Why making Banh Mi at Home Sounds like a Good Plan

CHEFTALK

Why making Banh Mi at home sounds like a good plan

Reading around lately I noticed a number of pretty contradicting trends in the American fast food businesses. Pizza Hut announced to forgo their plans to introduce ‘skinny’ healthy pizzas. Dominos tried to introduce healthy pizzas earlier, but apparently they also hit a wall of non –acceptance from the public, same reason why Pizza Hut abandoned the idea. 

I noted a couple of articles ago that one of the food trends of 2014 was healthy Gourmet Pizza’s, a trend seemingly growing fast in the US, the move sounded therefore surprising.

A few days later, Vietnamese sandwich outlets were introduced by Yum, owners of Pizza Hut, and Taco Bell, among other famous fast food brand names, in an effort to introduce healthier items on the menu.

Why, Pizza Hut’s owners abandon healthy ‘skinny pizzas’ because they are rejected by the public and they believe that healthy Vietnamese sandwiches will be accepted is somewhat puzzling.

Healthy food is a very difficult to overcome issue for fast food companies, health food has perishable ingredients and perishable ingredients are very difficult to control for the staff. Except maybe for a salad here and there

Fast food does not hire chefs at store level, they have ‘workers’ (with due respect for the word) trained to prepare very simple food, that food has to be fool proof or the risk of contamination and more over cross-contamination reaches dangerous levels, something fast food companies cannot afford to happen.

Sales for a number of fast food chains, that entered China, went down by 20% last year due to some food safety scandals. Millions of dollars are needed to restore customer confidence and no fast food company is looking forward to that, let alone the image damage it causes.

No cooking here

A closer look at a fast food kitchen lay-out, may explain why that is so. 

Frozen foods are strictly separated from perishables and processed foods and handled by different staff members. The moment you mix the two, you have a recipe for disaster.

That is the main reason why fast food uses processed food. A pizza for example has a processed sauce, vegetables, processed meat and some processed cheese on top of the dough, when prepared, the raw pizza goes through a 473 F oven and is served, quite difficult to mess that up. 

Ingredients are replaced after a set period of time, so if everybody follows the rules, you can safely eat your pizza. The moment raw meat or fish enters the circle matters become tricky.

With burgers you see the same thing, a worker places a frozen burger patty on a hot plate or in a grilling machine, flips it over after the buzzer beeps, somebody else adds a slice of lettuce and a slice of tomato on top of a halved bun and the ‘burger man’ tops the patty, pack, serve, also difficult to mess it up.

The moment fresh (not frozen) meat has to be cooked with vegetables, all is lost and food safety control is out the window. The solution? When the pizza does not work for the public, choose a complete new concept and the public will welcome the idea, believing it has been invented by people going out of the way to make our life more exiting.

When you ask me, the best way to have a great Vietnamese sandwich (Banh Mi) is to make them yourself. Why? Well here is a good reason:

In the early 1980s, Vietnamese sandwiches were at the center of a food craze in the US, several peddlers ensued in a sort of food war, advertising prices as low $1 or $1.25. Obviously you got eventually what you paid for and the fast food masters know that benchmark.

Banh Mi is made with a light crispy baquette as a base; this kind of baquette is made with a mix of wheat and rice flour resulting in an airy crumb. They are available in Vietnamese and Chinese stores, bakeries or deli’s. The baquette is traditionally spread with (chicken) liver pate, topped with chili pepper, daikon and carrot pickles, protein is an option, roast chicken, grilled pork, chinese char siu pork and tofu are common.

I am pretty sure that you will not to find a traditional Banh Mi in the fast food. Simply because grilled, roast and barbequed meats are not processed meats and therefore very perishable. 

Focal point is the protein and when you have leftover vacuum packed grilled or roasted meat in your freezer you’re half way done.

Crunchy

Here is a recipe :   

1 small Vietnamese baquette

1 serving of grilled, roasted, or barbequed pork, chicken or beef

1 tbsp homemade mayonnaise

4 thin de-seeded cucumber strips

1 tbsp cilantro leaves

4 thin chili pepper slices (Jalapeno works fine)

1 tsp light soya sauce

Daikon and carrot pickle

Slice the baquette lengthwise in half and remove some of the inside (keep that for bread crumbs)

Spread the mayonnaise on the inside and layer all ingredients in the baquette. Top with the soya sauce and voila. Enjoy.

