My Watermelon Baby

(Music plays) Other than tomatoes the thing I pine for all year long is watermelon.

I don't even care about cooking it.

I just want to eat it.

I want it cold, crisp, sweet, and sprinkled with a little salt.

(Theme Music plays- The Avett Brothers "Will You Return") I'm Vivian and I'm a chef.

My husband, Ben and I were working for some of the best chefs in New York City when my parents offered to hep us open our own restaurant.

Of course, there was a catch.

We had to open this restaurant in Eastern North Carolina, where I grew up and said I would never return.

(Theme Music plays) (Theme Music plays) So this is my life.

Raising twins, living in the house I grew up in, and exploring the south, one ingredient at a time.

(Music plays) Previously on A Chef's Life.

Tomorrow we're doing a fundraiser for the Lomax Incubator Farm and the most exciting part about this is that we're doing the dinner with the Avett Brothers.

I think this is gonna be a nice evening.

I'm not looking at anyone's cookbook now though.

I'm scared of accidentally copying somebody.

Well I'd be flattered.

You wouldn't sue me?

Well, it depends on how many you sold.

(Laughter) (Music plays) I could clog right now.

I'm not going to though.

(Music plays) (birds chirping) We can try this watermelon tea.

I like it.

So, did this ring true to the directions?

So, I had a seeded watermelon and I don't know if that makes a difference, but I think you just to be safe need to say a quart and a half of diced watermelon flesh.

Okay.

When I thought about writing a cookbook I thought about writing a cookbook.

I didn't think about testing recipes and having someone else test the recipe.

Part of the process of doing a cookbook is having someone test all your recipes.

Really go through them and make sure when I say it serves four it serves four or when I say it makes a quart it makes a quart.

So, Anna, who is a teacher during the year but an avid home cook.

Aspirational.

She used to be an avid home cook.

She's never gonna cook again after she leaves here.

(Laughter) Is testing all my recipes and making really detailed really detailed comments and she's staying in my parent's house while she is doing this.

So, everything she makes she is sharing with my parents, which is something I would never ever do.

So, you're getting critique from... From all sides.

Everywhere.

And they think Anna is brilliant.

So, this is the red curry, country style pork ribs with watermelon.

I think we're gonna do this in the restaurant.

I love how this looks like tomato.

It's really good.

It's good.

It's kind of spicy but sweet.

I tried cooking watermelon in this braising liquid with red curry but I just tried and it came out and looked like tomato and I was like, this is awesome.

It's brilliant.

And it's also really interesting to see what it looks like when someone else does your work.

I'm happy when a recipe works and I'm thrilled when a recipe works even better than I had hoped and this braised watermelon with pork is pretty freaking awesome.

(Music plays) You know, yesterday he told me vinegar is an acid and baking soda is a base.

Alright, I love you.

Bye!

(Music plays) So I feel like, very strange because I literally have not been here all summer.

I've been working on the book and then I descend today to work on these dishes and I literally don't even know some of the people working here right now.

And it makes me very uncomfortable because... well you can kind of imagine why it makes me uncomfortable.

(Music plays) Watermelon is not something we typically think of as a component in dishes but it's crisp texture and honey sweetness is actually the perfect foil for creamy fatty things like goat cheese or avocado.

So, I'm working on a country style pork rib with red curry braised watermelon.

So, a country style pork rib is a part of the loin that comes from the front end so when you look at a whole pork loin there's the center cut pork chops and then on the back end towards the ham there is the blade cut, then you have the rib end and that's where country style ribs come from.

They have a lot of nice marbling but also a lot of this lean meat, which is what a lot of diners are looking for.

So, I like that it has both.

So, Kendra, you're gonna be the one that is doing this.

Probably.

So we're gonna sear them and then you're gonna take the vinegar and deglaze the pan because we want all that caramelization.

Every serving gets about five cubes of watermelon.

It's a lot of watermelon.

You can see these are like kind of like golden brown and caramelized and caramelization as I've said before, really does build a lot of flavor and it's a step that people skip a lot.

They just put stuff in the slow cooker without searing it and I'm not hating.

My sisters do that and they're good people so... Woah!

I have seared off these ribs and there's all this brown stuff in the bottom of my pan.

It's actually more black because I burned it a little bit.

So, I'm gonna deglaze.

I'm gonna pour a liquid in there.

I'm gonna do vinegar and scrape up all those little bits and they're gonna do a lot to build flavor in my overall dish.

You never want to leave that stuff out.

