Healthy Fare

I remember back when I was awaiting my admission date to culinary school my father jokingly said: "Nobody trusts a skinny chef." I was twenty years old and twenty pounds underweight; nothing a crash course in classical French cuisine couldn't cure. I gained thirty pounds in two months. Thirteen years later I am literally embodying my father's words.

My weight now isn't so much of a result of my success as it is a result of my love for rich, fatty foods; if there's a Bacon Anonymous group I should be a member. I'm still not a huge guy, but I'm starting to push the index and with my 34th birthday just around the corner it's all downhill from here if I don't make some changes soon, so after I came home from NYC back in May I decided to really concentrate on my diet.

With a hereditary disposition to cholesterol I had already been focusing on chicken, turkey and fish, but that had proved not enough so I had to start focusing on my culinary nemesis: tofu.

Even as a chef I had problems coercing tofu into something satiable enough for a serious meat-eater like myself, but with perseverance and a little imagination I came with some delicious uses, the easiest of which is by using the silken variety as a substitute for cream in purees, which led to the sauce component of this special, as well as the notion that I could create a dish that not only tastes fantastic but is healthy too.

The main focus of the dish was inspired by a Asian-style marinated beef that I grilled and made into tacos to celebrate our server Tommy's 40th birthday last month, and after the great response I realized that I had to let our customers enjoy this amazing flavor as well. The marinade consists of ground, dried chiles, fresh lemongrass, lime juice, ginger, garlic, scallions, sesame oil, soy sauce, and black sugar, a unique variation popular in Asian cultures. I stuck with beef for the special - a Flat Iron steak - merely for presentation and consistency, though it is fantastic with chicken and could easily have been done successfully with a block of "extra firm" tofu if I had the gall to offer it!

Since I had this Asian theme going I knew I could put my new tofu techniques to good use by creating a sauce from two totally different ingredients that are actually of the same plant. Edamame is a popular soybean snack that originates from Japan but is now enjoyed all over the world, but the most famous soybean product is tofu, which is simply a vegan cheese made from soymilk. I used this adjusted thinking to make a surprisingly rich puree by blending the cooked soybeans with garlic, green onions and a touch of wasabi with soft tofu before pressing it through a fine strainer, leaving me with a refined sauce that stays true to the art of Japanese cookery.

To keep with the light theme I decided on a slaw based with jicama, a high fiber, low calorie root vegetable that I tossed with shredded carrot, unsweetened coconut, scallions and sea beans, a plant grown in salt marshes that has a bite like green beans and a fresh sea salt flavor. To bring the slaw together I made a vinaigrette with tamarind pulp, shallots, garlic, extra virgin olive oil and rice wine vinegar. By using the tamarind along with the lowly acidic vinegar I was able to reduce the amount of oil that's usually needed to make a vinaigrette by half!!!


Who knew that healthy could be this delicious?!?!

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In a rare coincidence I am able to offer a cocktail special that actually compliments the dinner special!!!

I say coincidence because I've had this drink on the back burner of my mind for a little while now, and since fresh orange and ginger already go together so well on their own, they will flourish alongside the Asian and citrus components within the marinade.

I wanted to go with a variation of our house margarita where we muddled fresh limes and oranges, but also with the addition of ginger slices and leaning more heavily on fresh orange juice and less on the manufactured triple sec and sour mix, ending up with a drink/food combo that has been called Chino/Latino, but I've lovingly referred to it as Latinasian.


With Love,

Cheffrey

To Curry Your Favor

Even after it happens time and time again, it has yet to amaze me where my inspiration comes from and the chain of ideas that link inception and execution.

Due to the heat and humidity I had to switch the caramel garnish on the Banana Bread Foster dessert to a more resilient plantain chip. As I peeled the green, starchy cousin to the banana something sparked in my mind, and like a fire I had to fan and nurture the idea by adding a little bit here, taking away some there and move things around before it really got going.

