Fuck Foodies

I have been debating whether or not to refrain from using profanity in this blog. While I’m making up my mind (and I would appreciate people’s input on the subject), I am going to get this one off my chest.

My anger only increases as I see that “foodies” stands pure and alone on the page, sans any squiggly red line. That means the word meets Microsoft’s seal of approval, in this day and age, the equivalent of making it into Miriam-Webster’s. Fuck! I just looked it up online. IT IS in Merriam Webster’s. Oh Gods of the Word, why have thou forsaken me?

Why all the vitriol? You may ask, “Don’t you, genteel food blogger, consider yourself one of them?” Fuck no. Let’s go back to Merriam-Webster.

Foodie: noun \’fü-dė\ Definition of foodie: a person having an avid interest in the latest food fad.

For the record, I ain’t never been the kind of person to follow a fad. I’ve been an eater since birth, and I’ve had a fascination with cooking ever since I called my Mom at work one day, and asked her what we had to eat in the house.

“There’s chicken,” Mom said. I heard the beep of a cash register in the background. She put her hand over the receiver, and she spoke a muffled, “thank you,” to some customer.

I looked in the fridge. Sitting in its plastic, tight, with red blood, pale and plucked, a whole chicken. I gulped, yet my hunger overcame my fear. I knew from experience that it could be turned into a browned, crispy-skinned, steaming carcass of goodness. “What do I do with it?”

With the patience only a mother can have, she said, “You preheat the oven to 400 degrees….”

So fad would not be the way I describe my relationship with food. Overriding addiction, yes. Fad, no. I will go a few parsecs out of my way for new food experiences, but not because they happen to be popular at the moment. More likely, because I just heard about them and now I must partake.

Words also have connotations. Images come to mind when I think of the word “foodie.” I see rich New York dickheads with too much time and money on their hands, sipping crappy Californian wine, and bitching about how nothing passes their lips that’s not organic, locally sourced, more expensive than my computer, and rarer than diamonds. Not that I mind any of those qualities in the items I imbibe, only that they do not necessarily make it good. And they do not confer any status or virtue upon those that consume them. Plus, you gotta eat. You only have so much time, access, and money. In the words of the late, great, George Carlin – “Drop some of your needs.” I’m sure this caricature does not envelop the vast majority of self-proclaimed foodies, but I stand by my prejudice.

The part of me that hates the word the most would be my inner writer. It galls me that the American population’s education level has sunken so low, (especially amongst the wealthier folks who follow this shit), that we have forgotten that we already have many perfectly good words we can use. If you need a word to describe my obsession, why not just call me a gourmet? Or, if you’re feeling snobby, a gourmand? Or, even an epicurean? Or gastronome? Though the last one sounds like I have an unhealthy interest in how it’s processed. We don’t need to make up cutesy new words like foodie to describe people who have a passion for comestibles.

Application

My Mom’s Chicken via Thomas Keller

As always, you can get just the recipe, no commentary here.

This application demonstrates my dedication to knowing how to cook, and my desire to keep it real. For those who don’t know, Thomas Keller is one of the most celebrated chefs in America, owner-operator of the infamous French Laundry, nestled in the heart of the most pretentious valley of Napa. At the French Laundry, they give you a choice of tasting menus, coming in at $270.00 a pop. Yep, that’s $270 bucks per person, before wine. I’ll set aside my moral judgments, but you have to admit, that’s way more than you and I will ever spend on dinner.

At the same time Keller intrigues me. He is the consummate perfectionist. According to food writer Michael Ruhlman, at the French Laundry every pan sparkles. In any other kitchen, pans get coated with burnt on grease, turning the bottoms brown. I’m sure your pans at home have long since turned a brownish-black on the underside. Thomas Keller does not tolerate this kind of impurity. Every pan must be scoured until they shine like new. How do you know when you need a new pan at the French Laundry? So much of the underside has been scrubbed off, when you set it on the stove it tilts over, the handle now heavier than the pan itself.

Take it from me; the man knows how to cook a chicken. Because he’s cooked a couple hundred of them, taken meticulous notes, picked out the best qualities, and reproduced them every time.  Keller’s recipe seems so deceptively simple, you read it and say, “Duh, of course that’s how you cook a chicken.” Yet so many of us screw it up because we don’t pay attention to the details. If you follow his advice to the letter, you will cook a perfect chicken.

Except… we all can’t be Thomas Keller. We got what we got at the Kroger and we need to feed the tribe. What we can do is take his advice and apply it to our situation, and add a dash of what you really like. You like it the way Mom made it.

