Listen Up, Fool

Your kitchen equipment sucks. Ok, ten percent of you do not need to read this post. Your kitchen equipment is passable. You have sharp knives, large cutting boards, and sturdy pots. Come back to Blackened Out tomorrow. But for the rest of you, or those who aren't sure if you are in the 10%, listen up, fool.

I have been in your kitchens and they make me wonder why you even spent money remodeling the space. No wonder you don't think you can cook. You can't cook because you do not have the right tools. Let me ask you this, if you hired a plumber and he came to your house with plastic wrenches and a matchbook, would you expect him to unclog your drain? If a doctor showed up at your surgery with a Swiss army knife and a bottle of ether, would you expect your appendectomy to go well? The answer is no. And the substandard tools you have in your kitchen make you look like a rube.

Take a look at your cutting board. Is it small, plastic, and scratched up? Throw it out. It is absolutely useless and harboring bacteria. I went in a kitchen recently with one cutting board in the whole kitchen that was no bigger than an outline of Rhode Island in a map of the world. Seriously, what the hell are your cabbage smelling hands going to cut on there? Liliputian leeks? Tiny tomatroes? Miniature mushrooms? Small satsumas? Find something wooden, heavy, and large, and lasting. You do realize that plastic's only usefulness in the kitchen is just for fake boobs, right?

Now onto your knives. They couldn't make the cut on well-groomed ski slope. Let me guess, you registered for a set on some wedding website. "Look honey, it has a butcher's knife, a serrated chef's knife, 14 steak knives, and three boning knives, all for $35.99. What a deal for Uncle Ernie." That is your first mistake, entrusting your crazy uncle with making sure you keep all of your fingers.

I wish I could tell you where you got your shoes at, because you are a sucker. If a knife, or better yet a knife set, costs less than filling up your gas tank, those knives couldn't cut the tension in a divorce proceeding. Go get yourself two knives - an 8 inch chef's knife and a pairing knife. They should NOT have a serrated edge, they should be sharp to the touch, and do not put them in the dishwasher. Does the knife feel balanced in your hand, without feeling light? Good. Together do the two knives costs less than $100 bucks? Find another knife. Wanna get crazy? Get a serrated bread knife and a boning knife, but that is just an extravagance.

Hey, you own a food processor? That is cool. They work for all sorts of things. They are good for making dough, crushing large amounts prep work, and making mayonnaise. Again, your food processor is probably a small one cup model. Maybe you bought it because it was "cute" or "practical". You would be wrong on both accounts. If your food processor can't fit at least eight cups of anything, you got hosed. Get rid of it.

Stop embarrassing yourself. You spent thousands of dollars on a kitchen so you could entertain and throw big dinner parties. You spend $200 on shoes or surround sound stereo systems. And you are going to skimp on the things that actually help you cook? How does that make any sense. Sack up, bite the bullet, and buy some good gear.

Now that you have a large, wooden cutting board and a good knife, it is time to learn knife skills. With enough practice you should be able to dice an onion in less time than it takes to plug in a food processor. I'll be back with more reasons your kitchen equipment sucks, but for now just get a bigger wooden cutting board, a sharper knife, and a larger food processor.

Kitchen Essentials

The Waiter's Key (also called Waiter's Corkscrew)

To some people the process of opening a bottle of wine causes anxiety that only Xanax can cure. They worry if the cork will fall in, if bits of the cork will become lodged in the neck, if the foil will cut them to shreds. So what do they do? Why they go out and buy all manner of openers and devices to make opening wine a cinch.

The device manufacturers know you will pay good money for almost anything, so they make useless crap for you to buy in hopes of solving your problems (see also, pharmaceutical companies). These devices sometimes resemble medieval gallows with a faux wrought iron neck holding a bottle clamp and a lever to pull out wine in one fell swoop. Or they use quick bursts of high-powered gas to dislodge, disarm, and debilitate the cork before the cork has a chance to fight back. Or they are named "The Rabbit" and come in a shiny silver and black finish. I believe there is another company that makes a product called "The Rabbit," and it is not used for opening wine.

I don't know about you, but none of those sound like an attractive option.

All you need is a Waiter's Key. The Waiter's Key does not cost a fortune. The Waiter's Key will not taunt or frustrate you. The Waiter's Key does not require you to borrow carbon credits or blast gaseous fumes into your beloved wines. Most importantly The Waiter's Key will not seduce your wife. It will just open wine perfectly every time. You can even use it to open beer.

