Oh Brother!

Brother Juniper's Restaurant - Memphis, TN
http://www.brotherjunipers.com/

Whenever my father and I visit each other, we always like to go out one morning for a classic American breakfast. Because he lives in St. Louis, we have two great cities to find a good place for an early morning meal. A lot of times it is a buffet of some sort, other times it is a small, mom and pop diner. Last year when he came here for a visit, we went to CK's off Summer and Stage. That was a mistake because we smelt like a cigarette for a week after that dining disaster and the food was awful. I felt like I let him down so I was on a quest afterward to find somewhere better than that. I have driven past Brother Juniper's in Midtown 100s of times and heard nothing but great things about it. I decided to add it to my mental list of places to take him. Upon his next visit, during the 2010 holiday season, we woke up my nephew one Sunday morning and journeyed to the University of Memphis campus.

There was a very brief wait as we beat the church crowd. The restaurant was packed with people who all had the same idea as us: to enjoy a splendid breakfast on a gorgeous Sunday morning. The aroma of fresh coffee filled the air as we took our seats in the crowded dining area. I noticed on the table several hot sauces that appeared to be home made. One was a Louisiana chipotle, another a special blend and the last a garlic pepper. There was also a small pepper shaker filled with a red spice that looked intriguing. I reviewed the menu, surfing through the amazing selection of one-of-a-kind omelets and my eye got caught on an open face omelet called the "Fireman". This bad boy consisted of avocado spread, tomatoes, green onions, chorizo sausage, chipotle hot sauce, jalapenos, cheddar and mozzarella cheeses. I sipped on my delicious cup of coffee and contemplated ordering the Fireman. I passed this particular morning and decided on portabella mushroom omelet that was out of this world. I would save the Fireman for another day.

Another opportunity to grab a bite at Brother Juniper's on another gorgeous Sunday morning recently became available. I knew what I would order before walking in the door this time. We waited at the coffee bar and I took in the amazing flavor of their coffee. It's one of the best brews in the city, which is fitting considering this may be the best place to have breakfast around town. Once we were seated, I placed my order for the Fireman. It didn't take long for it to arrive and once it did, I knew I was about to lift off to outer space again. I dabbed on some extra chipotle sauce and dug in. A few brief moments later, the flavor of the sausage combined with the avocado, jalapenos and chipotle sauce blew me away. I was eating an omelet that I would later classify within the top 3 of all time omelets that I have ever had, anywhere. There was hardly any heat to it, however, but that didn't disappoint the experience of the scarfing. My mouth was not burned but it was very satisfied with joy. The cheese grits are amazing for a side to any omelet. Also, their fruit spread is outstanding, so good that I took some blueberry home with me. At the register, they have all their sauces and spreads available for purchase. You can also find it for sale on their website. In the end, I wouldn't recommend the Fireman if you are there to burn your mouth but if you're there to enjoy a blast to another planet, you came to the right place.

Red Winging It

Southern Hot Wing Festival 2011 - Memphis, TN
http://southernhotwingfestival.com

This time last year, Burn My Mouth was in its infancy. There were so many opportunities being presented to me in the world of hot and spicy food that I had blog material for months. I then heard about the Southern Hot Wing Festival in downtown Memphis and that they have a hot wing eating contest. All my other material at the time took a back seat because I knew I would be going to the fest and entering the eating contest. See post here: http://www.burnmymouth.com/2010/04/chicken-wing-extravaganza.html/ After all the fun we had, we knew the next step would be to create a team to compete in the big challenge in 2011. Within this last year, The Red Wings were born.

I began the quest by creating and perfecting an amazing hot wing rub. I took ideas and ingredients from several other rubs that I was able to purchase and came up with, what I consider a true Memphis-style dry rub that has amazing flavor with a good kick. It coats the wing perfectly, aiding to the tenderness and caramelization. It took me several months to get it down and once I did, I couldn’t seem to make enough to please my family and friends. After the wing contest this year, it appears that the judges felt the same way about it, too.