Ingredients

1 Big Ass Chicken
1 tablespoon Salt
1 teaspoon Pepper
1 teaspoon Half-Sharp Paprika
1 teaspoon Smoked Paprika
1 Teaspoon Sweet Paprika
1 teaspoon Garlic Powder

Special Tools

Lots of Paper Towels
Twine
Roasting Rack
In-Oven Thermometer
Thick Latex Dishwashing Gloves

Preheat oven to 450°

Admit it; what you really want on your chicken is crispy, brown skin. How? Put away that butter and oil. The enemy of crispy skin is steam. The less surface moisture on your chicken, the better the skin. DO NOT SKIP THIS STEP. Get yourself a whole mess of paper towels. Start by stuffing them up into the chicken’s cavities, both front and back. Next, take more paper towels and rub that chicken skin down until it shines no more. Get it bone dry all over, under the wings and thighs too. After a few minutes, take the paper towels out of the cavities.

Now liberally salt the bird inside and out. You want it good and salty, not only because it tastes good, but because the salt will draw away moisture and make the skin crispier. It may look like too much salt, but remember, you need enough salt for the entire hen, not just the surface area.

Now you need to truss the chicken. Don’t get nervous. The point of trussing the bird is to give it a more compact shape so it cooks evenly. So it you end up with a Gordian knot, don’t sweat it. As long as you made the bird more compact, mission accomplished. Here’s a video. I picked this one because she ends up with a pretty ugly bird. Also, because she snips off the wing-tips. No one eats those things anyway, and they will burn at the temps we use to cook our clucker. You might as well cut them off and save them for something they are good for, the stock pot.

Apply the rest of the spices.

Put it on a rack. Put it in a roaster or a baking pan if you don’t have a roaster. I recommend lining it with tin foil for easy clean-up, unless you intend to make a sauce. Insert the thermometer into a thigh, careful so you get it all the way in the center, but not touching the bone. You only get one shot at this, so be careful. You do not want to perforate the chicken.

Shove it in the oven. Forget about it for at least 45 minutes. Do not open the door. You want a good constant temp, especially at the beginning. If you’re lucky, your oven has a glass door and you were smart enough to put the thermometer in a place you can read it. Otherwise, you will need to check it. If you cook a bird my size it’ll probably take close to 90 minutes.

Chefs talk about this concept called carry over. In essence, after you take something out of the oven, especially something with a lot of mass like a whole chicken, the temp will continue to rise. You want the thigh meat to hit 180°. These chefs will tell you yank the carcass out at 175°, or even 170°. Apparently, however, the laws of physics don’t apply to my kitchen, and the temp on my meat tends to drop like a rock as soon as I take it out. You’ll need to play with this. Remember, the French eat chicken rare. If you got some pink, take a chance. If you’re a pansy, wait until 180° before hitting eject.

Let the chicken rest for at least ten minutes. DO NOT SKIP THIS STEP. Do not remove the thermometer. The whole point of this step is to allow time for the pressure inside that bird to ease and the moisture to redistribute throughout the tissues. Puncture that fowl now and the juices will pump out like a Texas gusher. You want those in the bird when you eat it.

Carve. I like wearing thick latex dishwashing gloves for this because they insulate the hands from the heat. Remember, Keller says that the cook deserves to eat those delicious medallions of flesh attached to the backbone as tribute. After I carve, I tear them out with my thumb and suck them down right at the cutting board, before I call anyone to dinner.

Notes on the Ingredients

Chef Keller advises you to get a 3-4 pound organic free range bird. Yeah right. I got people to feed and only one oven. I will not be paying $4.50 a pound for fucking chicken anytime soon either. I like the big ass Perdue Roasting Chickens. Fat Sunday birds, old enough to develop some flavor, weighing in between 7-9 pounds. That’ll feed a family of four.

Salt I use in order of preference for this, sea, kosher, table – any will do. Get your paprika fresh if at all possible. I love paprika, and I keep all kinds on hand. If you only have one, treble the amount and go to town. I’ve already talked about garlic powder in my last blog.

For the love of Buddha, do not buy the two-feet of “butcher’s twine” in the cooking gear aisle for $3.50. Go to the hardware section, find any un-coated twine, and pay $3.50 for enough to last you five years.

An in-oven thermometer is one you can stick in a piece of meat and leave it there while it cooks. Personally, I’ve had no luck with the electronic kind. The concept is swell, set the thing to beep when it hits the temp you want. Problem is, I’ve never had one last more than three months. The old dial-faced analog ones work fine and last a decade.

