The Fiery Hell, The Wonderfill Bliss

The fiery hell that you see before you is the wonderful bliss that my taste buds crave.  Some of you may not be able to eat spicy foods, for this I will not call you weak.  Just like some of us can sing like a nightingale and others can make numbers tap dance, some of us can handle the heat.  We not only tolerate the pain that ensues from an oily substance that spreads like wild fire in the presence of water, we crave it.  There are cuisines that harness the chile within.  They take such a beautiful, painful entity and make it part of my own little infinity.  These are bird's eye chiles that will make most of your mouths foam and scream in agony.  Yet, they are simply, beautiful, bright, burning, vibrant red with a hint of green to contrast the blinding coloration.  Why post a picture of these fruit?  Simply to show the beauty of nature in the raw.  From these angels of agony, spawns a delicious Thai basil, chile, and garlic paste that I lovingly toil with in the kitchen.  What can you do with these beauties?  Add just a pinch to grandma's spaghetti sauce, a sprinkle into babushka's borscht, a smidgen to your egg white omelets, and a heaping spoonful to your award winning chili cook off recipe.  The tingle, the depth, the ever so slight floral notes, will delightfully elevate your cuisine.  I never commanded you to be a masochist like me.  Give it a try.

While I Was Out

I decided to go on an adventure to Tennessee with some friends of mine.  We came across some awesome food while we were out and about.  I love to go to new places and try new foods.  The experience lights me like a kid in candy shop.  The 1 inch thick, dinner plate smothering, buttermilk panclock at Aretha Frankenstein's was awesome as always.  Well that was not a new find, Mandi and I found these gems on our last road trip. This whole in the wall cafe, in a residential area of Chattanooga, never displeases me with their fluffy pecan cakes of divine greatness.  We stopped by a place called Merchant's in downtown Nashville and I was pleasantly surprised by the country fried chicken dish I ordered.  The chicken was tender, the breading crispy and light, the potatoes creamy and buttery, and the spinach wilted perfectly.  With a splash of gravy on top, I was in artery clogging heaven.  The other morsels I had here were delicious as well.  The fried green tomatoes were tangy sweet with light breading and cooked until tender.  If you know me well, you know that duck fat fried tater tots is something I had to try out.  Sweet and simple, they were heaven in my mouth.  I can only eat out so much before I body starts to scream at me to stop.  When I crossed the line, I suggested we make a dish from scratch.  My friends Jared and Allison have this awesome kielbasa and fennel soup they shared with us.  It was hearty, healthy, and refreshing.  The next dish was a creation of my own doing.  Right before bed one night the idea popped into my head for a seared pork loin chop with apple, bacon, jalapeno jam served with roasted golden beets and sweet potatoes.  Unfortunately, none of us thought to take pictures of the dishes we made as we all started to dig in without hesitation.

Jared and Allison in front of Aretha's

Tiny hole in the wall right?

Yes I am handsome I know!

The pecan panclock of greatness

The Old Hotel

Flavored popped corn to wet the pallette

Fried Green Tomaters

The tots that got fried by the duck.  Get your own tots.

The chicken that clogged my left ventricle.

I forgot what this was.  Pork chop with a bourbon sauce I think.  It was good too but my chicken had my brain tied up. 

Three Chile Seared Chicken Tacos with Jicama Slaw

I just wanted to post the recipe for this delicious, clean, and easy to execute dish.  Serve with some queso fresco and hot tortillas.

The Protein:

1 lb medium sized chicken breast, or butterflied if bigger. 
1 lb Tile Fish or Grouper
2 tsp ancho chile powder
2 tsp arbol chile powder
2 tsp new mexico chile powder
1 tsp roasted ground coriander
1 tsp black pepper
3 tsp kosher salt
 2 tsp olive oil

Season both the chicken and fish well.  These are rough estimates on measurements so adjust as you see fit.   Sear the chicken on medium high heat for 3 minutes each side, reduce heat to medium, cover and continue to cook until internal temperature reaches 165F, about 8-10 minutes depending on the size of the breast.  Seperately, sear the fish on medium high heat for 2-3 minutes per side depending on the thickness of the fillet.  Cover and cook until an internal temp of 135 is reached.  Remove and let cool slightly, slice up and place on a hot plate for serving.