This is the red wine vinegar from the recipe that you deglaze with.

And this is the honey.

And then red curry paste and then that fish sauce right there is gonna go in there.

(Music plays) So, we're gonna cover these in a 325 oven for an hour and then we'll open it up and look at it.

I've always uncovered it for like 30 minutes (Music plays) Hey Rose.

(Laughter) Hi Vivian.

Hey.

How are you?

Great.

Good to see you.

You too.

Rose taught me how to can so whenever I have a preserve or canning related question she's my go to.

So, we're gonna make a watermelon rind preserves or pickles?

Preserves.

Preserves.

I peel my melon before I cut it.

Oh really?

I do.

It makes it easier.

What I do is I take my potato peeler and bare down on it like this or you can take a knife and just go, probably not towards you like I do but safely.

Yeah, just some background information.

Rose and I used to work together at Chef & the Farmer and she's great in the kitchen, but we used to say that Rose is a tornado and Chef & the Farmer was her trailer park.

So she's got this knife coming straight towards her.

Do not do that at home!

(Music plays) What I do is just cut the squares.

With my grandmother we always cut them the size o a biscuit because that's typically how we would have them, inside of a hot biscuit.

Oh wow, I like that.

My grandmother, she would put them in a large crock and left them sitting out in a cool place.

They didn't last through the winter and they never spoiled.

So, then you've got these that you've already cut all the green off of.

What's the next step?

Typically to this I would add two lemons.

Okay.

We're going to slice the lemon a little thin.

You know, maybe a quarter inch or a little bit less.

Add your lemon to your rind.

Just kind of get them down in there.

To this I would do five cups of sugar.

Oh wow!

The ratio is one to one I guess?

You have five pounds of rind...

Right.

So you need five cups of sugar.

We're gonna stir that around and you would let this sit over night.

Cover it maybe with a plate or saran wrap and the next morning the sugar draws the flavor and the juices from the melon and it helps it stay in tact.

Right and if you were making apple preserves or fig preserves...

Right.

Which we've done.

If you just did this here, toss it in sugar and put it directly on the stove and cook them they would all fall apart.

Right.

Because they sit overnight, they hold up and have whole fruit integrity.

Right, right.

Which makes it a preserve and not a jam.

Right.

(Music plays) Bring it to a boil and turn it down to a medium to medium low simmer.

Okay.

What's gonna happen is the syrup is gonna cook down and caramelize so color is key.

You can't let it get too dark because that's gonna mean your syrup is too thick when you get ready to use it.

Just get it kind of a pretty caramel color which could take two hours maybe.

Okay.

This is a finished product and this is the caramelization I was talking about.

The pretty color and the slow drip when it comes off your spoon.

It's taking something that most people just toss away and making really good use of it.

I mean, I love the idea that your grandmother cut them into biscuit shape.

Not to rip her off but to do that at the restaurant would be fun.

She would not mind if you ripped her off at all.

One of the things I love about what I do is that just when I think I know everything there is to know on a subject I learn something completely enlightening and exciting and invigorating.

Inspiring even.

I love what I do.

(birds chirping) So, Casey, how did you make the leap to do this?

I was a banker for 15 years and I mean it was good to me and I enjoyed it for the 15 years but I decided to do something different and this is really different.

Really different!

(Laughter) He's doing a great job though.

Yeah, everybody has the nicest things to say about you.

Good.

Thank you.

I'm glad to hear that.

A few months ago we put an ad on social media and we got some really good applicants and Casey was one of them but he didn't appear so on paper.

Because he was a banker for 15 years but he came and staged, which is what we call when you come in and spend a day in the kitchen and it's kind of like a two way interview.

We see if we can work together.

We see what your skills are.

Casey came in with little to no professional cooking experience and the note that I got from Justise and John was that he left here a better cook than he came and not everybody can do that so he's one of our newest hires.

And he's made a huge life shift you know, from banker to line cook.

Yeah.

Very different You should write a book.

I'm working on it.

Yeah.

I hear that's tough work too.

It is.

It's awful.

I mean it's great.

(Laughter) (Music plays) One thing about a professional is that you can gauge the level of contentment and happiness as soon as you walk in the door.

And it's good right now at Chef & the Farmer and that's incredibly reassuring since I'm hardly ever here right now.

So, these uhhh we're going to cut into squares because the story is, Rose, who used to work here, her grandmother used to make these and she made them the size of a biscuit.

So, you want to make sure you get all of this light green off because that will end up being tough.

