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Asheville, North Carolina, is like a cross between Mayberry and Brooklyn.
This town of 80,000 has over 100 restaurants
and over 22 farmers' markets.
On any list of most food-friendly towns in America,
Asheville figures high in the rankings.
There's great eating everywhere, but nowhere more than on the street that winds
from Asheville's most famous landmark to its downtown center.
It's Biltmore Avenue, Asheville, North Carolina.
Come on, let's eat the street!
(laughter)
♪♪
One British travel writer compared Asheville, North Carolina,
to your favorite hole-in-the-wall restaurant.
You want to keep it a secret, but it's just too good not to share.
Davy Crockett and Daniel Boone used to pass through these parts
when it was a wilderness outpost.
Prosperity came to town in the late 1800s,
when the railroad came through, and Asheville turned into
a popular resort area.
People from all over the country came for the fresh air and mountain scenery.
One of them was a young, New York millionaire called George W. Vanderbilt.
He bought thousands of acres at the edge of town and started building
a little, private getaway he called Biltmore.
By the time he was done, it was the biggest house in America.
It was also one of America's first experiments in sustainable agriculture.
Meat, vegetables, even wine are still produced on the estate,
which is now open to the public.
Executive Chef Damien Cavicchi oversees an operation
that's been doing farm-to-fork dining longer than just about anybody.
What do you think?
Kind of like you could have done better, but it's all right, it's all right.
I mean, this is beautiful, this is where you come to work every day.
Wow.
How many restaurants are at the Biltmore?
We have a total of five sit-down restaurants,
and we have about 12 when we fully expand into all of our operations.
Yes, sir.
Wow, let's check it out.
So what we're gonna make today is a smoked leg of lamb,
and we're gonna serve that with a grilled plum salad.
So what do we do to get started?
The first step is to make the brine.
We're gonna start with water, kosher salt, sugar...
this is pink salt.
So nitrate salt, really kind of like a curing...
It also gives us kind of that pink hue that we like.
Ooh!
Maple syrup, cloves, crushed juniper berries,
bay leaves, and fresh thyme-- put it on the stove,
and bring it to a boil for about 10 minutes,
Beautiful.
Awesome.
We're just gonna break this into two,
and then we'll just simply butterfly it so that we can get this cured relatively quickly.
So next, we're gonna add the brine to the lamb.
So there's two kinds of cure-- there's a dry cure, which would be like a salt rub.
This is the same principle, we're just gonna get there faster.
This needs to go into the cooler no longer than 24 hours.
I've got one that we've brined already, and you can see that it looks
a whole lot different, kind of taken on a different color.
Right.
We're gonna keep the fat side out as we roll this up,
Tie it up.
The reason that we're tying it is to secure it,
but also to make sure that it has an even shape
so that all parts of it cook evenly.
So we'll let this sit out for about 30 minutes at room temperature
to continue to dry-- the skin will become tacky,
and that'll kind of absorb more of that smoke.
So over here on the stove, I've got some wood chips
that have been soaked for about 30 minutes,
just over low heat so they're smoldering.
Right in there.
right in there.
So that'll take about an hour, hour and a half.
Beautiful.
Start with a little olive oil and the plums,
let these go for about a minute on each side,
just to char them lightly.
We're gonna start the next step with some hazelnuts.
Can you crush those by hand?
Chef, you tell me hand crush, I hand crush.
(Damien laughs)
It just looks phenomenal.
And then in the same pan, we're gonna take this butter,
and we're just gonna brown it, so...
Obviously, using the same pan, we're getting all that flavor.
Add this right into the hazelnuts.
(Chuck laughs)
That heat is gonna kind of pull out some of that oil from the nuts.
Only the finest, hand-crushed nuts.
Cider vinegar, maple syrup, fresh lemon juice,
That's awesome.
Just chop it up?
(Chuck) Microgreens.
Get the lamb-- just a couple of slices,
and that rosy color is what we were after.
Lamb is already cooked, we're just gonna brown it.
Put the (baaing) laaamb (normal) in there.
