Banana's Foster

OK guys, here is the deal on this recipe.  Girls, talk amongst yourselves and don't listen to this guy talk here.  OK guys.  We alone?  If you happen to get a girl you've been dating to be brave enough to come to your place for dinner, or even dessert, and you make this recipe...  It's almost a guaranteed trip around a couple of bases.  I won't guarantee a homerun here, but you can almost count on a double, and I mean a solid one.  No sliding into the base, or need for an umpire's ruling here.  OK, call the ladies back.  Girls, we were talking about sports, don't worry.  

2 large bananas sliced in half lengthwise and then in half widthwise (get a couple on the greenish side, they will hold up better in the pan.)

1/2 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup butter

1/2 tsp salt

1/4 tsp cayenne pepper

1/2 cup brandy

1/2 cup coconut rum

ice cream for serving

Place a saute pan on medium high heat.  Let it sit for a couple of seconds to bring the temperature of the pan up.  Add the butter, and and bananas flat side down.  Fry them until you see a caramel color develop on the bananas.  Turn the bananas over, and add the brown sugar to the pan, begin to slowly stir with your spoon to make sure the butter and sugar come together as best you can get them.  Add the salt, and cayenne, continue to stir until the butter and sugar mixture begins to bubble.  Stand back, and add your liquor.  If you have one of those long grill lighters, you can light it over the pan to flambe.  This is not necessary for any reason except the ooh and ah factor, which just might get you an extra base.  After the fire goes out, stir to combine and serve immediately over vanilla ice cream.  This is one of my wife's favorite desserts, I ended up married to her, so I guess you can say it was my biggest home run of all.

Why My Cooking Tastes Better Than Yours. Volume Three. Cookware.

OK, by now you are getting the message that I'm simply titling these posts the way I do to just get your attention.  Again I don't think I'm realy a better cook than you, blah, blah, blah.  Let's just get to the post shall we?

I will call this post Cookware.

Listen to me.  You have two choices here.  You can go out and pay about $100 or $150 for a set of cookware that will do a good job for about a year or two, or you can save up, spend $1000 and NEVER BUY ANOTHER SET FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIFE!  Does a great set of cookware make any difference at all?  HELL YES IT DOES!  Does your dentist buy his tools at walmart?  Or if he did, would you really want him rooting around in your mouth with a seven dollar drill that just might shatter on your tooth?  Does a carpenter use tools that are made from cheap plastic or does he invest in Snap On or MAC tools that have lifetime warranties and are extremely reliable?  A good set of cookware is a tool, just like anything else, and it is something you are going to use every day.  It doesn't matter if you fancy yourself a great home cook or not, your tool chest will help you along your way to perfecting your abilities in your kitchen.  First things first.  Don't invest in a set.  You will get stuck with pieces you may not use, and not all pieces are made alike.  I strongly suggest you stay away from anything that says "coated, or non-stick, or anotized," in the description.  This stuff will, after time, come off in your food regardless of the price.  The only piece of non-stick I recommend it a small 8 inch fry pan to do your eggs in.  There are two basic groups you want to stay with, and don't stray from these.  Beware of celebrity chefware, I'm sorry, but Emeril does not cook with Emerilware, he uses allclad (which makes Emerilware as a low cost alternative) and he uses Le Crueset.  Just watch his show.  You want stainless steel for two reasons.  Allclad, and my personal favorite Viking cookware have aluminum cores.  For those of you afraid of Alzheimer's disease don't worry, the aluminum is inside of the stainless steel, and your food will never have any contact with the aluminum.  Allclad has 3 plys of aluminum, Viking has 7.  Aluminum is one of the best conductors of heat, and since these pots and pans are clad all across the bottom, and up the sides, you will have an even distribution of heat through-out the entire pot.  So no matter what kind of burner you have, you will not end up with any hot spots, which is very important.  The other thing about stainless / aluminum cookware is when you take it off the burner it begins to immediately cool.  When you are finished sauteing, you don't want your food to continue to cook after you are done with it.  This is a problem with other cookware.  Something that is perfect can end up burnt even after 2 or 3 minutes off the burner.  I suggest your fry pans, and sauce pans you buy in stainless steel.  Get a nice 11 inch fry pan, and a 1 quart sauce and a 2 quart sauce.  You can also invest in a saute pan if you do dishes that require browning, and then covering.  Stainless cookware can also go stovetop to oven, and does not have a plastic handle that can melt.  Stainless steel does not conduct heat (hence the aluminum core) so the handles will not get hot on the stovetop (they will in the oven though, so don't be a fool, and grab it barehanded out of a 400 degree oven, unless your name happens to be Clark Kent.)  

