Rouxde Cooking School

There is a lot going on (aka: apology #8,273.9)

2012-01-17T14:55:00.002-05:00

I feel like I am neglecting my first (fake) child by giving attention to my real child/ jobs/ life and I feel horrible for it. I have been writing recipes for The Sun lately though. They have me developing tailgate recipes for the Baltimore Ravens games. It's been a hell of a lot of fun and makes me wish that recipe development was my real job. Hopefully one day, but until then check them out:

Meatball subs: http://www.baltimoresun.com/entertainment/dining/bs-fo-tailgate-recipe-0113-20120112,0,4732205.story

Chili: http://www.baltimoresun.com/entertainment/dining/bs-fo-tailgate-recipe-1230-20111229,0,6567223.story

I have another on coming up this week. I hope it's not the last one because I like doing this but also because I want the Ravens to go to the Super Bowl (and beat Tom Brady on national TV). I'll post it as soon as it goes live.

I will feed this beast more and do what I can to get recipes cooking tips to you, my wonderful (and sexy might I add) readers.

Cheers and pickles,
Johnny

P.S.
Here's a photo of one of my favorite grilling dishes. This recipe will pop up with the spring flowers, but until then imagine how good it is (or just bother me so I'll post it early).

Restaurant review: Patrick's of Pratt Street tempts tradition

2011-10-26T20:18:00.000-04:00

Restaurant review: Patrick's of Pratt Street tempts tradition

You say tomato I say tomate

2011-08-13T14:44:00.004-04:00

©John Houser III 2011

Summer is in full bloom and the tomatoes are attacking. They are ubiquitous right now from the farmer's markets to family-owned road side stands. Around this time of year I constantly get bombarded with questions about what to do with the 30 quarts of tomatoes that someone has just bought. The first answer is always "just make sauce and jar it" and then I get the look. You know the one. The "no shit dude, of course I'm making sauce. Why else would I have bought 197 pounds of tomatoes?" look. What my tomato laden friends mean to ask is "Look shitbird, if I have to eat one more bowl of pasta, I'm gonna open a vein!! Help!?"

So it is with this in mind that I will give you a culinary life raft. This recipe takes less that ten minutes to make and will become a go-to recipe in your arsenal of summer dishes. As a side or a snack it never ceases to please. It also is a recipe that the sum of its parts are greater than just the few ingredients in it. The higher quality of tomato or olive oil, the better the dish will be as a whole. When people ask me about this recipe they seem to think that its complicated. This couldn't be farther from the truth. This dish is dead simple and really doesn't require much cooking.

It's called Pan Con Tomate and unsurprisingly, when translated, it means bread with tomato. It is my favorite tomato recipe and I make it year round. This time of the year though is especially great for making pan con tomate because the variety of tomatoes to choose from is so wonderfully diverse. I've made this recipe with red tomatoes, green tomatoes, white tomatoes (yes there are!), numerous heirloom varieties and a mixture of all of the above.

I had eaten versions of this recipe before, but it wasn't until I spent two weeks in Spain last year that I really became obsessed with the stuff. In Barcelona, where we spent most of our time, they serve it to you with every meal. Like the basket of bread you get here in America, pan con tomate comes out at the beginning of the meal as a complimentary appetizer, a saucy welcome mat if you will.

Before we start let it be noted that this is a base recipe. Try it this way once and then feel free to improvise. Herbs, fruit and spices all can be added to enhance and change this dish, but this is the mothership recipe. Like I said, just try this once this way first. You might never want to try it another way. It's beauty in simplicity.

So lets get in to it shall we????

Pan Con Tomate

©John Houser III 2011

Ingredients:
Red Tomato (your choice of style) Cored* & cut in half
1 Baguette (new or a few days old; both are ok)
Salt- 3/4 tsp
Pepper- I know this is anal but I do 35 turns of my pepper grinder. Tomato loves pepper.
1 clove of garlic- halved. (not pictured, look below for Mr. Garlic)
Extra Virgin Olive Oil (Use the good stuff here. The greener the better)- 1/4 cup

©John Houser III 2011

*Before you start you need to core the tomato. To do this, hold a pairing knife in your palm and stick the point of the knife into the tomato, on an angle, next to the core. Place your thumb into the core as a pivot point and turn the tomato (not the knife) until the core is cut out.

©John Houser III 2011

Now that you now know how to core a tomato, let's move on.

Have a grill heating up or a coal chimney burning down. You'll be using the grill in 10-15 minutes. It will need to be hot. Don't feel like fucking with a grill? No problem. Just put the bread under a broiler, or if adventurous, hold the bread with tongs and toast over your stove's open flame. I have done both and they are equally as effective.

1. Take a tomato half and, over a bowl, grate it on the bigger holes. Grating the tomato serves two purposes. One is that the tomato takes on a great texture, and two you have to stop when you hit the tomato skin. Grating it in fact is also skinning the tomato (its a pain in the ass the other way trust me!).

©John Houser III 2011

2. Add salt and pepper to the grated tomato. Mix it all thoroughly. Do this before adding the olive oil.

©John Houser III 2011

3. Add the olive oil

©John Houser III 2011

4. Cut your baguette in the middle vertically, making two pieces. The cut each half horizontally as if you were making a sandwich. Cut those piece in half vertically. In all you should have 16 pieces of bread ready to be transformed.

©John Houser III 2011

4. Drizzle your bread with olive oil. It doesn't have to be the good stuff, but that's what I used.

©John Houser III 2011

5. Make sure your grill is hot.

©John Houser III 2011

6. Place the bread over the hot coals. Do NOT walk away from the bread. Keep watching the bread to make sure it doesn't become charcoal. Some char on the edges is expected, but you don't want all of the toast blackened.

©John Houser III 2011

Remember Mr. Garlic who wasn't pictured above??

©John Houser III 2011

7. Wipe one of the halves of garlic on your toast. I find ten strokes to be sufficient. Remember, the garlic should be a background flavor, not a main. We aren't making garlic bread.

©John Houser III 2011

8. Spoon your tomato sauce onto the toast. You can put as much or as little as you want. I like a lot on mine. The bread will suck up extra juice if it's piled on a little high.

©John Houser III 2011

8. Cut into pieces and serve immediately. It's great crunchy and sorry, the flavor will hook you like a smack addict.

©John Houser III 2011

Enjoy!!!!

Working like House Elf

2011-07-03T17:32:00.000-04:00

(Jed Kirschbaum, Baltimore Sun / June 30, 2011)

Here is a Link to my latest restaurant review for the Baltimore Sun. I would love to know what you guys think. Leave comments and share this with your friends.

That burger was really good even though it was overcooked (I have no idea how they did it).

Restaurant review: Sumptuous sandwiches at On the Hill Cafe

Just a few quick things about the immediate future.

2011-06-10T01:34:00.000-04:00

La Petite Sciere: my favorite Foie Gras purveyor in Paris.
BTW, random pics like this will now be the norm.

Are you tired of me not blogging everyday? Yeah, me too. I am from here on out going to loosen up the format of this blog. I will continue to post recipes as much as I can. Two recipes a month is what I'm going to aim for. With work, baby, doing restaurant reviews and cooking classes I'm a wee bit swamped.

So I will update the blog with as many random pictures of food and non sequiturs as I can. There will be waaaayyy more updates than usual. I've normally spent my time planning these blog posts and driving myself a bit crazy when they don't go up. Now, if there is something that I make, see, or eat, it's more than likely going up on this blog.

I hope you enjoy my less anal approach.

Cheers,
Johnny

Cooking Bacon: You're doing it wrong.

2011-05-21T11:24:00.001-04:00

I never even thought about writing a how-to-cook bacon post but after talking with a few people at the farmer's market on Sunday I realized that I had an obligation to fulfill. While waiting to pay at the Truck Patch Farms stand, I got to talking with the guy in front of me about how delicious their bacon was. The guy mentioned that he loves bacon but it is always such a mess to deal with while cooking. Fat spitting everywhere, bacon curling up and his general lack of attentiveness were his main problems with his favorite cured meat product.

So me, being the well natured, unbelievably helpful and handsome person that I am asked him if he had ever baked his bacon before. He looked at me like I had thirty seven penises attached to my....... well, penis.

I explained to him that in restaurants they pretty much all back their bacon on baking sheets with racks in them. I started doing this when I worked as a prep cook at The Candlelight Inn in 1993. It is a trick that has always stayed with me. You can cook a lot of bacon at one time quickly, evenly, and cleanly. You just put it in the oven, set a timer and walk away. If you were feeling a little devil-may-care you could do it naked if you wanted (and I have).

By this point I had a few people listening in on the conversation and asking me questions. It was then that I realized that I should probably post about this since it seems as if a fair amount of people probably don't know about this simple way to cook the king of American breakfast meats.

This is a fairly straight forward step-by-step, but I still will treat it as if it were a recipe.

Let's get started shall we?

Baking Sheet Bacon (aka restaurant bacon, baked bacon, naked bacon)

1 pound of bacon, sliced
1 sheet pan with wire rack insert
no clothes - optional

1. Set oven to 375°F

2. Place as much bacon on the sheet as you can (usually 1 sheet can hold 1/2 pound easily). You can add as much as you want but be advised that like Biggie Smalls once said "Mo bacon, Mo bacon grease". I'm pretty sure that's how the song went....

3. Place the bacon in the oven, set a timer for 20 minutes.

4. After 20 minutes, check your bacon for your desired crispness*.

5. Take out of the oven. CAUTION!!! There is hot bacon grease in the pan. Keep the pan parallel to the floor at all times otherwise skin bubbling oil will splatter out. Seriously, be careful. Once the sheet pan is out and set upon a trivet, immediately loosen the bacon with a spatula. Be sure to do this step. Bacon has a tendency to stick to the rack once it cools down.

You now have bacon to do with what you want. Don't tell me, I don't want to know.

Enjoy!!

*Bacon crispness is a matter that people will come to blows over. I've seen it, it gets ugly. It's worse than watching drunks argue over religion in a bar. This is why it's always a good idea to ask the people you are cooking for how they like their bacon. My parents used to get made at each other when the other made bacon. My mother liked her bacon super crispy and my father liked his bacon soft and chewy. Having both of them cook me bacon those different ways made me appreciate the range of textures that bacon can give. Try it yourself. If you like soft, go crisp and vice versa. It's a different experience each way. What's the worse that will happen? You'll eat more bacon? A terrible price to pay indeed.

Secrets and the arcane tales of the cryptic and esoteric food occult

2011-05-13T13:15:00.002-04:00

Errrr...... don't listen to the heading. It thinks it's clever

Anyways...

I’ve been keeping a deep dark secret for a while now. I’ve been hinting at it and now I can finally reveal it to you. I am a ~~serial killer~~ the weekend restaurant reviewer for the Baltimore Sun. I’m really happy to be working for them and it’s my pleasure as always to inform you about where you might be better off spending your hard earned money in Bmore. My first review came out last week and my newest came out yesterday. Here are the links:

SoBo Café- http://www.baltimoresun.com/entertainment/dining/bs-ae-eats-0506-20110505,0,7648023.story

Pure Wine Café - http://www.baltimoresun.com/entertainment/dining/bs-ae-eats-0513-20110512,0,6337299.story

My reviews will be a weekly occurrence and I will link to every last one of them (whether you like it or not). If you guys have any questions about anything involving the process or my decision making, feel free to ~~fuck off~~ ask. Seriously, I will answer your questions.

I’ll be posting a new recipe soon.

Cheers,
Johnny

Shroomin on a Sunday Afternoon

2011-05-05T14:59:00.003-04:00

One of the better things about springtime is the return of the JFX Farmer's Market. It's a great place to grab some breakfast/ lunch, meet up with friends, get out of the house for a bit and most importantly; buy fresh vegetables.

One of the stands I really have never given my custom to was the mushroom farmers table. They sell, unsurprisingly, mushrooms and prepared mushroom dishes to eat there or take home. One of the reasons I have never bought anything from them in the past is because I thought that most of their prices were a bit too high for just a small box of mushrooms. Yes, yes... I know. Certain fresh mushrooms are expensive and I have no problem paying for them, but usually when presented with a choice between a box of expensive (to me) mushrooms and almost anything else in the FM (that's slang for Farmer's Market), I'm going with almost anything else.

That was until two weeks ago when I noticed that they were selling a box of assorted mushrooms for $11 (at time of writing). Curious, I looked over the contents of the box and was hit by a bolt of inspiration. I'm a sucker for caramelized mushrooms over toast and this seemed like the perfect mushroom mélange for the job. The different types of fungi would combine their collective flavors to make a mushroomy super group.

To add a spring flavor to the dish, I decided to add a few spears of our old friend Mr. Asparagus and a couple of spring onions. Rounding out the dish is some butter, garlic and thyme. And finally, to give the dish a punch in the face I am hitting it with some Dijon mustard, lemon juice and a little bit of chili pepper.

This dish is easy to make because there is no need for fussiness or special techniques. The important thing to do for this dish is to remember to get a lot of caramelization on the mushrooms. It makes the dish and adds a depth that will make you want to go back to the mushroom people every week that the Farmer's Market is open.

Caramelized Mushrooms on Toast

Ingredients:

1 box of assorted Mushrooms (or a mix of Shitakes, button, oyster, cremini, maitake and Shimeji mushrooms) - 1/2 pound chopped or torn into medium size pieces

4 medium size spears of Asparagus thinly sliced on the bias (see picture)

2 medium size Spring Onions- light green parts minced, dark green parts sliced

1 bunch of Thyme woody parts picked away and chopped finely

1/2 Lemon

1 ounce butter

2 tsp Dijon mustard

2 cloves of garlic minced

1/2 dried red chili minced

2 Slices of Country Bread (Italian, French)

Extra Virgin Olive Oil

1/4 cup water

1. Tear the bigger mushrooms into smaller pieces. Chop the buttons and caps into slices. It's ok if the parts seem big, they will shrink during cooking.

2. Chop the asparagus on the bias. It's not hard. Just move your asparagus spear from being in the nine o'clock position (spear head to the left) to the 10 o'clock position and slowly slice thin pieces from the bottom of the spear until you have reached the top. Place pieces into a ramekin.

3. Do the same slice job on the spring onions except you will want to separate the dark green parts from the light green parts. Continue to chop the light green parts until they are minced. Place the light greens in their own ramekin. Place the dark green slices in the ramekin with the asparagus in it.

4. Heat a few good glugs (technical term alert!) of extra virgin olive oil until is starts to shimmer. That's how you know it's hot. If you cant see the shimmer, one good way to see if your oil is hot enough place one piece of mushroom into the oil and look for bubbling/ sizzling around the outside of the mushroom.

5. Once the oil is hot, throw in the mushrooms and don't move them. Do not add salt to the pan!!!! If you add salt to the mushrooms a kitten will punch a baby in the face. Let the shrooms sit in the pan until you notice the bottoms starting to brown at the edges.

6. Give the mushrooms a stir once they have browned and then add the minced garlic, chili and the minced light green spring onions. Stir to cover with a little oil. If the mushrooms have soaked up all of the oil then add a little more to coat the garlic and onions.

