(upbeat music) - [Announcer] This is a production of PBS Charlotte.

- [Announcer] The following episode of "Charlotte Cooks" is brought to you by Central Piedmont Community College, and viewers like you.

Thank you.

- Coming up on this episode of "Charlotte Cooks" we're smoking this brisket, and then we're turning it into burnt ends, and we're putting that with some creamy grits and red eye barbecue sauce.

Stay tuned.

(upbeat banjo music) Welcome to this edition of "Charlotte Cooks".

I'm real excited you're here today, because we're gonna do a really special dish.

We have Matt Barry here with us from Midwood Smokehouse, and we are gonna be doing a beautiful brisket that we're gonna be smoking, and then we're gonna take it, and we're gonna turn it into burnt ends.

We're gonna make some yummy creamy grits, and then Matt's gonna show us how to make a really outstanding red eye barbecue sauce with some cold brew coffee.

Let's get started.

Matt, welcome.

- Hi, thank you.

- Now Matt, you don't necessarily like to be called Chef, is that right?

- Yes ma'am, that's correct.

I learned how to smoke brisket, and meats for that matter, well before I learned how to cook.

I started in college, just kind of as a pastime, and kinda of became a career for me.

But I never went to culinary school, and sort of barbecue to be kinda blue collar, And I consider myself that way.

So Pitmaster suits me.

- When it comes to brisket, it's not just brisket that you learn by the seat of your pants.

You actually got an education in brisket.

- That's correct.

After some time of working with smokers, and brisket, and whatnot, I got the opportunity to go to barbecue school at Texas A&M, their Meat Science Department, and they have a brisket camp twice a year.

- That's fun, so you eat a lot of brisket when you're there.

- Absolutely.

- [Pamela] You learn a lot about brisket, don't you?

- You do, the science behind it.

There's a lot more than just a piece of meat, as you know.

- Well, why don't you show us this brisket?

And we gotta clean it up a little bit.

Tell us all about this brisket.

- Okay, so this brisket right here is a USDA Prime.

I like to use prime over choice.

It's just a better product.

And if you look at the brisket, you've got two parts.

You've got the flat, which runs this way, and it's the leaner piece of meat.

And then on top, you've got what we call the nose or the point.

And that's where we're actually gonna get our burnt ends from later on, once we finish prepping this guy.

So the first thing that I'm gonna do is flip her over, and you've got this deckle right here.

That's the hard fat that connects to the bone.

It's not something we want.

So we're gonna go ahead and just take that out, 'cause really that's gonna cook up, and you're not gonna do anything with it.

So also too, you've got some fat pockets down here on the bottom.

I kinda trim those off as well, 'cause really it's anything that you're not gonna eat, you don't really want on here.

And then you want to try to square it up as much as you can.

So right here, you can see, I just want to take that little corner, and cut it off right there.

And then I'm gonna flip it over.

And on this side, I'm trying to get a quarter inch of fat, much more fat than that, and you know, it's something you don't eat.

Like I said, if you're not gonna eat it, you don't want to have it on there.

The other thing that's really important, is trying to make the brisket as uniform as possible.

That way when it's cooking, the smoke and the heat is running over the brisket evenly, and it's cooking evenly, and you're not getting parts that are over cooked, or crispy ends.

So anyway, like I said, we're just gonna even this thing up, and then I've got this little guy up here.

We're gonna take that off.

And if you've got a grinder at home, you could actually use this and make a great sausage.

That's what we would do in the restaurant.

And you see me constantly kinda rubbing my hands over the brisket.

I'm kinda feeling, we got hard fat and soft fat.

Soft fat is good.

It's gonna melt like butter, and run into the meat.

The hard fat is like the deckle underneath that we took off, and it's really, we're not gonna eat that.

It's not gonna add anything to the brisket.

And you want to do small, short, concise cuts.

The longer cut you try to do, the more likely you're gonna take some of this fat off, and expose the brisket.

And that's what you definitely don't want.

You want fat covering the entire portion of the meat.

If you get a spot where you divot it out, you can take a piece of fat and kinda put it back on there to cover that divot up, but you definitely don't want that.. - So when you buy this piece of meat in the grocery store, are you buying it like this?

- More than likely, you're not.

More than likely you're getting just the flat with the fat cap on top, the point.

So I'm just gonna take this off right here, and you kinda want to have everything sloping down as well.

Like, see, I kinda took a little bit of fat off there.

so I'm gonna fix that by straightening it out, but you want it kinda sloping, and that way the grease runs out, and you don't get a pool of grease, that's gonna take some of your rub off.

And you see the rub.

You can see one of the things that really sticks out about it, is the course butcher grind, pepper.

That's a big deal for us.

It's something we started doing.

It adds just that extra bit of bite and oomph.

- [Pamela] It's a lot different than table grounds.

So you want to use that nice coarse ground pepper for that.

- And you'll be able to see it in the bark when you get this thing out, but you can see it.

Also too, they call it rub for a reason.

Don't just sprinkle it on there.

If they wanted you to do that, they would call it sprinkle.

- Right.

- So you want to get in there and get it rubbed in real good.

We're gonna get the bottom side too.

- [Pamela] Talk to him.

Tell him he's gonna taste so good.

- [Matt] You gotta form a relationship with your brisket.

- [Pamela] You do, you really do.

- And you're gonna make a mess.

Just go ahead and just acknowledge that.

But you want to get the sides real good.

Get this peer to peer, and that's gonna give you a nice dark bark.

And it's really tasty.

When you have this brisket, that pepper's really gonna stick out.

- Now, what else is in that rub?

- We've got a salt, like any rub, paprika, chili powder, a little bit of cayenne, just for a little bit of bite, but it's like your main three ingredients are gonna be your black pepper, your salt, and your paprika.

- All right, great.

That smells fabulous.

- So this thing's ready to go.

- So when we put our meat in the smoker, we're looking for a particular temperature, 225 degrees.

That's the temperature inside of the smoker.

And then we're gonna look for an internal temperature for the meat.

You're gonna search for about 190 degrees.

Now that's gonna be different on the meat that you're doing.

It's gonna be different according to how long it cooks.

- Yeah, how much fat, how strong the animal was or was not.

You don't know what this cow did when he was out in pasture.

Like 190's a good rule of thumb for a beginner to kinda find out where you're going.

When you see it, when we pull it out, when you pick it up, you want it to kinda settle in your hand.

- [Pamela] Ooh, okay.

- It's like a feeling you get.

I don't know how to describe it, but instead of like, just coming up, it settles down, and you can tell, you get the feeling in your head, you're like, "This is good to go."

- And it takes it awhile to get there, doesn't it?

It takes like, how long?

- It takes about 12 to 14 hours, and about half ways through the cook, you're gonna hit something they call the stall.

That's around 165 degrees, and it stays there for an hour or two.

And then it magically begins to go back up.

But that stall is caused by the heat on the inside coming out.

It's kind of hit a point where the internal temp of the meat is kinda consistent all the way through.

- [Pamela] What kinda wood do you use in the smoker, Matt?

- [Matt] I use all hickory wood.

- [Pamela] Ah, hickory, yeah.

- And you're gonna ask why.

There's a lot of hickory in North Carolina.

If you were to go to Texas, they use a lot of post oak a lot of mesquite, because it's what's native to the area.

It just wouldn't make sense to import wood, when you've got so much great hickory wood growing around here.

All right, so we've got this guy out of the smoker now, and you can see it's developed that nice dark bark that we're looking for.

That's like, when you do have barbecue competitions, that's like one of the first things that judge looks for, is how's the bark formed?

And you can see those cracked black pepper pieces on here have really like formed up nicely.

If I pick it up, you can see we've got that settle that I was talking about, that dent in there.

