021: IN THE KITCHEN - Almond Baked Mussels

Phil

Yeah, I agree with you. and I almost feel like that's maybe the tone we're starting to take with the show. but yeah, we, we didn't really dive into Christmas cookies a whole lot. And did you, did you make any of this year, like, did you frost them and decorate them?

Chris

No, we don't actually do. That's another thing that we do, Molly did make some cookies. she had this, I don't even know where she came up with it, but it was chocolate ginger cookie. That was really, really good. Um, Add fresh ginger in it, both fresh ginger and candy ginger. it was, it was great. But other than that, yeah, we didn't, we didn't really do Christmas cookies and we don't, that's not, that's not like a tradition that we've done.

Phil

Sure. Yeah,

Chris

wow. What about you guys?

Phil

well, yeah, a hundred percent, but my favorite thing to do with them is take one of the shapes and then turn it into something totally different. You know, like maybe the most obvious one would be, the bell, right? Turning that into a Darth Vader helmet. Super fun. That's like the most dad thing you can do or let's see, what's another one we had this we had the stocking shape and I turned it into a mountain. So it's just like turned it 90 degrees and then like the little elbow or like the heel of the stocking that became Pike's peak. And it was another one that we did. Um, So I, I took a gingerbread man.

Chris

We are listed as a clean show.

Phil

it was actually a gingerbread woman and I, I severed her and then I put a bunch of red frosting, like at the base of the head, like at the neck. And then I attach that. Like with the frosting as an adhesive to her hand. So she's like holding her head and just like bloody and then like access for the eyes and a frown face. And my girls are four and seven and they thought it was the funniest thing they'd ever seen in their lives. And then Ashley just like gave me the most Epic eye-roll, you know?

Chris

So you're saying it was worth it.

Phil

Yeah, and I really, really want to see some other listeners Christmas cookies if they, if they took pictures of these things, like we got to see them because I feel like as a dad like decorating Christmas cookies isn't about making them more Christmasy. It's about turning them into obscene shapes, you know? It's that's, that's my creative outlet. I look forward to this once a year. So do you think I should share the picture of the severed head lady,

Chris

Yes, absolutely. That's a must. That needs to be posted tomorrow. And by tomorrow, I don't mean, I don't know what I mean. I don't mean, I don't know if, I mean like a real-time tomorrow or a podcast I'm tomorrow

Phil

Yesterday we'll S we'll post it yesterday.

Chris

figure that one out.

Phil

So when I'm making Christmas cookies today,

Chris

no. So that has passed and if, that's that's best. It's like our Christmas episode

Phil

speaking of slimy balls,

Chris

Anyway, we were, we were speaking of slimy. But yeah. uh, It's kind of like a follow-up to our Christmas episode, I guess, Phil,

Phil

It's like Rocky mountain oysters part too.

Chris

And actually in that episode, we, we did hint at what we were going to be doing today, today being or Tuesday, every other Tuesday in the kitchen episode. So once again, if you haven't. So once again, if, if you are, if, once again, if you missed out on last week, you can go back and listen to that one and get an idea of what we're going to talk about today. That's kind of lame. I don't like that.

Phil

I've been, I've been fighting this Yon for like,

Chris

let me hit.

Phil

since we started ah,

Chris

Anyway. Yeah, we did talk about what we were going to do.

Phil

Rocky mountain oysters, headless gingerbread. Uh, They they're, they're all fairly Christmasy Severing that head though. it didn't take a whole lot of muscle. Was it was was it too much work? You know, and it, it was just a cookie, but, um, but I, I, I'm not one

Chris

he's gonna need a lot of muscles,

Phil

the one that has the muscles.

Chris

I mean like a pound or two pounds, I guess it depends on how many of you there are, but if you don't have a head, then you don't need muscles, I

Phil

Right gingerbreads. They, they ha they have hardly any muscles at all. Um, have you seen those guys?

Chris

are our J our gingerbread people allergic to shellfish.

Phil

I think they're allergic to, I have no idea what to say.

Chris

this

Phil

You can just cut to me laughing right out to your question.

Chris

No, no. anyway, you know, glad you brought those muscles up, Phil,

Phil

You gotta pump the iron as opposed to the

Chris

that's what we're making today. Yeah. You mentioned that that muscles, like the shellfish variety hair shellfish, right?

Phil

Uh, It has uh, it has a shell. I know there's a muscle shellfish.

Chris

you did mention the muscles, like from the, from the sea, not in the body. Uh, Actually don't contain a lot of mercury.

Phil

That's right. Pregnant women can eat mussels because there's not a lot of mercury there it's president and all that

Chris

We're not planning on having another one anytime soon.

Phil

really. I feel like the timing is perfect. We can just taper our kids like you and then me and then you

Chris

Gosh, our transitions are fantastically awkward, but yes we are making almond baked mussels today. It's A great recipe, super easy and I love mussels. Uh, I feel like any way that you make them, you cannot go wrong. They are great. And so this, this is a dish that's really good as an appetizer. I think I mentioned in the episode, uh, we first tried it as a new year's Eve appetizer. And so that's why we thought it might fit

Phil

rather apt. Yeah, it's an, it's an app. That's apt.

Chris

sure.

Phil

and did that, but dive in.

Chris

Yeah, here we go.

Phil

I'm ready for some muscles.

Chris

I am too, because uh, this is actually starting to smell kind of good. Just like the ingredients being prepped smells good. You know, there's garlic and some like parsley and I just like that smell. So yeah, today we're doing it's actually an, it's an Allmand baked muscle. The original recipe is from a cookbook called the kitchen in France, by Mimi Thorsen. And it's one that Molly likes a lot and she made this the first time? I don't know, four years ago, four or five years ago for new years. And I don't know, it's just kind of become a little bit of a favorite since then. So I've already kind of got stuff prepped. I've got my muscles cleaned and ready to steam. So I don't know if you kind of know that the trick with muscles that they're open. ahead of time, you can tap if you tap them and they close, they're still like good.

Phil

Really? No, I did not know that.

Chris

don't close, they're dead and you want to throw them out.

Phil

So that's like their defense mechanism to kind of close up.

Chris

Yeah. So I have a couple of these that have opened back up Since I washed them. So I know it's going to be noisy, but I'm just going to go ahead and make sure that these are still closing.

Phil

now these muscles, they I've only made them once before. There's like a beard that you've got

Chris

Yeah.

Phil

It's a deep beard them. Right?

Chris

Yeah. Kind of depending on where you get them from they'll. Relatively clean usually. But if they do have, it's almost like uh, like some roots coming out of, out of the end is kind of what it looks like. And then you just pull that off. you'll wash the shells. You can scrub them using cold water. You don't quite want to get them hot just yet.

Phil

how quickly do they close up?

Chris

sometimes pretty quickly. you know, it might close a quarter of an inch in five seconds.

Phil

I would imagine they're pretty pissed off when you do that.

Chris

they're going to be even more so when they get steamed. Okay. Um, and I'm actually just seeing these, just a tiny, tiny bit of a chicken broth. A cup really is. And it doesn't take long at all. Maybe five minutes.

Phil

So how are you, how are you seeming these? Is it like a. I can't quite tell in that frame. Right. Is it like a double boiler type method or what'd you do then?

Chris

No, actually, I just sorry for the noise, actually. I'm just throwing them in a pot. It's like a three-quarter sauce pan and uh, There's a cup of chicken broth in it. That's pretty much it. Media or yeah, like a medium high heat should be good to go. you guys know that your parents now

Phil

uh, We, so we just got in today and we're leaving tomorrow, just a quick, overnight trip. My. Brother is in town from Nashville and he, he lives just right outside of downtown. So uh, if you've, if you've kind of been following the news, yeah. There's just some weird stuff happening in Nashville. So I think he's glad to be here. But he, he actually does have his in-laws. That are staying at his house while he's gone and they don't have any wifi, because you know, all, all comms were knocked out pretty, pretty much in the whole state from what he's told me. And so, yeah, it's kind of been, been an interesting. And, and saddened little journey for them. So just, just crazy stuff. But nice to be able to have him here and do a little bit of Christmas in our own way. So

Chris

Yeah. Um, While you're talking, I started to mix a little bit of this feeling that we're going to put in there. So I'm just mixing the breadcrumbs. I actually didn't have almond flour, like the recipe called for it. I just had the actual elements. So I threw those in the food processor real quick. a, it's a mixture of breadcrumbs. that uh, almost flour that I made some garlic. Parsley and then a little bit of butter. So nothing, nothing too complicated. The butters room temperature, and you just kind of mix and mash all of that up. it's like a pasty consistency. Honestly, the muscles are already starting to open.

Phil

Yeah, it doesn't seem like they take very long at all.

Chris

Uh, So you said that you've made muscles just like once or twice.

Phil

I've made mussels by themselves once loved him. Absolutely loved him. And I think I just kind of forgot about them. I mean, I would have made them again, but I just, I didn't have a new year's tradition. You know, I didn't have an excuse to make him again. But the second time I was actually just in some Paya, which I think I mentioned a couple of weeks ago. And so that, that had had it in there, you know, Paya just kind of has like a lot of different types of seafood. Um, I don't think there's a wrong way to do it, and really, really enjoyed that as well. So, thanks for choosing this recipe because now

Chris

Well, yeah, this is,

Phil

revisit some old favorites.

Chris

this is a slightly different way of, uh, making the muscles. You know, most of the time you have muscles, it's just going to be like steamed in a broth and. I like either steaming in wine or beer and um, and then you kind of have this, broth with bread and the mussels. And it's really good. And I love mussels that way, but this is, this is a little different in that Of now that now that the muscles have opened, we're going to take them out and split the shells. And it's just going to be like a half shell that you pour this mixture into and you'll bake them. And so really muscles like this, you know, you can kind of treat them like oysters. You know, you said that you had some big oysters down in new Orleans. This, this may be like, kind of similar, you know, like I think, I think actually the, the new Orleans big, like classic baked oyster dis dish, the new Orleans classic baked oyster dishes, like oysters, Rockefeller. So I don't know if that's what you had, but,

Phil

It sounds really familiar.

Chris

You can treat them very much the same posters and muscles that is, toasty, so I'm just transferring him from. Might take a minute.

Phil

Did you have any that didn't make it at all?

Chris

Huh? No, actually all of them were good. And then kind of the way to tell it whether or not a muscle is good is if it opens once it's steamed.

Phil

Chris? How do you de beer? The muscle.

Chris

So kinda, kinda, like I mentioned earlier, what's hot kitchen, hot things. if, if it hasn't already been taken off, you know, a muscle might have some called a beard that you mentioned Phil, it literally looks like a root coming off the bottom of it. And he's just pulled off. That's it

Phil

It's like a grip it and rip it type

Chris

very much. So sometimes, sometimes they uh, you know, are a little, strong they're kind of on there a little bit, but yeah, like definitely. She got it and pull it. It'll eventually give okay. Still just transferring muscles. Yeah.

Phil

uh, Just been thinking about how unfair it is to those little guys. First, you, you just rip the beard right off their face, and then you smash their home up against the countertop. And then if that wasn't enough, then you steam and, and then bake the heck out of them, but they're delicious and that's all that matters.

Chris

Yeah, Yeah. I don't think, I really want to think about uh, all the feelings that are hurting right now. It's

Phil

So you're probably not going to be eating these with pita chips, Hey, man. You're the one that asked for more dad jokes.

Chris

the moles are tasty. Okay. So now that I've got all the muscles out, I'm just. Taking off one of the two shelves. We kind of have like a muscle in a little dish here and then yeah, I think, you definitely need to continue to flex your dad joke muscles there. DASA.

Phil

liking the pun journal idea.

Chris

No, I was just going to ask if Ashley got you a plunger on for Christmas.

Phil

Yeah. She, you know, she, she got me kind of a coffee themed Christmas. I got a new French press. We had one that actually shattered um, in the dishwasher. So yeah, that was a mess, probably not ever going to wash a French precedent dishwasher again, which I don't know. Maybe, maybe I shouldn't have been doing that all along, but I've learned my lesson.

Chris

we, we have done that and it's works. Okay. I mean, like we, we occasionally run our campaigns a disruptor, I'd say maybe once a week or so. I don't know. Maybe we should do it more often.

Phil

well, by and large, it worked for us too until it didn't. So I got a French press I got and. Electric tea kettle with a temperature gauge so that I'm not burning my French press. That was actually a mistake that we used to make. I would just scorch those beans. And then I got a hand grinder,

Chris

Nice. Like a little hand grinder.

Phil

a little hand crank for those coffee beans, you know, to give a real course, you know, of course texture. So I don't know. Um, Maybe, maybe we could do an episode one of these days on like the perfect cup of coffee. Cause if you're a dad and you're not drinking coffee, I just, it doesn't compute. I don't, I don't get it. Yeah. Okay. So this is like my coffee Christmas. So pretty excited about that. Made a couple of French presses this morning and with I'm going to do that again, made a couple of French presses this morning with some Ethiopian beans, actually an Ethiopian Yirgacheffe

Chris

nice. We're from, uh, The roaster

Phil

It's a little, little place here called I think it's called Carolina coffee roasters or low country coffee roasters. I'll find out. I'll put it in the show notes. Good place.

Chris

yeah. How, how is the coffee culture up there in,

Phil

Oh, it's coming around.

Chris

Yeah,

Phil

Yeah. It's it's for sure. Coming around. There's there's actually a pretty big tea culture here as well. There's. I guess for lack of a better term, a plantation that that has its own T that they export quite a bit out of. And so kind of competing against that, but the coffee culture is really coming along. There's some really cool little coffee shops, downtown Charleston that I really kind of enjoyed pre 2020.

Chris

yeah.

Phil

So as those open, back up, I'll enjoy hitting those up again. But you know, of course you can pick up beans from, from any of those places still. So

Chris

Which you should do, got to support our local businesses,

Phil

you've got to support them now more than ever.

Chris

especially in the food industry. For sure.

Phil

Absolutely.

Chris

imagine like just how rough it is. Know we've been so lucky to not really like. Have any, like we're, we're, we're obviously downs over past years, but not like a lot of other businesses that I've heard of. So, I can't imagine how, you know, the small, independent restaurants, the non change, the, the good restaurants or making it, it's gotta be so hard.

Phil

I know

Chris

So we're definitely tried. We're definitely trying to, you know, still eat out or order order out once a week or so kind of

Phil

sure. Yeah, it was too,

Chris

Okay. So I am just. Uh, Finishing up putting the, that kind of topping mixture that we're talking about, the breadcrumbs and all that into garlic and butter. I just kind of spread it evenly through all of the muscles. And then it's going to go into the oven, not for very long, get the oven up at four 75. And honestly, these all only take like five minutes or so really. It's just kind of Browning that topic.

Phil

so you're, you're literally just putting that mixture directly inside the shells that have opened up wide enough to where is it? Just like a direct bake into it, into the open to muscle.

Chris

So when you're steaming the muscle um, When, when you put it into the pot and you want the shelves to be closed, so you have like two halves of a shell and you want it to be close. And so that's kind of like the tapping that we're talking about. If it's open and it's still alive, it'll close. Once it's steamed, you know, it's done because it's opened back up. And so once I pulled all of them out there open and I took one half. That was a shell off. It took one of the shells off. And so the muscle is just sitting kind of like open face inside of the other shell. And then I'm just, I just sprinkled the topping in that kind of like dish that's left the little dish shell that's left. So yeah, these are just going to go in for a few minutes and then they're going to be done and delicious.

Phil

I can't wait for you to eat them. Just being super selfless over here. I'm really excited for you. I'm super excited to try it. Try it myself. What was the name of the cookbook?

Chris

okay. So the cookbook is a kitchen and France by Mamie Thorson, she has a blog and she just, she makes them absolutely killer. Recipes. They're simple. Definitely more than just French style cookie, but an emphasis in fresh stuff. So, I mean, like I said, super simple, recipe. Works great as an appetizer, you can just have these mussel shells out on a plate and people can come and grab them. Again, one of those things that feels a lot more, I don't know, involved in like challenging and elegant, then it is, you know, it's just like a couple of minutes to actually make, so

Phil

those are the best kind.

Chris

I forgot how much that I liked muscles in general. But that one, specifically, you know, muscles are, uh, I feel like a little bit more of a delicate flavor. It's like a more, more delicate flavor profile, I guess,

Phil

that mean that the, that the almond kind of came out as a flavor.

Chris

the garlic way more than anything.

Phil

Oh, okay. Hmm.

Chris

uh, for, especially for that wasn't bad. Like it, it, just tasted so good when you get garlic and butter together in anything like it's, it's going to be a win that's. That's gotta be one of my favorite smells is like garlic and butter, or actually this morning

Phil

a hundred

Chris

making almost, it's kind of been a little bit of a new kid cause like French style omelets and I was softening some shallots and butter for the omelets and man, Oh, any type of onion cooking, you just can't can't beat that smell and bed. Garlic is a close second for me.

Phil

yeah, I completely agree. Do you ever put shallots on a salad?

Chris

Oh, yeah. Or in a salad dressing actually.

Phil

Yeah. Yeah.

Chris

no, I really like

Phil

I, I found that like my wild card on a salad is just red onion.

Chris

Okay. Okay.

Phil

Let's just love the flavor.

Chris

Getting, getting bold there.

Phil

Yeah. Kind of, kind of a little bit of a bold flavor. That's like one of those onions that you never really cook. I feel like red onion. You typically want to leave raw. I dunno if you have any thoughts on that or if there are any thoughts to be had, but yeah,

Chris

I like my onions cooked more than not honestly. I think there's something so great about the caramelization that comes with cooking them and you don't even have to take it that far, even just like softening. Yeah.

Phil

my grandfather used to eat. 'em like an Apple.

Chris

Yeah. I feel like, I feel like my, at least my great grandfather did, I, don't like onions that much. I love cooked onions,

Phil

just peel it and take a bite.

Chris

I don't think I can do that.

Phil

Do you like them on a hot dog?

Chris

Uh yes, raw. Eh, I pass, but like I sauteed onion uh, that that's going to be, it's going to be a toss up between that and sauerkraut for me. And honestly, I would probably just go with both. I don't know about on a hot

Phil

I know. I love you, Chris. Yeah. Oh my gosh. We should do an episode where we just talk about sausages.

Chris

sure. Yeah.

Phil

We can follow up our Rocky mountain oysters episode with that, which is this one. So, so I hate to hijack your, your muscles, but just talk about sausages for the rest of the time.

Chris

I'm torn. I like sausage. I do. I but those muscles were fantastic. They were so good. They really were. So we actually ate them, you know, surprisingly enough uh, right after, right after we recorded. And we had some like random, we're trying to figure out like what else to add, just because, you know, like in and of itself, that's not like the most fulfilling meal. So we had like a little simple green salad and then grabbed some, like, Random stuff that we had in the freezer for. I don't even know why. We had these little like frozen spanakopita. Um, So I threw those in the oven and you know, it, it actually kind of reminded me of our sharkutery episode, just in like the type of dinner it was. I don't know. We made some drinks and it was just kind of like this really interactive finger foodie type meal where there wasn't like a main course. And it kinda felt like date night a little bit date night in our kitchen. Cause it's not fun. So

Phil

that's my favorite day nights.

Chris

So yeah. When are you guys making them?

Phil

Uh, So we're going to do we're going to do new year's Eve. we're going to do Thursday night and we're also going to make some cocktails with it and kind of excited to launch that episode as well. So, so this is kind of fun. We get to plug the Christmas episode from a few days ago and we get to plug our new year's episode, which airs in a couple of days. Two really, really great episodes that I'm super excited about

Chris

Yeah. Now I think, I think both of them are fantastic and we're ending the year on a high note. which is great. I'm ready to get out of this year case. I haven't mentioned it before the holidays haven't felt like holidays. I'm just honestly ready for spring. I'm tired of the short days. And I'm ready to use our back patio. I finally finished the deck. I put up, I put up the deck railings this weekend,

Phil

Nice. I've been wondering about that. I know our listeners have been as well. I just been berated with

Chris

yeah. Oh yeah.

Phil

emails, you know, at the hello at dad's kitchen co.com email address, people have just been hounding me lesson, right. Is Chris done with his patio yet? Facebook messages, Instagram DMS at dad's kitchen co it's. It's honestly getting a little bit overwhelming.

Chris

yeah. Sorry about that.

Phil

Shoot. Some people were even asking me about that deck through well podcasts. They were leaving these ratings a true story. Like if you, if you go to Apple podcasts and you give us five stars, you'll see some comments on there as Chris done with his deck yet.

Chris

But you have,

Phil

with his

Chris

five stars first. That's how you access those

Phil

Right? Yeah. Yeah, actually five stars. And then you also have to leave a positive comment. It's the only way to see what other people have been saying.

Chris

It's, it's like a weird unlock code that Apple does apparently like. Five stars.

Phil

Above down, down left, right left. Right. BA start for our Contra fans. you play that right? Deep dive in. I had done that since probably nine years old, so. Okay.

Chris

Well, uh, Phil. I can't wait for you to have those muscles on new year's Eve. Now

Phil

I'm going to feed them to my gingerbread lady. You liked that lady? Let her frat it'll turn into a happy face. I'm sorry. Ever in this we're in this whole thing.