When I got the Modernest Cuisine At Home cookbook, I was overwhelmed. Bringing science into the kitchen was very exciting to me. I grew up with pressure cookers, so that was not a big reach for me as a tool, but I never had access to a chinois, using a fine sieve instead. We recently got a chiniois, and I have to say, it is a game changer. If you like smooth sauces and soups, get one immediately because it will change your life.

There are a few steps to making this dish, which will absolutely blow your mind.

First, you need broccoli. Trimmed, you need 500g, I find its about 3 heads of broccoli. You need to trim the brocolii down to floweretts, making sure to set a fair number of them to one side for later.

Then you need gruiyere cheese grated, in this recipe you need 40 grams. It’s not a good idea to overdo the cheese.

You need chicken stock, or my preference is chicken bone stock, but you priobably need about 2 cups worth to get the soup the texture you like.

The magic happens in the pressure cooker

To begin, you need a half cup of unsalted butter, 30 grams of water, 5 grams of salt and 2.5 g of baking soda.

Melt the butter in the pressure cooker, add the water, baking soda and salt that you have mixed, then add the brocoli, other than the floweretts you saved, put the lid on, and bring it to 1 bar of pressure for 20 minutes. When its cooked, cool it and take the lid off.

While its cooking you need to fry the saved flwoeretts till they are bright green. It works great when the oil temperature is around 200 F. They get bright green quickly so pay attention then let them drain on a paper towel.

You also need to roast and chop hazelnuts and strip the leaves off of thyme stalks.

Back to the pressure cooker.

Use and immersion blender, and blend the cooked broccoli. This works with just 30g of water because the water content of the broccoli allows it to cook correctly.

Add chicken stock till you are satisfied with the consitency.

Then run it all through the chenois.

Bring it to a good simmer adding the cheese and chicken stock as needed till you are happy with the consistency.

Serve it with the broccoli, hazelnuts and trhyme leaves as illustrated. We also make garlic bread out of toasted bagettes that I rub a clove of garlic over.

It is an absolutely the best dish of soup I have ever had in my 67 years on the planet.

vindaloo is a bold, authentic Goan-style spicy curry—tangy from vinegar, deep with garlic and spices, and properly hot (but adjustable). This version stays true to its Portuguese-Goan roots: no tomatoes, no cream, no sugar unless you intentionally balance heat at the end.

It begins with the marinade. First using these ingredients:

For the Vindaloo Paste

• 8 dried Kashmiri chilies (or 4 Kashmiri + 2–4 Thai chilies for extra heat) 🌶️
• 6 cloves garlic
• 1 tbsp fresh ginger
• 1½ tsp cumin seeds
• 1 tsp coriander seeds
• 6 black peppercorns
• 4 cloves
• 1-inch cinnamon stick
• ½ tsp turmeric
• 2 tbsp white vinegar

They all go into the food processor and make a thick paste that you marinate the chicken in. I prefer bone in thighs, so I skinned them, cleaned the fat off and chopped them into pieces before applying the marinade. They sat in the marinade in the fridge overnight. Thats the best way! Then in the morning, I chopped a big onion and caramlized it before adding just half of a roma tomato chopped to help build the sauce. I added the chicken and browned it a little before adding some broth and half a bottle of spicy vondaloo sauce before letting the whole lot simmer on a very low heat all day.

What happens is that the first flavor you smell is the vinegar. The vinegar-forward aroma is exactly what you want at this early stage. It means the dish is still in its early vindaloo phase—sharp, bright, and angular. Over the next few hours it will round out as:

• garlic sweetens
• onions dissolve into the sauce
• chili deepens
• fat emulsifies
• acidity integrates

Vindaloo almost always smells too sharp midway through a long cook—and then turns magical later. Its pretty hot and so that will be the thing I watch. We like it hot, bet too hot is not good either.

Naturally, when you make curry, you make smosas. These are potato and peas with chicken vindaloo

We LOVE food from NOLA. That Big Easy feel in every bite. A heat that grows, with textures and flavors that demand you take another bite on your way to cleaning the plate. Because beef is getting really expensive, we made the choice to try to make less expensive meals. Red beans and rice NOLA style is a very good and tasty strategy.

