Confit Chicken Wings
24 free-range, organic chicken drums, skin cut on the small end of the drum and bone scraped to the larger end like a lolly-pop
Marinade:
1 cup soy sauce
¼ cup fish sauce
3 T brown sugar
1 knob ginger, grated
1 thai chile, split in half, stem remaining
1 tsp red chile flakes
2 T cilantro, rough chopped
½ cup lime juice
Mix all ingredients in a medium bowl and pour into a ziplock bag and add chicken. Marinate 6 hours. Remove and discard marinade.
1 gallon canola oil
1# bacon
1 yellow onion, rough chopped
8 garlic cloves
1 T salt
Heat oven to 300 degrees. In a roasting pan, add bacon in whole strips with onion and garlic cloves. Render the bacon fat just until soft and fat has released. Add one gallon of canola oil and the chicken wings. Place the pan back in the oven and cover with foil. Cook the wings for 3 hours or until tender. Remove the chicken and strain the oil carefully. Keep the wings in some of the oil so that they stay moist. Place the strained oil in a frying pan or small fryer.
Dredge for wings:
2 cups cornstarch
2 cups rice flour
½ T salt
4 cups cornflakes ground
Mix all ingredients in a shallow pan. Set aside.
Heat the fryer oil to 350 degrees. Dredge the wings in the flours and press to stick. Fry the wings in the oil for 2 minutes or until crispy. Drain on paper towels.
For the sauce:
½ bottle sweet chile sauce
¼ cup sambal
3 limes, juiced
1 tsp salt
1 T fish sauce
3 T cilantro, chopped
Place all ingredients except for the cilantro. Bring to a boil and reduce heat to a simmer. Reduce the sauce by 1/3. Finish by adding cilantro. When wing is hot from the fryer, dip the lollipop part of the chicken drum in the sauce leaving the bone dry.
Baby Arugula, Dill, Fennel and Pumelo Salad
Baby Arugula, Dill, Fennel and Pumelo Salad
Serves 4
1 shallot, minced
1 T fresh dill, minced
½ cup fennel, shaved on a mandoline
2 cups baby arugula
1 ½ cup iceburg lettuce, white part only, torn
½ cup good olive oil
2 T raspberry champagne vinegar
¼ cup pumelo, diced
¼ tsp fennel pollen
1 tsp salt
fresh cracked pepper
In a large bowl, place minced shallot, dill, fennel and fennel pollen and pumelo. Season with salt and pepper. Add olive oil, vinegar, toss to combine. On top of the ingredients in the bottom of the bowl, place arugula and iceberg. Keep refrigerated until ready to serve. We eat our slad at the and of the meal, I toss it right before we eat it. Adjust the seasonings if necessary.
No Knead Bread!!!
If you can recall, there is a limited amount of bread and pastry making on Top Chef. It is not that we do not enjoy eating, using, and cooking them of course. Quite honestly, there isn’t really time to bake bread. But, of course, I serve it in my restaurant. I LOVE bread. The biggest problem I see with baking bread at home is the kneading, the proofing, the waiting. I like the idea of wanting fresh baked bread and actually getting to eat it in the next couple of hours. …Read on…
Flamiche! Quiche Aux Poireaux
What am I eating right now? What is going on right now? I will tell you. The seasons are about to change and that makes me look to food to inspire me. Dinner last night was Dungeness Crab- one of the most sustainable seafoods that we can eat right now. And, not to mention they are delicious! Thai coconut soup and a spicy salad of cilantro, cucumber, hot chiles, ginger, and lemongrass. Key ingredient? Lot’s of fish sauce. I am in love. In love with food!
…Read on…