The lobster's mini me

Starting off with a "what if" version of the future where lobsters are wiped out, Alton Brown introduced viewers to the best reason to replace our desire for them with crawfish. And why? Because the smaller kin of the lobster are plentiful and sustainable.

It was wonderful to see AB address the sustainability in food on Good Eats, especially after seeing him at the Smithsonian's Sustainable Seafood event last month. He is offering this important information to viewers and helping us to understand how this can be obtain in our food chain.

Okay, off the soapbox. ;)

The episode included one of the best elements of what makes me love Good Eats so much, the information! AB spent the first part of the episode explaining about crawfish (or crawdads as I've always called them). I had to laugh when Alton said he spent his youth stalking them in chilly Georgia streams because, as a kid, I remember catching crawdads in the creeks near my friend's house. Yeah, I was a weird little girl.

Nice to see AB showing off his airplane and his piloting abilities, too.

I doubt this crawfish boil would be anything I'd ever make, but was great to see how to actually do it and to prep the little bugs for dinner. And the lesson on eating them was so funny. But now I have to know what's in the head that AB wouldn't tell us.

This episode does make want to try crawfish because I love lobster. But I have no idea where to buy these critters locally, either alive or cooked. Looks like a research mission.

The one thing from the episode that really caught my attention was the crawfish roll. I've been wanting to make lobster rolls for awhile and this just reminded I want to make it! If I can find some precooked crawfish I'll try AB's recipe.

If you are looking for the crawfish roll recipe, its not on FN's site right now but I transcribed it from the episode and have it here.

Overall, I very informative episode. Although, I would have liked another recipe or two since the large boil is something I probably wouldn't make. Get the boil recipe here. The crawfish going on a rampage also made me laugh, so the episode was very entertaining. 4 1/2 crawfish for a great episode.

Crawfish roll recipe from new episode

Watching the latest offering, crawfish, from Alton Brown, I noted the lobster or crawfish roll recipe is currently missing from Food Network's site.


So here's the recipe until they get it posted.

Two crawfish rolls

8 oz of cooked crawfish tailmeat
3 tablespoons of mayonnaise
2 teaspoons of freshly squeezed lemon juice
Pinch of cayenne pepper
Pinch of kosher salt
1/2 grind of black pepper

Whisk to combine. Should look like a salad dressing.
Fold in the tailmeat.

Augmentation possibilities:
Cut cilantro
Finely diced celery
Finely sliced green onion
Dice ripe avocado

Use New England style hotdog buns, toasted.

Alton Brown's pound cake

Have I mentioned that my favorite Alton Brown cookbook is I'm Just Here for More Food? Well in case I haven't, it is! My copy is filled with makeshift bookmarks, post-it notes and tabs because there are so many great recipes in the book. The very first recipe I made from More Food, was the pound cake.

Now, pound cake may just be my favorite type of cake (but after making the fudge cake from More Food, that may be my favorite cake!) so I had to try this recipe first. My first one was awesome. A nice dense yet moist cake. Buttery too. Yeah this cake was a keeper. When I first made it my Mom told me it would be very good with strawberries. Nice hint.

Well, I never made it for strawberries. Just for plain ol' eating.

My friend J asked me last week if I make pound cakes. She was looking for a new recipe to make for her husband's birthday. I immediately told her about AB's. I gave her a copy of it and while she was telling me it was much simpler that her typical pound cake recipe, I got the urge to make one too.

And by happenstance, I saw strawberries at the megamart earlier in the week. Perfect.

The pound cake is a wonderfully simple recipe. Butter, flour, leavening, eggs, buttermilk and vanilla extract. Not much, but oh so yummy.


Yeah, I just love I'm Just Here for More Food!

Alton Brown on the tube!

Remember to catch Alton Brown in a new Iron Chef America on Sunday night at 9p.m. EST.
And most importantly, a new Good Eats on Monday a 8 p.m.!

The recipes, or I should say recipe, is up on Food Network for the episode. One thing, a crawfish boil. Looks like AB might do a little discussion on sustainability in this episode too. The description mentions crawfish as being sustainable.

