One of the benefits of having a dog is that you HAVE to get out of the house – on occasion at times not of your choosing. Da Google knows that without Shiloh needing his morning, ermmm, constitutional, I would most certainly NOT have been tromping about the neighborhood as dawn broke this fine November morning, and so would have missed the light just reaching the trees across the street.
Da Google knows many things, of course, one of them being how to make your own Hoisin Sauce at home, should the need arise.
As it happens, a need has arisen.
I was quite happy with last week’s Pear and Spinach ‘Za – even tho’ I screwed up getting the crust onto the baking stone – so I went back to the source: 365 Ways to Cook Vegetarian, by Kitty Morse, for another shot at ‘Za with a difference – and mebbe for redemption in getting my dough into the oven in more or less the shape I intended.
What I found is a meatless riff on Hawaiian Pizza that calls for Hoisin in place of the more usual red sauce. Thing is, I don’t really care for most of the commercially bottled Hoisin Sauces I’ve sampled, so I was not feeling the love for buying a jar of something already iffy for an experimental recipe.
Enter da Google.
Well, more specifically, da Google and food.com, with a wee, tiny bit of help from one commenter, joshthehoosier, who recommended limiting the peanut butter to 1 tablespoon MAX, and adding 1 teaspoon of maple syrup, which intrigued me. As it happened, I misread his comment and added a full tablespoon of maple syrup – OOPS!
INGREDIENTS
•4 tbsp soy sauce
•1 tbsp peanut butter
•1 tbsp brown sugar
•2 tsp white vinegar
•1 tbsp maple syrup – trust me, the full tablespoon is good
•2 tsp sesame oil
•1/8 tsp garlic powder
•1/8 tsp onion powder – I used 1/4 tsp dehydrated onion from The Spice House – not to be confused with those powdery little onion-like squares from the spice aisle in the market
•1/4 tsp hot sauce – the original recipe calls for 20 drops of Chinese hot sauce, or habenero or jalapeño as alternates, I went with Earl’s Five Pepper Hot Sauce
•1/8 tsp black pepper
SO, no extravagant or overly exotic ingredients, and, if you really need to, da Google offers options for the sesame oil, now let’s make some sauce!
The recipe called for tossing all the ingredients together in a mason jar, closing the lid, and shaking it all about until everything is well combined and emulsified.
I used my immersion blender instead, worked a treat.
Oh, and the sauce?
Creamier looking than the stuff from the market, but wicked good! This bodes well, I think, for our Hawaiian ‘Za; check it out, ermmm, tomorrow.