The Chef Show Season 1, Episode 6: Aaron Franklin review

Tips for Home Cooks:

• When carving a brisket, you need to remove the fat in clean layers.
• Don’t throw away the parts of the brisket that can’t be cooked on the barbecue; use it to make sausage, burgers, chilli, or stew.
• Lean meats don’t absorb flavour the way fatty meats do. If your meat doesn’t have much fat on it, you may need to add more seasoning.
• For a barbecue, it is best to use kosher salt instead of regular salt as the rougher granules will help the brisket cook better than salt that smooths down its surface.
• To find out whether your meat is cooked in the barbecue, tap it with your knuckles. If the bark (the hard crust) cracks, that means its on its way to being done. If it still feels spongy, it has a way to go.

Final Thoughts

There was more history in this episode of The Chef Show than there was in the previous episode, but it was definitely fascinating watching the many steps of making a good barbecue. The care and precision shown by both Franklin and his protégé Favreau was mesmerising. They clearly demonstrated a love for their product with their knife skills.

Unlike in most of this season of The Chef Show, there wasn’t nearly enough of Choi in this episode, which was unfortunate. As a fellow chef, his thoughts on the barbecue process, particularly regarding carving up the brisket, would have been appreciated, but alas, he barely said a word and we are left to ponder what he was thinking.

An enjoyable episode nonetheless, even if there wasn’t nearly enough cooking as we would have liked.

The Chef Show is streaming on Netflix internationally.