Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
Episode: 05 We are Back
52 Plays2 years ago
We are back folks, sorry for the hiatus. In ep 5 Justin and Zack catch up with each other and discuss Justin's trip to Florida, what each of them have been making lately. Pour yourself a cup of coffee and enjoy this episode.
Recommended
Transcript
Return from Mid-Season Break
00:00:01
Speaker
Jutty. Zach, we're back. Little mid-season hiatus week that we took there. We needed to clear our heads. I don't know. Deal with this, I guess. But we're here. That's all matters. Yeah. Life things happen and it delays things, but we're back.
00:00:26
Speaker
We're back. We did not we did not abandon this podcast. This is this is our baby. We birthed this. We don't want to dog. You know, we didn't want to. Yeah, we didn't want to disappoint any hoggaholics out there. It's true. We do at least three. Yeah.
00:00:45
Speaker
So cool. Yeah, we're back.
Where to Listen and Engage
00:00:47
Speaker
And this is on all of the platforms, right? YouTube, Spotify, iTunes, maybe Google Podcast. I don't know. That platform kind of sucks. So like, subscribe, write comments. We want to hear from you. Email us. Scratchthehog at gmail.com.
00:01:07
Speaker
And, uh, yeah, we're, we're, we're kicking it back, um, picking up the rest of, I guess we'll call it a season. I don't know. Maybe it'll be 10 episodes. Maybe it'll be eight episodes and then we'll reevaluate and see what goes from there. Yeah. It's a British season, which is like six episodes. Oh, should we, should we do our best? Yeah. I guess British accents on here. My, my British accent is so bad. Judd A. Judd A. Zack.
00:01:36
Speaker
Oh, Judi. Would you like some? What do they eat for breakfast? Beans? What do they eat? Beans? Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding. Pudding.
00:02:03
Speaker
We don't really have too much planned or scripted.
00:02:10
Speaker
That's true.
Florida Vacation Highlights
00:02:12
Speaker
One thing that we left off with in the last episode, you were about to go to Florida and you mentioned you had a couple things you wanted to talk about.
00:02:27
Speaker
Uh, yes. So Florida was great. Weather was fantastic. Uh, and I saw it 80 degrees throughout the whole week. Um, so it was wonderful. Uh, stayed with our in-laws and, you know, eight out like every night, uh, went to a couple of breweries, got a new tattoo. Uh, so it was a great time. Great time. Your tattoo by the way, the way I really like your tattoo, by the way.
00:02:58
Speaker
Oh, thanks. For everyone listening, it is a tattoo of a crane, a Japanese crane, which I named him Niles. So it's Niles Crane. Oh, that's funny. For any Frasier fans out there. I got it. Thank you.
00:03:20
Speaker
So yeah, Florida was great. Like I said, food was good, but there are a few different events that I want to talk about.
West Palm Beach Green Market
00:03:29
Speaker
So the first one is the green market. So the green market was voted best farmers market in the country for, I don't know how many years now. And it's on every Saturday in West Palm Beach from October to April.
00:03:49
Speaker
because they can't have it in the summer because it just gets too dang hot down there. So they don't even bother. So, you know, every time we go down to Florida, we go to the green market.
00:04:01
Speaker
And it's one of the best farms markets I've ever been to. It's, you know, they have so much like tropical fruit, fresh food, vegetables, all these different, excuse me, all these different vendors, like food, arepa, like food, duh. Arepas. There's this one cart that we go to and it's like fresh ceviche and it's the best ceviche I've ever had in my life.
00:04:28
Speaker
It's insane how good it is. Super tangy. The fish is big chunks of fish, onion, cilantro, the whole bit. It's so, so good. Absolutely the best ceviche I've ever had. They have a bunch of bakery booths, a cheese booth, so many different things.
00:04:52
Speaker
But the ones that really stand out to me the most I like to go to every year is the ceviche booth. There's a booth where people are cutting up fresh coconut and pouring out the juice, like fresh young coconut, cutting it open, pouring out the juice, and then scooping out the flesh. And then they give you the flesh in a little baggie. And then they give you a cup with the juice. It's amazing.
00:05:19
Speaker
It's so good, so fresh. It doesn't taste like anything that you would get in the grocery store. It's unbelievable. It's wild. It's not like that shitty coconut flavor that people think tastes like coconut. It's completely different. Completely different. Yeah. Okay. It's so, so good. What else?
00:05:39
Speaker
Uh, there's this, um, tea, like dry tea and spice vendor called Monday spice. Um, and we always get a handful of stuff every, every time we're there, uh, which is fantastic. They have these avocados down there, which are about like this big. They're about four or five avocados, you know, combined into one, I guess it's just a Florida avocado.
00:06:03
Speaker
Oh, yeah, wild like they're so big and so, so good. Sounds great. Did you buy some and mix like guac with it or do something with them? No, we didn't because like they were all like super hard and we were leaving on Monday morning.
00:06:28
Speaker
Gotcha. So like, wait, the other one's going to be time for them to write, you know, like smuggle some avocados in your pants through the airport. You don't want to be that kind of person, you know, when you used to put like an orange in your sleeve and you go like this, make it look like a big bicep. Yeah, sir. What's what do you what do you have in your pockets there? Those avocados. Those avocados are you just happy to see me?
