Saveur.com: Techniques

Grilling 101

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 16:30:00 GMT

While developing our June/July 2013 grilling issue, we tried out a seemingly endless array of grilling products and methods. Here, we've compiled the essential equipment, tips, and techniques that we discovered along the way-the best ways to arrange coals for direct and indirect cooking, our favorite tools for skewering kebabs, ways to achieve great grilling results indoors, and more.

Secrets of the Grill: Kebabs

Mon, 17 Jun 2013 15:30:00 GMT

by Juliya Madorskaya
In countries surrounding Eurasia's Caucasus Mountains, people have been cooking their meat on swords, sticks, and skewers over an open fire for eight centuries. My Russian family keeps the tradition alive each summer, balancing skewers of marinated lamb shoulder and onions over coals on a mangal, a grateless grill. We serve them traditionally, slathered in salty, tangy sauces, which perfectly complement the richness of the meat.

Second Act

Reserve the marinade, cook it down, and use it to baste kebabs as they grill. As the marinade caramelizes on the meat's surface, it creates a flavorful crust.

Onion's One-Two Punch

Thick slices of onion do double duty: When raw in the marinade, they lend sharp flavor to the meat; threaded on the skewer with the lamb, they add sweet, crunchy contrast.

Go Fat Over Lean

Fatty cuts of meat are great for kebabs: As they cook, the fat melts, moistening the meat and resulting in a tender kebab with nice char.

-Juliya Madorskaya

See the recipe for Shashlik (Russian Lamb Kebab with Tomato-Prune Sauce) »

An Al Fresco Pizza Oven Worthy of Napoli

Tue, 11 Jun 2013 06:30:00 GMT

by Kellie Evans
When developing recipes for our issue #156 Neapolitan pizza cover story, it occurred to us in the Saveur test kitchen that, hey, it's almost going to be summer once this issue comes out. And how great would it be to cook these fabulous recipes outdoors? Pizzaiolo Roberto Caporuscio of New York's Don Antonio by Starita pizzeria recommended the Kalamazoo Artisan Fire outdoor pizza oven. He said it's the closest thing to having a Neapolitan wood-burning pizza oven at home. When I balked at the near $6,500 price tag, he assured me that it was worth every penny. When I tested the equipment out, I understood what he meant. I slapped the raw pizza onto the ceramic base, and after about 3 minutes, was rewarded with a puffed crust with the slight char I was hoping for. I slid a peel under the pie and lifted it up into the intense heat of the oven's stainless steel dome, mimicking a pizzaiolo's finishing touch. The result: a harmony of just-melted milky mozzarella swimming in a shallow pool of simmering tomato sauce. This pizza was as close to perfect as it gets. When I bragged about my success to Roberto, he laughed, and said it was all about the oven.

How to Make Spiced Beef Flatbread

Tue, 11 Jun 2013 05:00:00 GMT

The East African snack khima chapati, a spiced beef flatbread, calls for shaping dough into a spiral, flattening it, and sealing the filling in a tidy packet.

See how to make it, step-by-step »

Cook It Right

Mon, 10 Jun 2013 16:30:00 GMT

by Vitaly Paley
Cooking with fire is a process of discovery. You're figuring out the flames and their rhythms on the grill, which dictate how the food should be prepared. At one of my restaurants, Imperial by Vitaly Paley, in Portland, Oregon, we cook on a custom wood-fired grill (depicted here) and reevaluate our approach every day. Each piece of meat, every vegetable, needs its own treatment-fundamental wisdom that can be applied to home grilling, too.

For fuel, we've found that the denser and harder the wood, the hotter it burns and the longer it stays hot. I like to use a combination. (1) I'll burn a hardwood such as oak or maple for that lasting heat, plus cherry, apple, or other fruitwood, which creates soft, sweet flavors.

Some foods are too delicate for direct contact with the flame but still taste amazing grilled. For the Spanish cut of pork called secreto, a tender muscle that connects the front leg to the belly, we place the meat on a plank made from an old pinot noir wine barrel set over a high flame. (2) The heat and smoke that rise up around the wood cook the meat slowly, while the stave imparts a vanilla-oak taste. This method works just as well with pork loin, fish, seafood still in the shell, even fruits and vegetables. For the plank, any type of fragrant wood, from cedar to alder to oak, works great.

Though grill cooks tend to obsess over meat, vegetables require just as much finesse. I cook them on very high heat, very quickly, so they retain their inherent qualities. For quicker-cooking vegetables such as young carrots, green beans, asparagus, or Brussels sprouts, (3) I blanch them first so they keep their color, put them in a grilling basket over a very hot flame, and shake them until they brown and char around the edges. For vegetables that need more time such as eggplant or leeks, (4) I start them on higher heat to get a good sear, then move them to a cooler part of the grill to cook through.

When it comes to grilling, indirect heat is a term you'll hear a lot. This means placing food out of the way of the fire and the most intense heat to allow for longer, slower, gentler cooking (see How to Cook on a Grill). Instead of filling the bottom of the grill with blazing fuel, we build a fire in the back and work with the radiant heat it throws off, which you can do on your home grill as well. (5) For roasting a bird or large cut of meat, like a leg of lamb, using indirect heat, we employ a rotisserie, which ensures even cooking and is self-basting-the fat and juices bathe and moisten the meat as it turns. (6) I'll even put a pineapple on the rotisserie, because it's such a dense fruit and needs ambient heat to cook and stay succulent.