Next I suggest cast iron.  Now a good cast iron skillet is a beautiful thing.  Grandma's old black skillets are truly prized possessions, so if they are offered to you, take them with glee.  You never wash these, you simply wipe them out with a paper towel, rub some oil into them, and put them away.  Over time they develop a non-stick coating better than any teflon pan could every have.  This sounds gross, but culinarily speaking, any bacteria that could be on these pans will turn to cinders the moment that skillet hits the heat, so don't let your delicate sensibilities ruffle your tailfeathers.  Aside from copper (which you can't afford probably) cast iron is the best conductor of heat, and it's cheap.  For those of you who like cast iron cooking but don't want the responsibility of seasoning their pans, enameled cast iron is the way to go.  Now there are only two companies to buy from they are the original purveyors of this kind of cookware, and no one else can touch them.  Le Crueset, and Staub.  Both are French companies, and both have lifetime warranties.  A little old lady brought her Le Crueset pot into the Rolling Pin Cooking Store last year that she had been given as a gift for her wedding almost 50 years ago.  The enamel had begun to chip off the inside of the pot, and she wanted to buy a new one.  Rather than selling her one, the owner called Le Crueset customer service, and they sent her a brand new pot free of charge no questions asked.  They take their lifetime warranty very seriously.  The items you want would be a 7 and 1/4 quart dutch oven.  This is what you would do all your slow cooking in.  You can roast a chicken, pot roast, pork roast, Chili, etc.  You can even bake a loaf of bread in it.  Now cast iron retains it's heat very well.  A pot of chili will still be hot even an hour after you shut the heat off.  This is great for some things, and not for others.  A stainless steel dutch oven is not worth the money, you want cast iron every time, hands down.  You also may want a grill pan, or a skillet.

A cheap, thin, frying pan is just like throwing your food directly onto the burner.  There is no insulation between the food and the burner, and your meat, eggs, sauces, etc. are almost guaranteed to burn.  In a good Viking pan, you can heat the pan up, add your food, and get a great even browning without any worry about hotspots.  You will definitely see a difference.  

In Athens, you can get everything you need at the Rolling Pin in Beechwood shopping center.  Yes it's expensive, but it's worth the cost.  Spend the money, and be done with it forever.

My Dumpling Making Experience

Place 1 tsp filling in center of Goyza skin

Bring centers together

Make 4 pleats in the side of the dumpling

Finished Dumpling

I have had some really exiting things happen to me in my life.  I've met Pavarotti, and shook his flabby sweaty hand while probably acting like a 16 year old girl meeting Brad Pitt.  He was actually kind of a jerk to me, but I didn't care, the man could do no wrong in my eyes at the time and he had just finished singing a beautiful concert in Miami where some friends of mine and I scored tickets.  I had been talking about nothing else but seeing Pavarotti for a whole week.  I stood in line for 3 plus hours for Star Wars episode one tickets with the same level of excitement I had when I was seven years old seeing the original for the first time.  How was I supposed to know my intelligence would be insulted by Jar Jar Binks the most irritating character of any movie ever made?  I still talked about nothing else but the premier of that movie for at least a week before hand.  My business partner Jeremy Hankins has told me that since he's worked for a long time as a wok chef he could teach me how to make Asian dumplings any time I wanted to learn, but when my buddy En-chi Anna Ho told me she wanted to teach me how to make her dumpling recipe, it was Pavarotti and Star Wars all over again.  I was exited about it all week, and was not disappointed for one second, because I got a double experience.  I GOT ANNA'S MOM TOO!  Sorry Jeremy, but there's nothing better than learning how to make truly authentic Northern Chinese dumplings from a woman that can only communicate with you with smiles, gestures, and a few shared words in English.  I'll never forget it.  I'm going to give you the gist of Anna and her Mom's recipe here without any embellishments on my part, but it's kinda hard to be truly accurate in my measurements by what I saw with my eyes since no measuring implements were utilized at any time during the event.  Here is my best guess.  This recipe makes wonderful chive dumplings.  We did vegetarian dumplings because a lot of her friends at her party were vegetarians, but I will include the meat option here as well.  If you want all vegetarian, just leave the meat out.  I will do this again later this week and try to upload some pictures to help you along the way.

