Hangover Helper

Woo I overdid it last night, and yet for some reason, I still couldn't sleep past 10:00 this morning. This getting old thing, sucks, for sure.

One of my worst habits is going grocery shopping while I'm still intoxicated from the night before. These trips are never inexpensive, and I usually wind up with a ton of junk food, which I VERY rarely buy in more sober circumstances. Today, I woke up craving Ropa Vieja, which translates to "old clothes". It's Cuban, I think, but the Venezuelans have a version as well. Oddly enough, I got it out of a Mexican cookbook. Whatever, I don't get it either.

One thing I do get, though, is that Ropa Vieja is delicious. Completely delicious. Staggeringly delicious. This dish is the Edward Cullen of food, ugh, I can't believe I just made a Twilight reference, this hangover is a nasty one.

Anyway, here's what you'll need to put this together yourself.

3ish lbs of cheap beef
1 yellow onion
1 can of pickled serrano chiles with carrots. They sell it in Mexican grocery stores and woo boy is that juice/oil hot. Don't put your finger in it.
A few cloves of garlic, smashed
A couple other random peppers if you feel like it
Water with boullion cubes, or beef stock (I forgot beef stock, ugh)
A tablespoon or so of kosher salt
A tablespoon or so of cumin
Chili powder

I think that's it, just throw in Mexican tasting crap.

So, to start. Grab your crock pot. Throw the meat into it. Add the spices directly on top of the meat. Add the rest of the stuff into the pot. Um, it's not hard.

Set the crock pot depending on how long you want it to take. I got started around 11:00, and I wanted to eat before midnight, so I stuck it on high. About 5 hours later, it was tender enough to cut with a fork. That's what you're looking for (um, in case you've never done meat in a crockpot before). Reserve your liquid because it is wonderful.

So let it cool down unless you're a total masochist, and then shred your beef.

You'll want to get a big frying pan ready. Stick it on medium high heat, add a couple tablespoons of vegetable oil, and add the beef as you shred it to save time. Once it's in there, add a few ladles full of the cooking liquid. Try to catch a few peppers while you're fishing for broth.

I have no idea how long this step actually takes because I've never paid proper attention, but you'll know it's done when the Maillard Reaction takes place and the beef becomes crunchy. The broth will evaporate leaving behind concentrated, awesome, amazing flavor in the meat.

Once this is done, serve it up on flour tortillas with chopped radishes (trust me on this), guacamole, and queso fresco if you can find it. If your grocery store doesn't carry queso fresco (or if you were too hungover to remember it), any sort of Mexican cheese blend will do in a pinch.

Another thing you can do while waiting for the beef to crisp is to throw together side dishes! YAY! Sean calls these my "fancy beans". You'll need:

1 can corn, drained (I like the no salt added stuff, but whatever)
1 can black beans, drained and rinsed
4 cloves of garlic, smashed and chopped
1 shallot, chopped
1 jalepeno, chopped and seeds removed
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp kosher salt
1 tsp chili powder
A couple ladles full of the meat liquid

This couldn't be any easier. Cook the garlic, shallots, and jalepenos for a minute or so, until the garlic and shallots are translucent. Then, add the rest of the crap and cook it for as long as you want. I keep telling Sean that this is one of the easiest things I make, but he continues to act impressed. I'll take it.

Speaking of Sean, he went to Sam's to pick up some provisions, and look, he's back. Just in time. Everything looks done. Time to feast.

Chicken n Stars, this is not.

I like to experiment in the kitchen a lot. It's only food. Who cares if the potatoes are a little overdone or if the dish is a wee bit too spicy. Too much garlic? No such thing. Well, there *used* to be no such thing. Now I know better (thanks, worst hummus ever!).

Sometimes when I attempt a new dish, I start to fancy myself the second coming of Julia Child, but in my case, I don't need no stinking school to master cooking. Pshaw. It's my God-given talent, or so I think. It's usually in these moments, these manic episodes of quasi-foodie pretense, that I commit my most spectacular failures. Usually those failures occur in the form of burnt consumables, but they often happen with completely unbalanced flavors that render the dish inedible by anybody but my husband Sean, who will eat pretty much anything.