00:06:58
Speaker
It's like, sir, you should go to the doctor. So you said this is, you said this should, uh, this is, uh, October to April or may. Is that what you said? October to April. Oh, wow. Nice. So you just caught, well, I guess you caught, uh, yeah, I guess you kind of caught towards the end of it, right? You're there in mid March. Yeah. But yeah, it's, it's fantastic. I mean, like I can go on and on about the green market, but,
00:07:29
Speaker
I don't want to make this whole episode about that. So yeah, if you're ever in West Palm Beach between October and April, definitely go check out the green market. It's awesome. Nice. That was one thing.
Retirement Community Dinner
00:07:42
Speaker
The second thing is what Mandy and I like to call the United Nations dinner. It's not what you think of when you think of United Nations. We're not in the...
00:07:56
Speaker
where the leaders from all these countries meet and all this other stuff. Okay. So the United Nations Dinner. So Mandy's parents live in a 50 and older retirement plan. And so they live in this nice little house right next door is
00:08:24
Speaker
Mandy's mom's aunt and uncle live right next door to them. And on the other side, their neighbors are this couple. They're like 80 years old. And they recently just got married. Oh, lovely. Yeah, it's like like a beautiful story. And the guy that lives there, his name is Andrea and he's from Sicily.
00:08:54
Speaker
And his wife, I did not catch her name. But she was a lovely, she was a lovely woman. There was a lot of people there. I didn't catch her name. Mandy knows her name and she'll probably listen to this and be like, I told you her name was this. And I was like, I forgot. So anyway. It was a Thursday that we were down there. You know, Andre and his wife were going to throw a dinner party.
00:09:25
Speaker
And the reason why it's called a United Nations dinner is because like basically everyone that goes there is from like a different country. Like. And they're all friends of theirs that live in this community. And they all live in this over 60 community or 50 community. Yeah. Cool. Yeah. And like one woman was from Russia, one woman was from Croatia. And like, so that's why we call it like the United Nations dinner.
00:09:54
Speaker
So we go to this, we go to Andrea's house and then as soon as we walk in, there's like chafing dishes, like 10 chafing dishes of food that he made himself, which was like chicken parm, but it was like chicken eggplant parm. It had a layer of eggplant and then a layer of chicken and then mozzarella cheese and sauce. Okay.
00:10:16
Speaker
It was yeah, it was it was it was unusual, but it was really good. Seafood, risotto, fresh seafood salad, sausage. He made like homemade zeppoles, like his whole like kitchen and dining room was just filled with food, like so much food. And it was all really, really good. Like this guy, he's like this guy can cook because he used to own a restaurant and he used to like
00:10:44
Speaker
work in a restaurant and own a restaurant. So he knows this stuff. Fantastic. And so we'd just sit at a table in his living room. He cleared out everything in his living room and there was like one long table from his living room into his dining room. So it was like a big communal thing. How many people are here?
00:11:06
Speaker
Oh, I want to say like 20, 20. Oh wow. Nice. Like 20 to 30. Maybe. Yeah. They do this once a year. I don't know how often they do it. Or he might just be doing this all the time. That's what I'm, that's what I'm thinking. Cause I mean, honestly, if you're retired and you have this money, I would do the same thing. I would just invite people over. Yeah. Excuse me. I'm really burpy today. I would just invite a bunch of people over and cook them food. Like absolutely the amazing.
00:11:37
Speaker
So anyway, um, so we eat food was really good. And after we're done eating, they clear the table from the living room and he pulls out this like karaoke machine, but it's like, like a semi-professional karaoke machine is crazy. Like in his living room, it was wild.
00:12:00
Speaker
Yeah. So he pulls out this karaoke machine and all of the old Italian guys that were there started singing Italian songs and people were like dancing, singing. Like he made like coffee out of his mocha pot and just like sat on the table and they had like all these desserts and it was just like, it was fantastic. It was probably one of the best things. That just sounds like such a wonderful experience.
00:12:29
Speaker
It really was. It really was. You know, just seeing all these people, you know, they're older, they're in their, you know, 60s, 70s and 80s just having a good fucking time. That's amazing. Yeah. And like, that's how I want to be when I get older. I just want to, I want to party all the time with people I know. I want to hang out and, you know, cook for people and like do all this other shit. Um,
00:12:58
Speaker
But yeah, it was fantastic. I absolutely loved it. Yeah, so much singing, so much dancing, so much food.
Andrea's Serenade
00:13:08
Speaker
They had like a professional, I guess he was a professional opera singer that he's, everyone kept like, everyone was like, oh, come on, come on sing a song. And he was just like, ah. And so he finally gave in, he sang a song and, oh, dude, it like blew me away.
00:13:28
Speaker
how good he was. Like I felt it in my soul. Wow. I mean, that's worth the trip right there, right? Oh, yeah. Geez, knock him right over. That's worth the trip right there. It was, yeah, probably one of the best experiences I've ever had. And it's like, you're just sitting there thinking like, this is life. This is like what
00:13:52
Speaker
It's about just having a good time being around people you love, eating good food. I mean, what a beautiful little moment, you know? I mean, that's everything. I mean, that's why we love food, right? Because it's not just food. Food has this unique ability. It's communal. It's conversation. It's connecting.
