So Much On My Plate – More from New Orleans

Posted on August 10, 2006 by Don Genova

Img_2112 This week So Much On My Plate returned to New Orleans…kind of.  I made a Voodoo shrimp recipe with BC side-stripe prawns and uses my barbecue for a cedar plank variation on the classic Bananas Foster! 

Voodoo Shrimp

I picked up this recipe in New Orleans from chef Duke LoCicero at Café Giovanni.  He and his family are real troopers, recovering from the devastation of Hurricane Katrina in record time.  The restaurant was looted, and they had to clean up $30,000 worth of food that had spoiled in the fridge and freezer due to the power outage.

Anyway, this recipe is great as an appetizer for four people, or serves two as a main course entrée, either on pasta, or with lots of crusty bread to mop up the juices.  I’ve given it a BC twist by using BC side-stripe shrimp, which are in season for most of the summer.  You could use any other large shrimp as a substitute.  Don’t overcook them!

Ingredients:
1 pound side-stripe shrimp, shelled and de-veined if necessary
1/4 cup olive oil
1 tbsp. Cajun spice rub, or other hot spice mixture
1/4 cup butter
2 cloves garlic, chopped
2 medium tomatoes, seeded and diced
1/2 cup Southern Comfort liqueur, in a small heatproof ramekin
1/2 cup sweet Thai chili sauce (available at most Asian markets)
1/4 cup fresh basil leaves, chopped

Pour the olive oil and the Cajun spice over the shrimp and toss to blend well.  Set aside for up to half an hour.

In a heavy skillet on medium-high heat, melt the butter, then add the garlic.  Saute until translucent, then add in the tomatoes and stir.  When the tomatoes soften, add the shrimp mixture and cook the shrimp, stirring, until they just turn opaque.  Pour in the Southern Comfort and, if cooking on a gas stove, tilt the pan slightly into the flame to ignite it and flambé the shrimp.  On an electric stove you can carefully ignite the liqueur with a match.  When the flames burn out, add the Thai chili sauce and the basil leaves.  Stir again to mix well and serve immediately.

Planked Bananas Foster

This recipe is from Ron Shewchuk’s Planking Secrets.  It’s a variation on the classic Bananas Foster recipe invented in New Orleans in the 1950’s.

Ingredients

1 cedar plank, soaked overnight or at least 1 hour
4 ripe but not overripe bananas, peeled, then cut in length halfwise, then cut in half
1/4 cup butter
1 cup brown sugar
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1/4 cup banana liqueur
1/4 cup dark rum in a small bowl or ramekin
4 scoops vanilla ice cream

Preheat your grill on medium-high for 5 or 10 minutes.  Rinse the plank and put it on the cooking grate.  Cover the grill and heat the plank for 4-5 minutes, or until it starts to throw off a bit of smoke and crackles lightly.  Reduce heat to medium.

Put the bananas on the plank, cut side up, and cover the grill.  Cook for 8 to 10 minutes until they are light golden and soft but not mushy.  Remove from plank and set aside.

Combine the butter, sugar and cinnamon in a heavy skillet and heat, stirring, until the sugar dissolves.  Stir in the banana liqueur and transfer the bananas to the skillet.  When the mixture is warm, carefully add the rum.  If you’re cooking on a gas stove, tip the pan slightly to ignite the rum.  On electric, use a barbecue lighter or match to do the same.  Serve hot, placing the bananas on a scoop of ice cream and spooning the sauce over the top.

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Food For Thought – Bar Basics

Posted on August 8, 2006 by Don Genova

Tony_abou_ganim This week on Food For Thought, I talked about how to stock your bar at home, with The Modern Mixologist, Tony Abou-Ganim.  Tony’s website is a great source of some classic recipes, as well as links to other cocktail sites that will give you all the basic information you need (and much more) to set up a bar at home and make almost any kind of cocktail that is out there right now.  To listen to Food For Thought in streaming RealAudio, click here.

Boston_shaker This is the Boston Shaker, the classic mixing device that Tony recommends.  He likes it because you can use the glass as a receptacle for mixing the basics, and the metal part to hold the ice, applying the ice to shake the drink at the last moment.  Just make sure you have a good seal on the shaker before you start shaking!

Threepiece_shakerThis is a three-piece shaker, which most home bartenders use.  Still works just fine, with the strainer built in.

If you use the two-piece, you will need one of two strainers, the Hawthorne or the julep.  The Hawthorne is the first photo, the julep the second.

Hawthorne_strainer  Julepstrainer

Finally, at the bottom of the page, a jigger, used to make measurements, which, as a beginner, you should use, instead of freely pouring by hand.  A cocktail is almost like a baking recipe.  Just a half-ounce too much or too little could really affect the final flavour of the drink.

