Sometimes my mom would buy pig’s tongue and put them in stews or soups. She usually slice them up and we would dip them in soy sauce and eat. I love pig and ox tongue. Nowadays when I go to Chinatown to buy roast pork or duck for dinner I would get 1 or 2 pig’s tongues. These pig’s tongues are cooked in soy sauce. So last Friday afternoon I decided to go to Chinatown to grocery shop. I wanted to make a big pot of stew that I can eat for a whole week. I thought of something simple. A stew with pig’s tongue with different kinds of mushroom and vegetable. I also decided on making a pot of curry with pork ribs but that will be another post. So I went to Chinatown and bought 4….yes 4 pig’s tongue, shiitake mushroom, enoki mushroom, brown beech mushroom, and baby bok choy.

To make the stew I poured whatever was left in my bottle of chicken marinate and oyster sauce. Then I added water and gave it a stir. I also added some 5 spice powder, pepper and salt. Turned the heat up to high and brought it to a boil. I took a sip of the liquid and was surprised to find how tasty it was. Sorry but I didn’t measure anything. Before the liquid started to boil, I sliced all 4 tongues and the shiitake mushroom. Once the liquid was boiling I threw them in. I cooked it on high for about 5-10 minutes then lowered the heat to medium. While that was cooking I cleaned and prepared the brown beech mushroom, the enoki mushroom and the bok choy. I cooked the tongues and shiitake for about 30mins before putting in the brown beech. Gave it a good stir then cooked it for 15 minutes before putting in the bok choy. Stirred it again. Cook it for another 15 more minutes then turned off the heat. Threw in the enoki mushroom and scallions that I had sliced up earlier. The heat of the stew will cook the enoki mushroom. Done

I know bacon wrapped anything is good but my favorite has to be bacon wrapped enoki mushroom. The first time I had this was at Oh! Taisho in the East Village. The mushroom basically acts as the comfort, the comfort that I’m still eating something “healthy” even though it’s wrapped in bacon.
So when I was having my apartment warming party it was an obvious idea to make these oh so wonderfully delicious evil things. Also it’s relatively cheap and easy to make for a large group of people.

Recipe:
1 pack of bacon
2 packs of enoki mushroom
Toothpicks

Marinade:
Soy sauce
Pepsi or coke

Mix soy sauce and soda together. I didn’t measure the amount but I think I did 1 to 1. Of course if you want the marinade to be sweeter, add more soda. I wrapped the bacon the night before so all I did was pop these little delights into the oven. Pre-heat the oven to 350 degrees. Cut each strip of bacon in half and also cut the enoki mushroom in half or else they would be too long. Then grab a bunch of enoki, here the amount of enoki mushroom per strip of bacon is all up to you, place them at the beginning of the bacon (the end closest to you) and roll. Normally you would stick a toothpick (soak the toothpick in water so they don’t burn in the oven) through the bacon but since I made these the night before I waited till the next day right before these went into the oven. Repeat until all of the bacon is used up. With a brush, brush the marinade on each bacon wrap and bake! I don’t remember how long it takes to cook these but you’ll know when the bacon is done.