The Art of Making Fried Cornbread Nuggets: A Journey with Chef Eric

Aromatics play a crucial role in many recipes, and when it comes to making Fried Cornbread Nuggets, they are essential wet ingredients. We're going to focus on adding these aromatics to our batter without overmixing or developing too much gluten. The main wet phase of our recipe is buttermilk and eggs, which will serve as the binder. When we mix them with dry ingredients, we need to minimize handling to prevent gluten from developing. Instead, we want a purposefully lumpy texture that allows us to maintain control over the final product.

To begin, we'll whisk together our wet ingredients until they're well combined. This is an important step in creating a smooth batter that will hold our cornbread nuggets together perfectly. Next, we'll add our tasso ham, sliced scallion greens, and shredded cheddar cheese to the mixture. The tasso ham works beautifully with the hush puppies, adding a savory element that complements the sweetness of the cornbread. We want to mix everything together until it's evenly distributed, but we don't want to overdo it – just enough to create a cohesive batter.

Now it's time to add our dry ingredients. This is where patience comes in – we don't want to overmix the batter, or we risk developing too much gluten and ending up with dense, tough cornbread nuggets. Instead, we'll mix everything together in batches, adding the dry ingredients gradually as we go. We want to allow the starches and flour to hydrate slowly, rather than rushing through the process and risking a dense final product.

With our batter ready, it's time to fry our hush puppies. The oil is heated to 350 degrees Fahrenheit, the perfect temperature for achieving that crispy exterior and fluffy interior we all love. We'll use an ice cream scooper to portion out our batter, but to get that perfect spherical shape, we'll need a little trick – dipping the scoop in hot oil before adding it to the pan.

As we fry our hush puppies, we want to keep an eye on them to ensure they're cooking evenly. We can use a thermometer to check for doneness – anything above 195 degrees Fahrenheit means our nuggets are cooked through and ready to be devoured. While waiting for our nuggets to cook, we'll season them with salt while they're still hot. This allows the salt to dissolve instantly, infusing our hush puppies with that perfect balance of crispy and salty.

Finally, it's time to taste the fruits of our labor – Fried Cornbread Nuggets with a drizzle of Apple honey and a sprinkle of scallions. The combination is pure magic: sweet, savory, and utterly addictive. When we serve our hush puppies at the restaurant, we know that each bite will be a culinary delight. And for home cooks looking to try something new, these Fried Cornbread Nuggets are the perfect recipe to start with – a delicious fusion of flavors and textures that's sure to impress.

As we sit down to enjoy our Fried Cornbread Nuggets, it's clear that Chef Eric has outdone himself once again. The nuggets are perfectly crispy on the outside and fluffy on the inside, with just the right amount of sweetness from the Apple honey. And the tasso ham? Absolutely divine. It adds a depth of flavor that elevates the entire dish to new heights.

For us, Fried Cornbread Nuggets are more than just a recipe – they're an experience. They evoke memories of special occasions and warm, comforting moments with loved ones. And when we share them with others, we know that we're sharing something truly special. So go ahead, give these Fried Cornbread Nuggets a try, and taste the magic for yourself.

Eric's full recipe for Fried Chicken, Dirty Fried Rice, and many other mouth-watering dishes can be found on his website at chefsteps.com. Be sure to subscribe to our channel for more cooking tutorials, recipes, and tips from Chef Eric himself – and don't forget to check out his YouTube channel for a full episode of making Fried Cornbread Nuggets!

