This past Sunday, I went on an adventure over the bridge to the SoWa open market. I had no clue what to expect, and had no idea what I was getting myself into. The plan was to grab a quick brunch before and then enjoy the beautiful day walking around shopping under the beaming sun.

The “walking around shopping” part gave me serious anxiety as I pictured myself watching my wife “walking around shopping” along with five thousand other zombies, picking up nicknacks and putting them back down over and over again as my bloody mary buzz slowly wore off.

For the most part, this was not the case. I actually really enjoyed the SoWa market and at least half of the little tents had things inside that truly caught my attention. The culinary-themed tents all had great products, most of them ridiculously creative and innovative spraying the terms “Local, Organic, Sustainable, and Farm-Fresh” in my face until that’s all I could possibly think about.

The samples were delicious and being the impulsive idiot that I am, I clearly walked out down about $400 and forced to hail a cab because I couldn’t walk home with a dozen bags on each arm.

One thing that really caught my eye was some bright red angel hair dangling from a table in the corner like Raggedy Ann’s mop. Upon walking closer, I read the chalkboard that described that this is in fact Sriracha Spaghettini; I was speechless.

My favorite condiment combined with fresh pasta?? Clearly I bought a pound for dinner and spent the rest of the day walking around like a zombie trying to compose a pasta dish that would be worthy of this fire-engine red noodle (grabbing a snack at the food trucks is an absolute must at SoWa too, I wish I never ate brunch).

After unloading all my crap that I just bought back at the condo, I got in the car and zipped over to Yankee Lobster on the pier.

Knowing how many lobster rolls they go through a week, I figured that they must save the bodies. Sure enough, they freeze and save all of the lobster carcasses for only $1 per pound.

I picked up some hollow bodies as well as some fresh lobster meat from the tail and the claws. I immediately turned on the oven and threw the bodies inside to roast. In a large pot, I threw in some onions, carrot, fennel, and some leftover ramps to serve as the aromatics for my homemade lobster stock.

Once the smell of roasted lobster carcass filled our tiny condo and woke up my napping wife, I threw the bodies into the post, filled it with water and let it start to simmer away; all day in fact.

By the time I came back to it, the liquid was dark amber and loaded with flavor. I strained the pot twice, setting aside the golden liquid next to my sauté pan.

I pulled the fresh Sriracha pasta from the package and tossed it into the roaring water for only about 45 seconds.

That’s all the time it took to cook since the spaghettini was to tiny. In my sauté pan to the left was the lobster meat simmering away in the rich lobster stock with a little butter. I tossed the pasta into the pan and added some coconut milk and a handful of chopped cilantro.

With the pasta being enhanced by the sweet garlic-chili sauce, I didn’t want to make anything that would mask that actual flavor and it needed to be a flavor profile that worked. I chose to work with a island-like pasta dish and the coconut milk made the sauce rich and creamy with lobster and chili in the forefront and the fresh hint of cilantro enhancing the whole dish.

It was still about 85 degrees outside so we climbed up to the roof deck with our new pasta, that sat in our new bowls, and a bottle of Rose’. We popped the ice cold, 2011 Domaine de Bagnol Rose’ from Cassis, a tiny port in the Cote d’Azur, France.

It is a beautiful pale pink in color and is made from Cinsault, Mouvedre, and Grenache grapes. It’s very light and elegant with a soft bouquet of fresh strawberries and herbs. The sharp acidity and clean, dry finish helped cut through the rich coconut milk sauce and was a refreshing sip after a bite of the chili sauce spaghettini.

After ripping through the entire Sriracha cookbook, I thought that I had literally seen it all when it came to the little green top wonder but I was very wrong. This was some really badass pasta. The lobster wasn’t so bad either. It was quite interesting with the cilantro component when I’m used to seeing more savory herbs such as parsley or basil in a big bowl of pasta but it totally worked in this instance. Overall the SoWa experience was a success and I literally cannot wait to get back to find more pleasant surprises!

You can find this spaghetti at Valicenti Organico.

There are very few foods in this world that I dislike. Lentils are one of them (although they’re not as bad as couscous). It probably has to do with my brief, one-year stint in a professional kitchen. Everyday around three o’clock, the staff would put down their knives, finish up butchering fish, peeling squash, or whatever tedious prep work they had in front of them and grab a plate.

Staff meal; the only time during your twelve hour shift when you can sit down (sometimes) and stuff your face.

Each day, a certain chef is assigned to not only prep their station for a whirlwind dinner service, but to cook dinner for the entire front and back of the house using whatever they can find in the walk-in.

I have to admit that sometimes, the food was out of this world but for the most part, the chef in charge would reach for the easiest, most abundant thing in the pantry; lentils.

Yes, we fell into a serious lentil rut, serving mounds of steaming legumes with bland chicken, pork, or God forbid, only vegetables. This is where I developed a dismay for flavorless, earthy mush that resembled a pile of steaming dog doo.

