Those Saucy Spanish Sauces!

When I learned how to make Romesco sauce, a signature sauce in Spanish cooking, I knew I had hit culinary gold.

Given the consistency is more like thick mayonnaise, I regard it more as a topping than a sauce and that's why it lends itself so beautifully to seafood appetizers and first courses.

And in researching Romesco, I found that there are numerous varieties, but all have two things in common: the use of almonds and roasted peppers of some sort. I use red bell peppers, but I've seen pequillo peppers and other similar reds used. I've also made versions combining both almonds and hazelnuts, carefully toasting the nuts before adding them to my food processor.

And, with the essential oils of the nuts left in the pan, it makes for an interesting way to toast the French bread slice, torn into pieces, and then added to the food processor. I like using this sauce to show my cooking school students how bread can act as a thickener when making sauces.

With just a dash of cayenne, the background heat really makes for an interesting flavor profile. I've also experimented with this aspect of the sauce, adding and subtracting various forms of heat -- including piri piri, chipotle, jalapeño, Tabasco, etc. In the end, I've decided that cayenne works best.

I chose jumbo shrimp as the "vehicle" to show this sauce/topping. But I'm confident you'll enjoy it with vegetables -- raw, roasted, sautéed or steamed. Here's the video and recipe. Let me know what you think.





2 Tbsp slivered almonds
1 slice French or Italian bread, crust removed
1 large garlic clove, smashed
7 oz. roasted red peppers (jarred is okay)
2 Tbsp olive oil
1 Tbsp sherry vinegar
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
16 large or jumbo shrimp, peeled and deveined

Stir almonds in a heavy skillet over medium heat until they begin to release their essential oils and start to brown. Be careful not to let them burn. When they are toasted, add them immediately to the bowl of a food processor.

In the same skillet, tear the bread slice into pieces and toast. When toasted, add it to the food processor with the almonds.

With the food processor running, drop the garlic through the feed tube and process until almonds, bread and garlic are finely chopped. Add the roasted red peppers, olive oil, sherry vinegar and cayenne pepper and process until the mixture is the consistency of thick mayonnaise, scraping down the sides to ensure that everything is incorporated.

Arrange cooked shrimp on plates and top with Romesco sauce.

Confessions of a Carboholic

I'm a bread lover through and through. While my brother and two sisters insisted on having the crusts cut off from their slices of Wonder Bread, I not only had my slices intact. I would eat the end pieces of the loaf. When my Dad brought home a fresh rye bread from the deli, I'd go for the heels and eat the slices plain.

Then I learned how to make quick breads -- aptly named because you don't need to let them rise before baking. I've got a few quick breads in the Kitchen Guy Recipe Archive and this week's episode is actually a remake of an old episode we shot in standard definition at a location we used before we had our current Kitchen Guy kitchen.

I've used quick breads in cooking competitions as a device to catch the notice of the judges, because it's such an unexpected element -- especially when one must create 10 portions of four courses from a mystery basket of ingredients. Why would a "cheftestant" under that kind of pressure add something else to cook? By the way, that particular quick bread -- which a Master Chef actually asked me for the recipe -- was made with roasted garlic and black olives. Here's a link to that recipe.

But I digress. This week's quick bread uses the carnation and yeast contained in the beer to activate the leavening powers of baking powder in the self-rising bread. You can also use Bisquik. But if you have neither, just add 1-1/2 tsp of baking powder and 1/2 tsp of salt to each cup of all-purpose flour. That's the "magic" formula.

It's important for the beer to be at room temperature. And I'm sorry to tell all of you Guinness fans out there, that dark beer just doesn't work. It's too fermented and too yeasty, not to mention thick.

The final addition of butter is also a critical element. Normally, a quick bread (think scones) has to be eaten while it's still warm out of the oven. But the addition of this melted butter near the end of the baking process made the loaf shown in this episode good for three more days, wrapped of course.

Here's the episode:


 

And here's the recipe:

3 cups self-rising flour
1/4 cup sugar
12 oz. room temperature beer
4 oz. unsalted butter, melted

Combine sugar with self-rising flour and mix well. Add the beer slowly and mix to form the batter. It's okay if it has lumps. Set it aside to rest while you pre-heat the oven to 350 and spray a loaf pan with non-stick spray.

Spoon the batter into the prepared pan and bake for 60 minutes. Remove the loaf from the oven and add the melted butter, using a table knife to pull the loaf away from the sides, so the butter gets into the bread.

Bake for an additional 5 minutes, then remove to a rack to cool. When it's cool enough to handle, but still warm, remove from the pan, slice and serve.

Kitchen Guy: Is There Such a Thing as Mexican Pasta?

