e pur si muove

I hereby declare my support for Mike Gravel to be a presidential nominee. There something charming and refreshing about the no-nonsense straight talk; this video clip is but one example:

Faced with an imminent sushi party this evening and an inexplicable shortage of tamago (卵) at all four Asian groceries in town, necessity dictated trawling through Google in the hopes of finding a recipe easy enough for me to follow.

Amazingly enough, the solution was not to be found on Food Network, but on YouTube:

This video guide to dashimaki tamago (だしまき卵) explains nicely the somewhat perplexing step of folding the omelet as it cooks layer by layer. This worked well on a square griddle. See, learn, do, and enjoy!

Magic ingredient tip: add 1/2 tsp. truffle oil to the omelet mix to add a rich twist to a traditional recipe. Also whisk very well to get that yummy fluffy texture.

If you’re wondering why posting has been light, you can blame it on the end of the semester and my sudden interest in green tea ice cream.

Since someone asked, here’s my recipe:

Ingredients

Beginner’s note: as with all cooking, using only the very best ingredients makes all the difference.

• 6 egg yolks
• 1/2 cup refined sugar¹, plus more to taste
• 1/4 tsp. salt
• 1 tsp. vanilla essence (optional)
• 3 cups heavy whipping cream (preferably unpasteurized)²
• 3 tbsp. matcha (green tea) powder³ or 1/2 cup loose green tea leaves
• 1/2 tsp. pure cocoa powder⁴ or one small lump of quality dark chocolate (my secret ingredient!)

Equipment

Beginner’s note: as with all cooking, appropriate measuring apparatus are a must. Don’t agarate 1 cup unless you are experienced at this, because your chances of crewing up are very high. Also, one spoonful means one level spoonful, not one heaping spoonful.

• 1 medium saucepan (at least 2 qt. capacity)
• 1 medium mixing bowl (at least 2 qt. capacity)
• 1 ice cream maker (at least 3 cups capacity), or a bowl you can cover and put in the freezer⁵
• 1 whisk (an electric whisk is preferable, but a hand whisk works too)
• 1 silicone scraper (optional but very useful)
• 1 fine, wire-mesh strainer
• 1 burner (electric or gas)

Recipe (~30 min)

Beginner’s note: if you are using green tea powder, add it very slowly and stir very well in between additions, otherwise you risk forming lumps of undissolved powder and waste a lot of tea. See footnotes for places to be extra careful at.

1. Whisk yolks, sugar and salt together in a mixing bowl and set aside. If you want to add vanilla, do it here.
2. In a medium saucepan, scald⁶ the heavy whipping cream.
3. When the cream starts to froth, remove the saucepan from the heat. If you have an electric hot plate, turn the heat off; if you have gas heaters, turn it to medium-low heat.
4. When the froth settles down (about 1-2 min) put the saucepan back on the burner and sprinkle green tea powder one tbsp at a time, stirring continuously.⁷
5. The cream will gradually turn green. Once the cream stops darkening (i.e. the green tea is well-dissolved), sprinkle in the optional cocoa powder a little bit at a time. The moment the mixture just barely turns a little brownish, stop unless you don’t care about the final color. If you are using solid chocolate, chuck it in and stir until it dissolves, making sure you don’t burn it.⁸
6. Pour out about 1 cup of the green tea and cream mixture and whisk very well with the egg yolk mixture.⁹
7. Once the mixture is well mixed, add another cup of the green tea cream and whisk again. Repeat one cup at a time until the mixture attains its desired consistency.
8. At this point the mixture should be thick enough to coat the back of a spoon. If it isn’t, pour the whole mixture back into the saucepan and simmer at low heat, stirring continuously, until it is thick enough. This is also a good point to taste the mixture and add more sugar if it’s not sweet enough.¹⁰
9. Now strain the entire mixture through the sieve into the ice cream machine or freezer bowl.¹¹ Follow the instructions for your ice cream machine, or cover the bowl and put it in the freezer overnight.
10. Eat and enjoy.

Variation

1. Use 1.5 tbsp green tea powder and 1.5 tbsp cocoa powder and 1 tbsp vanilla essence for a luxurious “mocha” ice cream. If you have vanilla beans, use one here for the vanilla taste. Using solid chocolate (dark or bittersweet, not milk or white) is phenomenal.

1. I usually don’t use white sugar, but because green tea has such a mild taste in ice cream, brown sugar, honey or molasses would overwhelm the taste of unless you want the taste of molasses or honey to dominate.↩
2. You can substitute anything less rich down to 1% milk, but at a corresponding sacrifice in mouthfeel.↩
3. I used Uji green tea for its mild but very fragrant characteristics, but any green tea will do.↩
4. Make sure it is 100% cocoa for cooking/baking, not presweetened cocoa powder used to make hot cocoa drinks. Godiva or Scharffen Berger cocoa works very well here.↩
5. If you don’t have an ice cream machine, your ice cream will be somewhat lumpier and less creamy. One possible workaround is to whisk everything much more thoroughly.↩
6. This means bring it to a boil quickly but carefully, because when it boils it would bubble and froth very quickly. If you’re not very careful the cream froth will spill over the sides of the saucepan and create a substantial mess.↩
7. This is the trickiest part because any experienced cook/chemist will know that adding dry, moderately soluble powder to liquid is a surefire way to create lumps that take forever to dissolve. Should you encounter lumps, try to break them up by stirring more, turning up the heat and/or manually breaking them up with a ladle or scraper against the sides of the saucepan. Or to minimize this problem, you can dissolve up all the powders in boiling water to create a very concentrated green tea broth which you can then pour into the cream. You will need to boil the cream longer to remove the extra water.↩
8. The smell of burnt chocolate is unforgettable. As is having to clean it out from the bottom of a pan.↩
9. Here you can control how heavy or light your ice cream is, by the amount you whisk. The more you whisk, the lighter the end result. Up to a point, that is. If you whisk until the mixture becomes stiff (~10 min by hand), stop.↩
10. The quantity I use is just sweet enough to balance the intrinsic bitterness of the green tea. If you actually want the ice cream to taste sweet, add more sugar!↩
11. Most likely you will despair at the number of green tea lumps you wasted. Not to worry, you can rinse individual lumps them off and steep them in boiling water to enjoy as tea later!↩