Monday, June 6, 2011

Simple braised beef shank

The plentiful and cheap shank is sadly foreign to most dinner tables. It's a cut for braising, and little else. I'm very familiar with the shank. It's a collagen rich group of muscles responsible for supporting the animals weight and balance. It's comprised of long sinews and isolated muscles connecting the hoof to the anchors in the knee. Because of the constant work and blood flow, this meats develops lots of robust beefy flavor. In ANY kitchen that is practicing whole animal utilization you must find a use for these cuts. This meat isn't even good for grinding.

Ok, let's get to the meat of this article. The cut I'm working with is a cross-cut shank from Bastrop Cattle company. It's local to me and 100% grass-fed. I paid only $4 for this cut. I'm making a dinner for 2 two, and I wanted to prepare this as simply as I could. I bought veggies at the Barton Creek farmers market; red potatoes, red onion, green beans. Total of 8 dollars. Everything else was in the pantry. You can substitute anything you like. Water for stock or carrots for green beans. It's just a good idea to keep in mind your going to cook this for several hours. So pick roots or add more delicate ingredients later in the process. What ever you do just have fun with it. Be sure to have good methods in the kitchen. Mis En Plas is a french term that means "everything in it's place". Do all you prep before you start, and clean up before you start preparing your meal. This is a professional approach to working in the kitchen. 

There's always a little debate about the effects of searing meats. Regardless of any of that mess, I can tell you one thing searing does. It lets you build flavors. I've started off with some homemade rendered lard we make at Salt & Time. Once the lard is hot add 1 tablespoon or 3-4 if you like more garlic. Sauté the garlic over medium heat. Just till translucent, and then remove garlic from pan and reserve.

Salt the meat 5-10 minutes before cooking. Just before putting the beef in the stock pot turn the heat up 1/4. Then put the largest surface down first. This will help keep the meat from distorting under heat. Making it harder to keep contact for the searing of the other side. Shanks can have more or less meat on them depending one where it comes off the shank. So look at the cut you buy closely cause sometimes there's less meat and more bone. 

Sear at medium-high heat for 5 minutes. Then flip and repeat. Take note of the brown bits left behind. This is known as "fond" and it's all flavor. Leave it alone, it's going to turn loose before to long.
 Once your shank has got a good hard crust on both sides, remove from the pan.  Add the shank back to the pot. 

At this point I add back the garlic and 3 cups of diced onion. Add salt and fresh cracked pepper. Cook till onion begins to caramelizes. Add enough COLD water to the pot to cover 1/2 of the shank.  I'm adding some Worchershire sauce, 1/4 cup worth. Two points I'd like to make here.


If you not using pre-made stock here's two tricks to still have a rich braising liquid. Always use cold water preferably filtered and from the fridge. Cold water, instead of hot or tap, will slow down the cooking process and lets a richer flavor develop. Worchershire sauce is great with red meats and helps add more flavor, easily. Bring the liquid to temp, not quite boiling.
 I'm adding the potatoes and green beans and moving to a pre-heated oven (at 300 degrees). Put on a lid and cook for 2 hours. Go do something for a while. Your house should be smelling amazing at this point. I like to plan this to happen when your dinner quest is arriving. You get some nice responses and can chat a bit. Meanwhile make a simple roux for the sauce later. Start this about half way through the braise. In a small cast iron skillet on low heat, combine 1 table spoon of flour with 1 tablespoon of unsalted butter. A roux is simple to make and is something you should be comfortable with making. No lessons here just be sure to get the mixture free of lumps. Don't worry about color for this use. 


Two hours in check for doneness. Remove shank, potatoes, and green beans. Move pot to the stove, fire the burner to high. Add 1 cup dry red wine and reduce the liquid by half. I've added fresh parsley and fresh thyme. Add the roux you made and stir in slowly. Let this thicken for 2 minutes over heat the turn off burner. This will be your sauce so season to taste. 

