Tony's Food 101: Improving and Inventing Cocktails

Hi guys and gals,

Things have been wildly busy lately, with one of our residents out on medical leave, medically leaving the rest of us to shoulder his calls. I did get out of the hospital recently, for a cocktail holiday party at my best friend's house. The premise was great: everybody dressed in sports coats ties and dresses, with a huge assortment of liquor with mixers left on ice, and some pretty interesting cocktail recipes framed on the wall above. The guests were hesitant at first, making slow circles around the bottles, except me. I dove right in, egg in hand, and whipped up a Ramos Gin Fizz for my girlfriend. After that, all sorts of drinks were flying off the bar and into the eagerly waiting hands of party guests. A couple of things needed to be tweaked here and there (especially with the more complicated libations like the Ramos), so I had to do some quick thinking on my feet. An altered Ramos recipe is below, as well as an off-the-cuff cocktail present for the party's hostess, who's a die-hard amaretto fan.

The Ramos Sans Flowers
Not having an ethnic grocery store near his house, we didn't have any access to orange flower water, an arguably essential ingredient to the Ramos Gin Fizz. We made due with some substitutes, or equally incredible results:

• 2 oz gin. I like New Amsterdam in this one because of it's great citrus notes (plus the architectural bottle looks impressive on a home bar).
• 1/2 oz. lemon juice
• 1/2 oz. lime juice
• 1/4 oz triple-sec
• 1/2 oz orange juice
• 1/2 oz. St. Germaine (which everyone at the party is now officially obsessed with).
• 1 egg white
• 1 oz. heavy cream

Combine all ingredients, more or less in that order (but definitely cream last due to the acids in the citrus juices) in a cocktail shaker with ice. Shake until your arms literally hurt. The key is to get a huge amount of delicious foam on the top of the drink. Pour into a tall glass then add club soda until the foam rises to the very very edge of the glass, then enjoy. As an aside, a bartender once told me that this drink tastes like "lemonade and a creamsicle making sweet love."

The Christmas Cookie

This was my small gift to the party's hostess, who loves amaretto. She is also very much a franophile, so the inclusion of two wonderful french liquors was an added bounus.

• 2 oz. Domaine de Canton ginger liquer.
• 1 oz. amaretto
• 1/2 oz. St. Germaine
• 1/2 oz. heavy cream

Shake with ice until creamy and foamy, and strain into a martini class. It could be garnished with one of those Pirouette cookies that are ubiquitous around the holidays.

I will try to post more now that things are slowing down, I hope everyone enjoys their holidays and has a great New Year!

Tony's Food 101: Pot Roast for a Hard Rotation (or Busy Work Week)

It's no secret that I haven't been particularly good about posting lately, and it's primarily because of a rough month on the Stroke team in September and a deadlines for AAN 2011 abstract submissions in October (along with my annual pilgrimage/vacation to Burlington, VT and a houswarming party to throw). So what's a busy resident to do, balancing service requirements, studying, social life and a stalwart dedication to cooking at home as much as possible? Well, as the weather cools down, the answer is simple: the crock pot.

If you don't own one, go and buy or order one right now. I'm not even kidding. They don't cost more than $30 and they accomplish two amazing things:

1) They do all the actual cooking for you while you're at work - all you do is throw ingredients in and turn it on. It's also nearly impossible to burn anything in a crockpot, so no worries there.
2) They cook things at a very low temperature for a very long time - delicate flavors are preserved and overall the flavor of a dish has hours to develop.

This allows busy people to make amazing things to eat without dedicating more than 15 minutes in the kitchen. It also allows said busy people to cut down on all the salt and fat and preservatives they would otherwise be dragooned into eating from prepared foods. I tend to view crockpot-type foods as more seasonal for fall and winter (e.g. roasts, hearty stews), but there's no reason not to haul out this ceramic wonder May through August. Here's a super fast, amazing technique for pot roast that I developed in medical school and perfected for busy service months.

Crock-Pot Pot-Roast

• A 3-5 pound beef round or chuck roast.
• Two large onions, cut into 1/4 inch thick rounds or half-rounds.
• Two cloves of garlic, smashed.
• Whole seasonal fresh herbs (I like sage or rosemary in the colder months).
• Coarse salt and cracked black pepper to taste.

Ok, this is really, really easy. Put the onions and garlic in the bottom of the crock pot in the morning before you leave for work (you can cut everything up the night before, if you're not up on your knife skills). Rub the roast with salt and pepper and plop it down on top of the onions. I find that if there's a fatty side, putting that up works best. Throw your herbs on top. Cover and turn on low. (In the past, I've tried turning it on high for an hour and then turning it down: This makes no difference). Go to work. Come home to find a tender, flavorful roast sitting in a ton of jus. You will have leftovers (it makes an awesome sandwich with horseradish sauce). I store it in a tupperware with the jus in it, this will keep it from drying out, and you can just microwave the whole thing to re-live your home-cook-rock-star dinner on another late night later that week.

I will try to post more often, I have some pretty good material lined up for November.

Why You Should Buy Eggs From Local Farms

Read this report from the inspectors from one of the farms involved in the recent egg recall and see if you are persuaded to switch to eggs laid by cage-free local chickens, regardless of price. Even before the recall, I had started buying eggs from the farm that we belong to for our CSA and this recall only helped me confirm the wisdom of my choice.