Now, for the most important part, and this is very underrated, but very important to me, is we're gonna let this rest for an hour or so, to let all those juices inside redistribute.

And that way, when we slice into it, it's not just losing all this moisture.

Everything comes together after a good rest.

- You just want to bite on it, but you gotta rest it yet for another hour, right.

- It's patience.

I mean, If you spent 14 hours cooking it, you can spend an hour letting it rest.

- Yeah, but we've got stuff to make while we're letting that rest, right.

- That's right, so we've got our cream and chicken stock over here, is coming to a simmer.

- Let's put it up to a boil.

- Yep, you want to always bring it up to a boil before you add your grits.

And now that it's up to a boil, we'll whisk these grits in, and then you're gonna bring it down, and you're gonna let it simmer for about 30 or 45 minutes until those grits are fully cooked, and all this.

Crazy, it looks very liquidy right now.

By the time it's done, it's gonna be good and thick.

- Do you stir it while it's simmering?

- [Matt] I occasionally will stir it while it's simmering.

- [Pamela] But you don't have to do it constantly.

- Not constantly.

Once it's all fully incorporated, we'll turn it down, and then we'll kinda give it a go.

- All right, well why don't we move that over here?

And then we'll get busy on the barbecue sauce.

- There we go.

- Here's a pot for your barbecue.

- Thank you.

- Now I'm gonna pass you your ingredients.

How about that?

- Awesome, so there's a bunch of different kinds of barbecue sauce.

You got your vinegar sauce, your tomato based sauce.

South Carolina, you've got your mustard based sauce.

This is kind of like a play on Kansas city.

It's like a sweeter sauce that we're gonna put on the burnt ends.

It's a catsup base, and this is just a pretty standard base for all barbecue sauces.

We can go straight into the pot with this too.

And then we're gonna do the same thing.

We're gonna bring it to a little simmer.

Turn this down a little bit, so I don't scorch it.

Next up, we've got some Worcestershire.

and then we're gonna add the molasses and the vinegar, and vinegar is a pretty standard in all barbecue sauces as well.

The molasses will add some sweetness.

One thing with barbecue sauce, they're trying to create a balance.

So for every sweet or acid, you've gotta add something to counteract it.

So we added that molasses in.

- There's the secret.

- And there's the secret.

This is the or cold brew coffee.

This definitely adds some really deep flavor to this, and it's really gonna go well with the heavy cream that's in the grits.

- Um-hum it will.

- That's all of our wet stuff.

We're gonna have our dry spices now.

We're gonna add brown sugar, got some salt, black pepper, which pretty much goes in every barbecue sauce.

- Salt and black pepper.

Now, when you get the recipes, we'll have the amounts for you, so you can know exactly how much you can use to make each one of these.

You're probably gonna ask for something I don't have in my hand.

- I got crushed red pepper.

No, we're good.

Crusher red pepper, a little bit of spice with some paprika.

- [Pamela] Now, do you use smoked paprika or sweet paprika?

- I just use sweet paprika.

With smoked paprika, it seems like it would make sense, but that's what we use for the rubs and stuff.

- But that's what we got on the unit here, you know.

So, why the extra smoke?

- You don't need that.

Some granulated garlic, and I just added dry English mustard to it.

- Ooh, yum, okay.

- We're gonna whisk all this together, and fully incorporate it.

And then we're gonna bring it up to a simmer, and let it cook for about 20, 30 minutes as well.

It's gonna thicken a little bit, and let everything kind of cook together.

- There's nothing like a good homemade barbecue sauce.

- And like I said, this is like a play, like Kansas City, where the burnt ends are actually from they use a sweeter sauce there.

This one is not quite as sweet with the coffee.

- It sounds really lovely, and I love the idea of putting coffee into a barbecue sauce, because a lot of times, it really just is nothing more than just really fabulous depth of flavor, isn't it?

- Yes, absolutely.

And then as it starts to to simmer you can kinda.

(sniffs) - I'm smelling this brisket here.

- You're right over top of it.

