(bright upbeat music) - [Announcer] This program was made possible by contributions to your PBS Station from viewers like you.

Thank you.

(bright upbeat music) - Hello, I'm Melinda Keifer, your host for "Live Green Tennessee."

Thank you for joining me in the kitchen today.

We've got a lot of great things planned for you, ways that you can explore and create a beautiful bounty for your family and friends.

We're gonna have Dr. Carl Owens in, with Carl's collards, a great recipe and so many things I've learned from Carl.

We're also gonna have Yadira and Ellie Alanis and they're gonna be sharing their dessert empanadas with us.

I cannot wait to fix my butternut squash soup.

We're gonna prepare a bacon wrap tenderloin that I know you're gonna love, so stick around, we have a lot of great tips, we have a beautiful feast to share with you.

(bright upbeat music) Okay friends, welcome to my kitchen, and what a treat for all of us.

I'm joined by Dr. Carl Owens, one of my favorite, favorite people in the whole world, but more importantly, a fellow foodie.

Thank you for being here Carl, we're gonna have a great time.

- I'm happy to be in your kitchen.

- Okay, so today we're gonna start with our first recipe.

You know how it is in the holidays, gets kinda cold, everybody needs a little something.

And even if you don't do this for a holiday meal, this is a really good soup.

We're gonna do butternut squash soup.

So this is a butternut squash.

And so what you're gonna do is cut it, peel it and seed it.

So we've done that already.

So we're gonna set the oven at 350.

We're gonna brush the inside, every bit of this, and I'm just using a canola oil.

You could probably do olive oil.

By doing this you really get some good kinda texture.

And Carl, as I go through here and brush this, if you wanna start salting and peppering.

That's all the seasonings you need to roast the vegetables.

Once we get these finished, this is gonna go in the oven for about an hour.

And then we really start to develop those extra flavors.

All right, stay tuned, we're gonna get this ready for the oven and we'll be back in just a minute.

Okay Carl we're at the stove, finally.

- Yes.

- We got that butternut squash in the oven.

You ready to help me make this soup?

- I'm ready.

- From your least favorite vegetables?

- I'm ready.

- Okay, here we go.

Well, you know that the mirepoix, the things you got to have for a base of just about all of it.

So I've got a little butter in here right now, about four tablespoons and a little olive oil.

- Yes.

- Right, okay.

Any tips you have for me, please share along the way.

- Wonderful.

- We're gonna do our onions, our carrots and our celery.

So if you wanna add those in.

We're using about a cup and a half of onions.

We like onions in our family so the more, the better.

Um, about a half a cup of celery, half a cup of onions.

We're gonna let that get going.

There's some garlic we're gonna put in there as well and gotta have the garlic right?

All right, if you'd stir that around.

We're gonna turn on that heat up a little bit.

And I'ma salt and pepper for you here.

So we've had a full day in the kitchen already, haven't we?

- And it's been fun.

- It has been fun.

I've had the best time.

I had a couple of other great recipes coming so I'm super excited about that.

Oh, isn't that smell amazing?

- That's the joy of cooking.

- That is the joy of cooking.

Okay, so we're gonna let that simmer at a good steady pace for about 10 minutes.

- Sounds like fun.

- Okay.

(upbeat music) So I'm gonna check on our veggies.

Look at that.

They're getting so nice and soft, okay?

So I think we're making progress.

What do you think?

- I think they're there.

- Okay, we're about ready for that.

All right next we're gonna move on to the next step with this maple garlic sage bacon wrapped tenderloin.

So if you'll chop up some sage for me and do it fairly thinly.

We're gonna get it good and small.

And we're gonna make this into a paste we're going to put in that tenderloin.

So this is maple syrup.

And of course, again, some garlic.

We super love our garlic in everything we do.

So yeah, when you get that chopped up we're going to add all of this into this maple syrup.

And then we're going to take this and we're going to just slather it all over that tenderloin.

All right, this is going to get ready.

We're going to get that butternut squash, get our pork ready to slather with all the beauty.

All right, we'll see what happens next.

All right my fellow chef, this looks really good.

- It smells really good.

- I think we're there.

- Yes.

All right, so what we're going to do next is put in the chicken broth.

And so I have to tell you all it is is just a passion of mine.

Chicken broth is something that I make at home.

We eat a lot of chicken.

Um, we'll get a whole chicken and boil it and I'll make my own broth.

Freeze it so that I can pull it out whenever I need.

All right, so we've got the broth in there and then here's what comes next.

All right.

I am fixing to blow your mind with a squash recipe.

So this roasted squash, if you can see, is absolutely gorgeous.

It has all those beautiful flavors built in and just letting it sit in the oven and get that roasted effect is gonna be incredible.

- [Carl] And how long did we leave it in the oven?

- [Melinda] It was an hour.

- [Carl] An hour?

- [Melinda] Yeah.

All right, We're going to get this in here.

We're going to let this boil just for a little bit.

And then we're going to get out the best quick tool in the kitchen.

Talk about a tip, get you an immersion blender.

All right, Carl, we're getting there with this butternut squash.

I just needed everything to kind of marry a minute, right?

Okay.

To this, I'm going add a teaspoon of coriander and a teaspoon of cumin.

Again, it's that warm spice thing we're kind of after here.

All right.

Here's what we're going to do here.

Best gadget there is to have, this is an immersion blender.

You can do this in a food processor.

You can do it in your regular blender, but what we're going to do is try to puree all of those flavors and this will finally be the soup.

(blender whirring) Wow.

Okay.

We're starting to simmer.

- Yes.

- We're going to add two tablespoons of honey.

And we're so blessed to live in a region where local honey is abundant, if you will.

We'll let that simmer for, I don't know, 15, 20 minutes.

- [Carl] Okay.

Sounds good.

- Okay.

Carl, we're about ready.

Um, again, the longer stuff cooks the better those flavors go together.

So I've got about a cup of heavy cream.

We're going to put in here.

Then for us, we're not super hot spicy people, but in things like this, that really are a palette that'll take on any flavor, We like just to little kick on the back end.

So I always add just a little bit of cayenne pepper.

- [Carl] Love that.

- [Melinda] Just to give it a little extra boost.

Okay.

Are you ready?

- Yes.

- Got your spoon.

- Okay, yes.

- All right, we're gonna ladle up some of this beautiful soup.

Okay.

Now here's how we like to serve, with just a drizzle of olive oil.

Right?

Just to give it that extra what.

One of my next favorite spices, smoked paprika.

So just a little sprinkle of that and you are set and ready to go.

All I need is some crusty bread for you, right?

- That is not my mother squash.

- Thank you.

- Wow.

- I'm so happy you like it.

I hope you like it too.

This recipe, along with all the others from our show today, we'll be in the WCT website.

Yay!

My friend likes my dish.

- Yum.

- Yay!

(laughter) - Yum.

(uplifting music) - Well Melinda, it's my turn.

- It is your turn.

- [Carl] Carl's collards.

- [Melinda] I am so excited.

So I've always heard the, I don't know if it's a folklore or whatever, but their best right after the first frost.

- That is correct.

- Isn't that interesting.

That is correct?

Okay.

- And there's a reason there because one of the things, as we prepare these, one of the first things that you want to do is you want to remove the stem.

Now this is just in our family.

We've never had the stem.

And I want you to hear, after I tear like a second one and remove the stem.

- [Melinda] I can hear.

- [Carl] You can hear.

- [Melinda] You can hear.

- [Carl] That they should sound crunchy.

- [Melinda] That's right.

That's right.

- [Carl] Sort of crunchy.

- [Melinda] That's right.

That means they have a lot of body to them.

And they're going to hold that.

Alright, you want me to dice this onion?

- [Carl] Yes, why don't you begin to slice.

- [Melinda] Okay, so I'm gonna do this.

This is going to go in your collards as well.

Right?

Okay.

- Now the next step is to make certain with collards, you really want them to be clean.

- Absolutely.

- So we're gonna wash these a couple of times after they're, I'm going to actually tear them into small little pieces.

- And that's a whole nother thing.

We'll give you a tip on a lot of people cut their collards.

I know I have multiple times, but especially when you're doing a collard, which is a little bit more of a heavy leafy green, tearing them is just so much better.

It gives extra texture.

I know that sounds silly, but it really does.

- So Melinda, it's time mow.

We're gonna parboil these and that is just getting them prepped and just soften the greens.

So we'll go ahead and just put them in the pot.

And this is with, with no seasoning.

It's just the greens.

- Okay, just straight water.

So it's a true parboil?

- That's correct.

And they've been thoroughly washed.

- That is great.

I'm learning so many things from you.

- And we will leave these now for to boil with the lid on, for about three or four minutes.

- Okay.

Look at the change in this color already.

- [Carl] Oh, yes.

- [Melinda] Isn't that amazing?

- [Carl] So, after parboiling the collards are now drained.

And so what we've done is we have a little butter in the bottom of our pan.