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enwe're here with Chef Eric Wong of pecking house in New York and today we're busting out the cornballer and we're making his cheddar tat Hush Puppies yes starting with your Apple honey no Bees involved no bees bees that live on an apple orchard it's made from apple cider light delicate crispy cornbread nuggets with a touch of sweetness smokiness and saber from the ham those are all the indicators of quality there what's not to love it sounds great what's get into it okay so we're making apple honey a lot of people think this is honey that comes from bees that live in apple orchards that is incorrect this is honey made from unpasturized apple cider and that is a key detail uh it has to be fresh pressed unpasturized apple cider you want as much pectin in there as possible we're combining fresh press apple cider unpasteurized with sugar and we reduce it by about 50 to 60% and then it will have the consistency and texture of honey so it's a vegan honey and it's quite lovely and very delicious a very simple technique to do at home so give it a try okay going to mix up our beautifully fresh pressed apple cider here put it in our pot and then combine it with sugar and then we're going to bring it to a simmer and then we need to be constantly stirring just until it brings to a simmer just so you don't get any sticking or burning any sugar on the sides and then once this come with simmer you keep it to about a medium so that it's slowly simmering away and then we reduce it down and you're going to see that the sugar is going to clarify everything it's going to add a lot of viscosity along with the pectin and it's going to behave just like honey we simmering you know this is where you want to keep it at you want to be constantly cleaning up the edges here with a lovely rubber spatula a low simmer can't bring you can't boil it too hard it will bubble over on you because of all the pectins and good stuff in there but reducing it slowly via simmering is going to get you the right Clarity the right consistency and it's going to have better control so we're just about there going to turn this down let the bubbles to theide and then we're going to season it with lemon juice uh adding a little bit of acidity will prevent it from just being one-dimensionally sweet and then you're looking for something that eventually will be the consistency of Honey at room temperature uh obviously now that it's hot it flows quite readily it's quite thin but I assure you once it cools down it will have the consistency that you would normally find in a good old bear-shaped squeeze bottle of honey we'll give it a little taste but just so you'll see it almost has the consistency of maple syrup it's tasty all right so we're at the mixing stage we're going to keep our dry ingredients together and our wet ingredients together so all our dry ingredients here we have cornmeal AP flour sugar salt baking powder and black pepper the black pepper is a really nice addition and it will go very well with all the ham and all other alium aromatics later going to mix it together Boop and Boop we're going to mix everything together make sure uh it's mixed now so we can minimize the handling later then we're going to put the dry into the wet ingredients all right so now we're going to mix our wet ingredients together for our purposes ham cheese scallions all these aromatics that we're adding in uh they are wet ingredients if you will but the obviously main wet phase is buttermilk and eggs those are going to serve as the binder and then when we mix them with the dry ingredients we're going to try to minimize the handling it needs to be purposefully a little lumpy uh you don't want to develop too much gluten make it too uh resilient and bouncy there's a fine balance to be struck uh but first we just need to mix these all together whis that up together first all right then we'll add our tasso ham works really well with the hush puppies and sliced Scallon greens and then uh just some really nicely shredded cheddar cheese just kind of mix that in see everything's even then we're going to add our dry ingredients you don't want to over mix this you can just add it in batches and then fold things as we go again you don't want to develop too much gluten anything you just want all the starches and the flour to hydrate once basically everything's Incorporated you don't see any more dry cornmeal or dry flour you are good to go all right so we are going to fry our Hush Puppies our batter is ready our oil is up to Temp 350 and then we're just going to use handy dandy ice cream scooper what can help is giving it a little dip in the hot oil this will help keep your scooper clean and allow your hush puppies to be more spherical it's pretty straightforward we're just going to scoop this is a 2 O scoop dry into the oil don't do too many at a time but you can probably do some routine five and six and we're going to let them dry up tease them off the bottom a little bit all right so the O puppies might take a minute to start floating but once they do float uh you'll notice that some of the surface like half of them will be out of