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Hi, Melissa. Thanks so much for your interest -- I had no idea so many folks would want to participate.

In my experience, group meals at Aroy are best when kept to around 15 people. As much as I'd like to expand the group, we're going to stick with the original plan for this exchange.

Ronna

OK, I will be making skhug (variant schug, zhug, zchug), a hot sauce used in Yemen and Israel.

GG, I absolutely love skhug. I've come across my favorite versions, which have all had a fluorescent yellow hue (must be turmeric?), at Israeli-style falafel stands here and there. Despite a couple of tries, I've never been able to capture the magic at home. I'm very much looking forward to trying yours.

I've been playing around with an as yet unnamed hot sauce made from fermented Genesis lipstick peppers, garlic, and homegrown chiltepin peppers. It has a pleasant, tangy funk to it and some bitter, back-of-the-throat burn, but I still think it needs more heat. If it works out, this sauce will be our contribution to the Spicy Condiment Exchange.



--Rich

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I don't know what you think about dinner, but there must be a relation between the breakfast and the happiness. --Cemal Süreyya

The sriracha is fermenting vigorously. I'm going to boil it down and spike it with vinegar to see how things turned out.

I also made a batch of shito a couple days ago. It's been developing some nice flavors in the fridge. I used 100% palm oil, which was a mistake because palm oil is solid at room temperature so it's more of a spread. Still it's pretty tasty.

I'm considering which one to bring, and may just end up bringing both since I made so much of them. We'll see how tomorrow goes.

I hope all of you will post recipes for these delicious sounding, and I'm sure delicious tasting, condiments.

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Jyoti
A meal, with bread and wine, shared with friends and family is among the most essential and important of all human rituals.
Ruhlman

I'm working on a vinegary homegrown cayenne, bird's eye, jalapeno something-or-other, with shio koji (supplied by Jazzfood) instead of salt. We'll see what happens. . .

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The Food Chain—the Chicago Reader’s food and drink blog

Rich--the color of that sauce--it's stunning! And g-gnome, I've never tried skhug, and can't wait to. In honor of PIGMON's mom and grandmother, I'll be making Tunisian harissa.

I got bored working on the recipe for pikliz, so I decided to add Ti-Malice as well. My contribution will be a twofer.

Haven't figured out exactly what my final containers will be but my entries are:
1) a chimichurri style sauce heavy on jalapenos along with onion, garlic, cilantro, arugula, lime juice, kosher salt and white vinegar
2) Bruleed peach and hot peppers (mustard habaneros, caribbeans and scorpion peppers (I think))--pureed with sungold and some other kind of small yellow tomatoes, champagne vinegar, salt and a gas mask. This sucker is devil hot.

I am also doing a batch of 10 pepper hot sauce--depending on how much I make and my container situation, I may bring some of that as well.

See you all tomorrow!

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“The problem with people who have no vices is that generally you can be pretty sure they’re going to have some pretty annoying virtues.” Elizabeth Taylor

I made XO sauce for the exchange. But last night I was given 10 habanero peppers. I'm interested in any interesting sauces I could make with these.

Thanks, to REB & RAB for setting up this really fun event, and everyone who contributed their great condiments. Stupidly, I left my camera at home but I did snap a cell phone shot of the haul. It was Christmas of Condiments . . .


Spicy Condiments

Hopefully, folks will comment (further) on what they made and what inspired them.

One new dish we had tonight was the Orange Curry soup, which was really funky and sour. I'm told that it was a relatively mild version compared to some others around town but having never had it before, I have to say that I really enjoyed it. Of course, the Aroy greatest hits were spot on tonight, too. I thought the meal was very tasty and it was a lot of fun eating those familiar Aroy dishes with some of the condiments that were brought.

Thanks again, to everyone who participated and contributed. The culinary prowess and generosity of LTHers never ceases to amaze me.

