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Mains are any substantial recipe that will be the centerpiece of a meal, or a major element of a feast!

pasta kermit

Pasta Kermit

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THE COOK’S TOUR

It is really easy being green (Sorry, Kermit.)! It’s also pretty simple to turn out this exceptionally fast meal, especially if you have Cypress Grove’s Sgt. Pepper® goat cheese.

This is a riff of a Parmigiano Reggiano dish common to Northern Italy, made a lot more interesting, with half the work, and (shh…) a bit healthier, too.

For my fellow home chefs who live outside of North America, any good herbed chèvre that you like will work fine.

There are lots of variations on this recipe. Feel free to riff away!

Prep & Cook Time:

15-20 min.

Serves

Four (4)

The Gear

  • Vitamix® Mixer, or similar high-speed;
  • Pasta pot
  • Wok, or deep sauté pan
  • Large microwave container with lid or a steamer;
  • Large mixing bowl
  • Large slotted spoon
  • Colander
  • Spatula
  • Tasting spoons

The Stuff

Base Sauce

  • 113 g. / 4 oz. Cypress Grove fresh chevre Sgt. Pepper® cheese disc
  • 300 g. / 10 oz. Organic Baby Spinach
  • Shredded Parmigiano Reggiano for topping.
  • Salt to taste
  • EVOO to thin, if necessary

Pasta

  • Water;
  • Kosher salt;
  • Orecchiette for four people (or any other pasta).

Variations

Meat (as pictured)

  • 1 lb. organic ground pork;
  • 4 to 6 g. of truffle salt;
  • Sprinkle of dried basil;
  • Sprinkle of dried oregano;
  • 30 ml/ 2 tbsp avocado oil, or rice bran oil, for sautéing.

Roasted Cauliflower

  • 1/2 Cauliflower head, top florets only, finely cut into pea sized bits. Reserve remainder to rice/chop finely for other dishes;
  • 4 to 6 g. of truffle salt;
  • Sprinkle of dried basil;
  • Sprinkle of dried oregano;
  • 30 ml/ 2 tbsp avocado oil for roasting.

The Steps

  • If using cauliflower, pre-heat your oven to 350Pre-heat your wok on high, or your sauté pan on medium-high. I prefer the wok because I want that “crispness” to the texture of the meat, to counter the soft sauce. Sautéing will take a bit longer;
  • Add water and kosher salt to your pasta pot. Set on HIGH;
  • Wash off your spinach in the colander. Drain. Put in your microwave dish;
  • Add the Sgt. Pepper cheese to your blender;
  • When the wok is hot, add rice bran oil (It has the highest smoke point, to avoid toxing out your oil), and sauté the ground pork, breaking it up into as small bits as possible. Add the truffle salt, basil, and oregano.
  • When the water achieves a rolling boil, add the pasta to your pasta pot. Set the recommended time for that type of pasta;
  • If your meat or vegetable is done, keep warm on a low setting;
  • With four minutes left, put the spinach in your microwave dish into the microwave. Heat on the fresh-vegetable setting, or for 3:20 at a power of 70% (Power-7);
  • Drain the pasta. Add to your large mixing bowl;
  • Add the add-ons: Meat; vegetable; etc.;
  • Put the spinach in the blender with the cheese disc. If it’s very dry, add 15 ml/ 1 tbsp of vegetable broth, or water. Pureé by starting slow, and then integrating until the spinach is fully emulsified into the cheese. No little spinach bits. Takes about 1 min. to 90 seconds;
  • Add the sauce to the pasta. Use the spatula to get it all out of the mixer. Toss with tongs (long noodles), or the spatula (small noodles), to integrate;
  • Plate, and sprinkle with the shredded Parmigiano Reggiano, then serve.

Wine Pairing

This pairs well with a nice, light white.

Pinot Grigio would be my call. A dry one, like Santa Margherita, would help contrast against the heavier cheese element in the pasta, clearing the palate, and opening up the next delicious bite!

