WELCOME TO OUR KITCHEN: We're making chicken "char siu"!

Bruce: 00:00:01

Hey,

Bruce: 00:00:01

I'm Bruce and this is the podcast cooking

Bruce: 00:00:03

with Bruce and Mark

Mark: 00:00:04

and I'm Mark Scarbrough and together with Bruce we have written over three dozen cookbooks and Now I have to say welcome

Mark: 00:00:33

And now what we're doing is we're concentrating on a single thing in each episode.

Mark: 00:00:37

We're going to start with a cooking tip, the famed one minute cooking tip.

Mark: 00:00:42

Then we're going to go on and do some.

Mark: 00:00:44

thing in the second segment, whether that is cook a recipe, have an interview, talk about food, and then

Mark: 00:00:52

So we might as well get started.

Bruce: 00:00:58

Our one minute cooking tip.

Bruce: 00:01:00

Whenever I turn the oven on, I think about what else I can make at the same time.

Bruce: 00:01:04

If I'm baking potatoes to go with a steak, well, I'll throw a tray of eggplant slices in so I could have eggplant parm another night.

Mark: 00:01:11

Is this a one minute cooking tip?

Mark: 00:01:12

Or a lesson in how to be OCD.

Bruce: 00:01:14

If I'm baking lasagna, maybe I'll throw a few sweet potatoes in the oven so I have them for a salad at lunch the next day.

Bruce: 00:01:20

Saves time, saves electricity, and allows me to have something to eat beyond the meal I'm currently making.

Mark: 00:01:25

I guess that's our one minute cooking tip.

Mark: 00:01:27

Think what else you can cook in your oven.

Mark: 00:01:30

In this episode of the podcast Cooking with Bruce and Mark, we are going to actually make a recipe.

Mark: 00:01:37

So we're going to go into the kitchen and pull together, believe it or not, an air fried version of chicken char siu.

Bruce: 00:01:47

Most people know char siu as pork, or it's pork char siu, but what?

Bruce: 00:01:51

is char siu in Chinese markets.

Bruce: 00:01:53

It's usually pork, right?

Bruce: 00:01:55

And it's barbecued and it's hanging in the front of the store or in the back of the store.

Mark: 00:01:59

We often call it street meat, but yes, street beast or street meat.

Mark: 00:02:04

Yes, exactly.

Bruce: 00:02:05

And lately I have found packaged, ready to grill Chinese marinated pork and chicken labeled char siu.

Bruce: 00:02:12

And yes, even in my local supermarkets, I have something that The big Y, which is a big New England chain.

Bruce: 00:02:18

But usually that stuff is just sweet soy, almost like teriyaki.

Bruce: 00:02:22

And maybe they put some red food coloring in it.

Mark: 00:02:25

Okay.

Mark: 00:02:25

We're going to make a traditional marinade.

Mark: 00:02:27

We're going to put it on untraditional meat using chicken.

Mark: 00:02:30

And we're going to make it in an air fryer because you know, we're all about air frying with all our air frying books.

Mark: 00:02:34

You know, all about all that stuff.

Mark: 00:02:36

So here we go.

Mark: 00:02:36

Let's get started.

Mark: 00:02:37

So I've got a big.

Mark: 00:02:38

bowl here.

Mark: 00:02:38

And you need a big bowl.

Mark: 00:02:40

Don't pull out some little salad bowl.

Mark: 00:02:42

You need a big mixing bowl, or as my mother would call it, or as my grandmother would call it, a big stirring bowl.

Mark: 00:02:49

You need a big bowl.

Bruce: 00:02:50

We called it a salad bowl when I was a kid, because that was always the biggest bowl we had

Bruce: 00:02:57

And that was like the biggest mixing bowl we had.

Mark: 00:02:58

Okay.

Mark: 00:02:59

Well, anyway, you need the biggest thing you have.

Mark: 00:03:01

And here's what we're going to put in here.

Mark: 00:03:02

We're going to start with a quarter cup of hoisin sauce.

