Creating Food Memories- What Bite Takes You Home #TheHundredFootJourney

“If you have a spice use it.  Don’t sprinkle it on top- pour it and mix it in.”

Welcome to The Hundred Foot Journey, the delectable story that leaves you with food for thought long after the movie comes to a close and you’ve had adequate time to push back from the table, to take some time to digest this delicious feast for the heart and soul. Who doesn’t love getting lost in a good movie? Just like a 5 star meal, when all the perfect ingredients are brought together and blended in just the right way, when cooked correctly it transports you back to a time and place when life was served up in perfect proportions.  DreamWorks The Hundred Foot Journey is one of those movies.  With plenty of food for thought, suddenly I was 5 years old again, at my aunt’s house at Thanksgiving with the hustle and bustle that only family gatherings of 100 relatives and great food can bring.  With the smells emanating from the kitchen, the sneaking and sampling of food that sticks to your soul because they were mixed with love, and the sounds of the laughter, with a light smattering of bickering of a family once again reunited I was back at the little kid’s table longing to make the move to the table where all the real action was taking place.   “Food is memories.” The days of those Thanksgiving’s may be long going, but just like a great meal, the memories will live on forever.

“Sometimes brakes break for a reason"

In The Hundred-Foot Journey, Hassan Kadam (Manish Dayal) is a culinary ingénue with the gastronomic equivalent of perfect pitch. Displaced from their native India, the Kadam family, led by Papa (Om Puri), settles in the quaint village of Saint-Antonin-Noble-Val in the south of France. Filled with charm, it is both picturesque and elegant – the ideal place to settle down and open an Indian restaurant, Maison Mumbai. That is, until the chilly chef proprietress of Le Saule Pleureur, a Michelin-starred, classical French restaurant run by Madame Mallory (Academy Award®-winner Helen Mirren) gets wind of it. 

Her icy protests against the new Indian restaurant a hundred feet from her own escalate into a heated battle between the two establishments until Hassan’s passion for French haute cuisine — and for Madame Mallory’s enchanting sous chef, Marguerite (Charlotte Le Bon) — combine with his mysteriously- delicious talent to weave magic between their two cultures and imbue Saint-Antonin with the flavors of life that even Madame Mallory cannot ignore. 

At first Madame Mallory's culinary rival, she eventually recognizes Hassan's gift as a chef and takes him under her wing.

“The Hundred-Foot Journey” abounds with flavors that burst across the tongue. A stimulating triumph over exile, blossoming with passion and heart, it is a portrayal of two worlds colliding and one young man’s drive to find the comfort of home, in every pot, wherever he may be.

“What Bite Takes You Home?”

Food Network Star Chef Bal Arneson was inspired to create these dishes in honor of the movie.  To save any of them so you can try each of these burst of flavors right in your own kitchen, simply right click the recipe and save it to your computer.  Bon Appetit- Now let the cooking begin!

“Every hundred-foot journey is like ‘The Wizard of Oz,’” shared producer Oprah Winfrey. “It’s never any further than your own backyard. And food can bring back a fondness or a feeling of being nurtured, supported and loved. Every bite makes you think of being loved and every bite takes you home.”  What bite takes you home?

Check out these fun links when our team got together to share our favorite food memories:

Turner Family Homemade Lasagna

Ferguson Family Fried Green Beans

Giardi Family Meatloaf

Gosdin Family Chicken Tortilla Soup

Bob's Journey Home to the Authentic Philly Cheesesteak

Be sure to see “The Hundred Foot Journey” now playing in theaters everywhere this weekend and then let us know, what bite takes you home.

Get social with “The Hundred Foot Journey”

Website: http://100footjourneymovie.com/

Like us on Facebook: http://facebook.com/100footjourneymovie

Follow us on Instagram: http://instagram.com/thehundredfootjourney

Follow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/the100FtJourney

Follow us on Pinterest: http://pinterest.com/100FtJourney

Follow us on Tumblr: http://thehundredfootjourney.tumblr.com

Subscribe to us on You Tube:

http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCP5Dxvl0VGwB2q4qpkMfKbA

What Bite Takes You Home- #TheHundredFootJourney Philly Cheesesteak

What Bite Takes You Home - The Hundred Foot Journey

I was born and raised in Philadelphia but moved to northern California when I was 20 so I’ve lived here much longer than I did in Philadelphia and call California my home. But my tastes were shaped in Philly and whenever I go back there I can’t help but search out my favorites and my most favorite is the Philly cheesesteak. 

In Philadelphia there is a pizzeria or steak shop on every neighborhood corner. Like small family restaurants everywhere they vary in quality. Some years ago on one of my visits to my parents in Philly I decided to indulge in some serious cheesesteak research. I’d eaten my fair share of cheesesteaks when growing up but found that this was one impossible to obtain sandwich in California. Since this was the early days of personal computers the internet was barely up and running so I was confined to print media. Thankfully my mom and dad were voracious readers and there were plenty of years worth of Philadelphia Magazine and their annual Best Of Philly articles stacked up in the basement. I went through years worth of articles and also used the local newspapers to compile a list of restaurants. Armed with my list off to culinary over indulgence I went. I quickly found that the most famous cheesteak places, Pat’s and Geno’s in South Philadelphia where I had eaten as a child were also among the worst today. They may have invented the cheesesteak but these places are now tourist traps serving greasy, tasteless sandwiches. A good cheesteak is never greasy but rather juicy from fine quality, well seasoned meat and cheese.

Slowly over several years I ate my way through my list, adding and subtracting restaurants and coming up with some great results. You can’t go wrong at places such as Cosmi’s Deli, Delassandros, Tony Luke’s, Jim’s Steaks and Steve’s Prince of Steaks but the best of the best for me turned out to be just about the ugliest little shop imaginable in an industrial part of South Philadelphia called John’s Roast Pork. 

