The Great American Recipe

Hey Fu. What's up, buddy? D'you wanna work out? Do I wanna work out? Yeah, you wanna work out? You're gonna take a chance and knead this dough for me? (Fu laughs) I've been going with this for like five minutes. You know, we could start a gym after this. What's your gym called? No Knead. (laughs) No Knead! Oh, nice! I'm really excited to make something different than Korean fusion for the judges. I'm making a kind of a deconstructed Cannoli which is an Italian dessert. So I'm making cannoli dip with homemade chips for it. So it's kind of my go to dish for making out at outdoor events. Whenever I have picnics or a football game, I just love making it for friends. It's a very sweet, very tasty dish. This is definitely a little bit more out of my comfort zone that the judges are used to seeing. And I'm also making the dough completely from scratch. -

Tiffany

Hey, Tony! Hi judges. -

Leah

Hi Tony! How are you? - How are y'all doing? What're you making? I am busy cutting out the little pastries for my Cannoli dip. Did you say cannoli? I said, cannoli dip. (Leah laughs) Yeah. It's like a deconstructed cannoli right here. So I'm making the pastries right now for them. I'm gonna deep fry those. And so what's in your filling? -

Tony

So in my filling, I've got ricotta cheese, mascarpone cheese, some vanilla extract, powdered sugar and chocolate chips. -

Tiffany

Mmm! - I actually worked in Sicily and I worked the pastry station for probably three months and I made cannolis every day. Oh! I put orange zest in my cannoli filling and it just took it to the next level. So if you wanna steal that little tip-- -

Tony

Okay. - I'll share that with you. Well, hopefully mine's at the par, alright? -

Leah

Yeah. Thanks Tony. Thank you, Tony! - Thank you, judges! So I'm taking Leah's advice and added freshly grated orange zest to the cannoli filling. I mean, I'd love to get Dan's advice on the cannoli once it's in its final forms and give Dan a taste and let him see what he thinks of it. He's looking good. Next thing we'll have to practice is which way the beach is. Hey, there we go. The beach is that way. Oh! - (laughs) Oh! What I'm making is Caprese Chicken and I'm gonna make some homemade Cavatelli. Where I would take this to is 4th of July parties or any type of house party. And I get invited to a lot of house parties. Hi Dan, how are you? - Hello! I'm well, chefs, how are you today? Good! What are you making for us, Dan? -

Dan

I'm brining some chicken out right here. I have the tomatoes and the mozzarella cut over there and I've made a dough over here. Then I'm going to make cavatelli with my grandmother's cavatelli maker. After she passed, I got it. Hopefully I'll pull it off. -

Leah

Wow. So this you learned to make from your grandmother? The cavatelli? I did, I did. You would start out, you get to roll the dough. That's it, just roll the dough. And then you were able to graduate up to making them with the fork. And then once they were happy with your performance there, you were allowed to use a cavatelli maker, at which point you said, "I cannot believe I rolled 10,000 of these things by hand when I could have run them through this machine." But hey, that's the price you gotta pay. This is the original, right? Yes, that's the original. It has the price on. There it is, it's like $11.95. Wow! - Ah, I love it! Handwritten note in it from her and-- I can feel the love that you have and the respect that you have for your Nona. And I think that's a really beautiful thing. Thank you chef. Means a lot. Well, Dan, I'll tell you what, we cannot wait to taste the legacy that she's left behind and the love and all that she's taught you through food. I'm glad you stopped by. Thanks for popping in. -

Leah

Thank you, delicious! Thank you, Dan. -

Dan

Thank you. What makes me think about it my grandmother? It's when I'm turning the cavatelli maker, it's not the visual of seeing what comes out of it. It's you hear that clicking, click, click, click, click, click, click, click, click, click. And that's actually what reminds me of her. My whole life, I've been waiting for that.