The Impatient Chef Mocktail Recipe: The Pink Paradise

As some of you may know, The Impatient Chef looooves cocktails, especially ones containing gin and olives.  Love of, and the consumption of, cocktails is in the finest American tradition of getting one's wit lubricated when the need strikes.  The trouble occurs when the need strikes too often, and doctors start wagging fingers, and talking about blood sugar levels.  Mortality being the harsh mistress that it is, and diabetes being the mother of prevention, the martini had to take the back seat to other drinks.  I still have the occasional martini, daiquiri, margarita, etc on weekends (one per day maximum), but for the work week, no alcohol may be consumed.  

Enter: The Mocktail. 

A mocktail is essentially a non-alcoholic cocktail.  The trick is to obtain complexity and deliciousness while following a different treasure map, one where there is no gin or rum at the spot marked 'X'.  This can be tricky.  I started out with variations on the gin and tonic, substituting bitters and simple syrup for the gin.  To my surprise, it worked nicely.  That recipe will be forthcoming in the near future.  Until then, The Impatient Chef is pleased to present:

The Pink Paradise.  

Why pink, you ask?  Surely a man's drink isn't pink.  

The Impatient Chef doesn't care.  It's pink.  Get over it.  

Here goes;

• 1 oz fresh lemon juice
• 1/2 oz simple syrup
• 1/2 oz grenadine
• 4 dashes orange bitters
• 3 dashes Boker's bitters (you can substitute Angostura, but it won't be as good)
• 4 oz seltzer.

I use a fairly large cocktail glass, and it fits.  

Add everything but the seltzer into a cocktail shaker with ice.  Shake vigorously.  Open the shaker, pour in the seltzer.  Swirl for a few seconds, and strain into a chilled cocktail glass.  You can add more seltzer if desired.  

Enjoy.  

--The Impatient Chef.  

The Impatient Chef is Learning to Take Food Pictures

I have taken a few weeks off from regular posts for a two reasons.  

1. The pandemic makes it hard to write restaurant reviews.  
2. I want to learn how to take better food pictures.  

It is reason # 2 that I want to address here.  

The Impatient Chef is a side project, behind my main passion, which is photography.  I do mostly landscape photography.  As such, I have struggled with studio photography for years, not really seeming to make it click.  

As part of my photography business, I sell to stock photo agencies.  When the pandemic hit, I was less able to travel to the places where I love to set up my tripod.  Yet, I wanted to keep sending pictures into the agencies.  Something new was called for.  Why not practice food photography?  

So, I started taking food to the studio, and playing with lighting, and composition.  Here's a taste.  

 

That's a little taste of what The Impatient Chef has been up to in recent months.  More Recipes to come, and maybe some reviews of food carts.  Sounds like a plan.

The Impatient Chef.  

The Impatient Chef Forgot to take Pictures of his Nashville Hot Chicken Recipe

Image curtesy of clipartpix.com

So, this piece of clip art will have to do.  

Where to begin?  

Heat.  The Impatient Chef likes spicy foods.

Where else?

Taste.  Every bit as important as heat.  

I have tried Nashville Hot Chicken, and attempted to make some from a recipe once.  I did it by the books, which is to say that I made the chicken with some spices in the breading, and made a spice mixture into which I ladled some of the friar oil, and mixed it up before slathering the crispy chicken with it.  

The result?

A resounding "Meh".

I was missing something.  But, what was it?  

Well, living in Nashville, of course.  That is something certainly missing.  I don't know what real, authentic, bona-fried Nashville Hot Chicken tastes like.  After some serious sourpussing over the sheer mileage between here and there, The Impatient Chef gradually hatched a plan.  

The Plan.

A bit of research revealed that really crispy fried chicken gets breaded in corn starch.  The breading had been a little soggy in the sauce for my first batch, so why not?  However, I wasn't too certain about using entirely corn starch, so I though "What about corn flour?"  

Now for the spice.  

The Impatient Chef adores buffalo wings.

Of course!  Use butter instead of the friar oil.  While I was at it, I decided to forgo the spice mixture, and instead use hot sauce.  I opted for Tapatio.  

The Recipe.