Now John’s Roast Pork specializes in, of all things, an incredible roast pork sandwich but their cheesesteak is what I went there for and it’s the best or among the best according to Philadelphia Magazine, the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Food Channel and the Travel Channel just to name a few. John’s also won the James Beard Award for Culinary Excellence and is routinely on top ten lists of Philly cheesesteaks everywhere but this national attention all happened years after I discovered the place. When I would visit Philadelphia I would take a red eye flight so I could get to John’s just after they opened at 6:45 in the morning and have a cheesteak for breakfast on my way from the airport to my parents’ home in northeast Philly. On my way home I would also arrange my flight so I could have another cheesesteak on my way to the airport to fly back to California. My mouth is watering just thinking about it.

I like my cheesesteak simple and traditional, just meat, cheese and onions although most of the chains in California think you need mayo, ketchup, peppers, mushrooms, pizza sauce, etc., on your sandwich. You can certainly get that in Philadelphia but that isn’t really the way a cheesesteak should be.

So just what makes John’s so good? John Bucci Jr. the son of the founder of John’s Roast Pork still man’s the grill. He does a few things differently than the normal cheesesteak shop. First off rather than use the traditional Amoroso bakery roll that most shops use John uses Italian rolls from the Carangi Bakery, a local Philly bakery, that are a little crustier than the normal roll and are seeded. He then removes a bit of the interior bread so as to better hold the 12 ounces of top quality, paper thin, sliced beef loin plus fried onions and cheese that he piles onto the sandwich. Most cheesesteak places will have a pile of lovely, browned chopped onions waiting on the side of the grill to grace the sandwich but John starts off with the raw sweet onions on the grill and then tops them with the beef so that the caramelizing onion flavor permeates the steak. He then seasons the meat and leaves it alone for a couple of minutes to brown up. Then he chops up the steak and onions on the grill and again does something different by toping the steak with chunks of extra sharp provolone cheese, waiting a moment for it to melt a bit and then chopping the cheese into the steak so that with every bite you get cheese, perfectly seasoned beef and onions in a mouth watering combination. A regular shop would put slices of cheese on top of the browning steak, let it melt for a moment, scoop it on to a roll and add onions. These simple differences in ingredients and technique are what I think makes John’s cheesesteaks the best. 

I’ve heard tell you can get a good cheesesteak in Los Angeles but here in northern California it just doesn’t exist. You can forget the chain cheesesteak places. They simply don’t use quality ingredients. There are a couple of places in the south bay area where you can get what I would consider a decent neighborhood cheesesteak but nothing approaches the rarified heights of John’s Roast Pork or any of the other places I mentioned above. This is the one food I miss from my childhood and this is the one that takes me back to the place I was born.

What Bite Takes You Home? #TheHundredFootJourney Chicken Tortilla Soup

  Chicken Tortilla Soup by Dawn Gosdin

Notice my Mickey Flatware

Ingredients:

_______________________________________________________

• 4 oz. unsalted butter (1 stick)
• 4 oz. extra virgin olive oil (1/2 cup)
• 2 oz. bacon drippings ( 1/4 cup)
• 2.5 oz. green bell pepper ( 1/3 cup)
• 8 oz. yellow onions ( 1 cup)
• 4 oz. celery ( 1/2 cup)
• 4 oz. carrots (1/2 cup)
• 1/2 bunch cilantro (stems included) My personal fave herb
• 1 teaspoon ground white pepper
• 10 1/2 oz. fresh or frozen corn kernels
• 1 teaspoon cracked black pepper
• 1 teaspoon chili powder
• 1 teaspoon cumin
• 1 teaspoon Lawry's Seasoned Salt  (I’m from the South, I like it SPICY)
• 1 tablespoon finely chopped fresh garlic
• 5 oz. white corn tortillas (about 4-5)
• 2 1/2 quarts chicken stock (or 10 teaspoons chicken bouillon granules and 2 1/2 quarts of water)
• 12 oz. tomatoes (2 to 3 medium)
• 18 oz. grilled boneless chicken breast
• Roux (thickener): 3 1/2 oz. unsalted butter, 3 1/2 oz. all-purpose flour

 How to make it:

________________________________________________________

• Peel, clean and wash all vegetables. (Give them a bath & a massage)
• Place bell pepper, onion, celery, carrot and cilantro in a food processor and chop fine.
• Heat sauce pot over medium-high heat for 2-3 minutes. Add butter, olive oil and bacon fat.
• When the butter has fully melted, add the vegetables, white and black pepper, chili powder and cumin, salt, and garlic. Cook until the onions are translucent and slightly brown. While the vegetables cook, chop the tortillas in the food processor until fine. Add tortillas to the sauce pot and cook until soft.

•  Add the chicken stock to the sauce pot and bring to a boil.
• While the soup is coming to a boil, prepare the roux (Roux is a mixture of equal parts fat and flour used for thickening sauces and soups.) Heat a 6-10-inch sauté pan over med-low heat. Add butter and melt fully. Add the flour and mix thoroughly using a wire whip. Cook roux for 2 to 3 minutes, stirring occasionally.
• Add roux to the soup using a wire whip. Reduce heat to simmer and cook for 15 minutes. Add diced chicken breast.
• Finely chop the tomatoes in food processor. Add corn and tomatoes to the soup and simmer for 10 minutes.
• Ladle soup in equal parts into 8 heated soup bowls. Garnish each with fried tortilla strips, shredded cheese and Pico de Gallo and you’re finished~ Voilà

“Chicken Tortilla Soup, “takes me home” even though I only live two blocks from my parent’s, lol! Woot*O*