=R=

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I just wanna live until I gotta die. I know I ain't perfect but God knows I try. --Todd Snider

Twitter: ronniesuburban

It turns out that gefilte fish topped with pikliz is a great combination!

Having tasted the pikliz last night, that doesn't surprise me a bit. Can't wait to try it out myself.


This one was absolutely fantastic as an accompaniment for some dry-aged NY Strips that I grilled tonight on the Weber over lump charcoal. Thanks, gastro gnome, for a great condiment.

I'm really excited check out all the other goodies in my trove.

=R=

_________________
I just wanna live until I gotta die. I know I ain't perfect but God knows I try. --Todd Snider

Twitter: ronniesuburban

Sadly my recipes weren't measured or recorded at all, but I'll share the best I can.

Pikliz

1 medium head cabbage sliced thin
2 red onions
1/2 to 3/4 head purple cauliflower
3 leeks (white part only)
A couple red onions
vinegar to taste (used some white distilled, and some red wine)
bunch of cloves (maybe 15 to 20?) soaked in warm water, juice included
some thyme to taste
salt and pepper to taste
bunch of habaneros (about 20 or so), seeds and veins included,
sliced everything thin like slaw, but then remembered that pikliz is always in tiny bits to be used as a condiment, so then i pulsed it in the food processor

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Ti-Malice

This one will be tough to repeat, as I just kept throwing in more ingredients until it tasted right.
2 or 3 large onions
1 red bell pepper
1 green bell pepper
½ to 1 stick of butter
olive oil
4 garlic cloves smashed then diced
Lime juice and pikliz vinegar to taste
Thyme to taste
Salt to taste
4 or 5 habanero peppers
I threw in some extra fresh spices from the garden, probably oregano, parsley and sage.

I diced everything and sautéed it in order of which I though everything would soften evenly (onions first)

Also, I'd like to request the recipe for the XO sauce, it was great in some soup i had last night!

Laikom - thanks for posting those recipes. I really like both.

The XO sauce is from David Chang's Momofuku. The recipe makes 2 cups:

2 oz (about a 1/2 cup) dried scallops (apparently you can buy whole dried scallops or dried pieces. The pieces are cheaper, though I don't know if the quality is any different. I bought them at Tai Nam on Broadway and they only had whole pieces. If you can find dried pieces, that may be the way to go since you are going to mince the scallops anyways).

2 oz (about 3/4 cup) dried shrimp.
1/2 cup peeled garlic cloves
1/2 cup sliced peeled ginger
1 cup chopped country ham, ham scraps, or chinese sausage (You can buy excellent county ham scraps at Publican Quality Meats for $5/lb, which is what I used. I bought some Chinese sausage at Tai Nam and would not recommend it. The Chinese sausage that I bought was really sweet and had no smokiness.)
1/2 cup grapeseed, canola, or other neutral oil
1 tablespoon crushed dried red chiles (I pulsed dried chiles in a food processor to break them up. I probably used a bit more than a tablespoon.)

1. Combine the dried scallops and shrimp in a bowl, cover with water by 1/2 inch. Cover the bowl and let them sit out overnight. Drain. I strained the liquid and froze it for future use.

2. Next day: Pulse the garlic and ginger in a food processor until finely chopped. Set aside. Do the same thing with the drained scallops and shrimp. Set aside (or combine with the garlic and ginger). Pulse the ham in the food processor and set aside (do not combine with the other ingredients).

3. Heat the oil in a large saute pan over medium-high heat (I made a double recipe and used a dutch oven.) Add the ham to the oil. Cook for 3-4 minutes, stirring, until the meat starts to brown. Add the chiles and cook another 2-3 minutes. At this point it will look like you are deep frying the ham.

4. Turn the heat as low as possible and the dried seafood, garlic, and ginger. Stir to combine and stew until the mixture is fairly dry and the garlic and ginger are a dirty blonde. Chang's recipe says it will take about 45 minutes. I cooked mine for at least an hour, perhaps 75 minutes. The key is not to let the garlic burn but to cook long enough so that it isn't a wet mixture.

