Named for a small town in Thailand, created by a Chinese immigrant from Vietnam, and made in California, Huy Fong Foods’ Sriracha became the standard hot sauce for anyone eating Southeast Asian food in the United States in the 21st century. Vietnamese American food writer Andrea Nguyen holds a theory as to why that is: “It has the texture of ketchup.”

When David Tran started making the famous “rooster sauce” in the U.S. in 1983, few other hot sauces shared the space in North America, and Nguyen notes that Tran did his best to appeal to a wide audience by using multiple languages on the bottle. It worked: its ubiquity and lack of competition in the category helped propel it to viral popularity. Tran’s Vietnamese background meant that his version of sriracha landed on the table of restaurants specializing in pho, and for many non-Vietnamese people, it became the assumed topping for the dish—a fact that makes Nguyen sigh in despair. “I find that to be an insult to the pho broth,” she says.

The way that it sits in the broth without disappearing—thanks to that aforementioned ketchup-esque thickness—appeals to Americans, theorizes Selah Kendall, an account executive at Snuk Foods. “Unlike a traditional hot sauce, which is really runny and has that vinegary kick,” she explains, “sriracha has that really nice, thick, luscious texture. So when you add it to dishes, it really feels more like a salt than a heat.”

Though it gained popularity in Vietnamese restaurants, sriracha originated in Si Racha on Thailand’s east coast, about an hour south of Bangkok. “Vietnamese food is full of rolling hills,” describes Nguyen, “whereas Thai food is full of these lusty peaks and valleys of sharpness.” Sriracha goes well with those bigger flavors, she says. If people really love the classic version of the condiment, she advises that they branch out and explore the Thai brands. “There are many versions of [sriracha],” Nguyen reminds people. “The rooster brand isn’t the only brand.”

How We Tested Them

A team of testers from a variety of culinary backgrounds tasted each sauce alone and on a selection of foods—namely noodles, eggs, and potatoes. Among the bottles that tasters enjoyed, ranking became a matter of individual preference, but when it came to the best on individual foods, the choices became much clearer.

After tasting a slew of different styles of sriracha, one conclusion stood out to us: The Huy Fong style so dominates the category in the U.S. that it served as a reference point for comparison. Tasters declared sauces “sweeter,” “saltier,” “runnier,” or “spicier,” but always used Huy Fong as the anchor.

• The Original: Sriraja Panich Chilli Sauce
• The Classic: Huy Fong Sriracha Chili Sauce
• Best for Noodles: Shark Brand Sriracha Chili Sauce
• Best for Meat: Fix Sriracha
• Best Nontraditional: Bushwick Kitchen Weak Knees Gochujang Sriracha

Features to Keep in Mind

Ingredients and Taste: 

A set of five core ingredients and a fermentation-based process define what makes a sauce a sriracha. Each sauce begins with a red pepper (type varies) that gets aged. The length of time at this step brings in a second variable to the flavor equation: Versions from Si Racha use a red chile pepper similar to tabasco peppers, explains Kendall. Milder than traditional Thai peppers, these yield a much sweeter flavor than the sriracha most Americans know. Vinegar, sugar, salt, and garlic round out the core ingredients, and the amount of each ingredient used creates the wide differences between the various styles. 

Preservatives:

The other big difference between various types of sriracha comes from whether the sauce uses thickeners and preservatives. Sauces with xantham gum or modified tapioca starch felt smoother and more luxurious on the tongue. Other sauces use MSG to boost the flavors, and many use sodium benzoate to stay fresh longer. These ingredients seemed to have little effect on the outcome of the taste test, but if you have a preference, check the bottle before purchasing.

Our Top Picks

The Original: Sriraja Panich Chilli Sauce

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The woman who is said to have created the original version in Si Racha back in the 1930s was looking for the perfect sauce for seafood, as Kendall tells it. After more than 85 years, it’s still made entirely in Thailand and bottled there with just the core ingredients. Even without the use of preservatives, it comes out of the bottle thick and silky. It leans garlicky and sweet, and the spur peppers keep the spice level mild. As with the texture, the flavor is smooth, with fewer of those sharp peaks Nguyen mentioned earlier, and with more complexity than any of the other brands, which worked particularly well with Thai omelets. The pleasant tang and balanced flavors come from the longer fermentation process, Kendall notes.

The Classic: Huy Fong Sriracha Chili Sauce

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The sauce that needs no introduction fared well in the tastings, but it also left our tasters wondering whether that was out of familiarity more than anything else. “The American palate is built around this,” says Kendall of the jalapeño-based sauce. Still, it stood out in two ways: as the least sweet and the smoothest option we tried. (The smoothness comes, at least in part, from its generous use of additives and preservatives.) Without the sweetness to temper the vinegar and spice notes, it comes off sharp and bold, with a heat that lingers on the tongue. Nguyen finds it most useful when she stirs it into mayonnaise to spread on banh mi.  

Best for Noodles: Shark Brand Sriracha Chili Sauce

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The runny texture of this sauce was a bit off-putting to our testers initially, at least on its own. But in dishes already prepared with a sauce—like noodle dishes—the thinness rarely mattered. Once this sriracha was incorporated into a dish, the brightness of the vinegar-forward sauce won praise, and the mild heat carried a strong pepper flavor, giving it a complexity that kept it among the favorites. Despite using both preservatives and a thickener, Shark Brand’s loose texture keeps it from being an all-purpose favorite, but for adding to anything where the runniness doesn’t matter—or can be an asset—it’s an essential.

Best for Meat: Fix Sriracha

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At first the unique flavor of this sauce out of Vietnam felt slightly off. It sticks only to the core ingredients, but while many srirachas use acetic acid (undiluted, unflavored vinegar), this one uses rice vinegar, and the sugar used is specified as cane sugar. The end result carries a slightly smoky, meaty flavor that deterred diners in most of the tasting applications but felt right at home in a marinade for grilling. Without thickeners, the texture leans runny, but it carries a hefty spice. Nguyen also recommends the company’s lemongrass-tinged, spice-forward green version.

Best Nontraditional: Bushwick Kitchen Weak Knees Gochujang Sriracha

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Though it felt the least like the classic sriracha, this version brought a fun new twist to the style. Instead of using peppers, the heat comes from Korean gojuchang paste, which includes tapioca syrup, brown rice, red pepper powder, salt, alcohol, soybeans, garlic, and onion. Bushwick Kitchen then added more sugar, garlic, and vinegar to give it more of the expected sriracha flavor profile. It ends up extremely mild, with a fair amount of natural sweetness from the gojuchang. Kendall recommends it for people already knowledgeable about sriracha and in search of something different. The low tang and minimal garlic flavors are accompanied by a thick, slightly grainy texture, which Kendall suggests works well in sandwiches.

Ask the Experts

Q: Does sriracha expire?

“Condiments don’t live forever,” says Kendall. She recommends using any sauce without preservatives within a month or two of opening, and even the ones with preservatives within a few months. While some people believe that the darker color in older bottles of sriracha adds flavor, eventually the vinegar flavor takes over and the sauce loses any nuance it once had.

Q: Should you keep sriracha in the fridge?

