This is a complicated recipe. It takes a couple of days to do properly,
and works best done with a slow-cooker. But it’s worth it. It’s a Taiwanese dish – a spicy beef noodle soup. It’s pretty much the national
dish of Taiwan – Taiwanese love this dish. There are annual competitions
in Taipei for who can make the best Niu Rou Mien. I learned about it from
my wife, who grew up in Taiwan. I’ve made this a few times, and this is the
recipe the way I’ve worked it out.

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This recipe is based on a recipe for Moroccan spiced duck breasts, from
The Soul of a New Cuisine,
Marcus Samuelsson’s new African cookbook. Chef Samuelsson is the guy who’s
responsible for getting me to eat beef after not touching the stuff for
nearly two years. He’s a very interesting guy – born in Ethiopia, but
adopted as a baby and raised in Sweden. He’s famous in NYC for being the
chef at a Swedish restaurant, called Aquavit, where he was the youngest chef
ever to get 3 stars in a New York Times restaurant review.

A few years ago, he became interested in African cuisine, and
spent a lot of time travelling around Africa, studying the cuisine. He’s
written a fantastic cookbook based on the experience. Roughly two weeks ago, he opened a new African restaurant in NYC called Mercato 55. My wife and I had dinner there last saturday, and it was fantastic.

Anyway, as I said, his book has a recipe for Moroccan spiced duck breast. It’s a bit of a fusion dish – french style seared rare duck breast, cooked with moroccan spice blends and a Moroccan orange sauce. Duck breast is too expensive for my kids, so I made his dish for me and my wife, and worked out this variation for my kids. I actually think I like the variation a bit more – the flavor of the spices penetrates the duck much more nicely in a well-done roast duck. I’ve also simplified the recipe a bit.

Ingredients

• Two ducks
• 4 cups orange juice
• 2 cinammon sticks
• Several large onions
• 1 teaspoon cardamom pods
• 1 teaspoon whole allspice
• 1 teaspoon turmeric
• 2-3 whole cloves
• 1 teaspoon black pepper
• 2 large cloves garlic
• 2 tablespoons chilled butter

Instructions

1. Put all of the dry spices together into a hot pan, and stir around until they become fragrant. Then move them to a blender or food processor, and grind them to a coarse powder.
2. Mince the garlic and one half of the onion.
3. Put the orange juice into a pot with the garlic, onion, and spices, and
   heat to a simmer. Let it simmer about ten minutes, and then cool to room temperature.
4. Take 2 ducks, cut out the back, and press flat. Cut a light crosshatch pattern
   over the skin of the breasts, and trim off excess fat. Sprinkle with kosher salt, and then lay them out in a large roasting pan.
5. Put the orange-juice mixture through a fine sieve, and then pour it over
   the ducks. Let it sit for at least two hours.
6. Remove 3/4ths of the marinade from the roasting pan, leaving the remainder in the pan. Keep the marinade – we’re going to cook it into a sauce later.
7. Cut several 1-inch thick slices of onion, and set them up as stands in the roasting pan. Set the ducks on top of the onions.
8. Preheat the oven to 300 degrees. Put the ducks in, and cook for 2 to 3 hours. (It’s important to let it cook for a long time. Duck is terrific rare, and it’s terrific when it’s been cooked for a very long time; it’s tough as leather in between. We’re going for the meltingly tender well-roasted duck here.) Every half hour, baste the duck with the marinade in the pan. If the pan starts to get dry, and a cup of water.
9. When the duck is done, finely mince half an onion, a clove of garlic, and a small bunch of flat-leaf parsley. Put the onion and garlic into a saucepot with the reserved marinade. Heat to a simmer, and let it cook at a low simmer for 10 to 15 minutes. Then add the parsley, and salt to taste.
10. Right before serving, turn the heat off on the sauce, and add two tablespoons of cold butter, whipping it in with a whisk. This should turn the sauce a little bit thicker, and give it a nice glossy appearance.

