@imp_of_the_perverse and I made a meal together, well, he held the camera and grated the cheese. But he was very good at it. We brought together our concepts of creativity through dye— transforming something once plain into something vibrant and fun.
Ciao friends. Today I’m here with Giovanni. Hi everybody. Never made a meal with another chef and I’m here with a professional food enthusiast, Matteline. That’s me. How you doing? I’m great. How are you? I’m a shade better than fabulous. Thank you. Why don’t you tell everybody what we’re going to be making today? Today we’re going to be making beet ratoto. One of my favorite recipes. Tell you what, this is your kitchen and I’ll be your s chef. Sounds good. Let’s go, chef. Let’s cook. Let’s show everybody the ingredients, shall we? Let’s do it. All right. Here’s what we got. We got some pretzel, some parsley. We’ve got some lemon beets of course. We’ve got some toasted hazelnuts, parmesano regiano, the only parmesano you should be using. A sweet onion, shallot, and garlic. Of course, we have our rice. Finally, we need some white wine. Let’s cook. Anyo. Hey, Maline. You got any knives? Oh, I’m so glad that you asked these bad boys. Oh, look at this one. Uh, you’re not quite ready for that yet. Well, you’ve got some wonderful cutlery here. This one is my my favorite. My right hand uh by Shun. Not sponsored, but you know, one day I’ll get there. I love this hack. It’s the best one out there. Honestly, I don’t know why everybody doesn’t do it. Explain to them real fast what you did. It’s like this is a slippery surface. If you put the wood up against this, you’re trying to cut something. This is how people end up with so many knife injuries. You need to have that friction to make sure that your knife doesn’t slip and you lose a finger. All of the professional kitchens use this hack. That’s why she’s a pro. Meline, why do I always cry when I chop an onion? Well, first of all, your knife probably isn’t sharp enough. Second of all, you’re doing it wrong. Let me show you. First thing that you’re going to do, going to take off the nub. Go ahead and peel away that first layer. We’re all like onions out here. See what’s underneath the layers. That’s what’s important. It’s underneath. Everybody should know. Four years later, 20 minutes. So, you’re going to turn it lengthwise. Cut it down the middle. Now you’ve got two halves of an onion. What do we do from here? Take one of the halves at an angle. Slice. Now, we’re going for a fine dice here. Yeah. So, I’m going to show you a trick here. You see these lines? Mhm. You just cut along the lines. You cutting all the way through? Yes. All the way through. Because if you look at the onion, right? Yeah. It’s already, you know, the the grooves are already in a vertical direction. Oh, wow. So, all you need to do is cut along right horizontal. That makes so much sense. In the direction that the onion naturally grew. Where’d you learn this? I learned this at my first kitchen job in Albuquerque, New Mexico from Chef Chris Bethany. And now that you’ve got this, look at that fine dice. You get to the nub. Turn it over. Couple chops here. Couple chops there. Save this for your stock. And that’s how you properly dice an onion. Shallots have got to be my favorite onion because they’re so fresh. I would I would eat them by themselves. What I love about them is that they’re so diverse. So, you can use them in salads. You can use them in rice. You can use them in anything, raw or cooked. We love a subtle onion. Your date will want to kiss you after eating these. And I wouldn’t be with her if you didn’t want to kiss me. Okay. You can’t forget about the garlic. If you’re not taking the time out of your day to peel the garlic, then you don’t deserve it. You’re a garlic lover. Oh, I should be. Absolutely. Garlic with every meal. Clove a day keeps the doctor away. Garlic is a universal love language. Would you be a doll and zest my lemon? Sure, Doll. Thank you. I’m going to get into my Jeff Gold Bloom character as Meline judges me. How am I doing, Meline? Well, you’re missing the bowl there. We’ve all been there. We’ve all been there. First time for everything. Well, this is more like a cheese grater. Oh, don’t worry. Next, you’re going to be doing the o Oh, excellent. I’m good with the cheese. Oh, we all know I love cheeses. Want to do the whole lemon? Yeah. Be be generous. Yes, chef. Thank you. This is why I like cooking alone. Coming in hot. Don’t stop the