Which really, the coffee starts to come up.

- How are we gonna take this and make our burnt ends?

- Okay, so we'll grab the brisket.

It's nice and rested now.

And like I said before, we've got the point and the flat.

We're actually gonna take the flat off of this and put it aside.

We'll use that for cheese steak at the restaurant.

You can see those juices running out of there.

- Oh, that looks so good.

- And you can see you've got the smoke ring coming around.

I kinda damaged it when I cut it right there, but that's a good sign that it's got the smoke.

We'll cut this point this way, and that's where we're gonna get our burnt ends from.

And you can see right here, it's kinda marbled fat up in there, and you can see where the fats kinda caramelized around the top.

And that's a good sign that our brisket was cooked the way we want it to be.

So then we're gonna go ahead and cut this into blocks.

So we'll cut it like this.

Like I said, there you go.

It's almost like a brisket steak right right there.

- Oh man look at that.

- You can see all the juice coming off of it.

I'm gonna go ahead and cut this down.

- [Pamela] Look at that.

- And then we're gonna cut it into cubes.

And so at the restaurant, like I said, we'll take the flat, and we'll use that for cheese steak.

That's not gonna be as good for the burnt end, 'cause you see here that it doesn't have the same amount of fat as that part does.

- [Pamela] So you need the fat.

- Yes, 'cause when we're gonna double smoke these, without the fat, that's gonna dry out it's gonna get a little tough.

So all this fat in here is kinda what's protecting it during the double smoke.

- So when you do the double smoke, how long do you leave it in there for?

- We'll throw it in for another 30 minutes.

- Another 30 minutes.

- We're gonna re-rub it.

We're gonna take some of the brisket rub we had earlier, and then we're gonna add some of our rib rub from the restaurant as well, And we're gonna re-season it, and then we'll throw it back in on a wire rack for 30 minutes.

- [Pamela] Same temp?

- [Matt] Same temp, yes ma'am.

This is like melting in my hands, barely.

- [Pamela] It looks fabulous.

- All right, so we've got that.

I'm gonna grab my bowl, and I'm gonna throw these cubes in here.

Generally, about an inch by an inch is what you're looking for.

- [Pamela] Now, will that shrink much more going back in the second time?

- A little bit, but you've lost most of your shrinkage that you're gonna get.

It's already happened during the initial smoke.

So what I'm gonna do here, is I've got some of my rib rub.

We'll throw that on there.

And the rib rub's a little sweeter than the brisket rub.

- I was gonna ask, what's the difference between the rib and the brisket rub?

- There's not as much sugar in the brisket rub, because when you're cooking for 12, 14 hours, that sugar is all gonna burn, and it's gonna turn hard, and your bark's not gonna be as soft.

It's almost gonna be like leathery, and you don't want that.

This will add a little bit of sweetness to it.

And then we're just gonna add some of this brisket rub too, a little pinch.

And we're just gonna toss those around real quick.

Give 'em a nice coat.

Pass me that wire rack, please Pam.

- There you go.

Oh, that's gonna get lots of air around it while it's in that smoker.

- [Matt] There you go, yep, so we're gonna hit it from all sides.

- [Pamela] Oh, this is so amazing.

(chuckles) - That's gonna go back in the smoker for 30 minutes with this rub on there, and when we come back out, it should be like kind of crystallized on all sides of it.

- All right, so the grits are now starting to get thick.

They've been simmering for about 20 minutes, and we're gonna season 'em now.

What are you gonna you go to season them with Matt?

- Just a salt and pepper mix.

I do a three to one salt to pepper ratio.

We'll throw about two tablespoons into this recipe right here, and this just brings all the other flavors out.

- So now we're gonna put this and let this continue to simmer until they're nice and thick, and done.

And you could see the seasoning in them.

You could see the beautiful color that they got in there from the chicken stock.

Oh, it's gorgeous.

Grits are ready.

How's our barbecue sauce doing?

Oh, it's nice and thick now.

