Hot & Steamy Bamboo Baby

My metal steamer basket always gets a workout in my kitchen. Broccoli and asparagus frequently fall victim to its wrath. With just an inch of water, seasoned or not, in a heavy-bottomed (hee,hee) sauce pan, veggies are perfectly cooked in about 3-4 minutes. Lately I’ve been looking at other foods to throw in it.

We have been eating a lot less meat these days, holding out for organic, locally sourced, free-range, grass fed, (insert any foodie buzzword of your choice) proteins to really focus on a plant based diet. However, the other day Kelly was craving a roast chicken and I felt the need to oblige ‘cuz I wanted one too. By not making a protein the focus of the meal, we can get close to three meals out of one bird. I will say that even though I haven’t been cooking my usual “Sunday chicken” as I have for years, that chicken I cooked the other day was spot on!

Well, time came to reheat this beautiful bird and the last thing I wanted to do was to dry it out so I looked for another method to warm it up. I sure as hell wasn’t going to nuke it, the microwave is the devil, and the oven was out of the question. I looked over at the faithful steamer basket and decided to give it a whirl. I really can’t say I was surprised by the wonderful outcome because I remember the old “Yan Can Cook” infomercials from the 80s where Martin Yan reheated everything in bamboo steamer baskets. I was using my metal guy, totally forgetting that I have a small bamboo basket I picked up in San Francisco that goes in my wok.

The metal basket worked just fine, but it made me realize that I need to go by the Asian market in North Charleston to get the bigger, stackable baskets that they carry for really cheap. It’ll be good to use them in my wok because I feel like I’ve been neglecting it and need to keep that thing well-seasoned. Yan would be proud.

Ciao down,

Penn

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