right now we're going to our chicken
distributor bobo chicken which is in
east williamsburg
these are older chickens actually and
we're going to get a much more delicious
stock by using an older chicken as
opposed to a new younger chicken they
breed their chicken specifically for the
asian market asian markets values the
dark meat leg and thigh
so i've got to break these chickens down
immediately get them into our steam
kettle so we can keep on sketch today
with our soup production we've got to
make fugga chicken stock today for us
that's going to take about five to six
hours so we're doing 15 birds today and
we're going to get 15 gallons of this
beautiful yellow chicken stock stock is
definitely the life blood in the
restaurant not only does it go into our
soups but sometimes it finds its way
into sauces
so this is our steam kettle this is
where all of our stock production
happens in our kitchen now i'm gonna
take the chickens and put them in here
right now ba is a dish that i think is
the gateway for a lot of people in
getting introduced to vietnamese food
we're not doing a very traditional fall
it's a fall that's been inspired by our
travels in hanoi so you look at right
now it just looks like kind of cloudy
and murky
what i need to do throughout this entire
process is never let this machine hit a
rolling boil if it hits a rolling boil
i'm going to end up getting a very
cloudy stop for us in this situation i
want something that looks yellow and
very clear close it up
to finish off the process we add our
aromatics now ginger and onion
all of this is going to get prepped
getting ready to finish out our bug out
this is actually a very untraditional
way of making fun the traditional way
the way that i was brought up and a lot
of people teach it they actually take
the step here of roasting the onion and
ginger my personal opinion is the
roasting aspect doesn't necessarily
yield a product that i'm particularly
happy with it makes the color of the
stock a little bit darker than i would
prefer i like something light and blonde
because i know the haters online be like
you didn't roast the ginger you didn't
roast the onion that's how my mom makes
it well i'm not trying to make it the
way your mom makes it i'm trying to make
it the way that we enjoy here at dmd
while still honoring the dish we're
going to bring this all up we're going
to put it in and we're going to let it
cook for probably another hour now we're
you know three or four hours into the
process you can see the colors change
quite a bit that gold layer that we're
looking for you're starting to see that
up top
so we'll add in the onion ginger
we'll add in the fish sauce and we'll
add in our salt and sugar
that's it
we'll let this run for another hour
richie is just poaching off some rice
noodles in anticipation for service we
source these beautiful noodles from kana
noodles and it's the best noodle you
know i will stand behind that 100
so we kind of par cook it right now
because once service starts between
delivery and dining we have to be able
to keep up with the pace
our chicken stock is ready to get pulled
now first we have to strain out all the
bones and then we're going to release it
from here and then pass it through a
filter to further clarify the stock
we now need to rapidly cool it from a
good food safety practices we need to
make sure that this rapidly cools so
that there's no bacteria growth or
anything
[Music]
7 am in the morning this is one of the
first tasks that our prep team has to
handle day in and day out and it's
making the mix for our jiya our fried
rice paper rolls we have pork here that
we grind in house he's just trying to do
his best to wick away as much of the
moisture as he can we don't get all the
moisture out these rolls when they fry
they're going to want to explode because
all the water inside is going to be
trapped it's going to convert to steam
and it's going to want to find its way
out
we like to use whole shrimp for this a
lot of times you'll find in other
restaurants they'll grind up the shrimp
to like a kind of a paste but i really
want to get whole pieces of shrimp in my
rice paper roll
saunders is going to take our dry
ingredients and he's going to hydrate
them with some hot water
and then we're going to add this all and
combine it and mix it all up
first off this is the rice paper that
we're going to use for our fried rice
paper rolls the triangle shape lends
itself to just having the right amount
of rice paper needed so we can roll it
and not have excessive amounts of rice
paper in the roll
and making these is very similar to when
i was growing up as a kid this is
something that uh i would be doing my
parents while this process is scaled up
for a restaurant this reminds me a lot
of home so we have a scoop to get
consistent sizing and he's now going to
go through and place the meat mix on
there
and then we'll come back and we'll
actually roll them
it's going to start with edges it's
important to get clean sharp lines and
then you're going to roll from the
bottom over the mix
and just repeats over and over
this is one of our most popular dishes
on our menu we sell hundreds of these
per day
finished 42 here we've got about