- [Matt] Yeah, it's got like a nice maroon color to it.

- It's got a beautiful color to it.

Look at that shine, yeah.

- That's exactly what we're looking for.

- Mm, mm, mm, that looks good.

- So we'll get our skillet on high, high heat.

We're gonna add a little oil to it, so it doesn't stick to the pan.

And then we're gonna add our burnt ends straight into this, once it heats up.

- They smell amazing right now.

- This whole place smells amazing.

And you can see too, like the spice on the burnt ends, it's kinda caked in since we re-smoked it.

- When I was reading your recipes and reading about the bark, I was just salivating, just like.

(sighs) This is just amazing to have it in real life, instead of reading about it now - It's flavor country right there, so we're gonna turn these in.

We're gonna kinda let them crisp up a little bit Move it around so it doesn't stick.

Then we're gonna add our coffee barbecue sauce right here.

(pan sizzling) There we go, and we're gonna let that coat everything.

You can go ahead and turn it off at this point.

The pan's nice and hot.

(pan sizzling) There we go on that.

So we can go ahead and plate.

We're gonna take our grits right here, nice big portion.

It's kinda like a play on lowcountry shrimp and grits.

This is the barbecue version of burnt ends.

- There you go.

Hey, there you go, I like it.

- So then we're gonna grab these, and we're just gonna stack them on top here.

And you're gonna get some of the grease from the brisket, and some of that sauce is gonna kinda run up, and pull off in the grits as well.

- [Pamela] And you guys serve this in the restaurant, right?

- Yes ma'am, we were running this as a special.

- How could you go wrong?

Oh my goodness.

- [Matt] And a little green onion.

- Let me have that plate, cause this is mine.

Oh boy, this looks so good.

Not only can you have burnt ends, but add a little bit of coleslaw, and little bit of baked beans, and y'all gonna be in heaven.

I'm telling you.

So Midwood Smokehouse, Matt Barry.

Thank you so much for being here.

- Thank you for having me.

- Because ah, this is just heavenly right here, right now.

(upbeat banjo music) Joining us in our kitchen today is Chef Beverly McLaughlin from Beverly's Gourmet Foods and also from the Mecklenburg Farmer's Market, which happens to be the oldest farmer's market in Mecklenburg County, doesn't it?

- [Beverly] Yes.

- [Pamela] How many generations now?

- [Beverly] Well, I am the fourth generation to this farmer's market, and my great grandmother started this market nearly 90 years ago.

- [Pamela] Wow.

- And she sold there for a number of years.

My grandmother sold there.

My father has been there since he was a little boy, and I grew up in that market and started my business when I was 21 years old out of that market, which is still my retail location.

And now both of my boys work at this market.

So we've got five generations.

- What are we gonna make today, Beverly?

- We are going to make a vegan leftover red wine cake.

- Is there such a thing as leftover red wine?

- Usually not.

- (laughs) Not in my house, anyway.

- First we're gonna start with all of our dry ingredients, flour, our sugar, our cocoa or cacao.

- So it's gonna have a chocolate flavor to it.

- It is, definitely.

And this is baking soda.

We're gonna whisk all this together, and we're gonna do our wet ingredients separately.

- So you're mixing your wet ingredients separately from your dry ingredients.

- Yes, and then we're gonna put 'em all together.

- So we really don't even need a mixer for this cake.

- No, this cake is simple, easy and fast.

- But how does it taste Beverly?

- It is so good.

- Is it, okay?

- I have started taking it to all of my friends birthdays.

- Oh, so we can use this as a birthday cake?

- Yes you can.

- Oh fun.

- Especially with the topping that goes with it.

People love it.

This is the oil that goes in it.

You can use canola oil, or you can use sunflower oil.

I chose sunflower, because it's a much cleaner oil.

- [Pamela] Then lighter too.

- Yes, and you know, olive oil.

You don't want to use that.

It's just too heavy.

- And it also adds a flavor to it as well.

