06.29.06
Posted in Other Fun at 9:36 am by Chef Matt
This is a bit off topic, but I can’t help but join in on silly games when presented to me. One of my favorite games is called Stampin’, a game that had a trial run from the USPS and was billed as “The Lively Game of Stamp Acquisition”. I am serious about this. No, really! OK Mr. Doubter, look here. It is silly and I can see why it didn’t catch on (stamp acquisition is NOT lively), but I love it all the same.
So anyway, in that line of thought, I was tagged for this Meme of Fives by Anne from Anne’s Food yesterday, and I can’t help but play along. She billed me “entertaining” in my writing, so I hope she likes my answers!
Five Things in My Freezer:
- Frozen Perogies
- Italian coffee (Starbucks is burnt crap people! Wake up and smell the… hmmm, is that a bad or an apt metaphor?…)
- Raspberries from my garden I am saving for winter
- Chile peppers from New Mexico (thanks Jeff and Charlotte!)
- Assorted nuts (insert crude joke here)
Five Things in My Closet:
- Hawaiian shirts
- Moose slippers
- Things I don’t want my wife to find
- An overflowing clothes hamper
- Numerous skeletons
Five Things in My Car (my car is always full of crap of one kind or another. Here are some of the longer-term residents)
- A CB radio and antenna I have never used
- A map of the DC area from 1997
- Three bungee cords
- A piece of toe molding
- A deck of mind teaser cards (I told you I love stupid games!)
Five things in my purse. (Ummm.. I don’t really have one of those, but I can tell you “Five things in my wallet”):
- A Taco Bell “Club 1000″ card from 1997 (one of my most prized possessions)
- A Red Cross Donor card (type O Positive)
- About 350 Home Depot Receipts
- A Kuwaiti 5 Dinar note*
- Assorted business cards from chefs and restaurants I have been talking to.
*The Kuwaiti note was from a friend of mine who was a military contractor who went to Kuwait in about 2002-3. When he got back, he had the note, but had no idea of the value (nor did I). As a night of drinking went on, I was challenged to chug an entire side of blue cheese dressing, and he offered up the Kuwaiti Dinar in return for it. He told me it was like worth $3 or so. I did it, and it was one of the dumbest things I figured I had ever done for $3. Anyway, much to my surprise, 5 Kuwaiti Dinar are actually about $17 US, so it worked out OK for me. Now I just have to get to a currency exchange somewhere…
OK, so all that is done, and now I need to tag some other people with this.
- Boutros from Nookie Cookie - no question. She rules, and is a frequent commenter.
- Alejandra from Sent from My Dell Desktop - She also rules, but is not as frequent a commenter.
- Robert from Appetites - He has similar opinions to me, but does he have any Kuwaiti Dinar?…
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06.28.06
Posted in Greatest Hits, Recipes, Other Fun at 1:01 am by Chef Matt
A friend of mine sent me this a while back, and well, I am still not sure if I believe it. It is a recipe for…well, hang on a second.
First of all let me say that I am a fan of fried food. By spending a mere 10 seconds in my presence, my oily sheen will give that away to you, and my physique is one that can only be described as “Body by Krispy Kreme“. I think that frying is good stuff, and while it may not be good for you, it makes everything better.
I just want to swim through them like Scrooge McDuck through a pile of money… |
Take for example such treats as deep-fried potatoes or onion rings. Who among us can say that these are not the definition of awesome? McDonalds alone makes 4 million pounds of fries every day - so we have to assume that they are on to something here.
But recently there has been a trend in this rotund nation of ours to deep fry things that for no reason should be deep fried. Deep-fried Oreos come to mind. I had these at a county fair about a year ago, and the sweet batter that they were coated in actually achieved a feat that I would have up until then called impossible: they actually made Oreos sweeter. Inside, the chocolate cookie had melted while the frosting was surprisingly firm. It was like hot chocolate with cream wrapped in a donut. This was good living.
Well, at least the first bite was. After the third bite I wanted the nightmare to be over. The sugar rush, the fat influx, the burning sensation of a myriad preservatives coursing through my G.I. tract at incredibly high temperatures - I wanted it all to stop. This was the worst pain ever. Sure, it may have been psychosomatic, but something in my brain told me that continuing on was a bad idea.
