Queezle_Sister's Reviews
5 recipe(s) reviewed. Showing 1 to 5Sort by: Title 
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Simply Ming: Easy Techniques for East-Meets-West Meals
By Ming Tsai, Arthur Boehm
Clarkson Potter - 2003
Asian Sloppy Joes : page 53
Sloppy joes are mostly made in the traditional way - sautéed onions, celery, and browned meat. Flavor in part comes by using beef and pork. But then the magic happens. You add diced tomatoes (we used the last of our garden's roma, but really canned would have served just fine), and the Hoisin-lime sauce.
My husband called this "a screaming 5" and "the best sloppy joe I've ever had".
It certainly satisfies, and it truly is an east-meets-west recipe.
It takes about 1 hour to prepare this (assuming the sauce is already made), and so its quite possible for a week night meal.
useful (1)
This dish made a pleasant dinner, and surprisingly, I had nearly all the ingredients at hand. The recipe calls for marinading your salmon with this, which was wonderful.
The salmon cooking technique was interesting - broil with skin side up - and watch to make sure the skin does not burn. This is a great method as it keeps the fish really moist. It was the first time using my broiler, and I was cautious to put the broiling pan at the middle of the oven, but the skin almost burned. I ended up flipping the fish to top side up for the final 2 minutes, and it turned out really well.
The other component to this recipe is the Umeboshi Rice. Umeboshi are small pickled plums, and on their own they are really salty, but cut into small pieces and tossed with the rice they were a great complement to the rich salmon. Probably this is a guest-worthy recipe.
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Hoisin-Lime Sauce : page 46
This recipe largely uses commercial Hoisin sauce, and so its quality will determine your final product. To the hoisin, you add minced ginger, minced garlic, lime juice, and some oil.
These additions turn Hoisin sauce from that cloyingly sweet substance to a better rounded flavor profile.
Note that Hoisin comes from Asia, and so happily - no high fructose corn syrup!
This is one of the "master recipes" in this cookbook. It is followed by 3 recipes that use this master to prepare a food selection.
I was able to prepare this sauce in about 15 minutes during our morning getting-ready-for-school-and-work rush. Whew.
useful (1)
Hoisin-Roasted Duck with Sweet Potatoes : page 50
My first duck, and don't look at my picture too closely, or you'll realize I cooked it upside down!
The duck marinaded in the Hoisin-Lime master recipe for about 24 hours. Sweet potatoes were cut in wedges, mixed with some sliced onions, and then this potato-onion mixture serves as a bed for the roasting duck.
I had never realized the copious fat that is packed all over a duck! I pulled off what fat I could see, but most seems to be just under the skin - and all the skin. The roasting duck drips over the potato-onion mix, making it taste amazing. The duck looked beautiful, although it took longer to cook through than the suggested time (about another 15 minutes). There is not so much meat on a duck (which is why a 5-6 lb duck only serves 3-4). My family was not enthusiastic about this, though if you can get past the skin, the meat is delicious.
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Miso-Citrus Marinade : page 144
This marinade was wonderful - with sake, ponzu, white miso, and fresh ginger. In place of sake, I used Shaoxing wine (suggested on several food sites, such as chowhounds), and I realized once committed to the recipe that I had the wrong type of Ponzu. The recipe specifies ponzu that is not prepared with soy sauce. So, because ponzu provides a citrus flavor, I substituted fresh grapefruit juice.
Note that as with other recipes in this book, this recipe makes a lot of marinade. I prepared less than 1/2 batch, and it was plenty for about 1.5 lbs of salmon.
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