs
• 3 tbsp minced fresh cilantro, divided
• 1 tsp ground cumin
• 1/2 tsp ground coriander
• 1/2 tsp paprika
• 1/2 tsp kosher salt, divided
• 1/2 tsp freshly ground black pepper, divided
• 1 pound ground sirloin (I used 90/10 chuck)

• 1/2 cup light sour cream
• 1 tbsp minced shallots
• 1 tsp fresh lime juice
• 1 (7-oz) can chipotle chiles in adobo sauce (you will just need 1 chile)
• 4 (1.5-oz) hamburger buns, toasted

• 1/2 cup white vinegar
• 2 tbsp white sugar
• pinch red pepper flakes
• 1 tsp kosher salt
• 1 red onion, thinly sliced
• 1 tsp dried oregano

First, get the pickled onions pickling.  You can do this a day ahead, but a few hours is better than nothing. Most importantly, slice your onions thinly and uniformly.  For this, I use a mandoline, also referred to in my kitchen as 'the finger slicer'.  This medieval torture instrument is valuable not only for injuring yourself, but also for making precisely sliced foods.  Observe:

The mandoline - observe nature's cruelest mistake

I recommend using the finger guard, unless you have excellent medical insurance

These perfectly sliced onions were created in about 10 seconds total.

In a small saucepan over medium heat, add vinegar, sugar, red pepper flakes and salt, heat until sugar dissolves. Remove from heat and add onions and dried oregano. When mixture is cool pour into a quart container. You may need to add a bit of water just to cover. (If you have time, keep at room temperature for about 6 hours, then place in the refrigerator).

Next, prepare the chipotle cream.  Combine the remaining 1 1/2 tablespoons cilantro, remaining 1/4 teaspoon salt, and remaining 1/4 teaspoon black pepper in a medium bowl. Stir in sour cream, shallots, and juice. Remove 1 chipotle pepper and 2 teaspoons adobo sauce from can; reserve remaining chipotle peppers and adobo sauce for another use. Chop chile. Stir chopped chipotle and 2 teaspoons adobo sauce into sour cream mixture.  Set aside and allow flavors to combine.

Now you can get the poblano peppers roasted.   Preheat broiler, or use a gas / charcoal grill.  Either grill, turning frequently, or place poblano chiles on a foil-lined baking sheet, and broil for 8 minutes or until blackened, turning after 6 minutes. Place in a zip-top plastic bag; seal. Let stand 15 minutes. Peel chiles, and discard the seeds and membranes. Finely chop.

Now, prepare your spices.  Naturally, you use whole spices, right?  What's that, you don't?  Well, throw out your spices, because they are undoubtedly bland and gross.  Instead, go to a latin market and pick up fresh coriander (the seeds of the cilantro plant) and cumin (the seeds of some other plant), and grind up fresh as needed.  I specifically purchased a coffee mill that I use just for latin spices, which would produce some of the worst coffee ever at this point, but which does an excellent job at making fresh ground spice.

Grind your spices fresh for the best flavor

Combine panko, poblano chile, 1 1/2 tablespoons cilantro, cumin, coriander, paprika, 1/4 teaspoon salt, 1/4 teaspoon black pepper, and beef, tossing gently to combine. Divide mixture into 4 equal portions, gently shaping each into a 1/2-inch-thick patty.  Make sure to shape the burgers thin and wide, so that they won't contract into a sphere when cooked.  A trick I learned on Food TV - press a small indentation in the center of each patty, which helps prevent this 'burger bulge' and results in a completely flat burger after cooking.  Cover and chill until ready to grill.   Also, if you're going to the trouble of making this recipe, shell out for decent buns.  A burger that takes this long to make deserves to be on bread without preservatives, that doesn't cost 25 cents, has some flavor, and won't turn to complete paste if looked at incorrectly.  Like a good CEO, burger buns should have some integrity.

Place patties on a grill rack coated with cooking spray; grill 3 minutes or until grill marks appear. Carefully flip patties; grill an additional 3 minutes or until desired degree of doneness.  Don't be that person that squishes the burger with your spatula - yes, it sounds great, but all you're doing is wringing the flavor and moisture out of the burger, along with potentially cross-contaminating your cooked burger implement with raw beef bits.

I try to make the burgers wide, so they don't shrivel up into small burger balls that are gross when you get them to a bun.

Place 1 patty on bottom half of each bun; top each serving with 3 tablespoons chipotle cream and 1 tablespoon Pickled Red Onions.  Serve with whatever sides you like, and enjoy your hard work - you earned it.

Chipotle pickled red onion roasted pepper burger

Thai Red Curry Chicken (Gaeng Gai)

I've noticed a trend so far on my recipes - either a bunch of meat, or Thai food.  Well, today it's a meaty Thai food recipe.  Don't worry, one day soon we will break out of this trend.  Last night's dinner was my Thai Red Curry Chicken, known in parts that know these things as "Gaeng Gai", where "Gai" means chicken, and "Gaeng" means either 'curry' or 'freaking awesome', depending on which dictionary you use.  It's a very easy recipe if you have about 3 weird ingredients, all of which can be found routinely at asian grocery stores.  If you don't have an asian grocery store nearby, I recommend importfood.com, which seems to have the right assortment of foods, though I can't vouch for their freshness.

