Slow Cooked Brisket with Chimichurri Sauce

Since it is cold out, or coldish, I thought it would be a lovely time to braise a nice piece of beef.  I've got a big piece of brisket in the freezer and a hankering for one of my favorite Argentine recipes Chimichurri Sauce.

I was introduced to Chimichurri by a colleague when I was a general manager for a company that provided corporate dining services.  Wow!  Now that was some great stuff.

My exposure to South American cuisine is somewhat limited I'm afraid, but what I have experienced has been either an astounding culinary discovery or a complete train wreck.  Luckily there have been fewer train wrecks than cool discoveries!

I remember making a Argentinian dish for our wine club years ago that sounded like a complete train wreck: grapes, ground beef, polenta, and chicken breast(?), we found the traditional regional recipe online and it sounded disgusting, but in some strange way it worked.  Maybe it was the wine because this combination just screamed "wrong! wrong! wrong!" when you read it.

The Chimichurri when I read it at the corporate dining gig, sounded a little funny, but it held some promise.

The recipe that I tried that first day was a cilantro based Chimichurri and have since learned that there are a great deal more parsley based versions.  A little investigation has told me that the origin of this sauce is a little foggy.

Seems the originator of the sauce is an Englishman Jim Curry who, while visiting Argentina created the sauce in homage to the spicy grilled and BBQ meats he was experiencing.

Some sources say that it consisted primarily of oregano, some say cilantro, and a few parsley.  My take on the whole issue is that it started with oregano or cilantro.  Parsley is a western favorite, and has probably replaced cilantro to suit the palates of their audience.  Oregano can be a little overwhelming and met its maker when palates became bland around the time my Grandmother learned to cook. I'm guessing here.

Then there is cilantro.  The fan base of cilantro has no middle ground.  I have been in kitchens where a chef would berate a competitor for his supposed heavy handed use of the herb.  Either you love it or hate it.  Except me.  I love it in Chimchurri, and pretty much hate it in almost everything else.

Here is the recipe for the brisket:

Heat your oven to 250F.

2 Medium Onions, Diced

1 - 5# Brisket

Spice recipe:

2 T Granulated Garlic

5 T Medium Chili Powder

3 T Ground Cumin

Kosher Salt

This is a 2X recipe of the rub we I used in the pulled pork post.  Rub the brisket with the spice mix and coat completely.  Place in a roasting pan on top of the diced onions.

Place in oven and go to bed.  Or go to work and dinner will be done when you get home.  It will be perfect in 6-7 hours.

Now for the Chimichurri.  I'm going with the cilantro since that is the version that I like best, you can use the parsley or if you are really looking for the historic version you may want the oregano.

My recipe:

1 large bunch of cilantro 

2 medium cloves of garlic

2 tsp white wine vinegar

1/2 tsp ground cumin

1 tsp red pepper flakes

1/2 C olive oil

Kosher salt

White pepper

Place cilantro, garlic, vinegar, cumin and red pepper flakes into your food processor. 

Pulse until you have a smooth product.  While the processor is running, slowly pour the olive oil into the mixture.  Season with salt and pepper.

Give it a taste and adjust as you would want.  This recipe should taste a little tart, a little salty and a little spicy.  I can't compare it to anything that you might know because I don't know of a recipe that is like this one.

The Chimichiurri can be made up to three days ahead.  It has quite a long shelf life in the refrigerator due to the chilis, vinegar and salt.

Slice the brisket for service, re-heat and serve with your Chimichurri on the side.  Fabulous!  

Pan Seared Grouper with French Green Lentils

When it comes to cooking fish, there is nothing better than a beautifully seared filet, except a fried one.  Or grilled.  O.K. They're all tied for first for me.  Depends on the fish, the mood and sometimes the weather.

I am not one of those that only grills from Memorial Day to Labor Day, I have often stood in a driving rain over my Weber and prepared the food of the day.  So this time it's mood and type of fish.

We bought some gorgeous grouper today and I feel like searing it.  I'm looking forward that crisp golden brown crust that forms when the caramelization on a white fish is done perfectly.

Grouper is a beautiful fish that is simultaneously meaty and a little flakey.  This fish can be prepared in many ways, although I would shy away from battered and fried since the delicate flavor would be overwhelmed or poaching which for me is just wrong for most fish.

I'll be preparing French Green Lentils to accompany the grouper and since searing is pretty easy, as long as your pan is hot enough and you are patient, we'll cover the preparation of those as well.

Since the lentils take longer, let's start there.

I like the French Green Lentils more than all other lentils combined because of their texture, their ability to hold together (rather tan becoming a paste) and their earthy, almost peppery flavor.

The recipe below is very simple for a reason, I really want the flavor of the lentils to be evident.  They hold up well to other flavorings as well such as fennel, bay leaf etc.

