Porcine-Flavor-Fest 28.4

The next dish we served, "inside out", deconstructed bacon and shrimp tamales. Salty steamy fluffy masa, savory bacon and shrimps with sauteed mushrooms and peppers, then topped with a creamy avocado lime sauce. If you've ever had a tamale and wished that there was more filling, this is the solution.

The next course in this unforgettable meal, Piggy Roll, was a porchetta, pork loin, wrapped in pork belly and spices with a layer of citrus in between. Roasted crispy and sliced, to be served between bread. This savory spiced layered pork creation tickled the taste buds with its contrast in flavor between the orange and spices mixed with salty savory fat in the porks.

This Little Piggy Went in my Belly 28.3

"Jelly Belly", the next dish is pork belly confit. Pork belly, cooked low and slow in pork fat, then carefully chilled, pressed, cleaned, seasoned, and pan fried crispy. This is the most pork dish of all the pork dishes you have ever imagined, condense the porkiness of a thousand bacons into a cube of savory mouth coating crispy salty jelly, and you will have a cube the cubes of mouthpleasure found below. Pork Belly Confit.

This is the belly after it has been cooked the first time, pressed and cleaned. Next we peel back the skin the reveal the sweet sweet fat. Cut that into bites, and pan fry to perfection.

Below you see the final product, layers of belly meat, fat, and crispy salty perfection. This is bacon on steroids. This is why God's chosen people couldn't eat pork until the spirit of the Lord came down to Peter in a vision. This is Pork Belly Confit.

After such a savory and mouth coating it was prudent to cleanse the palette. After the "Jelly Belly" came a "Hana Medows" sorbet, Rangpur Lime Gin and Ruby Red Vodka with fresh grapefruit juice made this  sweet and tart sorbet a perfect intermezzo, a wonderful sweet and tart mouth pause between pork another course of sweet sweet pork.

After the sorbet gave us a fresh start we hit the ground running with these legendary pork ribs. Black Berry Brandy Bar Be Que Baby Back Ribs. That's a whole lot of B. These sweet, tender, fall off the bone pork ribs are literally the best ribs anyone has ever had. For many years I have personally tried every known method of making ribs to only approach the goodness of these ribs. These are a work of art, these are a practice in perfection. These are ribs that pigs happily give their lives for.

We served the ribs with cornbread, cornbread filled with bacon.

Birthday 28.2 Swinelust Porkapalooza

First another shot of the "Sunburn" Iberico De Bellota Lardo with Strawberry and Fig on crispy cracklin. It I found this shot in among the others and decided that it must be posted. The way it coats your mouth with sweet tart fatty goodness is truly inspired.

The next dish was "Timothy's Vietnamese Balls", a ball of white rice with a dash of pickled daikon raddish and carrots, topped with a lemongrass seasoned pork chop and a generous drizzle of fish sauce. These were a mouthful of Vietnamese porky goodness. Really, they were tasty.

The third dish of the day, "Mexican Lettuce" was a Mexican Cesar salad, [in hindsight I should have called it a Cesar Chavez Salad]. This was a savory Cesar topped with corn, black beans, savory carnitas and a creamy avocado Cesar dressing. This was the third course of many. It was a great start to a wonderful day filled with food and friends, and more food.

Birthday 28.1 Courses 0-1

This past Saturday I gathered together my friends for a meal of incredible proportions. 11 courses, 2 intermezzos, and more pork on pork action than a healthy heart can handle. Below you will find the begining of what was a wonderful day of friends and food.

First (off menu [to be published later]) Ndujla, a soft salami spread on crispy pork cracklings. This spicy pork on pork combo was a wonderful creamy crunchy beginning to a day filled with sweet salty pig meats.

Next, another tasty treat served on crispy pigskin, the "sunburn" was a bitesized Lardo de Iberico de Bellota served with fresh figs and strawberries. The sweetness of the fig, the tart of the strawberry, and the creamy richness of the lardo all came together on the crispy mouth coating cracklin to form a wonder bite of sweet and savory goodness.

Standing Rib Roast

For my mother's birthday I made her dinner, savory Brussels Sprouts and a Standing Rib Roast. I love this food, I never understood why as a child nobody ever made Brussels Sprouts well. They were always mushy, smelly, and kinda sulfurous: not these. These savory miniature cabbages, slightly caramelized and tossed with caramelized onions, these are delicious.

Oh and standing Rib Roasts are delicious. 

Warning: The Playground will Hurt You.

Today I went to The Playground in DTSA (Down Town Santa Ana). I must warn you, if you like food, if know the difference between choice and prime, if you sometimes wake up in a cold sweat at 3AM crying out for Jamon Iberico, then you might hurt yourself if you go The Playground. When I say hurt yourself I mean that you will want to taste all of the things, you will want to bankrupt yourself on food, you will, from deep within your being, desire to put all of the things into your mouth: for pleasure.

I was going to do a five blog expose on the place, but I would rather relive the experience with you now. It starts with a great venue and a great beer selection. I had a Brew Dog Tokyo, an incredibly unique imperial stout coming in over 18% abv. I only had one. It was enough.

The first course was a smoked salmon tzatziki rillette with fresh greens and house made toast. The smoke from the salmon cut through the tangy Greek yogurt and paired very well with gently salted fresh greens. Honestly this was not my favorite of the courses which we had (there were four), it left me wanting more of the salmon. However, its difficult not to recognize the bravery it takes to put a bold dish like this on your menu.It certainly was a wonderful dish, and a fresh start to our meal.

The second course blew me away. New York Steak Tar Tar with a Peanut Satay, Pickled Onions, and Fresh Herbs. The texture, spice, and beefy magic of this dish left me literary breathless. The execution of this food, the balance of spicy and savory flavors, highlighted with sweet peanuts and fresh herbs, really demonstrates the passion and dedication of the chefs in the back of the house. Eat. This. Food.

 

The burger. This burger is made of some majestic amalgamation of beefs, ground day of, in house, and the patty is left intact from the state that if comes out of the grinder. Each bit holds the texture and flavor of the beef it was ground form, rib-eye, waygu tri-tip, and unicorns. House baked bun, and wonderfully carmelized onions. I would eat this seven days a week if it wouldn't kill me and break my bank account.

Pork. I love pork. As much as I love beef, pigs are the most delicious animals to grace this good earth, and this is hands down the best pork chop to grace my good lips. Glazed in a magical maple butter sauce, tender and juicy to the center. There are few times in my life when I have tasted something and thought to myself that I could never make something better. This is it. This is real life. This is the best pork chop you will ever taste. Oh and here is the aftermath.

Nothing but the bones left, honestly I wanted to drink the sauce through the bones, but I was too proud. I wish I wasn't.

Vietnamese Mexican V-Mex 3.0

I think I might be obsessed. I think I might be undergoing some second generation Vietnamese American identity reconciliation crisis. I have been poisoned with this fusion food concept and I cannot escape it. I want to Vietnamese-Mexican all of my favorite Vietnamese and Mexican foods. Who knows what sort of  ungodly concatenation of culturally iconic foodstuffs I will create. Below you will find Carne Asada Spring Rolls: fresh Vietnamese herbs from my back yard, rice noodles, and home pickled carrots, wrapped up with carne asada in a sheet of rice paper. Of course I dipped them in fish sauce! What else would I dip them in?!