May Atlanta magazine's Ask Alton

I received my May copy of Atlanta magazine yesterday and quickly turned to the table of contents for Alton Brown's column. To my horror, there was no Ask Alton column this month! I'll check online to see if they post it there. Oh bother!

And the ironic thing, this issue was the "food" issue. ;)

Alton Brown interview with me, please?

One of the big plans I've had for this blog is to land an interview with Alton Brown. Since finding out about his new show plus his upcoming cookbook, has made me want to interview AB even more because there is a huge need for information about these new projects.

I'd love to sit down with him (or over the phone), fire away some well thought out questions from cooking to TV production and get those little tidbits of information to pass along to everyone here. When I met Alton back in March, I pitched some ideas to him about ways we could partner to help make this blog the best place on the Internet for his fans.

I'm still waiting to hear back from him about those ideas.

He promised to look over the items I gave him about my plans and ideas. I have such high hopes that he will be interested and afford me an opportunity to make this site the very best fan site on the Internet. But I realize AB is a very, very busy man and working on his projects, of course, takes priority over sitting down with some like me, who is just a fan.

I still have hope, sometime soon, he will agree to an interview. He has my contact info after all. ;)

In a perfect world

With the recent talk about Alton Brown's new cookbook, it has been posed to me, by several people, what's in the darn thing? Well... I can't tell you. I'd love to tell you. To have the inside scoop, nuggets of goodies to dole out or even a sneak peak inside. To let everyone to know all about the book.

Alas, I've got nothing.

Zip.

Zilch.

Zero.

Yeah, nada.

There's just not much out about AB's book yet. The publisher's site has blurb and the cover art but outside of that nothing else.

And I have even less. Despite having the fan website and blog, in reality I'm just an average fan--well maybe not average.

I am, however, constantly scouring for information and when I find it rest assured it will be on here! I'll do my very best to get the information out about the book.

The only thing I know about the cookbook is Alton did say a lot of the recipes have been reworked. He talked about that briefly in Nashville back in August. Not sure what that means for the recipes versus the ones on Food Network's site.

Maybe I should contact Stewart, Tabori & Chang and ask to be put on the press junket for the new book.

Veggie Spread from Alton Brown

I've pulled out a recipe on the list of ones to try. Since seeing AB make the roasted vegetable spread in the "Sandwich-craft" episode it has been on that growing list ;)

I'm not certain why it struck me to finally make this (the episode originally aired in 2004), but I am sure happy I did give it a try. First, the was a snap to make. Second, the taste was amazing.

Start with one red bell pepper (I used an orange one because it was in the fridge) cut into rings, one small zucchini sliced up and one medium onion cut into rings. Add four cloves of crushed garlic to the veggies and coat with olive oil.

Roast the veggies in a 400 degree oven for about 45 minutes, until they are soft and a little brown on the edges. I love charred onions, so I let mine get a little darker than just little brown.

After allowing the veggies to cool, place in a food processor with an 8oz block of cream cheese and process until almost smooth.

I served mine with blue tortilla chips. Mmm.


AB's roasted vegetable spread recipe from the Food Network.

Under the Table

While the book Under the Table by Katherine Darling has not one thing related to Alton Brown, I am placing this post on here because if I did not have this blog the opportunity would not have presented itself. And before I go any further, I would like to thank Esther at Atria Books for extending the offer for the advance copy of the book. I still can't believe she gave me this chance!

For me to really enjoy a story I have to identify, or at the very least like, the main character. In many books I'm put off by whiny heroines, heroes with too many flaws and the like. But in this book I found myself, immediately, drawn to Katherine. She was me, apart from being a petite blonde with a wonderful fiancee and living in NYC that is. But what grabbed me, from the opening page, was the driving force to start the journey toward becoming a trained chef. Or Chef with a big C as she liked to say. Katherine had a wonderful spirit and determination from the beginning and all throughout the trials of culinary school.

What caught me at first, was Katherine describing her work life in a fishbowl cubicle with mountains of manuscripts to plow through but instead of working she thought about cooking. Replace a few descriptors, and that's me. Stuck in a soul deadening job thinking about the joys cooking gives me while going through the trained monkey steps of my job. She also had a deep admiration for Jacques Pepin. Chef Pepin is to Kathrine like AB is to me.

Yeah, I was going to love this gal.

Making the decision to follow her passion for cooking, a passion cultivated since childhood from her mother and grandmother, Katherine left her job in publishing to attend The French Culinary Institute. Right away she was thrown into a hellish, boot camp-like program that tested in both culinary skills and mental and physical stamina. What I loved about the story was through the long hours of school and the tongue lashings from the chef-instructors, Katherine never gave up. She could have easily stopped and returned to her former life but she continued onward toward that grande diplome. Katherine had a beautiful spirit.

Besides a wonderfully told story, filled with wacky students and mad French Chefs, the other fabulous part of the book was how Katherine explained culinary techniques and ingredients. Of course as a devotee of Good Eats and AB's superb teaching ability, reading these passages quickly became some of the greatest parts of the book. The lessons were straight-forward and easy to understand. In reading this book, I learned about making fish stock!

Peppered through the book, typically at the end of a chapter, where several recipes. There are a couple I have my eye on, flourless chocolate cake, cheddar biscuits and apple-bottom gingerbread.

Call yourself a foodie or, like me, you just have an unnatural interest in all things culinary, Under the Table is a great read. After finishing the book, I was pleased to know more about the actual experience of going through culinary school. Since my early teen years I have dreamed of attending culinary school. While I'd love to have the culinary knowledge that education would bring, I've told myself (and others who asked me why I haven't gone culinary school) with no burning desire to become a chef in a top-notch restaurant it wouldn't be the best thing for me. This book cemented that notion. I'm extremely happy and grateful to receive my culinary teachings from Alton. He's much nicer than those French Chefs too. Although, I'd love to earn one of those tall toques.

The last thing I took away from reading this book, was taking chances and perusing dreams. At that start and until the end, Katherine didn't have a clue about a career after culinary school, but she continued to strive and reach the dream of being a trained chef. She didn't give up or give in. I loved that about her. I found her a big inspiration for my own pursuits. Upon reading the first page of the book and seeing the reasoning behind leaving her career, I wondered about my own current job situation and if this book was since to me for a reason. Who knows? But I am seeing the same spirit and determination in my own attempts. I can only hope and pray this spirit can bless me in the same way.

Ok, back to the book... an awesome tale filled with colorful characters, a spirited leading lady and plenty of culinary insights, Under the Table deserves a 5 whisk review!

Yes, there are bookstores in WV

I'm still pretty giddy about Alton Brown's new cookbook and more importantly, excited that he will be doing a book tour along with it. I am, however, unhappy about the fact AB will not be paying my home state a visit. In case you missed it, during my last meeting with him in DC, AB claimed the reason he would not be visiting is because, "there are no bookstores in West Virginia." After I poked him on the shoulder for the comment, he quickly placed the blame where it should be--his publisher.

Now, I'm not certain if AB's new book will be published by the same company as his others, but if so, I need a word with them!

Stewart, Tabori and Chang, an imprint of Harry N. Abrams, Inc, has published all of AB's cookbooks thus far and in all of his book tours he has yet to pay the Mountain State one visit. I think Alton may have it right. Those big NYC publishers don't think there are bookstores here, I guess. ;)

I would like to assure AB's publisher that there are in deed bookstores in WV and that Alton has many, many fans who would love to come out, buy his book and meet him. And unlike the disastrous Sandra Lee event scheduled for Charleston back in October, which was canceled because a grand total of 14 tickets were sold, any AB event held in WV will have my personal guarantee that he can out sale dear Aunt Sandy. Heck, I'd buy at least 15 tickets alone.

For the publisher's convenience, I can tell them a few places to hold the event as well.

Taylor Books, Charleston
Empire Books, Huntington
Trans Allegheny Books, Parkersburg
Borders, Huntington Mall
Borders Express, Charleston Town Center
Books A Million, Charleston (where I purchased one of my copies of Feasting on Asphalt.)
Barnes and Noble, Morgantown

Oh, and the Kanawha County Public Library has a nice book festival in October. Then there's the Clay Center for the Arts and Sciences in Charleston. AB would fit in at the science center quite well.

