Adding spice brightens food and gives it depth and complexity.

Properly seasoned food is the key to good taste.  When your guest comments on how great the food tastes you can be certain that the food was seasoned to perfection.  But how do you season to excellent taste?  The simple answer is that practice makes perfect, but having a starting point to guide you will send you down the right path.

Chef Mark Chayette, in response to an article in Restaurant Hospitality about properly seasoned food, says, “You can’t intellectualize about salt and pepper.”  Chayette understood the importance of the basics—you can use all the exotic ingredients you want to flavor your dishes but none of those elements will matter if your food is fundamentally off.  Chef Thom Bennet likens seasoning “to making music.  There has to be a harmony to the flavors that ultimately produces a flavor that is complex without having one taste or seasoning dominate and overpower the dish.  That is the magic part.”  If you want to read more about what these chefs and others say about seasoning, you can read the article here.

Making harmony is part of a process but will make the flavors of your food more vibrant than they would otherwise be.  Food must be cooked with salt in order for this to occur—and food that is salted at the table will just taste salty.  Tasting food in the back of the house and adjusting seasonings from there is absolutely imperative.  Dissect the flavor profile.  If you notice anything missing or if you notice one flavor dominates your dish, season accordingly.  Food should be a complex balance of flavors, a marrying of the five known tastes:  sweet, salty, sour, bitter, and Umami.

To accomplish this harmony, try practicing the following steps:

1. Does the dish need salt?  Most of the time the answer is a resounding “YES!”  Add about a half teaspoon at a time, stirring in between, to reduce bitterness and heighten the flavors.
2. Does the dish need more spices? The amounts of spices given in a recipe are usually a general guideline, and good chefs will adjust according to the needs of their restaurant.  Add just a pinch of spice at a time until you accomplish the flavor you want.
3. Does the dish need acidity? Acid will help the flavor in an entree shine.  Try adding a splash of citrus juice, some vinegar or wine, or even some hot sauce to brighten up the meal.
4. Does the dish need more depth? Remember, you want your food to be complex and not just ordinary.  If the flavors seem okay to you but seems a little lackluster, try adding umami flavors.  Worcestershire or soy sauce can do the trick, or perhaps minced anchovies or tomato paste will help your food achieve the brightness you desire.
5. Does the dish need more richness? Cream or butter will work wonders in melding the flavors in food.

Cooking need not be implemented with the same precision as, say, baking.  The biggest thing to remember is that it does take some practice to get the seasoning right, and detecting the subtle nuances of the food you are creating will get easier after time.  Cooking with this in mind will make the learning process easier, and really, more fun.  Because you get to taste all those great sauces and soups as you make them.  Bon appetit!

The post Spicing It Up in the Kitchen appeared first on Houston's Blog.

Culinary influences from the kitchen are trickling into cocktail bars, especially inside fine dining.  In 2015 look for more infused spirits.  And not “easy” infusions like jalapenos in tequila, cucumbers in gin, or herbs in vodka.  Bartenders are stretching their creativity to include such recipes as rum infused with brown butter.  And savory “broth-tails” are threatening a takeover too—cocktails inspired by Vietnamese pho or lamb broth mixed with your favorite high-end whiskey, for example.  House-made ingredients are hot as well, allowing bartenders to showcase their inspirations in their own specially prepared bitters or shrubs they will use to make delectable drinks for their customers.

Another trend to watch for in your favorite bar is the explosion of bitter…in fruity cocktails, and even in simple drinks like gin and tonic.  The bitter gives your favorite beverage a complexity it is likely otherwise lacking, providing a balance of flavor.  If your bartender doesn’t suggest it, try asking for a dash of Angostura® or house-made bitters in whatever drink you are craving.  It will surely not disappoint!

As the saying goes, out with the new, in with the old.  Well, maybe I mixed it up a little, but what was once considered old is fast becoming new again.  Prohibition-era recipes are bringing back some obscure ingredients that haven’t been seen in more than 70-80 years—flavored bitters and even shrubs are quickly hitting the bar scene after a long hiatus.  What does this mean for you?  It means fresh new (old?) flavors combine for fantastic, refreshing drinks that invite you to have another…and maybe even another…how can you resist a second Peach & Bourbon Shrub, like this one:

Peach & Bourbon Shrub

2 oz bourbon

¾ oz peach shrub syrup  (the recipe for the shrub can be found here)

¾ oz cherry liquer

1 dash absinthe

And speaking of old, how about a little moonshine to replace your vodka?  This legally brewed white whiskey is never aged in a barrel, giving it a sweet, smooth flavor without the smoke/oak profiles found it its brown-colored counterpart.  You’ll be right in style if you order this white whiskey in your Moscow Mule or in a martini, and your taste buds will thank you.

Not much of a drinker?  Not a problem.  Low-alcohol cocktails and mocktails are also on the rise in 2015.  Supporters of this trend include the consumer, who wishes to drink responsibly.  But the mocktail/low-alcohol cocktail support doesn’t stop there.  It makes great commercial sense to operators who can entice their customers to drink more than just a cocktail or two, which equates to high sales at a much higher profit margin than if they sold, say, a soda.  Win-win for the bar scene!

No matter what your drink of choice, there is no doubt that you can find something that will please your palate.  Which of the cocktail trends tempts you?

The post Raising the Bar at the Bar appeared first on Houston's Blog.

As medical researchers learn more about the health benefits of the darker-roasted coffee beans, touted for their higher level of antioxidants, Americans are buying into the slightly bitter taste of espresso, for example. Consumers who used to brew pots of Folgers in their homes are now heading out to coffee shop where they are “more than willing to wait over a minute for their ground-on-the-spot, individually brewed cup of Joe,” states Katherine Sacks of CulinaryTrends.net. And customers are essentially putting their foot down when it comes to “waterlogged coffee made with over-roasted beans.

Chocolate, likewise, is gaining momentum in the world of healthy eating. The latest research backs up claims that dark chocolate, without being deluged with sugar, milk, and butter, is good for you, working well with exercise to strengthen your cardiovascular health, and thus lowering your risk of heart attack. And the chocolate that we reach for when we are stressed? Imagine our joy at learning that stress hormone levels are reduced as we indulge in a dark chocolate bar!

But what is bitter, exactly? Turns out it is more difficult to define, if not nearly impossible, because the taste is so complex and somewhat elusive. Often it is our tastebuds that determine a bitter flavor, but seemingly as often our sense of smell detects it before our mouth does. And, crazy as it may sound, it may be the texture of a food, or the temperature, that tip us off that a food is bitter. Even scientists are a bit baffled because the “compounds that are perceived as bitter do not share a similar chemical structure,” as concluded by A. Drewnowski in his article written about the science and complexity of bitter taste in an NCBI article published on PubMed.gov.

And this complexity and elusiveness is precisely what is causing the bitter trend expected in 2015. Try it out for yourself with a small piece of 65-70 percent dark chocolate; simply put the piece in your mouth and experience it on your tongue. Your tastebuds pick up many different flavors, and its texture is much more exciting than a bite of mainstream milk chocolate. The same complexity is found in hoppy, bitter beers; in cocktails with a splash of Angostura bitters; in foods that impart a touch of bitter with sweet or with creamy. “It adds a new dimension, and perks up the tastebuds,” says Jorge de la Torre, dean of culinary education at Johnson and Wales University. “It makes you want the next bite.” As Americans are exposed to more exotic tastes, you can bet chefs and brewers, chocolatiers and coffee roasters will continue to experiment with bitter as a means to entice their customers in 2015 and beyond.

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