Prune

Shock the tomatoes by giving them a 5-second dunk in an ice bath and then setting them on your cutting board; don’t let their sunny interiors run cold by forgetting them in the ice water. In and out, please.

Peel and core. Save peels, lay out on Silpat mat, and dry in slow low oven until papery. Grind in spice mill to flecks.

To plate:

Slice in thick slabs, 1 whole tomato per portion, about 3 cuts per tomato.

Shingle on the plate.

Heat small saucepan on stove. Add rather generous hunk of salted French butter and quickly bring to the foamy stage of melted.

Spoon butter all over tomatoes and allow it to pool up on the plate—it will turn slightly pink-tinged from the juices of the tomato commingling with the butter.

Scatter a few Maldon flakes and dried tomato skin flakes to sell.

Take care not to have cold tomatoes. And don’t bring back heirlooms from the farmer’s market. This is all about the plain, fantastic Jersey beefsteak.

Celery Hearts Victor

Yield: 6 orders

6 celery heads

*1 whole heart per order/portion

2 bay leaves

8 black peppercorns

3 quarts College Inn chicken broth

6 oil-packed anchovy fillets, minced by hand

4 fresh, sticky, burning garlic cloves, minced

not microplaned

½ teaspoon chili flakes

*use commercial, not our homemade ones

⅓ cup fresh lemon juice

1 cup extra virgin olive oil

kosher salt to taste

½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

parsley, to finish

Remove big, fibrous outer stalks of each head of celery and shave off dirty, browned bit at the root end to reveal clean white flesh. Keep head intact.

Trim the tops without losing the interior bright yellow leaves.

Wash thoroughly, rinsing deep into the heads by holding directly under the faucet.

Place celery heads in single layer in hotel pan and cover with commercial chicken broth. Don’t use our homemade stock.

Scatter with peppercorns and add bay leaves. Don’t salt. The celery itself has some salinity.

Cover with parchment and foil and bring to a simmer on the stovetop over 2 burners, if necessary. Lower heat to barest flame possible and let braise for 15–20 minutes on the stovetop until tender when you pierce deep into the base with a blade or skewer.

Remove seal and lift cooked celery out onto a baker’s drying rack set over a sheet pan to fully drain and cool. Save the celery braising liquid from batch to batch, well labeled and accurately dated.

When cool enough to handle, pull off any green outer stalks that may have over-cooked. Contribute green outer stalks to family meal.

Leave the hearts as natural and “as is” as possible. Cut crosswise into 2½" medallions, and pack neatly and tightly into shallow container to be marinated. Don’t let them fall apart.

Whisk together the olive oil, lemon juice, minced anchovy, and garlic and season with the chili flakes, kosher salt, and freshly ground black pepper.

*Make it bright, assertive, and bracing. Make sure the marinade saturates the hearts evenly.*

To plate:

Arrange 1 heart’s worth of medallions per order in the shallow small bowl, keep nestled close together so they hold their shape without falling open. Be sure much of the dressing is spooned over and really drenching the cold celery. Add freshly chopped parsley as you plate and allow to temper briefly to shake the dulling cold from the reach-in before you send to the table.

Roasted Beets and their tops with Aioli

Yield: 4 orders	x20
2 pounds small beets (red, mixed variety, or mixed color) with their greens attached	10#
1½ Tablespoons extra virgin olive oil	evoo
¼ teaspoon kosher salt	salt
½ cup Aioli	1 qt. +/-

Remove the beet greens and wash thoroughly. Set aside.

Scrub the beets in a sinkful of cold water; use the vegetable brush.

Rinse the beets and arrange them in a single layer in a shallow hotel pan—you want them wet from the washing. The few drops of water will help during the roasting; this is not a dry roast. Don’t use a sheet pan; we’ve noticed that the beets get dry and hard and don’t peel well when they are spread out too far away from each other.

Season the beets with a gentle glug of olive oil and sprinkle with the salt.

Cover tightly with foil, shiny side out.

Roast in 400° oven for 1 hour but check at 40 minutes, by inserting skewer, cake tester, or thin blade of your knife tip to see if they are tender.

Remove from oven, remove foil, and allow to cool enough to handle.

Wear gloves and slip the skins off of the beets. Leave the long tails when possible. If the skins are not slipping off easily, they may be undercooked. Rewrap them and continue to cook until perfectly done—don’t try to forge ahead with a product you know is not properly done.

If you have mixed color beets, take care to store them separately when you are peeling as the red are powerful stainers and they obliterate the gorgeous paler hues of the cioggia, yellow, or candy cane beets when you throw them all together—you just end up with universal crimson. On the other hand, you can sometimes add a red beet to a tray of yellow to create gorgeous color.

For the greens:

Blanch the clean beet greens—stems and all—in perfectly salted, boiling water. Cook until just tender, shock in ice water, and lay out on a baker’s rack over sheet pan to drain thoroughly.

To plate:

Generous hearty dollop aioli, spread out a little with the back of the spoon.

Loose nest/tangle of cooked greens, centered on aioli.