Mark: 00:03:06

Now, if you don't know about hoisin sauce, That is a, well, it's supposed to be a sweet potato paste,

Bruce: 00:03:14

It's barely been made with sweet potatoes in the last, uh, how many dynasties?

Mark: 00:03:18

I don't know.

Mark: 00:03:19

A lot.

Mark: 00:03:20

But you can find it in even supermarkets.

Mark: 00:03:23

It's hoisin sauce.

Mark: 00:03:24

And then we, I'm going to add a quarter cup of brown, what brown sugar?

Bruce: 00:03:28

What is this?

Bruce: 00:03:28

Well, I like, I like using light brown sugar in this, but I think dark brown sugar probably is a better choice.

Bruce: 00:03:34

I just have this thing about light brown sugar.

Mark: 00:03:37

What in the hell is this stuff?

Bruce: 00:03:39

Mmm, , a third of a cup of red fermented bean curd.

Bruce: 00:03:42

What?

Bruce: 00:03:43

Wait, what?

Bruce: 00:03:43

Mark is asking me what it is because there's not a, there's not a word of English on this bottle.

Bruce: 00:03:47

What?

Bruce: 00:03:47

This bottle is all in Chinese, a little square bottle.

Bruce: 00:03:50

So, this is...

Bruce: 00:03:51

Tofu, but it's not stinky tofu.

Bruce: 00:03:54

Oh, well, thank heavens.

Bruce: 00:03:55

If you know about stinky tofu, uh, well, it's not what this is.

Bruce: 00:03:58

This is tofu cubes that are brined and preserved and, sometimes it's called tofu cheese.

Bruce: 00:04:05

It comes In, oh, that didn't make it sound better.

Bruce: 00:04:08

. It comes in, uh, varieties that are red or white.

Bruce: 00:04:12

Most Americans don't know what it is.

Bruce: 00:04:14

So what is it?

Bruce: 00:04:15

It actually is one of those foods that I think could have been on Fear factor.

Bruce: 00:04:18

Remember that show where people would have to eat all sorts of gross things?

Mark: 00:04:21

Yeah.

Mark: 00:04:21

Well, I'm fear factored right now.

Mark: 00:04:23

A third, a cup of red fermented bean curd.

Bruce: 00:04:25

So it's basically you start with fresh bean curd and then they, they age it and ferment it with salt, with rice wine.

Bruce: 00:04:32

flavorings.

Bruce: 00:04:33

Um, actually in Cantonese, it's a called foo ee.

Bruce: 00:04:37

And,

Mark: 00:04:37

oh my gosh, please don't write in about that pronunciation.

Mark: 00:04:40

I can feel the idiocy of that pronunciation, but do go on.

Bruce: 00:04:45

And it is used mostly as a flavoring agent, not as a main protein.

Bruce: 00:04:51

It's salty.

Bruce: 00:04:52

Mostly the red comes from red rice yeast.

Bruce: 00:04:56

That is the ingredient that.

Bruce: 00:04:58

Turns it red.

Bruce: 00:04:59

Okay,

Mark: 00:04:59

so, so, okay, so what am I supposed to do with all this stuff?

Bruce: 00:05:02

So you're gonna take a fork and I want you to mash up that fermented bean curd red cheese with

Bruce: 00:05:12

You're doing good.

Bruce: 00:05:13

So it's a smooth paste.

Mark: 00:05:15

Is it's supposed to look like something in a baby diaper?

Mark: 00:05:18

Is that what it's supposed to?

Mark: 00:05:19

Well, I guess if your baby's having bloody, yeah,

Bruce: 00:05:21

I was about to say, if it's coming out red, Seek medical attention.

Mark: 00:05:25

Did you know the woman in TikTok, maybe you don't, as I do this, who always says, everybody's so creative.

Bruce: 00:05:30

Everybody's so creative.

Bruce: 00:05:31

Notice how that looks like something you never want to eat, but we're gonna.

Mark: 00:05:35

That's what I feel like.

Mark: 00:05:36

I feel like she said, notice how that looks like something, yeah, you don't want to eat.

Mark: 00:05:40

Well.

