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CP Chefs Pass

Ok, here are the puts and takes I'm thinking about:

T: #21, Padron 1964 Diplomatico Maduro P: OpusX Reserva D'Chateau from 2006
T: #26, Punch Corona P: Bolivar Royal Corona from 08
T: #31, Tatuaje Noella Reserva P: Casa Fuente Corona Gorda from 2008

Let me know if these look ok to everyone. Thanks!
I'm going to have to deny the Noella Reserva trade. Simply because I wanted it. Try again.
 
This is one of my favorite recipes for Pork Sui Mai. These are little steamed noodle dumplings that are served in Dim Sum restaurants. I have adapted it to my personal preferences and have made a few dozen batches. It's kind of time consuming but they are delicious! The meat can be ground pork, chicken, beef, whatever you like.

Recipe:

1 pound of ground meat of your choice (I prefer ground pork)
1 teaspoon salt
1.5 tablespoons sesame oil
2 tablespoons thinly sliced green onions
1 tablespoon cornstarch
1.5 teaspoons grated ginger
1/4 teaspoon of white pepper
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1 egg white
1-2 cloves of garlic, preferably put through a press.
3 tablespoons of saki (I use dry sake)
1 1/2 tablespoons of soy sauce
3 tablespoons of bamboo shoots (you have to blanch these)

1 package of fresh round won-ton wrappers (about 50 wrappers I think), usually available in the fresh pasta area of the supermarket.

To blanch the bamboo shoots, boil a pot of water, then throw in the shoots for about 3 minutes or so, then remove them from the water and run under cold water until they are cooled off. Then slice the bamboo shoots into a very fine dice.

Now put it all into a bowl and mix it up really good. I use an electric mixer for this. You want to make sure all the ingredients are well mixed, so mix it up for a few minutes.

Now, get your won-ton wrappers ready. What you want to do is take a small ball of the mixture and put it into the middle of the wrapper and kind of make a little "bowl" with the won-ton wrapper to hold the filling. Then after you form the little dumpling, set it on the counter and kinda push it down a little to make the bottom flat so it sits nice in the steamer. Repeat this 50 times. (that's where the time consuming part comes in)

Once you've made all your little dumplings, you can begin steaming them. I use a rice cooker that has a steamer tray, but you can use a bamboo steamer also. Whatever you end up using, make sure its sprayed with non-stick spray so they come off easy. Steam the dumplings for 7 1/2 minutes then let cool for about 5 minutes.
 
This is my hot sauce recipe. Every year I make about 3 gallons of it as soon as habaneros are at a reasonable price. This is a tabasco style vinegar based sauce that is extremely spicy.

I recommend having some sort of respirator or face protection while making this, as well as a couple box fans going to vent the air. And don't forget to wear gloves! You don't want to have to go use the restroom and find out what happens when you touch yourself after handling pounds of sliced habanero peppers! This might seem extreme, but wait until the peppers start steaming in the boiling vinegar, the room will become very painful to be in! :D

This recipe can be doubled, tripled, quadrupled, or like I do, 10 times the recipe.

Recipe:

1 pound of habanero peppers
2 cups distilled white vinegar
2 teaspoons kosher salt

First prep your peppers. You'll need to take the stems off of all of the peppers and give them a good washing:
DSCN0889.jpg


Then start feeding them into the food processor to slice them. Don't create a puree, you want to slice them thin so they look like this:
DSCN0895.jpg


Now, get a large pot or saucepan and pour in the vinegar. Heat it until it comes close to a boil, then add your sliced habaneros and salt. make sure if you're making a double recipe or larger that you keep the ratio of salt, vinegar, and peppers correct. Once the peppers and salt are added to the boiling vinegar, cook the peppers for 5 minutes. This is when the kitchen will become a hazard, don't forget your breathing protection! Remove from the heat after 5 minutes and pour into a bowl and let it cool for a while. Now, get your blender ready. Pour the mixture into the blender and liquefy it until its a smoothie like consistency. Then you want to place it into a container and let it sit in the fridge for about a month.

After a month passes, its time to strain it! Since the peppers still had all the seeds in them and maybe stems or other unwanted stuff, this is important. Get a siv or a very fine mesh strainer. Pour some of the sauce into the strainer and work it around with a spoon so all that's left behind in the strainer is the pulp from the peppers. Repeat this process until it's all strained into a new container.