Ingredients

• 1 lb dried red kidney beans (soaked)
• 1 smoked ham hock + ½ lb thick-cut bacon (or pancetta)
• 1 lb andouille sausage, sliced
• 1 large onion, diced
• 1 green bell pepper, diced
• 2 celery stalks, diced
• 5 cloves garlic
• 2 bay leaves
• 1 tsp dried thyme
• 1 tsp smoked paprika
• ½ tsp cayenne (adjust later)
• 1 tsp black pepper
• 6–7 cups low-sodium chicken stock
• 1 tbsp Worcestershire
• 1 tsp soy sauce (secret umami boost)
• 1–2 tsp apple cider vinegar (finishing acid)
• 2 tbsp butter (finish)

Rice:

• Jasmine or long grain rice
• Add 1 tbsp butter + 1 bay leaf while cooking

. Render & build flavor

• Cook bacon slowly until fat renders and it’s lightly crisp.
• Remove bacon (leave fat).
• Brown sausage in that fat → remove.
• Add the trinity (onion, pepper, celery). Cook longer than you think—you want slight caramelization.

Garlic + spice bloom

• Add garlic and spices.
• Let them toast 30–60 seconds in the fat (huge flavor payoff).

Slow simmer with structure

• Add beans, ham hock, bacon, sausage, and stock.
• Simmer low for 2–3 hours.
• Skim occasionally, stir gently—don’t rush this.

• When beans are tender:
  • Remove ~1–2 cups of beans
  • Blend or mash them smooth
  • Stir back in

This gives that silky, gravy-like body instead of watery beans.

Final layering

• Stir in:
  • Worcestershire
  • Soy sauce (you won’t taste it—just depth)
  • Butter
  • Splash of vinegar

Taste and adjust:

• Salt (now, not earlier)
• Heat (cayenne or hot sauce)

Rice (don’t neglect this)

• Cook rice with butter + bay leaf.
• Fluff and let steam off slightly → you want distinct grains, not mush.

Plating like a pro

• Rice first (tight mound)
• Beans ladled around and slightly over
• Slice of sausage on top
• Finish with:
  • Green onions
  • Parsley
  • Few drops hot sauce

The process from start to finsih was simple but involved. The first step is to soak the beans for 24 hours. Then you start by making pancetta with the chopped bacon. Next you brown the sausage coins, and only then do you start to build flavor. Yook the holy trinity in the bacon and sausage fat till its pretty caramlized before adding the garlic, then the spices. After that you add the meats and the ham hock along with the stock and the beans, and it cooks very slowly on a simmer for about 3 hours. After that, you mash a cup or two of beans to get that silky smoothness before adding the liquid flavoring. We let it sit ovenight, and ate it the next day after finishing it with butter. We served it with chopped green onion and parsley along with a thick slice of sourdough bread. I am certain we will make this again!

One of my go to Indian dishes when I eat out is Butter Chiken. It’s a classic INdian dish made with marinate and grilled chicken (Tandoori chiccken), simmered in a creamy tomato gravy (curry). The sauce is super silky, buttery, aromatic and mildly spicey. It’s such a beautifully balanced and tasty dish that is a favorite of Indian food lovers all over the world. It’s a dish that layers in flavors. One of the things I learend about Indian cooking is the ginger garlic sauce. You blitz fresh ginger with garlic and olive oil to get a nice paste that is used in so many dishes that many Indians keep a jar of it in the firdge.

The dish begins its flaovor journey with chicken marinating in lemon juice, Kashmiri chili poweder and a lttle salt as its first 20 minute marination, in preparation for the second marination which includes greek yogurt, the gardlic ginger poaste, garu masala, cumin, coriander, kasuri metha (dried cilantro), and tumeric. This marinade should go from 12 to 48 hours.

Next you start with the gravy. First, you let chashews hydrate in water in anticipation of blitzing them in the blender along with tomatoes. Not all butter chicken dishes use onion, but the recipe I used did so. You slice ontions and brown them before adding them to the blender with the finely blitzed cashews and the fresh tomatoes.

Next, while the sauce is blitzing, I put the chicken onto a sheet pan under the grill to par cook.

to make the sauce itself you start with the spices. A stick of Cinnamon, cloves and cardemom pods along with the sliced green chilles (I use sorrano). You cook these in butter for a few mintes before adding garum masala, paprika and more chili powder. Next you add the garlic ginger paste and cook it all making sure not to burn it. Then its time to get the blend into the pan, and you can do this through a strainer if its not smooth. enough. Then its time to get this going on medium high heat (avoid the splattering.) You parttially cover it and let it boil for around 10 -15 minutes stirring often till the mix is nice and thick. You add a couple of cups of hot water, and make sure its beginging to come together.