You can replace the mayonnaise with pate, if you like  

What a way to make perfect use of your vacuum packed meat you stored in the freezer.

If you have no homemade vacuum packed meat in your freezer start making some, you can find your vacuum sealer here:

  www.vacupack.com  for USA and www.vacupack.ca for Canada.

A delightful sandwich that will save you money as well, the fast food plans to charge you $7.50. 

By: Marinus Hoogendoorn

Vacuum Sealed Food and Food Safe Temperatures

CHEFTALK 

Vacuumed food and food safe temperatures

Vacuum sealing food is THE way to prolong shelf life, maintain freshness and to increase the overall quality of food, either by chilling, freezing or dry storage.  Vacuuming raw, cooked or dry food alone does not guarantee success, there is a little more to it.

Find your vacuum sealer here:   www.vacupack.com  for USA and www.vacupack.ca for Canada.

Every type of food, whether vacuum sealed or not vacuum sealed need to comply with a set of temperature measures to make them safe for consumption when they need storing for a period of time.

Enforcement at home

These temperature measures apply to all foods, raw, cooked, marinated and also dry foods. Guidelines have been set by various departments of public health, but often apply, or seem to apply to catering businesses and related food retailing businesses like supermarkets, restaurants and cafés, seldom have they referred to households. 

We all know that caterers need compliance with food safety measures, but how do these measure translate when we store and cook food at home. 

Caterers and food retailers basically do the same thing as what homemakers do at home. Food is ordered, received, stored and prepared, quantities may vary, but the principal remains the same.  

Main difference is that caterers and other food handling businesses are checked at intervals by enforcement officers where homemakers are not. Does this mean that we can rely on the integrity of caterers and supermarkets? 

The answer is NO! Homemakers have their own part to play.

When foods are sealed in a vacuum and left unchecked on a kitchen counter they are as much subject to spoilage in a caterer’s kitchen as they are in a domestic kitchen.

Safe temperatures

The danger zone lies between 41 F and 135 F. This is the temperature range bacteria love and multiply at rapid speed. Bacteria multiply individually, meaning one becomes two, two become four and four become eight. If you would start with one bacterium, (which is highly unlikely) you will have 4000 bacteria after 4 hours considering that particular bacteria multiplies every 30 minutes.

This proves the importance of food storage under refrigerated or frozen conditions.

Vacuum packing food, slows the process of bacterial growth considerably, but does not stop it, in fact nothing does, shelf life of vacuum sealed food becomes however interesting prolonged as the chart below will show.   

Vacuum for prolonged shelf life

Food	Stored in	Normal shelf life	Vacuum shelf life
Large cuts of meat, beef, poultry, lamb and pork	Freezer	6 months	2-3 years
Ground meat: beef, lamb, poultry, pork	Freezer	4 months	1 year
Fish	Freezer	6 months	2 years
Berries	Refrigerator	1-3 days	1 week
Cheeses, hard, semi, soft and pasteurized. Soft cheeses should not be vacuumed	Refrigerator	1-2 weeks	4-8 months
Cookies, crackers	Room temperature	1-2 weeks	3-6 weeks
Coffee beans	Freezer	6-9 months	2-3 years
Coffee beans	Room temperature	4 weeks	16 months
Tea	Freezer	6-9 months	2-3 years
Tea	Room temperature	4 weeks	16 months

 

 Source: Dr. G.K.York, Dept. of Food Science & Tech, U of California, Davis

It is important to note that laboratorial test are usually performed under perfect conditions, conditions homemakers cannot comply with, even if they want to.

Food Safety Guide Lines

We don’t walk around with thermometers when we do our grocery shopping, well at least I don’t. It is nevertheless good to keep some guide lines in mind which will help improve food safety standards.

·         Ensure to buy fresh meat and fish that has been stored in a chilled environment.

·         Avoid buying food in damaged packaging, for example: dented cans, damaged caps on jars and other sealed products.

·         Ensure that frozen food is in full frozen condition. (not half soft when handled)

·         When your travel time from store to home is longer than 30 minutes, store fresh food in a cooler box with frozen cooling elements.

·         Store food immediately in the respective storage, freezer or refrigerator, after returning home from the store.

·         Place a refrigerator thermometer in your refrigerator and check regularly if the temperature is constant.

