(light music) - This program is brought to you by the members of WCNY.

Thank you.

- Nationwide, Hungry for History markers from the William G. Pomeroy Foundation highlight unique foods and traditions, including salt potatoes and Berry Dairy Days, available through grants for communities and nonprofits.

More at wgpfoundation.org/tv.

- Syracuse sits in the heart of New York State, with access to the Finger Lakes and the Adirondacks, from city vibes and great local eats, to live music and festivals that roll on year-round.

Four seasons for everyone.

- Liberty Tabletop has been crafting flatware in America for over 20 years and is dedicated to supporting our community and preserving the craft of flatware manufacturing.

- "Spatchcock Funk" is in the house.

Our house and your house too.

You know where the party's at?

Wherever you're at.

We're gonna teach you how to throw the best parties, the best dinners, the best get-togethers.

All you need is the people you love, and we'll take care of the rest.

"Spatchcock Funk," dope food, strong drinks, great stories.

(upbeat music) People first.

Rep your people, y'all.

You gotta make sure they feel valued and respected if you wanna live right.

Man, we love making people feel it, especially our wives (effect pops) and girlfriends.

I'm only got a wife, but you get the point.

Sometimes it's flowers for no reason.

Maybe just listening and not trying to fix everything.

It's all about showing mad love by taking care of the people that take care of us.

- Okay, what he was trying to say, sometimes you need a little time with just the girls to feel right.

There's something that just hits different when you're with your squad being your best self.

It's even better when they make you all the food and drinks.

Whether you're on a girl's trip or just showing up with champagne at a friend's house, this is our time to feel comfortable, confident, and cared for.

So hit up the liquor store, hit up your girls, and hit the reset button.

This is ladies first.

(upbeat music continues) (upbeat music) - All hail the ladies, y'all.

This is ladies first.

We're throwing a Ladies' Night for our girls, our girlfriends, our homies, our significant others, all that.

But it's not just splitting genders, y'all, because we ain't about that at all.

It's not boys on one side of the room, girls on the other.

We respect all genders, man.

No matter how you identify, if you love people, we love you.

But we're throwing a party for our friends.

'Cause let's face it, sometimes being around me get on your nerves a little bit.

We're gonna do it right though.

And we're gonna start with a cocktail that's fit for queens, y'all.

This is the kir royale.

It's a pretty simple libation.

When you're gonna throw a party for women that are getting together, doing their thing, you really can't go wrong with champagne, baby, from France.

So what I wanna do first is pop a bottle, because there ain't nothing better than popping tops off making champagne bottles just... (bottle clinks) (cork pops) We're not trying to break anything on the set here.

Bottle of champagne, simple drink, it's beautiful though.

Got a champagne flute.

We're gonna fill it maybe three quarters of the way.

Let the bubbles and the foam subside.

So we just have the bubbles come up in the bottom, and that's what we want.

Look at that.

That is gorgeous.

To make this thing special though, to make it the kir royale and give it the royale treatment, if you will, we're gonna add in a little bit of creme de cassis, French blackcurrant.

It actually goes good in a beer too.

(effect pops) Then we made some strawberry simple syrup, super basic.

Cup of sugar, cup of water, two cups of strawberries heated together until the sugar dissolves, then cooled.

We're gonna put a bunch of that in there.

And now we've got this beautiful color.

I'm also gonna stir a little bit.

And you see how the foam is coming up to the top again as it bubbles up as you add stuff.

And let that chill for a second.

(objects clatter) And I'm gonna garnish it with a strawberry slice or break one in there.

So we'll put another one on there.

I know it's for the ladies, but I don't want anybody getting sick, so I just gotta try this.

Mm.

Yeah.

They're gonna feel good about that.

(mellow music) Bless her heart.

You know when you hear that someone's about to spill the tea, y'all.

Some gossip is flowing out.

This is, Bless Her Heart dip.

The perfect setup for sitting around and telling some stories and gabbing a little bit.

And that's what we want to have happen for these ladies tonight.

Have a good time and share it.

Now when it comes to gossip, now look it, and this is true, men gossip more than women.

I'm pretty sure of that.

At least most of the men I know gossip their faces off.

But like any great dip, any great outfit, the accessories are what Kill it, y'all.

