All fired up
Chef Roger Mooking digs into primal cooking
Is there anything that’s quite as satisfying as cooking with fire? The steady warmth of glowing hot coals, the blazing heat of flames and the distinct taste of smoke can all bring out something deep and primal inside of us, whatever they’re being used to cook.
For chef Roger Mooking, fire’s more than just flames: it’s the most primal and pure way of cooking, and in “Man Fire Food,” airing Wednesday evenings on Cooking Channel, he checks out some of the most mouthwatering and innovative dishes being prepared using humanity’s oldest cooking method.
In this week’s episode, airing Wednesday, Feb. 21, Mooking jaunts across the country to find some of the most innovative ways in which classic surf and turf is being prepared. His first stop is in Miami, Florida, where a chef shows off a unique homemade rig that can roast, sauté and grill over hot coals. With Mooking’s help, he uses his cooking contraption to grill up some juicy pork, which he serves with a seafood-stuffed paella, a Spanish seafood and rice dish that they cook in a huge, party-sized pan.
Later, our host heads across the country to Southern California, where he dives into a transplanted New England clambake. This East Coast classic has been given a Golden State twist, with the fresh seafood, spicy chorizo and local produce all being steamed in a wooden wine barrel. Farther north, in the state’s Sacramento Valley, he finds a local making juicy Italian porchetta that’s been spit-roasted on a handcrafted rotisserie, which he serves with fresh oysters that have been basted in the pork drippings.
Open flame may be the oldest cooking method we have, but everywhere Mooking goes, he finds inventive devices, contraptions and machines built by people to get the most succulent flavors imaginable out of it. Even desserts can be on the menu, and in next week’s episode, airing Wednesday, Feb. 28, he checks out scrumptious sweets that are being made the old-fashioned way.
Cooking with fire may be old, but the creative methods and inventive devices used in “Man Fire Food” are anything but. Join Roger Mooking as he checks out the most primal of cooking methods Wednesdays on Cooking Channel.