Best temperatures for storage

Refrigerated potentially hazardous food	41 F or below
Frozen foods	0 F or below
Dry storage	50 – 70 F

    

When cooking food before vacuum seal storage, ensure to cool rapidly!

·         Do not cool at room temperature

·         Use an ice water bath to hasten cooling

·         Divide food in small units or spread it out to make a thin layer and refrigerate

·         Cool the food from boiling temperature to 70 F within 2 hours and then to 41 F within 4 hours.

·         Transfer to food to new clean vacuum seal bags, vacuum pack and freeze or chill immediately.

·         Thaw frozen food overnight in the refrigerator or on the defrost mode in your microwave.

·         Reheat food for consumption to 165 F  

A few simple measures and a bit of common sense, go a long way when it comes to food safety

By: Marinus Hoogendoorn

            

The Art of Charcoal Grilling and why you should Vacuum your Steaks

CHEFTALK

The art of charcoal grilling and why you should vacuum pack your steaks

The end of summer is nearing and while I am writing America celebrates Labor Day, for many the last blast of summer but hopefully the weather gods are in a good mood and give the barbecue fans among us a few more occasions to showcase what they love most.

Grilling meat over an open fire is as old as humanity itself which may explain why the craving for food grilled over charcoal is universal popular. Who doesn't like the experience of a garden setting with a barbecue on standby and a table full of marinated meat and vegetable goodies ready to get cooked with that lovely smoky, charred smell and flavor to it?

Does charcoal flavor meat

Flavorless

Among barbecue lovers there are two kinds of people, one group prefers the convenience of the electrical grill and there is the die- hard group that sticks to the real charcoal thing. Some may use brisket, others use hard wood lump, wood embers or extruded charcoal.

Some cooks or self- proclaimed chefs swear by a certain source of heat in the belief that it makes a difference when it comes to the flavor of the grilled piece of meat on your plate. There is even one who makes charcoal from animal bones; you can have your pork chop grilled over pork-bone charcoal in his restaurant. 

Well let me tell you that which ever type of charcoal you choose, it is not vital to the taste of the final product. The raw product (meat, fish and vegetables) is of primary importance together with your marinade and how you marinate. 

Charcoal consists of pure carbon, called char and made by burning wood in a low oxygen environment, a process that can take days to complete. All water, tar, hydrogen and methane get burned off and the remains are known as charcoal.

Lighting up

When ignited, the carbon combines with oxygen and forms carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, other gasses, water and significant amounts of energy. The amount of energy is much higher than heat from raw wood. Char burns steady and slow, produces more heat than wood, less smoke and fewer dangerous vapors.

A perfect charcoal burn produces little or no smoke; the vapors we experience are solely produced by the drippings from the marinated product we place on top of this heat. 

In practice charcoal is often not perfect and produces smoke when it is not fully ignited, when there is too little oxygen to vent the lot because new charcoal is added or the charcoal is not fully carbonized, this will add flavor to grilled products but is not the decisive factor that determines the flavor of the finished product.

If you master the perfect burning charcoal but love that smokiness to your meat, add some wood or a handful of wood chips to the barbecue and you get exactly that. 

Our noses can detect smoke at one part to a billion, which is like a droplet to an Olympic sized swimming pool, a little bit goes a long way. 

The deliciousness of the smoke comes from lignin, a complex molecule existing in wood but eliminated when wood is turned into charcoal. 

A good set of drippings from a great marinade and a bit of lignin is then also the secret to a successful barbecue.     

Smoke and drip for flavor

 Temperature is another factor; charcoal produces more, intense heat than wood and therefore  caramelization known as the Maillard (browning) reaction comes fast, it produces big flavors but can also destroy your carefully purchased and marinated meat and vegetables in an instance, the intense heat ensuring that caramelization turns into black burned meat or vegetables. Recognizable isn’t it?

To elude your party going down the drain make sure to have a ‘cooler’ section on the grill where you can park items that have achieved color but are not fully cooked yet, covering a part of your barbecue with a piece of aluminum foil works fantastic as well.  

Marinating, vacuuming your food

Clean, Safe, Delicious

Vacuuming sealing meat after adding seasoning or a liquid marinade to the bag opens the pores of the meat and allows faster and better penetration of the seasoning, if you decide to have meat with bones, like back ribs or chicken drumsticks on the barbeque and you want to marinate a few days in advance, vacuuming packing ensures that your meat is stored in a clean, safe environment, it will not dry out in the fridge and it prevents accidentally messing up your fridge by toppling the bowl over or placing something inside a bowl with marinating food. 