The Slaw: Double the recipe for a group of 8

3 tablespoons lime juice
1/2 teaspoon red chili flakes
1/2 teaspoon chili powder
6 tablespoons rice wine vinegar
1 teaspoon sugar
6 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon pepper
1 1/2 cups peeled, julienned jicama
1 cup, peeled, julienned carrots
1 cup shredded napa cabbage
1/2 cup thinly sliced red onion
1 cup julienned English cucumber
1/2 cup julienned red bell pepper
1 tablespoon cilantro, chopped

In a small mixing bowl add lime juice, chili flakes, rice wine vinegar, sugar, and extra-virgin olive oil. Season with salt and pepper and whisk to combine. Combine the jicama, carrots, cabbage and onion, cucumber, red pepper and cilantro in large bowl and toss. Add dressing to vegetables and let sit for 15 minutes, stirring 2 or 3 times. Serve.

The Fish House That Tried

Being a kitchen mongrel, I know how hard it can be to prepare, execute, and time every dish coming from the kitchen perfectly.  What is equally difficult is conceiving and designing a menu that will delight the taste buds.  You must start off with high quality, flavorful ingredients.  After procurement, the kitchen then needs to have the ability to transform the delectable ingredients into something spectacular;  An experience that every customer who spends their hard earned dollars at your concept will be fired up to share with others.  Unfortunately, Mitchell's Fish House at WestShore Plaza falls short of these tasks.  While the atmosphere and decor are inviting, the concept has some growing up to do before it will be able to wow the taste buds of foodies in the area.   Guests can look into the area where they prepare the fish and store them daily, an open fresh oyster bar for those who want to slide down some hand shucked oysters, and an open kitchen that also poses as a very small seafood market.  The fresh seafood display case is only adorned with selective fillets of very few fish.  I would recommend going to Cox's Seafood off the corner of Dale Mabry and Sligh if you want fresh, seasonal, varied selections of raw seafood.  I also strive to give a place the chance to show me their chops, however, there were some very major issues with the food we received.  The roasted oysters, while decently tasty, were swimming in butter and grease.  The lobster tail and beef tips combo was plated haphazardly with both items being overcooked and somewhat chewy.  The other dishes were on par with this observation, except for the calamari.  The lightly breaded and fried squid was the most tender I have had in a long time.  The presentation was decent, with a light, accommodating sauce, lemon slices, and asparagus that was a little overcooked.  Overall, the experience was what you would expect from a casual, corporate, seafood restaurant.  The only other drawback was the price points for each dish.  While not expensive for a fish house,  I expect some more sophistication from the kitchen, and the concept as a whole.

Do You Smoke? Unfortunately, we do not!

We love BBQ, yet we do not have an awesome smoker to make the magic happen.  There is a way that an equally delicious BBQ dish can be made.  Put your favorite dry rub on your favorite low and slow slab of protein;  we chose to use good quality pork back ribs.  We made our own dry rub with a large proportion of high quality smoked paprika to help us get some smokey aroma into the ribs.  From there, the ribs sat for 12 hours, wrapped in foil, and cooked on 300 for roughly 3 hours.  Once the ribs were fall of the bone tender, we put a layer of BBQ sauce on top, placed the rack under the broiler, caramelized the sauce, and repeated this for a couple of times to get a nice layer of flavor.  The taste of the pork was still intact all the while a delicious BBQ meal with corn on the cob was scarfed down. 

From the scrap pile to the skillet!

In the professional kitchen, food scraps that can be used for another purpose are rarely thrown out.  Bits and pieces of carrots, onions, tomatoes, mushrooms, chiles, and so on can be used to make stocks and soups.  We take this simple philosophy to heart at home as well.  Throughout the week we save our bits of vegetable and fruit pieces and turn then into delicious meals.  This time around we have parts of jalapenos, tomatoes, onions, carrots, mushrooms, and red bell peppers.  We took all the left over scraps, tossed them in olive oil, added some garlic and herbs, and roasted then on 425F until tender.  We then took the roasted pieces and pureed them up with chicken broth, finished it off with some salt and pepper, and ate a hearty, tasty meal.  Try using your scraps for dinner!

The Taste Bud Foreplay

What is the best foreplay to arouse the taste buds?  Simple, flavorful, souvlaki is your answer.  This greek inspired street food item is versatile, easy to make, healthy, hearty, and definitely arousing to the senses.  Here is an easy recipe to follow:  http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/cat-cora/souvlaki-small-skewers-of-pork-recipe.html.  We looked at it to get an idea of what ingredients we needed and then winged it.  I used red wine and apple cider vinegar instead of red wine vinegar, lemon juice freshly squeezed in the juicer, fennel, and smoked paprika, red bell pepper, and onion.  We used chicken instead of pork and added twice as much garlic to the marinade.  If you do not have a grill, you can use a cast iron grill pan as we did.  Here is what we came up with.