use real butter

Okay kids, I really have been thinking of that giveaway. I believe I have settled on the prize, but I need a little more time to come up with an interesting question - something that allows me to learn a little bit about my readers. You can be sure that my questions are out of curiosity and not some bloody marketing strategy.

It’s soup season. I was going to say it is soup weather, except it wasn’t when I made this - it was positively balmy and sunny. I wanted to cry my eyes out. Where the *bleep* is my snow?! But today IS soup weather. Overcast, cooler (high in the 50s), rainy… I love it. I have been wanting to try a recipe for seven bean soup for several years. When I walked into the grocery store, I searched the bulk bins for beans. I needed a half cup each of seven types. And then I came across the bin with THIRTEEN beans, all mixed together, right there for me! It was so pretty, I could not resist.

13 kinds

In the continuing saga of emptying out my freezer, I found not one, but TWO ham bones! I am always the dork who lurks around at parties that served large hunks of meat, asking if I could have the bone. I have heard that foodie types fight over turkey carcasses or ham bones at holiday parties, but I seem to be surrounded by non-cooks who don’t know that broth comes from bones.

two ham bones - yip!

a nice yield of ham from the bones

While the broth cooked, it gave the house a heady smell - that of baked southern-style ham. You know what I’m talking about - the ham that packs enough sodium to kill a party of 12? Oh yeah, baby, that’s the one. If I sound like someone gushing over her lover, it’s because I grew up in Virginia where Pork is King AND I’m Chinese (pork is also King… or Emperor?). Anyway, I tried out a nifty trick because I was getting impatient waiting for the broth to cool. I usually de-fat my broth by letting it cool and refrigerating it so I can remove the fat. But this broth was taking so long to cool off and there was too much fat to ignore, so I de-fatted it with ziploc bags.

defatting the broth

like so

Worked like a charm! And it also took me back to my sixth grade science fair experiment where I measured the rate of water discharge from a nozzle at the bottom of a bucket and how it varied with volume (height for constant cross-sectional area) of water in the bucket. First Place. SCIENCE!!!

stirring in the beans

sauté

The soup is chocked full of delicious beans, vegetables, precious pork meat(s), and that lovely broth. The southern-style ham lends enough sodium to the broth that I never had to add any salt. The ham also gives a little bit of a smokiness to the soup without tasting burnt.

pan fried sausage slices

dump everything into the soup

Awesome soup. I’m having a bowl of it for dinner right now as I type. Those ham bones work magic too, because the moment I put the bones in the pot, Kaweah came and plunked her little furry self in the middle of the kitchen. I nearly killed myself a few times tripping over her, but she would not be separated from those ham bones… The only thing I would do differently is to dice the sausage rather than slice into discs. I think it works better with the size of the beans and vegetables.

hearty

Seven Thirteen Bean Soup
slightly modified from The Complete Book of Soups and Stews by Bernard Clayton, Jr.

3 1/2 cups dried beans (preferably a variety of at least seven, but go for more if you like)
[navy, pinto, cranberry, kidney, black-eyed, garbanzo, lima, etc.]
water to cover the beans
2 ham bones
10 cups of water
2 tbsps butter
2 medium onions, diced
2 medium carrots, diced
4 ribs celery, diced
1 clove garlic, minced
28 oz. canned tomatoes, including liquid
1 lb. kielbasa or some kind of garlic sausage
salt, if desired
black pepper, to taste

Soak the dried beans overnight in a large vessel with enough water to cover 3 inches above the beans. In a large pot, cover ham bones in enough water with 2 inches above the bones (about 10 cups). Bring water to boil and partially cover with lid, reduce heat and simmer over low for 2.5 hours. Skim off brown film as it collects on the surface. Drain the beans. While meat is cooking, place beans in another saucepan and add water to cover plus 2 or 3 inches above beans (about 4 quarts). Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer for 1 hour or until the beans are al dente - not mushy. Drain the beans and set aside. In a large skillet, heat the butter to foaming, add the onions, carrots, celery, and garlic. Sauté until translucent but not browned. Set aside. Cut sausage into diagonal 1/4 inch slices and fry in skillet [OR dice, which I prefer]. Cook until fat is released and meat is browned, about 10 minutes. Lift out pieces and discard the fat. When ham bones are done, remove pot from heat and strain the broth into another vessel to cool slightly. Pick off any meat from the ham bones and chop up finely. Discard fat and bones.

To de-fat the broth: When broth is no longer hot (but warm is okay), carefully pour half of the contents into a gallon ziploc bag (set it in a bowl or tall tupperware for support). Seal the bag and let the fat settle out from the broth to the top. Hold the bag above the liquid, in your intended soup pot with one corner pointing straight down. Take a sharp knife and puncture the bag as close to the tip as possible. Let the broth release into the pot. When the fat layer nears the cut in the bag, pinch it closed with the other hand and discard. Repeat with second bag.