Doesn't it?

- [Beverly] It does.

- [Pamela] If you use a flavored olive oil.

- And that is the vanilla.

So we're going to whisk this together.

(whisk clanging) And then we're just gonna mix 'em both together.

Gonna pour the wine mixture, and the wet ingredients into our dry batter.

Mix this up.

- So while you're doing that, we're just gonna take a simple cake pan, and you can even cook this in a cast iron skillet, which the one that we're serving later on today's in a cast iron skillet.

Is that right?

- That's right, my grandmother's.

- Oh, your grandmother's, oh awesome.

Did this skillet grow up in the market too?

- I'm sure it did.

- One way or another.

So you're just gonna take a simple cake pan, and we're gonna spray it, because we want the cake to release.

So whatever it is that you're using, spray it down.

Oh, look at that batter.

It looks like a real cake batter, and it looks like a mixer.

It was so simple, no special mixers, or, wow!

- [Beverly] Fast and easy.

- It looks rich.

- It is, you're gonna love it.

- Oh, it looks wonderful.

We're gonna put this in the oven, and we're gonna cook it at 350 for about 28 to 30 minutes.

- So we're gonna make the mushroom stroganoff next, right?

- Right.

We've got button mushrooms that we have sliced and cooked down just to where they start to change colors.

And to that, we're going to add vegetable broth.

This is a vegan cream cheese.

- [Pamela] That sounds delicious.

- And I kinda mix the cream cheese into the broth, 'cause this will make a nice thick broth.

- That's what makes the creamy base, isn't it?

- Yes.

- Yummy.

And you know, a lot of vegan dishes use nutritional yeast, and they use nutritional yeast kind of like a cheese substitute, is that it?

- Exactly, it's like a kind of a Parmesan substitute.

- And it's not at all like yeast to put in bread, is it?

- No, it's completely different.

And this is fresh chopped garlic that came from the Mecklenburg County Market, such that all of our ingredients that we're using here today.

- I love that everything's come from the market.

You guys could get just about anything you need there.

I get my eggs there, and the eggs are wonderful, 'cause they had those Araucana chickens, and they have the different colors, like the green and the rosy pink.

Those have never seen those, go to the market and buy those there, because it's really fun to get those, isn't it?

You like those?

- They're so pretty.

They look like they've been dyed for Easter already.

- I know, they're gorgeous.

- [Beverly] So now we're gonna add Dijon mustard.

- And so you're just doing this over, like a medium heat.

- Yes.

- Okay.

- [Beverly] Nutritional yeast to give it that cheesy flavor.

- Nice cheesy flavor, yes.

- A little bit of olive oil for a little more creaminess.

And this is coconut aminos, which is very similar to liquid aminos, but sweeter.

- Now it's at all similar to soy sauce, is it?

So if they didn't have aminos, is there something they could substitute?

- You can use soy sauce in this recipe but soy sauce, you know, is-- - Really salty.

- Really salty.

- Really salty.

- And it's hard to find gluten-free soy sauce.

And this particular dish we're making is gluten-free.

This is caramelized onions that I have just added.

- Well, Beverly is that ready?

- This is ready.

- [Pamela] It looks delicious.

- So this is a gluten-free pasta, and we're gonna add our stroganoff mixture to the pasta.

And when you're cooking gluten-free pasta, you want to make sure you follow the directions on the bag that it comes out of, because once you've reached your time that it should come off the stove, it needs to come off the stove, because it will tear and disintegrate.

- It's a lot different than regular pasta, isn't it?

- It is.

- And it really depends on what kinda of gluten-free pasta.

There's made out of lots of different kinds of, you can get chickpea, and black bean, and different things.

So pick something that you like.

You can even get artichoke.

- [Beverly] This particular one is brown rice pasta.

- [Pamela] Brown rice pasta.

- So we're gonna finish it off with a little bit of fresh thyme.

- [Pamela] I love thyme.

- [Beverly] About a teaspoon of that.

