The Lowly Chicken Thigh in a Starring Role

Chicken thighs are the Fred Ward of the culinary world. You've seen 'em in everything but they never get to be the star. If they were in 5th grade P.E. they would be the effeminate, chubby kid with asthma and never get picked first. But why? Dark meat is more flavorful. The thighs have that massive hunk of skin that get crispier than anything else in a Popeye's Bonafide Family Meal and yet...they are passed over for the breast almost universally. What is this obsession with breasts that has grabbed hold of our nation. Has the trend for bigger breasts on everything from models to mommys really gone so far as to skew the popularity of chicken parts? I think so. Turkeys have been bred over time to have such large breasts that they can no longer mate naturally. The physics and the geometry don't work anymore.

To help turn the tide back to thigh-appreciation (and to save some serious money) I love to use chicken thighs in almost every recipe that calls for chicken. I remove the bones and use them as fillets and I love to cook them whole on the grill or in stews, soups and ragouts. Tonight, they went into a big pot of red sauce with some veggie and herb pals and ended up in a bowl over toasted polenta. If you want the recipe, just send me an email (info@ivyanddevine.com)

Bon Appetit!
~Tom

I Love this Kind of Work

To prepare for a new "thing" that I'm currently working on, I spent an evening working on a couple of new dishes with my friend and mega-chef, Dan Blumenthal. My good friend and new partner in a business venture, Kim Brown, came along for the learning experience and entertainment value. Dan and I worked out the kinks in a chipotle/lime/ginger shrimp dish. The original version was a marinated shrimp, cooked on a grill pan. It morphed and evolved into a dish cooked in the same way as New Orleans Bar-B-Que Shrimp, made famous by Pascal's Manale Restaurant. We blended a bunch of chipotle peppers with lime juice, melted butter, cilantro, ginger, honey, and sunflower oil, then cooked the shrimp in this concoction for a short time and served them over soft polenta. Don's call this "Shrimp and Grits" or I'll stop writing about it. EVERYBODY now does a shrimp and grits dish. I swear we'll see it on the menu at Red Lobster within the next year.

To go with this searing hot delight, we made a cold soup of cucumbers and avocado with an island of whipped cream and buttermilk floating on top alongside a dollop of salsa fresca and some baked tortilla strips. It was great. Kim cleaned her plate and was only mildly disturbed by Dan's and my behavior.

Bon Appetit!
~Tom