Congratulations, Eric: Canada's First MasterChef

Photo from the MasterChef Canada Facebook page

It is official. The MasterChef Canada season finale came down to Marida Mohammed and Eric Chong each creating a three course meal to compete for the title of Canada's first ever MasterChef. For the appetizers, Marida made a callaloo and pumpkin soup with salted pig tail while Eric made a crispy pork belly and Chinese dumpling dish. Though the judges seemed to enjoy both dishes overall, Eric narrowly lost the round over a dry piece of pork belly. For the entrée course, Marida made a black cod with pigeon pea purée while Eric prepared a stir fried noodle dish with poached lobster. Again, the judges seemed to be pleased with both dishes but Marida was given a penalty for what was deemed an inadequate serving of cod and so it appeared that she lost that round. In the final dessert round, Marida did a play on apple crumble with coconut ice cream while Eric prepared two ice creams (green tea and red been) with banana tempura. After trying both dishes the judges deliberated and ultimately, Eric was deemed the victor and given the title of MasterChef Canada. Eric has won $100,000.00, a handsome trophy and the right to call himself Canada's first MasterChef.

A big congratulations to Eric for being the champion and I wish him a very successful future. If you're no stranger to the blog then you know that Marida and I have become good friends since the show. I would like to take a moment to congratulate Marida for all of her efforts and for making it so far in such an intense competition. She had a very valiant and respectable journey throughout the competition and she certainly deserves credit for a game well played. I'd like to extend my wishes of success and fortune to her as well.

Photo from CTV.ca

Well guys, that's the end of season 1! What an incredible journey it has been. Preparations are already underway to produce a second season and as promised I will be applying to compete again. Wish me luck!

Stay tuned for much more coming on the blog very soon.

B

Glazed Chocolate Cake (Happy 2nd Birthday, www.foodbybram.com!)

Today is such a significant day! Firstly, it's the blog's second birthday today! Hard to believe that I've been doing this now for two years already. It is an absolute labour of love and I have no intentions of stopping any time soon. I, of course, wouldn't be doing this if it weren't for all of the support and feedback that I have received from all over the world. It is truly touching and I can't thank you enough. Looking forward to another year of cooking amazing food with you guys. Let's see how far we can take this blog in the future!

Secondly, tonight is the night that the season finale of MasterChef Canada is going to air. Either Marida Mohammed or Eric Chong will be crowned Canada's very first MasterChef. It's been an amazing journey and an incredible competition that I am proud to have been a part of, although my part in it was very brief. Be sure to tune in tonight at CTV to see how the whole thing goes down. Who do you think will win? I am very proud of both of them and wish them the best in their careers and success. 

Also completely unrelated to food I'm going to see Ledisi and Robert Glasper in concert tonight! The Truth Tour has only one Canadian stop and it's right here in Toronto. Ledisi is one of my favourite living vocalists and it will be at a small and intimate venue. I am so pumped! Yes, this means that I will be missing the finale of MasterChef Canada as it first airs, but you can't always get what you want as a famous rock band that I've also seen in concert (twice) recorded a little diddy about. 

Being that it is the blog's birthday I thought it would be fun and cheeky to put together birthday cake recipe! What could be a better choice for cake than chocolate? Well, there are plenty of answers to that, but I'm a chocolate guy and so chocolate it shall be! As you might already be aware, I don't do a ton of baking and don't have much of a sweet tooth. I brought this cake in to work because I was only interested in trying a sliver of it. The feedback was great for my confidence. One person said it was the best chocolate cake he'd ever had! Another person had seconds and I had three different people ask me how I kept it so moist. Apparently, Bram can bake! 

That being said, in true amateur foodbybram fashion, there were a couple of hiccups. lol! In the recipe I'm about to share I'll tell you how to do it properly, but in real life I added too much cream to my ganache and it was too thin. I tried to salvage it the only way I could by whisking in some of the chocolate filling (more on that in a bit) to thicken it up. It did help to thicken it up a bit but it did form little lumps in the ganache. My intentions were to coat the cake in a dark chocolate ganache and then pipe a swirl of milk chocolate ganache on top. Then using a toothpick, create a "Spiral Napoleon" design by swiping alternating lines from the center of the cake making an elegant, feathery spider-web effect. Well, since my ganaches were too thin they kind of ran all over the place instead of forming distinctly different lines. The end result looked more psychedelic than elegant and there were small lumps of chocolate all over the top. I set out to make an interesting looking cake, which I did, but it was not at all the presentation I was going for. If you follow the directions in this recipe, your ganache should work just fine. Otherwise, you could always just stick to one ganache and just glaze the cake. It will be simpler but still beautiful and scrumptious.