the oil like a little bobber so just keep turning them spinning them as you go so you get nice even Browning and cooking all the way around okay we're looking golden brown and delicious here okay uh if you want to make extra sure we can use a little instant the read thermometer here anything over 195f is going to mean we are cooked on the inside and then uh as with all fried foods you want to season them while they are hot uh that way the salt will dissolve readily and season all your beautiful fried food with Crispy salty goodness we're here we got we got the hush puppies Hush Puppies fried cornbread nuggets is that what I mean who fried cornbread nuggets I think that's the best way to describe it everything has to be fried all things fried at our restaurant but yes they're fried cornbread nuggets tasso ham scallion cheese and we're going to drizzle the Apple honey over it with what we learned is called it a honey wand honey wand this is a honey wand it's a honey wand I want to like rip One open look at that look at that moist cornbread nugget would you like some honey from my honey W do I want some honey honey wand drizzle me oh yes that looks so good there we go cheers cheers to cornbread nuggets pretty crispy it's still light though it's not it's not dense or anything the little morsels of taso give you that like nice salty pop love the scallion in there m Cheddar's there but it's not you know your face or anything and uh really ties the rim together this is great man yeah I think you know everything works there you can add as much honey as you want but I think a light drizzle kind of brings the party together without being too dominant but yeah I mean mainly forward it is Savory but with hints of sweetness there I mean I feel like that Apple honey too for the you know Thanksgiving time if you're making just regular cornbread and you're not doing cornbread nuggets with some some butter and that Apple honey that would be pretty oh yeah is that what you do at the restaurant yes we serve it on cornbread that sounds yeah not cornbread nuggets we're we haven't cornbread nuggets is a special that will never appear or maybe someday maybe we'll see you one day Eric thank you so much I can't wait to eat all 15 of these hush puppies by myself off to the side here go to chefsteps.com to get Eric's full recipe plus his Fried Chicken his dirty fried rice so much good stuff to check out and yeah let's eat some Hush Puppy let's do it all right I think it's a very nice visual subscribe to our Channel and visit chefsteps.com for more tips recipes guides and tools to help you level up in the kitchenwe're here with Chef Eric Wong of pecking house in New York and today we're busting out the cornballer and we're making his cheddar tat Hush Puppies yes starting with your Apple honey no Bees involved no bees bees that live on an apple orchard it's made from apple cider light delicate crispy cornbread nuggets with a touch of sweetness smokiness and saber from the ham those are all the indicators of quality there what's not to love it sounds great what's get into it okay so we're making apple honey a lot of people think this is honey that comes from bees that live in apple orchards that is incorrect this is honey made from unpasturized apple cider and that is a key detail uh it has to be fresh pressed unpasturized apple cider you want as much pectin in there as possible we're combining fresh press apple cider unpasteurized with sugar and we reduce it by about 50 to 60% and then it will have the consistency and texture of honey so it's a vegan honey and it's quite lovely and very delicious a very simple technique to do at home so give it a try okay going to mix up our beautifully fresh pressed apple cider here put it in our pot and then combine it with sugar and then we're going to bring it to a simmer and then we need to be constantly stirring just until it brings to a simmer just so you don't get any sticking or burning any sugar on the sides and then once this come with simmer you keep it to about a medium so that it's slowly simmering away and then we reduce it down and you're going to see that the sugar is going to clarify everything it's going to add a lot of viscosity along with the pectin and it's going to behave just like honey we simmering you know this is where you want to keep it at you want to be constantly cleaning up the edges here with a lovely rubber spatula a low simmer can't bring you can't boil it too hard it will bubble over on you because of all the pectins and good stuff in there but reducing it slowly via simmering is going to get you the right Clarity the right consistency and it's going to have better control so we're just about there going to turn this down let the bubbles to theide and then we're going to season it with lemon juice uh adding a little bit of acidity will prevent it from just being one-dimensionally sweet and then you're looking for something that eventually will be the consistency of Honey at room temperature uh obviously now that it's hot it flows quite readily it's quite thin but I assure you once it cools down it will have the consistency that you would normally find in a good old bear-shaped