Good morning. This is not a big weekend for health food. People will fry chicken wings for the Super Bowl, make loaded nachos, chili, barbecued ribs. I’ll put out queso and chips, some stuffed jalapeños, maybe some brats, get everyone comfortable, ready to watch violence and advertising.
That’s for Sunday, though. Tonight, I want to jump in the wayback machine, transport myself to the 1980s and the heyday of the chef Paul Prudhomme, who first popularized the magic of blackening redfish by dipping fillets in butter, coating them with cayenne and dried herbs and then searing them tight in a ripping hot cast-iron pan.
Naz Deravian adapted the technique for a dish of blackened salmon (above). I fold the fillets into French bread with mayonnaise, sliced tomatoes and shredded iceberg lettuce for a Cajun Alaskan po’boy situation. It’s an excellent meal, worth the shrieking of the smoke detector when it inevitably goes off while you’re cooking. Crack some windows and follow my lead.
Featured Recipe
Blackened Salmon
Then maybe stay with the Louisiana pantry for breakfast in the morning with some French toast amandine? And yakamein for Saturday lunch? I’ll be ready for travel in the evening, toward bulgogi, maybe, or masala black-eyed peas.
Of course, you could consider a zag on Sunday, when everyone else zigs toward game-day standards like guac and mozzarella sticks. It’d be nice to spend the day assembling a proper cassoulet, the culinary equivalent of a 1,000-piece jigsaw puzzle, or pancit palabok to serve to a crowd. It might be fun to bake an apple pie on a chilly February afternoon, or a chocolate Guinness cake.
Me, I’m on this elk kick. I recently got a bunch of stew meat going in the pressure cooker, with lime juice, cider vinegar, smoked paprika, cumin, ground cloves, a bunch of garlic, a chopped onion, a few splashes of chicken stock and a couple of slices of salt pork for fat. I let that go on high pressure for around 30 minutes, then strained off most of the braising liquid and beheld a nice bowl of barbacoa. It was great on warm tortillas with salsa, and you could make it with beef if you don’t have game. You’ve been at this cooking game a while now, I’m betting. You don’t always need a recipe. Embrace the confidence you’ve earned. Just cook.
Still, there are plenty of actual recipes waiting for you on New York Times Cooking. Go browse our digital aisles and see what you find. You need a subscription to do that, of course. Subscriptions are what make this whole exercise possible. Please, if you haven’t already, would you consider subscribing today? Thanks.
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Now, it’s nothing to do with pigeon peas or matcha tea, but the second season of “Mo,” on Netflix, is much more ambitious than the first, both more and less nuanced, silly and serious. Very “Texas Forever.”
My colleague Sam Dolnick put me onto Susie Boyt’s 2023 novel “Loved and Missed,” proving once again that the most serendipitous book recommendation machine is the human one. It’s absolutely gutting.
It really comes out of nowhere, but Jerry Jones, the owner of the Dallas Cowboys, has a cameo in “Landman” that’s kind of extraordinary. Guy can act, apparently.
Finally, here’s a new track from Bonnie “Prince” Billy, “Turned to Dust (Rolling On),” music for blackening fish. I’ll see you on Sunday.