As for the filling, I cheated here. When I was shopping for ingredients to make the cake I still hadn't decided on what filling I was going to use. Common cake fillings are buttercream, custard, jam, dulce de leche, mousse, etc... At first I was leaning towards dulce de leche which is a thick caramel spread made from boiling sweetened condensed milk and caramelizing the sugars. Although I also had a vision of a "death by chocolate" theme and having chocolate on chocolate on chocolate. While shopping, I found a Belgian chocolate de leche. It was a brand new product at a bulk store so I don't even have a brand name for you to look up. In my head I was looking for a dulce de leche only in chocolate and miraculously my vision manifested into reality so I jumped at it. I have no doubt that finding this product may be a challenge, but you can use any cake filling that you like!

Let's get started! I'm excited to share this post. Brace yourself for some really tantalizing pictures. My favourite colour is brown which sometimes isn't the easiest thing to explain to people. If I'm ever in that position again I will just refer them to this blog post. You are about to find out what I mean.


Ingredients for Cake

1 tbsp unsalted butter (or so, just to grease two 9" cake pans)
2 cups sugar
1 3/4 cups pastry flour (AP flour will work, it will just be denser), plus additional
3/4 cups cocoa powder
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1 1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
2 large eggs
1 cup milk (anything but skim)
1/2 cup vegetable oil
2 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup hot black coffee (hot water can be used as a substitute)
2 cups of chocolate de leche (or the cake filling of your choice)


Preheat your oven to 350F/175C. Prepare two 9" cake pans by greasing them lightly with butter and lightly dusting with flour. This will ensure that the cakes easily come out of the pans when they're done. Set aside.

In a mixing bowl, add the flour (sifted), cocoa powder (sifted), sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Stir or whisk until well combined.

Crack in the eggs, add the milk and oil. With a hand mixer, beat on medium speed for about two minutes or until a smooth batter comes together.

Add the vanilla extract and beat on a slow speed for about a minute to incorporate completely. Pour the hot coffee into the mixture then stir with a wooden spoon to avoid splashing. Stir to incorporate well.

Pour the batter evenly into the two cake pans. Lightly tap each pan on a flat surface to release any trapped air bubbles. Then place in the middle of your preheated oven for 30-35 minutes or until an inserted toothpick comes out clean.

Remove the cakes from the oven and place on a wire rack to begin cooling.

After 15-20 minutes the pans should be cool enough to touch. Flip the pans to invert the cakes onto the rack. You may have to use a butter knife to gently release the side of the cake from the pan, but the flour and butter should should have done most of that for you. Then leave the inverted cakes on the rack to cool completely. This can take 90 minutes to 2 hours. 

The baking soda, baking powder and the eggs will have made the cakes rise. They may have created dome shapes on the top of your cakes. You want your cakes to be level before  the next step. All you want to do is place a hand on top of the cake and slowly and steadily cut the domed part off with a serrated knife. Be calm and confident and you should end up with flat, even cakes. As you can see, my wire rack formed mesh-like scars on the faces of my domes. This is a good opportunity to get rid of that.

Ta dah! Clean and even presentation. Don't worry if there are a few nicks or imperfections because you're just going to cover everything with a beautiful chocolate ganache anyway!

This next part is optional depending on how you plan to serve your cake. I used a cake plate and then used it as a stencil to trace a piece of parchment paper of the same shape and size. Then I included a tab that I could easily grab. This piece of parchment has a couple of jobs. My cakes were 9" but I could only find 10" plates, so the paper will help to keep the exposed plate clean and presentable when it's removed. I also transferred the cake to a box so I could bring it to the office. The tab makes it so you can grab it and pull it from under the completed cake before building the box around it. I still had to use an offset spatula against the cake to pull the parchment out, but hey, it worked! 