Filling

2 cups finely chopped chives

2 cups finely chopped pork, turkey, shrimp, or whatever your carnivorous heart desires

2 Tbsp minced garlic

1 tsp white pepper

1 Tbsp minced ginger or powdered ginger

1 Tbsp soy sauce

1 Tbsp sesame oil

pinch of salt

Seriously.  This is it.  Combine all ingredients in a big bowl, mix well, and set aside to stuff.  You should be able to get at least 50 dumplings out of this recipe I think, so one package of goyza skins should do it.  Get a small bowl of water.  Put one tsp of filling in the center of the skin, and with your finger trace a thin line of water around the edge of half the skin.  Do this so that the half moon of wetted wrapper is away from you.  Fold in half and let the centers come together.  On one side of the wrapper create 4 pleats and stick them to the other side.  Dumpling should stand up by itself.  Trust me, I will upload pictures.

In a pan on medium high heat, add a thin layer of oil, arrange the dumplings around the pan in the oil, don't worry about crowding the pan.  Your dumplings might stick, Don't touch them.  Let them fry for 3 minutes.  Add half a cup of water or possibly chicken stock if you have it.  Immediately cover the pan and let the dumplings steam cook the rest of the way, approximately 7 minutes.  The liquid in the pan will release the stuck dumplings from the bottom.  

Sauce

1 cup soy sauce

3 Tbsp rice wine vinegar

1 tsp minced ginger

1 tsp minced garlic

1 tsp minced scallions

1 tsp minced cilantro

1 Tbsp sesame oil

Whisk all ingredients in a bowl.  Dip your dumplings and enjoy!

Why my cooking tastes better than yours. Volume two. Herbs and spices, or the dead and dying!

Again, don't judge me from the title of this post.  I don't believe for a moment that I have more natural cooking talent that the next guy.  It's just that I have lived and learned in the kitchen more than most, and have some basic knowledge to pass on to those frustrated individuals who just can't seem to get their dishes to taste like they think their recipes should.  One cause of this dilemma might be what you use in your pantry.  Do you remember those jars of herbs and spices from that nice little spice cabinet you received back in 1967 when you married your husband?  The stuff that's still in those jars that might look perfectly fine is just as bad as using little pinches of King Tut to cook with.  It's dead.  It's mummified, and if it's all not totally dead, if you listen closely enough, you'll be able to hear the death rattle.  

Now this might be hard for you to believe, but the shelf life of dried herbs and spices is only about 6 months, AT THE MOST!  After that, the structure of what's in there begins to break down, and all the flavor begins to go away.  Now throwing this stuff away might seem like a waste, but it's no longer food.  Put it in your compost pile (I can't guarantee the worms will even like it.)  Here is another thing that's hard to believe.  The major spice manufacturers may not ship their inventory for a few weeks after it is made.  Why?  Well, they don't have enough orders to fill, so they keep stuff in stock to sell.  Also, your mega mart may have the same bottles of spices on their shelves for several days before you come to buy it.  All told, you may be purchasing spices that are already a month or two old.  Stay away from the bargain bins!  These have already expired.  Cheap yes, but you actually need twice the amount your recipe calls for if you want to truly draw out the real flavor profile your recipe calls for.  So what it the answer?  Most towns have an organic market with a bulk spice bin.  Buy your herbs and spices in small amounts and use old jars to keep them in.  After a couple months if you still have any left, toss it.  Throwing away a couple teaspoons of something hurts a lot less that a whole jar.

Now if you want to keep your spices longer, buy them whole and grind them yourself.  If you like cumin, buy whole seeds, toast them in a pan for a couple minutes, and put them in a spice grinder.  If you have a recipe that calls for chili powder, buy some real dried chilis and grind them yourself.  I'll post a wonderful recipe for that later.  Buy a microplane and grate your nutmeg (by the way, in large quantities nutmeg is a hallucinogenic.).  Cinnamon ground from sticks has much more flavor than the already ground stuff.  When purchasing cinnamon sticks, look for long sticks that are still malleable, the McCormick stuff is crap, don't use it.

Contrary to what people might say, dried herbs are not evil.  When I think of the Italian grandmothers who hang the abundance of herbs they grow in their gardens up to dry for the winter, I think, "Wow, there has to be a reason for this."  In many instances I prefer dried herbs over fresh.  They have a more pungent taste and aroma than the fresh, and are great in dishes that cook for long periods of time.  I tend to prefer fresh herbs to finish a dish.  They add a brighter flavor at the end.  Marinara sauce especially is a sauce made from canned tomatoes.  It's made traditionally from canned tomatoes because it is a wintertime sauce.  Sauce pomodoro is made in the summer.  Marinara to me cries out for dried basil over fresh every time.  I like to add the fresh on the top as a garnish when I serve it, but that deep robust basil flavor infused into the sauce can only really come from the dried stuff. 

The important thing to remember is to throw the old stuff away.  Be frugal in other ways, but don't subscribe to the theater of the bland by torturing your family and friends with herbs and spices that have lost their flavor.

Pizza on the Grill

Thai Chicken Pizza

It's grilling season again, and aside from the heat of summer, (of which I am not a fan, and what the hell am I doing living in Georgia?) grilling season is my favorite.  I love opening up a fine craft beer, sitting on my adirondack chair, and letting 500 degrees of searing coals send an envious wave of delectable smells into the air ducts of my neighbor's house.  Yes I BBQ too, which (for those of you who don't know the difference) means to cook a roast, brisket, chicken, rack of ribs, leg of lamb, etc., at a very low temperature over indirect heat (usually utilizing smoke) until the object is literally falling off the bone, or succulently tender just waiting for my Texas toast and sauce.  Do not get me started on grilling!

My other favorite food has got to be pizza.  Now in Athens, aside from a couple of places, (Namely Ferrandos Pizzaria), you cannot find a real authentic Italian style or New York style pie.  This is not to say that the pizzarias in Athens suck, I am all for corporate pizza when I'm watching the game, and I really like Depalma's wild mushroom pie.  There is fantastic pizza in Athens, but if we really want to go back to the roots of pizza in this country we have to go to New York.  In 1897 an Italian immigrant reinvented a Napoletana staple food into one of the worlds most eaten foods. New York City was the birth place of New York style pizza. During the year of 1905, Lombardi's was licensed by the City of New York, becoming America's First Pizzeria.  (www.firstpizza.com) They still use their original coal burning oven to make the pizza, and it is truly the most perfect pizza I've ever had, until I started making it for myself ON MY FREAKIN' BACKYARD GRILL.

For truly authentic Italian pizza there are a couple of rules.  There is no such thing as a meat lover's pie, or supreme pizza where there are more toppings than crust.  Pizza is all about the crust, the toppings are an afterthought.  Usually on a really well balanced Italian wood fired pizza, there are only three or four ingredients.  Sauce (usually just olive oil and garlic, however tomato sauce is appropriate), cheese (usually sliced or balls of mozzarella, provolone, or even shaved parmigiano reggiano) one topping of your choice (pepperoni, prosciutto, calamata olives, etc.) and finally a fresh herb, (usually added after the pizza is cooked)  you can also add fresh chopped tomatoes, or other cold items after the pizza is cooked.  This balances cold and hot, fresh and crispy with salty and meaty, etc.  When doing pizza on the grill it's important to not overload your pie or it will end up not happy.

Next is this.  You want your grill hot.  You will be doing this pizza on direct heat, so get your coals ready, or turn your gas burners on high and get the space nice and hot.  You are going to want a covered grill for this.  If you don't have one, a nice wok lid will work great.  If you don't have one of those, well... make your pizza inside in the oven, and forget about this recipe.