- So is that all mixed in?

That's all ready to go now, isn't it.

- It's ready.

- All right.

So, before we plate this up, we have gotta make a sauce for that cake, right.

- That's right.

- Let's make that sauce.

We have back here, a little bit of sugar.

Here's your sugar, and a little bit of the mythical leftover red wine.

Do you have to caramelize that sugar at all?

- We're just gonna mix both of it together in the pan, and we're gonna cook it to a boil, so it gets a little bit thick.

- [Pamela] So we're just making a syrup.

- Exactly.

- Oh, well that's easy.

- So easy.

- No complications.

Oh, that's wonderful.

So that's that.

- That's that.

- We have one more thing to make, right?

- Right.

- We are going to make?

- Cilantro lime dressing, and this is also a vegan dressing.

- Lovely, oh, lovely.

And we're gonna put that on this incredible, look at this salad.

Just look how fresh that is.

Isn't that awesome.

And so, let's make that dressing.

- We're gonna add one big bunch of fresh cilantro fresh squeezed lime juice, vegan yogurt.

- [Pamela] So the yogurt's gonna make the creamy base.

- Right, and this salad dressing can be used obviously, as a salad dressing, or a finishing sauce, for chicken, fish, pork, or of course, tofu.

And then we're just gonna put one clove of garlic in it, and you don't even have to press the garlic because the immersion blender, or the Vitamix will be strong enough to mince it.

(blender grinding) - And once again, that's fast.

You just put it in there, and blend it all together.

And how could you go wrong?

How could you not have flavor with those ingredients?

- Nice, bright green color.

- It's a beautiful green color.

Oh, look at how pretty it is on that salad.

Y'all, no bottle dressing at home, make it.

- Make it, they're so fast, and easy, and fresh.

- You saw that, fast, easy, and look at that vibrant color.

Oh, that is gorgeous.

We're gonna bring out your grandmother's cast iron skillet.

- So like we said earlier, you can cook this in anything, any pyrex dish, casserole pan, or of course, a cake pan.

I'm and just going around the edges to release it, and we're gonna cut it.

And it's a very rich cake, so you want to make some very thin slices.

- [Pamela] Oh, so not great big ones.

- I mean, yeah, of course you can make great big ones.

So we're gonna cut some smaller sizes, slices of cake here, because it is a rich cake, and it releases really well from the pan - Mm, look at that.

Wow, that's like foolproof.

You just couldn't have an easier cake.

Absolutely not.

- And the great thing about this cake is you can just keep it just like it is, in your cast iron skillet, in the refrigerator, and add your sauce to it with each slice you serve throughout the week, because it will keep for at least seven days.

So our sauce has reduced quite nice.

And you can top it with any kind of berries.

We obviously have strawberries and blueberries.

Raspberries are great with this too.

And you can even keep your raspberries in the sauce to make it a drunken raspberry cake - Drunken raspberry cake.

I love it, I love it.

Oh, and that puts a gorgeous glaze on it.

Mm, mm, mm, look at that.

Y'all dessert first.

Here we go, dessert for, and this is beautiful.

- Thank you.

- It's beautiful.

All right, so we have our leftover red wine cake, our mushroom stroganoff with gluten-free pasta, our beautiful market fresh salad with cilantro lime dressing.

Doesn't that look delicious?

Look at how colorful this is.

That's something I love about big and cuisine is that it's so bright and colorful, and our leftover wine cake.

Look at how gorgeous that is.

Thank you for being on the show with me, and we'll have you back sometime to do some more wonderful, fabulous vegan cooking from the Mecklenburg Market.

Thank you for watching this episode of "Charlotte Cooks".

If you want to grab these recipes from us, send me an email at Pamela, P-A-M-E-L-A .Roberts, R-O-B-E-R-T-S@cpcc.edu, or you can get 'em off of our website at pbscharlotte.org.

In the meantime, we'll catch you next time on "Charlotte Cooks".

Thanks for watching.

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