Text 5679, 84 rader
Skriven 2011-01-10 22:03:00 av JIM WELLER (1:123/140)
     Kommentar till en text av CAROL SHENKENBERGER
Ärende: cooking messages
========================
-=> Quoting Carol Shenkenberger to Sean Dennis <=-

 CS> Now to read a few cooking messages!

I've been saving a recipe just for you...

MMMMM-----Meal-Master - formatted by MMCONV  2.10

     Title: About Chinese Boiled Peanuts By Chichi Wang
Categories: Chinese, Nuts, Appetizers, Info
  Servings: 1 text file

           Chinese Boiled Peanuts

As a kid, I watched my grandfather settle into dinner every night by
sitting down at the table with a cold beer and a handful of peanuts.
He had a routine: his Chinese news program, a can of Budweiser, and
the peanuts, which were sometimes roasted but more often than not,
boiled. 

He allotted himself exactly half an hour to finish his personal
appetizer. When my mother set the first cold dish onto the table, he
would take his last sip of beer and shell his last nut. Sometimes I
would pilfer a peanut or two from his stash, I always liked the
boiled ones more than the roasted.

There was more of everything to enjoy when the peanuts were boiled.
Boiled peanuts displayed their inner-legume rather than the crunchy,
nutty side of their personality, so much so that the two types of
preparations, dry and wet, seemed like almost entirely different
foods. The shells, softened by the braising liquid, enclosed
engorged, tender peanuts. 

Like a soup dumping, each peanut pod had a small pocket of braising
juice inside that I would hoover into my mouth before shelling the
pod. 

My mother boiled peanuts in what was basically a Chinese red-braise,
sans soy sauce. The rest of the aromatics for a typical red
braise, salt, sugar, cinnamon, cloves, star anise, and sometimes a
dried chili or two perfumed the kitchen as the peanuts cooked on the
stove. Stewed for several hours, the raw peanuts would absorb the
flavors and soften to a starchy bean or cooked corn texture. Boiled
for even longer, the nuts became more tender, like roasted
chestnuts. 

Boiling peanuts isn't uniquely Chinese or Asian. Down south in the
United States, gas stations and roadside shacks sell bags of boiled
peanuts next to basins of pickled eggs. When I finally got around to
asking my mother why she never put soy sauce in the pot, she said it
was because of the color, the darkened shell would have made the
peanuts look dirty and unappealing. 

If you're going to suck on a shell, that shell should be as
delicious as can be.

Furthermore, you can play around with the seasoning: add lemongrass
for a more fragrant stock and honey for a sweeter legume.

Or, dispense with the shells altogether and use the raw peanuts as
you would dried beans for a hearty winter's stew with squash and
coconut milk. And finally, I should mention that those bags of raw,
unshelled peanuts that you'll find at your Asian grocer next to the
piles of potatoes and starchy roots, can be bought for peanuts. 

Chichi Wang

From: Serious Eats
 
MMMMM-------------------------------------------------




Cheers

YK Jim


... All I get is chicken feed, I dream of working for peanuts.

___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.20
--- Platinum Xpress/Win/WINServer v3.0pr5
 * Origin: Doc's Place BBS Fido Since 1991 docsplace.tzo.com (1:123/140)