Sometimes a favor flips itself over. You start off thinking you are doing someone else a favor and end up so grateful for what they have done for you.

About a week ago the lovely Tara Austen Weaver, author of The Butcher and the Vegetarian: One Woman’s Romp through a World of Men, Meat, and Moral Crisis, sent out a request. She asked that people check out her new e-book, Tales from High Mountain, part 1, about the months she lived in a very traditional house in a very traditional town high the mountains of Japan. It costs only $3.99, as a PDF or a Kindle download, with all proceeds going to on-going relief efforts in Japan. She set the price low to encourage buyers, but you can enter any amount you want in the final purchase price to give more, if you’re so inclined.

So I bought it and stayed up late reading it – remembering so well the unbelievable fatigue that can come when living in a foreign country, in a foreign language, in other people’s houses – and tweeted about it, trying to get the word out about her great writing and inspiring goal of raising money to help a country she deeply loves.

But I kept thinking. Her descriptions of the food were, of course, so tempting. I do not cook a lot of Japanese food. Hardly any, really. But that night of reading about Japanese food made me turn the next morning to Everyday Harumi: Simple Japanese Food for Family & Friends by Harumi Kurihara who, according to the press release sent with the book from the publisher, is the Martha Stewart of Japan. I have absolutely no idea how accurate that comparison is, but I do know that the recipes in this book are super simple and beautiful and there are at leasta  dozen post-its sticking out from its pages marking the recipes I meant to cook when I first looked through it. Then recipes for work needed to be cooked and other books showed up and piled on top and I simply lost track of those intentions.

Until, of course, I read Tales from High Mountain. So I cooked up the onigiri, rice balls with chopped chicken (although the book has you use ground, which I didn’t note until I’d chopped the chicken – I’m a good recipe writer and not really the best recipe follower). We loved them. Origiri are, according to this book, what Japanese people might eat when we would turn to a sandwich. Lightbulb. My son, age 8, does not like sandwiches. This makes packing his punch everyday sort of a pain. Not so this week. We made another batch of origiri together and have popped them in his lunch bag two days in a row now.

I thought I was doing Tara a favor and in the process giving some more money to natural disaster survivors (something no San Franciscan every sneezes at). In the process I had a stupid, quotidian, boring, and unremarkable problem that has vexed me regularly for years – what to put in that lunch bag – solved.

How is that for a lead-in to asking you for a favor or two? First, check out Tara’s post and consider ordering her book. Second, cook something totally new this week. Who knows what other problems – big or small – we might solve?

Origiri – chicken rice balls

This is my version – a bit less sweet and with a bit more chicken in the chicken-to-rice ratio.

Rinse 1 cup sushi rice (long grain really won’t work) in cool water until the water runs clear. Put in a rice cooker or pot with 1 1/2 cups water and 1/2 teaspoon salt, bring to a boil, cover, and simmer 15 minutes. Take off the heat and let sit 5 minutes. Uncover and let cool.

Meanwhile, put 1/2 pound finely chopped chicken thigh meat (or ground chicken if it doesn’t freak you out the way it freaks me out), 3 tablespoons tamari or soy sauce, 2 tablespoons sake, and 2 tablespoons mirin in a medium saucepan and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to a simmer and cook, stirring, until the chicken is cooked through and the liquid is pretty much absorbed, about 5 minutes. Let cool.

Combine the rice and chicken mixture thoroughly. With damp hands grad a small handful of the mixture and press – press really hard – into a ball or patty. Set on a plate and repeat – being sure to rinse and re-wet your hands between each one (you’ll be tempted to try to do a second without rinsing your hands first, don’t give in to this temptation, it will only lead to super-sticky rice-covered hands). Cover let sit a bit before eating or chill and eat later.

If the mixture is still a bit warm, the balls will not hold together as well, so don’t fret if they start plopping apart a bit if you’ve jumped the gun and made them before things are cooled off.

Sometimes you do not want another fish sandwich. Even if it is remarkably fresh and delicious. Luckily, if you find yourself driving through Kawaihae, Hawaii on a Friday, there is GJ’s Huli Chicken.

Also, as you can see, GJ’s also hulis up ribs.

Huli? What is huli? It’s Hawaiian barbecue. Meat is slathered with brown sugar and soy sauce and usually some ginger and maybe other seasonings depending on the cook and cooked directly or indirectly with a fire.

GJ’s offers a plate lunch, with a scoop of rice and macaroni salad (“mac salad,” which can be a bit confusing because in every other instance I’ve ever experienced “mac” in Hawaii is short for macadamia nut, although it is usually phrased as “mac nut” so I should have caught on just a bit sooner than I did) or you can just buy the meat.

If you just want the meat, GJ picks up a half rack of ribs or half a chicken and puts it right in a plastic grocery bag (well, really two plastic grocery bags to avoid the quite fragrant meat juice dripping all over you and your car) and hands it over.

The plate lunch, with its carb-heavy propensity, seems like something developed for workers, surfers, and kids at that stage when they’re growing like weeds. My son loved nothing more than a plate lunch, especially the one from GJ’s with its generous allotment of bird.

My dashing husband and I preferred to get our meat-in-a-bag and doctor it up a bit back at the house with a vegetable or two. Spicy pickles and piquant dressings were key to cutting the fatty deliciousness of GJ’s huli.

GJ’s Huli, in Kawaihae on Fridays, Waimea on Saturdays, and Konohaa on Sundays. You supply the pickles.

My son helped me make these. They were, in fact, his idea. When asked if there was anything that sounded really good for dinner, he said “chicken enchiladas,” which was a new one because he usually wants, or rather begs for, chicken tacos. He also specified that he would like to help make the enchiladas, which was also odd because he usually asks, or rather insists, that those chicken tacos come from El Metate. It wasn’t completely out of character, though, because he’s been really into helping in the kitchen recently. He’s also been really into telling me that I am the best mom in the whole world. It is very sweet and charming, but it does loose some of its impact after the 20th iteration in a single morning. It becomes even less meaningful when I hear him repeating, chant-like, the phrase “Mama is the best mama in the whole world” to himself as he gets ready for school. It’s an odd mantra. It seems more like he is trying to make it so than proclaiming a deep truth.

It’s also a phrase that I have a bit of baggage around. You see when I was maybe 11 or almost 11 I saved up my allowance, walked up to the drugstore, and picked out a beautiful cut glass “crystal” votive with a blue candle in it for my mom for mothers day. I then wrapped it carefully, tied a ribbon around it, and made a card. My memory gets fuzzy here, but I’m pretty sure I drew a big rainbow on the card with out-sized bubble-like flowers growing on a green hill.

On that Sunday morning I asked my brother – two years younger – what he had gotten mom for mothers day. Nothing. He had forgotten. So he went downstairs, found a rough piece of scrap lumber, used enamel paint leftover from the model car my dad and I decorated for Indian Princesses, and painted “Your the best mommy” (sic) on the wood. This he presented, still wet, to my mom.

She fell for it. She also fell all over him thanking him for it. She then displayed that aesthetic monstrosity in their house for the next 20 years. A redwood and royal blue thorn in my side. The votive and candle which were so clearly the superior gift in every way to my 11-year-old eyes were ignored to my 11-year-old perceptions in favor of the crappy, stupid gift from her favorite child.

Of course, my 40-year-old self completely understands that perhaps the affectionate utterances and declarations of love for my mom were fewer and further between from her rambunctious, Star Wars-obsessed son than they were from her older daughter. I’m also pretty sure my memory of my gift being totally ignored isn’t accurate at all. Yet the very phrase “you’re the best mommy” rings, at a certain level, hollow to me. Perhaps it’s because as much as my son may think that – and that is great and fabulous in every way – I, the adult, know that it just really isn’t even remotely true. Don’t get me wrong, I have my parental strengths and high points. I bring a lot to this party. But I’m not the best. Not even close. The best is more patient and less distracted, at the very least. As a parent I know my own failings all too well. I need to believe that there are better – not just different but straight-up better – versions out there. Of course, I’m not telling him that. He’ll figure it out soon enough and in all likelihood spend the rest of my life reminding me of that very fact. For now I try to push that redwood slab out of my mind along with all my maternal weak spots, and feel the unconditional adoration that a 7 year-old can have for their mother. It is fleeting and I’m going to want to remember its sweetness.

