Wednesday, January 07, 2009

Iron Chef NY - Kumquats

For those who have seen Iron Chef America on the Food Network, you know that it is a challenge between two chefs to make a five course meal, each course including the "secret ingredient".  Well my youngest brother is in town visiting for a couple of days and came with two plastic grocery bags relatively full of kumquats.  I'd never seen or eaten a kumquat before but hey, around here, we don't turn down fresh produce in the middle of winter!

For those unaware (like I was before noon today), a kumquat is a small, golf-ball sized citrus fruit with really thin skin that you can eat and it's not yucky like eating an orange peel straight up. These kumquats came to our door from St. Simon Island, GA and I'm told grow year round. 

My Brother's initial inkling was to make marmalade.  Since he arrived on the eve of icy-yucky weather, and I didn't have all the makings for the marmalade, we went to plan B and consulted with google on kumquat recipes.  Thanks to the Kumquat Growers we found some pretty good recipes.  Here's the bowl-o-kumquats we started with: 



From here we went on to make kumquat pound cake - so good but so bad for you!



Kumquat, Oatmeal and White Chocolate Chip Cookies - also very yummy...



Ginger Candied Kumquats (we added ginger)



Ginger Candied Kumquat Cream Cheese Dip with Almond Crisp Crackers



and for dinner we had a Polynesian type pork stir fry with a kumquat-pineapple-teriyaki marinade with rice and mixed veggies.  I forgot to take a "before" picture of the finished dish, but here is what the marinade looked like 



and this is all that was left: 



And with all that - there are still quite a few kumquats left - looks like I could end up making marmalade yet!

(and so far it doesn't seem that kumquats have any labor inducing properties) :D
~sjt

5 comments:

katharine said...

You are quite the cook! Take care of yourself and your back... and too bad re: the labor inducing qualities. :)

Anonymous said...

lol, it must be a little brother thing, get the big sister to make lots of yummy food.

Patty said...

You guys are so fun and creative! I wish I'd been a guest at your home yesterday to try out all these yummy sounding kumquat creations. They all sound WONDERFUL!!

I, on the other hand, would have sat down and eaten them as is -- so much easier, but look what I'd have missed.

Natalie said...

Reminds me of a vacation bible school song:

"The fruit of the spirit's not a kumquat...what?
The fruit of the spirit's not a kumquat...what?
Well, the fruit of the spirit...yeah, you might as well hear it...the fruits of the spirit are these:
love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and selfcontrol."

I'm so thankful that you and Emrys display so many fruits...not just yummy kumquats!

Jenny said...

Hahahahaha!!! Your post was like a clown car...I think you're going to show us one thing you made instead of marmalade, but it was like, 'And THEN we made THIS...and THEN we made THIS, and THEN....' I can't believe you had all the ingredients for all of THAT, but not for one batch of marmalade!! HAHAHAHAHAHA!!

So easily amused am I.