November 2005 Archives

Last week I was contact by the producer of Open Source, a public radio show with Christopher Lydon out of University of Massachusetts at Lowell. They had a Thanksgiving 2.0 radio show scheduled for November 18th and I had time to participate. Turns out I was to be 1 of 4 guests for the show. First off was Jim Leff of Chowhound, Derrick from An Obsession with Food, Julie from A Finger in Every Pie and of course, Me.
I really had no idea what to expect, but Chelsea kept tabs on me and got me situated with times and what to expect. Maybe 30 minutes before I ran back out to our detached garage in the back yard and sat at my desk, waiting. I had some reference material handy, just in case. I lifted up the phone every 5 minutes or so, just to make sure we had a connection. The phone rang and it was time. Time to sit and wait. What with station intros and news bits, much of the time you're listening to dead air. I was only to be on for a portion of the show, that was fine. Being on air for 60 minutes sounded a bit much to me. I was done in 40 minutes and went on my merry way.
If you visit the Thanksgiving 2.0 link and look for the "click to listen so the show" link, it'll download the mp3 and you can listen to the entire show, too cool.

Most everyone was in attendance, poor Babs wasn't able to come down to enjoy. Let's give a large raspberry to Allstate for being such pigs. The day's weather started a little gloomy, but cleared up soon enough for everyone to enjoy. Meathenge Labs goes traditional for Thanksgiving (Gravy Day). I figure we have all year to play with food, don't mess with my roasted turkey and gravy, don't mess. Today's post is just a little sharing of what went on in and around the stove and table. Wanna see?

Share the love and have some peace today, Meathenge cares.

I was perusing Nick's Hot Sauce Blog yesterday, looking at all the spicy things. I thought to myself, "Dang, I'll bet I could make my own Hot Sauce." It sounded easy enough and I knew where to get the peppers, the game was on.

Why do I go out of my way to buy natural/free range/organic chickens? Two reasons, flavor and how they're raised. You will not find a quality bird like this in some large chained grocery store, nope. Look at the fat placement and that firm lean breast. Those breasts have seen exercise and good food. Nothing does it for me like a good firm breast. The leg and thigh portions are quite large and healthy. See the lower portion of the leg? The skin is lean and clean of bruises. Go now to the wings, down there. They're a good size when matched to the proportion of the rest of the beast, it was able to stretch, this is a good thing. Stand back and let the symmetry envelope you, this is an excellent example of how your chickens should look. This chicken will render you any type of preparation you could possibly think of in the grandest of rich chickenny flavors. So, when you're out searching for a better bird, look at it. Ponder the silhouette, look for even fat placement, search for bruises or broken legs, make sure the wings are topnotch and you'll be rewarded for your efforts.

Wanna see what it looked like after roasting?

I can hardly wait, the largest gravy celebration day of the year is coming up and I am SO ready. I have my turkey reserved, I have my Fatted Calf stuffed duck ordered and I pulled out my gravy boats and gravy warmers! Cold gravy is no good, so we have a crock pot for the table. This is where the Gravy Well resides and we always have warm gravy from the start of the meal right up to desert time. Gravy counts most for meals, dinners and get-togethers. No gravy? No love. Speaking of love, Fatted Calf has brought to us the Porchetta style pork roast. If you haven't had one, you haven't had a pork loin roast before, nope. Sorry, you haven't. This is your chance to get one and you'll need to reserve it if you would like to pick it up this coming Saturday. They're just too popular now to expect to buy one at the stall anymore. OoOh, look they're running heavy on the Pates, Confits & Terrines. If you have any gathering to attend this weekend, grab yourself a Pate Maison and a little Pork Rillettes. You will always be greeted with kind words and warm hearts when you arrive with pork, or duck. QUACK !!! Another nice appetizer would be something under the Salumi heading. I like the Petit Sec Aux Herbies for breakfast on a bright Saturday morning, always a winner. And if your roast isn't large enough for 9 gallons of gravy, get some Duck Demi to embiggen the richness of your sauce. No matter what you come away with this weekend, it'll surely delight you and your friends. Please continue on to read Kim O'Neill's widely read Fatted Calf Newsletter that has a detailed list of the items available for Saturday's Farmer Market in Berkeley.

Cheers!

PS - Remember, you have until November 18th (tomorrow) to place your special Thanksgiving Holiday meal from Fatted Calf. Please use their Thanksgiving Holiday Order Form to let them know what you'll need.

