Most people are familiar with (and love, for good reason)  Korean style BBQ short ribs. Sliced thin, marinated overnight and grilled over hot charcoal they are a fantastic alternative to standard BBQ fare. However, short ribs are not limited to just the grill for cost-effective enjoyment (they are considerably cheaper than your average steak) as I’ll show you with a follow up to my braising article - Braised Beef Short Ribs.

The short ribs in all their glory:

You’ll notice these are considerably thicker than the Korean BBQ style. These will be cooking for a longer period of time, so you’ll want to ask your butcher to slice them 3/4″ to 1″ thick for you.

Next slice up some fresh veggies. I’ve got some local garlic, new potatoes, carrots, onions and button mushrooms, but feel free to use whatever you have on hand.

Next, slice the short ribs in half and season them with kosher salt and fresh cracked black pepper, then sprinkle 1 tsp of flour over each short rib. Heat 1 tbsp of oil and 1 tbsp of butter in a large heavy bottomed pan:

Brown the short ribs well over high heat on both sides. Getting a nice sear is important to the flavour of this recipe.

After well browned, remove them from the pot and brown the onions and garlic, then sautee the rest of the vegetables:

Now add the short ribs back to the pot, and add in the demi glace, beef stock, red wine, and tomatoes. Season with salt and pepper and bring mixture to a boil. (Full recipe posted at the end)

Now, I know not everyone is crazy like me and makes their own demi glace, then freezes it in cubes, so omit this step if you like and thicken the braising liquid with a roux at the end of the braising process instead:

Your pot should look something like this:

Pre-heat the oven to 375F, and once mixture is boiling, place the pot covered in the oven and braise for 1.5-2 hours or until short ribs are ridiculously tender.

Plate simply and garnish with a little flatleaf parsley if you like (I couldn’t wait and started eating mine before this step)

There you have it! Something new and some good eats if I do say so myself. Here’s the ingredients for those keeping score at home.

Braised Beef Short Ribs

2-3 lbs beef short ribs, 3/4″ to 1″ thick
1 lb new potatoes, halved
8-10 small carrots, peeled
3 gloves garic, diced
1 medium onion, sliced
10-12 button mushrooms, quartered
4 cups beef or veal stock
2 cups dry red wine
2 cubes or 2 tbsp demi glace, or the same amount of roux
2 cups whole canned tomatoes
1 tbsp butter
salt and pepper

I had a bit of time over the long weekend to do some relaxing cooking for myself. It’s funny how that works, I cook for others for a living yet still find it relaxing and exciting cooking for myself in my spare time, which is why I love what I do so much.

Now, my plans for cooking today started off pretty normal. I was going to head out to the butcher and pick up a nice big bone-in pork butt, smoke it slowly all day and by dinner time, turn it into a huge pile of pulled pork for delicious smoky sandwiches all week long. I also planned on making some cornbread in my trusty cast iron skillet.

Neither of these things ended up happening, as my butcher’s shop was closed (for the holiday of course) and upon starting the cornbread I realized I was fresh out of cornmeal…somewhat of a key ingredient in making cornbread.

Determined to make something tasty and time consuming I ravaged my cupboards and found an old recipe I printed out a long time ago for everyone’s favorite guilty pleasure: brioche.

A quick scan revealed I had all the necessary ingredients and I went to work (don’t worry, I’ll post the recipe at the end). After some measuring and mixing the dough needed a couple hours to rise, and I was still looking for something tasty to cook up in the meantime. A raid through my spice rack and I found something interesting, some Ethiopian Berbere spice powder I picked up at Gourmet Warehouse awhile back. A fiery blend of spices, this was to be my starting point for a unique dinner, though not necessarily a traditional accompaniment for brioche, to say the least.

After a bit of searching I decided to make a traditional Ethiopian dish called Doro Wat, which is basically a spicy chicken stew garnished with hard boiled eggs. I’ve eaten this before at an Ethiopian restaurant but never prepared it myself.
The aromas in my house as I cooked were amazing, and before I knew it my brioche was in the oven. After a few hours of running around, improvising and cooking, here’s what I ended up with:

I did end up finding some pita bread in my freezer to simulate the traditional inerja bread of ethiopian cuisine, however I’d be lying if I said I didn’t dip a bit of the brioche in it too, and I’d also be lying if I said it wasn’t awesome.