One of the staples of chinese cooking is fried rice. Unfortunately, what we get in
American restaurants when we order fried rice is dreadful stuff. The real thing is
absolutely wonderful – and very different from the American version.

The trick to getting the texture of the dish right is to use leftover rice. Freshly cooked rice won’t work; you need it to dry out bit. So cook some other chinese dish one night, make an extra 2 cups of rice, and then leave it in the fridge overnight. If you can, take it out of the fridge a couple of hours before you’re going to cook, to get it to room temperature. Then when you’re ready to start preparing all the ingredients, use your hands to crumble the rice – that is, break up the clumps so that the grains aren’t sticking together.

What I found surprising about real fried rice was that you don’t put any soy sauce into the rice. The rice is the heart of the dish, and you don’t want anything as strongly flavored as soy sauce to disturb the fine, delicate flavor of good rice.

I generally start with around two cups of uncooked rice to make a large portion for four people.

Ingredients

• 2 cups rice (uncooked measure), prepared the day before, and left to stand
  overnight.
• 1/2 large onion, finely diced.
• 1/2lb ground meat. (I use ground chicken thighs; ground pork is more traditional.)
• 1 tablespoon of soy sauce.
• Vegetables (quantity to taste); something like snow peas, green beans, broccoli
  florets, etc – something nice and crisp.
• 1 tablespoon finely minced pickled turnip. (You can get this in a chinese grocery
  store. If you can’t find it, just leave it out.)
• Salt, to taste. Approximately 1 teaspoon.
• Green parts of two scallions, finely chopped.

Instructions

1. Mix the soy sauce into the ground meat, and let it marinate for a few minutes.
2. Heat your wok on high heat, then put in the ground meat and stir-fry until nicely
   browned. Then remove the meat, leaving the drippings in the wok.
3. Add the onions to the pan, and stir-fry quickly until they start to soften.
4. Add the vegetables and turnip, and stir around until the veggies just start to cook.
5. Lower the heat to medium, add the rice, sprinkle with the salt, re-add the ground
   meat, and continue to stir until the rice is hot and just barely starting to brown.
6. Add the scallions, stir one last time, and serve.

This is a recipe that you should feel free to fool around with. It’s pretty versatile. After thanksgiving, I make leftover turkey fried rice; if we buy a roast duck and have leftovers, I make duck fried rice. It also supposedly comes out very well with smoked ham as the meat. One chinese chef even suggested adding finely diced tomatoes to it, which
surprising worked extremely well!

I’m a big fish eater. In general, given a choice about what to eat, I’m
usually happiest when I get to eat a nice fish. Even now that I’ve started eating
beef again, most of the time, I’d rather eat a nice piece of wild salmon
than pretty much anything made of beef.

When it comes to cooking fish, I think that there’s no cuisine that does
a better job with fish than Chinese. The chinese style of cooking fish is, in
my opinion, perfect. It relies on getting really good quality, fresh
fish – and then doing as little to it as you reasonably can, so that the wonderful
flavor of a really fresh fish comes through.

The best example of that is a Cantonese steamed fish. You do so little to
it – and yet the result is one of the best dishes in the entire world. To make this
work, you need a really fresh, smallish fish. I typically do this with either rainbow trout or striped bass, and I try to get it from someplace where I can be sure that the fish was
swimming no more than 24 hours before. The easiest place to find fish like that is usually
a chinese grocery; American grocery stores often have fish that’s been sitting on ice for a long time. Chinese shoppers are, properly, very picky about their fish, so you tend to get it much fresher from a chinese grocery.

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I recently started eating beef again, after 18 years of abstaining. Last weekend, I made a big batch of Chili using beef, and it was fantastic. So I thought that was a good excuse to give you my chili recipe.

This is real chili. Up here in NY, usually when you see chili, it’s ghastly stuff. Usually made from ground meat, insane amounts of cumin, and tomatoes, and very, very little actual chili pepper at all. In this recipe, the chili pepper is the main flavor: the entire recipe is based on my favorite chili pepper, the ancho chili. Anchos aren’t
particularly spicy as chilis go; they’re pretty mild, but they have a lovely
flavour. If you want to make it spicier, you can add some minced jalapenos (or if you want it really spicy, a habanero) at the same time that the meat is added back in to cooked vegetables. Don’t overdo it: chili should be spicy, but not so spicy that you can’t taste anything but the heat.