Place the parchment stencil evenly over the plate and place that on the wire rack. Place a pan under the rack. This will give the excess ganache a chance to run off without making a mess on your counter or making the bottom of the cake soggy. Place one of the cakes in the middle of the plate.

Cover the cake with the chocolate de leche or whatever filling you chose. Leave a bit of space between  the filling and the edge of the cake to account for same displacement when the weight of the second cake is added on top. Smooth out into an even layer.

Place the second cake on top to form an evenly stacked, undressed cake!

In the next step, we're going to glaze the cake with warm ganache. So again, trust the text moreso than the photos for the next few steps because I added too much cream to my ganache. You want your ganache to be thicker than mine turned out. 


Ingredients for Ganache


8 oz good quality dark chocolate, coarsely chopped or chips
1 cup whipping cream (may be called "heavy cream" in your country)
1 tbsp butter (coconut oil or corn syrup could also be used, just to give the ganache a shine)

*To make a milk chocolate ganache, make the same recipe but with milk chocolate instead of dark.


Place your chocolate in a large heatproof bowl.

 


Heat the whipping cream on the stove and bring it to a gentle boil. Keep an eye on it because it will go from gently boiling to boiling over in the blink of an eye. 

Pour the boiling whipping cream over the chocolate. 

Quickly cover the bowl with a plate or anything that will trap the steam. Leave for 2 minutes. This way the chocolate will melt slowly and gently. If we were to stir it right away we would lose too much steam in the process and there wouldn't be enough heat to melt the chocolate into a ganache. So this part is key.

Then remove the plate and begin stirring. Don't panic. At this stage it will always look like you screwed it up and it isn't working. Sooner than later, with enough stirring a beautiful chocolate ganache will form. Just have faith. Add the butter at the end stir in until completely melted and incorporated.

Here comes the best part of the entire process! Pour the ganache over your cake. Start from the middle and carefully move out towards the edge a little but do not assist it it any way. Let the ganache flow freely and smoothly all over your cake until it is completely encased in a shiny, chocolatey glaze. To ensure that you resist the urge to touch it and mess it up, take a step back and marvel at the sight in front of you. Take in this moment as it is one of the moments that make you realize why you love cooking so much. At least it does for me.

Mmmmmmoney shot!

  

Then I tried to pipe my milk chocolate ganache into a spiral pattern on the top while the dark chocolate ganache was still warm and liquid. My milk chocolate ganache was even thinner than the dark chocolate (because I didn't add any of the filling to it). So it was a runny mess and when I went to do the toothpick Napoleon pattern it turned more into a brown tie-dye look. It certainly didn't get ruined by any means. It was just not at all what I was originally going for. I wish you better luck than I had if you try this technique. lol

Boom! The hard parts are all over. Let the cake sit for about thirty minutes or so to let the ganache solidify a little. All you have to do is scrape any excess ganache off the parchment and carefully place it over the laid out box before you shimmy the parchment out and build the box around it. Place the cake in the fridge. The cold air will help to seize up the ganache more. As soon as the glaze is set it is ready to eat. I made this in the evening and then brought it to work the following day. After a night in the fridge and a safe transport to work, this is what the cake looked like after I unboxed it.

I didn't nail the presentation, totally my own fault, but at least I was able to pinpoint exactly what I did incorrectly so that you don't have to. I'm not even bothered by the presentation because this cake was such a hit. Everyone raved about it. My confidence was entirely restored.

This cake was chocolatey, moist, decadent, not-too-sweet and just an overall pleasure to eat. Despite a little panic near the end with the ganache, this was also a lot of fun to make. I'm not big into sweets and if I had to choose my top five sweets I don't think cake would even make it on the list, but this was awesome. If you're in a baking mood or have an event coming up that may call for a cake, why not give this a try? You can get creative with the filling you choose. Chocolate mousse or raspberry jam would have made excellent substitutions for the chocolate de leche. I wish you the best of luck with your cake!

That about does it for now. Thanks again for making it a great two years and stay tuned for much more to come! I have some more exciting surprises in store.

Passing on much love and gratitude to you guys!

B

MasterChef Canada Recap: Top 2!

It's been over a month since I covered anything about MCC. Since Carly was eliminated, the competition continued to heat up and intensify. 