7. Oil up the slices of bread with some extra vigin olive oil. Use a toaster oven or an oven set on broil. Watch your bread carefully as it will go from soft white bread to charcoal very easily. Seriously..... watch those soft and crusty little bastards,,,,

8. Once the garlic and spring onions are soft and tender from cooking, add the butter and let it melt. Add the mustard and the lemon juice into the mix and then stir everything together. Now hit the pan with the 1/4 cup of water. Turn up the heat and bring the mixture to a boil while stirring to get a sauce made. Once the sauce (and it won't be a lot) is not watery turn off the heat.

9. Add the sliced dark green onions and the asparagus and let the heat of the mushroom mixture take care of the rest.

10. Take out your toast (it's preferable to have a little char on them) and put them on your plate. The reason you only broiled the tops is because you want the tops crunchy and ready to sop up some sauce but not get soggy. The bottoms should be light and fluffy to mop up what's left on the plate. If the bread was toasted all the way it would be a bitch to cut up and it would totally fuck the roof of your mouth up like a bowl of Cap'n Crunch when you were a kid.

11. Spoon the hot mixture over your toast. It's time to eat!

This dish is delicious and healthy. Mushrooms on toast, it doesn't get anymore simple.

But I can hear some of you out there saying "John, what if I wanted to put an egg on it?" Well dearest reader my answer would be "Fucking right you can put an egg on this delicious motherfucker!!!!"

Remember, a recipe is only a guideline. Feel free to improvise with whatever your taste buds are telling you what they want. Enjoy!!

Cheers,

Johnny

The Spear of Destiny

2011-04-18T01:03:00.019-04:00

Spring has finally sprung and here's the proof:

Asparagus has finally hit the Baltimore Farmer's Markets and it is time to savor the green spear that makes our pee stinky. All toilet humor aside (get it?... toilet?..), I love asparagus in all forms and one of the best ways that I like to have it is raw.

When I was in Barcelona Spain last year I had a dish that has haunted me since I had it. It was a poached egg with shaved asparagus, truffle and extra virgin olive oil. It was incredible. The taste of the fresh asparagus, the creaminess of the poached egg, the bite of the olive oil and the depth that the truffle added made it a perfect plate of food. This is a good representation of that dish with the truffle and truffle oil left out. The reason I left it out was because one: truffles are expensive, and b: they're not readily available to most people easily. If you have access to truffles then by all means add the truffle. It will take this dish to a place you will want to hang out all day. Don't use truffle oil as a substitute. Most truffle oils use cheap chemicals to fake the truffle taste. Real truffle oils are expensive and not worth buying most of the time.

Note: You will want to use the fatter spears of asparagus. They're easier to shave because they are thicker and they're sturdier. Grill or pan sear your thinner spears. They'll thank you for it.

Let's get started:

Shaved Asparagus with Poached Egg

1 Egg

2 Fat Spears of Asparagus

2 Tbls Salt

2 Tbls Vinegar

Extra Virgin Olive Oil
1/2 Lemon

Salt & Pepper

1. Fill a small saucepan 3/4 full with water. Add 2 tbls salt and 2 tbls vinegar. Bring to a light simmer (slight bubbling or 190°F). The vinegar helps stiffen up the egg whites when they are in the water. The salt is for flavoring obviously.

2. On a plate, shave one spear of raw asparagus to make a small bed to lay the poached egg on. Add a pinch of salt and a few turns of pepper onto the asparagus.

3. Crack an egg onto a flat surface and pour it into a large ramekin. If you do not have ramekins, use a small bowl. This way you can slip the egg into the water gently.

4. With a spoon, stir the water in a circle (clockwise or counter does not matter). Stir it enough to make a little vortex. The vortex keeps the egg from reaching it's eggy little tentacles all around the water. It makes the egg nice and round. It's also really fun to watch by the way.

5. After the egg has set (roughly 3 1/2 minutes), pull it out with a slotted spoon and sit it on a napkin to wick away the excess water. Set the egg on the shaved asparagus.

6. Shave the second raw asparagus spear over the egg. Hit with salt and pepper and anoint the egg with a good glug of extra virgin olive oil.

7. Squeeze just a few drops of lemon juice onto the dish. Not too much, just enough to brighten it up. If you had a gun to my head I'd say 5 drops of lemon juice.

It wouldn't hurt to have a thick piece of toasted bread to use as an edible mop for the egg. I'm just saying.

This is a simple and delicious recipe that should be part of any cooks repertoire. It's a dish that becomes much more than the sum of its parts. Make it once and it will become a go-to whenever you have fresh asparagus on hand.

Enjoy!

Cheers,

Johnny

Soooooo.... I've been a little busy......

2011-03-23T00:12:00.000-04:00

And this is why:

This is John Crosby Houser IV. Hereto know as Crosby. He was born on Feb. 17th. He is my greatest creation and obviously has been keeping me and my wife busy for the past few weeks. The preparation for this little guy has kept me from this blog (read: I was drinking as much as I could until the end). Now that I will have lots of spare sober time on my hands expect the word production to go up considerably. Yes, eventually I will post baby food recipes. All in good time my friends, all in good time.

I also will have some great news on the professional front very soon, but I don't want to let the proverbial cat out of the newspaper bag just yet.

2011 is going to be pretty fucking interesting.

Cheers!
Johnny

Salmon Chowder

2011-01-28T00:00:00.011-05:00

This entry is going to be a no-frills version of Rouxde Cooking School. Bare bones if you will. I never intended on putting this recipe onto the blog but because it was so goddamn good, I felt the need to share. This is why you will find no pictures of the ingredients or steps in the cooking as usual. I could only manage a picture of the final product because I realized after eating this chowder that I had something worth sharing and poured another bowl just for the picture.

It also is a well timed recipe considering how the weather is at the time of writing this. It's snowy and gross outside. I wanted to counteract the freeze by making something soothing and warm and my very pregnant wife wanted salmon (good omega 3's!). So after some research, I put together a rough sketch in my head of what I wanted in the chowder and this is what I came up with. Enjoy!

Smokey Salmon Chowder

4 rashers (slices) of thick cut smokey bacon - small dice (1/4 inch)
1 large white onion - cut into medium dice (1/2 inch)
1/2 cups corn kernels (fresh or frozen)
Salt and Pepper - to taste (I used about a tablespoon of salt when all was said and done)
3 ribs of celery - cut into medium dice (1/2 inch)
3 medium sweet potatoes - cut into medium dice (1/2 inch)
1 tablespoon smoked paprika
1 8 oz bottle clam juice (I used this)
2 pints of fish stock (if you don't make your own use this)
8 oz cream
6 oz roux
1 bunch of scallions
1 pound of salmon- as fresh as you can get!
1/4 cup of parsley - chopped finely
1/4 cup of dill - chopped finely

1. In a large pot that has been heated over a medium high heat; add the bacon. Cook until the fat has rendered out and the bacon is crispy

2. Add the onions and corn. Stir everything up and leave it along until the onions and corn start to brown. Stir again and let it brown a bit more. Turn the heat down to medium.

3. Add the Salt, pepper, celery and potatoes. Cook until the celery is tender.

4. Stir in the smoked paprika. Stir to combine thoroughly.

5. Add the Clam juice and the fish stock. Turn the heat up to high and bring to a simmer.

6. In a sauce pan set on a medium flame, heat up the cream. When it starts to simmer whisk the roux into it. It will thicken immediately and become the consistency of a very wet dough. This is normal and nothing to worry about. Turn the heat to medium low and cook for 5 minutes stirring constantly.

7. Add the thickened cream to the mixture and stir until combined. Bring the chowder back to a simmer. Now, turn the heat down to medium low and cover (I know... up, down, up, down, make up your fucking mind right?).

8. Once the potatoes are cooked through (easily pierced with a knife *) add the scallions, parsley, dill and the salmon. Cook until the salmon is cooked through (flakey). It will take about five minutes, so don't walk away.

9. Bowl it up and enjoy!!! It's great with crusty bread.

* People always talk about knowing when potatoes or other root vegetables are done by sticking a knife in it. When the knife goes easily into the middle, the vegetable is done. Most people don't really know what that should feel like. So before you throw your potato into the soup test its give with the knife while it’s raw so you can feel how much it resists getting poked (insert joke here). This way you'll notice how easily the knife goes into the vegetable when it’s cooked. This also works with forks, thus the saying "stick a fork in me, I'm done". No, really... I'm done.

Cheers!

Treacle Tart: Harry Potter's Favorite......Yes, I get it! I'm a nerd.

2010-11-18T14:32:00.006-05:00

If you ~~are ridiculously obsessed with~~ enjoy the Harry Potter series as I do, then you know that J.K Rowling created lots of imaginative foods for the kids of Hogwarts to eat. Foodstuffs like Chocolate Frogs, Acid Pops, Cockroach Clusters and Nosebleed Nougat are just a few of the sweets enjoyed by our wizarding wunderkind. One item that is often thought of as made up but is actually a real dish (before the books) is the Treacle Tart.

I can hear you now "Treacle? That's totally a made up word?" Nope, it's real alright and its recipe is as old as Rowena Ravenclaw's diadem.

The Treacle Tart's predecessor was a mixture of honey and "medicinal" herbs and spices that the Romans used to fight sickness. Over time, as industrialization took hold, the recipe switched out the honey for the more affordable Treacle. What's Treacle you say? Tell us now goddammit you say? Well, Impatience McGhee, Treacle is a syrup that is left behind after sugar is processed. We call it Molasses here in America.

That's it? Yep. Kind of disappointing isn't it. Treacle sounds like it's something that is made by House Elves in the kitchens of Hogwarts castle, or at the very least an Oompa Loompa or two. But alack, no, it's just fucking molasses.

There is no reason to be disappointed though, molasses makes for great pies. The Shoo Fly Pie is made from molasses and people travel far and wide to find a place that makes a good one. Treacle Tarts and Shoo Fly pies are basically the same thing with slight differences. Let's just say that they're twins and The Treacle Tart is the evil twin.

It is evil because at some point in its development, the Treacle Tart got a bit sweeter with the addition of golden syrup (light treacle) and the subtraction of the regular Treacle. Some of today's modern recipes even leave the regular treacle completely out. This is not the recipe we will be going over today.

I have put golden syrup (light treacle) in my version but used black strap molasses (black treacle) to give it a deeper flavor. Yes. I'm using it because it sounds dirtier than regular molasses, but it also balances out the golden syrup in a way as to not make it cloying. Confused yet? Don't worry I'm here to help. I'll even teach you how to make a sweet pie crust.

*I do want to point out that the photos were taken during the first test run of the recipe. The final product will be a few shades lighter than the tart pictured. I know you are shocked, but I do test my recipes.

Treacle Tart

Recipe makes 2 pies

Sweet pie dough (Pate Sucree):

12 oz Flour

3 oz Sugar

zest of 1/2 of a Lemon
8 oz frozen butter chopped into 1/2 inch cubes

2 eggs
pinch of salt

1. In a food processor, add the flour, sugar, salt and lemon zest. Pulse a few times to mix together.

2. Add the butter and pulse until the flour mixture looks like cornmeal. See the picture below.

3. Add the eggs to the flour and pulse until combined. The dough should keep together when squeezed in the palm of your hand. If it doesn't stay together, add a teaspoon of water, pulse, and try again.

4. Turn out the dough and fold it over a few times to combine.

5. Wrap the dough in plastic wrap and put the dough into the refrigerator. Let it sit there for at least an hour. While in the fridge, the flour sucks up the egg and hydrates making it sticky and bonding the dough together so when you roll it out later it doesn't crumble apart. Letting the dough sit is important.

And now, while the dough is chilling in the fridge..........

Filling:

28 oz Golden Syrup (I used king syrup, but feel free to find whatever golden syrup you can find)
4 oz Blackstrap Molasses
6 oz Country Bread (baguette, Italian loaf- something dense) cut into cubes
3 Eggs
2 1/2 oz of Cream
8 oz Butter
1 Lemon- zested and juiced

Special Equipment:
Tart Pan
3 cups of dried beans
rolling pin
aluminum foil
bench scraper - not essential but great for dough cutting and clean up

1. Preheat your oven to 325°

2. Put the cubed bread onto the food processor and pulse until your bread crumbs are around the size of peas. Set them out to dry out a little more. There will be smaller and bigger pieces throughout, it's not a big deal.

Note! You will need to get a tart pan for this tart (surprise!). A tart pan has a false bottom so when the baking is done, you can life the tart out without damaging the sides of the dessert. Cool huh? They are great for quiches as well. Mine has an 11 inch diameter (insert self deprecating sentence here).

3. After flouring your workspace, grab the cold dough and cut it in half. Take one half, re-wrap it and put it back into the fridge for later. Now with the other half roll it out to just under a quarter inch thick. Make sure that it is big enough to fit over your tart pan. Instead of picking the dough up with your hands, roll the dough onto your rolling pin and then drape it across your tart pan. Cut the edges off of the of the dough and now put it back into the fridge. You do not want the butter to get too soft. Now clean up!!!!

4. Now that you're all cleaned up, take the pie dough out of the fridge and pierce the bottom with a fork to create holes so the air will come out and not dome your crust.

5. As another precaution, rip off two pieces of aluminum foil and crinkle them up and open them back up. Place them on top of your dough as a barrier for the beans that you will use to weigh the dough down and keep it from doming up and ruining your beautiful crust.

6. Lay your foil pieces criss crossed over the dough and fill with the dried beans.

7. Put the crust into the oven and bake for 30 minutes. Set it on a cooling rack and don't touch it until it is completely cool. Keep your oven set on 325°.

8. While the pie crust is baking, melt the butter and cook it until the solids brown. Be careful here and watch the butter and keep it from turning black. Set it aside to cool a bit.

9. Mix your syrups together then add the warm butter, salt, lemon zest and juice. After they are combined, add the cream and then finally the eggs. Whisk together until homogeneous.

10. Toss the bread crumbs into the filling and stir until mixed through. Let the mixture sit for ten minutes so the bread crumbs can suck up the filling a bit.

11. Place your tart pan onto a sheet pan (it might bubble over), and then place your pan onto the top rack that has been pulled out. Fill your tart crust while it is on the rack. These kind of fillings are a pain in the ass to fill and walk across the room without spilling it all down the front of your shirt. Looks lovely doesn't it?

12. Let it bake for 1 hour. It will look something like this by the way.

13. Let this cool for at least 20 minutes. I find that it is best served a little warm. When it is warm, it's a bit of a pain to cut, but if you lightly (lightly!) wipe some grapeseed or vegetable oil (something neutral) on the blade of you knife before cutting, it will not get as gummy with treacle. Always wipe your knife off on a damp towel after every cut.

14. This is not a super sweet pie. I have found that it is complemented wonderfully by a scoop of vanilla ice cream.

Dobby and Winky can kiss my ass. They never made a Treacle Tart as good as this. Enjoy muggles!

Cheers!

It's the great...... somethin?

2010-11-10T14:57:00.005-05:00

So this recipe is something I'm posting because I posted a few pictures on my Facebook and Twitter pages and there has been a bunch of people asking what it was and how to make it. Well dear readers, don't say I never gave you anything.

The pictures in this blog are the originals I took last with my phone week when I made this, so please forgive their quality. They are not my usual step by step pics, but this recipe is so damn easy that there is no need for such rigmarole.

