Oven Baked Crab Cakes From the Sea Grill Restaurant

Ready in 45 minutes, makes 20 crab cakes • 2 lg Egg yolks • 2 lb Jumbo lump crab meat • 2 ts Old Bay Seasoning • 1/4 c Unsalted butter, softened • 5 c Cornflakes • 1/2 c Mayonnaise • 2 tb Dijon mustard • 1/8 ts Cayenne pepper In a food processor, pulse cornflakes until ground coarse and spread in a shallow baking pan. In a large bowl, whisk together mayonnaise, mustard, Old Bay seasoning, cayenne and yolks and add crab meat and salt and pepper to taste, tossing mixture gently but thoroughly. With a 1/4 cup measure, form crab miguel into slightly flattened rounds about 2 1/2 inches wide and 3/4 inch thick and gently coat crab cakes with cornflakes, transferring as coated to a wax-paper-lined baking sheet. Chill crab cakes, covered with plastic wrap, at least 2 hours and up to 4 hours. Preheat oven to 400F. Transfer crab cakes to a large baking sheet. Put about 1/2 teaspoon butter on each crab cake and bake in the middle of the oven until crisp and cooked through, about 15 minutes. Serve with tartar sauce.

Ruth Reich’s Easy Caramelized Vietnamese Pork

Shopping list: 2 Armenian cucumbers, ginger, 3/4 pound pork tenderloin, fish sauce, peanuts, mint, basil, 1 lime.

Staples: 1 small onion, rice vinegar, oil, sugar, pepper, Sriracha.

Serves 2.

Pour a couple tablespoons of rice vinegar into a small bowl and add a pinch of salt and a teaspoon of sugar. Slice two Armenian cucumbers into thin rounds, along with a small knob of ginger. Put them into the vinegar and allow the flavors to mingle while you make the pork.

Slice 3/4 pounds of pork tenderloin into very thin slices.  (This is easiest if you get the meat very cold before slicing.  It can be difficult to find small tenderloins; when I end up with more meat than I need, I chop the remainder and save it for another dish.)

Get a wok so hot that a drop of water dances on the surface and then disappears. Add a couple of tablespoons of peanut or neutral oil and immediately toss in one small onion, thinly sliced, and a clove of smashed garlic. As soon as it’s fragrant, add the pork and a tablespoon of sugar and stir fry, tossing every few minutes, for 10 to 15  minutes, until the pork has crisped into delicious little bits. 

Take the wok off the heat and stir in two tablespoons of fish sauce; it should become completely absorbed. Grind in a lot of black pepper.

Remove the ginger from the cucumbers, drain, and mix into the pork. Serve with rice. Put fresh mint and basil on the table, along with crushed peanuts, lime wedges and Sriracha, and allow each diner to make a mixture that appeals to them.

This will feed two people very generously. Unless you have a very large wok and a ferocious source of heat, the recipe does not double well; you want the pork to get really crisp.

Ruth Reichl’s Tandoori Chicken

6 whole chicken legs (or 12 thighs) 3 cloves garlic Fresh mint 1 knob fresh ginger Fresh cilantro 1 shallot 1 cup whole milk yogurt 1 lime 1 teaspoon ground coriander 1 tsp. salt 1 tsp. ground cumin Good black pepper 1 tsp. turmeric Ground cinnamon 1 cayenne pepper Paprika

Pull skin off the chicken and discard. Chop a handful of mint and a handful of cilantro and mix them in the yogurt, along with the coriander, cumin, turmeric cayenne pepper and garlic and a Tbsp. of fresh minced ginger. Slice the shallot into the mix and squeeze the juice of the lime in with 1 tsp. salt., a lot of ground pepper, and a dash of cinnamon and paprika. Slather the chicken all over with this mixture and allow to sit in refrigerator for 4-12 hours.

Preheat the oven to 500 degrees. Place chicken pieces on a foil-lined pan (or on a rack on a foil-lined pan). Roast for about a half hour. Wonderful finger food and terrific cold the next day. Serves 6.

The Gramercy Tavern Famous Chilled Corn Soup

Soup Garnish 2 tablespoons olive oil 1 teaspoon olive oil 3 shallots, thinly sliced ½ cup corn kernels 2 garlic cloves, thinly sliced ½ cup finely diced zucchini 1 leek (white and pale green parts), Salt and pepper halved lengthwise and thinly sliced 12 cherry tomatoes 8 cups corn kernels (from about 16 ears) 1 radish, thinly sliced Salt and pepper Extra virgin olive oil 1 teaspoon honey 2 shiso leaves, julienned 6 cups water or corn broth (optional) Fresh lime juice

Make the soup. In a large pot, heat the olive oil over medium-low heat. Add the shallots, garlic, and leek and cook, stirring often, until the leek is softened, about 6 minutes. Add the corn kernels, season with salt and pepper, and stir for 2 minutes. Add the honey and water or corn broth (made by simmering stripped corn cobs in water with chopped onion, garlic and celery for 30 minutes), bring to a simmer, and cook until the corn kernels are just tender, about 3 minutes.