For the Dough

1 packet of active dry yeast

1 tsp sugar

1 cup warm water (bathwater temperature)

3 cups of bread flour

1/2 tsp kosher salt

2 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil

In a large stainless steel bowl or the bowl from your trusty stand mixer, bloom your yeast with the water and sugar.  (blooming is the act of dissolving your yeast in warm water, and waiting for a nice froth to develop on the top.)  Attach your dough hook to your mixer, and add the flour, salt and 1 Tbsp of the olive oil.  Knead on low speed for 6-10 minutes.  The longer you knead, the more elastic your dough will be.  If you don't have a stand mixer, simply stir in your flour, and knead by hand for 10 minutes, allowing the dough to rest for a minute in the middle of the kneading process.  When the dough is kneaded, place in a bowl and toss with olive oil to completely coat.  Cover the bowl with a towel and let sit one hour.  After an hour, punch the dough down, and let it re-rise for another hour.

Toppings

I love Italian sausage, especially the hot kind.  If you use any meat on your pizza that isn't cured (like pepperoni, prosciutto, etc.) you need to make sure and cook the meat completely before topping your pizza with it!  The total cooking time for this pizza is just around 4 minutes, so there is not enough time to actually cook raw meat.  If you happen to be a werewolf, don't worry about cooking your meat, you'll like it much better raw.

Prosciutto, as thinly sliced as possible makes a lovely pizza topping, as does pancetta (an Italian cured bacon).  Pepperoni is of course a staple, but hold out for a good one.  Nothing against the Hormel company, it's just that there is much better out there.  In other words, look for quality ingredients.  As my best friend in high school used to say, "don't marry the girl just because she'll put out, find one to bring home to Mamma!"  If you are shopping at a local mega mart, and don't happen to have a market in your neighborhood with a short, balding, squatty guy at the counter wearing an apron that talks in broken English, Boars Head actually makes a decent pepperoni; but the kind wrapped in wax paper hanging from the ceilings at a real Italian deli is the Pavarotti of pepperoni.  If they have a black pepperoni, get that too, but just eat it by itself with a nice baguette, block of cheese and fine Chianti.  I am Italian by the way, so my reference to Italian Americans is made with tremendous respect and admiration.

For cheese, my choice is smoked mozzarella.  It has the same very mild flavor as regular mozzarella, but with a hint of smoke.  Cut this into 1/4 inch thick slices.  Also provolone cheese slices are fantastic, but make sure you don't use meat that's too salty, otherwise you will overpower your pie with salt.  The rule is, the saltier the cheese, the milder the toppings, or the milder the cheese, the saltier the toppings.  If you want to use mozzarella cheese, PLEASE DON'T BUY THE GRATED STUFF IN YOUR CHEESE CASE!  If you want Dominos pizza, order Dominos for goodness sake, but if you're taking the time to make it from scratch, why create something that will taste the same as something that arrives at your house in 30 minutes or less and only costs you 5 bucks.  It's not worth the extra work involved.  Get real mozzarella, the kind packed in water, in balls.  I like the mini balls, and just toss a few of them on my pizza.  However the king is the real mozzarella di buffalo.  This cheese is made from the milk of water buffalos.  You can buy it, or find it on-line.  It's more expensive yes, but it's the best, and dammit, you deserve the best don't you?

Sauces 

My favorite is this.  Take a few Tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil, and put them in a small saucepan on the stove.  turn on low heat.  Add 8 cloves of garlic, uncut, and 3 Tbsp white wine.  Cook until the garlic is mashed potato soft.  Add a liberal amount of freshly cracked black pepper and some french grey salt.  Smash the garlic into the oil with a fork, and baste liberally over your pizza.  YUM!

I also like a nice olive tapenade.  If you want to try something fun, use the peanut sauce I posted as my very first post with chicken, cilantro, and cheddar cheese for a Thai style pizza.

Assembly

OK, finally.  This is it.  Take your dough, and divide it into 4 equal sized portions.  Roll your dough out about 1/4 inch thick, and brush one side with olive oil.  Place the oiled side directly on the grill, and don't touch it for two minutes.  watch for flare-ups.  After two minutes, turn the pizza over with a pair of tongs or a pizza peel, and be ready.  As soon as that cooked side hits the grill, top your pizza as fast as you can and immediately cover the grill.  Wait 2 more minutes.  Your pizza is now done.  Eat it with relish, and tell your friends.