I used hanger steak for it. I’d recommend a similar cut of beef – that is, a cut that’s
sort of tough and a bit fatty. In a dish like this, where it’s going to cook for a long time,
you don’t need to use a tender cut of meat, and in general, the tougher pieces of meat actually
have more flavor. So if it’s going to be cooked for a long time, which will make the meat turn
tender from cooking, you’re much better off with one of the tough cuts.

There are a couple of unusual ingredients. Avacado leaves are used as a spice in some mexican dishes. They’ve got a lovely aroma and flavor, quite unlike anything else that I’ve discovered. Epazote is
a central american herb, vaguely remniscient of oregano, but really quite unique. Achiote is
a spice with a very mild nutty flavor, and an intense red color. And finally, cinnamon – not an unusual
spice, but unusual to use in a dish like chili. Just a pinch of it is used, but it has an amazing
influence on the flavor of the dish.

Ingredients

• 1 lb hanger steak, cut into cubes.
• 2 large dried ancho chilis.
• 2 cups stock.
• 1/2 cup tequila.
• One onion, diced.
• One carrot, diced.
• One tablespoon coriander seed.
• One tablespoon black peppercorn.
• One tablespoon cumin seed.
• 1/2 teaspoon avocado leaves.
• 1/2 teaspoon epazote.
• 1/2 teaspoon achiote.
• 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon.
• Salt
• 1 heaping teaspoon flour.
• 1 teaspoon tomato paste.
• 1 can beans, drained.

Instructions

1. Break open the dried chilis, and remove the stems and seeds.
2. Put the chilis into a small saucepot, and add enough stock to cover them. Turn on
   the heat, and simmer until the chilis are soft.
3. Put the chilis and stock into a blender, puree, and then put through a sieve.
4. Heat a pot on medium-high heat. Put in all of the spices, and let them toast until they
   turn fragrant. Then remove them from the heat, and grind them in a mortar and pestle until
   they’re a fine powder. (You can also use a mini food processor, but I find that that leaves things
   a bit gritty.)
5. Season the beef with some salt. Add oil to the hot pot, and put in the meat, and stir-fry
   on medium-high heat until well-browned. Remove from the pot, and drain off any excess fat.
6. Lower the heat to medium, put the onions and carrots into the pot, and cook them until they’re
   soft.
7. Re-add the beef, and salt to taste. Then add the ground spices, stir, and cook for a few minutes.
8. Sprinkle the flour over the meat and vegetables, and add the tomato paste. Stir in, and let it
   start to brown. You should get a bit of stuff starting to stick to the bottom of the pan.
9. Add the tequila, stir around, using it to loosen the stuff stuck to the bottom. When it’s mostly
   evaporated, add the pureed chilis, and the rest of the stock. Once again, use the liquid to stir up
   anything stuck to the bottom of the pot.
10. Lower the heat to a simmer. Add the beans. Add salt to taste.
11. Taste for spices; depending on your chilis and your tequila, you might need a bit of sugar
    if it’s sour. You also might want to add some group chili powder if the chili flavor isn’t
    stron enough; some cayenne if it’s not spicy enough, etc.
12. Simmer for at least 1 hour. Add stock as necessary if it gets too dry. You want to simmer until the meat is almost falling apart.

Serve it with some fresh chopped cilantro, grated cheddar cheese, and bread.

Because of the holiday, I’m posting my recipe early this week. It’s actually too late, but I don’t let little things like reality worry me.

This is my thanksgiving turkey stuffing. The origins of this stuffing date back to my discovery of the “black turkey” recipe. I tried it one year, and the stuffing was really good, but the whole thing was just insanely overdone – everything about it was overcomplicated, and there were so many spices muddled up in the stuffing that I just didn’t believe that there was any way that you could taste all of them. So over the next few years, I experimented, and eventually came up with this recipe, which makes the best stuffing I’ve ever tasted. I actually prefer to cook this outside of the bird – it develops a nice crust baked on its own. But to give it that “roasted in the turkey flavor”, I usually take a basting bulb, and give it a few good squirts of turkey drippings while it’s cooking.

Ingredients

• 3 loaves of bread, preferably a bit stale.
• 3 lbs sweet yellow onions, sliced thin.
• 6 cloves garlic, minced.
• 2 lbs portabello mushrooms, diced into 1/2 inch cubes
• 1 lb miscellaneous mushrooms, sliced.
• 1/2 head fennel, sliced thin.
• 2 stalks celery, diced.
• 3 carrots, diced.
• 2 lbs sweet italian sausage. (I use turkey sausage, but real pork sausage would probably be even better.)
• Salt and pepper.
• 1 tsp each marjoram and thyme.
• 1/2 tsp dry mustard.
• Olive oil.
• 4 cups chicken stock.
• 1/2 cup brandy.

Instructions

1. Heat about 4 tablespoons olive oil on medium high heat. Add all of the onions, and cook them until they’re well carmelized. This will probably take between a half hour and 45 minutes. If the onions start to stick to the bottom of the pan, add some water to get them to unstick.
2. Reduce the heat to medium, add a bit more oil, then add the garlic, fennel, carrots, and celery,
   and cook until the vegetables are soft.
3. Add the mushrooms, and let them cook through.
4. Add the spices, and salt and pepper to taste.
5. Add the brandy and about 2 cups of the chicken stock, and stir. When it comes to a boil, turn off the heat.
6. Throw the bread into a food processor, and grind it into coarse crumbs. Pour the crumbs over the cooked stuffing base. Press the crumbs down until some of the liquid from the base comes
   through the crumbs. Add enough stock to make the bread moist. Then let it sit for 15 minutes
   or so.
7. Stir the bread crumbs into the stuffing base. Cover it, and set it aside to cool. It needs
   to be cooled to room temperature, which will take at least an hour.
8. Get the sausage, and remove it from its casings. Fold the meat into the stuffing mixture until
   it’s well blended. Add more stock if you need to to keep everything moist.
9. Take a large roasting pan, and oil it liberally with olive oil. Then put the stuffing into
   it, pressing it in so that it’s packed tightly. Brush to top lightly with olive oil.
10. Bake in a 350 degree oven until the inside of the stuffing reaches 170 degrees. Baste
    with turkey drippings once or twice while it’s baking. Depending on the depth of your roasting
    pan, this will take between one and two hours.

This is a very simple, authentic chinese dish. It’s a great example of what real chinese food
is like – it’s a lot lighter and more delicate than what’s typically passed off as Chinese food in the US. You should really go to a chinese grocery store for the bean sprouts: you’ll get them fresher, and a
hell of a lot cheaper. (My local chinese grocery sells bean sprouts for under $1/lb; at the local
grocery store, I can buy one-half a pound of sprouts for $4.) Like most real chinese food, a this isn’t
a full meal by itself – a real chinese meal has several contrasting dishes served together.

Ingredients

• 1 lb. fresh bean sprouts.
• 1/2 large onion, sliced thin.
• 3 large dried black mushrooms.
• 1 teaspoon sugar.
• 1 teaspoon salt.
• 3 tablespoons soy sauce.
• 2 tablespoon vodka.
• 2 chicken breasts, sliced into long thin strips.
• 3 scallions, green parts sliced thin.

Instructions

1. Remove the soaked mushrooms from the water, squeeze the excess water out, and
   slice them into narrow strips.
2. Take the sliced chicken breast, and mix in 1 tablespoon of the
   soy, and 1 tablespoon of the vodka, and let it sit for five minutes.
3. Heat a pot of boiling water, and blanch the bean sprouts for about 1 minute,
   then remove and rinse with cold water.
4. Heat a wok on high heat, until it’s smoking hot. Put in about 1 tablespoon of
   oil, then add the chicken, and stir fry until it’s browned and just barely cooked through. Then remove it
   the wok, and put it aside. Try to leave as much of the oil from cooking the chicken as you can in
   the wok.
5. Add a bit more oil to the wok – just enough to be able to cook the onions. Make sure the
   wok is really hot, then add the onions. The idea is to get them to brown on the outside,
   while the centers are still almost raw.
6. As soon as they start to brown a bit, add in the bean sprouts, and stir around. This will cool
   the wok a bit, because of the bulk of the sprouts.
7. Add the mushrooms, the salt, the sugar, the remaining soy and vodka, and the chicken.
8. Stir around until the sprouts are nice and hot. Add the scallions, give it one last
   stir, and then dump it into a serving bowl.

Serve it with rice.

One of my favorite comfort foods is a mac&cheese tuna casserole. That’s real mac&cheese, not any of that glow in the dark orange garbage. It amazes me just how many people have never actually had a proper, home-made macaroni and cheese! It’s really good eating (unlike the glow in the dark stuff). The most important thing for this is to use good cheddar cheese. The pre-shredded stuff is tasteless – you need a good brick of some kind of high quality, aged cheddar cheese. Of the widely available stuff, my favorite is Cabot extra-sharp.

Ingredients

• 1 pound of macaroni, cooked according to instructions an the box, then cooled.
• 3/4 pound shredded cheddar cheese.
• 2 cups milk.
• 8 tablespoons butter.
• 1/2 pound crimini mushrooms, sliced.
• 1 teaspoon dijon mustard.
• 1 can of good quality tuna, preferably packed in olive oil, drained
  and crumbled.
• 1/2 cup bread crumbs.
• 2 tablespoons of flour.
• 1 head broccoli, steamed and cut into small pieces.

Instructions

1. In 2 tbs of butter, brown the sliced mushrooms. Add salt to taste.
2. In another 2 tbs butter, toast the bread-crumbs until they’re nicely browned.
3. Put the cooked macaroni, broccoli, mushrooms, and tuna into a large mixing bowl, and mix
   them together.
4. In a saucepan, melt the remaining 4 tbs butter, and then add the flour. Whisk together
   to form a roux, and cook on medium low heat until it’s about the color of coffee with milk.
5. Add the milk, and whisk vigourously to dissolve the roux into the milk. Increase the heat
   to medium, and stir until it reaches a boil and thickens.
6. Add the mustard and 2/3rds of the cheese, and stir until the cheese is melted and the sauce is thick. Add salt and pepper to taste (remember that the salt in the sauce is the only salt for the macaroni.)
7. Pour the sauce over the pasta mixture in the bowl, and mix it through.
8. Dump the resulting mixture into a large casserole dish. Top with the toasted bread crumbs
   and the remaining cheese.
9. Cover with foil, and bake at 350 for about 30 minutes; then remove the foil and let it bake
   for another 20 minutes.

It’s a humble dish, but it’s really awfully good. If you’re adventurous, you can also do all sorts of variations – this dish is great for playing with. For example, replacing the mustard with curry powder
is terrific!

Lo Mein is one of the staples of Chinese restaurants in the US. In general, it’s not bad,
but it’s a bit greasy, and a bit bland. This version of it is closer to authentic, and has
a really nice kick.

The heat comes from a sauce called Sambal. Sambal is the vietnamese name, but Chinese make
it too, and call it chili-vinegar sauce. It’s basically a ton of fresh chilis – the variety that
we call Thai bird chilis – pounded in a mortar and pestle until it forms a loose sauce, roughly the consistency of a thin ketchup.

You really need to go to a Chinese grocery for the noodles. The chinese egg noodles have a different consistency and flavor than any Italian pasta. To prepare them, you get some water boiling, toss the
noodles in for just one or two minutes, and then take them out and rinse with cold water to cool them, and toss them with just enough oil to stop them from sticking together.

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