Bi-polar dinner disorder and cooking in the unconscious February 25, 2010
Posted by Eli in : Uncategorized , 1 comment so farUnlike Max who is always at The Breslin working a 12 hour shift, I work at a “9-5″ job in a standard-ish office. Yes, the deep dark secret about us is that I do not have a full time cooking job… unless you count twitter as a full time job (which unfortunately for our society, some people now can). Max and I often talk about the vast differences between the mindset it take to be in a kitchen, in your zone – tickets flying, hot pans, yelling, consistency, timing -often total unbridled chaos…and the more composed order of an office routine still with large stresses and fires to be put out, but lightyears different in their form and solutions. But while I sit for hours “doing advertising” the thoughts that dominate my subconscious are what I’m eating for lunch or what I’m going to be cooking for dinner. The busier I am at work, the more I look forward to rushing home, cracking open some wine and cooking with a record playing in the background. So yeah, when my brain is free to roam, I daydream about driving 20 min home from a full work day in order to spend an hour plus standing in a small kitchen at home cooking.
Tonight it was raining in LA and while I am the most staunch advocate of it being sunny and 74 every day, tonight the rain seemed extremely relaxing and for some reason, weirdly appropriate. I opened the sliding side door off of my kitchen to listen to the rain and get a breeze going and then put on a record. It’s only slightly coincidental that I find myself reaching a lot for the Phil Collins album “No Jacket Required” when I cook. I say only slightly coincidental because well, it’s awesome (Don’t Lose My Number, Sussudio and Doesn’t anybody stay together anymore – Instant classics) and secondly, I only own like 25 albums on vinyl so my choices are somewhat limited. And…here’s where we get down to the actual cooking part of the post.
Unlike my limited vinyl selection options, on sunday I went on a black out shopping binge at (industrial grocery store) Smart+Final where I came to, lying on the floor in my living room, drowning in plastic bags and opened items having sampled 1 of everything I had just bought (as I always do when I come home from the grocery store).”EVERYTHING IS SO DELICIOUS” I cried in between mouthfuls of beef jerky chased with salsa chased with pickles chased with peanut butter chased with Soy Sauce chased with tortilla shells chased with batter blaster (what can I say, I’m reckless).”I JUST…. WANT ….TO TRY… ONE OF EVERYTHING!” (you know you do this too).
So when I came home today after work, I was greeted by a still overflowing fridge offering me a bounty of industrial sized riches. The dinner possibilities were endless. But this, this my friends is where it gets tricky. If you have bread and PB+J…there is only one true direction. But me, I looked at my full fridge and I got bi-polar dinner disorder. My mind began to race. I’m high and low. I’m thinking italian. Then mexican. Then middle eastern. Then american…
“I want chicken nuggets and french fries.” No problem! I began to defrost the chicken, got out the bread crumbs and pulled some potatoes to make the fries.
“Wait wait wait…I think I want an artichoke, sundered tomato and grilled chicken sandwich. Yea….that’s def gonna be delicious.”
But when I reached for the artichokes, I noticed the white mushrooms and the yellow and green peppers.
“Hmmm…those are going to be no good soon, so I should probably cook those up… I guess now it’s looking like a spicy chicken hoagie with grilled peppers and mushrooms. Maybe put some bbq sauce on top…So i began to reach for the BBQ sauce only to spot the heirloom tomatoes. I took a step back.
Don’t they make some sort of pill for this type of food-born anxiety illness?
So with all these flavors and choices and options…literally a wealth of food…and with my mind all over the map…in what direction would I go? It was then I realized that while I had been pulling item after item deciding what to make, I had chopped garlic which was now sautéing lightly in oil and had began breading the chicken. (Is it possible you cook and think with different parts of your brain or do I just black out around food a lot?) I sliced the peppers and the mushrooms and added them to the garlic. I still had no direction but I was going with it. Water was boiling. Penne entered the water, for what – you’re guess at that point was good as mine. The heat against my legs reminded me the oven was on, set to 425. The chicken went in and began baking.
Artichokes , tomatoes, spinach, black olives and some left over cooked sausage hit the frying pan and sizzled, juices and flavors creating a thick aromatic sauce. I was making ‘the kitchen sink’ jealous with this display. With the chicken cooked and the perfect ratio of the italian breading KFC crisp and slightly burnt, I diced it and added it to the frying pan along with the penne. I added parmesan cheese and folded it in gently. A little drizzle of BBQ sauce for some bite. Then over the top I sprinkled bread crumbs creating a solid crust. A light drizzle of olive oil and then I put the frying pan in the oven to bake.
What emerged was not where my brain started. It was some sort of bastardization of a baked pasta. A frankenstein dish borrowing from lasagna,utilizing homemade chicken tenders, sausage, olives, artichokes,peppers,mushrooms, spinach and tomatoes. A ripoff based on pasta al forgo? A pizza-esque pasta? Whatever it was, It was insanely delicious and will be tomorrow’s lunch and dinner too.
So I started off in one place and ended up somewhere else completely different. The brain is funny like that. I was either thinking too much or wasn’t really thinking at all.Trying out things without a real dish in mind, hoping for the best by mixing flavors and just going for it.
