Smoky Roasted Chicken

All right. All right. Hi everyone. Here we are again, Around the Kitchen Table, and welcome to our show. And I'm here with our amazing chef Dennis Littley, and myself, I'm Susan Sarah. I'm a kitchen designer for many years on Long Island, as you can probably hear in my voice. And how you doing, chef?

I'm good. I've still got a little bit of this cold, but From what I hear of my friends around the area, it's going to be with me for quite a while. So it is what it is.

Yeah, so far I've avoided being sick, which I can't believe. I'm so glad this winter. So, you know, it's been, it's been lucky up here. But, you know, who knows? Who knows? So, so anyway, for those of you who are new, we are here every week. And good to see you here. So what's on the menu today?

Well, today we're going to go back to chicken because, you know, people do eat a lot of chicken and coming up with new ways to prepare it is fun and ways that you can prepare it a little bit in advance. So when you're busy coming home from a workday, you can just pop it in the oven and make it pretty simply. So we're going to start with a whole chicken today. I'm going to cut it up again. So, you know, give you another quick lesson on deboning, not deboning, but breaking down a whole, a whole. Oh yeah.

Don't even go into deboning. Oh my gosh. Please don't. I can barely, I can't even cut it up yet still, so.

Well, once you cut it up, and a lot of it's in the knife too. People don't all have those boning knives with the thinner blades. So that goes a long way in actually deboning. That's why they call them boning knives.

Yeah, yeah, that sounds good.

So we're gonna take it a little bit healthy too. I've got some Brussels sprouts. I've got some beautiful little Brussels sprouts. And so we're gonna use those. And then I've got some chickpeas. And if you've never roasted chickpeas, you don't know what you're missing.

Wow, that's— that already sounds amazing.

Chickpeas, I used to cook them at school, and I mean, I'd open up a number 10 can of them, and the whole trick is drying them out a little bit when you're just roasting them. And I would dry them out, put a little, just a little bit of oil on them, and then season them with whatever you like. And that's where the magic comes, 'cause you can make sweet, you can make sweet and spicy, you can make spiced in any variation that you like. And they're crunchy, they're tasty, and it's a healthy snack. So chickpeas, you know, they're better for you than eating potato chips or some other things that you might have as a snack. So—

You know, that's such a good idea to have these alternative healthy snacks snacks. In fact, I told you I've been obsessed with organizing my refrigerator, which I did 2 weeks ago. And let me tell you, I've turned the page in my life. So what did I do the other day? I dehydrated apples. I sliced them in my food processor into all these little slices and then I dehydrated them. So I'm loving the— so those could be like snacks.

Yeah, absolutely.

Love it.

Absolutely. I mean, you can roast up a couple cans of them. I mean, you could season them differently and put them on the same sheet pan. Just keep them separate and mix them together or just have them separate. Like I said, you can go any direction. You can do Old Bay ones, you could do Cajun ones, you could do garlic, or you could do, you know, a little chili powder and a little brown sugar. So you can go all ways with it and come up with different kinds of tasty snacks. With chickpeas. So, you know, Renee had asked me earlier if I could do this in the Crock-Pot. I said, yeah, you can, but you're gonna kind of miss out on the chickpeas getting crunchy.

Yeah.

And on the chicken skin getting crunchy. So that's part of the beauty of doing a chicken. And it's only going to take about 45 minutes in your oven. So leaving your Crock-Pot on all day really isn't going to make a big benefit. Setting it up, the day before or in the morning or whenever you do it. Now, that's the time saver. And that's what we're going to show you how to do.

Now, I will say that with my dehydrated apple slices, I put the oven on 150 and I kept it on for about, I don't know, 8, 9 hours. So is there a benefit to cooking the chickpeas quickly or slowly? Do you know?