300 more to go so we're gonna have to do
this entire process again um another
five to six times
so it gets par fried and then for the
pickup when a guest orders it we'll fry
it at a higher temperature which will
complete the cooking process inside but
then also make the outside very crispy
so this is from green point fish
what do we get we got the cake fillets
in and this is a process that gerald
created for us
we're going to uh marinate it and we
will smoke it in banana leaves
to try to mimic the flavor of uh
grilling it over chocolate it gets
marinated in a northern trinity of
galangal mam tom which is the fermented
shrimp paste maya which is a fermented
rice kind of like shiokoji but uh in
vietnam it's more of a sour fermented
rice as opposed to a savory fermented
rice
so this is our hake filet
back in the day they used to uh serve it
sizzling on a pan with hot charcoals
underneath
uh thus giving it that smoky flavor so
to mimic that we're going to smoke it in
banana leaves
so i'll move it around you'll see it
gets super nice and smoky i'll add my
fish
trap smoke
and then i'll kill the heat and i'll
just let it bathe in the smoke and i'll
repeat this process two to three times
so the wrap and roll is a very common
way that we eat in vietnamese cuisine
for us it's something on a sizzling
plate which creates a lot of excitement
in the dining room which we like so we
have three different options for that we
have a fish one we have a mushroom with
queso and we have one with
lamb
so we're just getting our delivery of
mushrooms for the day this is from
smallhold farms we have these beautiful
yellow oyster mushrooms which we get
blue oyster ones as well
and then the other mushroom that we get
is going to be
are these beautiful king trumpets yeah
and this will go into our sizzling
mushroom plate which is a rapid roll
dish as well so we have to process all
these mushrooms we kind of create a
mushroom medley here with the king
trumpet blue oyster and the yellow
oyster
[Music]
we're going to work on some dishes um as
we continue to tweak our menu we have a
noodle dish that was a big success for
us previously so we're thinking of doing
one with lobster today so we're going to
plate up one with these alive lobster
we're breaking down this lobster for our
seafood and garlic noodles a very
popular dish we used to serve it with
squid shrimp a little bit of clams at
one point and now we're gonna try and
make a nice large format whole lobster
discs we're not a top-down structure
where i'm telling everyone we're going
to cook this we're going to cook that i
feel like we're more successful when i
set everyone up for success and when i
say that it's like identifying the
things that they're strong at and
leveraging those skill sets jimmy with
his strong background and cooking pasta
there's no reason he can't take those
experiences as an italian chef and apply
them here in a vietnamese context i'm
just gonna try to drop one piece at a
time make sure they don't touch or
stick right so while that's working
we'll start working the garlic noodles
so we've done this with a bunch of
different types of noodles uh
classically it's with you know a low
main style egg noodle because you know i
like to have fun change it up i'm going
with some uh just pure semolina pasta no
egg at the end of the day it's not a
vietnamese noodle it's more of like
how can we cook noodles well with
vietnamese ingredients i think that's
where this dish really shows uh jimmy's
technique so i've just added a little
bit of our fun gas stock dropped my
compound butter uh based on butter miso
garlic
it's a very deep garlic flavor you know
it's rich it's buttery you get that
luscious seafood but i really want that
garlic to stand out i grew up eating a
ton of garlic in my household
everybody had the stinky breath so uh
you know one of my favorite flavors one
of my favorite ingredients to cook with
and any time that i see a recipe that
has garlic in it my natural instinct is
just add more
you know we're always getting requests
for group dining options parties so it
behooves us to have these um kind of
large format dishes in our back pocket
um well you know i already know this is
going to taste delicious um just seeing
the lobster and how well he cooked it
obviously you know finding the right
size plate we don't really have plates
big enough to accommodate for um a whole
lobster so that's something i already
see already as i was playing this up i
realized i don't i hate how i played it
yeah
it's too big for this entire plate so
you know if we wanted to introduce this
as a large format option we're going to
get some new plates for this you know so
but we'll taste it and see
we've always used like a round noodle
this kind of a flat noodle i feel like
it obviously carries the sauce a lot
better than the round sure so you know
do we send this with a lobster cracker
you know do we send it with wet naps
because people are eating i don't know
about you guys but i've almost only ever
ate lobster with my hands but you have
to consider the whole process of serving
the dish the guest experience that's
what hospitality is it's not just about
serving food it's about creating an
