This little ditty was quite an adventure, and not just because I was chasing down bone marrow and suet.  When I set about printing all four recipes (yes, four!:  burgers, ketchup, pickles, and buns) and compiling a grocery list, I realized that there were no less than a zillion ingredients involved.  Okay, 40-ish ingredients, but it seemed like a zillion.  And considering that marrow and suet were two of those 40 ingredients, it should be no surprise that shopping was the real challenge here.

So.  Questions.  Yes… you in the back?

1) What the heck is suet?  I had to look this up, of course, but suet is hard raw fat from around the loin and kidneys – not the same kind of stuff you would trim from a cut of meat. 

2) Is beef marrow what I think it is?  If you’re thinking of soft fatty tissue found in the center of bones (usually leg bones for culinary purposes), then yes.   

3) Where the heck would you even buy that stuff?  Well, the short answer is “from a good butcher”, but there’s an interesting story there, if you have a moment.

As regular readers know, Central Market has been my go-to source for the more exotic ingredients for this challenge, because they are wonderful, local, and right around the corner from my office.  I called ahead about the suet/marrow request, and they said sure! we’ll take care of you!  of course!  yes!  no problem!  And since I had to go there for the juniper berries and pickling cucumbers anyway, this gave me hope that I’d be able to get everything at one place.  Oh, how naive I was back then… (sigh)

At the meat counter, the first words out of my mouth were that I had a really weird order.  Beef Dude gave me a lay-it-on-me, I’ve-heard-it-all look, so I told him that I needed three different types of beef, plus suet and marrow.  To which he replied: “Okay, but you have to tell me what you’re making.”  When he learned that I was going to personally grind all that bovine loveliness into four phat burger patties, he asked, “And just who is it that you love this much?”  Wow.  Even Beef Dude gets the Food of Love thing.  I love this store!

So he knocks out my order, which involves him cutting bones with the bandsaw, to expose the marrow… which obviously slows down the line a bit.  So I started whistling Dixie and sheepishly avoiding eye contact, but no one really noticed my whistling over the bzzzzrrrrrtttzzzzbzbzzzzrrrrbzzzzz of the bandsaw.   A couple of them overheard my order and looked at me like I was the female incarnation of Jeffrey Dahmer.  Looking back at it now, I should have barked at them or something.  Ruff!  That would’ve been so perfect.

The next morning, it was time to break out the apron and channel my inner Sweeney Todd.  I unwrapped the three packages of beef, and chunked ‘em all out to fit through the grinder.  No problems so far.

I unwrapped the suet.  Nothing to write home about, really – it looks like hard, pinkish fat.  I can tell from the texture that it’s going to melt differently than normal fat while the burger cooks, which is probably the whole idea.  I chopped it for the grinder and moved on.

Then I unwrapped the marrow bones.  Uhhhhh, ummmmm.  Well, humph.  What I had before me were three knobby hip bones… the big ball of the ball-and-socket joint, I think.  And they were each sawed in half, which was all very well and good, but there was no marrow.  I scraped at the middle of the cut surface with my knife, and it was porous, but very hard.  Great.

Seeing as I know exactly zip about marrow, I considered the possibility that it’s actually there, in the bone, but just needs to be softened somehow.  So I simmered some water, dropped the bones in, and… nothing.   Well, not “nothing”, really, because after an hour of simmering it looked like I had the beginnings of a terrific soup, but to the extent that soup was not on the menu, “nothing” seems appropriate.

Regis, I’d like to Phone A Friend, please…

I called the original Perry’s Steakhouse & Meat Market, to see what they had to say.  The person that answered the phone asked me to repeat the word “marrow” no less than three times, at which point she asked me to hold, at which point I asked to talk to the manager of the meat market.  When that “manager” actually asked me to spell “marrow”, I hung up.  So much for that idea.

It was a bit of a challenge to locate a marrow donor.

I jumped online and looked for other meat markets near my house, and the juiciest hit was a carnicería that I didn’t even know was in my neighborhood.  The clock is ticking at this point: I was making these puppies for dinner, for our friends Scott and Caryn, whom I had never cooked for before.  (Brilliant planning on my part, don’t you agree?)  I knew that I would be ordering pizza (and making a run for a LOT of beer) if I didn’t grab a gear.

I headed over there and wandered in, and it wasn’t just a meat market, it was a full on authentic Mexican grocery store with a lunch counter.  How did I not know about this place?! 

