[Music plays] Butter milk is a beautiful thing.

Like so many other southern ingredients it comes out of our desire to not waste anything.

Not even something that is spoiled.

The Avett Brothers perform "Will You Return" I'm Vivian and I'm a chef.

My husband, Ben and I were working for some of the best chefs in New York City when my parents offered to help us open our own restaurant.

Of course, there was a catch.

We had to open this restaurant in Eastern North Carolina, where I grew up and said I would never return.

[Music plays] [Music plays] So this is my life.

Raising twins, living in the house I grew up in, and exploring the south, one ingredient at a time.

Previously on A Chef's Life We have one guy.

Today is his last day.

He gave his two weeks notice.

I'm gonna have a nervous breakdown.

I always let situations like this go a little bit too far, I think because of where we are.

I'm begging people to work here.

Ben and I have a small chance of moving into our house before Christmas.

Either way I don't care I'm just so ready to move in here.

[Music plays] Yeah, everybody is coming to my mom's house.

Our house will not be ready.

Don't know?

Ummm So strong....

I could be crying over the house actually.

Theoretically we were supposed to have a certificate of occupancy by December 30th but I just don't see that happening.

There's so much stuff to do.

Hey girls.

Hey Warren.

Hey Vivian, how you doing?

Good.

How are you?

Good, good, good.

Not a great day to be farming.

I am sure glad we got it yesterday.

Ooooh!

Am I paying for all that water weight?

I mean a bunch of water came out, didn't it?

Yep.

We might have to re-weight it.

Five dollars worth.

Okay cool.

Umm so have you planted my turnips?

No I haven't but I got it on my mind.

Okay hahaha.

I got to get to work.

I understand, I understand.

Okay.

Thank you Warren.

Uh huh, you're welcome.

[Music plays] I always thought of buttermilk as something that you soaked chicken in before frying it or added to biscuits.

You know, I never really did much with it until we started using this buttermilk because buttermilk from the grocery store is kind of gross.

It's really thin and watery and has no real character.

But this is tangy and thick and rich and almost reminds me of like a yogurt.

Okay, so we're gonna be buttermilk, orange, and cranberry flavored profile.

Yes mam.

Yes mam?

[Laughter] How do you feel about a little bit of Grand Marnier in there?

We can.

Okay I'm gonna get some Grand Marnier then and we'll add it to the batter.

[Music plays] I am folding in egg whites.

The egg whites make it fluffy.

Chef, would you like to try the batter?

Sure.

Have you already put the Grand Marnier in there?

No Kim has a very low tolerance for alcohol so I like to put that in.

Start with a teaspoon?

A teaspoon for this big?

Tablespoon?

I would start with two tablespoons Kim.

Two tablespoons, okay.

I think that's good.

I do too.

Do you think it needs more?

No?

Do you taste it?

-I taste the orange.

Not the alcohol.

-Are you drunk?

No.

[Laughter] [Music plays] One of the things I have wanted to buy locally but have had a hard time getting has been dairy.

About a year ago we started driving to Maple View Dairy which is in Hillsborough which is about a two hour drive from us to get milk, cream, butter, and buttermilk.

Ben makes the trip usually and surprisingly I had never been there but it was fun to go and see the cows who make our milk and buttermilk.

Hey Roger.

Hey Vivian, how we doing today?

Good, how are you?

I'm doing well.

I forgot a check.

That's okay.

[Music plays] I like to supervise.

Alright so would you mind showing us around?

Yep.

[Music plays] This is the tank where we make our buttermilk in.

This is making now.

We get it up to 72 degrees.

We can add the buttermilk culture to it or we can add more buttermilk to it and the bacteria in the milk will cause it to make again.

It takes about 16 to 18 hours.

I can smell it.

Yeah.

You can smell it starting to make.

Yeah, wow.

[Music plays] How many cows then, do you have?

Ummm about 350 total head on the farm.

How many times a day do you milk each cow?

Three times.

Wow.

Three times a day.

365 days a year.

So what time do y'all get started here in the morning?

They start milking at 4 o clock in the morning.

And the cows, they are like lined up.

They're ready.

Uh hmm.

They come right in.

So this is an important... what's the name for a female cow?

Cow.

Cow.

[Laughter] We know a female pig is a sow.

The male is a bull.

This cow lived to be twenty years old.

She is extremely old for a cow.

Most cows average is about 4 to 5 years.

But she sired several bulls that we used in our herd back in the 70s and sired a lot of good daughters.

Buttermilk is really a byproduct of making butter.

Used to when you made butter you let the milk or cream sit out over night and basically sour a little bit.

Uh hmm.

And then you churned it at room temperature.

And then the milk that came from that had a little acidity to it and that's what made it the real good buttermilk.

So I found my grandmother's butter churn and I was going to make a little bit of buttermilk.

Uh hmm.

I need to let the cream sit out over night?