As sick of lentils as I possibly could be, what type of chef would I be if I didn’t re-try them and revisit my arch nemesis? So the opportunity arose the other night when I stopped by the Butcher Shop and found a cut of meat staring at me in the face that was quite different; boneless lamb loin.

]]> http://www.rooftopgourmet.com/wine/boneless-lamb-loin-with-moroccan-spiced-lentils-roasted-fennel-ramp-yogurt/feed/ 0 http://www.rooftopgourmet.com/pasta/bucatini-allamatriciana/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=bucatini-allamatriciana http://www.rooftopgourmet.com/pasta/bucatini-allamatriciana/#comments Tue, 08 May 2012 01:04:18 +0000 Mike http://www.rooftopgourmet.com/?p=4553

One of the things that I love about traditional Italian cuisine is the simplicity. Take three of four amazing ingredients and use them to their potential and you have an amazing dish. Whenever I’m in Italy, I love side-stepping into tiny roadside trattorias or ristorantes for a quick pasta dish.

Less than a dozen tables, a few carafes of the “vino de la casa”, a bowl of noodles and you hit a soft spot in my heart. One of my favorite Italian staple pasta dishes is the Bucatini all’Amatriciana (don’t tell the spaghetti a la Carbonara).

This is one of those traditional Italian dishes that you just don’t see very much in America. It’s made with Bucatini pasta… thick noodles with a hole down the center, resembling flimsy drinking straws.

Although Bucatini sounds like a trendy cocktail, it’s actually an extremely messy noodle that inhibits even the most professional slurping ability. Twirl with the best of them, but try slurping a spoonful of Bucatini when you’re actually just sucking air through the noodle while their slapping across your cheeks like a pair of nun-chucks.

Amatriciana is traditionally made with guanciale; a cured pig’s jowl that closely resembles pancetta. I absolutely love guanciale because of its sweet, earthy, grassy flavor combined with the ever-s0-delicious crispy pork fat.

A friend brought be back a slab from Salumi in Seattle, chef Mario Batali’s parent’s salumeria. Rumor has it, you have to wait in line for hours quite early in the morning just to get in the door before they run out of the good stuff.

I sliced up the jowl into thin matchsticks and rendered out the fat in a pan with smashed garlic cloves, and thinly sliced onions. This is the base for the sauce. Pork fat, onions, garlic and sometimes, especially for me, a handful of chili flakes.

I let this render, soften and caramelize intensely to build extreme flavor in the bottom of the pot before I even pull the can opener from drawer. I just so happened to have a massive can (more like a bucket) of San Marzano tomatoes that held the equivalent of 6 normal-sized cans.

Being a rustic dish, I didn’t rely on precision of knife skills and especially not the milling of tomatoes. My weapon of choice: hands only.

I crushed whole plum tomato after tomato, getting squirted in the face and ruining my favorite tee shirt but dropping the juices and hunks of sweet tomatoes into the rich pot.

A brief simmer to bring all of the flavors together it was almost time to plate. After tossing the al dente Bucatini into the savory, farmhouse sauce, I finished it with the final secret ingredient; salty, tangy Pecorino Romano cheese.

Freshly grating the Pecorino on top of the porky pasta mound and smelling it melt into the dish is heavenly. What occurred next was a delicious disaster.

I needed a bib or a smock or something because this is a messy dish.

It is virtually impossible to not be wearing the Amatriciana before the bowl is devoured. The combination of sweet, spicy, salty, bitter, cheesy was euphoric. I served a traditional Tuscan red with with this dish called La Maialina ‘Gertrude’ Toscana Rosso, which means “baby pig”.

It is a blend of Sangiovese, Cabernet Sauvignon, and Merlot and it is meant to express the true meaning of Tuscan wine. Rich and powerful, yet indicative of the land and the cuisine. It is full of dark cherry, herbs, and burnt red fruit with earthy hints of leather and dried figs. Rustic meets rustic. Nothing better.

I felt like I was parked at a checkered table cloth adorned table, under the Tuscan sun, slurping away at a mid afternoon snack, wiping my face with an old cloth napkin just enjoying the pace of the country. There’s nothing better than revisiting the classics, and your favorites.

]]> http://www.rooftopgourmet.com/pasta/bucatini-allamatriciana/feed/ 0 http://www.rooftopgourmet.com/wine/butterflied-marinated-grilled-leg-of-lamb-with-mint-oil/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=butterflied-marinated-grilled-leg-of-lamb-with-mint-oil http://www.rooftopgourmet.com/wine/butterflied-marinated-grilled-leg-of-lamb-with-mint-oil/#comments Wed, 25 Apr 2012 19:09:02 +0000 Mike http://www.rooftopgourmet.com/?p=4522

Is there anything better than charred lamb fat? Well I guess maybe crispy chicken skin, anything fried in duck fat, and the succulent lard from a pig… but lamb fat is definitely near the top of the list. When it’s roasted over an open flame it softens to a butter-like texture and forms a sweet, flavorful crust that crackles in your mouth.

