Recreating Roy Choi's Carne Asada Tacos From Taste | Bon Appétit

hey guys it's Alex I'm here in the VA Test Kitchen and I'm gonna have a little secret conversation about Chris Morocco with y'all once again we're gonna put his super taster abilities to the test these are Roy Choi's carne asada tacos with salsa verde Roy Choi LA native grew up in Koreatown cooking Korean food and eating a lot of Mexican food we're gonna challenge Chris to create this exact dish with every ingredient in just two days Chris is gonna be able to taste it touch it smell it but at no point will he ever lay his eyes on this dish at the end of the second day I'm gonna come back through taste Chris's version and be the judge of whether or not he pulled it off [Music] I really hope you guys aren't screwing me on this mask man I've got a real bad feeling about this okay cool hi right these are the ones that freak me out a little bit like this is like very soft very subtle I thought I maybe smelled a little bit of corn and just feeling the edges of these plates feels like I've got like a tortilla situation when I get really close I feel like I get something a little bit kind of cool and crunchy but it's so faint hmm okay let's just take this item by item shall we it's in like very like very fleshy cilantro or something here got diced raw onion I would kind of imagine that's white onion there's some heat to this there's some zip there's a little bit of moderately spicy fermented hot sauce there's something a little bit yeah it's not crazy spicy it's like and there's not a lot of other flavor going on but it's got a little bit of like funky frumenty kind of thing happening everything's freaking me out today even the cilantro is freaking me out today who is that oh my god why are you like lurking oh my god what I feel like I'm getting antlers I'm getting a little like button nose yeah I've got a really bad feeling that I'm rude off you make me very jumpy sometimes we are mostly okay so got some kind of piece of meat here whoa that has a deep level of char on it that's what I was kind of smelling that was like that meaty toasty edge it tastes like beef it's got a pronounced kind of fibrous Ness to it could this be our friend skirt steak back for another rodeo or is this something a little bit denser what is on the steak that's giving it that accentuated kind of char in that edge is there like a little bit of like a dry rub and then how is the hot sauce being used it's really hard to sort of figure out okay like is the hot sauce only on the meat was the hot sauce kind of everywhere there's also sweetness in here that's like is it as simple as somebody made a tomatillo salsa and like somehow like sweetened it and then like punched it up with lime I think part of it is like tomatillos themselves have a ton of acidity but they still have that green tomato character to them what's really tricky is where does like the brightness of like the lime juice kind of end potentially and then like the acidity of the tomatillo begin then there's also a little bit of that vegetal bell pepper quality to like green chilies you know specifically and I can't necessarily tell like what the chili source is here tricky all right so I'm feeling around to see if I can have an edge of meat that doesn't seem to be overly sauced yeah I don't think I'm calling this for skirt skirt would be a little bit floppier it would have like a little bit more of like a shreddy kind of texture to it I'm like picturing in my mind all the graphics that are gonna be appearing for you guys like wrong skirt steak Chris sucks you know like check it's too even it's too fine-grained I think my opening move with the steak is gonna be a New York Strip in my mind like a dry rub makes more sense on this but then again I'm not tasting like obvious spices there is like a very savory umami quality to the meat it tastes good it's almost a scenario in which I could see something like like a soy sauce or something that's like salty like very mommy you know being used on the meat this one's a tricky one the [ __ ] is that you guys just be funny I love you I can sense your presence because he went quiet I heard you back there right and then like you're not on the net quiet is not what you do good luck brother thanks dude I mean it would be just like you guys to like choose skirt steak after like the pork belly debacle I don't know whatever take it away I'm gonna go like sulk with the other misfit reindeer over here I guess there's the question like is this not strictly Mexican in my head it could skew slightly Asian all right shopping list so steak I want to get dirt and some New York Strip for this first pass sauce I think that's it I'm gonna head it over to the supermarket up the street I don't know I'm gonna be doing a lot of thinking on the way there I'm not yet ready for the spice aisle we're gonna start in veg produce okay tomatillos I'm gonna grab a couple Serrano's for safety but I think I'm dealing with hot jalapeno here cilantro we're gonna get some limes we're gonna get some garlic we're gonna get some oranges corn tortillas let's go to the meat case I'm not dealing the spices yet could I have the skirt steak that's right on top there and could