So we are gonna deep-fry some saltines with some cajun seasoning on it.

Saltines or AKA soda crackers as they call it back in the day.

Simple, unique.

Get your oil to 300 degrees.

Then we're gonna drop 'em in for about 30 seconds.

Get 'em nice and crispy brown.

While they're still warm, we're gonna hit 'em with some cajun seasoning.

That way, the flavor sets in as it crisps up.

So look at how golden brown they are.

This heart-stopping dip is not for the faint of heart, y'all.

There's a lot of cholesterol, a lot of cheese, a lot of fat in here.

But, man, it is worth it.

To get this thing started up, we got our broiler torched up to high, and the rack at the top level.

Get that thing piping hot.

Then a little bit of extra virgin olive oil.

Whenever we can, we use fresh herbs that I actually cut from my garden.

This is rosemary.

And that's what's up, y'all.

I had a friend of mine named Rosemary.

We had a some fun times together.

A whole bunch of thyme.

I'm gonna mix this up and set it aside.

We're gonna add this in a little bit, but I want this oily mixture to be ready to be spreadable.

Set that aside.

We got in a wheel, like a pound or so of fontina cheese.

Fontina cheese, awesome.

Melty, delicious.

It just works really great.

(effect pops) We got a pound of that and then we cut into cubes, cut the rind off and cut into cubes.

Because once it's spread out, it'll melt.

But that's the best way to do it right now.

I don't wanna shred it.

Also got a bunch of gorgonzola for some sharpness, you know?

'Cause these people are not just sharp-tongued, they're sharp-minded, they're really smart and fun, and we wanna make sure they feel that respect going.

Also got a whole bunch of shredded Parmesan cheese.

Also some fresh Asiago.

About six or so cloves of garlic sliced semi-thin, like me.

Not really, not semi-thin.

I'm not thin at all.

Kosher salt, black pepper.

Then we're gonna throw in hot sauce to your liking.

And to my liking, it's gonna be probably around a teaspoon or so.

This is not gonna become very spicy.

There's just so much fat in here that the hot sauce balances it out.

I'm gonna mix all this in together, the cheese, and the salt, and the pepper until it's really good and mixed up.

'Cause our friend's night, man, they hanging out, y'all.

You're gonna see people that don't know each other that well, that know some of us well, getting together.

And we've got so many friends in our friend group.

We've had people start dating from some of our parties, form new friend groups because of it.

And we have yet to see a friend group break up yet, which is pretty cool.

We haven't seen a pregnancy either, but that's probably on the way.

We got a greased cast-iron skillet, I just use neutral oil.

And as I've been reminded, not all spatulas, sometimes size does matter.

(effect pops) We get a bigger spatula in here.

I'm gonna evenly distribute this thing all the way across the bottom of the cast-iron skillet.

I've got that mixture here.

And I'm gonna take that in little bites, and I'm gonna spread it across.

So it's gonna bake in there and it's gonna look really nice.

Then we just put this beautiful baby in the broiler for five to six minutes.

Take a look at it until it's bubbly and browned up nice.

Look at this cheesy goodness, y'all.

And you can tell actually where I missed some of the oil on the side.

But you see this dark brown, beautiful roasted garlic.

It's fantastic.

I'm putting some more fresh rosemary on here.

I love the way it smells.

Also got some chopped-up green onions.

Scallions, if we're feeling fancy.

I might have been kicked outta this party, but it ain't keeping me from making some good stuff.

And since I got kicked out, I'm gonna have a bite.

Got this super dope saltine.

Get myself a nice scoop with this awesome cheesy (effect pops) magic action.

Bless her heart and bless mine too.

The first course for ladies first is first class.

About to get some FaceTime, y'all.

We got the ladies set up for the party, and now it's time to pamper ourselves.

We learn a lot from these girls, especially my wife.

And you've gotta take care of yourself, some self-care.

So I'm here to get a facial with our awesome friend Jess.

We're gonna learn how to take care of that skin and actually hopefully make me look a little better on camera.

- You ready?

- Yeah, I think so.

I rubbed in a bunch of like gasoline, and dirt, and everything into my face.

Is that how we get ready for this?

- Yeah, it is.

- I know that this is like good for your pores and everything, but I think the stuff that's been in my pores (effect pops) has been there for like decades.