Mark: 00:05:40

Okay,

Bruce: 00:05:41

so now I'm going to pour into that a third of a cup of soy and I'm not gonna keep mixing.

Bruce: 00:05:47

No, you could stop.

Bruce: 00:05:48

And I'm not using low sodium soy in this.

Bruce: 00:05:51

Why?

Bruce: 00:05:52

This is a marinade.

Bruce: 00:05:53

This is a brine.

Bruce: 00:05:54

This is a salty dish.

Bruce: 00:05:56

And to balance that soy, I'm using two tablespoons of honey for a little sweetness.

Bruce: 00:06:01

And I'm putting two tablespoons of Shaoxing wine, which is a rice cooking wine.

Bruce: 00:06:07

And one.

Bruce: 00:06:08

Teaspoon of Chinese five spice and Mark, what is five spice powder?

Bruce: 00:06:13

It's

Mark: 00:06:13

a traditional like five spice powder.

Mark: 00:06:14

It's a traditional mix of cinnamon, sometimes cardamom, fennel.

Mark: 00:06:18

There's a star anise.

Mark: 00:06:19

Honestly, there's as many versions of five spice as probably there are Chinese home cooks.

Mark: 00:06:27

I know when you go in the store, you just see this bottle of five spice.

Bruce: 00:06:31

But you know, the thing is you can buy a little tiny jar of it.

Bruce: 00:06:35

in almost any supermarket and it's worth having.

Bruce: 00:06:38

It'll last a while.

Bruce: 00:06:38

So I would just go in and use this last ingredient.

Bruce: 00:06:42

Uh, red food coloring.

Bruce: 00:06:43

Isn't that cancer?

Bruce: 00:06:44

No, it's actually usually insects.

Bruce: 00:06:47

It's that carmine red.

Bruce: 00:06:48

And it's made from ground up, dried insects.

Mark: 00:06:50

So we really are at fear factor.

Mark: 00:06:52

Okay.

Bruce: 00:06:52

So a few drops, it really gives it that beautiful char siu golden red that you want.

Bruce: 00:06:58

Okay.

Bruce: 00:06:59

So mix those up.

Bruce: 00:07:00

Let's get all that mixed up.

Bruce: 00:07:01

Okay.

Bruce: 00:07:01

There, that's good.

Mark: 00:07:03

This seems wrong.

Mark: 00:07:04

I mean, I don't know.

Mark: 00:07:05

I don't know why it seems wrong to me.

Bruce: 00:07:06

You know what seems wrong, and this is interesting.

Bruce: 00:07:09

Notice how there's no garlic, there's no ginger, except for whatever ground ginger is

Bruce: 00:07:17

The holy trinity of Asian cooking, of Chinese cooking, and it's none of those are in here.

Bruce: 00:07:20

Was that

Mark: 00:07:21

racist?

Mark: 00:07:22

That felt racist.

Mark: 00:07:23

Was that racist?

Mark: 00:07:23

The Holy Trinity of Chinese cooking?

Mark: 00:07:25

I don't know.

Mark: 00:07:26

Is that?

Mark: 00:07:26

I don't know.

Mark: 00:07:27

I don't know.

Mark: 00:07:27

Um, let's skip over that.

Mark: 00:07:30

Okay.

Mark: 00:07:30

Because maybe garlic, ginger, and scallions is the Holy Trinity of Armenian cooking.

Bruce: 00:07:34

Well, maybe it is.

Bruce: 00:07:35

Okay, now we're going to pull out a cutting board and we're going to pull out a knife.

Bruce: 00:07:38

And we have one pound of boneless, skinless chicken thighs, and I'm only cutting off the large blobs of fat because quite

Bruce: 00:07:52

So I'm just slicing off some of the larger pieces, but I'm keeping the big chunks of chicken thighs whole.

Bruce: 00:07:59

And now we're going to Add them to that marinade you just made.

Bruce: 00:08:01

I believe the

Mark: 00:08:02

culinary term is plop them in.

Mark: 00:08:04

We're going to plop them in.

Mark: 00:08:05

We've got this in here, and I've stirred it around a little bit.