Cooked mixed colored beets, cut in half, neatly arranged on top of greens.

Healthy drizzle of EVOO to just slightly pool in bottom of dish.

Fresh grind pepper. Do not salt.

Soft-Cooked Zucchini with Green Onion and Poblanos

Yield: 4 orders	x16
1½ pounds firm, tightly pored, and shiny green zucchini	6#
¼ pound new green onions or conventional scallions	1#
3 cloves fresh sticky garlic with plenty of “burn”	1 head
1 small glossy, firm poblano pepper	3 lg.
¼ pound sweet butter	1#
kosher salt	salt

Wash zucchini well under cold running water and wipe dry and thoroughly with a clean kitchen towel.

Cut the zucchini into ¾" disks, and include the delicious and tender stems at the tops that attach the fruit to the vine. (But shave off the dry and discolored tips.)

Wash the scallions or green onions thoroughly in a cold-water bath, letting the dirt and sand settle down to the bottom of the sink. Wash multiple times if necessary. Trim the roots if they have browned and look old and unappealing, but if we are lucky enough to have fresh and vital roots still attached, leave them on, making sure they are free of sand.

Cut the scallions/green onions into ¼" rings, cutting as far up into the green of the stalk as you possibly can. In some cases, you can get 100 percent yield from the onion, but others get a little too fibrous and unappetizingly hollow at the very top. Trim according to the condition of the onion in front of you.

Peel the garlic, trim the hard dry tips, and cut across the grain into thin slices.

In a heavy enameled cast-iron Dutch oven, melt one third of the butter over gentle heat.

Add onions and peppers and garlic, season with salt, and let sweat 2–3 minutes, with the lid on, letting the accumulating steam run back into the pot.

Add the zucchini and season again with salt to taste.

Add another knob of butter. Stir well to coat the zucchini and sweat briefly, uncovered.

Add the remaining butter and cover with a tight-fitting lid and allow to braise in its own liquid approximately 20–25 minutes, until soft and nearly falling apart.

Fresh Shell Bean Ragout with Cardoons and Mint

Yield: 4–6 orders	x20 +/-
2 pounds shell beans—see if we can get a few varieties in addition to borlotti and cranberry, and ask for those picked young if he has them	8#
1–2 pounds cardoons	8#
4 cups Chicken Stock	4qts.
⅓ pound butter	1# +/-
mint—1 large bunch	12 oz.
salt and freshly ground black pepper	S+P

Shell the beans and measure your yield—it’s usually a little less than half of what you started with in weight after you shuck. 8 pounds of shell beans yields a shy 4 pounds of shucked beans, approximately.

Trim the tops and bottoms and shave off the leaves of the cardoons until you have good substantial stalks to work with. Take care with the little prickles and also wash your hands immediately after handling to remove the intense bitter film they leave on your skin. Switch out your cutting board as well for a new clean one after you have finished the cardoon prep.

Cut directly across the stalks in ¼" to ⅓" slices.

Clean and yield an equal amount of cardoon as your shell bean yield.

Boil plenty of salted water in pot large enough to hold the cardoons.

Blanch the cardoons for a couple of minutes and drain.

Taste a slice to determine how profound the bitterness is.

If it’s still tremendously off-putting, boil more fresh water, season with salt, and do a second blanch.

More or less, you want equal parts shell beans, cardoons, and chicken stock to start with.

To build:

Melt a healthy slab of butter slowly in a sauteuse, and add the blanched cardoons.

Stir until coated and glossy.

Add the shell beans and stir and heat through until glossy.

Just cover with chicken stock and bring to simmer.

Chop a generous amount of mint and stir in.

Add another healthy slab of butter and stir in.

Season with salt and pepper and simmer until beans are cooked through, cardoons are tender, and their high bitterness is tamed, 20–30 minutes.

Stir in another big handful of freshly chopped mint just before serving.

The butter is there to tame the high bitter of the cardoon, not put it to sleep entirely. Please keep the ratio of butter to chicken stock such that the final dish is brothy but rich and full-bodied, and that it allows the cardoon to retain some of its personality. It shouldn’t be challengingly bitter; just pleasantly bitter.

Artichokes Barigoule with Lemon Aioli

Yield: 6 orders	x18
6 large globe artichokes	18
1 whole head garlic as is, paper skins intact, split in half horizontally	2
1 onion, coarsely chop	2 onion
1 celery stalks, 1½" pieces	2 celery
1 carrot, peeled, 1" rounds	2 carrots
1 fennel bulb, quartered	1½
¼ cup extra virgin olive oil	¾ c.
1 Tablespoon fennel seeds, toasted	2T.
1 Tablespoon whole black peppercorns	¼ c.
kosher salt	2T.
1 lemon, rinsed under warm water to remove wax, halved	2
1 bay leaf	3 bay
3–4 sprigs fresh thyme	6
3–4 sprigs fresh parsley	6
½ cup white wine	1 bottle @750ml.
½ cup fried bread crumbs
thin lemon slices
4 Tablespoons cold sweet butter
¾ cup Lemon Aioli
olive oil for packing and frying

Place whole artichokes into salted boiling water, weighing down with kitchen towel and undersized lid or dinner plate. Do not worry about trimming or cleaning.

Cook until just tender where stem meets thistle.

CHECK AT 10 MINS.**

Remove from water and drain—stems up, leaves down—in perforated hotel pan or use the flat silverware dish rack if prepping large batch. Let cool until you can handle them with your bare hands. Doubled-up pairs of latex gloves vaguely help if you are in a rush and they are too hot to handle.

Peel tough outer leaves of artichoke away from top and down toward stem, peeling fibrous stem “naturally” in process.

Remove in one handful the remaining cone of good tender leaves and pack in quart containers for service.

With your fingers, remove the hairy, prickly choke from the heart and discard. I like the natural goose bumps look of the heart’s flesh when you do this by hand more than the smooth look that often leaves the track of the spoon’s edge when you scrape out the choke with a spoon. This also is a way of telling you how perfectly you have cooked them; if you can’t pluck the choke with your fingers and are obliged to scrape with a spoon, you have probably undercooked them and they will be prone to blacken.

Cut discolored tip off bottom of the stem.

Cut hearts in ¼'s and pack in olive oil for service.

Bring vegetables, herbs, spices, white wine, and EVOO to boil in a stainless steel, nonreactive stockpot and then reduce to simmer. One day I am going to weed out and trash every piece of aluminum we have in the house and splurge on all stainless and all enameled cast-iron cookware—and maybe some beautiful copper as well if we ever make any lavish money—but in the meantime, please know when to only use stainless. Anything with wine, citrus, tomatoes, pineapple … never in aluminum, please.

Simmer 30 minutes until vegetables are totally soft and spent and broth is aromatic and flavorful. Strain broth and set aside. Chuck the aromatics.

To assemble:

Heat barigoule liquid in a stainless sauteuse. Add artichoke hearts. Simmer until just heated through.

Heat the oil the hearts were packed in in a small pot to 350°; fry the tender inner leaves until crispy and golden brown like potato chips.

Drain the leaves in small stack coffee filters; lightly and evenly salt while warm.

In the same oil, fry ultra-thin lemon slices; drain and lightly salt.

Remove the artichoke hearts with a slotted spoon and hold warm in your station. Return barigoule to burner and whisk in cold sweet butter until emulsified and the off-putting, astringent acidity of the barigoule is tamed but not docile.

To plate:

Pool nice spoonful of lemon aioli in bottom of shallow bowl.

Stand artichoke hearts up.

Spoon barigoule sauce all around.

Garnish with fried lemon slices, warm bread crumbs, and fried artichoke leaves.

For the bread crumbs:

1 cup real homemade bread crumbs; panko as a backup if we are out

3–4 Tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

salt and freshly ground black pepper

Toast bread crumbs in a sauté pan with olive oil until golden brown. Season well.

Fresh Flageolets with Braised Baby Leeks and Chanterelle Mushrooms

Yield: 8 orders

1 pound shelled fresh flageolets

10 baby leeks

1 pound chanterelle mushrooms

8 cups Chicken Stock

3 garlic cloves

1 cup loosely packed parsley leaves

2 medium shallots

butter

salt and freshly ground black pepper

EVOO

Simmer the flageolets in water seasoned with just salt, bay leaf, and a few black peppercorns. Fresh beans are a different game—they will only need 30 minutes +/− to lose their raw quality and start to show their true waxy nature. Strain when cooked.

Clean baby leeks but leave whole.

Clean chanterelles with a few brisk dunks in sinkful of cold water.

Chop garlic.

Chop parsley.

Slice shallots into thin rings.

In mixed fats, sauté the chanterelles over medium-high heat; season with salt and pepper.

When the water they release starts to reduce and have body; add a little more fat and the chopped garlic and reduce the flame just a tap.

Let the garlic soften but not take on any color.

Push the mushrooms into a ring at the edge, clearing space in the center of the pan, and add one more knob of butter.

Lay in the leeks in one layer and sweat them until their exteriors are bright green and turning translucent; roll them around a bit; season briefly with salt during the sweating. You want to take the hard raw edge off of them and let some of their sweetness start to develop before adding the stock to fully braise them.

Scatter parcooked flageolet generously in and around the pan, to create a more or less equal ratio of beans:leeks:mushrooms.

Ladle in chicken stock to not quite cover but to flood the contents.

Season with salt and pepper to taste, and bring to a gentle simmer.

Lay the handle of your wooden spoon across the pan with the bowl of the spoon resting beyond the lip, and set a lid down on the pan to loosely cover during the simmer. The spoon handle gives a better gap to allow steam to escape than just setting the lid askew. We want the weak watery condensation to escape but the chicken stock and the sweet, earthy juices of the leeks and mushrooms to continue to commingle and reduce together.

Stir in chopped parsley and one nut of cold butter before plating.