If you're lucky enough to live in an area where you can afford the luxury of being a Mexican Food, food snob, you've had conversations about who had or has The Best. Does Del Palmar have the best Chile Colorado, or is it Trevino's? Today, I believe it would be Trevino's. Looking for the best papusas in Richmond? The debate is still going on to this day. However, if you're looking for the best chile verde? There's only one place to be, Meathenge.

I put a lot of thought in to preparing this roast (45 minutes in the recliner) and how I was going to present it to you. That all went out the window just now as I realized what I've been doing. I've been roasting fowl and beast so I could reclaim the best possible gravy I could muster. How can I include butter and savory herbs to give me that slow roasted leavening in the bottom of the pan? Sure I like the black & brown crusty bits, but what if I slowed the oven down a bit and just caramelized everything? Would the onion, garlic, rosemary and butter all come together as friends? Yes, yes they would. Would I care that the beef wouldn't have a dark crust? No, no I wouldn't. Would you like to come play? Let's all take a journey now to Meathenge Labs where meat and gravy meet as old friends, comon.

Usually I steer clear of holiday meal posting mostly because I'm too busy and there's a glut of holiday recipes out there already. What could I possibly add that would be worth reading? Nothing.
However, there's one bit of information I'd like to impart to all you fair weather home cooks around this time of year. If you can't cook or don't do it often, you sure as hell shouldn't be cooking that special meal for friends and family this year. Stay out of the kitchen and let someone who knows what they're doing prepare the meal. Gee, I wonder who would be good at that? mMMmm, could it be? FATTED CALF? Yeah. Turns out they have a special holiday meal available this year, no kidding. How does a Whole Liberty Farm Duck seasoned and stuffed with sage sausage, apple and cornbread sound to you? I know what I doing in the kitchen and can prepare a holiday meal for 14 with one hand and I'm considering having them do it for me. Yup, in fact when I get done with this post I'm going to order me up a duck. QUACK !!! Please use their Fatted Calf Holiday Order Form. If your order comes to $100.00 or more, you get delivery.
Okay, that's then and this is now. This coming Saturday at the market they'll be open for business. Please continue on to read Kim O'Neill's Fatted Calf Newsletter. She's filled it with fancy prose and this week's badass menu. GO !!!

Day of hell finishes with Love, meat love. In fact, it was far better than I had expected. Fatted Calf delivered to us a Rabbit Boudin sausage that I played over the top of a green salad, this was shaved with fancy hard cheese of crazy tasty.
Go in to detail? No. This is what it is, just have a gander.
A kind end to a day, share the love.

Biggles

I don't know. However, I can tell you where not to go, retinning.com.
I'm so mad, evil bucktoothed mad. Crazy, evil, bucktoothed, out of my mind, shaking mad. Got it?
Listen up, for the first time I'm going to swear on Meathenge. So, cover your tender eyes and ears.
I'm really p.o.'d. These lameass fucktards received my most coveted favorite fry pan of all time on 4/28/2005, says so on my invoice. They wrote up the invoice on 5/27/2005 (that's 1 month later in case you're wondering), how do I know? Says so on my invoice. I called, usually just rang and rang. I wrote a few letters asking where my pan was and could they please return my pan. I received a 3" toy pan in late August, nice for melting a teaspoon of butter or an ash tray. Where the heck is my 8" 3mm solid copper FRY PAN ?!?! I called and wrote letters and returned the ash tray (2 mm thickness).
Keep in mind, they never called, wrote, faxed, nothing. Sure, but they cashed my 60 dollar check on the spot! How convenient for them.
Guess what rolled in the other day? It's early November, by the way. An 8" fry pan that resembles mine, but I don't remember putting a sharp divot IN THE BOTTOM OF MY SOLID COPPER FRY PAN !!! Plus the tin is slopped over the edges, all messy. Sure I should be happy to have my pan back and I am. But waiting nearly 7 months and receiving zilch for communication blows whale snot. Screw you Atlantic Retinning, you've left a bad taste in my mouth, PAHTOOEY !!!

I rolled home the other day with a pound of freshly gound beef chuck under my arm, ready to make the boys some burgers, they love burgers. After putting my things down I checked the food stuffs for hamburger buns, no buns. See, personally I can take or leave buns for home made burgers. We didn't have them when I was growing up, just didn't seem to matter either way. But our boys care, they love their burgers & dogs on buns. This of course, in no way means they'll EAT the buns, but they're there just in case. What to do? Hmm, we had hamburger meat and I found some hot dog buns. Hamburger meat and hot dog buns, oh dear.