I also have a New York Strip yeah if I could have the second one from the back perfect thank you so much for help appreciate it I feel like it's probably skirt but I don't want to commit a hundred percent let's go get some hot sauce this is a problem like when you start talking hot sauces like what are you even talking about I think unequivocally like what I'm tasting is an amalgamation of several ingredients but I don't know but if you don't know the players that doesn't like get you that that only gets you so far well this is Molly let me see if she's like got any inspiration hey Molly what do you need a box of oyster crackers yeah I thought you were my lifeline you just really need the oyster crackers all right some like flying you are Molly all right I'll get you the oyster crackers you're the best all right cool bite well that was interesting [Music] alright alright just back from the supermarket I have most if not all of what I think I need here still some TV DS see what I mean it's like he comes in and he's loud so if you hear Brad go quiet he's probably about to blow on your neck or do something kind of weird but kind of a little bit awesome to do the sauce two ways I'm gonna roast some of the ingredients and I'm gonna do a version where do you actually have something in the oven of the oven man since when do you ever have anything in the oven no probably not I probably beeped it I'm so sorry where the for my timers since when does Andy ever all right I'm gonna do the sauce two ways I'm gonna use more or less the same ingredients but I'm gonna prepare the sauce using two different techniques so one technique is going to be blistered in the oven and then pureed and one technique is going to be with the ingredients sweated out on the stovetop and then pureed so I'm starting with the tomatillos here because I believe they are a major component of the sauce some white onion garlic clove let's go Serrano why not a little neutral oil a little pinch of salt I'm roasting in kind of a high temp to like kind of charred up a little bit over here we get our onions started just gonna sweat that a little bit no sandy Siemer I'm not touching it alright so I've got garlic it's just gonna go in on top of that white onion in the saucepan this is a somewhat spicy Siriano so it's gonna use this quarter of it alright so I just added garlic and a little bit of Serrano chili to the pot and then I'm going to have these tomatillos and just throw them in there after another minute or so I'm gonna add a splash of water to that tomatillo one's kind of like let the sauce cook out I just don't want any of everything getting too toasty in there alright sauces are going starting the marinade so I've got lime juice and orange teaspoon of ancho chili some garlic I'm gonna do it a little bit of soy sauce and see what happens so this is our roasted sauce didn't take long but tomatillos are collapsing and I've got a little bit of char a little bit of raw bite taking off the onion so I'm just gonna wait a minute and then blend this all together tomatillos are soft just about ready to go I want to just cook off a little bit of that moisture both of these will be blended with cilantro and more lime juice and salt and then we'll taste side by side alright so this is our strip steak now we've got skirt steak here I'm just cut a cut like a little sample piece off I don't need to marinate the whole thing I don't want to waste it both of these pieces are gonna go into our marinade I'm gonna try to give them 20 minutes in there okay sauce one is sweated and simmered on the stovetop all right so that's turning pretty nicely I'm gonna throw in a little bit of cilantro all right so we need to loosen this just a little bit you know what I like about that it actually has a fair amount of sweetness and the heat is kind of balanced and not not that different from the original sauce I don't hate it a little lime juice right now I'm strongly leaning towards this but let's continue the exercise since we're here he heats a little bit more pronounced in the roasted version of the sauce I like the roasted version however I do feel like the stovetop version of the sauce it's just a little bit writer flavors shine through a little bit more so I'm leaning towards this here which is the stovetop version so I want to drain the steak really well [Music] the marinade has done something see what happens here when we grill this I don't know if these guys cook the dares on the grill all right I think we are good skirt looking real good New York Strip maybe touch over we're all right everything's cool we're gonna let these guys rest so I'm just doing my diced onion for the garnish picking some cilantro for the garnish if it's not steak then just cancel the show then we can all just go home early I'm going with skirt that's what's in my head version 1 so this is my first attempt at the dish already I can just know in my mind I want a little more flavor development on the steak I'm hoping that the next tasting of the original dish will be revelatory somehow I doubt that that's going to be the case come on mind it's not bad but only it's time to taste the original dish again I don't think I'm getting anywhere here by myself ingredients honestly this is one of those cases where it could be a pinch of this could be a dash of that could be entire other ingredients that just do not register flavor-wise in terms of a individually distinct way in the original dish so I'll give myself sixty-four ingredients tastes I'll give myself a 65 things are dark today it's just the way it is I'll give myself 64 technique parents I'll call it a 70 I think this is sort of the overall composition of this dish so I think overall maybe I'm hovering around d-plus I have one more chance to taste this dish tomorrow and then I really need to bring my a-game so big night of sleep maybe a couple glass of wine when I get home and fresh start tomorrow [Music] I am a sad little reindeer today so this is a piece of what I believe to be steak well I can't tell what is happening from the sauce and what's happening from the steak there the sauce is picking up a little more heat today it's very like angular you know like it's bright and sort of buzzes there's like a fattiness to this sauce there could be a little bit of like a fermented kind of quality to this flavor that I kind of was feeling like was a result of using kind of like fermented hot sauce that I was responding to yesterday like I have like a like a bit of a wild guess in my mind but I kind of don't want to say it cuz then there's gonna be like that graphic here that's like an you know you Chris well I guess the other question then is if it's just green fermented hot sauce you know like green Cholula or something what does that mean I'm definitely feeling better about skirt steak this just feels like a little bit looser and it's kind of like sort of muscle fiber structure not for nothing straight-up like I don't know that like anybody could figure out what the hell was on that steak I'm thoroughly confused here take it away we're gonna try a few different things here set up some base recipes and then kind of branch off add some different things to you know one or the other okay let's do it for the marinade I'm gonna start with some orange in the lime I'm gonna do some garlic as well ancho chili powder so far they're identical but I feel like I need to like set up a little experiment I'm just not sure what variables I want to tweak that was just a little bit of light brown sugar a little salt just so I can kind of get a better gauge on the flavor I grab some green tape just I can keep track of what's what let's put this piece of skirt steak in here I want to make another tomatillo salsa and really think about the texture of it and then possibly combine it with some avocado just thinking of ways to kind of add richness and fat specifically to the salsa I kind of just want to make a base and then see where it goes so this is a little neutral oil white onion we're gonna do some garlic in the sauce today as well this is Serrano again although I do want to mess around once I have that base sauce made I'm gonna let that go for just a minute some tomatillos going in there so there's the one with the sugar I just want to see how it's gonna color up there's no like real obvious smoky flavor in the original dish although there is char so I'm thinking maybe it's just like a hard sear in a pan kind of we sinned I just wanted to gauge the difference between like doing it in a pan versus you know the grill a little too much flavor development happening around the edge you know like the sugar is certainly gonna do that I frankly like the grilled steak better I'm gonna let that rest for a minute salsa's cooked we're gonna let this cool down for a couple minutes a little too sweet I also don't like what happened in that cast-iron skillet I frankly liked the grill better what I'm gonna do taking this piece of skirt I'm gonna put it in our marinade that doesn't have the sugar so this one the big difference from yesterday will be that it does not have soy sauce but it has everything else that I put in the marinade yesterday and we'll see what we're we kind of end up flavor-wise not looking great what do you mean yes I don't I don't think it is but I need you to stay positive but he's struggling with the salsa struggling a little bit with everything there's like to be very Chris I think this might be more than a tough one more than a tough one oh you know what it is Delaney knows all about it so would you lay that tomatillo spicy zingy yes but there there's a creaminess and there's a richness to the salsa that's Vitamix right there but vitae but like I was almost like mango yes an avocado I knew what he meant you guys came along at a good moment I was like having a hard time filling the silence [Music] I'm gonna hold some of this sauce back or safety I'm gonna put in a nubbin of avocado and then I want to put some of that green Cholula and see what happens I also want a little bit more cilantro I mean the hot sauce definitely helped so I get built up like that vibrancy you know that energy in the sauce a little bit do I love it am I in love with it I don't about that all right so this is a marinade that does not have sugar in it it's gonna see some assault I'm going back to the grill with this did not like the way steak cooked in the black steel skillet yeah why why would