Barbuzzo on philly.com and Foobooz

We've had a few mentions on philly.com and foobooz recently while everyone anticipates our opening! Check out what they've been saying...

from philly.com:
from July 29th: Looking Forward to Debut of Barbuzzo
from August 24th: Restaurant Notes: Barbuzzo Gets Close;...
from August 30th: Of Popcorn, Pickles, and Pasta: Barbuzzo's Menu

And read the latest on Barbuzzo from foobooz here.

What's for Dinner?

Soon (as in just days from now) Barbuzzo will be open and serving up awesome Mediterranean-inspired dishes! You can check out what's on the menu by going to barbuzzo.com (the dinner menu is up and the rest will follow soon!) We can't wait for you to try it all--and you'll definitely want to try it all!

We're Almost There!

Barbuzzo is only a week away from opening and everyone is busy with final details and finishing touches! It's all coming together, but opening a restaurant is still stressful! Marcie might be feelin' the stress a little (see drawing), but she'll pull through...she always does!

Barbuzzo Piggy Popcorn & Bacon!

We love pigs a whole lot, no surprise there...We have been cooking our way through all kinds of piggy parts, all from the awesome farmers at Green Meadow Farms. This week alone we have started to cure jowls for Guanicale, fat back for Lardo, and a couple bellies for Pancetta and Bacon. The pig’s skin gets an awesome treatment in the dehydrator and deep fryer to make our pork rinds!

We have been going smoker crazy and some bellies just came out of cure this week, so we decided to do the obvious. Our house smoked bacon is so good it hurts. I feel that it will just keep getting better each time. It is very cool to slow roast bacon until it gets nice and tender and caramelized, (see the picture above). This might end up in a couple pasta specials once we get going!

The pork rinds are way too addicting. They are a simple and really delicious way to utilize something that could just be discarded when we are cleaning up pork belly. We are still putting the last touches on them but are sure they will be perfect soon!

House Smoked Chourico

We have all been smoking a lot at Barbuzzo…..a lot of food that is. Our favorite by far has been a fresh pork sausage called Portuguese chouriço. It is similar to Chorizo but made a little different by adding piri piri chilis and a lot of lemon zest.

The sausage is made with our farmer’s pork, fat, wine and spices. Once it is stuffed we let it hang overnight to develop the flavors a bit more, then we cold smoke it in The Big Chief for about 45 minutes. The result is so delicious I have been cut off from letting people try it, in fear there will be none for the opening.

Our chourico will be featured on the menu in a couple different places:
Migas are awesome bread crumbs that get toasted in the fat rendered from the chourico. We use some sliced garlic and olive oil as well, we are all getting fat from snacking.

Another dish will use the chourico to flavor a rich broth used to cook fideo, cockles, octopus, and other deliciousness. We are hard at work on it!

This weekend Chris got to make 50 pounds of the chourico, here are some pictures of the fun!

Who Ate Roger Rabbit?

We did, and he was delicious!

It's always really exciting to get in whole animals and these little guys are no exception.
 We will be using them in two places on the menu:

A mixed rabbit grill, that will use the saddle, leg and thigh. They will get a marinade of house preserved lemon, extra virgin olive oil, garlic, parsley and a little mint. They cook super fast and stay juicy and awesome…simple food mmm.


All of the other parts are going to be house smoked, braised, pulled and used to fill our empanadas. We added sherry soaked raisins, olives and pepitas. On the plate will be our tomato-ginger marmalata and a valdeon espuma.


The goal is always to waste nothing, so it's a fun challenge for us in the kitchen to come up with creative ways to do so. It’s about respect for the animal and the chance to make something from nothing. 
As you can tell from the photo we are having tons of fun and can't wait for everyone to come join us in a couple of weeks!


Pasta?

We have been patiently awaiting the arrival of our awesome pasta machine from Italy. Really, patiently waiting.  So, when it was delivered this week we couldn’t have been happier. That is until we realized the six brass dies that shape the pastas were missing. This is what we call crunch time, with our opening very close we can’t help but wonder…. Where are they? Every day the question gets a little more urgent, and we all lose a little more sleep.

The good news is once they arrive we are going to make the most delicious pastas we can, all in-house! So far the favorite has been our “Sunday supper pork ragu”. It starts with Barbuzzo bacon, pork shoulder, and trotters (all from our farmer!), San Marzano tomatoes and simmers lazily for up to four hours. The sauce becomes rich with porky goodness, then we shred the shoulder meat and toss it with our Paccheri, top it with cheese and call it a day. See you all soon!

We're Smokin' at Barbuzzo...

 

We have been going crazy with charcuterie for the past month getting ready for the opening. So far we have done house-made and either smoked, dry cured, aged, or fresh sausages.
All of our piggy parts are coming to us right from Green Meadow farms in Gap, Pa. It is the best, most delicious pork we have ever worked with!
Highlights include:
-Tuscan salami w/ orange and fennel (dry cured)
-Spanish chorizo (dry cured)
-soppressata w/ sumac and coriander (dry cured)
-barbuzzo pancetta
-lomo rubbed with espelette chili and cacao nib
-Portuguese chourico (aged)
-catalan fresh sausage w/ raisins and pine nuts

We are excited to start feeding everyone!