Mark: 00:08:07

And now what we're going to do is cover this in plastic wrap and set it in the fridge for six hours.

Mark: 00:08:13

Um, you can do it up to 24 on the day ahead.

Mark: 00:08:15

Okay, when we stick this in the fridge, great.

Mark: 00:08:17

Okay, in it goes.

Mark: 00:08:21

Now, talk to me about this red fermented bean curd.

Mark: 00:08:24

Where in the world does one find this?

Bruce: 00:08:27

I found it in the little town of Great Barrington, Massachusetts in a Japanese, uh, grocery store and he

Bruce: 00:08:39

Okay, that's great.

Bruce: 00:08:40

Um, any Asian...

Mark: 00:08:42

So if you live in Oregon, you just drive to Great Barrington, Massachusetts

Bruce: 00:08:45

and If there is an Asian supermarket near you, they should have it.

Bruce: 00:08:49

And if you don't have one near you, you can go online.

Bruce: 00:08:54

There are so...

Bruce: 00:08:55

Many online Asian markets from yammybuy.

Bruce: 00:09:00

com to gogofresh to posharp store.

Bruce: 00:09:03

So there are just Google red fermented bean curd.

Bruce: 00:09:07

You will find square jars without any English writing on them.

Bruce: 00:09:11

And that's what you're looking for.

Mark: 00:09:12

And why is this a secret?

Bruce: 00:09:15

There's an umaminess to this tofu there when, you know, umami being that other sense that's not

Bruce: 00:09:32

But without it, there's a huge difference in taste.

Mark: 00:09:35

Right.

Mark: 00:09:35

Okay, and let me say one more thing before we get on to air frying this.

Mark: 00:09:39

We're going to actually have to cut away and let this marinate.

Mark: 00:09:41

Before we get on to air frying it in a minute, let's just say for a minute that we did use the Shaoxing wine, the rice wine.

Mark: 00:09:49

It is traditional in Chinese cooking.

Mark: 00:09:51

If you don't have Shaoxing, the best substitute is dry sherry.

Mark: 00:09:57

because it has a slightly woody flavor to it.

Mark: 00:10:01

It's the better substitute than vermouth or any kind of white wine.

Mark: 00:10:06

If you want to dump the alcohol completely from the dish itself, then what I would suggest that you use is a little bit of

Mark: 00:10:19

Some people say you should use unsweetened prune juice for a Shaoxing substitute, but I always think that's too far.

Mark: 00:10:26

But you can dump the alcohol from this, but just be mindful of the fact.

Mark: 00:10:31

That most of the alcohol here will cook out.

Mark: 00:10:34

Well,

Bruce: 00:10:35

not all.

Bruce: 00:10:36

And plus the food's not going to absorb that much alcohol to begin with.

Bruce: 00:10:40

And then what it might have will cook off, but okay.

Bruce: 00:10:42

We're going to come back after this has been marinated 24 hours and cook it.

Mark: 00:10:48

Here's the air fryer and it is going, it's at 400 degrees and we are heating it up.

Mark: 00:10:54

Now this is really debatable.

Mark: 00:10:56

And a lot of people debate this endlessly, and we have a theory, because we've written so many air frying

Mark: 00:11:04

You want to talk about that?

Bruce: 00:11:04

It's called Do It.

Bruce: 00:11:06

Basically, do it, and I get questions all the time in our Essential Air Fryer group on Facebook, where

Bruce: 00:11:15

I get questions on our YouTube channel with the air fryer recipes all the time.

Bruce: 00:11:18

They say, well, my recipe says I don't have to, or my new air fryer says I don't have to.

Bruce: 00:11:22

All

Mark: 00:11:22

the online gurus of air frying say, you know, essentially put the crap in there and turn it

Bruce: 00:11:27

on.

Bruce: 00:11:27

And they're telling you that so that they think you're making your life easier.

Bruce: 00:11:31

And are they?

Bruce: 00:11:31

Well, sure.

Bruce: 00:11:32

You're making your life easier, but you're not making your food better.

Bruce: 00:11:35

And it doesn't take but two to three minutes at most for an air fryer to heat up.

