The Daily Double Shot - May 31, 2012

This weekend, I noticed that we were running out of Blue Bottle’s Roman Espresso. That small bag only yielded us ~15 double shots, which is close to the proper amount from an 8 ounce bag. (I’ll show you the math down below in the mini-Appendix.) So, while we were running our weekend errands, we picked up some Ritual beans from the Ritual Roasters stand over in Hayes Valley. Â The barista’s description of their normal espresso sounded really delicious: sweet, caramal-y, peach-y. Â And then, she started talking about the seasonal espresso, “Nine Darling Road” : sweet, light, caramal-y, apple, brown sugar. Â S’s eyes lit up, and I knew which one we needed to get.

I went about my new morning ritual (see what I did there?). Â Wake up at 7am, turn on the machine, grind the coffee, pour the milk in the stand-in glass pitcher, put the glass pitcher in the fridge, Navy shower. Â At this point (~10 minutes from turning on the machine) the sight glass should be around the green zone, which I’ve read is a good time to start frothing milk. Â So, this morning, I tried that. Â The froth looked more or less the same as before, except with more foam. Â I did notice that I was frothing for a longer period. Â After I have the froth ready, pour the grinds into the filter, tamp, turn, tap out excess grinds, tamp, turn again. Â Now we’re ready for the pull.

There’s the good stuff.

See? Â More foam!

For the taste, I didn’t taste apples, but now that it’s in my head, I tasted the brown sugar. Â Not sure if that was what I really tasted or if that’s what I wanted to taste. Â Anyway, the way I would describe the taste of this one, it’s like you are sixteen, it’s a morning where you wake up from camping, and you can smell the fire from the night before, still having that taste of burnt marshmallows in your mind. Â Hard to explain, but that’s what I’m experiencing right now.

Mini-Appendix

How many cups of lattes should I be able to make with my 8 ounce bag of espresso beans?

Let’s do some lazy man math. Â One Double shot should hold from 14-16 grams of coffee. Â So I’m going to say on average 15 grams. Â One ounce is roughly 28 grams. So, 8 ounces should be about 228 grams. Â Divide that by 15, and we get 14.93. Â Eh, close enough.

 

 

 

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Dad’s Kitchen - Red Snapper in Szechuan Hot Sauce

Everyone always asks me, “You own a home, but you still live with your parents?” And every time, I answer with, “Well, I get a ride to work every day from my mom and my dad has a gourmet meal on the table when I come home.” I know it sounds awfully spoiled, but that’s how it is in the Lee family household. To be fair, I’m living at my home part-time. But seriously, would you leave if you had food like this, this and this?

Last week, my dad got a whole fresh red snapper from Costco. And now that he’s discovered the internet, he just loves scouring the web for new recipes. Most of the recipes he found were boring to him because they use the same ol’ ingredients - lemon, dill, olive oil, etc. He decided to search for “red snapper Chinese style” and came across this recipe. It was different and spicy, so he decided to give it a shot.

And, it’s a keeper! Just take a look at the ingredients:

2 (8 ounce) red snapper fillets (or whole red snapper)
1 tablespoon soy sauce
1 tablespoon dry white wine
3 tablespoons vegetable oil
2 garlic cloves, minced
3 stalks green onions, finely chopped
1 teaspoon fresh ginger, finely chopped
2 tablespoons chili bean sauce
1 tablespoon tomato paste
2 teaspoons sugar
1 tablespoon white vinegar
1/2 cup water
1 tablespoon cornstarch
1/2 teaspoon sesame oil (optional)

Directions:

  1. Rub the fish with soy sauce and dry wine mixture.
  2. Let the fish fillets marinated in the refrigerator for about 15 minutes.
  3. Heat oil in a large skillet, saute the fish fillets for about 3 minutes on each side.
  4. Remove the fillets, add garlic, green onion, ginger, chili bean sauce, tomato paste, sugar, vinegar and water.
  5. Bring the mixture to a boil before adding the fish fillets back to the skillet.
  6. Braise the fish in the sauce for about 4 to 5 minutes.
  7. Mix the cornstarch with 2 tsp of water, stir in the sauce and cook for another minute.
  8. Sprinkle with sesame oil (optional) and serve immediately with steamed rice and your favorite steamed vegetables.

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The Daily Double Shot - May 29, 2012

Good morning! Here’s a shot of the latest milk-based coffee drink I made. Â At this point in my career in amateur professional coffee making, it’s hard to tell what I made, I’m leaning towards a latte. Â Critical point from the image: too many gosh darn large bubbles. Â As for latte art… erm… uhh… it’s becoming more and more like finding familiar shapes in the clouds. Â (Cow face above a koala in this one, see it?).

Lessons learned today. The drip was leaking too early this time. Which means I need to either grind a bit more fine or tamper harder. Â Another factor may be the amount of grinds I’m using. I’m using a 14g double shot filter, but I’m kind of eyeballing it. To get a scale or not. That is the question. Â Still too many bubbles in the milk, which can mean that i’m not frothing in the best zone and/or I’m not watching the temperatures right. Â I will get this!

 

PULL!

Man… so many splatters. Â Who is going to clean it up? Oh.. me.


 

 

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Amateur Professional Espresso Maker: The Prelude to the Daily Double Shot

Last week, S bought an exciting new appliance for our kitchen, the la Pavoni Manual Espresso Maker. S has been gaining a lot of interest in coffee, especially since her coworkers have been talking about their own endeavors in high-end coffee making. My interest was originally utilitarian, coffee was only used to stay up for work.

la Pavoni with my first finished latte

I remember the first time I started drinking coffee for taste in 2009. Blue Bottle was my first. I didn’t realize coffee could taste so unique. I drink my coffee black. The drip coffee was dark and potent. As a coffee novice, I didn’t really care what roast was being made for me, I just didn’t want weak coffee. Over the years, I’ve tried other local coffee boutiques like Philz Coffee, SightGlass, Cup, Curbside Coffee and Brown Owl. (I actually really enjoyed the Turkish coffee at Troya.)

It wasn’t until we went to Europe that I tried straight espresso. I’ll admit that I was deathly afraid of the effects of drinking a shot. S had ordered a Cafe au Lait almost everywhere we went, and I didn’t really know what I could order.  And so,  I had my first espresso at Giolitti in Rome.

Fast forward to April 2012, Sam had been talking about Lattes and Coffee all month, so I pulled out our old Krups XP 1500 Coffee and Espresso machine from college and started trying to make espressos at home. It worked for a week, and then it broke while I was trying to make a Cuban Latte (more on that later.) S had borrowed her coworker’s Kyocera Hand Grinder and purchased the Blue Bottle Roman Espresso beans that same week! Talk about Blue (Bottle) Balling.

This was the turning point. We decided we were going to get an espresso machine. Sam did all the research and debated on which one to get. On my birthday, the machine arrived. Check out my first week of espresso and latte experiments.

Failed Cups of Espressos

The first day, I pulled 8 test espressos with some Safeway Select Kona coffee beans. The cheap beans served as a way to test the technique in grinding and brewing a nice espresso. The variables were all there: temperature, grinds, and tamper pressure. The temperature is maintained by the machine. The grind was the first part I played around with. I started with a coarse grind using the borrowed Kyocera hand grinder mentioned earlier. Once I figured out the fine-ness, I messed around with the pressure of tampering the grinds. I didn’t get the perfect brew the first day, mostly because I didn’t know what it would look like.

First Finished Latte

It was nice to try frothing some milk. I’m terrible at it. I always get big bubbles and not enough froth.

The first time I experienced Crema!

That’s the first time I produced Crema. It was the first time I noticed that the drip should not arrive right away, and I needed to apply pressure on the lever.

Crema looking better and better

Third time after producing the first crema, I finally improved it! Getting consistent!

Safeway Select Kona on Left, Blue Bottle Roman Espresso on Right

The Kona test batch had a darker, sour taste. It wasn’t really about the taste at first, since it was just for a test. I compared the taste to the Roman Espresso from Blue Bottle, which turned out to be much lighter and more enjoyable.

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Del Popolo Pizza Truck - San Francisco

Del Popolo
Currently at Mint Plaza, SF
(415) 967-1853

Rated: ♣♣♣♣♣

Sigh, I feel awful for leaving The Culture Bite for 2 months. I caught a case of the lazies and I couldn’t get myself motivated to write anymore reviews… until yesterday. It’s not surprising that pizza is what drew me back!

A coworker, and fellow food lover, suggested we take a trip out to the Mint Plaza to try this brand new Napoletana-style pizza truck by a former Flour + Water chef, Jon Darsky. Holy smokes, this truck is impressive. Darsky shelled out $180 THOUSAND to build his new restaurant-on-wheels in a shipping container complete with a wood-burning oven that can reach up to 800-degrees and pop out 72 pies per hour. Do you see how insanely large this truck is compared to its patrons?

For $10 each, Del Popolo offers 2 different kinds of pizzas - a classic margherita and a white pizza. I opted for the margherita since it’s usually my benchmark for comparing authentic Napoletana-style pizzas. In less than 5 minutes, I had a piping hot, freshly baked pizza in my hands. We ate in the plaza because I couldn’t bear to trek 15 minutes back to work without a taste of this cheesy-tomato pie. As I pulled apart my first slice, I immediately felt the soft pillowy crust between my fingers. I thought that since the pizza was scorched in a 800-degree oven, the pizza would be crusty. Fooled I was! I took my first bite and immediately went into pizza heaven. The crust was soft, chewy and salty. The mozzarella was perfectly gooey and the sauce had the right amount of tanginess.

I would say their margherita pizza is on par with my favorite Tony’s Pizza Napoletana in North Beach. But instead of waiting 2 hours for a table at Tony’s, I could come early to Del Popolo, the pizza big-rig, and get a pizza in less than 5 min!

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