I'm gonna add a little olive oil.

- [Melinda] All right, you say when.

Just a good circle.

- [Carl] That's perfect.

- We've got this chopped onion.

- Now we're ready for the chicken stock.

- Okay.

So we're going to look at, what, six cups about.

- Sure.

- [Melinda] So we're going to pour that in.

We're going to turn our heat up a little bit so we can get this liquid going.

There's the rest.

See, look at that color.

That is just beautiful.

All right, we're going to let this boil, and then we're going to bring those collard greens back over here.

- [Carl] So we've parboiled and we prepared our onions.

- [Melinda] Onions and chicken broth.

Right?

So we're just starting with the simples and here's where the beauty happens.

- So now we'll go ahead and put our collards in and we'll want this on a nice rolling boil.

- [Melinda] Yes, sir.

- [Carl] And we made certain that we got most of the stems out and- - [Melinda] Here, I can take this.

There's your spoon.

- And then we wanna just sort of stir.

And if you'll add our ingredients, let's go ahead and add the course ground pepper.

- All right, so this is ground pepper, different than like what their pepper mill, you know, most pepper mills will have a setting on it.

You can go.

But this is when the Karl buys that is really has a beautiful flavor.

- The ingredients will be you'll, you'll see them.

- Yeah.

We'll put them on, we'll put them on the website.

The recipe will be on here.

Okay, that's gonna be delightful.

- And then next, our roasted garlic.

- Okay, that's beautiful.

Excellent.

- [Carl] And, uh, red pepper.

- [Melinda] Okay.

Red pepper flakes.

And again, these are great because they give it a little bit of spice, but they don't bite you.

- Right.

- Right.

- [Carl] And then I typically use sea salt.

- Okay.

We gotta have a little sea salt.

Yeah.

And do this to taste every, you know, usually greens need a lot of salt and then, okay.

this is interesting.

- Yeah.

Look, the little magic ingredient that we've always used and that's hot sauce, Louisiana hot sauce.

- Louisiana hot sauce.

- It has to be Louisiana hot sauce.

- So go ahead and add that.

- [Melinda] That is delightful.

That also puts a little tinge of a vinegar base in there because that's typically the base for most hot sauces.

Okay, now I know you have the one ingredient that sets this pot into its total ready for eating.

- [Carl] Yes.

So one of the things I've discovered along the way, of course, we always typically had bacon and we always had the bacon drippings.

- [Melinda] See, that's amazing.

- [Carl] So we're going to add the ingredient.

- So other, you know, things you could see done with these collards is a lot of people will use a ham hock.

You know, that's their family tradition.

I've kind of done it both ways, but, but this is absolutely gorgeous.

- And this has all the flavor without the hock, so.

- [Melinda] That's right.

That's right.

All right, Carl, how long are we gonna let these cook?

So typically how long do you.

- What we do, what we've done, we typically bring them to a boil and I do medium, medium boil.

- Sure.

- For about an hour.

- Okay, so we got about an hour for this to simmer.

And then, I cannot wait to taste these collards.

Carl's collards.

- Well, we're in about an hour now.

And along the way, we sort of, you know, add a little more seasoning to bring the flavor out.

One of the things we've always done is to add a little vinegar or sometimes people have pepper sauce.

We add pepper.

And this cruet is my great grandmother's.

So this little guy is over a hundred years old.

And so I wanted to make certain that as you have, Carl's collards that you have a little, bring a little bit of my family, from my house to yours.

- That is beautiful.

So y'all this, this is what family and friends is all about.

Sharing those experiences over food.

Okay.

I cannot wait.

Well, I have a little surprise for you too.

- [Carl] Okay, yes.

- [Melinda] Right, here goes this vinegar.

Cannot wait.

This cruet is beautiful.

It's so heavy.

And they don't make them like this anymore, Carl.

- [Carl] You can find them in antique shops but not like that.

- [Melinda] Okay, so I made some deviled eggs.

- Yes.

- You know, I have my own chickens, so we have five girls.

So these eggs were laid yesterday.

So I wanted to make sure if you're one of those families that enjoys deviled eggs and vinegar with your great collards that we had some of that too.

Oh, I cannot wait.

You can have an egg.

Okay, there's nothing like fresh collards and fresh eggs.

- Wow.

- Carl, that is incredible.

Just enough heat but that Applewood is insane.

It's a whole different flavor.

- Makes it or breaks it.

- In these collards, that is amazing.

And I love the onions.

Golly.

I am so blessed.

- And that would be Carl's collards.

- Carl's collards.