As silly as it sounds, no hablo Ingles was not a possibility I’d considered until I actually tried to order up some ol’ bone marrow.  ¿Cómo se dice ”bone marrow” en español, anyway?  I had no idea.  Mexican Beef Dude was blinking alternately at me and then the other customers, as if to say, can someone please explain to me what the heck this pasty blue-eyed gringo lady is doing in my shop?

In the end, we reached a bit of a compromise.  Lucky for me, Home Fries was selling some sort of steak I’d never seen before that included a round bone teeming with pearly marrow.  After trying unsuccessfully to use that as a prop for explaining exactly what I was after, with plenty of lo siento‘s sprinkled in, I finally gave up and said, “Aquí, éstos.  Siete, por favor.”  He put seven of the steaks on the scale, and then gesturing, asked “Todos?“  Sí, todos, I replied, defeated.  Muchas gracias!  And then, for good measure, one last lo siento mucho!  since I was already planning to return during tamale season.

And that, friends, is why I have seven slabs of mystery meat in my freezer, all with hollow bones.  But here’s the funny thing… those seven steaks only cost me twelve bucks.  Whaaa?  Later, I looked up the translation for the label on the meat, which read “hueso para caldo”.  Turns out that Mexican Beef Dude rang me up for “bones for broth”, which I’m guessing is why they were so dang cheap.  (On the other hand, these steaks look like they’re going to need a good long braise to be edible, so it may be that they were just cheap cuts of meat and I’m used to Central Market price points.)  Either way, when I dug those silky Crackerjack prizes out of each bone and dropped them on the scale, guess what?  It was three ounces, exactly the amount I needed, no more and no less.  Whew!

*                                    *                                    *                                    *                                    *

Through cyberspace, I can hear you all yelling: Enough with the rambling! Tell us how the burgers turned out already!

Well, they were great.  And obscenely huge.  They were the best burgers I’ve ever made, actually, but not for the reasons you might suspect.

Once the shopping was done, the prep was fairly easy.  Check it out…

Burgers: Grind, shape, salt, pepper, done. 

Spiced ketchup: Squirt, measure, stir. 

Red Vinegar Pickles: Bring vinegar, water, and a dash of everything in your spice cabinet to a boil.  Slice cucumbers and onions, place in large jar.  Pour kitchen sink mixture over veggies in jar.  Refrigerate.

Don't want none unless you got buns, hun!

I contemplated not making the buns, especially while lost in translation in the carnicería.  But since I’ve been working with yeast since I was a kid, and since I technically said I would make any and everything that appeared on the cover, and since the marrow thing actually worked out in the end, I went for it.  And you know what?  It made all the difference.   The weirdo preservatives they put in bread to keep it soft on the shelf would have made it too absorbent for all this yummy goodness.  They would have soaked up the juices and turned to mush.  These homemade beauties were sturdy, and you could tell that, left to their own devices, they’d be hockey pucks in 24, maybe 36, hours… which means they absorbed all the juice the burgers had to give, and then mocked them for not having more.  Take that, suet!

And then something really interesting happened.  When all those components came together, it created one harmonious entity: a colossal burger.  I couldn’t taste the meat.  I couldn’t taste the bun.  Or the ketchup, or the pickles.  Or even the sharp cheddar, which I sliced pretty thickly.  My buddy Caryn and I sampled the watercress beforehand, just to see what watercress is all about, and that stuff was peppery and in your face.  We were worried, actually (Caryn was too nice to say so, but her eyebrows were way up).  But when it was buried in the six-inch tall behemoth of a sandwich, it was totally lost in the crowd.  It was like a symphony… I knew the woodwinds were in there somewhere, but for the life of me, I could not pick out a clarinet.

So, in that sense, this was the best cover recipe yet.  I’ve never had a savory dish fuse together so completely.

The real stars of the show were the pickles, ketchup, and buns, all of which I will be making again, many many times.  But I can’t say I’d go chasing down marrow and suet again.  They didn’t do anything for the flavor, because fat itself has no flavor - so I can replicate the taste by grinding good beef.  They did, however, create a lovely texture, which means that if you’re wanting to make the best burgers EVER, then find yourself a carnicería and go for it.  Just be sure to take your Spanish-English dictionary with you…

Tags: bon appetit cover recipes, main dish recipes, recipe reviews

Tossing these beauties directly into a pit of embers felt incredibly wrong.

This was, by far, the most daunting cover yet. I don’t mean intimidating, because the steps were actually very simple (light charcoal, spread hot embers, add meat). But simple doesn’t always mean easy.

Crazy as it may sound, I’ve never cooked with charcoal before.  I’ve seen it done, but seeing is different than doing, especially when you’re talking about cooking with fire. My first love and strongest suit is baking – so I cook like a baker. Did you know that these are drastically different ways of life, cooking and baking?

True cooks are intuitive, they taste as the go, and they let their instincts and their palate guide them as they layer flavor on top of flavor. If they’re really good, they know when just enough components and heat have been added to bring out the dish’s full potential, which is when they put it on a plate and hand it to you. Good cooks are artists. This is not me, but this is the realm of Food of Love that I’m working on most at the moment.

We bakers are a very different lot. We cannot taste as we go. Imagine reaching into the oven to break off a piece of half-baked cookie, to see how it’s coming and whether it needs a pinch more salt.  Ridiculous, right?  By the time all the elements are in place, it’s too late to add or subtract. You have two options: persevere or start over. Bakers learn how to spot a good recipe and follow it, to take good notes and follow those, and to measure, measure, measure, because you only get one shot. Good bakers are technicians: it’s more science than art. This is me.

When I say that I cook like a baker, that means I try to control as many variables as possible, especially temperature. And I’m not sure I’ve told you, but I’m the biggest klutz I know. Soooo, cooking with fire? Real temperature control is obviously out of the question, and I’ll be lucky not to singe my eyebrows off.

So what’s a flexitarian baker and wannabe cook do when faced with cooking Caveman Porterhouses directly on the coals? Call for backup, of course.

A great shot of Andy, who honestly did most of the work.

Andy is one of the best grillmasters I know, and unlike me, a true carnivore at heart. He’s the kind of cook that throws together a rub or marinade with whatever’s on hand, tosses a huge slab of meat on the grill, facilitates a lively conversation while it cooks, and knows when it’s done by prodding it with a finger.

When I attempt that kind of thing, I spend two days researching marinades, try not to catch anything on fire when I finally put it on, and then make a lame attempt to be social with my guests while it cooks. The whole time I’m talking, I can’t stop thinking about the meat, and of course the whole time I’m futzing with the meat, I’m thinking about what a terrible hostess I am.

So even though he had just helped with the shrimp skewers on the June cover, I called up Andy and asked if he would chaperone my first date with charcoal. This call was much different, though… last month’s call was “Andy, can you please come over so I don’t wind up eating five pounds of seafood single-handedly?”  This time it was “Andy can you please come over and keep me from ruining a hundred bucks worth of premium choice beef? And by the way, can I borrow your charcoal grill?”

Although the questions were different, the answer was the same: “What time?”

Man, I love this guy.

Okay, so porterhouses. If you’ll remember, one of my first comments after putting my eyes back in my head was, what’s the difference between a porterhouse and a T-bone, anyway?

The answer is, not much. They’re both cross-sections from the short loin, with New York strip on one side of the T-shaped bone and tenderloin (aka filet) on the other.  The only difference between them is where along the tenderloin the cut is taken, because as the short loin tapers off, the filet side gets smaller.  So a porterhouse is essentially a T-bone with a larger filet.

In fact, the USDA’s Institutional Meat Purchase Specifications require that the maximum width of the filet side of a porterhouse be 1.25 inches at minimum.  Anything below that would technically be a T-bone, although even T-bones must have a half-inch of filet attached, otherwise you’d be the proud owner of a New York Strip with a bone hanging off of it.  I was absolutely certain that I’d find specs for the thickness of the cut, because while I’ve seen a thin T-bone, the few porterhouses I’ve had the pleasure of meeting have all been hefty specimens, an inch or more thick.  But no such requirement exists… at least not that I could find.

Aside from the novelty of cooking one of the highest quality cuts of beef at home, the more obvious shock value of this cover is the whole business of cooking directly on the coals.  How do you keep it from tasting like ashes?  The long answer is that you brush any residual ash from the finished steaks with a pastry brush, and the short answer is, you don’t.  This is not Smith and Wollensky’s, this is caveman food.

I’ve told you before about my purist philosophy when it comes to seasoning steaks, so I was pleasantly surprised at the lack of seasoning called for in the recipe.  After tasting the results, I realized that the charcoal is very much a source of both flavor and heat.  The finished steaks tasted liked well-seared beef, a little ash, and in our case, mesquite.   Plus, the poblano pan-fry is delicious and adds a ton of flavor.  Marinades and rubs need not apply. 

(As a side note, I served Root Beer Baked Beans on the side and Roasted Apricots with Honey-Vanilla Crème Fraîche for dessert, both also from Bon Appétit.  The beans were okay, but the apricots were fabulous.  I’ll definitely be making those again.)