No. And I would think quickly and at high temperature. Is really, because it's not like you're trying to really dry them out, you're trying to get them crunchy. So you could probably do it that way. I've never done them slow and low, but I'm sure you could. So, you know, that would be a way, something else you could try. That's my phone vibrating. I don't know if you can hear it. Nope. Let me move it off this side. I had to look to see who it is. I don't know who it is. It's getting loud. All right, so let's get started. And the first thing we're gonna do is we're gonna make some seasoning for our chicken 'cause I'm gonna start on a clean cutting board and then move to the chicken last. So we're gonna start with some spices. Now again, you know, what I'm making is just something that I'm making up. It's not something that's etched in stone that you can't change. And I'm just gonna make up some, and I'm using equal amounts of chili powder, And it could be as hot as you like. This is just run-of-the-mill chili powder, or is not hot. And then I'm going to hit some smoked paprika because I've really started to enjoy smoked paprika. I never really liked it. And then as I've been making different blends, I enjoy the flavor that it imparts, especially—

oh, you mean when you use it in different spice blends. Interesting.

I just overmeasured, so I'm just going to cut this one back a little bit. It's not exact. It doesn't— it's not rocket science here. It's nothing's gonna— so get the proportions as close as possible. And then my wife is slowly coming around to cumin when it's mixed in, or cumin, uh, when it's mixed in with other spices.

So yeah, that's pretty easy to hide. I mean, it depends on how much you use.

Obviously it's distinctive. My nose picks it up whenever, but I also grew up with it in Mexican cooking and love it in most applications. But again, she's never been fond of Mexican food, so—

Oh no.

Yeah, I keep reminding her that I'm Mexican, but that's okay because I'm not real fond of all Polish food either. We're kind of, we're kind of okay with that. We both like Spanish food, so that's all right. And Italian food. So this is my smoky seasoning for this. And again, it's nothing that you can't make easily. You know, I encourage people to buy some just plain spices, not all mixtures, and to start experimenting with coming up with some flavors simply because it gives you an option to change up the same old boring chicken. Okay, with the seasoning method, this is pretty much going to be the same for everything. What you serve with it and what you season it with is where the changes come. So there's my spice, that's done. So now I've got these beautiful little Brussels sprouts, and what I've done with them is I have just taken the bottom end off like that. Whatever leaves fall off, fall off. I'm going to roast them whole. You could cut them in half. There's some bigger ones in here. I cleaned these up already, so I just wanted to show you a few. All you're doing is taking off that bottom and whatever leaves fall off with it. There are Brussels sprouts. It's going to be pretty simple to do. Now we got a bowl. And we're going to put our Brussels sprouts in here. This is a really, really simple recipe. We're going to put our chickpeas in here. I'm going to hit it with a little bit of olive oil, sea salt.

Now, that's an interesting combination. I have not seen that combination before.

You know, neither have I. It was in a Healthy Living magazine, which I have subscribed to now. And I've just, I made some adjustments to it, but this is basically what they call for. Great magazine if you don't get it. And oh, last but not least, a little thyme. And again, any of these are deal breakers for you, leave them out, put something else in. So now I'm gonna do, just toss them. Get them seasoned up, and I'm going to put them in my pan, and I will show you that shortly what I did with it. And I'm going to move this off the side while I cut some potatoes because I'm going to serve a starch with this. And I would have made a rice, or I would have made them separate, and I started thinking, well, why don't I just put them in the same pan?

Oh, convenient. Now, what kind of potatoes are those?

These are just russets. You know, whatever they sell organic, I buy. And these happen to be russets. I have, I think I have some Yukon Golds in there, but I always try to use up my older potatoes first. These had started to sprout a little bit. It's funny. Did you see the, have you read or seen The Martian?

I want to see it.