*Take care that your leeks are fully cooked. Make sure there is no raw bite at the center and no “all dente” texture. Leeks should be slippery and silken when perfectly cooked.

Creamed Corn, Fresh and Dried

For fresh corn:

4 orders	x20
3 ears sweet yellow Jersey corn	24
⅓ pound butter	2# +/-
1 cup heavy cream	3c.
salt	S+P
freshly ground black pepper
sugar	sugar +/-

For fresh corn:

Shuck and shave the ears of corn. Save a few of the cobs.

In a rondeau, gently melt the butter. Add the cobs and sweat briefly.

Add the shaved corn. Stir to coat with butter. Add more butter, if not glossy and slick.

Allow to steam and sweat and turn bright yellow.

Add heavy cream.

Season well with salt and pepper.

Add sugar, carefully, sparingly, depending on the initial sweetness of the corn.

Bring to simmer over medium-high flame until the corn has turned bright yellow and is soft but not mushy. Remove the pot from the heat. Remove the cobs.

In the Robot Coupe, grind 60% of the corn, about 3–4 long pulses until coarse puree. Combine with the rest of the corn; stir well. Check seasoning again.

Run this as an addition when any corn on the cob in house has been in walk-in more than 2–3 days and has lost its incredibleness.

For creamed dried corn:

6 orders	x12
1 pound John Cope’s Pennsylvania Dutch dried yellow sweet corn	2#
6 cups milk	3qt. milk
1 cup heavy cream	2c. h. cr.
8 Tablespoons sweet butter	½#
sugar	sugar +/-
salt	S+P
freshly ground black pepper

For creamed dried corn:

Soak corn in milk and cream overnight in walk-in.

Transfer to rondeau and bring to boil.

Season with salt, pepper, and sugar once milk mixture is hot.

Simmer for approximately half an hour, partially covered.

Keep an eye on it and stir occasionally so it doesn’t scorch on the bottom.

Stir in butter at the end until fully melted.

Grind 60/40 in Robot Coupe and recombine.

*Only John Cope’s. If we have failed to order/inventory properly and run out, do not substitute anything from Whole Foods or any Goya Product.

Fried Zucchini Agrodolce with Chilies and Fresh Mint

4 orders

6 clean, firm medium zucchini

kosher salt

olive oil

agrodolce

mint leaves

For the agrodolce:

1 cup cider vinegar

⅓ cup sugar

2 garlic cloves, slivered

2 pinches homemade chili flakes

Slice zucchini into ¼"-thick rounds or long ribbons, or both, and lay out in single layer on a baker’s rack set inside a sheet pan.

Salt lightly and evenly and set in turned-off oven to dry in the warmth of just the pilot lights for about an hour. We are looking for a papery, slightly leathery quality.

This is our ridiculous makeshift way of approximating sun-dried zucchini.

But if you ever get the chance to do this the right way, under the extraordinary heat of the southern Italian sun, you will see a big difference.

To pick up:

Fry pieces of dried, salted zucchini in ample olive oil in a small sauté pan. Make sure oil is hot when slices go in. Attend to it with a slotted spoon, flipping and dunking as needed, until zucchini is blistered and pale gold.

Arrange fried zucchini in shallow bowl allowing whatever hot olive oil that clings to your slotted spoon to drain off into the bowl as you plate.

Scatter a loose handful of small picked mint leaves over the warm fried zucchini.

In stainless steel, nonreactive saucepot, simmer cider vinegar and sugar until mixture begins to turn syrupy, 5–10 minutes. Add chili flake and turn off heat. Drop in slices of raw garlic, and spoon while piping hot all over and around the zucchini and mint until you smell the mint bloom under the hot liquid exactly like a tea.

Fire this early when the order comes in so that it has time to settle, permeate the fried zucchini, and also be mellowed somewhat by the oil that will leach out of the zucchini as it rests.

Pumpkin in Ginger Beer with Brewer’s Yeast

Yield: 6 orders	x18
⅓ pumpkin (5 pounds) pumpkin (red kuri, cheese, or white variety)	1 whole/15#
⅓ can (4 ounces) Gosling’s ginger beer	1 can
⅓ pound butter, in cubes	1# +/-
kosher salt	salt
brewer’s yeast	yeast

Set oven at 400°.

Rinse and split the pumpkin into large wedges, about 2 ribs per wedge. Clean out seeds. Place points up (like Viking boats) in a shallow hotel pan, lightly salt. Dot liberally with butter, and pour the ginger beer over the wedges.

Sprinkle nutritional yeast over the pumpkin and the braising liquid generously.

Roast in oven until pumpkin is cooked through, about an hour. Baste frequently throughout the cooking time to be sure ginger beer and butter and unique flavor of yeast penetrate the flesh of the pumpkins.

*Ok if the tips of the wedges char slightly.*

To plate:

Reheat in oven with some of the liquid from roasting.

Pour liquid over the wedge; season with salt and a generous dusting of brewer’s yeast.