Ragoût Thiam - Final Cover

Ragoût Thiam (A Senegalese-Inspired Meatball Stew)

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An umami parade of flavors from many countries, the magic of the Jazz Chef’s Ragoût Thiam features complex meatballs, infused with a hint of umami-savory, not sweet, mint, and peanut flour/powder, simmered in a hugely flavorful tomato and okra base, finished with expeller-pressed peanut oil and served on a bed of couscous. It’s a little Italian Sunday Gravy twist, diving into my aromata to grab some assists from my Indian, Turkish and Arabic spice bases.

 

RAGOÛT 101

North Americans dump Ragoûts, or their Italian cousins, Ragu, largely into the broader category of stews. The term comes from the French verb ragoûter, which means: “To revive the taste.” This is because a lot of the meats that find their way into a ragoût are already cooked, often boiled for stock, or another flavor-sucking form that leaves the meat in need of a little “encouragement.”  Bet you thought “ragu” was just a brand of spaghetti sauce!

Truly, even though ground beef, and sometimes smaller stew scraps, are “first pass,” they are so devoid of flavor or character that they too, could use a little ragoût style to their preparation.

A ragoût is all about the seasoning, which, for the improvisational chef, is what a blank canvas was to Matisse. Highly seasoned, and nuanced, they offer waves of taste sensations, textures, and content smiles, when done properly.  Ours is going to be rich with umami, peanuts tomato, and the mouthfeel from textures of kale, black-eyed peas, and okra, in my tribute to a chef-hero, Pierre Thiam.

SUFFUSED WITH A SMIDGEN OF SENEGAL

This dish pays homage to my hurricane Irma read, chef Pierre Thiam’s wonderful book, Senegal: Modern Senaglese Recipes from the Source to the Bowl.

The cuisine of Africa is amazingly diverse. Thousands of tribes, dozens of peoples, with access to unique regional foodstuffs, abundances, scarcities, created a cornucopia of cuisine long before, along with colonial occupation, Europeans arrived, enforcing their principles of cooking.

Sadly, much of African cuisine has been lost to that “lesser than” thinking, that their approach to food is not as elegant, or as worthwhile. It is only within the last decade or so that the traditions are making a comeback.

More often than not, both flavors and techniques of preparation that might be seen as “French” or “American,” really draw from Africa, and not vice-versa. Senegalese recipes are infused with a lot of umami flavors, what Chef Thiam likes to call “funk.”

So let’s FUNK IT UP!

SAVORY MINT? DON’T BE A HERB HATER.

Before you flip to another recipe because that voice in the back of your head says: “Mint?!!! That’s just for desserts and mojitos!”

Don’t be like that. Don’t be a herb hater.

If mint had a theme song, it would be: “Please Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood.”  Throughout much of North America and Europe, it is a herb shackled to sweets, bound to beverages. Its savory qualities rival those of basil, thyme, or oregano, and it is the perfect herb for umami cooking.

PEANUT POWDER POWER!

Likewise peanut flour (powder), which has found its way into North American and European stores for smoothies and as a supplement, is a culinary powerhouse, as long as you have no peanut allergies. The flour/powder gives us big peanut flavor, and a great source of protein, with most of the fat from the oil stripped away. Unlike peanut butter, you can control how much oil, and when it is added, improving both the flavor and the calorie count!

If you’re a Creole/Cajun fan, this Senegal-riffed recipe definitely is a journey back to the roots of  your fave Southern American cuisine. Indians, Mediterraneans, and Turks will see some of the commonalities in their cuisines with this root ragoût from the real “old country.”

SERVES

4-6 (Four to Six) People.

THE STUFF

Meatballs

RAGOÛT BASE

TOPPING

  • 1 tbsp. Za’atar
  • 1/4 cup crushed peanuts for topping

THE GEAR

HEALTH WARNING

 

If you are allergic to peanuts, or nuts in general, probably best to take a pass on this recipe. It’s very very peanut dependent. Can work with other nuts, like pistachio or cashew, if you are not allergic to all nut meats, but the flavor is different.

