Recipe: Brisket Chili

We have been toying around with the idea of the perfect chili for a while now. Of course, depending on your location and heritage, there are a thousand different variations on a classic. Beans or no beans? Pork or beef? Do you use a whole muscle or ground meat? What cut? And then, what kind of chiles do you use? Researching a "classic" chili doesn't answer many questions as much as it just asks more. And so we stewed (get it!?) on these questions happily, experimenting and tasting along the way. It's a hard job, but someone has to do it.

At long last, we decided: beans on the side; beef; whole muscle; brisket, ancho and chipotle chilies. And since the only thing more American than apple pie is chili, we debuted our well-tested recipe on election day for a group of hungry and anxious friends.

 
As he was closing up shop Monday night, Jake grabbed a gorgeous and fatty Whippoorwill brisket, along with some Cayuga black turtle beans, Wild Hive cornmeal, two quarts of beef stock, and a few ancho and chipotle chili peppers. On Tuesday afternoon, he put the brisket in the oven, the beans on the stove top, and let everything simmer away. Meanwhile, Silka made some skillet cornbread to soak up the smokey, spicy sauce.

In the end we couldn't have been happier with the results... ALL of them.
 

Brisket Chili

+ 4 tablespoons of lard or bacon drippings
+ 1 whole beef brisket, with lots of fat (roughly 6 lbs)
+ Sea salt
+ 2 medium onions, chopped
+ 4 cloves garlic, crushed
+ 3 teaspoons sweet smoked paprika
+ 3 teaspoons cumin
+ 4 dried chipotle chillies
+ 4 dried ancho chillies
+ ¼ cup brown sugar
+ 2 tablespoons tomato paste
+ 2 cans of plum tomatoes
+ 2 quarts beef stock
 

To prepare:
Bring the brisket out of the fridge at least one hour prior to cooking so it comes to room temperature. At the same time, soak the dried chilies in hot water for about ½ hour.

1. Pat the brisket dry and coat with salt. (We used smoked salt - if you can find it, we recommend it!). Preheat the oven to 250.
2. Heat the lard in a large dutch oven over high heat.
3. When the lard starts to smoke, brown the brisket for 3 minutes on each side. Set brisket aside.
4. Add the onion and garlic to the pan, cooking until softened.
5. Add the paprika, cumin, sugar, tomato paste and chillies, cooking for an additional minute.
5. Return the brisket to the pan along with tomatoes and stock. Bring to a boil and cover.
6. Place in the oven for 6 hours, removing the lid for the final 1 ½ hours of cooking.
7. After you have removed the the brisket from the oven, take the brisket out of its sauce, place in a deep dish and let rest.

8. With an immersion blender, or in a food processor or blender, puree the sauce remaining in the dutch over and reduce for about ½ hour. 

9. Serve brisket with the chili sauce poured on top, beans and cornbread on the side. 

Serves 8-12.

Recipe: Santa Maria Tri-Tip

Jake has been talking about bringing a tri-tip steak home to grill all summer - easier said than done. Each steer only has two tri-tips and it's an elusive cut in the north-east, so they generally don't last long in the case. Like other one- or two-to-an-animal cuts (skirt, flank, and hanger) Jake had resigned himself to going yet another summer without one. But last weekend The Meat Market had a few too many of this much-coveted cut and Jake was finally able to sneak a couple home!

The tri-tip is a incredibly flavorful and unique cut, but because it's a muscle that starts in one primal (the loin) and ends in the other (the round) it is usually forfeited at the hands of industrial meat processing. It is also a part of the sirloin subprimal, sometimes referred to as the bottom sirloin. As a result of this cross-sectioning of cuts, the tri-tip cooks like a roast as much as it does a steak, giving you a ton of different preparation options. We think it's the best of three pretty awesome worlds; the texture of a flank, the tenderness of a sirloin, and the flavor of the top round. 

