Ingredients
The following ingredients have 7 Servings
- 5 large cloves garlic
- roughly chopped
- 2 cups mayonnaise (480 ml)
- 2 tablespoons capers
- drained in brine
- 1 ½ tablespoons caper brine
- Juice of 1 medium lemon (2 to 3 tablespoons)
- 1 cup parsley (32 g)
- loosely packed
- roughly chopped
- tough stems removed
- 1 cup dill (24 g)
- loosely packed
- roughly chopped
- tough stems removed
- Freshly ground pepper
- 2 cups all-purpose flour (250 g)
- 1 teaspoon salt
- ½ heaping teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
- Tapatio or another red hot sauce
- 2 ½ cups cold seltzer or sparkling water (600 ml)
- 2 quarts vegetable oil (2L)
- 3 large purple onions
Instruction
- For the Special Sauce, combine the garlic, mayonnaise, capers, brine and lemon juice in a blender or food processor
- Zap to roughly blend
- Add the herbs to the bowl with the rest of the ingredients
- Zap for a second or two
- Now add ludicrous amounts of black pepper and zap it all until it's all totally smooth and creamy, pausing occasionally to wipe down the sides of the bowl with a spatula so that you get it all in there
- The end result should be somewhere between a dressing and a dip
- Taste for salt, adding more capers or caper brine if needed, or pepper or lemon juice, etc
- (Sauce will keep in the refrigerator for 4 to 5 days
- ) For the Purple Onion Rings, whisk together the flour, salt and black pepper in a large bowl
- Like the Special Sauce, this also has to be mad peppery
- I just grind until the top looks like black snow
- Now hit it with about 3 tablespoons of hot sauce, then whisk in that seltzer
- (You don't want to add flat water, because the bubbles make the batter airier and crispier
- ) Whisk until you have no lumps and it looks like a pancake-ish batter — when you move the whisk through the batter, you should see ribbons
- Whisk in a little more hot sauce until the batter is a nice light pink, like the color of Russian dressing
- You won't taste the heat so much, but the rings will fry up a nice golden brown
- Put the batter in the refrigerator for 15 minutes to let it settle a little bit, then line a baking sheet or a plate with paper towels
- Fill a Dutch oven or stockpot with the oil just a little more than halfway up the sides of the pot
- Heat the oil over high heat until the oil begins to shimmer
- It should be around 400 °F (205 °C) if you have a thermometer, but otherwise you can tell when it is ready because of the shimmer
- While the oil heats, cut the onions into ½-inch (12–mm) thick slices, making sure to separate the rings
- It's better to make them a little bigger than a little smaller
- When the oil is hot, dip a few of the rings in the batter with tongs, flipping them once or twice so that they're fully covered
- Shake off the excess and then add them to the hot oil just 2 to 3 at a time so they have lots of room to swim
- Flip them with a clean fork when they just begin to turn brown — this should only take a minute or two
- Let them cook for another minute or two, until the other side is golden brown, then remove to the paper towels
- Repeat, adjusting the heat of your oil as necessary
- Don't let it get too hot or too cool
- But since you're only making a few at a time, you're good either way
- Serve these piled high with a side of Special Sauce
- Obviously, the cook should keep the Special Sauce nearby the stove and just eat these as they're ready
- From Action Bronson's book, F*** That's Delicious