The Rosemary Bush

Grill/Roasting a chicken on a bed of rosemary is one of our favorite dishes. Finding a sufficient supply of rosemary can be a problem. If you have to buy rosemary at the supermarket it can be expensive. If you know where to find an old bush of rosemary you are all set.

Grill Roasted Chicken Video

Here is the recipe

I wandered by my old office the other day and the rosemary that had once been part of a small herb garden is now a huge rosemary bush. The copious amount of rosemary is enough to roast a flock of chickens or skewer a truck load of appetizers.

The empty parking lot brought back a funny memory. One morning I pulled into the lot early and found a crane operator setting up his crane to lift a very large HVAC unit onto to the roof of the facility. Very close to the crane was the BMW Roadster that belonged to Andreas Schauffler our chief financial officer. Andreas was a native of Germany and not known for his sense of humor. Actually, he once admitted to me that his wife had accused him of not having one. Being a former finance guy, I always had sympathy for Andreas. I remember once walking into the office back in my early days at Maxwell House where I was a financial analyst with my boss Vince Summa the controller and him telling me: “You have to remember that we are the fiduciaries of the company and Fiduche to our friends”.

As I walked into KFI that morning with the crane and the BMW there I couldn’t help myself. I went to the crane operator and laughingly asked what it would cost me to have the BMW put on the roof as a joke. To which he replied with a smile: “A lot less than you might think”. As luck would have it, just as I was having this conversation, Nancy Webb, who worked for Herr Schauffler, pulled into the parking lot, and I asked her if she wanted to kick in $50 to have Andreas’s prized Roadster put on the roof. She explained to me, with a frightened look on her face, that it wasn’t a great idea and she wanted no part of it. Of course, I chickened out.

Fast forward to today and the good news is that I cut off a branch of rosemary to roast a chicken with tonight and If you are ever in Memphis and need rosemary, I can tell you where to go.

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How To Grill The Perfect Steak.

A question I get asked all the time is: Can you teach my husband to grill a steak? He over-cook’s everything.

There are several things that I do for everything I grill:

Let the steak slack out to room temperature for 45 minutes
Pre-heat the grill on high for 15 minutes
Brush on a light coating of olive all and season liberally with kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper.
Place on the grill and cook side one until about 60% done. I don’t believe in flipping the steak. It is good to get a little char on side one. Side two should be less charred

In my method there are 3 ways to check for done-ness

Touch it. Every steak you have ever had st a restaurant has been touched. At KFI we trained salespeople to check for doneness. I call it the GOLDILOCKS METHOD. We had them touch a raw steak. It is too soft. We had them touch an overcooked steak. It is too hard. We had them touch a medium steak and it was in between hard and soft. It was just right. Touch takes practice. GOLDILOCKS KNEW HER STUFF!
Use an instant read thermometer. They work pretty well.Thermometers work better for roasts than they do for grilling. Sometimes the high heat of the grill throws off the reading. I cook it to 115 degrees. Pull it off the grill and let it sit. It will continue to cook up to 125 degrees which is the perfect medium rare(For the record, the really good chefs I have worked with, make fun of chefs that keep an instant read thermometers on their sleeve. Great chefs have a sense of touch that obsolesces thermometers)
Cut a little slice. This a taboo in most cookbooks as “they” say you are letting out the juices. I once saw one of the best chefs I have ever worked with cut a little slice. There is nothing like seeing the doneness to be sure.

The goal is medium rare. I have surveyed chefs that work in high end white table cloth restaurants and they say 85% of customers want medium rare. I have one friend that asks the waiter for his steaks “Medium rare plus”. I pity the poor server that goes back to tell the chef that a customer wants his steak medium rare plus. If the server is lucky the chef will laugh. A few chefs I know would explode.

The first question I get asked is how long should I cook the steak. My answer is that it depends on several factors:How hot is the grill. All grills vary:

How often you open the grill
How often you flip the steak (Only once recommended)
How thick is your steak

Time and temperature doesn’t work! Stick to the 3 doneness measures above and with a little practice you will get really good.

With the goal of medium rare. I cook to rare (warm red center) pull it off the grill, brush it with a compound butter (butter, garlic, shallot, herbs, salt and pepper) and let it sit for 15 minutes. Then slice and serve.

So what about steak for people that like their steak well-done? This is bad, but I avoid friends that like well done steaks. I love the line in Anthony Bourdain’s book where he claims that most chefs save the worst steak for dinners that ask for well done. If they want well done they don’t have a clue. Truth is that there will always be end pieces of meat for the well done guys

Lobster Lovers

The People that love lobster, really love lobster. Building a summer time menu around lobster is always popular. Lobster salad is a great summer-time way to enjoy lobster in s supper club dinner party.

(Susan and Jennifer at Jennifer’s and Ethan’s wedding rehearsal dinner which featured – LOBSTER)

My wife Susan is a consummate lobster lover. She remembers the first time she had lobster as a ten-year old girl. She enjoyed it then and never misses the chance to enjoy it again. When we make our annual pilgrimage to the beach she tries to have lobster at least once a week. Somehow lobster tastes better at the beach. I will never forget the lecture she gave an old boyfriend of our daughter’s who was a Memphian. He hade the mistake of saying that the lobster from Kroger in Memphis was as good as lobster in the Hamptons. That boyfriend didn’t stand a chance…

(Another crustacean that lost out to Susan)

After college we had an annual “Hamptoons” party with over 20 friends at my parents place in Westhampton. The highlight of the weekend was a lobster feast we would have on Saturday night. Every year some of our guests were lobster neophytes. Susan would conduct “How to eat lobster” training. Back in the day, there was a fair amount of alcohol consumed at those parties. Somehow the combination of a little too much alcohol and a lot of lobster with butter led to stomach issues. Every year we would give out the “Poison Lobster” award to poor sucker that was either over served kamikazes or over indulged with lobster or both.

(Susan relaxing by the pool in Westhampton)

Lobster salad is a great, lighter way to enjoy the prince of the seafood world. I prefer to serve lobster salad in conjunction with a salad ring. Check out the recipes:

Lobster Salad

Salad Ring

I prefer my lobster salad as part of a larger salad with cucumber, tomato and fresh mozzarella versus a lobster roll. My daughter’s in-laws spend summers in Montauk N.Y. where lobster rolls are legendary. I have had some great lobster rolls in Montauk and elsewhere. For me, the bread takes away from the lobster versus the salad ring that complements the lobster. In the end, whether it is in a roll or with a larger salad it doesn’t matter. It is all about the lobster.

(Ode to Montauk and its Lobster Rolls)

Build a supper club menu around lobster and you can’t go wrong.