That's it! Now you have hot sauce. I've also had success replacing some of the habaneros with cayannes and thai hot peppers. You can play around with it as long as you keep the weight ratio the same.
 
Ok, I confirmed Bfisher88's shipping address, so this will ship out tomorrow via USPS Priority, Delivery Confirmation™ Label Number: 0103 8555 7495 5407 3007. Thanks for letting me play Gonz! :D
 
This is my hot sauce recipe. Every year I make about 3 gallons of it as soon as habaneros are at a reasonable price. This is a tabasco style vinegar based sauce that is extremely spicy.

I recommend having some sort of respirator or face protection while making this, as well as a couple box fans going to vent the air. And don't forget to wear gloves! You don't want to have to go use the restroom and find out what happens when you touch yourself after handling pounds of sliced habanero peppers! This might seem extreme, but wait until the peppers start steaming in the boiling vinegar, the room will become very painful to be in! :D

This recipe can be doubled, tripled, quadrupled, or like I do, 10 times the recipe.

Recipe:

1 pound of habanero peppers
2 cups distilled white vinegar
2 teaspoons kosher salt

First prep your peppers. You'll need to take the stems off of all of the peppers and give them a good washing:
DSCN0889.jpg


Then start feeding them into the food processor to slice them. Don't create a puree, you want to slice them thin so they look like this:
DSCN0895.jpg


Now, get a large pot or saucepan and pour in the vinegar. Heat it until it comes close to a boil, then add your sliced habaneros and salt. make sure if you're making a double recipe or larger that you keep the ratio of salt, vinegar, and peppers correct. Once the peppers and salt are added to the boiling vinegar, cook the peppers for 5 minutes. This is when the kitchen will become a hazard, don't forget your breathing protection! Remove from the heat after 5 minutes and pour into a bowl and let it cool for a while. Now, get your blender ready. Pour the mixture into the blender and liquefy it until its a smoothie like consistency. Then you want to place it into a container and let it sit in the fridge for about a month.

After a month passes, its time to strain it! Since the peppers still had all the seeds in them and maybe stems or other unwanted stuff, this is important. Get a siv or a very fine mesh strainer. Pour some of the sauce into the strainer and work it around with a spoon so all that's left behind in the strainer is the pulp from the peppers. Repeat this process until it's all strained into a new container.

That's it! Now you have hot sauce. I've also had success replacing some of the habaneros with cayannes and thai hot peppers. You can play around with it as long as you keep the weight ratio the same.

Now that is a lot of Habaneros. You might want to add DO NOT TOUCH YOUR EYES after handling them.
 
ok, the pass is away!

..... And don't forget to wear gloves! You don't want to have to go use the restroom and find out what happens when you touch yourself after handling pounds of sliced habanero peppers! ....

hehe, been there done that! :D
 
OK, the first post is updated, this thing is moving right along!

And I've chosen the winner of the first contest, ironpeddler! I'm impressed by his love of this kitchen tool(s), and all the things he could think of off the top of his head that he uses it for!

Ironpeddler, I'll get a little something out to you this week, thanks for the great description of your chefs skillet!

My favorite cooking implement? I'll give you guys two...my 13" chefs skillet and a fork.

I use my 'Everything Pan' for...everything...pretty much every day. I sauté garlic, onions, shallots & veggis...plus wilt greens. Fry various cutlets & fish fillets, brown different cuts of beef, braise chops & steaks, pan sear prime rib, veal & pork chops, grill chicken breasts & flank steak, make sauces, reductions, combine ingredients with different pastas to bring meals right to the table, stir fry every type of meat, veggi & seafood. For breakfast, omelettes, pancakes, fried & scrambled eggs, hash browns, grits, bacon & sausage....and sausage gravy. I even make corn bread and brownies in it. You name it, I do it with this pan...from stove top to oven to grill. I couldn't live without it.

As for the fork, that's the one utensil I use to flip, grab, beat, whip, add, remove, pick-up, transfer, stir and move stuff around with. I'm Italian, we use a fork for everything!
 
All ready for it here. I'll take a look through the list and get an idea of my PTs tonight.
 