My next task was with sauce. I spent hours searching online for a 100% from-scratch recipe for hot wing sauce and could not find anything that didn’t have Red Hot as a base. To me, if you’re going to use Red Hot in your sauce, then it’s technically not your sauce. Franks uses a long, tedious process when making Red Hot that you eliminate when using it as a base for a sauce. Great for convenience, not so much for originality. I finally talked to the right people who make some of the sauces that I have reviewed on here and their tips got me in the right direction. I took several pounds of peppers from my garden at the end of the season last year and experimented until I came up with one amazing sauce. I found that a Fresno chile was a perfect flavor for a red sauce and mixed in habaneros to kick it up. I then added just salt and pepper for spice, keeping it simple. I made several batches, distributed them out to family and friends who all reported it as amazing. It was then time to try it on our wings to see if I nailed it. There is now zero doubt that it was the perfect sauce for our awesome wings.

Next up was perfecting our method for the wings. I won’t go into much detail here because we hold these valuable to our hearts. I used to love grilled wings and had those down really well. I also loved to straight fry them, too. I have tried so many methods to discovering the best wing I could make and ended up perfecting a smoked-then-fried wing. This method isn’t a big secret around Memphis. I find it to be the real Memphis-style hot wing, used in several BBQ joints around town. Our challenge was getting the timing and consistency down in my brother’s big smoker. After a few cookouts at the house, inviting great, 3rd party people for opinions who all raved over the final product, we got them down to perfection. It was then time to take it to the Southern Hot Wing Festival.

Before the event, we had to tackle several other tasks, including coming up with a team name. Within 5 minutes of this task, “The Red Wings” fell in my lap and instantly became our name. Since I am not a Detroit Red Wings fan, like several team members, I didn’t want to fully associate the two teams. There were lots of ideas for logos, colors, themes, etc. from outstanding support of family and friends. I then decided to have a friend edit the Detroit logo, removing the wheel and adding a chicken. He didn’t disappoint. I submitted the logo for our T-shirts and in less than two weeks, we had our uniforms. Burn My Mouth stickers were printed, sauce and rub packaged, 85 lbs of wings purchased, a keg of Samuel Adams Noble Pils ordered, and lots and lots of other, small things taken care of, we were ready to compete. We were ready to represent Burn My Mouth in the absolute best way possible.

April 16th, 2011 finally arrived and I woke up wondering why we tapped the keg the night before. It wasn't long before the adrenaline took over which flew me to South Main Street in downtown Memphis. Load in was at 8 AM and it was a complete nightmare. The weather was awful and it instantly became obvious that the event staff was ill-prepared for the growth of the festival. Within the last 3 years, the number of teams went from in the teens in ‘09 to in the 30s in ‘10 and now 54 in ’11. We were on our own from the moment we drove to our spot, which was boldly already taken by another team. After some arguing, we got our way and began setting up. The volunteer tent was next to us and the staff that set it up (very late) was beyond rude, tossing stuff in our area and not supplying the volunteers with their own trash cans (they kindly used ours instead). I refused to let it get us down. We began pumping out wings for the crowd around 11 and it was an instant, amazing census. Our Red Wings logo attracted a big crowd as well throughout the day (it’s amazing how many people you run into around the country that are from Michigan). Throughout the fun, however, we kept our game face on and began cooking our competition wings.