I quickly realized that I could grate the plantain and pan-fry it in metal rings to make perfectly shaped pancakes that were seasoned with onion, garlic, brown sugar, salt and pepper, but that was only a base, and considering that plantains are grown and used in every tropical country from Hawaii, Egypt, Malaysia, Australia and back again, I had a broad spectrum of cuisines to draw from. After cycling through my mental Roll-A-Dex of unused ideas I remembered one about cashews and curry, and I was off from there.

Cashews are a staple in vegan cuisines for their fiber and protein and are high in delicious fat, making a butter that blows away peanut and almonds, which is why I chose it; I wanted to create a cross between an Indian curry and an Asian peanut sauce to help give richness to the starchy plantain cake. Instead of a soupy base, though, I opted for more of a powerful sauce-like consistency that I achieved by blending raw cashews with coconut milk, hot curry powder (similar to the sweet version, but with a touch of cayenne and spicy ginger) and a touch of dark soy sauce to give it that fifth dimension of taste: umami!

To continue my avoidance of the typical curry stew I went with pan roasting Cornish game hen breasts to have a white meat version that is not overcooked by braising, like so many Americanized curries that I've seen. Since Cornish game hens are sold whole I had all of the leg meat leftover I decided to make my own crumbled sausage by chopping and cooking it with freshly ground fennel and fenugreek seeds and extra virgin olive oil, mirroring some of the curry powder flavors while excluding the typical ones.

To balance some of the sweetness of the dish I went with an ingredient that I've had my eye on at Uyajimaya for over a year now, and despite all of the common greens now available it was the only option in my mind: Chinese spinach. Its beauty was the initial draw, but the fact that it had a mild bitterness made it a keystone to the dish. I sauteed it with the handmade sausage from the leg meat along with a little butter, onions and spring garlic.

What I ended up with was a special that combines ingredients from other countries that would be considered blasphemy in their own, yielding something uniquely American, referred to as the melting pot, but decidedly my own.


"Damn, what the hell am I going to with all of these cheap strawberries!!" was the first thought that crossed my mind after a recent pricing update, but that's really just the same question that has been asked for centuries.

Strawberry cocktails are very popular, especially this time of year, probably because it represents summer in full swing, and I came up with a drink that is so dated that it has now become retro. I have to admit that the combination of strawberries and balsamic vinegar has outdated even my career, but like a boomerang and bell-bottoms, everything comes back eventually.

I'll be the first to admit it though; the rich vinegar does compliment the beautiful little berries perfectly, so why not try the combination as a cocktail??

With the abundance of ripe strawberries I simply chopped them up and simmered them in a little water, allowing their natural sugars and water to create a true nectar. While that was working I reduced traditional balsamic vinegar with some corn syrup to keep the acidity from becoming too overwhelming. Once both were cooled I poured the strawberry syrup over ice in a tall glass along with some Skyy vodka and a little strawberry puree and topped it off with a healthy squeeze of the balsamic reduction that slowly mixes itself into the drink as it settles.


After the hot weather predictions that have been forecasted for our Seattle area this week, it's nice to know that there's a place that you can go to experience a drink as cool as this!!

With Love,

Cheffrey

All About the Family

It's hard to believe that at the end of this week it will already be July, with the Fourth landing on Sunday. Normally we close on the holiday, but when it breached the weekend the last couple of years we decided to stay open for brunch, before the festivities begin.

Since the Fourth is the biggest grilling day of the year in our country I knew that I wanted to create something that not only reflected this truly American tradition, but what it has also come to represent: being with family (hey, freedom was last week's topic).

On our last trip to NYC my wife and I spent some much needed time with her family, starting with our ritual family dinner at Frannie and Phil's, where Uncle Phil and I collaborate on the menu. A true "foodie", Phil's taste is on par with my own, but due to a bum wing (shoulder surgery) he made a better advisory than sous chef, leading me on a Sunday hunt for the freshest ingredients that Cobble Hill, Brooklyn had to offer.

Frannie and Phil's pantry could astound even the most seasoned chef, from the best olive oil, to muscat vinegar (his AMAZING secret ingredient to a warm beet salad) and even a selection of dried chiles smuggled from Mexico. And then there's the built-in grill on top of his stove... how could I not cook in this kitchen?!?