Yum.

You should try them at home.

Impress your friends and family.

Cause I'm super impressed.

- Oh yes.

(uplifting music) - Okay, now it is time for us to work on our incredible dessert for a holiday spread that we're doing here on Live Green Tennessee, It's my incredible joy to bring into my kitchen.

Yadira and Ellie Alanis.

They are here to share with us their recipe for dessert empanadas.

And today, Miss Yadira is gonna show you how to put those together.

The cool part about this is when I think of empanadas, I think of a very long and timely thing.

This is a quick recipe, isn't it?

- Yes.

- Very much so.

So we're going to share those tips with you now.

Okay, so the dough that Yadira has brought with us is a little bit of a sweet dough.

And if you'll notice she's flowering her pad there with confectioner sugar.

So, you know, right off the bat, that it is truly going to be a great day.

Now, Ellie, there's a secret ingredient in this dough too.

I know that makes it extra special.

And what is that?

- Cola.

- It is Cola.

So think about that.

It's got the carbonation in there.

It's got some great syrupy flavors.

So that's truly going to make this empanada cool.

Right?

- Yes.

- All the way around.

So we have pineapple with us today, but talk to me about this empanada in your family.

How fun is it to see your mom doing this here?

- Well, I mean, it is very fun and yeah, it's very nice to, you know, have a family dessert and especially in fall and the winter time.

It's very nice to know, eat them with coffee or anything like that.

- How yummy.

Absolutely.

So we're using a cup to cut the circles out.

We also have a cutter here too.

So it's a tip, whatever's available and whatever's easier for you to use will be great.

So as we're cutting out our empanada rounds, we're going to make sure we spray this sheet so everything stays nice and moist as we put them in there.

So we're working with pineapple here.

Is that a family favorite filling?

- I'm pretty sure my dad prefers caramel.

- Okay, so there you go.

But pineapple is just a great filling and it gives you that citrus flavor.

And I noticed we got, what about a tablespoon, maybe a filling in there.

And I know there's a reason for that.

- Yes.

You have to put a considerable amount in the empanadas because well, if you put too much, you put them in the oven, they'll explode it and you don't want exploded empanadas.

- You don't because then all the filling's on the tray and not inside your pastry.

- It's also good not to have too little either, just the right amount.

- It's the right amount that takes practice.

Doesn't it?

I'm sure it does.

If you noticed Yadira is also pinching that dough, that way it will keep all of her filling in there.

It'll get nice and warm and cooked as we go through the process.

Ellie, Yadira was sharing with us earlier, empanadas from where she came from and then coming to Cookeville and trying to, to be able to have those traditional items.

And so where did she take it from there?

- Um, well, she, you know, she really missed them.

And since, you know, it was kind of hard to just go back to Mexico and stuff, she decided, she said, you know what, I'm going to do it myself.

Look for a recipe and make them myself.

And now.

- She's an expert.

Absolutely.

Yadira and Ellie shared their empanadas with people in town.

And so we'll have her recipe on the website so that everybody can share as well.

And for me, it's, it's new because I typically think of empanadas as savory.

Yeah.

And, and so to, to, to go on this sweet dessert path is really something exciting.

I'm super excited.

(mellow country music) Okay, we're putting the finishing touches on these beautiful pineapple empanadas.

We're going to, she's putting beautiful cinnamon sugar on there and it just puts a whole, look at this.

It puts an incredible little crispy sugary coat on everything.

And so she has perfected every single bit of this process and we cannot wait to take a bite of this.

We're super excited.

So Ellie, talk to me about your favorite holiday tradition in your family.

- Singing, dancing, just getting together with the family and you know, having a good time and just spending it together.

- Spending it together.

It's kinda special, isn't it?

- Yeah - Yeah.

It's been really special having you here.

- Thank you so much.

- And I'm wishing you and your family a very, very happy holidays.

Now, is it okay if I try one?

- Sure, go ahead.

- This is amazing.

They're still warm.

That dough, I mean, you can taste the Cola.

You can taste that rich dark syrupy.

The cinnamon is phenomenal.

You've made my holidays.

This is delightful.

I'm so glad you've been here.

- Thank you.

- Pineapple empanadas.

And the recipe will be on the WCT website.

- Mommy, high-five.

- Happy holiday.

- Thank you.

Okay.

Carl, I'm ready to kind of deal with this pork tenderloin and you know, the pork can dry out.

So if you've got fat on there, obviously you want to leave that, but here's, here's where you kind of get mistaken.

That's not fat right there.

