Cook's Country

-"Cook's Country" is about more than just getting dinner on the table.

We're also fascinated by the people and stories behind the dishes.

We go inside kitchens in every corner of the country to learn how real people cook.

And we look back through time to see how history influences the way we eat today.

We bring that inspiration back to our test kitchen so we can share it with you.

This is "Cook's Country."

-Today on "Cook's Country," we're cooking from the pantry.

Christie shows me how to make Okinawan taco rice, Jack explores the world of herb and spice blends, and Julia and Bridget make French bread pizza.

That's all right here on "Cook's Country."

-Funding for this program has been provided by the following.

-Monument Grills, offering innovative technology and design for the grilling enthusiast.

With a lineup of gas grills to suit every level, our mission is to ignite your passion to pursue the art of grilling.

Learn more at monumentgrills.com.

-Okinawan taco rice is a delicious dish that brings together the flavors of two cultures in one weeknight pot.

It comes together fast and easy, and Christie is here to tell us all about it.

-Taco rice is such an interesting dish, Toni.

It was designed to appeal to American GIs who were stationed far away from home in Okinawa.

So it contains all the usual suspects that you'd see in Americanized tacos.

But then, it also contains some Japanese pantry ingredients that really develop the flavor further and give us even more of a savory bite.

-Love that.

-We'll start with the taco seasoning.

Right?

Any Americanized tacos, we got a packet of taco seasoning, usually.

And that's what they would use traditionally in Okinawa to make them.

But you can also make your own.

So that's what we're going to do today.

Here is 2 tablespoons of chili powder.

I have 2 teaspoons of cumin and 2 teaspoons of cornstarch.

The cornstarch is going to thicken the sauce and add some more body to the ground beef mixture.

A teaspoon of paprika, a teaspoon of salt, and then 1/2 a teaspoon of granulated garlic, 1/2 a teaspoon of onion powder, and 1/2 a teaspoon of dried oregano.

You could use a 1-ounce packet of taco seasoning in this recipe if that's what you wanted to do, but it's really easy to make your own, and it's kind of fun to use a little jar like this.

Shake it up.

Get a little workout on your weeknight.

-I love that.

And you can use it on other things, too.

-We're going to use all of this.

-Okay.

-This is 1/4 cup.

This all goes into our taco rice today.

But you can make it ahead if you wanted to because you could hold it for about a month at room temperature.

-Good to know.

-Now let's talk about the rice because this is Japanese short grain rice or sushi rice.

This is going to be the base of our dish.

-That makes so much sense, Christie.

My goodness, this dish, you know, began with a teenager in Okinawa who created a business making tacos.

But he eventually decided that rice would be more filling, be less expensive, and it was a really good option for his customers.

-Well, it is so easy to make.

The only thing you really need to keep in mind is it's a starchy rice, and we want to rinse off a lot of that starch before we start cooking.

I'm going to rinse this with some cold water for about a minute, a minute and a half, and I'll swish it a little bit with my hands just to make sure I'm exposing a lot of the rice.

We'll know that it's as rinsed as we can get it when the water starts to run clear.

I'll try to shake off as much of the excess water as I can.

Okay, now we're ready to start cooking.

This is 2 cups of rice, and I'm adding this to 2 1/2 cups of water.

That's our ratio.

Give it one last drain.

-You can still see a little bit of that starch there, which really tells you how much starch was there to begin with.

-There's a lot of starch and it's still going to be sticky, but we're getting rid of the worst of it.

And while that comes up to a boil, we're going to do the only prep that we have to do for this whole recipe.

Chop an onion.

So I'm just going to cut this in half.

So I'm going to make some cuts up the sides of the onion horizontally.

And then I'll make some vertical cuts, not going all the way through to the back of the onion, but going all the way down to the bottom.

-The tip of the onion stays in place and it creates like a holder.

-The root holds all of the layers together, and so you keep it on until the last possible moment.

-Right.

-It makes your job a lot easier.

-A lot easier.

-All right.

So we'll just do the same thing with this one.

You know, there are many techniques for doing things.

It's really whatever works best for you.

But we're good.

My water has come up to a boil.

Put the lid on, turn the heat all the way down to low, and we're just going to let that gently cook for 20 minutes.

Okay, the rice has cooked and now I've taken it off the heat where it's going to sit for 10 minutes with the lid on.

But in the meantime, I have 2 tablespoons of vegetable oil that I'm heating over medium-high heat in a 12-inch nonstick skillet.

And I'm looking for that oil to start to shimmer.

And I think we're there.

So we can add the onion and get the meal started.