All in all, I’d grade the porterhouse recipe a B.  Some of our guests loved it.  Some, like Matt, actually didn’t care for it much, and although I enjoyed it, I probably wouldn’t do it again.  If you like the nuances of flavor in beef, the ash thing is quite a distraction.  But if you’re into showmanship at your dinner parties (talk about a conversation starter), and if you prefer a – shall we say? – rustic flavor, you’ll love this.  It’ll make you grunt like a Neanderthal and appreciate the fact that we ever discovered fire in the first place.

Tags: bon appetit cover recipes, main dish recipes, recipe reviews

Hot off the grill...

I was grown and married before I learned that spices have a shelf life. Thinking back on the kitchen of my childhood, I’d bet good money that there were jars of stuff in there at least twenty years old. You could actually trace the evolution of McCormick’s label design through the years in mom’s cupboard by starting at the back (vintage whole allspice) and working your way to the front (last week’s garlic powder).

That explains why I grew up thinking that paprika was a tasteless red powder that had one use in the world: looking nice when sprinkled on deviled eggs. Seriously.

The reality is that while the color is gorgeous, paprika also packs a ton of flavor. I just didn’t know that because Mom had purchased a half-gallon of the stuff in 1979 and we’d been using it ever since. I’m not sure, but I’m guessing that the flavor departed somewhere around the time Reagan took office.

I learned of paprika’s true identity after reading about a rule of thumb: if you can’t tell what a spice is by sniffing it, without looking at the label, it’s old and should be tossed. So I went home and sniffed my paprika, and got nothing. The olfactory needle didn’t move a smidge. Unconvinced, I bought fresh paprika during my next grocery trip, just to prove the article wrong. I got home, stuck my beak in that jar, inhaled deeply… and almost passed out.

Why hello, Paprika. It’s nice to finally meet you.

Since then, I’ve learned that paprika not only has flavor, it has a family tree – sweet, mild, smoked, hot, Spanish, Hungarian. People in the know swear that it can revolutionize your cooking, like this guy (who, interestingly, also dismissed it as deviled egg dust before being converted).

And now, along comes Bon Appétit, with Grilled Shrimp and Sausage Skewers with Smoky Paprika Glaze. This is a big moment for paprika: a title role on the cover of a national magazine, instead of being relegated to also-ran ingredient status. Once I saw that sherry vinegar was involved, it was clear that the glaze would be the star of the show.

And how!

The shrimp and vegetables were completely reliant upon the glaze for flavor – there’s no marinade and no other seasoning in sight. The glaze required a bit of prep, but when it came together, it was a revelation: smoky, earthy, and amazingly complex for such a short list of ingredients. In this way, it was much like the Salmon with Sweet Chili Glaze from April – delicate protein, layered glaze, few ingredients. Very nice.

There was only one problem: the sausage. Actually, it was an execution problem, and not a sausage problem at all.

The recipe calls for “andouille or other fully cooked smoked sausages (such as linguiça)”. I didn’t notice the linguiça shout-out until just before it was my turn at the meat counter, and at that very moment, what did I see nestled between the bratwurst and the chorizo? Why it’s a pork/lamb linguiça! So I nabbed it and bustled along to my next stop.

I haven’t yet mentioned that Andy was there for dinner, along with his wife Paula and my dad. The skewers were already on the grill when Andy asked if I was concerned at all about the timing of the sausage vs. the shrimp. Not an issue, I said, because the sausage was already cooked… and as the words came out of my mouth, I realized that the sausage wasn’t already cooked. I just thought it was because the recipe had suggested it. Well, poo.

... and how it was actually served.

We grilled the skewer just long enough to cook the shrimp, and then cut through the sausage. No go. So I snapped a few photos of the beautiful yet undercooked specimens, and then proceeded to dismantle them and finish the sausage with a quick sauté. No harm, no foul, but if you plan to make this, be warned! I don’t know if all linguiça is fresh instead of cooked, but mine was.

And although the properly cooked linguiça turned out to be delicious, we thought it had a little too much flavor for this dish, and wound up competing with the glaze. Next time, I’d probably just stick to my favorite andouille. But I loved having an excuse to try it, and I’ll be using it again – just not with Spanish style surf-n-turf.

All in all, I had a lot of fun with this dish, and given the relative ease of prep compared to the punch of flavor and presentation, I’d make it again.  We’ll call it an A-.