Braised Green Cabbage with Anchovies and Garlic

4 orders	x16
2 pounds heavy, firm regular green cabbage, cored, halved, and then cut into 1-inch wedges	8-10#
8 anchovy fillets in oil	30
½ head whole garlic, peeled but leaving cloves whole	2 heads
¼ pound sweet butter	1½#
salt to taste	S+P
freshly ground black pepper to taste

In a large, heavy-bottomed rondeau, heat the butter over medium-low heat. Add the anchovies and garlic and stir around until the garlic softens slightly and the anchovies dissolve a bit. Do not fry or otherwise brown the garlic and anchovy; we want it to just soften and take on a sweet quality rather than a nutty one. Stir frequently and let the garlic and anchovy cook gently and slowly.

Rinse the cabbage ribbons under cold running water in a colander and allow to drain without shaking the colander. Whatever water remains in the crevices is desired.

Turn the colander of cabbage out into the rondeau and stir well with the garlic and anchovy, coating all the ribbons with the fat. If this pot has a tight-fitting lid, cover the rondeau and turn down the heat and let the cabbage gently cook over low heat, retaining its own moisture and letting whatever condensation forms on the lid to drip back into the pot. This wants to be a true braise. If the pot does not have a tight-fitting lid, use both parchment and foil to create a tight seal.

This can take an hour to braise but sometimes less depending on the cabbage itself. Some heads are sturdier than others.

Keep an eye on it and cook until soft watercolor green color; the cabbage should still hold its shape and there should be a rich “broth” formed from the anchovy, the sweet liquid of the cabbage, and the now very soft cloves of garlic.

Into this, stir in a good chunk of cold butter with a wooden spoon and shake the pot a bit as well. This will turn the cabbage a bit creamy and take off any of the hard saltiness of the anchovy. Hold warm, gently.

Charred Okra and Mixed Onions with Berbere Spices

4 orders

⅓ pound mixed types of onions, peeled and cut into uniform wedges

⅓ pound okra, split in half stem to tail

extra virgin olive oil

cold butter

Berbere Spice Mixture

salt to taste

Dredge cut side of okra in berbere spice mixture, tap off excess, and allow to dry cut-side up on baker’s rack.

Arrange onions on sheet pan, rounded sides down, and drizzle with olive oil. Season briefly with salt.

Roast onions in a hot oven until soft and tips start to blacken. Set aside and separate two or three of the onions for the butter sauce.

Set a large cast-iron skillet on a medium-high flame and let heat up 5 full minutes.

Into the dry pan, efficiently arrange the seasoned okra cut-sides down, and let the okra char slightly. Remove with a spatula.

Reduce heat under skillet and add a half cup or so of water and a good knob of cold butter, and blend together. Add the charred okra. When the okra is perfectly tender and rounding the corner toward soft, 15 minutes +/−, add the onions, and with extreme gentleness, stir together to integrate. Turn off heat, but keep warm.

In a small saucepot, boil ½ cup of water with the reserved pieces of charred onions and a pinch of salt. When the water is truly oniony, discard the onions and reduce the remaining water to just a few tablespoons and then quickly whisk in a few knobs of cold butter until you have a viscous, light onion-butter sauce.

Spoon okra and onions into shallow plate attractively.

Drizzle the onion beurre fondue over the onion-okra mixture to finish.

Roasted Mixed Onions with Onion Butter and Toasted Seeds

6 orders

4 pounds torpedo onions, cipolline onions, red onions, shallots, scallions, in approximately equal parts.

butter

water

EVOO

salt

1 teaspoon flax seeds

1 teaspoon millet

1 teaspoon sesame seeds

1 teaspoon poppy seeds

Toast seeds in a dry pan on the stovetop or on ¼ sheet pan in the conventional oven. Don’t use the convection oven downstairs unless you want to see a bee swarm of seeds blow around the oven and be ruined.

Peel all the onions, cut in halves, quarters, sixths, or leave whole depending on natural state of onion.

Save all of the trimmings, but discard all the skins.

Use a little oil and salt and roast at 400° to get nice blackened tips here and there, but be sure bodies have softened and released their sugars.

Roast onions separately, keeping like with like so they cook uniformly.

Make a strong onion tea by boiling all the onion scrap in 1–2 cups of water until all onion flavor is completely extracted. Discard the spent solids and keep the onion tea.

Per order, arrange some of each onion on sizzle plate and reheat in hot oven.

In small saucepot, boil 4 Tablespoons onion water.

Don’t psych yourself out over this — you can practically let it boil and it still won’t break, as long as there is more h₂o than butter.

Mount in 2 Tablespoons of cold butter to make glossy full-bodied oniony beurre fondue—season with salt to bring out full sweetness of both the onion and the butter.

Plate onions in shallow small bowl.

Spoon onion butter over generously.

Sprinkle with a healthy pinch of the toasted seeds and a few Maldon flakes.

We want the uncanny taste of an everything bagel.

Roasted Garnet Yams with Brown Butter Vinaigrette and Deep-Fried Skins

4 orders

4 medium sized garnet yams, firm and in good shape

Brown Butter Vinaigrette

kosher salt

Wash yams and then roast directly on oven rack in hot oven (400°) until tender throughout and softened.

