Showing posts with label cooking. Show all posts
Showing posts with label cooking. Show all posts
Thursday, April 16, 2015
Behind the Scenes of a Television Cooking Segment The Weekend Gourmet Cooks on Great Day SA!
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| Its 15 minutes until the show goes live, so Im busily putting the finishing touches on my prep work in the KENS 5 kitchen set. |
Most of yall dont know this, but I have a background in broadcasting. During college, my undergrad degree was in Radio, Television, and Film. Ive worked for a variety of radio stations...and I dabbled in a bit of TV back in the day as well. I also love public speaking, so its a dream come true to appear on a professional television broadcast!! This time, they asked me to focus on a light and healthy summer meal...so I shared my yummy Pollo Confetti Chef Salad. I thought it might be fun to share some behind-the-scenes pictures that Michael snapped, along with some information about everything that goes into preparing for a 4-to-5-minute television cooking segment.
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| Five minutes before the show starts, the ingredients are laid out...the decor is set up, and a finished salad is on display. |
The alarm goes off at 600...I need time to do full hair and makeup and load up the car before we leave at 730. The show airs live at 900 each morning, and guests are asked to arrive at 800 to set up. Let me tell you, the time goes by QUICKLY!! There are tons of lights, cameras, and monitors on the set...and lots of production staff running around getting ready for the show. As I prep my ingredients and decorate the kitchen set, the producer tells me that Ill be up after the opening segment and first commercial break. Host Paul Mireles stops by to discuss what questions hell ask...and I let him know that Im going to have him help me assemble the salad as we chat.
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| The view of the Great Day SA set from the audience point of view. Notice multiple cameras, monitors, and crew. Ralph, the producer, is in the Spurs Ginobili jersey. His job is to keep this controlled chaos organized! |
The audience is seated about 15 minutes before the show starts. Im mostly set up by then, so its time to go into the production booth to verify the spelling of my name and the blogs url for the pop-ups that will be inserted during my segment. Then, its off to the dressing room to powder my nose, fluff and spray my hair, and put on my apron. Not only does the camera add 15 lbs. (NOT fun, by the way...), but the bright studio lights can really make you look washed out -- especially when youre as fair as I am! That means I have to wear a lot more makeup than usual, and more vibrant colors. Then? Its showtime!! During the opening segment, I make sure that everything is in place...and I just try to relax and have fun. Michael waves at me from the audience and gives me a thumbs up...hes my biggest fan!
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| This is a teleprompter. It is mounted to the top front of the camera, and the text crawls up as the host reads the words. |
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| In the KENS 5 kitchen with host Paul Mireles. There are three cameras and a monitor over my shoulder the entire time! Its really not as scary as it looks. I just try to think of it as hanging out in the kitchen and talking about food...and all the cameras just happen to be there! |
When the show is over, I thank the production crew for their work...chat a bit with the hosts and producer, and leave one of the finished salads for them to enjoy! Michael and I pack up my stuff, load it in the car, and get back to our normal life. Its time to head to my day job for the rest of the day...and I take the other completed salad to the office to share with my co-workers. People ask me if its scary or nerve-wracking to be on live television. I can honestly say that I find it to be a blast...and not the least bit scary. Cooking on television is such fun for me! And now...heres how the final product looked as it aired live. Now that you know what it takes to make this segment happen, tell me what you think!
Saturday, February 14, 2015
Cooking Lights Mad Delicious Cookbook Giveaway Featuring Carnitas de Pollo
I’m a long-time fan of Cooking Light magazine, because their recipes are healthy without sacrificing the big flavors that we crave. Tastes good + healthy for you = a recipe for success in my book! I recently received a copy of Cooking Light’s new Mad Delicious cookbook to try out in my kitchen, and Im happy to say that its one of the best cookbooks Ive cooked from this year! The focus of the cookbook is the creative use of ingredients and cooking techniques to maximize flavor while reducing sugar, salt, and fat. The end result is food that tastes great and is healthier for you. Author Keith Schroeder has created an informative, fun-to-read cookbook that features a unique format. Mad Delicious contains 126 recipes – both savory and sweet – that even novice cooks can feel confident preparing. Using a detailed and informative chart-style recipe format, Schroeder clearly explains why each ingredient in a recipe enhances its overall flavor and texture. This format helps readers easily understand how a recipes ingredients interact. With a conversational writing style, he walks the reader step-by-step through the preparation of every recipe. When the dish is complete, you have delicious food to enjoy -- as well as insightful knowledge about ingredients and cooking techniques. The photography in the book is gorgeous and colorful too -- every recipe features at least one photograph! This cookbook is a fantastic cooking resource, no matter your skill level in the kitchen. While looking over my copy, several recipes quickly caught my eye! Among them are: Georgia Peanut Fried Chicken -- which includes peanut butter powder in the crispy coating, Twice Cooked Garlic Shrimp, and slow-braised Carnitas de Pollo. As soon as I saw carnitas made with chicken, I knew I had had found my first recipe to try!