So, there's no excuse for not putting one of those locations on the new book tour... unless AB is avoiding WV because of me ;)

Oh the horror!

To say I dislike the Next Food Network Star competition is an understatement, but every season I somehow end up watching it the craptacular thing. Why? Because Food Network has to drag Alton Brown into the mess. No, into the train wreak. Looks like he's set to be on there again this season. According to this article from the Orlando Sentinel, AB will join the merry band of other FN hosts to locate the next big thing. Oy!

I can only hope this season gives us a better crop than last year. When I can answer the culinary questions posed to these potential Food Network stars and they can't I seriously question what is happening. Come on last year's "winner" didn't know what a chipotle chile was... and this guy has a cooking show now? Sheesh!

And more importantly, I can only hope AB will not be on the first episode. That happened last year and I got sucked into the stupid show.

Back to tales from the kitchen

It has been over two weeks since seeing Alton Brown in person at the Smithsonian and finally telling him about my little blog and fan website for him. And as much as I hope AB likes what I'm doing here, I need to stop fantasizing that he gives a flying rat's behind about either of them and get back to more important things... like talking about trying recipes and food!

Last week I tried AB's pantry friendly tomato sauce for the first time. I was making Eggplant Parmesan and needed a tomato sauce. Now, as much as this pains me to say, I typically turn to a jarred pasta sauce for spaghetti. Not that I haven't made my own sauce for spaghetti and pizza, its just the jar is so much more convenient. And sometimes I need that. But it takes me at least an hour to make my spaghetti, even from a jarred sauce, so its more about having it on hand than time saving.

But this time, I didn't want jarred sauce or even my canned tomato sauce concoction. No, I wanted real honest to goodness tomato sauce. Of course, I looked to AB for guidance on the subject. The sauce from Pantry Raid II has long been on that list of recipes to attempt. Since I was looking for a sauce, why not try it?

While the eggplant parm turned out mighty fine, the true discovery was the tomato sauce. It may have been some of the best I've ever tasted. I quickly began contemplating other ways to highlight this wonderful new find.

It came to me a few days later... spaghetti and meatballs. I rarely make such a thing, but something told me this was the perfect application for this sauce. To the horror of Italian chefs everywhere, I can just hear Giada De Laurentiis over enunciating some Italian swear word in my direction or Mario Batali cringing in his orange Crocs at the mere mention of the dish, but I like it and wanted to make it! I don't care. Even dear AB has bad-mouthed cooking meatballs in red sauce but they're my meatballs and I'm cooking them this way.

Anyway, back to the tomato sauce. In actuality the recipe is simple. A basic mirepoix with garlic is sweated until the veggies are soft. Then seeded can tomatoes added, two 28 ounce cans. The liquid from the tomatoes is placed into a sauce pan along with herbs, sherry vinegar and sugar and reduced to half. The veggies are broiled for 15-20 until caramelized a bit. After that, 1/2 cup of white wine is added to the roasting pan and cooked for 2-3 minutes. Add the reduced liquid and buzz up with a stick blender. I decided upon ultra smooth for my sauce.

With sauce in hand, well in bowl, I delved into making meatballs. They would not be from AB or any TV chef or cookbook for that matter, no these beauties are from the my brain. Scary as that seems, they are pretty good. And simple too. I did decide to use AB's baking technique for them. I placed 24 balls o' meat into mini muffin tins and baked away. I loved how they came out and will be using that method again. Plus, I bought mini muffin tins some time ago to try cooking them this way so I have to keep doing it that way.

After the meatballs cooked, they went into the now warmed tomato sauce. Next came a bed of spaghetti with the sauce and meatballs. Topped with fresh mozzarella cheese, the plates baked for a few minutes to make the cheese melty and gooey. Mmm.

Who Framed Alton Brown? ;)

I did! Muhahaha. Yeah, I finally got around to putting my goodies Alton Brown signed for me at the Smithsonian event into nice little displays. The Southwest Airline magazine got a faux cherry wood frame with a white mat.


You can see my little Food Network keychain AB signed for me back in August at the Opryland event. It is still probably my favorite Alton item.

Next was finding something for the bench scraper. Since it was thicker than a normal item, a regular picture frame was out. I found a nice shadow box for it.