Bring on the July cover! (Fingers crossed for homemade ice cream…)

Tags: bon appetit cover recipes, main dish recipes, recipe reviews

Apparently salmon is a bit of a lightning rod for a lot of folks.  You may have known this, but it’s news to me.

I show each cover to Matt when they’re published, and his reaction to this one was, “Meh. Salmon’s not really my thing.”  Well that’s nice to know, considering that I’ve made it more than a few times for him.  (Maybe I should start leaving customer comment cards on our dining room table, with a header in bold print that reads “Your opinion matters to us!”  But on second thought, maybe I shouldn’t.)

What’s wrong with salmon?, I asked.  “Nothing.  There’s just lots of other fish I like more.”  Huh. 

Next thing I know, I’m standing at the fish counter in the store, talking with the seafood dude about which salmon filet looks best and what kind of poundage I need.  Suddenly, this otherwise well-adjusted looking woman approaches me and strikes up a very enthusiastic conversation.  She’d had a revelation, she said.  She had salmon at a restaurant recently, and (gasp!) she liked it!  Wow!  Isn’t that amazing?! 

I immediately started going through my mental Rolodex, trying to decide if I actually know this person.  Meanwhile, she starts asking for salmon advice.  I steal a pleading glance at Seafood Dude, whose eyebrows are up.  His look tells me I’m on my own.

Now, she asks, which variety of salmon did I have at the restaurant?  Forget the Rolodex, now I’m looking for security and/or the candid camera.  Lady, how am I supposed to know what kind of salmon you ordered?

She continues her monologue, and soon it becomes clear that she thinks there’s a magic species of salmon that’s not dry and fishy-tasting.  Ohhhh.  She’s not crazy, she’s just been consuming abused salmon.  Poor thing!

I tell her that I’m no expert, but those issues are more a factor of freshness and cooking technique than species.  All salmon tastes more or less the same, although some are fattier than others, and farmed salmon doesn’t have the high levels of Omega-3′s that the wild stuff has.  She got so excited that I thought she was going to hyperventilate.  Seafood Dude, who taking his time so as to avoid getting involved, finally handed me my prize.  I deftly handed her off by mentioning that he could tell her all she ever wanted to know, and made a bee-line for the dry goods.

I broiled grape tomatoes alongside the salmon.

The next day, I made Salmon with Sweet Chili Glaze for Leah, who was down for the weekend.  Luckily, our neighbors Ryan and Shana were able to join us and brought this amazing salad (which I’m hoping they’ll share the recipe for via a comment – hint, hint).  

Over lunch, my neighbor Ryan explained his position on salmon, which was similar to Crazy Grocery Lady’s, but without the hyperventilation.  He pointed out that casual mid-level restaurants often mistreat salmon, serving it overcooked and less-than-super-fresh.  But when he goes to a higher-end restaurant, he orders something out of this world, not ho-hum salmon.  Hmmm.  Makes sense.  No wonder salmon has a bad rep.

And that brings me to the low-down on this month’s Bon Appetit cover, whose layers of flavors can go toe-to-toe with anything at a nice restaurant (if you cared to waste your order on salmon, that is).  And here’s the thing: it was fast, super easy, and tasted great.

This time around, the pea tendrils and sweet chili sauce jumped out as the ingredients of note.

Pea tendrils, according to the recipe, are the young leaves and shoots of the snow pea plant.  Translation: good luck finding them at a store.  (I used sunflower sprouts.)

Sweet chili sauce, though — now that’s interesting.  Folks who don’t recognize the name may know it by sight as the slightly sweet dipping sauce for spring rolls at Thai restaurants.  The zing comes from chili paste, and the rest of the flavors are rounded out with garlic, vinegar, and cilantro.  By the time you add soy sauce and ginger, per the recipe, you’re balancing tons of different flavors with just three ingredients.  Bravo!

Essentially, the preparation goes like this: mix three marinade ingredients, brush the fish with the marinade, and broil it until it’s barely done.   While it cooks, quickly stir fry the sugar snap peas, tossing in whatever sprouts you’re using in place of the pea tendrils you couldn’t find.  That’s it.  Done.  Finito.

Considering the time invested in mixing homemade meatballs, braising short-ribs, and rolling grilled slices of eggplant, this was a nice break.  But what I really love about this dish is that it packs tons of flavor and still lets you taste the fish. 

Ryan is right about not ordering salmon in a restaurant, and now that I have a restaurant-quality recipe, I may just never do it again.

Tags: bon appetit cover recipes, main dish recipes, recipe reviews