In the following episode, the remaining contestants were split into 2 teams for a food truck challenge at Toronto's city hall. Eric, leader of the red team (Danielle, Kaila & Julie) served from the Italian food truck while Tammara, who led the blue team (Marida, Mike & Pino) served from the Mexican truck. Each dish cost $5 (and went to charity) and the team whose truck makes the most money wins the challenge. The blue team won by only $15.00. The red team went on to compete in a Baked Alaska pressure test which sent Danielle home.

Then the remaining contestants had a lobster mystery challenge, basically given fresh lobster and their pick of anything they want in the MasterChef Canada pantry. In the end it was Mike's dish that gave him the advantage of being not only exempt from a teams-of-two dim sum challenge, he also got to choose the teams. The teams were Pino-Tammara, Marida-Julie and Eric-Kaila. The contestants had to work as a tag-team meaning only one person could physically cook at a time and they would switch at timed intervals. In the end it was Julie who was eliminated.

In the next episode the remaining contestants teamed off for a restaurant takeover challenge. The restaurant was none other than MasterChef Canada judge Claudio Aprile's Origin North. The red team was Tammara, Mike and Kaila while Pino, Eric and Marida made up the blue team. The two teams put up a good fight in handling a busy dinner service on their own, but the team that was undone by their own flaws was the blue team. Marida, Eric and Pino entered a pressure test where they had to make a dozen donuts in at least three different flavours. Pino's flavours were peanut butter & jam, s'mores and an Italian pastry cream with sour cherry. Marida's flavours were very coconut, strawberry lemonade and vanilla brûlée. Eric tried to take on eight different complicated flavours which nearly cost him the title, but in the end it was Pino who left.

The next mystery box, instead of being presented with ingredients, the contestants were surprised by members of their families. After an emotional reunion, the remaining contestants went into a challenge in two teams. At this point, there were five of them and they couldn't be split into even teams. Marida, who won the previous doughnut challenge, got to choose the teams. She paired herself with Tammara while Eric, Mike and Kaila made up the other team. Each team had to prepare a family style meal to the judges... and their families. While the families feedback is taken into account, ultimately it is the judges who decided the winning team. In this case, it wasn't Eric, Mike or Kaila who had to have to go into a Pressure Test. The challenge is to make a perfect steak frites (classic French dish of seared steak and french fries) with a Béarnaise sauce. In the end, it was Mike's undercooked steak that cost him his apron.

In last night's episode, the final four: Eric, Marida, Kaila and Tammara faced their final mystery box. A large mystery box revealed Joe Bastianich, the razor-tongued judge of the American version of MasterChef. Joe chose all of the ingredients in the mystery box which were some of his favourite Italian items. All four contestants created Italian inspired dishes, but Tammara was dubbed the chef with the worst dish and was the victim of a surprise elimination. The final three then went into a shellfish elimination challenge. Kaila, with the best dish in the previous round got first pick of which she would prepare a dish with: fresh scallops, razor clams or dungeness crab. She choose the scallops. Marida, who had the second best dish, ended up picking for herself as well as Eric who will get stuck with whatever's left. Marida chose the razor clams for herself, leaving Eric with the crab (and he is thrilled about it). All three end up producing some stellar looking dishes, although Kaila is ultimately given the boot.

Leaving us now with the first ever top 2 of MasterChef Canada, Marida Mohammed & Eric Chong. Who do you want to win? Any hard feelings about previous eliminations? I wish both Marida & Eric the very best.  

Since Tammara and Kaila were eliminated in last night's episode, they flew back to Toronto to do some press today, such as the Marilyn Denis show. Last night a bunch of us got together to catch up and watch the episode. It was the largest MasterChef Canada reunion that I've been part of: 13 of us in total (out of a possible 50 spread out across Canada). Here is a group shot of us below...

From left: Pino, Jordan, Narida, Rob, Dale, myself, Kaila, Marida, Brooke, Tammara, Chris, Mylene and Maryam. 

  

 Other pictures from the evening...

From left: Pino, Mylene, Rob, Chris, Tammara, Jordan, Marida & Narida. 

Pino, Tammara & myself.

 

    

Pino, Mylene and Tammara.

Tammara and me.

 

Myself & Marida.

Mylene and Marida.