That is known as silver skin and if you leave it on any pork, you know, specifically a pork loin or a pork tenderloin that is very, very tough and you cannot eat it.

And so what you want to do is take a very sharp knife and just peel that silver skin away.

It will come off fairly easily.

And then when we get ready to put this incredible maple sage garlic on there, every bit of that flavor is going to go right down into this pork.

Okay, we got this ready.

So we'll, we're gonna get us a pan and start the magic.

(mellow country music) Carl, we have taken the silver skin off of this pork tenderloin and know usually they come in packages of two, we're going to start with one at a time, just so we get it.

In this bowl, I've put together some chopped sage, right?

You chopped that for me, put the garlic and then that's maple syrup in there.

So I've laid out as many pieces of bacon as I think it's going to take, right, to cover my loin.

So my hands are already dirty.

So I'm going to put this right here.

And then I'm going to ask you to spoon that on there.

Now that's enough for two, again, we'll have the recipe quantities for you on the website, but that no salt, no pepper necessarily.

You're going to get lots of salt flavor from that bacon, as you go through a little pepper would be good if you want to put that on there, but you can see that just really gives it a great, just a nice little coating on there, right.

- And the aroma from this, it's you know, very pleasant.

- You know, if you can get a good quality maple syrup that makes all the difference in the world.

All right.

So you and I are gonna kind of try to do this together.

So typically what I do is do just a little angle wrap, right?

So yeah, kind of point it down a little bit and that way they overlap.

Pull one down this way and one down that way.

So you can see that kind of cross a little bit.

So typically I'm gonna take these, I'm going to put this on a wire rack.

So that, that way the bacon kind of gets done all the way around.

And then about halfway through, I'm going to start basting it.

- Okay.

- I'm going to baste it with maple syrup and cider vinegar.

On top of this bacon.

And so what that's going to do is that vinegar makes it really shiny and beautiful.

- So, no toothpicks to hold it in place?

- You don't need to.

It's amazing just like that.

So we're going to take this, transfer it.

We're going to get that in the oven.

Typical, I'd do pork to about 140.

So you're going to look at maybe anywhere from 20 to 30 minutes, depending on how big your tenderloin is.

All right.

I'm going to go get this in the oven, okay.

- Okay, great.

(mellow country music) - Okay, so I've always been told you eat with your eyes first.

- Oh yes.

And trust me.

- What do you think?

- Looks lovely.

Wonderful.

- Okay.

So we've let this cook about 40 minutes.

It's a good size.

So we have, you know, they come in packs of two, so there's one, but here's what we're going to have to do is I'm going to have to slice a couple of pieces so that you can taste.

Look at that.

Look at that.

It is so Tinder, Carl, look at that juice running out of there.

Isn't that beautiful?

- [Carl] It is.

- [Melinda] And that is a cool part about pork too, is that you're going to get that smoke ring.

Isn't that pretty?

Even though you didn't put any smoke on it.

Okay, Carl.

It sliced beautifully.

I'm super excited.

So I want you to taste it and see what you think.

Of course, all I can think about is how great this is going to be with Carl's collards.

I cannot wait.

- Oh, the blend of the garlic and the sage.

- Very good.

So something kind of new and different.

And again, all those fall flavors, you could take this pork tenderloin in a million different directions.

In a million different regions of the country and of the south.

That's the beauty of food, isn't it?

Yeah.

And I got you with your mouth full.

I'm so happy.

Yay.

- And I'm looking forward to the entire meal.

- I know.

We have beautiful butternut squash soup.

We have Carl's collards.

Have a delightful bacon wrapped pork loin and incredible dessert empanadas.

- Yes.

- Yeah.

We hope you've enjoyed, you know, looking at recipes in a different way possibly.

From a different part of the country or different region or in a new way.

- And I've learned a lot here today.

- I have learned so much from you too and, of course, when you're a self professed foodie, you think you know.

- Oh, no.

- Great tips.

- Thank you for inviting me.

- I've enjoyed it so much.

- Lovely, lovely time together.

- Let's get our meal ready.

- Yes.

- What a great time we've had in the kitchen today.

I so want to thank my guest chefs and fellow foodies of the Upper Cumberland, Dr. Carl Owens and Yadira and Ellie Alanis.

It was such a treat to have them in here and to learn something new, even if it's an older recipe that you do in a new and different way.

I encourage you to explore spices and cultures in your holiday kitchen this year.

Once again, thanks for watching Live Green Tennessee.

(mellow country music) - This program was made possible by contributions to your PBS station from viewers like you.

Thank you.