Summer Semester '10: Ceviche

Ceviche is one of those foods that, in the same vein as sushi, a good number of people are deathly afraid of because it is not cooked with heat. Unfortunately, even in this day an age, well past the days of cholera and dysentery here in the US, infectious diseases and food bourne illnesses are a very real concern. While it is true that raw and undercooked foods present a higher risk for carrying food bourne illnesses than their well-done counterparts, I've always found it fascinating that people don't think to ask about where their food is coming from as an indicator of how likely it is to be contaminated. Admittedly, I've been on a big Omnivore's Dilemma kick (only fueled by my girlfriend getting me Animal Vegetable Miracle for my birthday this year). Just this past week, 380 million eggs were recalled from an Iowa concentrated animal feeding operation (CAFO) because of salmonella outbreaks. To bring this post back to blog relevance, this is why I bought the fish for this following recipe for ceviche from my local Whole Foods. Sure it was more expensive, but at least it came with some token knowledge of where regionally the fish was caught or farmed, and something about the farming practices of the specific place (no hormones, antibiotics, et cetera). Sure there were people who didn't want to eat it, just for what it was, but out of everyone who did at the large cookout I prepared it at, not a single person got ill.



I became hooked on ceviche years ago, and recently got one of my friends hooked too. In fact, we actually cleaned out our cruise ship's supply of it back during our last vacation in April. It was being offered as a free appetizer at the ship's wine bar, and his wife and my girlfriend didn't even get to try any after we were through! Although there are many, many variations (some local and some more progressive-chef-creative), it really couldn't be a simpler formula:



Fresh Fish + Citrus Acid + Salt + Time = Ceviche



Of course, there are some other wonderful additions like chiles, garlic, herbs, tomatoes and garnishes, but I will leave those at your discretion. As it is served cold, I prefer it as a summer dish.



Simple Ceviche

• About one pound of fresh, high quality, preferably organic, preferably local (to increase freshness) seafood (Figure 387.a). Previously frozen isn't ideal, but it is acceptable. I've used sea bass, scallops, snapper, shrimp ... really any solid, meaty seafood or shell fish. Avoid flakier and more delicate stuff like tilapia. You want something that will hold it's shape after 3-4 hours of marinating in a relatively strong acid.

Figure 387. a - Big Fish.

• One to one and half cups of freshly squeezed citrus acid. Lime is classic, but I've recently used a combination of lime and grapefruit to good effect. Strain it to make sure mostly all of the pulp is removed (figure 387.b)

Figure 387.b - A combination of lime and grapefruit juice. I wish I had tested the pH for nerdiness' sake.

• A teaspoon of salt. Feel free to omit this right away and sprinkle it on later. You can also use more interesting salts post-hoc in this way as both a flavoring and a garnish, like Himalayan pink salt, Maldon salt, black salt, et cetera.
• One or two hot chili peppers to taste.
• A big bunch of cilantro, de-stemmed and chopped.
• A clove of finely chopped garlic.
• Garnishes like match-stick cut mango and super thinly sliced spanish (red) onion or sweet onion.

Toss all the ingredients together in a non-reactive (read: not plastic, not metal - glass) bowl. Keep it cool and allow it to marinate for 3-4 hours. The acids in the marinade will actually denature the proteins in the fish as heat would, leaving you with super tasty fish with a cooked texture. Serve with whatever garnishes you like, and if bringing it outdoors, put the glass bowl inside another bowl with ice and water to keep it cool.

Figure 387.c. - Please note how unreactive the bowl is.

Figure 387.d - The finished product, ravaged by party-goers.

Sorry that I haven't been posting as regularly as I'd like to, my girlfriend and I took the big step and moved in together, and two apartments worth of unpacking (and my other birthday gift, Red Dead Redemption) have been keeping me pretty occupied. I'll figure out something to post next week.

Summer Semester '10: Catch of the Day

Sorry for the lack of updates, I recently moved and my computer is busted. I'm stealing a little time away from work, believe it or not, to chip away at this update I've been meaning to post for a few weeks now.

So this is something I really enjoy: deep sea fishing. I went a couple of times back in medical school for various friends' bachelor parties, and then I just went again recently. We mostly fish for striped bass (a.k.a striper, rock fish) in the North Atlantic. Once, we went on an all day trip, but forgot to bring anything but beer. That was entertaining. My personal favorite part of the trip is bringing home filet upon filet of awesome fish. The last time we went, we also caught some blue fish, which I found infinitely more flavorful, but much smaller than the striper.

Being known to experiment with food and having a huge glut of striper filets to experiment with, here's something that I came up with that works really well. You can certainly buy the fish in a market rather than catching it yourself, but for some reason, it may not taste as good. Use panko bread crumbs - this will give the outside of crispy texture that regular bread crumbs won't give you.

Panko and Spice Encrusted Sea Bass

• One or two whole filets of striped bass (0r blue fish), cut into portions.
• As much flour as you need for dredging (probably about a cup per 2 lb of fish). I initially used all purpose flour, but I've recently found that whole wheat flour works better.
• Pick your favorite spice or spice mix and get about 1-2 tsp of it. I've used cajun blend, smoked paprika and chinese five-spice so far. Mix it in well with the flour.
• One egg per pound of filet, beaten.
• One cup of panko bread crumbs per filet.
• (optional) A small bunch of flat leaf italian parsley, stemmed and chopped fine, mixed in with the panko.

In three seperate bowls, prepare your flour and spice dredge, your beaten eggs and your panko, with our without herbs (Figure 17.x). Start some olive oil (or cooking spray) in a flat skillet on medium heat. Dredge your fish portions in flour, then egg, then panko in that order. Make sure every surface of the fish is coated at each step. Toss into the pan, and cook for about 5-10 minutes per side, depending on thickness. Flip only once, when the fish releases easily from the bottom of the pan (Figure 17.z). Enjoy!

Figure 17.x - Flour, then egg, then panko.

Figure 17.z - Fish in action!