experience that's enjoyable that people
are going to pay for so yeah this is our
face for our banchan gnome so we use
rice paper in a multitude of different
ways we have the grilled rice paper and
more or less it kind of looks like a
pizza and we call it a pizza but it's
rice paper that's been grilled and
treated in a certain way for it to be a
rigid structure a lot of rice paper that
actually gets sourced in the united
states is like very heavy with tapioca
so it's like melted doesn't really hold
up as well our solution to that is just
taking two sheets of rice paper using a
little bit of water and then putting
them on the grill and when you end up
with something that's like pretty sturdy
and almost like cracker-like that can
hold up when you start putting
ingredients on top of them so right now
i'm just like making a bunch of these
just so i have them ready to go before
the start of service and then the final
way you see rice paper is a salad the
penchant drone so that is rice paper
strips we top that with fried rice paper
strips as well so in this case you get
to appreciate the chewiness of rice
paper as the rice paper sits it gets a
little bit chewier and softer
you know one of the things that i like
to do here is get everyone involved in
the r d process what we're doing is
called the benjum and this is a dish
that's normally savory that we would eat
for the lunar new year but we thought we
would try stuffing it with bananas
and actually turning it into dessert so
i have a mold and then i have banana
leaves that i've cut into the size of
the molds the banana leaves have to fit
exactly in the mold the idea is this is
going to help the rice stay inside this
rice that's been soaking i'm just going
to put some in there
these are plantains like the baby ones
so they're sweet and i like the texture
better
then i'm gonna fill the rest of it with
rice you know we have a 20 top in a
couple weeks and i think morgan and i
thought this might be a good dessert for
us to try for this 20 top so i'm folding
the leaves that's fully sealed this is
the
complicated part so i'm going to fold
triangles
right so margot she has a filipino
background cooking she provides that
context and experience of the deep
knowledge of filipino cuisine
so if you look at it right now it's a
little loose so this is how it looks
when it's cooked we cook it overnight so
i'm gonna open it up for you guys
this is also why i like folding it the
way that i do it's like opening a
present
so you can eat it like this but we like
to deep fry it so this is how it looks
when it's deep fried
it's really like crunchy on the outside
whoa
colors change quite a bit those are the
bananas right those are the bananas yeah
it looks like
like sausages yeah i think it's awesome
how the bananas turn purple
they look like little hot dogs i like it
i like youtube it's a mouthful but i
like the flavor of it i wish this was
crispier first of all
it feels like too much banana yeah
banana rice ratios maybe it could be a
little bit maybe the rice down a little
too much
but i thought this was a very successful
um kind of r d task i like it i think
it's something that we're going to be
proud to try out and serve in uh next
week we have a 20 top so this is going
to be an easy pick up for us fried
smoothies off and cut them into nine
pieces and we're done so you know it's 5
15 now everybody's trying to get ready
for service right now the line cooks are
just getting their station set up and
they have to do plate ups we're gonna
get a lamb dish this is a you know
normal routine for us and that's our
opportunity to check our mise en place
i'll start with the lamb dish this lamb
dish is part of a rap and roll series
you know i'm going to eat it right now
just to double check everything
so we're all good today so these checks
done plate ups are done these are all
good for today so feeling confident as
we head into service that uh
we'll be cooking consistently so kitchen
notes today we are we have a heart count
on curry we're limited on bread we sold
a lot more ben me this uh this morning
than uh we realized so tonight we're
gonna start with a six count of curry if
we actually sell all six you come back
to chef and see get an update we might
be able to release a couple more let's
have a good service y'all
all day humvee to go we are working tai
cha's all one of them is for boone hi
one head hi taylor
[Music]
more than ever we need a good time these
days so hopefully showing people a great
experience great service but from a food
perspective that's stuff that i'm
interested in hopefully we expose them
to some new things you know like going
back to the rice paper oh hopefully they
put two and two together wow i got rice
paper in a lot of different ways here i
didn't really think about rice paper
from that perspective
so just showing that there's a lot of
variety here as opposed to just the
common way that a lot of other
restaurants are doing it and hopefully
it opens their eyes that there's more to
vietnamese food than fun by me and
they'll start to dig deeper i'm just
hoping that i get people more excited
about vietnamese food and wanting to try
other things
you