Michael Twitty's Sorghum-Brined Chicken

This last week, I tried out one of the recipe's from Michael Twitty's, The Cooking Gene. Sorghum-Brined Chicken sounded very "exotic" to me, because sorghum is something completely unavailable in Seattle. A previous blog post tells the tale of how I recently came to be the proud owner of my own adorable pint of sorghum syrup and finally had the chance to taste it. When my local grocery store had a great sale on whole chickens, and I got one for under $5, I knew my time had finally come. Here's a link to the recipe. The recipe for kitchen pepper, that isn't included in the link, is available in his book. Here are some pictures of the cooking process. It was surprisingly not difficult to make, and had more hands-off time than hands-on time. This is a great way to roast a chicken if you don't have a lot of time to devote to chopping and mincing.

This is the kitchen pepper that I made. I didn't have all the ingredients, but was happy with the results anyway.

 The brine is really simple, it's just salt, water, vegetable stock, and sorghum syrup. I used an oven roasting bag to put the brine and chicken in. I never use them in the oven, they're just lying around my kitchen, but I discovered that those bags are really great for brining. I highly recommend using one for this!

 Post-brined chicken with the kitchen pepper covering all of it. Under the chicken is a layer of green cabbage leaves. Under the cabbage are two pieces of kitchen twine. You can kind of see them on three sides. You definitely need kitchen twine for this recipe, so if you don't have any on-hand, buy some at the store beforehand.

 The chicken has been topped with another layer of cabbage leaves, and I have tied all the twine to hold everything together. The recipe calls for a Dutch oven, but I don't have one. I used a disposable roasting pan that I covered with foil, instead. It seems to have worked just fine.

This is the final result. I took the foil and top layer of cabbage off and let it sit in the oven for a while to brown on top more. Definitely test it with a thermometer to make sure it's at least 165 degrees. I think it had great color! The pepper blends well with the sweetness of the syrup and the salt from the brine. The cabbage cooks down and mixes with the flavors too. I made some garlic-flavored rice to eat with this and it was a perfect meal!

The next time you're looking for a new and simple way to roast a chicken, I recommend this recipe. If you can, try to find a chicken that doesn't have additional salt water added to it. This can be difficult to find because it's a cheap and easy way to make chicken stay moist while jacking up the price because it also makes the chicken weigh more than it really does. (Random capitalism-ruining-food rant.) I haven't checked lately, but in the past, Foster Farms chicken never added salt water to their chicken.

There are some other recipes in The Cooking Gene that I'd like to try some day. I'll make sure to write a report about them when I have a chance to make them! If anybody else out there has read or reads this book, I'd love to hear what you thought of it. If you try this recipe, let me know what you think of it! And if you do the Twitter thing, give Michael Twitty, aka, Kosher Soul, a follow. He's great!

New Ingredient-Sorghum Syrup

I have finally finished reading Michael Twitty's book, The Cooking Gene, and in order to try out some of the recipes featured in the book, I had to get my hands on an ingredient that turns out is pretty much impossible to get your hands on in Seattle. I scoured every grocery store in my vicinity, and even made a special trip to Whole Paycheck Foods to look for it there, but with no luck. The only thing that could be done, was to order it online. I finally did, and it arrived last week in a super cute jug. I had no idea what it tasted like or how to use it, but I had a couple recipes to try and also have this handy guide called the internet to refer to for answers.

I had a roasted salmon recipe that calls for sorghum syrup, and decided to try it out last night. The recipe is from Cooking Light, and can be found here. The first thing I noticed when I opened the jug, was how sticky it is. It's super sticky. I'd say it's halfway between molasses and maple syrup in thickness. It got on everything, including things I swear I hadn't even touched. Be prepared to clean extensively when you're finished!

 This is the salmon with the sorghum-mustard glaze on it, waiting to go into the oven. After a discussion on twitter last night, I would say that using tofu would be an excellent vegetarian option for this. Please note, that the recipe doesn't call for salt, so you might want to add some anyway, or make sure to season properly before eating. Especially if you end up using tofu. I didn't have lemon zest on-hand, so I just threw in some lemon juice instead. It worked fine.

Here is the post-roasted, post-broiled salmon. I probably could have broiled it longer, but the glaze on the pan was getting really burned and I was afraid of it smoking too much, so I took it out. You can see the edges are nice and browned.

