If Aunt Jemima & Col. Sanders Went On a Date...

...they'd probably eat chicken and waffles.  What better combination of salty and sweet could you ask for?  We drew inspiration from Edward Lee's recipe for adobo chicken and waffles in his latest cookbook, Smoke & Pickles.  We took a few shortcuts from his version because it was a chilly night in the Capitol and we wanted some comfort food in a hurry.  I wanted something green to accompany our chicken and waffles, so we braised some mustard greens, making a homey, southern comfort dinner.

We had some chicken breasts on hand, so we trimmed the fat, and pounded them into slightly thinner cutlets.  This helped reduce the cook time, and keep them moist.  Lee's recipe calls for an adobo marinade, but since we didn't really plan ahead, we just let the chicken soak in some buttermilk while we got the rest of the meal started.

While the chicken soaked, we got to work on the greens.  Originally, we wanted to cook up some collard greens, but our grocery store didn't have them, so we settled for the mustard greens.  For the greens, we used Lee's recipe for kimchi collards as our guide.  We started by crisping up some bacon.  To that, we added a sliced shallot, and a big clove of garlic.

Once the shallot and garlic had some time cook down, we added in our mustard greens.  We got this huge bunch for less than $1.  You can't beat that!

I gave them a quick spin in the salad spinner to get any grit off of them, and then gave them a rough chop.  Then just toss them into your dutch oven with the bacon, shallots, and garlic.  As they started to wilt down, we added in a pat of butter, chicken stock, a splash of soy sauce, and a splash of apple cider vinegar.  Since we didn't have any kimchi on hand, we added in a bit of sriracha sauce for spice.  Give everything a good toss, so all the liquids combine, your butter melts, and the greens are tossed in the liquid.  Then we just put a lid on it, and let it simmer for about 30 minutes.

Now back to the chicken.  For the breading, we used a combination of flour and panko, and added some adobo spice to replace the adobo marinade that we didn't use, paprika, salt, pepper, and a bit of our homemade bbq rub.  Once your chickens are breaded, just drop them into the oil to fry up.

While Justin took care of frying the chickens, I handled the waffles.  You can use any waffle batter recipe you like.  Ours used buttermilk, for some tang, as well as some paprika and black pepper, to make them a little more savory.

As our waffles and chickens finished up, we placed them on a wire rack and popped them into the oven to keep them warm and crispy.  If you put them directly onto the baking sheet, the bottoms will get soggy.  Putting them on the rack allows the air to circulate around them, keeping all sides crispy.  Plus, putting the chicken on the rack allows the excess oil to drip off.

Once all of your waffles are made and chickens are fried, it's time to eat!  We topped ours with some maple syrup.  We also had some leftover chipotle yogurt sauce, so we used that as a dipping sauce, to add a little smokiness and balance out the sweet syrup.

While we took a few shortcuts and used breast meat, the end result held up in the taste department.  The chicken was perfectly seasoned, and tender on the inside while nice and crispy on the outside.  The waffles had a perfect balance of flavor from the buttermilk and spice, and came out crisp with a light and soft interior.  This was some definite southern comfort with an Asian twist that was perfect for a cold night.

This is How We Casserole!

One of my favorite Thanksgiving dishes is green bean casserole, so when Justin and I were developing this year's menu, I was pretty adamant about including it.  Turns out it's really easy to make a dressed up version of the traditional dish.  We used this recipe as a guide, and were on our way!

Instead of using the standard, canned fried onions, we decided to fry up some shallots.  We thinly sliced 4 shallots (which you can do ahead of time, though it made our fridge smell like onions), and they were ready to be fried.  The beauty here is that you don't need to make a batter or coat them in flour.  Just heat a pan with some oil, and drop the shallots in.  Be careful not to drop too many shallots in the pan at once.  They crisp up pretty fast, and you want to be able to pull them all out before they burn.  Once your shallots are fried, you can set them aside while you cook up the rest of the dish.

Bring a big pot of water to a boil, and drop in your green beans or hericot verts, just to blanche them.  Make sure you have an ice water bath ready, so as soon as you drain your beans, dump them into the ice bath to stop the cooking process.

While that's happening, you can whip up your creamy mushroom sauce.  You want about 3/4 lb. of mushrooms.  Just get whatever kind of mushrooms you like, and slice them into bite sized pieces.  For our casserole, we went with shiitakes.  Melt some butter in your pan, and saute your mushrooms.

When you first drop your mushrooms into the pan, season them with pepper.  You'll see the mushrooms first release their liquid, and then reabsorb them.  When they've reabsorbed them, that's when you season them with salt.