So we're just looking for the onions to soften.

This will take 3 to 5 minutes to get there.

Okay.

My onions are nice and soft.

Now we'll add the beef.

This is a pound of 90% lean ground beef.

And I'm just going to add it in.

And what I want to do is get my spoon in here and break up the pieces.

Using a wooden spoon like this with a straight edge can be really helpful for doing this.

And we're using 90% lean ground beef because we're not going to drain this at all after the meat has cooked, so we don't want it to render too much fat or it'll make the sauce greasy.

-Makes sense.

-So we're just going to keep breaking this up.

We'll let this cook until the meat is no longer pink.

And that's going to take another 3 to 5 minutes.

So this is looking pretty good.

I'm just continuing to break this up and look for any errant pink pieces.

Do you see any?

-I don't, and it's really smelling good, too.

-Mm-hmm.

I think we're ready for the next step, which is to add our spice blend.

Here's our homemade taco seasoning.

And I'll just sprinkle that over the top.

And we're just going to cook this until we can start to smell it, about 30 seconds just to bloom all those spices, get them in touch with the heat and the fat so they really, really develop their flavors.

We're gonna make a left turn, which is ketchup.

So, convenience ingredient.

It's 2 tablespoons of ketchup.

And that might sound a little unusual for tacos, but if you think about it, it's tomatoes, it's salt, it's sugar.

We get umami and a whole lot of tang and sweetness.

Now, the next three ingredients, if you don't mind handing them to me, these are the Japanese pantry ingredients that we're talking about.

You want to add it?

-Sure.

-2 tablespoons of soy sauce.

Next up is 2 tablespoons of mirin.

And then we have a teaspoon of HonDashi instant dashi.

-Okay.

-So this is a cup of water.

We're going to let this come up to a boil.

Now, those three Japanese pantry ingredients are what really make this that teenager's vision... -Mm-hmm.

-...back in Okinawa.

That instant dashi.

Now, dashi is the stock that's the base for lots of Japanese dishes.

Miso soup, ramen.

And what it is is katsuobushi, which is smoked dried tuna, konbu, which is dried kelp.

And they're steeped in water.

And that's how we get this really rich stock.

Well, instant dashi is essentially the equivalent of using a bouillon cube.

So it's something that you keep in the pantry.

And you can add it to popcorn, you can add it to lots of different dishes to really give an extra umami boost.

-We can fuse our pantries with all kinds of ingredients from other cultures and start to comingle them, and it all just becomes part of an everyday pantry.

-Mm-hmm.

And you build on the flavors.

So the soy sauce is also going to give us some umami.

Now, the mirin, which is sweet rice wine, that's going to add sweetness and some acidity that's going to balance a lot of that saltiness and that -- that deep umami flavor.

We're just going to let this cook until the sauce part starts to thicken.

Another 3 to 5 minutes.

But we're on our way.

See how this is thickened?

It's still juicy but not so runny.

-Yes.

-So we'll turn that off and our rice should be ready to fluff.

That looks great.

So I'm just going to use a big fork to give that a fluff.

And you can see it's still sticky.

-Mm-hmm.

-But it's a good sticky.

So I'm just going to give us a big old scoop of rice.

-Yeah, I love that texture.

Sticky, but you can still see all of the grains.

-All right.

Now look at that.

-Yeah, you can definitely see the importance of having the just right consistency for that sauce.

-And it's already kind of clinging to the rice.

-Mm-hmm.

-All right.

That looks good.

And we have to leave room for the toppings.

-Okay.

-I have 4 ounces of Monterey Jack that I've shredded.

And this is 2 cups of shredded iceberg lettuce, or "shrettuce" as we sometimes call it.

This is an avocado that I've cut into 1/2-inch pieces, and then 1/2 a cup of jarred salsa.

We will go in this order to top our taco rice, so we'll get a little.

-Now, why are you particular about the order?

-It's not me, it's the rules.

[ Laughs ] -It's what made it a success.

-This is how it is.

Well, you want the cheese close to the meat, so it melts a little bit, right?

-Sure.

-And you don't want the iceberg right on the meat 'cause then it'll wilt.

-It'll wilt.

Love that avocado.

-Oh, me, too.

So, there we go.

-All right, well, let's try it.

-All right.

Now, you kind of have to find an entry point into this, which might be a little difficult with all of those layers, but... -I love the way that the sauce is clinging to the rice, but not oversaturated.

-No.

Mm.

-Mm.

-It just tastes really beefy, doesn't it?

-It does.

And it still tastes fresh.

And there's a little hint of sweetness.

