You have to use these two ingredients. You have a well stocked pantry. A well stocky pantry is defined as the things you normally keep in your kitchen. What would you make with the featured ingredients?
You have to use these two ingredients. You have a well stocked pantry. A well stocky pantry is defined as the things you normally keep in your kitchen. What would you make with the featured ingredients?
Whoops, I didn’t really look at the reviews until I’d already posted the comment. I then watched about the first four dish reactions and they all sounded fairly clueless to me. On later shows, usually it’s a mix of a couple airheads and a couple knowledgeable food critics, such as Dr. Hatori. The real fascination, energy and spirit of the show comes from the food-prep stage, though.
Unfortunately that happens fairly often. The chefs themselves are really talented, and it’s pretty common for them to create a bunch of stuff that surprises the tasters by *not* tasting all that characteristic of the main ingredient. That’s partly why my personal first choice was to keep it simple and bake the pineapple. I’m thinking the resultant maillard reaction might be really interesting, as with baked apples or such.
I used to watch Iron Chef back in the late 20th century. I’m very familiar with the airhead / expert balance they worked for in the judges. I often felt that was an aspect missing from Chopped!
In this one even Chairman was all “we might need a new Iron Chef.” In America that’s potentially playful ribbing. In Japan that’s a full insult to one’s honor.
I’m still tripping over that pineapple gyoza. Might have to go watch how that was made. I have found gyoza is the best use for a rooster that has earned a trip to freezer camp. Minced, not ground.
Oh, okay. Aside from Iron Chef Japan and various recipe videos, I haven’t seen too much outside of the old, equally-hilarious Justin Wilson Cajun cooking show. Or Pete Schweddy from Delicious Dish on SNL. :P
In terms of crazy-ass Japanese game shows, I want to say it works because a massive point is to be outrageous in ways that one normally wouldn’t dare doing in ordinary society.
Hmm, why is that?
“Why is that?”
Roosters are lean. The meat is tough. That’s why you find typical rooster recipes are boiling or simmering for a long time like chicken and dumplings or Coq au Vin.
Gyoza benefit from the texture of that tough meat. If you grind it you remove that texture. It’s also lean with very little fat. Ground meat loves fat. But by mincing it you get all the flavor without adding fat. You get a satisfying flavor and toothiness.
We have a general “no roosters rule” but sometimes they are unavoidable. We let them live their best life until they become a danger to the hens or my wife is tired of getting attacked first thing in the morning when she lets them out.
That’s when they go to freezer camp. With gyoza I can make a big batch from one rooster. One of the other issues with roosters is that despite their size they don’t have a lot of meat on them. So you might get one meal from the other popular recipes. But with gyoza you are bumping up the meal value with cabbage and other things. You can get 40 gyoza from a single bird. And you don’t need to eat them all at once.
I make the gyoza and place them on a baking sheet and freeze them before tossing them in a freezer bag. Now I have quick fix meals for the future. I can deep fry, air fry, steam or pan fry them and have a quick meal after a long day.
So that’s why gyoza and why minced instead of ground.
Interesting stuff, thanks.
I do happen to like momos / gyoza, but have never made them 100% by hand. I’ll have to see if they have rooster at the local grocery. (hmm, I wonder what coq au vin or curried rooster would be like as dumpling-filler?)
I don’t know of any grocery that sells roosters. Due to economics all chicken for sale in grocery stores are females. The males are disposed of in vast quantities on the day they hatch in one of the most crushing aspects of factory farming. But here is the real rub, most of them are disposed of pretty quickly in non factory farms too. Rooster genocide is one of the dirty secrets of all chicken farms.
In the summer time all the roosters that were intentional or accidentally got by backyard chicken owners end up on Facebook in posts like “looking to re-home my sweet baby boy rooster.”. That’s about the time they turn six months old and start being a menace. But you can’t re-home a rooster. Because everyone is trying to re-home their roosters too.
Hmm, okay. I didn’t realise it was as skewed as all that. So the main problem with roosters is what? Their general aggression and loud crowing?
Factory farming is horrific from almost every angle I know of as a layman, but I was also exposed to the idea that “free-range” chickens (and other animals I guess) can also be effectively BS. The idea that you can give them an open area to the outside from their habitat enclosure, but with no significant food there and/or generally unpleasant conditions, there might be stronger reason for them to simply stay in their enclosure for the most part, even if crowded and filthy.
At the commercial level they don’t put on weight like hens so less profit. And even with Cornish cross needing to be processed at exactly 8 weeks old their roosterness makes humanely raising them cost prohibitive.
Free range chickens means that they are in a giant building with thousands of others. Very different from pasture raised which actually get to go outside, see sunlight and eat bugs. But pasture raised there is an increased risk of bird flu. And the current strain of bird flu is nearly 100% lethal in birds. So that’s a huge insurance risk.
It’s all money. Every single consideration comes down to profit.
Thanks. So “caged” - can barely move around. “Free range” - can move within a giant, filthy enclosure. “Pasture” they can go outside and do stuff.
I think it was the “pasture” angle I was thinking of. As in, in some cases they’re labelled such as more of a technicality than anything else, but are only let out during limited hours, to a limited “outside” space that might be of no real interest to them. For profit.
Searching my bookmarks, I think it was probably the Craig Watts thread I was referencing. I’ll give that a re-read in coming days.
That’s one of the things about the current industrial processes that I don’t get. Capons (neutered roosters) used to be prized over regular chicken, and they’re much easier to keep than regular roosters. You’d think someone would try diverting at least some of the male chicks from the macerator to market as “Premium Chicken” or something.
They aren’t worth the surgery costs. Literally more profitable to hatch, sex, trash half the results. A couple of years ago some company was claiming they could sex eggs but I haven’t checked to see if that was actually legit or if the cost was more than it was worth.
Isn’t there also a chemical method to do it? I’m not a chicken farmer though. Maybe even with that it doesn’t make sense economically.
Still though, it feels like there’s an opportunity there that a creative marketing campaign could exploit to transform what’s currently a waste product into something more valuable. If not “Premium Chicken” then maybe “Ethical Rooster Meat” or an “Eat the patriarchy!” angle or something. Selling the sizzle rather than the steak, so to speak…