Ingredients:

• 4 pieces of chicken.  I used dark meat.  
• 1/2 cup corn starch
• 1/2 cup corn flour 
• 8 tablespoons Creole seasoning (I like Tony Chachere's)
• 1/2 tsp cayenne pepper
• 1/4 cup and 1 tbsp. hot sauce (I used Tapatio)
• 1/4 cup butter
• 1 egg
• 1/2 cup AP flour

Equipment:

• A deep fryer, or dutch oven with just enough oil to cover the chicken.  
• 3 pie plates, or shallow dishes for the breading
• Fat skimmer.  
• Fast read thermometer.
• Sheet tray with a cooling grid. 
• Small sauté pan
• Wire whisk
• Shallow bowl
• Pastry brush. 

Directions:

1. Rinse the chicken and pat dry.  
2. Arrange the pie plates in a row.  To the first one, add the flour.  In the second one, crack the egg, add one tbsp of the hot sauce, and beat until uniform in color (but don't get carried away).  Into the third one, add the corn flour, the corn starch, and 4 tablespoons of the Creole seasoning.  
3. Sprinkle 4 of the tablespoons of the creole seasoning on all sides of the chicken.  Roll it in the flour until coated, then the egg mixture, and then the corn starch mixture.  Place the chicken onto the sheet tray with the cooling grid.  Do not discard the surplus corn starch mixture.  
4. Turn on the fryer, or start heating the dutch oven.  The temperature should be 375 degrees.  
5. While the oil is heating, you will notice that the chicken is turning slightly red.  This is the red from the hot sauce in the egg mixture showing through the breading.  Sprinkle a little more breading on all sides of each piece, and pat it down.  You are trying to cover most of the red.  Wait a few minutes and do it again.  I did three rounds of this.  Now, if you are making french fries with this meal, you can heat the oil first, and add the extra breading to the chicken while those are frying.  Otherwise, heating the oil at the start of the recipe means that you will have to keep it heated for 10 to 15 extra minutes while adding the extra breading.  The Impatient Chef loves good food, but hates Global Warming, so using only the BTU's that are necessary is a plus.  
6. Once the oil is heated, carefully add the chicken.  Be careful to not get splattered.  After a minute or so, nudge them with the fat skimmer to make sure that they aren't sticking to the bottom.  
7. After about 5 minutes, melt the butter in the small sauté pan until it barely starts bubbling.  Add the remaining 1/4 cup of hot sauce.    Whisk it until uniform.  Remove from heat.  
8. When the chicken has reached 165 degrees, remove it from the oil and into a shallow bowl.  Pour the hot sauce and butter mixture over it.  Use the pastry brush to spread it over as much of the chicken as possible on both sides.   There should be very little of it, if any, left in the bowl.
9. Serve with your choice of sides and have a box of facial tissue handy.  

Note to spice lovers.  You may experiment with hotter sauces, but be kind to your less adventurous guests or spouses.  This recipe has a nice flavor, and a nice heat.  Why make tomorrow morning any harder than it has to be?  

Disclaimer:

This is not authentic Nashville Hot Chicken.  When I moved to the hot sauce instead of the spice mixture, the recipe became more Buffalo than Nashville.  My wife really liked it, so I will call it a success.  

--The Impatient Chef.

The Impatient Chef Cocktail Concoction: The Modified Moscow Mule

The Moscow Mule is all the rage these days, and I have to admit that I like them.  The problem is that I suck them down way too fast.  They go down like, well, ginger ale.  A local Distillery, one that I have no problem shamelessly plugging every chance I get, called New Deal Distillery, that resides in Portland, Oregon, has a Ginger Liqueur, and a fine vodka.  Now, I have no use for vodka in anything other than the Moscow Mule and pie crust, but it's okay in the Mule.  New Deal puts a Moscow Mule recipe on its bottle, and it consists of lime squeezin's, vodka, Ginger Liqueur, and soda water.  You can find the recipe here, or buy a bottle to get it (preferred).  I started thinking about how to make this into a cocktail rather than a fizz.  Here's what I came up with:

Ingredients:

2 oz Vodka (New Deal Portland Vodka works well)
2 oz New Deal Ginger Liqueur
1 oz fresh lime juice
raw sugar + boiling water (see directions), or 1/2 to 3/4 oz simple syrup (depending on your taste)

Directions:

In a measured shot glass, add raw sugar to the 1/2 oz mark.  If it is coarse raw sugar, fill it slightly higher.  Fill with water to the 1 oz mark.  Microwave for about 20 seconds.  Less may be necessary.  You just want it to be warm enough to dissolve the sugar.  Stir to dissolve.  Set aside while making the rest.
In a cocktail shaker, add the lime juice, vodka, and Ginger Liqueur.  Add ice.  Then add the sugar water.
Shake until the shaker is frosted.
Serve in a chilled cocktail glass.  Garnish with a twist of lime.

Tasting notes.
This is not a sweet cocktail.  The New Deal Ginger Liqueur packs a whollop.  The sugar mellows it a little.  It's a sipping cocktail like I wanted.  It's a little puckery because of the lime, and the ginger is real, and pronounced.  It passed my wife's "Oh my God, it's good" test.

Enjoy.

The Impatient Chef Recipe: Beer Butt Chicken

Well, folks.  There comes that time in a chef's life that all pretensions must be thrown aside, and we have to try a recipe just because it's funny.  However, a question that these discerning home chefs have asked for decades is thus:  Does inserting a beer can into the nether regions of a chicken do anything for the flavor?

The answer:  In a word, no.  

But, what if there was a way to make it work?  Fortunately, there is.  

The traditional way to cook this somewhat humiliated bird in the beer can fashion is to empty out half of the beer, and fill the can the rest of the way with italian dressing.  After it finished bubbling out of the can, it is inserted into the chicken, and baked standing up. 

I propose three changes to this recipe:

1. Make homemade Italian dressing.  You can tailor it to the needs of your bird.  Hint: extra salt and garlic.
2. Add dressing to the half can of beer you poured out.  Loosen the skin of the chicken, and pour it through, letting the excess drip into the pan.
3. Cover your bird with foil to keep the flavor in.  Baste it on occasion with the liquid.
4. I lied.  There are four changes.  Get a good beer.  A hoppy IPA would be profoundly better than a mass-marketed lager. 

Tools:  

• Blender 
• Aluminium foil 
• Baking twine 
• A high-sided roasting pan, or iron skilley
• An oven with some head room 
• A two-cup measuring cup 
• A sense of humor

Ingredients:

• 1 cup white wine vinegar
• 1 cup vegetable oil (grapeseed or canola)
• 1 tbsp salt
• 1 tbsp oregano
• 1 tbsp basil
• 1 tbsp tarragon
• 1 tsp marjoram
• 1 tsp thyme
• 1/2 tsp ground black pepper
• 1 tsp Old Bay Seasoning
• 1 tsp mustard (as an emulsifant) 
• 7 cloves garlic
• 1 16 oz can of beer (IPA, or other flavorful beer)
• 1 chicken (preferably deceased and plucked)

Directions:

The day before you want to bake the bird, make the dressing.  
Add all of the ingredients except for the oil, beer, and bird to a blender, and blend until the garlic is minced.  With the blender still on medium speed, open the lid, and slowly pour the oil into it to create an emulsion.  Refrigerate overnight to let the flavors mellow and blend.  

On baking day, 

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.  
2. Pour half of the beer into a 2 cup measuring cup (or any container with a pouring spout) with room to add half of the dressing, and, of course, add half of the dressing.  You may have to stir it first it it has separated.  Then stir the beer / dressing mixture briefly.
3. Add the other half of the dressing to the remaining beer in the can.
4. Loosen the skin on the chicken in as many places as you can by pulling in back, and sliding your hand in, and working it until there is a cavity between the flesh and skin that will hold liquid (or at least the solids).  
5. Over the roasting pan, insert the beer can containing half of the beer/dressing mixture up the chicken’s cavity.  Feel momentarily embarrassed for the poor little guy.  Place it standing up in the baking tray  or iron skillet.  
6. Over your roasting pan, pour the dressing/beer mixture in the measuring cup through the chicken skin in as many places as possible.  It’s okay if a lot of the liquid ends up in the tray.  
7. Use the baking twine to force the poor little guy to stand up in the pan or skillet.  Cover loosely with aluminum foil.  I used four toothpicks (blunted on one end) around the top to hold the foil away from the bird.  I stuck them in at 45degree angles, and laid the foil over top, making sure that there was no place for the steam to escape.  Seal the foil tightly around the pan as well.  How tight you can make the seal with the foil is the key to this recipe.  
   
   
   
   
8. Bake until the internal temperature is about 150 degrees.  Remove from the oven.  Remove the foil, and increase the temperature to 450 degrees.  Place back in the oven and bake until the internal temperature is 165 degrees.  This should be enough to make the skin nice and crispy.  
9. Remove the poor little bugger from the oven, and remove the beer can.  Carve and enjoy. 
   
   
   
   

Unlike Beer Butt Chickens I've had in the past, this one was moist, and flavorful.  That hoppy aroma came through, and the herbs have it a pleasant flavor.  This is definitely an improvement on the concept.  It's not just for show.  

Enjoy!

--The Impatient Chef

The Impatient Chef Cocktail Recipe: The Bitter Old Man

So, The Impatient Chef ran out of his favorite cocktail gin on Thursday.  Friday evening rolled around, and the medicine cabinet still was a bit bare in the gin department.  Not only that, but the cocktail books did not reveal anything that looked appealing without a good gin.   Did that stop The Impatient Chef?  

Almost.

But, necessity is the mother of invention, and there was a liquor that I wanted to try, and I actually had it.

It’s called “Torani Amer”.  Not to be confused with the Torani syrups you may order in your latte, this is a tad astringent, and a little bitter.  I bought it a few years ago for a drink that I never got around to making.  Sans gin, I still couldn’t make it.  

What next? 

Invent a cocktail.

First the base spirit.  I was considering Old Tom Gin, or Laird’s Applejack. I smelled the various ingredients, and went with Applejack.  The drink would have three bitter parts: Torani Amer, Green Chartreuse, and Orange Bitters, and then the name struck me.  It would be called The Bitter Old Man.  Laird’s Applejack is a very old spirit, but Old Tom Gin would have worked with the name as well.  

Here Goes:

Ingredients:

• 2 oz Laird’s Applejack
• 1/2 oz Torani Amer
• 1/2 oz fresh orange juice
• 1 oz Lillet Blanc
• 1 bar spoon Parfait Amour
• 3 dashes orange bitters
• 3 dashes Green Chartreuse
• Lemon juice
• Lemon peel

Directions:

1. Even though this has orange juice in it, I decided to stir it instead of shake it.  So stir everything but the lemon juice and peel with ice, and strain into a chilled cocktail glass.  Cut a lemon in half, and squeeze it briefly over the cocktail, getting perhaps 10 drops.  Garnish with a twist of lemon.  
2. This cocktail is not for the faint of heart, not because it tastes strange, or weird.  It does taste similar to other cocktails I have had.  Where it is quite different, and where fans of dark chocolate, black coffee, and the negroni will perk up and listen, the aftertaste changes flavors at least three times, getting more bitter and astringent for about 10 seconds.  It isn’t overwhelming, but it’s a noticeable, and interesting sensation. 
3. Enjoy if you dare.  

The Impatient Chef Presents: Bacon-Wrapped Jalapeño Yukon Golds

The Impatient Chef is at best, like all cooks, a recipe thief.  In this case, the thievery was done from a place in The Dalles, Oregon, called Rivertap.  The Impatient Chef has reviewed Rivertap favorably here.  This recipe should not, in any way, prevent you from eating there if you are within striking distance, and to be perfectly honest, theirs are better.  I made them based on my approximation of how they do it.  There is some secret to Rivertap's supreme yumminess which The Impatient Chef is in no danger of revealing in this post.  This recipe will get you part way there, though.  

These babies never fail to please.   

Makes 16.  

Ingredients:

• 4 smallish, roundish yukon gold potatoes (the more spherical, the better)
• 8 jalapeño peppers, cut in half lengthwise, and with the membranes and seeds removed
• 8 strips of bacon, cut in half
• Cheddar cheese, shredded
• Ranch dressing.

Equipment:

• A deep frier, or large cast iron dutch oven.  
• Thermometer
• fat skimmer, or other utensil to remove spuds during initial fry.
• 16 toothpicks

Directions:

1. Start your frier or dutch oven with the oil of your choice (peanut oil is preferred).  Heat to 320 degrees F.
2. Cut the spuds in half, and then the halves into thirds.  Try to get them as even as possible, but there is a workaround if you don’t. 
3. Fry the spuds for 8 to 10 minutes, getting them out after 6 minutes if they float.  Some may float too early because they will develop air pockets around the edges.  Use your better judgement in removing them when they are actually done.  
4. Once they are fried, remove put them onto a plate, and place them into the refrigerator while you prepare the jalapeños and cut the bacon.  
5. Increase fry temperature to 375 degrees F.
6. Once the spuds are cool enough to handle, place them into the jalapeño halves, and wrap with the bacon.  Skewer them with toothpicks, being sure to secure the bacon ends to both the jalapeños and spuds. 
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
7. Once fry temperature is 375 degrees, fry the spuds until the bacon is crisp. 
8. When they are done, place them on a platter, sprinkle with the shredded cheddar, and serve with ranch dressing as a dipping sauce. 

Enjoy!  

--The Impatient Chef.