It’s great when attached to a dainty, Frenched chop but even better in the leg… because there’s just more of it! Last night I splurged on a whole leg of lamb because hey, it’s Spring and had it deboned and butterflied.

Butterflying it is essentially opening it up and laying it flat to ensure even cooking temperatures throughout; think about turning a basketball into a frisbee.  The frisbee is the same thickness throughout. If you’re grilling a leg of lamb, this is the way you want to go unless you like your lamb black and chewy on the outside and bloody raw in the middle.

In order to infuse flavor as well as tenderize this cut, I marinated it in Greek yogurt, garlic, rosemary, fresh oregano, mint, and lemon zest.

Here’s a little secret about marinades. Some people think that highly acidic marinades such as citrus juice, wine, and vinegar are better agents to tenderize a cut of meat. Turns out, these marinades actually make meat tougher and sometimes mushy.

The only true tenderizers are low acid marinades such as buttermilk or yogurt.

In India, people have been soaking tough cuts of lamb and goat in yogurt for hundreds of years. The calcium in the dairy products produce an enzyme that breaks down proteins in the meat, a process similar to the way aging tenderizes meat.

So anyway, as my lamb was hanging out in the love tub, getting all herby and garlicky I fired up my grill to as hot as I could possibly get it. Because of the heavy marbling and the oil in the marinade, I knew that there were going to be some intense flare-ups and I actually wanted them.

I wanted the flames to absorb the lamb initially, creating that crispy char crust before I yanked the heat down to finish it off.

Sure enough, the sizzle blazed as I flopped the placemat of meat down on the 800 degree cast iron grates. Campfire-like flames roared high above my head and the smell of toasting garlic and woodsy rosemary filled the air.

Blinded by the smoke, I jabbed my palm-searing tongs in and out of the hood trying to position and reposition the leg in order to achieve a perfect crust without totally burning the thing. Once the smokeshow was over, I cranked down the heat and shut the lid, leaving the meat to roast slowly at around 300 degrees until it was medium-rare temperature inside.

As the meat was resting on a cutting board inside, perfuming my condo with sensual aromas, I stepped back outside to grill some pencil-thin asparagus. I made sure to pop a special bottle of red to accompany the butterflied leg of Spring lamb.

I decided on the 2009 Dom.Vieux Telegraph Chateauneuf-du-Pape ‘Le Crau’ from the highly esteemed region of the Southern Rhone Valley, France.

We have a somewhat odd connection and affinity to this bottle other than for the fact that it’s delicious. Two years ago when we bought our condo, got engaged, and moved in together, our very first place happened to be on Telegraph Street. On one of our first nights in the place, I opened a Vieux Telegraph Chateauneuf-du-Pape from a previous vintage.

The wine is absolutely beautiful! Bright ruby red color, powerful aromas of licorice and lavender and a plush texture of juicy red raspberries and bitter cherry fruit. As I sliced into the tender flesh, you could see how pink and juicy the meat was as it oozed from each slice.

I don’t know if my mouth was watering from the meat or the striking acidity in the wine. I served the lamb family-style with the grilled asparagus on the left and a chick pea tabouli on the right. Right before serving, I grabbed my can of mint-infused extra virgin olive oil and drizzled it across the pink slices as you would truffle oil. The fragrant mint freshened up the dish and was a sexy supplement for mint jelly.

We sat together, high above Telegraph Street, drinking Telegraph juice and slicing into a generous portion of succulent Spring lamb, making sure not to waste any of the charred, fatty bits on the ends.

Spring is my favorite season for food. It’s like a refreshing deep breath and a chance to pack the hearty stews and braises away for the summer. Spring vegetables are popping through the earth, bursting with vibrant color and confidence and the weather changes, allowing me to revamp my rooftop garden.

Spring is like a renaissance; a re-birth or new season for vegetables and for a lifestyle of  lighter, healthier eating. Yesterday, we took a drive to Russo’s Market in Watertown for some fresh produce and some herbs and flowers to decorate the first wave of pots to hit the deck.

Baskets were overflowing with Spring staples like fresh fava beans, asparagus, peas, morels, fiddleheads, and ramps.

I gathered my own little Spring veggie collection as well as some potted herbs and was off to the roofdeck. Siobhan got dirty with the topsoil and gardening while I prepared dinner inside.

Although tedious, fresh peas and fava beans are so delicious when you can find them fresh. It’s totally worth the prep time.

Fava beans look almost like long green peppers but when you crack open the pods, several pale green legumes emerge. You simply blanch these pods which will help you open them, eventually revealing the bright green fava.

You sometimes feel like you’re opening a Russian Matryoshka doll; one thing inside another, inside another.