Carnitas are normally made with succulent pork slow cooked in its own fat. It’s delicious – but very high in fat. Schroeder’s version reduces the fat by using boneless, skinless chicken thighs slowly braised in a rich cooking liquid. The end result contains just 7.8 grams of fat per serving, but the tender meat has a rich depth of flavor. The only change I made to the recipe in the cookbook is using skinless bone-in chicken thighs in place of boneless, skinless thighs. That’s what I had in my freezer, but the bones were easily removed at the end of the braising time. This dish is also a winner because it’s economical and uses staple ingredients that I have on hand in my kitchen nearly all the time. This recipe makes enough carnitas de pollo for a dozen tacos. Schroeder recommends topping the finished tacos with a pickled onion recipe from the book. I decided to top our tacos with reduced-fat Monterrey Jack cheese and spicy pico de gallo. This is one amazing recipe!
Carnitas de Pollo
from Cooking Lights Mad Delicious
Ingredients:
- 2 lbs. skinless, boneless chicken thighs
- 1 tsp. kosher salt
- Cooking spray
- 2 cups sliced yellow onion (about 1 large)
- 6 garlic cloves, halved
- 2 cups water
- 12-ounce bottle light beer
- 1/2 cup fresh orange juice
- 1/4 cup fresh lime juice
- 1 tbs. brown sugar
- 12 6-inch corn tortillas
- 2 limes, cut into wedges
Directions:
Step 1: On a cutting board, rub the chicken thighs with the salt. Transfer to a plate momentarily.
Step 2: This is the time to break out your top-quality Dutch oven or heavy-bottomed pot. Heat the Dutch oven over medium-high heat and spray evenly with cooking spray.
Step 3: Lay down the chicken thighs in a single layer and cook 12 minutes or until theyre well browned before turning. Flip the thighs over and cook 8 minutes or until browned. You want them to be quite crusty, the point of almost seeming overcooked. Fret not, youll add some liquid to rehydrate the dish in a moment.
Step 4: When the chicken thighs resemble roasted chicken thats been accidentally left in the oven overnight with the pilot light on, theyre ready for the onions and garlic. Tumble about for a minute or so.
Step 5: Add 2 cups of water and the beer, and bring to a simmer. Lower the heat and simmer robustly at a steady, constant bubble for about an hour and 20 minutes, uncovered, or until the liquid is about 1/4 cup from being fully evaporated.
Step 6: Now, add the orange juice, lime juice, and brown sugar, and continue to cook and turn the thighs, about 2 minutes or until the chicken pieces are nicely glazed and nearly falling apart. Turn off the heat.
Step 7: After about 10 minutes, when the chicken is cool enough to handle but still quite warm, remove the chicken and tear it into bite-sized pieces. Combine the pulled chicken with the cooked onions and soft garlic.
Step 8: Platter and serve with warm corn tortillas and lime wedges.
I can’t begin to tell you how much we loved these tacos! The meat is juicy, with a rich depth of flavor thanks to the slow braise in the beer-onion-garlic mixture. The orange and lime juices provide a subtle brightness, and the small amount of brown sugar allowed the chicken to caramelize nicely on the outside. I can see this recipe becoming a part of my go-to recipes rotation, and its also excellent for feeding a crowd without breaking the bank. The fact that it’s lower in fat than traditional pork carnitas is a definite plus too!
I can’t wait to try more recipes from Mad Delicious in the coming weeks and months. The cookbook can be purchased via Amazon and would be a fabulous holiday gift for the health-conscious foodies on your shopping list! The publisher is also going to give one lucky reader a copy of Mad Delicious so you can try out all of these amazing recipes in your kitchen! To make it totally easy, this giveaway only requires you to comment below letting me know your best trick for cooking recipes that are lower in fat, sugar, and calories – without sacrificing flavor. I’ll accept entries until Monday, November 24th at 11:59 p.m. Be sure to include your e-mail address, because the winner will be notified via e-mail the following morning. Good luck!
Disclosure: I received a complimentary review copy of Mad Delicious to facilitate this feature. However, all opinions expressed are solely my own.
Saturday, January 31, 2015
My Experience Taking Part in a Sur la Table Cooking Class Celebrating Julia Child!
