Editor’s note: This is chef John Broening’s 200th column. His first “Short Order” column ran on May 28, 2008.
Some years ago, I tried to turn myself into a boxer. I worked out every day, sparred once a week and assiduously did my roadwork, first on the steep hills of San Francisco, then in the thin mountain air of Colorado Springs. I trained with a Tunis-born Parisian, who improved not just my fighting skills but my French. (How many boxers can say that?)
I had good stamina and fast hands, but my defense was rudimentary and my footwork was hopeless. Worst of all, I hated getting hit, especially in the face.
Though I didn’t have courage or skills, I had something better, a great ring name: John “Short Order” Broening.
Can’t you see it, I would say to my friends, the Fighting Chef. Swaggering into the ring in my chef’s toque, miming slicing, dicing and frying up my opponent, and elevating trash talk to an inspired new level.
Nothing ever came of my boxing career, but when Tucker Shaw, then editor of The Denver Post’s Food section, asked me to do a weekly column, I immediately thought of my ring name: What did Short Order mean? A little flash and posturing, perhaps, then quickly down to business, like my idol, ’80s middleweight champ Marvin Hagler.
I started this column because I wanted to write miniature prose poems about food, but what I’ve learned is that like boxing fans, readers of the Food section will put up with a little rhetoric as long as attached to something tangible — a knockout, say, or a workable recipe.
Having looked over my previous 199 columns, it occurs to me that there is a common thread, a set of principles running through them, with the caveat that there is a “yes, but” attached to some of these seeming absolutes:
• Eat local: It’s sustainable, it’s gratifying, and it’s fresher. But, sometimes frozen is better (French fries and peas) and so is California.
• Eat seasonally: It’s cheaper, it’s fresher, it tastes better. Yet, I don’t know about you, but in the wintertime, I don’t want to eat only brassica, root vegetables (actually fall vegetables that have been languishing in storage for months), dried beans, duck confit, sausage and canned foods.
• Embrace your inner woman chef: “Men cook to satisfy their egos; women cook because someone is hungry,” wrote British novelist Kate Atkinson in “When Will There Be Good News?”
• Eat like the rest of the world eats: America has a greater variety of foreign cuisines than any other country, but on a daily basis, we still eat in an insular way. Use meat as an accent and build your meals around vegetables, grains, pasta, beans and broths.
• Use acidity: Citrus, vinegar, wine, tomatoes, fruit, and fermented meats, chocolate, coffee and sourdough bread — without them food would hardly be worth eating.
• Easy with the sugar shaker: Too much sugar in everything is a big problem with most American food. Sugar coats and deadens the palate (which is why I never serve a “palate-cleansing” sorbet). Add too much sugar to your savory food and you’ve also ruined the savory-to-sweet progression of a good meal.
• Explore bitterness: Quinine, unsweetened coffee, cloves, chicories, hoppy beers and my all-time favorite flavor, grapefruit. Bitterness, especially when it daringly skirts the unpalatable, adds a thrilling complexity.
• Season to make your palate dance: This means not just salt and acid, but roasted whole spices, thinly sliced raw onion, whole or torn herbs, and chiles. If it says something other than “wow” to your palate, keep seasoning.
• Use fat consciously: I almost never cook with cream because like most people, I can’t digest it. At home we cook with high-quality fats, like estate-bottled olive oils and Kerry Gold butter, but we use less of them.
• Eat to live: As I face 50 in comparatively good health, there are two things equally important to me about the way I eat and the way I cook: how food tastes and how it makes you feel afterward.
This isn’t a widespread attitude in my business, especially among younger cooks. Bathing food in butter, drowning it in cream, inflicting multicourse pork tasting menus on the public shows that you’re hard-core.
If I stay a cook’s hand with the butter or bacon or ask him to think about nutrition as well as taste, I sometimes get a look that says, “You wimp.”
