[jyl]

chicken and pork cooked with homemade hoisin sauce with beet juice instead of red food coloring

Looks good. It is hard to get marinade to penetrate deeply. I'm doing another batch or char siu tonight (friends coming over), and am marinating in lots of beet juice, I also poked the pork all over w/ a toothpick in hopes of making for more marinade penetration.

Edit: beet juice worked, got pretty red. Family preferred the less sweet taste of the other one. Toothpicking didn't make a difference.

Another experiment going on - doing another pork belly but pressure-cooking this one in Grand Marnier and gelatinous stock. Not sure it's going to taste right - but too late now, the PC is closed.

Edit: not worth using Grand Marnier, taste too delicate to matter. Think sake next time.

Also have some beef shanks that I need to do. Not sure how - have never done - will default to pressure cooking in lots of red wine and stock and rosemary and garlic, unless other suggestions?

Edit: worked well. Used part of javadog's linked recipe.

Then trying again to make xiao long bao - not working well, if the testers I just steamed and sampled are any guide. Might give up on that for tonight.

Edit: dough not high gluten enough.

Oh, just pulled two ciabatta loaves from the oven, they sprang to 2X the height of the first attempt - this might be a good sign - we'll see at dinner, I'm not peeking.

Edit: was good stuff.