-Mm-hmm.

-Just a little.

Absolutely balanced.

-Nothing overpowers anything else.

The rice and the bits of meat are almost the same size.

-Right.

-You've got kind of chewy and then tender.

-Really delicious, Christie.

Thank you.

-Thank you.

-So, for a flavorful weeknight dish reminiscent of Okinawa, start by creating your own taco seasoning mix.

Thoroughly rinse short grain rice and use pantry ingredients like ketchup and instant dashi, soy sauce, and mirin for big flavor.

From "Cook's Country," Okinawan taco rice.

This is so good, Christie.

-Mm.

-Spice blends are such an easy way to build flavor fast because you just need one jar, not 6 or 8 or 10.

Here at "Cook's Country," we use a variety of spice blends in classic American recipes.

And let me start down at the end here with chili powder.

This started in the early 20th century as a convenient way, of course, to make chili.

It's got dried chilies and garlic and oregano and cumin in it.

And if you see chili powder with an "E" at the end rather than an "I," that's an indication it's actually 100% chilies.

A classic chili powder with an "I" at the end is 80% chilies and 20% all the other stuff.

Taco seasoning is very similar, but it's going to be milder.

It's going to have cumin added to the mix, maybe some paprika to replace some of the chilies, and it's got a sort of gentler flavor.

Now, when we make our own, we actually add a little bit of cornstarch to the mix because it helps that saucy liquid surrounding the ground beef, which of course, when you typically use taco seasoning, adhere to the meat.

We're going to go to Louisiana and we've got Creole seasoning.

Now this is cayenne forward.

No surprise because that's the local red pepper in Louisiana.

A little bit of thyme.

It is a classic in so many Cajun or Creole dishes.

Blackening spice powder, very similar.

It's got red pepper in addition to the cayenne.

The key to using blackening spice powder is to make sure that it sees some fat.

You really want to cook this in melted butter, so thinking about coating a piece of fish for blackened catfish.

And then, the fat will really release the flavors of the blackening spice powder.

Next up, we're moving to spice blends that actually season liquid rather than the food itself.

So, crab boil, whether you're in Louisiana, maybe you're making Frogmore Stew from the Carolinas or doing an old-fashioned New England crab boil, you want to be seasoning that liquid.

Zatarain's, Old Bay are classic names.

And you can see actually the ingredients here.

We've got mustard seeds in here.

We've got crushed-up bay leaves.

We've got coriander seeds.

Pickling spice blend is similar, except it's much more tart and kind of fruity.

You've got cloves, which has got a big personality.

We've got allspice here.

And again, it is seasoning the liquid that you're using to make your pickles.

Last and, I don't know, perhaps least -- I'll let you decide -- pumpkin spice blend.

Now, if you want to make your own, for every teaspoon of pumpkin spice blend that you see in a recipe, you can actually use 1/2 a teaspoon of cinnamon -- that's the dominant flavor -- 1/4 teaspoon of ground ginger, and then just 1/8 of a teaspoon of the nutmeg and allspice because they're so assertive.

It's actually lovely in a pumpkin bread, for example, or other baked goods.

I'm not sure it belongs in your latte.

So there you have it.

American Spice blends, an easy way to make your food delicious in just a flash.

-French bread pizza, the frozen kind in the red box, was a big deal when it first appeared at our supermarkets back in the '70s, and it was a prized after-school snack for me and my brother.

Now, it wasn't great pizza, but that didn't matter because the idea of using French bread as a pizza crust was revolutionary to me.

And now Bridget's going to help me relive those youthful days, but making one from scratch, which is going to taste better, I bet.

-I have our whole evening planned out.

We've got French bread pizza on the menu with pepperoni.

-Thank you.

-We're going to do each other's hair and then Mad Libs.

-[ Laughs ] -All right.

Sound good?

Let's get started on the food, though.

-Okay.

-We are going to really improve French bread pizza.

And I love this recipe because it's very simple to make.

I mean, you know, we're not reinventing the wheel here, but it's a great basic recipe you can put together quickly.

It's also a great recipe to teach kids how to cook.

-Mm-hmm.

-All right, now this first thing I am going to do, it would be an adult supervision moment.

I'm going to cut this French loaf here.

So it's about 24 inches long, about 4 inches wide.

You don't want to use a hearty artisan baguette here.

It's already too crunchy.

And then, this is going to go into the oven.

It would just get really hard to eat.

-That makes sense.

-So I'm going to cut this in half.

Really try to get halfway.

There we go.

I think that's close.

Just halfway lengthwise.

This French loaf goes on forever.

My goodness.

And then, I'm going to cut it roughly in half.

Now I did say that we prefer 24 inches by 4 inches.

But bakeries, they don't listen to us.

So they make them any shape that they want.

So what I like to do is I like to see if I need to cut off a little bit from this one cut end.

So I'll just cut.

-It needs to lay flat on the sheet?

-That's right.

-Okay.

-Yeah.

So that looks great.

And I'll do the same.

All right.

Before I move them to that sheet pan, I do want to brush the exteriors with a little bit of olive oil.

So this is a tablespoon of extra virgin olive oil.

This is going to add some richness to the exterior.

But I also like it because it makes it super crisp.

-Mm!

-We don't want really, really crunchy.

You want a nice crisp exterior here.

And this is just a great technique to use anytime that you're reheating bread in the oven.

Just a little bit of olive oil.

This is perfect because it just makes -- it kind of renews it.

-Mm-hmm.

That's very clever.

I really never thought of brushing anything on the outside of the pizza.

-True.

Yeah.

You're just thinking about the interior part, right?

The crumb part, which is what we're going to do next.

Let me just put them right on my sheet pan.

So, now, before we add sauce on top, we want to waterproof this crumb a little bit.

Tomato sauce has a lot of water in it.

-That's true.

-A lot of liquid.

So we're going to use this opportunity and a little bit of butter here... -[ Laughs ] A little bit.

-...to waterproof it because the fat's going to work its way in there before the water would have a chance to.

This is 8 tablespoons unsalted butter.

And we've melted it.

It's cooled a little bit but you don't want it to re-solidify.

We're going to introduce a little bit of flavor here.

We've got 2 teaspoons of granulated garlic.

-Oh, hello.

-Yeah, it's a half a jar.

So, basically, we're making garlic bread meets pizza bread.

-Oh, I love it.

-Yeah, it's awesome.

So this is 1/2 a teaspoon of salt and 1/4 teaspoon of red pepper flakes.

So I love this because we're getting that garlic flavor directly into the crumb of the bread.

-Oh, I can smell it.

-I know.

It's so good.

-Ooh.

-All right, I'll just paint this all over.

All right.

So this is going to go into a 450-degree oven for just only about 5 minutes.

-Mm-hmm.

-What we're going to look for is the edges of the bread are going to start to turn just a little bit brown.

All right.

We're going to make a super quick no-cook sauce.

Well, it's going to cook once it's on the bread.

-That's true.

-But we don't have to pre-cook it.

So I've got 1 1/2 cups of canned crushed tomatoes.

It's going to give us just the right texture of tomato.

And I add a little bit of olive oil.

It's another tablespoon in there.

And then, 1 1/2 teaspoons of Italian seasoning.

So depending on what brand you might buy, it's going to have some oregano in there, a little bit of fennel.

-Oh, yeah!

-Sometimes some dried basil.

You can also make your own.

Or you can just add oregano, whatever you like.

It's your party.

Now 1/2 a teaspoon of sugar.

And that's to temper some of the acidity of the tomatoes.

And same amount of salt.

That's 1/2 a teaspoon of salt and 1/2 a teaspoon of black pepper this time.

We're going to whisk this together and call it a day.

-That's easy.

-Yeah, that's super easy.

-Stir and go.

-And looks great, doesn't it?

-Yeah.

Smells great, too.

-Next up, cheese.

-Mm!

-It's a low-moisture mozzarella.

Always a good idea to grate it yourself instead of buying that pre-packaged stuff.

-Yep.

There is a place for that if, like, you're in a super hurry, but that stuff has a little bit of the cellulose.

-That's right, and it doesn't melt as well as the block that you shred yourself.

-Exactly.

So this is 12 ounces, and I'm just going to grate it on the large holes of the box grater.

Oh, ha ha ha ha.

Ready for some garlic bread?

-Oh, that smells delicious.

-That smells amazing.

And you can see it just started getting a little bit of color around the edges.

Now we can top it.

So, use a spoon and start evenly topping our pizza slices here.

All right, I'm going to start spreading.

That sauce is going to spread out a little bit in the oven, too.

I love this, too, because the crushed tomatoes add just the right texture.

So it doesn't just feel like pizza sauce out of a jar.

-Yeah, I like that.

It has little bits of tomato.

-Yeah.

There we go.

Got our 12 ounces of grated mozz.

Some is probably going to get on the tray.

I'm going to try to avoid it, but we're loading this up.

-Oh, yeah.

-You know, this is one of those recipes that I don't really even think of as a recipe.

It's more of a guideline.