Kendall notices that people sometimes keep their Huy Fong Sriracha in the cabinet, but she likes to keep hers refrigerated. Because this version uses preservatives, the label suggests that you simply “store in a cool dry place,” but Kendall feels it stays fresher when chilled. Preservative-free sauces should uniformly be stored in the fridge.

Our Take

“It’s a great condiment, but it should be used with moderation,” says Nguyen, summing up much of what our taste test proved. “It should complement or supplement, not overwhelm.” With more options for which sriracha best fits the meals you cook or the way you eat, this becomes easier—you can pair the exact right version with the right flavors and dishes. But in the end, if faced with limited room or budget, you can’t go wrong with keeping a bottle of Huy Fong’s version in your fridge.

The post Our Testers Agree: These Are the Best Srirachas appeared first on Saveur.

When you think of Seattle, you might imagine seafood shacks and life-changing fish and chips. And while we have those, the city’s laid-back restaurant scene is better defined by the freedom it gives chefs. Take Dungeness crab, the super-tender crustacean caught off the coast, which might get curried and folded into scones, or tossed with mint and crispy fried onions in pappardelle.

This genre-bending and boundary-busting makes Seattle an unpretentious food town that harbors surprises at every turn and prioritizes flavor and function over formality. My list of essential local restaurants tells the story of a city in constant flux—and invites you to join in. Whether you wind up tucking into Lebanese tacos at an art bar or sharing an order of Ethiopian-spiced green beans at a Halal butcher shop, use this roadmap to plan your culinary adventures. Along the way, you’ll get a true taste of Seattle’s diverse communities.

Ahadu

1508 NE 117th St.
(206) 440-3399

Samuel Ephrem and Menbere Medhane’s Ethiopian restaurant evolved from a butcher shop when customers started asking if the duo could cook Halal beef. It wasn’t long before the ribeye was destined for kitfo (raw chopped beef with spiced butter) and the bone marrow for a stew called kikel. They still bring in fresh local meat and break it down themselves. But the expert butchery can’t explain why their (vegetarian) green beans—heady with caramelized red onion and floral coriander—are such a sleeper hit.

Mike’s Noodle House

418 Maynard Ave St.
(206) 389-7099

The food and decór at this cash-only Chinatown-International District standby are as straightforward as its name implies. The chatter of elderly couples, the clatter of families serving up soup, and the slurps of solo diners fill the room better than any wall art could. Mike’s light, flavorful broth and needle-thin egg noodles draw lines out the door on weekends. The soup comes in almost 30 varieties, from standard wonton to house-made fish balls with beef brisket. And there are nearly as many styles of dry noodle and congee.

Wedgwood Broiler

8230 35th Ave NE.
(206) 523-1115

Stepping into the Wedgwood Broiler is like journeying back to the ‘60s, when this steakhouse opened—and the old-school booths and sassy waitresses still charm customers like they did back in the day. But my favorite part of the retro set-up comes in how they carry on the prudent custom of turning the beef trimmings into fresh burger patties and French dip sandwiches. Either pairs nicely with an equally old-fashioned martini in the wood-paneled lounge, or with a milkshake in one of the dining room’s many booths.

Situ Tacos at Jupiter Bar

2126 2nd Ave Suite A.

When the pandemic forced drummer Lupe Flores to cancel her shows, she found a new way to entertain audiences: by making them tacos like the ones her Lebanese Mexican grandmother cooked for her as a kid. Fastened shut with toothpicks, the crisp-fried tacos come filled with brown-butter beef, garlic mashed potatoes, or harissa cauliflower and cilantro chickpeas. Place your order at the stand in front of the quirky, sprawling art bar, then head over to the arcade consoles to knock out a game of pinball or Street Fighter II while you wait for your food.

Toshi’s Teriyaki Grill

16212 Bothell Everett Hwy.
(425) 225-6420

In 1976, Toshi Kasahara opened a tiny shop near Seattle Center selling his spin on the teriyaki of his childhood in Japan. Filling Styrofoam containers with piles of steamed rice and shiny, crackly-crusted chicken year after year, Kasahara honed and defined Seattle-style teriyaki. When Seattle teriyaki took off, so did Toshi, expanding and franchising until he completely burned out. Now, he’s back to his roots, with a single spot which harks back to the original: small and simple enough that he can run it himself, serving only teriyaki—no extras or ceremony.

T55 Pâtisserie

18223 Bothell Way NE.

Muhammad Fairoz Rashed shapes his pains au chocolat like flowers, dotting each petal of feather-light croissant with semi-sweet chocolate, which ups the ratio of chocolate to pastry. The same attention to detail and innovation fuels the savory specialties, such as the curry crab scones or black truffle goat cheese focaccia served in T55’s sleek, minimalist space.

Local Tide

401 N 36th St UNIT 103.
(206) 420-4685

This casual spot specializes in fun and funky seafood lunches. The bounty of the Pacific Northwest’s chilly and pristine waters shines through in dishes inspired by Seattle’s favorite foods, like the bánh mì filled with ground rockfish and pork patties. Subtle surprises also tweak familiar flavors in the house clam chowder, enriched with clam fat, the “BLT,” which swaps in crispy salmon skin for bacon, and Local Tide’s own “Filet-o-Fish” starring Dover sole.

Billiard Hoang

3220 S Hudson St.
(206) 723-2054

When this Vietnamese pool hall sprung up off Martin Luther King Jr. Way in 1986, Seattle barely knew its bánh mì from its bún thịt nướng. But today, locals line up at Billiard Hoang for both those dishes, plus soups and rice and noodle bowls. The latter come topped with tender short ribs or puffy fried tofu, which pair well with either Vietnamese coffee or beer, no matter the time of day.

Mashiko

4725 California Ave SW.
(206) 935-4339

Seattle has an outstanding sushi scene, but Mashiko stands out for being the first established sushi restaurant in the country committed to serving only sustainable seafood. Those limitations elevated the skills and resourcefulness of the chefs, who have created a thrilling menu centered on offbeat species like spot prawns, geoduck, and herring.

Mezzanotte

1210 South Bailey St.
(206) 466-6032

After flirting with fame on Bravo’s Top Chef, dabbling in Middle Eastern cuisine at Mamnoon, and briefly trying on taco cheffery at a brewery, Jason Stratton has settled back into his sweet spot: high-end, Northwest-inflected Italian cooking. In the casual low-slung brick dining room in Georgetown, expect seasonal gems such as tender asparagus cloaked in bagna cauda sauce, burrata draped over sweet grated carrots, and Dungeness crab pappardelle. Other menu stalwarts include Stratton’s signature tajarin al coltello, hand-cut noodles in rich sage butter sauce.

Salima Specialties

11805 Renton Ave S Suite C.
(206) 906-9331

When Salima’s Restaurant closed in 2009, the region’s significant Cham population lost its community gathering point—and Salima Mohamath’s bold peanut sauce. For those unfamiliar, the cuisine of these Indigenous people of Southeast Asia is a blend of local and Islamic cuisines. At the new Salima Specialties, which opened in 2022, expect Malaysian-style satay, rich lamb curry, and Vietnamese sandwiches with housemade Halal chicken “ham”—plus that killer peanut sauce.