I was recently able to cross an item off my personal culinary bucket list: take a cooking class. I’ve wanted to take a hands-on cooking class for ages, so I was very excited when Sur la Table offered to host me for a very special cooking class. Celebrating Julia Child was held at San Antonio’s La Cantera location of Sur la Table last month…and it took place on Ms. Child’s birthday! Julia’s one of my all-time culinary idols, so I was beyond thrilled to learn how to make some of her classic dishes. I own both volumes of Mastering the Art of French Cooking, but have to admit that I can sometimes be intimidated by all the steps involved in cooking the French classics. Learning how to make a few of her signature dishes made them much more accessible for home cooks – even experienced home cooks like me!
Michael attended the class with me, so it was a fun culinary date night for us!We headed off to Sur la Table after work and arrived just as the class was starting. We were warmly welcomed by Chef Chris Kidd and his staff of assistants. The cooking classroom is large, modern and full of light. The room can accommodate approximately 15-20 food lovers. We were seated at a wooden table with another couple. At each place setting were cooking tools, a name tag, and an apron to wear during class. As everyone gathered, we were offered an appetizer of bruschetta topped with brie and jam. Once everyone arrived, Chef Kidd had each of us wash our hands and gave us some background information on Ms. Child. We also found out what we’d be cooking that evening. On our menu was: Curly Endive with Bacon and Poached Eggs, Coq au Vin, Stove Top Anna and Mousseline au Chocolat. 
Over the next three hours, class participants watched as Chef Kidd demonstrated helpful cooking techniques and gave us lots of very helpful kitchen hints. We also had ample opportunity to take part in hands-on participation in the kitchen classroom. For example: Michael chopped garlic and I diced the bacon for the coq au vin. We started with the salad. We learned how to make perfect poached eggs using ingenious silicone molds, as well as a fabulous homemade bacon dressing. After the salad was tossed and plated, we sat down at our tables and enjoyed this first course. I had never had a poached egg on a salad; we loved how the bacon and egg worked together with the slightly bitter curly endive. We agreed this would be a great starter for a weekend brunch.
Next, we tackled the coq au vin. Although there are many steps to this classic braised chicken dish, Chef Kidd broke each one down for us. His detailed instructions made the dish much less intimidating, and now I can’t wait to make it at home when the weather turns a bit cooler! Since coq au vin needs to braise for several hours, he prepared a pot ahead of time for us to sample during class. But first, it was time for Chef Kidd to demonstrate how to make the Stove Top Anna. This is basically paper-thin slices of potatoes layered with Swiss cheese and butter…and slowly cooked on the stovetop. A golden, crispy crust forms on the bottom of the pan, and the potatoes are perfectly tender all the way through. This dish is simplicity at its best!
Finally, we learned how to make Mousseline au Chocolat for dessert the classic French way. That entails melting chocolate and coffee very slowly while also whipping egg whites and cooking a sabayon over a water bath. It sounds harder than it is, because the egg whites are whipped in a stand mixer. This allows you to keep an eye on the melting chocolate as you whisk the sabayon over the water bath. Once the components are ready, it’s a matter of carefully and patiently folding everything together into a light, fluffy mousse. While we made this batch of mousses, Chef Kidd’s kitchen assistants unmolded a batch of mousse that had been prepared and chilled earlier that day. Then? It was time to eat!
The price of the class includes hands-on instruction, as well as a generous serving of the dishes created in the class. We enjoyed plates of braised coq au vin paired with the potato gratin. The chicken was literally fall-off-the-bone tender and flavored with bacon, pearl onions and mushrooms. It was divine! The simple potatoes were delicious and paired perfectly with the more robust coq au vin. Then, we went into the kitchen to serve ourselves some of the mousse. It was light in texture, but very rich. A small serving was the perfect ending to our educational and fun classroom experience. I like to think that somewhere in that Great Kitchen in the Sky, Ms. Child was looking down and pleased to see others share her passion for French cooking to celebrate her birthday!
After the class was over, we chatted with Chef Kidd for a few minutes and snapped a couple of pictures. He was a great instructor, making the class informative for cooks with all levels of experience. I consider myself a seasoned cook, and I learned several great tips and techniques during the class. Sur la Table offers cooking classes at its locations across the United States. Each location has an online calendar that shows at least two months worth of upcoming classes. Classes are offered in a broad range of categories, including: baking, chef spotlights, and themed date night classes geared specifically to couples. Based on my experience, I can vouch that the classes are a great value. You learn a lot, get hand-on experience in new cooking techniques…and end up with a tasty meal afterward to boot! To find classes offered at the Sur la Table near you, simply visit the Cooking Class locator at the Sur la Table website.Disclosure: Sur la Table provided me with a complimentary cooking class to facilitate this post; we paid for Michael’s class registration. All photographs are copyright Michael K. Garcia. They may not be copied or otherwise used without prior permission.
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