With that questionably useful tip, let me jump right into the recipe.  And at last, this one can't be attributed to another author, because I have made it dozens of times, and I've been tweaking both the ingredients and the instructions to get something I'm most pleased with.  It's still not perfect, but it's pretty close for home-cooked Thai food.

First, a word on ingredients.  In this recipe, I use Thai eggplants whenever possible, which are green globes about the size of a golf ball.  Next up, the red curry paste.  There are some standard curry pastes available both in asian grocers and now in most regular grocery stores.  I use Maesri brand red curry paste for this, although I have recently gotten my hands on some excellent imported curry paste I acquired at an asian grocery store, found in their freezer section.  Feel free to ask around, but Maesri does a pretty good job.  Next, the Thai basil.  This looks a little like basil, but with smaller, less rippled leaves.  There is also a plant called holy basil, which has more purple-colored leaves.  I like them both for this dish - they both add a licorice flavor to the basil backbone, with a hint of mint on the Thai basil side.  I happen to grow Thai basil specifically for this recipe, but it's fairly easy to come across one or both of these in the asian grocery store.  Finally, the kaffir lime leaves.  If you can find them fresh, good job!  However, you are much more likely to find these in the freezer section, in small bags.  Try looking in the smaller grocery stores - this is a somewhat hard to find item, and while not essential to the dish, it does add a tart citrus flavor to the sauce.



Thai eggplants.  Try to find them at an asian grocer, but substitute regular eggplant if you really have to



Red curry paste.  This brand is good, and easy to find.  Look for the little old lady on the side - that's always a good sign



Kaffir lime leaves.  From importfood.com - they have all of the Thai ingredients listed, if you can't find any at the store

 

 

Think about this recipe as a stew - that's all it is.  Saute your meat, throw in the liquid and vegetables, and simmer for a while.  It's very easy, and tastes just like what you'd get at a restaurant.  Very impressive results.

 

Thai Red Curry Chicken (Gaeng Gai)

Serves 2-3

Prep time: 10 minutes

Cook time: 10-15 minutes

• 1-2 tbsp cooking oil (I use canola)
• 2 tbsp red curry paste, more if you prefer more spicy
• 2 cups coconut milk (go for the full fat version, it does make a difference)
• 4 Kaffir lime leaves, shredded (optional, but I like the taste)
• 1½ tbsp brown sugar (use palm sugar if you would like something more authentic)
• 1½ tbsp Thai fish sauce
• 1 pound sliced chicken breast (or lean pork, or shrimp, or tofu...)
• 4-5 pea eggplants, quartered (substitute regular eggplant in 1" cubes if you can't find)
• 1 bell (less preferred) or poblano (more preferred) pepper, sliced into thin strips
• 1 small red chili, sliced (optional)
• 1 can Bamboo shoots
• 2 tbsp fresh Thai, holy, or standard basil leaves
  
  
  

Heat the oil in a wok. Add the curry paste and stir-fry for about one minute, but before it starts sticking to the wok.   WARNING: THIS MAY FILL YOUR KITCHEN WITH PUNGENT CHILE FUMES, SO TURN ON YOUR HOOD FAN AND OPEN WINDOWS!!!  If you start coughing, all is lost - you just get more worked up, and then cough even more.  You might consider drinking water... or giving up and ordering in.  No?  Good, you are a truly dedicated cook.  Throw in the chicken and quickly stir-fry to cook the surfaces of the meat and turn them white, but not necessarily all the way through.  This will infuse the chicken with the curry flavor while still allowing for them to finish cooking in the sauce, and prevent excess boiling of the coconut milk (most recipes have you just simmer the raw meat in the milk / sauce), which breaks it down too much and loses some of its fresh taste.

 



The setup.  Not a ton of things to prep this time

  

Stir-frying the chicken in the red curry paste.  Don't overcook, or else it will wring out the moisture and end up tough and dry

Now add the coconut milk, kaffir lime leaves, fish sauce and sugar.  Bring the coconut milk just to a boil, then reduce heat to a simmer. Add eggplants and whatever peppers you're using.  Simmer for about 10-15 minutes, until eggplants are tender.  Add bamboo shoots towards end of the cooking time - they just need to be warmed up, and won't add anything to the overall flavor.  Kill the heat, then add the basil leaves, tossing to coat.  Serve with steamed rice. 



The full mix after it's been simmering for a few minutes.  Keep things moving so you get all of the eggplant cooked.  A lid would have helped.




The final product, served over rice.  Tastes like restaurant food, but made by you on the cheap



Ramble alert!!  I will add a caveat - I'm still not sold on when to put in the eggplant to make sure it cooks through without damaging the coconut milk.  The step for stir-frying the meat with the curry paste came from a coworker's Thai girlfriend, who told me not to overcook (or even boil) the coconut milk.  To avoid this, I once tried blanching the cut up eggplant by boiling it for 2 minutes and then dunking it in ice water, to cook it mostly through and avoid having to boil the whole stew for too long, damaging the coconut milk flavors.  However, this didn't work so well - the eggplant had very little taste when boiled in water.  Another recipe I saw called for boiling the eggplant in coconut milk, then adding it to the stew for the last few minutes.  This also seems like a decent plan, except it's the same damaging effect on the coconut milk.  So in the end, I would just recommend the original recipe posted above, and be careful not to bring the liquid to a rolling boil.  Just keep it at a simmer, or else you will both damage the sauce and make the meat tough.