Bruce: 00:11:40

So heat it up.

Bruce: 00:11:42

You want that little sizzle on the bottom, on the cooking tray.

Bruce: 00:11:45

You want the instantly to have.

Bruce: 00:11:48

The marinade, the coating, whichever on it to start to set, not blow off.

Mark: 00:11:52

What we've discovered is that this has nothing to do with the recipe we're making now, but that lighter coatings

Mark: 00:12:07

So you really, really want to heat your air fryer.

Mark: 00:12:11

So we've got this thing up to 400

Bruce: 00:12:13

degrees.

Bruce: 00:12:13

I'm going to open the drawer, and I'm going to lay these Chicken thighs in there.

Bruce: 00:12:18

Using kitchen tongs, he said.

Bruce: 00:12:21

The chef wants to use his hands.

Bruce: 00:12:23

Always.

Bruce: 00:12:23

Your hands are the best tools you have in the kitchen.

Bruce: 00:12:27

Gross

Mark: 00:12:27

fingernails.

Mark: 00:12:28

Gross food safety.

Mark: 00:12:30

So, using kitchen

Bruce: 00:12:31

tongs.

Bruce: 00:12:32

And if they touch, it's okay.

Bruce: 00:12:34

If your hands touch?

Bruce: 00:12:35

No, if the chicken thighs touch.

Bruce: 00:12:37

And you just don't want to make a...

Bruce: 00:12:39

solid wall of them.

Bruce: 00:12:40

So as long as air can get around, that's okay.

Bruce: 00:12:43

If yours is not big enough to fit all of your thighs in there.

Bruce: 00:12:47

Oh, are we still talking about cooking?

Bruce: 00:12:49

Then you're going to have to do it in batches.

Bruce: 00:12:51

We're using...

Bruce: 00:12:51

Oh, are we still talking about cooking?

Bruce: 00:12:56

So ours fit and because I have this like super sized giant double vortex thing which is really pretty

Mark: 00:13:11

Okay, so 10 minutes are over and these are pretty sizzly

Bruce: 00:13:14

already.

Bruce: 00:13:14

They're blackened on the edges, which is nice.

Bruce: 00:13:17

That's because all the sugar that's in it and the fat we left on the

Mark: 00:13:19

chicken.

Mark: 00:13:20

There's sugar in the hoisin.

Mark: 00:13:21

There's the honey that we've put in it.

Mark: 00:13:24

Brown sugar.

Mark: 00:13:24

Yeah.

Mark: 00:13:25

There's the brown sugar.

Mark: 00:13:26

And then there's that.

Mark: 00:13:27

Red fermented bean curd going on.

Mark: 00:13:30

So it's blackening up like char siu, except again, we're using chicken thighs and we're air frying it.

Mark: 00:13:36

So this is so weird.

Mark: 00:13:37

We're using a very traditional marinade, but a very non traditional meat.

Bruce: 00:13:43

And a very non traditional cooking method.

Bruce: 00:13:45

Yeah.

Bruce: 00:13:45

And method.

Bruce: 00:13:46

So I'm going to turn them and each one of these, Oh God, you can see, look at that beautiful,

Bruce: 00:13:52

It looks a little lacquered.

Bruce: 00:13:53

I've seen recipes.

Bruce: 00:13:55

Where people insist on brushing them with more honey at this point.

Bruce: 00:13:59

We're saving back some of that marinade and brushing it on.

Bruce: 00:14:01

Now, I think that's overdoing it.

Bruce: 00:14:03

Personally, after testing this recipe a number of times, I think the flavor is best to just turn them.

Bruce: 00:14:08

So, back in and another 10 minutes and then they'll be done.

Mark: 00:14:14

Okay, so we're done.

Mark: 00:14:15

And let me just say that, uh, remind you that if you're gonna make this recipe...

Mark: 00:14:19

Uh, two things.

Mark: 00:14:21

One, the recipe itself exists in the program notes to this episode, so you can just look down in the player,

Mark: 00:14:35

And two, let me also say that if you have to do this in batches, Put the remaining chicken thighs back in the

Bruce: 00:14:44

And I want to say something about people who are going to write and say, can I make this with chicken breast?