I'm big on grilling all kinds of fruit. It has to be ripe but not too soft, or it will break apart. I put figs on a white-hot grill (any cooler and they stick), count to ten, flip them, count to five, pull them off, serve them with olive oil and prosciutto, and they're the best thing in the world.

Vitaly Paley is the chef-owner of Imperial by Vitaly Paley, Paley's Place, and Portland Penny Diner in Portland, Oregon.

How to Grill Indoors

Mon, 10 Jun 2013 06:45:00 GMT

Most any grilled-food recipe can be made in your oven or on a stovetop-or a combination of the two.

Burgers, thin steaks, kebabs, shellfish, and other items that cook quickly can be grilled in the oven under the broiler flame (which is an upside-down grill of sorts), or you can use a cast-iron grill pan on the stovetop. If using a grill pan, place it over medium-high heat, then grill foods to desired doneness. (You'll know the pan is hot enough when a droplet of water sprinkled on the surface skitters across and evaporates.)

For thicker cuts with longer cooking times, such as bone-in chicken, start with a sear in a hot grill pan, then transfer to a baking sheet and place in a 400° oven until cooked through. (For tough cuts, such as ribs, set oven to 300° and cook 'til tender.) To crisp up chicken or to add a light char to cooked steaks, place them under a broiler set to high for 1 to 2 minutes before serving.

How to Cook on a Grill

Fri, 07 Jun 2013 16:30:00 GMT

For successful grilling, two techniques are essential: direct grilling and indirect grilling.

With direct grilling, food is grilled right over hot coals where the heat is most intense. It's ideal for foods such as whole fish, shellfish, thin steaks, burgers, kebabs, and other dishes that can cook quickly at a high temperature.

Indirect grilling makes use of the ambient heat a short distance away from the coals and is great for foods such as bone-in chicken and thick-cut steaks that take longer to cook all the way through; placing these foods to one side of the coals exposes them to a gentler heat, where they cook slowly over time, without burning their exterior.

Since most of us tend to grill different kinds of meats and vegetables all at once, it's best to organize your grill so that it has both direct and indirect grilling zones. Such a setup lets you move foods back and forth between zones, alternating between high-heat direct grilling and lower-heat indirect grilling. Creating dual zones for a gas grill is easy. Here's how to do it for a charcoal version:

Remove top grill grate; set a chimney starter over bottom grate. Place crumpled newspaper under chimney starter.
Fill starter to the top with charcoal and light newspaper with a match. Let coals burn until white-hot and covered with gray ash.
Using a heatproof glove or mitt, pour coals from chimney starter onto bottom grill grate. Replace top grate and cover grill.
Allow grill to heat 30 minutes before starting to cook. To tell if the temperature is high enough for cooking, hold your hand about 3″ over the grill grate. If you have to pull away after 4 seconds, it's time to start grilling.
Using a heatproof glove or mitt, remove top grill grate and, using tongs or a shovel, push all the coals to one side of the grill. Replace top grate.
Use the hottest area on the grill-directly over the coals-for your direct grilling zone. The area without coals will become gradually cooler; use this part of the grill for indirect grilling.

Shaping Kebabs

Fri, 07 Jun 2013 06:30:00 GMT

There's an art to forming kebabs with ground meat such as Simit Kebab (Ground Lamb, Bulgur, and Pistachio Kebabs). Three simple steps will ensure well-formed kebabs that cook evenly.

See the step-by-step instructions in the gallery »

Black Gold

Mon, 03 Jun 2013 05:45:00 GMT

by Sean Rembold

I've always loved the smoky intensity of wood-fired foods. So at Reynard, the Brooklyn restaurant where I'm the chef, we cook lots of dishes over burning oak. While we do most of the grilling on stainless-steel grates, sometimes it's fun to get our hands dirty, intensifying the caramelization and char on vegetables by tossing them directly on the coals. The technique, of course, isn't new. In cultures the world over, sweet potatoes are cooked in the embers; Mexican chefs have long roasted chiles this way for salsa; and some cooks in the Middle East do the same with eggplants for their baba ganoush. We think the method works particularly well for vegetables that have hardy peels or skins. Coated in a little olive oil, for instance, whole onions, shallots, and garlic roast beautifully, melting and mellowing in their papery sheaths, and gaining a pleasant bitterness that complements any dish to which they're added. Sometimes we bury a whole butternut squash in the embers and cook it until it yields easily to a knife. Then we scoop out the flesh, mash it up with salt, butter, and maple syrup or honey, and top it with shaved pecorino, black pepper, and sage. Sweet, smoky, and salty all at once, the combination is dynamite. To protect smaller, more delicate vegetables, we place them in a wire mesh basket. Potatoes-par-boiled in salted water first to minimize the risk of burning-develop a delicious char when crushed and laid in the basket on the coals. And carrots' natural sugars caramelize, accentuating and deepening their sweetness. Sure, there's lots to be said for a juicy hunk of meat cooked to perfection atop a grill, but when we want to maximize the flavors of vegetables, we're not afraid to go beyond the grate.