So when you yank it out, is my face gonna like get all droopy?

- Oh, it might.

- Might look like a dog or something.

- It might.

I mean, listen.

- It might?

- Listen.

I can't perform miracles here.

I'm gonna try.

- Oh, man.

- We'll see what happens.

After today, you may feel a little bit more drier just because there's a lot of exfoliation going on with this facial.

It's removing a lot of dead skin.

And we're gonna do some extractions.

(effect pops) So you may feel a little dry, you may have a little bit of redness, not too much.

- What is exfoliation?

I think I'm confused.

- So what we're gonna do is we're gonna start with this right here.

You're gonna feel products being pushed into the skin and simultaneously at the same time suction out.

So everything from your skin, from your face is gonna go right into this collection cup right here.

So at the end you can see everything- - All that nasty stuff on my face.

- That I'm gonna pull out.

- Oh, man.

Will this get rid of wrinkles and stuff?

- So it's definitely gonna soften the fine lines.

- Okay.

- I mean, like I said, I can't perform miracles here, dude.

- I do have a lot.

- I'm gonna try.

- I do have a lot of fine lines.

- The product that I'm using is basically breaking up the glue.

- Yep.

- That, like, holds the dead skin cells together.

This tip and this machine is, you feel that suction?

- Yeah.

- That's actually like removing it from you.

- I don't take care of my skin that much.

- No, after today, you're gonna start taking care of your skin.

- Okay.

- 'Cause you're gonna see a noticeable difference.

Now, you're gonna look, they're gonna be jealous.

- Yeah, that's right.

- They're all gonna be like, "Matt, what the hell?

Why do you have such glowing skin?"

- Awesome.

- Sebum, it's basically just like the dirt oil, the buildup that's in your pores that you're not gonna have after you see me.

So right now, this is when you're gonna feel some pressure.

- Okay.

- Okay?

I'm just gonna start, I'm gonna extract some of these deeper ones.

You got this really good one right here.

- Are you gonna do this like one by one?

- This a big juicy one.

- Why do you sound... Why do I sound different?

Am I in something right now?

- Yeah, yeah, yeah.

- Happa, happa.

- Matt, Matt, Matt.

(effect pops) Are you there?

So basically what it's gonna do is it's gonna help with the redness.

It helps firm the skin.

- Oh.

Wow.

- See how bright that is?

- It's bright.

- So it's open on this end and this end.

So don't panic.

- Okay.

- And this is gonna take about 10 minutes.

- Okay.

Cool.

- Okay?

All right.

You ready for this?

- Yeah.

- Oh, look at all that.

- That is- (upbeat music) If you wanna be really good at something, talk to someone who's an expert.

You wanna learn about women, talk to a woman.

You wanna learn about men, talk to a man.

(effect pops) So for our pasta course, which is awesome, we're making Zsa Zsa pasta, and it's off the charts, y'all.

I can make some pasta myself, but I brought my friend and expert, my homie Danielle.

What's up, girl?

- Hey.

- This person makes the best pasta that I know.

And also, when you go in restaurants, she'll tell you what it's all about.

But let me ask you a question.

- Go for it.

- Why is it so important for women to have a Ladies' Night and just be by yourselves?

- Honestly?

- Yeah.

- I'm not allowed to tell you.

- Oh-ho-ho-ho.

- But truthfully, it's like that bonding time where you get to like hang out, spill tea, share secrets, you know, make a girl's girl girly girl.

- That's what's important.

Being yourself around people where you can be yourself, y'all.

And I feel it that way with you, man.

So let's make some pasta.

- Let's do it.

- All right, so what are we gonna do here?

- So today, we are gonna be making ravioli.

- Ooh.

- The reason why we're making ravioli is because you can customize them, individualize them, just like every female is.

(host grunts) - Right?

Right?

- Love it.

- So while we start with the flours, why don't you start cracking those eggs?

- All right.

And we've got these eggs at room temperature.

That way, it binds better and doesn't coagulate, basically.

That's the deal.

- So it mixes, integrates better.

- Okay.

- So for the ravioli dough, we do two different types of flours.

- Yep.

- We do two cups of Tipo, double zero.

So get that in there.

This is gonna make a mess, by the way.

(effect pops) And then I do a cup of semolina.

All right, so once you get that in here, we wanna just quickly give it a little mix.

- Okay.

(machine whirs) - Just like that.

All right, so now we're gonna take these five room temperature eggs.

We're gonna dump 'em into there.

You're gonna mix it for about two minutes.

- Two minutes is a long time.

- Yeah, of course, you'd say that.

(host laughs) So you're gonna mix 'em for like two minutes.

And what you're looking for is when it all starts to get together, and actually the the stand mixer will have a hard time getting it to go around 'cause it starts to get hard.

- So once it starts to struggle, you're in the right place.

- Yep.

- Story of my life.

- All right.

Here we go.

(machine whirs) Ready to make a mess?

- You know it.

- Get that outta here.

- All right.

- Toss some flour down.

It's kind of a little crumbly.

- Yep.

- But we're gonna knead it now by hand- - Okay.

- For a little bit.

- I knead it.

- We're gonna knead it.

We're gonna knead it, and we're gonna keep doing it until it's like a really tight little dough ball.

And when you go like this, the fingerprint sponges right back to you.

- Love it.

- All right, now that it's ready, you're gonna take a semi-wet cheesecloth.

- Semi-wet cheesecloth.

Got it, Doctor.

- I know.

Put it right around there.

- Okay.

- And then you're gonna let this sit for about 30 minutes.

And you want that gluten to all get together.

So when you go to roll it out, it doesn't crumble apart.

So now that our dough has rested for at least 30 minutes- - 30 minutes.

- We're gonna get ready to roll out.

- Roll out!

- You wanna be ready.

- I'm ready.

- So we have our pre-floured ravioli template here.

So what you do is you start by cutting off a chunk from your dough ball.

- Okay.

- You want the the chunk to be pretty much the width as close as you can to the roller.

- Yep.

- We're gonna start on setting one.

The roller has one through six.

And we're gonna start at one, and we're gonna roll it through every single number.

- Why don't we just go straight to six?

- Physics, man.

Physics.

- Physics.

(machine whirs) - You can start slow.

- Yeah.

- Till you get a good feeling here.

- So dope.

- You might have to add a little bit of flour on it by, you know, along the way.

- Yep.

- So you're gonna take this, and you're gonna drop it right on that template.

- Okay.

- All right?

- Yeah.

What about this little dimple?

That's okay?

- That's all right.

So once you get your first layer down- - Yep.

- You're gonna take this and you're gonna push this in not too deep.

So we made a custom filling for Ladies' Night ravioli.

It is a mushroom and shallot.

So we started with olive oil, added the mushrooms, added the shallot, saute those down.

Add a little bit of butter, add salt and pepper.

Take it off the heat.

Let it cool down.

Add in the marscapone cheese and the parsley.

All right, let's fill these raviolis up.

Perfect.

- Yeah.

- You're filling those up pretty good.

- Trying.

- Next we're gonna add some water around the edges so you get it to stick extra- - Finger water right here.

- Finger and water, yeah.

(effect pops) - Yeah, yeah.

- You're just gonna go through and do 'em all quick, and then we're gonna go right to layering this other one on.

- Yeah.

Yeah.

- And you're gonna kinda start at the end here.

- Yep.

- And kinda roll.

- Press it down.

- Yeah, press it down.

Sometimes we have a chaotic kitchen.

- Yes.

- We don't have a rolling pin, or we can't find the rolling pin.

So you know what we do?

Take a bottle.

- Yeah, the champagne we used today.

- You take a bottle today.

- Love it.

- Yep.

And you're gonna take it and you're gonna roll it.

It's gonna cut those raviolis.

And you're gonna peel off the extra.

And then we're gonna flip 'em.

- Flip it.

They even look cool from this side.

It's like a ravioli factory.

- It is.

And then you can pull 'em out, shake 'em out a little bit.

And then the next step.

- We're gonna make some sauce.

- And we gotta boil 'em.

- Yeah.

How long do they boil for?

Three minutes?

- About three minutes.

Three minutes, you throw 'em in until they start floating.

(water bubbling) - Those raviolis are fire, dude.

- I'm so ready.

- Me too.

So we gonna make a sauce that's worthy of the people and those beautiful pillows.

- I'm ready.

- Champagne cream sauce.

Let's do it.

Let's start with a butter and the oil in the pan.

Now we're gonna put in some garlic and the shallots, finely diced, like food-processed shallots.

We're gonna go for about five minutes until the garlic starts to brown and the shallots are translucent.

Now, with all these fatty salty flavors, just a little bit of hot sauce in there, I want some acid.

So, yo, the juice of half a lemon, throw that in there.

Dude, that's my move.

All right, now the special ingredient is the sebum they pulled off my face during the facial.

(effect pops) - Yeah.

No.

- Ah, JK, JK, JK.

Okay, the real special ingredient is a cup of room temperature champagne, baby.

- Yes.

Party is starting.

- No doubt.

So we're gonna cook this until it reduces by half.

So maybe like five or six minutes.

I'm gonna slowly add in one cup of room temperature cream to prevent any curdling.

So we're gonna keep whisking this and cook it for probably eight or nine minutes until it starts to thicken a little bit.

Yeah, that is thickening up.

To make it thicker, we're adding in a half cup of great grated Parmesan.

So stir that until it melts.

And while you're doing that, I'm gonna do a little S and P, baby.

We got the ravs, we got the sauce.

Let's drape it on, baby.

- Ooh.

- All right, dog.

So as we're getting ready for this awesome group of humans and making them feel awesome, and super fantastic and pampered, we're topping it with some chopped parsley because that always looks cool.

And the green is nice on top of this here.

- Fancy.

- Fancy, fancy.

- Very fancy.

- Let's get real fancy.

We got some salmon roe caviar, y'all.

So that gets a little pink pop on there, and adds a little bit of saltiness to it too.

Let's take one and see how we did.

- Let's do it.

That's so good.

- Okay.

(Danielle laughs) That's how you have a party right there.

"Spatchcock Funk," our girl Danielle, pasta, champagne.

Let's go.

(upbeat music) Yo, we trying to show these ladies a good time, y'all, and I'm all about showing the ladies a good time.

We're making eight-layer bars, instead of seven-layer bars.

We had a classy one we're gonna throw on there.

We got champagne in this mix, this party's jumping, but this one's easy to make.

As a kid, I learned how to do it, as a youngin'.

Simple, cheap, fantastic.

To start us out, we've got crushed-up graham crackers and some melted butter, a whole stick of unsalted butter.

That's important here because they're gonna get salt from the nuts.

I'm gonna mix up the butter and the graham crackers until it looks like wet sand.

Now put this in the middle of it, and just keep spreading it out until it evenly covers the entire bottom of the pan.

Press it into the corners too.

Make sure you get the corners and the edges set because that's where you're gonna see, like, a crispy edge to it.

We also got some sweetened coconut flakes.

Same thing, distribute that for layer three all across it.

And it creates another layer of texture in here.

So the seven to eight layer bars, depending on how you're making it, will have different textures and flavors.

They're all sweet and all fantastic, just like the group of people we have.

So they've got different sweet personalities or fun or feisty personalities, but you want those differences.

When they're together, it makes everything better when you have variety.

It's a spice of life.

It's a spice of friend groups, y'all.

And we wanna celebrate that today.

Now we got some semi-sweet chocolate chips.

(effect pops) Same thing.

Another layer, some butterscotch morsels in here across the bottom of the top.

We got some chopped walnuts.

Puts a little salt into this mix, balances out all that sweetness.

We also have 14-ounce can of evaporated milk.

I mean, I used to put this stuff in my cereal, but don't bring that up to my mo She doesn't like that story.

(effect pops) I'm gonna slowly drizzle that and evenly spread that all the way across.

And then I've got a teeny little spatula here, which is useful to start spreading this stuff around so we can get as much of it to cover the top.

As it heats in the oven, it's gonna seep down into the mixture, but that's kind of the thing that holds it together.

So that's really what we're starting with this.

I'm feeling good about this.

I'm feeling all the evaporated milk kind of seep down to the bottom, which is great.

So now I've got my oven preheated at 350 degrees.

This goes in for 25 minutes.

But I check it around 20, 22 minutes to make sure the edges are starting to get golden brown.

After that, sits at room temperature for an hour, then in the fridge for an hour.

Then we just lift this thing out and chop it up.

After cooling, they pop right outta that parchment paper square and beautiful.

These are your traditional seven-layer bars.

But we got an eighth layer, y'all because these girls are so awesome.

We want to do 'em right.

And since I can't afford jewelry, I do have 24-karat gold that we're gonna add in as the eighth layer.

So I'm using tweezers to do this, only because I wanna be fancy, and I love seeing people use tweezers.

And that's a real reason why.

But you can just shake it over if you want.

(upbeat music) Now, just like before, when I buy my wife jewelry, (effect pops) I always try that on.

I'm gonna try this first.

(upbeat music continues) The eight-layer bars are ready to roll, and now it's time to roll onto this party.

(upbeat music continues) (upbeat music) - So loving that we're doing the Girls' Night.

- Girls' Night is my favorite night.

Never better than a Girls' Night.

- Yeah.

- Never better than a girls' night at Saratoga Race Track.

- Ooh.

- Love Saratoga.

Did my bachelorette party there.

- Right?

The best time ever.

- One of the best.

Oh, my gosh.

Best times, best places.

- It is- - Good memories.

- It's hilarious.

I just find Saratoga, it's like you feel like it's only a couple hours from us.

It's like an escape.

Right?

- Two hours, 20 minutes.

No big deal.

(person laughs) - Yep.

- And when you go there, you know, everybody just becomes a different person.

Most of the people that roll to Saratoga, the moment you hit Broadway, the wedding ring comes off.

- The outfits are out.

- And you know what?

- The outfit- - You don't feel like you're in New York.

- No, absolutely.

- I'm like, where am I?

I need to move here.

(person laughs) I need to be a Saratogian.

- Oh, no question.

It is- - Get me a horse.

- It just gives you like this feeling of like, I don't know who we are, but we're gonna try something different.

And, you know, I'm the married lady there with my friends, (person laughs) most of whom are single.

And so I'm like, I'm gonna do the wingman thing, right?

- Okay.

- I'm gonna try and like help them have fun because why not?

So one weekend that we went, I decided to do a kissing contest.

- Wait.

- Between a couple of my girlfriends.

- Explain that.

- So we're going from bar to bar hanging out, and I'm like trying to like add up who could get kissed the most.

And they're all for it.

- It was you, right?

- They're both recently single.

- It was you, right?

- My friends.

And so I'm like wingmanning it hard.

I'm walking up to random people like, "Hey, my girlfriend Catherine, (person laughs) we really wanna do this kissing contest.

Would you like hang out with her?"

- I'm sure it wasn't hard to find- - And all very willing participants.

- I was gonna say, I would be willing, even though I'm married too, like I would be willing to do it just to have some fun.

Right?

- There you go.

I'm sure Ryan will love that.

And the next thing we know, there's like other random groups of women who are like, "What's happening over here?

How come these women all are all making out with these guys in bars, like firefighters from Boston?"

- Oh.

- And they're like, "What's happening?"

So I'm now wingmanning for random groups of people.

- Okay.

(laughs) - And beyond all of us knowing this, the next thing we know, my, like, 70-year-old friend is making out with a 28-year-old in, like, the corner of a bar.

- Good for her.

(person laughs) - And single, both of them.

And we're like, I'm like, "I did not make that happen, (claps) but here we go."

- But you did.

- Yes, listen.

This is what Ladies'- - That's okay.

- That's what Ladies' Nights are all about.

- Ladies' Night.

- There it is.

Love it.

Ladies' Night.

- Ladies' Night.

(glasses clink) (person chuckles) (dramatic music) (effect pops) - "Spatchcock Funk" is all about bringing people together, making them feel special for who they are, either by giving them some space or just making them feel seen.

Make sure you're giving time to you and your crew.

Be good to your people.

- Be good or be good at it.

(lips smack) - Hungry for History markers from the William G. Pomeroy Foundation shares stories behind regional dishes and local food festivals, including Smith Island Cake and Spiedie Fest, available through grants for municipalities and nonprofits.

wgpfoundation.org/tv.

- Syracuse sits in the heart of New York State, with access to the Finger Lakes and the Adirondacks.

From city vibes and great local eats to live music and festivals that roll on year-round.

Four seasons for everyone.

- Liberty Tabletop has been crafting flatware in America for over 20 years, and is dedicated to supporting our community and preserving the craft of flatware manufacturing.

Liberty Tabletop.

(bright music)