Why my cooking tastes better than yours. Volume one. Salt.

Does this blog title piss you off?  Don't worry, I don't think I'm a better cook than you.  This isn't a my food tastes better than yours does nah nah nah nah nah nah!  There are a few simple reasons why a trained chef's dishes might taste different or better than yours even while following the same recipe, and these blog postings are here to enlighten you.  Much of the reason might simply be your pantry, and what's inside of it.  So this posting is all about my favorite ingredient, and one of the most important of all ingredients.  Salt.  

You may not know it, but that dark blue container with the cute little girl on it is only good for about one thing.  Defrosting the ice on your steps.  I'm sorry, but Morton Iodinized Salt is not a great culinary ingredient.  Yes, it's salt, yes it tastes like salt, but not all salts are made the same, and once you learn the differences in their unique flavor profiles, the can of salt you have that hangs out in your pantry, and fills your salt shakers will hopefully become a thing of the past.

There are two categories of salts.  One to use during the cooking process, and the other is what we will call finishing salts.   Cooking salts have a deeper and more robust flavor, while finishing salts are meant to add just a little extra flavor to the dish, and are very light and mild in flavor.  Some can have a mineral flavor, some can have a very soft flavor.  For cooking I really like kosher salt.  When I'm seasoning meats like beef, pork or lamb, that's what I reach for.  Kosher salt is generally mined, and has a nice robust flavor.  When I'm seasoning fish, or poultry which has a milder flavor I like to use sea salt, which is a salt made from evaporating sea salt.  A heavy table salt like a kosher salt which generally has a larger grain than sea salt can overpower fish, and sea salt goes with fish well.  Perhaps using the salt from where a fish actually comes from might contribute to the harmony, since most commercial fish comes from the ocean, and not from a mine in the ground.  

For pasta water, soups, braising, grilling, etc., I use kosher salt on the first application.  I find that kosher salt when added to sauteing vegetables, onions, mushrooms, etc., will cause the liquid inside to evaporate a lot quicker than a sea salt.  This is important when you want to caramelize onions or mushrooms, since the quicker you can achieve a good browning the better.  Longer cooking times can turn your vegetables to mush rather than give it the texture you desire. 

When a dish is finished, and you are ready to season it a final time, that's when you use a lighter salt.  Sea salts are best for this.  Overly salted food can ruin a dish, and you can always add more salt, but you can't take it back.  My favorite is a grey sea salt from France.  You can find this in any whole foods, or most specialty gourmet shops.  Or you can get it online.

http://www.saltworks.us/salt_info/si_gourmet_reference.asp

I also like fleur de sel which gets it's name from the aroma of violets that emerges as the salt dries.  It gives an incredible flavor to a dish, but can be very expensive.  It doesn't take a lot however.  If you are on a budget, just plain sea salt can be purchased at any mega mart, and gives a nice flavor for about $3 a container.

Please throw your iodinized salt away, and buy some kosher salt at least.  It will make a big difference in the flavor profile of your dishes.

Tropical Fruit Ketchup

Once you try this Ketchup, you will never eat Heinz again!

1 (28 oz) can whole tomatoes in puree

1 medium onion chopped

2 Tbsp olive oil

1 Tbsp tomato paste

2/3 cup packed dark brown sugar

1/2 cup cidar vinegar

1/2 tsp salt

1 soaked and seeded ancho chili

1 grilled mango

1/2 grilled banana

Puree tomatoes (with puree from can) in a blender until smooth.

Cook onion in oil in a 4-quart heavy saucepan over moderate heat, stirring, until softened, about 8 minutes.  Add pureed tomatoes, tomato paste, brown sugar, vinegar, mango, banana, salt, and chili pepper and simmer, uncovered sirring occasionally, until very thick, about 1 hour.  (Stir more frequently towards the end of the cooking time to avoid scorching.)  Puree Ketchup in 2 batches until smooth (use caution when blending hot liquids.) Chill, covered, at least 2 hours (for flavors to develop.)