Midnite Ramen

Seattle, WA
(425) 524-1604

Elmer Komagata made his name cooking in LA’s fine-dining restaurants in the 1980s, then spent decades running hotel kitchens in Mexico. But he always dreamed of something smaller, like the tiny ramen cart he and his wife now park outside Seattle breweries a few nights a week. The concept is modeled after yatai, the evening mobile food stands he remembers from growing up in Japan. His balanced broth is a testament to decades spent cooking and studying French, Chinese, Mexican, and Japanese cuisines; it combines Chinese preserved vegetables and ground chicken breast. The noodles are specially made for Midnite and parboiled to his specifications, so they cook in 15 seconds. That keeps the lines outside the cart for the limited number of bowls each night moving just a little bit faster.

The post Where to Eat in Seattle Right Now appeared first on Saveur.

Many cooks tend to think about fish just as fillets, ignoring the head, tail, bones, and scraps that make up the rest of the animal. But once you learn how to make fish stock, you not only have a quick, easy way to use up the inevitable waste, you have the base to soups and sauces, or even the stock for poaching the fillets. The stock ingredients, especially the aromatics, and the method vary depending on what type of fish you use, explains Jonathan Ragsdale, the chef and entrepreneur behind Estuary in Seattle, though the basic concept remains the same.

What you need:

• Heavy-bottomed stainless steel pot
• 2-4 oz. ladle
• Small bowl
• Conical fine mesh strainer
• Fish bones or scraps
• Assorted vegetables (celery, radish tops, onion, fennel, even tomato for darker stocks)
• Aromatics (peppercorns, bay leaf)
• Wine or liquor

BEFORE YOU BEGIN

Start by assessing the fish you plan to use: for mild white fish, like rockfish or halibut scraps, Ragsdale recommends a lighter, European-style version, while fattier fish, like salmon, can take on heartier flavors, even using tomatoes or tomato paste. 

STEP 1: Clean and dry your fish scraps, and (optionally) roast them.

Ragsdale notes that many people wash their bones and fish scraps, but to preserve the maximum amount of flavor, he prefers to simply wipe out any blood or bits with paper towels, pat them dry, and then let them dry out overnight in the fridge. For a deeper, darker fish stock, Ragsdale also recommends roasting the bones before using—simply put in the oven at 450 degrees Fahrenheit with salt and pepper for 15-20 minutes, then deglaze the pan with whatever wine or liquor you plan to use for the stock.

STEP 2: Collect the ingredients and place in stockpot.

In a heavy-bottomed stainless steel or Le Creuset-style pot, add the fish bones and scraps, plus the fond and deglazing liquid if you roasted them. Then add your selected liquor, aromatics (Ragsdale recommends bay leaf and peppercorn), and water. For a lighter stock, Ragsdale also now adds whatever vegetables he plans to use—stuff like onion, celery, radish tops, and fennel. For a darker stock with roasted salmon bones, he waits until halfway through the simmer process in step three, then adds his vegetables, and often adds tomatoes and even tomato paste to bolster the flavor.

STEP 3: Simmer the stock to extract flavor from fish.

For the lighter, classic clear stock, bring the pot to a simmer and then cut the heat down for a simmer that Ragsdale describes as having “barely Champagne-type bubbles,” and keep it there for about 30 minutes. As the stock simmers, use a 2- to 4-ounce ladle to skim the top, dropping it into a side bowl. For the darker style of stock, start by bringing it all the way up to a boil, then turn down to a full simmer and leave it there for a full hour. With this version, you don’t need to skim, but do add your vegetables halfway through, as described in step two.

STEP 4: Strain and season stock.

When the stock is finished cooking, strain it through a fine mesh strainer. Ragsdale uses the conical type, but says anything super fine works, as long as it gets all the small bits out. Then he seasons the stock, keeping it simple. “I like to have room to play with it, later,” he explains. For lighter stock, that means just salt, a touch of sugar, and some mushroom powder for umami flavor. For a darker stock, he often uses fish sauce or soy sauce. 

Final Thoughts

The flavor of fish stock varies greatly because there are, to paraphrase the old saying, as many versions as there are fish in the sea. But knowing the basic methods of how to make fish stock allows you to substitute in the types of fish you have on hand and match them with the aromatics and vegetables that create the light, bright classic European stock needed to gently poach white fish or to build a flavorful, rich sauce that works like a beef broth for noodle soups. 

The post How to Make Fish Stock appeared first on Saveur.

Chicken stock is an essential building block of many cuisines, becoming the base of flavorful soups, reducing into savory sauces, and adding flavor to all kinds of recipes. And there are almost as many ways to use it as there are to make it. “There are so many belief systems about stock,” says Lauren Garaventa, the butcher and co-owner of The Ruby Brink, a restaurant and bar on Vashon Island in Washington State. She prefers to avoid some of the more prescriptive French methods that involve constant skimming. “I just don’t care about how clear it is.” Most home cooks don’t either. Instead, she focuses on getting smooth, flavorful stock without needing to babysit it.

What you need

• Chicken bones or whole chicken, enough to fill ⅓ of your stock pot
• Assorted vegetables, herbs, and aromatics, including one potato (optional)
• 20-quart stainless steel stock pot
• Fine mesh strainer

BEFORE YOU BEGIN

If you don’t have enough bones and plan to use whole chickens, boil them for 30 minutes before you begin. Pull the meat off to use later, and use the bones for the stock.

STEP 1: Fill up the stockpot with bones and water.

Fill your stockpot one-third of the way up with chicken bones, or a little more if you are not planning to add vegetables and aromatics (see step 3). Garaventa prefers to use a 20-quart stainless steel stockpot to make large batches, but the ratio of bones to water remains the same for any quantity. Fill the rest of the pot with cold water—anytime you want to extract flavor you start with cold water, says Garaventa.

STEP 2: Bring to a boil, then turn down to a simmer.

Place the stockpot over high heat on the stove and bring to a boil. Once it boils, turn down to a simmer. If adding vegetables and aromatics allow it to simmer for 10 hours; if omitting vegetables, simmer 12 hours. Garaventa adds that some people let their stocks simmer for up to twice that, but she says she finds chicken stock tends to taste weird after so much time.

STEP 3: Optional — add vegetables, herbs, and aromatics.

If you plan to add vegetables, such as the traditional stock options of onions, celery, and carrots; aromatics (peppercorns, bay leaves); or herbs (such as parsley), do so after about 10 hours of simmering. Garaventa says that when dietary restrictions permit, she also makes sure to add a potato at this point, because it improves the consistency and flavor of the broth. Let it simmer for two more hours.

STEP 4: Allow the broth to settle and strain it.

After 12 hours of simmering, turn the heat off under the pot and let everything settle to the bottom, then strain the liquid out through fine mesh. Once just the liquid remains, the stock is ready for use or storage.

Final Thoughts

Using homemade chicken stock in any dish (and especially in soups) makes all the difference in the world, and uses up bones that might otherwise be simply tossed out. While traditional methods require a fair amount of hands-on time, this version takes a long time from start to finish, but requires almost no work in between. And the results are liquid gold—physically and metaphorically.

The post How to Make Chicken Stock appeared first on Saveur.

