Miela Tahril

Creamy Scallop & Mushroom Gratin Recipe  Ingredients for 4 portions: 2 tbsp unsalted butter 1/2 cup diced shallots 8 oz button mushrooms, sliced salt and pepper to taste 1 cup white wine 1 pound sea scallops (about 3 scallops per person) 1/2 cup heavy cream 1 egg yolk cayenne to taste 2 tsp minced tarragon 1 tsp lemon zest 1/4 cup grated Gruyère cheese Broil on high, about 8-10 inches under the flame, until the scallops are hot, and the cheese is browned and bubbling....

I knew better than to expect you guys to wait until next week for this buttercrust pastry dough, after teasing you with its flaky seductiveness during the apple hand pies video. Yes, the audience has spoken, and basically said, “post this before Easter or else.” As I mention in the clip, you really want to use a food processor for this. You can certainly use a wire pastry blender and do it by hand, but it’ll take a while, and mixing in the ice water is so much easier with whirling blades....

It’s not unusual for me to steal a recipe idea from a local restaurant, but it’s not everyday that I’m inspired by something I eat at a bowling alley. This happened recently at the Mission Bowling Club, a fun and funky, six-lane bowling alley located just a few blocks from our home, which despite the cacophony, features some of the City’s best bites. In addition to an otherworldly fried chicken appetizer, and a “granulated,” aged beef burger some (including my wife Michele) consider the...

Labor Day weekend is always a bittersweet holiday. It’s supposed to honor America’s organized labor movement, but really what it mostly celebrates is the end of summer.  Pretty soon our grills will be covered by huge snow drifts, and the season’s warm breezes will be a distant memory. Well, not for me, as I live in California, but you get the point. This grilled kiwi and chili-rubbed beef short ribs recipe is specifically designed with that melancholy in mind. The prep is minimal,...

They say when life gives you lemons, make lemonade; but what about when life gives you empty mayonnaise jars? Mayonade? No, of course not. We’re going to make salad dressing instead, and “scrape the scrape.” I’ll often add a tablespoon or two of mayonnaise when I make a vinaigrette, to help emulsify things, as well as provide a little extra creaminess to the dressing. With that in mind, when I get down to the end of a jar, I don’t scrape, I shake. I’m posting the ingredients I used below...

As promised, here’s the new and improved peanut dipping sauce recipe we just featured in the beef satay video. Of course, now I’m finding out that real beef satay is actually served with a sweet, spicy rice vinegar sauce, but that’s another video, and a rather easy one at that. Stay tuned. There are no great mysteries here – mix it up, and then taste, taste, and taste. Peanut sauces are like snowflakes, and you really should twist the formula to suit your palette. You can add all kinds...

Beef satay was the very first Thai food I ever tasted, and it was literally love at first bite. Ah, that sweet, spicy, salty, smoky, and slightly funky bite…I remember it like it was yesterday.  It helps that I ate this yesterday, but still. If you’ve never had satay before, its lightning bolt of flavor can be a bit of a shock to the system. A recipe for the subtle palate, this is not. By the way, I do know that satay was actually invented in Indonesia, but for the purposes of this blog...

Some younger foodwishers may not realize this, but there was a time, before the Internet, when not everyone knew everything about everything. These days, if you’re wondering what “focaccia” means, you Google it, and all is revealed. In case you’re wondering, it comes from the Latin word for “hearth,” but that’s not what pre-Wikipedia Chef John thought. Nope, I figured focaccia meant, “fingers.” Since the signature characteristic of the bread is the deeply dimpled surface, and those holes...

While the grilled salmon with bacon and corn relish recipe we posted Monday was extremely well received, some viewers had a problem with my extremely dangerous and difficult to perform method for shaving the corn off the cob. So, just in case you’re one of these people who prefer your culinary techniques not to be dangerous or difficult, I’m posting this alternative method. Sure it’s just as fast, just as easy, and way safer, but you do have to admit, my style was way more exciting. Anyway,...