THE STEPS

  1. Cut your bread into chunks that can be worked by a food processor. Place the bread into the processor with a standard blade attached. Close and pulse chop until the breadcrumbs are fine and well aerated. Measure the amount of breadcrumbs and remove the excess. (Any excess can be used for other recipes by just bagging it.)
  2. Add the wet and dry meatball ingredients to the breadcrumbs. Pulse until fully integrated and aerated. Set aside.
  3. In a 10-12″ fry pan, heat the avocado oil to 300°F  /150°c. Use a digital thermometer to check. Do not use supermarket blend vegetable oils or canola oil as they can affect the taste. Use avocado oil or expeller pressed peanut oil at 280°F  / 138°c, if it is unavailable. (Click the link to learn more about why avocado oil should be your go-to oil.). Set out some paper towels to drain the cooked meatballs in a place within easy reach of your range-top.
  4. Remove the center stems of your kale and mustard greens and pulse-chop in the food processor until they’re about 1/4″ to 1/2″ (6mm to 1.2 cm). Put in a work bowl and set aside.
  5. Bring your work bowl with the meat mix close to the fry pan. To make the meatballs, you may need a bowl with some water, if there isn’t a sink with running water handy. A good idea to wet your hands between meatballs as that’s your “nonstick” coating. Wet your hands, and pull together a meatball from the meat mixture about 2″, a golf-ball and a half. Roll in the palms of your wet hands until it’s solid, with no gaps or breaks.  Place into the hot oil and fry, turning with tongs, not applying too much pressure. Cook until browned on all sides of the ball.
  6. Drain on paper towels.
  7. Add the meatballs and roll them in the sauce. Let the heat come back up. Add the black-eyed peas. Stir gently. Bring back up to a low simmer.
  8. Add the frozen okra, and bring back up to a simmer.
  9. Add the kale, and simmer for approx 10-12 minutes to let the flavors from the ragout and the meatballs interact, and the kale to soften. Stir to avoid burning, but don’t overdo it. The flavors will find each other!
  10. Chop peanuts for the topping. Set aside.
  11. Fluff the couscous.
  12. The ragout is finished when the meatballs have that coated sheen to them. Turn off the heat. Add the expeller (first) pressed peanut oil and stir to kick up the flavor.
  13. Plate the couscous. You can spoon it on, but if it’s clumpy after fluffing it, you may want to grab a handful with a clean hand or two and gently rub between them to sprinkle it on to the plate which opens it up and keeps it light. I sprinkle a little extra za’atar on mine.
  14. Plate the ragoût on top, starting from the center and working your way to the outside of the couscous. 
  15. Sprinkle with crushed peanuts and za’atar. Serve.
SiSiSi Meat Rub

The Jazz Chef’s “Si Si Si” Smoked or Sous Vide Brisket Rub

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THE COOK’S TOUR

This coffee (¡Si!), aji chile (¡Si!), and cocoa powder (¡Si!) rub is great for cooking a first-cut brisket in either a sous vide or a smoker. I shred the meat and put it on my Costa Rican-inspired arepas.

The aromas and flavor are amazing!

THE STUFF

THE GEAR

THE STEPS

  1. Deseed the pepper pod, and remove the connective tissues, where the heavy heat is stored. Leave a bit in if you want the rub spicier, but if you want the amazing aji chile’s BIG flavor, pull it all out.
  2. Add the ingredients to a coffee grinder or small electric chopper/grinder.
  3. For the coffee mill/grinder, grind until the whole is combined and fine. For the chopper (in the photos), pulse grind, then chop, then grind, back and forth, until the spice mix is a powder. If you’re a masochist, you can use a mortar/pestle.
  4. When finished, it will look like grains of sand:
  5. Apply to a meat, or it can be stored for use for about eighteen months.

MY HEADS-UP

This spice mix is built best for a sous vide.

If you are going to put the meat into a smoker, omit the smoked hickory salt and add an equal amount of the Himalayan pink salt.  You can grill it as well, but I would vacuum seal it for 24 hours for a large brisket 2.5 lbs.+ (1.13 Kg.) , 12-14 hours for smaller ones.