Mild, versatile chicken stock acts as the kitchen’s workhorse, but beef stock steps in for the heavy-duty work. With plenty of flavors to sip on its own as a broth, plus the body to support gravies and sauces, beef stock is absolutely worth the time it takes to make. At The Ruby Brink on Washington State’s Vashon Island, butcher and co-owner Lauren Garaventa uses it in tandem with chicken broth as the base of the restaurant’s noodle soups, a method she picked up from her Mexican grandmother.

What you need

• Beef bones, the more marrow, the better.
• Assorted vegetables, herbs, and aromatics, including, ideally, one potato
• 20-quart stainless steel stock pot
• Fine mesh strainer

Before You Begin

When looking for bones to use in your stock, Garaventa says that beef knuckles, gelatin-rich bones from just above the knee joint, work well; check your local butcher shop for them. If you can only find cleaned bones at the grocery store, she recommends using short ribs to supplement.

STEP 1: Fill up the stockpot with bones and water.

While other recipes direct you to roast or boil the bones before starting, Garaventa skips that step to retain more nutrients from the bone. Instead, she starts by filling the stockpot at least halfway up with beef bones—it’s a higher ratio than with chicken stock, notes Garaventa. She likes to use a 20-quart stainless steel stockpot to make large batches but uses the same ratio for any amount. Fill the pot the rest of the way up with cold water.

STEP 2: Bring to a boil, then turn down to a simmer.

Place the stockpot over high heat on the stove and bring it all the way to a boil. Once it boils, turn to a simmer and leave it alone for “as long as you can stand,” says Garaventa. For her, that usually means about 24 to 36 hours of simmering on the stove. (If you’re unable to leave stock unattended or on the burner for that long, experts recommend a minimum of eight hours for simmering.)

STEP 3: Add vegetables, herbs, and aromatics.

Two to three hours before the stock finishes simmering, Garaventa adds her vegetables, like the traditional stock options of onions, celery, and carrots; aromatics such as peppercorns and bay leaves; and herbs like parsley and thyme. In a non-traditional twist, Garaventa says that she likes to add a potato at this point because it improves the consistency and flavor of the broth. Let it simmer for a few more hours.

STEP 4: Allow the broth to settle and strain it, reduce it if desired.

After simmering, turn the heat off under the pot and let everything settle to the bottom, then strain the liquid out through a fine mesh sieve. Once just the liquid remains, Garaventa says she often finishes by reducing it for another half-hour to an hour. Otherwise, the stock is ready for use or storage.

Final Thoughts

The best beef stock turns scraps from the butchering process—the flavorful marrow bones and meaty knuckles—and turns them into a versatile liquid that enhances sauces and stews and stands alone as broth for drinking or making into soup. Beef stock takes very little work and plenty of patience, but in return for waiting until the combination of heat and water extract every speck of flavor from the bones, comes a sticky, hearty reward.

The post How to Make Beef Stock appeared first on Saveur.

Though chicken or beef broth is often the chosen base for soups and sauces, it’s time to ditch the impulse to compare a well-made vegetable stock to its meat-based brethren. A proper version relies on the inherent flavor and diversity of produce scraps to create a complex liquid that works as a building block to any broth or sauce. When former vegetarian Lauren Garaventa trained as a butcher and opened her own shop and restaurant, The Ruby Brink, on Washington’s Vashon Island, she chose to use vegetable stock for its earthy singularity. Here she shares her tips on how to make a vegetable stock that you just can’t quit.

What you need

• Assorted vegetables: enough to fill ⅓ of your stock pot, including one potato, some alliums, and plenty of mushroom stems and scraps.
• Herbs and aromatics such as parsley stems, peppercorns, and bay leaves
• 20-quart stainless steel stock pot
• Fine mesh strainer

STEP 1: Fill the stockpot with vegetables, herbs, and aromatics.

The most important part of making a good vegetable stock is using a diverse selection of ingredients, Garaventa explains. She collects the scraps from various other dishes and throws them all into the stock pot, aiming to fill it about one-third of the way up before adding water. Along with traditional stock vegetables, like celery, she makes sure to add plenty of mushrooms—especially leftover stems—and a good selection of alliums like onions, leeks, scallions, and shallots. The one non-scrap—and somewhat non-traditional—vegetable she always includes is a potato, which she calls a key ingredient for how it transforms the consistency of the stock. “It mellows it out and makes it taste so good.” 

STEP 2: Add water, bring to a boil, then simmer.

Fill the rest of the pot with cold water—essential to extract the most flavor and produce a clear stock, according to Garaventa. Then bring it to a boil over high heat. When it starts to boil, turn the heat down to simmer, then Garaventa leaves it for four to five hours—longer than most vegetable stock recipes call for, but the amount of time she feels it takes to get the flavor where she wants it. While meat-based stocks require much longer simmers, the fresh flavors will degrade after a point, and vegetables will break down and make a cloudy stock.

STEP 3: Let the stock settle and strain.

After four to five hours of simmering, turn the heat off under the pot and let the contents settle. Once most of the flotsam sinks, strain the liquid through a fine mesh strainer. Discard the remaining vegetable matter, and let the liquid cool completely before storage. The stock will keep a few days in the fridge, or up to many months in the freezer—even then, it doesn’t go bad after time, as much as the flavor fades and degrades.

Final Thoughts

Thinking of vegetable stock as only an alternative to meat-based stocks does it a grand disservice. Vegetable stock that fully employs the complexity and depth of mushrooms, onions, and herbs gives all cooks a versatile, useful addition to their arsenal that’s vegetarian-friendly and wildly cost-effective. Stir it into mushroom dishes, use it to simmer squash, or build it into layers of grain dishes. Made properly, vegetable stock brings more flavor to any dish, especially ones that benefit from a little extra earthiness. 

The post How to Make Rich, Flavorful Vegetable Stock appeared first on Saveur.

Setting out cut cheese keeps shared food more sanitary than letting guests hack away on their own. Small pieces also tend to look better than large ones, and ensure that each bite is just the right size and shape to enhance a cheese’s particular style. 

On the surface, knowing how to cut cheese seems barely more complicated than the supposedly idiot-proof recipe for how to boil water. But proper knifework has come up a lot recently, says certified cheese professional, cheese podcast host, and general jill-of-all-curd-trades Janee’ Muha, aka “The Mobile Monger.” This perhaps came about alongside the popularity spike of artfully arranged charcuterie boards. Or, just because people have realized that better cheese slicing can improve not just the looks, but also the taste and texture of their selection. Whatever is behind the renewed emphasis on the art of the slice, Muha is ready to teach people the tricks of her trade, starting with the right tools for the job.

What you need: 

• Epicurean cutting board (“They’re indestructible,” says Muha)
• An assortment of cheeses
• Corresponding cheese knives:
• For soft cheeses: Boska Holland Stainless Steel Soft Cheese Knife
• For large-format soft cheeses: Franmara Serrated Stainless Steel Cheese Knife
• For extra-soft cheeses: Small wooden spoon
• For hard cheeses like Parmigiano-Reggiano, aged Gouda, aged/clothbound cheddars: Franmara Stainless Steel Hard Cheese Knife
• For larger formats: 7″ Japanese Santoku Knife
• For slicing: Fox Run Marble Cheese Slicer
• To get one set with everything you need: Formaticum Professional 4-Knife Set
• Parchment paper
• Cling wrap

BEFORE YOU BEGIN

If you plan to cut multiple different types of cheese, start by putting them in the order you will cut them, Muha recommends: begin with the softest cheese and work your way to the hardest.