Made popular in central California at the turn of the 20th century, the tri-tip is most often cooked in the Santa Maria style - coated in a dry rub and grilled. As you well know, we generally like to keep our steaks as simple as possible, but the flavor of the tri-tip is bold so we knew it would stand up to a heavy rub. We looked around for various recipes but in the end, surprised by how few there were, we put our own mix together. While the spices were setting in, Silka threw together a minimal salsa verde with a pile of tomatillos from our garden. It may have been one of our last nights of grilling this season, and we couldn't have asked for a better send-off!

Santa Maria Tri-Tip

+ 2 tablespoons coarse sea salt

+ 2 tablespoons freshly ground black pepper

+ 3 tablespoons dark brown sugar

+ 1 tablespoon sweet paprika

+ 1 tablespoon chipotle-chili powder

+ 2 teaspoons garlic powder

+ 2 teaspoons onion powder

+ 1 teaspoon ground cumin

+ 2 trimmed tri-tips (1 ½ lbs each)

1. Mix all of the spices together thoroughly.

2. Rub the spice mix all over the steaks. 

3. Let the steaks stand for two hours, reapply any rub left over.

4. Meanwhile set up your grill so that there is a very hot side and a side for indirect heat.

5. On the hot side of the grill sear the steaks on each side for 3 mintues.

6. Move the steaks to indirect heat and cover the grill. Cook for another 15-20 minutes, or until the steak reaches 120 f.

7. Let stand for 10 minutes, slice and serve!

Serves 4-6 people

Recipe: Grilled Flanken

 

You may have noticed that we often gravitate toward affordable and overlooked cuts of meat. And why not? Rather than fight the crowds for grill-ready rib eyes, flank steaks and London broils during the summer months, we skip the line and go for flanken. For Jewish grandmothers and Korean BBQ lovers this cut of beef is nothing new, but for most American shoppers it's an unusual looking piece of meat. Quite simply, flanken is short ribs sliced thinly across the ribs rather than along the bones. And just like short ribs, flanken are intensely marbled with fat and have an amazing beefy flavor - even on the leanest grass-fed animal.

 

The other morning Morgan Hartman, owner of Black Queen Angus, delivered the most beautifully marbled beef to the Meat Market, and as soon as Jake started to break it down he knew it would make the perfect flanken. So he zipped off 3 pounds of 1/4 inch thick strips on the band-saw and grabbed a bottle of Fire Cider - our new secret ingredient - some soy sauce and a little garlic for a marinade. The meat hung out in the marinade for the rest of day and when Jake got home, we threw it on a low grill with some asparagus. How was it, you ask? When a fight almost breaks out over the last slice, you know you've put together a great meal.

* While we don’t often use marinade - preferring the simple flavors of pastured meat - flanken is the ideal cut for it. The marinade (especially with something acidic like Fire Cider) helps to break down the naturally chewy quality of the cut without getting in the way of the chuck flavor. 

 

Grilled Flanken

+ 3 lbs of ¼” thick flanken
+ 1 cup of Fire Cider
+ ½ cup of soy sauce
+ 4 cloves of garlic, minced

1. Mix the Fire Cider, soy sauce, and garlic together in a bowl.
2. Set the flanken in a dish, deep enough the cover them. Pour the marinade over and let sit for at least 6 hours, no more than overnight.
3. Start the grill up and over low heat grill the flanken for about 7 minutes per side, or until they take on a deep brown caramelized color. Serve!

Recipe: Piemontese Short Ribs

When we asked Harmon of Maple Avenue Farms how he likes to eat his own Sun Fed Beef, he said a rare hamburger, just like Grazin Angus' Chip did. The reasons were similar - it's cheap, easy and a great way to showcase quality grass-fed flavor. Alex, on the other hand, said short ribs. We were pretty pumped about this answer. Not that we don't love a good burger (and boy, do we!) but we hadn’t posted our short rib recipe yet and Jake had been looking for an excuse.