What I ended up making was large, one pound hamburgers topped with foccacia and a grilled tomato version of salsa that was a mix of something American, Italian and Hispanic; the perfect taste of American summer to offer as the ultimate tribute to the birth of our nation.

Since I couldn't offer gigantic hamburgers, I chose to do a variation of pork cutlets by pounding thin slices of pork loin and breading them with finely ground popcorn, which not only gives them an airy crust but also allows the ever-growing gluten allergic the opportunity to enjoy a fried breading.

I made the salsa by grilling tomatoes and sweet Walla Walla onions that were then chopped and tossed with ground, dried New Mexico chiles that are mild and smokey. I finished the "salsa" by adding freshly chopped cilantro and parsley, and an added bonus of pancetta that was braised to not only tenderize it but also remove the excess salt required to cure it.

As a final note I swirled the plate with Chinese black vinegar that I had reduced with some corn syrup to replicate the common balsamic vinegar reduction that normally adorns these simple dishes but with another dimension of spice and complexity.

I thought about featuring a fancy cocktail with red, white and blue layers to honor the 4th of July but two important truths made me reconsider: 1 - Tommy, our resident bartender/server would deal me a well deserved slap in the face for forcing him to tediously pour layer after agonizing layer, even if it's in honor of freedom, and 2 - the only truly blue liqueur is Blue Curacao (which is dyed) and the only white colored ingredients are cream, and maybe even chilled Ouzo... not a great start for a tasty beverage, so I went another route.

We all go through our cocktail fazes; like for me there was one summer in college where spent tonic bottles leftover from gin and tonics were so prevalent that we started to use them to hold up windows, prop open doors, etc. It has taken me 14 years, until just now, to start appreciating gin again. I'm sure you all have your own sagas; feel free to send them to me if you want.

My older brother, Craig, naturally introduced me to many, many things, including my first drink as well as new (to me) cocktails. Once, he was on a Sloe Gin Fizz kick; another time, when we lived together in NYC, there was the Cherry Lime Rickey. It was by his account a non-alcoholic version made with an Italian cherry syrup, fresh lime and soda water, but eventually ended up with vodka added to it without knowing that the true origin lies with gin.

Now that I have come to terms with using gin's botanical aromatics (thanks to my confusing love for juniper berries) I feel that I can finally offer my own version of this cocktail that combines a little of my past with my present.

Although cherries were once my favorite fruit it's still too early to offer them, so here I went with raspberries instead. With their sweet and tart balance they made a beautiful base for this refreshing drink. After cooking them down and straining out the pulp I poured the remaining syrup over gin and ice along with a healthy squeeze of fresh lime juice and a good douse of club soda to keep it light and bubbly, a true representation on the original.

With Love,

Cheffrey

Pride and Joy

It's that time of year!! Pride officially kicks off at 12:01 am Thursday morning and we have a few things planned to help you celebrate and get involved. First, Thursday night is PrideFest, where a portion of each bill goes to support Gay City Health Project which provides HIV and AIDS testing to gay men, and Seattle Counseling Service that advocates for and offers health services to the GLBT community.

Secondly, this Saturday is the Capitol Hill Pride Festival, where Broadway will be closed from Roy to John St./Olive Way allowing for local businesses like ours to offer booths or tables in the street as well as a variety of events like music and a Doggie Drag Costume Contest (WOW!), bringing some of that flare back to The Hill before the big parade on Sunday.

Finally, I have my personal contribution to commemorate this special occasion, in a way that I know best - tasty cocktails!!! After an ongoing collaboration with one of our servers, Kari, we ended up with a simple yet effective way to celebrate diversity by infusing Skyy vodka with individual flavors of Skittles candy, creating a rainbow of colorful liqueurs resembling the pride flag.


It is it's simplicity that is astounding, because as long as you allow the candy to completely dissolve in the vodka, thoroughly strain it through cheesecloth and shake it over ice you end up with the perfect balance of alcohol, sweetness and flavor that is undeniably a Skittles Martini!!

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You may not think that my dinner special seems like a direct example of what Pride exemplifies, so allow me convince you otherwise...

