Fit to Be Tied - Recap

An eight year old Alton Brown sits down to dinner at the home of his Aunt Ethel and Uncle Fred. They offer him a layered roast; a delicious dish he’ll later learn was called braciola. Alton’s uncle tells him the roast comes from special cows – the farmer opens the cow and massages the filling into the muscles. He also tells the impressionable lad that the cows come in all kinds of flavors, even chocolate for dessert! Aunt Ethel tries with limited success to rein in the teasing.

Later, Alton learns the truth: braciola is a member of the roulade family. These are flattened meat with a tasty layer of stuffing... Alton’s crew interrupts with the ‘stuffing is evil’ mantra as they wave the sign. Alton changes his tune; the tasty layer is a filling covering the meat and rolled inside it, not a ‘nasty handful of breadcrumbs shoved up some poor turkey’s backside!’

The perfect meat for roulade is flank steak, a cut that lies just behind the skirt steak and contains a lot of the diaphragm. This cut starts out quite flat, and because of the way the grain runs, when it is cut it contains only short muscle fibers, meaning that it is tender and easy to chew. The particular piece Alton plans to use could be a little flatter, and that leads him to discuss tenderizing meat. And for that, he’ll go to the pound.

At the pound – a drawerful of meat tenderizers – Alton explains how to select the right tenderizer from the choices. Done correctly, a good pounding tenderizes the meat, but done poorly, well... Alton holds up a photograph of a tattered mess, the result of a tenderizing gone wrong. The problem is the hammer-style tenderizers, which concentrate the force in a small area, destroying the meat. Alton chooses instead a tenderizer with a large, round head. It delivers force to the meat without crushing or tearing it.

Back at the flank steak, Alton demonstrates a few other precautions. He lightly spritzes the meat with water, then covers it with a sheet of plastic wrap, and spritzes that with more water. Using a skydiver doll, he explains that broken legs result when skydivers land with knees stiff. When they land with knees bent and then roll to the side, injuries are much less common. The same principle applies here: Alton brings the tenderizer down and slides it to the side. The water and plastic add lubrication so the meat doesn’t tear. Once the meat is the correct thickness, Alton turns his attention to the stuffing.

The cry rises again from the crew, “Stuffing is Evil!” Alton quickly reminds them that what he’s making is really a filling – and to make it, he’ll need a food processor. Into the bowl go some garlic, and when that’s chopped Alton adds fresh parsley, fresh oregano, fresh rosemary and fresh thyme, chopping these a bit first. Grated parmesan, flavored croutons and eggs joins the garlic and herbs and Alton takes everything for a spin.

Okay, he said he’d never buy croutons again, so what’s up? Well, it seems never is a long time, so Alton vows never to say ‘never’ again – flavored croutons are both convenient and tasty.

At the Cook’s Warehouse, a shopper purchasing a larger and expensive chef’s knife from Tool Tyrant W notices Alton nearby and greets him. W tightly explains that the customer was just getting ready to check out and spears Alton with her trademark stare. Alton tells the customer that cutting twine with a knife will “leave him in stitches” and recommends kitchen shears. W immediately finds a nice pair, but Alton shoots them down, noting that they’re really designed for poultry and little else. They’re too large and have too many places where germs can collect. W next shows the man a complicated looking tool, but Alton disdains this one as well, suggesting that it tries to do too much and probably does little of it well. Instead, he finds a variety that looks like regular shears with a few important features. The handle is longer than the blade, giving the user leverage for tough cutting jobs. Fine serration on one blade grabs what the cook wants to cut. And the two blades disassemble easily, making complete cleaning easy. The customer selects the inexpensive shears and Alton, sensing the storm cloud over W, hastens out the door himself.

Back in his kitchen Alton considers twine next. He chooses butcher’s twine made of cotton and keeps it clean by storing it inside an old plastic pitcher, looping the end through the spout. He brings that up and pins it under the cutting board to keep it handy.

Now it’s time to prepare the roll. Alton positions the meat with the narrowest edge away from him and peels the plastic from the meat. The filling is very sticky, so he puts a little oil on a spatula, then scoops out the filling and spreads it very evenly. He keeps away from the wide edge of the roll; this will be the outer edge and must seal meat to meat. Starting from the narrow edge farthest away, Alton gently rolls the meat.

Now comes the butcher’s twine. Since the camera can’t zoom close enough, Alton uses a heavy rope and a cushion to demonstrate a surgeon’s knot – loop the ends twice (like tying shoes, but with an extra loop), and then bring them around and loop them twice again (like a granny knot, but with an extra loop at each stage). Returning to the roast, Alton loops twine around the far edge and ties a surgeon’s knot, arranging for a short end about eight inches long. That “tail” will be used momentarily. Then he brings the long end about an inch down and makes a loop that he slides up the roast and snugs tight about an inch from the first loop. Seven or eight such loops tie the roast snugly, and then Alton gently rolls it over. Bringing the end of the twine and that eight inch tail together, Alton makes one final loop and uses a surgeon’s knot to tie it off. Then he lets it rest at room temperature for fifteen minutes before coating it with canola oil and kosher salt to pull water soluble proteins to the surface of the meat where they will aid browning.

Then the roast goes into a cast iron skillet to brown – this will create smoke, so turn on a vent or open a window. Alton notes that most cooks prepare this kind of roast entirely on a cooktop, but there’s a hazard: the cooktop can’t maintain the low temperature needed for cooking without burning. To achieve that, Alton plans to finish his roast in the oven, at 350º. While the roast begins to brown, Alton preheats the oven with his favorite tomato sauce – Good Eats tomato sauce. Returning to the cooktop, he rotates the roast to ensure it browns evenly, turning it along its long axis and rotating it in the pan so that it’s exposed to new, freshly heated metal. Once the roast has fully seared and the sauce has heated, Alton slides the meat into the sauce.

This is braising, not stewing, so the sauce won’t cover the meat. But Alton spoons generous portions of sauce over the meat, warning viewers that the high sugar content of the sauce means it will get very hot and be very sticky. Care here avoids painful burns. Next, he needs a cover – the best choice is a tent of aluminum foil doubled over. The tent shape means the foil doesn’t touch the meat, preventing condensation and also reducing the chance that the acid in the sauce will leech aluminum into the food, creating bad flavors. In forty-five minutes, the roast comes out of the oven; Alton snips the twine and cuts it into nice sized portions with an electric knife. For best presentation, he sauces the plate and sets the roulade into the sauce.

Usually only terrestrial creatures get the roulade treatment, but Alton next offers a seafood idea. He starts with some parchment covered with plastic wrap and a tray of nice seafood. Several flounder fillets and some long, thin salmon fillets, a few sea scallops and some dill and parsley are all he needs.

He starts by laying the salmon fillets on the plastic covered parchment with the tails facing away, slightly overlapping. Then he lays out the flounder with tails facing him, and nearer to him. He skewers the scallops (with a metal skewer) and puts them at the tail end of the salmon fillets. Then he seasons everything will salt and pepper, and sprinkles it with dill and parsley. After seasoning, it’s time to roll. Alton starts at the far end, where the skewer of sea scallops sets, and carefully begins the roll, using the plastic wrap and the edge of a half-sheet pan to keep gentle pressure on the roll, compressing it. Then he removes the plastic wrap and goes in the opposite direction, rolling the parchment around the fish. That goes in the fridge; a few hours in the chill chest will firm it nicely. You could skip that step if time presses, but Alton advises against it.

Alton loves grills, which may explain why he loves his broiler, which is basically an upside down grill. On the bake setting, heat radiates toward the food from all directions (foam balls pelt Alton, driving the point home). During a broil, heat radiates directly down on the food (more foam balls rain down in Alton). Resetting his glasses properly, Alton explains that the seafood swirls work well under the broiler because they’re flat. Flatter food has more surface area facing that direct heat, and cooks faster. And that’s good, because faster cooking minimizes moisture loss. Food broiled for too long dries out. Alton preheats his broiler as he retrieves his seafood roll from the chill chest, carefully extracts the skewer, and cuts it into inch-thick rounds, moving these to an oiled broiling pan. Alton waits until after he has placed the rounds on the broiling pan to remove the paper – the paper will hold them together. He leaves about an inch of space between each round and its neighbor. When they’re all in place, he brushes them with oil and seasons with a little salt (avoid pepper – it burns under the broiler). Moving the top rack to about 6” from the heat, Alton slides in the tray. How long do these back? That depends on how powerful the broiler is – Alton’s is pretty strong, so he broils for just three minutes, until the rounds are golden brown and delicious. Alton plans to eat his rounds with a pat of herb butter, but says they’re delicious plain or with a vinaigrette dressing.

Alton sits down to tuck in, hoping that he’s inspired viewers to take a... roll... on the wild side, for roulades are definitely good eats!

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