Once they cook down, you'll sprinkle them with a couple tablespoons of flour.  Toss them around so the mushrooms are coated.  The flour will start to form a bit of a paste, but this will help to thicken your sauce.  Once the flour has cooked down a bit, add in your vegetable or chicken stock and some heavy cream.  You want a 3 to 1 ratio of stock to cream, so depending on just how saucy you want your casserole to be, you can adjust accordingly.  I don't like my beans to be swimming in sauce, so we stuck with 1 1/2 cups of stock, and 1/2 cup of heavy cream.  This was the perfect amount of sauce for about 1 1/2 lbs. of beans.

Stir everything together and let it simmer until it thickens.  Once your sauce has thickened, you can toss in your beans.  You want to make sure they get evenly coated in the sauce.

Then pour everything into your baking dish.  Make sure you transfer all of the sauce into your dish too.  Top it all with your fried onions, and pop it into the oven for about 15 minutes.

You want the green beans to heat up again, the sauce to be bubbling, and the onions to really crisp up again.  This from-scratch version of green bean casserole doesn't require much more effort than the traditional dish, plus it's a bit healthier since you know exactly what's going into it.  You can pick your mushrooms, and you're not getting all that extra salt or preservatives from the canned mushroom soup and fried onions.  Not to mention, it tastes extremely delicious!

Get In My [Pork] Belly!

Despite having shelves of cookbooks and cooking magazines, we rarely take the time to flip through them and try out a recipe.  But last night, we did just that.  This summer we've gotten a watermelon in every share and we were running out of ideas (watermelon is to summer as cabbage is to winter in the CSA world).  Justin had actually already spent an afternoon thumbing through Eat With Your Hands, flagging the recipes that piqued his interest, including a crispy pork belly and watermelon salad.  It's not the first combination that comes to mind when I think of watermelon or pork belly, but let me tell ya...it's ridiculously good.

You'll want to start by pickling your rinds since they need to sit in the pickling juice for at least an hour.  You can also do this up to 2 days in advance. Start by mixing your liquid:
2 c. rice vinegar (we only have about 1.5 c. rice vinegar, so we used white vinegar for the remainder)
3 shallots, thinly sliced (we only used 2, since ours were pretty big)
2 Thai bird chilies, thinly sliced (we used jalepenos instead)
2 fresh Kaffir lime leaves (we found ours at Whole Foods, but Asian markets have them too)
2 inches ginger, peeled and sliced
1.25 oz palm sugar or 1 round gula jawa or 2 tbsp light brown sugar
1 tbsp koser salt

Combine everything in a saucepan and bring it to a boil.  All the flavors of the lime leaves, ginger, shallots and peppers will steep into the vinegar and sugar as it cooks.  The sugar adds a much needed sweetness to help cut the tanginess of the vinegar.  While your liquid is warming up, you can start slicing your rind.  You'll want to cut the flesh of the watermelon away from the rind, and also remove the tougher, dark green skin, so that all your left with is the fleshy white part.  You'll cut the rinds into cubes, and once your pickling liquid has come to a boil, and the sugar has dissolved, strain the liquid over your rinds.  They can go into the fridge while you prepare everything else.  You'll also want to cut the flesh of the watermelon into cubes, which can also go into the fridge to stay chilled until you're ready to serve it.

Now for the pork belly.  The recipe tells you to fry your pork, but we decided to just render out the fat and braise it in my dutch oven.  Just cut it into 1-inch chunks, and drop 'em in the dutch oven.  We had about 1 1/3 pounds of pork belly, and it took 20-25 minutes for it all to render down and crisp up.

While your pork is cooking, you can make the dressing for your salad.  In a food processor, combine:
3 oz. palm sugar or 2 rounds gula jawa or 1/4 c. light brown sugar
1 c. rice vinegar (we used Chinese cooking wine since we were out of rice vinegar)
1/2 c. fresh lime juice
4 inches fresh ginger, peeled and sliced
24 cilantro stems (use both the leaves and stems)
2 garlic cloves
3/4 tsp Kosher salt

Mix equal parts watermelon and pickled rinds, along with 2 sliced scallions, and freshly torn mint and Thai basil leaves (we used lemon basil instead).  Pour enough dressing over the salad so it lightly coats everything.  When your pork is done, divide it amongst your plates, and top each with the watermelon salad.  Garnish with some sesame seeds, and in our case, some crumbled chicharrones (I couldn't pass them up in the market!).