squeeze bottle of honey we'll give it a little taste but just so you'll see it almost has the consistency of maple syrup it's tasty all right so we're at the mixing stage we're going to keep our dry ingredients together and our wet ingredients together so all our dry ingredients here we have cornmeal AP flour sugar salt baking powder and black pepper the black pepper is a really nice addition and it will go very well with all the ham and all other alium aromatics later going to mix it together Boop and Boop we're going to mix everything together make sure uh it's mixed now so we can minimize the handling later then we're going to put the dry into the wet ingredients all right so now we're going to mix our wet ingredients together for our purposes ham cheese scallions all these aromatics that we're adding in uh they are wet ingredients if you will but the obviously main wet phase is buttermilk and eggs those are going to serve as the binder and then when we mix them with the dry ingredients we're going to try to minimize the handling it needs to be purposefully a little lumpy uh you don't want to develop too much gluten make it too uh resilient and bouncy there's a fine balance to be struck uh but first we just need to mix these all together whis that up together first all right then we'll add our tasso ham works really well with the hush puppies and sliced Scallon greens and then uh just some really nicely shredded cheddar cheese just kind of mix that in see everything's even then we're going to add our dry ingredients you don't want to over mix this you can just add it in batches and then fold things as we go again you don't want to develop too much gluten anything you just want all the starches and the flour to hydrate once basically everything's Incorporated you don't see any more dry cornmeal or dry flour you are good to go all right so we are going to fry our Hush Puppies our batter is ready our oil is up to Temp 350 and then we're just going to use handy dandy ice cream scooper what can help is giving it a little dip in the hot oil this will help keep your scooper clean and allow your hush puppies to be more spherical it's pretty straightforward we're just going to scoop this is a 2 O scoop dry into the oil don't do too many at a time but you can probably do some routine five and six and we're going to let them dry up tease them off the bottom a little bit all right so the O puppies might take a minute to start floating but once they do float uh you'll notice that some of the surface like half of them will be out of the oil like a little bobber so just keep turning them spinning them as you go so you get nice even Browning and cooking all the way around okay we're looking golden brown and delicious here okay uh if you want to make extra sure we can use a little instant the read thermometer here anything over 195f is going to mean we are cooked on the inside and then uh as with all fried foods you want to season them while they are hot uh that way the salt will dissolve readily and season all your beautiful fried food with Crispy salty goodness we're here we got we got the hush puppies Hush Puppies fried cornbread nuggets is that what I mean who fried cornbread nuggets I think that's the best way to describe it everything has to be fried all things fried at our restaurant but yes they're fried cornbread nuggets tasso ham scallion cheese and we're going to drizzle the Apple honey over it with what we learned is called it a honey wand honey wand this is a honey wand it's a honey wand I want to like rip One open look at that look at that moist cornbread nugget would you like some honey from my honey W do I want some honey honey wand drizzle me oh yes that looks so good there we go cheers cheers to cornbread nuggets pretty crispy it's still light though it's not it's not dense or anything the little morsels of taso give you that like nice salty pop love the scallion in there m Cheddar's there but it's not you know your face or anything and uh really ties the rim together this is great man yeah I think you know everything works there you can add as much honey as you want but I think a light drizzle kind of brings the party together without being too dominant but yeah I mean mainly forward it is Savory but with hints of sweetness there I mean I feel like that Apple honey too for the you know Thanksgiving time if you're making just regular cornbread and you're not doing cornbread nuggets with some some butter and that Apple honey that would be pretty oh yeah is that what you do at the restaurant yes we serve it on cornbread that sounds yeah not cornbread nuggets we're we haven't cornbread nuggets is a special that will never appear or maybe someday maybe we'll see you one day Eric thank you so much I can't wait to eat all 15 of these hush puppies by myself off to the side here go to chefsteps.com to get Eric's full recipe plus his Fried Chicken his dirty fried rice so much good stuff to check out and yeah let's eat some Hush Puppy let's do it all right I think it's a very nice visual subscribe to our Channel and visit chefsteps.com for more tips recipes guides and tools to help you level up in the kitchen\n"