Ali on FoodNetwork

So here is me and Bobby Flay. You tell me whose show it was . . .

Pie N Burger review

I was on a mission to try "White Hut" in Pasadena. The rumor is that they have a burger that is of the Steak N Shake style. It was closed so I decided to make the most out of the spent gas and hit up a popular burger spot called Pie N Burger.

Now there are no doubt fans of this place and for good reason. Pie N Burger is a spoon. They do a great breakfast, the prices are fair for LA and they make a good burger. Now some call it the best in town. I beg to differ. I cannot call "good" the "best". Its a style preference I suppose but I just never feel completely satisfied when I leave Pie N Burger, its a good snack but its not burger nirvana. Lets take a look why . . .



Now there is no question that what we are looking at is a damn good burger. And taking this burger apart, each ingredient delivers, but not all together, not for me anyways. Lets start with the bun. A great bun, soft, bends like a blade of grass on a windy field. I have no problem with the bun. Next, the dressing. Thousand Island, made in house. Its great and I love thousand island, so no problem there. Raw onion, raw onion is the stuff of true meat lovers, no problem there. Cheese, I dig cheese, sometimes I get it sometimes I don't, its a mood thing in the end, I can deal with my cheese. Meat. Oh yeah, that part. The patty is a good quality meat. Too bad its cooked past medium well. I can't get over how hard it is to get a true medium rare in this town and Pie N Burger is no different. Lettuce. The Lettuce. The lettuce KILLS this burger. There is a ton on there, it dwarfs the patty and the bun. The lettuce is the deal breaker.



Upon closer look, one can see the ratio is way out of whack here.




"Where's the beef"

I have gone back to Pie N Burger and tried to request the burger "my way". While I have gotten the burger "light on the lettuce", time and time again my request for medium rare has gone unheeded. To be fair, Pie N Burger is not alone in their inability to cook the meat to order but I cannot call it the best. Also I really believe that LA has better "gourmet burgers" than "classic" ones. It may be comparing apples to oranges but when I go to 25 degrees I leave full, sated and my burger fix is taken care of, not so in Pasadena. Pie N Burger is good, and reminds me of a burger from my childhood, the one you get after school that ruins the dinner you are about to have at home in an hour. But I am a grown man and this burger is for children.

I give it a "B"

Coming Home to the Kids

"Coming home to the kids and a stone cold dinner. Thank God Becky didn't pour the whole bottle of Jameson down the sink."

Sometimes Photoshop can reveal a greater truth that may not have been present in the original photograph. Case in point.

Sur la Table cooking class: what a joke

"i could have taught this class"

-my wife

So first off, thank you to my brother and sister in law for what should have been the perfect gift; a cooking class. Sur La Table is a pretty capable store but the class was a sham. We picked "Sicily Date night" and were, well, excited, about learning to cook Italian food. What we got was two hacks in chef's coats and a couple recipes pulled from the world wide web. At the beginning of the class, the chef goes "be sure to read the whole recipe, and be familiar with all the steps". What that really meant is "I dont what youre making, so figure it out cuz im a hack".



So here is me making some sauce. We pureed tomatoes and had a TON of liquid in the pan. I ask the chef - "uh, is this supposed to be so watery?" He is like "yeah, well, let me see the recipe, uh, wow, huh."

The sauce was not bad actually, we started out with some shallot and anchovies in the pan, added the puree and just took some time to reduce the liquid. Unfortunately the finished pasta also included bread crumbs that were "toasted" also known as "burnt" and looked a lot like this -



This pasta was ultimately undone by the burnt toast topping. The noodles were cooked a perfect "al dente" but eating this dish was like licking a toaster.



So yeah, chicken can be boring, especially when its baked. But when the oven is not working properly you get rubbery skin AND dry chicken. Awesome.







This dish was the most interesting one of the night . . . till I tasted it. Squid was stuffed then simmered in a tomato sauce. The squid itself was alright but the stuffing was more like chewing gum.

CONCLUSION:

So if anyone says "lets take a cooking class at Sur La Table?" Save yourself the money and just go eat at Sbarros - its better food.

Strip Steak Trifecta: Dry Aged vs Organic vs Buffalo

While I almost always go for Dry Aged Prime beef, I thought a three way taste off would be a good way to try Organic Beef and compare them both to an old favorite of mine - Buffalo.




On the left is the Organic beef, Dry aged in the middle and Buffalo on the right. The Organic beef has a deep ruby red color, and features the least amount of marbling. The Dry Aged steak had a bright red color and the most marbling of the three. The Buffalo on the right features a hue of red similar to the Organic Beef with just a touch more marbling.



The steaks were rubbed with Sea Salt . . .



and a generous amount of cracked blackpeppercorn





I built my standard two stage fire in my weber with some hardwood charcoal I picked up from Home Depot called Cowboy. Apparently this brand of hardwood can hit temps of just over a 1,000 degrees, so I seared the steaks at about 4 minutes a side with the lid down before moving them to the cool side of the grill.



The steaks after being seared on both sides.



I pulled the steaks off after about 2 minutes on the cool side and let them rest another 10 minutes on the cutting board.



Threw together a peppercorn sauce . . .



Steamed some broccolini



Roasted some baby Yukon gold potatoes



The Buffalo is on the left, the Dry aged is on the top and the Organic is on the right. The Dry aged seemed to be the hands down winner, people asking for seconds and thirds. The flavor was salty, but in a really good way and this steak was the most tender.

The Organic beef was a real surprise. Given the fact that it had the least amount of marbling, I thought the steak would be a dog. I was wrong. The organic beef had a deep beefy flavor compared to the Buffalo and was very very juicy.

The Buffalo was still a solid steak despite coming third. Some found it a bit gamey and bit tougher that the other two but I would not hesitate in picking up a couple of these for a future BBQ.

While the Dry Aged beef was a favorite it comes at a hefty price, near $30 a pound. The Buffalo and Organic were at around $20 which, while not cheap is a steak to consider if you are looking to feed a party or not drop dead of a heart attack at 40.

King Khan and the Shrines

So google images is a pretty amazing thing. I dont speak Hindi and I dont care to sing along to Bollywood musicals but damn if the 1970's and India weren't the place to be. Look for an invite based on this image for a Summer BBQ sometime soon.

Chef Jeff and Ali: the original

Watch Chef Jeff and Ali serve up perfect babyback ribs, experiment with shellfish and habaneros and change the game with 1lb burgers stuffed with Blue cheese and butter.

Chef Jeff and Ali: 500 degrees

Chef Jeff and Ali start off the summer with an out of control booze fest. and we cooked some food too . . . .

Ali Grillz

Ali Grillz.

three rules of the BBQ

Hardwood whenever possible

two stage fire

aromatic woods