i had spent all day last week at my non-restaurant job on the computer researching jerk and hunting down authentic-sounding recipes. at this point, i could describe in detail jerk sauces and what i've learned they usually contain, but to be honest, big fat jerk sauces don't get me all that excited. sure, they're complex and oniony and savory and tart and spicy and hot, whew. but the whole thing was to get my brother's cooking rolling. and i showed him how we dice our way through 60 lb. bags of onions at work, which, in my pretend-world, blew his mind, but probably just bored the crap outta him.
in the end, we had 14+ individual pieces of chicken to try, so all of us (E, my brother, E's sister/our roommate, my boyfriend, and me) huddled around the table, gnawing ferociously like cavemen, only occasionally coming up for air to point at the one we liked. except for me--i tried a few, but i'm basically a vegetarian, so i wasn't gnawin'. there were two winning recipes according to the cavemen (and caveladies), "sauce 2" which was thick and allspicey and molassesy and reminded me so so much of Gandhi mahal's tamarind chutney, the best tamarind chutney around if you ask me. "sauce 3" was thinner on a account of a higher onion content, and also had some vinegar, lots of garlic, and was seasoned with soy sauce. if i were president, more things would be seasoned with soy sauce than plain salt--why wouldn't you want mushroomy, meaty, deep flavors along with your salt???
all that jerk business yesterday just means that i had to swing by Seward Co-op and bring home some beauuutiful Kadejan chickens. i had my brother buy everything else so i wouldn't have to.
the problem / amazo thing about living in our neighborhood is being surrounded by damn good grocers. i can't go a saturday (my day off) without visiting each one, stop by stop spending more and more of my measly paycheck. so, while i didn't have to buy all the jerk sauce ingredients besides chicken, i DID invest in some crusty, salty olive bread, Comte, tons of Larry Schultz eggs, stupid organic produce (organic isn't stupid--but sometimes i buy it just for being pretty, and THAT'S stupid), and, oh yeah, a fish.
i've recently decided to try to become a pest at Coastal Seafoods. that's why i end up there twice a week, smelling the clean, fresh oceany fish smells, and holding my chin, trying to look cool while on the inside i want to jump into the cooler and roll around in the fillets. ew. not really.
two weeks ago, on my usual saturday trip to Coastal, they happened to have HUGE (that's "yuge" for our new york readers) gorgeous prawns that told me to bring them home and roast them with just salt and pepper, have D (boyfriend) suck out their brains, and then use their shells for stock. every time i go back, i'm looking for prawns. any normal person would keep their distance and call, asking for when they usually have or expect to have prawns. that's not a pest's style. i amble in, take a quick look in the prawn's usual spot, and do a "oh no they're not there, nowwhatelseshouldiget???" D pointed at one of their whole fish yesterday, a big ol' striped bass, to be exact, and looked at me. my first reactions were "that's too big for just you to eat" and "there isn't a special occasion for this fish tweeday," but 10 minutes later i was gently placing the giganto fish into its carseat and speeding back to Seward to buy more ingredients for the damn thing.
at 10 pm, after all the jerk business was taken care of, i wrangled the bass into the oven along with lemons, capers, olives, thyme, red pepper flakes, and some of my fake dicing lesson onions. half hour later, it was pure dead (white eyes and all), but briny, spicy, and gooorgeous to serve--flaky, but not so flaky that it fell apart when you poked it, so it came off the bone in generous fillets. thing was, i was only serving D (and he wasn't there when i plated it, so i said "tah-daaaah!" as i did). everyone else had left after demolishing the jerk chicken. pfff i TOLD them that it was only the first course!
No comments:
Post a Comment