For more tips, make sure you listen to the program, and visit Tony’s website.  Cheers!Jigger_1   

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Food For Thought – BBQ Part Three

Posted on August 1, 2006 by Don Genova

Bbqqueenslowrescrop This week on Food For Thought, I chatted with the The Barbecue Queens, Karen Adler and Judith Fertig.  Their latest book is Weeknight Grilling with The Barbecue Queens: Making Meals Fast and Fabulous.  You can save 34% off the cover price by clicking on the title and purchasing through Amazon.ca. I also spoke with Anita Stewart, a food activist and cookbook author from Elora, Ontario, about her annual confluence of barbecuing Canadians from around the world and how they take part in this weekend’s ‘The World’s Longest Barbecue’.  Check out the website and send in your story of cooking Canadian food outdoors this weekend and you could win prizes of cookbooks or the grand prize of a brand new Weber gas grill.

To listen to this week’s documentary in streaming RealAudio, click here  . 

This weekend I’ll be at a backyard barbecue on a beautiful piece of property in the Cowichan Valley as chef Bill Jones of Magnetic North Cuisine roasts a whole lamb on an open fire. Check the BBQ section of this blog next week for some pics and a report…and check out the BBQ Queens, they sure were fun to talk with.

Weeknight_grilling

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Crave – Great Addition to Main Street

Posted on July 30, 2006 by Don Genova

Crave_sign A couple of weeks ago I had my first taste of what’s on the menu at Crave, a relatively new restaurant on a section of Vancouver’s rapidly-gentrifying Main Street.

Chef/owner Wayne Martin used to be the executive chef at Vancouver’s Four Seasons Hotel, but this is not a hoity-toity place by any stretch of the imagination, also the food definitely qualifies as high quality.

*disclosure:  I was part of a media dinner held on the back patio, so I did not pay for this meal and the rest of the restaurant was closed, so of course all service was focused on this dinner party.

CraveWayne told us that the next step in his career would have been some other corporate position with the Four Seasons chain, or he could strike out on his own and do whatever he wanted in his new place.  Great decision!

Crave is a real comfort food kind of place, but there are still a few items on the menu that harken back to Wayne’s roots at the Four Seasons, like his ahi tuna tempura roll and Dungeness crab cakes. 

Img_2062 Where the dishes shine include Wayne’s take on some classics such as the Cobb Salad, which in this case was composed in colourful rows of the salad ingredients topped with his buttermilk batter-fried chicken.  I also enjoyed some excellent barbecued pork ribs along with a pulled pork sandwich.  If it’s a nice evening make sure you ask for a table out back on the patio, which has been nicely landscaped and is a real unexpected oasis on that stretch of Main Street just north of King Edward. 

That Main and King Ed neighbourhood was part of my old stomping grounds when I lived on the East Side, and I kind of miss not only the old stalwarts there, such as The Reef, Windsor Meats and Jasmine Halal Meats and Deli, but new entries such as Crave.  Take a stroll in that area and you’ll see what I mean.  It’s no longer fair to call it Vancouver’s Antique Alley, as the modern bistros and shops are starting to eclipsing the old second hand stores and antique shops.

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So Much On My Plate – New Orleans

Posted on July 27, 2006 by Don Genova

Muffaletta_sign This week on So Much On My Plate, some culinary highlights of my visit last week to New Orleans, including the legendary Muffuletta sandwich.  These sandwiches are made on a round loaf of Italian bread, piled high with cold cuts and a special olive spread.  The Central Grocery Company, established in 1906 in New Orleans, purports to be the home of ‘the original’ muffuletta.  Whether that’s true or not I don’t know, but I liked the sandwiches there enough to buy two of them!

Muffuletta_cut Here’s how I tried to recreate the sandwich at home, you can certainly play with the ingredients to taste:

Ingredients:

1 cup pitted Greek olives, chopped

1 cup pimento-stuffed green olives, chopped

2 cups Italian pickled vegetables, sometimes called giardiniere, larger bits chopped

1 small jar capers, drained

1 tsp. black pepper

1/2 cup olive oil

Combine all ingredients and refrigerate for at least 24 hours before using.

For each sandwich, you need the following:

1 Italian bun, cut in half

slices of mozzarella and provolone cheese

sliced ham, Genoa salami and mortadella salami

Put one layer of each meat on the bottom half of the bun.  Top with one layer of each cheese, then put another layer of all the meats on top of the cheese.  Top with a generous helping of the olive spread and top with the upper half of the bun.  These sandwiches are better if you let them sit for a bit, so wrap tightly in waxed paper and refrigerate to help the sandwich hold its shape when you eat it.

(but take it out of the waxed paper!)

The cocktail I made today is called the Sazerac, a classic from New Orleans. You can read about the history here, and get the recipe here. It calls for absinthe, which is now legal to buy in Canada, but you can use something like pernod or sambuca instead.

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Food For Thought – BBQ Part Two

Posted on July 25, 2006 by Don Genova

Planking_secrets_1_2 This week on Food For Thought, Part Two of my Barbecue series, featuring Ron Shewchuk’s latest book, Planking Secrets.  If you click on the link, it will take you to amazon.ca, where you will save 24 percent off the cover price of the book.   I’ve tried a couple of recipes out of this book, and I love Ronnie’s treatment of cedar-planked pork tenderloin with rosemary and garlic.  See the recipe and all of its variations below.  Last night I tried another recipe from the book, planked steak!  I didn’t have all the exact ingredients called for, but a little bit of ad libbing and the top sirloin I used turned out just fine.

Img_2160 The steaks were marinated in soya, rice vinegar, ginger, garlic, onion, honey and hot sauce.  First you put them on the grill for a couple of minutes on each side so you get some nice caramelization going, then put them on to your soaked plank for another 15 minutes or so for medium-rare.  In the meantime, you’ve taken the marinade and brought it to the boil,

Img_2162 then reduced it to a simmer to thicken it a little.

The resultant sauce is quite spicy and tangy.  If you want to listen to this week’s mini-documentary, the streaming RealAudio is here .

Bbq_secrets_1 If you don’t think you want an entire cookbook of planking recipes, I also recommend Ron’s first book, Barbecue Secrets.  It covers a much wider variety of topics, but also has some planking recipes.

Now, here is Ron’s planked pork tenderloin recipe, reproduced here with his permission:

Planks and Pork Tenderloin: the Perfect Marriage

When I set out to research this book I knew that planking worked great for fish and for summer fruits like peaches and pears, but I had no idea what a perfect match this cooking style is for pork tenderloin. These little cylinders of tender, juicy pork are a staple of Chinese cooking and are great on the grill, but they are ideally suited to planking. Their size allows 2 or 3 to fit nicely on a plank, and they have just the right amount of surface area to cook quickly without losing moisture. They go with all flavors of smoke, from cedar to mesquite. And they take to marinades and rubs extremely well. Here are some basic techniques and a little collection of ideas for how to flavor pork tenderloin, but use your imagination and experiment with your favorite rubs, marinades and basting sauces.

Technique:

1.   Marinate and/or rub the tenderloin and have it ready to go before you start the grill. (Three tenderloins is usually enough for 4 servings.)

2.   Preheat the grill on medium-high for 5 or 10 minutes or until the chamber temperature rises above 500°F/260°C. Rinse the plank (which you’ve soaked in water overnight or for at least an hour) and place it on the cooking grate. Cover the grill and heat the plank for 4 or 5 minutes, or until it’s starting to throw off a bit of smoke and crackling lightly.

3.   Reduce the heat to medium and place the tenderloin on the plank. Cook for 10 minutes, turn, and cook for another 5 to10 minutes, basting if you like, until the pork is springy to the touch or has an internal temperature of 140°F/60°C. (This will give you juicy pork cooked to a medium doneness. The internal temperature will come up slightly when you let the meat rest.)

4.   If you like, just before it’s ready you can move the tenderloin from the plank onto the cooking grate and char the outside, or caramelize it if it’s coated with barbecue sauce.

5.   Take the tenderloin out of the grill, tent it in foil, and let it rest for a few minutes before serving. Carve the tenderloin into 1/2- to 1-inch/1- to 2.5-cm medallions and apply whatever sauce or garnish is called for.

Tasty Tenderloin Treatments (the recipes for all the rubs, sauces and marinades mentioned below are in Planking Secrets, but you can substitute your favorite versions):

Classic Barbecue: Coat with ballpark mustard, sprinkle with Championship Barbecue Rub. Cook on a hickory plank till nearly done and finish with a light glaze of Ron’s Rich, Deeply Satisfying Barbecue Sauce. Serve more sauce on the side for dipping.

Easy Asian: Marinate with Easiest, Tastiest Steak (or Anything Else) Marinade and finish with a coating of Asian Barbecue Sauce.

Spice-Crusted: Season with salt and pepper, drizzle with oil and coat with minced garlic, toasted fennel and cumin seeds, and a little cinnamon.  Serve with chopped cilantro and your favorite chutney.

Balsamic: Coat with balsamic reduction. Marinate overnight. Sprinkle on some chopped fresh rosemary and granulated garlic. Serve with a drizzle of the balsamic reduction and some chopped fresh mint.

Harvest Time: Season with salt and pepper and coat with a rub made with light brown sugar, powdered ginger, a sprinkle of freshly grated nutmeg, a pinch of clove and a little cayenne pepper. Baste with melted apple jelly and serve with Plank-Baked Apples with Rum-Honey Sauce.

Southwestern: Flavor using the same seasonings as Spice-Crusted Pork Blade Steaks and serve with some salsa and cornbread.

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