What We Ate Last Night : Venetian Liver

I am partial to a little bit of liver. I love the stuff. I was such a fussy eater as a kid, but for some reason I always ate my liver. I grew up eating lambs liver, potatoes and peas. Although my dad used to overcook the liver, well it was the 70’s. I now prefer it a little pinker these days.

Some of my most loved dishes are rather liverish. A quickly seared calves liver and mash is a dish made in heaven for me. Deviled chicken livers on toast or made into a creamy pate.

Oddly enough pigs liver I rarely eat, as it generally has no taste, maybe that is more to do with the pigs than the liver itself.

The Italians love their liver as well, or should I say the Venetians. I’ve seen many different versions of this dish, but the most simple is the one I cooked last night. Although I used lambs liver as it was in the fridge. Normally this is done with baby tortured cows liver, as Cartman once said.

You will need :

Liver, as much as you want. Dusted with seasoned flour.

Finely sliced onions

A few knobs of butter

Olive Oil

Seasoning

Finely chopped parsley

1. Sweat off the onions in the butter and olive oil until you feel no resistance when you squeeze them
2. Remove from pan
3. Dust the liver with seasoned flour. Add more of the butter to the pan, and when it is foaming add the liver
4. Cook for a minute or so on each so, depending how pink or how thick it is
5. Add the onions back to the pan
6. Add a tiny amount of water. Bring to a simmer, Cook out the flour
7. Simmer down to thicken the sauce. Add the parsley
8. Season and serve with creamy polenta or mash
9. Enjoy your offaly meal

Foto Friday # 39

Grilled offal from Estilo Campo in Buenos Aires. Heaven, pure heaven.

Leong's Legend - The Original

I’m not gonna say too much about the original China Town Leong’s Legends, as I’ve already eaten and blogged about number 2 in this slowly growing chain of Taiwanese eateries. Plus the décor and menu are both the same so fewer words will be written. The only difference is really the vibe. The younger sister has a much better one.

The restaurant is somewhat smaller, but still has the same Song Dynasty drinking den feel and look to it. But somehow it is not as cosy as Continues is. I’ve not visited number 3 in Bayswater, but I’m sure it’ll be the same. But that won’t stop me from going one day soon. Real soon.

We weren’t that hungry so we only had a few dishes to tide us over. For starts we had a basket of Legends Siu Loung Bao. There were 8 of these little dumplings to wet our appetites. They were a mixed bag really. The insides were delightful, the pork was well seasoned and had a good texture. The jelly had melted and provided a soupiness to this dumpling when we bit into it. The only downside was the wrapper itself. It was too thick and almost chewy. Good but not great.

Next up were our mains of hot and fiery beef slices with beef tripe and a spicy pig’s offal dish. Our waitress, bless her, seemed shocked that we would order this dish. She did her best to dissuade us from ordering it, saying that only Chinese people liked it. She obviously had no idea of my obsession with offal. After a minute of this joyful banter she agreed to supply us with their offal dishes. As she turned to leave, she looked back at us and was about to try again but felt maybe we were ready for the good stuff.

Both were pretty damn good. The spicy beef slices with tripe were just that. Pretty damn spicy. Good texture and great flavour with some nice heat thrown in as well. Only downside was there wasn’t enough of it, as we could of eaten that all night.

The spicy pig’s offal came as more of a soup or stew than the previous dish as we were expecting. I think I tasted all bits of the pig there, liver, heart and kidney and all were well cooked and seasoned. It wasn’t that spicy but all can be forgiven as it was a really good dish.

I think word had spread amongst the staff, as they seemed impressed that we had eaten everything. I think they were expecting us to have it sent back and order something else that the other laowai were ordering.

All in all Leong’s Legends is a good restaurant with some funny staff, but somehow Continues has a much better vibe. Well we’ll see with numero tres.

Do you have the Heart?

Offal seems to be kind of coming back into fashion, although with some of us it never went out.

I know a lot of people who eat offal in restaurants, but refuse to cook it at home. Why? They say they are squeamish, hate the texture and the thought of touching a slimy product. Yuck. Oh boy.

But not only is offal high in vitamins, but it’s pretty damn cheap as well, and in these so called credit crunching times, (I want to shoot the person who came up with that saying) not only is it high in flavour, but low on the wallet too.

Offal is not that difficult to cook but it does require some respect and sometimes a little bit of pre planning and attention to detail, but the effort you put in is paid back to you in dividends in the end.

My favourite animal for offal is lamb. I love it, the kidneys, liver, and hearts. It’s amazing that from one small animal, its insides are so so good. Although lambs brains are the bottom of my list, after a dodgy episode in Kathmandu, which left me laid up for a week or two.

The offal from my other favourite eating animal, pig, which I find slightly too strong in flavour and not to my liking. For me lamb rocks. Although saying that, the liver from a baby tortured cow or calf is my favourite cut of all time. Dusted in flour, quickly fried in butter and served with peas and Jersey Royals. Heaven on a plate.

I was a fussy eating child, and would never eat any veggies at all. Those things changed as I grew up, although I still cannot stomach sprouts. But I did used to eat my dad’s lamb liver. Gorgeous.

I haven’t cooked hearts in a long time, but after seeing some for sale at the Ginger Pig in Borough Market. I had to grab a couple, and at 50p each. Cheapest dinner I’ll be cooking this week.

My normal way of cooking them is to give them a dusting of a Memphis bar-b-que rub. This I got it from a Steven Raichlen book. It works well and gives the heart a spicy note, which cuts through the fat a bit.

I’ve thought about stuffing and braising hearts, but I like them grilled. Pure and simple.

To prepare offal is pretty easy. I slice them in half from pole to pole. Give them a good rinse, getting rid of any traces of blood and cut away any sinew that will be there.

