Tri-tip is an easy, inexpensive cut of meat to prepare. It is typically 1.5-2.5 pounds and is from the bottom sirloin. The tri-tip is full of flavor because of excellent marbling and very tender as long as you don’t overcook it. If you are going to take this steak beyond medium then you should probably marinate it. Below is an easy recipe…just in time for your Labor Day cookouts!

GRILLED MARINATED TRI-TIP ROAST WITH RED ONION COMPOTE

• 1 Whole Trimmed Tri-Tip roast
• 1 cup Basic Meat Marinade
• 1 cup Ginger People Ginger Hickory Sauce

RED ONION COMPOTE

• 4 medium red onions, peeled, halved and sliced
• 1 TBL olive oil
  1 TBL kosher salt
• 2 tsp fresh cracked black pepper
• 2 TBL Tomato paste
• 5 TBL Brown sugar
• 5 TBL red wine vinegar
• 1 TBL dry mustard
• 1 bottle of beer

1. Place tri-tip roast and marinade in bag and refrigerate overnight.
2. Heat oil in large saucepan. Add onions, salt and pepper and cook over medium heat until they just start to caramelize, approximately 8-10 minutes. Stir in tomato paste and cook another 3-5 minutes or until the onions are caramelized. Add brown sugar, vinegar, mustard, and beer to the onions. Reduce heat to low, place lid just off pan to create a small vent, and continue to simmer slowly, about 30 minutes or until mixture is cooked and has a thick, sauce-like consistency. Stir contents every 10 minutes to prevent sticking. Transfer to a bowl and cool to room temperature.
3. Clean and heat grill. Sear roast on all sides over high direct heat. Transfer to indirect heat with wood chips and cook approximately 45 minutes or until desired doneness. (We recommend medium rare.) Baste with Ginger Hicklury sauce the whole time on indirect heat, turning every five minutes or so.
4. Remove from grill, let rest about 10 minutes and then slice thin against the grain Serve with room temperature onion compote.

Have you ever had Posole Verde? At any time of year, it is delicious…and our MOST REQUESTED recipe! Here’s a little history of posole and the Cook’s Fresh Market Recipe follows. It makes A LOT so plan a party to serve it or share with your family and friends.

Mexican-style soups are light and full of fresh flavors. We serve it “straight up” here at CFM every Friday, but it’s also fun to top it with some of the traditional toppings of shredded cabbage, diced avocado, radishes, onions or cilantro. Also goes well with tortilla chips, tequila and a cold cerveza! Hope you enjoy it as much as we do!

Cook’s Fresh Market Posole Verde (Makes approx 3 gallons)

32 oz hominy
1 pig’s foot
1.25 gallons rich, homemade chicken stock
3 bay leaves
1 TBL Kosher salt
3 sprigs fresh thyme
1 tsp dried oregano

2 TBL Olive oil
3 oz bacon, diced fine
1 quart onion, diced
2 cups carrots, diced
2 cups celery, diced
1 cup poblano chile, diced
3 TBL minced garlic
4 TBL jalapeno chile, minced
2 guajillo chiles, toasted, soaked, pureed
1 TBL chile powder
1.5 TBL cumin ground

1.75 pounds roasted green chiles, skinned, seeded, diced (hatch or anaheim)
2.25 pounds chicken breast, diced fine or ground
2 quart rich homemade chicken stock
1 quart tomatillo puree (fresh roasted or canned)
2 cups diced tomato, canned
salt and pepper to taste
hot sauce to taste
1/4 cup fresh cilantro, chopped

Bring stock with hominy, pig’s foot, bay leaves, salt, thyme, oregano to a simmer. Cover and cook over leow heat until very tender and hominy is starting to split, approximately 2+ hours (dried hominy will take longer). Remove pig’s foot, remove meat, dice and add back to cooked hominy. Remove bay leaves and thyme sprigs.

Heat olive oil in soup pot; add bacon until cooked half way. Add onion, carrot, celery, and poblano. Partially cover and cook until vegetables are tender, stirring often.

Add garlic, jalapeño and cook one additional minute. Add guajillo puree, chile powder and cumin and cook one additional minute.

Add green chiles, ground chicken, stock, tomatillo and tomato. Bring to a simmer. Add cooked hominy with diced pig feet and broth. Simmer 45-60 minutes.

Adjust seasoning with salt, pepper, hot sauce and lime juice to taste. Finish with cilantro right before serving.

Serve with shredded lettuce and/or cooked cabbage, diced onion, limes, and fried corn tortillas on the side.

The bakery here at Cook’s Fresh Market is one of the first things you see when you come in to the market. Faces lights up and smiles abound when people see the whole cakes, tarts, pies and tortes, cookies, brownies and breakfast pastries. Truly a sweet tooth’s paradise! Would you like to meet our baker and pastry chef, Brian? Here you go….

Q: What’s your favorite dessert to eat? A: Brownies with ice cream.

Q: What’s your favorite dessert to make? A: Ice Cream! Flavor? Vanilla

Q:  Favorite beverage?  A:  Milk…oh, wait…really it’s freshly pureed and strained grape juice!

Q:  Dessert with milk, coffee, wine or another beer?  A:  Milk please!

Q: Did you have a career before you went to culinary school? A: Accounting and I hated sitting behind a desk all day. I went to the New England Culinary Institute and that’s where I met my mentor, Brent Kimbrough.

Q: Favorite baking ingredient:  A:  Honey

Q:  Favorite Cookbook:  The Flavor Bible, In the Sweet Kitchen, Hamelman’s Bread

Q:  Love or hate to “decorate” cakes?  A:  Don’t mind it at all

Q:  Biggest baking disaster?  A:  In culinary school someone put salt in the sugar bin and I used it to make a 30lb batch of butter cream.

Q:  Favorite thing to cook at home?  Vodka penne with a piece of fried chicken on the side.

Q:  Favorite thing to cook for a date?  Chicken Fra Diablo or Marsala.

Personal Info:  Single, 2 yellow labs named Ranger and Caspian, astrological sign is Cancer

There are four basic food groups: milk chocolate, dark chocolate, white chocolate and chocolate truffles. -Anonymous

That being said, we will explore some of the different brands of chocolates we carry in the market. We have lots to choose from so we hope to see you soon for your favorites!

BISSINGER’S This company has been making chocolates in St. Louis since 1927, but originally they started in 17th century Paris. They have three chocolate shops in St. Louis with one being a “chocolate lounge” featuring confections, desserts, savories, wine and gourmet coffee. Currently we carry their Caramels and Chocolate Covered Cherries.

VOSGES These are some sexy chocolates! Katrina Markoff personally chooses every spice, flower and chocolate that is flown into our Chicago kitchens. The infusions of rare spices and flowers combined with premium chocolate give a delicate balance of flavor, leaving you with a layered and lingering sensation of spice and chocolate, a true haut-chocolat experience. On the back of each box she explains how to enjoy an exotic candy bar: Breathe, See, Smell, Snap, Taste, Sense…aaaahhhhhhh! Currently we carry the Black Pearl Bar (wasabi, ginger, black sesame seeds), the Woolloomoolloo Bar (macadamia nuts, coconut, hemp seeds), Naga Bar (curry powder, coconut flakes), and the FAMOUS Bacon Bar.

CHOCOLOVE These are sooo sweet they even come with a love poem inside! Choose from Raspberries in Dark Chocolate, Toffee and Almonds in Milk Chocolate, Orange Peel in Dark Chocolate or Decadent Dark Chocolate.

CHOCOLATE SANTANDER The only single origin chocolate produced in Colombia and one of South America’s most special takes its name from the State of Santander, Eastern Colombia. The privileged terrains of the Andean mountains of Yariguies, yields Colombia’s best cacao known by its exquisite and delicate flavor. We carry 36% cacao milk chocolate, 53% cacao semi-dark, 65% cacao dark, and 70% dark.

VALRHONA Chocolate from France. We carry the Les Grands Crus line, flawless and perfect for melting or baking.