1 C French green lentils

2 C chicken stock or water

1 tsp kosher salt

2 T minced shallots

2 tsp minced garlic

Get a two quart sauce pan and put it on the stove.  Mince a shallot and some garlic.  I have included a video on mincing a shallot below.

On medium heat sauté the garlic and shallot with a little olive oil until fragrant and the shallot has become tender (about one minute).  

Add the lentils and kosher salt with them them in the pan.  

Pour in your chicken stock or water bring to a simmer and stir occasionally.  

They should be ready in 25 minutes or so.  Test them by removing a few and tasting them.  They should still be reasonably firm but should not crunch.  This is also a good way to check the seasoning.

For the Grouper:

Heat your oven to 375F.

Cut the fish into the portion size that you want to serve and pat dry with a paper towel.  Place a skillet or sauté pan on the stove that is large enough to hold all of the portions that you will be cooking.

Season the fish with kosher salt and white pepper.  Add some oil to the pan and heat until it shimmers place the fish in the pan "presentation" side down.

When examining the filet, the skin side will look like this:

Note the darker fatty line that runs down the center.  

The presentation side looks like this:

This can also be called the "bone side" or when removing the meat from the whole animal, this is where the knife comes between the meat and the bone.

Once the filets are in the pan, you need to be patient while the caramelization takes place.  Keep the pan on high.  If you are using a regular pan (i.e. no non-stick coating) the fish will start to separate from the pan as the golden brown goal is achieved.  To check "shake" the pan.  Be careful, we're looking for a very small jerking motion.

Once the filets are caramelized, turn them over, again be careful and turn them away from you to avoid being spattered with hot oil.  Cook skin side down for about two minutes and transfer to the oven to finish.

To serve, spoon a small pile of lentils into center of the plate and place the finished grouper on top.

  

Baba Ganoush

I have a hate hate relationship with eggplant.  I hate it.  Except for baba ganoush and maybe two other preparations.  This stems mostly from my youth where my mother, an avid gardener, grew eggplant.  One per year would have been good for me, but alas, eggplants grow in larger numbers.

My problem with them stems from their texture when they are cooked, which happens to be the basis of baba ganoush.

I guess my issue was that I couldn't get used to a vegetable that you can't pick up with a fork, and that texture!

Mum put it in her ratatouille which I hated until I learned to make it myself with a great deal of modifications on the original that I had been served as a child.  I'll write about ratatouille later.  On to baba ganoush.

I was recently asked to make baba ganoush for a friend who was having a gathering at his home.  He wanted to have a version much like a local restaurant serves that has a smokey quality to it.    

One day for lunch I visited the restaurant that my friend had mentioned and tried their version.  My conclusion was that this would be easy.

Here is my recipe:

2 whole large eggplants

2 medium cloves of garlic

1 tsp kosher salt

White pepper

1 oz fresh lemon juice

2 T toasted sesame oil

1 T olive oil

Heat your oven to 400F.

When preparing baba ganoush in the traditional way, you puncture the eggplant's skin with a fork a few times and roast it whole.  I lightly salted the pieces of eggplant and drizzled them with a little olive oil.

In order to get that smokey flavor that was requested I chose to quarter the eggplant lengthwise and roast it until the flesh wash was soft and had started to pick up some color, about 20 minutes.

While the eggplant is roasting, rough chop the eggplant, add the salt and crush to combination into a paste with your knife.  If you have a sauté pan with a clean, flat bottom, use that.  Much faster.

Once the desired caramelization has been achieved, pull the eggplant from the oven and cool slightly.  Scrape the flesh away from the skin.  You don't want it to get cold because this step which is normally simple becomes harder to do when the roasted eggplant is cold.

Once the flesh has been removed, place it into a colander and let some of the excess liquid drain.  If you skip this step, your final product is likely to be too loose.

After the eggplant has drained, put it into your food processor with the garlic/kosher salt mixture, sesame oil and lemon juice.  Process until smooth and check your seasoning.  Your done!

Side note: Am I the only person out there that bristles at the amount of stickers that are on our produce these days?  I detest those things for a few reasons, the extra step that it takes to remove them, the cost that I assume it has added to our produce and most importantly, the fact that I don't always catch all of them and have to hunt through a pile for prepped vegetables to find the pieces!

About 7-8 years ago I received a 25# sack of red onions that had two stickers on each piece.  One to identify it as a red onion, the other was an advertisement for a movie.  I am glad that did not become a trend!

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Curried Chicken Skewers

Today I'll be making Curried "Chicken Skewers".  This on is a favorite around here as it is a simple, flavorful dish that is relatively easy to make.

For the longest time I hated making skewered items because unless I just "marked" them on the grill and finished them in the oven I would invariably burn the bejeezus out of the little wooden sticks.  So frustrating.  Even when I soaked the skewers.