But what I’m advising is not ascetism but moderation. The best compliment I ever got was from a feinschmecker (German “gourmet”) who was comparing me to a famous chef: “A genius, for sure; but your food, your food I could eat every day.”
John Broening was born in Baltimore and grew up in France, the Soviet Union and Portugal. He attended Haverford College and Peter Kump’s New York Cooking School. He staged with Guy Savoy in Paris and has been a chef in New York and San Francisco. He is currently the executive chef of Duo, Olivea and Spuntino Restaurant. He is married to Yasmin Lozada Hissom, a James Beard-nominated pastry chef. They live in Denver with four dogs.
Broening’s best
Favorite recipes
Sweet Fava Bean Crostini With Shaved Pecorino and Red Onion Pesto
From John Broening, makes about 20 crostini.
Ingredients
One loaf ciabatta, cut into 20 rectangles (1 inch by 2 inches each)
½ cup extra-virgin olive oil, plus more for drizzling
3 pounds whole fava beans, shucked, blanched and peeled to yield about 2 cups cooked (see note below)
¼ cup toasted almonds
cup grated aged pecorino, plus more for shaving
10 mint leaves
Pinch chile flakes
2 cloves garlic, minced
Salt and freshly ground pepper
3 tablespoons minced red onion
Directions
Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Place the ciabatta slices on a baking sheet and brush on both sides with half the olive oil. Bake until golden brown, about 12 minutes. Remove from the oven and cool.
Place the cooked fava beans, the remaining olive oil, the almonds, the grated pecorino, the mint, the chile flakes, the garlic and the salt and pepper into food processor and process until you have a rough paste. Remove to a small container and cover with a thin layer of olive oil topped with plastic wrap.
To assemble, spread a tablespoon of the fava bean pesto on each crostino. Top each with a drizzle of olive oil, some minced red onion, shaved pecorino and salt and ground pepper.
Note: To shuck the fava bean, open each pod along the seam (using a sharp vegetable peeler can expedite this process) and remove the beans. Bring a large pot of heavily salted water to a boil. Place a large of bowl of ice water nearby. Boil fava beans about 2 minutes, then drain and cool in the ice water. When the beans are cool, drain well. With your thumbnail, pop open each fava bean and discard the inedible shell. Keep refrigerated until ready to use.
Cider-Poached Apples
Sweet, juicy red apples with a nice tartness such as Elstar or Jonagold are best suited for this dessert. By John Broening, makes 4 servings.
Ingredients
2 cups unfiltered apple cider
1 cup water
½ cup sugar
2 cinnamon sticks
A few large strips of orange zest
Juice of half a lemon
8 black peppercorns
4 apples
Directions
In a covered saucepan large enough to hold the apples in a single layer, place the cider, water, sugar, cinnamon, orange zest, lemon juice and peppercorns. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer 5 to 10 minutes. Core the apples from the bottom trying to keep the shape of the apple intact. Leave the skin on.
Gently add the apples to the poaching liquid. If necessary, add some extra cider to completely cover the fruit. Simmer gently for 15 to 20 minutes or until a skewer poked into an apple meets little resistance. Allow to cool completely in the liquid, preferably overnight.
Using a slotted spoon, remove the apples from their liquid and stand upright in a serving dish deep enough for the reduced liquid to be poured over. Remove zest and cinnamon stick and continue simmering to reduce the liquid to a syrupy consistency. Serve warm with a scoop of vanilla ice cream or at room temperature.
Quinoa Salad
By John Broening, makes about 8 cups, 4-6 servings.
Ingredients
QUINOA PILAF
2 cups quinoa
1 tablespoon olive oil
½ tablespoon butter
½ onion, diced
Salt and pepper1 tablespoon sliced garlic
2 cups (1 quart) water
1 bay leaf
QUINOA SALAD
1 recipe cooked quinoa, above
2 cups cooked diced shiitakes (about 1 pounds)
¾ cup scallions, cut on bias
½ cup toasted sliced almonds
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
½ tablespoon sherry vinegar
1 teaspoon sesame chile oil
1 tablespoon soy sauce
Freshly ground pepper
Directions
For quinoa: Clean quinoa as directed on package. In a heavy-bottomed pot, heat the oil and butter. Add the onion and cook until tender but not colored, about 10 minutes. Add a pinch of salt and pepper. Add the garlic and cook 1 minute without coloring.
Add the quinoa and stir to coat in the oil and butter. Add the water, a little more salt and the bay leaf. Bring to a boil. Cover immediately; turn the heat down to low and cook 18 minutes. Turn off the heat and let sit 5 minutes. Immediately turn the quinoa onto a sheet tray and fluff with two forks. Adjust seasoning.
For salad: Combine all ingredients.
Baby Beet Salad With Goat Cheese
I prefer cooking with Chiogga beets, which have a lower concentration of betanin and will not stain everything they touch. Chiogga beets, which are also known as Candy Striped Beets because of the alternating pink and white rings in their flesh, are best picked when they’re about 1 to 2 inches long. By John Broening, makes 4 serings.
Ingredients
8 ounces baby Chiogga beets, cleaned and trimmed
4 tablespoons olive oil, divided
Salt and freshly ground pepper3 ounces shelled pistachios
4 ounces fresh goat cheese, crumbled at room temperature
¼ cup thinly sliced red onion
4 ounces arugula
Juice of half a lemon
Directions
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Place the beets in a small baking pan and sprinkle them in 1 tablespoon olive oil. Season with salt and pepper. Cover with aluminum foil and bake 1 hour. The beets are done when they are easily pierced with a knife.
While the beets are still warm, rub off their skins with a towel. Cut the beets vertically into halves or quarters, depending upon the size.
Bake the pistachios in the same oven for 10 minutes, until crisp but still green. Roughly chop the pistachios and set aside.
In a large mixing bowl, combine the beets, pistachios, goat cheese, red onion and arugula. Toss with the remaining olive oil and lemon juice and season with salt and pepper. Serve immediately.
White Bean Soup
From John Broening, makes about 3 quarts.
Ingredients
SOUP
2 cups dried white beans
2 quarts chicken stock
1 sprig rosemary
½ cup garlic cloves (about two heads)
1 onion, peeled, cut in quarters1 carrot, peeled, cut in quarters
2 teaspoons salt
Pinch chile flakes
Freshly ground pepper
4 tablespoons olive oil
BACON-ONION GARNISH
4 ounces smoked bacon, chopped into small dice
1 yellow onion, chopped into small dice
4 cloves garlic, sliced
1 cup white wine
2 cups chicken stock
1 tablespoon minced rosemary
Salt and freshly ground pepper
Directions
For soup: The night before, cover the white beans with 2 quarts cold water. Refrigerate overnight.
The next day, drain the beans and place them in a pressure cooker with the stock, rosemary, garlic, onion, carrot, salt and chile flakes. Bring up to pressure and cook about 40 minutes, until very soft.
(If you don’t have access to a pressure cooker, substitute 6 cups drained, cooked canned beans for the dried beans and reduce the amount salt in the recipe to ½ teaspoon. Combine the beans with the stock, rosemary, salt, chile flakes, garlic, onion and carrots, and simmer until the vegetables are soft, about 40 minutes.)
Remove the rosemary and the carrot. Place the soup mixture in a blender. Do not fill more than full, and pulse several times before blending (this will keep the hot soup from exploding all over the place). Blend in batches until smooth along with the pepper and oil. Adjust seasoning to taste.
For bacon-onion garnish: In a medium sauté pan, caramelize the bacon. Add the onion and cook until golden, about 10 minutes. Add the garlic and cook until soft but not colored, about 4 minutes. Add the white wine and reduce by two-thirds. Add the chicken stock and reduce by about two-thirds again.
Add rosemary and adjust seasoning to taste.
To serve: Warm the soup. Ladle into wide, flat bowls and garnish with generous amounts of the bacon mixture.