STEP 1: Identify the proper knife and cut the cheese into the number of slices needed.

For each of the broad categories of cheese, Muha uses a different tool and technique for cutting. The soft cheese category includes brie, camembert, Loire Valley-style goat cheeses, and the like, while the “hard” category includes firm and crumbly varieties like Parmigiano-Reggiano, aged Gouda, and older cheddars. “Medium” or “semi-firm” cheeses include Goudas and cheddars with a bit less age on them (the type you might slice thinly for a sandwich). Check the “What you need” section above to get the right tool for each cheese ready.

STEP 1A: Cut soft cheese into wedges.

The important thing to watch for with this style is the rind-to-paste ratio; it’s important to make sure each piece has a consistent balance of each texture. Using a soft cheese knife, Muha cuts a standard small wheel of brie or camembert into wedges, like cutting a pie. “[The knife] is offset, so it goes through the entire wheel, and you don’t have to push.” For larger format wheels, she uses a “skeleton”-style cheese knife, which has cutouts in the blade so it glides more smoothly. SAVEUR Editorial Director (and resident cheese expert) Kat Craddock adds that a knife with a serrated edge is helpful for neatly slicing into a soft cheese with a rind, “Much like cutting through the skin of a ripe and juicy tomato.” After making wedges (or starting with the wedge, if you purchased a partial wheel), keep the same rind-to-paste ratio in mind and cut slices running from the point to the outer edge.

Craddock also offers another option for a very ripe soft cheese with a rind (such as Vacherin Mont d’Or or Rush Creek Reserve): Slice the top rind off the whole wheel and serve with a little spoon or wooden spatula for scooping directly into the creamy center.

STEP 1B: Chisel crumbly cheeses into rustic chunks.

Use a wedge-shaped cheese knife to crumble apart any flinty hard cheese. Stick the tip of the knife in, then turn it a little, and pieces will naturally break off along the curd structure, explains Muha. Large-format cutting for these cheeses is less important in the home kitchen, unless you just impulse bought yourself an entire wheel of Parm while on vacation in Italy, in which case study up on this video (or hire a friendly local cheesemonger to help you).

STEP 1C: Slice medium cheese with a knife or slicer.

For thin slices of medium cheeses like a cheddar for a sandwich, Muha chooses between a chef’s knife and a wire slicer. But she is a professional, and thus can do a pretty good job cutting a medium cheese using a knife. For those without pro knife skills, she says a simple wire cheese slicer is a pretty good home alternative to the tools professional cheesemongers use. “But you’re not going to get deli slices at home,” she warns.

STEP 1D: Slice blue cheese with a wire slicer or spreader.

Because blue cheeses vary greatly in texture, the right tool depends significantly on the specific blue you have. “I usually prefer a wire for more crumbly blues,” says Craddock. For creamier types, she might reach for a spreader, since it will be soft enough not to need any actual cutting, or even a butter knife.

STEP 1E: Slice mozzarella balls—or don’t.

For smaller mozzarella balls (bocconcini or ciliegine), cutting is unnecessary, as you can just let people take an entire ball. But for larger formats like ovolini, Craddock recommends using a thin cheese knife. The best way is to simply slice the ball in half, turn each half cut-side-down, then cut crosswise from, leaving you with a stack of semi-circular slices.

STEP 1F: Slice log-shaped cheeses like chèvre with a skeleton knife

Using the skeleton knife or a wire slicer to keep the cheese from losing its shape as you work, cut even crosswise slices from the log. Hopefully the size makes it easy to create portion-sized coins of cheese, but if they are too large, cut each in half across the equator before serving. 

STEP 2: Lather, rinse, repeat with other cheeses.

It’s super important to wash your knives and board between cheeses, says Muha. Otherwise, if you, say, cut a brie or blue cheese and then use the same knife on a cheddar, you essentially inoculate the cheddar with the blue cheese spores. To put it in simpler terms: that cross-contamination can make your cheese get moldy much faster than it otherwise would. Once you clean up, head back to the board and cut the next cheese. Repeat as needed until you finish all the cheeses.

STEP 3: Leave cut cheese at room temperature to warm up and wrap remaining cheese for storage.

Leave out the cheese you cut for eating for at least half an hour to warm up before serving or consuming it. You can taste more of the flavors at room temperature, says Muha, describing this as the flipside of why cheap beer companies promote serving their product ice cold (“So you can’t taste how terrible it is.”).

To keep any remaining cheese fresh as long as possible, she recommends wrapping it first in parchment paper and then in plastic. The parchment gives it enough air to breathe and prevents light oxidation (which makes it taste old and cardboard-y), while the plastic wrap prevents the cheese from drying out. For soft cheeses, Muha says it’s especially important to make sure that the paper is right up against the gooey part to keep it in prime condition.

Final Thoughts

Cutting cheese is easy. Cutting cheese well takes some specialized equipment and a little bit of know-how. When done right, the cut matches the curd, and the texture maximizes the flavor. With a few tips and the right tools for the task, your cheese board will go from smeary mess to Instagram hit faster than you can film your next TikTok. 

The post How to Cut the Cheese appeared first on Saveur.

The first taste of caviar for Bonnie Morales, chef and owner of Portland’s renowned Kachka and its sibling restaurants, was not from a mother-of-pearl spoon or presented tableside. It was served to her at home as a child, spread on buttered white toast by her Belarusian immigrant parents. “It’s so nutrient dense, much like chicken eggs, but even more so, and full of really healthy fats,” she explains. “So as a result, it’s often considered to be a food for children.” And, before you ask, she’s not trying to convince anyone to go broke feeding tins of fish eggs to toddlers. It’s instead about showing how normalized the salty snack is among Russians. “Anytime you want to show hospitality, there is caviar on the table,” she says.

Americans tend to put caviar on a pedestal because of its cost, and Morales notes that when she started serving it at Kachka, people weren’t enjoying the wonderful texture and intense flavors as intended due to that reverence. And that’s a shame, laments Morales. “You’re kind of cheating yourself when you’re worried about every little bead.”

Writer Seung Hee Lee, like Morales, prefers a casual approach to caviar. Lee trained in royal Korean court cuisine before moving to the United States, where she translated her traditional cooking with local ingredients and tools in her book Everyday Korean. While she calls herself a caviar purist in some sense—she likes to drink champagne with hers and first tasted it in fine-dining settings—she fell in love with it when she realized, “if we just eat it at home, it’s cheaper.”

Restaurant servings don’t add much more than presentation, and it costs significantly more in that context. Instead, have one tin (or a few) in your price range delivered at home, and give yourself the space to really enjoy it. Lee rejects the idea that caviar should be eaten in certain ways or with specific foods, and encourages anyone to just dig in and experiment. “Whatever needs crushed sea salt,” she says, “you can put caviar on it.” But if you’re looking to figure out exactly which kind you should put where, we’ve put together a list of our six favorites. 