Two complete culinary opposites in classic French cooking and Ethiopian came together in one strange and wonderful day of holiday cooking today.

Oh, and before I forget, here’s the recipes for the brioche and the Doro Wat:

Ethiopian Doro Wat (Chicken Stew)

Does it get any better than smoked pork? I mean really. I wanted to demonstrate with this video that making great restaurant quality BBQ ribs is possible without any fancy equipment, or even nice weather (as demonstrated in this particular video).

If you learn anything from this video, learn this:

- DO NOT BOIL RIBS. EVER. Well, that is unless you like eating flavourless gray mush grilled at the last minute and drowning in store bought BBQ sauce. But I guarantee once you try these, you’ll never go back.

Okay, I’ve talked enough, watch this will ya? By the way, I apologize in advance for the questionable video quality and lighting, it’s BBQ, it’s outside, and it’s all about the end product anyways!

Now for recipes and method:

Drew’s BBQ Rub

1 cup Lawry’s Seasoning Salt
1/4 cup garlic powder
1/4 cup onion powder
1/4 cup brown sugar
2 tablespoons fresh ground black pepper
1 tablespoon chinese 5 spice powder
1 tablespoon chili powder
1 tablespoon cumin
1/2 tsp cayenne pepper

Mix all ingredients well and store in an airtight container.

Method for Great BBQ Ribs on Any Grill

1. Prep ribs by trimming excess fat, and removing the membrane along the underside. Use a butter knife to lift the corner and a paper towel to help you grip the membrane and pull it off in one piece.
2. Apply a thin coat of yellow mustard to the exterior of the ribs (as stated in the video, there will be no mustard taste left, but if this still freaks you out, use olive oil)
3. Liberally apply the BBQ rub to both sides of the ribs to coat evenly.
4. Heat BBQ on indirect heat (completely off on one side, low on the other side, shoot for an internal temperate between 225 and 275F if you have a gauge)
5. Place ribs on unheated side of the BBQ along with a foil pouch of wood chips and let smoke for 2 hours.
6. Remove ribs from the grill and wrap loosely in heavy duty aluminum foil. Place back on BBQ for approx. 2 more hours
7. Remove ribs from foil place back on BBQ unfoiled for an additional 30 minutes to 1 hour, or until ribs are crispy and tender to the touch

Remove and enjoy with your favorite BBQ sauce! Or try making one of mine

Sweet and Smoky BBQ Sauce

Ingredients:

- 1/4 cup apple cider vinegar
- 2 cloves garlic, finely minced
- 1 small onion, finely diced
- 1.5 cups ketchup
- 1/4 cup brown sugar
- 1/2 cup molasses
- 1 tablespoon instant espresso powder
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 tsp pepper
- 1 tablespoon worcestershire sauce
- 2 tablespoons water
- 1 tsp tobasco

Simmer all ingredients except water for approximately 15 minutes. Add in the water and stir to bring sauce to desire consistency. Pour sauce through a fine strainer into air tight container and refrigerate any unused sauce for up to 2 weeks.

For those who love a tangier sauce with their BBQ (like me), here is a mustard and vinegar based sauce that goes great with ribs and pulled pork especially:

Tangy Mustard Vinegar Sauce

3/4 cup apple cider vinegar
1/2 cup Yellow mustard
1/4 cup onion finely minced
2 cloves garlic finely minced
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon Tabasco sauce

Simmer all ingredients together for about 20 minutes over low heat. Strain throw a fine sieve just like the other sauce and enjoy! Refrigerate that leftover sauce (if there is any) for up to 2 weeks.

So there we have it! And lastly, for the BBQ purists, I am well aware that “true” BBQ is cooked over wood or a combination of wood and charcoal and not a tiny propane grill on a rainy patio. My point with this video was simply to show that great tasting ribs with smoke flavour CAN be cooked on a small condo grill, where bylaws often forbid charcoal and wood burning BBQ pits. Hey, anything’s better than boiling right?

