Entries from The Amateur Gourmet tagged with 'David Chang'
Momofuku's Ginger Scallion Noodles
Bow down before me, mortals, it's time to face facts. David Chang is one of the most celebrated, important chefs in New York, right? Right. His cooking is hardcore and bad-ass isn't it? It is. So what does it mean that a mere amateur like me, a tiny speck on the giant tapestry of New York gastronomy, not only created one of Chang's signature dishes at home--his Ginger Scalllion Noodles--but that I did it so accurately? So triumphantly? So magnificently? It means, I surmise, that I am the King of Awesomeness! BOW DOWN BEFORE ME, YOU HEATHENS....
The Books in the Bathroom at Momofuku Ko
Back in May, when Robyn Lee wrote on Serious Eats about the books in the bathroom at Momofuku Ko, the picture she shared showed just a stack of vintage cookbooks ("African Cooking," "The Cooking of Italy," "The Cooking of Japan") and a few fancier books--Michael Bras's "Essential Cuisine," Roger Verge's "Vegetables in the French Style" and Alain Ducasse's "Grand Livre De Cuisine"--all displayed, rather simply, above the toilet. Now, as you can see from my picture above, the library has grown exponentially: there are three shelves worth of food-related books in there. Enough that you almost wish you'd get food poisoning so you could spend a long time in there, flipping through all of them. Instead, though, I took a few close up pictures so we can examine EXACTLY what's on those shelves. Here's what I found....
Momofuku Ko
If you live in New York and you're a food blogger who writes about restaurants, it's inevitable that, at some point, you must visit and write about Momofuku Ko, David Chang's most celebrated and impossible-to-get-into restaurant. So many food bloggers, in fact, have visited Ko--among them, The Wandering Eater, Food in Mouth, The Girl Who Ate Everything--that the restaurant now has an official "no pictures" policy. This, I must admit, was a bit of a relief when I surprised Craig on Sunday, taking him there for his birthday; now I wouldn't have to spend half the meal adjusting the aperture and manually focusing over plates of rapidly cooling food. For great pictures of dinners at Ko, click any of the links above. For a brief account of our time there, click ahead....
Lunch With Steven Shaw at Ippudo & Momofuku Milk Bar
On October 3rd, 2003, I shared my very first piece of food writing ever on a forum called eGullet. The post was called Charlie Trotter Superdud and it set off a storm of comments from hundreds of subscribers, some of whom were well known entities in the food world (Anthony Bourdain among them.) After that happened, my friends told me I should start a food blog and that's why this blog exists. So it's quite clear that I owe something to eGullet and, more specifically, to its creator Steven Shaw. And yet we'd never met or had any contact until, years later, I met him at an offal tasting dinner at the Astor Center. Then we became Facebook friends. And, most recently, we met for lunch to talk about his new book, Asian Dining Rules....
From The Desk of The A.G. (A Day of Letters)
Dear Craig Claiborne, I am greatly enjoying your somewhat notorious autobiography, "A Feast Made For Laughter." Sure, it's a little creepy when you talk about touching your dad's erect penis while sharing a bed, but I appreciate your zeal for people and food. Case in point: early in the book, you tell a story involving Parker House rolls. Your brother passes you a basket of them and instead of taking the basket from him, you start to reach your hand in and take one out and your brother, appalled, drops the basket to the floor saying: "When anyone passes you a basket of bread, you take the basket. Or at least you touch it as a gesture of thoughtfulness." This passage amused me because it's a good story, but mostly it made me hungry--hungry for Parker House rolls. I cracked open "The Joy of Cooking" and found the most basic recipe in the world; a recipe that required only yeast, butter, flour, sugar, salt and milk. I'd write out the recipe here, but it's so standard any internet search will suffice. And those rolls--which took a few hours to rise--were quaint and comforting, the kind of food you want an American food icon to eat. Thank you for inspiring me to make them; I look forward to the rest of your book....