Look it even has a knife on it. You can use this knife to cut the foil off to gain access to the cork or to stab marauding bands of would-be intruders. But sometimes the best way to get the foil off is just to grab it with your hand by the collar and pull it off the bottle. It should come right off.

Now what you do is place the screw in the center of the cork and begin turning. When the screw is about 90 percent in, stop. Now you see how there are two ledges on the silver lever. The one closest to the fulcrum (or better yet the ledge over the purple book in image below) is the one you want to use first. So place it on the bottle's edge. Pull up on the handle of the key. When you can't pull anymore, switch to the lower ledge, pull some more, and watch as the cork pops right out.


And hey while you are busy, check out Peter's 15 words of fame in the Times Pic today.

Kitchen Essentials

Tailgating

As a friend of the blog noted recently, "Saturday night's Saints game is going to be wild...it is the only game where people do not have to go to work the next day. People are going to be real drunk."

If you are going to cook, you might as well learn how to do it outside of the confines of your kitchen. Cooking in an outdoor environment presents a unique set of challenges. Why if you want to win Top Chef, it is almost a guarantee you will need to cook Alaskan Halibut in Times Square using a Fry Daddy.

You are going to need a grill. Any model will do, but it is probably easier to use a gas grill for tailgate applications. You want a metal spatula and a few rags. A cooler filled with water so you can clean up your gear and paws wouldn't hurt either.

For food-you could grill sausages, burgers, and tube steak and have a perfectly fine time. But for tailgates, I like to keep it simple and do as much work ahead of time. Plus, giving people something unexpected is as nice as a 13-0 start. So here is what I recommend.

Make a meatloaf the night before, use ya momma's recipe. After it cooks, let it cool and then cut it into individual portions. Bring those out to the tailgate. You can serve them cold, or sear them off just like you would if it was a burger. Let's be honest this is a burger that requires less cooking on site. Get some nice grill marks on each flat side, place in between two slices of bread, slathered with Blue Plate mayo, you will have people nodding dey heads like whoa. If you add some ketchup and hot sauce to that mayo, more power to you.

Or another crowd pleasing option is wings. Wings are cheap and can be eaten with God's utensils. To give the wings added flavor, toss them in a coating of Crystal and salt, let them sit in the fridge overnight. Grill them and serve as is. If you have blue cheese dressing that would be good for the wings or any vegetarians who may co-habitat with you.

Saturday night is going to be a wonderful night for the City of New Orleans. What are you cooking? Maybe we should have a Blackened Out and Gold Tailgate Cook-off this weekend? Winning team gets a cookbook?

Tell us where you are tailgating, and we will pay you a visit. Who Dat!

Kitchen Essentials

Caramelizing

Flavor does not appear out of thin air. It must be developed. One of the easiest ways to develop deep flavors is to caramelize the sugars that are in most foods. Due to a complex chemical reaction (called a Maillard reaction) the heat of cooking and the sugars of food can turn into flavor with a little bit of coaxing from you.

About the only thing you can not caramelize is water. But if you haven't tried this essential of the kitchen before, let's start with something simple and practical: caramelized onions. Caramelized onions are a boon to a cook. Top hamburgers with them, use them in soups, or as a sprinkle over a bed of cold Asian style noodles, they are an easy, cheap way to boost your cooking chops.

Start with the onion. It has to ends that I refer to as the neck and the butt. This is what I call the neck.
This is the butt.
We are going to slice half moons of this onion because we want larger pieces of onion for the finished product. Ohhh, this post will double as a recipe for French Onion Soup. So cut off the neck and butt end. Your onion now resembles a rough approximation of the earth. With the butt and root end representing the poles. Place it with the pole side down (either north or south you pick) and cut it along a line of longitude. I like the prime meridian.

Now peel off the outer skin of each half and place cut end down on cutting board. Slice onion into thin strips along the lines of latitude starting at one pole and working through the equator to the opposite pole. Do this for both the Eastern and Western Hemisphere.

Dont worry, you will get better, but for now anything thinner than a two quarters thickness will do. Repeat on 5 other onions. Try not to cry, Tebow.

Now heat a thick pot or your dutch oven on medium heat. When pan is hot add a knob of butter and a two second glug of olive oil. Place onions in pan and stir. Add some salt and pepper. The salt will draw out moisture from the onions which helps caramelize them.

The goal here is to cook slowly like making a roux. Keep vigilante make sure the onions do not burn or cook to fast. Stir every few minutes; it will take a good amount of time, just be patient. When the onions are good and brown you are finished. They will keep in a container in the fridge for a week or so. They hardly ever last that long in my house though.