Well, did you see when he cut up his potatoes and he was growing potatoes on Mars? Yeah, well, that's that. It's really that simple, folks. They start to sprout and you plant them and you grow potatoes. So here are my potatoes. I'm going to throw these in here. And I have an onion. Lisa doesn't like onions, but I do. And this would be a good place, like, if you had some leeks. Leeks would've been great. I don't have any in the house or any kind of onion that you do have. So I'm just going to go with an onion and I'm just going to chop it up roughly, not in real small pieces, but not in real big pieces and add half an onion into here. You know, again, if you really like onion, you could put more in and then I'm going to hit it with some olive oil, some black pepper, Some sea salt.

It's a nice winter roasted dish.

Oh yeah. And this could be any vegetable you really like. I mean, I have turnips in there, I have some parsnips in there, carrots. If you wanted to really make it colorful and put some another roasted root vegetable in there, that's great too. I didn't because Lisa loves Brussels sprouts. Chickpeas are a hard sell and she likes potatoes. So here is my setup, and I'm only— I'm not really separating them. I'm just trying to give the chickpeas really enough room to dry out.

Yes.

So I'm just— because I'm going to put stuff on top of it anyway, but you want to get it into as much of a single layer as possible. So the potatoes, you know, you're gonna not get them all unless I had a bigger pan, but this will work really good. So here is my setup. It looks really pretty and colorful, doesn't it?

It looks delicious. It just looks— yeah, yeah, it looks great.

So this is good to go. So, so far I've used one bowl and one pan. So this is something in a matter of minutes, if that's set up. All right, so now let's go to the big guy, and we take a chicken, and this is a whole Why am I off?

That's good.

Okay, this is a whole chicken and I'm simply going to start cutting it apart and I'm going to take the back out first. So I'm just going to cut into here.

Oh, that is one sharp knife, I could say.

I'm sorry, the breast. I'm still sick. Let's go in the back. Yeah, I did sharpen it up. And again, you know, I always tell people I, I don't buy expensive expensive knives, but I buy a knife sharpener. So anytime I need it.

Yeah, I've just been sharpening my knives with this.

Some, I don't know, something you have, one of those ChefPros or whatever they're called.

Yeah.

So here's the back. All right, I got the back out. And I'm just going to throw that— this one came with a neck and gizzards. So I'm actually going to freeze all that. And I will use it in a stock later when I, when I make stock. So now here, when you spread this apart like this, you get the little breastbone in here. So then if you have a smaller knife, it can come in here with the smaller knife. You can kind of cut that out and it'll almost come out just by breaking it apart with your fingers. There we go. This is cartilage. You don't have to save that. That bone is nice, but this bone isn't really anything.

You are the boss of chicken taking apart, taking apart the chicken. You're the boss.

A lot of it will come out with your hands, so don't be afraid to use it. So now it just kind of splits, and I had cut it from the other side because I'm still a little curious. All right, so last time You noticed there's a, there's a bone here I'm going to get rid of. I don't need. So I'm going to— whenever I go to a bone, I don't know how far it's going down, I'm going to go in a little bit sideways with it because I don't want to lose a lot of meat.

Is that the wing?

No, that's not the wing. It was just part of the back.

Oh, okay.

They didn't get out. This is the wing here. No, that's the leg. That's the rest of the leg bone. That was just part of the back. So now I'm just going to turn it over and I'm going to cut it into quarters. We'll get rid of this excess skin. All right, and I'm going to leave the wing on the breast because I think it kind of looks nice that way. It gives the breast a better appearance. All right, we're coming in here. I got anything that I can take out? So if you get bones like this, you can always just kind of go in here and pull them, let gravity help, and just cut against it.

But you know what, I, again, I can see how incredibly sharp your knives are, which make the whole process easier. Because when I think to myself, I mean, I do sharpen my knives, but probably not as frequently as I should. And, and I picture myself struggling a little bit. This is just going as a breeze.

Yeah, and it really, like I said, these are— this is a KitchenAid knife that came with something.

So I mean, it doesn't really matter.