Kitchen Guy: Is There Such a Thing as Mexican Pasta?: We've been misled. Too many of us think that Mexican food is just a bunch of variations of tortillas stuffed with meat or fish, add a ...

Is There Such a Thing as Mexican Pasta?

We've been misled. Too many of us think that Mexican food is just a bunch of variations of tortillas stuffed with meat or fish, add a little Jack cheese, some refried beans and rice on the side. Nachos, salsa, sour cream, cilantro. Well, some of it is true. The real truth is that much of what passes for Mexican food in the U.S. is really Tex-Mex. But most of it is really a corruption of what people think is Mexican food, in the same way that Chop Suey passes for Chinese. So much of it is the creation of fast food chains and American street vendors. But as a number of top chefs like Rick Bayless have shown us, there can be great refinement in Mexican cuisine. You just have to look beyond the burrito and taco stands and look to the Mexican countryside or the fishing villages to find some great variety, fascinating flavors, spicing and saucing techniques That's what we did in this week's episode with "Sopa Seca." That translates literally as "dry soup." This dish is not dry, however. It turns out something like a casserole with a delicious sauce that you can make as spicy or as mild as you like. But is there really pasta in Mexican cuisine? When I first saw this recipe, I asked myself the same question. Does Mexican cuisine even have pasta? The original recipe calls for a pasta known as "fideos," but you can substitute vermicelli. See the link below if you want to purchase this product from a Mexican food purveyor we found. Like so many other cuisines, pasta is borrowed -- some say from Italy, others from China. Nevertheless, this is probably the most difficult part of this recipe: frying the vermicelli and making sure it's not too greasy. Because the pasta is quite absorbent, it will soak up the oil and retain it if you fry it at too low a temperature. And, like all foods that we deep fry, it needs time on paper towels to drain. The other "issue" with this dish is the spice level. Our recipe has four chipotle chilies, which can add quite a bit of heat. But you can add less or more, depending on your taste. We also call for Cotija cheese, a Mexican cheese that's quite crumbly - a lot like feta. We also call for crema, the Mexican version of creme fraiche. If you can't find either of these ingredients in your store, you can certainly use feta and sour cream. Or you can order then online at this Mexican specialty store. Here's my version of "Sopa Seca," with the recipe coming from one of my favorite food magazines, Saveur. You can find the recipe at my website: http://kitchenguy.biz.

Say It With Me: AGRODOLCE!

Sweet and sour is a favorite flavoring combination in my recipe repertoire. And while most folks associate sweet and sour with Chinese cuisine, it's actually a common flavoring in many other cuisines. And so we demonstrate that with the classic Italian style of sweet and sour, known as Agrodolce, pronounced aw-grow-DOLE-chay.

While we taped this episode, some of the crew were surprised to see me pairing fish and fruit, but it's a classic technique, for example Possion Veronique (sole with white grapes). And I've used other berries with salmon before, notable strawberries.

Sweet and sour in Italian dishes is actually not that unusual. The Italians have sweet and sour sausage, sweet and sour meatballs, chicken, and other sauces, particularly from the Parma area that include pine nuts as an additional flavoring agent.

You'll also find sweet and sour in other European cuisines, especially Eastern European foods like the Polish "halushki," or stuffed cabbage. In Eastern European Jewish cuisine, sweet and sour was employed, especially for Sabbath dishes using vinegar to help preserve the food, with the addition of honey or sugar to counteract the sourness of the vinegar.

The bottom line here is that I highly recommend that you add "agrodolce" to your recipe repertoire; experiment with it; most of all, enjoy it. This recipe came to my attention last summer when it was featured in the New York Times in the Dining section. Here's this week's Kitchen Guy episode, featuring Salmon with Agrodolce Blueberries.




 RECIPE:

 6 4-ounce filets Atlantic salmon
2 shallots, peeled and sliced very thin
1-1/2 cups white wine
2 Tbsp white wine vinegar
4 sprigs fresh thyme
2 cinnamon sticks
1-1/3 cups blueberries
4 Tbsp unsalted butter
2 Tbsp honey
sea salt to taste
vegetable oil for greasing baking sheet.

Season fish well with the sea salt and set it aside at room temperature while you make the sauce.

Preheat the oven to 400 and lightly grease a baking sheet large enough to hold all of the fish.

Simmer together shallots, wine, wine vinegar, thyme, cinnamon sticks and a pinch of salt in a saucepan over medium low heat until most of the liquid has evaporated, about 12 to 15 minutes.

Add the blueberries, butter and honey and cook until the berries soften and begin to release their juices and the sauce turns pink - another 2 to 4 minutes.

Place the salmon on baking sheet and spoon the berry mixture over the fish and season with freshly ground black pepper.

Bake until the salmon is cooked to desired doneness -- 8 to 10 minutes for medium rare. About 12 minutes for medium.