Breaking Buns: Heisenburgers

 

Ah, a meal fit for a drug kingpin!  Straight out of the Superlab; it’s Heisenburgers with tots and a side of blue…. Jell-o.  The Skyler’s the limit!  We know you’ve been Hank-ering for it!

Don’t knock it… unless you’re the one who knocks.

Gus what in it!  In Pollos Hermanos style, it’s a chicken sandwich!

Our inspiration, as per usual, is a Bon Appetit recipe, which you can find here.

We know what you’re asking.  How did you do it?  What was your meth’? 

We followed that recipe, with a couple of Chez Venza modifications.

These are the (fruits and) veggies for the slaw.  (Jalapenos and bell peppers are fruits, yo.)  We had a little red cabbage leftover from the Chicken Khao Soi plus a little cole slaw mix.  We also added bell pepper and a radish.

These all got tossed together along with some pickles and pickle brine.

We had a jar of these bad boys sitting around.  The pickles and some of the brine went into the slaw.  The rest of the brine….

…went to brining the chicken.

The Bon Appetit recipe calls for you to cut the breasts in halve, lengthwise.  Instead, we pounded them thin between two pieces of saran wrap, and then cut them in half.

Now the recipe calls for a spicy mayonnaise.   Some of us here at Chez V are a little sensitive to how rich mayo can be.  So, this sauce employs three standard Chez Venza recipe alterations:

1.  When a recipe calls for garlic, double it unless absurd.

2.  When a recipe calls for hot sauce, double it unless absurd.

3.  When a recipe calls for mayo, cut it or substitute it with (lite) sour cream)

 

The Pinkman Sauce is pictured on the left (garlic, hot sauce, mayo, and sour cream).  Surprisingly, the recipe doesn’t call for this sauce to be added to the “slaw.”  The slaw is only dressed in pickle juice.

After brining for about an hour, the chicken gets…

…dunked in seasoned flour…

…dunked in milk (we didn’t have the buttermilk)…

…and dunked in flour again.

Then it’s fried at 350 degrees until GBD in ABQ.  (Golden brown and delicious in Albuquerque).

If you’ve made it this far and still have no idea what we’re talking about...well…you should watch more TV.  We deemed this sandwich good, but not great (unlike our inspiration, which has been deemed Emmy-worthy).  The Jell-o was…well…people our age don’t really eat Jell-o.  What should we make next?  Ricin-cakes?

This Soup is on Fire!

 

Naw, it ain’t that spicy really.

Chicken Khao Soi

Otherwise known as….Spicy Thai Noodle soup.  This cover shot from Bon Appetit magazine has been mocking us since March when it came out.  It’s just been sitting there…on the coffee table…waiting.  And then Chez Venza finally came around and showed it who was boss!

It looks daunting, but it’s just a Thai curry broth with chicken and ramen noodles.  And you can throw whatever toppings you want to make it pretty (and of course delicious).  Check out how we did it!

We started by making a red curry paste.  First step is to soak some guajillo chilles in hot water for 30 minutes (essentially….chili tea.  But don’t drink this when you have a cold!)  Or do.  Whatever, I’m not your mom.

Then the chilies go into a food processer with shallots, garlic, ginger, cilantro, coriander, tumeric, and curry powder. 

  

After some quick blending, you get a nice, earthy paste.  The paste goes into a large pot with some oil to toast the spices and cook the shallot, garlic, and ginger.  Now that’s a hot mess! No… you are!

 

Next we added 2 cans of coconut milk and 2 cups of chicken broth.

Now it’s looking like a curry!  Once we got it boiling, we dropped in some boneless chicken thighs. 

The chicken thighs are braised in the liquid for about 25 minutes, and then we pulled them out.  Now let me tell you…chicken thighs are the way to go.  They came out tender and juicy.  None of this dried, tough, boring white meat.  Too often I get overcooked chicken from restaurants.  This was way better!  It was so easy to shred the chicken with 2 forks.

Next we added some fish sauce to the curry.  Fish sauce is a strange but fascinating condiment.  It’s best not to ask what goes in it.  Just know that it tastes amazing when mixed into other things.  Don’t be afraid, just do it!  Also, we ended up using a lot more than the recipe called for… the soup lacked salt.

Now for some fun stuff.  We bought Chinese egg noodles at the store, but if you can’t find them you could totally just buy a couple packets of Ramen and throw out the spice pack.  You’re too good for that spice pack anyway!  We soaked the noodles in hot water from the kettle for 4 minutes and then drained the liquid.  Done!

Now a note on spices.  We find ourselves hard-to-please when it comes to spice.  The hotter the better.  I mean, c’mon Chick Fil A…you call that a “spicy” chicken sandwich??  Pu-leaze.  Give me a challenge!  So naturally, we added some extra heat to our curry.  Do as you will.

Now for the condiments.  We went with sliced red onion, cilantro, radishes, jalapeno, lime wedges, and crispy onions!  The radishes and jalapenos are our additions.

 

Time to assemble!  We put the noodles on the bottom, poured in the curry, and topped it off with some crunchy stuff.  We also drizzled a little chili oil on top.  Nice and spicy, the way we like it. 

Check out the custom chopstick holders in the bowl!  Aww yeah.

A very tasty, and very rich soup.  So much coconut milk.  Its almost more like noodles with a thin gravy, so don’t go too heavy on the broth!