If your lucky like me there was a small bit of marrow left in the bone. Slurping out the rich marrow is the best way to start this meal. The veggies are tender and full of flavor. The meat is also extremely tender almost gelatinous. Eating collagen rich food with give you health benefits too. Look it up. So a meal once a week of grass-fed beef is a good idea. A meal containing collagen rich grass-fed beef is a great idea. Hope you like this recipe. Shanks!

Friday, June 3, 2011

Round two--Nawlin's

So this was my second trip down to the Crescent city. The first time was three years after Katrina, and even though the city was getting back on its feet they still had a way to go. That said my girlfriend and I had a great time. Even after a disappointing trip to Emeril's restaurant Delmonico. This time is was just the boys. The Salt and Time crew. That just amounted to more drinking, not late nights per say. Just copious amounts of booze, hooch, liqueur, whatever we drank it.


 We also got around to some great food in Nawlins. We stopped in on our friend Morgan Weber at his market, Revival Market, in Houston. Had a great B.L.T & very excellent asian coleslaw. I couldn't get enough of the slaw. BLT was great. Made with house bacon that was perfection. Passing though Lake Charles I always have to stop at Steamboat bill's for the Boudin Balls. Not as great as i remember but still good. The surprise goodie was the pistolettes stuffed with etouffee--crazy good. Chased it down with 5 pounds of boiled mudbugs, and several beers.
The next day we got into Nawlins, and went right to Cafe du Monde for beignets and coffee. This was pretty much every morning. Went mixed it up between Cafe Beignets and cafe du monde. Last day i pass on the beignets for croissant breaky sandwich, wise choice. I will say one thing about breakfast in Nola. Really good coffee is hard to find. Im not against chicory, I like it. It just got old. We did seek out some better coffee options down Magazine st.
Lunch was easy both days. First stop was Cochon butcher shop. My 2nd trip. I love this shop. I went for there salami sandwich and was very pleased. Also the first of many La 31 Beere pale--excellent brew.

We got to meet Steve Stryjewski this year James Beard winning chef for the south. http://www.nola.com/dining/index.ssf/2011/05/cochon_chef_stephen_stryjewski.html
Very nice, jovial guy who treated us very well for us cold calling. We talked about dry curing a bit and about Cochon 555. We made reservations for Cochon dinning room for diner. Sadly i took no pictures, but i can tell you we ate a good section of the menu between 5 people. I was one of the best meals of my life. So many great items; fried alligator, meat pie, rabbit dumpling, smoke ham hock over beans and rice. All was fantastic. Do not miss this place if your in New Orleans.
Second day we headed for the classic Po'boy. Domilises was the objective, after having a hard time getting there it was closed. So we headed to Liuzza's by the track, not a bad back-up. Cause I got my Po'boy. Fried green tomato topped with sauteed shrimp, OMG. I also enjoyed a nice bowl of gumbo too. They also surprised me by serving beer in frosty fish bowl beer goblets. In Texas we call them Big O's, and we fill them with cheap light beer. Not sure if big o's are common in Louisiana, it was the one and only time I saw them. Liuzza's had a really great vibe and is a guaranteed return visit in the future. 



We had dinner at Felix's Oyster bar on bourbon st. It was ok. I had turtle soup and fried calimari. The chargrilled oysters were defiantly worth getting. Chargrilled oysters are severed all over in Nawlin's. We had them a Dragos the first time here and they were better than at Felix's. I'm sad to report Oysters Rockefeller have dodged me once again.

We had a light lunch (I had to judge food later) at a tapas bar we found out of the quarter down Magazine street. I went super easy with Pimenton crudo. Good flavor, simple. I was really jealous of the chargrilled burgers that made it to the other 2 place mats. Some sort of chorizo burger with amazing texture, almost like it wasn't ground. To quote the other guys, reaction. It was served with Yucca root fries. These I did try these and I'm defiantly going to make at home soon. Great texture and taste.

I'm saving my finale, food at Cochon 555, for another post. Cheers!

Been a minute

So i have found keeping a blog to be somewhat time consuming, but folks always wanna hear these stories. I doubt if i will ever time to keep this going consistently, then again i should just make time.

Well last week was the Cochon 555 in New Orleans. Getting to compete in butchery is a new thing for me. It was lot's of fun. I was also a judge for the chef portion of the event, the real reason why Cochon 555 exists. Well that and supporting heritage breeds of pig. Right up my alley.