Which brings me to my point. Sean just had surgery on his face, and it hurts him to chew, so he's on a soft foods diet, nothing too spicy. I decided to try making chicken noodle soup. It's not rocket science, but given my tendencies for massive kitchen cock-ups, I'd rather just go the Campbell's route, dig? But I'm off work today, and I've got nothing better to do but watch Grey's Anatomy DVD's and play World of Warcraft, so why not.

I couldn't find a recipe I like online, so here's what I'm going to try.

1 chicken, cut into parts (or go lazy and get country style), giblets set to the side
1 cup diced onion
1/2 cup diced celery, plus 2 stalks roughly chopped
1/2 cup diced carrots, plus 2 carrots roughly chopped
A few cloves of garlic, 3 or 4 smushed, 1 or 2 diced
1 shallot, diced
A couple tablespoons of bouquet garni
Cajun seasoning to taste (but on the light side if you're making this for somebody whose face has been recently sliced open)
2 bay leaves (whose purpose I haven't quite figured out, but I've got them, so why not?)
1 tsp marjoram
1 tsp tarragon
Egg noodles (the quantity? I've got no freakin' clue)
Olive oil
Butter (once again, no idea how much)
Flour (same untold amount as butter)
Black pepper to taste

So here's what I've done so far.

1. Take your chicken and roast it in pieces. Rub it down with olive oil, a tablespoon or so of the cajun seasoning, and a tablespoon or so of bouquet garni. Cook it at 400 degrees for about an hour or until the chicken is quite well done.
2. Take your giblets (and mine included a bonus breastbone! YAY!) and stick em in a big pot with two quarts of water, some cajun seasoning, marjoram, a bay leaf, tarragon, and your roughly chopped celery and carrots, and the four smashed cloves of garlic. Stick it on medium for, I dunno, an hour?

And here's what I'm planning on doing.

3. Once the chicken is done, take it out of the oven and let it cool down. Feel free to snack on the wings because there isn't a lot of meat on them anyway. Also, you don't really need the legs, so eat them (or set them aside). Chop up the breasts and thighs and set them aside. Oh and save the juices from the pan. That's good stuff.
4. Drain the liquid from the pot o guts and set it aside. If you happen to know any nasty people, let them eat the giblets (ugh). Otherwise, discard the stuff that you just lovingly boiled.
5. Wipe out the pot that you used for the make-shift stock. Go get, oh, I don't know, three tablespoons of butter? That sounds good. Melt three tablespoons of butter and add your onions, celery, carrots, diced garlic and shallots. Cook em until they're softened, I don't know, maybe 10 minutes?
6. Once the onions are kind of clear (and ideally before the garlic burns), throw in three tablespoons of flour and create a roux. Once it reaches a color you find pleasing and the room starts smelling nutty, stir in the makeshift stock and chicken drippings. Add the chicken.
7. Now, here's where I have no idea what's going to happen. Maybe two cups of noodles? I think I'll make sure that the veggies are fully cooked before adding the noodles since I don't want to overcook those. Overcooked veggies > overcooked noodles.
8. Taste frequently and adjust spices accordingly. Oh yeah, go ahead and add another bay leaf. Maybe some parsley. That would be pretty good. Keep extra stock on hand in case your stuff boils down too hard.
9. I'm assuming that once the noodles are done, so is the soup? Well I guess we'll see, shall we?

I think I'm about to move on to step 3 once I get motivated. I'm comfy, and this shit isn't going to burn anyway.

Just checked on the patient (my husband, not the chicken), and he was sleeping blissfully. Now it appears that he's smelled food and is going to move in its general direction. If it were me, the only movement I'd make right now would be towards the bottle of vicodin.

Ok, that's it. I hope it doesn't suck. It's probably going to make a shitload of soup, and that's ok with me if it's good. So long as I can get the noodles and veggies cooked right, I sincerely doubt this is going to fail. In fact, it might be one of my most triumphant experiments ever.