*Don’t use a sheetpan — right onto the rack itself, please. Also, don’t pierce.

Remove the yams from the oven when they are cooked and when they are just cool enough to handle but still quite warm; slit the skin from tip to tip without cutting into the flesh. Sometimes a sharp pair of scissors is good for this job but stop stealing scissors from the office! You should have a pair in your knife kit as part of your discipline as a line cook, please.

Remove the yams from their jackets and set aside in a warm place under plastic film so they stay warm and moist. Cut or tear the skins into wide ribbons.

Deep-fry the skins until crispy. Drain in a short stack of coffee filters.

Season evenly with kosher salt while still warm.

To plate:

Slice the yams into thick coins, slather with generous amount of brown butter vinaigrette, and scatter the fried skins on top.

Please don’t use the jewels or the beauregards, and never the standard sweet potatoes, in place of the garnets; I love their water content, which makes them downright juicy, and their relatively lower sugar content, which in most of the sweet potatoes I barely find palatable. If you can’t get the garnets, seriously, 86 the dish.

Celery Root with Caraway Butter and Caraway Seed Gastrique

4 orders

2 pounds whole celery roots, trimmed of their beardy bottoms, scrubbed meticulously—not a grain of sand, please

3 cups Diamond Crystal kosher salt

8 egg whites

Caraway Butter

Caraway Seed Gastrique

For the gastrique:

	x12
1 cup sugar	2c.
¼ cup water	½c. h₂o
½ cup apple cider vinegar	1 c. vin
1 Tablespoon finely ground toasted caraway seeds	1T. + 1 tsp.

Combine water and sugar in saucepot. Bring slowly to boil, reduce to simmer.

Bring steadily to dark amber caramel, about 8 minutes. Quickly remove.

Carefully add cider vinegar. Stir in caraway.

Let cool.

For the caraway butter:

	x2 pints
½ pound sweet butter	1#
1 Tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon toasted ground caraway seeds	2T. +/-
¼ teaspoon salt	salt +/-

Blend completely. Chill.

For roasting the roots:

Whisk egg whites past foamy to true soft peaks. Fold in all the salt.

Encase celery roots completely in salt-egg mixture on ½ sheet pan.

Bake in hot oven (400°) for 2 hours.

Hold warm, above grill, during service.

*Save all whites from prep and use here. Do not crack new eggs — we have so many extra whites floating around!

To plate:

Crack salt crust, remove celery roots.

Cut into thick rounds and smother in softened caraway butter.

Spoon gastrique all over.

Do not salt!

8 whites = 1 cup +/−

Whole Roasted Cauliflower with Fried Capers and Brown Butter Bread Crumbs

Per order:

1 medium cauliflower, whole but cored

*save all the cores for waxing*

1 Tablespoon capers in brine

3 Tablespoons unsalted butter

3 Tablespoons bread crumbs (ours, not panko)

kosher salt

½ cup extra virgin olive oil

Start early and don’t get behind. Each head will take a full 50 minutes. If service is bogging down, blanch heads for 10 minutes and then finish as usual in oven.

I can eat a whole one of these myself—no sweat—but tell servers to try to only sell one per table, please.

Put whole head in sauté pan just big enough to hold it. Drizzle with ¼ cup EVOO. Season with salt rained down evenly.

Roast in oven at 375° for 25 minutes. Leave it alone.

Flip upside down, add another ¼ cup olive oil. Return to oven for 25 minutes.

On stovetop, fry capers in butter until butter browns and capers burst open, about 2 minutes.

Quickly add bread crumbs and toast until golden brown.

Plate cauli in large wooden bowl. Spoon buttered caper bread crumbs all over.

Make sure you have a soft core—use cake tester or skewer or knife tip. Sometimes the crumbs have been too dry. Make sure they are luscious with brown butter.

But not greasy.

Stewed Yellow Lentils, Cardamom Braised Chard, and Gunpowder

For the lentils:

Yield: 4 orders	x16
½ pound toovar dal	2# dal
4 cups water	16c. h₂o
2 teaspoons salt	2T.
1 teaspoon turmeric	1T.
¼ cup clarified butter	1 c. clari
1 cup sliced shallots	1 qt. full
1 Tablespoon clarified butter	¼c. clari
1 pinch asafetida	½tsp.
1 teaspoon cumin seeds	1T.
1½ teaspoons garam masala	2T.
½ teaspoon cayenne pepper	2tsp
3 dried curry leaves (no stems)	10 leaves

For the braised chard:

2 pounds chard leaves	10# chard
1 small yellow onion	1 large
½ cup cream	2c.
½ cup milk	1 c.
1 large pinch ground cardamom from whole toasted pods	1T. +/-
kosher salt to taste	salt
2 rounded Tablespoons solid cold-pressed coconut oil	coconut

For the gunpowder:

	x1QT.
¼ cup cornmeal	3T.
1 teaspoon salt	3T.
½ teaspoon cayenne pepper	1T.
¼ teaspoon ground cumin	1T.