Add the chopped ham meat, cooked beans, vegetables (including tomatoes), and the sausage slices to the broth. Simmer the soup over medium-low heat for 30-45 minutes. Taste for seasoning. Serve hot.

Can’t think. I’m tired and there were so many pictures and observations from today that I wouldn’t know where to begin. So I won’t just yet.

But there is a recipe…. because it is my dad’s birthday today. I think most people associate birthdays with cake, but I associate birthdays with noodles per the Chinese tradition.

My dad is the CEO of the house and my mom is the CFO. Dad likes management speak, because he was a manager as well as an engineer. When I was in college, they sent me a check for my birthday one year. My father told me, “I have authorized Mommy to release some funds for your birthday present.” What a hoot.

goofing off with dad at kris’ wedding

at my college graduation

When I was growing up, Dad insisted that the family eat dinner together at the table, no TV. There were many evenings when Mom, Kris, and I would wind up buckled over laughing at my dad. He would smile and inform us, “You know, I manage a division of a couple hundred people and they all do what I say. But you three have no respect for me!” The last part would be drowned out by the deafening roar of our laughter. He was usually a good sport about it. Because he was outnumbered 3 women to 1 man in the house, Dad was always the butt of our jokes.

dry chinese noodles

an assortment of vegetables

We eat long noodles on birthdays for long life, but we always told Dad that he would live a loooooong time because he’s mean. It’s a joke. In my family, we laugh a lot and we yell a lot (even when we’re happy). We love each other very much and we also drive one another insane. If you can’t laugh at yourself, best not to venture into our family’s brand of Crazy.

slicing flank steak

green onions and garlic

Despite the prediction that Dad’s longevity is proportional to his disposition, I made some noodles this evening to celebrate his birthday. I want him to live many more healthy and happy years so he can continue to dispense priceless advice. For instance, when I was boarding the plane to go to college he told me, “Don’t touch boys.”

adding sesame oil to the beef

the pan fried noodles

Dad and I live our lives very differently. We have different priorities, politics, interests… but he stood behind me when I decided to quit my job at Clusterfucks R Us over the highly unethical behavior there, he never questioned me about why it took so long to defend my PhD, and he has always called me his little girl - even today.

sautéed vegetables

mixed with the beef

When my parents visited last month, I was recovering from my appendectomy. After a couple of days watching me barely able to amble about the house, my dad told me that he felt bad about my past year. He said he knows that I, like him, am very (hyper)active. He told me that he couldn’t imagine how frustrating it must have been for me to be sick so often and for so long. Dad isn’t the most empathetic guy in the world and so his words nearly brought me to tears. We are so different and yet, I am so obviously his daughter.

He told me this evening that he had a very nice birthday and that he can’t wait for me to visit in the spring so we can go fishing and sailing together. Yes, we’ll go sailing and fishing and we’ll cook together. Happy birthday, Baba.

birthday noodles for dad

Stir-fried Beef Noodles

8 oz dried Chinese egg noodles
vegetable oil (a few tbsps to 1/2 cup)

1/2 cup snow peas, trimmed
1 head broccoli, florets of
1/2 cup straw mushrooms or shitakes
1/2 cup baby corn
1/2 cup bamboo shoot strips
salt to taste

1/2 lb flank steak
2 stalks green onions, trimmed and sliced
3 cloves garlic, sliced
4 tbsps soy sauce (or more if you want more sauce)
2-3 tbsps sesame oil
1-2 tbsps corn starch

Boil the Chinese noodles according to the package instructions. Drain the noodles and set aside. Heat the vegetable oil in a large frying pan or wok. If you want slightly fried noodles, then just use a few tablespoons of oil. If you want crispy fried noodles, use up to 1/2 cup. Add the noodles to the hot oil and let fry until golden or just crisp. Flip the noodles over to fry the other side to desired doneness. Remove noodles from the pan and set on plate. Slice the flank steak against the grain at an angle. Mix the flank steak slices with soy sauce, sesame oil, and cornstarch. Set aside. In the frying pan, heat remaining oil (you want about 1-2 tablespoons) and sauté the snow peas and broccoli until they turn a rich green color. Add the mushrooms, corn, and bamboo shoots and continue to sauté, seasoning with a little salt to taste. Remove the vegetables to bowl and set aside. In the same pan, heat a tablespoon of vegetable oil and add the garlic and green onions. Sauté until fragrant and add the beef. Stir-fry until the meat is pink and add the vegetables. When the meat is just done, pour the mixture over the noodles and serve hot.

That phrase is the first sentence I learned in Spanish way back in high school, from a bunch of friends who took Spanish. I took French, see. So when I headed down to South America to do field work for graduate school I was all, “Guys, I don’t speak a lick of Spanish.” Well, except for por que tu eres un taco grande? Everyone assured me I’d pick it up.