I'm a dork and added the pen he used to sign it and one of the tickets from the event. It wasn't the ticket from the time he signed it, they took those at the food sampling. It is the ticket from the next day. Oh well, same weekend, same main event.

And by the way AB, the bench scraper is still NOT on eBay! I will be hanging it next the the apron from Opryland 2007.

Oh, the infamous photo has not been framed. It still makes me giggle too much.

Ask Alton -- April issue

For this month's Atlanta magazine's column, Alton Brown tackles a cheesy question. A reader inquired about the wonders of "American cheese."

AB explains what exactly it mean to be American cheese. And my favorite was his take on those cheese "singles."

As for the yellowish square sheets cut and wrapped in individual plastic sleeves hanging on the rack in the dairy department? I’m not even sure they’re “food.”

That cracked me up because I call it plastic cheese. ;)

Read AB's cheesy thoughts here.

Surreal moment with Alton Brown

The grande finale for the my experience with Alton Brown in Washington,DC brings me to the most odd moment of the whole thing. I'm talking strange, bizarre just plain surreal. Actually, now that I think about it most of my encounters with AB have been different, yeah let's go with different.

It started off normally. I brought a photograph for Alton to sign this time. It was a picture many people have told me was a nice photo of him. It came from last year's book signing in Marietta. At the meet and greet, I snapped a nice little candid picture of AB. It was pretty good if I do say so myself, nice natural lighting, good solid background and Alton with a hint of a smile. My co-worker D saw it after I got back and told me I had to show it to him the next time I saw him because it was so nice. She told me him might like to use it for something.

I figured I would show AB. And thought he would be great and put a nice inscription on it. Yeah, it was going to be suitable for framing and a great conversation piece.

So on the night of the book signing, I brought an 8x10 print of the picture. I was excited to present the photo to him for signing. I pulled the photo from the folder and began to explain to Alton about it, how people tell me its a nice photo and that I'd like for him to sign it.

He looked at it and the first thing from his mouth -- okay brace for this -- "I look constipated!" I was dumbfounded. I know my face turned red from embarrassment. Nothing came out of my mouth, I looked down at the table.

As he continued to claim the look on his face in the photo spoke to his condition, I began to laugh. Laugh very hard. Then I finally looked up at him as he was in the process of writing something on my photo. While writing on it AB proclaimed aloud, "I am not constipated."

Seriously, he did this. Look.


Oh I wanted a conversation piece.

Think I got it?

I was still in shock a bit afterward. Then AB reached over to me and pulled the cutting board I was holding from my hand and asked if I wanted it signed. I squeaked something out, still in part shock and part laughing my butt off.

So now I have this experience to add to the other bizarre AB meetings. Forgetting my name and AB telling me I need therapy. AB backing away from me and telling me I brought my guns and ammo to the book signing. AB telling my I was poisoning him with Fiestaware.

Yeah, each time has been quite the experience. Not once a normal encounter. And I, of course, relish having these surreal meetings with him. :D

Maybe next time I should bring him another gift.

Someone got Alton Brown's goat

I promise this is a real post, not an April Fool's Day joke. Alton Brown will be featured on Heifer International's Pass on the Gift month. On April 4th check their website: www.heifer.org/passonthegift for something from Alton.

AB will be discussing the organization's years of assisting people around the world to raise animals to better themselves.
I don't know if this what will be on the site, but here's a video where AB is talking about the organization. I hope everyone can see this embedded video, its having issues on different browsers :(




Oh, if you're still doubting because it is April Fool's Day, here a screen capture of the email ;)



So there! ;)

More FOA on the way?

Great news for Feasting on Asphalt fans, I have an exclusive scoop. Alton Brown will be reprising the motorcycle journey this summer to cover another vital piece of American road food.

For the newest installment, AB will be traveling solely on the Interstate system and will be eating only at national chain restaurants. He will seeking if a Big Mac is universally the same throughout the country as the golden arches are the corporate sponsor for the trip.

Its exciting to know AB will be heading out on another Feasting trip, I love the series.

Guess what I think about the new show?

Who cares. It isn't real!!!

April Fools!

Muhahahahahaha!