Mostly, I guess I was just cooking.
And that’s just the way I like it.
Super-Pulled-Pork-Party February 9, 2010
Posted by Eli in : Cooking, Events, Recipes, Updates , 2comments
Ok – that picture of coleslaw sucks. I knows it. But hey, you try starting to drink at 1pm while cooking and entertaining 40 people and then trying to remember to take picture of the food. Yes, the coleslaw recipe will be in this post…but wait…we are getting ahead of ourselves. Let’s rewind to Saturday evening around 7.30pm.
I went up to my favorite place to buy meat - Marconda’s at the 3rd street Farmer’s Market (http://www.yelp.com/biz/marcondas-meat-market-los-angeles) to snag 8 lbs. of beautiful fatty pork butt. Little known fact - Jews actually learn how to spot a good cut of pork butt while studying for their haftorahs. And…now that we’ve offended several dozen people with that joke let’s move on.
At Marcanda’s I had a good conversation with a guy next to me at the counter who was buying 20 lbs of pork butt for his Super Bowl party (ok, showoff Mcgee). He and HIS buddy had gone halvsies on a $500 smoker and were going to town starting it at 5am (oooo la-fuckin la, Im SOOO impressed early risers).
Since I had just drank an orange pop, which to my sensitive system might as well be made out of adderall,water and orange food dye, and since I wanted to knock this guy off his meat high horse, I told him I was starting my pulled pork THAT NIGHT bc I’m that dedicated to my craft. I then did some side to side finger snaps, told him to talk to the hand and took a huge bite out of a raw steak to let him know a) I’m crazy b) don’t step to this bull bc he WILL get the horns. Supposedly he was just trying to make casual conversation, but I was way too much in the zone.
I got home at about 8ish, cleaned some of the fat off the top for the (heart attack alert)pork fat sauteed onions and then put a nice dry rub all over the PB. The dry rub consisted of Salt,Pepper,Onion powder,Paprika,Brown Sugar,Cayenne Pepper,Cumin and Garlic Powder. I seared the pork belly and cut off a small hunk to make a pork sandwich for that evening cuz, dudes gotta eat.
Then I put the remaining butt in the dutch oven with the braising liquid, which consisted of – apple juice,ketchup,grey poupon mustard,more cayenne and a whole yellow onion. Into the real oven set at 220, I placed the dutch oven ever so gently and waved goodbye.”When I see you again you’ll be pulled pork!!” I said. It was as emotional as it sounds.
At 1.30am as Ashton Kutcher continued to be consistently unfunny on SNL,I knew I needed to taste the PB and make sure this train hadn’t gone off the rails on the way to flavortown. I pulled the pork using two forks,my massive triceps and all the personal will i had to not gobble it all down right then and there. The aroma wafting up was like if Albert Einstein built a special BBQ in heaven for Julia Childs to make God’s BBQ lunch. I put the shredded meat back in da dutchie,closed the oven door and let it do it’s damn thang.
Still awake at 3.30am, I made an executive decision to not leave the oven on all night for fear of liquid evaporation and separated the pork from the liquid allowing both to cool faster. At around 4.15 I put it all in the fridge. The next morn at 10am it was back in the 220 degree oven cooking away till 2pm. By mid-party, the sun still high in the sky, discouraged party guests were left with nothing else but the ability to wipe clean the sides of the dutch oven to gather the last tasty morsels of liquidy porky goodness. 8 lbs taken down in no time. Save your clock/portion management mumbo jumbo for someone else.To me, THAT is party success.
In addition to the coleslaw and the slow cooked pulled pork I made a variation of German potato salad with pork fat onions and bacon and then a sample pack of handmade donuts. Here’s a shot of the donuts
from L-R : M&M encrusted, Vanilla Frosted, Almond and Vanilla, Caramel coated.
Overall the Super Bowl party was a slambash of epic proportions. Half a keg, 100+ beers, a handle of Johnnie Walker, 8 lbs of pork, 5 pounds of slaw and 10 pounds of potato salad. If you were to tell ME that you left hungry, I would tell YOU that you also left a goddamn liar (or perhaps you just came a vegetarian…)
Jalapeno Coleslaw
1 head green cabbage, quartered then sliced into strips.
2 medium sized jalapenos,cut in half lengthwise then sliced on a mandolin
1 whole carrot, grated
1 red onion, quartered, sliced nearly paper thin on mandolin (while drinking Gin)
juice of 1 lime
2-3 tablespoons mayo
1 tablespoon white vinegar
2 cloves of raw garlic diced fine
salt and pepper to taste
OPTIONAL – 1-2 shakes Cayenne pepper (this will obviously make it spicier)
Cut all veggie ingredients. Mix well.
Add mayo and gently toss.
add vinegar and lime juice.
salt and pepper. Mix well.
Taste it.
if you want it to have more of an acidy flavor (more bite) add another 1/2 tablespoon vinegar until its where you want it.
Remember that as this sits overnight, the flavors/spice will intensify