To finish making soup, add a few cloves of chopped garlic, some thyme, cayenne (to help combat the sweetness), a few dashes of Worcestershire Sauce, a bay leaf, a cup of red wine, and 6 cups of beef, chicken, or veal stock. Bring to a boil, lower heat, let simmer for thirty minutes. Top with cheesy croutons if so desired.

Kitchen Essentials

Pans

Calphalon, All-Clad, and the like make a pretty good dime marketing space age pans to cooks worldwide. They use words like carbon-fiber technology and solid aluminum transitional core to give people fodder for a dinner party conversation. "Ohh yes, our Calphalon 1820 Dicam can withstand 47 days in a low oxygen environment while still conducting heat on the Kelvin Scale."

Forget it. A saute pan just needs to be tough and durable. You are going to be slinging this puppy around like a stoner with a Frisbee in a college quad. You don't need to spend $100 on a non-stick, anatomically correct saute pan. You want this stud.


Now listen, I realize sexy it aint. That blue handle will likely clash with the color scheme of your inspiring kitchen. But you can hide this in the cabinet. This pan heats in a hurry and is large. Meaning you can cook a large amount of food in one pan rather than using two or worse, doing it in batches (which will result in uneven cooking). Better yet, this pan is stick. That means when you cook, little pieces of food will caramelize on the bottom of the pan. This is called fond. Add some liquid to this, and scrap with a wooden spatula, and you have the beginnings of a beautiful sauce.
Other pans I recommend is a non-stick frying pan. This is perfect for making eggs, omelets, fritattas, and other egg dishes. I pretty much only use it for eggs, but occasionally I have fried a boudin puck in it. This pan has never met detergent. After it is used, just wipe it with a paper towel.
And the grandpappy of them all. A big honking Cast Iron Skillet. I call this one Summer, cause it brings the heat. It can fry catfish, sear a steak, make a mean chicken and dumplings, and still bake a cornbread. You buy this at hardware stores, this brand is made by Lodge. Take it home, wash it in hot soapy water, then pour some veg oil in the beast, and stick it in a 300 degree oven for 2 hours. Wipe it out, treat it as your egg pan.

With those three pans (and admittedly two of them are superfluous), the stove top will be at your command. I would estimate that you could get all three pans for around $120. Treat them right, and you will never have to buy pans again.

Kitchen Essentials

The Art of the Braise

Braising is one of the easiest ways to turn a tough, inexpensive cut of meat into something soulful and delicious. But fear not, the meat need not be so tough you can see where the marks from where the jockey was whipping it. You can braise just about anything including chicken or even pork belly. Braising requires a minimum of active cooking time, allowing you to do other things like watch the Saints, talk about the Saints, or listen to people talk about the Saints.

Without getting technical, to braise is to cook a piece of meat in a minimal amount of slightly, bubbling broth enhanced with aromatics and herbs. Think of it as an all day shabu shabu or fondue. This post will lay out the general structure of how to braise something. It is by no means an expert report nor definitive, but I hope you will try the technique soon.

You can use any hunk of meat you like. I find that cuts with a lot of fat and a bone work best. Recently I braised some pork belly from Cochon Butcher. (If you are nervous about eating pork belly, its just the non-cured, non-smoked name for bacon.)
If the piece of meat you are using has a side with a good layer of fat, you can leave it, trim it, or "score" it. To score it, simply run asharp knife over the fat and make some shallow slices. Then rotate the meat 90 degrees and do again to create a diamond pattern. Congrats you have scored for the first time and you didn't even need to rent a tux.

Now, we need to season that big hunk of sexy. So apply some Kosher salt and fresh ground black pepper to all side. You want to over season it. Its a large hunk, it can handle it, I promise. You are using real pepper and Kosher salt right?

Then we want to sear the meat over medium high heat on all sides to develop an nice brown crust. So get your dutch oven smoking hot, add a little oil, and place the meat fatty side down in the oil. Let it go for about 15 minutes. Meanwhile preheat your oven to 300 degrees. After meat has browned, remove it from pot. It should look like this, but if you go darker, even better.

At this point there will likely be a lot of rendered fat in the pot. Remove the majority of it. Then into the pot, place your mirepoix. Here I used a diced carrot, slices of onion, celery, a leek, a few hot peppers, garlic, and thyme. Use these aromatics to scrap up all the brown bits from the pan. Cook on medium heat for about 10 minutes or until mirepoix has softened.