Turn in for blind judging was at 1:50 PM and we got them in on time, looking and smelling amazing. Onsite judging was from 2-3 PM. We were beyond prepared with the help of a few team members who are no strangers to the Memphis BBQ Network. We nailed onsite judging with the presentation of these amazing wings. It was then left up to the blind box. After a huge breath of relief after judging, it was then time to have some real fun. We cooked the rest of our wings for the public, entertained guests, enjoyed the festival and became ecstatic when the weather cleared up. Good times were happening and I felt good going into the awards announcement. After a very long delay from the event staff, the awards were finally announced. We did not place in the top 5 and had no idea where we landed on the list. It was a mess that I was not prepared for. In the wait of the delay, we could have had our spot loaded up and ready to go with our cleaning deposit handed back to us (in the time that I type this post, I still have not heard anything about the deposit). By the time we had everything loaded, my spirits were slightly damaged. We did everything right, entertained several people, raised money for the Ronald McDonald House, cooked amazing wings, but I couldn’t shake the fact that our team was left in the dark all day by the event staff. Would we do it again next year? Am I out of my deposit money? Did we place in the top 10? Too many unanswered questions that are always answered at any other event within the Memphis BBQ Network.

I woke up the next day refusing to let the event staff ruin the fun and excitement that we experienced. Of course we will be back next year. Our folks came in town for the event, helped out and made it obvious that it was a really fun time. You live and you learn and this being our first year, I believe we did quite well. With that being said, we finally found out our placement thanks to a great team member who made the right calls. We placed 10th out of 57 teams, which was our original goal and made us extremely happy! Next year’s goal will be top 5 and beyond. The experience out there was something that we needed to see where we are with our method. A little tweeking here and there and we have no doubt that we will be more successful. Look for The Red Wings to snag a trophy in 2012!

The Thai House

Bhan Thai - Memphis, TN
http://www.bhanthairestaurant.com

For quite some time now, I have been hearing of this place in Midtown that has great Thai food. On the evening of the largest full moon in 18 years, I finally got to enjoy their Thai cuisine. Bhan Thai is located on Peabody Avenue in a large, old house that, if it weren't for the lights out front, I probably would have driven past. The neighborhood that it's in still has several residents, mostly residential but some businesses have set up shop in the old homes. As I escorted my date inside, we walked into a packed house, happy that we called in reservations for the patio. They do not waste a single inch in this place, filling it with as many tables and chairs as possible. Everyone seemed to be enjoying their dinners as we made our way to the back patio. Once out there, we waited for our table while having a drink at the bar. I was taken back by the size and creativity of the patio. It is their hidden secret and turned out to be the best part of the experience. A musician was playing acoustic in the back corner while several people at the bar were going nuts over a huge March Madness upset. Our table was available quickly and we reviewed the menu. My eyes scanned for the hot stuff while my date was interested in a good seafood dish. She got the Thai red snapper while I ended up ordering the spicy garlic chicken stir fry, telling the waiter to make it extra hot.

As we enjoyed our beverages on a gorgeous spring evening, listening to some good tunes on an amazing patio, the dishes were served in a short amount of time, despite how busy they were. The first thing I noticed, once it hit my nose, was the amount of spices on the top of my stir fry. I knew it would be good right off the bat. The red snapper looked even more delicious, with whole garlic cloves and fresh peppers topping the slab of fish. We didn’t waste any time and got busy. I added a bunch of white rice to my stir fry which soaked up some of the sauce that was saturated on the bottom of the plate. The spices were excellent on the chicken and veggies but it wasn’t very powerful. I don’t believe they used any of it to actually cook with the stir fry, it was just added before serving. Nonetheless, it was an excellent flavor that didn’t last very long and had my nose running madly at the end. Throughout the meal, I helped my date with her snapper which was absolutely incredible. I cannot remember ever eating anything that contained whole garlic cloves for spices like this. I am a big fan of garlic so this was excellent to me. I have read a few bad reviews for their fish here but none of them would have been accurate this particular night. It was good stuff!

Like I have said in previous reviews on this blog, I have been to Thailand before and know what true authentic Thai food is all about. The meals we got this evening were not close to this, which in many ways is a good thing. I consider it more of an Americanized Thai restaurant that doesn’t pack a lot of heat but serves large dishes of incredible food. They also have Singha which is a beer that brings back lots of memories. Although we didn’t leave with our mouths burned, we sure did leave as full as the moon that night!