We do have a whole bunch of different variations on our website.

And you know what it needs?

Needs more cheese.

-Mm!

-So I've got an ounce of grated Parmesan.

This is just going to go right on the top.

You can use a really lovely Parmigiano-Reggiano.

-Oh.

Mm-hmm.

-That'd be beautiful.

And that's going to give it a nuttiness.

And also, it's going to help create those little brown tips on the cheese.

So same thing that I did with the mozz.

I'm going to go back and forth and make sure that I'm not preloading that first one I come across with all the cheese, and then there's not enough for the fourth one here.

All right.

Looking good.

Last up -- pepperoni.

-Oh.

-2 ounces of thinly sliced pepperoni.

-Do you hear that?

That's my stomach growling.

-Is it?

-Oh.

It's ready.

Aw.

-Yeah.

It's like dealing cards, you know.

So it's roughly seven slices depending on pepperoni that you're using.

There we go.

Kaboom, boom.

-Mm.

Those are beautiful.

Yeah.

So this is going to go back into that 450-degree oven.

Now, this time it's going to be in there for about 15 minutes.

Ovens all run very differently.

-Mm-hmm.

-So it's always a good idea to check around 10 minutes and see how it's looking.

-All right.

Oh, my goodness.

Ah.

[ Laughs ] -That looks amazing.

-That looks a lot better than the stuff out of the box, doesn't it?

-Yes.

-But one thing that they did warn on those labels is to let it cool a little bit before you eat it.

We're going to do the same here.

So about five minutes.

Time to eat.

Five minutes is up.

-About time.

-Ooh, still hot, still hot.

There we go.

Oh, this one has a little bit of that beautiful frico right there.

-Oh!

-The brown cheese that hit the pan.

-Yes.

-All right, I'm going to cut a couple of these.

-It smells like French bread pizza.

It is distinctive and it is different than regular pizza.

-There we go.

-Mm.

Oh, yum.

-Mm.

And you can use a chef's knife for this.

I do like just kind of gently getting it through that top, though, with the bread knife.

There we go.

All right.

I'm going to give you a heel.

-Oh, yes.

-That's for you.

-Thank you.

-There we go.

-Mm mm mm!

-Mm.

But it looks a lot better than what comes out of the oven.

And those frozen brands, you've forgotten all about them, right?

-Yeah.

That's a whole different breed of pizza.

-All right.

-Mm.

-Mm.

That's good cheese.

-Mm!

Mm-hmm.

See how tender it still is.

-Mm-hmm.

-And even with that in the oven for 5 minutes with the garlic butter on... -Yeah.

-...and then another 15 minutes, it's still really tender.

The bread itself is nice and tender but crispy.

-Yeah.

Crisp on the bottom.

Not spongy in the middle, but almost still has that delicate bread taste.

-Mm-hmm.

-The ones of my youth, the bread was hard as a rock.

-Mm-hmm.

-This, you still have the texture of the bread, but all the flavor of the pizza on top.

-But like I said, this is one of those guideline recipes.

-Mm-hmm.

-I mean, you could put pesto on this, a whole bunch of different things would be great on this.

-Yeah.

I love that garlic flavor you get.

-It's in the bread itself.

It's not just a little bit in the sauce.

That was two teaspoons of that garlic.

-Yeah.

Yeah, but it's not too garlicky.

-Right.

-It's just the right amount.

Bridget, this is fantastic.

Thank you.

-You bet.

-If you want to make marvelous French bread pizza at home, start by brushing the back side of the bread with oil.

Parbake the bread with a little flavorful butter, and finish with sauce and cheese in a hot oven.

From "Cook's Country," an awesome recipe for pepperoni French bread pizza.

You can get this recipe and all the recipes from this season, along with select episodes and product reviews at our website, cookscountry.com/tv.

[ Chuckling ] Oh.

-You're gonna need another one.

-I know.

This is delicious.

-Mm.

So good.

-Mm-mm!

-Let us help with dinner tonight.

Visit our website anytime for the newest seasons fail-proof recipes, full episodes, ingredient advice, and equipment reviews.

Cookscountry.com/tv.

"The Complete Cook's Country TV Show Cookbook" includes every recipe, tasting, and testing from all 17 TV seasons.

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The cost is $24.99, $15 off the cover price of $40.

To order, head to our online shop at CooksCountry.com/book.

-Funding for this program has been provided by the following.

-Monument Grills, offering innovative technology and design for the grilling enthusiast.

With a lineup of gas grills to suit every level, our mission is to ignite your passion to pursue the art of grilling.

Learn more at monumentgrills.com.