And just for a minute or so on each side.
So you're kind of just waking it up a little bit here.
Aw, yeah, that looks awesome, man.
You should really come to my restaurant in 2 weeks and have this same dish.
(Damien) We're ready to plate this salad.
Take this cornbread that we've cut up here,
So chef, how do you make the cornbread?
It's very simple, we start with coarse-ground cornmeal, salt, baking soda,
and baking powder, and we'll mix the wet ingredients separately--
bacon fat, the egg, buttermilk.
Add in the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients,
Beautiful.
Then the lettuce-- we've got that tossed with the dressing,
Plate.
Now we're gonna add this smoked leg of lamb
that just looks phenomenal.
Next are the plums,
and that's it, just a simple lamb salad with grilled plums.
Chef, that looks fantastic, let's give it a try.
Weird, you're not going for the greens.
Yeah!
Obviously, there's a smokiness.
I've gotta admit, that lamb is fantastic,
the croutons, those plums...
but really, that butter vinaigrette is just...
it's really a revelation for me.
I'll do one of those everything bites.
Lamb, cornbread, and butter...
how can you go wrong?
Coming up, forget Plan A,
You've gotta suit up.
Sorry.
(Chuck) The Blue Ridge Mountains around Asheville
are a natural habitat for the fiercely independent types.
A lot of them are farmers, and those are the folks
Chef Laurey Masterton likes making friends with.
Her Biltmore Avenue eatery, Laurey's, improvises dishes
from whatever the local farmers and foragers are bringing around.
I'm meeting Laurey at her house to get one of
the key ingredients for today's dish.
Okay.
Beautiful.
So, this is 1/12 of a teaspoon of honey,
and it is the amount of honey that one worker bee will make in her whole life.
I'm serious, so if you eat a pound of honey,
you're eating the work of 625 bees.
Yes.
I figured you wanted to meet the bees,
Let's do it.
You look like you know your way around a blowtorch.
When the time comes...
That's it.
Okay.
And the deal is, once the smoker's lit, we want to...
No, not yet.
How about now?
Thank you.
Crank it.
Yeah, that's good.
(Chuck) Yeah, baby, beautiful.
We've gotta suit up.
Sorry.
First thing we're gonna do is just smoke the bees a little bit.
(Laurey) So pick that up, and you'll see there's... basically it's nothing.
However, check this out.
There is a good bunch of honey.
You see that on the edges, these frames are all capped.
That's fully matured honey, and that honey is gonna last forever.
They have pulled honey out of the tombs in Egypt--
3,000 years old, and it's fine,
as long as it's still capped.
How did you know?
ESB.
(Laurey) Okay, I'm gonna shake these bees off here.
Okay, take your glove off-- okay, give it a try, Chuck.
(Chuck) Oh, my God, look at that!
Beauty.
Wow!
Yeah.
Taste a little bit of the butterfly bush and lilacs.
I mean, better than any honey I've ever had, obviously,
but wow!
Bye, girls, I love it.
Okay, girls.
(Chuck) Having seen where Laurey harvests her gold,
I'm excited to see what the buzz is in her kitchen.
We're making a honey-glazed pork tenderloin
with North Carolina peach salsa.
We're gonna marinate this pork,
put on some pepper, smoked Maldon salt.
This salt is smoked over 300-year-old oak.
Right.
Nice, big crystals.
(Laurey) This garlic needs to be minced.
Drizzle it with a little bit of extra *** olive oil,
and Stoney *** Gold.
All right, let's get the griddle going for the pork.
All right, we'll heat that up, and let's get the salsa going.
Freestone peach-- this is my fun little way
(Chuck) This is what I love to see.
Let me try it.
(Chuck) All right, so what's next?
Lime zest, the lime juice, some cilantro,
Red onion?
We'll just let that sit while we're grilling the pork.
Five minutes like this, we're gonna turn it, five minutes,
it's gonna have beautiful cross hatches on it.
In the meantime, we can frizzle the shallots.
Yeah, frizzled.
Yeah.
It's like crispy, little shallot things.
Yeah, but why would we use the word "crispy",
because then we'd actually know what that means.
Frizzled.
Olive oil in the pan, shallots...
Yeah, flip it.
I think the oil's looking good for the frizzlement.
Dump those in there, man.
Yeah.
(Laurey) Okay, I think those are good.
Give 'em a little salt there, Chuck.
Mm, I'm frazzled by the frizzle-- it's delicious.
And let's put some foil on it and let it rest.
Although there's no rosemary in the recipe,
I love to make a bed of an herb,
because rosemary goes with pork so well.
All right, we're gonna plate this baby up.
Mm-mm, that's perfect.
Yeah.
Next is the salsa.
Frizzleage.
Finish it off with a little Stoney *** Gold honey.
Now, I have forks over here, but I'm like...
Fork who?
Mmhm.
That pork is phenomenal.
That's really good.
I just got a little... little crunch of the salt,
sweetness of the peach, the cilantro that just kind of throws a curve ball in there,
a real fresh punch of flavor.
Sweet, sour, salty,
bitter, crunchy... just about everything you need, right?
Beautiful.
Life is a precious thing-- glad to share it with my bees, and with you.
Thank you so much.
Mmhm.
Coming up, a biscuit as big as your head.
Yeah.
Good Southern town that it is, Asheville has its share of eccentricities.
Follow a couple of twists and turns down Biltmore Avenue,
and you'll come to Tomato Jam Cafe.
Tomato Jam Cafe caters to
an in-the-know local crowd with Southern home cooking.
Chef Daniel Wright owns the place with his wife,
and it does kind of feel like you're eating at their house.
I'm dropping by because I've heard Daniel makes
a decadent version of an old, Southern staple.
Mmhm, c'mon, y'all!
Tell me a little bit about the recipe we're gonna make right now.
I'm gonna show you how to make a cathead biscuit,
Cathead biscuit?
What's the deal with that?
Okay.
and they can kind of be knotty, kind of lumpy, kind of heavy,
but light and soft on the inside and really good.
What do we do to get started here?
All-purpose flour, 8 cups, going right into the mixing bowl.
Baking powder, 6 fat tablespoons,
2 and 1/2 tablespoons of salt,
3/4 cup of sugar,
pop that bad boy on there.
We're gonna start and let it just kind of dry mix for a moment.
(Daniel) Pound of butter, cubed, cold, butter.
We're gonna let that sucker mix for about 5 minutes
so that the butter is evenly distributed throughout the entire mix of flour.
I think we're ready.
It's about to drop on them biscuits!
(Chuck laughs)
Okay.
because we want to see the true consistency of it without getting it too wet.
We're gonna bump it up on high speed for just a second.
We bring our dough over here-- gimme a little shaky-shake right there, Chuck.
A little shaky-shake.
You gotta be the boss with the dough.
We just wanna kinda find a good, flat surface
for the biscuits to start with here.
Poof!
Rolling pin, must have in the kitchen, especially for biscuits.
My dad made this.
Now, this batch that we're making right here,
Chuck, is gonna make about eight or nine biscuits.
Don't wanna roll it too thin, 'cause we're making cathead biscuits.
Will you hand me the ring? All right.
Now, it's important not to twist when you're cuttin' a biscuit.
That seals the edges of the biscuit off,
makes it kinda lopsided.
We want 'em to rise straight up if we can.
Put them suckers on there.
I think these things wanna go in the oven.
Most importantly, set the timer.
We put 'em in there for 10 minutes.
Okay.
Um, 350 degrees on convection heat.
And tell me a little bit about the other dishes
that you have here on the menu at Tomato Jam Cafe.
Sure, we also make our own berry jam here.
We serve the Jammin' Pancake, some big burgers, big fat chicken sandwiches,
a big fat funky grit bowl.
(both) Catheads.
Now, this is halfway through.
We're just gonna spin the tray around.
Oh, my God, you are joking.
Beautiful.
That's right.
So how do you make the tomato jam?