No, you know, it's all the heft in your hand. If you're a professional chef and you're cutting stuff 8 hours a day, you want a knife that's balanced really well. But spending $300 or $200 on a knife, unless it's your toy, and that's what you like to do, which is fine. It's not really necessary. It's anything else, spend your money where you like to spend it.. And if that's where you like to spend it, that's okay. So, and then I'm just going to cut it in half. So now I have 4 quarters that are done. Any excess fat or things that are hanging off here, I'll throw it in where my stock bag, and that'll go in the freezer. And this is what I have.

Oh, beautiful.

So this is all going in the freezer, and when I make chicken stock, I've got all that to go by. I finally made shrimp stock the other day with all the shrimp shells I've been saving.

Oh, that's great. Did you freeze it or did you use it?

I used it. I made a cream of shrimp soup that was really good.

Wow. But I do have a question to ask you. Have you ever used one of those really expensive knives? Yeah. And is there anything like, you know, incredible about them or Well, yeah, so the blade, I mean, I will notice more probably than you would notice.

Yeah. The blade is just made of a little bit better steel. The heft of it, the weight of it is a little more balanced. It feels a little bit better in your hand. But when you start cutting, you know, the big thing again with a really expensive knife is, is how you hold it and every knife is going to be different. So if you're really going to spend money, you should go to the knife store where you can hold them. Oh, because I always tell people with cameras too, you know, in the— what kind of cameras? Well, go to the store, pick one up, hold it, see what feels best in your hand. Because it's— you want to take it for a little bit of a test drive because that's going to determine whether you really feel good about it. Don't just buy it because it's, it's got a name on it. I don't want to mention any brands, but if it's got a name on it, it's not necessarily the name that's selling. It's how you feel with it, how it feels in your hand. And if you can justify spending that much money for it, then by all means. But for me, you know, I've been using these Dexters because I've been working in kitchens that we have to supply knives to our workers all the time. So I'll buy like a dozen of these and have them come in and then just keep sharpening. So I always would use, I wouldn't leave my good knife laying around because someone would pick it up and use it to cut and cut on counters or stainless steel or use it to open a can with. You know, makes me cringe. So if someone was to use this—

oh yeah, my husband used— oh, it kills me.

I know, I come in, the tip of my knife is gone, you know.

So, right, right, right.

$30 and buy a new knife.

Yeah.

And then I don't feed the guy that did that for a while.

Okay, answer me one more question. How often would you say you sharpen your knives?

Uh, probably once every 3 or 4 weeks.

Oh, that's all?

Yeah, if I do that. Okay, no, it's, it's kind of like, oh, this is like cutting cardboard, then I sharpen it. And when I pull it out, I sharpen them all, you know. So if it's a knife I haven't used, like I have some bigger knives in there that I don't really use that often, I may not sharpen it. But for the most part, I'll run them all through a little bit just to get a new nice nice hone to the blade and some sharpness. And, you know, you just have to be careful. They always say, you know, the only knife that cuts you is a dull knife. Well, that's not true, but that's because you're working so hard with a dull knife that that's when you make mistakes. Sharp knife will cut you and you won't know it till about 3 seconds afterwards when it starts bleeding. You know, it'll go right through it. You'll go, right, right. And you'll see blood. Ah, damn. So here's my chicken quarters. I'm going to back this up just a little bit because I got it a little too close for some reason. There we go, that's better. Okay, and I'm just going to season this, and this is the seasoning mixture that I made. And again, depending on how much you like and how little you like is what you can put on it. And I can smell that smoked paprika even though my nose is clogged up. Oh, I love smoked paprika now. And you can buy smoked paprika. I actually found a spice store. We were traveling and we went to this little town, Tarpon—

Tarpon Springs?

Yes, the sponge capital of the world. And they had a spice shop. So I saw smoked hot, smoked sweet, and I thought of you 'cause we had been talking about paprika.

Mm-hmm.

And they had like a bunch of different kinds of paprika. So here's what I'm doing, and I have skin on these. So if this seasoning really offends my wife, she can peel the skin off.

There you go. Not eat it.