And you want to get most of the flesh off, but I like it when you leave a little bit because that light pink shows up very very pretty.

(Music plays) We're gonna do watermelon preserves with a goat cheese biscuit and lamb ham.

So, we're gonna do basically what Rose did.

I've started with three pounds of watermelon rind, three pounds of sugar, and then I did one lemon per pound, and I just let it sit overnight.

You can see all that liquid that leached out.

Then I'm just gonna cook it really slowly over a low temperature but I'm gonna add some star anise because I can't just leave well enough alone.

Put maybe one star anise for every pound of watermelon I got going.

I'm not gonna take it as far as Rose did.

Hers was really thick and I want ours to be a little bit syrupy.

And I'm gonna add a little bit of vinegar in the end because I want a little bit of acidity.

(Music plays) Some of the farmers I work with grow a little bit of a lot of things and some of them grow a lot of a few things and for Curtis Smith, one of those things is watermelons.

Good morning.

Good morning.

Thank you for doing this.

I'm sorry.

I told Dad what we were doing today and he's like, "Oh Vivian, he's barning tobacco."

(Laughter) So... That's right.

(Music plays) I think he's trying to get away from me.

Okay.

My parents were tobacco farmers and this time of year would be their busiest time trying to make sure everything was in line to barn tobacco and then take it to market.

So, whenever my Dad is in his busiest work time or I'm in my busiest work time he makes this joke that I'm barning tobacco.

And Curtis is barning tobacco, I think times like twenty.

(Music plays) So, this is early for picking watermelons.

When we were planting on plastic we'll have some watermelons July 1st.

July 4th we'll be picking watermelons.

Right, because you can't have July 4th without watermelon.

That's correct.

And black plastic for the people that don't know it, it heats up the soil.

It heats the soil but also it keeps the moisture from evaporating.

It holds the moisture there.

This is a seeded watermelon and we use this as a "pollinator" to get the male flowers because the seedless only produce female flowers.

So, you need the bees to take the pollen out of the male flower to transfer it over to the female.

I was gonna ask you why anybody grew a seeded watermelon anymore?

For pollination.

That's right.

This is a seeded and it's ready.

Look at what we call the pig tail and it's drying back.

See, it's dead.

That's the pig tail right there?

Yeah, we call it a pig tail because it's curly.

It would have been green earlier, right?

That's correct.

It's drying back and I like a yellow bottom.

When this turns not a white but a creamy and also if you take and rub your hands over the top of it and feel the little ridges on it... Mmm hmm.

Sometimes too they get sun burnt.

Bleached out white?

Put your hand right there and feel how hot that spot is right there.

Oh yeah!

That's where that direct sunlight.

See, it starts burning.

I guess if we laid out here all the time and didn't move we would be sunburned too.

Yeah.

So, you have to grow these seeded watermelons so that the others will pollinate, but does anybody wanna buy these?

In my opinion and a lot of people's they're sweeter than the seedless.

If you have some seeded ones picked, I'd like to get one.

Sure.

Because we're gonna have watermelon this evening and I want to see... My kids have never had a watermelon with seeds in it.

So, where would I get one of those twenty-five pound ones?

I think my kids would get a kick out of that.

Alright.

Oh yeah!

That's what you're looking.

That's what I want.

That's what you want right there.

My watermelon baby!

(Laughter) (Music plays) I did get your message and I o have a reservation available for you this evening if you're still interested.

We look forward to seeing you at 6:30 tonight.

(Music plays) I'm really excited about this dish for two reasons.

One is you very rarely see cooked watermelon on a menu.

Two is that this is a dish tht actually originated in my book and I'm retrofitting for the restaurant.

And it usually goes the other way, so it's cool.

Okay, so we've got two things.

Some of you might remember Rose that used to work here.

We just made watermelon preserves.

So Rose told me this really cool story that when her grandmother used to make these preserves she cut the rind in the shape and size of a biscuit so I thought well wouldn't that be fun to do something like that here.

So, we've got a goat cheese biscuit and these are really really good with watermelon rind preserves and then lamb ham.

Then, this is a country style pork rib.

So, this is actually watermelon on top.

Y'all are supposed to go, "Oh wow!"

OS- That looks like tomato on here.

I know.

It looks like tomato but it's watermelon.

So y'all try that.

So, y'all started the bread service with the sliced tomatoes and the smoked corn mayonnaise.

OS- Yes.

It was a huge hit.

We eighty-sixed it.

OS- It was huge.

That's great.