It is so exciting to see how this very first season of MasterChef Canada is going to end up. Be sure to tune in to CTV for the finale next Monday, April 28th. Check your local listings from time as it will vary depending on where in Canada you are. If you're not in Canada you can always look for the episode online. You can watch full episodes on CTV.ca but I'm not sure if it will work outside of Canada. Please let me know.

I can't believe this but I'm going to miss the season finale. I have tickets to a concert that night that I bought well over a month ago and I didn't realize that the concert fell on the same night as the finale. I'll have to miss an incredible party that I'm sure a bunch of the other top 50 will have. As soon as I get to watch the episode I will come back with another recap post and a congratulatory announcement of the winner.

I hope all you MasterChef Canada fans and the like have enjoyed this post and the photos. I would love to hear your thoughts on who you think will win. 

Speaking of the finale on April 28th, I have a special surprise in store for the blog that day so make sure you don't miss it!

Until next time,

B

Grilled Moroccan Chicken with Steamed Vegetables and Couscous

I have been making excellent use of the Moroccan spice mixes that my coworker gave me. I just shared the spatchcocking technique so I had to do something with that chicken from the tutorial. Since spatchcock chicken is so perfect for grilling and we are finally getting some version of spring, I decided to barbecue it. The spice mix, from what I can make out, has turmeric, paprika, cumin, cinnamon and ginger. If you spatchcock your own chicken you can do whatever dry rub or sticky sauce you wish. To keep with the Moroccan feel I decided to make one of my go-to warm couscous salad combination of chopped nuts, dried fruit and two fresh herbs. This time I chopped almonds, added green raisins and fresh chopped cilantro and parsley. Instead of making a sauce, I decided to grill some caramelized lemon so that smokey, lemon juice could be squeezed at will. I already had broccoli in my fridge and I got my hands on some heirloom orange cauliflower so I decided to make a papillote out of foil and steam them on the grill with some onion, garlic, chili and seasoning. Turned out awesome and overall pretty healthy too!

If you haven't spatchcocked your chicken yet, scroll down or click here to see how it's done. I lightly massaged my chicken with olive oil and then seasoned with salt, pepper and a generous application of the Moroccan poultry spice mix that I mentioned before. Then I put it in a bag and left it to marinate overnight. If you don't have the luxury of preparing a night ahead, try to let your chicken marinate for at least a couple of hours. 

    

Just for fun, here is a shot of the broccoli and the heirloom cauliflower before I prepped them. 

I cut those into florets as well as an onion. I crushed and halved some cloves of garlic that were actually quite huge, and three small chilies leaving all of the seeds in for extra kick. I seasoned with salt, pepper, dried parsley, dried oregano, dried mint and sumac with a little butter and some coconut oil. I made a makeshift parcel out of aluminum foil to envelope all of that and I sealed it tight ensuring there was excess room in it for steam.

I also prepped a lemon by cutting it in half width wise and sprinkling the juicy flesh with a generous pinch of sugar. The sugar will do two things. When it comes into contact with the hot grill it will caramelize which will create a unique flavour and charred look. It will also counteract the extra bitterness that lemon tends to produce when it's cooked. It will only take 2 or 3 minutes on the grill to achieve this so best to do it at the end when the chicken is resting. 

I sprayed my grill with cooking spray and then preheated it to medium-high on one side. The thermometer read 400F/205C. I removed the chicken from the bag. The spice rub had saturated the exterior of the chicken and stained it with its goldenrod colour.

I placed the chicken on the grill breast side down on the opposite side of the grill from the heated part. The indirect heat will promote even cooking. Most of the cooking will take place on the backside. All we want is to give the breast side a head start with some lovely colour before the rest of the cooking is done through the other side. It needs to cook on the breast side for about 10 minutes. I recommend turning it 90 degrees five minutes into cooking to create a cross hatch design with the bars of the grill.

When your 10 minutes are up, turn the chicken onto its back side so that the breast is facing up. Cook the chicken for about 30 minutes or until the juices from the thickest part of the breast runs clear and it reads an internal temperature of 165F/74C. Be sure to move the chicken occasionally to prevent it from sticking to the grill. It is important that you let the chicken rest for 10 whole minutes before cutting into it to avoid losing all of the delicious juices.

 

Allow 25-30 minutes for the parcel of vegetables, depending on how you prefer your doneness. Place them on the hotter part of the grill next to the chicken when they go in. 