We were slightly worried how this would come out.  As any good chefs, we try and taste the elements along the way; the rinds were bordering on too sour, the watermelon was cloyingly sweet, and the belly was very rich.  Fortunately, the sum was definitively greater than its parts--this was a delicious meal.  Calling it a salad doesn't do it justice.  The dressing, along with the mint and basil rounded it out with a clean, herbaceous taste.  There is a definite salty, sweet, and sour thing going on here that made you want to keep going back for another bite.  The chicharrones and sesame seeds gave it a nice crunchy textural component.   I strongly suggest getting a piece of pickled rind, the sweet watermelon, and the warm crispy pork all in one bite.  The flavors really pop in your mouth, and compliment each other nicely.  Take it from us, this is one summer dish that can't be missed!

I Pity the Moule[s]

Now that you're pumped up and ready to go, let's talk about the other kind of mussels, or moules, as they are called in French and Belgian cuisine.  Tonight's meal was inspired by my co-worker who made mussels the other night.  They looked so good, that we had to make a pot of our own.  The nice thing it, it's a simple, one-pot meal that you can make any night of the week.

Start by cleaning and scrubbing your mussels.  You want to make sure you get all the grit and sand off the shells.  Otherwise, it'll end up in your broth.  Then we sliced up some bacon and crisped it up in the pot that we made our broth in.  Once the fat rendered out, and the bacon was crispy, we removed the bacon from the pot and kept it to the side for later.  Now, our bacon was pretty salty, so as we built our broth, we really didn't have to add any additional salt, but just taste as you go, and season accordingly.

Our bacon was also pretty lean, so we added a bit of grapeseed oil to the pot of bacon fat.  Once it was up to temp, we tossed in our minced garlic and shallot.  Once they softened, we added in some sauvignon blanc to deglaze the pot.  Make sure you scrape up all the tasty bits from the bottom of the pan when you add the wine.

Then just let it simmer and reduce down.  We added some freshly cracked pepper, and a bit of water because it was tasting a bit salty.  Just before you add your mussels, toss in your tomatoes.  You want them to cook down a little, but not completely.  

Toss in your mussels, place a lid on the pot and let them steam for about 3 minutes.  Give the pot an occasional shake so all the mussels can be coated in your broth.  And voila!

It couldn't be any simpler.  Spoon your mussels and broth into a bowl, and garnish with some chopped parsley.  In true Belgian fashion, the meal wouldn't be complete without beer and frites.  We went with some sweet potato fries with a homemade roasted garlic mayo, and some Biere du Boucanier, a Belgian ale.

Our 100th Post!

What better way to celebrate our 100th post, than to go all out with some molecular gastronomy?  I F#*%king love science, almost as much as I do food, so why not combine the two?

Justin has been chomping at the bit to try some molecular gastronomy ever since we got our hands on some sodium alginate and calcium chloride for Christmas.  These may sound like something you'd find in a chemistry lab, but when mixed together in the right proportions, it allows you to sphere-ify liquids.  But that wasn't the only technique we tried.

On the menu, we have some sous vide duck breast with a cherry-port relish and cherry "caviar", roasted asparagus with grapefruit "snow", and some coconut ice cream with Thai tea pearls.

Let's start with the duck.  Start by scoring the skin of the duck, making sure you only cut into the skin and fat.  We then seasoned it with salt, pepper, and some chopped rosemary.  Place the duck in a vacuum-sealed bag, and place in a pot of water at about 135 degrees.  If you don't have a vacuum-sealer, like us, you can use a straw to suck the air out of a ziplock bag (just don't suck up any raw duck juices!).

You'll want to cook the duck for about an hour.  Once it's cooked through, we placed it in a hot pan, skin-side down, to render out the fat, and get the skin nice and crispy.

Meanwhile, we got to work on the cherry-port relish and roasted asparagus.

We used about 2tbsp of the rendered duck fat to saute our shallots, and then added some chicken broth, the halved and pitted cherries, port, and some honey.  Then you just let it simmer and reduce.

Because we were going to sphere-ify our sauce, we didn't want it to reduce too much.  We pulled about 1/4c of the liquid out of the pot, and set it in the freezer to cool.

While it was cooling, we mixed up the sodium alginate with some water.  This is the solution we'd mix with the cherry-port sauce to make spheres.  We also mixed the calcium chloride with water, which served as the water bath that we'd be dropping our cherry mixture into.  We followed the ratios found here.

Once our cherry sauce had cooled to room temperature, we added it to the sodium alginate mixture.  Then we loaded it up into a plastic syringe, making sure to get out any air bubbles.  Then just drop your sauce into the calcium chloride water bath, letting them hang out for a few minutes to really congeal.  Justin figured out a good technique for creating larger spheres; place the tip of the syringe close to the surface of the water bath, and as you push down on the syringe, move it in a circular motion.  This left us with big beads of cherry sauce.