You gotta know, coming up with a daily dinner menu has lately become akin to slamming my right hand in a door repeatedly. And lord help me if I have to roast another damned chicken. Yet, after wandering the meat counter at Rick's Quality Meats in El Cerrito for a few minutes, I came away with another !@#$%^ whole natural chicken.

Please give a big round of applause for Chilebrown's premier BBQ Joint review here on Meathenge. I've never been and it's nice to see some pictures of the food, gives me motivation to go have a look myself.

During the day Downtown Martinez is a fast and furious little town. There are a lot of people doing business with the Court House, numerous antique shops and other small businesses. As soon as the sun sets the town becomes a ghost town. There is a bright spot at 601 Main St. It is BULLDOG BBQ. It's owner/propietor Chad Reichold is a Martinez native. He opened Bulldog in 2003 and has brought some real barbeque to the downtown area. Chad uses an "Ole Hickory" smoker made in Cape Girardeau Mo. This smoker if fueled with apple, almond and local fruit tree wood. It produces the smoky flavor that I crave.

When today's Fatted Calf Newsletter rolled in, it took me by surprise. Well, okay I wasn't surprised, just cornfused. Google didn't help either, what exacly is this Brasato al midolo? Simply put, it's, it's ... well here's a quote. "We remove the bone from a beef shank and replace it with the bone’s marrow, fresh rosemary and black pepper to create the pot roast of your dreams."
I'll wait a few moments while you read that again. Dang, that's some serious meat perfection right there. Kim was even nice enough to weave in a recipe for handling this little bundle of joy, so there's no excuse for not reserving one right now. I think I'm going to have to just to SEE what it looks like, I'm really interested.
Uh, I've got a really nasty headache coming on. I'll ramble for a bit, but I think I'm going to be a bit short today, hey.
Oh, dear oh dear LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOK !!! Uh, I see Rabbit Boudin under the sausage heading. I'd like 6 tons, please. I've never had any, but I will soon, probably lunch on Saturday. OH man, looky here. There's Saucisson a l’ail fume’, that must be the newish salami that JLee was talking about, I'm wondering about that. Why? Cause I have no idea what it is, that's why. How do you find out? Buy and eat, that's how. This, I can do.
Ya'll take care and see you Saturday morning bright and early at the Berkeley Farmer Market.

Biggles

Please click through to read Kim O'Neill's fab newsletter that she writes each and every week for your enjoyment.

Is 3rd time the charm? If not, it was going to be strike 3 and you're out, that's for sure. As you all know, I've given Jones' BBQ 2 chances in the past to come through and each time it was a flat out bust, except for the potato salad. Which is good if you like potato salad, but if the word BBQ or Barbecue is in the name of your joint? You should have some decent smoky meats and sister, or brother, Jones' has not delivered me this. I've received a few emails and comments from close friends and complete strangers over the last year saying that Jones' BBQ isn't about the BBQ, it's about the fried chicken. Aroo?

Last week I received my little shipment of hot sauces I ordered. Included as a freebie was this teeny little container of Bottled Up Anger. The bottle says it has lime juice, serrano peppers and finishes with the warm heat of the habanero. First off, I LOVE lime or vinegar in my hot sauces, LOVE. It works so well with the fiery hotness and excites the tongue so you're ready for more. I tried some on a cracker and found the cracker muted the flavors too much, so I started taking sips directly from the bottle. And within a few moments? Gone. The lime and serrano hit you first, going back and forth as you refresh the intake. Then, the warmth of the habanero takes you out the door. While it does make you suck fresh air a bit, it isn't nearly overwhelming as some sauces can be. This would be an excellent hot sauce on nearly anything and in soups as a garnish. With the lime it'd excite the rich chickenny or ham flavors greatly.

As you can see it's a pretty liquidy situation and has a few bits of serrano floating around in there. So, this'd go right through a saltine or anything similar. I will be getting a larger container of this soon. I hope it doesn't come in too small of a bottle, because of it's consistency, it'll go QUICK. Maybe I'll just get 2 or 3.

I place this sauce pretty high on the usability scale. It's got enough heat and the lime would take you in to nearly any menu with ease. A definite winner in my book.

Biggles