All right. So that's all there is to that. And I have extra seasoning made, which I try to do now. So we'll just lay this in the pan. Okay, so here we're gonna lay it in, and I'm just gonna put it on top of everything.

Oh, how easy is that? A one-dish meal.

All right, now I'm gonna leave— we talked about with our turkey This is going to— this isn't going to cook until she gets home. I'll probably put it in the oven. She took lunch with her today, so we probably won't eat till 6. So about 5 o'clock, I'll think about it. I'll preheat my oven and I'm going to put it at 400 degrees.

Okay. That's my CSA delivery. I'll be right back. All right.

She's got to get her veggies. This is so easy to make. Up ahead of time that you can set this up, put it in your refrigerator, and you could even do this, you know, a well in a day in advance. And when you get home, take it out of the refrigerator, let it start to come up a little bit to room temperature, and while it's preheating—

I'm talking to someone on my computer. Yes, thank you very much.

And Michael had mentioned too, Michael had mentioned too, they do take pride in our knives and choices. So again, you know, if you— for years I took a really expensive knife with me. And then I just kind of got out of the habit. And even at home now, and again, it's partly my hands. My hands are so carpal tunneled that holding a really expensive knife is just be a matter of pride and my choice in it.

And what did I miss?

Oh, nothing. Michael had just mentioned that the chefs do take pride in their knives and choices. So I was saying, you know, it is a good point. And if I was working in a restaurant, I would probably have my own knives wrapped up in there just because I am the chef and I should have them. But for, for now, for home, I don't worry about it. And again, my hands are again, are so not really good that holding a really expensive knife would just be making me feel better. I'd rather spend the money on something else. Something for my camera or something for my—

Well, that's exactly why I asked. That's exactly why I asked, because you come across these ads and these, these articles online and about, you know, these amazing knives and, you know, your emotions get into it. Oh, well, that may be a better cook. Well, that may—

will that make everything, you know, but you know, if you like, if you have pride in your kitchen and it's something like when people come over, you want to pull out a set of Wusthof or, or something really cool. Yeah, that's fine. If that makes you happier to be in the kitchen, it's a good thing. If it makes your time there more joyful, it's a good thing. And then it's money well spent.

No, it is. You're absolutely right. You're really right. There's nothing wrong with it. There's nothing wrong with it.

Not at all. So it's all up to you. You know, I just, you know, keep them sharp. I wouldn't sharpen them real often on one of those commercial sharpeners, though, because then you're going to ruin the blade. If you have a really good knife, you want to be careful with it. So like I said, with these, I've been using these for years. If it dulls. I've had this knife for probably 5 years, it's still running well. If it dulls, I'll just chuck it and order another one from Amazon. That's all. I don't feel bad about it, where I would cry if I ruined one of my good knives. So, all right, so that's it. So this is set up. I'm going to let it sit in the refrigerator uncovered just so maybe the skin dries out a little. I don't know how much it will with all the spice on it. But just to let it dry out a little bit. And then it's going to go in the oven for 45 minutes approximately. All depends on the chicken being done. And I'm going to put it at 400 degrees and I'm going to let it hit 400 degrees for about 15 minutes. And then I'm going to turn it down a little bit, turn it down to 350 and let it finish cooking at that. So it could go at 400 and probably wouldn't hurt it, but it might darken things up just a little bit too much. So We drop it back down. And that's all I have. So you have a nice tile for us now.