Lately I have figured it out, which I will explain later, but I always hated it when I was a line cook and the chef would put an item like this on the menu.  They were always very popular, but I don't think that many of the folks I worked with we're ever able to send out a product without having the final dish looking like neatly lined up food with blackened knobs at each end.  They never looked like the test plates that we would make for the menu change tastings.  Probably because at these tastings we were able to give the little guys way more attention than was realistically possible in a busy restaurant when grilling over an open fire.

When I was the chef or executive chef, skewered items only hit the menu when demanded by the owner or seared in a pan.  The same goes for mixed grill plates, but I digress. 

I specifically remember a Day Boat Scallop dish that we made at Röti, a restaurant where I held the position of Sous Chef in the mid-nineties in San Francisco.  Röti was a very busy restaurant with about 250 seats and about 45 percent of our covers were cooked by one guy who manned the fireplace.  An amazing position that required an attention to the cooking product like few I have known.

For a line cook, to be trusted with that station, at least at Röti, meant that you were the "rock star" of your restaurant.  And they were.

The problem of burnt skewers continued there to the frustration of all of us.  We searched and searched for a way to keep them intact, but the volcano like heat of the fire made that all but impossible.

For our recipe today, here is what you need:

2 chicken breasts (I'll be using thighs as well)

Plain yogurt

Kosher salt

Dry mustard powder

Curry powder

Ground cardamom

Lemon juice

Vinegar (I'm using champagne vinegar)

About 15-20 skewers

You may start with boneless chicken breasts or with a whole bird.  I'm working with the chicken that I cut for my "how to Cut a Chicken" post.

First we make the marinade.  A couple of tablespoons of yogurt, a pinch of salt, about a half teaspoon of dry mustard, 2 tsp of curry powder, a pinch of cardamom, 2 tsp each lemon juice and vinegar.

We begin to prepare the chicken by slicing the breasts lengthwise.   

And the across the strips to make cubes.  Remember to make the pieces reasonably large.  They need to be large enough to stay on a skewer, but small enough to be easily eaten.  I cut mine to about 1 1/2" X 1 1/2". Place them in the marinade and let sit.  

If you have an hour or more for them to marinate, that would be ideal, if you don't, try to give it half an hour.

Soak your skewers in water.  This will not stop them from burning, but will slow it down.  When we get to the grill, I'll show you how to cook these without the losing skewers to the fire.

Prepare the vegetables in much the same way that you prepared the chicken.  Place in a large bowl and add, chopped garlic, some herbs and olive oil.  Set aside to marinate.

After the chicken has been marinated, start your grill.  As the grill gets going, remove the skewers from the water and start to assemble them.  Often people like to add some vegetables to their skewers.  I don't do that.  This is not because I am a complete carnivore, it is because they cook at a much different speed than the meat.  I do the vegetable skewers separately.

Carefully pierce the pieces of meat in their center.  You can make these as large or small as you would like depending on the appetites that you are feeding.

When the grill is ready, white coals is a good sign, move the coals to one side and grill the skewers with the exposed wood end away from the heat.  Turn the skewers occasionally until they are done.  This positioning to the exposed wood away from the heat should save most of your skewers.  Bear in mind that the meat needs to be above the coals and that the skewers will be above the coals as well, just place them so that they are not above the most intense heat.  This may take some practice.

Since I have been grilling this dish at night, the photo may not show you clearly what I am trying to explain.  So here it is.  When I am able to get a better photo, I'll post about skewers again.

When they have finished grilling, you can set them aside for service later, or serve immediately.  Obviously the fresher they are, the better they will be, but if you are preparing them for a large group, you will likely need to hold them and possibly re-heat.

Possible sides for this can be as wide ranging as tzatziki, hummus, baba ganoush, cous cous etc.

Next up:  Baba Ganoush


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My Favorite Hummus

Hummus is interesting stuff.  

I've had so many variations of hummus from amazing to downright indelible.  

I'm not talking about the flavored versions of hummus that have exploded on the food scene in the last ten years, I'm just talking about the traditional varieties.

At one restaurant where I used to work, the cooks had it in their head that they needed to make five gallon batches in a tall square container using one of those three foot immersion blenders to mix and purée it.  

The recipe was pretty dry as hummus goes, so it was rare that all of the chickpeas even met the blender once much less enough times to become part of the smooth consistency that was intended. 

I tried to reason with them that if they made smaller batches more often and used the Robocoup (the best food processor available in my opinion), we would have a better product.  This argument was dismissed out of hand before I had even finished it.

Anyway, they wanted to prep it one time a week, so by the fifth day in that large container, it began to discolor and crack from the inevitable evaporation of the small amount of liquid in the recipe and two gallons would be wasted.

I was unable to alter the recipe as we were held to the recipes of the brand.

