Cooking Creations: JW BBQ

I love to barbeque!  Our condominium has a smaller-sized, wooden deck, but that never prevents me from cramming friends and family outside around the grill.  (If you'd like a visual: one must place the grill strategically.  If it's too close to one side it burns the wooden fence and if it's too close to the other it gets the side of the house.  There's no extra space to negotiate in- only one specific spot will do.)  If all that doesn't stand in my way, there's no way I was going to let a fractured heel deter me.  Spring-like weather signifies the beginning of bbq season.  End of story.

Salsa verde

I wanted to cook another meal from Jonathan Waxman's Italian My Way, but with a BBQ spin.  I decided to prepare two of his signature sauces: the salsa verde and the JW roasted tomato sauce.  I chose to serve them alongside some chicken off the grill.

My dad graciously took care of the fire.  Normally I would do that all myself too, but that was hardly safe while balanced on one foot.  He did, however, position a chair next to the grill so that I could monitor and grill the chicken myself.  I was at the mercy of the wind since I could not reposition myself when it blew the smoke in my direction, but I didn't really mind.  I am a savant of grilled chicken breasts.  I don't brag about much and there's little I'm completely confident in, but I will stake my pride on perfectly cooked grilled chicken.  I use wood chips- in this case Jack Daniel smoked chips.  I prefer hickory chips, but those were the ones on hand.  We have a charcoal grill (and in my opinion that's the only way to BBQ!).  For chicken, aim for 5-6 minutes a side.  Another tip: lie the breast so that the long way is perpendicular to the metal grill slots.  That way you get the pretty brown lines on them!

The salsa verde was a doozy to prepare.  I don't want to give away the recipe itself, but I'll give you the general premise.  It requires many fresh greens: chives, basil, rosemary, arugala, sage, and tarragon.  If you've got an herb garden you're good to go, but if not that can run up the grocery bill.  You also add capers.  And anchovies.  Which is where my struggle began.

Jonathan Waxman's recipe instructed me to debone the anchovies with tweezers.  It sounded simple, but there were a lot of little bones in those anchovies!  I sat there for at least a half an hour trying to debone 4 tiny anchovies.  It's possible that I did not have to take out all of the bones I did; some were so tiny that they probably would have been undetectable by the time they were ground into the salsa.  It's also possible that there's a way to debone them that is faster (such as going in a particular direction).  In any event, it wound up taking a lot longer than anticipated and dinner got started later than intended.  I have reached out to Chef Waxman via twitter to see if he has any suggestions, but so far I have yet to get a reply.  In any event, the salsa verde was a crowd-pleaser.  It seemed to be worth the extra time!

JW roasted tomato sauce

(PS. You may not tell my father there are anchovies in the salsa verde!!  He loves the salsa verde, but will swear up and down that he hates anchovies.  I'd rather not give him a heart attack or have him stop eating the salsa verde, so I have been disguising the truth.)

The roasted tomato sauce is super cool- it uses lavender!  Although I have seen many chefs use lavender, I have never incorporated it.  Now that I have, it is my new culinary obsession.  It is a dream for wine-pairing!  It wil highlight the floral notes of so many spring and summer whites.  (For example, I cannot wait to try it with my new Ermita de San Felices Rioja Blanco 2010).  It was delicious in the sauce.

It is important to note that Chef Waxman's recipe calls for 2 lavender sprigs.  I purchased dried French lavender from Williams Sonoma.  There were no conversions available for those quantities online, so here is what I found.  I guestimated (based on other herb sprigs) that 2 lavender springs would yield about 1 tablespoon of fresh lavender.  Websites could make a fresh to dry conversion: 1/3 units dried = 1 unit fresh.  So I wound up using 1 teaspoon of dried French lavender.  In my opinion it was the perfect amount.  It certainly imparted the floral flavor, but did not overwhelm the sauce.  This sauce is what I put on my chicken!

Bowtie pasta

My dad ate all of the remaining salsa verde with a spoon.  He loves that stuff.  Although I heaped the tomato sauce on my chicken multiple times, there was some leftover.  My mother and I decided to make new dishes the next night with the sauce.  We each made our own unique dishes based on our personal taste preferences.  She likes pasta so she heated up some bowtie pasta and used the sauce on top.  (I also suspect that our respective choices had a lot to do with our cooking skills.  Let's be honest: her meal ultimately only required her to boil water.  Love you, Mom!)

My shrimp "scampi"

I am not a pasta fan.  I do, however, love the shrimp on top of shrimp scampi.  I did a pastaless rift on shrimp scampi.  I sauteed the shrimp and added the tomato sauce, shallots, a bit more garlic, an assortment of the leftover herbs, and capers.  The rough recipe is as follow:  Spray large non-stick skiller with cooking spray.  Sautee shallots until just tender.  Add the garlic and cook 1 minute.  Add shrimp and cook for 2 minutes.  Flip shrimp.  Add desired sauce, herbs, and capers.  Simmer for 2 more minutes (or until shrimp are done), stirring frequently.  Simple, but yummy.

BBQ season has officially arrived.

Since posting this, I did hear from Jonathan Waxman via twitter. When it comes to the anchovies: Literally just yank off the filets, the bones will not stick. Glad you enjoyed!
Thanks, chef!