Thursday dinner: Pecan-planked fig-marinated pork tenderloin

Back in February, I picked up a jar of fig jam to use in a panini recipe. Since then, the jar has waited patiently in my refrigerator to make another appearance.

Four months later, it got the call.

Tuesday dinner: Honey-lime chicken breasts

We’re going to try a new format for the recipes. We’ll start with a little bit of babbling, touch on what worked and what doesn’t, and then drop in the recipe. This way, we can cut back on the stream of consciousness that kicks off so many of these pieces and focus a little more on the food.

My hope is that this focuses me a little more on the topic at hand. I’ve noticed that I wander a little bit (okay, a lot). It adds some personality and color to an otherwise boring recipe, but holy hell, even I get sick of hearing myself talk after a while.

So, let’s call this the end of the babbling and move on to…

Monday dinner: Mojo flap steak with salsa verde

Take a walk through the meat department at your grocery store and look at the beef cuts available. You expect to pay more for the more tender, leaner meat: tenderloin (filet mignon), sirloin, the in-between (T-bone/porterhouse). Pick up a pack of sirloin steaks and compare the price with steaks cut from the flank or skirt. Do yourself a favor and try not to drop anything, because they are probably the same. Actually, you might find the sirloin strip steaks priced cheaper than the tougher flank steak.

Why? Because flank steaks are trendy. Think of them as the summertime version of short ribs. Restaurants can get these cuts cheap, marinate them and attain a big markup on dishes like carne asada or fajitas. The kicker is that flank and skirt steak come from the underbelly of the cow, supporting the weight of the animal and undergoing quite a bit of stress and strain. Flank, plate and shoulder cuts get worked a lot, meaning that the muscles get a workout. And, strong muscles mean tougher, sinewy meat.

While flank and skirt prices go up, flap steak remains affordable. Called bavette by the French and sirloin tips in New England, flap steak is the new cheap cut. From the San Francisco Chronicle:

An extension of the T-bone and Porterhouse steaks, flap meat is officially part of the short loin section, explains Bob Fanucchi, known as Butcher Bob by his students at San Francisco’s California Culinary Academy. “It’s actually in the belly of the animal,” he says. “You remove the flank, take the layers of fat off and the meat is called flap meat.”

Saturday dinner: Guinness marinated chicken

We broke the grill out for the first time this season today. For some, this is an annual rite of passage marking the beginning of summer. Not so much here. It’s the time of year where I roll the dice and wonder if I have enough propane from last season to start and finish dinner.

Complicating matters was an oversight on my part. Last year, I must have put the grill away not realizing it would be the last time I would use it for the year. As a result, I never turned the gas valve off. Whoops. Nonetheless, there was enough propane in the tank to get me through this evening and, likely, a couple of more nights on the grill.

Got my mojo workin’ (or Sunday dinner)

Mojo!

My first exposure to Cuban mojo came about 10 years ago when I first tried Goya’s version of the marinade. The boldness of the spices were mellowed by a sharp citrus flavor, adding a terrific flavor to chicken, pork, beef, seafood and small vermin.

I’ve made my own, but it’s tough during the summer when citrus fruit is so hit and miss. Oranges are not nearly as juicy in summer months as you would hope. That said, I’ll undertake the challenge from time to time and deal with the disappointment of dry fruit.

About a year ago, I ran across a recipe (that I can no longer find) for a Cuban pork shoulder roast in a citrus marinade. The cooking time and temperature followed the low and slow method I had learned from my father and the countless cookbooks and magazines I’ve read over the years. So instead of simply using citrus juice, I opted for some homemade mojo. I also used it as an opportunity to pick some cilantro out of the planter box and put it to good use.

More ham than pork. Disappointing Wegmans. Very disappointing.

The recipe comes together quite easily. Most of the time is spent soaking the pork. The end result was average. The shoulder I bought was marked by your friends and mine at Wegmans as just that — pork shoulder. Turns out it was a picnic, not a Boston butt. The difference? Butts are perfect for slow roasting, with the fat breaking down and tenderizing the meat. Picnics are basically uncured hams. The end result was a really tough piece of meat. Flavorful, but really tough. In retrospect, I would use the same temperatures and timings, but use a loin roast to complete the task. I’ve adjusted the recipe to reflect that “should have” and not what I actually did. Learn from my mistakes on this one.