Next update (hopefully next week once I get my computer fixed... Geek Squad here I come) will be another fish dish... a little more fresh and a little less wild. The fish, I mean. Not the dish.

Rhubarb Errata

I recently tried adding a dash of aromatic bitters to each of these drinks, and it really changes their flavor. I highly suggest it. I've been using good ol' Angostura bitters right along in cocktails, but I recently also picked up a bottle Fee Brother's Whiskey Barrel Aged Bitters, which are amazing. Both are great, although I would stay away from fruit-based bitters, as they really detract from the rhubarb's flavor.

Summer Semester '10: The Last of the Rhubarb

I've never really interacted with rhubarb on any level prior to this year, now that my girlfriend and I have joined a local community supported agriculture farm (CSA). My grandfather never grew it in his garden (at least, during my 28 years eating from it), and my mom, never one to whip up pies, cakes, or other desserts without a good reason, never baked with it. I would walk by it in the grocery store every year and turn up my nose at what I thought was pretty much equivalent to ugly red celery.

One of the joys of participating in a CSA is that you never know what you're going to get in your share. For 3 weeks now, we've gotten big bundles of rhubarb (see figure 19.i). My girlfriend took some, promising to make jam or a cobbler or something. The problem is, she's away at her family's summer beach cottage while I'm stuck here working over night shifts every four nights or so while the new residents "acclimate" to the hospital (I swear, they get softer on the new neurology residents in my program every year). I was also stuck with this week's rhubarb, which is apparently the last of the season. A quick search on my go-to food resource CHOW.com showed me a neat little trick to do with the scarlet stalks - rhubarb syrup. And thus, as a welcome back surprise for my girlfriend, the Rhubarb Basil Martini was born. Then along came it's younger brother, the Rhubarb Gin Fizz.

Figure 19.i - A quick before-and-after shot.

Rhubarb Basil Martini

• 1/2 oz. of rhubarb syrup - recipe linked above
• 1 & 1/2 oz. of vodka
• 1/2 oz. of dry white vermouth [note: we ran out of dry vermouth and tried using sweet red vermouth, and the drink came out disgusting. I do not suggest this substitution.]
• 6-7 small basil leaves, and one large basil leaf for garnish.

Place the basil leaves in your cocktail shaker, then add ample amounts of ice. Pour the liquors and syrup over the ice and basil, cover and shake. Strain into a martini glass and garnish with one large basil leaf.

Rhubarb Gin Fizz

• 3/4 to 1 oz. rhubarb syrup, depending on how sweet you want your drink.
• 1 & 1/2 oz. of gin. I have a bias towards Henricks, which I think a) is one of the smoothest gins on the market, and b) just feels right in a quirky drink like this one.
• Ice.
• Club soda.

Pour the syrup and gin over the ice in a rocks glass, fill to the top with club soda and give it a gentle stir.

Enjoy! Next week, we'll look at my #1 favorite thing to do after a deep sea fishing trip with my buddies (other than sober up and maybe take a nap).

Summer Semester '10: Squash Flowers are in Season

Figure 46.u - Behold, the mighty squash flower!

Squash blossoms are what I consider the ultimate seasonal food. Unlike even the venerable pomegranate (formerly only available around Thanksgiving, now seen in grocery stores year-round) you can only get squash flowers over a few weeks at the end of spring and the beginning of summer.

I'm lucky enough to have a family friend who sends me a beach-ball sized bag every year.

These edible flowers have a taste that's unlike anything else like them. They are very un-floral in taste, and not perfume-y at all. They have a very delicate, vegetal flavor with just a slight sweetness. So, what do you do with them? Traditionally, they are dredged or battered and fried. I have seen them on restaurant menus stuffed with cheese. When I get sick of frying them, I've been known to top pizzas with them, and I'm thinking about baking them into a quickbread in lieu of regular zucchini. My mom recently made a frittata (read: thick italian omlette) out of them, and it was better than a regular zucchini frittata she made the same day.

If you happen to have your own squash plants, make sure you only pick the male flowers, which grow on long stems. The female ones will eventually develop into the actual squash itself. Don't pick too many at once, or there won't be enough male flowers around to pollinate all the female flowers in the first place.

Traditional Squash Flowers

• As many male squash flowers as you can get your hands on, long stems removed. Leave the green leafy part at the bottom, though.
• A glass pie plate full of all purpose flower
• Another glass pie plate with 5-6 eggs, cracked and whipped up with a fork.
• Vegetable oil for frying.
• Salt to taste

Wash each flower thoroughly, making sure to rinse out inside the petals, as ants and other critters may have haplessly fallen in. Dredge each flower first in flour then in egg and fry at medium heat. Flip once, when golden brown. Remove to a plate lined with paper towels to absorb any extra oil, salt to taste and eat hot. In my house, these never make it farther than the paper towels, never mind a serving plate.

Figure 46.v. - Ready to eat, hot out of the pan.

Next week we have a cool dish for a hot night.

Summer Semester '10: Summer Reading List

Recommended:

"Ratio" by Michael Ruhlman – This book goes beyond just bread. It breaks any and all baked goods, as well as some sauces and other dishes, into simple ingredient ratios that can then be infinitely varied upon without any further help from the book (i.e. without recipes). This book comes the closest to how I cook for myself: I use a somewhat set number of techniques and vary ingredients to accomplish the dishes and flavors I want.

"Zingerman's Guide to Good Eating" by Ari Weinzweig – This book is broken down by ingredient, and tells you how to buy and use the highest quality items in each category (i.e. cheeses, spices, meats, grains).