Enjoy!

Have you ever walked into your butcher shop and taken a look at the items in the far recesses of the display? You know, the “weird” and cheap items that make you wonder who would buy that and what would they do with it? Let me help you out with some examples of things I’m talking about:

1. Lamb, Beef or Veal Shanks

2. Beef Brisket

3. Pork Butt or Picnic Roast

4. And perhaps scariest of all, Tripe

Now I won’t lie, even for me tripe (essentially the lining of a cows stomach) is a stretch. I only include this because while reading Thomas Keller’s book (arguably the top chef in North America) he had a fantastic recipe for braised tripe which I tried and actually enjoyed. It CAN be done.

However for the rest of this list, and several others not included here, it can be done much easier and just as cheap. For a fraction of the cost of some high end steaks, you can take home some beautiful meaty lamb shanks and create something beautiful and delicious with just a bit more time. I’ll include a recipe a bit later, but first:

What is braising?

The best way I have heard braising described is as “stewing with a college education”. It is essentially a combination of dry and wet cooking methods, where meat is seared in a pan with a small amount of oil until the exterior is browned and caramelized, and then vegetables, stock, wine, and other flavouring ingredients are added and the mixture is simmered to allow the meat to tenderize and take on flavour. Even the toughest cuts of meat are no match for mighty braising, and can be turned into melt in your mouth tender dishes bursting with flavours.

Why Bother?

Well for starters, eating grilled steaks and chicken every meal gets boring, not to mention expensive. 4 or 5 high quality ribeye steaks will cost you at least double as the same amount of the above cuts. Another reason is experimentation. Let’s be honest, anyone can grill up some steaks with a little practice and have it turn out great, but with braising and experimenting with other tougher cuts of meat, endless flavourings, herbs, vegetables and stocks can be added to the mix to create something unique and delicious that any cook would be proud of. Many top chefs include a large number of these items on their menus, not soley in an effort to save cost, but to challenge themselves to turn an often overlooked cut of meat into something refined, beautiful, delicious and worthy of a spot on their menu.

Have I sold you on trying it out sometime? Great, here’s my favorite recipe and great one to start off with if you aren’t familiar with braising.

Braised Lamb Shanks

Ingredients:

- 4 meaty lamb shanks (ask your butcher, these generally cost around $3.99/lb or less)
- 1 lb fingerling potatoes, halved
- 4 large carrots, chopped into large pieces
- chopped celery, about 2 cups
- 1 cup chopped onion
- 3 cloves chopped garlic
- 4 cups chicken stock
- 1 cup red wine
- 1 cup diced canned tomatoes
- Olive Oil
- 2 tbsp butter
- 2 tbsp flour
- Salt and Pepper
- Sprigs of fresh thyme and rosemary

Method:

Heat a small amount of olive oil  in a large heavy bottomed pot over high heat. Season lamb shanks with salt and pepper. Sear the lamb shanks in the hot oil, turning to brown and caramelize evenly on all sides. When all sides are browned, remove shanks from the pot and set aside. Add in potatoes, onions, carrots, celery and garlic to the pot and season. Add in the red wine to deglaze and use a wooden spoon to scrape the caramelized bits from the bottom of the pan. Add the lamb shanks back in and add in the chicken stock and tomatoes, along with a couple sprigs of fresh rosemary and thyme. Bring to a boil and then turn down to a simmer, covering the pot with a lid. Let simmer for approx. 2 hours until lamb shanks are extremely tender. In a separate pan, heat butter and whisk in flour to form a roux. Add to the pot and whisk to thicken the mixture. Do a final seasoning to taste with salt and pepper, and then plate the lamb shank in the center of a large white plate and arrange the potatoes and vegetables around it, ladelling some of the flavourful sauce on top to finish.

Enjoy!

If you’re tired of making the same old burgers for every BBQ, dripping with boring condiments and processed cheese, then please allow me to share with you a personal creation of mine.