Tools for the Talent

I know, you’ve been cooking without thermometers for years, why start now? Maybe you’ve done okay without them, but you can do better. You know when that chicken’s done by sight and smell alone? I’m glad you do. How often do you hit the sweet spot? Where your chicken comes out moist but the juices run clear? I can’t do it. I’m guessing neither can you.

You can get by, but you can’t excel until you KNOW what temp you have, not guess.

First thing you need, a good in-oven thermometer. A solid one you can depend on. Like this one on Amazon for a mere $13. KitchenAid Cook's Series Stainless Steel Meat Thermometer
I’ve seen ‘em as cheap as $3. I wouldn’t pay less than $5 or more than $20.

Second, if you want to fry right, you need an oil and candy thermometer. If you don’t get your oil up to temp, you’ll have greasy food. Overheated oil not only tastes nasty, it’s the most dangerous thing in the kitchen. If you make your own candy, you already have one, ‘cause there’s no chance of making anything right without. Once again, I go analog, easy to read and can be trusted. I own two of these puppies. Taylor Classic Candy and Deep-Fry Analog Thermometer


Last, you need an instant read to test the temp on baked goods and anything else. What the hell, go digital. Once again, no less than $5, no more than $20. I like one with a good range, like this one that goes from -58° to 300°. Taylor Digital Instant-Read Pocket Thermometer


Women love chocolate, men like scotch, and ovens lie. You might also want an oven thermometer, just to keep that bastard honest. CDN High Heat Oven Thermometer


Was it good for you?

Like me on Facebook, follow me on Twitter, leave comments and reviews, and most importantly, tell your friends.

To help support this poor blogger please use our Amazon search box. If you search through this page a percentage of what you would spend at Amazon anyway goes to us.

Do you think it was worth a measly buck? Hit the Paypal link.

Perspective

Is it pretentious to have a food philosophy? I have one, and I think my point of view may resonate with some folks out there. So much has been written about food and cooking it. Sure, we need to mangia every day to keep the flesh bag moving, so it makes sense. But why read my personal screed?

Given, most people like to eat. This is not for you, move along. Some people love to eat. You should stick around, this might entertain you. A few people can’t wait to stick the next piece of gooey, crunchy, sticky, meaty, exotic, spicy, luscious morsel into their pie-hole and chew on it. You plan your vacations on where you want to eat. You go the extra mile, spend the extra buck, spend a whole lot of your precious time brooding over what you want to masticate. That’s me. If that’s you, you’re gonna like this.

Point two, a lot of people claim they can cook. They dust of good ‘ole grandma’s recipe for meatballs every time they get invited to a gathering. They screw it up, because they don’t want to spend the money on real ingredients, cut corners when making it, or they just don’t have the knowledge or the skills to do it up right. Everyone tells them the meatballs rock just to be polite, even though they taste like rocks, and Mr./Mrs. I Think I Can Cook leaves patting themselves on the back--mission accomplished. Aren’t I special? Guess what? You’re not. You can go away now.

Some people do try. They look up recipes. Watch the cooking shows. They see something they might like, haul out the wallet, spend too much buying the chef ingredients. The recipe they picked is way over their heads, and they end up sad and depressed when they produce a flaming pile of shit. Do not despair. This may be a necessary step before you go on to the next stage. To be honest, I am not totally out of this stage.

Then you have the die-hards. People who realize you need to take the time, learn the basics, practice the skills. You realize it may be more important to know why food reacts the way it does when you apply heat, than knowing a fancy recipe. You know how to grill, sauté, sweat, deep fry, broil, braise, and roast. You know when, and to what, you apply these principles. You know that the keys to flavor are fat, spice, and brown. You have a food-pro, but you know how to use a knife.

We few, we happy few, we band of brothers, I wish to go on this culinary adventure together with you.

And by you I mean cooks, not chefs. We must all concede that we do not own walk-in coolers, huge convection ovens, salamanders, griddle-tops, or industrial ventilation. We must suffer with what we can fit in our house, and most importantly, what we can afford. I cook on a four-top electric stove. That’s a stove, not a range, and not a convection oven. Living in a McNeighborhood that doesn’t even have a gas line constricts my options. Yeah, I could get an induction cook-top, but I ain’t got that kind of bread. I’m guessing neither do you. Also, you can’t afford sea-urchin roe, truffles, or dry-aged prime. Shit, even if you could, you couldn’t find it. While we can, from time to time, use such expensive and rare ingredients as pancetta. And we at least throw-down the cash for decent cuts every once in a while. For the most part, I concentrate on the stuff I can find, get it cheap, apply heat, knowledge, and time, and turn it into gold.