Anatomy of a Dish: Momofuku's Sugar Snap Peas
It's difficult to improve upon a sugar snap pea. It's nature's candy: green, crunchy, juicy. It's interactive: you peel away the thread and then throw it in your mouth. This spring, I became a sugar snap pea junkie--buying moundfuls at the farmer's market and snacking on them all afternoon. The few times I cooked them, I sauteed them in olive oil or butter, sprinkled them with salt, a few grindings of pepper and called it a day. Sugar snap peas, like Lauren Ambrose, say, don't need much enhancement. They're beautiful as they are. What's a genius chef to do, then, to improve on something that needs little improvement? Enter David Chang. At Momofuku (the original) he's serving a sugar snap pea appetizer that works beautifully. The peas are sauteed in miso butter (note the tan-colored pool at the bottom of the plate); topped with fresh grated horseradish and then thin slivers of radish. All of these components serve to enhance the sugar snap peas in ways, like good drama, that are both surprising and inevitable. In fact, I'd argue that this simple dish, a dish that doesn't call too much attention to itself, showcases Chang's talent in ways that his more elaborate dishes might not. It's simple, it's smart, and it's seasonal. And it makes sugar snap peas taste better than they normally do which, at least according to this sugar snap pea enthusiast, is a feat worth celebrating....
nibbles 5.20.08
* The Leite's Culinaria blog has a nice post on Pimiento Cheese, complete with recipe. Remember: this is the cheese Craig and I ate at Watershed in Atlanta. It'd definitely be worth making at home. * The new bonappetit.com is looking pretty nifty. Congrats to them on the new site. * Also, congrats to Serious Eats on the new Serious Eats: New York. Today's interview with David Chang has provided three new dishes to try at Grand Sichuan. * And speaking of David Chang, can you believe it: I HAD a table for four on Sunday night at Ko. You know: Ko's the place that's impossible to get into that only takes online reservations. Well I was futzing around Sunday afternoon, playing the Ko Reservation game where I log on and see the page of Xs indicating there's no way in Hell I'll ever get a reservation, and lo and behold there was one for 9:15 THAT NIGHT. I clicked it and it said I had 60 seconds to say yes but I didn't say yes because Craig's parents were here and we had plans to go to Franny's. So, the lesson is: Ko reservations are possible, just keep clicking. * And just in case you want MORE David Chang, here's a video of Bill Buford's interview with Chang, Daniel Humm, and Marc Taxiera at the 2008 New Yorker conference....
Ssam Bar Brussels Sprouts
"This is a coup," said Craig, eagerly chewing a caramelized, spicy, salty, and sweet Brussels Sprout. "This could get kids eating Brussels sprouts all over the country." The recipe comes from superstar chef David Chang and it's a knock-out. It's a knock-out at his restaurant and it's a knock-out at home. The components marry in such a way that you'll start tap-dancing up your wall and moon-walk across the ceiling. I skipped the Rice Krispies bit because I couldn't find Japanese five-spice powder, but it still came out fantastic. The recipe was printed in last month's Gourmet and you can read it online here. I also tried his recipe for the apple salad with bacon but that didn't fare as well. The bacon I used--which actually wasn't bacon at all, but a D'Artagnan cured pork belly that I sliced into my own lardons--didn't produce enough fat to make the dressing. But the peanuts were a tasty snack later. And honestly, if you make a ton of those Brussels Sprouts no one will want anything else. They're a meal--a feast--unto themselves....
Asian Penicillin
I have a stripper cold. I caught the cold from a friend who caught it from her boyfriend who caught it from a stripper. In addition to the night sweats and post-nasal drip, the pole-dancing is exhausting and if Annie Lennox's "Little Bird" plays one more time I'm going to scream. At least the tips are good. In the past, when I caught a cold, I headed straight to the East Village for my favorite cold remedy at the Second Avenue Deli. You can read about my last visit here. That last visit was truly a last visit: the 2nd Avenue Deli is no more. Their soup--the best chicken soup in the city, as far as I was concerned--was fragrant, potent, and completely curative: one sip and I'd automatically feel better. When it closed down, I grew deeply concerned about what I'd do if I caught a cold. Where would I go? What would I do? The answer, surprisingly, was only one avenue away. There on 1st avenue is a soup just as potent, just as curative, and way more exotic. That soup belongs to David Chang, its served at Momofuku, and its listed on the menu as "Chicken Ramen." The ramen, of course, refers to the noodles; but I'm here to praise the soup. Having made my own chicken stock before, I marvel at how miraculous Chang's chicken broth is: it's a deep golden color, it's incredibly rich and it's truly well-salted. One spoonful, and suddenly I started to question my allegiance to my own culture's form of penicillin: do the Asians have the Jews beat? I'm not sure. But immediately I started to feel better, and now I know where to head the next time I get a stripper cold. I'd say more, but Elizabeth Berkeley's giving me the evil eye.......