"Omnivore's Dilemma" by Michael Pollen – This book will present a very different view of mass-market food, especially processed and prepared foods than what the marketing that surrounds us does. The best part is, that Mr. Pollen does it in a non-preachy, non-judgmental way. He understands why some people need to buy cheap, high calorie, low quality food, but he also understands the consequences.

"My Bread" by Jim Lahey - Previously covered in the course "Other People's Food 101." Will give you the tools you need to make amazing bread with relatively little work, and includes many variations on the basic loaf of bread. Also includes other savory baked goods.

(Optional):

"Heat" by Bill Buford – A cautionary tale of what happens to a journalist/amateur home cook when he decides to join the world of professional chefs and kitchen staff.

Tony's Food 101: Pork for a Party

I know I was initially going to post a recipe inspired by me watching both seasons of HBO's Rome, but I got a request for something I served up at a small dinner party at my place a while back. It's a tasty way to cook up a pork loin. I like to buy one of those HUGE ones at the grocery store (or your local whole-sale warehouse store), then cut it down the middle and freeze half. Feel free to pick up one of the smaller ones, but know that you'll pay $2-4 more per pound. This particular recipe is cooked like an Italian porchetta, but with a filling similar to my mom's braciola.

Stuffed Pork Loin

• Half of a large pork loin, roughly 5-6 lbs. There's a few butcher-type tricks you'll have to pull with this piece of meat, described below.
• Two big bunches of parsley from the grocery store, stems mostly removed.
• An entire bulb of garlic, all papery peel removed.
• About a quarter pound of Parmaggiano-Reggiano cheese coarsely diced.
• Black pepper, coarse salt and olive oil in sufficient amounts to lightly coat the outside of the pork loin.
• (Optional) Adding fennel seeds to the garlic/parsley/cheese filling will make this more like a true porchetta.
• (Optional) Feel free to add an herb blend (herbs de provence, italian seasoning, et cetera) to the pepper/salt/oil coating.
• It's not edible, but you will need about 2 feet of clean twine.

Preheat your oven to 475 degrees. Take your pork loin, and score the fat along the side of it into a diamond pattern. There's an easy way to stuff this baby, and a hard way. For the easy way, cut it lengthwise like a baguette and put the fillings in the middle. For the hard way, make a shallow cut in the same area, open it up, and then keep making a shallow cut in the same area until you have a large, flat piece of pork (that you will later roll back up into a pin wheel). Once you have your pork loin open, sprinkle the fillings in an even layer over the flat surface. Roll it up and secure it in three places with twine. Cover the outside of the loin with the pepper, oil and salt. Place on that roasting pan that came with your oven - the one with the slotted metal part that fits over the deeper roasting pan. As soon as you put it in the oven, decrease the heat to 350 degrees. Cook for 2 1/2 hours, then make sure to have the pork rest for 10-20 minutes after you take it out of the oven. Slice into thick or thin slabs (remove the twine first) and serve.

I will try to update more frequently, I'll be making up a bunch of new recipes with the random greenery the CSA my girlfriend and I joined sends me.

Tony's Food 101: Asparagus is in Season

That's right, everyone's favorite tender, spear shaped veggie is back on the markets again.

It seems like a paradox to me how vegetables can be unhealthy, but the recent bacon craze is aparently trying to bring asparagus down too. Restaurants across the U.S. will be wrapping asparagus spears in all sorts of cured pork products, making them more like cholesterol rockets aimed right at your arteries. I'm not saying that it's not a brilliant combination, as far as taste goes, I'm just proposing a healthier, markedly lighter alternative for this veggie. Bacon wrapped asparagus just reminds me too much of Paula Deen ruining ears of corn (As a physician, I'm always puzzled as to how her heart is still beating. This is the woman who made a hamburger and used krispy kreme donuts as buns).

Likewise, a slightly more healthy way to cook this spring favorite is grilling, which is also delicious, but cannot get around the universal 120-calories-per-tablespoon-of-oil necessary to keep them from turning into carbon tubes over those charcoals. It's waaaaay better for you then wrapping them in prosciutto, but those of us still trying to shed some winter weight may want an alternative.

Enter steamed asparagus. I know, I know: Just like a doctor to tell you to steam vegetables and take away everyone's fun. These are different, and they use a little trick I figured out to add extra flavor without altering the nutritional value of the asparagus: Lemon Steaming. And, I am a cook too... this recipe needs a little salt added.

Lemon Steamed Asparagus

• One bunch of asparagus. Take your pick whether you get the pencil thin or big fat ones, just know it will affect your cooking time. Wider asparagus = longer cooking. Wash them, then snap them about two thirds from the head. This gets rid of the woody, impossible to actually eat stems. If you just bend the asparagus in this region, it will naturally snap where the stem gets too tough.


• One lemon, sliced into disks.


• Black pepper and salt to taste.

Pre-heat your oven to Bake 350. Line the bottom of a glass 8x8 or 9x9 square dish with lemon slices. Arrange the asparagus in as close to a single layer over the lemons as possible. Season with salt and pepper. Cover the whole thing tightly with tin foil, and put in the oven. Leave in for about 20-25 minutes if you like your aspargus crisp, or 30-35 minutes if you like it "well done." You should be able to smell the asparagus and lemons around your oven. Discard the lemons and eat.

So. You're done with dinner. A commercial comes on during your favorite show. You trot over to the bathroom, unzip and let g.... wait a minute? What the heck is that smell?

Congratulations. You've discovered the downside to eating asparagus, and you're also sort of genetically special. Sort of. There are two different genes floating around in your cells: one to excrete an unidentified compound from asparagus into your urine, and another to be able to detect the smell. So you're in a group of 20-40% of people with this combination. It won't get you into the X-Men or Heroes, but hey, it's something.