I call it the Easy Brie-zy Burger, and I’ve served it to many a guest with rave reviews. I’m going to post the full recipe below (I swore I would never share it, but I’ve been worn down), but here is a breakdown of what you can expect on this burger:

- A flavorful brie and pesto mayonnaise
- Crispy fried onion strings
- Juicy heirloom tomatoes (sure, you can use regular ones if you want, but why not go for the gold?)
- And an optional upgrade to slices of crispy maple bacon

If none of that sounds good to you, please, stop reading now. For the rest of you, here is the full recipe good for about 8 burgers:

BRIE AND PESTO MAYONNAISE:

- 1.5 cups mayonnaise
- 2-3 tablespoons pre-made or fresh pesto
- 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
- 3/4 of a cup small cubed brie (put in the freezer for 10-15 minutes to make it easier to cut)
- few dashes of Tabasco sauce
- 1/2 tsp brown sugar
- salt and fresh cracked pepper

Combine all ingredients and mix thoroughly, place in refrigerator until ready to use.

CRISPY ONION STRINGS

- 3 medium onions, sliced thinly
- 1 cup flour
- 1/2 cup corn starch
- 1 tablespoon salt
- 1 tablespoon pepper
- 4-6 cups vegetable oil or other suitable frying oil

Slice onions as thinly as possible, preferably using a mandolin, although a very sharp knife will do the trick also. Heat oil in a medium sized heavy - bottomed sauce pan over high heat. Using a thermometer, heat the oil until at 350F. Mix the flour, corn starch and salt and pepper in a mixing bowl and toss the sliced onions until evenly coated. Very carefully place the onion strings into the hot oil, and fry until crispy and golden brown, about 2-3 minutes. Place on a paper towel to drain excess oil.

PUTTING THE BURGER TOGETHER

Alright, I’m not going to post a burger from scratch recipe, because everyone makes it their own way and there’s nothing wrong with that. But here is how we want to assemble our burger now that we’ve gotten the individual parts done.

Step 1. Liberally apply the brie and pesto mayonnaise to both sides of a fresh toasted burger bun.
Step 2. Place a grilled burger patty on the bottom half, and top with a thick slice or two of tomato, followed by lettuce.
Step 3. Top with your crispy onion strings, and if you feel like indulging, top with a couple slices of crispy bacon as well.
Step 4. Finish with the top half of the burger, and eat! The heat from the bun and burger will slowly melt the chunks of brie in the mayonnaise, giving you flavor, texture from the crispy onions and just plain good stuff in each bite.

Optional beverage choice: A crisp Strongbow cider

I want to share something with you that I’ve discovered in practicing my recent obsession with true slow smokin’ BBQ. While at the end of the day, it’s all about the meat, any serious Q’er will tell you the appetizers and sides are just as important. If you’ve ever gorged on the Elvis platter (pictures below) from Memphis Blues BBQ on either Broadway or Commercial, you know what I’m talking about.

But the appetizer I’m about to share is not even a part of the Memphis Blues menu, it’s a cult favorite among backyard Q’ers and weekend warriors, an appetizer so unbelievably addicting it has been said that it is physically impossible to make enough of them no matter what size gathering you are hosting.

Now, don’t prepare yourself for something modern or revolutionary, fancy plating or exotic ingredients. You won’t find it here, what you will find however, are:

ABTs!

Now, stick with me for awhile on the name, I didn’t invent this, but ABT stands for:

Atomic.

Buffalo.

Turds.

I know, I know. Moving on, an ABT is, essentially, a jalapeno which has been cut in half and seeded, filled with cream cheese (Q’ers often add their own seasonings to the cream cheese mixture), then, a mini sausage is placed onto the cream cheese, and the entire thing is wrapped in bacon and smoked. I don’t know about you, but any sentence with both the words bacon AND smoke in it, I pay attention. Here is a full tutorial:

Start by halving and seeding the jalapenos:

They should look like this when you’re finished:

Fill the halves with cream cheese, and at this point you can mix anything you want with the mixture. Shredded cheddar cheese, cumin, paprika, brown sugar are all nice additions:

Place one mini sausage in the middle of the halved peppers:

Wrap the entire concoction in bacon and secure it with a toothpick:

Place them in a pre-heated smoker at 250F or a gas grill with wood chips and smoke slowly for approx 2 hours. In a pinch you CAN do these in the oven, but seriously, the smoke flavor really makes them what they are. When they come out, they should look like this:

Here is a delicious cross-section:

The slow cooking will also remove nearly all of the jalapeno’s heat, and they are just ridiculously delicious.