Bruce: 00:14:48

The answer is, can you?

Bruce: 00:14:49

Of course you can.

Bruce: 00:14:50

Will it be good?

Bruce: 00:14:51

Not in my opinion.

Bruce: 00:14:53

This is something that really requires the dark meat, the juiciness of the dark meat, the fat of the dark meat.

Bruce: 00:14:59

You're cooking this a long time.

Bruce: 00:15:00

20 minutes is a long time for a boneless flattened out skinless chicken thigh, but you want that lacquer on it.

Bruce: 00:15:08

You want this.

Bruce: 00:15:08

Beautiful golden edges that we have quit talking.

Bruce: 00:15:11

All right.

Bruce: 00:15:11

I'm going to slice up one.

Bruce: 00:15:12

Really honestly, stop talking.

Bruce: 00:15:14

Okay.

Bruce: 00:15:15

And now we are going to taste

Mark: 00:15:16

this.

Mark: 00:15:17

Yeah.

Mark: 00:15:17

Um, I'm sorry.

Mark: 00:15:18

I'm stepping away because I'm blowing on it.

Mark: 00:15:21

I don't want to blow into the mic

Bruce: 00:15:23

Mark has this theory that you shouldn't blow on your foods.

Bruce: 00:15:25

I'm surprised he's even blowing on the spoon,

Mark: 00:15:26

but it's too hot.

Mark: 00:15:27

It just came out of the machine, but you know, in the, in the spirit of a podcast, here we go.

Bruce: 00:15:34

This to me tastes like Chinatown.

Mark: 00:15:36

Yeah, it is an amazing.

Mark: 00:15:39

Replication of flavors without the pork.

Bruce: 00:15:42

It's salty, it's sweet, it's umami.

Bruce: 00:15:47

What I want to do with these, because there's a lot of them here, is I want to slice them up and I want to make

Bruce: 00:15:56

The stir fried rice noodles with...

Bruce: 00:15:57

The homemade char siu chicken and some scallions and garlic and a little splash of black soy sauce.

Bruce: 00:16:03

Oh God.

Bruce: 00:16:04

That'd be so good.

Mark: 00:16:04

Let me just say before we step away from this actual cooking adventure, which I had

Mark: 00:16:11

And the red food coloring.

Mark: 00:16:12

Oh God.

Bruce: 00:16:13

Optional.

Bruce: 00:16:14

Optional.

Mark: 00:16:15

Oh God.

Mark: 00:16:16

Anyway, um, let me just say that again, this recipe lives in the show notes of whatever player you're looking at this on

Mark: 00:16:31

And let me also say that there is a video of Bruce making this on Tik Tok.

Mark: 00:16:36

So if you join our Tik Tok channel, Cooking with Bruce and Mark, you can actually see Bruce make these.

Mark: 00:16:42

Not as we did here.

Mark: 00:16:43

It's a very fast cut video.

Mark: 00:16:45

What?

Mark: 00:16:45

It takes like about 90 seconds to get the whole thing done.

Mark: 00:16:48

So it's a very fast cut video, but still in the, unless you'll get the idea of how it goes,

Bruce: 00:16:52

you'll see what that red tofu cubes look like.

Mark: 00:16:55

Yeah, you will.

Mark: 00:16:55

So there you go.

Mark: 00:16:56

There's a cooking.

Mark: 00:16:58

episode of Cooking With bruce and Mark.

Mark: 00:16:59

We got so many listener requests that we returned to cooking podcast episodes.

Mark: 00:17:05

And so here we are.

Mark: 00:17:07

Some people said that they missed the cooking spicy content.

Mark: 00:17:10

So I hope that we've given you spicy content here.

Mark: 00:17:13

I'm a little over the top.

Mark: 00:17:15

And let's move on to the typical last section of our podcast.

Mark: 00:17:19

What's making us happy in food this week?

Bruce: 00:17:24

Homemade creme de cassis liqueur.