You know all that good shit peasant cooking the big time chefs are always talking about? We’re making it. The ingredients have changed with time. What used to be cheap is now expensive, and what used to be expensive… is mostly still expensive, with some exceptions.

Still with me? Let’s get to it.

Application

Here’s this week’s recipe, or as I like to call it, application, because you can apply the basic principles to more than one thing. Some of these applications will be in ratios, so that you can cook a little, or a lot, depending on what you need.

The other day, my friend J.E. texted me with a question, “How do I make oven fries using two redskin potatoes?”

First off, you can’t, because “oven fries” do not fucking exist. To be fries they have to be FRIED. I understand if you don’t want to deal with heating oil for two measly potatoes (redskins at that, which would make lousy fries anyway). I kinda sorta understand if you don’t want to fry for dietary reasons. Though I would argue good fries done at the right temp in the right oil are not that bad for you. I do not count those abominations Ore Ida makes. In fact, whatever petrochemical grease-shellac they put on those things to make them “fry” in the oven is ten times worse than actually frying and tastes fucking nasty.

That being said, you can make some mighty fine roasted potatoes with those redskins.

For those of you who just want the freakin’ recipe without all the blah-blah, you can get it here.

Preheat oven, and aluminum baking sheet (Check out the Tools for the Talent later in this blog) to 425 f.

1 lb redskin potatoes

½ teaspoon salt

½ teaspoon pepper

½ teaspoon garlic powder

½ teaspoon paprika

2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

Cut potatoes into roughly 1 ½ inch cubes. I say roughly because you’re not a chef. This is not a test at the CIA, and you’re not gonna waste a bunch of potato just to get them perfect. To the guy who said, “but if you cut them all the same they will cook evenly,” shut the fuck up. Combine all ingredients in mixing bowl, stir toughly to coat the potatoes. I use my bare hands for this because I am not a sissy-boy.

Place on hot baking sheet. Here I will be a little fussy. Make sure the potatoes are all cut side down. You want to get as much brown on these things as you can, and peel won’t do that.

Bake for 15 minutes, stir*, doing your best to get them onto the opposite cut side. I’m not as fussy about this because the pan is hot and you need to get those things back in the oven quick before they lose heat. Cook for another 15 minutes.

As you see, I give ratios for this one. Be careful with this because the more potatoes you use, the LESS you will use of the other ingredients. Because of mass-to-surface-area-ratio, you won’t need as much of the other stuff. You only need enough to coat all the potatoes.

Some notes on the ingredients. Yes, I use garlic powder for this. I can hear the whiners now, “Always use fresh garlic!” I agree with them, except in cases where fresh won’t work, like this one. Add chopped fresh garlic to this and you’ll get nasty burned garlic bits. You could possibly roast a head of garlic and add it at the end, but that’s really more trouble than it’s worth. Go with the powder, just get the good stuff and use it fresh.

For paprika, once again use it fresh, I like smoked, but you could use sharp or sweet. I mix it up, depending on my mood.

A lot of people will also tell you that you don’t need to use extra virgin olive oil when you cook it. Cooking just kills the subtle difference between the straight olive oil and the extra virgin. Once again, I agree, except in this case. In fact, I say the generally rule should be when frying use the regular, when roasting I do notice a difference. You may want to go with the good stuff.

Salt can be kosher, or sea, let your heart be your guide. Always grind the pepper.

You can apply this application to Yukon Golds or your standard baker. Results will vary. You can also use this to roast most other veggies. Roasted asparagus done this way makes me drool just thinking about it.

You can use substitutions. My friend J.E. didn’t have any olive oil. He used vegetable oil and it turned out fine. You could also use melted butter, clarified would be best. If you use the butter lower your temp to 400 to prevent it from burning. Never use margarine. I would hope anyone who made it past the intro to this blog wouldn’t even have that shit in their house anyway.

*Note for the terminally stupid, do not use your hands at this point.

Tools for the Talent

One small investment you will not regret is good heavy-duty aluminum sheet pans. You can get Lincoln Wear-Ever® Standard Duty Half-Size Sheet Pan 18 Gauge for under $20 on Amazon. I got the tip on these from Cooks Illustrated, a subscription website. They test kitchen products and usually hit the nail on the head. Yes, a little pricy for sheet pans, but I’ve had mine for four years now. They don’t bend, they don’t bow. Most importantly, they cook evenly. Those of you who have had a batch of cookies come out half-brown-half-raw know what I’m talking about. You want these in your life. Other companies make similar products; just make sure they are 18 gauge. If you need to make a batch of cookies tonight, I’ve seen these at restaurant supply stores, and your local Gorden’s Food Service outlet, Sam’s may as well.