I may take some flack for this, as this is about as far away from quote unquote “gourmet” cooking as you can get, but let’s just relax a little bit, and realize that some of the best tasting food out there can come from backyards and homes, and not from over-priced over the top restaurants. Keep it simple!

There it is Vancouver! The scorching long weekend that we’ve been waiting to come along for quite some time while enduring our longer than normal winter this year.

If spending time in front of a hot stove on a 30C degree day is not your idea of a good time, check out this unbelievably refreshing chilled summer soup and this great cocktail to serve to your sun-parched guests:

Chilled Avocado and Citrus Soup

Ingredients:

- 1 cup diced onion
- 1 tablespoon salt
- 3 large ripe avocados
- 1 quart fresh orange juice (or fresh from 12 oranges if you’re feeling particularly ambitious)
- 1 cup fresh lime juice (about 6 limes)
- 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
- 1 tablespoon sugar
- 1/2 tsp black pepper
- 3/4 lb small diced plum tomatoes
- 1 cup small diced radishes
- 1 cup finely sliced mushrooms (optional)
- Garnish: fresh chopped cilantro

Rinse chopped onions under cold water and drain thoroughly. Pit and peel avocados and cut into 1/2 inch cubes. Whisk together the orange juice, lime juice, olive oil, sugar, salt and black pepper until sugar is dissolved. Gently stir in onions, avocados, tomatoes, radishes and mushrooms.

Chill covered, for 1 hour before serving cold with chopped cilantro as a garnish.

Now, with our beautiful local strawberries just hitting the stores, cool off with one of my favorite cocktails:

Strawberry Tequila Mojito

- 1.5 ounces good quality white tequila ( I know mojitos are usually made with rum, but trust me on this)
- Dash of triple sec
- juice from 1/4 of a lime
- Two local BC strawberries
- 10 mint leaves
- 1 tsp sugar
- 2 ounces club soda

Pour tequila in a shaker glass filled with ice. Muddle the strawberries, mint, sugar and lime juice in a glass and add to the shaker. Shake vigorously and pour into a cocktail glass, then top it up with the club soda.

There you have it, and of course, remember, when all else fails in summer time, throw a few thick bone-in ribeyes on the grill and have at ‘em!

Mark Twain once said, “Twas a brave man indeed, who first ate an oyster.”

True, maybe, but aren’t we all glad he (or she, I suppose) did? With most people, oysters are a love ‘em or hate ‘em type of food. The reasonings behind the latter I’ve heard over the years are nearly all to do with their texture, though my personal favorite was “Um, I don’t eat things out of their homes.” Touche.

Personally? I can’t get enough of them.

As a chef there is something so intriguing about an ingredient as “pure” as an oyster. You can gather them from the ocean, shuck them open and shoot them down and they taste fantastic and exactly as you would expect, ice cold, salty, and depending on your oyster of choice, varying levels of sweetness and other subtle flavours.

For inexperienced oyster shoppers, shuckers or tasters, I encourage you to visit your local seafood and fish monger and buy some fresh ones to experience the art (aka the frustration) of learning to shuck oysters. Here is a great youtube video with a demonstration:

Oysters are great on their own or with a simple squirt of lemon, but here are a couple nice mignonette recipes. A mignonette is a classic french accompaniment for oysters, but here are a couple of my favorite variations:

Blood Orange Mignonette

1/4 cup blood orange juice

1/4 cup champagne vinegar (white wine vinegar or even rice wine vinegar works as well)

1 tablespoon finely diced shallots

1 tsp finely chopped flat leaf parsley

Pinch of salt and pepper

Sweet Chili Mignonette

2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

2 tablespoons white wine or champage vinegar

2 tablespoons Thai sweet chili sauce

1 tablespoon finely diced shallots

Pinch of salt and pepper

Simply shuck your oysters and top each with about 1 tsp of the mignonette. Shoot ‘em down like normal!