Bruce: 00:17:29

Mark is an amazing gardener, and many of you may know this, and he has these beautiful blackcurrant bushes right outside

Bruce: 00:17:47

So I mushed them up and I steeped them for three weeks in a bottle of Everclear, which in case you don't know is like 190 pounds.

Bruce: 00:17:54

proof grain alcohol, anybody who's been to college knows what Everclear is, anyone.

Bruce: 00:17:58

And then I strained that out in a jelly bag and I mixed it with simple syrup and it is delicious.

Mark: 00:18:04

It is wild.

Mark: 00:18:06

I just say that I'm going to say one thing about this, that I'm a total renegade.

Mark: 00:18:10

Because when I planted those black currant bushes in New England, they were illegal.

Mark: 00:18:16

You couldn't have black currants.

Mark: 00:18:18

And I'm not exactly sure what the legality of it, but it was, at the time, illegal.

Mark: 00:18:24

So it was like growing pot in my garden.

Mark: 00:18:27

It was a total illegal substance, allegedly.

Mark: 00:18:30

Like, someone's going to arrest me for black currants.

Mark: 00:18:32

What's making me happy on Food This Week is French press coffee.

Mark: 00:18:34

I don't know if you ever have a French press at home.

Mark: 00:18:37

But I love French press coffee.

Mark: 00:18:39

Explain what it is.

Mark: 00:18:40

So, right, a French press is a, um, coffee maker where you put the grounds in the bottom, it's a glass carafe, you

Mark: 00:18:55

over the grounds.

Mark: 00:18:56

You put the plunger in the carafe.

Mark: 00:18:59

You wait.

Mark: 00:19:00

I like really strong coffee, so I wait five or six minutes.

Mark: 00:19:03

You push the plunger down, the grounds go to the bottom, and then you pour off the coffee from it.

Mark: 00:19:08

And the coffee is super smooth, super delicious.

Mark: 00:19:13

I'm having a great time having French press in the mornings, and I'm enjoying every

Bruce: 00:19:19

And let me just say that French press does require a very coarsely ground coffee.

Bruce: 00:19:24

You do not use the same grinds that you would put in a drip pump.

Mark: 00:19:27

It must be a very, very coarse.

Mark: 00:19:29

They'll all slip through the filter and it's a mess.

Mark: 00:19:32

And also, let me just also say, since I love French press coffee, that it is a real mess to clean up.

Mark: 00:19:38

It's ridiculous.

Mark: 00:19:39

I line a colander with paper towels, and then I have to pour the grinds into it and keep washing the carafe

Bruce: 00:19:50

And that's because we live in the country and we're on spetic.

Bruce: 00:19:53

If you're not on septic, coffee grinds won't really hurt it.

Bruce: 00:19:57

too much if you cut some down the drain, but not where the septic is.

Mark: 00:20:00

I don't even know about septic.

Mark: 00:20:02

I mean, non septic.

Mark: 00:20:03

I don't even know.

Mark: 00:20:04

We've lived so remote for so long on septic.

Mark: 00:20:06

I don't even know about real town.

Bruce: 00:20:08

Yeah.

Bruce: 00:20:08

Your, your town.

Bruce: 00:20:10

Yeah.

Bruce: 00:20:10

Your town probably wouldn't like it if you were dumping coffee grounds down there.

Mark: 00:20:12

No, probably not.

Mark: 00:20:14

But, um, okay.

Mark: 00:20:16

Anyway, so there you go.

Mark: 00:20:17

That's.

Mark: 00:20:17

That's our show, uh, in the fourth season, our first episode of Cooking with Bruce and Mark.

Mark: 00:20:22

We actually cooked the dish live.

Mark: 00:20:25

It took us a while because we had to let that chicken marinate, so it's been kind of a labor of weirdness to get, to get to

Bruce: 00:20:40

And we still have our group, Cooking with Bruce and Mark on Facebook, so please go to

Bruce: 00:20:47

We post episodes, we post videos, we talk about recipes.

Bruce: 00:20:50

So we'll see you there.

Bruce: 00:20:51

And we'll see you back here for another episode of season four, cooking with Bruce and Mark.