Fresh Vegetable Rice Paper Spring Rolls - Testing

https://cookieandkate.com/fresh-spring-rolls-recipe/#tasty-recipes-34271-jump-target

1 - The sauce totally rocks! The wraps, they need work. - the mint was too strong (too much? chop super fine? or left whole?) - the chives were the wrong texture (chop super fine?), they're unlike green onion tails. I was distracted by the textures, and Ben by the strong mint
2 - I don't know where the original recipe came from. I kept the sauce and replaced the spring rolls instructions.

3 - The sauce continues to be good. (This time I did not have hoisin sauce so I substituted with 2Tbsps. teriyaki sauce, 1.5 Tbsps. red wine vinegar and a pinch of Chinese 5 Spice). The filling is quite good but I wonder about adding something else, like a strip of pickled ginger, or Ben was suggesting tofu or scrambled egg. What are Asian scrambled eggs like?

Spring Rolls

2 oz bean thread noodles (cellophane noodles) OR rice vermicelli 

1 tsp toasted sesame oil

¼ tsp fine sea salt

1 cup torn butter lettuce, ribs removed

1 cup very thinly sliced red cabbage

2 medium carrots, peeled and cut into matchsticks or sliced into strips with a julienne peeler

2 Persian (mini) cucumbers or 1 small cucumber, thinly sliced or sliced into strips with a julienne peeler

2 medium jalapeños, ribs and seeds removed, thinly sliced

¼ cup thinly sliced green onions

¼ cup roughly chopped fresh basil

¼ cup roughly chopped fresh mint

8 sheets rice paper (spring roll wrappers)

1. To make the spring rolls: Bring a pot of water to boil and cook the noodles just until al dente, according to package directions. Drain, rinse them under cool water, and return them to the pot. Off the heat, toss the noodles with the sesame oil and salt, and set aside.
2. Fill a shallow pan (a pie pan or 9″ round cake pan works great) with an inch of water. Fold a lint-free tea towel in half and place it next to the dish. Make sure your prepared fillings are within reach. Combine the green onion, cilantro and mint in a small bowl, and stir.
3. Place one rice paper in the water and let it rest for about 20 seconds, give or take. You’ll learn to go by feel here—wait until the sheet is pliable but not super floppy. Carefully lay it flat on the towel.
4. Leaving about 1 inch of open rice paper around the edges, cover the lower third of the paper with a few pieces of butter lettuce, followed by a small handful of rice noodles, some cabbage, and a few strips of carrot, cucumber and jalapeño. Sprinkle generously with the herb mix.
5. Fold the lower edge up over the fillings, rolling upward just until the filling is compactly enclosed. Fold over the short sides like you would to make a burrito. Lastly, roll it up. Repeat with the remaining ingredients.
6. When you're done preparing the rolls, sprinkle with the chopped peanuts.

Sauce
½ cup natural creamy peanut butter
½ cup warm water
¼ cup fresh lime juice
2 Tbsps. soy sauce
4 teaspoons sugar
½ tsp Asian hot sauce 
3 tbsps. hoisin sauce
½ tsp toasted sesame oil
1 medium garlic clove, pressed

1. Just put everything in a bowl and whisk until it's smooth. 
2. Whatever chopped peanuts left over from sprinkling over the wraps, you can add to the sauce.

Testing - Teurgoule (Rice pudding from Normandy)

I love these kinds of recipes, because the history and method of preparation are intertwined. There are several slow-cook recipes that come from a time when each village had a communal oven where each household would bring their bread for the day to be baked. Once the bread was baked, the oven was still hot so, instead of wasting all that energy and making the most of the fuel used to heat it, people would put in slow-cooking dishes, seal up the oven and come back at the end of the day. This is one such recipe. Crazy easy, too. Now the trick is to get it just right.
This is a very slow cooking recipe - 4-7 hours. How, in the name of all that is reasonable, is it possible that such a recipe, traditional to boot, takes so long? It turns out to be fascinating and absolutely reasonable. Well, that is, if you cook with a wood-fired bread oven. To use as much of the energy created from the wood fire, after baking the bread, the still-hot oven was loaded with other dishes and sealed up, the original slow-cooker for, as the temperature very slowly decreased, the food would cook. This rice pudding is such a recipe, where today, we have to burn energy continuously in our modern ranges to get the same effect.