So as he fawns all over me, we rolled up these enchiladas: The filling was plain cooked and shredded chicken meat. You could bake some breasts or pull meat off a rotisserie chicken from the store. I poached a whole chicken, pulled the meat off, and then used the carcass to make a pot of stock, but I’m funny like that. So fill some corn tortillas (we used these “Mi Abuelita” ones they sell around these parts that have some wheat gluten in them and thus are soft and don’t break when you roll them; pure corn tortillas need to be soften with a dip in sauce or hot oil before you fill and roll them) with chicken, roll them up and put them in a lightly oiled baking pan. Pour red enchilada sauce on them (many many jarred versions are delightful but you can make your own with this recipe if you were so inclined), cover the pan with foil and bake in a hot oven (somewhere in the 375°F range) until toasty hot all the way through. Serve with crumbled cotija cheese, sliced red onion or green onion, and chopped cilantro on top. You could go old-school and cover the sauced enchiladas with a freight load of Monterey jack cheese and bake them uncovered until the cheese melted and bubbled and those would also be very delicious. That version, however, isn’t so much in sync with my current interest in maintaining some semblance of what was once a girlish figure. And honestly, this less-cheesed version was, though I say it myself, delicious in a different and perhaps even better way. I’m not saying they’re the best enchiladas in the whole world, but I sure like them a lot.

This is the new favorite chicken at my house. It’s a lot like eating a salt lick. In a good way.

I used pitted black olives here partly because they are so much easier to eat but more in order to use some of the lovely pitted naturally cured olives hanging out in my cupboard that some company at some point sent me to taste. I like them a lot but I’m also way too lazy to get up right now, go into the kitchen, pull the stool over, climb up onto the counter, and root around on the top shelf where live those cans to remind myself of the exact name brand, which is why I’m always delighted but surprised when people send me samples.

Pancetta olive chicken

Note that ideally you salt the chicken and let it sit overnight. A few hours, or an hour, is better than nothing, though. This both seasons it and helps the chicken hold onto its own juices and stay moist. It might seem counter-intuitive, but science makes it so.

1 chicken

1 1/2 teaspoons salt

2 tablespoons olive oil

1 head garlic

3 thick slices pancetta, finely chopped

1 cup white wine

Black olives

Cut the backbone out of the chicken (save it for stock!) and cut the chicken into 10 pieces – 2 drumsticks, 2 thighs, 2 wings, and each breast half cut in half. Put in a baking pan, sprinkle with all over with salt, cover, and chill overnight.

Heat oven to 450. While oven heats, peel the garlic cloves.

Drain off any juice that’s accumulated in the pan and pat chicken dry. Rub chicken with olive oil. Scatter garlic and pancetta over and around the chicken. Pour wine into the pan. Roast until the chicken just starts to brown, about 20 minutes.

Add black olives to the pan and roast until chicken is cooked through and the skin is well browned, about 30 more minutes.

Serve with plenty of bread to sop up with winy garlicky bacon-y olive-y chicken juices.

One of my craziest friends (believe me, that is some stiff competition) sent me a recipe from Fine Cooking that she claimed was a) delicious, b) quick, and c) neither pasta nor soup.

I got the hint.

I messed around with it a bit, but just the specifics, not the big picture. I pretty much doubled all the spices, used more herbs, used two preserved lemons instead of one (you don’t develop this “how to make preserved lemons” without ending up with too many preserved lemons sitting around; I need to use them with abandon). I also used all one cut of chicken so they would cook evenly. Feel free to mix it up if your family has white meat-only and dark meat-only people making your life difficult.

When I make it again, I’m going to chop a bulb fennel and add it with the onion. If you beat me to it, let me know how tasty it is.

Preserved lemon chicken with olives
I used thighs for this, but any chicken breasts would work just fine – bone-in, boneless, skinless, whatever you like, just decrease cooking time a bit if you use boneless. My son would have liked it if I’d used wings and drumsticks, and I’m sure it would have been just as over-eatin’ good. Feel free to bump up or turn down the paprika, ginger, and cayenne depending on how kicky or mild you like it.

2 1/2 – 3 pounds chicken thighs (or other chicken pieces)

1/2 teaspoon sea salt

2 Tbsp. vegetable oil

1/2 bunch worth of fresh cilantro (a generous, loosely-packed 1 1/2 cups)

1/2 bunch worth of flat-leaf parsley leaves

1 onion

2 teaspoons ground ginger

1 1/2 teaspoons hot paprika

1 teaspoon ground cumin

1/2 teaspoon turmeric

1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

1/4 teaspoon cayenne

Generous pinch saffron threads (about 20)

1/2 cup white wine or chicken broth (water works too)

2 preserved lemons

1 cup black olives (unpitted would be fine, but I used some pitted black olives that were really a red-brown color from Lyndsey’s “Naturals” line)

Rinse chicken pieces and pat dry. Sprinkle with salt. Cover and chill up to overnight, if you like, or simply set aside while you heat the oil.

Heat the oil over medium high heat in a large, heavy pan or pot that will be able to hold all the chicken in a single layer eventually – that eventual single layer can be crowded.