Yes. Yes. So, you know, we've talked about organization, we've talked about other things in the kitchen. And I wanted to show you kind of what's happening with tile in the kitchen. And let me just move my trusty camera over this way. And do my professional setup like this. And yep, there we go. Okay, well, texture is, is really big in tile these days and in, in other areas of design as well. Texture is really, you know, coming forward as something people are very much interested in. And we can see that in so many different ways. It could be, you know, used in a feature area. I'll tell you, this is wood, this is a wood tile, and a texture with wood, with a wood grain, it is almost imperceptible except for the touch from real wood. It is absolutely imperceptible, and that has to do with today's technology and printing techniques. It's unbelievable, and it shows no signs of slowing down, really. You know, it's also nice to have a feature, sort of, you know, you want to think about shines and matte finishes in the kitchen, in the kitchen, and you may want a spot where you have a featured area of shine and something, you know, that's attractive to the eye. So, That's always something to note, shine, glossy versus matte surfaces in the kitchen. Here's another place where there's two different types of the wood grain type of tile. This is in a large format, which means a large size tile, also which has been popular in recent years. Now look at that on the floor, it's a blonde tile, blonde, still ceramic. You know, it could be porcelain, but I mean, and we even go to a very, very rustic type of look as well. I mean, this looks so real. It looks so real. You know, I'll tell you something. I've, you know, when you many years ago, if you were in the industry like I have been many years ago, you know, the products that tried to be authentic, they'd never looked And so what happens is, as a professional, you, you kind of become a snob and you say, no, no, I don't want these fake, you know, fake authentic products. But I'll tell you, that's all been put on its head in recent years. And these, these, let's call it fake authentic products, look amazing. Now this is a refreshed look on traditional tile, which has been holding strong for the past few years. And you can see it's kind of a blow-up and a composite of larger traditional kind of Moroccan, Spanish tile, and just beautiful, a new take. And again, texture. This happens to be wood tile. You can see they're probably 4x4s. Modern urban, you know, different types of tile, you know, they're out there too. And here's another refreshed sort of traditional tile where you have all these images, all these different designs kind of put together with similar colors. Again, now here's a mixture of the large format. It's large format, but it's glossy, and then, you know, maybe the pattern is matte. So that's something to think about. Again, simple clean lines on the cabinetry, but then texture in the backsplash. Again, large format on the back, so against the bright green, and you know, it just makes it more interesting. You don't have to have everything in proportion. Things can be more interesting when things are out of proportion. And here's a glossy green tile, again large format, very, you know, sleek, very modern. This I love. This is going back a little bit retro to almost like a terracotta look, but a refreshed terracotta look. What do you think of this, Chef? Isn't this nice?

I like that one.

It's really— you know why? It's warm, it's earthy, yet the way they're lined up, it's modern. And again, a little bit— this is a different take on subway tile. We've seen subway tile forever for the past 10 years, but this is a different take. This one's a little bit glam, you know. Oh, let me tell you, the rough kind of industrial concrete look, very prevalent for the past few years. And, and then this is another retro, gorgeous, gorgeous color, but a retro glossy tile. Beautiful paired with the the brass and the white, just beautiful. And again, here's the retro orange layer with the kind of retro, that's very Spanish look, which was actually taken in Spain, but it's a refreshed traditional Spanish look on the lower part. Isn't that beautiful?

That is beautiful. Now let me ask you a question. When you were talking about like that industrial tile, not this one particularly, but— industrial tile, things like that. When we put them in, aren't, aren't they going to start to age homes more than a traditional look that will last forever? It seems like sometimes we put things in and then the fad passes and then people can kind of date what you put in. I love the look of the industrial tile, but I'm wondering, is that something that's going to stay?

Well, you're absolutely right. And you have to be careful how you use— I wouldn't recommend having multiple trends in a kitchen. If you use something like that, yeah, you have to be very, very careful. Maybe use it in a different way than is typical, maybe in a smaller featured area, but you are right on about that. Yeah, you have to take care.

I mean, I would, I would jump with that in a minute and then that would be my my thought.

Yeah, no, you're right. And this, of course, is lighter shades, which have also become more, you know, definitely more popular. And that's easy to have a classic connotation. This is— yeah, this is gorgeous, but definitely a trend. So I would expect this to fade in, you know, 5 to 10 years. This is out of the box that I wouldn't necessarily call this a trend, you know, it's very interesting. So, and more large format tiles and beautiful, beautiful mixture. This is stunning, isn't it? Just a beautiful mix of marble-like look tiles and here's a better look at the refreshed tiles. So yeah, and that's that concrete and here's the wood. And so it's really interesting what's out there.