Along with the favas, I also blanched some fresh English peas, snap peas, sugar snap peas, and haricot vert (French green beans). This medley of beans and peas, a melting pot of shades of green from Boston Celtics to Kermit the Frog, was the perfect backdrop for my Spring dinner plate.

I picked up some fresh monkfish filets to serve for my protein. Monkfish is a horribly ugly-looking fish but the meat from the tail is one of my favorite types of seafood. It’s a firm white fish that almost tastes like a cross between Cod and really tender lobster tail.

It’s sweet and succulent and often requires a slightly longer cooking time, but once overcooked it dries out quickly, so you have to be careful. Often times, it is wrapped in fat such as pancetta or lardo.

I simply pan roasted the monkfish, which curl up like lobster tail when it hits a screaming hot sautee pan.

While the fish was finishing inside the oven, I sautéed the blanched green medley in olive oil with salt, pepper, fresh mint, and parsley. I also grilled some ramps to add a smokey, charred onion-garlic flavor to the dish, as well as some texture.

Ramps pop through the ground this time of year and chefs jump through hoops to get them into their kitchen and onto their menus. They look like a purple-stemmed green onion and have a mild onion and garlic flavor.

To round out the dish, I started making a Beurre Blanc sauce which translates to “white butter” sauce. This is a classic French sauce that is perfect for seafood or vegetables. It’s an emulsified butter sauce made from reducing white wine and shallots from a cup all the way down to about two tablespoons.

Then the rigorous whisking begins, while adding small cubes of ice-cold butter one at a time, suspending the fat into the acid (essentially making a vinaigrette). The result is a creamy, rich butter sauce with popping acidity and it tastes like a layer of silk is being draped over your tongue.

I delicately spooned the Beurre Blanc over the monkfish and topped it with the charred ramps. The sauce oozed down into the beans and peas and worked magic with the fresh mint in the vegetables. I actually served the wine that I used to make the Beurre Blanc with the meal.

The 2010 Gaujal de Saint Bon Picpoul de Pinet is from the Southern Languedoc region of France. The grape variety is actually Picpoul and if you enjoy Sauvignon Blanc or Pinot Grigio, you will love Picpoul. It is medium bodied and has intense citrus aromas. It is light and clean on the palate with lots of acidity that will make you drool, and a crisp mineral finish. Perfect with oysters, light seafood dishes or just a big refreshing glass of wine on the deck.

In this case, it was a perfect compliment to the spring flavors, with acidity to cut through the rich butter sauce but not too much intensity to overpower the favas or the fish itself. Siobhan washed the dirt out of her fingernails and we sat outside admiring this years herb garden while feasting on Spring produce. We sat back with some refreshing wine and took that much needed deep breath, pushing us ahead into our favorite season of all.

The one food that I associate with Spring more than anything else is pesto. Maybe it’s the bright green color or the fresh flavors of basil and garlic. Perhaps it’s just the time of year when I start to see bushels of locally grown basil lined up at the market.

That was the case last week and I couldn’t resist leaving without stuffing my bag with tons of the Royal Herb. The word pesto means “to pound”, which is how it was originally made in a mortar and pestle from the northern region of Italy, Liguria.

I’ve made my fair share of unique pestos with everything from cilantro to garlic scopes, but this time around, I wanted to recreate a classic. Five ingredients; that’s all you need. Basil, garlic, pignoli (pine nuts), Parmigiano-Reggiano, and extra virgin olive oil.

I simplified my evening and left the mortar and pestle in the cupboard, using the blender to buzz my ingredients together. I’m convinced that you could drizzle pesto on just about anything and it will taste great, but I chose some grilled swordfish.

I seasoned the thick swordfish steaks with fresh oregano and chili flakes before tossing them on the grill. Because of its firm texture, swordfish is one of the easiest fish to grill but it is a fish that you don’t really want to undercook unlike salmon which I like to eat medium-rare.

With my fish and pesto, I tossed together a type of fusion salad; a cross between Nicoise’ and Greek. I had frisee’ and red watercress for greens, olives, capers, tomatoes, and fingerling potatoes.

A thin slice of grilled Naan bread to sop up the leftover globs of pesto and a block of Feta cheese “au poivre”.

I simply rolled one side of the authentic Greek Feta in freshly ground, black peppercorns to give the milky, tangy cheese a little peppery bite.

This Greek Feta is a combination of sheep and goats milk and this one is on the salty side. It was my little take on a salt and pepper shaker resting on the plate, which I very lightly seasoned knowing that the salty, peppery feta was garnishing the dish.

This melting pot of a plate had just a little bit of influence of so many different countries and cuisines. Naan bread from India, pesto from Italy, Feta cheese from Greece, and Nicoise’ and Au Poivre styles from France.

To screw with everything even more, I served this with an American wine made in the style of the Rhone Valley, France.