Be back next week with some Reconstructionist cuisine... yes I am that nerdy. Sorry about the lack of real pictures, my digital camera bit the proverbial dust. I'll try to con my girlfriend into letting me borrow her's.

Other People's Food 101: The Bread that Changed Everything

Remember how in my first few posts, I pretty much said I hate baking.


I still do. I just hate it a lot less, and it's fully because of this book:

Figure 17.B-2 If I had a summer reading list for you guys, this would be on it... that gives me an idea for a post!

I've been churning out loaf upon loaf of crusty, flavorful bread with a soft, tender crumb that would impress even the octogenarian Italian bakers back home. I'm happy to provide you guys with the formula and technique for this little food revolution, courtesy of the man who wrote the book:

Sullivan St. Bakery Bread Recipe - This is a little bit modified than the original technique in My Bread, but it's the same principle. Plus, I'm not breaking any copyright laws by posting this link.

A couple caveats: 1) although it may look cumbersome and drawn out (particuarly the 18 hour rising time), this recipe is stunningly easy. You mostly ignore the bowl of dough on the counter and go about your normal life while it does it's own thing, then chuck it in the oven for less than an hour. 2) I use a plain, seasoned cast iron pot like is shown on the cover of My Bread, primarily because I can't afford the Le Crueset he recommends. Plain cast iron, well cared for, works fine.

Tony's Food 201: Epic Ribs

I love everything about ribs.

I love the tenderness of the slow cooked, marbled meat. I love the smoky-grilly flavor. I love the satisfaction felt by tearing meat from the bone with the incisors and canines we evolved for that express purpose.

So of course, I had to tackle making them myself. This particular series of experiments started in medical school, and I've repeated it four or five times since, under varying conditions and sometimes with varying out comes. I made them once at my girlfriend's father's 60th birthday cook out, on his smoker. Little did I know, the birthday boy over did it on the charcoal and the grill heated to 600 degrees, during the "slow cooking" phase of the recipe. Apparently it was better than the last time he used the smoker, as one party-goer told me, when he got it up to temperature that actually made the paint on outside of it boil.

The biggest set back in creating this recipe was moving to place where state law doesn't allow gas or electric grills on balconies. I've since successfully modified the overall technique to take advantage of ovens. They come out almost as good as on the grill. I'm proud to say I figured out this whole recipe on my own, with out looking at any references for ideas. Also posted is my recipe for barbecue sauce, which co-developed with the rib recipe. Feel free to use regular old barbecue sauce from a bottle, though. Trader Joe's makes a good Kansas City style sauce.

Tony's Epic Ribs, On the Grill

• Enough hickory or mesquite wood chunks to cover the bottom of either a charcoal or gas grill. Soak them in water for an hour or two before putting them on the grill. The chips will burn up too quickly, the chunks will last long enough to smoke your ribs.
• 3-4 bone-in beef ribs per person you want to feed. I have yet to use pork ribs, but I guess you could substitute those if you can't find beef. This recipe probably won't work with boneless ribs, by the way, although feel free to try.
• 1/2 cup of barbecue sauce per serving of ribs, plus extra to serve the ribs with after they're done cooking. My personal, homemade sauce recipe to follow.

For gas grills, arrange the soaked wood chunks along the bottom of the grill, and turn all burners on to low heat. Since this technique requires a drastic temperature change to finish the ribs, it's a little bit trickier for charcoal grills. You want to set it up so that your coals are only on one side of the grill. This will give you a "hot zone" and a "cool zone," arrange your wood chunks over the embers one one side. Place the ribs on the one the grill (over the "cool zone" on charcoal grills) and allow them to slowly smoke for over 2 hours. The longer you let this process go, the more tender your ribs will be. After they're cooked through and tender, either turn up the heat on the gas grill or transfer them to the "hot zone" of your charcoal grill. Slather them with barbecue sauce and let it bake/glaze on, about 20-30 minutes. Serve them with extra sauce and let your inner carnivore loose.

Oven Variant

This variation involves the same principle as above: slow cooking the meat to tenderness, then adding sauce and turning the heat way up. You won't have the advantage of adding extra flavor from hickory or mesquite wood though, so make sure you choose a sauce with enough smoke to make up for it. Use the same ingredients as above (minus the wood, of course). Place the ribs into a 250 degree oven for two hours. At this point, you can even take the pan out, cover it, and finish them later in the day if you're crunching on time, or traveling for a cookout. Once they're tender and cooked through, add your sauce and turn up the heat to 475. Let the sauce glaze on for 20-30 minutes. Again, you could potentially slow cook these bad boys in the oven first, then bring them to some one's house for a cookout and impress your friends after finishing them off on the grill.

The Barbecue Sauce Formula

I don't know that my barbecue sauce mimics a certain "style." There are tomato elements in there, so I guess if anything it would be a Western or Southwestern style of sauce.

• 1/2 can of chipotles in adobo (use about 1/2 of the chilies in the can and 1/2 of the adobo sauce).
• One large raw yellow or white onion, chopped.
• 1/3 cup of molasses, preferably blackstrap.
• 3 tbs. olive oil
• 3 tbs. tomato ketchup
• 2 tbs. Worcestershire sauce
• 1 tsp. smoked paprika
• black pepper and salt to taste.

Blend these all together. I use my immersion blender, less cleanup. Feel free to adjust any of the individual ingredients for individual taste, or to balance the tastes in the sauce. You ultimately want a sauce that is sweetand smoky, and just a little bit tangy. The olive oil will give it a good, rich mouthfeel, but won't majorly contribute to the flavor.