How to Make Fresh Tortillas

Thu, 30 May 2013 08:30:00 GMT

Tortillas are one of the most elemental of foods; it's hard to imagine Mexican cuisine without them. Making supple homemade tortillas is easier than you might think-and the results are incomparable.

See our step-by-step instructions »

Tips for Successful Grilling

Tue, 28 May 2013 14:39:40 GMT

How to Prevent Flare-Ups

While fire is the essence of grilling, flare-ups-when flames surge out of the grill and burn food-can impart undesirable, bitter flavors. Since flare-ups are caused by oil dripping onto the coals and catching fire, prevent them by trimming off extra fat, and using a paper towel to pat off excess marinade before putting food on the grill.

How to Control Flare-Ups

If you do experience a flare-up, there are three things you can do: Move the food immediately to a cooler section of the grill; close the lid and vents of the grill briefly to cut off the fire's oxygen supply; or spritz the flames with water to douse them.

Baste to Build Flavor

Brushing food with a marinade or sauce as it cooks creates a browning effect as proteins and sugars both caramelize, building a rich, flavorful crust. When basting meats or seafood, fully sear the surface before you start basting-this will create a craggy surface for the marinade or sauce to cling to-and use just enough sauce to coat the food; over-eager brushing can lead to drips and flare-ups.

Use the Lid

Speed up indirect grilling (see "How to Cook on a Grill") by closing the lid and opening a vent over the hottest part of the grill. The lid will help capture and contain heat, while the open vent ensures that the hot air circulates evenly and rapidly throughout the grill, in effect turning the grill into a convection oven.

Back Up Your Chimney Starter

Strong, steady heat is essential for great grilling. We find it helps to have a backup chimney starter on hand to keep hot coals at the ready for stoking your fire when the first batch of coals dies down. Since coals take around 15 minutes to really get going, light your second starter as soon as you slap that first burger on the grill.

Keep Meat from Sticking to the Grate

So that food sears without sticking to the grill, make sure grates are extremely hot before cooking. At first the foods will grip the hot grate as proteins brown and sear. But as meats cook, they will start to firm up and pull away from the grate, making it possible to flip them without losing their charred crust.

Add Wood Chips for Flavor

Most charcoals burn relatively clean, allowing the flavors of grilled foods to speak for themselves. For added depth and a nice smoky taste, add wood chips made from hardwoods such as hickory, applewood, or cherry, to your fire. Be sure to soak chips in water first for 15 minutes to an hour to ensure they smoke (and don't just ignite), then toss them directly onto the coals just before you start cooking.

Secrets of the Grill: Chicken

Sat, 25 May 2013 06:54:46 GMT

by Maricel E. Presilla
I always do two things when grilling chicken: I flatten the bird, which helps it cook evenly, and marinate it. Marinating is a technique Latin American cooks inherited from medieval Spain. In Cuba, where I'm from, we marinate everything under the sun in an aromatic paste called adobo that combines garlic, cumin, oregano, and lots of fresh citrus. For even more punch, I add ground ají molido chiles, paprika, and lemon; a bath in this mouth-puckering concoction provides a basic underpinning of flavor that blossoms and evolves while the bird cooks.

Get Under Its Skin

Rubbing marinade or seasonings under the chicken's skin helps keep the meat succulent and flavorful as it cooks.

Flat Top

Cooking on a plancha, a flat grill-top griddle, gives an even sear, perfect for delicate or quick-cooking foods like fish. Here it prevents the chicken's skin from tearing while it crisps.

Weigh It Down

Removing the backbone and flattening the bird under preheated foil-wrapped bricks helps the legs, thighs, and breasts cook at the same rate, yielding uniformly juicy meat.

Liquid Gold

After searing the chicken, baste it with the marinade while it cooks. As the liquid combines with the meat's juices, the bird's exterior becomes beautifully lacquered and caramelized.

Maricel E. Presilla is the author of Gran Cocina Latina (W.W. Norton, 2012).

See the recipe for Adobo Chicken Under a Brick »

Secrets of the Grill: Corn

Wed, 22 May 2013 16:09:59 GMT

by Elizabeth Karmel
With its sweet flavor, just-picked summer corn is sublime on its own. But grilling-either in the husk or shucked-gives the kernels a nutty taste that makes each ear perfect for flavored compound butters, sauces, and glazes. More mature corn, which is slightly starchier, is my preferred kind to grill because the sturdy kernels can withstand the heat.

In the Husk

Cooking corn in the husk keeps kernels juicy and gives them a mellow toasty flavor, making them a neutral base for herbal compound butters or spreads like aïoli.

Get Soaked

Before grilling, soak unhusked ears of corn in water for 30 minutes. The moisture will steam the corn as it grills and prevent the husks from burning.

Stripped Down

When grilled, shucked corn chars deeply and develops a bold flavor that can stand up to assertive spreads like wasabi butter or barbecue sauce.

Oil It Up

All foods, but especially water-rich vegetables, need a brushing of fat, such as olive oil, before they go on the grate. The fat promotes caramelization and prevents vegetables from drying out. -Elizabeth Karmel, author of Soaked, Slathered, and Seasoned (Wiley, 2009)

See the recipe for Grilled Corn with Herbed Goat Cheese Butter »
See the recipe for Grilled Corn with Pesto »

Secrets of the Grill: Ribs

Wed, 22 May 2013 07:13:58 GMT

by Steven Raichlen
I've met cooks all over the globe who have rhapsodized over the primal pleasure of eating ribs, holding them in hand and eating the charred meat straight off the bone. Ribs take as many forms as there are places where they're cooked, and it's easy to replicate lots of them at home: Blast a rack of baby backs with garlic and fish sauce and they'll taste just like ones you'd find in Cambodia; marinate a lamb rib with ginger and yogurt and it takes on an Indian tandoori flavor. What a delectable way to keep such an ancient way of eating alive.