I did pick up some Spanish, all with an Argentine accent. That got me a lot of funny stares when I flew across the Andes to Chile for work on a field project with Jeremy and a team of astronomers. When Jeremy met me at the airport in Santiago and we caught a cab, he was amazed while I chattered away with our driver in my Argentine Spanish explaining the geophysical research project I had been working on for the past month. Jeremy speaks Spanish. When he saw me off at the airport in the US, the only new Spanish I had learned was No me molestes! and Chupacabra (from an X-files episode).

When I say Jeremy speaks Spanish, I really mean that he knows a lot of Spanish, but the guy hardly speaks much in English and even less in Spanish. He actually *thinks* before he speaks. That’s why when he finally says something, everyone listens. It’s usually something quite good. But me, I run my mouth all the time and let my jabbering find its way around until I say what I wanted to say. I don’t hesitate to speak. Same goes for my Spanish.

Despite my crappy command of the Spanish language I did surprisingly well communicating with the locals. I attribute that to my crappy Chinese. I’m well practiced in the art of getting semi-complex ideas across using a 3rd grade vocabulary. You should have seen me asking where I could find birthday candles at the grocery store in Pisagua, Chile [where can I find a small light that you place on a cake which is served on the day someone is born?]

So the other day I was thinking about how bad my Spanish has become (rather, how much worse) and I said aloud to myself, “Por que tu eres un taco grande?” Mmmm, tacos. It had been an age since I last made shredded beef tacos (and I had this giant sack of limes to finish off). I got on the shredded beef taco kick after going to an awesome Taqueria on Mission and 24th in San Francisco with a friend of mine who had grown up there. He told me if I ate Taco Bell, he’d beat the crap out of me. Ha! I could *so* kick his ass. But the memory of their amazing shredded beef tacos still lingers in my mind.

beef eye of chuck, limes, garlic

the marinade

I tried to reproduce these in graduate school, but I think when you work on a PhD, you become incompetent at everything you do (including the PhD). It’s worse than chemo brain, I tell you. I always used beef chuck and shredded the beef in the food processor using the dough blade. Somehow, a light bulb went off in my head this time… Why not READ the recipe carefully?

the beef cut into strips

into the ziploc

Beef eye of chuck is not quite beef chuck as I knew it. Dude in the meat department was all “That is not the right cut of meat in your hands, you want this instead.” I did look it up for shits and giggles because I like diagrams of animals and the names of the cuts of meat (and how the Brits have different names than Yankees do.) Being a Coloradoan, it’s my sworn duty to loathe Texas, but when it comes to Beef, Texas knows what she’s talkin’ about.

pour the beef and marinade into baking dish

add beef broth

Right, so the recipe said I could grill the beef or bake it. Grilling it won’t result in shredded beef, just fajita-like strips. I opted for the baked version because I am all about the slow-cooking and the falling apart of cheap cuts of meat. The original oven time was just over an hour. When I tried to shred the beef, it felt tough, so I let it go another hour in the oven. Much better.

shred it

ready to serve

After shredding the beef, I mix it in with the juices and serve it on lightly fried fresh corn tortillas with lettuce, guacamole, salsa, whatever you want, really. I highly recommend queso fresco instead of cheddar. Since all of the grocery stores in Boulder conspired to NOT HAVE queso fresco, I grated some feta which actually worked out nicely (not as creamy, but nice, smooth and salty). Of course, the first store I set foot in when I was visiting Grandma in California had GIANT slabs of queso fresco on display. *sigh*

Jeremy loves these shredded beef tacos. I, myself, feel like dancing while I eat them. They are THAT happy-making.

pile it on

can’t talk… eating

Shredded Beef Tacos
slightly modified from Tejas Tacos in The Border Cookbook

1 1/2 lbs eye of chuck (which is NOT beef chuck roast)
4 tbsp vegetable oil
2 tbsps vinegar
2 tbsps fresh lime juice
1 1/2 tsps ground cumin
1 1/2 tsps chili powder
3 garlic cloves, minced
1 cup beef stock
salt to taste
~ 24 corn tortillas
lettuce, queso fresco, salsa, guacamole, etc. (for toppings)

Trim the fat and cut the beef into 1 inch thick slices. In a ziploc bag, combine the oil, vinegar, lime juice, cumin, chili powder, and garlic. Place the meat slices in the bag, seal, mix it around and refrigerate for at least 4 hours or overnight. Bring the meat to room temperature. Place all contents from the bag in a baking dish with the beef stock. Cover the dish and bake for 1 1/4 hours (I baked it for 2 1/2 hours) at 350°F. Let the meat rest for 10 minutes and then shred it with forks or process it quickly in a food processor with the plastic dough blade (I prefer the forks method). Salt the meat to your liking. Fry the tortillas lightly in a little hot oil. I like to double the tortillas and stuff them with shredded beef, lettuce, cheese, guacamole, and salsa.