00:14:18
Speaker
You know, we both studied art, sort of different facets of art, but the things that we produce there are not food. It doesn't do what food does. It doesn't hit every sense, right? Like we go into museums and we stand in front of, you know, paintings and sculptures and we go, hmm, yeah. Oh, very interesting. Oh, how intellectual. Okay. I'm thinking about something, but I'm not,
00:14:45
Speaker
It's not moving me to my core. I'm not tasting it. If I am, they're going to kick me out. We can't talk too loud because we get shushed. Nobody's singing opera karaoke. I love opera karaoke. Never been to it, but I know I'd love it. You would have loved it. Yeah, it's a beautiful thing. It's a beautiful thing. The one part of the night that was over real,
00:15:14
Speaker
tearjerker is that Andrea pulled out a chair in the middle of the living room and sat his wife down. He kept telling everyone. He's like, I'm going to see if I could do this. I'm going to see if I could do this. He started singing Elvis Presley's shit. What is that song? It's like slow jam. Fuck, I forget. Anyway, it was like- Yeah, I know what you're talking about.
00:15:45
Speaker
You know, talk about. OK, so I'll find it while you keep talking. So he started singing this to her because they just got married. And, you know, his English isn't that great. So the reason he was saying was, I think I could do it is because like trying to read the lyrics, like sing the lyrics to this American song that he doesn't know. And. You know.
00:16:10
Speaker
just like in his wife, in his room, like it was like really sweet. And then he actually, he like finished the whole song. He nailed it, got through it flawlessly. And was it love me tender? Was it the one with some eyes, something curious, suspicious minds? Was it suspicious minds? Oh, it's I can't help falling in love with you.
00:16:39
Speaker
Oh, okay. Yeah, falling in love song. You should have remembered that one. I know I should have. I don't know why I didn't. It was really sweet. It was a real tearjerker at the end there. So everybody stayed to the end too? We left early. So all the old people stayed to the end? Yes, the two youngest people there left early.
00:17:05
Speaker
I don't know why. I think I think we were getting up early for something. But, yeah, everyone was still going. And we were like, man, run to bed. So, yeah. Nice. That sounds awesome. That sounds like it was. You'll always remember that. Oh, I definitely will. That's for sure. That's cool.
Culinary Experiments
00:17:30
Speaker
Well, not to pivot, but you cook anything good lately.
00:17:35
Speaker
Uh, yeah. So, um, today we had beans. That's why I made some beans. Good old, good old, uh, bean daddy hat. Um, so we made, uh, so yeah, we had beans today and it was mixed with, um, shallots, olive oil, parsley, not parsley, sorry, rosemary time and some ramp leaves.
00:18:03
Speaker
and tis the season. Cook those down tis the season. Cook those down till they're nice and creamy and sloppy and roasted up some fennel carrots and red onion.
00:18:17
Speaker
put that on top of the beans. Like water or stock. I'm sorry, chicken stock. Yeah. Yeah. Not just dried beans in a pot. I put chicken stock in there. I think I then toasted up a nice piece of crusty bread and went to town on that bad boy.
00:18:37
Speaker
I, per year recommendation, went full hog on the Rancho Gordo site and I got myself a bunch of beans and I made a really nice bean dish. Oh, I don't know.
00:18:59
Speaker
Maybe a week and a half ago, a week ago. It's really good. I did send you a picture. I think it was the, what beans I say it was the Marcella beans or something.
00:19:14
Speaker
Maybe I felt like you got like a hundred pounds of beans. I don't remember like, it wasn't that, no, it was maybe like 20, not even, no, it was like 15. So that's why I have 15 different sets of beans. Uh, well some I never even used before and, um, they got me really excited. Um, but I did. Yeah, I had sausage. It was like Italian sausage and white beans time rosemary. Um,
00:19:43
Speaker
You know, all the sort of, you know, normal aromatics, onion.
00:19:51
Speaker
chicken stock and what else? Trying to think there's anything else noteworthy and notable, but I just, oh, uh, probably, um, I think I put some Calabrian chili paste in there, uh, just to get a little bit of oomph. Um, when I was cooking some other stuff, uh, but man, it was good. It was really good. Um, those are good beans. I'm excited to explore, uh, some other beans,
00:20:16
Speaker
Oh, sort of hard pivot away from the beans. Did I show you those little mini desserts I was making with my brother? Little s'more, little s'more tarts. Let me see if I can show this on my camera. I don't know if it actually should. I loved it. They looked so good. Yeah, so we made the marshmallow. We made the chocolate ganache. I have a cross section. This was actually even before they fully set up, but it worked out pretty well.
00:20:46
Speaker
Look at that. So we're doing a event later this year, catering event later this year, and we're working on some recipes and some desserts.
Catering Experiences
00:20:56
Speaker
And we want it to be a little bit more elevated, but stuff that isn't really approachable still.
00:21:06
Speaker
and everybody loves s'mores. I was able to find the mini Graham shells from a nice food supplier and I can get 100 of them because we have to make a lot of them.
