The Time I Made Pasta and it Turned to Mush

Before the pasta hit the water.
Things were looking up at this stage. 

The other night, I attempted to make homemade pasta and, a pound of flour later, things didn't turn out as planned.
It was a 2012 cooking resolution failure.

But in every failure, there are some key learnings...right??

I didn't learn much except for the fact that, while I might be skilled at some things (accessorizing, grammar and navigation), making pasta from scratch is not my strong skill. At least not yet, anyway...

I won't call these learnings, but I will call them some initial observations about my first foray into pasta making.

1. Pasta dough is fickle.
2. Making pasta is messy. I'm still finding flour in odd places in my kitchen.
3. Kneading pasta dough is hard work.
4. The act of kneading pasta dough can be quite therapeutic after a long Monday.
5. Pasta dough is very unforgiving.
6. I probably don't know what good pasta dough is supposed to look and feel like.
7. Sometimes you spend a lot of time making pasta and then it turns to mush in the final step.
8. Even though the texture might be off, if you put enough Pecorino on it, the pasta can be salvaged (or at least made edible).
9. I will never look at fresh made pasta the same every again.
10. I will appreciate fresh made pasta much more that I ever did before.

Do you have homemade pasta making tips? If so, leave me a comment and let me know. I need all the help I can get!

Dim Sum at Home

Pork and shrimp & cilantro shumai in a
bamboo steamer. 

A few months ago, I wrote my 2012 cooking resolutions, one being to explore asian flavors and techniques. Today, I made dim sum at home, which included shrimp and pork shumai and pork dumplings.

Though time consuming, the process was easier than I thought and, surprisingly, pretty hard to mess up (always an excellent trait in any recipe).

In French cooking, onion, celery and carrot serve as the foundation to hundreds of different recipes. For asian cooking, I learned that garlic, ginger and green onions serve as a versatile base to many different asian dishes. Sesame oil, hoisin sauce, sriracha and soy sauce round out the other asian pantry essentials. When combined with fish, meat, poultry or vegetables, these ingredients come together to strike a careful balance of sweet, spicy, salty and savory in every bite.

Pork dumplings lightly seared before
steaming 

I used Mark Bittman's shrimp and cilantro shumai recipe as my guide. His recipe includes mixing together soy sauce, sesame oil, ginger and rice wine as the flavor base and dipping sauce. Half of the shrimp, cilantro and green onions are pureed in a food processor along with the sauce, and the other half is chopped coarsely, bringing together two distinct textures.

For the pork dumplings, I used this recipe from Kelsey Nixon, who recommends frying the dumplings in peanut or vegetable oil before steaming them.

The trickiest aspect of making dim sum at home is folding the dumpling wrappers. Some came out looking great, others looked like they had been run over by a car on Lake Shore Drive. Like anything, it apparently gets easier with practice. It also helps to bribe a friend or family member with promises of wine and homemade Chinese food to help with the shumai/dumpling assembly process.

Bittman offers some constructive advice in this video, although it made me feel better to remember that homemade dumplings are just that (and it's ok if they're not perfect).

       
If all else fails with dim sum at home, head south to Chinatown and spend a Saturday or Sunday morning at The Phoenix, which is almost as good as homemade.

Next up on the Drunken Goat's 2012 cooking resolutions? Fresh made pasta.