For the dal:

Wash dal in several changes of water until water runs clear. Often the legumes from our Indian store have a faint taste of sandalwood incense because they sell so much of it and they don’t sort their products very effectively. It’s gross to have that flavor in the food. Rinse well, multiple times.

Bring dal, water, salt, and turmeric to a boil, then simmer for 45 min–1 hour, stirring often to keep dal from sticking to bottom of pot.

Remove from heat.

Caramelize shallots in ¼ cup clarified butter until they are dark like copper. Keep them sweet and do not cross over into bitter from burning, please. Strain out fried shallots and set aside. Add the fat they were fried in to the stewed lentils.

In another smaller pan, warm 1 Tablespoon clarified butter and add asafetida, cumin, garam masala, and cayenne before butter gets hot.

When spices begin to sizzle, add curry leaves and swirl in pan until leaves become fragrant.

Add spice mixture to dal; include all the fat.

Dal will thicken as it cools. Taste and adjust for seasoning. We want a sure presence of garam masala and to feel some cayenne heat.

For the braised chard:

Wash and ribbon chard leaves.

DON’T THROW AWAY THE STEMS. Run as wax or addition.

In rondeau, melt coconut oil and sweat diced onions slowly to translucent.

Add chard leaves and any water clinging to them.

Sweat and wilt and add another spoonful of coconut fat if needed to get chard slick. Use a lot of chard; it reduces significantly.

Add cream and milk and bring to a boil. Season with cardamom and salt.

When chard is collapsed and tender but still lively, pull from the heat and transfer to processor. Pulse until creamed, but with a little texture.

To plate:

Generous pool of lentils in shallow bowl.

Generous spoonful of hot creamed chard, set on lentils. Don’t swamp the lentils; let them be seen.

Sprinkle with toasted gunpowder.

Finish with crispy shallots.

Mixed Colored Carrots with Preserved Lemon Butter and Honeycomb

Yield: 4 orders

2 pounds beautiful mixed color carrots

Preserved Lemon Butter

honeycomb

Maldon sea salt

Peel the carrots with Y-peeler.

Long fluid strokes please — do not chisel away at them.

Parcook briefly in salted boiling water; drain gently through a perforated hotel pan, taking care that they don’t get nicked and dented.

We have nothing here but carrots and butter, so let’s show we know how to work in a kitchen and take care of our ingredients.

During service, keep a dinner napkin draped in your hot water bath and lift the carrots out at each order by using your napkin as a kind of gurney or stork’s bundle. Turn them out into a shallow ⅓ pan and roll them in a generous spoonful of preserved lemon butter. Tip and slide the carrots right onto the plate without using a utensil. Arrange with your fingers into an organized casual pyramid.

Cut a drippy, oozing tablet of honeycomb and set on top at the pass.

A small pinch of Maldon to finish—be careful with the salt-sugar balance, keeping in mind the carrots themselves are sweet.

Pole Beans Braised in Kalamata Olive Oil with Anise Hyssop

6 orders

5 pounds mixed beautiful pole beans from Zone 7 or the market or Guy Jones

1 head sticky, fresh burning garlic, separated into cloves, peeled, gently crushed/bruised

equal parts water and kalamata EVOO

kosher salt

white pepper

2–3 good leafy branch anise hyssop

Use purple and yellow and green beans in a good-looking/equal-parts mix.

Trim stems but leave tails. Wash and lay out in hotel pan and scatter garlic around.

Cover in equal parts EVOO and water—don’t be stingy. Season with salt and white pepper, drop hyssop branch on top.

Cover with film and foil and bring to simmer on stovetop, but finish in 350° oven, 45 minutes to an hour.

We want them really soft-cooked, drab, lusciously oily—like they would do at a village restaurant on a remote Greek island.

Don’t refrigerate, and don’t reheat to serve. Let them sit at ambient temperature through service.

Asparagus with Sable Butter

4 orders

3–4 pounds asparagus

Sable Butter

Snap stems at natural breaking point, then trim ends to neaten.

Boil in salted water, “au point.” I know we talk about this ad nauseam all season long, but let’s get it right, people! Hit the point every time.

Give them close to a whole pound per order; it’s a short season and it only comes once a year!

Put 2 disks of sable butter on small football, lay hot drained asparagus on top, lay 1 final disk of sable butter on top to melt on the way to the table.

I can’t believe I have to say this but please arrange on the plate with all of the tips facing the same direction — not in a chaotic jumble.

Grilled Asparagus with Salsa Verde

4 orders

3–4 pounds asparagus

Salsa Verde

EVOO

Leave spears as long as you can but trim any woody bottoms.

Cook asparagus, dry, across the grids on grill. With the grids will drive you mad all night long trying to retrieve them from the deep crevices.

Get good black char spots all over, until kind of mottled green and black.

Spoon salsa verde on bottom of small football, lay asparagus on top, and finish with one more spoonful over top.

Light drizzle EVOO at the pass.

Be generous with portion.