The 2010 Joseph Kent Vieux Carre’ mimics the white wines produced in the Rhone. It is a blend of 34% Grenache Blanc, 33% Viognier, and 33% Marsanne and is extremely intense and complex… just like the pesto.

The wine starts off with loads of citrus peel and spice. Anise aromas and freshly grated vanilla bean. It is supported on the palate by fresh honeydew melon, Meyer lemon and pie crust. Full-bodied and rich, this intense white seems to change every sip you take. The really cool thing about the wine is that only 80 cases are produced each vintage.

Since you can’t make pesto without making a huge batch of it, we ended up eating pesto every single night last week. We made Orecchietti with Sausage and Pesto, Grilled Lamb  Chops with Pesto, Cucumbers & Chilis, and Asparagus and Pesto Flatbreads.By the weekend, I was extremely excited to see the empty jar.

I can still taste it just from looking at these pictures. The nutty, toasted pine nuts, combined with the peppery, raw garlic and the rich cheese work so well with the fragrant basil leaves. It leaves an impact on your tastebuds when you eat an entire jar in a week.

After a five-day, St. Patrick’s Day bender in Dublin, Ireland my body has been banger-ed and mashed to pieces. I have dipped my spoon into more hearty stews, and my snout into more pints than I ever thought possible. Not to mention the amount of starchy spuds in the form of mashed, boiled, or fried. Not even a few rounds of cart-less golf on a links course could walk off these calories.

Now that I’m back, it’s time to start eating healthy again.

Flying from brisk and damp Ireland into seventy-five degree, freakish weather in Boston helped set the mood for some lighter fare.

The first thing I did was rip the tarp off the roof deck and tune up the furniture for another season. There’s nothing like the first dinner of the year up on the deck, sipping ice cold white wine and watching the orange sun drop behind the Boston skyline.

It’s tough to fire up the grill when you’re already sweating, so I decided to construct a little cold, crab salad with a few other layered components.

I started off by brainstorming different ingredients that would make sense with a crab salad, enhancing the crab flavor, and adding different textures without masking the crab itself.

I grabbed up a few tubs of hand-picked, American Blue Crab and fished through it for any shells that may have been missed. I gently tossed the sweet meat with a touch of light mayonnaise, dijon mustard, and chives. After a few test spoonfuls, it was properly seasoned, sweet and delicious.

Next, I started to prep my other components. Celeriac is the name for the ugly root that celery grows out of.

They look like evil, gnarly props from a Harry Potter film but when you peel away the skin, you’re left with an ivory colored root vegetable that I decided to serve raw.

I simply julienned the celeriac for a slight crunchy texture as well as some earthy undertones in the salad. I brought out my ring mold and started to layer the base of the salad which was an avocado cream.

Next was a heaping portion of the fresh crab salad, followed by some celeriac strips. Last week, a very attentive friend of mine called me out for never using two ingredients in the history of this blog, and I think he was correct; Grapefruit & Dill.

The competitive side of me had to make sure that both were involved in this salad. I sliced the giant grapefruit into beautiful, ruby-red supremes and adorned the crab tower with a few slices to add some acidity and bitterness which complimented the sweet crab meat wonderfully.

As for the dill, I grabbed a handful and soaked it into a cup of buttermilk and let the intense flavors of the dill permeate the dairy for a while.

Once the creamy buttermilk was properly infused with dill, I drizzled some around the crab salad. Buttermilk is actually known to be very high in acidity which again, helped balance the flavors of the shellfish.

A small tuft of micro-parsley greens and the masterpiece was complete. I carefully carried the plates up the spiral staircase to the roof deck and popped a bottle of 2010 Gramona Gessami’ from the Penedes region of northeast Spain. This region is known for its sparkling Cava but also produces little hidden gems such as this one.

This wine is a unique blend of two separate clones of Muscat, Sauvignon Blanc, and a touch of Gewürztraminer. The first thing you notice once you pop the cork is how powerfully aromatic it is; even outside competing with the breeze off the ocean.

Freshly cut flowers, apricots, pear, citrus and jasmine flow out of the glass. On the palate the wine is light and crisp with flavors of white peach puree, citrus and spice. It finishes clean with brisk acidity and is the perfect aperitif wine or paired with a light seafood salad such as this. When we destroyed the shellfish towers with our forks, all the different elements came tumbling down and melded together bite by bite.

Everything seemed to work harmoniously, especially the creamy dill-infused buttermilk that acted as a binding vinaigrette for all of the other flavors. The succulent crab was totally addictive and the ambiance of the cool breeze and grapefruit-colored sky made my return to America extremely enjoyable; especially since there wasn’t a dram of whiskey or a stout in sight.

The other night we decided to check out a new restaurant that just popped up in Southie called Moko Japanese Restaurant. When we heard that they delivered sushi we ordered from them on Valentine’s Day, not realizing that it was their opening night. Needless to say, we were less than impressed but we gave them the benefit of the doubt since it was their debut and they were slammed.

Until Moko acquires a liquor license, which they explained they were having some major setbacks with, they will remain B.Y.O.B. I actually hope that they don’t get a license because it made the experience that much better, drinking what we prefer at a measly $5 corkage fee.

When we opened the menu, I was surprised to see that there was an entire section dedicated to traditional Korean fare.

Since I wasn’t entirely in the mood for sushi and I do love experimenting with dishes that are foreign to me, I “Eenie Meenie Miney Mo’d” the list of hard to pronounce Korean dishes. My finger landed on something called Yuk-gae-jahng which was described as a beef and green onion dish served with glass noodles, egg, and a spicy broth.

Fair enough. Sounded pretty good. One thing that I find when ordering menu items labeled  ”spicy” is that the chefs tend to play it rather safe as to not offend the diner even if the traditional dish is in fact really intense.

I didn’t know what to expect but I was eagerly awaiting one of my first, truly traditional Korean meals. When the dish arrived my body went into sensory overload. The aroma coming from the deep bowl was so extreme and the fiery red color had me googly-eyed.

I grabbed the porcelain spoon and raised a sip to my mouth to blow  on it and immediately felt the burn of heat in my nostrils. As soon as it touched my lips, I realized how serious this dish was. It was a whirlwind of flavor and a perfect balance of spicy chilies with rich, beef stock and pungent green onion.

The fine strands of shredded beef brisket melted in your mouth and the onions still had a slight crunch to them. Once you dig deep enough, you hit the glass noodles which are so slippery, you don’t even know when they’re sliding down the hatch.

The noodles combined with the raw egg that gets stirred in before service creates a silky smooth texture to the broth. I literally couldn’t stop eating it. It was rich, comforting, fiery, and insanely addictive.

This past weekend, I was craving Yuk-gae-jahng again so I decided to re-create the dish at home. After perusing several different online recipes, I thought that I had a firm enough grasp on the basic concept of the dish.

I headed to the Super88, the Asian foods market, to grab some rather unconventional ingredients, which is always a difficult task.

I was on the hunt for a particular Korean chili powder, paste, dried glass noodles, and fernbrake otherwise known as gosari, which I thought was a long bean at first but it appears it is like some type of royal fern. I have no idea, I couldn’t find it anyway.

Not one person in the store knew what gosari or fernbrake was so I eliminated it from the recipe. Another misstep is the fact that I underestimated the power of Korean chili powder. Holy cow it packs a punch.

I brought everything home and started on my homemade beef broth. I boiled a few slices of beef chuck steaks in water with onion, garlic cloves, and some peppercorns for hours until the meat was ugly and gray, but extremely tender.

I strained the liquid which would become the base to my soup and returned it to the pot. In a separate sauce pot, I added the Korean chili powder, chili paste, sesame oil, soup soy, minced garlic and black pepper. I stirred this around over low heat to bring it into a thick paste consistency and to warm the essential oils.

Once it was burning my nose hairs, I added it into a bowl with sliced green onions, bean sprouts, and shredded beef to hang out and marinate. After about twenty minutes I tossed the “salad” into the simmering broth. The liquid immediately transformed from crystal clear to bright orange before my eyes and the reminiscent smells of Moko restaurant that night started to fill my kitchen.

After about an hour longer of simmering, I ladled my soup over some rehydrated glass noodles and broke a fresh egg into the steaming broth which quickly cooked after a few swirls of my spoon. The Yuk-gae-jahng looked identical, smelled identical, and almost tasted identical except for the fact that again, I underestimated the heat inside Korean chili powder.

This Sunday dinner turned into a night at East Coast Grill’s “Hell Night” rather quickly. In fact, it only took a few slurps before we were both crying, sweating, and laughing at how hot this bowl of fire actually was. Soon, the laughter turned into straight panic as excessive drooling and tearing ensued. The problem was, it still tasted great. We kept punishing ourselves, trying to cool it down with a bowl of sticky rice but the burning continued.

We were forced to serve the dish with cold milk to help calm our taste buds. I’d say that overall it was a valid attempt to recreate a classic Korean dish, but now I know to go easy on the chili. I encourage everyone to go to Moko and try their version which actually has a pleasant amount of heat to it. If you’re tongue is rather sensitive to heat, bring a bottle of milk with you and they’ll gladly pour it into a glass for you.

With the Academy Awards getting all the hype last Sunday, I decided to make a blog post with a theme from one of the Best Picture-nominated movies. I had only seen a handful but the one that I really enjoyed was The Help. My wife had read the book on our honeymoon and that’s all she talked about all week, so there was no getting out of seeing the movie with her once it was released.

I actually loved everything about the movie, especially the scenes that involved traditional Southern food, entertaining, and cooking.