Tony's Drink 101: The Legend of the Beer Margarita

It all started in fourth year medical school. Some of you may be (or have been) fourth year medical students, so you know that much like during your senior years of high school and/or college, you're sitting pretty. Well, I happened to be sitting pretty in my apartment, flipping through the channels, when I started watching Knocked Up. Not realizing that this is the second worst movie ever (the worst being one I was forced to sit through by my high school friends), I quickly turned it off and went down by the apartment complex pool. A friend and fellow medical student was there, so we shot the shit for the rest of the afternoon. Later, he and his girlfriend (yet another medical student) invited me over for pulled pork and margaritas.

This is where the revelation of the Beer Margarita began.

That's right. A margarita that contains beer. It may sound disgusting, but trust me on this one: As long as you use the right beer (certainly no porters or stouts), these are crisp, refreshing and lack the sticky-sweetness that you get with most commercial mixes. I have been making them regularly for a variety of events, not limited to nights when my girlfriend and I make burritos, or my residency program's "Annual International Guacamole Competition," and they are always wildly popular.

Beer Margaritas

• One can of frozen Limeade concentrate
• Tequila
• Triple Sec (or Grand Marnier)
• One 12 oz. bottle of beer. I usually use Corona, Coronal Light or Bud Light with Lime. Any lightly colored beer is great in this mix, but feel free to experiment. A few microbreweries make raspberry or blueberry lagers that I can imagine would taste pretty good.
  

Dump the frozen concentrate into a pitcher. Fill the empty can all the way with tequila, and add it into the pitcher. Fill the empty can half way with triple sec and pour it on in. Finally, pour in your beer and give it a gentle stir to make sure the concentrate is dissolved - don't stir too much or you'll flatten the carbonation added by the beer. Pour over ice and enjoy!

Support for Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution

You may have seen Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution - a new show where the celebrity chef takes on America's "Unhealthiest City." Turns out that this is more than just a TV show. The British Celebrity Chef is compiling a poll to be sent to President Obama to show that Americans want healthier food, both at home and in their schools. Here's the link to sign his petition, or even donate to the campaign if you'd like to:

Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution Petition

And for those of you practicing evidence-based medici...er... support, here's an article from a British News site outlining Jamie's success in his homeland, specifically boosting grades and decreasing abseteeism in the schools he worked with.

Jamie Oliver's school dinners shown to have improved academic results

Next article is actually going to be a recipe for something markedly less healthy than Mr. Oliver is suggesting.

Tony's Food 101: Basic Technique for Leafy Greens

Maybe you belong to a community supported agriculture (CSA) farm, and just got a bushell of big, tough green leaves. Maybe your next door neighbor is an organic gardening enthusiast with a little too much yield this season. Maybe you read the latest Jamie Oliver book, went out and bought 5 heads of Italian Black Kale and you have no idea what to do with the remaining three or four. There is a simple answer to each of these questions, and it's right on the other side of a pot of boiling water.

Yup. Boil 'em... just not for British amounts of time. Quickly boiling any leafy green vegetable is an easy and healthy way to serve this particular class of food. Now, I'm not disregarding some tried and true recipes involving leafy greens - I am a New Englander, after all (just like this guy). Some of them aren't necessarily the fastest.... and some of them involve large amounts of salted animal fats. The best part about this way of cooking leafy greens is that the actual cooking process is fast and doesn't leave much time for the nutrients these bad boys contain to leech into the water they're cooked in. It also leaves (bu-dum-shinnnng) alot of flavor behind, too.

Flash-boiled greens

• One head of leafy greens for every two people you want to serve. Swiss chard, mustard greens, beet tops, non-baby spinach, kale, dinosaur kale, or any others are perfectly acceptable. Being largely a purist, I leave collard greens and cabbage to the professionals. Wash them well, as sometimes they're a little too farm fresh.
• Good, pungent extra-virgin olive oil. You're not cooking it, per se, so haul out the first-press, unfiltered Italian import you've been keeping in a cool, dark place for just such an occasion.
• A pinch of salt. You don't really need more than this. Don't salt the water either. I don't think I need to go on that tangent again, after the recent national media frenzy.
• Fresh ground black pepper, to taste.
• Either one of three things - A lemon, a pinch of nutmeg, or a whole garlic clove. More on this later.

Fill a stock pot or kettle with water and bring it to a boil (keeping it covered really does make it go faster). Make sure it's at a full, rolling boil. Put the water on as the very very first step of making dinner. As it's heating up, do all the other stuff you need to do, the water will take a little while.

If you picked garlic from the above list, find whatever bowl you're going to serve your greens in. Cut your garlic clove in half and rub the inside of the bowl with the cut half of the garlic. This will scent the greens, but not make you the least popular person at work the next day.

Dunk your leaves in and give them a swirl with a pair of tongs. Watch them closely. They will start to become limp, you don't want them too soft. When they're cooked to a tenderness you happen to like (I tend on the undercooked side out of personal preference), tong them out of the pot and into a collander. Shake them a few times to drain some of the excess water. Put them in a bowl (again, if you picked garlic, into your pre-garlic'd bowl). Toss them with a drizzle of olive oil, a pinch of salt, black pepper and either a squeeze of fresh lemon or some nutmeg. The nutmeg works especially well with spinach.

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle Vol 1: Bread

Wait!

Don't throw out that week old (maybe two-week old...) half loaf of artisan whole grain organic spelt flour rosemary peasant bread you bought at Whole Foods for $12.65. Just because it's hard enough to be used as an ad hoc construction tool doesn't mean it's not still good.... for something. And by no means should you feed it to geese, pigeons, sparrows or any other variety of hollow-boned pest.

Okay, so what should you do with it? The answer is simple: croutons. You know those crunchy bits of bread you put on salads, right? Well, send the people from Pepperidge Farm packing. Why spend an extra few bucks on a bag of those oily cardbord cubes when you've already spent it on bread you're about to chuck? The only thing standing between old bread and croutons is your oven. Bread also lasts almost indefinitely in crouton form.

The best part of croutons-from-scratch is that you can choose what ever flavors you want. You're not limited to "extra garlic" or "zesty italian." And this choice of flavor is in addition to what ever stale bread you decide to use as a base. Living (mostly) alone, I usually can't go through a loaf of bread before it gets stale, so I do this alot. I've tried a wide variety of herbs, spices, herb-and-spice mixtures*, and a variety of oils against a backdrop of any kind of bread you can imagine. It's next to impossible to screw this up. So, let's get started. Too use a more food-snob-approved term:

House-made Croutons

• What ever old, stale bread you have lying around. Just make sure it's not moldy. Mold may improve some cheeses, but it tends to ruin your croutons (and gross out your friends/family). Good, crusty breads you buy in unsliced loaves work best, but you can do this with odds and ends of the sliced stuff, too. Cut it into cubes of what ever size you want. Mine tend to be on the bigger size.
• Enough olive oil to just coat the bread.
• Salt, black pepper, and what ever other flavorings you want to use. I've had alot of success with dried Herbs de Provence. I've also recently used truffle oil, and that batch came out amazing. Garlic, chili pepper.... really what ever you want is fine.

Figure 35.q - Everything old is new again" - Peter Allen

Preheat your oven to the universal temperature - Bake 350. Toss the bread cubes with enough oil oil to lightly coat them and with any seasonings you want to use. Spread out in a single layer on a cookie sheet. You can put down a layer of foil first, if you're lazy like I am, but I understand it sort of spoils the whole "Reduce, Reuse, Recycle" theme. Bake the little bastards until you can smell what ever flavorings you've used emanating from your oven. A half-hour is generally safe for big cubes, 20 minutes for smaller ones. Take them out, let them cool. They will harden into perfect, crunchy little bites. Store them in an airtight container in a cabinet or shelf and use whenever you have a salad. Or soup. Or any other use you could think of for a crouton.

Figure 36.z - Airtight.

Until next week, loyal readers.

*If you happen to be near the place featured in the link - try their Cajun seasoning. It's one of the best I've tried.

Tony's Food 101: Girlfriend's House Jambalaya

Okay, so after sort of a long hiatus, Overeducated and Well Fed is back in business, and we're starting back off with a super-easy dish that's both healthy and cooks up in a single pot, making cleanup fast too (hence why I made it at my girlfriend's house).

Thinking about jambalaya conjures images of New Orleans, Mardi Gras and lots of capsaicin - the stuff that makes chilis so hot. While those things are all true, jambalaya shouldn't be relegated to the category of mystery and exotica by non-Southerners. Once you break down the components, it's actually a really accessible technique for making flavorful one-pot meals. You basically have meat, vegetables and rice. They are all cooked in a particular order and way, making jambalaya more of a technique than any single dish. Today's jambalaya looks more complicated that it actually needs to be, and that's by choice.

So that I could a) impress my girlfriend (and maybe her roommates too) and b) so that I could illustrate exactly variety jambalaya is capable of, today's version has chicken, andouille sausage and shrimp. Feel free to use one of these, any two of these, or all three of these, depending on what you have on hand. Likewise, don't confine yourself to the vegetables I used either. You don't even have to use the tomato if you don't want to! Apparently, in New Orleans, Creole (or Red) Jambalaya contains tomato while Cajun (or Brown) doesn't. Any deep southerners among the readership may feel free to validate or dispute this, by the way. I even messed with the seasonings, not having any pre-made Creole or Cajun seasonings on hand over at the girl's place. I'll include instructions for both in the recipe below, because what I used came out pretty tasty!

One definite Do Not is using a pre-made jambalaya mix. Pretty much all seasoned rice or pasta box mixes are loaded with salt, which is associated with high blood pressure and therefore vascular disease (e.g. heart attacks and stroke). Making this stuff yourself is easy, and you can control the amount of salt, fat (and all the other tasty bad-for-you) things that go into it. Make stuff from scratch and live to cook another day.

Girlfriend's House Jambalaya

• One large onion, diced.
• Two cloves of garlic, finely chopped.
• One or two large carrots, diced.
• One each red and green bell peppers, again, diced. By the way, when I say "diced" I mean cut into about 1/4 square in flat pieces. Here are more detailed instruction for those who want them.
• Two boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cut into bit-sized cubes.
• 1/2 lb andouille sausage, cut on a bias to make oblong or ellipse-shaped slices. I like Trader Joe's andouille chicken sausage, and the smokiness of it helped me get around not having any cajun/creole seasoning to use.
• One pound of frozen, cooked, tail-off shrimp. Any size is fine. Thaw them according to package directions prior to use. Actually, if you use the super huge ones, you may want to think about using two pounds so that they're a little more populous on your plate. You can also substitue crayfish (if you've been to Ikea lately) or langostine tails.
• One large can of diced tomatoes. The fire-roasted type are good in this dish, but avoid them if you're already using andouille sausage -and- cajun seasoning with a smoky flavor built in. Do not drain. Again, the tomatoes are all-together optional.
• One regular can of red kidney beans, drained and rinsed.
• A tablespoon or two of Cajun or Creole seasoning, to taste, and two big pinches of salt. Alternatively, you could do like I did an use the same amount of a salt-containing all-purpose seasoning mix that you like (I like Jane's Krazy Mixed Up seasonings), along with a dash of cayenne pepper and two of chili powder.
• One cup of low salt chicken stock/broth - use your own if you've made it!
• Two big handfuls (about one cup) of white or brown long-grain rice.