Then give them a thorough dusting of the rub, making sure every part is covered by the powder. Then place in a bowl, cover with cling film and leave in the fridge over night.

Before you cook them, make sure they are up to room temp before proceeding. After a bit of experimenting, I’ve found that about 2 or 2 ½ minutes each side will take them to about medium. Cooked but still nice and juicy.

As with meat you have to let them rest for a tad, then slice them and I serve with some sauté potatoes and a nice spicy salad. Yum yum yum.

So if you never tried hearts, give them a go….. 

A Little Push in the Right Direction

I’m finding recently that I am not doing too much. All I seem to do is eating in restaurants and write about it afterwards in a curious fashion.

Not to say this isn’t a good thing, but it seems to be distracting me from doing the thing I enjoy the most. Cooking. To be honest I just can’t be arsed.

I have no idea why I cannot be really bothered to cook that much. I’ve done a little since we’ve been back but nothing really to shout home about. I mean making lunches for Lina, (she must be getting so fed up with couscous by now) is not really inspiring me that much.

I mean it’s taken me 2½ months to start curing my own bacon, and only last week did I make a terrine for the first time since we’ve been back. These were normal things I would do only a bi-monthly basis at least before.

Am I going through a midlife crisis? Maybe. Were my vain attempts to shrug off hitting my 4^th decade just a whimsical effort of pretending it never happened.

Or is it as I think that being without work for so long is really having an effect on me. I mean it’s only been 10 weeks.

Boredom is settling in.

All this is to change, as of June 1^st I start work. Finally. Not for the want of trying. Well the company I will be working for call it training. Which will involve around 2 months of travelling in India, Nepal and China. Which I will not be enjoying, it’s for work and work alone. But I’m sure I can fit in some quality eating whilst I am over there. Hopefully.

So from now on I am making a vow. No more not being arsed to cook. I will cook damn it. I will be trying to cook what I enjoy cooking most. Offal and the cheaper cuts of meat. Although some of them are quite in vogue at the moment. These all will be posted here from time to time. But as I said it all depends on the outcome. We’ll see.

I’ve started by curing a piece of pork belly. Admittedly it’s a small piece as I slow roasted a sizable chunk of the rest, and half of what was left went into some Boston Baked Beans I rustled up the other day. Yum yum.

I’m not sure if I will reach up to my heady days in Colombia where I used to cook pig’s head and make a slab of brawn. Brine and cook ox tongues. I almost brought a calf’s head once to make a terrine, until Lina advised me we did not have a pot big enough. It was really big. 

So we shall see what the ethnic butchers around Islington and beyond can rustle up for me. 

Pho - Is it just a Noodle Soup ?

Pho, is with out doubt the national dish of Vietnam. It is a bowl of white noodles served in a clear beef stock. In Hanoi, it seemed to have taken on obsessional status. They seem to have it for breakfast, lunch and dinner. I am sure there are people who eat it 3 times a day, everyday. It comes in many different variants, the most popular is Pho Bo, or Beef Pho. thin cuts of beef, like brisket, flank or steak. Although Pho Ga, Chicken Pho is pretty good also. You can make it with anything really, intestines and other offal are popular. 

The stock is made in the usual way of simmering beef bones, with roasted veg and spices for several hours till you have a stock to die for. This is really the backbone of a good Pho. Without a good stock it would be just a beef noodle soup, as you get in some Chinese restaurants. The noodles people use are always fresh white ones. No self respecting Pho seller would use anything else. 

The noodles are put in the bowl first, then the stock is added, and finally before it is served a garnish is added. This seems to differ from shop to shop, maker to maker. This is what sets some apart from others. Mostly spring onions, coriander leaves, basil, bean sprouts are used. We had one today off a lady who sprinkled crushed peanuts on top. Yummy. Depending on the shop you will also get served a dish of other herbs to add at your will, like mint, and a few I have never seen before. You always get a bowl of lime wedges, chilli sauce, chilli slices and fish sauce to add as well. I am in favour of a little more heat to my Pho, but only after I have tasted a bit already. I like to see how good their stock is before I pep it up a bit. Phở is pronounced with a falling-rising tone in Vietnamese, as if asking a question in English. It is therefore pronounced as FUH? But I try my best to say it properly, I think I am generally understood though. Especially when asking for Pho in a Pho shop. Kinda obvious what I want. 

Pho originated in Northern Vietnam, and only spread to the rest of Vietnam in the mid 1950's, after the division of the country. The Northerners who did not want to be under communist rule headed South and took Pho with them. Noone is sure how it came about, maybe from the French and their stock making skills, or it was created out of the scraps that the people could afford. Similar to all good peasant dishes. Their are also those who say it was came from China, but the Vietnamese, I am sure would kill anyone who said it was that. They still hate the Chinese. Not surprising after 1,000 years of rule. 

Some of the best Pho I have had here in Vietnam, has actually came from a chain. Pho 24. It's a clean, trendy place, but lacks atmosphere of your smaller family run business. Other good ones have been at Pho 2000 in Saigon. In Hanoi, the best Pho is where the crowds are, and these places are small family run. They do not look much, you sit on small plastic chairs at small tables. You have to wipe the chopstix and spoon before using them. So if I see a shop with a lot of local people, then 99 times out of a 100 it has to be good Pho. and until now, this has never failed me. 

Pho connesueurs, will say that the best Pho is from the north, and the southern style from Saigon, is somewhat sweeter. Pho Hue style contains bits of offal, like steamed blood. Yum, yum.  This what Lina was eating in Saigon, when that chilli tried to kill me, but as it was Pho, I forgave it. 

To say wether Ramen noodles are better than Pho is a question I am avoiding. Lets just say I am addicted to both, and lets leave it at that shall we.