• Best Overall: Regalis Two-Tone Osetra
• Best Value: Browne Trading Company Osietra Supreme
• Best for First Timers: Pearl Street Caviar Osetra Keluga Duo
• Best Classic: Browne Trading Company Beluga Hybrid
• Best American: Island Creek Oysters Osetra
• Best White Sturgeon: Tsar Nicoulai Select

Features to Keep in Mind

Types of Caviar

There’s a reason caviar tends to be pricey: Sturgeon are huge animals with long lifespans, and it can take years or even decades for them to mature to the point that they lay eggs. The processing phase is similarly drawn out; the roe must be harvested and washed, sieved, and then salted and packaged. And while caviar is traditionally made from the roe of Caspian sturgeon, certain types of that fish—particularly the massive Beluga—are critically endangered. Overfishing has threatened the continued health of the species, and so the term “caviar” is now more broadly applied to salted and preserved eggs from related fish farmed elsewhere around the world. 

The finest-quality caviar is said to come from fish caught or raised in the coldest of waters, from late fall to early spring, but purveyor Alexandre Petrossian—who sources the roe for his family’s eponymous shop from China, Bulgaria, Israel, Uruguay, Madagascar, and the United States—believes that there’s much to be gained from a global approach. “Every territory has brought something new to our understanding of caviar,” he explains. “One day we might return to farming in the Caspian Sea, but the circumstances would have to be much different than they are today.”

The “big three” sturgeon varieties are the traditional Caspian types—Sevruga, Osetra, and Beluga—which sustainable caviar producers strive to replicate.

Sevruga, the smallest and most plentiful of the species, weigh between 50 and 75 pounds, are about three feet long, and mature in seven years, producing small, gray, subtly flavored, creamy eggs.

Osetra, the second largest sturgeon, weigh 150 to 300 pounds, grow four to six feet long, mature in 12 to 15 years, and produce medium-size, gray-brown to nearly golden, peppery eggs. One fish in 100 will deliver large, dark gold eggs—the pricey imperial osetra.

Beluga, the largest and rarest of the species, can weigh up to 3,000 pounds, grow to 12 feet in length, and live for up to 50 years. Beluga eggs are unavailable in the U.S., though some farms have created hybrid Beluga breeds in order to approximate the breed’s coveted large, gray eggs, which have a very delicate skin and clear flavor. Since Beluga imports are banned, and Sevruga are pretty hard to come by, Osetra is the most commonly seen of these. 

But there are many more types of caviar you’re likely to see—and eat—more of in the U.S. these days.

Siberian, these smallish, approximately 150-pound sturgeon tend to mature early, meaning they produce a lot of eggs and fish, making them ideal for aquaculture. The small, dark, glossy eggs are among the most affordable types of caviar, and the smaller, softer beads carry strong flavors of the sea.

Kaluga, the giant freshwater sturgeon, is nearly extinct in the wild, but the farmed version produces caviar with excellent texture. The firm, mid-sized bead ranges in color, but nearly always has the coveted “pop,” along with complex briny and buttery flavors. 

White, California’s native species, is now farmed around the U.S. and represents much of the domestic caviar scene. The creamy eggs are small, delicate, and on the dark side, and have a bold flavor that stays consistent throughout the bite.

Farmed vs. Wild Caviar

The reality is that you are unlikely to find wild caviar. Though there are people who still covet the traditional version, the long lifespan of sturgeon and declining populations makes it an unsustainable or unaffordable option for anyone involved, diner or producer. An interesting thing about this, notes Morales, is that it has led sturgeon farmers to breed for what they think customers want to see—features like bigger eggs, lighter colors, and taut beads—but that doesn’t necessarily result in the best taste.

Pressed and Pasteurized Caviar

While the caviars here are all cured fresh, other styles are available. Pressed caviar takes the broken and burst eggs and (naturally) presses it into a kind of jammy spread. Pasteurized caviar treats the eggs with a bit of heat, making them shelf stable, but they lose a little of the vaunted “pop” texture and fresh flavor. 

Our Top Picks

Best Overall: Regalis Caviar Two-Tone Osetra

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Eye-catching, complex, and buttery, this sustainably-farmed caviar from the Netherlands delivers on all the best parts of eating caviar. The strikingly large, green-gold and light black beads pop satisfyingly in the mouth, giving way to a silky, well-structured texture that unleashes a rich brininess on the tongue. Packaged without preservatives or additives, it maintains the desired complexity and evolution of flavors without hitting the upper echelon of caviar prices. 

Best Value: Browne Trading Company Osietra Supreme

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Paying more for caviar won’t always deliver a better product, and paying less doesn’t automatically mean you’ll like it less, which means that you can find great caviar for under $100 per ounce. While there are caviar options for the strict budget, like hackleback, and cheaper Siberian sturgeon options, this Osietra Supreme walks the line between high-end taste and reasonable price. Farmed in Poland, the firm, medium-sized beads carry a pleasant minerality and muted saltiness. 

Best for First Timers: Pearl Street Caviar Ossetra Keluga Duo

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Aside from producing these two excellent, reasonably-priced caviars, Pearl Street deserves special mention for taking sustainability seriously, even through shipping. Tins arrive in soft packaging, insulated with wool as a compostable alternative to styrofoam, and chilled by biodegradable ice packs.

On top of that, their prices are reasonable by the ounce—$77 for the Ossetra and $100 for the Keluga, both of which held their own in tastings against similar styles. Pearl Street offers both in 12-gram serving sizes ($31 and $44, respectively), giving newbies a chance to try it before shelling out the big bucks. Even better, their Pearl Duo buys both of those for just $72, plus fancy accessories: a tin opener, mother-of-pearl spoon in a little pouch, and a snack pack, which includes their surprisingly good crème fraîche, potato chips, and chives. It has basically everything you need for a little private caviar tasting. 

Best Classic: Browne Trading Company Beluga Hybrid

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With Beluga imports banned, many sturgeon farmers and caviar producers aim to get as close as they can to the coveted wild flavor of its eggs. This Beluga-Siberian hybrid farmed in Italy shows off the big pearls for which Beluga is known, but with the dark inkiness of Siberian. Its beads taste of deep umami flavor that evolves into a caramel finish, complemented by that signature texture and complexity. 

Best American: Island Creek Oysters Osetra

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Island Creek, famous for its oysters, also puts the same rigorous seafood sourcing standards into its caviar, and particularly its North Carolina osetra. While imported caviars can use sodium tetraborate to help with preservation, it’s not permitted in U.S. food production. Morales sees this as a plus, as it tends to round out the edges and sweeten caviar, leading to blandness. “If it tastes like nothing and it smells like nothing,”  she says, “It’s probably because it’s hiding something.”

Island Creek’s osetra stands out for its small, firm texture, big brininess, and roller coaster of flavors in every bite—just the thing that sodium tetraborate can hinder. It’s a rollicking caviar with good pop that shows off sea saltiness without overwhelming its subtler, almost fruity notes.