This dish is an interpretation of a general recipe by Dorie Greenspan that is outlined in her new book. She got this recipe from a friend and it's one of those recipes that is super versatile and open to many types of interpretation. I knew as soon as I saw it that I had to make a version of my own.

The original recipe called for a medium to large size pumpkin and that seemed a bit too bulky and precarious for me. All I needed was to pull this big ass pumpkin out of the oven and have it collapse on itself when it was moved for the baking tray to a serving dish. No thanks. So I've scaled the pumpkins down to mini guys that you can find easily in your local grocery mart, or farmers market.

You can use pumpkins or squash, either will be fine in this dish. I used these crazy little guys called red curry squash and a Siamese twin looking butternut squash that we got from our C.S.A. but any regular mini pumpkins or squash would work just as well.

So lets get to it.

Stuffed Mini Gourds:

6 mini Gourds (pumpkins, squash, whatevs)- Around 1 pound each.

1/2 pound French baguette or thick country bread (preferably stale) cut into 1/2 inch cubes

1/4 pound Gruyere cheese (substitute fontina or sharp white cheddar) cut into 1/2 inch cubes

1/4 pound Emmenthaler cheese (substitute any holy Swiss cheese, Jarsberg is good) cut into 1/2 inch cubes
6 Slices of bacon cut into 1/4 inch wide pieces
1 large white onion cut into medium dice (1/2 inch squares)
6 cloves of garlic minced
1 Asian pear (substitute a sweet apple or pear) cut into medium dice (1/2 inch squares)
1 large sprig of thyme destemmed
1 sprig rosemary destemmed and minced
1/2 cup of heavy cream
1/16 tsp of fresh grated nutmeg (just a pinch)
kosher salt and pepper

1. Preheat your oven to 400°

2. Cut the tops off of the gourds and reserve as lids for baking. Scoop out the gourdy guts and throw away (or keep for later to toast the seeds). Sprinkle the insides of the gourds with a pinch of kosher salt and a few grinds of black pepper.

3. Mix your bread, cheese, 1/2 of your herbs and Asian Pear in a bowl. Once they are combined add your cream and stir again.

4. Over medium heat, render out the bacon until it is crisp. Transfer over to a dry paper towel to drain.

5. Add onions to pan, add a pinch of kosher salt and sweat them out until translucent.

6. Add garlic. Cook until softened.

7. Add your bacon, onion and garlic mixture to the bowl containing the bread and cheese mixture. Stir to combine.

8. Stuff the gourds with your filling. Portion it equally between the gourds so no one is under or over filled. Place the tops back on the and place them onto a baking sheet. If you want, put down parchment paper or a silpat to catch the liquid spilling out of the gourds.
9. Place in the oven for 35-45 minutes depending on the size of the gourds. If a knife can pass through the outside flesh and into the center of the gourd easily then you are ready to go.

10. When they are done, pull them out of the oven and let them sit for at least ten minutes. Then plate up and serve. Top on or to the side is up to you. Now enjoy it's super gooey goodness!

A note on putting the tops on. If you are like me then you want the tops to line up perfectly for a good fit and a great presentation. Well, to get them lined up perfectly I peel a little slice vertically down the side with a vegetable peeler. I then cut through the peeled piece cutting the slice in half. This way when I go to line up the lid I just match the two peeled spots and voilà, perfect every time.

As I said earlier this dish is open to interpretation. I've read many variations upon this theme that I would like to try. Instead of bread, use cooked rice. Add greens, peas, mushrooms or change up the meats. Instead of bacon, use ham or sausage. If you change it around, let me know and I will post it to the comments section.

Cheers!

Makin Bacon!

2010-11-02T14:30:00.006-04:00

There are few things in this world as fun as smoking your own meat..... and then there is making Canadian bacon. Canadian bacon is one of nature's most expensive meats ($25 a pound) and a luxury that most people only have with Eggs Benedict when they go out for brunch. Also known as Back bacon or Irish bacon, Canadian bacon is actually unbelievably easy and cheap to make. Just like our friend Gravlax, Canadian bacon is a great first step into the world of charcuterie. Charcuterie, as previously mentioned, is the art of curing meats or vegetables. As with most curing techniques, Canadian bacon is cured with salt but there are also other flavors you can add that you will not find in the commercially made versions. This recipe will also call for you to order a special ingredient, but don't worry we'll get to that later. It's cheap and it will last forever and that's all you need to know now (hint: It's the Pink Salt).

Unlike Mr. Salmon that we cured in a dry rub, this pork loin will be cured in a brine. At its basic a brine is a saltwater solution that helps preserve meat, fish, or vegetables. When you add spices and herbs to it, a brine becomes an unlimited source of inspiration and an unstoppable way to add flavors to your food. The salt carries the flavors of the herbs and spices into the meat through osmosis (nerd alert!), penetrating deeper into the item being brined than just salting alone. The osmotic process also plumps up the cell wall of the meat with salt water making your meat almost impossible to dry out by over cooking.

There is no crazy technique needed in making back bacon. It takes care of itself and is pretty hard to screw up (unless you let it sit in your brine for longer than described). It really is all about patience. Most of the time, your bacon is will be out of sight and out of mind. The recipe takes 3 days to complete, and while this sounds daunting, it really means nothing more than your meat is chilling in the fridge. Even when it comes to the actual cooking, the pork just sits on your grill and soaks up smoke. You will do nothing more complicated than adding more wood chips to your smoker. So your total active time of cooking will be around 30 minutes over three days and it will yield you over 8 pounds of Canadian bacon. That works out to $200 worth of bacon for basically drinking beer and watching TV. I think that sounds pretty fucking awesome and if you do too then read on and let's get on with the bacon makin.

Ingredients:
8 Pounds of Pork Loin
3 Ounces (84 grams) Pink Salt* (see bottom for notes on Pink Salt and where to buy)
3 Cups (700 grams) of Salt
2 Cups (450 grams) of Sugar
2 Tablespoon (56 grams) of Black Pepper

2 Bay leaves
2 Bunches of Sage
1 Large Bunch of Thyme
5 Large Cloves of Garlic
1 Gallon of Water
4 Pounds of Ice

1. Start first by making sure that you have everything weighed out precisely. The salt, sugar, pepper, and water can be a little over or under but the pink salt needs to be weighed exactly. Large amounts of this stuff can make you sick, so as long as you have it weighed correctly, you have nothing to worry about.

2. In a large pot, or saucier, pour in the water. Add your salt, sugar, herbs, and peppercorns to the water. Bring to a boil and turn down to a simmer. Simmer everything together in the pot for 15 minutes. Take off the heat and let it cool while you get together your ice (at least 10 minutes).

3. Place a bucket on your scale and zero it out. Now add enough ice to weigh out 4 pounds.

4. Add your hot brine and mix thoroughly until cool. There should still be some ice left in the mixture to let you know that it's cool enough to add your meat. If the ice is all melted then test the temperature with a thermometer. If the brine is over 40°, put it in the fridge until it cools down.

5. Add you two pieces of pork loin into the brine and weigh them down with a plate. Place the container in the fridge and let them sit in the brine for 48 hour.

6. Pull the meat out of your brine. Rinse it off and pat it dry. Put the meat onto a rack on a sheet pan. Place this back into the fridge uncovered and leave those suckers in there for 24 hours. This is where your pellicle will form. A pellicle is when the meat becomes tacky from the proteins in the meat coming to the surface and concentrating as the meat dries. You want this tackiness because it gives the smoke something to stick to. DO NOT skip this part! If you do then Canadians will find you and make you watch reruns of The Littlest Hobo.

7. Now that your porky lovelies have had a chance to dry out and get sticky, it's time for the smoke!!! If you do not have a smoker box in your charcoal grill or a smoker box for your gas grill (like mine in the bottom left of the picture below) then you will have to wrap wet wood chips in aluminum foil and poke holes in the top for the smoke to escape.

I will add here that I am not really in the habit of cleaning the inside of my grill. The racks yes, the inside not so much.

8. Close your grill cover and hot smoke these bad boys like Bob Marley on a 3 footer full of Kind Bud. You will want to hot smoke these until they reach an internal temperature of 150 degrees. They should be lacquered and caramel colored somewhere around 2 to 3 hours.

9. Once your bacon has hit 150° you should move it onto a rack and let it cool. Once it is cool, you can wrap it up. I usually freeze one of the pieces because it will take you some time to eat 4 pounds of bacon no matter how lean it is. The bacon will keep in your freezer for up to 3 months without getting too much freezer burn.

Now you are a bacon makin machine. How's it feel? Pretty fucking good righ? Now don't get too cocky, you still have to use it in recipes. I like the classics for my Canadian bacon such as a CBLT, Bacon Egg and Cheese Sandwich, Eggs Benedict, or my new favorite, Creamed Chipped Canadian Bacon (used in conjunction with Mr. Roux). But experiment with it! You just made 8 god damned pounds of this stuff, you have some to spare. And now that you know how easy it is to make, you'll have no problem making more to find that perfect Canadian Bacon recipe. Imagine how much happier your friends and family would be if you gave them Canadian bacon instead of a shitty gift certificate to Couch, Toilet & Infinity for Christmas this year.

As always, if you have questions please feel free to ask me either in the comments section or at john@rouxde.com

Cheers!

*Notes on Pink Salt- Pink salt (aka Sodium Nitrite) is a curing salt that is dyed pink so you will not get it confused with regular salt or sugar. It is not harmful in small amount like in our recipe, but in large amounts it will make you sick, so be vigilant when measuring it out. Its primary use is to prevent botulism bacteria growth, but it also sets the red color of the meat (no, it is not a dye), keeps the fat from going rancid when it dries and enhances the flavor of the meat. It's not something that you can find just anywhere, but you can get it super cheap ($2.50 a lb) online right here.

Yes, I wrote "going to the dogs"

2010-10-21T14:59:00.008-04:00

Stuggy's Baltimore

Here is a link to an article that came out last week. I had fun researching it until I felt the need to puch anyone who uttered the word hot dog. Needless to say I will not be eating a hot dog anytime soon but my pain becomes your reading pleasure.

On a sad note, we had to leave out one of the places I covered in this article becaseu they closed. It sucked because they were by far the best hot dog shack in Baltimore. R.I.P. Weenie World, you will be missed.

After the jump I have a few more photos of some of the "creations" I had to eat. Some were good, some were bad. Try to figure out which ones were which. Click on them for a bigger photo view. Enjoy!

http://weblogs.baltimoresun.com/entertainment/bthesite/blog/2010/10/fancy_dogs_baltimores_wiener_w.html

Ann's Double Dog

G&A Chili Dog

Haute Dog Carte Binkerts Dog

Haute Dog Carte Chef Dog

Stuggy's Late Night

Stuggy's Manhattan Dog

Stuggy's Motor City Dog

Stuggy's Cuban Dog

Weenie World- Cheeseburger and French Fry Dogs

(with corn chip chili nachos)

Weenie World- Chicago and Bulldog Dogs

Weenie World- Dundawg and The Bomb Dogs

Weenie World- Rueben and Bum on a Bun Dogs

Baltimore Beer Week.

2010-10-07T14:58:00.000-04:00

Hey kids, how've you been? I've been drunk. Want proof? Well then, here is a link to my article for B Free Daily about Baltimore Beer Week. They cut a bit out for the online version but you'll get the idea. Let me know what you thought. I'll have a new post up soon now that my blood alcohol level is back down to it's normal .13 .

http://tinyurl.com/34a9yac

Cheers,
Johnny

New (to you) article by me!

2010-08-26T20:18:00.001-04:00

http://weblogs.baltimoresun.com/entertainment/bthesite/blog/2010/08/crack_eat_love_the_winners_of.html

The link above will take you to an article that I wrote that came out 2 weeks ago. Yes, it's two weeks old, but nothing has changed. It's a round up of what our readers at B Free Daily think are the best crab items in Baltimore. Check it out. I hope you like it. Talk to you in a bit.

Cheers,
Johnny

Corn Pepper soup

2010-08-10T12:50:00.011-04:00

So we're more than midway through summer and I know we should be bummed out, but I think this is the best time of the year. You might be saying to yourself "This fucking guy is crazy, nobody likes this time of year", but trust me my friends when I say that there is a lot to be happy for.

One of the greatest parts of this time of year is the unbelievable bounty from all of the farmers around us. There are so many amazingly good fruits and vegetables rocking right now that if you're not going to a farmers market you are seriously missing out. The weekly trip to the local supermarket has made us jaded to seasonal items that comparatively taste a million times better. Look, I'm not one for peacing out the Safeway, but when given the choice of the two, it's easy to pick the farmer's market when we're talking about buying meats, fruits, or vegetables. Seasonal foods are something we should all take advantage of while it's here. Why wouldn't we want to eat a tomato from some dude that lives 20 miles away and just picked it 7 hours ago? It's a hell of a lot better than from a big conglomerate that has had those tomatoes picked before ripe, shipped for days on a refrigerated container, and then piled up neatly at your local supermarket to sit for a few more days. That's not to say that I don't take advantage of the supermarket in the winter, but now, it's all about the local shit.

And this is what this recipe is all about. Right now there are two thriving crops for the local farmer: tomatoes and peppers. They grow like mad at this time of year. Ask anyone that has a small crop growing in their backyard.

Corn is ubiquitous this time of year. Farmers have tons of the stuff and sell it cheaply. This is good since most of us don't dare try to grow corn in our backyards. It would look a little odd in my small city backyard.

It goes without saying that peppers are easier to cultivate in your backyard. If you own a plant, then you know that they just grow and grow....... and they don't stop growing until October (which is when you make hot sauce) but at this time of the year it can become daunting to figure out what to do with all of the peppers that you have. That's what the recipe is for.

Ingredients:

1 stick of butter (not pictured)

1 tablespoon cumin mix* (see recipe later) (also not pictured)

1 medium onion

5 Anaheim peppers

5 ears of corn
2 poblano peppers
1 quart of milk

2 cups of stock (I used chicken, but you can use vegetable)

2 sprigs of fresh oregano

1 small bunch of thyme

Now this may seem to be a pretty complicated soup but trust me when I say its not. It's not fancy, it's not technical, but it yields flavor that yells summer and makes you want to get into a fire hydrant (if you grew up in the city that is).

The hardest part of this recipe is the prep, and the hardest part is burning your food. What???? Yes, burn your food! It will make the dish smoky and deep. Burning your corn and peppers brings out a flavor that is vital to the dish and easy to do. "But I don't have my grill set up" you say. Well that doesn't matter. It's all done on the stove top. It may get a little smoky in your house, but it's a small price to pay for greatness.

So let's start:

1. Put your largest burner on high. Set two of your ears of corn across the grill of the burner and let it char. Once it's black, then you will flip it to a virgin side and let it get dirty as well. Repeat until all sides are charred. If your have an electric stove (I'm so sorry), you can char your corn under the broiler.

2. After your corn is charred, it's time for your poblano to get the fire treatment. All you have to do is the same technique that you used on the corn. Pepper plus stove top fire equals hell fire charred pepper.

But unlike the corn, what you want to do with the peppers after they are burnt up is to put them into a plastic zip top bag. Leave them there until you are actually cooking. This way the skin that you charred on the pepper will have separated from the flesh thus making it easier to peel off. When they are cool to the touch, peel and seed them. Chop them roughly.