00:21:21
Speaker
So I, I was able to get like a box of a hundred, uh, like a reasonable cost, uh, you know, per item. And then, uh, I actually used, uh, Claire Saffitz, um, S'more tart pie recipe out of her.
00:21:40
Speaker
What's for dessert? Cookbook. So it's her chocolate ganache and her marshmallow recipe. And we just, you know, piped the marshmallow on the tarts and it, they were really, they were really quite good, actually. Yeah. We're going to experiment. Yeah. We're going to experiment a little bit with the marshmallows, whether we pipe them on there or we pipe them on like a Silpat and then kind of roll them in.
00:22:09
Speaker
confection sugar and then maybe set them on. Um, I'm not sure what the best way is going to be to kind of like place the marshmallow on top, but, um, pretty successful. Um, and really honestly, it's, it's a pretty easy recipe for, I would say people sort of getting into baking. You know, you people hear things like ganache and they go, Oh, what's ganache? It's not,
00:22:36
Speaker
super difficult and even making the marshmallows pretty easy. Just need to get some dry gelatin. Most of the stuff you'll have in your pantry, you can get everything you need in one aisle at the grocery store. Have you ever made marshmallow? Yes, I love it. It's good. It's so good. Yeah.
00:23:00
Speaker
It's so good. And you could flavor them to get all sorts of different flavorings and make your own different flavors and color them, whatever color. Let's think about kind of a fun thing. So Mandy and I made, because we were on this kick years ago about making marshmallows, we made marshmallows and actually gave them out for Christmas as little gifts to other people. Peppermint flavored marshmallows or something. Yeah, peppermint, chocolate, that type of thing.
00:23:28
Speaker
We did make one marshmallow that was like insanely good. So we took. Yeah, we had like the marshmallow fluff stuff, and then we mixed in like blueberries and then dip them in maple sugar. So it was almost like a blueberry pancake type thing. So you made your marshmallow. Morang for back, but lack of a better word.
00:23:58
Speaker
And you put blueberries in the marshmallow and then you dip it in. And what did you dip it in? Maple sugar. Oh, nice. Maple sugar is good. I'm going to try to find a picture of it because they were insanely good. Maybe you should post it on the Instagram. I think it was on there.
00:24:28
Speaker
Maybe we should post both of our things on the Instagram so the listeners can hear it. I think maybe we should use our Instagram. I think we should. I don't think we've posted. We posted like two things on there. You took a photo of me eating a pizza that you threatened to put on there. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Did we even talk about that event? No, we didn't even talk about that event. Yeah.
00:24:55
Speaker
All right, let me show you these marshmallows and then we'll talk about that. So here are the marshmallows. Oh, shit. I mean, those are that's actually that was that was that made me feel things that that was that was pretty. Do you need a moment? No, I was just like that was a really lovely photo. It was just like really nice food and and food art.
00:25:26
Speaker
If I can style food and take pictures of it for a living, I definitely would. I mean, that's a serious business, dude. It is. It really is. I worked, um, I'll actually, oh, usually I wouldn't say something negative about somebody here, but I don't care because these people are horrible. Um, so when I worked for that, uh, confection company in New Orleans, um, I was like a catch all designer, you know, doing all the design stuff.
00:25:53
Speaker
And, um, I had to work with a food photographer and he made a ton of money and he was a complete and utter, and he was, he would refuse, he would refuse to style anything. All he did was take photos and he was a complete asshole. So yeah, I won't say his name, but he knows who he is. He's listening.
00:26:17
Speaker
He's not listening, but he's somebody that knows him is listening and he was, but he should, he should, he should listen just so he could hear that. He was so crappy to me. And here's the other thing. Here's what really pissed me off. Um, he was related to the chef. So he got this job through, you know, pure nepotism, but, um,
00:26:42
Speaker
I would have to transport all of these insanely delicate, beautiful pastries in my car across New Orleans in the summertime to his non air conditioned, non air conditioned studio where these things are just degrading. You know what I mean? Instead of coming and setting up and one thing could be made in style. One thing could be made in style. One thing I had to pack all this shit up.
00:27:13
Speaker
put it in my nice nine nine Toyota Camry luxury vehicle and take it and then get yelled at because everything's sweating. You know what I mean? It was such bullshit. I mean, like, yeah, I think that's what you should do as a photographer. You go and like you go there, you go to the restaurant. Oh, that's annoying. That's unfortunate. So it was sweet. Um,
00:27:42
Speaker
Yeah, anyway, don't have to be there anymore. But yeah, you're really good at it. I think there's a need. There's a lot of people that are starting restaurants all the time that just don't have a budget for that sort of thing, and photos could go a long way. They really can. I think you should put yourself out there.
00:28:02
Speaker
Yeah, maybe we'll see what we'll see what happens in the future. But marshmallows. Yes. So tell me, actually, no, tell me more about this catering gig you have coming up. Like what's that? Well, I mean, we cook my brother and I cook like we we cook a lot and we think about food a lot, much like you do, you and I do. And
00:28:33
Speaker
My family, like my grandpa and his brothers were in the food business. My uncle Joe, my great uncle Joe was a caterer in Virginia. My grandfather was a caterer and he owned a restaurant here in town. His brother was a caterer. It's just like a thing. We grew up around food and catering in a way.