Braised Escarole with Raisins-on-the-Vine

4 orders

1 pound leafy escarole, cored and washed, toughest outer leaves removed

½ cup homemade rough and sweet white wine vinegar if we have it; otherwise, cider vinegar

4–8 ounces cold, unsalted butter, cut in cubes

8 small sprigs of on-the-vine raisins

freshly ground black pepper

1 whole nutmeg

kosher salt

In a large sauté pan, melt a very generous chunk of sweet butter. When it foams, add the escarole and sauté quickly over medium-high heat until it thoroughly wilts and releases its water, about 3 minutes. Continue to sauté until the water evaporates and the pan seems dry but for the slick of fat from the butter, 2–3 minutes.

Crowd the escarole over to one side of the pan, add the raisins and the vinegar to the empty space and simmer, covered, until the raisins swell and the vinegar reduces by half.

Integrate everything in the pan, then stir in the remaining cold butter, one chunk at a time. Use a microplane to grate the nutmeg to taste over the escarole. Nutmeg should be present but not overbearing. Season with pepper and salt.

Fresh English and Sugar Snap Peas with Wasabi Butter and Honeycomb

4 orders

½ pound shelled fresh peas

½ pound sugar snap peas, stemmed, left whole

6 Tablespoons Wasabi Butter

4 slices honeycomb

kosher salt

Cook shelled peas in an inch of salted water until starchy raw centers turn sweet and slippery on your tongue—90 seconds–2 minutes.

Add sugar snaps, stir around and cook for 60–90 seconds.

Drain off remaining water.

Slather in wasabi butter.

Spoon into shallow bowls. Cut oozy tablet of honeycomb and set on top.

For Wasabi Butter:

	x1#
¼ pound unsalted butter, softened	1#
1 Tablespoon + 1 teaspoon wasabi powder	5T.
2 teaspoons water	2T.
¼ teaspoon salt	1 tsp

Mix wasabi powder with water to make a paste.

Mix all ingredients together to thoroughly combine.

Soft Lettuces Vinaigrette

Well-washed Bibb, Red Leaf, or Little Gem lettuce.

*Perky. Lively. Fresh. Seriously. Pay attention. I have seen some wilted crap come out of this kitchen.

Prune Vinaigrette

Tear only once, by hand, and toss leaves in vinaigrette in stainless bowl before mounding into our wooden bowls to serve.

This way you can see if you have properly dressed. Over = sodden and the leaves can’t “stand up.” Under = dry patches and lack of glistening.

Reuse the same metal bowl for multiple orders but be aware of the dressing that builds up in there and contributes to overdressing.

Change out your bowl every 3 orders.

Season with final sprinkle of salt and few grinds of black pepper once in bowl—and rain from on high, both salt and pepper. Keep the portion serious—we want a real salad, please, not a garnish.

Bitter Greens Salad Without Acid, Only Oil and Salt

arugula

cress

turnip greens

radish leaves

EVOO

kosher salt

Stay on the porters to save all of the radish and turnip leaves from daily vegetable prep and ask them to label and date the containers properly. It’s crazy to let them throw away all those good bitter greens because they are in a hurry and don’t want to be bothered.

Leave a bit of the cress stem intact—I love their peppery-watery contribution—but cull out the intensely large woody ones when you come upon them.

Also, because there is deliberately no acid in this salad, the stems kind of contribute in that way too.

Drizzle EVOO pretty liberally over the tangle in the wooden bowl. Rain gently with salt only.

Really fill the bowl. Not messy and overflowing, but like we mean it.

Grilled Spring Onions with Romesco Salt and Lime

spring onions, with tops left long

romesco salt

hojiblanca olive oil

lime

Trim roots of the onions and slip off one layer of the outer skin—like pulling off an evening glove. Rinse the onions well.

Lay the onions horizontally on the hot grids and grill until relaxed and charred in spots. Leave them dry and plain (undressed) when grilling to avoid flare ups. Remove when the bulbs have softened and the water in the onions sizzles and bubbles.

Depending on their size and condition, use 4–5 onions per order.

Lay them on the large oval plate, and let them be a little unruly.

Drizzle generously with the hojiblanca olive oil, and sprinkle evenly, liberally with the romesco salt.

Garnish with a lime cheek.

for the romesco salt:

x 1 packed pint = 4 oz.

¼ cup hazlenuts, toasted, skinned, and completely cooled

2 Tablespoons piment d’espelette

1 Tablespoon kosher salt

2 cloves fresh peeled garlic

2 Tablespoons fine ground breadcrumbs—our homemade ones, not panko

1 Tablespoon smoked paprika

zest of 1 lime, taken with sharp microplaner

Grind nuts with garlic and breadcrumbs in clean spice mill until very fine.

Stir nut mixture together with rest of ingredients. Use a fork or a small whisk to integrate and thoroughly blend—and then let dry briefly, before packing. Keep refrigerated and make fresh every other day.

Grind a piece of soft fresh bread in the spice mill when you are finished to remove any lingering garlic scent.