Sweet & Sour Summer

It's summer.  Again. Still.

For this "recovering Yankee," August pushes me to the breaking point here in Baton Rouge with the relentless heat and humidity.  

And then there's that other dreaded "H" word--hurricanes!

So it's usually around this time that I call a halt to the usual summer fare of BLTs (my favorite sandwich of all time), salads, grilled food, and restaurant meals, of course, and pretend "everything's cool."

Recently,  I cranked up the AC, the ceiling fans, and the stove vent, and stir-fried a sweet and sour pork dish that is quite a bit leaner than the usual deep-fried versions.  

Sweet and sour pork is one of my husband's favorite dishes mostly because he is religious in his conviction that pineapple is the "perfect food."  I can't count the conversations that we've had where I say, "But pineapple wouldn't go with X," and he goes all pineapple-evangelistic about how pineapple would be a wonderful compliment to X.  (Pineapple and liver?  Really?)

But I digress . . . .

A few words about woks and stir frying:

I’m no Asian cooking expert, but Asian food is one of my favorite types of cuisine and one I’ve been experimenting with for many years.

My wok is one of the best investments I’ve ever made.  It is an anodized steel stove-top model that I got from Williams-Sonoma years ago.  Anodized steel is wonderful—it is “stickless” like Teflon but doesn't require the babying that Teflon does.  And it conducts heat well. 

The problem that home cooks often have with stir frying is that most residential stoves aren’t high in BTUs.(BTU stands for British thermal units and are the units that measure the heat given off by your gas burner.) This means that it’s difficult to get a high heat that lets your ingredients, especially vegetables, get to that great crisp-tender stage.  Lower heat means there’s a risk of mushiness. 

(My dream stove will have one of those super-hot burners—and red knobs, if you know what I mean.)

I have a gas stove, so to get the maximum heat, I take off the burner grate and put the wok directly on the flame.  I crank it to high and stir away with two matching wooden spoons.  It’s the best I can do for now.

By the way, adding that pinch of salt to vegetable oil makes the “smoke point” higher.  That addition might not be necessary if you are using peanut oil, which has a higher smoke point than vegetable oil.  

So below is my "I-am-in-denial-that-it's-still-stinking-hot" meal.

Sweet and Sour Pork

Source:  original recipe

Yield:  4-6 servings (maybe 8)

Ingredients:

1 lb. pork, sliced in ½-inch X  ½-inch strips (I've used tenderloin, pork chops--anything will work)

½ c. cornstarch

vegetable or peanut oil

kosher salt 

3 carrots, thinly sliced

1-2 green peppers, sliced in thin strips

1 onion, halved crosswise, then sliced lengthwise

1-20 oz. can pineapple chunks, drained, juice reserved

¼ c. ketchup

¼ c. cider vinegar

¼ c. sugar

¼ c. soy sauce

2 T. Asian garlic chili sauce

Process:

In a small bowl, dredge the pork in the cornstarch and set aside.  In another small bowl (or 4 c. measuring cup), mix the reserved pineapple juice, ketchup, vinegar, sugar, soy sauce and chili sauce.  

In a wok on high heat, heat about 2 T. oil and a sprinkling of saltt.  When the oil is smoking, add the carrots, green peppers, and onion and stir fry until crisp-tender and slightly brown on the edges.  Add the pineapple and continuing stirring until the pineapple is brown on the edges.  Remove the vegetables and pineapple form the wok to a large serving bowl.  

Add about ¼ c. oil to the wok with a sprinkling of salt and heat until smoking.  Shake off the excess cornstarch (reserve cornstarch) from the pork and add the pork to the wok, stir frying until it is brown and cooked through.  Add the reserved vegetables and pineapple and the pineapple juice sauce to the wok and heat until boiling.  

Meanwhile mix about 1 T. of the reserved cornstarch with about ½ c. water.  Pour a small amount of this mixture at a time in to the wok to slightly think the sauce.  (You don’t want it to get pasty.)  Serve with rice.
  

Marinated Cucumber Salad

My mother used to make a salad like this that she usually served with meat loaf.  As a kid, I used to love to put the slightly-pickled onions on the meat loaf--clearly I'm of German heritage!  This salad isn't especially Asian, but rice vinegar could be substituted for the regular vinegar.  Adding a tablespoon of chopped herbs could totally change the "palette"--dill for a Scandinavian meal,  basil for an Italian or Thai meal, etc.  

Source:  my mom and various old cookbooks

Yield: 4 servings

Ingredients:

1 medium cucumber

1 small onion

½ c. vinegar

½ c. water

2 T. sugar

¼ tsp. salt

¼ tsp. pepper

Process:  

Slice the cucumbers thinly.  (You can score the cucumber with a fork lengthwise which allows the marinade to soak in more quickly and makes the cucumber slices look a bit like flowers). The onions can be sliced thinly into rings, half-moon slices or chopped.  Place the vegetables in a small bowl or plastic container.  

In a small bowl or glass measuring cup, whisk the remaining ingredients.  Pour the marinade over the vegetables and chill for at least an hour to overnight.