Best White Sturgeon: Tsar Nicoulai Select

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Another standout American caviar from one of Morales’ favorite producers, Tsar Nicoulai has been sustainably farming white sturgeon not far from its natural habitat in California for almost four decades. The Select shows off medium beads with a gentle pop and miso-like complexity, which comes through prominently thanks to low saltiness or “malossol,” meaning little salt. This light hand preserves the eggs themselves and their natural flavor.

Ask the Experts

How should I store caviar?

As cold as possible in the refrigerator, says Morales. She recommends avoiding the door, which can be warmer. Lee suggests putting an ice pack in a Pyrex or similar container, then putting the caviar on top to keep it very cold. Before you break into them, most jars or tins will last a few months. But once they’re opened, quality will start to decline, so have plans to eat it pretty quickly.

What’s the best way to serve caviar?

Morales often sees people in scarcity mode, eating just a few beads at a time, but she recommends making sure to have enough for a full mouthful, and to try eating it straight off the back of your hand. This helps warm the caviar to just the right temperature and allows you to really taste it on its own. At Kachka’s happy hour, she serves it spread on challah with butter, which she prefers to the traditional crème fraîche topping, since the acid of the latter cuts, rather than enhances, the richness.

Lee likes a traditional approach, with blini and crème fraîche or on oysters, but also puts it in chawanmushi, on scallion pancakes, or even in a tortilla smeared with cream cheese. “The highbrow-lowbrow combo is where my heart is at,” she says. 

Morales also adds that it’s less about what you serve it with and more about how. People focus on crushed ice, she says, and it’s one of her pet peeves. The cold dulls the taste, so she recommends pulling it out a few minutes before eating and letting it come to room temperature. Check out SAVEUR’s full guide to serving caviar here.

Which drinks should I serve with caviar?

As noted above, Lee always drinks champagne with hers, particularly leaning toward blends or an option with high acid, which she likes to balance the saltiness. Her suggestions include the Pol Roger Sir Winston Churchill, Krug, and bottles from Frederic Savart. She also recommends super-cold, premium Korean soju, which is similar to one of Morales’ choice drinks for caviar, sake. But Morales’s favorite is vodka. “It’s super neutral and cleansing, so it helps you really taste the caviar.”

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The post The Best Caviar Doesn’t Have to Cost the Most, and You Can Order it Right Now appeared first on Saveur.

Forget the glitz and glamour and luxury connotations: The real reason you should serve caviar this season (and anytime) is that these little baubles of salt pop with big, fascinating flavor. Putting caviar on the table is a way to show hospitality in Russian culture, explains Bonnie Morales of Portland, Oregon’s Kachka. “There’s no snootiness,” she says, just enjoyment and nutrition. She even put it on her happy hour menu to encourage customers to stop worrying about the price or scarcity and really focus on enjoying the intense flavor and remarkable texture.

The best way to break out the caviar, thus, is any way that makes your guests comfortable. Worry less about the delicateness of the delicacy and more about making sure that you set up the kind of party where people feel no shame in letting their eyes roll into the back of their heads as the tiny explosions of brininess roll about in their mouths. Set yourself up for success ahead of time so that your laidback look influences your guests to dig into the caviar with aplomb and enthusiasm.

But if you need a little more preparation and concrete advice to embody that attitude, we have a guide on how and where to buy caviar, and some tips below on how best to serve it.

Go Big or Go Budget

Don’t be precious with the quantity. If you can’t afford enough of the high-end stuff, just ratchet down your caviar dreams to fancy fish egg fantasies. Caviar and caviar-like options exist across the price spectrum, so weigh your imported ambitions against your domestic paddlefish roe realities. More grams of a less expensive variety will make for more fun and festivity than watching all your guests worry if they took one or two beads more than their share. Getting the full flavor of caviar requires more than a sparse sprinkle, and if it looks plentiful, your guests will see that and serve themselves enough to truly enjoy.

Figure Out the Key to Opening Tins Ahead of Time

If you hate small fiddly tasks, buy your caviar from a place that uses small jars, like Tsar Nicoulai or Browne Trading Company, because copious amounts of caviar come in little vacuum-sealed tins that require a certain dexterity to open. The caviar companies will sell you a “key” to open them and it is absolutely the best tool, but you can use a short, wide flathead screwdriver or similarly shaped thin metal object—as long as you can get a decent grip on the handle. A butter knife works, just be careful. Press it up under the lip of the tin, then twist it, rotating the back of your hand toward yourself, much like you would when shucking an oyster.

Don’t Overthink the Spoon

If the dire-seeming warnings that you must use a mother-of-pearl spoon to serve your caviar give you anxiety, now you can relax. The idea is that you should avoid metal, as it will impart metallic taste into the fancy fish eggs. In reality, your stainless-steel home utensils probably won’t offer the same off flavors as somebody else’s silver. But if you are concerned, look around and remember all the other materials of utensil you have in your house: plastic takeout or kid spoons that say, “scoop some salty roe, we keep it casual,” elegant wooden chopsticks, or ceramic condiment spoons made for delicate dipping.

Go Beyond Bubbles

Champagne wishes don’t go with caviar dreams quite the way 1980s television led us to believe. Morales explains that she finds the fruitiness of even the driest sparkling wines to interfere in a way that the traditional Russian pairing of clean, neutral-flavored vodka does not. Her alt: Japanese sake. Seung Hee Lee, caviar connoisseur and author of Everyday Korean, loves Champagne, but also suggests the Korean spirit soju—especially some of the newly available premium versions coming into the U.S. For the non-alcoholic drinker, a nice sparkling water brings the fun bubbles of Champagne without any of the interfering flavors Morales dislikes.

Forget the Ice

It’s important to keep caviar as cold as possible before you eat it, but the colder a food is, the harder it is to taste the nuances. So store it in the very back of your fridge, maybe on ice packs, but also make sure that you let the caviar warm up a few minutes at room temperature before you serve it so that your guests get the full, buttery richness in every bite.

Fist Bumps Aren’t Just for Show

The extravagant-looking image of people eating lumps of caviar off the top of their hands seems to demonstrate a showy way to eat an expensive food, but the technique draws on solid reasoning about taste. “It’s to help warm it up a bit,” says Morales, who calls eating it off her own skin her preferred method. As the host, you may need to encourage others to get involved, but just spoon a “bump” of the eggs onto your hand and slurp them right off. Use a closed fist, held vertically, and drop the caviar on the expanse of skin between your thumb and the knuckle of your first finger. Your body temperature brings the caviar to the right temperature, and you get the purest taste of the delicacy.

Get Creative

Once you get a taste of it at its simplest, get creative! Lee says, “whatever needs crushed sea salt, you can put caviar on.” She likes it on Korean pancakes that she styles like pizza by slathering them with crème fraiche. Morales disagrees on the crème fraiche (she finds it too acidic), but does love cooking with caviar, like the caviar beurre blanc she uses to dress her potato dumplings. She looks for anything that matches the richness, like challah or white bread with butter. Similarly, caviar works great for simple, buttery pasta or soft-scrambled egg dishes, giving you more latitude to create a fun dish for your guests.

The post Skip the Fancy Pearl Spoon and Keep Your Caviar Spread Casual appeared first on Saveur.

