Alton Brown cooking demo at Opryland

There is so much stuff to report on from the past weekend, I don't know where to begin. All of the events attended with Alton Brown were wonderful. The demo this year topped the ones from previous years, which were beyond incredible. The dinner, well, that was the highlight of the weekend in my book. And my two embarrassing moments, one at dinner and the other at the demo, with AB. Those are next on my list to share, but I'll begin with the demo, after all that's why most of us were there!

The show started with Alton bolting from behind the curtain and to the stage. In fact, he brushed past my seat, giving me a startle in the process. Then he promptly went into discussing his amazing weight loss.

Since March, Alton dropped 45 pounds, he's down to 165 pounds and a size 32 pant from 215 pounds and size 38. He attributes the dramatic loss to a major change in his diet, mainly eliminating most carbs and increasing fats in the form of omega 3 fatty acids.

The omega 3 fatty acids segued into the afternoon's talk on fish. And of course, Alton champions sustainable seafood so he talked about small fish. These smaller, oily fish are the cornerstone of Alton's new diet and he believes are import to the overall health of not only people but our oceans as well.

Alton talked about several types of small fish including anchovies and herring. Be his most favorite fish is sardines. And eats them five times a week. He likes fresh ones but eats the canned ones as well.

However, the featured star was rainbow trout. Again, a sustainable choice for us. AB said all of the trout supplied for the demo came from farms in North Carolina. And inland fisheries are better because they are less harmful to the environment, such as fish escaping and mixing with the native species.

The main reason Americans have not embraced these small fish, Alton believes, is that we tend to like our meat in steak form or butchered leaving no head. At this point, AB drew a fish on the whiteboard (and as you can tell from my crappy angle, I couldn't see the whiteboard) then colored in the eyes looking back.

The fish eyes and heads be came a running joke through the demo about the eyes. My angle on AB demonstrating the dead fish looking back at us with the beady eyes wasn't that great, but my buddy Elizabeth caught a better photo of Alton playing dead fish :) Thanks for sharing that with everyone!


He showed how easy it is to fillet a small fish and prep it for cooking. He even ripped the head off of one trout with his bare hand.

When the time came for cooking, he illustrated three methods.

First, smoking.

Alton used an Army surplus item to rig up a smoker. This device replaced the cardboard box from the early "Where there's smoke, there's fish" episode on Good Eats. AB said the more permanent box came from an incident with his old cardboard box, which he had for three years. The box was eaten by neighborhood dogs.

After that, he opted for this model. You may remember this type of smoking setup as featured on a Food Network South Beach special several years ago.

Alton had through lessons on brining and smoking. First, he brines the fish for several hours in a simple brine of 1 quart of water and 1/2 cup of kosher salt. This brine is not heated since it is a small amount. After the fish is brined, rinse it and allow to dry for 24 hours. If you remember from the smoked salmon and the bacon episodes, this step is vital for forming pellicle on the meat so the smoke can stick to it.

The smoker should maintain a temperature between 150-160 degrees for 2 1/2 to 3 hours.

Next on the agenda was rollmops. This is German snack traditionally made from herring rolled around pickles or onions then pickled. For his version, AB used rainbow trout.

Last Alton made escabeche of trout. This is a Spanish or Portuguese dish where the meat is cooked then marinated.

The whole rainbow trout is used in this dish. On stage this smelled very good!

The recipes for these dishes are here.