Chimichurri Steak

There are five critical elements to this dish the way I prepare it. The steak, corn reduction, onion rings, chimichurri sauce and ahi. The ahi is optional but I feel it balances the plate out and adds a freshness, and the people I have made this for tend to agree. For the steak I usually use tenderloin/filets but this particular time I had just picked up a loin of prime NY Strip so I decided to make the best of it. Here is what you will need for 3-4 people. Adjust accordingly if you are serving more or less.

3 Steaks- I usually serve Filet in ~10-12 oz portions but this time I used NY strip prime and it was excellent.
1/2-2/3 lb fresh wild sashimi grade ahi (Optional, as an accompaniment)

For the corn reduction:
Four ears of corn (I use white corn but there is no reason to avoid others)
1 1/2 tbsp butter unsalted
salt and pepper to taste (I use virtually none for this element of the dish)

For the chimichurri sauce

1 bunch of Italian Parsley
1/2 cup of cilantro
3 cloves garlic
1/3-1/2 cup of red wine vinegar (let your taste of the final mixture key you in as to whether you should add more than 1/3 cup)
1 cup olive oil
1 tbsp roasted cumin
1 tsp flaked red pepper
2 tsp salt
pepper to taste

For the onion rings

~1 cup rice flour
~1 cup beer
1 large yellow onion

For the Ahi
1 scallion/green onion (cut up the white part and sprinkle on top of the sauce at the very end)
1/4 cup soy sauce
1/8 cup mirin
2 tsp sesame oil
1 tbsp sriracha
1/2 teaspoon wasabi
1/4 tsp ginger powder
1/4 tsp 5 spice powder
1/8 cup coconut vinegar or rice wine vinegar
(Simply mix all these together to creat a light sauce for the ahi)

The cooking

Heat your grill to high or your oven to whatever temp you like cooking your steaks at. If you are using a pan you can heat it up later in the process. Heat oil to 350 degrees. Obviously you will either need a deep pan, a deep fryer or a dutch over type device and an oil thermometer for this. I use a Le Creuset pot (one of the big ones). If you don't have access to anything you can deep fry in I guess you can just forget about the onion rings but it won't be as impressive/delicious.

First take the steaks out of the fridge so they can get to room temp before you cook them. Then shuck all your corn and get a bowl or baking dish deep enough to hold a fair amount of thick liquid.

Using a box grater on the coarse side, puree the corn into the dish until all kernels have been shaved off the ears. Set aside while you prepare the chimichurri sauce.

Using a food processor or blender chop up all the non-liquid ingredients of the chimichurri sauce, then when thoroughly chopped add the olive oil and red wine vinegar and mix until you have a smooth and somewhat thick sauce. Adjust it to your taste by adding salt, pepper, red wine vinegar and parsley if it needs to be thickened.

chimichurrigs7.jpg


Now you can put the corn 'puree' into a non-stick pan and heat over med-low. Let it thicken, stirring frequently, as you prepare the beer batter and get the steaks ready. I like to rub a little sea salt and pepper into my steaks but ymmv, do as you wish. I'm not going to tell you how to cook your steak. I like mine medium-rare and cooked on a grill but cook yours as you wish, if you don't know how find a man to help you figure it out (or use google :D ). Get your onion peeled and sliced nice and thin. You don't want burger joint onion rings here, this is a classy dinner. Mix the rice flour and beer to create a nice thick batter. At about this point your corn should be thickening and you should add in the butter and salt/pepper. It is also time to start actually cooking your steaks.

steaksbc1.jpg


While your steaks are on the grill/oven/whatever mix all the ingredients for the ahi sauce together if you are using the ahi. If not ignore this step. Slice your sashimi so it is ready to plate when everything is finished. No reason for your guests to sit around waiting for you to slice fish. When this is done the corn should be thoroughly mixed with the now melted butter and can be reduced to low heat just to keep it warm. Still stir it occasionally while waiting for the steaks to finish so it doesn't clump up.

ahikt8.jpg


Now go ahead and make your onion rings (yeah we all know you were waiting for that part). Just LIGHTLY coat the onion slices in the beer batter and dip then into the oil. Once they have turned a light golden brown and are beginning to float remove them and let them drain on some paper towels. Assuming this coincides with your steaks being done, let the steaks rest for 5 minutes while you finish making the onion rings. When ready, layer the plates with the corn reduction, then cut the steaks in half and place on top of the corn. Place the onion rings atop the steak and drizzle with the chimichurri sauce. If you are using the ahi slices go ahead and orient them off the corn and drizzle the serving sauce over them. Now serve and eat! If you get complaints you probably fugged something up.

finalyb3.jpg
 
OK, the first post is updated, this thing is moving right along!