(Daniel) Start with a big can of tomatoes, lemon zest, and lemon juice.
Sugar and nutmeg-- I'm gonna let it simmer for a couple hours.
I mean, it's almost like a tomato caramel.
Is that your pacemaker?
You're doin' okay.
(Daniel) Catheads, that's right.
Big time.
(Daniel) I'm gonna put a little butter on them while they're still hot.
It's time.
No.
I mean, look, I just picked this one up, and it's...
Yeah, right?
I mean, nice and crispy-- oh, look at that!
Nice, full of air pockets, that's how you know that it's light.
Yeah, it does, it's kinda...
I mean, maybe it's the butter and...a little tomato jam on there.
Yeah!
You know, this is jam, this is straight-up, like...
if you didn't tell me this was tomato, by the look of it,
I'd think it was raspberry or strawberry or...
Exactly, it's a little visually deceiving color-wise.
Cheers, man.
Damn, that's some good cathead.
What I love about food and flavors and textures,
you've got a little bit of crispy on the outside,
Yeah.
Yeah.
You know what we're missin'? More butter.
It's perfect.
The second that jam hits your tongue, it's all tomato,
Mmhm.
it turns to jam.
You know, a couple ingredients in the biscuits,
and just simple, great technique, and you end up
with something that's truly, truly unique,
and I can honestly say, this is the best tomato jam
and biscuit I've ever had in my life.
Game over.
Coming up, let's see how my baking stacks up.
Okay.
Nope, not even close.
The natural beauty and artsy culture of Asheville attract all kinds of creative people.
Two restaurant veterans, pastry chef Roz Taubman
and her business partner, Bobby Buggia, set up shop
on Biltmore Avenue with a restaurant called Blackbird
that hits the sweet spot of sophisticated yet approachable.
All over town, people tell me that there's one thing that Roz makes
that drives them completely coconuts.
You know what? I gotta see what this is all about.
So, what do we do to get started?
Well, it's the beginning of any good cake,
which is a lot of butter, and we add the sugar, and the eggs,
and we add the vanilla extract, and then we add
the little secret ingredient, which is the coconut extract.
Yeah.
it's like coconut everywhere.
Ohh, my God.
(Roz) We want to add flour, the salt, also the baking powder.
We're gonna be adding the dry ingredients into the cake batter.
We finish it off with cream.
Beautiful.
Oh, yeah.
All right, we can keep on going.
(Roz) We're just gonna dish it out.
Beautiful.
(Roz) All right, so we're gonna bake these off, okay.
In the oven.
We're gonna do a straight, cream cheese frosting.
Softened butter, the cream cheese... get 'er started.
Vanilla... and you're gonna think,
"Man, this is, like, so much powdered sugar."
Yeah.
So, we're ready to put this cake together.
(Roz laughs) It's a guy thing.
No, it's a guy thing.
Oh, you're doing good.
Okay.
(Roz) You can see how firm this custard is.
That's going to go between the layers.
So, we're gonna pop this cake out.
Now we're gonna put the custard on the layers.
For my cakes, I use, like, 6 ice cream scoops of custard.
So, how do you make this custard?
It's cream, butter, sugar...
you bring it to a boil, you add a little slurry of corn starch,
then I add a lot of coconut.
That's what helps it become so firm like this.
I've been known to eat glue.
All right, now we need the next layer.
Okay.
Nope, not even close.
Ice the top...
Oh, my God.
Time for me to take over here.
And now we're gonna do the coconut.
I mean, when I dream of cake in my head, I mean,
this is pretty much what pops up.
Dress the plate with only just a little bit of toasted coconut.
You think we could share that one? (laughs)
I thought that was your piece and this was mine.
I'm never gonna look at coconut cake the same way again.
I mean, the layers-- it's just perfect.
Yeah.
That custard in there... just elevates it.
Yeah, you're, like, really eatin' this cake. (Roz laughs)
Um! Roz, did I ever give you an impression
that I wasn't gonna eat the cake?
Oh, yeah.
(Roz laughs)
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