Here at the blog offices located in downtown Houston (we don't have an office) we ourselves must eat from time to time. When that time comes we eat fried oyster po' boys. Lsmoke and myself found ourselves in this situation last week. Below are the results.
(not a real place)
Since we were making "poor boy" sandwiches, I used a "poor boy" phone camera. Its a blackberry, and not an Iphone. I bought it at an Amish fair in Grandview, Texas. Terrific woodwork.
Anyway, let's talk about this sandwich. I think Robert Goddard, the father of American Rocketry, would agree that "the devil is in the details". You gotta know that when rockets are involved. You just GOT TO.
(Dr. Robert Goddard, the Father of American Rocketry)
And if the devil is in the details, then, the trickiest part of a really good sandwich is in coordinating all of the peripheral items that make up that sandwich. Pretty much all of the sandwich parts that are not the meat.
What's in a po' boy sandwich anyway? Well let's start with the bread. Traditionally you want a piece of French bread, so that's what we used. Its has the right texture and chewiness for the job. The loaf we got had a little too much bread in the middle, so we split a big piece of the bread and removed the excess uhh bread. Bread Bread Bread Bread!
Furthermore, it needed to be toasted correctly. To do this we melted a teaspoon of butter in a shot glass, and spread it on the bread, placed it under the broiler for about 2 minutes and removed it.
Next are the vegetables. According to Sophocles, the father of Greek drama, vegetables make up around 62% of a sandwich, so you'll want to use quality items here.
(Sophocles, the father of Greek drama,)
We used butter lettuce, heirloom tomatoes, Texas grown sweet red onions, and bread and butter pickles, placed on the bread in that order.
The other major player in the po' boy sandwich universe is the dressing. (Some do not use dressing here, and we understand this). We chose to use a homemade chipotle mayonnaise. Its very easy to make. You take an egg yolk, add a pinch of salt, sugar, and dried mustard, add a dash of vinegar and lemon juice, and whisk thoroughly. When it looks creamy, slowly add in a cup of corn or saffron oil. You need to whisk your ass off during this process, and/or use a mixer. I suggest watching an internet tutorial before attempting, but its really very easy. And that's it. Next I added a tablespoon of ground chipotles from Pendrey's and let it all sit in the fridge for an hour or two. The chipotle powder rehydrates and blossoms as it sits. We slathered this delicious concoction on the Upper side of our toasted bread.
Finally, the oysters. As always, the fresher the better. (Which means central market in this City). Not much to it. We bought a pound. First, you let them soak in milk and an egg for about 20 minutes. As you wait, in another bowl combine corn meal, salt and cayenne pepper. Put a healthy amount of vegetable oil in a cast iron skillet, bring it to temperature (we fried at 370) and fry em up.
Video!
At this point, and we are adamant about this, you really want the oysters to go from the fryer to the sandwich in under a minute or two. A quick stop in some paper towels to lose the excess oil, but then directly onto the preassembled sandwich. The heat of the oysters plays an important role here. Anyway, load that sandwich up with oysters, fold the bread over and give it a good press.
(My lordy ) (so delicious its blurred)
Anyway the hot oysters mix with the smokey dressing and the quality crisp vegetables, all wrapped in the chewy bread. Great sandwich, and it only took 2 hours from thinking of it in my bed, to putting it in my mouth.
Thanks for reading everyone! More to come soon. There is a rumor that a special magic meatsmith is in town and may be selling a very special meat which will be featured on the blog. Lets just say its "fit for a king".
-Smokehopper
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