Short ribs are a great cut, especially in the colder months. Like most cuts from the shoulder (e.g. brisket, chuck) it needs a long, slow braise. But unlike those other cuts, you cook it on the bone, which deepens the flavor of the meat. Short ribs are also great because they're fairly cheap and always a crowd-pleaser which makes them an awesome dinner party food! There are tons of delicious ways to cook them, but Jake like to refer to the northern Italian foothills of Piemonte for his version (doesn't he always?), using the deep flavors of the region's wine as an earthy base.

We were heading over to Christian and Lauren's apartment for a night of games and booze so we thought we'd bring our short rib contribution. For the low-key evening we didn't make any sides but in case you do, this dish is perfect over some creamy polenta. 

Piemontese Short Ribs

+ 3 lbs of Short Ribs

+ 4 tbsp of olive oil

+ 1 cup of flour

+ ½ cup salt

+ 1 lb of carrots, cut into discs

+ 2 large onions, diced

+ 3 tbsp of tomato paste

+ 1 bottle of Piemonte wine (e.g. Dolcetta D’alba, Barbera)

+ 2 cups of stock

+ 1 bay leaf

1. Preheat your oven to 300 degrees. Mix the flour and salt on a plate, and coat the short ribs in the mixture.

2. Heat the oil in a large heavy pot or dutch oven. When the oil starts to shimmer, brown the ribs in batches so as not to over crowd the pot. Set aside the browned ribs.

3. Put the carrots and onions in the pot, adding oil if needed.

4. When the carrots and onions start to brown, make some room in the center of the pot and add the tomato paste. Let that caramelize for a few minutes.

5. Stir the tomato paste into the vegetables then pour in wine, until the bottle is empty or the wine reaches the top of the ribs. Let the wine reduce by half.

6. Add enough stock so that the liquid just covers the ribs, and add the bay leaf. Bring to a boil and cover.

7. Put in the oven for 3 hours, or until meat is falling off bone.

Serves 4-5

Recipe: Beef "Barbacoa" Tacos

As we explore new dishes for the blog, we know we'll eventually have to branch out of our Euro-American comfort zone. Since we both love Mexican and most of the ingredients for a good taco are readily available at the Union Square Greenmarket, we thought it would be a good place to start.

We had already invited our friend Joe over and since he's a consummate beef lover we knew what meat would be the base. Given the weather we thought that a full-flavored shredded beef would be perfect - like the barbacoa at Chipotle! But when we started to look for recipes in all our usual places, nothing looked quite right. Many  recipes called for a crock pot, which we feel doesn't allow you to develop depth of flavor. On the other end of the difficulty spectrum was our go-to Mexican chef, Rick Bayless. His recipe is for real barbacoa including an open fire, a pit, and some banana leaves. So we decided to wing it, taking what we could from various recipes and relying on our epicurean instincts.

We are proud to say we pretty much nailed it, and without much difficulty. At the end of a 9-hour day of of slow cooking we had a bowl of rich, deeply-flavored shredded beef with a spicy, earthy sauce and amazing fresh corn tortillas from Hot Bread Kitchen. We made a cabbage and carrot slaw to add a green and acidic contrast to the beef, some chili-roasted potatoes and piled on the cilantro, limes, and sour-cream!

“Barbacoa” Beef

+ 2 ½ lbs Beef Chuck Roast

+ 1 chipotle pepper in adobe sauce plus one tbsp. of adobe sauce

+ 1 med onion, diced

+ 1 head of garlic, cloves peeled and crushed

+ 1 tbsp cumin

+ 1 tsp. ancho chili powder

+ 3 tbsp. of tomato paste

+ 3 dried guajillo chilis, de-seeded

+ 1 can tomatoes

+ 16 oz of Six Point Crisp (or other light beer)

+ 2 oz. bittersweet chocolate

+ 2 tbsp. oil or lard

+ salt

1. Preheat oven to 250 degrees.

2. Pat the roast dry and coat in salt.

3. Place a dutch oven, with oil or lard, on high heat. Brown the roast on all sides - about 2 minutes per side.

4. Turn heat down to medium-high and place onions, garlic, spices, and tomato paste in the pot.

5. Once the onions start to soften and the spices release their aroma, pour half a can of tomatoes, the beer, and the chilis into the pot. Bring to a boil, and place in the oven.