anything be wrong I'm actually gonna fix it now I was close so with a steak toss you can't get too greedy with it like doing it from over where Tyree is over there that would be a mistake I think I deserve a little bit of a bump a little extra credit because a I'm not losing heart here I'm keeping it light I'm keeping it fun and this is an opportunity to like you know kind of decide like listen I'm gonna give this what I can what I have to give but I'm not gonna freak out about it this does not define me although if the steak toss defined me a little bit that would kind of be okay this one's really hard I don't mean to like complain but it's just a really really tricky one really quickly rewarming our tortillas definitely looks better than me coming off the grill all right so this is attempt number two somebody reached out to me and they're like hey you know maybe you would help you if you tasted your own food with the blindfold on maybe that would give you a better judge what you've got and you know what I can't remember your name but this one's for you give me the mask the most satisfying thing about it is I can take the mask off whatever I want steak definitely needs more flavor even if I don't add other ingredients I need to double down on what I do have the salsa needs salt it could be a little less tomatillo e and maybe a little bit more like avocado E and hot saucy ingredients let's say 50% taste I put myself up around 75% I think things could be tightened up here but I think flavor-wise it's it's definitely this is a big step in the right direction technique-wise ooh I'd say I'm at 70% there could be anything happening here appearance this is where I want to say I'm closest I would maybe put myself at 80% this is kind of what I felt in the original dish I don't think I'm missing any elements so I want to say steak tortilla sauce couple Stoppers that's it overall scored can't do that math but maybe we've gone from a d-plus to a c-minus maybe we're hovering around 70 to 73 I've got one more shot if I can get everything a little bit tighter I think I may just eat this one out but one more chance to do it for Alex yeah I'll see you guys in a second I'm running out of time running out of options and I'm running out of ideas I've considered alcohol will do kind of like a light like more like lager style beer probably so I've got a dry hopped wheat bale fruit ale and then got a longneck here I think of these three it's probably the bud so I've got beer I've got garlic lime juice in both poncho chili powder feel like we definitely need some sweetness in here Lake Brown that's definitely tasting better I'm gonna just about double the chili powder just because I have more liquid than I was dealing with before and I wanted more intensity and the beer is diluting things quite a bit all right so it's bright it's zingy it's got a little bit of like chili depth or something happening got a little bit of sweetness so these marinades are still basically exactly the same I'm just leaving open the possibility of adding something if I need to okay I want to work with the sauce I have just see what happens when I add a little more avocado to it I feel like maybes a touch too much avocado it's now getting a little bit thick a little bit gloopy alright let's make one more sauce it's roasted alright we've got time on the clock okay I have green chili a couple cloves of garlic tomatillos white onion I'm gonna go look for green pepper option poblano pepper a poblano is the kind of chili pepper that you would most expect to see I feel in like a roasted tomatillo salsa it's gonna add depth it's gonna add bulk without making the salsa overtly acidic especially if you want to adjust it with the lime let that go for a little bit let's check back in a few okay so not too much color let's blend some sauce okay cilantro is going in flavor is good I'm adjusting with our friends our green hot sauce make the texture a little better feeling this watch see how this colors up [Music] alright I'm gonna cut into both these steaks in like five minutes see which one I think is good enough for my man Alex Delaney you only get one flavor of this one slightly better I think it's just a steak itself this is like a more richly flavored steak and taking the deer and the marinade a little bit better I would say I'm at limited confidence about the sauce I'm garnishing with white onion and cilantro okay so this is it this is the last chance this is the dish I'm gonna serve to Alex I'm brief the stage of this exercise where I just need to know what's going on I need answers all right I'm giving myself a C on this this is this is a really tough one that they're all tough in different ways this one oh wow I feel like I just didn't understand the concept from the beginning it's really a mix of two different sets of flavors that like ultimately combine to make this thing okay I would like to introduce you to Roy Choi's carne asada tacos with salsa verde do you see very joy behind that what you pretty much visual nails what I felt best about of everything oh man I would love to know the ingredient list first off visual I mean you pretty much nailed it right salsa verde color wise looks pretty close onions