Before Hannah Chamberlain became the TikTok bartending star and internet cocktail queen she is today, she made the same mistakes any overly ambitious aspiring hostess would. “I was doing my first holiday party and I wanted to really show off my bartending skills,” she recalls. She’d planned a classic, relatively simple cocktail, the stinger, adding an elaborate candy cane garnish for a festive touch. “Everyone requested a [drink] at different times, so I’m pouring one, and then as soon as I get that garnish together, the next person wants one.” Stuck behind the bar, she couldn’t introduce guests, or help them settle in. No matter how good the drinks were, she realized, hosting involves being there for your guests, making them feel valued, and, perhaps most importantly, making sure they’re having fun. The next year, she started a new tradition: kicking off every party with a show-stopping make-ahead punch.

Begin With A Bang

When guests arrive, a vintage punchbowl bobbing with bright red cranberries and big, crystal-clear icebergs welcomes them. Shopping for and picking out the old-school serveware has become a part of Hannah’s personal holiday tradition, and sometimes the one she finds even inspires the punch recipe she uses. “I look for the prettiest bowl, the prettiest pitcher,” she says. “I love going vintage.”

She squeezes all the citrus and mixes the punch earlier in the day (no more than eight hours ahead, to keep it fresh), only popping in the ice, garnishes, and any bubbles right when the first guests arrive. With most of the work done in advance, Hannah now gets to make introductions and mingle, with the self-serve set-up acting as an icebreaker (pun intended) for party-goers. 

Punch fell out of fashion when individual cocktails became popular, Hannah explains. But she sees the rarity and history as positives, transforming the vibes and making the event feel unique. “People take pictures of it and remember it when it pops up on their phones later.” To give a festive feel to holiday punch, Hannah uses the warm, mild flavors of The Famous Grouse, letting the dark whisky notes play with holiday favorites such as mulling spices, orange, or ginger. The addition of raw cranberries, rosemary, or citrus peels trimmed with craft scissors in garnishes lends a visual nod to the season.

Sweeten The Deal

Starting with the punch lets the host put out the most eye-catching drink when everyone is “in the best frame of mind” to admire it, says Hannah, and makes it easy for guests to indulge at their own pace. Additionally, Hannah follows that up with a fun option like her DIY cocktail and cookie station. The flavors of an old fashioned match well with traditional holiday cookies, so she sets out The Famous Grouse, along with a variety of complementary bitters, syrups, and garnishes evoking the flavors of the sweets, often including vanilla bitters, chai syrup, or even candy canes. A decorative instruction card gives guests a bit of guidance, but the cocktail-making and creativity involved also helps get people mingling as they stir. “Discussing different flavor and garnish preferences is a great way to break the ice,” she shares. It’s a win-win.

Bring It Home

At the end of the night, Hannah recommends sending your guests off with a gift. She likes to put together mason jar cocktails —another twist on the age-old tradition of bringing around holiday cookies—and, if time allows, makes a second batch of a large-format cocktail. A note detailing ingredients and serving instructions typically rounds out the party favors at the end of the night. Every time she’s done it, she says, “The recipients have been ecstatically merry.”

The magic of punch also rings true at smaller, more personal gatherings. Hannah replaced the bottled-orange-juice mimosas at her family’s Christmas morning present-opening celebration with an elegant brunch punch featuring fresh-squeezed grapefruit juice. Her mom continues the long-time tradition of serving bagels with smoked salmon, and now Hannah has her own updated role in their annual ritual.

“Julia Child said, ‘A party without cake is just a meeting,’” Hannah points out. “I feel like punch is similar: if you have friends over to hang out, and you put out a punch bowl, now it’s an event.”

Recipe

Cranberry Cinnamon Scotch Punch

Get the recipe >

The post Party Smarter, Not Harder with This Festive Throwback appeared first on Saveur.

Buying a whole chicken always costs less than buying individual parts, and it gets you a few bonus parts that you’d otherwise miss out on, like the carcass and wingtips for stock. But for it to be worth the effort, you have to know how to cut up a whole chicken. Thankfully, professional butcher Kristina Glinoga now dedicates her time to helping people break down their own birds (and pigs, and more) on her Butchery 101 YouTube channel. Recently she shared her favorite simple method for removing the breasts, wings, and legs from a whole chicken.

What you need

• Plastic cutting board with rim
• Sharp knife, 6-10-inches, with a square tip, like a santoku
• Whole chicken

BEFORE YOU BEGIN

Always check your chicken for any remaining innards, either fresh or packaged in plastic and stored in the body cavity.

STEP 1: Score the skin on the back of the bird.

Set the bird on the cutting board so the breast side is down, the legs are pointing toward you and the wings point down at the cutting board. Score the skin straight down the middle of the two symmetrical sides, from the neck to the tail. Then cross that line, right in the middle, with a single cut that goes about halfway to either side of the bird. This will help you later in the process. 

STEP 2: Cut down both sides of the keel bone.

Flip the bird over, so that the breasts are facing up and the leg bones are pointing toward you. Feel for the keel bone, which runs straight down the center of your two symmetrical sides. Then, starting on one side, cut the meat away from the bone. “Use shallow, exploratory strokes that go the length from wishbone to breast tip,” Glinoga describes. Continue cutting until the chicken is entirely open, then repeat on the other side of the keel bone.

STEP 3: Remove each half of the chicken from the carcass.

Fold the chicken over, like a book, down the center, so that the legs meet and the exposed meat and keel bone points out. Hold the top leg, the one you are removing, in one hand, using it to push and pull the meat away from the carcass. Use short, shallow knife strokes to just release the meat as your non-knife hand maneuvers it away from the rest of the body, continuing until that half, with leg, thigh, breast, and wing, are entirely separate from the carcass. “Your non-knife hand does just as much work,” says Glinoga. “You have to get your hand a little dirty.” Repeat on the second side. Set the carcass aside to use for stock.

STEP 4: Separate the breasts from the legs.

Lay the chicken half skin-side down, and find the area between the breast meat and the thigh. Cut the skin there, and separate the two parts. Smooth the skin down and lay the breast skin-side up and flat, to prevent the “crop-top look,” as Glinoga phrases it. Check the top of the breasts for the wishbone and remove it by pulling.

STEP 5: Remove the wing and wingtips.

Find the elbow of the wing—the closest big joint to the breast—and slice off the wing from the breast. Then move to the next joint out and cut again, which will separate the wingtips from the wings. You should now have two breasts, two wingtips (not great eating, but a good addition to stock), and two wings ready to go.

STEP 6: Split the drumsticks from the thighs.

To split the drumstick from the thighs, lay the leg quarter skin-side down, with the joint facing away from you. On the far edge of the upward-facing surface, just to the cut edge from the joint, you will see a stripe of fat. Use that as your guide and cut straight down to separate the

drumstick from the thigh. You now have two thighs and two drumsticks, and have successfully broken down an entire chicken.

Final Thoughts

Cutting up a whole chicken costs less than buying parts, plus it gives you a wide variety of cuts to use in various ways—which may inspire you or require a bit more planning. But either way, you use the entire animal, making it a more ethical way to eat meat. You also end up with a great pile of bones you can make into stock right away or stash in the freezer for another time. 

The post How to Cut Up a Whole Chicken appeared first on Saveur.