Monthly Archives: March 2018

The Forking Truth is that All Restaurants have Potential

The Forking Truth is that All Restaurants have potential. They have potential to do well or not to do well. I am purposely not mentioning the name of this restaurant because they are newly opened. It is NOT my intention to bring negative attention to them. It is my hope that they work things out because this restaurant certainly has potential that can go either way. I am not a professional reviewer by any means and I pay my own way just like you when I go out to a restaurant. I am not treated special and I walk in like anyone else. I can’t cherry pick my stories and only tell the good ones. I can only tell The Forking Truth.

Somewhere in metro Phoenix a New BBQ Restaurant opened and I had to try it for a few reasons. The chef is a known competition BBQ Master……so that means his BBQ should be great. The Chef was also skilled enough to make it on to the Food Network Grill Masters TV Show and the other reason I had to try this place was that pastrami was a regular item on the menu and no other BBQ restaurant that I know of in the area offers pastrami regularly on the menu. I’ve been working on my own pastrami recipe so this was of special interest to me. Pastrami is a lot of work and a very difficult thing to prepare correctly. Things do go wrong even if you do things correctly because each brisket is different. That is why (not all) but nearly every deli out there does NOT BRINE Corned Beef or Pastrami in house. The majority of places that serve corned beef and pastrami pay a professional company to brine by their own recipe. Pastrami sort of is an art. Speaking of art there’s artsy kind of decor in this tiny restaurant.

The dining room is very small with very limited seating and some stools on the other side.

When I arrived on the patio there was five outside tables but then they removed one for a DJ to set up.

Back to coming in……

As you enter your at the counter.

You see BBQ Awards to your left and a Pig Mural to your right. In front of you is the menu.

We made our orders and sat ourselves on the patio. In about fifteen minutes my husband goes to pick up our order…..

We orded a New York Style Hot Pastrami Sandwich that was suppose to contain a PTG Slaw (…..oh initials of Chef Guy) Russian Dressing and Toasted Marble Rye.

The White at bottom of sandwich is fat

My sandwich was missing the slaw….not a deal breaker but someone should have told me that they didn’t have slaw ready yet. The Pastrami is barely warm but is tender, a bit fatty with a few fat chunks I have to remove. It’s very different……..Mildly seasoned and mildly smoked…Not much of a crust but it’s a different unique style………It’s more like corned beef but with a very slight smoke……The dressing they used is sweet with chunks of pickles in it ………(technically more of a Thousand Island Dressing and not the savory, spicy Russian Dressing) …..The bread was toasted nice but I would have enjoyed the sandwich more with thinner bread….. It’s a lot of bread….like a double portion….I make a big 1/2 sandwich out of it and it’s still a lot of bread to eat with the meat. Makes it hard to taste the meat with so much bread. Maybe the ratio would have been better if my sandwich contained the slaw it was suppose to have.

We also tried the Two Meat Plate with an added Hot Link. I have to be FORKING Honest here……The Brisket had really good flavor but was just barely warm with hard fat and the beef part was chewy like rubber. This meat wasn’t ready to be served to people.

After I tried a bite my husband asked me to try more and I said, “NO.” My husband said the pork was good and he said the Hot Link would have been good if it wasn’t dried out…Usually Hot Links are juicy.

The Forking Truth is that the Cheesy Jalapeño Grits were inedible.

Again another thing served next to being cold and the grits were still hard and crunchy in a drippy thin watery sauce. It was like trying to eat sand mixed with water.

We told someone about the grits and she ran away. (Wow, I found this baffling…no I’ll tell the chef or I’m sorry or I’ll take that off your bill or anything……we didn’t get to say anything else….she just ran away….who does that?)

I will say the Waffle Fries were Delicious…..Seasoned nicely, seemed oil free with a fluffy interior. Shame they were also almost cold too.

To sum things up – The only thing that was served at the correct temperature was the Hot Link. All the other hot items were served next to cold. My Sandwich came out without slaw. The Brisket and Grits were served to us before they were ready to be served to people. That is NOT Professional or OK UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES……..(that is something a child might do)…….and lastly……….We started to tell someone about the grits and as we were talking she ran away….

We cleaned up our stuff and left. No Thank you for coming or come back again or anything.

The Forking Truth is that all restaurants have potential….to do well or not.

Hopefully they will work things out……… but I’m not going back.

Every FORKING THING Everyday Anywhere is subject to change and YOUR Experience may or may NOT differ.

The Forking Truth

General Admission – Devour Culinary Classic Day 2 Sunday March 4th 2018

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Devour Culinary Classic is an annual two day sold out event that is considered to be the premier culinary event of Arizona. Unlike other culinary events across the country that offer celebrity chefs Devoured is uniquely Arizonian and only features our local culinary elites.

2018 is a big year for change. No longer is this event hosted at the Phoenix Art Museum. Devoured has now moved to bigger grounds at the Desert Botanical Gardens. Bigger grounds are suppose to offer more people the opportunity to attend the annual sold out event and this is a bigger venture to offer more things…..Will it be bigger? Are more people attending? I know this annual event always sells out and it did again months ago so I do have to wonder……I also got informed that there is limited parking…..

That worries me…WTFork do I do if I don’t get a parking spot…..leave? I always had a place to park at or near the Art Museum……If you can’t park at the Botanical Garden there is nothing near by except for the zoo and if you park there it’s a few mile walk. in the desert with the brutal Arizona Sun.

Way back when I attended Devoured back in 2012 it only cost me $45.00 for each of the two days if I purchased my tickets in advance for general admission. Today in 2018 the same two general admission tickets has rocketed to a whopping $210.00 and if you times that by two it cost a couple $420.00 for two days of general admission. That’s a great deal of money so I’m only doing one day this year.

This year the tickets were broke down into THREE price ranges with no discounts.

general admission “tasting package” $105.00 per day

connoisseur package (1 hour early admission) $155.00 per day

VIP package (1 hour early, VIP gift bag and special VIP tastings and cocktails) $205.00 per day

Everyone ($105. $155. & $205. ticket holders) gets admission, access to Hensley/Quench Beverage Garden, access to chef demos, passport, wine glass, yolk, lift discount.

Connoisseur ($155.) also gets lift discount plus, admission to heritage food experience, admission to AZ Beverage experience.

The VIP’s ($205.) get all of above plus

One hour early admission, VIP access to Chef Welcome Beverage Service, Early admission and reserved seats to Heritage Foods Service & AZ Beverage Experience, VIP Swag Bag, Collector Pin, Reserved Parking & Lyft discount plus.

Parking was unorganized. They directed us to an already filled parking lot so we just found a spot ourselves.

We get paper wrist bands and wait in line. I look at the wines offered and most are not well known wines. I used to enjoy Merry Edwards wine at Devoured for years……Merry Edwards is a well made wine…..even the lower end Merry Edwards was awesome. ($38-$65). I recognize Marietta a $10.00 bottle that’s ok some years. I didn’t drink any wine today…….I don’t want to make myself sick……(well here anyway)

A one man band person entertains us while we wait to get in. It seems we got this instead of the nice reception room with goodies we used to enjoy……Gone is the reception room for general admission. Three years back you could stuff yourself silly in the reception room if you wanted to…..they have been cutting back on that but it was still something to look forward too.

The clock strikes 11:30 and we get to go in.

Tammy Coe – Cake

Pe’la – Shrimp Grain Bowl

Worth- Cuban Sandwich, Cocktail and Banana Pudding

District American Kitchen – Corn Pudding Avocado Mousse, Mole dusted Meringue and Waffle, bacon bourbon Ice Cream, apple butter compote, maple cotton candy, caramelized white chocolate pecan bark…Woof! This was among the better that I tried.

I think one of the most memorable (in a good way) dishes I tried came from Artisan. The Smoked Broth Congee with Mesquite smoked black garlic, chicken, spicy daikon and dehydrated onion was so interesting that I actually forget most of all the other things I tried. Artisan also served Indian Spiced hot shrimp.

Different Point of View – Duck Two Ways over Corn Cakes.

I didn’t try the Pibil Tostada from Mi Catering but my husband said the salsa on the tostada was exceptional.

I didn’t come back to try the noodles from Red Thai but I did try the Chewy Pounded Rice Noodle in Spicy Ginger Sauce. (sorry I forgot to photo)

My husband enjoyed this Pork Belly Dish from House of Tricks.

Gluten free pasta from the Parlor.

The Larder & The Delta – Pork Tamale

Sel – Pork Taco in steamed Bun.

Crujiente Tacos – Short Rib with Szechuan Sauce.

Clever Koi – Szechwan Chicken Feet and a Duck Dish.

Becket’s Table – Eggy Bread stuffed with Creamy Shrimp and Peanut Butter Topped Chocolate Cake.

Handlebar Diner – Crusted Green Chile Ice Cream and Sweet Corn Cake. This was interesting!

Green – Vegetarian (or Vegan?) Burger and fried potato strings.

Scallop and Short Rib Dish from Windsor

Federal Pizza – Chicken Parm (?)

This section is really crowed.

Sweet Republic ran out of Ice Cream before 1:00 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 ;(

Sweets from Nutwhats

Wigwam – Lamb Belly

Hawaiian Ahi Poke Taco and Mongolian Beef Bowl from Hulas and then we left. Only one dish pictured here made me gag……It was awful…..most were good a few were exceptional……..There were several restaurants missing from the general admission ticket that were moved up to the VIPS. Devoured is different now. I would recommend going if you can swing the VIP Admission. But they cut back on the General Admission so much I doubt I will attend again.

That was most of the General Admission Experience for Sunday Day Two of Devour Culinary Classic for 2018.

The weather for Devour 2018 was the best we ever had. It wasn’t too hot and it wasn’t rainy either…….The surroundings were lovely but……………..

Between the higher cost and getting much less for General Admission compared to past years I don’t think I’ll be attending Devour in the future.

The Forking Truth

Twisted Date Bread Recipe

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Twisted Date Bread

A few months back one of the food magazines had a recipe for a twisted dessert bread that looked something like this.I think it was for a Babka? I remembered how they twisted it (because it was very easy) and I thought I could do something similar with the dough I make all the time. I make a basic dough that I also use for focaccia, onion rolls, challah, pizza and cinnamon buns. Then I just rolled out the dough, made the date filling and rolled it up from the LONG ENDS. Then I just sliced the long rolled dough in half and just twisted the two pieces together. It was pretty FORKING EASY! I threw the dough in the oven and I almost burnt it but I didn’t. It got really dark and got me nervous but isn’t burnt! I put it in at 450 degrees F and pulled it out at about 18 minutes. I didn’t cover the bread but maybe I’d recommend to lightly cover halfway because it was that close. The bread is delicious and moist. Only a minimal amount of sugar was used because the dates are so sweet. You will have some extra date filling but it’s so delicious you won’t mind. You can use it for breakfast on toast or in your oatmeal. The two clementines and their zest I added just accent the date filling so well. I think next time I’d spread the date mixture a little thinner than I did. I thought some would bake into the dough but it didn’t. This technique is great for all kinds of different breads.

Twisted Date Bread

Ingredients for about 16 servings

1 packet active dry yeast – (2 1/4 teaspoons or 1/4 ounce)

1 1/2 Tablespoons sugar

1 1/2 cups warm water 100-110 degrees F

3 cups bread flour

1/4 cup scant extra virgin olive oil

1 Tablespoon course sea salt

1 cup bread flour – this is the extra flour that you knead into dough, let dough ball rest in and also use to flour surface and rolling pin.

1 lb 6 oz dates pitted and chopped (I note I had about a cup of extra filling I didn’t use for recipe)

2 1/2 cups water – Your amount of water may differ…..depends on how dry or moist your dates are…

2 clementines – just the zest and fresh squeezed juice

1 Tablespoon cinnamon (I used Vietnamese)

1/4 cup dark brown sugar

pinch course sea salt

1 large egg – beaten with a teaspoon of water

Directions

Start out with a large bowl and put the sugar and yeast in a bowl and add the 1 1/2 cups of 100-110 degree water. Mix it up and wait for a foam to develop on the top to make sure your yeast is alive and working. It should take between 10-30 minutes.

After you got foam add the (3 cups) flour, oil, salt and mix well. Keep mixing till the dough comes off bowl and your hands. Make a dough ball and get the remaining cup of flour. Let the dough ball rest on most of the flour and sprinkle the top of the dough ball with flour.

Cover with plastic wrap. Now work on the dates.

In a sauce pot on medium heat add the dates, One of the cups of water (start with less than the 2 1/2 cups I don’t know how much you will need keep adding water as you need it. That’s what I did) clementine juice and zest, cinnamon, dark brown sugar and pinch of course sea salt. If your dates are like what I used they kept absorbing the water quickly. I slowly added water until the dates stayed at a jammy consistency. Then I took them off the heat and used a stick blender and blended them up. I’d say they were close to apple butter like. Then I set them to the side.

Around this point you can turn your oven to 450 degrees F

Your dough should have doubled in size.

Punch the dough down and keep kneading it till it feels smooth and doesn’t stick to anything. Use the extra flour in the bowl to dust surfaces. Make it into a rectangle.

Pat the dough out as much as you can to a big rectangle shape and finish with a dusted rolling pin,

Sheet under the dough is 16×24 inches

From LONGWAYS you roll the dough like a jelly roll.

Then you cut in half LONGWAYS.

Then you put the two pieces of dough next to each other with the date side up and start on an end.

You just keep laying one piece over the other BACK and Forth! Like the right piece goes over the left piece till you get this. I made this on a Quilon Baking Sheet and I lifted the whole thing up on to a baking sheet and made it fit by squishing it together but you can cut the bread in half or make a circle…..

Then I cut off the ends of paper than hang off the sheet so they don’t burn. Next I brush the beaten egg mixture on the bread twice and avoid where it meets the paper so it doesn’t stick.

I put it in the 450 degree F oven for 18 minutes but next time I’d put a loose cover on it half way threw because another minute and it might have burnt…I got it out just in time and it was done. I don’t like cutting it that close…got lucky.