We had 40 minutes to breakdown a half pig + 20 minutes for a head. They gave us a cut list and turned us lose. In most of the Cochon 555 the butcher's, two of them, competed head-to-head. For whatever reason we didn't do it this way in Nola. I was judging food when Glenn Mistich was cutting. I didn't even get to watch. It's my understanding he had some problems, and didn't even touch the head. That's unfortunate since Glenn is a very respectable shop owner and butcher, but these things happen. 
I on the other hand was primed and ready to be turned lose on a whole pig and show the crowd what "seam butchery" looks like. In just the few minutes I had the crowd oooing and ahhing. Seam butchery is visually more exciting, almost like Tai Chi at times. Flipping the ham over for the break, then the shoulder. You get a loud crack, and people really got interested. Most people get surprised how little i need a saw or even a clever. I was happy with my product. Damn the 40 minutes just flew by.


 Sorry these are blurry. I was moving too fast.



The cut list was pretty basic, no curve balls.

Then got 20 minutes with the head. I'll be truthful, I did some deliberate practice runs with this one. I knew it was "freestyle". So I had a plan to make it the same way we do in the shop for our porchetta de testa. The first time it took me 30 minutes i'd say. Once i learned all the curves around the skull it went much quicker. Last practice run i had it deboned in 8 minutes and tied in 2 more. Not sure how long it took in the contest, but it was fast. I held the freshly peeled face up for the crowd, and they cheer. Some guy yells out "put it on!". I said "No way. Im wearing enough pork already". 





To see more of Cochon 555 checkout the web page http://www.cochon555.com/menu/photos/




Wednesday, April 13, 2011

SxSW decompression


Finally back in gear after SxSW. As much fun as we had, it was a tiresome affair. Fighting with tow truck drivers and late night drunkards. Got to meet one of my favorite local punk rock bands, The Hex Dispensers. A friend Mark Maddy,  turned me on to this band years ago. Glad he did, I listen to them all the time. One thing I like is lots of music play while I work. Either to drown out the drone of the refrigeration fans or just to keep your sanity during the day. When I saw your own music, I don't mean the freaking radio or the bastard muzak. I mean your personal stuff. Which for some people is a hard task to spend, oh say... the better part of eight hours of the day playing your Ipod or whatever. If I didn't have a good music collection to start with I'd be on repeat a long time ago. I'm lucky though, I have had access to some great digital music collections over the years. I have complete discographies of artists to work though. Did you know Miles Davis has at least 51 albums? He does, can't say I've heard them all... yet. I proud to have every thing Jimi Hendrix put out. Also a complete collection of the Minutemen. All 4 hours of it. Lot's of good stuff, gleamed from great libraries from lot's of genres. It has kept me going.

 I managed to smash up my truck during the week. Stupid lane change dance drivers do. You know, when a entrance and exit ramps are close and you want to switch lanes but there Isn't enough room. And neither of you wanna give an inch. Yea got caught in that switcheroo. Turned my head to quickly check my blind spot, and duder pumped his brakes. Crunch. It was slow speeds, so didn't do too much damage. All cosmetic for the most part, but damn it still pissed me off. The other driver was in a f3500 ford truck with a HUGE chromed drop bump. Not a scratch on it.


 In the shop we've pretty much just been making sausages for a couple of weeks. To get though all the SxSW crowds. It's all over now and Salt and time is back to regular production. Which right now is a half pig a week +2 heads. With just two people its hard to do much more. Trying to fill out inventory with dry-cured salami and cured whole muscles. Did bring in a nice Red Wattle breed pig in from Revival Farms in Yolkum Texas. We made a Proscuttio from the ham. Another ham from the shoulder (more common in Spain) and Coppa from the neck roll. I've gotten pretty good at the removal of the neck cut thanks to the Wiesner's seam butchery class.