The list of items that have no place in a deep fryer does not stop there. I have heard of deep-fried Snickers bars. Are these candy bars not good enough on their own? Come on people: chocolate, peanuts, caramel, nougat… do we really need to add “vegetable oil” to that list? And deep-fried Twinkies. These things are sponge cakes on the outside! What do sponges do when they hit liquids? That’s right! Please skip the effort on this one: melt some Crisco in a pan, stir in some sugar, drink it down. The effect is the same.
But still, we have not hit what I consider to be the coup de gras. The recipe my friend sent me was for deep-fried bacon. Don’t get me wrong: I love bacon. I really really love bacon. I dream about bacon. I want to be wrapped in bacon after I die. I want to be wrapped in bacon before I die! When I see a Beggin’ Strips commercial, I yell along with the dog’s nose on the screen: “It’s BACON!!”
But deep-frying it?
People, let me clue you in on a little-known culinary secret: all that white stuff on bacon… it’s fat. All that liquid stuff - the stuff there is shit-loads of in the pan after you cook it - that’s fat. Cooking bacon is done in a dry pan so as to REMOVE fat from it. You don’t grease a pan before adding bacon do you? So, to deep fry it, that is, to cook a fatty food IN MORE FAT is a about as misguided as a Scientologist signing up for an extended warranty when buying a Segway.
How bad is it? Take a look at these scientific images I researched for you:
This is a healthy artery - an image of one at least. See how it has healthy, elastic walls and blood flows through cleanly? |
These are the arteries of someone who has just eaten deep-fried bacon. Notice the breading that coats the outside walls and the mozzarella cheese filling? I consulted with some doctor friends of mine and 9 out of 10* of them agree, mozzarella in your arteries is a bad thing. (*the 10th fainted at the notion) |
I don’t want to be alarmist or overly panic-inducing, but if you eat this, YOU WILL DIE. Years will be stripped from your life in front of your eyes. If you order a second helping, your aorta may reach up to strangle your brain just to get it over with.
All that being said, it sounds delicious, and here is the recipe:
Bacon Tempura
4 egg whites
3 cups all purpose flour
2 1/3 cups cold club soda
½ gallon canola oil
12 pieces thick-sliced apple wood bacon
Salt to taste
In a large bowl whip egg whites until they form soft peaks. Fold into egg whites the flour and the club soda. In a 4-qt. Pot heat oil to 425 degrees. Batter the bacon slices and carefully drop into hot oil a few slices at a time. Do not overcrowd oil as it will overflow and bacon will cook unevenly. Once the bacon is golden brown, remove from oil using a slotted spoon, lightly salt.
Serve 2 slices fried bacon onto of about 2 oz of grilled corn or other seasonal salad garnished with chipotle aioli* and 2 lime wedges.
*yes, it has a fatty dipping sauce too!
Chipotle Aioli
2 egg yolks
Juice of 4 limes
4 oz canola oil
1 chipotle chopped very fine
Salt and pepper to taste
Blend yolks and lime juice together in a food processor, slowly add oil until thickened.
Stir in chopped chipotle and salt and pepper.
It’s your life, you can do as you please, but for God’s sake, if you plan on making/eating this, please first leave something in your will to me. I love cash, but I will take any cooking implements or books you may want to leave me. Happy dying dining!
Matt
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06.26.06
Posted in The Story at 10:10 pm by Chef Matt
This is the start of my last week of full time work for my organization! It is really happening! The time has come to take the big plunge, and as of now, the die is cast. I am crossing my own personal Rubicon.
It’s a laptop - what did you expect?… |
To adapt to my new life of working from home, doing freelance web work (yes, i can do a web site for you if you like - samples) and writing some silly blog, I went and got myself a new computer today! That’s right, these words may look the same to you gentle reader, but the keys I am using to enter them are all new, I assure you! Well, it’s exciting for me at any rate. I was gong to do some neat photo work showing me at my new computer, but then I realized I hadn’t installed Photoshop yet. So until then these will be a little boring photo-wise.
So my last week’s activities (for those of you contemplating leaving a job and actually keeping it on good terms) I have to send out our e-newsletter (I am an online marketer you know) and get all the lists of things I do in order for my replacement. And of course, since I will now be a part time employee, I have to work out with my boss exactly what the heck that means.
For those of you who are here for the other good stuff, the food stuff (oh yeah, this IS a food blog) my situation has led me to look into some possible leads. It is amazing how many people come out of the woodwork and know a chef somewhere. So here are some possible leads that I have here and there. Anyone with a suggestion, I am all ears as to which one you think is the best:
- 1789 - A coworker of mine is roommates with one of the chefs there. I have an email address and an assurance he is cool.
- Tenpenh - Another amazing DC restaurant, and a friend of my mom’s is friends with the owners. They have set up a meeting for me sometime next month.
- Blue Duck - Just opened next door to my job. A good place that is just starting out, and new places have lots of turnover, so there are bound to be jobs. The attractive thing about this is that it is all my own - nobody got me this job, it is all me.
- Colvin Run Tavern - Bob Kinkead is one of the great chefs of DC (and the country), this would be a great place to work, and it is near my culinary school (and home) and they love to hire students from my school.
- Denny’s - Just because.
Ideas? Suggestions? Leads? I’ll take whatever you got!
Matt
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06.24.06
Posted in The Story at 4:40 pm by Chef Matt
I have always wanted to post some examples of my food here, but it is so hard because I am always eating it too fast. Or I make it at school, and it looks like hell by the time I bring it back. But I feel it is only fair for you to see some of my stuff. So I brought home a decorated carrot cake for you all to take a look at.
But first, some disclaimers:
- I am not a baker. I am OK at it in general, but by no means is baking my strong suit.
- This is the first cake I have EVER iced and decorated. See disclaimer #1 to understand why I have never done this before.
- There were no cake boxes at the school this night, I had to bring it home wrapped in saran warp as you can see around the cake.
- I made this cake 3 days before photographing it, so it has fallen a bit.
- This is the big one: I was icing this cake with a soft cream cheese frosting (not a nice, hard butter cream) and my work station was RIGHT NEXT TO THE OVENS. It was like trying to ice a cake with melted butter. So all in all, I had a lot working against me.
So now the results:
I think the marzipan carrots are cute, and the top is relatively smooth for an icing that was sticking to my spatula like Oprah to…well…icing… but anyway, there is an example of my work.
My personal conclusion: I shouldn’t quit my day job.
Oh wait…
Matt
P.S. Before you ask, the reason I have a fully-loaded carrot cake sitting around for three days without even cutting into it is because I also have 2 pound cakes, another undecorated carrot cake (put that in the freezer), some angel food cake, assorted rolls and cornbreads and, of course, cheesecake. To say I am “drowning in baked goods” doesn’t even begin to describe my situation.
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06.23.06
Posted in The Story at 12:00 pm by Chef Matt
This will most likely be an ever-growing series as I notice that a lot of jokes are told in the kitchen, and it is amazing how many of them revolve around food. Or is it that a lot of jokes have food-related angles and I never noticed it before?…
Anyway, this one struck me as particularly funny, so I thought I would post it to give you all a sense of how low-brow it goes in a kitchen. My current chef instructor is a C.E.P.C. (Certified Executive Pastry Chef) and is gay. (Not that I care that he is gay, but it is important to note as you will soon see…) So we were making pound cake last night, and we needed to grease the pans. I had to get shortening and flour form the back to grease and flour the loaf pans.
I go into the stockroom and find the shortening which is in a giant box. No, not little tubs people. When you need a lot of shortening (and since it pretty much never goes bad) you get it in giant boxes–we’re talking bigger than wine cases here. I heft the box up, and carry it into the room.
The fact that I was carrying about 20 lbs of pure fat amused me somewhat, and as I came hauling that into the room the chef caught my eye (making sure I had the right box) and I said “Aww YEAH!”. I set the box down, and the conversation goes as follows:
Chef: “Matt, when you come into a room carrying a giant box of lube, please don’t say ‘Aww YEAH!’ It conjures up the wrong images.”
Me: “OK Chef, but when I put this back, I think I may need you to help me squeeze it back in.”
Chef: “You’re a bastard.”
Yes, it is entirely that low-brow, but it had us both laughing for some time. Thank God I have a delightfully low threshold for what I find funny. (Believe it or not, I was actually voted “Most Likely to Laugh” in my high school class. I am still not entirely sure what that meant, but I thought it was funny…)
Anyway, like I said, I am sure there will be many more of these jokes to share, and if anyone has a good food-related joke (or funny story that involves food) I would love to hear it! Keep it clean though people! There are children reading this! (and my mom does too…)
Matt
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06.21.06
Posted in The Story at 9:30 pm by Chef Matt
Today’s fun food foray was over to the USDA (Department of Agriculture) to help out my school with a presentation on food safety - notably safety while Barbecuing this summer. The content of the speech was generally common sense stuff, like, “Don’t put the cooked food back on the plate you used to bring the raw food out”, and “Don’t leave potato salad in the sun for 8 hours and keep eating it”. But it was fun to do something food-related, and I got to wear my chef’s uniform, which gave me a slight air of responsibility and “professional” status. People actually came up to me and asked me questions as if I knew what I was talking about!
Also, I got a photo op with Under Secretary for Food Safety Dr. Richard Raymond, so eat your heart out celebrity watchers! 
Note: If the food safety tips I just mentioned above are not “common sense” to you, I recommend you read the press release the USDA put out in conjunction with today’s event.
I hope to have some photos of me there on the mall in my whites for you all soon enough. There were some TV and radio people there, but so far I have not heard of anyone picking up this amazing bit of breaking news! Sure, Americans are dying every day in Iraq, but we MUST get out the message that chicken should be cooked to an internal temperature of 165 degrees Fahrenheit! This is urgent stuff people! It is a conspiracy that is keeping this message from being front and center on the news!
If any of you all see any other news outlet picking up the story of the presentation in front of the USDA building that happened today, esp any with photos, I would love to see it!
I have tons of cheesecake to offer up in return!
Matt
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06.20.06
Posted in The Story at 11:38 pm by Chef Matt
The cheesecake came home tonight.
After some were served on Friday night, we had about 4 cakes left that 7 of us got to divide up. Sure, that is an ugly way to divide up cakes (ever try to measure and carefully cut a cake into sevenths?…), but in fact there was actually enough for us to share with other classes. When all was said and done, I brought home about 3/4 of a 9″ cheesecake for my wife and myself.
However, my previous post about the cheesecake prompted a good friend of mine to ask if I was in fact getting lots and lots of sex for all the wonderful baked goods I was constantly bringing home. I think the phrase she used was: “bringing home a cheesecake is certainly worth a little ’slap and tickle’.”
While surely this is a personal issue, and I am not going to go into my sex life publicly in this forum, it is an interesting philosophical issue: Should I in fact be getting laid more frequently as compensation for my bringing home all this great food?
On the one hand, it is nice to be appreciated for what I do, and recognition of my extra effort to bring home sweets (which my wife LOVES) is a good thing. For her not to recognize these special gifts in any “special way” could send the message that she is possibly not impressed by, or has become accustomed to such treatment. This would be a sad state of affairs for all involved.
A close to porn as this blog will get… |
But on the flip side of that coin we have two problems. First, sex in exchange for consideration - even if it IS cheesecake - is basically prostitution. And secondly, it is not fair to demand specific payments in return for what really are gifts. Gifts should be given without any expectation of something in return - that is what makes them gifts as compared to ransoms. And also let’s not forget that if I constantly tried to get my rocks off by plying my wife with cheesecake, she would soon reach a body type that could only be classified as “morbidly obese” which would surely have an adverse effect on our sex life from the point of view of both partners.
So to bluntly answer the question at hand: No, I don’t get more sex merely because I bring home lots of cheesecake and other great baked goods for my wife. But I’m not exactly complaining either.
Matt
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06.19.06
Posted in Reviews, Greatest Hits, Rants and Raves at 5:25 pm by Chef Matt
I realized today that I have not been talking about cooking and cooking-related topics as much as some of the readers of this blog may want. So allow me to rant a little today on something really dumb that a friend of mine sent me the link to.
Behold the silliness that is “The Baker’s Edge”:
No, really, you’re supposed to put food in this thing and bake it. The concept being that every piece you get is an “edge” piece. That’s right, now EVERYONE in your family can be subject to the overcooked and burnt edges of your casseroles!
I personally like edges on things like brownies and lasagna, but there are some very simple reasons why this is a bad idea:
- Not everyone likes edges.
- The whole point of having only a few edges is that the rest of the pieces are easy to remove. Pulling slices of cake out of this MC Escher nightmare would be a continual hassle.
- This thing will not stack with anything else in your kitchen, it will demand it’s own giant storage space
- Keep those ridges clean when you put in batter people! Otherwise you will have a nice carbon flavor in everything you make!
- What is the hardest part of a pan to clean? If you said “the edges”, give yourself a gold star!
But where I really drew the line was when they described this:
That’s right, they actually mean for this thing to have a lasagna in it. I don’t know where you shop, but I have yet to come across the “GIANT S-SHAPED” noodles at my Italian market. Fortunately, the good people at the Baker’s Edge provide us with the following tip:
“Please note that some brands of noodle may be longer than the pan, so simply break the ends off in order to fit them into the pan.”
That’s great, because when I think of “breaks cleanly every time”, I think “uncooked lasagna noodles”. This would be a disaster.
To be fair, I have never tried this pan, but as you can imagine, I don’t plan to any time soon either seeing as how it costs $37. If the good people at The Baker’s Edge want to send me one, I will be happy to run a series of tests with it and will chronicle them here on this site. I will even willingly admit I am wrong (bake up a big humble pie with all edges) if the pan in fact turns out to be great.
But I expect them to come over to my house and clean the damn thing when I am done.
Matt
P.S. Don’t be the last one on your block to have one! Get your Baker’s Edge today!
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06.17.06
Posted in The Story at 10:22 am by Chef Matt
As some of you have been kind enough to point out, I am not actually done with culinary school - so why am I making this move right now? Why not wait for school to be over? What are the factors that are making it seem that the planets are perfectly aligned so as to make this move right now?
Well, first of all, in my job, we have hit a good transition point. Since I am a fundraiser, everything we do is based on fiscal years. And the fiscal year fo my company is about to end. Seems like a natural stopping point for me there seeing as how I finished what I started and will not be starting something that I know I can’t finish.
My house. This is the “after” shot, so only say GOOD things about it! |
Secondly, I just finished up some major expenses in my life. I was renovating my house, and I had planed a trip to visit a good friend of mine in Kiev. (Yes, in the Ukraine) Since this job is going to be roughly a 60% pay cut for me in the early stages, (please consider that those of you who want to follow in my footsteps!) I couldn’t make this move until I was in a financially more stable place.
And finally, the last factor is nothing more than a gut feeling. I just recently turned 30, and call it a “midlife crisis” or call it “culinary intuition”, but it was just time to make this move now. I can’t explain this last one very well, but for some reason I just knew the time was right and the time was now. I guess the best way to put it was that I was tired of waiting for my professional life to gt more interesting. It was time to get up off my butt and make it moe interesting myself!
So I have received emails from people saying that they too have dreams like this and that they want to follow them as well. I am hoping that my story here will serve as the inspiration for some of you to go out and get what you want in life as well! Either that, or my life will serve as a cautionary tale for you, warning you to stay put. I am sincerely hoping for the former…
Matt
PS I would like to send out a HUGE thanks to DC Blogs for listing me as the featured blog of the day yesterday. Lots of new readers came along, and I hope you all enjoy and stick around!
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06.16.06
Posted in The Story at 12:09 am by Chef Matt
Tonight at cookng school we made cheescakes.
This current baking class is sending me home with thousands of delicious calories every night, and while it is enjoyable, it is really packing on the weight. So tonight when the chef told us that we were making cheesecakes, I thought with dismay: “Lord, just when I thought I couldn’t get any fatter!”
But when we finished up and the cakes had cooled, we wrapped up the cakes and placed them in the fridge for Fine Dining Friday which is happening tomorrow night. And I couldn’t help but think: “Damn, I really wanted a piece of that cheesecake!”
It was a Chocolate-Kahlua Swirl cheesecake. Can you blame me?
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