Once they've congealed, scoop them out of the water bath and place into a plain water bath to rinse off.  Then carefully dry them on a paper towel, making sure not to puncture your spheres.

As for the asparagus, it doesn't require any chemistry equipment or strange powders.  All you need is a freezer.  You can do this step well in advance since the grapefruit needs time to freeze.  You'll need to cut the grapefruit into supremes (segments), which sounds like a really fancy technique, but it's actually quite easy to do.

Start by slicing off each end of your grapefruit.  Then, with it standing on one of the flat ends, start slicing off the rind, following the curve of the grapefruit, and doing your best to take off only the rind and pith.  You'll be left with a rind-less grapefruit.  Holding the grapefruit in one hand, start slicing out the segments.  If you're more of a visual learner, here's a quick video.  Once you have enough, just place them on some parchment or wax paper, and place in the freezer.

Rather than steam the asparagus, we decided to roast them.  So once they're cleaned, just toss them on a sheet tray with some olive oil and pepper, and pop 'em in the oven.  When they're roasted to your liking, pull them out, and place them on a plate or platter to cool.  While they're cooling, you can chop and toast up your almonds.  We also finished the asparagus with a little lemon salt, for some added citrus.  Just before you sit down to eat, grab your frozen grapefruit segments from the freezer, and using a microplane, grate them over your asparagus.

Voila! -- it looks super sophisticated, but it is really simple.  If you want to impress someone, whether it's your in-laws, a special someone, or friends, try this recipe.  It's becoming one of our signature dishes.

Now, onto dessert!

We started with the ice cream base; heavy cream, coconut milk, and some vanilla bean went into a pot to boil.  At the same time, we whisked together the egg yolks and sugar.

Once the cream/milk mixture had thickened, we tempered in the eggs.  Make sure you go slowly so you don't end up with scrambled eggs.  Once the mixture comes to temperature you can add more in all at once.  We also toasted up some shredded coconut, to be added at the end.  Next, throw your base back on the stove and let it thicken a little more, until it will stick to the back of your spoon.

Now your base should be all set.  Go ahead and let it continue to cool.  Once it will no longer create condensation go ahead and throw it in the fridge.  This basic recipe will work for regular churned ice cream, creme brulee, etc.  But we had something much more interesting in mind for 100th post.  Dry ice!  It's perfect for our purposes because it is cheaper, and colder than an anti-griddle.  Ok, we can't really say don't try this at home...but be careful if you do.  We consulted this webpage for some tips.  Honestly, it was a lot of trial and error.  Similar to the spheres, it took some experimentation to get into the groove with the technique.


First we tried sandwiching the dry ice between 2 cookie sheets, and pouring the ice cream base on top of the top tray to let it freeze.  The tray wasn't cold enough/our base was too warm, so it didn't freeze.

Next we tried placing a metal spatula on the dry ice and pouring the base onto the spatula.  Purportedly, this is how Grant Achatz experimented with it prior to opening his restaurant.  This method worked a little better, but the ice cream disc stuck to the spatula.

Then we tried pouring the base onto some freezer paper that was directly on top of the dry ice.  Again, it kind of worked, but the ice cream stuck to the paper.

Through our trial and error (and making a bit of a mess), we noticed that the drops of ice cream base that dripped directly onto the dry ice were forming nice little pearls, almost like dippin' dots.  So we resorted to pouring the base directly onto the ice.  This gave us a little more room to work with, and allowed us to get a little creative, and made various shapes and splatter designs.

We also experimented with different textures.  You may notice some brown specks in the picture above on the right.  That's the shredded coconut we'd toasted up.  As the ice cream solidified on the ice, we carefully lifted it off with a spatula, and placed it in the freezer.  If you want it to be frozen on the outside but creamy in the middle, don't bother putting it in the freezer...just eat it.  If you want it a little more frozen, stick it in the freezer while you make more.

To compliment our coconut ice cream, we made some Thai tea pearls.  We used the same method as we did for the cherry sauce, though we doubled the amount of tea for a more concentrated flavor.

The tea pearls were a welcome addition to the ice cream.  It took us awhile to get the shot for our final presentation so it didn't turn out the prettiest.  While we may not be ready to be chef de partie at Minibar or Alinea, we made food in our own kitchen that tasted nearly as delicious!  We hoped you enjoyed this as much as we had fun experimenting with some food science.  Thanks for following along for our first 100 posts, and here's to 100s more!