 We still find time to try experiments, which last week, was monumental. We made a Porchetta de testa. We have been considering making a headcheese, but find that it's pretty common. Everyone does at least one type, if not several. Although, if we had a ready supply of fresh blood we'd be making Redhead cheese. Alas, it's pretty hard to come by on a regular basis. The head turned out very tasty. I was a bit more concerned about the technical aspect of the stuff and rolling, than i was with the flavor profile. I know we will be making this again. It will probably replace any headcheese we can think of cause it's different but still a headcheese.








The heads we bought are not solely for making headcheese. It's been for practice. Just before SxSW I got accepted to compete in Cochon 555. If you've not heard about  Cochon555.com , look it up. Created by Brady Lowe it a touring meat carnival that puts 5 chefs against each other to complete over 5 pigs different heritage breed pigs. This alone is amazing. This year however they have butchery competition. It's head-to-head competition, butcher vs. butcher. It's judged but speed is part of it. Going to have to practice to get faster, only get 40 minutes. YIKES. I'm hoping I can use the seam butchery techniques, cause i know I'll be the only guy doing it that way. It's going to be a good way to get "out there" publicly. 

Who the hell buys carcasses anymore?

 I'm a butcher,  a proud butcher. I recognized years ago my profession was going the way of so many other old world crafts--extinction. I knew years ago the old butchers I had been lucky enough to work and apprentice for, wouldn't be around much longer.  Two things I'd never had guessed sixteen years ago...
 1) I'd still be cutting meat 16 years later.
 2) I'd be having the time of my life doing it.

So what the heck has made it so fun? Cutting meat doesn't sound fun to the layman. Honesty, its very hard work. It's physically demanding work; lifting, repetitive motion, falling objects and temperature extremes. Not to mention the fact your working with tools designed to cut flesh. One of the first thing butchers do when meeting each other the first time is hold their hands up. It's a light-hearted inside joke... till a guy holds up a hand with 8 1/2 fingers. Then you cringe at some horrific story about a power saw taking off their fingers or their hand got into a tenderizer. I'm lucky. I've have only needed a few stitches to fix any cuts I've had. But over the years, I've practically ruined my elbow. It's also mentally taxing and stressful. "Burn-out" is very common in my industry. I have walked away from a couple of really great jobs, just cause I couldn't do it anymore. I have flirted, over the years, with hanging up my knives for something else. Fortunately, chance experiences have touched my soul and kept me focused and passionate about butchery.

Out of school, I spent two years working at a Mom & Pop full service meat market. It's where I got my experience, except for school, where I worked exclusively with swinging beef. I was literally the only employee. One thing I remember about that place was how people just came in to buy but stayed to watch. One old man, Mr. Jones, a retired math teacher bought 4 pounds spare ribs every friday. He knew what time we prepared the spareribs for the case. He came at that time so he got the best pick. He also loved to watch me swing the cleaver as I cracked the ribs into. I just remember that big ole toothless grin. Come to think of it, must have been good meat or him a good cook, cause he as hell wasn't chewing it.

 The second job I took as a meat cutter was at a Wal-mart supercenter in Bellmead texas. It was a very busy meat market. I cut bone-in and boneless cuts with a tablesaw. I cut 200+ pounds of beef sirloins steaks a day. Half a dozen cases of bone-in pork loins, twice that in boneless loins during peak grilling seasons. This was for many reasons one of the worst jobs I have had. By the end of my time there I hated cutting meat. It was weighting on my conscience. Meat didn't look like what I was use too. All bagged primals and not carcasses. One day as I was running the tablesaw thru a top butt and I hit a "shot-pocket". If you have never heard of a shot pocket, it's a pocket of un-absorbed antibiotics or some kind of unnecessary medicine giving to animals. In this case, beef which is more common because of the scale of cattle operations and liberal use of antibiotics. They just give stuff to all of them as a preventative measure. However, in a healthy animal the medicine is invasive and actually causes infection. A nasty, stinky, puss-filled infection. This makes for quite a mess why you run a 4000 r.p.m. saw blade through it. One word, Nasty.

I have to say after some contemplation, and a fair amount of questions, my thoughts on my job changed. I began having a lot of guilt about what i did to earn a living. I'm a country boy. Ive grown up around farms and farm animals. I know how they should be properly treated. I knew these were animals were not properly treated animals. Signs of stress and over medications in the animals meat were too common. I didn't think i was a part of the right facet of the meat industry. Dark days.