Choice Cuts

Baby back ribs, from the pork loin, cook quickly, are generously marbled, and are easy to handle. Spare ribs are longer and thicker, with a handsome curvature perfect for gnawing. They're meatier, though, so they'll take longer to cook.

Straight-Up Grilling

Ignore those who tell you to boil or bake ribs before grilling: Both methods draw out that precious meaty flavor you want in a rib.

The Flavor 3-Step

Build flavor at three key points: with a rub, marinade, or brine before grilling; by basting with a marinade, mop sauce, or butter during cooking; and with a sauce or salsa when serving.

Rack 'Em Up

A metal rib rack, which cradles the ribs vertically above the grate, allows fat to drain off and leaves room on the grill for other foods.

Built-In Timer

When ribs are ready, the meat will shrink back from the end of the bone ¼ inch on baby backs and ½ inch on spareribs. Another test of doneness: You should be able to pull the meat apart with your fingers.

Steven Raichlen is the author of Best Ribs Ever (Workman Publishing, 2012).

See the recipe for Chrong Chomnei Jrok Oeng (Cambodian-Style Ginger Lemongrass Baby Backs) »
See the recipe for Tandoori Champ (Indian Lamb Ribs) »
See the recipe for Costillas Adobadas (Mexican Pork Spareribs) »

Secrets of the Grill: Steak

Wed, 22 May 2013 06:47:08 GMT

by Craig Koketsu
I spend a lot of time cooking indoors in restaurant kitchens, but I relish any chance I get to be outside grilling over an open fire. The sun and fresh air, the aroma, the flames-it's a hard activity to beat. I like to cook my steak in a slightly unconventional way: After a sear over a super-hot fire, I move it away from the hottest coals and baste it in rendered dry-aged beef fat, which adds incomparable depth of flavor. I then finish with another last-minute sear for a beautifully charred crust.

Best Baste

Next time you're at the butcher, ask for leftover fat scraps trimmed from dry-aged beef, then render the fat and use it to baste a steak; it will enrich the meat's natural beefy flavor.

Salt and Smoke

I like to season the steak with a blend of coarse smoked sea salt and seaweed salt to enhance its smoky grilled flavor and add umami and crunch.

Souped-Up Sauce

Instead of sticky-sweet bottled steak sauces, I prefer my own concoction. Packed full of garlic, hot and sweet peppers, fish sauce, and herbs, it adds punch to the flavor of the charred meat. This will be the signature sauce at Quality Italian in New York City, which is set to open later this year.

Clean Heat

The ultimate crust requires a fast kiss of heat over immaculate blazing coals. Binchotan, a traditional Japanese charcoal that burns hot and clean, is my go-to.

Craig Koketsu is the chef-partner of New York City's Quality Meats.

See the recipe for Grilles Rib Eye with Sweet-Hot Pepper Sauce »

Secrets of the Grill: Burgers

Mon, 20 May 2013 07:15:24 GMT

by Nathan Myhrvold
Deeply charred ground beef dripping juice onto a soft bun, melted cheese oozing over the edges-I'm obsessed with the American cheeseburger. At the culinary lab I run in Seattle, we decided to pay it a scientist's tribute. After researching the chemistry behind the deliciousness of every component-the meat, cheese, bun, sauce-we uncovered methods for making the ultimate backyard burger, no weird science required. It starts with grinding the meat ourselves and ends with a special sauce that puts ketchup to shame.

Uber-Sauce

My colleagues and I developed our "M.C. Special Sauce" in the lab to accompany a different recipe. When I tasted it, I thought, That's McDonald's special sauce! It's fantastic on a burger.

Egg It On

Although I prefer my burgers without it, for a richer, more cohesive patty, add one egg yolk per pound of meat.

On the Grind

It's convenient to get ground meat at the store, but it really tastes best when it's fresh. If you're a purist, you'll grind each meat in your blend separately to achieve uniform texture, then combine.

Melt Down

Lots of cheeses that might taste great on a burger-Gruyère, Emmentaler-aren't so great for melting because they separate when heated. Processed cheese, like American or Velveeta, contains emulsifiers which produce a luscious, even melt.

Salt Scoop

Salting meat causes it to extract a protein, myosin, which binds ground meat together. Mix salt into your meat one hour before grilling. For 26 ounces of ground beef, 1½ teaspoons of salt will do.

-Nathan Myhrvold, co-author of Modernist Cuisine (The Cooking Lab, 2011)

See our Ultimate Grilled Cheeseburger recipe »

Preserving Plenty: The Beauty of Fermented Foods

Thu, 16 May 2013 15:00:00 GMT

by Sarah Dickerman

When I was a kid, every pickle my father ate was a bit of a disappointment. Dad, who grew up in the 1930s and '40s in the Bronx, New York, remembered plucking kosher sours out of barrels filled with cloudy brine-"Now those were pickles!" he'd tell us. I only knew Claussen and other vinegar-cured pickles, the kind you buy in jars off the supermarket shelf, and I liked them just fine. But when I finally tasted a real pickle-the kind made the old-fashioned way, fermented with nothing more than salt, water, and time-I realized what I had been missing. A vinegary pickle plows through your palate with its tartness (often in a most pleasing way), but a live-cultured, salt-cured, fermented one tells a more multifaceted story. It is sour, to be sure, but it tastes of something more, something elusive: It's the flavor of Middle Europe captured in one bite.

When I started cooking for a living, I realized that the complexity I'd tasted in that pickle is the hallmark of well-made fermented foods, which include some of my very favorite things to eat and drink: not just pickles, but aged cheeses, tangy sourdough breads, blistering kimchis, tart yogurts, winy salamis, and of course, wine itself. I'd rush to volunteer on fermenting projects in the restaurants where I worked: I was eager to learn how salted cabbage could turn into sauerkraut, and how buttermilk mixed with cream and stuck in the back pantry, turned into a pretty good approximation of crème fraîche in a few days. Making my own yogurt seemed like kitchen magic, the way it so effortlessly soured and thickened overnight.

Nurturing live-cultured foods, watching their colors change, and tasting the results is incredibly satisfying.

I've been out of professional kitchens for several years, and in the meantime, it seems fermented foods have become something of a culinary trend here in the States. Beer making, cheese making, sourdough bread making, and, of course, pickle curing are now legitimate hobbies for the industrious DIY food lover. With markets stocked more generously than ever with items like kefir (an effervescent milk drink) and kombucha (fermented tea), I grew curious about the vast range of fermented, or live-cultured, beverages, foods, and condiments found around the world and how they're actually made. What's happening inside bottles of the fizzy, malty, bread-based Eastern European drink kvas? And could I actually make things like soy sauce and miso at home?

Photo: Todd Coleman

The answer to that last question is yes, though it would take a long time to make them. I learned this from a man named Sandor Katz, who is the Johnny Appleseed of fermentation in this country. In the final days of summer last year, I headed to a bucolic hillside farm in central Tennessee for Katz's five-day workshop on fermentation. I was part of an eclectic group of 13 students, including a newly wed home-steading couple from Maryland, a performance artist and poet from Georgia, and a General Motors wheel buyer based out of Michigan, who had gathered in the humid basement of a midcentury ranch house to learn how to preserve foods.

Some good friends of mine had introduced me to Katz by giving me his celebrated book Wild Fermentation (Chelsea Green, 2003). Inspired by it, they were running out of counter space for all their pickle and sauerkraut projects. In Wild Fermentation, Katz writes with an infectious combination of erudition and evangelical vim about the pleasures of fostering and consuming edible cultures, from the familiar (sauerkraut, beer) to the arcane (a sweet Japanese rice beverage called amazake, a bubbly Guyanese soft drink called sweet potato fly).

Figuring out an effective way to keep eating those fresh vegetables through the fall and winter was also really exciting.

Katz is a 49-year-old with piercing blue eyes and a shock of steely curls that creep down over a memorable set of silvery muttonchops. He was not raised in a pickling family: He grew up a city boy, on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, enjoying deli pickles just like my father did. As a young man, he did policy work for the city, but in 1993 he made a radical change in his life. He moved to a commune in the hills of central Tennessee and began gardening. "It was a rude surprise to me that all of my cabbages and all of my radishes were ready at the same time," says Katz. Not quite knowing what to do with his bumper crop, he remembered that sauerkraut might be an option, and using The Joy of Cooking and some favorite macrobiotic cookbooks as guides, he set to fermenting his first batch. The garden kept providing, he kept pickling and preserving, and before long, he was hooked. "Being able to create that flavor was really exciting," says Katz. "And figuring out an effective way to keep eating those fresh vegetables through the fall and winter was also really exciting."

Katz began our fermentation workshop with a lesson on sauerkraut. As we sliced cabbage and tossed it in a stainless steel bowl, he explained that long before Pasteur pinpointed tiny organisms-microbes-as the source of fermentation, cultures around the world had harnessed the power of fermentation to preserve food and improve its qualities (nutritive, alcoholic, or merely aesthetic). He revealed how wild colonies of microflora-whether yeast, bacteria, molds, or a combination-grow on food, changing its nature as the microorganisms ingest sugars or alcohols and excrete carbon dioxide, acids, or alcohols. The koji molds that spring up spontaneously on rice, for example, happen to be the same ones whose enzymes can turn cooked rice's starch into sugars. Those sugars then feed yeasts that transform the rice into the alcoholic drink sake.

Katz defines fermentation as "the transformative action of microorganisms." Often the microorganisms in question are bacteria. Take the sauerkraut we were making, for example. When chopped cabbage is combined with salt, squeezed to release its juices, and left to sit in the resulting brine, the various bacteria on the surface of the cabbage begin to grow, creating an acidic environment that transforms the flavor of the cabbage into the sweet-funky stuff we know as sauerkraut. This acidity also discourages the growth of pathogenic bacteria.

Similarly, bacteria can also change milk into yogurt and fresh cheese, and help turn fresh sausages into long-lived salamis. But bacteria are not the only microbes that transform our edibles: Yeasts consume the sugars in grains and fruits and excrete alcohol, creating beer, wine, and spritzy tonics. Sourdough bread is another yeast-bacteria collaboration: The gassy bubbles exuded by the yeast in the sourdough make the bread rise, while bacteria create a sour environment that gives the bread its characteristic tang. In Asia, countless foods are fermented, but beans account for a great many of them, from miso and soy sauce (which can take as much as three years to produce) to black bean paste and tempeh, a patty of soybeans bound by Rhizopus oligosporus mold spores.

Photo: Todd Coleman

In the contemporary world, we have outsourced these various processes to industries both small and large, but Katz is a cheerleader for bringing them back to the home kitchen. "A lot of people have the idea that eating cultured foods can be healthy for them, and maybe they'd like to make sauerkraut or yogurt," he says. "But they just have this fear of doing it because they don't have a degree in microbiology." True, there are some bacteria that can give you a gastrointestinal malady or worse, but we are reliant, too, on beneficial bacteria that inhibit the growth of the very toxins we fear.

In fact, live-cultured foods-foods that have not been pasteurized or have had the process of fermentation stopped in some other way-have long been associated with good health: They are believed to soothe the stomach and boost immune function. Yogurt sales, for example, have boomed in the past few years, in no small part because of yogurt's "probiotic" promise to regulate digestion. Katz is intrigued by studies that suggest eating cultured foods is fortifying: He himself has been HIV positive since 1991 and strongly believes that his habit of eating cultured foods has helped him maintain-and sometimes, after health downturns, regain-his health, alongside his use of antiretroviral drugs.

Still, many home cooks are cagey about fermentation precisely because it does not always go smoothly. Harmless but ungainly molds can bloom on the surface of a long-aged project, and, yes, bottles can explode-as my class learned when we made a watermelon drink, soured and carbonated with a bacterial yeast culture called tibicos. Despite Katz's urging to use plastic bottles, we ran out and decanted the drink into an old vodka bottle. In the morning there was shrapnel: The jug had exploded in the night, leaving shards of glass and sticky pink fluid all over the kitchen. We were lucky that no one was hurt. For Katz, such mishaps are part of the learning process. "There's a certain amount of flexibility and improvisation that you need to have if you're going to do these things," he said, as we cleaned up the mess.

On the last evening of the workshop, there was a huge bonfire party where we ate goat from the farm and foods we'd made in the workshop, including tempeh, pickles, and lots of sauerkraut. After that sendoff, I came home from Tennessee and quickly started culturing with wild enthusiasm-making homemade Concord grape soda, crunchy pickles from baby vegetables I had bought at the farmers' market, sourdough bread, and vinegar from leftover wine. My basement shelves quickly filled with jars and bottles, and I found true satisfaction in the mere act of nurturing them, watching their colors change, and ultimately tasting their transformation.

As a caregiver for millions of microorganisms, I have to admit, I've started to develop favorites. I'm darned proud of my kefir, whose culture keeps rolling along on my countertop. And my vinegar, well, it's pretty terrific-I've got my eyes on an oak barrel to make my next attempt in. And I've kept putting up new batches of sauerkraut and cucumber pickles: Katz's original fermentation revelation passed on to yet another fermentation convert.

See a gallery of fermented recipes »

Shaping the Dough

Thu, 16 May 2013 06:00:00 GMT

by Kellie Evans
A perfect Neapolitan crust requires a very gentle approach. First, dust the dough in fine semolina so it doesn't stick to your fingers or the work surface. Then, using your fingertips, press the dough outward from the center, working in a clockwise motion, spiraling gradually outward until you get within one to two inches of the edge; this edge will become the crust (Italians call it the cornicione). To stretch the dough while ensuring the crust remains airy and crisp, follow the steps below.

1. Using both hands, pick up the dough by the crust as if holding the top of a steering wheel; rotate the dough, passing it from one hand to the next, as though you were turning the wheel.

2. Taking care not to compress the dough, continue to pass it from one hand to the next; gravity will help it will fall and stretch naturally.

3. Stop when the center of the dough is stretched to about an eighth-inch thick and the diameter is about a foot across.

See more pizza stories, recipes, tips, and techniques »

Pizza-Perfect Heat

Wed, 15 May 2013 06:30:00 GMT

by Kellie Evans
The biggest difference between making pizza in a pizza shop and making one at home is the oven. The woodburning types you'll find at most Neapolitan pizzerias burn steadily at temperatures from 750 to 1,000 degrees Fahrenheit-temperatures at which the pizza cooks in a minute, resulting in crusts that crackle but stay pliant, mozzarella that remains milky, toppings that stay fresh, and tomato sauce that retains its raw brightness. Below are two methods we devised to reliably hit these volcanic temperatures at home.

1. The Broiler Since most home ovens won't go higher than 500 degrees, we concentrated on the broiler, where the heat is most intense. We placed a pizza stone on a shelf three inches from the broiler, set the dial to high, and waited. After 30 minutes, a temperature gun registered the stone's surface at 770 degrees. At this temperature, our pizzas cooked in two minutes, and came out with an airy crust, just-melted cheese, and fresh, pulpy tomato sauce.

2. The Grill A grilling kit and a pizza stone (see The Right Stuff) atop a grill create an ad hoc wood-fired oven. We banked our coals and wood chips to one side, let the temperature reach 775 degrees, then put in the pizza. In two minutes it emerged, its crust beautifully blistered and imbued with a kiss of smoke that's pure Naples.

See more pizza stories, recipes, tips, and techniques »

How To Make Ricotta At Home

Mon, 22 Apr 2013 09:00:00 GMT

by Hunter Lewis
Traditionally, ricotta was made by reheating whey left over from the cheese-making process; these days it can still be made from whey or whey fortified with milk or cream (to increase the yield), or by extracting curds from whole milk, which is the norm in commercial dairies. The author Janet Fletcher's friend Rosetta Costantino led us to an easy method that produces the sweet, earthy flavor of old-world ricotta by combining whole milk with rennet, which consists of enzymes that act as a coagulant. We tried coagulating ricotta with lemon juice, vinegar, and buttermilk but ended up with neutral-tasting, large, crumbly curds. Rennet produces moister, tastier curds, as it leaves more proteins intact and does not inhibit the milk's flavor compounds as an acid would. The temperature to which the milk is heated is also important. Bringing the temperature up to 200° sweetens the milk and readies its proteins for coagulation. It also causes the curds to retain more whey, for a creamier, smoother cheese.

See step-by-step instructions for making ricotta »

Nine Artichoke Varieties

Mon, 22 Apr 2013 05:45:00 GMT

by Karen Shimizu

Scores of different artichoke cultivars-encompassing a wide range of sizes, shapes, and colors-are available outside the United States. Here, by contrast, a single variety has dominated the market since the 1920s: the big, round California green globe. But in recent years California growers like Steve Jordan of Baroda Farms, in the town of Lompoc, have started to change that. Since 1986, Jordan has been developing domestic cultivars based on artichoke varieties commonly found in Italy and France. Some of the varieties Jordan grows work well as annuals, which are planted anew from seed each year and are not subject to the rigid spring-fall harvest cycle that governs perennials like the classic green globe, which comes from a single plant that is cultivated year after year. All nine specimens described here-some perennials, some grown from seed-came from Baroda Farms.

1. Light red and only roughly one inch in diameter when fully grown, the purple baby anzio is a relative of the romanesco artichoke of the Lazio region of Italy. Like many baby artichokes, baby anzios can be cooked and eaten whole.

2. Developed in the mid-1980s by a California grower named Rusty Jordan, the big heart is aptly named. It is endowed with a large, fleshy base and weighs in at over a pound. This green, 3 1⁄2-5 1⁄2" giant-the first patented annual artichoke grown from seed-is excellent for stuffing.

3. The classic green globe, sometimes called just the globe, has a buttery-tasting heart and bottom and an ample amount of meat at the base of the petals. This artichoke, which ranges in size from three to five inches in diameter and was traditionally cultivated as a perennial, was originally brought to California from Italy but is similar in shape and flavor to the French camus de bretagne, a summer choke grown in Brittany.

4. The oblong siena, about four inches in diameter and born of a breeding program in central Italy, has a small choke and a wine red color. Slow to mature and still grown in relatively small quantities, this small artichoke usually weighs less than a pound and has a heart tender enough to be eaten raw.

5. The petite mercury, with its red-violet hue and distinctive rounded top, is sweeter than many other artichokes and is usually three and a half inches in diameter. Like the baby anzio, the mercury is derived from the Italian romanesco.

6. The dense and rotund omaha artichoke (up to six inches wide) owes its striking appearance to its sharply tapered red-and-green leaves. The omaha is less bitter than many artichoke varieties.

7. The two-inch-wide fiesole artichoke has a fruity flavor and a deep wine color that does not fade with cooking. Bred from the violetta de provence, a purple variety native to southern France, the fiesole has a comparatively tender stalk that can be quickly steamed and eaten.

8. The chianti, a classically shaped, four-inch-wide green artichoke with a touch of maroon on the leaves, also (like the mercury) traces its lineage to the iconic Italian romanesco.

9. The blocky and vividly colored king has distinctive green spots at the tips of its leaves. Usually four inches in diameter and bred from romanesco varieties mixed with other Italian artichoke strains, the king typically weighs more than a pound in peak season.

Eggplant Essentials: How to Fry Perfect Eggplant

Mon, 25 Mar 2013 15:00:00 GMT

by Kellie Evans
Sichuan-style fried eggplant, firm yet creamy and bursting with flavor, is truly exquisite, but cooking it can be a challenge-eggplant's porous flesh soaks up oil like a sponge and can quickly go from silky to sodden. So we asked Danny Bowien, chef-owner of the Mission Chinese Food restaurants in New York and San Francisco, whose fried Japanese eggplant is exemplary, to share his technique. Here's what we learned:

1. First, after quartering the eggplant, score a crosshatch pattern on the skin or the flesh side. This creates more surface area for faster cooking, so the oil doesn't have time to seep into the vegetable.

2. Next, soak the eggplant in ice-cold water: The chill shocks the surface of the vegetable and fills tiny air pockets between the cells, preventing the oil from entering them. After a five-minute bath, pat the eggplant completely dry with a paper towel so the hot oil doesn't spatter during frying.

3. Finally, make sure that your frying oil is at least 350 degrees-at that high temperature, the eggplant will cook without absorbing oil. Deep-fry it for about two to three minutes, just until the cut side is soft and golden and the skin side is slightly blistered. Briefly soak the slices in a bowl of just-boiled water to rinse off any excess oil. Once drained and completely dried, it can be simmered in sauce, which it will readily absorb, yielding eggplant that is rich in flavor, not in oil.

See the recipe for Yu Xiang Qie Zi (Sichuanese Fried Eggplant) »

How to Make Confectioner's Sugar

Fri, 15 Mar 2013 15:30:00 GMT

by Judy Haubert
Where would donuts be without confectioners' sugar? Also known as powdered sugar, the ingredient forms the base of countless enticing glazes, and on its own is an essential topping for countless donuts around the world.

Professional grades of powdered sugar, made by grinding granulated sugar, which is then sorted according to the size of the ground sugar particles, range from 2x, the coarsest, to superfine 14x. The most widely available grade, 10x, is the best for donut glazes-the sugar is fine enough to dissolve completely and quickly in liquid, yielding flawless glazes that dry fast.

Most powdered sugars include a small amount of starch (usually cornstarch), which acts as a stabilizer and anticaking agent. This helps the sugar stay clump-free-especially useful for achieving even sprinkling on powdered donuts.

While confectioners' sugar is widely available in supermarkets, you can also make it at home: Combine one-half cup granulated sugar and three-quarters teaspoon cornstarch in a spice or coffee grinder. Blend on high speed for about one minute until the mixture is ground to a very fine powder. Sift through a fine-mesh strainer and store in an airtight container. Makes three-quarters cup.

VIDEO: How to Make Molten Chocolate Cakes

Mon, 11 Feb 2013 09:30:00 GMT

Molten chocolate cakes are a simple dessert that anyone can make for a special occasion - the perfect treat to surprise your special someone with this Valentine's Day. SAVEUR associate food editor Ben Mims has a simple technique for ensuring that the cakes have extra-delicious oozy centers: he bakes a sweet, rich chocolate truffle right into the center of each.

what you'll need

6 6-oz. ramekins
A hand mixer

What to do

Start by making truffles: bring cream to a boil and pour it over chopped chocolate and rum in a medium bowl. Let this sit for one minute. Stir until smooth, then let sit until firm.
Divide the mixture and roll it into six balls. Chill these truffles until set.
For the cakes: beat together sugar, vanilla, salt, and eggs until the form ribbons when liften from the beaters.
Add melted chocolate and flour, and mix well.
Divide half the batter between six buttered and floured ramekins and place a chilled truffle in the center of each.
Top with remaining batter, and smooth the tops with a rubber spatula.
Bake for 15 minutes, until the cake is just done.
Let cakes cool for one minute, then gently invert each onto a serving plate.
Dust with confectioner's sugar, and serve them immediatly to ensure the molten chocolate oozes out to create a sauce for the cakes.

See the complete recipe for Molten Chocolate Cakes »

Sponsored Recipe: Ghirardelli's® Individual Chocolate Lava Cakes »
VIDEO: How to Dip Chocolate Truffles »
VIDEO: How to Flow Royal Icing »
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Light as a Feather

Tue, 04 Dec 2012 16:30:53 GMT

by Harris Salat
At its crispy, gossamer best, tempura is unlike any other fried food. I remember the first time I ate at one of Tokyo's tempura-ya several years ago. At these specialized tempura shops, the chefs are experts at the technique, in which seafood and vegetables are dipped into a simple batter of flour, water, and egg yolks, then quickly cooked in hot vegetable oil and served piping hot. The deep-fried shrimp I ordered that day were steaming, sweet, and tender, with an airy, remarkably greaseless crust. Extra wisps of crunchy batter clung delectably to each piece. They were accompanied by a soy sauce-and-rice wine dipping sauce that was peppered with fresh, spicy grated ginger and daikon. I savored every bit of that tempura; for an American used to doughy batter-fried foods, it was a revelation.

Since then, I have eaten tempura innumerable times, in diners and noodle shops and at friends' homes all over Japan. Typically, it's been served alongside soba or udon noodles. Often it's paired with an umami-rich dipping sauce; sometimes it comes with a fine-grain sea salt flavored with dried shrimp, or matchajio, sea salt mixed with powdered matcha tea. With every batch I've sampled, I've wondered how the cooks achieve that incomparable contrast between the snappy, juicy ingredients and their crackly, ethereal exterior.

Eventually, I turned to the chef Tadashi Ono, with whom I have collaborated on several cookbooks, for the answer. Ono has been preparing tempura for more than two decades, and he agreed to share his method for achieving near-perfect results. The key, he told me, is in the preparation of the batter; get it right, and you'll end up with a delectable crust that doesn't mask or overwhelm the flavors and textures of the fresh foods it envelops. Since tempura is a fast-cooking method, these ingredients should be prepared beforehand, so they're ready to fry as soon as the batter is mixed. For four servings, Ono cuts one pound of raw vegetables into bite-size pieces, and four large shrimp, peeled and cut so that they stay straight and long when frying. Pat the ingredients dry, and allow them to come to room temperature before frying.

See instructions on how to cut shrimp to keep them straight for tempura »
See the gallery for step-by-step instructions on how to make tempura »
See the article "Big Dipper" for more on sauce and salt recipes »