This grilled salmon with warm bacon and corn relish is another installment in our long-running series, “Salmon Recipes for People Tired of Salmon Recipes.” No one eats as much salmon as I do, and so I’m always on the lookout for new ways to make it seem a tad more exciting. In the business, this is known as “elevating” it, and as you may already know, nothing elevates like bacon. It’s the helium of smoked meats. Combine that bacon with sweet, almost raw corn, and you have a relish worthy...

I usually don’t mention the time of year during these videos, since I have no way of knowing when someone will actually view them, but when it came to this goat cheese and peach tartine, I couldn’t help myself. For me, this is summer on a slice of bread. My apologies to those of you reading/watching this in February. August is national goat cheese month (no, I don’t know who decides these things), and what better way to enjoy chèvre than by topping it with sweet, ripe, impossibly juicy peach...

Sausage & Shrimp Paella – Before You Run, You Walk, Or In This Case, Crawl - When I first do a version of a classic dish like paella, I try to use a minimum of number of ingredients and steps so we focus on the technique. So, while you experienced paella makers will probably find this quite unremarkable, it really is intended for the first-timer.  Real paella is not baked, but cooked on top of a fire, which results in a similarly textured rice to what you see here, except a layer...

“Agua Fresca” translates to “Fresh Water,” which is kind of funny, since it’s made mostly from fresh fruit. Sometimes I do extensive research into why something has a certain name, but this time, because it's too nice to stay inside surfing on a computer, I’m just going to speculate. I’m guessing that back in the day before modern plumbing and refrigeration, water may not have always been the best tasting beverage around. Drinking wine and beer all day is a fantastic alternative, but not...

One of the sadder side effects of the American culinary renaissance we’ve enjoyed over the last thirty or forty years, has been the chronic under-cooking of green vegetables. Sure, there was a time when we cooked everything too long, but now, if it’s not bright green and still crispy, it’s considered ruined. That’s why every once and a while you have to enjoy something like these slow-cooked, southern-style green beans. These beans are cooked forever in a bacon-spiked, aromatic broth, and...

This take on the Standard Grill’s famous “Million Dollar Chicken,” showed me once again that so many of life’s great culinary pleasures happen when you least expect them. I saw this recipe featured on TV recently, and chose to try it for two main reasons: one, it’s slathered in crème fraiche; and two, it’s roasted over caramelized, chicken drippings-soaked bread. I know, we had you at “slathered in crème fraiche,” but it was the bread that I was really looking forward to when I pulled...

It only happens once every couple years or so, but sometimes I’ll think of the name of a recipe before I actually have the recipe. This summery, hot wheels pasta is one such dish. Not sure how “hot wheels” popped into my brain, but pop it did, and the next thing I knew I was at the market buying a box of rotelle. So the “wheels” part was easy, but what about the “hot?” Just as easy, thanks to an assortment of hot and sweet pepper rings. I used about two-thirds hot peppers to one-third sweet,...

No, it actually takes 45 seconds! Turns out I was wrong about mug cakes. I’ve had the belief over the past few decades, that a decent mini chocolate cake from a microwave was impossible. I based this on the fact that every example I’d come across had the texture of a hockey puck. I assumed the cause was the microwave’s ultra-violent thermodynamics, and that there was nothing anyone could do about it, but then I got to thinking. Maybe there was a way to tweak the existing recipes out there...

I saw some almost completely black barbecue chicken recently, which is such a shame, since it's so easily avoided. This happens when people brush on their usually sweet bbq sauce too early, which quickly burns as soon as it's turned towards the hot coals.  Some believe the solution is only brushing on the sauce during the last few minutes, but that doesn't allow enough time for the flavors to penetrate and pick up the desired smokiness. There has to be a better way!! There is, keep reading. The...

Finding high-quality hamburger meat at the market is a lot easier than it used to be, but the same cannot be said for the buns. They’re never the right dimensions for a decent sized patty; and they’re either made from some insipid white sponge with seventy-three ingredients, or from high-fiber, whole grains, which in many ways is even worse. A proper bun should be nothing more than a light, buttery, airy delivery system for getting a hot, juicy hamburger into your mouth. Oats, spelt, and...