Hey, everybody! Scott and Meltem Conant here.
We are making a couple dishes for you.
We have this beautiful chicken dish that I'm gonna make
with fingerling potatoes.
What are you making?
A Turkish borek,
which is something that my mom would make
for me all the time.
Why don't you start sauteing your meat
Okay.
With the onions and stuff.
So olive oil, onions, and a little bit of salt.
And once it starts to become a little bit translucent,
you're gonna add the meat directly too.
This is one of my favorite dishes, this borek.
Mel made it for me when we first started dating.
It was one of the first dishes that she actually cooked
for me.
That's when I knew she liked me.
You wanna add the meat to that now?
Sure.
Good stuff.
And this is a great time
to utilize this potato masher
because it will break up that meat into nice little pieces.
A little pepper too.
So we're gonna cook this up for a couple minutes.
Maybe while that's happening,
what I'll do is start to talk about the chicken.
I dry this chicken, so it's nice and dry.
Sometimes what I'll do is I'll even put it
in the refrigerator overnight uncovered,
so that skin gets nice and dry.
And then what I like do is this over medium-high heat,
I wanna pretty much cover this pan with the chicken.
And we have some potatoes here.
Now I'm just gonna add salt and pepper. That's it.
There's a little slit where some steam can escape.
I don't want this to boil.
I want this to be sure that it's gonna sear,
and as it's cooking, the steam is gonna escape,
so it doesn't kind of cook in its own juices.
That's a really important aspect
to this because if it starts to boil,
it's going to be a completely different dish altogether.
How're we looking?
So we'd like to cook it in a container like this,
so it really gets that nice layer.
Think of it as kind of like a Turkish lasagna, if you will.
How're you doing?
I'm doing well.
This is the guy that lives in the house that she lives in.
This is the guy that knows how to cook.
So I feel like that's a great place to start, right?
Yes.
And then to fill it in.
And I'm just gonna let this marinate.
I'm just gonna let it sit.
So inside here so far,
you just have the yogurt mixture with the eggs?
That's right. That's it. That is it.
Because what you wanna create is a nice crisp bottom,
kind of like a socarrat with a, like a paella.
If you do this the right way,
that bottom is almost crispy, right?
Yes
That cooks in the fat that's been separated
from the custard itself.
So that oil kind of fries it on the bottom of the pan,
which is delicious.
Delicious.
While that's going, I'm just gonna gently move this
around a little bit.
Look at that!
Yep.
All good?
Yeah, all good.
Awesome.
It really is a unique flavor and scent.
All right, wanna pop that in the oven at 375?
Yes, yes, yes.
So that'll be in the oven for about 40 minutes.
(oven dings)
So this bread, we put that here.
The chicken is finished, gorgeous golden color.
I'm just gonna take this basil and parsley chimichurri,
and I'm just gonna put it right over the top.
And that's it!