It was not my intention to post about pork products as my second entry on our new website, but the past few weeks have been rife with them. There have been jags of bacon, egg and cheese sandwiches for breakfast. Chef made a batch of tomato marmalade and bacon jam and he has smoked and slow roasted four pork shoulders in his smoker in the last 2 weeks. It has become an event around the complex where we are. The smoker goes on in the morning and we get a few visitors wondering what is in the works. So while this website has been coming online and we are busy introducing ourselves into the Chicago scene, Chef has kept himself busy playing with his pork. I know there are people that do not chose to eat pork. They could have religious or dietary restrictions, it could be the issue of meat in general. For those people, I am sorry if our excitement is offensive. It is not my intention to offend you. There is just something wonderful about watching a chef enjoying his work and being proud and excited about the product he has created.
During this time, I discovered "Vine". This is Twitter's 6 sec looping video app that Instagram's 15 second video was created to compete. Did that make sense? Anyway, I knew about Instagram's video feature, but never explored it. When I downloaded the Vine app, I began having a blast. I would recommend it to anyone that likes to get creative with visual arts. There have been several posts on our Facebook page (www.facebook.com/allnaturalchicago) and on Twitter, but I posted the latest one because it made our family laugh so hard, so often and for so long today, our sides hurt. I included it here for posterity! The gelatinous substance going into the barbecue sauce is pork gelee. This is the part of the blog that has something to do with real food preparation. Pork gelee, it's a curiosity. When the pork shoulders were smoked and roasted, there was a lot of liquid in the bottom of the pan. Chef strains that jus, allows it to settle in a special pitcher and removes all of the fat. When you chill it down, it becomes gelatinous. Viola, Pulled Pork Gelee. Isn't Jello just the gelatinous byproducts of animals, after all.
We smoke things in our kitchen. I know some jokes just write themselves, but I am referring to the process of flavoring food by burning water soaked wood chips. I am not giving away any secrets here, except that when Chef does it, it turns out fabulous. We have a dedicated smoker/roaster that can be used to make meat taste great, but we are looking forward to smoking all sorts of foods. Vegetarian may appreciate smoked mushrooms or even the chick peas in our Ceci salads. Stay tuned for our new menu items including smoked and/or slow roasted product.