Joining us for this week's installment of our TODAY Food Loves Football series is chef, YouTube personality and author Andrew Rea (aka Babish). He's cooking up a few of his favorite sporty snack recipes from his cookbook, "Basics with Babish: Recipes for Screwing Up, Trying Again, and Hitting It Out of the Park": crispy chicken quesadillas and melty cheesesteak pinwheels.
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Steak pinwheels are, more often than not, a gimmick perpetrated on the innocent grocery shopping public by impostor butchers, the same insidious forces responsible for prepackaged burgers stuffed with onions, and salmon loosely coated in soggy breadcrumbs and Buffalo sauce under plastic wrap. When, however, you load up the carnivorous jelly roll with cheesesteak-like ingredients (or the fillings of your choice), the results are as novel as they are delicious. The best outcome is the result of quality grill understanding and control, from temperature to placement, so that the delicious contents sear and seal shut without dripping out into the raging flames below. The method being exercised to this end is known as indirect grilling, wherein only half the grill is heated to apex, the other a thermally ambivalent, oven-like holding area, where the charred steaks can finish coming up to user desired doneness without burning. Understanding this concept is key to enjoying the full potential of your grill, no matter the fuel source, so this recipe stands as a test with real-time feedback in the form of cheese dripping tragically out of your once delicious pinwheels.
Quesadillas are like grilled cheese — both in that they are two layers of carbohydrates with melted cheese in the center, and that they are oftentimes some of the first snacks we learn to whip up in the kitchen. Also, like grilled cheese, while even their worst iterations are still pretty good, a little attention to detail can create the difference between a midnight snack and something you might order from your favorite Tex-Mex spot. So, while these might seem fussy for a stoned Saturday, your efforts may very well be rewarded with takeout that's better than takeout. Briefly marinating and quickly pan-frying (or grilling) chicken breast means that it enters its cheesy tomb juicy and flavorful, and frying the resultant turnovers in high-heat vegetable oil gives them a uniquely crisp exterior.
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