They won’t leave me alone.  Today’s NY times piece on burgers has opened up a Pandora’s box of craving.    The same cake tester, potato rolls, handling instructions, pickles and other pointers I’ve been playing with for weeks have been re-arranged and laid out for me in a way that has stoked an absolutely ravenous  burger lust.   I dare you to read it and try not to order a burger for lunch today.  I’m left  concerned for my future well being.

The Comme Ça burger recipe embraces my call for simplicity leaving me smitten, but it’s the quoted chef’s restaurant technique that has me most curious.  The author glances over a plancha as a high end flat grill, but I’ve stood next to these devices at Cafe Du Parc and I’m telling you they get HOT.  I’ve always thought the best burger had to be kissed by fire, but I’m envisioning a crisp uniform crust that amounts to one giant grill mark and I’m starting to drool.

Just a week ago I thought I had burgers perfected, but now I’m forlorn for a commercial source of steady and intense heat.  How do you make your perfect burger?

The quest for Bovinity continues.

Dear Anna,

Whoever is in charge of prepping your tidy station has clearly given up. Illuminated by the cold fluorescence of a sneeze guard everything looks a little tired.  But it’s the chicken I want to talk about most – The chicken salad I order every day.  It wouldn’t take much to go from pale postmortem gray to something much more alive.

The onion and celery you use for texture are lifeless so why not try nuts?  If you really cared for me, you could roast them.  Their toasty aroma would perfume your kitchen as well as my lunch.  Add a handful or two of golden raisins and cilantro for more than bright color –their flavors would brighten taste buds as well.  Perhaps we could finish things off with just a touch of curry?  Just enough to let me know there’s something there, but not quite recognize what.

I’m not trying to be needy.  It’s just I know all these ingredients are at your disposal.  I see them in the salsa, soups and other dishes that are also a little flat.  Let’s shake things up, and let ingredients trapped in monogamous relationships with their recipes get out and swing a bit.  If you truly love them, they won’t betray you I promise.  And we all might have a little extra fun.

Burgers are everywhere. The Washington Post penned an article today about burgers that are served with a side of food advocacy.  Husband-and-wife owners Derek and Amanda Luhowiak have built a food cart business that may make a drive to Reston mandatory this weekend.  In addition to serving burgers that earn the Post’s praise, Local Sixfortyseven’s stainless steel cart is also on a mission.

Right now, the cheese and onions are the extras because that’s what’s available. “The hardest thing is convincing people to eat seasonally,” said Derek Luhowiak, who previously was the chef at Ayrshire Farm in Upperville. “They want tomato on their hamburger. So I tell them if they can find a tomato plant with fruit, I’ll put it on. If not, how about some nice homemade ketchup?”

Keeping a restaurant local and seasonal is a logistical and cultural challenge, but it’s a movement that’s gaining momentum.  This Friday Food Inc. premiers at E street Cinema, and Shirlington theaters and  I’m hoping to attend with a few friends.  If enough people become aware of how big business is impacting our food culture restaurateurs like the Luhowiaks should be very successful.

Pig Headed

The more  I’ve read about what goes on at big business processing plants the less I want grocery store meat on my table.  Thankfully local farmers like Bev Eggleston have been bucking the trend focusing  smaller production organic, and heritage breed meats.  You have to go to the farmers market, and you have to pay more, but you get a certain satisfaction knowing your pork chop lived the good life before meeting your grill.

To promote heritage breads the Taste Network is hosting Cochon 555 Sunday, May 31.  The event features 5 chefs (Brian McBride, RJ Cooper, Nicholas Stefanelli, Jamie Leeds and John Manolatos) cooking 5 pigs, nose to tail.  I’ll be there this Sunday pinging chefs on tips to make killer head cheese while getting fat on swine straight from the farm.  Tickets are still available so if you’re not busy, you should go to.

More information here

The fellas at Ziploc were off to a good start.  Opaque windows on nearly all thier bags allow us to jot down highly informative tidbits of information on the contents frozen within.

“Chix Breast” is helpful.  Accurately identifying the contents hidden behind layers of plastic and foil.

“Chix Breast 4/5/08″ is better.   Letting us know that at the present date we should probably take a pass…and perhaps look at our pantry management skills.

“Use only in emergency”, well you get the idea.

But what about all the other containers in your fridge; the Tupperware and foil packets, the glass jars, and bottles.  For those I’d recommend doing what most restaurants do for kitchen inventory.  Simply grab a roll or masking tape and a good sharpie, and lable to your hearts content.

Contents are important, as are the date you made or acquired them, though that can still leave some ambiguity.  Just how long is chow chow good for anyway?  A better approach would be to check the recipe as you finish the dish, and label your food stuffs with an expiration date.  Lot’s of recipes tell you that they’ll keep in the fridge for 3 or 5, or 30 days.  Labeling them accordingly will take out the guess work, keep you from serving questionable items, and make a weekly fridge and pantry cleaning a breeze.

Plus it looks cool.

Kitchen Labels

I love the cool stories we tell while we cook.   Watching a pot simmer for hours can be like watching paint dry, so it’s nice to have a tale to tell to pass the time.   While hashing out an upcoming article for the Post I was afforded some time with Will Artley, the Executive Chef at the Evening Star Cafe.   Discussing comfort food he mentioned a breakfast dish that his mother regularly prepared. When  Will asked what she was making she confidently responded “Batones Para los Preguntones”.

It had a nice ring,  and supposedly described a hearty breakfast dish of tomatoes, eggs and tortillas cooked  in a single pan.   The dish was memorable enough to join Will’s repertoire, and he frequently made it in different kitchens.  Each time he’d proudly announce its name…Batones Para los Preguntones.  I’m guessing it was a humbling moment when he learned that every time he asked his mom what she was making, she was simply  answering “For me to know, and you to find out”.

Sometimes we revisit our best dishes time and time again, becuase the smells they generate stimulate memories in a way that simple stories and recollections can’t replicate.  But when dishes from our past join a favorite story or tradition we make recipes for memories that are lasting.

Steak and Eggs

Metrocurean’s post about tortilla soup, reminded me of the version I watched Morou Ouattara prepare as a staff meal before a Friday night dinner service. What was most interesting was not the soup itself (even though it was awesome), but the method used to bring it to life. Other than the two onions that started the dish, and the 6 chicken breasts, every ingredient was added without much regard to quantity. It made capturing a recipe difficult, but I at least jotted down everything that went into the pot.

Onions, cumin, coriander and whole dried chilies formed the base of this soup, along with sage, and marjoram. Morou didn’t use traditional herbs, he used what was on hand, and the results were no less stunning; But not at first.

After the soup cooked for a while, the chilies removed, and tortillas added, Morou had achieved a rather flat boring soup that was so intensely spicy it was inedible. And then the real cooking began.

To tone down the spice he added more stock, and to give it more body more tortillas followed. The boat motor whirred, and still things were lifeless. Lemon juice was added from a few lemon halves and the soup jumped to life, but with almost too much vigor. No matter Morou downplayed the acid with a bit of sugar, and everything fell into place.

“Cooking isn’t rocket science” Morou told me as he added some chopped cilantro to the mix. “You make something, you taste it and if you don’t like it you add and taste again. You keep going until you get things where you want them to be.” And sure enough Morou got exactly where he intended. The soup was devoured so quickly by his staff, he had to rescue the last few quarts to save for his wife.

The recipe below is just as open to your interpretation as it is to mine. I’ve not added quantities, or detailed instructions because a finished recipe isn’t the point. The goal is to cook and taste, and cook and taste, and note how each addition changes the overall character of the dish. Give it a try and see where you end up. At worst it could make you a better cook. At best you’ll end up with one hell of a soup.

Tortilla Soup

Tortilla Soup

This is by no means a tested recipe.  It’s just a road map that will (if you cook half as good as Morou) lead you to one hell of a tortilla soup.

2 dried New Mexican Chilies

Assorted herbs, whole

1 medium onion diced

3 cloves garlic minced

Cumin

Coriander

Cilantro

1/4 cup tomato paste

2 cups diced tomatoes

Chicken stock

2 bone on skin on chicken breasts

Lemon juice

Cilantro

Garnishes

In a big stockpot bring a lot of oil to temp, and toss in chilies, and fresh whole sage, and marjoram. They’ll cough and sputter and the smell is awesome. To cool the pan, and stop the chilies from burning toss in the 2 finely chopped onions and some garlic. This is cooked, and then tomato paste is added and toasted, and then diced tomatoes. Chicken stock is added.

Hit chicken breasts in a searing hot pan, skin side down only. Once well browned the pieces are thrown in the soup. Use some of the soup is to deglaze the chicken pan, and then return it back to the soup pot.

Remove chicken from soup, put into a pan skin side up, tossed into the oven to re-crisp the skin.

Toss in tons of tortilla chips and cook till soggy, then the remove chilies, and blend the whole thing with an immersion blender.

Season with lemon juice, salt, cilantro, and sugar if necessary, tasting all along the way. When finished add the diced chicken, and serve with fried tortilla strips, sour cream, extra cilantro, and cheese.

One of the things you don’t get to see in DC Chefs are the recipes that get dumped because the photos didn’t turn out, or the recipe didn’t fit the magazine.  It was a little heartbreaking when a dish really came out well but didn’t make the cut.

I loved the language Cesare used in the recipe.  When I read it I can here him talking.   Everything is in weights, and then he calls for half a glass of wine.  We can only presume what to do with the other half.  The secret to this risotto is a lot of butter and a lot of cheese that forms a creamy base for the savory mushrooms.

Mushroom Risotto

Risotto ai funghi

Serves 4

1 pound carnaroli rice

2 quarts chicken consomme

1/2 small onion, chopped fine

4 ounces dry white wine

2 ounces butter

2 ounces olive oil

2 ounces Parm

1 garlic clove,  fine julienne cut

1 shallot, fine julienne cut

5 ounces wild mushrooms

10 basil leaves

1 teaspoon chopped parsley

For the mushrooms

Gently clean the mushrooms removing all dirt.  In a warm saute pan heat 1 ounce of the olive oil and cook the shallots and garlic for a few seconds till aromatic.  Add the mushrooms  and saute for 3-4 minutes.  Add the basil and season to taste with salt and pepper.

For the Risotto

In a 6 quart saute pan over low heat, heat remaining oil and add the chopped onion.  Cook till translucent, and add the rice turning up the heat to medium high.  Toast the rice for 3 mins stirring occasionally.  At this point add the wine and stirring gently let completely evaporate.  When all the alcohol dissapates add one ladle at a time the chicken stock and let cook for 15 mins or until the rice is cooked through.

At this point turn off heat and add the sauteed mushrooms, butter, parm, and mix the rice vigorously to emulsify and combine all flavors, season to taste and let rest for one minute before serving, sprinkle the parsley and buon appetito.

Photo from the Washington Post

While scoping out a joint for the Post’s Good to Go feature, I was lucky enough to get a hands on Saletna lesson from a true pro.  I was curious how you got a liquid stew to chill out inside a pastry while they were rolled and sealed.  When I asked the chef, he invited me behind the pass to try it myself.

In a tiny stainless steel-framed kitchen, Raúl Claros works an achiote-dyed pastry on a seasoned maple bench.  A step away, his mother Haydée peels the boiled eggs that will join roast chicken, olives, and a gelatin-set beef stew.  The gelatin allows the stew to be portioned out using an ice cream scoop.  Raul shows me how to twist the dough in a series of overlapping creases, forming a braided rope that seals the ingredients inside a saltena ordered minutes earlier.

Raul and I discussed his history while I tackled my second Saltena.  Born in Caracas and raised in Bolivia with a father who was schooled in Chile, Raul uses his Latin American menu to tell his family history.  “This is our creole food, our comfort food,” he says, delicately brushing a thin egg wash over the pastries.   As he slides the sheet pan into the oven his mother describes pictures she has of a younger chef, only five, rolling small rounds of the same pale yellow pastry back in Bolivia.  Twenty-three years later little as changed.  “I can’t believe I’m still doing this” says Raul, “Saltenas are chasing me.”

It’s an exercise Raul and his small staff repeat hundreds of times a week, each turnover carefully crafted only after a request filters in from the dining room.  Nearly all of the dishes that leave the kitchen of La Caraqueña are cooked this way.

The unlikely storefront adjoining a Motor Lodge Hotel in downtown Falls Church seems less than ideal but upon entering you’re immediately set to ease.  The intimate space is cloaked in lively yellow and teal while photographs of South American scenery overlook matching booths.  A soundtrack loops through a lively Latin beat complete with raver hoots and train whistles,  and then you’re hit by the aromas of stewed beef and chilis.

If you go check out the Arepes ($2.49-8.49) puffed in the oven like corn cake pitas, grilled, split, and stuffed with delicious and addictive fillings.   Carne Mechada invokes tender strands of beef braised in tomatoes and chilies while JP’s favorite touts grilled steak with tomatoes and onions.  Beans with cheese, chicken with avocado, ham and many other combination make you wish they weren’t so filling.  Consider splitting one with a friend if you hope to explore La Caraqueña’s other offerings.

This place also turns out the best Yucca Frita ($4.99) I’ve had in a while.  Paired with salsa amarilla and a fresh salsa of tomato onion and jalapeno.

La Caraqueña Latin American Cuisine
300 W. Broad Street, Falls Church, VA 22046
www.lacaraquena.com
Hours: Mondays through Fridays, 12pm-10pm; Saturdays, 11am-10 pm; Sundays, 11am-9pm; Closed Tuesdays