Vacuuming sealing your marinated food also allows you to expose your meat to the elements at the last minute ensuring better food safety.

A bit of science to keep in the back of your head, your vacuum sealer, a little help from the weather gods and as always: 

A well prepared successful barbeque dinner comes with Good food, Good company and a bit of smoke. 

Have fun and Enjoy! 

Find your vacuum sealer and vacuum bag details here:    .www.vacupack.com  for USA and www.vacupack.ca for Canada

By: Marinus Hoogendoorn   

Inspiring Canning Stories

CHEFTALK

Inspiring canning stories

Retort, canning, jarring, bottling, name it as you like, we should add pouching to the list of words for retort don’t you think so.

Retort experiences are quite inspiring when you listen to what people have to say about their canning adventures. Many of them are already canning since childhood, you know that ‘my grandmothers recipe thing’ that you find when people talk about cooking their favorite dish, I found the same experiences when I was looking for retort tales.

From here

                              

To here

                            

Many of them were really very inspiring and I like to share a few of them. If you are inspired after this read, share your story here and inspire others to eat healthy homemade food made with their own retort produce.


Inspirational

In abundance 

I found this story of a lady who says that she has been canning for 45 years now and started when she was with her, now husband, in college, the budget was tight and behind their house was a yard with apple trees, she gathered the apples and made apple sauce and apple butter from it. Canning is work she says, but unlike house work it is very rewarding to have rows of jewels on the shelf that you can pull out in winter and have the taste of summer.

Her favorite canning memory was that her daughter once called her in the middle of the night and asked how to can peaches; because her husband loved the mother’s canned peaches to bits. She gave her the recipe and her daughter has been canning ever since.  

Juicy and Succulent

Another lady said that she loved canning tomatoes, crushed and stewed with onions and peppers. She makes salsa’s, pizza sauce, taco sauce, pickled jalapenos, dill and sweet pickles, soups and apple pie filling from their own green house and garden. She grows a lot of vegetables on their 1 acre land and says ‘Yes it’s a lot of work but I have so much fun doing it’.

Then I loved this comment, ‘A trip to the local farmers market is better than taking a vacation for me,’ working with the herbs and vegetables I bring home with me extends the sensory experience I brought with me from the market.   

‘I can fresh produce and control what ingredients go into my family’s food and that makes me feel good. The reason that I retort, is the sense of accomplishment I feel when I watch my shelves fill up with food that is not only safe and healthy but which is as nourishing to my senses as it is to my body’.  How true

One man said, ‘the amount of money we have saved by canning produce from our garden is hard to say, but it is a considerable sum for sure. It involves hard work but an enormous sense of pride and an incredible feeling of accomplishment and living.

I did not want to waste to excess produce from my garden and started canning for that reason, I can tell you now that there is nothing than to open a packet of your own produced retort in the middle of winter and smell your garden, said another contributor. 

Yes it may be harder work then going to the grocery store but knowing what is in my own produced retort, or maybe more importantly, what is not in it, justifies all the effort.

Homemade

He added that he makes tomato sauce, chili sauce and his own sausages that make to best hot dogs imaginable.

The last one: ‘Best thing is that we do it together, we clean, cut, cook, pack and process everything together, spending precious time together and enjoying every minute of it.

This couple’s favorite product were peanuts, wash them very well, boil for 5 minutes with salt and retort for 50 minutes under 11 LBS pressure.           Worth a try I would say.

   

My immediate assessment after reading some retort stories is the joy and feeling of accomplishment you get from making your own, if you do not have a garden, go to the local farmers market for more inspiration.

I found that some people manage to save up to $800.00 per year which is the icing on the cake.

Pouch retort is pretty cheap, clean, saves storage space and rewarding, go for it!!

www.vacupack.com  for USA and www.vacupack.ca for Canada 

By: Marinus Hoogendoorn

Money Saving Cooking Tips

CHEFTALK

Money saving cooking tips

A few blogs ago I promised to give money saving cooking tips how to prepare fresh, healthy home cooked meals that fit your budget.

My point was, quote: “I reject to believe that you have no choice or that your only choice is a 99 cents fast food meal because the organic aisle is too expensive. To me that is just a cheap excuse.” End quote.