For now, however, things are not going to be too crowded. Place the chicken, skin-side down if that applies, in the pan to brown. Don’t let the pieces touch to maximize the browning and minimize the stewing for the moment. Cook until the chicken naturally and of its own volition releases from the pan, 3 to 4 minutes. Turn and brown on the other side. Repeat with the second batch, if necessary.

Meanwhile – and you’ll need to either do some of this ahead or work somewhat quickly, chop the cilantro and parsley and onion (you could do this by pulsing it all in a food processor if you like, but I’m warning you now that you will eventually need to clean it) and put them in a large bowl. Add all the spices and toss to combine. When the first chicken pieces are done browning, add them to this mixture and toss to coat the chicken. Add the second batch if you needed to do one and toss to combine too.

Drain off any excess fat from the pan. Add wine or broth and scrape up the delicious brown bits on the pan. Add chicken and herb-onion-spice mixture and 1 cup of water. Bring just to a boil, cover, reduce heat to a gently simmer, and cook until chicken is tender and onions are melting into the sauce, 20 to 25 minutes.

After you cover the chicken, remove the pulp from the preserved lemons, rinse the rinds in cool water, and cut rinds into strips. Scatter lemon rind strips and olives over the chicken and return cover.

Serve chicken hot, with plenty of sauce, over couscous or with crusty bread with the heft and ability to soak up the addictive sauce. Some sauteed greens onto which you can drizzle some of the sauce as you eat are a nice addition.

I cut up a pasture-raised chicken (doing, I must admit, a rather ill job of it – sometimes those joints come apart with ease and other times I swear the bird is fighting back), threw the back into a plastic bag and froze it for future stock making, and put the chicken pieces in a giant bowl. I then covered them with buttermilk, a bit of salt, some black pepper, and a dash of cayenne. I covered this gruesome looking concoction and put it in the fridge overnight. The acid in the buttermilk tenderizes the bird very nicely.

The next day, I pulled the chicken out of the buttermilk. I let a lot of the buttermilk that others might rub off  the chicken cling as much as it likes – I like a fairly thick coating by the time all is said and done. Then I dredged the chicken pieces in flour that I’d seasoned with salt, black pepper, and a bit of cayenne.

The trick to doing this with as little mess as possible is to keep one hand dry and one hand wet – I use my left hand to only touch or handle things that are dry, my right for things that are wet. This helps avoid having to constantly wash my hands as buttermilk and flour build up to dexterity-reducing levels during the breading process.

Then I heated plenty of vegetable oil (I decided to forgo the lard-frying in this instance) in a well seasoned cast iron pan and only added the chicken when the oil was around 350 – measure it with a thermometer or do what I do and dip the end of the handle of a wooden spoon into the oil, when the oil is the right temperature it will instantly but gently bubble up around the handle. I fried the chicken until it was brown and crispy, about 12 minutes each side.

Cast iron – or other heavy pots – are so great for frying like this because they hold heat so well and can maintain a steady temperature. You want the oil to be gently bubbling around the chicken constantly.

Drain the chicken on paper towels or on a cooling rack.

The verdict from Ernest? “Mama, this chicken is even better than the chicken at the zoo!”

Snap.

Note: My cousin (technically another first cousin once-removed, the sister of the guest of honor) Jajie* really wanted to make the blog. She talked about it and made a fuss but then refused to stand still for any picture-taking. She made this awesome salad, however, which I then re-made, tweaked for the dressing, and posted a recipe (Blueberry Blue Cheese Spinach Salad) because it was so pretty and tasty and easy:

*You wonder what kind of name “Jajie” is? It’s short for Janet. You can’t really hang with the Watson clan and not have your named turned into a diminutive ending with a long “e” sound. Even Schuyler ends up being called “Schuylie” half the time.

I’ve been sick. Really quite sick. In bed for six days sick. It’s a been a bit of a bummer to say the least. I hadn’t eaten anything other than jello, crackers, broth, and popscicles since last Tuesday. Luckily, my mother-in-law was scheduled to come for a visit this weekend anyway. She did laundry and entertained Ernest and quick-set jello. And then last night she fried up some chicken cutlets.

They drew me down from bed and tempted me to eat an actual meal. I’m up and about today. Coincidence? Perhaps. But these cutlets have worked their magic in the past: they have aided many a recovery from long and painful flights across the country to visit her in New York, they fortified me after I had my son, they cheered me up when I broke my hand last spring.