One of the effects of baking over such a long period of time is that a dark crust of dehydrated milk will form on the surface of the dish. Trust me, it does not taste good, but it`s by no means dangerous for you to try some for yourself to see - goodness knows that, because of all the warnings I got, I absolutely had to try a bit, and was able to confirm that everybody who tried it before me and warned me not to eat it, were absolutely correct. HOWEVER, the dessert inside had reduced into a sweet, unctuous pudding, the rice having completely melted into the sweetened milk.

I first saw this in Anne Willian's Look&Cook French Country Cooking book, where the recipe instructs one to reach under the crust with a spoon to stir every half hour. Please do not do this. Since, traditionally, this was sealed in a hot woodfired bread oven for several hours, there was no way to unseal the oven and loose all that heat every half hour just to stir. And it is really hard to do without disturbing the crust AND give it a good stir. It's one or the other. I'm still working out the ratios, but the tiny amount of rice, which I distrusted until I tried it, is absolutely essential. The milk reduces while cooking, and too much rice would create a dry, sweet rice, possibly burnt. Although I haven't tried, I also suspect that using a long grain rice like Basmati would not create as pleasing an effect, either (although I will likely try it, just to see!).

All of this blah-blah for a relatively simple recipe:

1/3 cup round rice
5 cups whole milk (or cream?)
1/3 cup sugar (or 1/4 cup?)
pinch of salt
2 teaspoons of cinnamon

1. In an oven-proof bowl, mix in together the rice, sugar, cinnamon and salt. Make sure the bowl is bigger than the volume of the ingredients to make sure there is no boiling over.
2. Pour in the milk (no need to mix).
3. Place in the oven and turn on at a temperature of 300F.
4. Bake for 4 hours (I haven't tried longer. I suspect I'd have to reduce the temperature if I did).

Hot and Dry Barbecue Chicken - Test 1

http://bbq.about.com/od/rubrecipes/r/bl50617d.htm

1 - Delicious. Try rubbing on olive oil before applying the rub.

2 - Continues to be delicious. I omitted the garlic powder and liked it very much without it. And I spruced up the chicken-cooking part.

1/4 cup paprika
2 tablespoons salt, finely ground
2 tablespoons sugar
1 tablespoon mustard powder
2 tablespoons chilli powder
2 tablespoons ground cumin
1 tablespoon ground black pepper
1 tablespoon garlic powder
1 tablespoon cayenne

1 - 2 Tbsps vegetable oil
1 chicken, butterflied (also known as spatchcock)

1. Mix all the seasonings and spices together. You'll only need a couple Tbsps per chicken and the rest keeps well in a tightly sealed container.
2. Spachcock the chicken using kitchen scissors by cutting out the spine, opening the carcass and pressing firmly down on the breastbone to flatten the breast. 
3. Massage the oil on both sides of the meat, then sprinkle on the seasoning (ironically rubbing it in just helps it stick to your hands and clumps it on the skin of the chicken). Allow it to mellow for 30 to 90 minutes in the refrigerator.
4. On a gas barbecue, light it and close the lid, allowing the temperature to reach 500F.
5. Turn the heat down to Medium or 325-350F turn off one of the elements to cook the chicken over indirect heat.
6. Put chicken on bone side down. Close the lid and cook for about 40-50 minutes or, until the internal temperature of the thigh reaches 180F or, until juices run clear. 
7. Once cooked put the chicken on a plate and tent for about 10 minutes for the juices to even out in the meat. Serve as desired.