Add all of the veggies and a glug of olive oil to a shallow pot with a cover and sweat over medium heat - until the onions are just translucent.

Figure 8.a - I sweat vegetables.

Okay. Now turn the heat up to medium-high add in the chicken and sausage and let them brown for a while, stir it up occasionally. Add in your seasonings at this point. Once they are all brown and tastied-up, add in the kidney beans and tomatoes, then the stock, shrimp and rice. Bring the whole thing to a boil, then turn the heat down to low, cover and let it cook 20 minutes if using white rice, 40 if using brown.

The basic skeleton of the technique is 1) half-cook veggies, 2) add meat and half-cook, 3) add miscellaneous ingredients, stock, rice and simmer until rice is done.) See, you didn't believe me, but wasn't that easy?

Figure 8.b - The usual suspects.

Figure 8.c - The finished product.

Today's pictures are complements of my girlfriend, and her camera that's way better than mine.

Next week, we're going green... and no, I don't mean broccoli rabe.

Tony's Food 201: The Whole Chicken and it's After Effects

We're upping the course difficulty here in the New Year. Today, we're going to taken on an entire chicken.

Figure 10.p - Per my girlfriend, we apparently have a bright future of chicken-raising ahead of us. Our six future-chickens' names are (as decided by a committee made up of me, my girlfriend, my college friends, and a good deal of home-made pumpkin vodka): Henrietta, Gertrude, Nugget, Minerva, Galadriel and Cluck-cluck. (http://www.windsorfamilyfarm.com/)

Okay, I lied. Cooking a whole chicken isn't really all that difficult. I usually just throw it in an oven and call it roasting. What to do with it afterwards is where things get complex. It basically breaks down into two broad categories: meat and other. What to do with the meat is easy, you eat it. Plain chicken can get mind-numbingly boring, so we'll address that two ways: how to get piles of flavor into the chicken pre-roasting, and interesting things to do with all that bird. Turns out, what to do with the "other" category is pretty easy too, and we'll get to that in this article as well.

Whole Roast Chicken

• One whole "roaster" chicken, these are generally larger than the fryers. Remove the packaging, pull the packet of miscellaneous parts out of the cavity, rinse the whole thing in side and out
• Two whole lemons, cut longitudinally into long wedges
• 8-10 cloves of garlic, smashed with the flat side of a knife and your hand.
• What ever herbs you feel like using. I generally switch it up based on season - sage and rosemary in the cold months; thyme and bay leaves in the warmer months. Chili peppers would be a good match with the lemons and the bay.
• A bag of fingerling potatoes
• Two white or yellow onions cut into quarters.
• Salt and pepper.

After the chicken is all rinsed, pat the entire inside and outside with sea salt and coarse ground black pepper. Stuff the cavity full of lemon wedges, garlic cloves and herbs, but leave a few of each aside. Make some cuts into the skin on the breast side of the chicken and stuff herbs and garlic cloves in there as well. Make a couple more cuts in the skin on the folds of the wings, and put a lemon wedge in each fold, under the skin, as well as any garlic and herbs you can fit in there. A certain obese celebrity chef and enemy of public health does something similar, but rather than using herbs, she crams lumps of butter under the skin. Tie the legs together over the opening of the cavity with twine. I generally put mine in a shallow pyrex casserole dish, but feel free to put it on a roasting rack over a roasting pan. It will be dryer, you may need to baste it. Arrange the potatoes and onions around the chicken. Bake for about 2 hours depending on the size of the bird in question, and how long the package tells you to roast it.

Okay. So now you've had a meal with some delicious lemony, herby, garlicky chicken and sides. Now you have a pile of lemony, herby, garlicky white and dark meat, and a pile of bones, cartilage, skin and fat. Oh, and that packet of miscellaneous parts you pulled out at the get-go. The meat you can just eat as is, until of course you get bored with it like I usually do. The rest of the creature is the problem. This is where home-made chicken stock comes in.

Taking Stock of the Situation. (no, not that Situation).

Basically, take everything that you roasted that's not chicken meat, onions, potatoes and lemons and throw it into your biggest pot. Throw the lemons out, they will make your stock bitter. Add in whatever roasted herbs and garlic you recover from the pan. You can add new onions and maybe even carrots and celery if you like, but it's not necessary. There should already be salt and pepper inside the cavity and on the skin. Cover it to about 2-3 inches above the mess with cold water and let it simmer on the stove for 3-4 hours. Do not boil it, this will make it extraordinarly cloudy. When you're done, strain it and put it into what ever containers you have on hand. Mine mostly goes into old Cool-Whip containers and then into the freezer. You can use it in soups, to flavor rice, really anything.

Doing Something Different with What You've Got

Okay, there are only so many times a person can eat plain roast chicken. Yes, even if you've gussy-ied it up with various and sundry aromatic plants. So what to do with all your new-found poultry wealth? I usually end up making some sort of salad from the meat for sandwiches for my lunch. One of my favorites is a Provencal version, which includes the chicken (obviously) chopped fine with a knife for food processor, mayonaisse, a couple spoons of olive tapenade, cherry or grape tomatoes cut into sub-bite-sized pieces, and any other vegetables I have lying around: carrots, celery, red onion all work nicely, all chopped just as fine as the chicken. It makes a mean sandwich to bring for lunch, all the other flavors mask how sick of the chicken you are, and gives you some lean protein and raw veggies in your diet. Sure beats some of the alternatives out there.

So you have the assignment for the week, as well as a couple homework projects to keep you busy in the kitchen as well. See you all back here next week for one last thing to do with your left over chicken.