00:28:57
Speaker
So it's kind of a need for, um, I would say pretty nice food. Uh, but also I think we just find a lot of joy, um, in the process and taking on and thinking through the logistics and delivering something that's nice for somebody. So, um,
00:29:20
Speaker
Last year, Jess and I, who my wife doesn't like cooking at all, we did an event for a friend for like a celebration of life for her mother because she was kind of in a tight spot because no caterers were calling her back to do this thing. So I was pretty confident we could maybe pull it off. And we did. It worked out really well.
00:29:50
Speaker
I think the food was really good and it was like a real pleasure to be able to be a part of something like that. Um, and how about, you know, really close friends of ours, um, like really lovely, beautiful day. So doing that was like, Hmm, it was, it was really just Jess and I, and we did, I don't know, 10 or 15.
00:30:17
Speaker
heavy hors d'oeuvres for like 40 or 50 people or something. We way over did it. Way over too many, too much food. Then we do some things here and there for families.
00:30:35
Speaker
We're doing something this Sunday. My half-brother got his Eagle Scout, so he's a boy scout. He got the highest level you can achieve, which is a big deal. Good for him. That's awesome. Yeah. They're having a ceremony on Sunday, so my brother and I are going to do the food for that.
00:30:59
Speaker
We live down the street from our public library and they're doing a really big renovation on this old building. There's a couple of events that they're going to have this summer and they're going to be fun events. One's like the donor event for everybody that donated, so this could be like a really cool upscale
00:31:20
Speaker
thing and we can really deliver something that people haven't had here, which would be fun. And the other one's going to be a garden party later, which is like a really cool vibey thing. So he said we would do them just at cost, just to literally just at cost, we'll donate our time and, um, you know, all the, all the effort and everything to, to, to get it. Um, but I don't know if it's like,
00:31:47
Speaker
a side business or something that we really sort of pick and choose. And, you know, I don't know. I don't know what it's going to turn into. It's just, you know, if it scratches an itch for us to do some stuff like this and just like truly bring joy to people when they're eating stuff. So, I mean, catering is a completely different animal too. Yeah. What were you going to say?
00:32:14
Speaker
I was going to say, would you say that it's going to scratch that hog itch? It's going to scratch that itchy hog. Well, I'm sorry. I fucked it up. I couldn't help myself. No, that was good. It's just one of those things. The thing too is every situation you go in is completely different. Is there a kitchen? Is there not a kitchen?
00:32:42
Speaker
Are we prepping at like a commissary space? You have to design a menu. This is actually what I think is so much fun.
00:32:56
Speaker
because you have to solve the problem. So you have to understand like, where's the event? What time of the day is the event? Is it outside? Is it inside? Is there cold storage? Is there hot? Is there cooking available? And you really have to design a menu around all of those constraints. So it's a fun little problem to figure out.
00:33:21
Speaker
which, and then you have to like figure out and there's always a budget, right? So, um, that's, it's a fun puzzle to sort of sort out. So yeah, I think, I think we probably, um, we'll be doing a little bit more of it, uh, in the future.
00:33:42
Speaker
Um, I think especially after these library events, I think we could, there's going to be a lot of people there. And presumably if we don't get any, give anybody diarrhea, it'll, it'll turn out well. I would. Yeah. Yeah. If no one gets violently ill off your food, I would consider that a success. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Nobody shits himself. Perfect. Yeah. Yeah.
00:34:08
Speaker
Mild upset stomach. All right, we'll go. I do take food service like super, super serious. And yeah, I'll actually even get certified, like proper food handling certified for these things. So yeah, you can do it online. Just take the courses and make sure you know what the hell you're doing. There's just like some big no-nos. And honestly, you'd be surprised what places do that they shouldn't do. Really?
00:34:37
Speaker
like thawing and re-freezing stuff. It's a mess. Now, is it just like common sense practices mostly or is it mostly common sense stuff and then like stuff that's, was there things that you were even like, oh, I didn't know about that, like that you should do this that way, like that type of thing? I mean, I don't know.
00:35:00
Speaker
It probably depends. Even in my own house, sometimes I put on night show gloves. So I don't have, if I'm handling lots of meat and stuff, so I just don't have to keep stopping and washing my hands. I'll use plastic, thin plastic cutting boards to put over cutting boards. I'm kind of a maniac about that sort of stuff now. I don't let food set out. It has to cool down.
00:35:29
Speaker
Um, immediately, like quick, there's like, you know, the danger zone temperatures where, uh, bacteria and stuff can really, uh, really, um, breed, um, and take off. I also eat cold things. Like, so I don't want there to be sketchy if I'm not reheating stuff to, you know, temperature over time. So, right. Yeah. Yeah.
00:35:58
Speaker
It's, I mean, it's good to know, you know, it's like confidence. Um, so I don't know. Hey, so you mentioned ramps
Easter Lamb Recipe
00:36:11
Speaker
though. Oh, thanks. Yeah. It'll be fun. I'll keep you posted. Come up, come up and do it with us. Uh, yeah, seriously. Yeah. I'm serious. All right. Um, yeah.