When considering an Oscar-themed blog, Minny’s fried chicken immediately came to mind. Minny was one of the maids whose talents in the kitchen were considered exceptional by everyone in town. My favorite scene in the film is when Minny is teaching Celia Foote how to make her signature fried chicken to impress her working husband.

Minny discloses her secret ingredient: Crisco!

She says, “Ain’t just for frying. You ever get a sticky something stuck in your hair, like gum? That’s right. Crisco. Spread this on a baby’s bottom and you won’t even know what diaper rash is. Shoot, I seen ladies rub it under their eyes and on their husband’s scaly feet. And after all that, I will still fry your chicken”.

Now I rarely ever make fried chicken at home, just because it can be such a hassle, messy, and most of all unhealthy but it was a slow Sunday afternoon and I was craving something bad for me.

I couldn’t bring myself to go out and buy a tub of Crisco, so I used the next best thing… pork fat. Against my wife’s rationale, I do store tubs of pork fat in the fridge at all times. I collect the fat when I render out bacon or other delicious pork products and save it in tubs for times like this

. I just made sure that she was in the other room when I scooped it out and melted it in the cast iron pot. I really wanted to perfect my fried chicken making so I tried to follow a collaborative series of traditional Southern recipes.

I started off by marinating my chicken parts in creamy buttermilk. The buttermilk imparts some flavor but this method is mostly used to help tenderize the chicken and keep it moist. Buttermilk is actually quite acidic, which helps with this process.

To the milk, I added salt, pepper, eggs and a few heavy glugs of hot sauce.

After the mixture was combined, I threw it in the fridge for a solid four hours to let it do its thing. During the downtime, I got started on my take on cole slaw, a traditional Southern side dish.

Instead of using real cabbage, I decided to use brussel sprouts in my slaw. They look like little heads of cabbage, and this time of year I always have them in the house.

I sliced them up and tossed them in a bowl with sliced scallions, and parsley. I love the combination of the bitter sprouts and sweet, crispy bacon, so I did a play on that classic marriage.

I had a knob of guanciale in the fridge from American Provisions. Guanciale is very similar to Pancetta, except it is a cured pig’s jowl as opposed to the belly. It is one of my all-time favorite pork products because of its unique flavor. There’s just something about the fat that comes from the jowl area that tends to be sweeter, grassier, and earthier.

You cook it the same way you would bacon. I sliced it into matchsticks and when crispy, tossed it into the brussel sprout slaw.

A little homemade mayonnaise, heavy on the lemon juice and the slaw was complete. The little crispy nuggets of pork were delicious, weaved throughout the strands of bitter greens, all tied together from the creamy mayo.

On my countertop, I set up my dredging station for the chicken, which first hit some extra egg wash, and then my very heavily seasoned, all-purpose flour. Into the bubbling lard the pieces went causing a frothy foam of scalding fat surrounding the drumsticks, wings, and thighs.

It seemed that almost instantly a beautiful crust started to form and my kitchen soon developed a KFC-like aroma. It’s been a long, long time since I’ve eaten fast food, but this smell that was taking over my kitchen was deadly.

You know the smell. It’s the odor that you get when you walk within ten feet of a McDonalds, or Burger King let alone walk through the door. It seems to grab you and forces you to eat like a fat kid but then after you do, you want to kill yourself. The smell of bubbling lard is like fat kid heroin.

When I pulled each cooked piece out one by one, they glistened on the drying rack and while the excess fat dripped below. Once the extreme crispiness is visible and the smell is strengthening, it’s hard to resist.

As unembellished as I possibly could, I served the fried chicken parts on a plate with a scoop of the homemade slaw and a bowl of hot sauce. The first bite was nothing short of magical.

A huge dunk in the vinegary, hot sauce, a crunchy layer followed by moist, steaming chicken that fell right off of the bone. I was surprised at how tender the meat actually was thanks to the buttermilk bath.

We sat in front of the television, watching the red carpet with greasy grins on our faces and drinking beer. I kind of felt like I was a part of the 2011 Boston Red Sox clubhouse. We were pouring bottles of Hop Notch I.P.A from Uintas Brewing Co. in Utah. It is a beautiful gold color in the glass and extremely aromatic with notes of mango, grapefruit, and a touch of pine.

It is a drier style I.P.A than some of my other favorites and extremely hoppy, with sticky, caramel notes in the finish. It was a great contrast to all of the flavors in the dish and it certainly was refreshing after wolfing down about a whole bird.

After we had cleaned our plates and made moves into pants with elastic waistbands, Octavia Spencer won best supporting actress for playing Minny. It was a perfect ending to a Southern fried chicken feast. Thankfully, (for those of you who have seen the film) we didn’t have any pie for dessert.

As frustrating as shopping at Stop & Shop in South Boston can sometimes be, every once in a while they seem to amaze me. How is it possible that I can’t find a yellow onion without a hole in it but they carry the best skirt steak I’ve ever seen? No pork chops with valid expiration dates but giant cans of escargot for under $5 that you will not find anywhere else.

