Crêpes

Crêpes, oh, the beloved crêpe. So simple, yet so finicky to get right. It should be, in my mind: sweet, but not enough to make it overpower some good cheese and ham and savory, but not so much that it's like a saltine and easily pairs with some nutella, bananas and brown sugar or a basic marmalade. Texture is always as important as taste, crêpes should have a slight crisp to them, but not crunchy enough to be more akin to an ice cream cone, nor should it have absolutely no crisp that it might as well be a very thin, floppy pancake.

Now, here's Julia Child's recipe (I'll write it down at the bottom, no need to take notes here):

Start by pouring 2/3 cups of milk into a bowl

Add 2/3 cups of water

Add 1/4 tea spoon of salt

3 whole eggs (yeah, they're in there)

Beat until smooth

Add 1 cup of flour and mix

Next, you're going to melt 3 table spoons of butter (use the markings on the package to measure)

Melt, preferably in the skillet or griddle where you plan on cooking your crêpes, I used the o'le cast iron skillet for it's sweet, sweet heat retention

I like to fold a half kitchen napkin in ~8ths like so

And use this to soak up the excess butter, you'll use this napkin between crêpes to keep the skillet nicely greased

And shiny!

Back to the batter, add the melted butter and beat until smooth. At this point you can let the batter rest in the fridge over night or go straight into crêpe-making madness, yes, you could make crêpes at the time of service, but c'mon, it's easier to make them ahead and reheat as needed.

Let's talk fillings, shall we?

Strawberries are a popular in this household

As is cajeta (caramelized goat's milk "dulce de leche")

Now, when you make the crêpe, move the pan around to get the batter evenly distributed.

There should be enough to get to the edges of your pan

You can swirl around your ladle to get the batter to move

Flip when the bottom browns a bit.

If you find that the crêpe doesn't want to let go of the pan, sneak your spatula under the edges to make it start to let go

And start filling, I like "fold in quarters" method, so fill one quadrant.

And fold over the crêpe twice, so that it's 1/4 of the circumference

Plate and make pretty :D

Of course, you're not limited to sweet crêpes, this is one of the reasons that they're so versatile, you can stuff in some cheese and squash flowers

Or spinach

Or, why not? pepperoni and mozzarella to make a sort of pizza/hotpocket crêpe!

Yes, this was actually pretty darn good.

Yakitori

Yakitori (焼き鳥, やきとり, ヤキトリ) en su forma mas basica son brochetas de pollo, aunque como buena tradición japonesa, hay variaciones según preferencia y según la región. Se pueden usar diferentes tipos de proteina y vegetales así como la elección entre sazonar con sal o con salsa tare, coloquialmente conicida como salsa teriyaki, al menos en norteamerica.

En esta ocasión estaremos haciendo yakitori de pollo con pimiento, cebolla y salsa tare. En este post, además de la receta, o pseudo receta, estaremos concentrando nuestra atención a una parte mas importante que el pollo o la salsa: el fuego! y el respectivo acomodo para hacer las brochetas de forma un poco mas "tradicional".

Comencemos con acomodar el asador. Como son brochetas, dependerá de la longitud de las que tengas y de la cantidad que vayas a hacer, para 2 personas habría sido suficiente con un ladrillo de cada lado pero soy impaciente :). Los ladrillos van forrados en papel aluminio para que no se encochambren; estos se colocan a una distancia tal que se pueda poner una brocheta entre ellos y que quepa la comida sobre el fuego.

Ahora coloca unos trozos de carbón en una torre cilíndrica, más o menos así: this

Échale unas servilletas previamente humedecidas en aceite y enciéndelas. Normalmente con 2 o 3 son suficientes para que se mantenga solo el fuego, pero échale las que sean necesarias hasta que se mantenga.

Un fuego feliz (no creo que Bob Ross lo haya dicho alguna vez)

Flama azul!... Con carbón!

Ya que estén buen encendidos los carbones, desparramalos en el fondo del asador. Admito que le calculé mal y le eche más carbón al desparramar y ... No, mala idea.. tuve que hacer a un lado al menos una parte para evitar que se me quemara el pollo!

Si, digamos que lo configuré como "lado caliente" lado .. "menos caliente"

Producto terminado, poquito quemado el azúcar de la salsa.

Sobre arroz integral :D

Sources

1. http://www.bonappetit.com/columns/obsessivore-columns/article/i-m-big-on-japan
2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yakitori
3. http://www.japan-guide.com/r/e102.html

Yakitori

Yakitori (焼き鳥, やきとり, ヤキトリ) in it's most basic form is simply skewered chicken, although in japanese tradition, there's variations for what proteins and even vegetables you skewer and grill. One can choose to get sweet-salty tare or teriyaki sauce or plain ol' salt.

On this occasion, we'll be making chicken yakitori with pimentos and onions and with tare.

In this post, aside form the the usual recipe we'll also go through how to set up your grill and light up coals, in fact, this post will be more about lighting the grill than the food.

Let's start setting up the grill. First, you'll need to wrap some bricks in aluminum foil and place them on the charcoal rack of your grill, in this case, we won't be using the cooking grates, so you can remove them.

Now, lay down some charcoal, I like making a hollowed out tower, like this

 Now, throw in some napkins or pieces of paper that have been soaked lighty in oil and light, as each piece starts to die off, add another; usually 2~3 is going to be enough, but add as needed until the fire is self-sufficient.

A happy fire..

 Blue flame!

Now spread that charcoal around, in this instance, I added a little bit more and let them turn to embers which was way too much for what we needed to cook 6 skewer's worth of chicken and it was just way too hot.

So, after a quick sear on both sides, I removed the yakitori and pushed part of the embers to one side so I could make sure I finished cooking the chicken on the low-heat side.

The finished product, charred, caramelized and beautiful

Served over some brown jasmine rice, extra sauce optional.

Sources

1. http://www.bonappetit.com/columns/obsessivore-columns/article/i-m-big-on-japan
2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yakitori
3. http://www.japan-guide.com/r/e102.html