A Tiger In The Kitchen

Top 10: The Memorable Eats Of 2009

 

You know it's been a good year when you are able to say this: 2009 was when I began to eat for a living.

I'd always been a devotee of affairs of the stomach. I may have written about fashion and other lifestyle areas for a living but baking, braising, trying new recipes, eating out -- those were what consumed me when weekends rolled around. 

Luck has its ways of finding you, however. Now, on the precipice of 2010, I'm beginning to close out a lunar calendar year of cooking and eating with my family in Singapore as research for my book, "A Tiger In The Kitchen." 

My journey so far has taken me many places -- France, where I had the loveliest gingery champagne cocktail with friends old and dear; China, where my father and I went in search of my great-grandfather's footprints in the village of his birth. And, of course, Singapore, where my aunties and maternal grandmother have been plying me with meals, recipes and much, much love along the way.

With all that I've packed into 2009, it's hard to decide what the highlights have been. But, inspired by some stellar Top 10 gastronomic lists out there (definitely check out Sam Sifton's list of Top 11 dishes in New York in the New York Times), I decided to give it a go.

Here, in no particular order, are my 10 memorable eats of 2009. 

Enjoy, buon appetito and listen, let's do this again in 2010 ...

Debal: A Devil of a Curry

If you're still staring at a fridge full of Christmas ham, roast beef or turkey, here's something you can do with all those leftovers -- make debal.

The dish, a traditional spicy stew that Eurasians in Singapore make on Boxing Day, is a kitchen-sink concoction made with the myriad leftover meats of Christmas feasts. It's a classic dish in Eurasian cuisine, which developed in the 19th Century when European traders began migrating to Singapore and marrying into local families. Debal combines cooked hams and roast beef with spicy Southeast Asian chilis and ginger.

I spent a few hours last week learning how to make debal (pronounced "dee-bahl" and also known as curry devil or devil's curry) from chef Damian D'Silva of Big D's Grill for a piece for The Atlantic.

The process is fairly laborious -- you'll need to be stirring constantly for at least two hours. But the end result is out of this world.

Here's how to do it ...

Panettone: The Seven-Day Bread

 

If you are among the people who believe that nothing says "The Holidays" like a festive loaf of panettone, let me just say this: You are mad.

This bread, it is evil.

It will drive you insane, make you tear your hair out. You may find yourself repeatedly staring intently at an unrising bowl of taupe glop, thinking, "Just, why, God, WHY?"

I mean this for the folks out there attempting to bake it, that is. (If you're the sort who buys panettone in a store then, sure, go for it. I'm sure that's pretty harmless.)

The problem I had here was holiday spirit.

Recently, I found myself so infused with the stuff that I decided to tackle panettone for the Bread Baker's Apprentice challenge. 

Shantou: Going Home

Some girls are Daddy's little princesses -- as for me, I was more like Daddy's little eating partner.

My dad and I, our obsessions are numerous. But the one dish that we find ourselves constantly craving is ta meepok (also known as meepok ta), a tagliatelle-like Chinese noodle that's tossed with bits of crunchy, fried pork lard in a chili-soy-black vinegar sauce and topped with fish balls, fish cakes and bits of minced or sliced pork.

It's a simple dish by the Teochews, an ethnic Chinese group, that we'd eat for breakfast in Singapore every day if we could. (More important, if our bodies could handle it.)

So the moment I landed in the Teochew city of Shantou, China, for our trip back to the village where my great-grandfather was born, I knew what we had to eat right away.

The Breslin: Gastropub, Grown Up

This is the sort of restaurant that The Breslin is: You will arrive on a Monday night to find the restaurant full and the bar jammed with the studiedly -- and also studly -- casual set. The wait, they will say, is 45 minutes to an hour.

You have a drink, some snacks and 45 minutes go by. An hour passes. There is still no word -- even though a stroll through the dining room shows that there are not one, not two, but a few tables that have been sitting empty for a bit.

At almost 90 minutes, it's getting a little tiresome. Nearby Koreatown is starting to look like a surer bet for dinner -- but just as you start to gesture toward your bar waitress for the check, you spy her spotting you and then sprinting over to the hostess for a quick discussion. Faster than you can say "Check, please," the hostess is by your side, telling you that now, there is a table open.

You consider leaving because, well, this is all a little bizarre. But you decide to stay -- and it's a good thing you do because what's on the dinner menu, it turns out, is worth waiting for.

But you really wouldn't expect anything less or different from owners of the Spotted Pig, the small West Village gastropub that quickly became the place for Leonardo DiCaprio spottings when it first opened in 2004. 

The 12-Hour Bolognese

I used to think Martha Stewart was high maintenance -- but that was before I encountered Heston Blumenthal.

Yes, the man -- chef/owner of the three Michelin-star Fat Duck in Bray, U.K. -- is a molecular gastronomy genius responsible for tongue-boggling dishes like powdered anjou pigeon and scrambled egg and bacon ice-cream.  

But let's take something like, say, bolognese, one of the most basic dishes in classic Italian cooking. It should be fairly easy to make ... well, except that this is Blumenthal we're talking about.

His bolognese recipe includes this instruction: "Cook for at least six hours." And this would be taking place after a good two hours or so of cooking and prep work.

By the time my Blumenthal bolognese was done, it was 4:30 a.m. and the ragu had taken a total of 12 hours to make. I was mad at my oven, my bolognese -- while also plotting a trip to Bray to give Blumenthal a piece of my mind.

But then I had my first spoonful of the ragu, a rich and muscular concoction that was beefy and hefty but also so, so, so sweet. Each morsel had just the slightest hint of licorice and the beef was so tender that I wondered if it was possible that I was actually feeling it melt on my tongue.

It was, in short, a joy to eat.

Leftover Turkey Hash Brown Quiche: Dieters Beware

As much as I love Thanksgiving, I may adore the days after the holiday even more.

One word: Leftovers.

Sure turkey dinners with stuffing and corn pudding that have been doused in so much gravy that you have a thick, glistening brown moat on your plate are unbeatable. But this is also a great time to rev up your creativity in the kitchen.

What to do with your mounds of leftover turkey? Our Let's Lunch bunch -- a group of far-flung home cooks who have a monthly lunch date on Twitter -- decided to tackle this question for December.

My answer? A garlicky turkey hash brown quiche.