This was really tasty! Sorghum is hard to describe. When you initially taste it, there's an explosion of flavor in your mouth. There's an almost tart/sour flavor up front, but it quickly dissipates into a round, sweetness. It's less harsh than molasses, which I'm not terribly fond of. It's not mapley like maple syrup or like sugar. It really is its own, unique flavor. I was impressed, and ended up keeping the extra glaze to use again on some more salmon.

I found some other recipes to try, a cookie recipe and a cake recipe to try. I am also going to try out some of the recipes from The Cooking Gene, so I'll try to update when I try them out.

If you live in a region where you can easily access sorghum syrup, take a moment to appreciate it! It might not be special to you, but it's not something everybody can easily access. And for those of you wondering about ordering it for yourself, go for it! A little goes a long way, so it will last you a long time and make the cost worthwhile.

The Cooking Gene-Before

The Cooking Gene-by Michael Twitty, was released today and I am eagerly awaiting my copy, which is probably sitting at my parents' house, as I write this. I feel like I have been waiting for this book my entire life, but in reality, it's only been less than a year. I discovered Michael Twitty by accident, I can't even remember how anymore, but I have enjoyed his blog posts and his tweets ever since. I feel as though we are destined to meet in real life sometime, though when, where, or how, I know not.

I have always been interested in both food and history and have spent a lot of time combining them. When I was young, I loved The Frugal Gourmet on PBS and how Jeff Smith entwined the history of a country into the dishes he was preparing. I went to cooking school right out of high school and spent time in the restaurant industry before realizing I wanted to focus on writing. I left and went back to school. When I was in college, I focused on World War II as a history major, and spent most of my time writing about the home front and food rationing in both Britain and the United States. They were issues that fascinated me, yet hadn't been covered as much as the battles had. I have collected books on food history, which aren't that plentiful, and even contemplated writing one of my own, though I've never figured out what to focus on.

Writing and food are very much my life still, but I have added to it. Another element is my love of genealogy. I have always been fascinated by my family's long-past history, probably because of my family's more-recent history. My maternal grandparents both died very young, when my mother was still a child. She and her siblings were always incredibly close because of this, but because they were so young, none of them knew much about their parents or their past. I've always felt a hole inside of me that my grandparents left behind, and I think genealogy has helped me fill it, somewhat.

Technology has advanced over the years, allowing me to find out things I never would have imagined about my past. Most of my family lines come from Canada, but one line is American. My mother's father's line. It seemed to have originated in the South, a place I've always thought of as "far away" and "over there," but never connected to me or my history. I'd never been able to trace the line back very far for some reason and it always frustrated me. An internet search on my maternal family's surname brought a shocking discovery, in that it was the name of an enslaved man from Virginia. The first of his line. But I didn't have proof beyond the name. Is that why I couldn't trace it? Because they'd been enslaved and therefore, unlikely to have documentation? I didn't know what to make of it. How could a white person have had black ancestors? How is that even possible? I lived with this information and uncertainty for a few years, not sure what to make of it. Then DNA tests began to be available at affordable prices, and I had my parents and father's parents take the tests. And there it was, on my mother's test, a tiny bit of African, which I am happy to have inherited when I took my own test and saw the results. The proof I needed, well, more proof, at least.

As I lived with this information, things began to hit me differently. History that you always thought of as terrible, but not yours, felt more personal. A place that was far off and over there, now felt closer to me. People that I never thought I was connected to, are now connected to me, through a shared past. Knowing you have ancestors who were enslaved takes getting used to. Things make me angry now that I used to not even think about, before. My white privilege glares in my face and I see how ridiculous it is that it is granted to me, but not to everybody.

How do you come to grips with this? Do I have the right to embrace this? Should I ignore it all because it's not my place? Or do I have the privilege to ignore it because it doesn't show in my skin? Ignoring it doesn't change how your family's past played out, it just disrespects it. Embracing the past, acknowledging it, feeling the pain, sorrow, and the unfairness of it all, is how we honor the past, and our ancestors.

I was in the middle of all of this when I first came across Michael Twitty and heard about the book he was working on. It was perfect timing, possibly kismet. Here was a man who was talking and writing about a past and a place and a people that I had just found out I was a part of, even if only in small part. Would I find anymore clues to my family's past in these writings? Would I find my place in the past, and therefore, in the present? Will this help fill the void that I have spent my life trying to fill with family history? I don't know, but I hope I will at least find something that I can see myself in.

I will post again after I've read the book, and even during, if I feel the need to. I will try some of the recipes and share my experiences here. If you want to read along with me, click the link above and order your own copy today! I'd love to hear what you all think of the book too!