And I've chosen the winner of the first contest, ironpeddler! I'm impressed by his love of this kitchen tool(s), and all the things he could think of off the top of his head that he uses it for!

Ironpeddler, I'll get a little something out to you this week, thanks for the great description of your chefs skillet!

My favorite cooking implement? I'll give you guys two...my 13" chefs skillet and a fork.

I use my 'Everything Pan' for...everything...pretty much every day. I sauté garlic, onions, shallots & veggis...plus wilt greens. Fry various cutlets & fish fillets, brown different cuts of beef, braise chops & steaks, pan sear prime rib, veal & pork chops, grill chicken breasts & flank steak, make sauces, reductions, combine ingredients with different pastas to bring meals right to the table, stir fry every type of meat, veggi & seafood. For breakfast, omelettes, pancakes, fried & scrambled eggs, hash browns, grits, bacon & sausage....and sausage gravy. I even make corn bread and brownies in it. You name it, I do it with this pan...from stove top to oven to grill. I couldn't live without it.

As for the fork, that's the one utensil I use to flip, grab, beat, whip, add, remove, pick-up, transfer, stir and move stuff around with. I'm Italian, we use a fork for everything!
Thanks Andy...I'm lovin' this Pass! Food & Cigars :thumbs:
 
Pass arrived today but I just now got home. Will be getting my PT's done tomorrow evening after work and this should be back on the road Saturday.
 
Alright this is embarrassing. I have not beenhome cause I worked all day so I could not get it done. And now I get home tonight, and there is a power outage in the city. I'm on my phone typing this so I can let you know. I work 8 to 6 tomorrow but since I can't get it done tonight then I can't get my girlfriend to ship it. So, this is going out Monday. I'm really sorry for the delay on this guys. Weird timing I guess.
 
Power just came back on. Doing PT now.

Alright here we go:

P: #46 AVO LE 08 T: #5 Cabaiguan Guapo
P: #47 Fuente BTL T: #45 Casa Fuente Corona Gorda
P: #48 AVO 80th T: #18 LFD BTB 08
P: #49 Illusione MK
P: #50 CAO LX2 Robusto

Gonz this will be going out tomorrow Monday. I may need to change some of these now that I look at it and I have no time at all tomorrow. Argghhh sorry for the bad timing fellas.
 
Power just came back on. Doing PT now.

Alright here we go:

P: #46 AVO LE 08 T: #5 Cabaiguan Guapo
P: #47 Fuente BTL T: #45 Casa Fuente Corona Gorda
P: #48 AVO 80th T: #18 LFD BTB 08
P: #49 Illusione MK
P: #50 CAO LX2 Robusto

Gonz this will be going out tomorrow Monday. I may need to change some of these now that I look at it and I have no time at all tomorrow. Argghhh sorry for the bad timing fellas.

I'm not sure on the first one, the msrp on both is about the same, they are both limited editions, but I think the production run on that Guapo was smaller and it was from a couple years ago. I can't find that Guapo size (the 54 ring guage with the pigtail) anywhere in stock anymore whereas the LE 08's can still be had for about $10-$11ish. I think it's probably close enough though, since I still think this is supposed to be fun, not nickel and diming.

The second one I don't think would work though, since the BTL, while hard to find, still has an msrp of $13.50 vs. $18 on the CG from Casa Fuente. The CG's are only easier to find assuming you live in Vegas or know a Vegas member that will pick them up and ship to you.

The third one looks great.

Let me know what you think, or if anyone else has some input let's hear it!
 
Alright I'll tweak this tomorrow evening when I get off work and ship it out on Monday.
 
regarding favorite cooking equipment. My Weber genesis series was already mentioned. My electric Brinkman smoker is great too. The wok is important but I vote for the Ice Mountain Ice Cream freezer.

electricfreezer.jpg
 
Alright I finally got to it this morning. Here is the updated list.

P: #47 Fuente BTL T: #5 Cabaiguan Guapo
P: #48 AVO 80th T: #18 LFD BTB 08
P: Cabaiguan WCD 120
P: AVO LE 08

This will be heading out this afternoon. Sorry about the delays guys. Life is a little insane for me right now. Headin' down to Oklahoma to Brandon.
 
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