00:36:24
Speaker
I'm down. OK, let's do it in a room here. But you mentioned it's ramp season. You know, I love ramps. It is ramp season. Did you go? Did you go scavenging, foraging? So we went we went on a hike last weekend, but we went on a hike on a trail. We knew there were ramps. It's not our usual spot, mainly because we wanted to just get a handful of them.
00:36:54
Speaker
for Easter dinner. We didn't dig up the bulbs, we just took the leaves off. Yeah, that's a hot topic. You dig up those bulbs, I'm just going to come after you. We're going to come after you in the comments. Yeah, I know. It's the whole thing. We can get into that if we want to.
00:37:21
Speaker
Yes, I feel like we could make a whole show, a whole episode. We should. Yeah. It's evergreen. I have a video about ramps and every year at this time I get a shitload of views on it. When I say shitload, last year I got 2000 views on that video.
00:37:39
Speaker
Nice. And it was a year. That was one year after I made it. And then this year I'm starting to see the uptick. There was like a hundred views last week. So people are, people Google ramp butter at this time of the year. If you Google, if you search ramp butter in YouTube, I am either one, two or three for that video.
00:38:03
Speaker
It's pretty awesome. That's pretty good. What did you make with you? What did you? Yeah, which what did you make with ramps for Easter? You would like ramped up, you like ramped up to the top there. Hmm. I got the dad jokes today. I know I can't help myself. I know my team might be in bed being dad joke. OK, so yeah, what I make for Easter. So yeah, with ramps. So Manny and I didn't
00:38:31
Speaker
do anything on Easter. We just wanted to be by ourselves at home and just chill. It was great. I love hanging out with family, but we just needed a day. We both have really crazy weeks at work, so we just needed a day just to sit home and do nothing.
00:38:54
Speaker
So I told Mandy I didn't want to do ham this year. I wanted to do something different. So she bought a lamb leg and that still had the bone in it. So I deboned it, kind of like butterflied it. And I was going to roll it with herbs and different things like a porchetta style. So I put I made a gremolata.
00:39:24
Speaker
which is like for people who don't know what Grimulata is, it's like Italian style garnish, like parsley, lemon, garlic, olive oil. But for ours, we did parsley, rosemary, ramps, chocolate ramp, leaves. It's like Italian chimichurri. Yeah, yeah. Kind of like that, like an oily, herby thing. Yeah, that's a great way to look at it.
00:39:53
Speaker
So we did parsley, rosemary, ramps, lemon zest, garlic, olive oil, made that into like a paste, rubbed it all throughout the inside of the lamb, and then just rolled it up.
00:40:07
Speaker
threw it out on the grill for about an hour or so, and ate that with some charcoal grill. Yep. I did a reverse sear on it at like 400, then seared it off until it was like nice and medium rare, about like 125, 130. And then we roasted up fennel, carrots, red onion, and then we served that with like a
00:40:40
Speaker
like a yogurty, herby type sauce. Basically the leftover
Discovering 'Rumi' in Oakland
00:40:45
Speaker
gremolata mixed in with some Greek yogurt and some olive oil. Nice. So like Italian tzatziki? Basically, yeah.
00:40:57
Speaker
So that was dinner. And I completely forgot about breakfast. So for breakfast. Oh, you had breakfast. You had Easter breakfast. Dude, we were in the kitchen like most of the day, just like making food for both of us. So for breakfast, we made a it's called pizza rustica. It's a Italian dish.
00:41:23
Speaker
where you take, and there's like different, you know, variations on this. I've seen recipes with pizza dough recipes with like a short crust dough, but we made a pizza dough and basically what it is, it's a pizza dough shell filled with eggs, cured meats, like different cheeses, you know,
00:41:49
Speaker
Then you put the pizza crust shell on and then bake it in the oven for about an hour or so. And then it's just like a loaf of cheesy, meaty goodness.
00:42:04
Speaker
So, shell on top and bottom. You sent me a photo of that. When I saw it come through, I was like, oh, you made a frittata. And I was like, oh, there's dough on top and bottom. And it kind of reminds me of a... Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I'd never seen that before. It was good. It was... Dude. It was just like a pizza shell stuffed with meat and cheese.
00:42:29
Speaker
It's all it was. It was fantastic. I'm going to have to try that. You know what my favorite? My favorite, the absolute best thing that I've eaten and have made for breakfast, and I think about it all the time, is a Spanish tortilla.
00:42:49
Speaker
Hmm. I love those. So like onion, potato and egg. It's all fucking is, but my God, it's so good. It's so good. So good. The best, the best dishes like have the least amount of ingredients in them, dude. It's it. And there's something about like egg, potato and onion. I'm gonna have to make one. I think I'm so busy this weekend. I'm not going to have time. Um, I'm going to have to make one though, because they're so good.
00:43:20
Speaker
I'm gonna try it, I'm gonna try like different potato cutting techniques. I've cut them in like wedges and I've cut them thin. I don't know what works best. I gotta think through that. But yeah, anyway, Easter. Yeah, Easter, I don't know. I just really wanted a ham. So I made a ham, which I don't get that jazzed about to be honest. I did glaze it with like,
00:43:49
Speaker
Dijon, maple, I don't know, something stupid, it worked, whatever, brown sugar, Dijon, maple, kind of thing.