Recovering from the flu? Had a baby? Need a little pick-me-up? Try the magic of chicken cutlets. In the words of my mother-in-law, “they couldn’t be easier.”

Thinly slice 1 1/2 lbs. chicken breast (or, have your butcher cut them for you – that’s what my mother-in-law does!). Whisk 2 eggs in a medium bowl and spread about 2 cups bread crumbs in  a wide shallow bowl or rimmed plate.

Dip each chicken piece in the egg mixture, then dredge the chicken in the bread crumbs. Use one hand to touch wet things and the other hand to touch dry things to keep things as clean adn easy as possible. Dip and dredge all chicken pieces, laying them on a large plate or baking sheet when you finish them. [Note: Some people, including me, like to dredge the chicken in a mixture of flour, salt, and pepper before dipping it in the egg. My mother-in-law skips this step and her cutlets are better than mine.]

Heat a frying pan over medium-high heat and add enough vegetable oil to make a 1/4-inch layer in the pan. When the oil is hot, add several chicken cutlets – you want to fill the pan but not have any cutlets overlap. Fry until browned on one side. Turn cutlets over and fry until brown on the other side. Remove and drain on several layers of paper towels. Repeat with remaining cutlets.

Sprinkle with salt to taste. Serve cutlets hot, warm, or even at room temperature, with a squirt of lemon is you’re so inclined (my mother-in-law is not so inclined). These cutlets are most delicious with a crisp green salad with a French-style vinaigrette or old-school Italian dressing.

I’m in Colorado skiing with my family. My extended family. I suppose a week with parents and siblings and aunts and uncles may not sound so fun to many people, but my family… well, they’re pretty fun. Everyone makes an effort 1) not to hassle each other and 2) (and this is key) maintain a sense of humor about themselves.

I’m here with my dad’s side of the family. He is one of four boys, so the family ethic is definitely skewed towards activity-based (rather than relational or yackety-yack) bonding. Lots of exercise, fresh mountain air, and a carefully calibrated amount of Jamesons, Guiness, and mulled wine keep everyone cheery. The trip has become a bit of a tradition (5 years going and next year already set up). Last night my aunt made us a Lunar New Year dinner. Since it’s lucky to eat things cooked whole and there were seven of us at dinner, so she made two whole chickens. Can you say taste test? One was poached in a rich gingery broth and the other was roasted and covered with a ginger jam during the last bit of cooking so it developed sort of a sweet glaze and the skin became extra brown and crispy (that’s the one my uncle is mangling in the picture above). I begged not to have to chose a favorite, each succulent of flavorful in its own way. Are you forcing my hand? Really? Well, then I’m going with the roasted ginger jam-swathed bird.

Sadly for me she used the ginger jam when I wasn’t there, so I didn’t get to see it. Internets? Have you ever seen ginger jam? Anyone know how to make it? Or are you going to make me do experiments?

p.s. The night before my mom used the pork shoulder I packed in my luggage to make a green chile posole. It was quite delicious. I’m going to perfect the recipe and get back to you. I promise.

Want to join in the fun? Track down some gjetost* and write a sentence or two describing it. Not your opinion of it. It. If you want to throw in your opinion that’s fine, I suppose, but that’s the easy part. If you’d like to share it with the class, I’m sure we’d all appreciate it.

So that was me torturing others. I flew back today and had lunch with a friend. But now I wonder: Is she friend or foe? She took me to 900 Grayson where she suggested I order a Demon Lover. Since the Demon Lover is fried chicken on a waffle with cream gravy, I, being no fool, ordered it. Oh. My. God. She was right. She warned me. It will haunt my dreams. I will die wishing I’d eaten more of them, I’m sure of it. Crunchy and creamy and a bit spicy and just so much fat and flavor without being greasy or overly unctuous and coating your mouth in the unpleasant way and the chicken was so tender deep inside that spicy crunchy coating and there was so much of the coating, which is always the best part of fried chicken, and and and…. I couldn’t eat the whole thing. I just couldn’t. I wanted to. But I couldn’t. So I took about a third of it home. I meant to share it with my family, I really did. But I only lasted about an hour and a half in the house with it alone. I wasn’t hungry. In fact, I was still quite full. But I had to eat it. It was sitting on the counter, calling to me.

How did it know my name?

Long story short: I skipped dinner tonight. No little salad. No bit of toast. Just skipped it. I may never eat again. Not, that is, until I can get my hands on another Demon Lover.

* Once again, wikipedia is off. I’ve been to Norway. I’ve seen “gjetost” on the label in the stores.