Now that you have napalmed your main ingredients, you're ready to actually start your regular prep.

3. Grab your ears of corn and after they have been shucked, take your knife and cut the kernels off of the ear. A great trick to this is to cut your corn over a kitchen towel. If you've ever tried to cut corn on a flat surface you will know why I'm saying to cut it on a towel. Try it both ways if you want; and then send me an email about how you didn't want to listen to me and how you think I am a genius

Now that you have cut all of the kernels off of the ears, its time to scrape. It might seem like a trivial chore, but scraping the corn ears will get a lot of the corn essence into the dish. Just scrape your knife from one end of the ear to the other. Do it over a bowl and then wipe it into the corn kernels that you have masterly cut off.

4. Now that your corn cobs are spent, it's time to throw them away right? Wrong!! You want to cut up your cobs into thirds and toss them into a pot and cover them with your chicken stock (use a small pot!). Once submerged, turn your burner up until high and bring it to a boil and then turn down to a simmer (bubbles popping every few seconds). Let this simmer until you need to pour it into your vegetables.

5. In a pot, (I use an enameled pot) melt your butter until it is bubbling and separated. Watch it until it turns a deep brown and gets a nutty smell.

6. Throw in your onions, anaheims, and corn. Sauté the hell out of them until the onions are translucent. Once they are, you add your herbs, spice mixture, and chopped up roasted poblanos. Breathe easy, the hard part is over. Congratulate yourself with a cold beer.

7. Now it's time to add your corn infused stock. Pour your stock through a strainer to catch any corn cobs that will want to go swimming in your soup. Bring it to a boil and then turn it down to let it simmer for 10 minutes. .

8. After ten minutes it's time to add your milk. After the milk is added, DO NOT bring this soup up to a boil. It will make the milk separate ....... we don't want that. Just heat it up enough to be hot.

9. After the veg is soft you will want to take 1/4 of the veg mixture and puree the shit out of it. This will add body and a more "soupy" texture. You can skip this step; you will get a more "rustic" Yet, less flavorful soup.

Ladle out your beautiful soup into a bowl and sprinkle a little bit of cheese on top and then add some crushed tortilla chips. Finish it off with a bit more cheese and dig in. This is a great, cheap and hearty summer soup. It can also be made in the fall to help with feeding a lot of people for tailgating.

I hope you dig it. Cheers!!

You thought I forgot about the cumin mix didn't you. Here is the recipe.

2 tablespoons coriander seed

1 tablespoon cumin seed

1 teaspoon fennel seed

Place your whole seeds into a hot pan and toast them until you can really start to smell them, or they start smoking. Transfer the seeds to a spice grinder or mortar and pestle. Pulverize until it is a fine powder. It's now ready to use.

Back from the dead!!

2010-07-27T01:10:00.000-04:00

Yes, yes, I know..... I'm a bad blogger. Trust me when I say that I have a good reason (and no, it's not VD). I'll hip you to the secret in a few weeks, so don't worry that I'm lying to you. Until then, I have some great news. I am a food write for B the site. It is an entertainment site that is part of the Baltimore Sun. I'm currently working on a new article, but in the meantime you can check out my first article for them that came out on Friday (7-23-10). Here is the link:

http://weblogs.baltimoresun.com/entertainment/bthesite/blog/2010/07/baltimores_best_bbq_sweet_spot.html

I hope you like it. If you don't please let me know. That way I can ~~find you and make sure you will never bother anyone else with your dumb opinion~~ make sure to please you with food you will love.

I will be blogging hardcore in the next few weeks so get ready to cook some kick ass food.

Like the phoenix I have risen, unlike Dumbledore who is still dead. Hopefully I can do better than a dead guy.

Talk to you in a day or two,

Johnny

Unsavory Culinary term of the week: Gustation

2010-02-28T15:01:00.004-05:00

©2010 John Houser III
There are some food terms that when you hear them for the first time, you can sort of understand it without knowing exactly what it is. Meat emulsion is a good example. It obviously has to do with meat and emulsions, so if you know what those words mean then you can piece together a rough understanding of the term. Pretzel dog would also be a good example (I just added that because I like pretzel dogs).

Then there are food terms that unless you have a dictionary or a cookbook explaining it,, you would have a hell of a time figuring out what it meant at all. Gustation is one of those words. The first words that come to mind are gestation and disgusting, of which the latter is actually an offspring of our ugly word.

So now that we have those words in our head, we're thinking that gustation mean "gross fetus" right? Wrong! The word gustation means the act of tasting things. So something that at first brings to mind Rosemary's Baby turns out to be just an out of date word meaning taste. But taste is the most important part of eating. The physiology of taste makes up how we define food. The sensations of bitter, sweet, sour, salty, and umami make an onion taste like an onion and a big mac taste like.....well, shit.

The actual word gustation might be a bit anachronistic now, but its children live on in the terminology of modernity. Words like the aforementioned disgusting, which primarily describe things as repellently inedible or abhorrent, are used by most English speaking people on almost a daily basis. Similarly associated words such as gusto and gustatory are still in use but they are not used as much as in the past. Gustation may not be a word that you would use everyday, but it is definitely worth knowing if you care about food and cooking. Gustation is the basis for why we strive to prepare food in a way that is palatable to us.

So there you go. Another odd food word described. I know that in the age of Google it is easy as hell to just look the damn words up for yourselves, but I'm trying to use this as a forum to broaden your food terminology with words that you night not normally hear. I hope you enjoy this new segment in the blog.

Cheers

Hot Chocolate

2010-02-04T12:18:00.026-05:00

Look…….. we all know that the great snowgasm of 2010 is coming. The way it looks now, the eastern seaboard will be officially called Hoth by Sunday. We’re all going to either freeze to death or learn to tame Tauntauns to get around for the rest of the winter. We have no choice but to embrace our frigid overlord... or do we?

There is one way we can keep the Wampas at bay for a while (that's it for the Star Wars references, I promise). It is to drink a beverage that is universally loved by all. Be it a 5 year old kid, or a 49 year old hausfrau, everyone loves hot chocolate. Hot chocolate is such an iron clad staple that it even tickles the cockles of 23 year old hipsters (although they imagine its unicorn blood for irony’s sake). When the "HC" is made well it is that good.

Especially when the white stuff is falling, hot chocolate can just make the world seem like a postcard from a more innocent time. Life seems to slow down and get a little more important. We're talking full on transcendence here Jack!

With that being said, hot chocolate really is a study in simplicity. At its base you could have only two ingredients: cream and chocolate, but if you wanted to get fancier, there could be over twenty items in your recipe. Luckily for you, this one only has six and none of them are particularly hard to get your hands on. My version of hot chocolate is based on some of the better flavors I have tasted in recipes over the years. I have always found chocolate and orange to be really good friends, and lately I have found that chili pepper goes great with both. The combination of the three is like a power trio for the senses. Chocolate works as the drummer, holding down the groove. Orange as the guitarist plays its citric power chords while chili pepper heats up the performance with its undeniable bass chops. When they're mixed correctly, get ready to get your face rocked off!

This recipe is done in two parts. The first part is to steep your aromatics in milk. Once they are strained out and you have flavored milk, its time to add the chocolate; but there is a catch. I have never liked trying to whisk cold chocolate into hot milk (it never combines properly), so I went with pouring hot cream onto the cold chocolate and letting it sit until soft. Then when the cream and chocolate are whisked together they are mixed into the hot milk mixture and then you are ready to go. It’s that easy. Now don’t get thrown off by the presence of the chili pepper. It will not be really fiery. As long as you do not break up the peppers and keep them whole, you will be fine.

Hot Chocolate

Ingredients:

1 pint (2 cups) Heavy cream

6 cups of whole milk

20oz bittersweet chocolate (70% cacao, or at least 60%). I use bar chocolate, but you can use chips.

1 orange

2 dried arbol chili peppers - They are usually easy to get at you local supermarket.

1 stick of cinnamon

Preparation:

• Peel the zest (skin) off of your orange. You don't need a fancy microplane or zester. You want big strips of zest so just use your vegetable peeler.

• In a saucepan, combine the milk, orange peel, cinnamon, and chilies. Bring to a simmer (do not boil) and turn down to lightly simmer this spicy goodness for 15 minutes stirring occasionally (DO NOT BOIL!). Turn off the heat and let it sit for another 15 minutes.

• After sitting for fifteen minutes, strain out the solids into a new pot and cover to keep the heat in. If you don't think you need to strain it, just look at the picture below. You sure as shit don't want that gunk in your hot chocolate do you? Well do you?!

• Using a serrated knife (bread knife), shave your chocolate off of the bar in chunks. Basically you want to start in a corner of the chocolate and keeping the knife tip on the cutting board, chop down into the bar a 1/4 inch at a time. You do not need to put all of your body weight into it. The knife blade will take care of it for you. And you said that you never use your bread knife. If you are using chocolate chips, put them in a plastic bag and smash them with a rolling pin (it's good anger release).

• Transfer your lovely chopped chocolate to a heat proof bowl (metal or glass is preferable).

• Put the cream in a small saucepan and set in on medium low. You want to just bring this up to barely a simmer. Once it starts to move around (just watch it, you'll understand) it will be hot enough to melt the chocolate. If you want me to give you a temperature for how hot it should be, I would say between 190 and 200 degrees. Hey, it's cool; I like to use my digital thermometer as much as possible too.

• When the cream is hot and ready to go, pour it over the chopped up chocolate. Let it sit untouched for 3-4 minutes

• After the chocolate has sat in the hot cream, start mixing it together to combine the two. You can use a spoon, whisk, broadsword, or whatever you generally are comfortable stirring things together with. Once it is combined thoroughly, pour the cream and chocolate mixture into your still hot milk.

• Whisk, stick blend, or stir this mixture until it is smooth and looking like the best hot chocolate you are about to ever have. You will not need whipped cream (yes, I'm talking to you).

• Drink and enjoy!

This is not weak ass hot coco, or that Swiss Miss shit. This is a thick, rich, flavorful, and creamy hell broth. This is the kind of liquid love that Willy Wonka killed Augustus Gloop over touching, so enjoy it.

Now if you're like me you're thinking "how can I get some booze in this motherfucker?", don't worry I have you covered. This hot chocolate goes well with most brown liquors (whiskey, brandy, cordials), but my favorite is rum. I like to use a little bit of the spiced rum from a certain sea faring fellow who never does anything except stand around smiling with his leg cocked up on shit. That is just my preference feel free to use whatever rum you like. One great rum is a peanut rum that my friend John at Bad Decisions hipped me to in his hot chocolate. I don't know what it's called so I guess you're just going to have to go there and ask him yourself (and drink as much as you can afford as payment for his wisdom).

Let me know what you think of this recipe. I know that everyone who has had it loves it, but feel free to make adjustments, that's what cooking is. If you think it's too thick, put more hot milk into it to thin it out. If you think it's too spicy, pull out one the the chilies. This is not set in stone, have fun with it.

Now get out there and fight for that last gallon of milk. It's going to be a madhouse out there anytime it snows, but trust me; this hot chocolate is worth punching old ladies for.

*Edit- If you have leftover hot chocolate and refridgerate it overnight, you will need to thin it out when you reheat it. Make sure to blend until totally incoporated.

Cheers,

Johnny

Unsavory culinary term of the week: Meat Emulsion

2010-01-26T14:57:00.003-05:00

So this is going to be a weekly occurrence in this blog. My post take pretty long to research, shoot, write etc., that I wanted to have something interesting to put out there in between big pieces.

I've always found it funny that food; a concept that today means pleasure, beauty, and fulfillment, has some of the most disgusting sounding words and terms in it's lexicon. What I will do with this series is find some of the more grotesque culinary words and let you know what they mean so they won't disgust you as much if you were to ever come across them in print or conversation. So lets begin with one of my all time favorites: meat emulsion.

Meat emulsion is where the idea for this series came from. When I was in culinary school, I came across this term and burst out laughing at the nastiness of the way it sounds. I really don't mind the two words separate. Meat.... good, emulsion.....good; so why is it that when they are put together it sounds like a really bad title for a porno and what the hell is it?

A meat emulsion is for a lack of more scientific terms is a stable mixture of meat and fat. Gross you say? Disgusting you say? Well, have you ever had a hot dog? How about a sandwich with any number of meat products on it (turkey, bologna, ham)? Well, then you have eaten a meat emulsion.

A selection of cured meats at Sophia Place in Fells Points Broadway Market

Now if I told you I was fixing you a meat emulsion for dinner, you would politely (or not) tell me to fuck off, but if I said "hey, I'm making liverwurst, then you.......... yeah, I know... fuck off. Let me try another comparison instead.

Think of a mayonnaise (which is a stable emulsion) then you get the idea of the meat emulsion. It is when meat, fat, and a liquid are mixed together to become homogenized. This usually happens at a cold temperature because if the meat emulsion gets over a certain temperature, as with a mayonnaise, it will break. I have had a meat emulsion break on me and trust me, it is not a pretty experience. Think of meaty sponge surrounded by oil inside of a plastic bag. Got it? Yeah exactly, it's fucking gross.

Now think of a really good sausage sandwich with peppers and onions, or think of sitting at the ballpark, eating a hot dog (that you brought in) and watching the orioles lose while having the time of your life. That's what a good meat emulsion can do for you. From breakfast to dinner, the good ol' meat emulsion will be there to make you smile.

I will be getting into sausage making at some point in the future. I will go more into the making of a meat emulsion. For now though, it's better that you know what it is and to not be afraid of it. It is a lot easier than you think to make, as well as more satisfying to eat. So get ready to make you own delicious meat emulsions. Probably the greatest unsavory culinary term I know (for now).

If you have suggestions for unsavory culinary terms, I am open to suggestion.

As always, cheers everyone.

Gravlax's Mustardy Mates

2010-01-05T14:30:00.000-05:00

I originally posted these two recipes in the comments section for the gravlax recipe. After I realized who unbelievably stupid it was to do this, I have re-posted them here for your enjoyment. They don't necessarily have to go on gravlax obviously. Let me know if you like them.

Mustard and Dill Cream Sauce:
1 cup creme fraiche*
4 tbls Dijon mustard
(Approx) 2 tbls finely chopped dill
1 Small pinch of salt
1 Small pinch of pepper

Preparation:
Mix together all ingredients until incorporated. Let stand for at least an hour and preferably overnight.

* You can substitute equal parts of cream and sour cream for the creme fraiche. Whisk them together and let the mixture sit out for at least 12 hours (no, it will not go bad and you will not get sick from eating it).

Mustard and Dill vinaigrette:
3 ounces of cider vinegar
9 ounces of olive oil
2 tbls Dijon Mustard
(Approx) 2 tbls finely chopped dill
1 pinch of salt
1 pinch of pepper

Preparation:
Start with the vinegar in a bowl. Slowly drizzle in the oil while whisking vigorously. After half of the oil is emulsified you can add the oil faster. After the oil and vinegar are incorporated, add the mustard, dill, salt, and pepper. Stir until thoroughly combined.

If its too bland for you, feel free to adjust any of the ingredients. You're the one who has to eat it, make sure you like it.

Cheers!

The Cure for the Holiday Blues.

2009-12-09T14:43:00.307-05:00

Have you ever wished you could make something for a party that just blows everyone's mind? I mean something that everybody will love to eat and at the same time make you look like the king shit of cooking?

"Yes John, that sounds radder than a Sasquatch fighting a chupacabre. The problem is, my culinary expertise amounts to me just barely being able to open up a box of Stagg Chili".

Well faithful reader, I have the perfect dish for you. It's Called Gravlax. Don't be taken back by the funny name or that it sounds like Harry Potter speaking Parseltongue; Gravlax is a simple and wonderfully flavorful example of how to cure fish.

Curing is one of the ways humans have been preserving meats and vegetables for thousands of years. Now of course, humans don't have to preserve foods because we have refrigerators to keep our foods from rotting. We preserve our food now because it tastes damn good. From the aptly named salt cod to the more labor intensive prosciutto or salami, cured items are a huge part of modern society. The process of curing in the home though has almost been forgotten by the masses. It's a shame because the main ingredient is something that all of us have at our fingertips in the kitchen; salt.

In a cure, salt is what gives food its flavor, its texture, and preserves the food item so it can be stored for long periods of time. It has been sustaining our civilization for millenia, and now it will sustain you and yours once you learn how to use it properly. The transformative property of salt cannot be overstated here and after you have completed this recipe, you will understand the power of ~~the darkside~~ salt. Uhhhh, anyway..... let's get started!

Gravlax

Ingredients:

1 filet of Salmon with the skin on (2-3 pounds)
1 ounce of Gin (you can substitute vodka, Aquavit, or Pernod)
1 ounce of lemon juice
6 ounces of Salt
4 ounces of Sugar
1/2 ounce of fresh cracked Black Pepper (see picture on my favorite easy way to crack pepper)
1 bunch of Dill

Preparation:
• Rinse and dry your salmon filet.

• Combine the gin and lemon juice and brush the outside of the salmon filet with it.

• Chop the hell out of your dill. You want it rough chopped, not minced into a paste.

• As mentioned above, cracking whole pepper is easy. Just put said pepper into a metal cake pan, cover with plastic wrap and bash into oblivion with a heavy object (I use a meat tenderizer). Using the plastic wrap keeps the peppercorns from popping out as well as being translucent so you will be able to see which peppercorns have been crushed and which have not.

• Combine the salt, sugar, pepper, and dill in a bowl. Mix together with your hands. Try to squeeze the cure mix together so you bruise the dill. (This will extract a little more flavor from the dill).

• Place salmon on a piece of cheese cloth that is three times as wide as the filet. It only needs to be in one layer since you will be wrapping it up.

• Place the filet in a 13 x 9 baking dish (or whatever the fish fits into with walls). Make sure that your cheese cloth is hanging out of the dish, not under the fish.

• Cover the salmon filet with the cure mixture. Try to cover the thinner end of the filet less than the thicker end. More salt on a thinner end will make it super salty.

• Fold in the end pieces of the cheese cloth and then roll it up till there is no more cheese cloth. It will not look perfect (see mine). This is ok (seriously, it's cool), it just needs to keep the salt on the fish.

• Transfer the fish from the dish onto a sheet pan with a wire rack in it. If you do not have a wire rack insert (and why wouldn't you?), you can just put it on a sheet pan without it. The rack is there to raise it up so the water from the fish can drain out easier. Don't go killing yourself trying to find a wire rack insert, it will cure without it (but really you should have one).

• Place some weight on top of the filet. I just used the dish I had the fish in and a cast iron pan. You could use a brick instead of the cast iron guy; just make sure that you get even pressure on Mr. Fish.

• Place the wrapped salmon filet in your fridge and let it sit for 48-72 hours depending on how cured (salty) you want it. I go for 60 myself.

• Unwrap your gravlax and wash off all of the cure mixture. Pat dry delicately with a paper towel.

• If you are not going to eat it right away, just wrap it up in some plastic wrap or place it into a zip top bag.

* Do not worry about a little discoloration on the top of the fish. It is caused by the pepper and the dill bleeding into the flesh. It just looks a little strange. It you are wierded out by the way it looks, by all means thinly slice it away.

• If you are going to eat it right away then you should find your sharpest knife and begin to cut the gravlax as thinly as you possibly can. You want it almost transparent. This will not be easy at first, but I guarantee you by the time you have sliced that whole filet up, you will be an old hand at it.

Traditionally, this is served on pumpernickel with a dill mustard sauce (recipe in the next day or two). Other accoutrement that I use are finely diced red onion, capers, and a separated and minced hard boiled egg (whites and yolk apart from each other).

Non-traditionally, you can use this in whatever you want. I have seen it in potato salad, sandwiches and I've even put it in my scrambled eggs (recommended!). So go out there and make some gravlax. I will be by your house in a few days to test the results.........for scientific reasons of course.

Update: I have posted recipes for a mustard sauce and a mustard vinaigrette in the comments section. Feel free to comment on anything you like with your gravlax.

Gravy Baby

2009-11-26T03:21:00.000-05:00

So I know that this is totally last minute, but hopefully it will help you tomorrow while making your thanksgiving dinner. This post is about the life saver (or mouth saver) of thanksgiving; gravy. If you have played around for the last two weeks with roux, this will be no problem at all. The only thing you need to have is a little patience in the beginning and you'll be fine.

Gravy makes everything better. We know mom over cooks the turkey every year. We also know that the potatoes are gluey and dry, as well as the dressing that has the consistency of a sandcastle. These all are helped by decent gravy that although lumpy, makes dinner bearable to eat without stabbing everyone at the table with a shiv that you have fashioned out of the leg bone of the turkey.

This year fortunately, there will be no murder at the dinner table. If you stick to this general gravy recipe you will be good. This is also a great recipe to make on Friday for your leftovers. You can be gravy-ing up while your neighbors tear each other apart over $20 MP3 players.

This is you basic gravy that you can feel free to add more herbs, spices, or giblets. As always this is the foundation to build your gravy greatness on. Let’s get going:

Before we get going, we have to talk a bit about stock. I'll let you slide on using that boxed shit (broth) this time, but next time use homemade stock. Stock bases are also acceptable in a pinch, but no real substitute for real stock. Just a friendly warning for next time (I will hurt you).

Also a note on the herbs. You will need to chop the fuck out of these woody bastards. Chop them until they are super fine and then chop them some more. You'll know you’re on the right track when they look feathery. I know that sounds vague, but you'll understand it when you get there. The herbs have to be fine or else you will get chunks of rosemary stuck in your teeth and nobody wants a wedge of Christmas tree in their teeth.

Herb Gravy

Ingerdients:

8 cups of stock.

8 ounces of roux

2 bay leaves

2 sprigs of rosemary

6-10 sage leaves (depends on your taste, just start with 6)

Small bundle of thyme (if you had me at gunpoint I'd say 12 sprigs)

1 sprig marjoram (totally optional)

2 tablespoons salt

1 teaspoon black pepper

Preparation:

•Heat you stock to almost a boil.

•Chop your roux and add it to a hot pot.

•After the roux has melted, start adding one ladle of stock. Whisk until the roux thickens to the consistency of peanut butter.

•Add more stock ladle by ladle until the gravy has the consistency of over creamed mashed potatoes.

•Add the rest of the stock and whisk until incorporated. Bring to a simmer.

•Throw in your herbs, salt, and pepper. Whisk to incorporate.

•Simmer for 30 minutes. Taste and season (salt and pepper) according to how you want it.

Now you have a gravy recipe that will make you the envy of your family and might even get you booted from some of your more wealthy relatives wills. You will be able to take solace in your poverty that even though you won't have money you also won't have to eat dry turkey sandwiches for the rest of your life like the rest of your horrible family.

How to Make Roux...........Well it's about damn time!

2009-11-10T20:42:00.005-05:00

Ok, this will be the entry where I lose my recipe virginity. I know what the kids on the twitter and the interwebs want. They want recipes. They don't want to hear about my excursions to go pick cherries, eat crabs, or have photo shows; they want to make their own food. So in the spirit of giving, I will cave to your selfish demands.

This is going to be both simple and profound. It's simple to make and then it becomes profound when you get to know how to use it. It's also an obvious choice given the name of my blog/ business. It's called a roux (pronounced roo), and although it may look like a funny French word, it will change the way you cook. So what the hell is it?

Roux, when used properly, will thicken any liquid it is put into. When the liquid comes up to almost a boil the starch in the roux gelatinizes and thickens the liquid being used. It is super helpful for making gravies, sauces and for thickening soups and stews. It sounds like it would be really complicated right? Well, it's not.

If you have never made a roux before, fear not; you can't get any more simple that this:

Roux

Ingredients:

1 part fat

1 part flour

Preparation:

• Melt fat in a saucepan.

• Whisk in flour until incorporated over medium heat.

• Cook (while stirring every few minutes) until it becomes the shade you are looking for (white, blond, brown, brick).

• Cool in saucepan for 5 minutes, and then pour the roux into a glass or metal container. (Be careful, this shit is like napalm at this point!)

• Let the roux cool until room temperature, then stick it in the fridge.

• Once solid, cut it into cubes and transfer into a plastic bag or plastic container for storage.

• Roux may also be frozen at this point.

One ounce of roux will thicken 8 ounces of liquid thoroughly.

That's it? Yep, that's it dear reader. But what's that you say? What kind of fat and flour? How much is one part? How will I know when its white, blond, or brick? Jesus, do I have to explain all of it for you?........ Yes, actually, yes I do. Let's begin.

For this recipe, when it says "fat" it can mean almost any fat you would like to use. Butter, clarified butter, lard, tallow (beef fat), and vegetable oil would all be acceptable. They all produce the same exact product, albeit with slightly different flavors, and work exactly the same when you use them. Btw, Crisco is not really a good product to use in a roux because it is engineered to melt at such a high temperature that when combined with a liquid and turned into a sauce it will leave a film in your mouth (yuck).

Flour is the easy part of the equation. Just use regular AP (all purpose) or bread flour. Cake flour or pastry flour can be used in a pinch, but do you really keep cake or pastry flour around your kitchen? That's what I thought.

The one part to one part ratio is a standard sliding ratio that can be sized up or down depending on how much roux you want to make. The easiest way to express this would be to take a pound of butter and mix it with a pound of flour (which is what I used in the pictures) and this would produce 2 pounds of roux and you would be set for a long time. You can half that amount by halving the weights of the ingredients. You could also make 33.6547 times more and just adjusted the weights accordingly (if you appreciate odd proportions). Just make sure you are using equal parts (by weight) of fat and flour and you won't go wrong.

Now that you have mixed your melted fat and flour, you need to cook it. Depending on what shade of roux you are looking for, you can be cooking for 5 minutes up to an hour. Generally, you will be using a white roux for 95% of the recipes you use. Unless you plan on making gumbo all of the time, you won't really need to make too many dark rouxs. Luckily, the white roux is the one that only takes 5 minutes to make. You want to cook your roux for at least five minutes to cook the raw flour taste out of the roux. If you don't do this, the sauce or stew you are making with this undercooked roux will have a bit of a doughy taste. Nobody wants to get into some mac and cheese and have it taste like bread dough.

I realize that I have made things seem a little more complicated than they need to be, but I want you to be able and nerd out on someone who would have any questions about making roux. And now that you are a bad ass roux making mother fucker it's time to make something with it. Alas, this entry is only about making roux. That being said, future recipes will prominently feature the mighty roux. Mac and cheese (not that blue box shit), gravies of all kind, and thick soups will all have roux as the ingredient that makes them what they are. For now, just practice your roux making abilities (using water is a cheap way to practice) and get ready for god-like thickening power.

Cheers!

Nothing in this world is free...... except free stuff.

2009-10-21T14:47:00.013-04:00

I should start this entry with the disclaimer that I was given food for free to write this review/ story. Am I proud of this? Not really. Do I feel bad about this? No. I'm sort of ambivalent about the whole thing. I like the fact that I was given product to review for free but at the same time I have punk-rock guilt about being a shill for a business. Complicated stuff indeed, but that has neither here nor there to do with the overall story. I will sort out my feelings at a later date* in order to try and entertain you with this compelling story of free seafood and why I hate UPS.

A few months ago I wrote an article for Metromix.com about the best crab dishes in Baltimore. After appearing in Metromix, it was also put into "B" Magazine where it was seen by a PR person (henceforth know as the Crab Guy) for the website http://www.crabplace.com/. He liked the article and got in touch with me about maybe reviewing some of their product. After searching through the website and figuring out that they were in fact a legit company, I got back to the Crab Guy and told him "sure I would love to sample your wares".

After a few more emails back and forth we settled on what I was going to recieve from the company and it turned out to be a pretty sweet score. The list was as follows:

6 mini crab cakes

6 soft crabs

4 16 oz jars of crab marinara

1 # cocktail crab claws

I was excited to receive the package and get to cooking. But then UPS stepped in and fucked things up for a bit.

The food was going to be at my house on a Thursday but, was lost in transit and did not reach our house until Friday. My wife came home from work at 5:30 on Friday to find our package sitting behind a planter in the sun. It had probably been sitting there for a few hours and needless to say I was more than worried to see what was in the box when I got home. I was expecting a goddamn science project when I opened the box, but to my surprise, everything in the box was below 40 degrees and still cold. A day over the delivery date and left out in the sun for hours by a UPS asshole and the food was still cold and edible. It was a testament to the packaging procedures that the crab place workers put in place to make sure their food stays edible during shipment.

After the relief of knowing that the food was edible, it was time to plan. What to do, what to do? The soft shells and the mini crab cakes were easy enough (sandwiches for the cakes, fried and served on a bed of potato succotash for the soft shells), but the marinara and the claw meat was another story. After a few ideas were thrown around, we finally decided that we would make claw meat raviolis and toss them in the marinara for Saturday’s dinner.

I didn't want to mess with the crab cakes or the soft shells too much so I could judge the quality of the product. For the cakes I decided I would just broil them in the oven while I was frying the soft shells in butter. This way everything would be hot and ready for our judgment (there were five people helping me to sample the goods). Placed on a cast iron pan and popped into an oven whacked to full broil, the crab cakes were on their way. The soft shells were dredged in flour and fried until golden and crisp (after being rinsed and dried off) and lovingly placed on a succotash of summer vegetables. After its hellacious stay in the oven, the crab cakes were nestled onto a slider bun with lettuce, tomato, and mayo. Time to eat!

The soft shells tasted wonderful. They came out crisp and caramelized with no toughness at all. I prefer smaller soft shells to the larger ones because I am not a fan of the leathery texture that accompanies some larger soft shell crabs. These were a hit with the friends I had cooked them for. Even the people that were not big fans of soft shells liked them. I tend to think it was because of my extraordinary cooking ability, but the quality of the crabs had a lot to do with it as well.

The crab cakes were not as immediately loved. Although cooked to golden brown and crispy, there was not a lot of flavor going on. It turned out that after a generous sprinkling of salt, the crab flavor came out and they were gobbled up in a few bites. We were a little disappointed with the seasoning of the crab cakes. As long as you know this before you get the crab cakes you can plan how you will season them (salt and pepper, old bay etc.) and you won't have any trouble. The problem is, you will not know how they taste until you eat them and then it is usually too late.

So far so good? We were happy about the overall quality of the crab cakes and the soft shells. It was also agreed that if we actually did order that food from an internet site we would have been very happy with the results. So yes, so far so good.

