Grilled Asian Marinated Tri Tips

Tri tips are one of my favorite cuts of meat.  It's cheap, beefy, and if done right, amazing!  Tri tips' roots have been known to come from the Santa Maria area, in Central California.  As with a lot origins of good, tough meat, tri tip started with the landowners giving the poor ranchers this cut of meat.  It was thought by the rich to be a worthless cut.  It was tough and hard to chew.  These ranchers apparently were better cooks than the landowners and their personal chefs, and thus tri tip was invented.  (Of course the landowners were never informed of this.)

YUM! Gizzards!

How many of you actually love gizzards the way I do?  How many have tried it?  It seems to be a love/hate relationship for most people.  Either they love it, or they hate it.  There are a bunch of different ways to make it, but this is one of my favorite ways.  Deep fried.  What isn't good deep fried?

Asian Braised Oxtail

Who doesn't love a good braise?  This is especially true in these cold February months.  OK, it's not too cold in Socal, but who needs excuses to make a wonderful braise?  I don't.  Braising is very popular with dishes such as French braised short ribs where you'd start with searing some short ribs, throw in your mire poix, and braising it in either stock or red wine.  This dish is very similar.  I've got a tough, sinewy, but very beefy and flavorful cut in the ox tail.  Braising it will break down those connective tissues and leave you with an amazing beef flavor.  I'm going to throw in some aromatics and simmer it in some liquid.  I did a similar braise like this with a friend before, but that was many years ago.  I did it again and I'm going to let you know what went well.  I had a few things that I plan to add next time I make this dish.

Teriyaki Chicken, Just One of Many Ways

Chicken is so amazing.  It can be cooked in an endless amount of ways.  Brining it in an Asian marinade is one of my favorite ways to prepare it.  Why?  It's just so damn good.  OK, that's not all.  It's also ridiculously easy to do and relatively healthy.  I'm lazy, so easy is awesome.  Chicken thighs are my favorite, drumsticks are a decent substitute and chicken breasts... can be substituted for with chicken thighs.  This post demonstrates such a substitution.  Most people use chicken breasts not only because it's healthier than its dark meat counterparts, but because it's quicker to cook up and it's easier to eat due to the fact that it's usually boneless.  But maybe I'll convert some of you to the dark side (pun intended).

Sweet and Sour Duck Breast

Hey all, this recipe is on my seared duck breast with a sweet and sour sauce.  Now, I love duck.  Duck confit, some seared duck breast, or roasted duck in the Asian butcheries... all amazing.  So I'm really excited to do this recipe for you guys today.  This is a very simple recipe that I made.  Duck is amazing with sweets.  Much like with a sweet chutney over the duck to go with its rich taste.  So I made sure to add some sweetness to the sauce.  I plated the duck breast over some beautiful butter-leaf lettuce to give it a freshness and crispness.  So amazing.

Low and Slow Pork Ribs

Hey guys!  Hope you all had a great Superbowl weekend full of awesome excitement and amazing foods.  I also hope you guys were Packers fans, because, well... you know.  Over at my place we grilled up some burgers with two inch thick patties for lunch and we threw on some ribs afterwards for dinner.  The beauty of having the ribs done during the game is that there is so little care required.  It's done low and slow and you can't really mess it up.

Happy Lunar New Years!

We at TheFoodPirates.com just wanted to wish our Asian friends as well as everyone else a happy Lunar New Years!

Chicken Tikka Masala, Britain's National Dish... WHAT?

OK, something looks wrong with the title.  Chicken tikka masala, that dish that you order half the time at Indian restaurants (the othe half being chicken tandoori), is something that's... British?  Blasphemy!