Roast Pork Shoulder with Ginger and Garlic

These days, I generally stick to chicken for my protein. That, though, is not a hard and fast rule. Now and again, particularly if I am out to eat, I will throw down on a juicy hamburger.

Every once in a while, my inner ethnic groups start clamoring for something a little more substantial than chicken. And even more rarely they start squealing like a pig to get their point across.

That happened today on the way back from the gym.

One of the reasons, among many, that I love New York is that there are still things such as butcher shops readily available in almost every neighborhood. It just so happens that my landlord is also a butcher, and his butcher shop is about a half a block away from my apartment. If you are in Midtown and looking for a great butcher, check out Sonny's Meat Market on 52nd and 10th Avenue.

I swung through today and found Sonny himself behind the butcher block. I requested a pork roast, and he brought out a beautiful pork shoulder. Sonny's is one of those great places that will slice and dice the meat just the way you want it. Sonny asked if I wanted the roast with slices in it for stuffing, and I said heck yeah!

Once I got the roast upstairs, I was in anticipatory heaven. Here's what I whipped up.

Roast Pork Shoulder with Ginger and Garlic

1 medium sized pork shoulder
8 cloves garlic sliced
1 medium size piece of ginger sliced
2 jalapenos sliced
1 bunch scallions diced
1/2 cup soy sauce

If you get your pork shoulder from the butcher, ask your butcher to slice the bottom of the roast and also to make slits into the top of the roast. Make sure the cuts on the top of the roast are deep and wide, as you will be stuffing the slits.

If you buy your shoulder at the grocer, the first thing you will want to do is make a series of slits both lengthwise and width wise on the bottom. Basically, you are going to cut into the skin and make a series of cuts that makes the bottom look like a crazy tic tac toe board.

Then, on the top, make a number of deep slits/punctures throughout the roast.

Pre-heat the oven to 400 degrees.

Once you have the roast slit up, take your garlic, ginger, scallions, and jalapenos and stuff the hell out of the roast. Make sure to put some of each into each slit on the top of the roast.

Then, once you have the roast impregnated with goodness, place the roast in a roasting pan. Then pour the soy sauce over the roast. Then, cover the roast either with the lid to a good roasting pan or with tin foil.

Place the roast in the oven and bake it for 2 to 3 hours or until cooked all the way through.

This roast will blow your mind. A good sized pork shoulder will run you about $10 and you can feed 8-10 people easily.

Steamed Roughy with Ginger and Garlic

So, this week I made a couple of new dishes that I am super excited to share with all ya'll.

The other night, David and I went to gongyo at the SGI Cultural Center in New York along with my little brother Oshen and Oshen's new girlfriend (who was such a cutie patootie I just wanted to slap her on a grill and eat her right up). Afterwords, we swung by the Trader Joe's just off Union Square and stocked up on cheap fish. In general, whenever we are down that way, we pick up some frozen salmon, frozen uncooked shrimp, some scarlet snapper, and, this time, we grabbed some frozen Orange Roughy.

I have never worked with roughy before, nor had I ever steamed fish before. Whilst playing a game of Scrabble on Facebook with my Scrabble buddy Fred Chuang of Los Angeles, Fred sent me a message of a tasty way to prepare Catfish. So, I decided to apply some of what he said about the catfish to the orange roughy. And here's what I did:

Steamed Roughy with Ginger and Garlic

2 Large Pieaces Orange Roughy (frozen or fresh)
4 scallions diced
1/4 cup diced ginger root (FRESH!!!!)
1/4 soy sauce
3 cloves garlic minced


Make sure that your roughy is thawed out if you purchased it frozen. Take a large kitchen knife and make an incision down the center of each fillet. Take your ginger and garlic and fill the incisions in each piece of fish with the garlic and ginger. Lay the fish on one of those niffy vegetable steamers that fold up and look sort of like a flying saucer. Place that inside a large frying pan. Fill the bottom of the frying pan with water but not enough water that the water will cover the fish or even touch the fish. You want the fish to steam not boil. Cover the top of the fish with the scallions. Also add some of the scallions to the water in the bottom of the pan. Then pour the soy sauce over the top of the fish fillets. Place a lid over the top of the pan and turn the heat up to med high.

Let the fish steam for about 12 minutes.

Remove from the heat, the fish should be moist and flaky. Orange roughy is a very light fish, and it doesn't take long to cook.

I served the roughy with brown rice and some pan sauteed, with a little butter and garlic, fresh string beans that had been julienned by David. Super delicious!

The total cost for this dish, with the green beans, is roughly $7-$9 and comfortably feeds two. If you get large fillets you could feed four from this recipe.