On other occasions I have had exceptional versions and wondered why there could be this much variation by professional cooks.  In the last few years it seems that half the recipes stray from the traditional and have an added flavor, for instance the most common that I see is the addition of roasted peppers.  

The recipe that I will share with you today is not so much traditional, although it tastes that way, was developed by myself, a chef that worked for me and at least one other chef within our company.

Let's get started.  Here's the recipe:

4 - 15 oz cans of chickpeas

4    Medium garlic cloves

3   Oz toasted sesame oil

2   Oz extra virgin olive oil

2-3 oz lemon juice

Kosher salt

4  oz boiling water

Read this one over once or twice and you'll notice a couple of anomalies.  First of all, there is no tahini, the sesame oil replaces it, and also the addition of boiling water is unusual.  I don't remember where we got that part, but it is the thing that makes this recipe exceptional!  

Drain the canned chickpeas completely and rinse. 

Place them in your food processor. 

Rough chop the garlic before adding it to the chick peas.  This will help you get them more completely incorporated.

 Add garlic, salt, lemon juice and olive oil.  Purée.

While the chickpeas are being blended, bring some water to a boil.  I use a tea kettle because it is easy to pour it into my cuisinart.

The addition of boiling water not only adds a little more moisture to the hummus, it also allows the chickpeas to be more uniformly puréed.  This step also creates a fluffy, and light quality to the final product that is missing in many recipes.

I have tried a great many recipes for hummus over the years and believe that this one stands head and shoulders above the rest.

Let me know what you think.

Next up: Curried Chicken Skewers (finally)

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Easy Tacos

My wife and I like to say that my son has a "very discriminating palate", which really means that there are only a few things that he likes to eat.

For two people who eat nearly anything, this has been at times a frustrating situation because he would not eat what we had prepared for the family.  Absolutely refused.  Since we are the type that have decided to pick our battles, and battles around a meal is not where we wish to spend our energy, we have been preparing two meals.  Lucky for us, his tastes have been pretty easy to satisfy.

Each of the last nine years or so we have invited the teenage children of some european friends (and friends of friends) to spend the summer with us and experience the American way of life.  

One summer my wife shared her frustration about how hard it was to feed him with our visitor that year, now our dear friend Sophie, and Sophie replied " feeding him is not so hard, make a quesadilla and some tomato soup and he's happy."

That statement changed our thinking.  It really wasn't hard, it was just another step.  We did, after all, have to feed the boy.  If what he liked was simple, why not just do it and have a more pleasant meal?

His preferred meal changes from time to time, but one thing about it is that it usually is pretty simple.

His current meal of choice is tacos.  For the longest time, two months or so, I was putting the meat of choice (my choice this time, not his), into a pan and adding the spices one by one and then sautéing it, while cooking his corn tortillas on a cast iron skillet that my mother-in-law gave me.  Pretty easy right?

Well I started to get a little grumpy about having to pull five different spices from the cupboard any time I cooked for him.  I mean I was starting to get in a bad mood at each meal and snack time because he constantly wanted tacos.

Then he came to me one day with an empty jar on which he had placed a strip of masking tape and written "taco spice".  He asked me to make a batch of the taco spice and teach him how to cook his own meal/snack.

I was dumbstruck for a moment, and then really proud.  This little guy had noticed that his requests were making me frustrated and came up with a solution to make it easy.  What a great idea.

So I set out to write the recipe that I had been eyeballing all this time.  Here is the recipe:

4T ground cumin

3T New Mexico Chili powder

1 T granulated garlic

1 tsp Chipotle powder

For the first version of this spice mix, I added the kosher salt.  When I made it again, I left it out and told my son that he would have to add his own.

 I did this for two reasons.  First, I will use this spice mixture for other recipes and want to control the salt content, and second, this put my son in charge.  He needed to make the decision about how much salt he wants to add.

The method is really simple, here it is:

Place the pan on the stove and turn the heat to high, add the meat.  Break up the meat if your using ground beef as I am here, if you're making chicken tacos or something else that is not ground it is not necessary to break it up.

Add the spice, once it starts to sizzle, turn the heat to medium and cook, stirring occasionally until done.

While the meat is cooking grate cheddar, cotija or what ever cheese you would like in the tacos.

Also at this time, heat a pan or skillet with a little oil and toast your corn or flour tortillas to heat and soften them.  

On our taco nights, where everyone will be eating tacos, we also make guacamole, pico de gallo (see my knife skills 101 post for that), sautéed peppers and onions (also in the knife skills post), or what ever you like to have in your tacos.  We often have 7 or 8 small bowls on the table so that everyone can customize what they're eating.

This spice mix can also be easily modified to fit your own tastes, add more heat or another flavoring agent.

Cooking for me is really just a way to play with my food to make meals more interesting.

Easy stuff.  Also empowering for children who are old enough to work the stove for their own snacks.

Next up:  Hummus


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