beets. Look at those. Oh, look at that. Beautiful ruby color. Oh my god. This is the color we’re going to be seeing in that rice later. Nice. Okay. Smells fantastic. My job here is done. Hey, what’s next? Meline chef, I think you’re forgetting. Now that I know you know how to do. I do. Expert at the cheese department. Form pat. Grater. Do you want to cut that, Randa? Save it for my soups. See, I’ve got a bag full of that stuff. Audrey’s like, “What are you saving these for?” This is where the umami is right here. We got the cheese. The Italian word of the day, more precisely, parmesano deano. We’ve got our toasted hazelnuts that we’re just going to toss in there real quick. Can we make it rain? But it’s lovely. If there’s anything I love doing, it’s making a mess. All right, there’s our concoction. We need a spoon. We got to try this. Just blend all those flavors together. Are we going to taste this? Of course. Let’s review. We have parsley, hazelnut, shallots, lemon zest. Lemon. Oh, I did that. And garlic. Oh my god. I got to taste this. Let me think about this for a second. Mhm. I can’t wait to try this. Now, we just need some flaky salt throw on top of that. Let’s drop the beat. These two are going to have a lovely wedding this afternoon. Got our beeftock and our rice. Can I be the best man? No. No. You can be the ring bear. Okay, I’ll do that. What are you going to be? The flower girl. Of course. Defina. Can’t leave home without it. Our aliums. Use your hands. Okay, I will. When you’re sweating your onions, what’ll speed up the process is if you add a little bit of water. But we’ve got some special sauce today. Oh my god. We’re going to add a touch of that. Watch those onions turn pink. My favorite color. We’ve got some beautiful sticky aliums here. Look at that. This is our rice. We’re going to go ahead and toss that in with our aliums so they can all have a fun time together. We’re just going to stir this around. Marry all those flavors for about 45 seconds. And then we’re going to introduce our white wine. Not now, sweetie. Mommy needs a drink. I love that sound. You hear that song? You want it to sing now? We’re going to turn up the heat a little bit. We’re going to let that alcohol evaporate before we add in our stock. You smell that? I do. You want the alcohol smell to be gone before you start adding your stock. This That’s important for me, you know, being sober and all. We want no alcohol in this dish. All right. Right. Now, we’re taking our very dark, beautiful, sexy, rich beet stock, and we’re adding that to our rice. So, we’re going to do about 6 oz at a time. I measure with my heart. So, stir that in. We’re doing this uh the rooster way. We’re going to keep those chunks of beets in there. We like it chunky. This is the sound of love. Getting close there. All right. Now, we’re ready for our budo, our butter. We’re just going to add that in. Butter. Butter. Butter. Everything’s better with butter. And we’re just going to slowly mix that in to our beautiful deep red. Tell me this isn’t the sexiest rice you’ve ever seen. Along with this butter, we’re going to add in our lemon zest and our parmesano. Let’s get that lemon zest in there. Make it snow. And we’re snowing. Winter came early this year. We’re going to do about half of that parmesan. Stir it in all nice. Once that’s nice and sticky, we’re going to add the rest. Oh my god. Can you smell that? Look at that. perfect. All right, let’s be generous here. Okay, just throw it all in there. All of it. There we go. Keep it simply sexy. Might need a cigarette after this meal. We are ready. What do you think? Should we eat it? Oh yes, I think we should eat it. Oh my god. Let’s plate this. What do you say? color. Wow. We’re going to be generous cuz I know you’re hungry. I’m starving. You going to have any? This is for me. This one’s actually going to be yours. Beautiful. You got to spank it. It’s been bad. Now we’re going to take our beautiful hazelnut granola right there. Piled on top. Use your hands. Always gou. Javanni, do you want to taste it? I’ll be right there. Oh, I cannot wait to try this. Bonavito. This is so good. That’s the stuff right there. Yes, it is. I don’t think I’ve ever had as a delicious risoto as I have had here today with you, Meline. It’s my pleasure. Meline, you should become a food fluencer. I prefer the word food enthusiast. Should we sit down and eat like normal people? Might be a good idea. You want to do a choo? Come with us.
Dining and Cooking