6. After 8 hours, take out pot of the oven. Remove the beef and place in a  bowl. Remove the chilis, and throw away. Return dutch oven to stove top on medium heat.

7. Put in the rest of the tomatoes and chocolate into the dutch oven and stir. Simmer to reduce for another 45 minutes. Meanwhile, shred the beef and cover to keep warm.

8. When ready to serve, pour about a cup of the sauce over the shredded beef, serving the reserved sauce on the side.

Serves 4

Sunday Dinner: The Perfect Steak

It was a busy weekend for both of us - Jake spent most of his time at the Museum of the Moving Image attending a David Cronenberg retrospective while Silka worked on various freelance projects - so for Sunday's dinner we planned to keep it classic and simple. What's more classic, simple or just plain better than a French Bistro-style steak? Let us answer that for you...nothing! This particular steak dinner was also an excuse to vet yet another new beef stand at the Market - Sun Fed Beef.

When getting to know a new beef farm, we'll try out one of our three most commonly cooked steaks -  sirloin, hanger, or London broil. Sun Fed's hanger looked really beautiful so we went for it. Now, it's no secret that we like a strong taste of iron in our beef, which is really to say that we like the taste of blood. And no steak has a stronger, beefier, bloodier taste than the hanger. It's actually known as the "Butchers' Steak" because there is only one per animal and traditionally butchers would take it home for themselves. 

Well, Sun Fed's steak did not disappoint! It was beefy, tender and beautifully cut.  We paired it with some perfectly roasted fingerlings, mixed greens and a stiff drink and settled into a cozy Sunday evening.

A Perfect Bistro Steak

Even though steak is incredibly easy to cook, many people seem to be intimidated by it. The directions below are a sure-fire way to make the most of your steak. We use a meat thermometer, but you'll be fine without one.

+ 1 hanger steak

+ 2 tablespoons of butter

+ course sea salt

+ freshly ground black pepper

1. An hour before cooking, remove steak from refrigerator and let come to room temperature. 30 minutes before, preheat your oven to 350 degrees.

2. Pat steak dry with paper towel and salt heavily.

3. Place a dry oven-safe skilled on high-heat. When smoke starts to come off the pan, add steak. Sear on one side for about 90 seconds - the steak is ready to flip when it releases itself from the bottom of the pan. Flip onto other side for another 90 seconds.

4. Place a tablespoon of butter on top of the steak. Remove pan from stove top and put in oven. Roast for about 7 minutes for rare. If you are using a digital thermometer, cook to 120. We use the kind that you can keep in the meat while it's cooking.

5. Remove steak from pan immediately and place on cutting board. Add the remaining tablespoon of butter on top, top with freshly ground pepper and let rest for another 7 minutes before serving.

Serves 2

Sunday Dinner: Classic Roast Beef with a Pear Galette

When we started planning for this week's Sunday Dinner, Jake had his mind set on a roast beef. Though we love beef, we don't cook it all that often. But if you're going to do it, what's better than a simply classic roast beef? The problem is, most roast beef recipes call for higher end cuts - tenderloin, standing rib, strip loin - that are, unfortunately, not in the budget. 

This gave Jake an excuse to post a great recipe for a sadly undervalued cut of beef: the sirloin tip or silver tip. It's a wonderfully economical cut of meat that has great beefy flavor because it comes from the round (the hind leg). But, as it's literally the the tip of the sirloin muscle, it's still quite tender. And it's the perfect size for entertaining. A whole roast can feed up to eight people, and a half is perfect for 4. Treat a sirloin tip roast as you would a tenderloin and what you'll get is something a little tougher, but with way more flavor at 1/3 of the cost. 