Here is an unnecessary but pleasurably gratuitous shot of the completed grilled chicken, fresh off the grill and resting... Mmmm....

When the chicken is busy looking gorgeous, place the sugared lemon halves down against the grill. If you're preparing this for a group, ensure that each plate gets half a lemon. Feel free to apply a little pressure on the lemon to promote a good sear but don't apply too much pressure or you'll lose all of your lemon juice and it will defeat the purpose. 

Keep an eye on them but 2 or 3 minutes should do it. You want the lemon to be slightly blackened in areas but still quite juicy. 

Then serve with steamy, fluffy couscous and you're all set! This dish was very scrumptious, inexpensive to put together and overall quite healthy. Even if you don't use a Moroccan based marinade I still recommend you try the caramelized lemon trick. The lemon juice takes on such an interesting flavour. It becomes smokey and satisfying and the sugar really counteracts any extra bitterness that the lemon would have taken on while it was being cooked. A good squeeze of that stuff all over the chicken and the florets was incredible. I am placing a big seal of approval stamp on that. With summer around the corner it's always great to find new and exciting things to cook on the grill. Maybe spatchcock chicken with caramelized grilled lemon will be on your menu this summer. :)

Even if you don't try this, I am hope you enjoyed the post. I certainly enjoyed going over the photos. lol! There's something about grilled chicken... crispy on the outside, hot and juicy on the inside and just begging to fall off the bone. It satisfies a nerve like none other. 

I have a couple of posts coming up in the next week and a bit that I'm very excited about but it's a surprise so you'll have to come back and see what it is.

In the meantime, take care and keep cooking!

B

How To Spatchcock a Chicken

"Spatchcock" refers to the technique of removing the backbone and splitting the sternum of a bird so that it lays flat. This makes it ideal for grilling or roasting as it will cook more evenly. This is sometimes referred to as "butterflying". In this post I'll show you how to spatchcock a chicken. Though the basic technique can be applied to most birds including pheasant, quail, grouse, duck and pigeon. 

All you need to spatchcock a chicken are a sharp knife and a pair of kitchen shears. If you don't have kitchen shears (or a good pair of scissors) you can do the entire process with just a sharp knife. It's just a lot quicker and easier with shears.

To begin, place the chicken in front of you with the back of the bird facing you, as seen below. This chicken was trussed with string when I bought it. That's what the two indentations are across the back. Your chicken may not have those marks. 

Hold the chicken steady by firmly pinching the nub of the tail. With your other hand, use the kitchen shears to cut all the way up one side of the spine (backbone) of the chicken. 

Then use the shears to cut up along the other side of the spine. Use the nub of the tail as a guide. Otherwise, the incision should be about 2 centimetres across from the first one you made. Once you've removed the backbone, reserve it as it can be used to make stock with later (freeze if you don't plan to use within a few days). With that removed, you should be able to open the chicken up kind of like a book. The breastbone will prevent it from laying perfectly flat, you will notice. So in the meantime it kind of looks like something out of the Predator movies.

Let's take a look at the current situation from another angle. Here is a close up of the collar of the chicken. Separating the two breasts is a kind of dagger shaped piece of cartilage. That's the sternum of the chicken. If you look above at the 'V' section where the shoulders meet. That's where you'll find the wishbone. Place the blade of your knife in the middle of the V-area and clip down. This will break the wishbone in half. If you push down on it with your hand, the sternum will pop out and expose itself.

It's up to you if you want to break and pull the breastbone (sternum) out or keep it in and simply slice through it with the knife. The latter is demonstrated below. Once the sternum is either removed or split in half, the chicken will lay evenly flat on your work surface. 

Although the appearance of it may be gruesome your spatchcocked chicken is ready to be seasoned, marinated and then grilled or roasted. This technique is stupendous for barbecue chicken, jerk chicken and Portuguese piri piri chicken, to name a few. Those are some ideas but you can do whatever you like with your chicken.

Pretty simple, right? This is a really useful way of preparing whole chicken or any bird. There are endless directions you can take your spatchcock chicken from here. Stay tuned to see what becomes of this one here on the blog.

I hope this post is useful to you. Please let me know if you have any questions or comments.

Talk to you soon,

B