Yeah.

Another retro look, kind of retro. And then, then we go, you know, full circle to modern, very, very modern. This is so different than the industrial look I showed you. So this could be a keeper. This is gorgeous, kind of a crafted, wonderful look, not really in the main mainstream, I would say. I'd say it's on the periphery. So anything on the periphery— this is mainstream, this is more on the periphery. You know, you're— it's better off if you, you know, can get something that's on the periphery or not so popular. So that's a little bit about tile.

Great. But yeah, I love pretty black backsplashes. Getting something different. When I was in France, I loved all those looks with the Mediterranean colors.

Yeah.

But again, you have to be careful what you put in because you may like to live with it. But if you think about selling your house, if it's not in the near future, then you don't have to worry at all.

Yeah. Multiple trends in the kitchen, it will date it right away. If you, you know, the more personalized your kitchen is, The more personalized it is, the more timeless it will, it will be in the end.

Yeah, but anyway, thank you so much for that. It was a wonderful presentation.

Great.

We're good. It was a nice easy meal to make. You know, it's about showing you ways to come up with things to cook in your kitchen and things to make your kitchen a happier place because the happier the place, the more time you're gonna spend in it and you're gonna be happy about it. You know, like one of the best things, the deal maker for me for this house was the fact that I actually have windows that I can look out of. You don't know how many years I spent in a kitchen, never seeing daylight.

That sucks.

I know. And even at home, I had to do our remodel in New Jersey. I got left one door because we need— it wasn't a big space. We needed the room and we had to put, we had to move the kitchen around. I put cabinets where the windows used to be, you know, so it's just something you have to do. But this is just joyful. I'm so happy to be here. And it's not like I've got a great view. I mean, I have the street and the other houses, but I can see the sun or the rain and I can see some blue sky and daylight. So that makes a big difference about it.

It does, because when you're working with food, which is such soulful experience, it's— it all ties together. And that's why we talk about kitchens, you know, and cooking, because you want to have a good experience. And yeah, light, you know, light is part of it.

Your personality somewhat. It shouldn't be— don't let someone sell something to you because that's what's trending or that's what they like. When I redid my kitchen before, I think I told you, the guy said, you have 3 cabinets you can choose from. You don't want this one, you don't want this one. You want this one. And the tile for the floor, he goes, this is what I have in my house. You want this one. I'm like, okay, you know, but then later on you start to think, boy, I wish I had done this. I wanted to do this, but he didn't want to do that. So, you know, make yourself heard when it comes time to remodel or redo your kitchen. Let your, uh, let your contractor know that this is what you want. Or if you're handy and can do some of it yourself, you know, put yourself into it too, because that also add some flavor into it. But I love the ideas, you know, and it's great to have that many ideas with the different tiles and things that are open. Now let me ask you, how blending tiles and mixing tiles— you want to stay in one general direction, but what if you had like a couple different styles from different eras? You know, you're always asking me about mixing spices, so I'm asking you about mixing tiles.

It takes a lot of thought you have to be careful because you have to pick the— it begins with picking a professional to do it and one that cares, not one that will do it quickly and say, oh, these are great, these go together fine. You know, it takes time, just like to develop a recipe, it takes time. Sure, blending things is great. My general philosophy is less is more. So we— it's, it's, it's exactly like a recipe where you layer and layer and layer each decision. I— my philosophy is you start with what costs the most and start there. And, you know, for most people, it's cabinetry that costs the most. So pick out what you love for that. You know, remodel costs a lot of money, so pick out the finish you love first. And, you know, just love it. And then maybe countertops, you know, or flooring, things that, you know, I wouldn't necessarily pick out the tile. I mean, there's, you know, you can do whatever you want just in cooking, but that's what I've recommended to my clients, you know, where you put the most money in each category, start there and then go down.

Right. That makes sense because those are the things that are going to be most visual to you and most appealing to you. You're gonna notice first. That makes sense. So good, thank you. So that was a good show today. We had fun. We made a dinner ahead, showed you how easy it is to cook something. And I always say, you know, it's faster than going out for takeout. It really didn't take time to set this up, and you don't even have to cut the chicken yourself. You can buy pieces, you know. And if you don't want to do your own spices, find your favorite spice.

But you know what I love about what we do every week and about what you do is that it's all real food. It's all— it's just— it's not processed. It's real. It's the real deal. So it looks great and it feels— it feels good because it's all real.

Yeah, it's real food. I mean, I did buy an organic chicken and, you know, they're not as expensive as you think. I have been going to— and you're starting to see see more brands become aware that people are looking for these. And as that happens, prices come down. And I go to my big box stores because I can buy some really decent brands. I can't remember the name of this one. I actually wrote some posts for them, but it's an offshoot of Tyson and it's something farm-raised. But they have— they are free roaming. They do have room, or if they're inside, it's a large structure where they can actually walk around in. So you want to watch what you eat, try to eat healthier. You know, this is nice, fresh, you know, I have organic potatoes. The Brussels sprouts aren't organic. The chickpeas were organic. So, you know, where you can, you buy them. Where you can't, you don't. But at least it's real food, like you said.

It is. And you have different textures in there. And I'm finding, I'm telling you, since I organized my refrigerator, I'm cooking every night and And I just feel better. And it feels— there's a— I'll tell you, there's a sense of peace, something about cooking with this fresh food and not getting takeout and not using the processed food. It just feels like everything's changed.

And then every now and then you want to do something different and you do. You order a pizza. Yeah. Or you go out for dinner and then that makes that a little more special. Fun, and you don't feel as bad because you're, you're eating better at home. You know, Lisa loves this when I cook, and like I said, it's an adventure sometimes trying to get her— she's like a kid— to eat different vegetables, but you do what you can. Are there any vegetarian dishes coming up on one of our next shows? I do not do a lot of vegetarian, Peter, but Renee, who's on an hour before me every Wednesday, does vegetarian and vegan, and then my vegan pastry chef Christine does a show right after me and she does vegetarian and vegan desserts. So I'm like the meat eater in the middle, but a lot of these can be adjusted. Now, if you wanted to make this vegetarian, you could simply do the same basic thing and then have a different— either do your seasoning and take tofu. And one of the ways I could eat tofu was always blackened. I found it more palatable that way. I was never a big tofu fan, but, you know, you could season it with these. You could either pan fry it or oven roast it a little bit. In fact, I would put tofu out every day on my salad bar, but I never just cut it up and put it out. I always oiled it a little bit and then I seasoned it different every day. It might be lemon pepper, it might have been Cajun, that might have been Old Bay. And I would put it out that way. So you can do that. Renee is mentioning stuffed mushrooms would be great with this dish instead of chicken. And if you eat cheese, you know, you always have ricotta cheese and different cheeses that you can play with too to stuff. So there's a lot of different options. Think of the base, think of the technique, think of the seasonings, because seasoning in vegetarian items is still important because you want to have— especially even more so because you're not always worried working with the different proteins. So you want to make sure your seasonings vary and they're different so you don't get bored with what you're eating. But that's it. So thank you, Susan, as always.

And you look great.

I love that black on you, and I really have gotten used to your hair being natural color, and I enjoy that too. You're looking beautiful as ever.

Oh, thank you so much. You made my day. Well, I have to look good. I'm going to fabulous event tonight in the city. And so hopefully I can, you know, I can keep it going till then. Good.

Yeah, Lisa's going to Philly tomorrow for 4 or 5 days, so I'll be alone and just laying low here.

Yep. All right, well, you feel better.

Thank you. And I'll see you around the kitchen table. Okay.

Bye-bye.