Chef Jenny Dorsey

Weird Combinations is back this week with MOREL, WHITE CHOCOLATE and DILL. It know it sounds gross, but when made into a sauce with dashi, garlic & shallot it pairs beautifully with crustaceans. So far I’ve tried crab, lobster * langoustine — I think it would also work with prawns & crawfish. I first experimented with this on Chopped because my episode was chocolate themed. (See my Girlboss essay for a recap of that day.) I think this trio works because the earthy/musty note

Privilege: Pt. 1: Wealth What determines “value”? This is something I’ve touched upon before, so I wanted this dish to approach the topic with a different angle: the relationship between value and privilege. I’ve been thinking a lot of how each of us measure value in relation to something’s usefulness to us, but often don't recognize that inherent subjectivity when judging others. This dish is an expression of the duality of value: it’s a local radish, poached in wagyu fat

Pantry Engineering Pt. 4 is the final installment (for now), and is all about spices! As I mentioned in my post in this series, I find the most useful way to sort spices is by organizing them by top, middle and base notes. I think of top notes as the aromas and flavors that will hit your nostrils and tastebuds first — they are typically very bright, juicy, occasionally tart — and stay at the top of your senses while eating the entire dish. I find top notes are often underutil

Kicking off Weird Combinations with the pairing of OCTOPUS and BLACKBERRY. This dish was a result of me testing out a theory that similarly colored foods often taste good together, and seeing how successful this pairing was certainly motivated me keep digging. There’s some really fascinating research on what makes for good flavor at a molecular level — I mentioned in my Pantry Engineering post on umami agents how combining a variety of amino acids and nucleotides make for gr

It’s been very telling to observe how diversity, equity, inclusion (DEI) initiatives are faring in the current climate. So far, I’ve received a lot of responses from companies explaining their diversity programming is on pause because they have shifted to mitigating business risk and "ensuring the safety & well-being” of all their workforce. In a very shallow interpretation of “diversity” this appears to make sense, because many of the DEI programs put in place are about tole

Pt. 3 of Pantry Engineering series is all about salts, sweeteners and pepper. These are the building blocks of everything we make, and each contribute much more than just saltiness or sweetness. Flavor layering is the act of combining salt and sugar (and, in more complex scenarios, sourness, bitterness and umami) in a finished dish so that stimulates our tastebuds, appetite and brains to want and crave more — these are 2 most addictive flavors for our body because we’re biolo

I gave my very first TEDx this March, at the first ever TEDxIVC in Santa Ana, California. My talk was 15 minutes long, titled "How Food Can Be A Source of Identity, Intimacy and Vulnerability". The full transcript is below, full video can be watched here: https://vimeo.com/406992087 “Food brings us together.” We’ve all heard this. I will go as far to say this may be the most contrived statement we hear about food. The problem is, its emotional appeal has become all but meanin

I’m a huge advocate for organ meat because it utilizes the whole animal AND provides economical, highly nutritious protein. Especially in our current climate where our supply chains are awry (more on that in my Stories), it's a good idea to learn how to integrate these cuts into your repertoire. Below are general suggestions on how to process common offals, but I encourage you to experiment. Feel free to DM me on Instagram (@chefjennydorsey) me if you have q's on cooking time