Andrew Zimmern's Recipes: November 2011

Andrew Zimmern is famous as the host of the Travel Channel's Bizarre Foods, but he's also a born-and-bred New Yorker, a classically trained chef and a Minneapolis-based home cook. He brings every part of his experience to bear in the recipes he shares here, bridging the gap between exotic flavors and American comfort food.

December 2011 | November 2011 | October 2011

So, after the turkey tetrazzini, after all the turkey sandwiches and the potpies, I always return to this school-lunch classic. It’s one of the great comfort foods of all time, and if this doesn’t become a post-Thanksgiving favorite in your house, I will be shocked. Creamy and sublime, Old World and rustic in the best farmhouse sense possible, this dish, served with a pot of long-grain Carolina rice, can’t be beat. My dad for some reason became obsessed with this dish a zillion years back, and it became a Zimmern ritual to eat it as the last leftover meal of the week. It was also a great way to use the rich turkey stock that I always make from boiling the frame of my bird.

Photo courtesy of the Travel Channel

Home sweet home—on the Stone Arch Bridge over the Mississippi River’s St. Anthony Falls. One of the best views of the Minneapolis skyline. »

I first came across this dish while traveling with my father in the mid-1970s in Spain, where we saw this cake on almost every dessert table we came across. Over the years, I was always trolling for a recipe like this and finally found one in an old Penelope Casas cookbook. I promptly started playing with it and tweaking it and adjusting it, and I eventually got it to where it was workable for a dessert hack like me... The poached plums are insane with this dish and make good use of the conventional plums in the market right now. I serve this dish with plenty of sweetened crème fraîche passed at the table.

I love food festivals—from the super-fancy to the down-and-dirty, there’s nothing better than gathering around food. »

This asopao (stew) is Trinidad-inspired, but it fits neatly into the Flo-ribbean cooking genre. The southeastern zeitgeist is all about Creole and Amer-Indian style meeting Florida’s amazing multiple growing seasons and all of the Gulf’s impressive bounty from the sea, sky and land. This asopao is pure Trini magic. Don’t be shy about passing plenty of extra limes and hot chile sauce at the table.

This is the tastiest, saltiest, sweetest, spiciest, most amazing rib recipe for stovetop cookery that I know of. Barbecue is cooking with smoke, grilling is cooking over a fire source, and for most of us in the US, these options don’t work in the cold-weather months. Where I live in Minnesota, cooking low and slow, using indirect methodology, is impossible when the temperature at night is in the 20s. But inside, I can make enough ribs in one large pot to feed four, and serve the ribs with Japanese short-grain rice; a nice, tart, vinegary cucumber salad; and sautéed sugar snap peas or Chinese broccoli. This is one of the most popular dinner events in our home.

December 2011 | November 2011 | October 2011

Photo courtesy of the Travel Channel

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