I was a bit suspicious about the marinara sauce. I'm not the biggest fan of jarred tomato sauces, so I wasn't really looking forward to trying the crab marinara. I was a big fan of the claw meat that was sitting on the table yelling at me to dip it in melted butter. After resisting the temptation to eat the whole pound, I managed to strip it off the claw and fold it into a filling that my wife made of finely diced red peppers, onions and ricotta cheese. We then made raviolis with some pasta that was freshly made earlier that day by my wife (I was exceptionally lazy that day I admit). It was just a matter of boiling them until they were done (fresh pasta is extremely quick to cook), tossing them in the marinara, and topping it all with a snowfall of parmigiano reggiano.

As I was waiting for the marinara to heat up (the raviolis were not in the water yet) I decided that I would look at the ingredients list on the back of the jar to see what scary unpronounceable words were mixed in with actual food items. To my surprise I found that the list only consisted of a few items that were all actual food. No additives, no weird shit at all. Delighted in this revelation, I tasted the marinara. It was really good. It was better than a lot of marinara’s I have gotten in the Little Italy section of Baltimore. It didn't taste heavily of crab, although you could see crab meat throughout the sauce, but there was crab flavor there. It was the best jarred tomato sauce I have ever had. I would eat it again and not think twice about it. Needless to say the sauce enhanced our wonderful ravioli (as a sauce should do) and everyone that ate that night at our house was very happy with the flavor of the dish (as well as my wifes ravioli skills).

In the end it turned out that even the item I was sure I was not going to like tasted good. I have never ordered seafood off of the internet and I don't know if I would ever just because of where I live, but if I wanted to provide someone out of town with a taste of Baltimore I wouldn't hesitate to go to the Crab Place's website and order up a taste of home for a friend in need.

*After writing this, I still feel odd about not paying for it. Maybe it’s just because this was my first time reviewing food I haven’t paid for. Maybe I just need more, ahem, practice (wink, wink). I’ll keep you posted as always my dear readers.

What month is it again????

2009-10-06T14:29:00.007-04:00

Yes. it's October. Yes, it has been a long time since my last post. Yes, the next time you see me you can punch me in the face. OK, so maybe not that last one.

I do have a good excuse. I have been dutifully preparing and executing the artwork for an art show that I am in. If you go downtown to Abacrombie restaurant (digs of Top Chef contestant Jesses Sandlin) I currently have twelve photographs hanging up on their lovely walls. Here are a few preview pics for your viewing pleasure. These are artist proof shots taken on my iphone. The actual prints are much richer in person, but with these you'll get the idea of what sort of food photography I do.

Electric Allium- Silver Gelatin Emulsion on Paper. 11 x 14-2009

Frank – Silver Gelatin Emulsion on Paper. 11 x 14-2009

Mistress Corn- Silver Gelatin Emulsion on Paper. 11 x 14-2009

I have been working on these photos for over six months and to finally get them out of my head and onto walls was greatly fulfilling and terrifyingly fun. One of my best friends Andrew Gleason is showing with me. I would try to describe the madnees that came out of his beautiful, twisted brain, but I would be doing him a disservice. He does ink transfer prints that are heartbreakingly stunning and vibrantly ass-kicking.

I will be updating new stories and post starting this weekend. The next post will be about how I was contacted by a crab delivery company to test out their products. You'll have to tune in in a couple of days to find out how it went, I'm not saying shit...... yet.

So get your asses down to Abacrombie, have a great meal cooked for you by a great chef and see some great (in my opinion at least) artwork.

See you in a few.

Cheers

Ch ch ch ch ch ch ch Cherry Bomb!

2009-07-22T19:46:00.006-04:00

Is there a better harbinger of summer than the cherry? I mean, I'm not in school anymore so I don't give a shit about summer vacation and as far as going to the beach is concerned...... have you seen my complexion? Cherries perfectly time themselves around the beginning of the summer (June 21st) and last only a few months. So it is with this in mind that as soon as the cherries are ready to be plucked from their branches that I get excited to go out and pick a bunch.

Around the second week in June is when I start to get an itching for those little red drops of fruity goodness. It is also around the time that I started calling Lohr's Orchard and hoping that the recorded voice says that it is time to come over and pick your own cherries. When it was time, the wife and I woke up bright and early on a Saturday morning (11 am ) and headed on up to the orchard for a few hours of relaxation in the cherry trees.

After you have navigated your way through Lohr's agricultural maze to the cherry orchard, you find yourself in a small field full of cherry trees bustling with people all trying to pick a perfect crimson drupe. It is time to get to picking!

This was the contents of a ladies basket by us. (notice her form of stemming them before dropping it)

The first thing you realize is how shockingly red they are. We all know that cherries are, well cherry red, but damn these little fuckers are bright. They look like Christmas lights when the sun hits them the right way. Once you get over the sheer beauty of everything its now time to start grabbing. It's oddly relaxing up in the tree picking off the soft fruit. You're brain turns off and all you need to think about is "would I eat this?". If the answer is yes, then you pick it off the branch and pop it into your bag (a nice fabric one I hope). As time goes by you get into a rhythmic trance and before you know it, you've been in the trees for an hour or so.

After I had realized that we had been there for an hour, I asked my wife if she was satisfied with her haul and when she said yes we were ready to compare our plunder. She had picked way more than I did (in my defense I was taking pictures) and we realized that the total weight might have broken our previous years record by a pound or two. In the end we wound up picking 15 pounds which was up from 12 pounds last year. We were victorious, but then we remembered what happened to us last year. With dread we realized we were going to have to take them home and pit them ourselves. It took around 2 hours.

After the pitting, we looked like we murdered a bus full of nuns (or if you are disturbed by that image, how about a bus full of penguins. Better?). We were ready to eat, but there was no way in hell we could polish off 15 pounds of cherries in one sitting. Time to freeze.

After the cherries were pitted, all that was left to do was to put them on sheet trays and pop them into the freezer until frozen. From there, the frozen red marbles were scooped into a gallon size zip top bag for an indeterminate deep freeze.

Kept this way in the freezer, you can have individual cherries anytime you want. Although being able to pop them in your mouth frozen anytime you want is a good reason to freeze them this way (I do this constantly), there is another functional reason. If you were to just plop them all in a bag together at once, you would have a huge cherry colored block of ice that you could hack at with a butter knife.

So go get some cherries. Whether you pick them yourself, or buy them from a local farm at the farmer's market, they are a great and versatile fruit.

I will start posting cherry recipes as soon as the recipes start.

have it my way

2009-07-18T17:39:00.003-04:00

I saw this today on a really funny website called passiveagressivenotes.com and I felt the need to share it with you.

Cherry post tomorrow.

my work is done for today, PBR time!.....oh wait I'm already drinking.

Cheers

Johnny

Happy 4th of July!

2009-07-04T15:09:00.003-04:00

I've been taking a few days to collect my thoughts and relax a bit (read: getting scandalously drunk). I will be posting a lot more now that I have a little more free time. Here is just a taste.

(Photo Credit: John Houser III)

Guess what the next post will be about.
Have a good 4th of July and try not to blow your hands off with fireworks like so many poor mannequins do at this time of the year.

Cheers,
Johnny Bottlerocket

Eating Food at a Strip Club

2009-06-30T14:49:00.004-04:00

(photo Credit: John Houser III)

A new article I wrote has gone up on the Baltimore Metromix website. It is about the quality of food at three area strip clubs (in case you hadn't figured that out).

I had a lot of fun doing it and I would like to thank all of the people at the clubs that were super helpful in putting things together (such as this photo above of some of the beautiful ladies at the Millstream Inn).

Oddly enough, I didn't get one lap dance throughout the whole process. What the fuck is wrong with me? Anyway, I hope you like it.

http://baltimore.metromix.com/bars-and-clubs/essay_photo_gallery/strip-club-eats/1289725/content

Rock!

Johnny

It's Crabulous!!

2009-06-25T00:15:00.008-04:00

This is sort of a late post but if you haven't read it then it's new to you. I had an article on crabs go up last week on Metromix. It was then re-printed as B magazine's cover story on Monday (which I knew nothing about until it was already out). I was pleasantly surprised about it and happy with the way the piece came out. Here it is:

http://baltimore.metromix.com/restaurants/essay_photo_gallery/pick-a-crab-any/1241966/content

(photo Credit: John Houser III)

There was also a piece I wrote a month or two ago that finally got posted last week as well. Its on tater tots. Nuff said there. It's pretty cool as well. My wife is a tot freak and if I didn't get that assignment she would have punched me in my jaw. It made up for some of the horrible places that we've eaten in the past couple of years. Here is the link:

http://baltimore.metromix.com/restaurants/article/smackdown-hot-to-tot/1243219/content

Read and enjoy my pets, read and enjoy.

Just an update, the piece on strip club food is coming along well. I only need one more place and I'm good to go. I have been impressed with most of the places as to the quality of the food they're putting out. It's going to be a fun article to write.

Shit you will need. Part 3: Appliance Reliance

2009-06-10T15:00:00.005-04:00

Well, let’s see here. You have your nice new cookware (hopefully you're working on a good patina by now) and a few helpful kitchen utensils to help get you through your home dinner service. Now its time to break out the heavy artillery. This is the stuff that will make you feel like one of those cooks on TV who always have the nice, shiny, but quiet electric equipment that chops purees, crushes, and mixes. Now this shit ain't cheap. This is the equipment that you really only want to buy once every ten years (depending on how much you use it of course) so be sure that whatever you buy, it is a quality item so you are not wasting you time or money on a big piece of junk. A lot of these pieces will save you time as well as future rheumatoid arthritis (knead bread dough for 20 minutes and you will understand). But before you buy any of these magnificent machines, be prepared to ask yourself some questions:

Question #1- Do I need this?

This is the base question. You don't need to buy a juicer if you never drink juice. A shit ton of people fall into this trap. I know the juicer looks nice, and it will make you want to make juice more often, but it more than likely will just wind up being a 25 lb paper weight.

Question #2-

Do I have the space for this?- You better make goddamn sure you have space in your cabinets or on shelves somewhere in the kitchen before you drop a mountain of money on a machine you will never see. Out of sight, out of mind right?

Question #3-

Can I afford this- Seriously, if you can't afford any of this stuff then you shouldn’t go into crazy debt just so you can make waffles every other month. It’s that simple.

There are obviously hundreds more questions you could ask yourself (how long will it last, what’s the best model, why does it hurt when I pee), but those three will immediately let you know if you should be purchasing a kitchen appliance. If you are ready to go and get an electric appliance then here is a small list of devices I couldn’t live without and think you shouldn’t either. Notice that there are no ridiculous items on this list (rice cookers, George Foreman grills, popcorn machines). This is because they are either pointless (popcorn machine) or fall under the heading of " I made a mistake when I was younger and bought this piece of shit and realized immediately that I was a rube who just got had" (rice cooker, George Foreman grill). Do not be fooled by machines that claim you will instantly be a master chef in the kitchen. They are the culinary equivalent of penis enlargement commercials. Just stick with the basics first and then if you feel the need to blow some money then the choice is yours (I will say I told you so though).

I’m going to try and go smallest to biggest on this go-around. Let’s begin.

Coffee Grinder- A coffee grinder is not only to be used for grinding coffee my friend, oh no, it’s so much more. Just because it’s in the name doesn’t not make it a monolithic unitasker. Any hard spice you want to dispatch into a cloud of fine dust, this is your device. It is the best thing to get for making spice blends to be used as rubs for meat or blends for stews. Try grinding up a cinnamon stick in a mortar and pestle and you will understand what I’m talking about.

Immersion Blender- Lets say you have a hot pot full of potatoes, leeks, and cream. You want to blend it, but not too much, and without the horrible third degree burns that usually cover your face and hands after the blender that you use blows up in your face. This is when you will require the service of the immersion blender. Besides being just dead-easy to use, immersion blenders keep one hand free to do, ummmm, whatever you want to do with it (I don’t judge). Soups, fixing chunky sauces (or lumpy gravy), and whipped cream (some come with whisk attachments) are all at the touch of your lazy little fingers. The one thing to remember is this is NOT a substitute for a Cuisinart or a blender. It will not puree things as finely as a blender or a Cuisinart. You would have to sit at your pot and blend for 30 minutes to get every little particle (asparagus is especially tricky). But otherwise, these hand held blenders are pretty useful.

Toaster Oven- Ahh the toaster oven. A friend to potheads across the country who don’t want to have their pizza sogged out by a microwave and too impatient to let the big oven crisp it up. The toaster oven is much more than a munchie maker……. no, it really isn’t but that’s ok. When you quickly need to crisp up or reheat something that you don’t want completely fucked up by a microwave then this is your tool. It will also save you money on your gas bill since you are not using your oven. Yes, it takes a little longer but does a microwave make toast?

(the answer is: fuck no)

Coffee Maker- This sells itself. If you enjoy coffee or miss all of that Ritalin and speed you did in college; you need a coffee maker. You probably already have one so I have no idea why I’m even trying to push it. I will say though that for the record, I rarely drink coffee. There I said it, wanna fight? My wife does drink coffee however, and loves the coffee maker I gave to her a couple of years ago (which is the one I’m linking to). It also makes a mean espresso so she can deal with my grumpy ass in the morning. If, however, you do not have the space for one of these, and they do get pretty sizable, then get a French press. Used for all types on liquid infusions, they are incredibly easy to use, clean and will make you the best two cups of coffee you have ever had. I use mine for tea and it’s super-rad.

Blender- Always the constant companion of those loveable assholes that call themselves parrot heads, the blender is another appliance you should own. The blender at my house is really only used for drinks. Smoothies mostly, but alcoholic blender drinks are up there as well. One non drink thing I do with my blender is to make crepe batter with it. It makes it super fast and blends the batter perfect as well as chopping the herbs for the savory crepes.

Waffle Maker- I like waffles. Who doesn’t like waffles?

Crock Pot- The crock pot is not just for your mom’s key swap parties anymore. There are actual culinary uses for the crock pot that go totally overlooked just because they are looked as a useless dinosaurs. Do you like baked beans? Goddamn right you do. Now you can make some righteous slow cooked baked mutha fuckin beans with your old school crock pot. Duck confit? When it’s simmered at under a boil for hours it’s no problem. There are new devices that can convert your boring old crocker into a new fangled sous vide cooker. Just plug your crock pot into the device and then set the temperature and let it go until you are ready for the sous vide gods (Ferran Adria & Thomas Keller) to let you know when its ready. Also, you might want to every now and then use it to keep food warm during parties. Like I do every time I use it.

Cuisinart Food Processor - The Cuisinart is one of the culinary greats. It’s so badass that even when food processors aren’t made by Cuisinart, culinary professionals still call them Cuisinart. It is one of those items, that when you get one, you feel like an adult. You have suffered through the crappy imitations and now you have finally gotten the real deal. It chops, it slices, it grates, it purees, and it even will help you put together a mean pie dough. I use my Cuisinart as much as I possibly can (I just got a real one this year as well), and it is worth the relatively hefty price. This is an item I recommend saving up for because it is so well made and does the job you need it for perfectly every time.