Our country was built on fundamentals of diversity and equality, an ideal that was a thousand times greater than the founding fathers could have possibly imagined at its inception, allowing for a world of cultures to flourish and influence each other, thereby creating the society that we live in today, and something that will continually evolve into the future. After every hurdle and every struggle we always come out a little bit better than before, solidifying that notion of "home".

So what I wanted to do was create a variation of a classic American dish that dates back to the Colonial days of our country but with local and cultural additions (along with a few touches of me) to emphasize the steps that we have made, and that dish can only be our beloved chicken and dumplings.

My version is less practical than the traditional because I started with a rich chicken broth instead of the cooking process yielding a broth from water and chicken legs, guaranteeing me optimal flavor, and then adding roasted chicken thighs that were cooked separately so that they are perfectly juicy. To bring the broth to another level I simmered it with red wine and some crushed juniper berries while I worked on the tedious process of the dumplings.

As an interesting deviation from the usual dumplings I made mine with eggs, Parmesan cheese, half and half and semolina flour - a favorite among Italians in order to make great pasta that gives them a texture that is less doughy than all purpose flour but finer than cornmeal. For added refinement I shaped each dumpling into perfect balls by hand as opposed to the Rorschach-Esq versions that adorn the rustic versions.

I finished the dish by sauteing locally available Gai Lan, or Chinese broccoli, that is of the same family as broccoli and kale and has become a modern staple in Chinese-American cooking, along with morel mushrooms, one of my favorite fungi that also happened to be sourced locally, to my delight.

The broth is amazingly light and rich at the same time, while giving way to the creamy dumplings accented by the earthy mushrooms and vibrant greens; a perfect balance of culture and versatility that livens the taste buds as well as the mind!

With Love,

Cheffrey

P.S. - A funny side note; many of you are well aware that we change our pancake recipe for brunch weekly, and I have decided to offer our popular Ginger Pancakes in honor of a new addition to my family: Ginger, a Australian Shepherd mix that my wife and I adopted this past Sunday (hey, the food connotation comes naturally to a chef!).

I Can Do It All

As promised before I am continuing on with the seafood theme, though to be honest I was planning on having at least a one week gap in between, but with a menu change coming up I wanted to see if it will work before the menu was submitted to print so I can add it last minute. The short answer is yes. Here's the long answer:

I have lost many hours of sleep stewing over this special, and the funny part is that I was already set on the flavor combinations. Based on a slider dish that I had on the menu at my first restaurant in NYC, I have been wanting to make little taco shells out of three-inch gyoza wrappers that were layered with fresh avocado, raw, yellowfin tuna that had been tossed in a dressing of red onion, sesame oil, cilantro and soy sauce and topped with a fine shaving of local mixed greens and a touch of Sriracha aioli for spice and fruitiness.

So, if I already knew what the plate was going to be, why all sleepless nights? I am constantly trying to come up with new and interesting presentations that are sometimes beyond the means of the equipment that I have. So what do I do? I make it myself. While I have a taco shell fryer, it only makes one at a time, and since I planned on serving five per order I didn't want to stand over the fryer all day, so I created a multi-taco fry basket capable of cooking nine mini shells at one time.

Then I needed a way to serve the tacos so that they wouldn't fall over or slide around. First, I thought about making a metal stand that would hold all five in a row, but later realized that the best (and most sanitary) option would be to make a form out of something edible, and since the dish was centered around an Asian/Latino theme, I figured that there was no better medium than rice.

I chose calrose rice (a California variant of the japonica variety used for sushi) due to it's stickiness, and from that I came to the realization that the Japanese have a form of sushi called oshizushi, or pressed rice, where boxed forms are used to shape the rice, meat and toppings. I used this technique as inspiration to make my own mold with an elongated plastic box used to separate silverware in drawers with little wooden dowels set inside to create indentations that would cradle the mini tacos. For added sanitation (a chef's and customer's best friend) I used plastic wrap as a barrier when I pressed in the cooled rice that had been tossed with a sprinkle of black sesame seeds for color contrast and a bit of crunch.