On Sunday, I had an impromptu urge to make beef short ribs so I took a trip down there and sure enough, they didn’t have any. Why would they carry beef short ribs when they can carry beef neck right? Yes, I said neck. Hacked up, gnarly upper vertebrae entwined with tough, fibrous meat.

Sounds nasty, but I was up for the adventure. After all, with this much bone, it would be hard not to extract a boatload of flavor with some simple, slow-cooking.

Looking for inspiration with my bag of necks, I walked up the street to American Provisions, a specialty grocer focusing on locally made, sustainable foods and a great source for high-quality, hard-to-find ingredients.

After browsing the vast selection my eye caught a cloth bag full of Charleston Favorites Stone Ground Grits; admittedly not something that I dabble with very often. Grits are of American-Indian origin and most commonly eaten down South for breakfast.

They’re very similar to hominy or polenta, consisting of corn that is coarsely ground in a stone mill, and they are cooked in a manner similar to risotto; whisked into simmering liquid and slowly stirred until soft.

I figured that something rich and creamy like grits would compliment an intensely flavored, braised piece of beef so I took a shot and created a unique recipe of my own. When I got home, I pulled the necks from the bag and examined them.

It was a good thing that I bought enough because there wasn’t much meat left on the bones. Some of the necks looked like they came from a cow with Scoliosis, all warped and tangled around itself.

I seared the necks in my new Staub cooking vessel (I’m obsessed with the interior, cast-iron finish) and then removed them to saute my mirepoix. To the mirepoix of carrot, celery, and onion, I added a few cloves of garlic, and a bouquet of rosemary, thyme, and dried bay leaf.

I hit the pot with some dry red wine and beef stock before returning the necks to the mix and braising them for two hours at 325 degrees; a very classic braise. While the Staub was in the oven, I had plenty of time to get the grits going and conceptualize the other components of the meal.

I started off by rinsing and soaking the grits in cold water to essentially  clean them and help remove any dirt of bran that rises to the top of the water. I didn’t realize that they would be so dirty, but I ended up skimming off a good amount of crud that rose to the surface.

I added the golden, yellow confetti to a pot with boiling water, milk, and heavy cream and brought it to a simmer while whisking constantly. 25-30 minutes later, the whisk became heavy and could barely flow through the pot because the grits became so thick and creamy.

I seasoned them, and mounted them with a Paula Dean-sized pat butter and some grated, sharp white cheddar cheese. I had to keep the lid on to keep my wife’s and my own fingers out. These things were deadly!

When the necks were done braising, I removed them from the pot and pulled all of the tender, succulent meat from the bones. I wish we had a dog, because these neck bones would have been the ultimate chew-toy.

I strained and reduced the braising liquid into one of the most intensely beef-perfumed sauces I have ever tasted. The amount of flavor condensed into just a few tablespoons of sauce was mind-blowing.

I spooned some of this neck “gravy” into the bottom of my mini cast-iron frying pan, which I was using as a serving vessel, and carefully arranged the neck meat on top. Next, I layered the creamy, buttery grits on top of the meat and sprinkled them with some sliced chives.

In order to bring the dish to the next level, I added some chopped pistachio nuts for texture as well as a sprinkle of pistachio “dust” that I made in my spice grinder.

The buttery nut has this unique flavor that paired really well with the slow cooked beef and creamy grits. It also looked like Tinkerbelle’s bag of pixie dust exploded because of the neon green hue. To top it off, I added the zest of an entire lime for some freshness and acidity to cut through all of the rich components.

I threw the entire cast-iron skillet into the oven to warm it up and to wake up all of the aromatic oils in the pistachio nuts. Within minutes it was steaming hot and ready to serve. If this wasn’t a little taste of the South in a pan, I don’t know what is. Slow cooked, beef neck in its own gravy, smothered in cheesy grits… this would make even the straightest Yankee talk with a Southern drawl.

I served this bold, assertive dish with an equally persistent red wine from Argentina. The 2008 Luca Beso de Dante is a blend of 55% Malbec and 45% Cabernet Sauvignon that is aged for 12 months in 70% new French oak. It sports an inviting nose of cedar, spice box, violets, earth notes, black currant, and blackberry. Rich, plush, and savory in the mouth with firm tannins that were smoothed out by the buttery food.

With 92 points from Wine Advocate, this highly praised red is not only delicious now, but could also benefit from years of cellaring. It was one of the most serious and complex wines from Argentina that I have ever tasted. Siobhan and I shared the bottle and the small cast-iron pan because one portion of this meal was enough for the two of us.

Surprisingly, the beef neck was tantalizing and luscious. It literally melted in your mouth. I will absolutely eat neck again in the near future. As much of a pain in the neck, Stop & Shop can be, they do turn out a few hidden gems every once in a while, enough to keep me coming back.

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