CRABBY BUSINESS

a good while ago i made tuna patties inspired by something i saw on my favorite tv station. since then i decided to try making crab cakes and just never got around to doing it. until recently that is. i didn't have all the exact stuff i needed, but i decided to give it a try anyway. how far off could it be right?

well i started off with some multigrain crix,

crushed with my newest professional rolling pin made by guinness. (i got rid of the other one)

i used this crab meat in the tin that i had there. not exactly what i wanted, but it would have to do. it was a now or never kinda thing.

so i put the meat into a bowl with the crumbs, chive, shadon beni, onion, garlic, rosemary, thyme, parsley, a lil mayo and yellow mustard.

then seasoned it up with these dudes here.

the mix looked like this. i was thinking about making it a little firmer, but i decide to rock with this.

next, i spooned some patties into some hot oil. some very hot oil.

this skillet heats up reaaaaaally quickly, so the oil was too hot. flipping them was a scene.

EPIC FAIL!! flavour was real good. but... well... look at them.

however, an important commandment in these parts is THOU SHALL EAT THINE MISTAKES. so i put the broken up patties on some whole wheat toast and had a time. none of this animal goes to waste.

meanwhile, i sprayed some foil with cooking spray and made some more patties with the remaining mixture. defeat me?? never!! yuh doh wanna fry? well i'll bake yuh then! shoulda thought about doing it this way first. the healthier option i think.

put them in the oven until they cooked through, then put the fire on top to brown them up for the nice visual.

looked so nice i shot them twice.

and they tasted nice with some sweet chili sauce next to lentils over basmati rice. next time i want to get the chunky crab meat that they sell at pricesmart to mix in there for a different texture. but this did just fine.

HEADS OR TAILS????

a few people told me that they come to the blog to get ideas when they aren't too sure what too bubble. that's cool. glad to be of service. me? i use my indecisiveness to try out something different. i documented this one to share so you have even less reason to flip a coin when you're in that zone.

well this one involves pigtail, so swine haters beware. this one is pure swine and nothing but the swine. bbq pigtail to be exact. something i sampled some years ago and can't get enough of. until i made it myself that is. on this occasion, i wanted to see if it could be done minus the bbq pit.

basically, i put some pig tail in the pressure cooker with some spice and let that bubble like soup. the object here is to get that salt out and try to infuse some additional flavour into the pigtail.

while the pressure cooker was covered and doing its thing i started making a sauce. some sweet red chilli, jack daniel's honey dijon...

and some of this huge budwiser honey bbq that i got in pricemart. one of them impulse purchases that only manifests its insanity when you take it out of the car at home. "all this? but i don't own a restaurant! why did i buy this again? oh... because i was in pricemart being bitten by the it's-probably-cool-to-buy-this-massive-thing bug."

i put that in a pot with some sauteed garlic, onion, shadon beni, ginger, pimiento and thyme, then gave it a little heat for the flavours to come together.

not too long after that came the end of round one for the pigtail. round one is usually about 20 minutes, designed to cut a lot of the salt out. pigtail is a salty thing.

drained off that first water...

and added some more then put the tails back under pressure.

so at this point, there's still a lil salt in it. not overpowering, but enough to let you know that you're eating pigtail. i pressure mine to get it extra tender. that's just a preference though.

next move, into that sawse!

then onto a baking tray. heavy on the sauce. i mean... the sawse!

fire on top fuh dat!

we're just looking to get the sauce to darken up a bit to give it that bbq finish, so it doesn't take that long.

and a flip was necessary to get at the other sides.

and boom. that was it. my quick fix oven bbq pigtail. i sacrificed that smoked goodness you get from coals and wood, but to be able to drop this down without wheeling out the grill is worth it to me.

INTERNATIONAL CULINARY FESTIVAL take 1

the first day of the big event at the jean pierre complex/hasely crawford stadium was as unexpected for us as one of kes the illusionist's tricks to an unsuspecting patron. why?

well we expected a great show from iron chef garces (yes english, i did see him chop up the nuts with his knife like he was slicing paper or something). after all, he's an iron chef...

we expected to stumble upon some of those fine products that pop up at events like these...

we expected to see some friends of the blog, like Brian from the tobago blue food festival entry...

we even expected some good entertainment like the ever comical, ever lyrical nuts landing...

steel pan... check.

and tambu bamboo... check.

but we didn't expect to be that moved by the young culinarians competition. i mean, the excitement, the passion on display and the performances by all the teams involved was out of this world. and this is just the semi finals.

it was really nice to see the students making the most of the iron chef's presence.

surely a once in a lifetime opportunity that any motivated, aspiring chef would love.

of course we're going to show you the recording, but seeing it live is a whole different ball game.

check out the video below, but come down today to the finals and check it out live:

ENTER THE IRON CHEF

so, 1 day before the big taste t&t international culinary festival, we start to get the questions: "so when de iron chef comin?" "de iron chef reach yet?" "yuh know if de iron chef comin still?" yuh know trinbagonians. we have to see it to believe it... myself included. so we went up to the airport to see it for ourselves and to reassure everybody that iron chef jose garces will really be at the event judging the cooking competition and doing some demonstrations live.

we weren't disappointed. the seemingly omni-present chef debra sardinha-metivier did the formal welcoming in the TDC booth at piarco (quite a snazzy spot actually), while we looked on thinking "aye look the dude from tv right here."

chef debra didn't come with her hands swinging either. as part of the greeting, the iron chef received a "trini to the bone" bag, along with an explanation of the anthem that made the phrase a national i.d.

he also got a cool chef's jacket with the event logo on it. i looked around to see if there was another one that i could beg for, but no such luck or jacket was to be found.

talking on camera to ann-marie ganness of cnc3, the ecuadorian-born chef said that he was looking forward to working with the local produce and giving lots of what seems to be the patented jose garces bear hug (sounds like he's famous for it or something). he seemed intrigued by ann-marie's suggestion of the top 2 must have local foods, roti and bake and shark. for the first time it dawned on me how awesome it must make us sound when we tell visitors "yo... we eat SHARKS down here. it's our thing!"

anyway, fear not. the iron chef is here in the flesh and would be at the taste t&t international culinary festival saturday 29th october and sunday 30th october. we're not planning to miss this one... we think you shouldn't either.

check him out in motion:

FOOD FEST WITH FOOD'S BEST

really, this year's edition of taste t&t is no joke. the international culinary festival started off with workshops featuring chef claus meyer (in front) and chef bo frederiksen (behind the work station) at the trinidad hilton. in case you haven't opened the new tab to pull up the google page as yet, chef meyer is the co-owner of noma, a nordic gourmet restaurant that holds the title of "best restaurant in the world 2010". in other words, he's kind of a big deal.

not to sound like a line from a batman comic, but the dynamic duo hosted a very interesting discussion called "a conceptual approach to indigenous ingredients". they put forward some interesting ideas that fused their nordic style with ingredients that are locally available.

like this drink made with cabbage, celery, apple and pear, which they identified as a method they use to give their children the benefits of cabbage in their diet.

and a cheviche inspired dish made with carite. it was a favourite with the chefs, so by the time we switched lenses, there wasn't enough on anybody's plate to shoot.

but we were in time to catch this light appetizer that featured steamed cauliflower, a creamy cauliflower puree, a shadon beni sauce and some crispy bread.

and this blue crab soup which the chef described as crab and dumplin without the crab and dumplin. obviously somebody gave them the grand culinary tour.

most interesting was chef meyer's message, which wasn't to try and imitate nordic cooking, but quite the opposite. his was a message of harnessing the power of local ingredients. inspiration to cook with not just what you have but with who you are, thus making a connection between caribbean culture and caribbean cooking. he went as far as to suggest that we don't need to order fancy italian wares because it's the in thing, but use local art and craft to enhance unique culinary experiences. as a lover of local food, that sounded great to me.

from all accounts, taste t&t international culinary festival is something that shouldn't be missed. but don't take my word for it. listen to the passion in the voices of the chefs themselves: