I don't want to burn the kitchen down!
I'm Tarriona "Tank" Ball, lead singer of Tank and the Bangas.
Grammy nominated, never duplicated, poet, singer, writer, author...
But not too much of a cooker. So I'm going to need some help with that today.
I'm Tia Henry, chef and restaurant owner here in New Orleans, Louisiana.
I'm going to be in the kitchen teaching Tank to cook today.
In my life, every day, everything isn't so easy, especially right now,
and I need new things to keep me going, keep me interested,
so I need to do something to get my creative juices flowing. So I'm going to learn cooking today.
Out on the road, I'm always trying different foods, but I want to be the one to cook them myself
this time. I'm super excited about it and very nervous.
Everything is so special about New Orleans, especially the food.
I mean, it's the food capital of the world. I go all over, but still I always miss that good home cooking.
My mama's been doing it for me for years, but now, it's my turn. And the pressure's on.
Hey, Chef Tia!
Hey, Tank! I'm glad to finally meet you!
I'm so excited to meet you! I am on my way to you very soon.
Tia, how long have you been doing this?
So, I've been a restaurateur and owner of Café Dauphine for nine years now.
Before opening the restaurant, I had absolutely no culinary experience.
I'm just a home taught, stuff learned from my mom and my grandparents,
so just like I learned, I'm going to teach you the ropes, too.
So you mean to tell me that I, too, can become like Chef Tia,
since I have no cooking experience?
Anything is possible girl, let me tell you.
That is so amazing. I'm so excited to meet you.
So you're ready to go?
I am definitely ready to go. I am in the Lincoln Corsair, it has 4G WiFi,
keeps me connected on the go, so I'm on my way.
Every time you add something different to what you already do well, it kind of creates a different mindset,
a different focus, a different creative energy and angle that you want to tackle
whatever you're doing in your life.
That's what I'm really hoping this cooking class can do for me,
just add a little more fire underneath my stove.
Welcome to the kitchen today, I'm so excited to be teaching you to cook.
So how are you feeling about this cooking class?
I don't want to burn the kitchen down!
That's exactly how I feel. I mean, Tia, I'm not like you, I can't do this.
I'm really nervous, but I'm more excited than nervous.
What I'm going to be teaching you how to cook today is going to seem complicated,
your family and friends are going to be so impressed, but it comes together very simple.
We're going to jump right in to our dish that we're preparing today.
We're going to fry a soft shell crab, and we're going to put that on top of a pasta
with a white wine cream sauce with roasted garlic, tomatoes, and spinach.
Tia, what do you love about cooking?
The most rewarding part about cooking, and being a chef, and having a restaurant is,
think, just the aspect of bringing people together.
The impact that food has on people that, you know, food can just kind of lift you up if you're bad mood.
Food can inspire you, you know, food just kind of makes you feel better.
Dang, you sound like you do what I do!
You know, you're like, "It brings people together," that's a festival.
"Makes people feel well," that's a concert. If I didn't know any better,
I would think that you were talking about going to a Tank and the Bangas concert.
And the best part about it, is to see people's reaction whenever they take in your craft
and they love what you're doing, just as much as you love it.
That's the best part of it for me.
So, we're doing the basic starting off, boiling water. Everybody can boil water, right?
Why? Oh, you sure? Let me see, is my water boiling? It's boiling.
So you get an A+ in boiling the water.
Well, I like to start off with a good grade.
We're going to begin by boiling our fettuccine. While our pasta is boiling, let's prepare our vegetables.
So we want to slice our cherry tomatoes, grape tomatoes work well.
The red onion, and we have garlic that we have to chop up here, too.
And the next step of our recipe, Tank, we're going to saute our onions
and garlic to begin our white wine cream sauce for the pasta.
Ooh. That's kind of got a nice little sound to it.
Music and cooking, to me, I mean, it's such a creative experience,
and I believe it's very soothing, very calming, thought provoking.
Learning as I go. On this show.
I get to express myself in new ways, discover new flavors that are bold,
it's kind of just like writing a song, it's a process. And I'm all there for it.
So we're all set up to start frying our soft shell crab. So, let's check our oil
to make sure that it's nice and hot, and ready.
I'm just going to take a little pinch of my seafood breading,
so we're going to sprinkle a little cornmeal in there
and you see how this kind of sizzling, that's letting me know that my-
Sizzle it, baby. Go ahead, baby.
I love it.
I'm sizzle, babe.
So we put this crab in the oil. We want to make sure that we have the shell side down.
The defining moment.
Claws first.
Whoo! Ooo, ooo, ooo, we're sizzling. Ooo, ooo, ooo, we sizzling.
We're going to add our tomato.
We have 1/4 cup of white wine and we're going to add that to our vegetable mixture.
And we're just going to let that cook a few minutes and let that wine reduce.
And so after your wine has about reduced by half, you can see that the gravy
looks a little thickened in there. Then you'll be ready to add your heavy whipping cream to that.
It's now time to plate up this beautiful pasta.
And for our final step, we're going to take this beautiful crispy fried soft shell crab
and put it right there on top of that pasta. Beautiful!
Look at that!
Beautiful, Tank.
I'm a chef, yo!
So you ready to dig in and take a taste?
It's really good.
Soft shell crabs, I would've never imagined making anything like that.
And Chef Tia told me I did a good job, and I know I did, because I tasted it myself.
It's good!
Can you believe that you made this meal your own?
I can only believe I made this on my own because you are next to me.
Oh, you did a phenomenal job.
Well, I'm glad you were able to step outside of your comfort zone and try something different.
My band will be very happy to know that, I'm going to be a little more,
open to things that I was scared of, prejudged.
And wait till you cook this dish for them, they're going to be blown away.
Well, I just want to thank you so much for teaching me how to make-
You're so welcome.
... this amazing meal.
Anytime. I look forward to the next time.
This experience definitely taught me that I can do anything. I could do absolutely anything
that I set my mind to and I open my heart to. But today, I really learned something
that I'm going to keep probably forever and incorporate in my daily life
and my music, and that's to take chances on myself.