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This summer I plan to start focusing on more seasonally based fruit cocktails whenever possible (with next week's Gay Pride drink special being an interesting exception :) ). There are so many fruits out there now that I feel spiritually drawn and quartered when it comes to what fruit I could use, especially as the peaches perfume the air around me as I write this...

Now that the melons have shown their heads I can finally introduce a cocktail that I wanted to offer this time last year but had waited too long before the season ran out. Back then I had the notion that honeydew melon had a hint of licorice within it and the scent had never left me, leading me to pair the second-most sweet-friendly herb with one of our most common melons.

I juiced the honeydews before straining to end up with a pure essence of the fruit without all of the thick pulp, allowing it to soak up all of the fresh flavor of the muddled basil before the Skyy vodka was introduced, leaving a drink that is without added sugar and void of typical mixers; just good fun in the sun.



With Love,

Cheffrey

My Succulent Friend

Summer months bring summer words like melons, fresh greens, corn, stone fruit and our local hero: Walla Walla onions. Once spoken they give promise to a certain style of dish that embodies everything that we feel about this time of year in both spirit and cuisine. These ingredients are the cornerstones of inspiration for both chef and home cook alike, allowing us to take full advantage of this season.

This week's idea originated from halves of hollowed out green summer squash, better known as zucchini, that I had slowly roasted to concentrate their flavor and keep them moist, even going as far as using wet towels underneath to prevent the heat from the roasting pan from browning the bottoms, a technique I mirrored while reheating them to assemble the dish.

Even though I started with the squash, the main focus is always on the protein, and since I felt that I needed something that wouldn't overpower its vessel I naturally leaned towards seafood, which meant a visit from my longtime friend, the king crab.

As some of you may know, my love for this sea creature started at an early age and was probably the catalyst that initiated my love for food that lead to me becoming a chef, and yet still today I find its rich and succulent meat irresistible.

But it has become much more to me than that. Now I enjoy the process of removing the meat as much as I do the consumption; it's a meticulous methodology of cracking, twisting, prying and squeezing aided only by a pair of Cutco scissors bought for me by my father-in-law (thanks Bob!!). Just like handmade pasta or a long braise there is a certain amount of Zen to doing it. In the end I stay true to the final product by simply warming the crab in an emulsion of it's cooking liquid and good amount of butter - just like dunking it into a side of drawn butter.

For the base I wanted something fresh and summery, so I grilled whole ears of yellow corn just enough char them a little before I cut the kernels from the cob. To this I made a play on salsa, or more accurately pico de gallo, by adding freshly diced jalapenos, tomatoes, red onion, lime juice and a little twist of Asian with some reconstituted fermented black beans. Finally I drizzled the entire dish with creme fraiche that I made by culturing heavy cream with sour cream to make an uber-rich version of the traditional salsa condiment that was then pureed with fresh cilantro for both color and that authentic flavor.

For the drink special I decided to impart another favorite flavor by adding apple into the mix:

Maybe it's a bit of childhood nostalgia, but I have always loved sour apple (as in Jolly Rancher), so I don't mind using apple pucker liqueur as long as it's in moderation, and after a refreshing brew of herbal tea to inspire me I had a new direction.

In the past I have used an organic hibiscus and agave syrup for many other cocktails, but it seems that this subtle floral concoction is a bottomless well of inspiration. Due to its obvious red color it makes perfect sense to use it as a substitute for cranberry juice in a cosmopolitan, but by substituting sour apple pucker for triple sec and keeping the fresh lime juice and vodka injection I came up with a totally unique cocktail that has depth as well as being refreshing!

With Love,

Cheffrey

Abstract Compositions

I have realized lately that it has been a while since I have had any kind of fish or seafood special. True to form, once I sat down at my desk with a starting point like that, my mind lights up like a campfire - first there's a spark, then two, and before you know it everything is ablaze. There's nothing I love more than inspiration and direction. Normally I have this rule about spacing out the featured proteins of my specials, but with seafood it's easy to dream up summery ideas, so I accede to the old adage about rules being meant to be broken.