This was based on a study with the outcome that white bread and ground chuck were on average cheaper than healthy organic products and that is why consumers grab processed food instead of cooking with fresh ingredients.

Now, I do believe that organic artisan bread is healthier than factory made white bread but I also (strongly) believe that you do have a choice and there are more options than the organic isle.   

When preparing this article, I wondered myself what the best way would be to explain the subject.

You would probably say, easy talking for a chef.

Maybe it is, but read on, I am sure you will find something helpful.

Tip 1:   Vacuum to safe money

                                         www.vacupack.com www.vacupack.ca

My first tip may sound exaggerated, but vacuum – sealing tools are truly revolutionary when it comes to preserving food in your freezer and refrigerator. The ugly food destroying freezer burn is eliminated and your food stays fresh and delicious for months in the freezer. In the refrigerator vacuum prolongs shelf life significantly. If that does not save money?

  

Tip 2:  Use cheaper cuts of meat

Great Roasting Meat

A cheaper meat cut is not necessarily ground chuck. Pork, lamb, beef have many cheap(er) cuts that are delicious.

You need to get familiar with some different cooking techniques but making a roast it as easy as searing a steak.

Shoulders of pork of lamb cost $ 2.00 to $6.00 per pound compared to steaks $10.00 a pound. These shoulders make a great roast and make one (or two) at a time, use what you need for dinner and use the rest for other means, these roasts make a great sandwich filling (cheaper than cold cuts), or filling for a pasta or a rice dish later in the week. On top of a cracker with a bit of mayonnaise and a salad leave it makes a nice snack to go along with a drink on a weekend.

Consider investing in a slow cooker, these cheaper cuts are fantastic to use in stews, turn the slow cooker on before you go to work and dinner is ready when you come home. 

Tip 3:  Think ahead

Buy meats on offer and prepare all at once and use the balance in a stir fry. Or marinate what you do not use immediately, vacuum and freeze, this way you always have something on hand when there is no time to shop. This saves energy and your time.

Pre-prepared vegetables keep well when vacuumed and frozen; take advantage when you find offers.

Tip 4:  Serve the right portioning

This is not good

Have a look at how much you really need to cook and put on a plate. Tons of good food are wasted daily because of over-portioning.  

Tip 5:  Clever ways to use left overs

Overripe fruits are sweet, take advantage and turn them into dessert toppings by simmering them for a couple of minutes with sugar, a bit of water, a slice of lemon and a cinnamon stick , vacuum and freeze.

Tip 6:  Make the best of fruits

Turn overripe bananas into banana bread, this can be done in an hour inclusive baking, lovely for breakfast or a snack when the kids come home from school. A lot cheaper than throwing them in the rubbish and buy ready- made jars of toppings and packets of snacks.

Tip 7:  Make your own juices

Delicious

When the store has overripe fruit and sells it cheap, blend it with a bit of water or that little leftover of milk or yogurt. 

Delicious drinks/smoothies, I do that all the time and make healthy fruit juices for less than 0.50 cents per glass. If you know how packed fruit juices are filtered you will follow this tip.

Tip 8: Do not throw bread away

Do not throw stale bread in the bin, grind it in a food processor, fresh or wet breadcrumbs are a fantastic binding agent for sauces and stews. Easy to vacuum and frozen they last for months. If you have a lot consider a bread and butter pudding.

Tip 9: Think traditional

Two eggs, a cup of flour, 2 tbsp of oil and a bit of salt makes dough that gives you enough pasta for a family of four. It takes five minutes to make the dough, then ten minutes to make pasta from the dough and it cooks in three minutes.

With some left over bacon, mushrooms, broccoli or zucchini half an onion and two more eggs you make an unmatched traditional Carbonara. How does that sound?

Fry the bacon, add the vegetables until soft, boil the pasta, add the pasta straight from the water into the bacon vegetable mix. Off the heat, add the whisked eggs and toss. That’s how they make pasta dishes in Italy. Absolutely divine.  

            

Tip 10:  Spend wisely     

                

Invest wisely, buy fresh food that fit your budget and remember that recipes are ideas that sprung from somebody’s mind, change to your liking, recipes are no laws.

Shop Smart, Cook Clever, Waste Less

I compiled these budget friendly tips so that you will not be locked up in your kitchen every day. Be inspired and cook healthy foods.

By: Marinus Hoogendoorn