That's better than the review I just read about store bought biscuits.

He was very pleased with himself.

Yes.

Well, you know it's fine.

It's not for everyone.

This is not for everyone.

It's not what people consider fine dining.

I get that but some of the things he said were just so evil.

Yeah.

It was pure hateful.

I don't know.

Thank you, Chef.

Thank y'all.

Thank y'all.

(Music plays) So for some reason all of us here are obsessed with online reviews.

Yes.

This morning I pulled this up and he goes on to pick apart the food and talk about how even people in this area, their palates are not up to standard, that we don't know anything that we're talking about.

"If you are however like most locals and consider large chunks of fat and gristle that hang off a low grade steak..." which it's not low grade... Oh!

And he called our biscuits dry and store bought.

We don't do anything from the can to the pan here.

Never.

But it hurts your feelings to a point... Yeah.

Because this kind of review runs just a complete emotional scale.

Yeah.

Don't come back.

Basically, just don't come back.

Amen.

Yes, amen.

Order fire.

Small bread followed by a jed split and a third course tomato pie and a pork rib.

We're so glad you're here tonight.

What a great time of year to be here.

Summertime the gardens are popping.

The tomatoes are here.

The corn's here.

The butterbean's here.

The watermelon pickles are here.

Alright guys in five minutes I want two monkfish, one hen and a medium ribeye.

- Heard!

- Heard!

Listen to you projecting.

We're featuring the braised pork rib topped with a wonderful braised watermelon that almost has a texture of a tomato.

Order fire.

Peaches, pork belly, grit followed by a tomato salad and a pork rib.

Now the ham biscuits tonight.

That's a great way to begin.

Order fire.

Ham biscuits.

Oh cool.

So, Leslie, also known as Crusher is expediting now so we're trying to... what are we?

We're trying to...

I don't know either so... Ham biscuits here.

Excellent.

What I would recommend doing is actually slicing the biscuit open and putting some of the preserves inside.

Topping it with the ham.

Oh my God!

That's delicious.

Yeah, that's great.

I love that.

Then drizzle a little off.

Yeah, just like that.

When you have a new dish you should request to plate one before service.

Yeah.

Right You know what I mean?

OS- So, we're putting it on the rectangle plate?

I don't know.

I don't know.

I'm watching.

I thought that's what we put on the round plates.

Okay.

He didn't work this station yesterday so he doesn't know.

That's what I'm saying.

It's like... Is there a reason that the ceviche tomato is not a heirloom?

No, it's supposed to be the heirloom.

It doesn't look like it.

(Music plays) What is that?

It's a squash dish and you can't even see the squash really.

Yeah.

That's one of my dishes from last year but that's not even close to what it is.

And I know that, anyway we'll address it tomorrow but it's eighty-sixed now.

Okay.

Eighty-six fried squash.

Okay.

Consistency is incredibly important for a restaurant.

You want a cook to cook the same dish over and over again, night after night and that's not what I'm seeing happen tonight.

Did that squash get sent back?

Yeah.

Sorry.

Have y'all been doing like tastings at five o'clock everyday?

Yeah.

We did one on Friday.

You're gonna be up here a lot more so you should call for a tasting once a week.

Okay.

And if somebody is transitioning into a station and you've got two new dishes on it, they need to be plated before service.

Because...

I got you.

You know?

Okay, I'm flustered.

It's not the first time.

But the good news is that people love the watermelon preserves with the goat cheese biscuits and they are crazy over the curry braised watermelon and pork.

I have your braised pork rib and watermelon.

We are serving that on a bed of farro and butterbeans this evening.

OS- Tell me how that is.

That watermelon is excellent.

Yeah.

Enjoy your dinner.

Thank you.

Can't put my fork down.

(Music plays) Hey, how are you?

I'm good.

How are y'all?

And you got your hair permed.

Yes, she did.

(Laughter) Order fire.

Small bread and ham biscuit, followed by ham and a pork.

Kenny, I need you to drop me two hens please.

Thank you.

I think you got this.

Not that you needed me to tell you that.

(Music plays) There are things I want more in life than having absolute control over everything that goes on at Chef & the Farmer.

This is one of those things.

Wow!

Look how big that is.

Theo, you want a piece?

Mmmm.

What are the black things?

They're seeds.

Try to spit them out as far as you can spit them.

(Laughter) (Music plays) For more information on A Chef's Life visit pbs.org/food "A Chef's life is available on DVD.

To order, visit shopPBS.org or call us at 1-800-PLAY-PBS."