Table Talk: Aria + Deviled Eggs + Peruvian Quinoa Salad
Apr. 9 — Happy Tuesday! And welcome to the table!
Growing up, my mother taught me and my sister to eat slowly and savor our food. Meals tended to last 45 minutes to an hour, giving our busy family a chance to relax together and talk. It was my favorite time of the day. I still heed my mother’s advice and am almost always the slowest eater at the table.
⏱️ Recent studies show that eating a meal in less than 20 minutes might lead to health risks, including swallowing too much air, which causes stomach bloating, and not properly chewing your food, prompting bouts of indigestion.
“It takes about 20 minutes for the stomach to communicate to the brain via a whole host of hormonal signals that it’s full,” Leslie Heinberg of the Center for Behavioral Health at the Cleveland Clinic told the Associated Press. “So when people eat rapidly, they can miss these signals, and it’s very easy to eat beyond the point of fullness.”
🍽️ I guess my mother was on to something!
Today’s edition of “Family Meal” features some fun facts from my recent interview with Chef Gerry Klaskala of Aria, like the restaurant’s most ordered dishes and the number of bottles in its famous wine cellar.
For “The Move,” I tell you where to find one of my favorite grain-based salads in Atlanta. And with Easter only a couple of weeks away, I’m sharing Sweet Auburn BBQ’s recipe for its popular deviled eggs.
Cheers!
🍸 Beth
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Aria Interview Outtakes and Fun Facts
🙏 By now, you’ve read the news that Aria chef and owner Gerry Klaskala plans to retire from the restaurant industry after 55 years in the business. Longtime general manager Andrés Loaiza will take over ownership of the Buckhead fine dining institution. But Klaskala will stick around until Loaiza hires a new head chef to help ease the transition. In his retirement, however, Klaskala will return to painting and drawing.
Klaskala and Loaiza discussed a lot during our 45-minute interview. So, I’m sharing a few fun facts and outtakes that didn’t make it into the story.
🤝 The Regulars
Since opening in 2000, Klaskala and Loaiza said some Aria regulars have dined at the restaurant well over 300 times. One gentleman has dined at Aria 250 times over the last 25 years, almost always ordering the braised short rib as his entree.
🥩 Short rib fact
On the menu since day one, Aria has served over a quarter million pounds of short ribs.
🍷 The deep wine list
Aria keeps 1,700 bottles of wine stocked in the cellar, ranging from reasonably priced $39 vintages to baller bottles at a staggering $3,100 a pop.
😮 27 years at a 25-year-old restaurant
While Loaiza has been with Aria for 18 years, he’s not the restaurant’s most senior employee. That title goes to server Kim Huyhn. “When we bought the restaurant, he came with us! He’s on the lease,” Klaskala joked.
Huyhn worked at the previous restaurant and wanted to continue working at the East Paces Ferry location, becoming Aria’s first hire in 1998, two years before it officially opened in Buckhead.
🦆 Most popular dishes
Beyond the short rib, the honey-spiced glazed duck breast and herb-crusted lemon sole are two of the most ordered dishes at Aria. Last Thursday, the duck accounted for 20 percent of the entree sales that night.
🤗 The ethos behind Aria’s menu
“I look for ideas that stick. Meaning, these kinds of dishes you create become part of you and not part of a litany of ideas without staying power,” Klaskala said. “We try to make dishes that grab your attention but make you want to come back and try it again.”
“I don’t want you to stop thinking about that dish. This is homestyle cooking. I’ve always felt like it’s about creating memories for people when they eat. You’re just the caretaker of their dish,” he continued.
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The Move: Tio’s Salad at Tio Lucho’s
🥗 The Tio’s Salad at Peruvian restaurant Tio Lucho’s in Poncey-Highland may not seem like a standout on the menu, especially when competing against more traditional dishes like lomo saltado, causa, and ceviche. But don’t underestimate Chef Arnaldo Castillo, who always finds a clever way to marry the flavors and ingredients of his native Peru with those of the American South.
Nothing on the Tio Lucho’s menu is an afterthought, and nowhere is that more evident than with the quinoa-based Tio’s Salad ($18).
🌶️ A hearty salad arrives layered with colors and textures from puffy granules of red quinoa, crunchy corn nut kernels, feta cheese, apple slivers, leafy greens and herbs, and chunks of tomato. Tiny aji dulce peppers burst with a mildly sweet and smoky heat.
Castillo tosses the jumble of ingredients in a rocoto vinaigrette. Frequently used to make salsas and sauces, the flavor of the deceptively spicy Peruvian rocoto pepper is lusciously fresh and delicately fruity and necessary to bring this salad alive. For extra protein, add grilled chicken ($8).
Sweet Auburn BBQ’s Deviled Eggs Recipe
Today, I’m bringing you Sweet Auburn BBQ’s recipe for deviled eggs, a recipe that gives this Southern food staple a little zing and zest from bacon, green onion stems, apple cider vinegar, and Dijon mustard.
🧐 But did you know the origins of the deviled egg trace back to ancient Rome and not the South? Before the deviled egg became synonymous with Southern church functions, backyard cookouts, and summer luncheons, a Roman variation saw fragrant pine nut sauce poured over boiled eggs on a platter served like a canapé at the start of a meal.
By the 13th century, these egg canapés had evolved into something akin to present-day deviled eggs. A recipe from the Andalusian region of modern southern Spain called for mashed egg yolks mixed with cilantro, ginger, cloves, cinnamon, salt and pepper, and fish sauce stuffed into the cavities of halved egg whites and fastened together with a small stick or sprig of fresh oregano. Known as “stuffed eggs,” recipes from the 15th century included raisins, cheese, and even more herbs in the yolk mash. Filled egg white halves were then bound together with butter or fused by frying in oil.
😈 🥚The British would coin the term “deviled” in the 18th century, used to describe heavily seasoned or spicy foods. The name stuck and traveled to the U.S., with the first American recipe referencing deviled eggs published in 1877 in the “Montgomery Advertiser.” Nearly 20 years later, an 1896 recipe for deviled eggs appeared in “The Boston Cooking-School Cookbook” by Fannie Farmer, adding mayonnaise to the seasoned yolk mixture and thus creating one of the South’s most popular picnic foods.
Check out the recipe for Sweet Auburn BBQ’s deviled eggs below.
Yields 16 halves with a shelf life of two days
Ingredients
- 9 hard-boiled eggs
- 1 1⁄2 Tbsp green onion stems, diced
- 1 Tbsp celery, diced
- 1/2 Tbsp chopped parsley
- 1/2 Tbsp lemon juice
- 1/2 tsp apple cider vinegar
- 1/4 tsp paprika
- 1/2 tsp Dijon mustard
- 1/4 cup of mayo
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1/4 tsp pepper
Garnish
- 1/4 bacon pieces
- 1/4 cup sliced green onions
Directions
Refrigerate for no more than two days.
Cut hard-boiled eggs into halves. Remove the yolks and place in a food processor.
Put egg whites in a deviled egg tray and add the extra halves to the food processor.
Add remaining ingredients, except bacon and sliced green onions, to the food processor and puree until the mixture is smooth.
Place yolk mixture into a piping bag and evenly distribute into halved egg whites in the tray.
Garnish with bacon pieces and finely sliced green onions.
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The post ➕ Interview outtakes: Aria appeared first on Rough Draft Atlanta.