Kitchenaid Mixer- Not just for Martha Stewart anymore, the Kitchenaid mixer is the crème de la crème of kitchen appliances. It’s usually the most expensive appliance that a lot of people own in their kitchens and if you know how to use it properly, you will get every penny. We all know well and good that it mixes stuff, but did you know that it also makes sausages? Well, if you didn’t, then welcome to the future my friend. There are so many damned attachments for the Kitchenaid that they are starting to run out of ideas and are popping out some pretty useless shit (do we really need a grater attachment or a juicer attachment?). But the attachments that are useful transform this heavy bastard (mine weighs 30lbs) into a completely different appliance. The aforementioned grinder and stuffer attachments help you to make great sausages or give you the option to grind your own meats for burgers and pates. The pasta roller attachments turn making your own pasta into a quick and easy way to flex your culinary knowledge and feel like a badass. There is also an ice cream maker that once you use it, the temptation to make ice cream all of the time will only be hindered by the fact that your fat ass can’t get off of the couch because you ate so much damn ice cream. The downside of this spectacular machine is that it is expensive (some up to $550), but there are varying sizes and models that go down to as low as $239. This is still expensive but a little easier for the beginner to feel comfortable about getting one. If you are getting serious about your food and what you are more and more willing to make at home, then this contraption is without a doubt an essential. If you have ever tried kneading your own bread dough (which I do recommend trying a few times) then it pays for itself after the 7th time using it.

So I hope that this list helped you in anyway to get your collection of kitchen appliances started. This will more than likely be the last installment (or at least the last for a long long time) of the award winning shit you will need series. And by award winning, I mean no body reads it. We will start with terms, techniques and recipes within the week. I will be posting more frequently now that I’m done with these time consuming rants.

Nerd Alert

2009-05-17T01:14:00.002-04:00

I am walking across the stage for graduation from my culinary school (Baltimore International College) tomorrow. I have been done with school since December but tomorrow it is official I guess. I'm excited to be done with all of it and get on with the plans I have for the future (blog, food writing, culinar classes). So as of 11:00 tomorrow I will have 2 worthless degrees. Awesome.
If you see me at the farmer's market tomorrow say hi.

From the world of WTF????

2009-05-03T17:45:00.002-04:00

I know I am probably late on this item, but I just saw it today so its new to me I guess.

http://tinyurl.com/c6d59e

This is unbelivably fucking disgusting. I understand that people need to can things for longevity or .............. actually no, this is just ridiculous.

If nuclear war happpens, I don't need chicken. Fuck that.

Haggis not included

2009-04-24T19:35:00.002-04:00

Here is the link to my article on birds of a feather. Its basically my tasting notes on the scotch and irish whiskey I had there. As always I tried to make it interesting. There is nothing more boring to me than tasting notes from someone who is just trying to be waaaay too serious about their palate. Dude, we get it, it tastes strongly of dark fruit. But I digress....

http://baltimore.metromix.com/bars-and-clubs/photogallery/drinking-at-birds-of/1121903/content

Hope you dig it!

BTW, in your fucking face Brian!

Wow....just wow

2009-04-23T14:18:00.003-04:00

I just got the craziest assignment so far in my young career in food writing. I just got the green light to find the best strip club food in Baltimore. My editors wanted a piece on strip clubs and this came to mind for me immediately. I have a friend who only has one rule in life and that is to never eat at a strip club. Its a pretty specific rule considering that it leaves his life open to mass murder and smoking umbilical cords, but who am I to judge. So I mentioned the idea to my editor and he thought it was a good idea. Now I think I will just need to update my shots (hep A, B, C) as well as get those pills they give you before going to eat in a foreign country and I'll be ready to go. I'll let you know when its out.

Tomorrow I have a piece on Birds of a Feather Scotch and Whiskey Bar in Fell Point going up. I'll link it tomorrow when its up.

The 3rd installment of SYWN series will be up in a couple of days.

Ta Ta for now (get it... tata...)
Johnny

Books

2009-04-17T00:52:00.003-04:00

I'm constantly reading but there are certain authors that when one of their books drop, I lose interest in everything I'm reading until I check out their newest offer. Well I was not disappointed with the newest book from Michael Ruhlman. Its called ratios and it is a fucking miracle that no one has written this book earlier. This is the genius of this book, it is original as well as unbelievably helpful. Coming in at only 229 pages, it is jammed up with things that a lot of chefs (or professional cooks) already know. Most cooking can be broken down into basic ratios that are usually a constant as you increase the size of the recipe. For a home cook this book can be the key to another world, the door that opens to Oz, the first time you play a guitar chord and it makes sense. It is that profound for a home cook. In culinary school we are taught some of these ratios (Cookie Dough-1 part sugar: 2 parts fat: 3 parts flour, Pasta- 3 parts flour,: 2 parts egg, or Vinaigrette- 3 parts oil: 1 part vinegar), but this book takes it to a new level. Doughs, cake batters, sausage mixes, stocks, sauces, and custards are covered with each heading encompassing multiple basic recipe ratios as well as secondary recipes so you can learn to start and improvise on the basics. Its fucking brillant.

Ok, enough overview and ass kissing.

Well, maybe a little more ass kissing....

The book is without a doubt a must have for anyone who cooks. It's an educational mind fuck as well as an insight into the way food professionals think in terms of the basic fundamentals of their craft. On top of those superlatives, it's just a good read. Ruhlman, as always, makes food and cooking processes accessible for the home cook.

Get it and be astounded.

I'm back nerds!
Johnny

New Top Chef show and other random cough syrup induced ramblings

2009-04-08T22:00:00.004-04:00

I'm heavily whacked out on cough syrup at the moment so please forgive my digressions (if there are any).

I am currently working on a third part to the "shit you will need" series. It will deal with appliances. It will be done by Monday (I hope). I have been hearing good things about the first two "SYWN" pieces, so I hope this one will not disappoint.

I have also been hearing from a number of people asking why I haven't posted any recipes as of yet. Well my friends, I just don't think you are ready yet. That's right grasshopper, you are not ready. I don't feel comfortable putting up any recipes yet without laying a decent foundation for you wonderful readers to build on. They will be coming soon though, within the next month I would say. It will be worth the wait.

On a totally unrelated note, Bravo has announced that they will start a spin off to their popular Top Chef series. It will be called Top Chef:Masters. With the regular cast of characters off for the summer (Padma, Tom, Gail), there are new judges, a new host, and the contestants are some of the greatest culinary minds in the country. It should be interesting to watch Wylie Dufresne go up against Huber Keller, John Besh, and Rick Bayless. They will fight it out in groups of four and then bracket it down until, like the highlander, there will only be one. I think its great that Gael Green will be one of the judges. It starts On June 10th and will be hosted by Kelly Choi of Eat out NY fame. It will also have guests such as Zooey Deschanel and Neil Patrick Harris (did I just fucking write that?). It should be entertaining at least to watch the chefs cook, the judges and guests could be a train wreck.

And before I go I would just like to say the following: monkey, spackle, lock jaw, rock salt, Joshua.

Gotta love cold medicine.
Later
John

On a side note, if you want a great book to read, check out Insatiable: Tales from a Life of Delicious Excess by Gael green. It is probably one of the most openly hedonistic books I have ever read. If you want to know what it was like to dine at some of the best places in the world (Le Bernardin, La Maison Troisgros, Le Cirque) as well as what its like to sleep with some really famous dudes (Elvis, Burt Reynolds, Clint Eastwood, Jean Troisgros). It is a study in excess and unrestraint unlike any food based, non-fiction book I've read. It would give the Motley Crue bio book a run for its money.

Mekong Delta

2009-04-07T14:46:00.001-04:00

I just had an article go up on Baltimore Metromix's website. Check it out and let me know what you think. Remember to click on all of the pictures.

http://baltimore.metromix.com/restaurants/restaurant_review/get-served-mekong-delta/1080583/content

Rock!
Johnny

I'm not lazy.......really!!!

2009-03-31T22:01:00.002-04:00

Just because I'm not writing to help you wonderful people (all 9 of you) to learn how to cook everyday, doesn't mean that I'm not working on food related projects. Why, within the last few weeks I have had a couple of articles come out on the Metromix Baltimore site. I've been writing for them for just over a year and I am going to start linking the articles I write to this blog. The first link deals with an Absinthe tasting I went to and the second link is a guide as to where to find daily food specials in the Mount Vernon section of Baltimore from Monday through Friday. If either of those sound like anything you would want to read, then click on the links. Check it out (or I will kill you, I mean please):

Absinthe
http://baltimore.metromix.com/bars-and-clubs/photogallery/absinthe-tasting-at-mortons/1026121/content

Mount Vernon
http://baltimore.metromix.com/restaurants/photogallery/weekly-dinner-specials-mount/1057272/content

I also have a "first look" piece on Mekong Delta Vietnamese restaurant coming up on Metromix in a few days. I will post a link when they post it.

Hope you are all well.
rock out with your crock pot out.
Johnny

Shit you will need part two: Utensilitis

2009-03-21T18:54:00.008-04:00

So now that you have a few pans it is time to get cooking. The egg is in the pan, its time to flip that little sucker but you don't have the correct tool to do it. Watch out, you will burn your dumb ass if you try to use your hands. Now it looks like you need to buy a tool to flip foods properly in your hot pans; but what to buy? Fortunately for you there are thousands of utensils you can buy and use in your kitchen. Unfortunately for you, most of these utensils suck like a hooker with the rent due. There are only a few indispensable pieces in every kitchen, so fear not, you will not have to buy a bunch of drawer cluttering crap.

Spatulas are not the only tools you will need in the kitchen. This list is a little long, but unlike the pan list in the previous post, most of the items on this list cost under twenty dollars.

Remember that there are links provided for every item. The links will take you Amazon.com so you can see a picture of the item and how much it will cost.

So Lets get started....

1.Spatula- All right smarty pants, now that you have bought your spiffy spatula, what do you do now that you have your spatula? You're gonna flip shit of course! Grilled cheese sandwiches, pancakes, hamburgers, quesadillas, and obviously, your perfectly cooked sunny side up egg will all get the toss treatment with this indispensable tool. This item will get a lot of use.

Spatula #2- Yes, there are two different types of spatulas. One flips, the other scrapes and wipes. This is your omelet spatula. This is what you use to get all of that lovely hollandaise out of your bowl after making it. This is what you use when you need to get all of the coleslaw our of your cuisinart.Its also a huge help in sauteing vegetables and stirring together ingredients.You will more than likely use this more than any other utensil in your arsenal so make sure it is a good one.

2. Whisk- Whisks are great for getting your aggression out. If you are making scrambled eggs or a vinaigrette, a good whisk will beat the shit out of them all. I am amazed at how often I use my whisk. Just don't be fooled by those junky whisks that have balls in the balloon part or the type that look like a bunch of metal rods tied together. Just go for the traditional whisk and you will be whipping ass in no time.

3. Grater - I hate graters. they are a pain in the ass to clean, take up a ton of space, and you really only use on of their four sides (Do you know who has ever used the semi-circular bladed side?). So it is with trepidation that I endorse this product. Not everyone has a cuisinart with the grater disk attachments, so ol' boxy is getting the nod. Good for making hash browns, cole slaw, and of course, grating cheese for your pizza (please tell me you do that).

Of course there are the now ubiquitous micro planes. These things kick so much ass its incredible. Used for shaving things gossamer-fine, these rasps are great for nutmeg, lemon zest, and they were practically made for Parmesan cheese. Its one of the most beautiful things in life to have a hot steaming bowl of pasta, and then shave Parmesan cheese over top of it like god trying to put out the fires of hell with snow. Also, next time you try making a grilled cheese, shave a little hardened salami over the cheese before grilling....... yeah you know you can't wait to try it.

4.Peeler- peelers are the unsung heroes of the kitchen. They get used and abuse constantly and never are given credit for their work. They are the item that nobody ever wants to touch and probably hear more curse words that any other utensil ("goddamn, stupid fucking carrots"). Luckily there is a newer more ergonomic version with a wider blade to make it less of a chore for your ungrateful asses. I'm not saying that its going to make it fun for you but next time you need to peel a carrot, try peeling with a knife and then you will have a little r-e-s-p-e-c-t for this diminutive tool.

5. Strainer - Colanders are not just for straining. They are good for steaming food, cheese making, and in a pinch you can use it as an ersatz robot helmet. If you get one of the finer, wire mesh strainers, you can use it as a flour sifter. Strainers are a must have in a basically stocked kitchen. Try straining your pasta through your hands next time and you will understand.

6. Tongs- Tongs have been gaining popularity in the modern kitchen for the last couple of years. Usually relegated to the backyard for the grill, the tong is finally being recognized as a big player in the kitchen drawer. Pan frying, deep frying, boiling, steaming, and braising, it will handle all foods in all cooking climates. Have you ever tried to flip a piece of chicken being browned in a cast iron pot with a spatula? After you recover from your 3rd degree burns the first thing you will do is buy tongs. Tongs are dead useful for keeping you away from the burn unit, go buy some now.

7. Can opener- Do I even need to explain this one? Unless you want to rock that 1930's era, bugs bunny opening a suit of armor, busted ass "ye olde" can opener, you should own a good can opener. This can opener in particular. It cuts the sides of the can top and that is great for two reasons. One, you will never cut yourself on these opened can lids and two, you won't have to worry about having a filthy, nasty, germ infested can opener. The first time you use it makes you feel like you're in the future, how cool is that?

8. Spoons- This is another utensil that doesn't need too much thought. Its cheap, its big, and its a spoon for chrissakes. If you don't know what to use a spoon for, just stop fucking reading and start punching yourself in the throat until you pass out.

9.Bottle Opener- More and more beers are being sealed with caps instead of screw off tops lately, so its now time to break out the bottle opener. This bottle opener is a no frills professional model. It does what it does very well and will last you forever. It also doubles as a billy club.

But if using your strength to leverage the tops off of bottles is too much for you, you can always use your house as your load. This opener goes on the wall and will beautify any home bar or kitchen. It also opens bottles.

And if that still isn't good enough for you to have to walk across the room there is always this. Its good for couch potatoes and totally unbelievable drunks.

10. Digital Thermometer- A good digital timer will make you a deity in the kitchen. Never again will you have to eat dried out meat ever again. Just stick the probe into the roast or bird, set the alarm to the desired temperature and then go and make yourself a salad while you wait for the thermometer to let you know when its done. Seriously, this will make you feel like a Jedi master version of Julia Child, like you are one with the meat. It also has a timer built into it so you can set time limits for food just in case you are outside enjoying a frosty beverage and need to know when its ready to go.

11. Measuring Spoons- Measuring spoons are the training wheels of the home cooks kitchen. There is a lot you can learn from them. The more you use them, the more equated you will become with cooking itself. How you salt and pepper your food, how you season your food with herbs and spice is the most essential (and most easily ignored) part of proper cooking. After a while of following good recipes you will pick up how to properly season your food. Hopefully you will get to a point where you can take the training wheels off, when you will be able to pinch out a teaspoon of salt or eye up in your palm a tablespoon of dried herbs. When you get to that point, you will officially be a bad ass cook, then you will only need the measuring spoons for when you bake. Unlike cooking, you will always need the spoons for baking, so hold on to them even though you will think you are too good to be using those childish spoons.

12. Ladle- Soup has to get into a bowl somehow.

So now you have a good starting point for getting your kitchen well stocked and ready for you to spend some quality time with them making meals for your loved ones.