The thought of seafood has probably been on my mind lately because of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill that is threatening the Gulf's marine life. My best friend, Greg, runs a fishery in the middle of the Florida Keys, and when we last spoke he relayed his concerns that fishing off of Florida could be suspended for five years if the well couldn't be contained... that was two weeks ago.

With that in mind, it doesn't take much to scare price jumps, whether warranted or not, so why not start by focusing on something local, like my nemesis the salmon.

It may sound bizarre to think of salmon as an adversary, but as a chef I have cooked uncountable portions of it due to its popularity in both flavor and health benefits. After a while the smell of the prized oily fat just gets to you, but if it's any consolation, I can't stand beef tenderloin either. But being transplanted here, away from the abundance of east coast Atlantic (tie-dyed/farm-raised) salmon has helped, with varieties like King, Chinook and Coho as members of my new fraternity to help steer me into the right direction.

I chose to use Coho for this dish because it is still a readily available species of salmon that has a relatively high fat content but is still priced reasonably, and with quality ingredients like this it is best to mess with it as little as possible, so I simply season and roast it skin side down in a hot saute pan in order to crisp the skin underneath while leaving the flesh on top soft and flaky.

Once the salmon is cooking I saute a split king oyster mushroom that I had scored with hatchmarks to emulate what I used to do with foie gras due to the texture that the mushroom has when cooked through, but without all of the ethical concerns. With its massive size I add the mushroom along side of the salmon filet to finish cooking while I use the remaining clarified butter to crisp thick slices of fingerling potatoes. With that going, I start reheating the duo of sauces that I had prepared earlier.

The first sauce is perhaps the soul of the creation, inspired by the remaining case of pea vines from last week's special. Despite still being able to offer them as a sauteed seasonal vegetable side dish, I had enough to make a sauce by wilting the leaves down in onions and garlic that had been poached in white wine. I then pureed everything with half and half to add a richness to the vibrant pea flavor that the vines had given up.

To counter the succulent pea vine puree I needed an inverse of both color and flavor, so I used a variation on the classic roasted red bell pepper sauce, but by steaming the chiles instead. By steaming the peppers I was still able to remove the chewy skin while retaining its true essence. After blending with onions, garlic, red wine and red wine vinegar the sauce was as velvety and bright as I could have hope for.

When I had finally layered the two sauces with alternating erratic spoonfuls, each plate was truly unique in that the presentation is organic and personable because no two plates were exactly alike, allowing the colors to glow beneath the salmon as a visual example of the complementing ingredients: from the rich and flaky salmon compared to the crispy, chewy potatoes or the precise cuts on the mushrooms to the Rorschach-like patterns of the sauce.


Last week Stacey had made a request to add St. Germain elderflower liqueur to our bar supply, a decision that both surprised and delighted me. First, I have been wanting to tinker with it in cocktail special for quite some time now but the cost was too high to bring in a specialty item for just one week, but even more intriguing was what was she planning to do with it??

It turns out that her intentions were to use it where it would shine best: as a part of our special sparkling wine cocktails that we sometimes offer during brunch, perhaps like classic offerings like the French 77 with St. Germain, lemon juice and champagne, or .... or.... well, maybe she hoped that I would come up with something tasty myself.

Though this one is geared more towards dinner than brunch, rest assured that I will come up with an elderflower libation that will go with your French toast, but with more punch than crunch. In the meantime let's try this:

Elderflower liqueur has a floral sweetness that only the fortunate ones who have ever tasted honeysuckle directly from the flower can understand. It reminds me of my childhood on hot summer days. Now that I'm an adult, so do refreshing cocktails!! So I paired the two by first pouring a base of Absolut Vanilla vodka at the bottom of rocks glass full of ice along with a splash of St. Germain, pineapple juice and topping it off with a heaping pour of sparkling wine for lift!

With Love,

Cheffrey

Going The Extra Mile

Last weekend my wife and I took a little time off for a trip to New York City, my old home. I never like to say ahead of time that I won't be cooking at the restaurant because people generally automatically assume that the food will go downhill, but I have great faith in my staff to deliver in my absence. Of course, there is an unspoken rule that when someone is covering for you while you are away where you have to make sure that everything is setup and prepared so that it can be a walk in the park for the ones who you've left behind, which helps.