Into pot add two cups or so of liquid. You just want the liquid to begin creeping up the sides of the meat. Do not completely submerge your meat. You can use whatever liquid you like, be it stock, beer, wine, or even just plain old water. Bring to simmer, cover, and place in oven.

Come back three hours later, add another cup of liquid, and cook uncovered for another hour. You want the meat to be soft, when it is, it is done. You can experiment with cooking it uncovered or covered. Cooking it uncovered will help the sauce concentrate. Sometimes I cook it completely uncovered on the stove on low heat, just depends. On this piece of belly, I went in the oven. But the key is even, steady, low cooking.

You can also let the meat cool and serve it the next day. If you do this (which tends to make it taste better), make sure it cools in the liquid you braised it in and that the meat is completely submerged.

One of the best effects of braising is that the dish makes its own sauce. All the mirepoix soften and combine with the juices and fibers of the meat to make something really special. Chef Warren Stephens of Cochon Butcher and Calcasieu recently shared this tip on how to turn the sauce into an amazing gravy. After you remove the meat, place the sauce and mirepoix in a blender. Blend until smooth and pour over sliced meat. The result is spectacular. The fat emulsifies with the juices and mirepoix creating a thick and creamy sauce. Another trick is to remove the meat and add a cup of rice to the mix. The rice will absorb all the flavors and you end up with a hybrid gravy-rice pilaf thing which is just delicious.

The possibilities of braising are endless. Try chicken with garlic, saffron, Pernod and tomatoes for a take on bouillabaisse (obviously I call it Pouletbaisse, clever right?), or beef short ribs with a deep red wine like Cabernet, or lamb with carrots, star anise, and ginger.

Braise something this weekend. Just the smell alone of slowly simmering meat and aromatics is worth it.

Kitchen Essentials

Sa, Sa Sa Salt 'n Pepper here.

In his book Salt, Mark Kurlansky makes a very compelling argument that salt, and the pursuit of it, is the most important commodity in human history. He explains how ancient roads often follow a circuitous path which all either end or begin at salt deposits. This was likely the result of thousands of years of mammals, marsupials, and such traipsing through the wilderness to find salt. Or how about the word "salary" which is derived from the Roman word for salt, which coincidentally was what the Roman empire used to pay their soldiers.

Furthering Mr. Kurlansky's premise, the most important ingredient in your kitchen is salt and pepper. Properly seasoned food tastes better. And that is the whole goal right? But for many of you out there, you are still using table salt and pre-ground pepper.

If it works for you, fine. But chances are if you switch to kosher salt and fresh ground black pepper, your finished product will improve. Kosher salt, traditionally used by Kosher butchers, does a better job of penetrating the surface of food, thereby resulting in a more thoroughly seasoned piece of food. I keep my salt in a little olive wood box, sprinkling it on with my grubby fingers.

Kosher salt is flakier and coarser than regular NaCl. When seasoning a piece of beef, you can actually feel and see the salt, allowing you to judge if the food is seasoned properly by sight (as well as taste). Kosher salt is "softer" as well. The flavor is less chlorinated and more well-rounded. If you begin using Kosher salt, you will notice the harsh, chemical taste of regular old salt. Also, kosher salt is more forgiving, which means fewer run-ins with over salted food.

Pepper. You use it more than you think. The pre-ground stuff is a joke. Even if you don't want to invest in a $20 pepper mill, at least buy the little tube of whole peppercorns with the grinder for a lid. Please, I beg of you. Even if you don't want to go to all the trouble of grinding peppercorns, at least buy some whole peppercorns, place them on the cutting board, cover them with a towel and beat them like a red headed stepchild with a heavy pan.

Look at you becoming a better cook already. Next week, we introduce a technique. The tension builds. For those of you who don't think you can cook, check out this perfect recreation of risotto carbonara by Legend. If he can do it, half in the bag, emerging into a hangover, and with a Coleman stove, trust me you got it.

Kitchen Essentials

Time and time again, you will find yourself reaching for this piece of genius. Its limits are unknown to modern man and technology. No, it is not the iPhone, it is a Royal Blue Le Creuset Dutch Oven. You will use this piece of cookery at least once a week; that is a guarantee. However, feel free to choose a different color.

It is perfect for Red Beans. Saute some tasso or ham, a little trinity, garlic, add the beans, some water, place the lid half on and walk away. It will bubble and toil on the stove while you do the stuff you need to do. Same results with gumbos, but a different process.