You can use it immediately.
Store in the fridge. According to Chang, it will keep for "months if not years".

Chang says it pairs especially well with seafood that have a high sugar content, such as shellfish, but is also good on just about everything else. He has a few recipes where you quick-cook vegetables, then toss in some butter, soy sauce, and a couple of tablespoons of XO sauce. He also has a kimchi consomme recipe where you can substitute XO sauce for the kimchi.

I made a nice bok choy dish the other night with the XO: I browned a sliced chinese sausage and then set it aside. Then browned two quartered bok choys, added a little water, butter, soy sauce, and XO sauce, and tossed to combine and covered the pan to let this steam for a couple of minutes. Then I added the sausage back in and tossed it together. The water, butter, soy, and XO made an amazing sauce.

Thank you for the recipes.
Gastro Gnome - would you be willing to share your recipe for Skhug.

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Jyoti
A meal, with bread and wine, shared with friends and family is among the most essential and important of all human rituals.
Ruhlman

What a great thread! I only wish I could have been there to participate in the exchange. Georgian tkemali would have been my contribution. Next time, perhaps.

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Man : I can't understand how a poet like you can eat that stuff.
T. S. Eliot: Ah, but you're not a poet.

Thanks Darren! I'm glad my stuff was appreciated!

I have updated the Ti-Malice, I remembered that there was definitely Garlic and Olive oil in it.

Glad people liked the shkug. I'm a little embarrassed to share the recipe. It really wasn't that hard and a lot of others put a lot more work into their condiments. It was also weird making a condiment I'd never tasted before. I will try to hunt down the various recipes I used and recollect my proportions. Here's a rough idea.

Basically, toast some coriander and cumin and pummel it to powder. Then take, say, 6 garlic cloves, 8 oz chiles (not seeded - I used 2:1 jalapenos to serranos), 1 bunch cilantro, a few glugs of olive oil and a little water and whiz it in the food processor or blender to make a smooth paste. I also added lemon juice to taste. I saw some recipes state that it was to be a pour-able consistency. Others making it sound more like a paste. Mine was thicker like a paste or a chutney. Throw a little salt in to season, although it should be plenty flavorful. Then cover in a layer of olive oil (not really sure what this is for, I might just skip it), jar it up (should make about 2 8 oz jars) and keep in the fridge.

I got some feedback that this tasted perhaps more like a chutney and was missing some element of zhug sampled abroad. NOt sure waht that would be.

Already used some of RAB's unnamed condiment to wonderfully perk up a pot of beans. I am looking forward to using more of these condiments.

Darren, I've generally found Chinese sausage to be sweet. It's possible some versions are also smokier. Have you gotten some in the past that had a better balance?

Thanks for the recipe Gastro.

The covering of olive oil serves as a seal to preserve the ingredients below. It is a method often used in all kinds of preserving, pickles, pesto etc.

I have never tried Skhug so can't comment on that. When I looked it up on the Internet there were so many variations. I suspect, each place has its own version. Eager to try your version.

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Jyoti
A meal, with bread and wine, shared with friends and family is among the most essential and important of all human rituals.
Ruhlman

This is the first time I've bought Chinese sausage. I don't recall the brand, but I think it was made in San Francisco. Perhaps there are smokier versions.

Ronna and I enjoyed an easy dinner designed around laikom's ti-malice and pikliz the other night. We defrosted and heated some pulled pork, and topped it with a big pile of the fiery, purple pikliz. For a side, we tossed cauliflower and onions in ti-malice and roasted them. Add some last-of-the-season backyard tomatoes and Bob's your uncle.


Thanks, Matt. Awesome stuff.

Next up: Grilled lamb with trixie-pea's Tunisian harissa.

--Rich

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I don't know what you think about dinner, but there must be a relation between the breakfast and the happiness. --Cemal Süreyya

My wife and I really enjoyed the harissa on eggs the other morning.