While in NYC we took the opportunity to dine at the one restaurant that we have always regretted not visiting when we lived there: Le Bernardin, which focuses on seafood with modern French cooking and is one of the most acclaimed restaurants in the world. I was there not only for the experience, but also for research; to find something that I could bring back to share with you and pass along the magic even beyond vicariously by attempting to recreate a portion of it myself. To be honest, each course of our tasting menu gave me insight and inspiration that will be seen in my cooking for quite some time, but there was one that stood out in both simplicity and triumph:

Midway through our meal we were presented with a seemingly basic dish that had only a piece of perfectly baked wild stripped bass topped with corn kernels, finely shaved fennel and tiny pea sprouts and was paired with a corn "cannelloni" which was more accurately described as a tiny tamale wrapped in a layer of braised leek. But it wasn't until the servers finished the plate by pouring the "Perigord sauce"; a rich blend of stock, black truffles and sherry wine. The combinations were explosive, and by the second bite I already knew that it was going to be the most memorable portion of the meal.

It's very difficult to recreate something simply by taste, especially when I don't have the ability to offer the same type of ingredients as a 3 Michelin star restaurant, but I am a classical French trained chef and have been building a career based off of being able to create fine dining caliber food at affordable prices, so I was confident that I could create a economical equivalent that could still earn the nod of approval from Eric Ripert.

First and foremost, I had to create the sauce, which to me represented the epitome of perfection and refinement, so I fortified a rich chicken stock with fresh herbs, mushrooms, caramelized onions and garlic and reduced it with an entire bottle of cream sherry, which is sweeter and more complex than the traditional dry version. Once strained, I seasoned the sauce with a black truffle cured sea salt that emulates chef Ripert's very effectively.

As a former chef of a seafood restaurant I appreciate the versatility shown in the many courses of Le Bernardin, but I am on my own path now so I chose to instead go with veal, another classical French component. Though once the center of debate, farmers have since reformed their caring of baby steers, enough for me to consciously offer it at our restaurant. The old school version would be to use the tenderloin, but to keep the costs down I opted to us the eye round, which when pounded a little with a meat tenderizer can be just as tender. To extend that earthy truffle flavor I also seasoned the meat with the black truffle sea salt before pan searing each medallion until a perfect medium rare.

The second bit of inspiration came from the tiny pea shoot garnish on top of the dish, which I had stated to be my new favorite ingredient last year in an older post. The leaves and stems of this pea plant are just as flavorful as the offshoots, and are possibly more versatile. For this application I simply sauteed them in a little butter, olive oil, spring onions and garlic with just enough white wine to wilt them down.

Finally, as all of the other ingredients are taking their turn, I have pieces of red Belgium endive that I have schmeared with whipped butter, Parmesan cheese and garlic roasting in the oven that come out as a kind of gratinee that compliments the dish with its rich flavor and bitter balance.

Another destination of our visit was Little Branch in the West Village, an underground cocktail bar that has the look and feel of a speakeasy. We have been there several times before but the place still inspires me because of the simple fact that at the bottom of their cocktail list is a selection call "Bartender's Choice" where you can leave it up to the mixologist to create something for you, which is always my only choice.

I guess that life isn't without a little irony, though, because between the two cocktails that I had at Little Branch the first one inspired this week's cocktail, while the second happened to be very similar to the Cucumber Gin Cooler that I was featuring at 219 that very same weekend... I guess that great minds do think alike!

I can't compete with their specialty shaped, purified water ice cubes and fancy glasses, but I can take a cue from the greats and focus on traditional techniques with a new way of thinking, just like with the inspired dish above.

So I made my own sour mix (which is normally full of chemicals and HFCS) but for this I dissolve lemon juice, lime juice, water and honey and shake it with ice, Pikesville Rye whiskey and a spoonful of egg white powder for froth (a traditional ingredient in sour mix but without the health concerns), and strained it into a martini glass for my own cocktail: the Honey Rye Sour!!

Maybe I don't have to travel all the way across the country to get this kind of research, but don't tell the IRS that!!!

With Love,

Cheffrey