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Wednesday, May 20, 2009
Talk online cookbooks, grilling with chef David Bull
Today at 1 p.m., join me and the James-Beard nominated (and ‘Iron Chef’-defeated) chef David Bull in a live chat on Relish Austin. We’ll talk about his new interactive cookbook (his first solo cookbook!), life at the Driskill, summer grilling, ‘Iron Chef’ and when we can expect him back in a Central Texas kitchen besides his own.
From today’s Food Matters:
Even though chef David Bull left the Driskill Hotel in 2007 to oversee the culinary operations at the renovated Stoneleigh Hotel in Dallas and the St. Anthony Hotel in San Antonio, he never left Central Texas. Bull and his wife, who is expecting their fifth child, have called Manor home for the past five years, and it’s where Bull put together and tested many of the recipes in his first solo cookbook, “Bull’s Eye on Food,” an interactive venture available online only ($35 for a yearlong subscription, Keeper Collection).
Home cooks can search and sort the 80 recipes, read stories behind their creation and organize a shopping list through the site, which also features videos of Bull explaining cooking techniques. “You can’t impart that level of information in a book,” says Bull, who will be adding dishes, including seasonal grilling and holiday recipes, as the year progresses. “You can get a hardcover for life, but it doesn’t change. ‘Bull’s Eye on Food’ will become my database for all of my recipes.”
If all goes well, Austinites soon will get to enjoy Bull’s cooking in real life again. As chef-partner of LaCorsha Hospitality Group, Bull says he will be working on the planned Seaholm Plaza Hotel near South Lamar Boulevard as the project gets under way next year.
Yellow Tomato Gazpacho with Jicama Hot Stix
This summery vegetarian soup is a good way to use up all those fresh tomatoes from the market or your garden. Bull says that of the thousands of ways you can prepare gazpacho, he prefers this one, which has a chunky feel in the mouth, thanks to the diced vegetables.
For gazpacho:
8 yellow tomatoes, quartered 4 cloves garlic, smashed 1/3 cup cucumbers, peeled, seeded and diced large 1/3 cup baguette, torn into large pieces 1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil 2 Tbsp. sherry vinegar 1/4 tsp. sea salt 1 large jalapeño, seeded and minced 2 tsp. cilantro, finely chopped 2 cups cucumber, small diced 2 cups red onion, finely chopped 4 Tbsp. lime juice
For Jícama Hot Stix:
1 jicama, cut into 1/4-inch by 3-inch sticks 1 tsp. arbol chiles, toasted and ground 1 Tbsp. cilantro, finely chopped 2 Tbsp. lime juice 1/2 tsp. sea salt, to taste 8 sprigs cilantro, for garnish
Place the yellow tomatoes, garlic, cucumber, bread, extra-virgin olive oil, sherry vinegar and salt in a medium bowl and marinate in the refrigerator overnight. Place everything from the bowl into a blender, purée until smooth and strain through a fine mesh sieve. Transfer the purée from the blender to a mixing bowl and combine with the jalapeños, cilantro, cucumber and red onion. Add lime juice to the mixture and season with salt to taste.
For Jicama Hot Stix, combine in a large bowl the jicama sticks, ground arbol chile, cilantro and lime juice and season with salt to taste. Ladle equal portions of the gazpacho into chilled soup bowls. Place the jicama sticks into the soup and garnish with sprigs of cilantro. Serves 8.
- David Bull, ‘Bull’s Eye on Food’
(soup photo by Mark Knight)
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Cupcakes from Down Under at Sugar Mama’s
The two met each other through Twitter after both were featured on the New York-based blog Cupcakes Take the Cake. They struck up a virtual friendship and less than a year later, Pryles trekked to Austin for a week of guest baking at O’Neal’s South First Street bakery.
For five days starting Tuesday of next week, Pryles will serve some of her signature Australian treats, including the malt chocolate ball-based Malteser cupcake (top right), the Cuban cocktail-inspired Mojiteaux cupcake (top left) and cookies made with wattleseed (above), which comes from the national flower of Australia.
No Vegemite cupcakes, Pryles promised.
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Texas Best Barbeque Sauce is back on shelves
For years, the smoky, not-too-sweet sauce based on an Austin family recipe was one of the top-selling sauces in the country, says Alen Smith, whose great-aunt got the recipe from a teen who worked at her house in Austin in the 1930s. Smith was just 13 when he learned the recipe. He got the company off the ground in the late 1970s and eventually sold it.
Years after Smith sold the company, things went downhill and the sauce was pulled from grocery store shelves. In 2007, Smith bought the company back, and the famous sauce ($3.99), rub ($5.99) and hot sauce ($1.79) are available at H-E-B and several other large retailers again. “We brought it back to the way it originally was,” Smith says.
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