Transfer the solids to a blender in batches and process until very smooth and creamy, adding enough of the liquid to the blender to achieve a thin consistency. Pass the soup through a fine-mesh strainer into a container. Season with salt, pepper, and lime juice, then cover and refrigerate. Reserve any remaining liquid. (The soup will likely thicken as it chills, so thin with a bit of the reserved liquid or water.)

Just before serving, prepare the garnish. In a small skillet, heat the olive oil over medium heat. Add the corn and zucchini and cook until just crisp-tender, about 3 minutes. Season with salt and pepper. In a small bowl, season the tomatoes and radish with extra-virgin olive oil, salt, and pepper. Ladle the soup into bowls and top with the corn mixture and the tomatoes and radishes. Sprinkle with shiso leaves, if you like. Serve warm or chilled. Serves 4 to 6

Japanese Chive Blossom Tempura

You’ll need: 2 cups chive flowers, washed and trimmed of any debris 3 cups vegetable oil 1 cup flour 1 tablespoon cornstarch 1 1/2 cups of seltzer water 2 tablespoons soy sauce 1/4 cup water 1/2 teaspoons sugar 1 tablespoon sweet rice wine sea salt

Heat your oil in a small, relatively deep pot to 375 degrees. (Another way to test oil temperature is to stick a bamboo chopstick into the oil. If bubbles start sizzling around the chopstick, the oil is ready). While you’re waiting for that, whisk together the flour, cornstarch, and seltzer water in a medium bowl. Prep the dipping sauce by combining the soy sauce, water, sugar, and rice wine. Using a fork, coat the flowers in the batter. Gently tap the fork on the side of the bowl to get rid of the excess batter. Fry up to 5 flowers at a time. When they get just golden, transfer to a plate lined with a paper towel. Sprinkle the hot chive flower tempura with a bit of sea salt as you take them out of the fryer, and serve immediately!

Paola Bottera’s ’s Pasta Con Asparagi

1 bunch (approx. 1 ¼ lbs. of fresh asparagus) 1 lemon, zested and juiced. 1 cup Reggiano Parmigiano cheese (plus ½ cup to pass with the pasta) 2 tbsp. unsalted butter 16 oz. Orecchiette, Gemelli or Pici pasta Salt and Pepper

1. Take 6 or 7 stalks of asparagus, trim the ends and set them aside. Cut the remainder of the asparagus into ½ inch pieces on the diagonal. Set aside. 2. Fill a large, heavy skillet with water.  Salt the water generously. Set the pan on high heat and bring it to a boil.  Add the  stalks of asparagus to the boiling water. Cook till tender, about 3 minutes. Fish them out of the pan, leaving the water in the pan.  3. Put the asparagus into the bowl of a food processor with the metal blade in place.  Add the lemon juice, the cheese, the butter and ¼ cup of asparagus water and process until the mixture is the consistency of soup.  Add more water if necessary.  Put the resulting sauce into a medium sized bowl. 4. Cook the pasta following the package instructions for timing. (Orecchiette take 12 minutes).  Three minutes before the pasta cooking time is up, add the asparagus pieces to the pasta.  Cook pasta and asparagus together.  This will up the asparagus flavor to the pasta.  Set aside a half cup of the pasta water.  Drain the pasta and the asparagus. 5.  Add the pasta, asparagus and lemon zest to the bowl with the asparagus sauce and toss all the ingredients together.  If the pasta sauce is to thick, add some of the pasta water.  Salt and pepper the dish to taste.  Serve at once passing the additional Reggiano Parmigiano cheese.

RUTH REICHL’S DAMN DELICIOUS BULGOGI

RUTH REICHL: SCROUNGING FOR DINNER AGAIN JANUARY 4, 2010

The snow came down all day, the wind howled, the drifts mounted around the house. Three weather advisories warned us not to leave unless absolutely necessary. I stayed put. But a second day of scrounging through the fridge found it considerably barer. Happily I came upon a piece of flank steak in the freezer, a jar of kimchee (how old, I wonder?) and a single sad head of butter lettuce. Visions of Bulgogi danced in my head. It was my favorite meal all week. And simple!  Here's a kind of recipe; but use your imagination.

Take 1/2 pound beef of some sort – you could use just about anything – slice it across the grain as thinly as you possibly can, and plunk it into the following marinade.

soy sauce  – 2 tablespoons or so a couple of cloves of smashed garlic a small knob of ginger, minced whites of 2 or 3 scallions, minced a big spoonful of sugar a splash of sesame oil

Leave it to soak up the flavors for 15 minutes or so while you separate the leaves from their head of lettuce, put a pot of rice on to cook, and rummage through your cupboards to see if there's anything that you would like to add. You're going to wrap the beef and rice into little lettuce packets, and many accompaniments suggest themselves: Kimchee is a good start, Sriracha sauce is imperative in my mind, sliced cloves of raw garlic would be nice, as would shredded carrots or toasted sesame seeds (should you happen to have some lying around).

Cover the bottom of a large skillet with a sheen of oil, wait until it shimmers and then cook the meat, stirring, for about 4 minutes.  Plunk it onto one platter, the lettuce on another and the rice into a bowl. Set them all onto a table, along with whatever else you've found, and let everyone make his own deliciously savory little wraps. No forks necessary.

This is enough to fortify a couple of people on a cold winter night. Eating it before a roaring fire makes it even better.