chopped the same way cilantro up top double tortilla I need a little refresher yeah on what this thing's app all right Chris I'm going in for your taco let's do it texturally it's all there consistency of sauce same the big flavor and here that's jumping out to me though is like citrus peel of orange and lime orange lime zest and juice yeah I could read some of the chilli thing happening with the steak it made sense but the peel ya know for the chilli - there was the duh it was the double dose so you had the ancho chili powder yep and then fresh jalapeno then on the sweetness level this is where it really like the Roy Choi element comes in sweetness here yeah he uses mirin and this is absolutely wild to me he uses Kiwi but when I read the recipe I was like Chris is going to hate this there's Kiwi there's also sugar straight up which sugar is it a good pinch white sugar great you got the salt got salt I got ancho chili yes but you got to be right oh yeah there's beer in this okay what kind of steak did you use skirt steak check got it how did you prepare this cursing so I marinated it I drained it salted it and I ultimately grilled it you made the right call yeah grilled in the recipe cool yeah okay sauce so there is a ton going on in this all right shallot garlic basil cilantro and then I was here for the or maybe I've observed from afar the avocado situation yeah you were correct to put it in really there is avocado in this so there is charred tomatillo and there's also this is like a little it seems a little atypical to me in Roy's sauce there's a mint so like he's really going for the kitchen sink yeah herbs then again going back to the mirror there's mirin in here as well raw uncooked mirin yep suspect okay so you're talking about the fat content the creaminess yeah the creaminess just like not greasy but there was like a fatty is if anything quality canola and olive oil in Roy sauce okay and this is like maybe I'm gonna burn most out of left field toasted sesame seed which could explain like [Music] alright Chris I think I need to I need to break this down get this of course okay yeah it's time to talk numbers lessard numbers starting with ingredients yeah I will say this was an incredibly hard list a lot of nuances story so many things from a numbers standpoint the things you hit I'm gonna tell you right now it's not looking good it's gonna be like a 68 okay tough yep yeah okay on taste you're probably about a solid beat okay so I'll give you one say I'll give you an 87 oh okay all right all right all right I think you did you didn't I can rely on the flavor technique we're gonna go all right we're gonna go in 86 okay appearance Chris I mean like you know my eyes you know the appear come on gotten a puzzle makers yeah boom and I do want to say this I don't know if we're in the market for extra credit uh-huh I heard there was some pretty impressive acrobatics oh yeah throwing things major style points if I had to like try to make up for my deficit somehow so I'm you know I'm a lenient professor I'm gonna give you an extra five points Oh based on style oh yes okay so we're gonna give you an 84 plus five bonus points all right 989 Wow this is not where I expect it to be at the end of the day today I know tittering the list I think you killed it all right all right I'll definitely take this one okay thank you Oh gorgeous pleasure and all right down cool all right wow what a journey I feel like a few things definitely went my way today and and I and I'll definitely take it I feel like I really trusted in the flavors on this one if you're not like truly tasting it like maybe it's better just leave it out so this is huge for me to just like trust myself to just like let flavor be the guide was the approximate location from the of the tortilla shot I'm trying to like make sure I get give you the right amount of extra credit here so I think I was here right all right get it hold that bear to say to the center of the pan about center of the pan what are we rocking I've got eight feet let's call it eight feet six inches it's not nothing it's not nothing and what are we talking with the steak the steak where was I guys was I like here here blender blender oh I don't know I feel like I was like oh I was like this guy I'm here okay also the thing about this shot in particular there's a fire element a little bit more danger oh the more open flame so now we've got eight feet three inches both over eight feet yes pressure distance to beat on the hanger steak toss is 8 feet 3 inches why is Roy you're gonna come in and try to beat me Roy's not getting that [Music]

Channel: Bon Appétit

Views: 2,556,874

Rating: 4.955833 out of 5

Keywords: chris, cooking challenge, carne asada, chris morocco, chris makes, reverse engineering, chris bon appetit, chris reverse engineering, chris test kitchen, blind cooking, blindfood cooking, blindfold cooking challenge, taste testing, roi choi, carne asada taco, roi choi carne asada taco, chris carne asada, recreating, recreate, tacos bon appetit, bling cooking, make carne asada, making carne asada, how to carne asada, how to make carne asada, food, bon appetit

Id: qom3PQTLTr8

Length: 34min 24sec (2064 seconds)

Published: Tue Jan 28 2020