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| Photo courtesy of Pursell Farms |
My latest culinary road trip took Brad and me to Pursell Farms, where I recently had the opportunity to sit down with award-winning Chef Andrea Griffith during our Easter weekend visit (read about our fun weekend HERE!).
With over 13 years of experience, Chef Griffith is no novice and is using her passion for farm-to-table southern cuisine to create exciting new menus and culinary experiences at Pursell. She was gracious enough to sit down with me after a long day to answer a few questions, which I think you'll really enjoy. Read on as she talks about trying to duplicate an elusive Canneles de Bordeaux, her advice for home cooks, and making authentic Polish Pierogies with her grandparents:
Let's start with what everyone wants to know about an award-winning chef: What are 5 items that you always have stocked in your kitchen?
1. Sriracha
2. Sweet chili sauce
3. Grits
4. Greens (collards, turnips, etc)
5. Bologna
(for my kids!)
I love that you're passionate about farm-to-table
Southern cuisine. What are some key points about this
philosophy that you think readers should know?
My biggest thing is the
importance of what you put in your mouth.
Nowadays, everyone is so conscious of health, and they're so conscious
of any kind of pesticides, bacteria or any sort of crazy growth products,
hormones, or chemicals given to the animals and things that are sprayed on
foods. There's nothing better than for a
chef to be able to say I know exactly where your food came from, exactly how it
was treated, how it was sprayed, if anything was put on it, how it was picked
and cared for, how it was cleaned, washed and prepared.
From the beginning stages, I'd be able to tell even more about the soil because Pursell Farms has been doing soil tests for so long.
So, information about what's in it, where it's from, what minerals are
in it, and what nutrients are in it is available. It's not just so much the fact that I can go in my yard and grow
something. Everyone can do that. But, they can't do it on such a big scale. We are doing it in a huge way at Pursell. We're even trying to grow enough so that we
can eventually go to the market and sell it.
An outstanding meal can be life-changing. Tell me about your most unforgettable
meal.
I would have to say it was
when I staged at The Inn at Little Washington.
Since I worked in the kitchen, they wanted me to try everything, so it
was a 9 course meal with pairings. My
husband drove up to meet me, and I didn't know he was coming, which made it a big
surprise. They have these huge Dalmatian
dogs as mascots in the restaurant with you.
It was just a very unique experience.
Of course, my husband surprising me made it even cooler. There's nothing in particular that made it the
best thing in the entire universe, but it was the experience - the feeling, how
everyone was so interactive, and the great service.
I remember the dessert
best, because I am a chocoholic. I love
mint chocolate chip ice cream, and it was the one thing I didn't see when I was
working there. I was trying to decide
what to have for dessert, and they told me they'd bring me their famous ice
cream, and said "I hope you like mint!" They brought it out in a bowl. The bottom of the bowl was smeared flat with
green ice cream and covered with chocolate ribbons piled up on top. The server picked the spoon up and started
cracking the chocolate ribbons, and mixing it in, turning it into mint
chocolate chip ice cream. My husband got
a brandy snifter, and it had rum raisin ice cream in the bottom and a disc of
white chocolate on top. They poured this
hot rum sauce over the white chocolate, so that it melted and dripped into the
bottom, becoming like a hot toddy.
The one thing that I had
there that I still to this day try to duplicate are the Canneles de Bourdeaux. You have to have a certain brass mold to cook
them in, which I haven't been able to find.
They almost look like a Charlotte mold.
They are golden brown on the outside, and when you bite into them, they
are crunchy, buttery, yummy, and almost like creme brulee on the inside. I have no idea how they did it. You have to get these certain molds, pour
beeswax into them, and then pour it out.
They sell different molds now, but you have to have this certain type in
order to make it happen. No one I've ever
met has made them like that.
The Inn
at Little Washington does a lot of really cool things. They're in a historical little hotel, and
their whole thing is focused around culinary, so it reminds me of what we're
doing here at Pursell Farms. They do
cool, little intricate things.
When it comes to developing new recipes, what
inspires you the most?
The product. There's nothing better than the simplest
little things, like an egg. Everyone
thinks that it's just an egg, but, an entire dish can be built around that egg. There's nothing better than when a farmer
from two doors down comes and brings you eggs that are still warm. When you crack them, they are neon
yellow. You just can't get that kind of
color, richness and flavor from a grocery store. Then you start building from that point. The sky's the limit. As soon as you see something, that's what
drives me. I see a product and ask
myself "How can I cook this, and
what can I do to make it different from anything else I've ever
done?" I try to be more
creative. Before, it used to be all
about manipulating a product to the point where it's overly touched, and the
integrity of what you've taken out of the ground has now been beaten to heck
and put back together. I just don't
think that's the right way to be. I've
dabbled in molecular gastronomy and have done some sous-viding, but the product
itself needs to speak in the dish. You
need to be able to taste every single flavor and every single bit of dirt and
earth that's on it. So, I think about how
you're going to taste something the best and what's going to bring those
natural flavors out the best.
Is there a particular culinary trend for 2013 that
you're most excited about?
I'm excited for the
molecular gastronomy to go away (laughs).
The big trend now is farm-to-table.
It's what everyone wants. It's a
matter of being able to be in the right place to do so. I believe that with where I'm at, I've found
that place. I look forward to continuing
to develop my farm-to-table, and the farm's concept for it. I don't think I'm going to change anything I
do because of what other people are doing.
It just makes sense here.
If you could eat dinner tonight anywhere in the
world, where would it be and what would you order?
There's so many
answers. I'd have to say I'm a total
daddy's girl. I would definitely want to
go to a place called Tony Luke's. That's
my dad's and mine's favorite place in the entire world to go to eat together in Philadelphia, which is
where I was born and raised. My father
and I haven't both been back in Philadelphia
at the same time in probably 3-4 years.
So, I'd love to go there with my dad.
At Tony Luke's, I would
order either a Pork Sandwich or Fried Hots.
To make Fried Hots, you take hot peppers, roast them in the oven, peel
off the skin, let them sit in a little olive oil with crushed garlic and then put
them in a pan and fry them in that same oil/garlic. Then, stick them right on top of your
steak. It's amazing! Also, you can't get a roll like you can get
at Tony Luke's. They call them Amorosa
rolls. People who go to Philadelphia get these rolls and individually
wrap them to take home!
Then again, I could
probably also eat at Joel Robuchon's, or Gordon Ramsay's The London, Thomas Keller's French Laundry, or Alinea. I also
would have loved to have gone to dinner at Charlie Trotter's closing.
What would people be surprised to find in your
kitchen?
It would probably be
Country Crock spread. People would think
that was weird, especially for a chef.
My husband is a total Country Crock-a-holic, and if I buy normal butter,
he won't eat it. And a chef would
totally be like, "Why do you have plastic?!?" Because it's plastic...that's basically what's
in it. It's gross.
What advice would you give a serious home cook?
Follow your palate and
follow your heart. Look at something,
taste it and experiment!
What are your favorite foods from childhood?
My mom's version of
spaghetti when we were kids was elbow macaroni with ketchup and butter. So, I ate that for probably 12 years of my
life. As a chef, I make all this
wonderful stuff like my own spaghetti with bolognese sauce, but if I'm having a really weird day
I'll still make it and eat it. It's
gross, but I like it.
I also have really fond
memories of my grandparents, who were always cooks. Before my grandmother passed away, we'd
always make fresh homemade Pierogies because she was Polish. They sell Mrs. T's Pierogies at grocery stores, but it's
nothing like a fresh Polish Pierogie. It
doesn't taste anything like that. We'd
make the dough and all the fillings. If
you go to the old Polish markets in Philadelphia,
you can find them still like that today.
A Pierogie is made out of a real fine sour cream kind of dough and is
rolled out. Classically in Poland, they'd
make a filling out of cabbage that was cooked in rendered down bacon fat and
butter. The cabbage would be cooked
really slow for almost 4 hours, until it almost broke down completely. Then they'd add a pinch of salt, so that it
had almost a caramelly, buttery smokiness.
Then they'd let it cool, and then fill the pierogies with it, crimp the
dough, boil them and then pan fry them with caramelized onions and a little
sour cream. They're amazing. I have some of my grandmother's recipes, so every
now and then I'll make them.
If you were deserted on an island and could only
have one ingredient and one tool, what would they be and why?
I would bring jerky and a
knife. The jerky will preserve itself forever,
so I'd have a protein. A knife would
help me cut fruit, climb trees and hunt!
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Thanks again to Chef Griffith for taking the time to chat with me!
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