Dill Death Do Us Part

        Dinner Lab is, as described on their website, "a social dining experiment that unites undiscovered chefs with adventurous diners who are looking for something different from the conventional restaurant experience."

       In short, Dinner Lab is a vehicle for up-and-coming chefs to share their stories with guests by way of thoughtful, multi-course meals. Each participating diner is given a comment card to rate and give constructive feedback for each course. 

       The event, which took place at Invisible Pictures at Philadelphia Sound Stages began at 7pm with a cocktail hour. A featured cocktail of dark rum, jasmine black tea, rosemary simple, and finished with a fresh sprig of rosemary, was served along with a small selection of beer and wine. The drink was fabulous. 

         After cocktails, Chef Kwame Onwuachi spoke to us about From Candy Bars to Michelin Stars, the menu he had curated for the event. Born and raised in the Bronx by a single mother who owned a catering business, Chef Onwuachi was introduced to culinary arts at an early age. As a teenager, determined to start his culinary career, Onwuachi hustled candy bars on the MTA subway lines to make money, and within a matter of months, was able to fund his own catering company. His business was successful and in return, paid his way to attend the Culinary Institutes of America. After attending CIA, Onwuachi went on to work under extremely reputable chefs at restaurants such as Eleven Madison Park, which is considered to be one of the best restaurants in the world.

Menu:

-First Course-

Strawberry Salad

green tomato, celery, pistachio brittle, whipped honey

-Second Course-

Hamachi Rioja

beet cured hamachi, avocado purée, cilantro, charred romaine

Beverage Pairing:

Cucumber Caipirinha

Cachaça 51, cucumber juice, lime, oregano

-Third Course-

Corn & Sage Deux Fois

corn relish, candied bacon, sweet corn velouté, sage

-Fourth Course-

Braised Chicken

smoked tomato ragu, fennel gratin, kalamata olives

Beverage Pairing:

Pinot Noir

Les Pants Nobles, 2013, France

  -Fifth Course-

Dreamsicle

candied kumquats, almond pound cake, milk foam

-Sixth Course-

Homemade Butterfingers

        The meal was extremely well-executed and thoughtful. Everything was deliciously comforting with distinct complexities that made each course unforgettable. Chef Kwame Onwuachi continues to dazzle diners while competing in Dinner Lab's Chef Tour and has plans to open his own restaurant in the near future.

Check out Dinner Lab online to stay updated with upcoming events and news.

I apologize to my *16* sweet followers for not posting about the rest of my hot dog journey. Honestly, it happened so fast, and I forgot to document the rest of the process.

LUCKILY, you can read about it HERE because I won 1st place :)

You can also EAT my hot dog creation at Hot Diggity (630 South St, Philadelphia, PA) for the entire month of August!

I figured to begin this thing, I should make the one thing I was most uncertain about, which was the pepper relish. 

I took a trip to the Italian Market in South Philly and bought a pound of multi-colored long-hots and a quarter pound of cherry peppers. 

I washed them, cut them in half length-wise, took most of the seeds out (i kept a few in for extra heat), and cried like a fucking baby. Turns out onions and ASPCA commercials aren’t the only tear-jerkers. Eeeeehhhh.

Then, I roughly chopped them into half-inch pieces and put them in a big bowl with:

-1/2 cup of sugar 

- a generous pinch of sea salt

and a splash of red wine vinegar.

I tossed it all around until the peppers were coated, put tin foil over the bowl, and left it on my kitchen counter for ten hours. 

During this time, the peppers sweat from the sugar and salt and released LOTS of yummy juices, which prepared them to be cooked into the final (awesome) product.

I poured the contents of the bowl to a shallow, stainless steel pan with more surface area than the peppers could cover, which allowed them lots of space to cook down quickly.

Over high heat, I sautéed the peppers while stirring constantly with a wooden spoon, for about 12 minutes. About half way through the cooking time, I threw in a splash of red wine vinegar, which I repeated every two minutes for the remainder of the cooking time until I had caramelized, slightly wilted, sweet-smelling peppers. 

I transferred the finished product to a ceramic bowl, let it chill for a bit and tasted it. 

Spicy, sweet, and freakin delicious. 

Hello All (or none)!

I've been wanting to start this blog for a long time, but never found anything that screamed first-post-worthy to me. 

THAT HAS CHANGED.

About a month ago, I woke up and saw a post on Foobooz about the 3rd Annual Dog Days of Summer Hotdog Cook-Off. Hot Diggity allows the public to submit their own hot dog concepts for the chance to compete at the cook-off. They narrow the submissions down to 20, and this year, my concept was one of those chosen.

The theme this year? Philadelphia

Interpret that how you may, but I figured using products from local brands would be the coolest option, so my idea is as follows:

An all-beef dog with homemade long-hot pepper jelly, coffee BBQ sauce made with cold-brewed coffee from my place of work, Federal Donuts (who uses a custom blend roasted by Elixr), and topped with Kenzinger-battered onion straws, all atop a Martin's potato bun.

I thought this up one morning and didn't expect to get the email saying I was chosen to compete... so now I have to make all this shit!

Starting to experiment today. Will post updates/recipes. Pumped on this.