I quit and moved to austin. I wasn't sure what to do at this point.  I was in my early twenties and still had lot's of wanderlust in me. I didn't really think of my trade as a career, it just payed the bills. I had returned to school one week, while visiting my folks, to look at the job listing board. There was a job in my neighborhood. What LUCK. I found myself employed at a small local neighborhood grocery in the old neighborhood of Clarksville. Nothing special, mediocre-over priced foodstuffs. I did have two GREAT mentors there; Arnie Flores and Bruce Lamb Contributors to my techniques and over all approach to being a "friendly-neighborhood butcher".

 I spent 6 years working off and on with the chain at two locations. Still something bothered me . I was still working with commodity boxed meat. I could walk around the back of the store and I see the signs of another era. The above rail system was in place for hanging meat. Id seen them before, and worked on them. I knew i'd never see these rails in this store in use again, ever. The butchers I worked with seemed... deflated. Like they could only reminisce about a time long gone by. They were still were incredibly skilled in the art of displaying food, crafting sausages, and cutting techniques. Now they had to setting for skinning chicken breast for ungrateful snooty customers.

Fed up over something, dissatisfaction probably, I walked. I had heard though the grapevine and there was a opening for the local granola Coop. I was unemployed for all of 15 minutes. From the time I left till I put in a application for the position I ultimately got. I found myself working for the famous Wheatsville food Coop. I finally began working with meat that had values backing it. Hell, I was giving the task to find the "best". This could have been a better deal for me. Though I hid my internal conundrum at job in the past. Now I was pleased to put my issues of animal rights and welfare to rest. I had basically enrolled in a crash course in all things sustainable and ethically treated. I was now allowed to asked the question, where does this meat come from? I began working with purpose and i felt like i was having a positive influence in my community. I had opportunities write about "good meat" in the newsletter. I was getting to touring farms and ranches, and got to meet some great people. Like tour Paul Willis's farm in Thornton Iowa.


While There I was attending a Niman ranch appreciation dinner put on annually for the farmers. I got to meet a personal hero of mine, Dr Temple Grandin.

 I was inspired to represent meat and butchery in the best light possible. Some people called me passionate. I don't know about that, but i did believe in what i was doing. This made my days much brighter. I thank Wheatsville for those opportunities.




The second eye opening event in my career happen quickly and much impact. During a 2 day seam-butchery class put on by Christoph Wiesner a master butcher from Austria and his wife.


  It was a informative class, you gotta love it when you learn new thing 15 years later in your job. But it wasn't necessarily that. I had the opportunity to hangout with that austrian couple. We drank a arm full of cheap czech style beers.  We talked about the importance of proper husbandry, and how it play a roll in our job as the butcher. Christoph and his wife Isabella described their farm back in austria. We talked about the problems of the US meat food supply, not safety but quality. Then i asked about his take mastery of the craft of butchery. I actually had a the same number of years on the knife. As he talked about his time as a apprentice and the journeyman years and on, i realized this all sounded rather similar. He explained that in the butchers guild in the UK a master butcher is the one who teaches. Although i would only reluctantly call myself a master butcher. I had already apprenticed several people myself. Some i just helped with there technique, others i took as a focused dishwashers and made a damn fine butcher. For the record i have nothing but respect for dishwashers, its a respectable job.

Suddenly it was full circle. Not only had I escaped the dark underbelly of the industry. That had all but turned me away from butchery. Now i have a mission.... I will be that Master butcher. So i'm going old school. Everything short of traveling to europe to work (for right now). I'm embracing all of the oldness disciplines of butchery. I've found myself neck deep in the netherworld of salume. The Italian craft of curing, fermenting and aging meat. Not to be confused with charcuterie, the french cousin to salume.

So, who buys those carcasses? Well I do. I take one animal and make many things with it. It's a much slower pace i keep now, more methodical. I use knives and a cleaver, sometime a hand saw. I have minimal waste. I use the whole animal.