We were out of town on Saturday and missed the Union Square market. Back in the city on Sunday, we walked over to the Chelsea Market to pick up a sirloin tip roast at Dickson’s, a superb butcher shop that sells all local pasture-raised meat as well as a fantastic selection of charcuterie. We already had a bunch of fall vegetables to roast with the sirloin tip, including some stunning purple and white carrots and the last of the seasons rainbow chard from Windfall Farm. When we got home, we realized we had some beautiful Barlett and Bosc pears from Migliorelli waiting on the counter - perfect for an impromptu galette. 

Classic Roast Beef with Gravy

+ 1/2 Sirloin Tip Roast, about 2 lbs, tied

+ coarse salt

+ ½ lb leeks or onions cut into big chunks

+ 2 garlic cloves, crushed

+ 2 carrots cut into big chunks

+ 1 cup of dry white wine - we used a white Bordeaux

+ 3 tablespoons of drippings or oil

1. Take the meat out of the fridge an hour or two before cooking so that it can come to room temperature.

2. Preheat the oven to 450.

3. Pat the roast dry and cover heavily with salt.

4. Place a large cast iron skillet over high heat. When it starts to smoke, brown the roast on all sides, a few minutes each side. When browned, add vegetables and the drippings to the pan.

5. Put the pan in the oven until it reaches 120 degrees at the center of roast (about 45 minutes).

6. Take the roast and veggies out of the skillet and let sit for 15 minutes. Meanwhile put the skillet with, all of the roast's drippings, on the stove over medium-high heat. Pour in wine and simmer to reduce. You can whisk in a little butter or flour for desired thickness/creaminess.

7. Eat! Serves 4.

Pear Galette

Adapted from Martha Stewart

+ 1/2 recipe of your favorite Pate Brisee - we used Nick Malgeri's recipe, used here in our Apple Pie
+ 1 tablespoon cornstarch or flour
+ 1/4 cup granulated sugar plus a little extra for sprinkling
+ Pinch of salt
+ 4 large ripe pears, cut into 1/2-inch slices (about 3 1/2 pounds) - we used a combination of Barlett and Bosc

+ 1 tablespoon unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
+ 1 large egg

1. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper or a nonstick baking mat.
2. Sprinkle work surface with a little flour. Roll out dough to a 14-inch round, about 1/4-inch thick. Transfer dough to prepared baking sheet and refrigerate until ready to use, up to 1 hour.
3. In a small bowl, mix together cornstarch, sugar and salt. In a large bowl gently toss together pears and cornstarch mixture until evenly coated. Mound pear mixture on top of dough, leaving a 4-inch border all the way around. Fold dough over pear mixture, overlapping where necessary and gently pressing to adhere the folds. Transfer galette to refrigerator and let chill, 20 to 30 minutes
4. Meanwhile, preheat oven to 400 degrees. In a small bowl, beat egg. Brush edges of dough with egg, and sprinkle edges with sugar. Dot top of galette with butter. Transfer to oven and bake until crust is golden brown and juices are bubbling, about 1 hour.

5. Let cool briefly before serving warm or at room temperature.

Recipe: Grazin' Angus Burger with Chip’s Ranch Dressing

When we asked Chip from the Union Square Greenmarket what his favorite thing to make with his own Grazin’ Angus beef was, he listed a few things before admitting, "Ultimately, it's a burger." He loves a Grazin’ Angus burger so much that, as we mentioned before, he and his father-in-law are opening up a burger joint in Hudson, NY.

He likes to serve the burger "black and blue" (a heavy sear on the outside and rare in the middle) with caramelized onions and good local blue cheese or with homemade buttermilk-ranch dressing. We were pumped about the prospect of the homemade ranch because we love anything made with buttermilk or mayonnaise. So we got a pound of ground meat from Chip and some Coach’s Cultured Goat Milk and headed home to try it.

Black and Blue Burger

+ 1 lb of ground meat - grass-fed if possible!

+ salt and pepper

+ 3 tsp of butter

1. Preheat the oven to 350.

2. Take the ground beef and fluff it up a little without over working it. Lightly form it into 3 ⅓ pound patties, each about an inch thick.

3. Take a teaspoon of butter and gently press it into the middle of each patty, covering it back up with a little meat. Now salt! Don’t be thrifty with the salt if you want a nice crust. Pepper both sides.

4. Turn your pan (cast iron if possible) on high and wait until it's very hot. Sear patties on each side for a minute, until you have a nice deep brown crust. 

6. Stick the whole pan in the oven for 5-7 minutes. If you're not sure if the burgers are done, poke them. If they spring back but don’t give too much resistance they are done.

Buttermilk Ranch Dressing

+ 1 cup of homemade mayonnaise

+ 4 cloves of garlic, minced

+ ½ cup of buttermilk - we used cultured goat milk because we like it's tang and grassy flavor but regular buttermilk works just as well.

1. Mix the garlic into the mayo. Add the buttermilk to taste, one tablespoon at a time.

Chip was right, this was an amazing combination. The intense beefiness of the grass-fed burger combined the the tang of the buttermilk and sharpness of the garlic was out of this world. It was especially fantastic on a (somewhat flattened) homemade burger roll with a slice of late summer tomato. Thank you, Chip!

Market Interview: Grazin Angus Acres

For our first Market Interview we wanted to talk to someone we really admire and who's product is truly exceptional. The obvious choice was Chip from Grazin’ Angus Acres, a grass-fed Black Angus beef farm in Ghent, New York. Chip is at the Union Square Green Market Fridays and Saturday’s selling beef, pasture-raised eggs and chicken. Their beef is out of this world! It's easily the best beef we've had anywhere. It has an intense beefy flavor, a grassy finish and the perfect amount of chew- sounds like we're describing a wine, right? Well it's that good. Our favorites are the Sirloin, Hanger, and Flap steaks, and the ground beef. We always keep a steak and ground beef in the freezer. 

Chip is a warm and energetic man who's favorite part about working the stand is "talking to people shopping at the market and helping them eat better.” The farm is all about transparency so when we asked him how they got started, he launched right in... 

After September 11th, Chip's father-in-law Dan decided their family needed a change, so they ventured upstate and bought a dairy farm. Not knowing what to do with it they held on to the farm managers, Jim and Ilene Stark, made them partners, and they started selling Black Angus as seed stock in auctions. One day a friend asked how their livestock was raised and Dan explained that they were grass-fed and pasture raised. The friend had two autistic children and was concerned that industrial food had played a part. He then asked Dan if he would be willing to sell the beef, suggesting that Dan read The Omnivores' Dilemma. With his curiosity piqued, Dan went out the next day, bought the book and then read it 5 times in the next 3 weeks. 

In the four years since, Grazin' Angus Acres has operated as a 100% grass-fed and hormone/antibiotic free beef farm, using sustainable farming techniques employed by Joel Salatin. They are also proud to be Animal Welfare Approved.

When we asked Chip- formerly a successful IT guy in Midtown- how he got involved with the farm he laughed. As soon as Chip asked Dan for his daughter's hand in marriage, Dan started prodding him about joining the family farm. At first Chip couldn't imagine leaving his urban life, but he soon found himself moving closer to Ghent. Motivated by the dream of opening a farm-to-table restaurant, he started working for the family by manning the stands at markets. And now, after years of planning, they'll finally be opening a diner this month serving all Grazin' Angus hot-dogs and burgers in Hudson, New York!

Grazin' Angus can be found on Fridays and Saturdays at the Union Square Greenmarket and on Sundays in Brooklyn on Carroll Street between Smith and Court and in Manhattan at the Museum of Natural History Market. If you can't make it to a market, you can always write to them with special order's or questions.  

Hear the complete interview here: