had my first experience at the nra show this weekend. for a while i had some pictures of me and some friends in the desert in az shooting some rifles, so some friends were a bit concerned when i mentioned my excitement about the upcoming nra show. i assure you there were no guns to be seen, just lots of food, drinks, and other fun restaurant stuff. like fao schwartz for industry peeps.

featured recipe: marinated shrimp with fava bean and preserved lemon salad
featured recipe: marinated skirt steak with sweet and sour peppers and cilantro vinaigrette

i spent most of the day with le cordon bleu doing demos and signings. i graduated form scottsdale culinary institute (which is a le cordon bleu school) back about 10 years ago (yikes) and have been working a lot with them this year. it has been fun to meet all of the students and remember how much fun i had way back when. oh to be young again…ok well i am not getting that old but someone did refer to me as middle aged the other day at a meeting. maybe that explains my constant mid-aged crisis.

for my demos i wanted to do something light and springy but also throw in the number one ingredient, bacon, to lure in a crowd with the aroma. bacon aroma…works every time. or it just puts me in a hungry trance while i am doing my demo and i start to speak jibberish.

i made marinated shrimp sautéed in the bacon fat along with some favas, asparagus and radishes to highlight spring (since chicago weather has finally started to catch on that winter is in fact over). year round, but especially in the spring and summer, i use a lot of preserved lemons to add a nice zing to various dishes. it is an easy process and you can hold on to the lemons for months afterwards so it is great to do in large batches and pull out whenever you are in the mood. i started making them when i worked at spring restaurant here in chicago and have stuck with the same basic method ever since, just changing up the spices and liquor depending on my mood. give it a try and just use the spices that you like and use often in your cooking.

later in the day things got a bit exciting when i found that there was no food around the culinary scene prep area for my demo. i know i was on top chef and all but i have had enough random challenges for this year. luckily we were surrounded by food from all over and a couple of my chef friends from le cordon bleu came to the rescue and gathered everything i needed. i was pretty impressed, especially when a woman from the pr agency handed me two eggs for my vinaigrette. i did not really want to know how she swung that one.

the focus of the culinary scene on saturday was lower priced cuts of beef. i had planned to do skirt steak, which has great flavor and can be very tender if cooked properly. no skirt steak was available but thanks to the canadians, i got a very large tri tip to work with. the only tri tip i had used before was kobe and was about a third the size. we used it back at scylla for our beef tartar because it was delicious and about half the price of the strips and tenderloins.

i had to give a shout out, and i will do it again right now, to the shoes i was wearing during my demo. i was lucky enough to get a pair of dawgs, which are awesome kitchen clogs made out of firestone tires. super comfy, highly recommend, even though they lack the extra inch i get when i wear my other clogs. guess i will just stay 5’2” from now on.

i had been inspired by the skirt steak for my dish and wanted to do a twist on the flavors of fajitas, which 2/3 of the skirt steaks in this country turn in to. i used some red, orange and yellow bell peppers along with some random korean chilies that were around the show and sautéed them with some red onion, fennel (my fav) and a little sugar and vinegar to make it sweet and sour. to top it off i made a tangy cilantro vinaigrette. very simple recipe that is great for a grill out.

on monday i headed back to the show just to wander around and check it out. i think the highlight was the australian booth. my friend roger and i ran into art smith hanging around with all of the aussies (my favorite accent by the way). we tasted some great products including some oysters that were amazing….just a hint of sweetness and a nice meaty texture. it is not all kangaroos and koalas down under, the seafood selections were fantastic.

other than that there were the usual suspects…lots of fried foods and pizzas. i was able to find some tasty cheeses, which always makes me happy. the bud area seemed to draw one of the biggest crowds though i have to say the belgian style wheat beer they came out with is not going to make it to my top ten beers any time soon (or top fifty).

thank you to all those who came by the le cordon bleu booth and to the nra for letting me be part of the show this year. until next year…