Receta Wings and Radishes of Desire.
The bowl of pink shiny candy was dessert.
Well, it's officially summertime (everywhere but Seattle). Truth be told, I'm not particularly fond of the big, hot ball of fire in the sky. No, I don't drink human blood but I do tend to be as pale as milk and skulk around in the shadows. Occasionally, I crave the sunlight even if it makes me sparkle (especially after I roll around in glitter, which I do daily). Yeah, I'm a shiny, sharp toothed vamp... uh regular person. A real Jane Doe. Yup, that's me. I'll steal your soul and damn you to an eternal Hell! Haha. Just kidding. So, who's hungry?
What I mostly crave about summertime is the food. I'm a sucker for fresh watermelon. I once ate a whole watermelon in one sitting seeds and all. I threw-up pink gobs of seeds for days. Still love it though. Grilled corn on the cobb? Yup, even the 7 years of painfully prying corn out of my braces couldn't sway me away from the golden, buttery treat. I still love the creepy warped music of ice cream trucks driving by and I've been known to bully my way to the front of the line for the last rocket pop (Sorry kid, get a Spider-man pop. That rocket pop is mine!). Another one of my summer favorites is chicken wings. Spicy, delicious, messy, tiny chickens with a handle.
Chicken Wing heaven.
There are a few ways to cook a good wing. On the barbecue, deep fried (when I make Buffalo wings I go this route), and baked or broiled. My go-to wings are broiled and have a South East Asian sort of thing going on. Glazed with sweet kecap manis (Indonesian sweet, syrupy soy sauce), spicy chili garlic paste, rice wine vinegar, & sesame oil. Super tasty. This time around I made a batch of those but I also made a batch of honey mustard BBQ wings. Sort of a Carolina style BBQ wing (minus the homophobia). I mixed together white wine vinegar, Dijon mustard, honey, chili powder, Worcestershire, cumin, garlic, and salt and pepper. Marinated the wings for a few hours and broiled them (on middle oven rack) for 7 minutes each side basting halfway through. So simple and tasty even a monkey missing a leg could do it.
I made three sauces to go with the wings.
sauce #1: Honey Mustard BBQ Sauce (for my super gay Carolina BBQ wings)
sauce #2: Harissa and Lemon Spiked Sour Cream (for both wings)
sauce #3: Fermented Black Bean & Chili Garlic Sauce (for my Indonesian wings)
I also made a fresh and cooling (especially since I made my wings so damn spicy) cucumber and radish salad. Very simple but addictive like crack for hippies or rabbits.
This is my kind of salad.
- Cucumber and Radish Salad
- 1 cucumber, peeled and seeded, thinly sliced
- 1 bunch of summer radishes, thinly sliced (I use a mandoline. You can chop some of the leaves in too)
- 1 small stick of celery with leaves, thinly sliced and the leaves roughly chopped
- 1/4 cup red onion, small diced
- 1 Tbsp fresh chopped tarragon
- (for the vinaigrette)
- 1/4 cup rice wine vinegar
- 2 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil
- 1 tsp sesame oil
- 2 tsp Dijon mustard
- 1 clove of roasted garlic (I always roast extra garlic and let it soak in olive oil. Use for a few days)
- 1 tsp honey
- 1 tsp salt
- fresh cracked black pepper to taste
In a bowl whisk together the rice wine vinegar, roasted garlic, honey, salt, pepper. Make sure you mash up the garlic. Slowly whisk in the olive oil. The whisk in the sesame oil. Toss with the remaining salad ingredients and serve. Make sure you have a sixer of peach wine coolers to wash it all down. xoxo