Now peel me some potatoes!!!!!

Shit you will need. Part one: Metal Gear

2009-02-15T03:06:00.019-05:00

So after a couple bottles of wine and many glasses of absinthe, I got excited by thinking about what the home cook will need before they start to have a really well prepared kitchen. A few of these items might not be possible right now for some, but there is always a way to get around (i.e Macgyver) your way to culinary greatness.

Now I will try and start with the basics on this entry, but understand there are all types of specialized food related products that you might want to buy (food choppers, special pans, and specific food cookers) but just do me a favor and stick to this basic list until you feel comfortable with buying stupid shit that you will never really use but feel will make you a better cook.

There are only a couple of draconian items that you will need to be a badass, super shitbird, fuck all cook. They are not hard to acquire, but maybe are hard to wait to buy (you can't buy all of them at once). So we will start with the obvious items you need to get started; the pans.

So if you want to cook properly you need good pans. The one problem everyone makes (myself included) is that you get mesmerized by the siren song of those beautiful, ebony coated, slick as Donald trump cooking utensils... the non stick pan. Most of these pans are totally fucking awful. The pans do not cook food properly and generally start to flake all of their space age polymer off of the pans after being scratched by the dullest of vegetables. Do yourself a favor and only buy one GREAT non stick pan. There are non stick pans that deserve to cook eggs or crepes in your humble abode. The good thing is you are only going to buy one pan. The bad thing is that this one pan will be relatively expensive, which is ok because like most quality pans, you get what you pay for. Do not buy anything with ridges, crevices, lines, or criss-crosses. These pans will righteously fuck up most of the food you will want to cook in non stick pans; so there you go. Get a regular, smooth, but small non stick pan. There is nothing big you will need to cook in a non stick pan (unless you like ostrich eggs). So you're good with the non stick? Good. Lets go on to real pans.

You can buy a 20 piece set of cookware from you local mega mart or mall, but what you will want to do is find your cookware piece by piece. You don't need a complete set of cookware. It is nice if you have a matching set but it really doesn't matter does it? If I were to buy a matching set there is no question in my mind that I would go for a Le Creuset set of pots and pans. They are pricey, but you get what you pay for. LeCreuset makes pots and pans that arre made form cast iron covered in enamel (the cast iron holds the heat and the enamel is just as good as most non stick pans). I have luckily been able to find many of my Le Creuset pots and pans on sale or have had them given to me by people who don't cook. The important thing really is to have a quality pot or pan to cook in. The best rule of thumb is to buy a pot or pan that you know you will one day be passing on to your children or your neighbor's kid that always shoveled your pavement during snowstorms. I will be linking all of these pans to its corresponding picture so you can get an idea of what they look like so there are no mix ups. This is a mixed match set of cooking tools. This list is my basic setup that I use everyday. The main point is that you do not need to have a matching set of cookware. You will not make a great steak if your "soup pot" is watching you.

The basic list is as follows:

1. 8 inch non stick pan- Good for eggs, crepes, and anything else that is likely to stick to you normal pan. It is also great for caramelizing cheese, cooking low fat, and making ecsquisitely delicate desserts.

2. a 10 inch saute pan-You can pretty much cook anything you want in this pan. This will be your workhorse. From steaks to asparagus, you will be able to use this pan for everything. I use a restaurant style aluminum pan and it is cheap (I got mine for under $20) but durable and great to cook with. A lot of people complain about hot spots with these pans, but if you use them for actual "saute" pans, there will be no problem.

3. A 2 3/4 sauce pan- Even if you don't actually make sauces in it, this pan is invaluable for small, concentrated food cookery. Peas, corn, veg-med, and obviously sauces are perfect for this under appreciated staple of the smart cooks kitchen. This will be the pan that you use to reheat a majority of your leftovers. This pan is also great for heating up stocks, milk and othr liquids to add to complex dishes.

4. 5 1/2 quart pot- This is great for rices, beans, small amounts of soups, and little casseroles. This is a pot that you don't think you will use very much but find yourself constantly reaching for it for all types of gastronomic applications. You could probably cook a dead man's spleen in it and it woud turn out well.

5. 12 quart stock pot- Like pasta? This is your pot. Soups, stews, and of course, stocks. Some of the items on this list you can wait to buy, but this ain't one of them. You need to get this pot ASAP! Trust me, trying to make fettuccine in a saute pan sucks.

6. 12 inch cast iron skillet- This is one of those pans you can wait off on, but once you get it will become an indispensable part of your culinary arsenal. Let this little baby sit on a flame for a few minutes and then throw in a steak on it; you will never need to go to a steakhouse again. It creates a perfect crust on steaks every time. Don't forget about the wonderful cornbread that is yearning to be made in your pre-seasoned cast iron skillet. This is also the item that's most likely to be taken on a camping trip and thrown into the campfire to make sure you don't have to only eat trail mix.

Now that you have a sizable cookware collection you will need knives to cut up the foods you will be cooking in said pots and pans. Knives will be in our next installment. So until then, get out there and burn yourselves on some new pots and pans.

Rock!

Night of the Living Duck

2009-02-03T01:35:00.002-05:00

Duck is an animal that lots of people do not like to eat. I don't know why. The reoccurring phrase I always hear is (in a whiny voice) "it’s too greasy". Well that might be true if you get your duck only at bad Chinese food joints, the word Ding How comes to mind. The problem is no one cooks duck at their own house. Duck is not as readily available as chicken and not as conveniently packaged. You'd be pretty fucking hard pressed to find a 12 pack of duck legs or a 6 pack of duck breasts in the poultry section of Safeway, although it would be pretty goddamn awesome. Instead you get a whole, frozen duckling stored in the bottom left of the freezer section with all of the "weird" shit nobody eats (i.e. liver, tripe, chitlins). This is a compounded problem. One, people begin to associate duck meat with offal meats and B, the duck comes as a whole and generally most Americans do not know how to break down poultry. This is a shame because duck is versatile and can be used in myriad ways. Over the next couple of weeks I will post a project I recently finished involving duck. I bought 3 ducks (thanks for the rip-off Springfield farms!) and used every piece of the duck I could. After breaking the ducks down I used the legs to make confit, the breasts I used for a duck terrine and duck prosciutto, the carcass was used for stock, the skin and fat trimmings went into rendering down for duck fat (that revolutionizer of potatoes), and finally the giblets (hearts, livers, and gizzards) were used for salads and spreads. With the proper instruction, it is possible to utilize all that you can from this humble yet noble animal. Stay tuned true believers to learn how to make sure you get the most quack for our buck. If you have any questions about what else to do with duck, or even how you like it, just let me know.

On a totally random note; did anyone see the commercial for the new Marco Pierre White TV show on NBC? People think Gordon Ramsey is a fucking nut job, well wait until they get ahold of uncle Marco. He is certifiably bat shit fucking Mad with a capital crazy. He is like a savant Poet and does had an artist's heart, but I think he might be much for Americans. When people are expecting Ramsey's childish tantrums and they get White's Hannibal Lecter rants it will be interesting. I can't wait, I love MPW.

Rock! Johnny

Homer Simpson's Wet Dream

2009-01-29T15:02:00.002-05:00

Combing through the thousands of food related stories today, I stumbled upon this NY Times story about jelly doughnut pudding. Totally grossed out and intrigued I went to the story and after reading it realized that it really had little to do with jelly doughnut pudding and more to do with reusing leftovers. After my initial "I just wasted 5 fucking minutes of my life" tirade, I got to thinking about frugality in this economic climate and realized two things: one is that Eli Zabar is a ~~prick~~ genius for charging people insane amounts of money for leftovers and two is that people should recycle their leftovers more at home. I try to do it as much as possible because most of the time it takes me some descent time and money to make a meal and other times I just don't feel like screwing around in the kitchen (I'm not a machine people). Last night for instance I made a few quick french bread pizzas by reusing some leftovers from previous dinners this week. Starting with a three day old baguette, I looked for my options and went to town. One had a tomato sauce base, the other had a pesto base. I also used different toppings to try and maximize the stuff I was emptying out of my fridge. Salamis, cheese, herbs, salad garnishes, nothing was safe. It was an easy and simple way to make dinner that tasted great. So how do you like to recycle your leftovers? Let me know.

Ben's Chili Bowl

2009-01-26T02:07:00.001-05:00

So on Saturday my friends and I hit up Ben's Chili Bowl in Washington D.C. An institution in the D. C. area, Ben's has been serving up chili, chili dogs, and burgers with fries (with chili of course) and shakes (sans chili) to people of all creeds, colors, religions, and Bill Cosby for 50 years. It was no wonder that when we got to the place there was a line out of the restaurant and around the corner into their back alley. Although the line was long, it did not take long to be welcomed into the raucous cacophony that was at times part side show and part celebration of good greasy-ass food. Upon getting into Ben's dining room you are forcefully but politely shown the end of the line, where once settled in the stimuli hit you like Go-Go music in the middle of a hurricane. People are shouting, singing, chewing, laughing, giving orders, dancing and eating all at once. We were lucky enough to score a table thus foregoing the need to stand in line to order our dogs. The service at this joint should be a shining example to all restaurants in the country. Within five minutes of sitting down, we were asked by six servers if we were being helped, which we already were of course. And these servers don't play around Jack; they want your drink orders when you sit down and your food order by the time they bring your drinks. They have to be ruthlessly efficient to be able to turn the tables over to sit the people that are literally around the corner waiting for their chance to sample that famous chili. We ordered the half smokes (the Cos's favorite) which are a spicy mixture of beef and pork topped with mustard , onions, and chili (the holy trinity of encased meat emulsions). Also ordered were the chili fries, regular chili dogs and chili burgers. Oddly enough, no one in our party actually ordered the chili by itself, so I guess I'll have to wait till next time. Overall, there is a really good time to be had at Ben's Chili Bowl, its not the best chili hot dog I've ever had (I'm a dirty water dog girl myself), but it is a unique experience. Being surrounded by photos of the years gone by, tourists from all over the world, and the servers running around like mad while Chuck Brown, The Junkyard Band, or James Brown kick out the jams there is a feeling of family. Its sort of like going to your friends house where you don't know his mother, but she treats you like one of her own children... no special treatment (if Dr. Cornell West doesn't get it neither do you). Basically, I can't wait to go back before hitting up the galleries and dropping by the White house to hang out with Barry.

Cheers,
Johnny

All Photos ©2009 John Houser III

Shit Show Pics Part Duex!

2009-01-12T19:48:00.000-05:00

So here are the rest of the pic (that I feel like posting) for the Shit Show at Jacks Bistro. I hope you have dug the photos. If anything it should give you impetuous to get your asses down to Jacks and have a great meal at a fantastically original and support you local restaurants. Thanks to Ted, Christy, and the peeps at Jacks for making my stupid ass feel like part of the Fam for one night!

If you have any questions or want any of these pics forwarded to you, just ask.
Rock!
Johnny

All Photos ©John Houser III 2008

Shit Show Pics! Part 1

2009-01-07T00:38:00.000-05:00

So here are some of my favorite "Shit Show" photos that weren't published in the Metromix article (there just wasn't enough room). It'll give you a behind the scenes look at what went into the madness out in the front of the house. Remember, click on the pics to get a better view. I'll post the rest tomorrow. Enjoy!

All Photos ©John Houser III 2008

New year, New fear

2009-01-05T14:32:00.000-05:00

So its been almost a month since my first post and man has some shit gone down! Besides the obvious festivities of Xmas and New Years there has been a couple of interesting developments in my humble life. One is that I have graduated from Culinary school (thank you, thank you). It was a long couple of years but I'm both elated and somber about the fact that I won't be taking classes there anymore. I know its cliche, but that's how it goes. I do look forward to starting a few new ventures (this blog being one) and reconnecting with a couple old projects.

I am currently in the middle of writing an article for Baltimore Metromix about daily specials in restaurants around the Federal Hill/ Locust Point area. It amazes me that there are still restaurants that open and have no fucking web presence whatsoever. I mean, its been the norm now for years! It also makes me laugh when I see that low end to middle rung restaurants think that they are above giving diners daily "specials" to entice people to go to their restaurants. In this economy you better damn sure as shit have a "burger night" or "two for Tuesday". People are tired of tuna tartare at $12 a pop and they want a good mac and cheese (get that dry shit out of my face) for around $6. Is that asking too much? We will see in the next couple of months I guess when restaurants start dropping like flies. The article I am doing will be done next week. I'll let you know when its posted and I'll provide a link.

My other endeavour this month is to stay completely sober for the whole month of January. To some this may sound really easy, but to others its a horrifying proposition. I did it last year with great success and this year is going well (5 days in mind you). Its just a way of clearing my head and preparing for things to come in the new year. Also, its unbelievable how much work I can get done on many projects I have going. For those of you who know me, you know I like to have a soda pop now and again, and why taking a month off is such a big deal for me. Oh well, see you at the bars on Feb. 1.

I know I haven't posted the "Shit Show" pics, but they are coming. I want to make sure I put up photos that haven't been printed on Metromix.

By the way, have you heard that Tony Bourdain is in Baltimore? Apparenly shooting an episode of No Reservations? Looks like I picked a bad week to stop drinking.

F your F

Johnny

The first time is always weird and awkward

2008-12-10T00:30:00.000-05:00

Check check one two........... ok, so I will in the soon to be future begin writing a food blog. Yeah, yeah, who gives a shit. I know, I get it. What I will try to do in this space is show how easy it is to cook good food with just a little preparation and the right amount of knowledge and respect for the ingredients that you are gonna use. I will be posting photos, video, and of course words to help people to cook better. After the first of the year I will start giving cooking lessons around the Baltimore/ Washington D.C area as a companion to this site and a better instructional tool for the peeps that want hands-on experience.

So who the fuck am I? Good question. Let me introduce myself.

My name is John Houser III. I am about to graduate from Baltimore International College culinary school in one week and have been a food nerd (professionally and not) for over 15 years now (I'm 32). I'm a food writer as well, currently doing reviews and general restaurant articles. I'm currently employed as a graphic designer and I have a B.F.A with a concentration in Photography, Painting and Printmaking. I forget what my blood type is and if you want to know, yes I am a great lover. Is that good enough for you?

As you can tell, I am not trying to write a traditional, stuffy, house-frau style of food blog. I'm actually holding back on the language until we are cool enough with each other to toss the "fucks" and "cunts" around like old friends.

I want people to feel comfortable with cooking and eating without thinking that they should be proper or know everything to impress all of the food snobs out there.

I will be posting recipes of course, but also musings on the world of food, cooking techniques, cookbooks and hardware that I think would be pertinent to you.....my beloved dear reader. I might also toss in some cool music suggestions to throw on the Hi-Fi while you're making a tasty treat for your friends.

Eventually, I would like to have all of these cylinders firing and then invite some of my chef friends to guest blog with some of their ideas and suggestions to make it easier to recreate some of their dishes in the comfort of your own crypt.

So that's it for now. I look forward to getting this going and trying to answer your questions and giving you the knowledge and help to feed you and your friends and family better.

Cheers,

Johnny

BTW, the next post will be about a dinner I covered a couple of weeks ago that was just insane. It was called "The Shit Show". That's all I'll say for now, but here is a teaser photo: