Wednesday, February 20, 2008

Super Secret Recipe Revealed!

Yes friends here it is:

Chicken-fried steak with mole colorado.

Here are facts you need to know:

  1. Chicken-fried steak (and Chicken-fried Chicken) is traditionally served with gravy. White flour (White Flour!) gravy. No me gusta el gringo gravy blanco.
  2. There are seven different styles/schools of Oaxacan mole : negro , red, yellow, colorado, green, almendrado, pipián. Mole is - in my ignorant opinion - Mexican curry. I don't mean that gross tumeric ridden powder you get in grocery stores I mean the real deal curry - a melange of flavours and spices. Personally I'm a SE-Asian curry kind of fan.
  3. One day while sitting at the Austin Diner - I'm not name dropping, we live next door and eat there all the freaking time - I wondered if a Chicken-fried Steak would be good with anything except white gravy. They did not have any mole made so I could not test my theory then and there. About a week later we went there for lunch and on the Specials menu was an Omlette with mole verde and Chicken-fried steak. I asked the waiter if the guys in the back could just put the mole verde on my Chicken-fried steak. They did. It was good but it wasn't right.
  4. If you want something done right you have to do it your damn self.
  5. Before you do it your damn self you have to learn how to do it. To the internet!
  6. I enlisted two real life Texans to help me make a trial batch of Chicken-fried steaks. This being Texas it really wasn't that difficult.
  7. The day of I began with a jar of mole - what? you ever make mole from scratch the first time out? - and started adding things to it. The flavour I was shooting for was smoky, mysterious, and dangerous. I think I did fairly well but I will tweak it a bit the next time.
  8. Making Chicken-fried steak is very, very easy but involves the need for counter space - you need room for flouring pans, etc, etc.
  9. Make more than you think you could possibly eat because you will eat all of it all the while thinking, "We have to eat it all...it won't keep!"
  10. If you have any doubts about the awesomeness of this Chicken-fried steak variation then come over and let me disspell them for you.

That's all for now. I must think of a way to tweak my mole...or something...

Wednesday, February 6, 2008

Super Secret new recipe in the works.

That's right folks. Super. Secret. New.

Okay it's a variation on a theme so it's not that new but the R&D is happening this weekend.

More news to follow.