CauliflowahCumanChowdah

Cauliflowah Cumin Chowdah

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My confession: You know. You “experiment” in college. I used to be ashamed of it, but I can say it now:

I love puréed soups!

French cuisine’s powerful, simple heart of darkness. Beguilingly simple, flavorful, healthy… soup.

Club Med La Caravelle, Guadeloupe

My friend, who was a medical student at Columbia, talked me into taking an adventure:  A student Spring Break deal at the Club Med on the island of Guadeloupe in the French Caribbean. College girls, fabulous beaches, tiki bars, college girls, and, as I found out when we got there, puréed soups.

Each night started with a different  potage (soup), taking advantage of a good supply of vegetables that were grown on the island by the hotel, an early stab at sustainability by the French owners.  Simple vegetables, a carrot-ginger. or a potato leek, or a lentil, combined with a spice or two, can create amazing flavors. These potages were hearty, nutritious, and so fibrously filling, that they kept you from over-indulging on the later courses.

A few of us played beach volleyball in the afternoons with the kitchen staff. They worked out their aggressions on the guests who were willing to endure their volleyball Thunderdome.

David, the Potager (soup guy), looked more like Goliath out there. He had a big mane of black hair, a rocket serve that could leave a huge welt on your arms if you actually stopped it. He always sported a massive, and confident grin, a visual affectation that telegraphed his palpable Parisian smugness. He had a right to be cocky. He was the kitchen’s rock star. His soups were the opening act of every evening’s meal.

One day, a few of us were allowed to come to the kitchen. I discovered David’s secret weapon was not a slingshot, but steam! He didn’t drown the vegetables, only adding enough liquid to make his soup, and leave enough room in his massive pot to allow for the  steaming of his vegetables before puréeing. It maxed out the flavor and nutrition!

Fast Forward thirty-five years to 2017, in Killarney, a charming coastal tourist town south of Cork, situated near beautiful parks, on the verdant coastline of Western Ireland.

These days the big draw is a tiny rock of an island, Skellig Michael,  recently made famous by Luke Skywalker’s appearance on it in final scene in Star Wars Episode VII.

The chef at the amazing Brehon Hotel, Charlie Byrne, rekindled my romance with puréed soups. His wicked wonder is a cauliflower soup, with a toasted cumin seed.  The cumin seeds compliment the cauliflower brilliantly!

This is my more humble, and low-volume home homage to the soups of the Caribbean and Kilarney, with a lot of the heavy fats lifted from past recipes that I’ve tasted/reviewed, that rely on a lot of butter. Fats are a necessary part of our diet, but too much is a bad thing. Fatphobes, don’t freak out about the cream! 118 ml/ 1/2 cup, distributed over 12 servings, is only 10 ml per 148 ml serving (5 oz). By contrast, a pat of butter is about 12 ml. (1-1/2 tsp.)

It’s simple, easy to make with a good blender or an immersion blender (my fave). It’s also really  inexpensive!

Serves: 12

THE STUFF

MISE EN PLACE

THE STEPS

  1. Set the pots and pans on the stove. Set your 8″ sauté/fry pan to medium low.
  2. Add the cumin seed to the 8″ fry pan. Swirl gently to distribute the seeds across the pan or stir with a non-stick spatula. Remove when lightly toasted, meaning if y’all can smell the fragrance of the cumin oil warmed up, it’s done. We’re not looking for burn marks like toast.  3-7 minutes depending upon stove equipment. Use the spatula to put the toasted seed into a mini glass work bowl. Set aside;
  3. While toasting the seeds, trim off the base and leaves from the heads of cauliflower.  Open the head up by trimming clusters, breaking them down into smaller 1-2″ (approx) bits. Smaller chunks of cauliflower let steam work more efficiently to cook more evenly and help the immersion blender work better.. Stop and swirl/stir the cumin as needed.  Put the cauliflower florets into the stock pot;
  4. Peel the carrot. Quarter it.  Put in the stock pot.
  5. Clean the celery.  Quarter.  Put it in the stock pot.
  6. Very coarsely cut the onion. Spray or coat the nonstick frying pan with avocado oil. Set to medium. Put the into the 12″ frying pan. Cook, stirring periodically with the spatula, until the onion softens and starts to turn translucent.
  7. Add enough water to fill up about 1/3 of height of the vegetables. About 2 cups. Mostly we’re worried about steaming the veggies here. You can always add more water if it is too thick down-road;
  8. Set the pot to medium. Cover. When is reaches a boil. Set to low to simmer. Cook for approximately 20-30 minutes, or until tender enough that the cauliflower falls apart easily when poked at with the spatula but still has some structure. Resist cranking up the heat, and let the steam do its job. Fiber is lost when overcooking.
  9. Add the cumin, cayenne, and white pepper. Add the cream or coconut milk with coconut cream in it.
  10. Using the pimer/immersion blender, purée the soup until smooth and creamy. Keep the blender down, and use the low setting, working in a circle by blending in different places to break down the bigger pieces.PIMER/IMMERSION TIPS:
    • REMEMBER TO STOP COMPLETELY before you pick up the immersion blender and move it, or stuff will go everywhere.
    • Don’t rest the stick on the bottom. Keep it just about a 1/2″ from the bottom to let the vegetables get under it.
    • If your stick has a Turbo feature, like the All-Clad, featured below, stick it in the middle. Get it positioned well. Brace yourself and hit it. Turbo can have a bit stronger pull, so hold on. This will get that final, nice smooth pureé quickly though. Otherwise you have to keep moving around on low speed to get it to the same consistency.

    BLENDER/FOOD PROCESSOR TIPS:

    • Make sure it has a good motor. Soups can put more load on the motor than smoothies.
    • Empty the vegetables and any liquid in the pot into a large work bowl, as you’ll need to work in batches.
    • Reserve the pot, as you’ll return the finished puree back to it, and then finish the soup there.
  11. Add salt to taste. If too thick, add a little water. Stir.

Serve.

The Jazz Chef’s Cauliflowah Cumin Chowdah goes great with slices of a nice crusty French bread. It can easily be frozen/reheated.  If you do freeze or store, you may need to add a little water to thin it.

Diner M&C

The Jazz Chef’s Diner M&C

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QUICK Diner M&C

SERVES 5-6

This is a quick mac and cheese that has that diner-grade sticky gooey that can go toe-to-toe with my chili in my split dish Chili Mac Attack plating, and it’s a star in my scrambled mac sandwich, with scrambled eggs, ham and mac and cheese in a hoagie roll.

I do several mac and cheese recipes, depending upon how upscale I want to go with it.  You can either lovingly grate quality cheese and go A-game, “grandma” mac and cheese, or, if you have a need for speed, you drop to this Diner-grade M&C.

Yes, greasy spoon Mac is all about speed, which, if you’ve made this stuff, usually means Kraft’s Velveeta. Please don’t go there for your base.

I have no problem with whey, which is most of a “cheese food.” Whey may not be cheese, but it is high in protein, and, if the fats are kept under control, and they keep the other junk out of the product, there is nothing wrong with it, from time-to-time, as a protein in your family’s week.

Big K, though, still manages to work in some really cheap stabilizers and other ingredients that aren’t things that I choose to feed my family, and you shouldn’t feed yours, especially with any weekly regularity. One of these days they’ll get the hint.

Amazingly, Walmart, of all places, the Mecca of mass-produced foods, your Official Obesity Center, seems to be on a better path with more organic foods and its in-house generics.  Their reduced fat, Easy Melt cheese is far less full of junk than what is made by our friends at Kraft.  Always good to read the labels!

I put in a little good dijon and white pepper to add a little of that sharp-cheddar edge that a better mac-and-cheese would have from using a higher-grade aged cheddar.

THE STUFF

  • 1 32 oz. block Walmart Easy Melt Reduced Fat Cheese Food
  • 1 cup milk
  • 1 tsp Fallot or other quality dijon mustard (1.5 tsp for American Grey Poupon)
  • 1/4 tsp white pepper
  • 1 16 oz. box macaroni elbows (Barilla or Italian equivalent)
  • Salt for pasta water

THE GEAR

  • Pasta pot with insert for draining
  • Melting Pot big enough for cheese and all the mac

THE STEPS

  1. Add water and salt to the pasta pot. Set on high
  2. In the melting pot, put in the cheese block and the milk. Set heat to low. Stir periodically to even the melt.
  3. When the water boils, add the pasta and reduce the heat slightly. Set a timer for 6 min.
  4. Add the remaining ingredients to the cheese melt
  5. When the pasta is just al dente, remove and drain.  Put it into the cheese pot. Stir in, and let absorb the liquid in the cheese pot, turning occasionally for about 3-5 minutes. If it’s a bit thick, add a little milk, but not too much. We want it thicker, but we want the pasta sucking in some of that good cheesy liquid to bind inside the noodle.
  6. Take off the heat and serve immediately.
Pee Wee's BBQ Pork Top

Pee Wee’s BBQ Pork Perfection

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PEE WEE’S BBQ PORK PERFECTION

Servings: 15-20

Lactose Free

There are a LOT of BBQ pork recipes out there. Literally thousands of ’em. So how/why to find a new take? Riff one of the best BBQ foods AND do it pretty quickly and easily?

I make a great shredded pork using my Komado, BUT it’s a lot slower, longer process.  I was looking for something that has all of the authenticity of a good slow-cook pulled pork, with the speed and convenience that most home chefs need when they don’t have hours and hours to make food.

Photo by Gottlieb/ Wikimedia Commons

When I create an original, I like to honor one of the greats of Jazz with the dish. This one is so good that I wanted it to celebrate an artist who has been, sadly, all but forgotten by modern audiences… Pee Wee Russell.

He’s a guy whose career may be less celebrated, but, like the great Louis Armstrong, it spanned every era and style of the music, from Dixieland to Free Jazz,and his unique style saw him featured at gigs with Bix Beiderbecke in the Jazz Age of the roaring 1920s all the way to the Bop era with Thelonious Monk  and others in the 1950s.

Pee Wee was a clarinet genius. Check him out if you have a minute, since I just freed up fourteen hours of cooking to get to this quality of pork.

MISE-EN-PLACE

 

WHAT YOU NEED

 

THE STEPS

  • Add the pork shoulder to the Instant Pot. You may have to cut it to fit it in the bottom of the pot.
  • Add all ingredients EXCEPT the tomato paste to the instant pot:

  • Stir and coat the pork shoulder.
  • Lock on the Instant Pot lid. Press the Meat button, then add time to 90 minutes using the PLUS button. Set the pressure cooker to HIGH. It will start automatically.  (If using a Fagor pressure cooker, lock the lid set to 2 slower cook on the steam knob, bring the pot to a boil, and, once the steam locks the lid, with the button up, set to med. low or low and cook for 90 minutes.)
  • When the meat is done, remove it from the Instant pot with tongs. Leave the pot on its warming cycle. Let it drain before placing in a work bowl. Using your fingers and/or a fork, shred the pork, discarding any heavy fats or cartilage, and put the meat into a second work bowl.
  • Finished meat should look like this. Leave a bit larger chunks for good mouth feel. The meat is so tender you don’t need to shred it to bits.
  • Add the shredded pork back to the BBQ base and stir in.

  • Add the tomato paste.
  • Stir in the tomato paste. Run the video so you can see the proper thickness.

 

  • Cover the pork and keep warm until serving.
  • Plating – Take your bun of choice, and heap a little on with tongs. Let the sauce drain off a bit to keep the bun from swamping. Serve with some BBQ beans and a vegetable side. For a nice riff, make some mayo-free spicy coleslaw and add a bit to the top of the pork before topping with the bun.
  • Freezing – If you’re not feeding a bunch of people, store and freeze smaller batches. It freezes great!