You rpepare to add the chicken from the grill. To finish the chicken in the grill, you want it browned, but not burned. Before you add the chicken, remove the whole psices and discard. Once you add the chicken, you can add a little more more water to get the consistency you desire. Let it cook for another 10 minutes or so. Adjust salt, sugar and add cilantor, and a tablespoon of butter. Take it off the heat, then temper a 1/3rd of a cup of heavy cream and add that to the mixture, and serve it over basmati rice.

We made our rice with saffron and I also made garlic naan. It is such a great dish. A fair bit of work, but great.

This is a great dish. Midway though the meal, Heather said, “This goes into regular rotation for sure!” It’s an interesting way to make a wonderful chicken dish for sure, but, let me warn you, it’s HOT! How hot you ask? The kind of hot where your hair sweats. Your shirt sweats. There is sweat pouring down your face, and even so, you just cannot wait to take another bite!

The secret is in the marinade.

Jerk Marinade

• 4 scallions
• 1 small onion
• 4 cloves garlic
• 3 Scotch bonnet pepper (We could not find Scotch Bonnet, so we made it with Habanero, which is pretty similar on the Scoville scale.
• 1 tbsp fresh thyme leaves
• 1 tbsp ground Allspice
• 1 tsp black pepper
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• ½ tsp nutmeg
• 1 tbsp brown sugar
• 1 tbsp soy sauce
• 2 tbsp lime juice
• 2 tbsp vegetable oil
• 1 tsp salt
• Optional: 1 tbsp dark rum

Blend everything into a thick paste. Slash bone in chicken, we used thighs, and massage the spice into the chicken. The outer limit for the marinade is 3 days, but one day will suffice. To prepare for cooking, I used a 12 inch pan, and carefully wiped the bulk of the marinade off the chicken, leaving a thin layer. I let it rest out of the fridge for about 30 minutes before baking to allow it to come to temperature and tighten up a bit. I baked it for about 40 minutes at 375 before putting the chicken on a grid and painting it with the finishing glaze of hot honey, lime juice and a pi9nch of freshly ground allspice, then caramelized the chicken under the broiler, turning and basting it often for the next few minutes till it began to turn.

I let it rest for about 10 minutes before serving it over rice. I used the time to reduce the sauce that was in the bottom of the roasting pan and poured it over the rice.

Again, an absolutely delicious meal.

There is so much to like about Thai flavors. This soup leverages them all. It’s an easy brothy soup that is two parts, the marinade for the chicken, and then the broth. I marinaded the chicken in bite size pieces, although the recipe does not call for that. You use boneless skinless thighs that you lay on a bed of jasmine rice when you serve. This is a broth heavy soup where the broth does most of the work. It’s so delicious and so moreish and so easy. Definitely one of the contenders for “The best version chicken soup”. It’s pretty easy to make, you just need the right ingredients. The other thing about Thai food is that its HOT and makes your hair sweat! You can ramp up the heat with that Thai chili sauce and add an extra serrano pepper or two. But the sweetness and tanginess of the coconut broth with lemongrass and a touch of lemon juice to finish it is so moreish. I used a little fish sauce and a touch of rice wine vinegar to ramp up the umami. After you marinade the chicken, you sear it in a pan, make sure the sauce caramelizes, then set it aside for serving.

For the chicken marinade:

• Boneless chicken thighs
• Crushed pepper
• Grated garlic
• Grated ginger
• Grated lemon grass roots
• Chilli oil
• Soy sauce
• Red chilli sauce
• Lemon juice
• Honey
• Oyster sauce
• Red chilli flakes
• Olive oil

For the broth

• Olive oil
• Onion petals
• Thinly sliced ginger,
• Green chillies
• Spring onion whites
• Kafir lime leaves
• Lemon grass roots, crushed
• Lemon grass greens, roughly chopped
• Water
• Coconut milk
• Salt
• Lemon juice

To serve:

• Jasmine rice
• Spring onion greens

You put a pile of rice in the bowl, top it with the chicken, if you do not marinade in bite size pieces, then cut into bite size pieces. Top with the broth and the green onions, add chili sauce and a little lime juice, sit back and enjoy!