00:44:00
Speaker
What else? I made a coleslaw. I made a nice coleslaw with like a Zatar. It was actually like a Zatar dressing for the coleslaw. So I just like trying to do something a little bit different with that and pickled some red onions and made some pickles for ham sandwiches throughout the week, you know.
00:44:24
Speaker
Yeah. Mm hmm. So simple. Mm hmm. That sounds. Oh, I love a good ham sandwich. Yeah. Yeah. But it's got to be like, I get so tired. I am, though, like day two and I'm like, I'm over the ham. Yeah, I really am. Oh, God, I'm getting caught up in my chair here. Oh, Jesus. Over the ham.
00:44:53
Speaker
Yeah, it just doesn't, it's good for like, I don't know once or twice a year, but I have so much left over here and I'm like, I have no idea what to do. I'm actually probably gonna do a ham and bean dish. I think I'm gonna have to do something with beans and ham because I have so much extra ham. You have like 30 pounds of beans. You said 20 and now 30. You said it was 20 then 15. Do you know how many beans you got?
00:45:23
Speaker
Wasn't that funny? I was trying to keep up with you. I had bean FOMO. I only ordered two pounds of beans at the time. That's not even worth the shipping cost. What are you talking about? They last forever. I didn't want to order all these beans. It'd be like, oh, these beans are...
00:45:42
Speaker
terrible even though I knew they weren't going to be terrible. I didn't just get beans. I got some lentils which I was pretty excited about. Honestly, it was like if I didn't ever saw the bean before, I was like, I need to try this. I need to do something with this bean because I just don't know what it's going to taste like. I've been trying to find other types of bean recipes that aren't just
00:46:06
Speaker
the same ones. More to come. Here, I thought you're sitting on a stockpile of beans. You have a bomb shelter full of beans. You're wearing a bean daddy hat. I was like, man, if Justin's got 90 pounds of beans, I can get 15. I like to buy my beans at a moderate pace.
00:46:31
Speaker
Not me. But you're, but you're over, you're over here. You have, you have bean envy. Yeah, I do. I do have bean envy. It's literally like, Oh, I kind of get on this. I gotta get in this, this, this, this bean enterprise. Big bean. Yeah. Big bean. But that company is really cool. Rancho Gordo. They seem like, uh, I liked how they were packaged, like everything came. Um, yeah.
00:46:59
Speaker
Really impressed, like truly, like really, really impressed. I didn't soak these beans. I cooked them for like almost four hours to be honest.
00:47:10
Speaker
three, probably over three hours for sure. Um, and they're pretty sizable. Uh, I am going to soak, soak them and try it that way and see if there's like a different texture or something. Yeah. I don't know. I don't know. What else? Anything you want to call it? You want to keep going? Um, I mean, we're pushing on 50 minutes here. Let me just go for a little bit and call it a night. Yeah. Well, yeah.
00:47:39
Speaker
OK, a little bit longer. Yeah, we can squeeze out another little diddly bit of content. Sure. All right. Oh, that is. Oh, I know. OK, I got one. So last week, Mandy or no, it was not last week. It was only been like two weeks ago.
00:48:07
Speaker
Mandy and our friend Amy and I went to a Turkish grill restaurant in Oakland. And and it's like legit Turkish food. Is it new? You know, I think it's been there for a while, but I've never heard of it. It's called it's called Rumi R-U-M-I. OK. And holy shit, dude. It's like.
00:48:34
Speaker
one of the best Turkish dishes that I've ever had. And I love Turkish food, Mediterranean food. Huge, huge fan. And it was fantastic. So it's not a huge restaurant, but food is fantastic. We ended up getting
00:49:02
Speaker
like a mixed grill, like platter that had chicken kofta kabobs, lamb kabobs, lamb kofta. And then it came with a side of rice. And then also came with a side of these red pickled onions that have sumac on them, just like dusted, sprinkled on and tossed on. Love sumac.
00:49:29
Speaker
Like, oh, yeah, me too. And ever since I've had that, like I've been putting sumac on like pickled onions all the time. I'm going to try that. I have both. I have some pickled onions. I'm going to try it. Just, you know, sprinkle a little bit on there. And it's it's crazy. It's like a brightness, fruitiness, you know, just sumac is a weird, crazy. It's hard. It's a hard thing to describe, but
00:49:58
Speaker
It's really an interesting kind of flavor that nothing else is like it. Yeah, that's a good kind of way to put it, but it's almost like a little bit bitter, but it's also, like you said, bright and kind of citrus-like, I don't know. Yeah, it's weird, but I love it. I'm here for it. I'm here for the same. It's kind of floral. Yeah, it's got all these different characteristics. It's wonderful.
00:50:27
Speaker
I'm gonna go there next year in Pittsburgh. Can we go there? Yes, we can go there. Everything was great. Baba Ganoush is some of the best I've ever had. Oh, and they also have these Turkish-style pizzas. They're called Pide's, P-I-D-E, which looks like pizza where the edges were kind of folded up. So they form like a boat shape.
00:50:55
Speaker
essentially. And they had, you know, a couple different flavors, but we opted to get this one where it was ground lamb, tomato, like peppers, onions, with just like a little bit of cheese on top. So good. Like so, so good. Insane. That's awesome. I can't believe I like never discovered that sooner. Yeah, you wouldn't think that because, you know, it doesn't
00:51:24
Speaker
The outside just looks like a generic.
00:51:28
Speaker
restaurant. The outside doesn't look like anything great. It's on a corner right across from a Dunkin Donuts. I'm sure a lot of people walk past there all the time. Oakland's a weird place too. It's confusing what the campus has done and there's new construction, but there's still old stuff there. Then you're just a bunch of rundown ass apartments. It's a weird neighborhood to navigate.
00:51:58
Speaker
No, no. Yeah. Next time you come down, we'll go. I'll take you there. All right. That sounds good. I like that roomy roomy, but yeah, I love it. What else you got? Um, what else? Well,
00:52:23
Speaker
I, it was just his birthday. So my wife's birthday. Um, her family came up. I made, um, like my family's version of Italian wedding soup, which is a bit different than most wedding soups. Hmm. And, uh, also made her a double layer chocolate cake with chocolate icing, chocolate buttercream ice cream. Pretty good. Use bought cake mix. Or did you make the cake?
00:52:51
Speaker
I did use like the fudgiest boxiest cake mix I could find, but then I'd made the buttercream chocolate icing that was really, really good. Yeah, and then the soup, like I think most people think wedding soup, you think like, you know, mini meatballs,
00:53:17
Speaker
the either pastina or a small pasta and some sort of like green something or other. Not really how my family does it. We don't have the green, we don't put green stuff in our Italian wedding soup. So how I make it, I,
00:53:47
Speaker
usually have a whole chicken or whole chicken parts. Big chunks of carrot, onion, celery, garlic, a can of San Marzano tomatoes. And I cook that broth, pull the chicken
00:54:05
Speaker
pulled it, like pull the chicken out and tear it apart and then strain the broth off of the vegetables. Um, Oh, I'll re add carrots and celery, like fresh to cook a bit. So they're still crunchy and you still have that. Um, and I'll bake small meatballs cause everybody likes small meatballs, chicken and this, and then, uh, a small, um, you know, like a Pustina or something, whatever you want to use.
00:54:35
Speaker
But we also make like a soft crouton that we put in. So think of almost like a French toast, like we mix egg and Parmesan and like pepper and take like an Italian bread and soak it in that eggy cheesy mixture and then just like pan fry it.
00:55:01
Speaker
Then we cut it into chunks and, uh, we put that on like in the soup. Dude. What? It's kind of addicting to be honest. Dude, that sounds so wild. Yeah. So most people don't actually put like the can of Sam Marzanos in the soup. Um, and the, uh, it's all, it's always, it's really about the freaking breadcrumb or the, not the break, the cute, like the soft croutons.
00:55:28
Speaker
Yeah, I'm all like, I'm like, everything else sounds great. But like, you, you got me at that. Something's up with that. Like, yeah. Yeah. And it's like, you know, all that chicken broth, like, man, I don't know who came up with that in your family, but they're a genius because that sounds amazing. Yeah. I've been trying to figure out how the origins of that came about. And if there was,
00:55:55
Speaker
I don't know. I don't know. Trying to figure out how, how, but, uh, that, that, that happens. But, um, yeah, my family has been doing a long time. Wow. Yeah. Okay. Well, you need to make that when I come up there. Yeah. You have, you have to. Yeah.
00:56:13
Speaker
It's like the only thing Jesse's dad likes that I've ever made. So I make it every time. I'll put like a big K in there too. You know, oh yeah. Yeah. Like time, whatever time, uh, you know, Parsley, whatever it doesn't matter. Yeah. So yeah, that's, that's, uh, that's what, um, it's a little nugget for you. Hot tip, soft croutons make it make soup better.
00:56:41
Speaker
I'm going to be obsessed with these half group tons now. They're good. And they last, you just cut them up, put them at Tupperware and eat them with the soup all week. You always have to make way more than you think you're going to need to. Of course. Cause you know, you're going to snack on a few, like while you're making it. Oh, totally. You're just like plowing them while you're cooking. There's no way, like if there's a tray of like crispy bread that I'm not eating a few while I'm cooking.
00:57:09
Speaker
Yeah. It's like a croak, miss your kind of, you know, that's what I'm like kind of getting that vibe of like, you know, like kind of squishy almost, but like cheesy. Yeah. Yeah. A little bit crunchy on the outside, soft on the inside. Yeah. Oh man. Yeah. It's good. I want the, it's a nice like soup to have with your other, your other food. Yeah.
00:57:38
Speaker
Well, that sounds wonderful. Yeah, man. I don't know. I'm glad we got together after our mid-season hiatus. Yeah, me too. It's good to see your face as always. Always good to see your face. Yeah. I know life shit happens and things get delayed, but hopefully we can still keep doing this.
00:58:04
Speaker
Of course, 100%. So, you know, like, subscribe, give us comments, email us, but yeah, hit the like button. I guess that's episode five in the books. We're halfway to ten. As long as we make it to ten, as long as we make it to ten, then if we decide to close the book on this, I'd be happy. We'll do at least ten.
00:58:32
Speaker
Yeah. No matter what. I promise. Yeah. Oh man. All right. Take it easy. Until next time. Bye Zach. Bye.