ASIDE: While I heartily agree and love the tradition of Red Beans on Monday, I think we can all agree that most of us work on Monday. You do, we know you do, cause you read us on Monday, not on the weekends. Thus, it is likely you aren't doing the wash on Monday. Red Beans (and gumbos, braises, roasts, etc...) are always better the next day. Therefore, by the power invested in me by the great state of the Internet, I hereby declare that from henceforth Red Beans shall be made on Sunday and eaten on Monday.

A dutch oven was a multi-tasker before Steve Jobs invented the word. It can fry, it can roast, it can braise, it can make soups, it can bake bread, hell I think it even changed my oil last week. The secret is that a dutch oven, especially a cast-iron one, retains and distributes heat remarkably well. So there are no hot spots on the pan which means no uneven cooking which means you can go home and kiss the prom queen.

I tried to think of something a dutch oven couldn't do. Steak, it cant cook a steak. But then, it got me thinking. One of the best ways to cook steak is to sear it on the stove, while spooning hot butter on it, then sticking it in the oven to finish cooking through. So what if I got the pot smoking hot, seared off a thick cut filet on both sides, then shut the heat down, put the lid on and let the meat continue to cook in the "oven." Hmmmmmm....

Kitchen Essentials

Editor's Note: We are rolling out another feature here at the Internationally Acclaimed, Number Two Local Blog called Kitchen Essentials. As Rene's interests have shifted more to home cooking, we realize there are a lot of you out there with absolutely no idea what the heck your kitchen needs or how to blanch a vegetable. So here goes something...

Before we get started some background/ranting. Cruising through a couple's wedding registry is a particularly enjoyable pleasure. A vast majority of the kitchen gear on a couple's registry is either a) pointless b) redundant. Take for example, the Margaritaville Frozen Drink Maker. This machine is a fondue pot of desperation. If you buy one, you get a free bottle of Axe Body Spray and an Affliction shirt (rape charges sold separately). The only thing that piece of crap is useful for is buying Jimmy Buffet another beach house. You own this already, but it is called a blender and it doesn't play "Fins". So let's make this disappear faster than Jessica Simpson's career.

I once saw a registry with not one, not two, but three food processors of all different sizes and horsepower. Here is a hint, if you want a food processor, buy one and only one. Just make sure it is the biggest, baddest son of a bitch on the block. And how many times are you going to use the Avocado pit extractor or the Mango Slicer?

While we are at it, Williams-Sonoma is Orvis for fat people. Sure, its great to shop there, to wander around looking at the Ferrari's of espresso machines, but really its a lot of overpriced, average gear. If you really want to stock your kitchen head to a Restaurant Supply store. Don't worry you need not wear a chef's jacket or memorize a secret code. Most places have showrooms that are open to the public. Try Caire or Loubat in Mid-City. The stuff they sell is durable, affordable, it works, and is damn sexy.

Essential Number One: Knives and Cutting Board

The first thing you need in your kitchen is a few good, sharp knives and a solid wood cutting board. Since food isn't Emo, it won't cut itself. Therefore unless you are reheating Sandra Lee's Pinto Beans with Teriyaki Sliders, you are going to need to cut something to cook a meal. Let's start with the knives.

If you can only buy one knife, make it a good all purpose chef's knife. For this I use a 7 inch, Henckels Santoku knife for everyday cutting, chopping, and street fighting. It is not the world's greatest knife, but I like it and that is all that matters. Don't skimp on your everyday knife. You will use this knife more than the internet. Spend the money; keep it sharp with a honing stone and professional sharpening every 6 months. Go to a store, try them out, get the one that feels most comfortable. Using it everyday will make you a better cook and the next time you use that dull knife at Aunt Edna's you will understand why a good knife is the first step to better cooking.
You also want a paring knife (far right), a carving knife (second from left), and a knife with a serrated edge (bet you can figure it out on your own). Again, spending the money the first time will save you money in the long run.

A cutting board may be the most overlooked thing in the entire kitchen. It should be wood. It should be solid. It does not need to be pretty. It should not be made out of glass. It should make other people feel insecure about their cutting boards. And it should be big. How do you know how big it needs to be? If you can't fit a Thanksgiving turkey on it comfortably, put it back on the shelf, tis not big enough.

This cutting board has a moat around it, which is particularly useful should the Moors invade. Incidentally it was made by Richard the Snark, a waiter at the Old Green Lady. If you ask him nicely, he will not make you one.

Next week - you need pots.