Uh hmm.

And then I'll churn it and then I'll add a little bit of buttermilk to it.

You can.

Before we started buying your buttermilk we never cooked with it at the restaurant because we didn't have access to anything worth a darn.

[Laughter] And we love your buttermilk.

Well, thank you.

Cheers.

It's even better with a little cornbread.

[Music plays] It looks nice.

I just hope I didn't over cook it.

Sure that's not too big?

I don't think if somebody is paying eight dollars for a slice of pie they want it to be tiny.

Yeah that's fine.

I think it looks great.

How we looking?

97.

We got an 8:15 ten top.

Ooooh.

Yeah, enjoy.

Y'all make me to want to drink.

[Laughter] So where'd that catfish go?

-I put it in the fish bowl in the walk in.

-Okay.

So we are making a marinade for catfish.

We are gonna marinate it in this buttermilk, herb, onion, garlic mixture.

Buttermilk as a marinade or a pre dredge is a wonderful thing to use because it is thick and it adheres to whatever you're soaking it in.

It also has this wonderful tangy flavor that I think lightens fried foods.

Alight I'm gonna let that sit for a hour and then I'll bread it.

[Music plays] You look so... What?

Unpleasant.

I'm doing my nine o clock work at 2:30.

Haha, so tell me about the house.

Does Nut still think we will have the CO by the 30th?

A CO can be had by the 30th.

It will not be ready for us to move in.

[Music plays] I'm excellent at this.

I see that.

There he goes.

There he goes.

There he goes.

Flies buzzing in the kitchen.

You know we're down south.

I can't see that good.

Being from the south people would automatically assume that my mother and grand mother made these amazing buttermilk biscuits and I grew up eating them in the morning and on weekends but unfortunately that is not the case.

I grew up eating canned biscuits and loving them.

Come on over here.

-Don't we need a measuring cup or something?

-No Okay.

[Laughter] Today we are at Warren's house making biscuits with Lilly Hardy.

She's the daughter of Mary Vaughn who showed us how to can tomatoes earlier in the summer and she's gonna school me.

Are you ready?

[Laughter] As ready as I'll ever be.

Okay.

I just put the flour in here.

I was told to get self-rising flour and I knew we were making biscuits so I bought something -that said biscuit on the front.

-Yeah.

Do me a cup of that please.

Okay.

Ooooh!

Then I just take my hand and I goes in here like this.

That's all I need for that.

Does that need to be cold or room temperature is okay?

It doesn't matter.

But first I'm a go on and grease my pan for my biscuits.

And your hand.

I go right dead center.

And I mix it together.

You just kind of bring it together slowly.

Uh huh.

Who taught you how to make biscuits?

I watched my mama.

See.

Now it's ready for a biscuit.

And I beginning to bunch up a little piece and I roll it together.... like so.

Biscuit.

[Music plays] May I do one?

Sure.

A little bit more flour.

Put you a little more flour in there.

Don't forget to pour your buttermilk in there.

Whoo!

Okay, lard.

Uh hmm.

Alright, start mixing it together.

So I bring this in?

Uh un.

Take your hand and start mixing this together.

It's coming apart.

Add some more buttermilk.

This is a disaster.

No it's not.

Get on in their with your fingers.

Get in there good.

Now you start making it get.... Come wash your hands.

I'm a show you how to do it.

Okay, I'm trying.

[Laughter] Just bring the flour you already got.

Just keep kneading it in.

Keep kneading it in.

There ya go darling.

Thank you.

Make your biscuits.

Thank you for rescuing my biscuits.

Too big.

Okay.

Oh it's so like, soft and tender feeling.

Keep rolling it around til you make it like a ball.

I'm making a mockery of this.

Vivian, you're biscuits are going to stand out.

[Laughter] How about that?

That's your biscuit.

[Laughter] I'm gonna put mine right there.

So Lilly, what do you cook your biscuits at?

350 For a certain amount of time or do you just look?

You can tell when you start to smell em.

Okay.

I can hardly wait.

Seriously.

I know.

I want a biscuit so bad I can't hardly stand it.

Can we try one of those just to see?

No they ain't done.

[Laughter] How long have you worked with Warren?

Too long.

[Laughter] Mmmm hmmm.

That's good right there.

This is the fun part.

How is it?

A biscuit is a biscuit.

I make em all the time.

[Laughter] Molasses is good.

I love that bottom.

It's like... Crunchy.

Crunchy.

Mmm hmmm.

I can't believe this is only flour, lard, and buttermilk.

Mmm hmmm.

Thank you Lilly.

You're more than welcome.

[Music plays] This is uhhh my studio.

This year hasn't been as productive art wise as I would like it to be.

We umm obviously had the fire but the week that the fire happened, that Saturday the seventh I was actually supposed to take the next week off to spend a week in here working and getting it cleaned up and running the restaurant doesn't leave much time for other things so this is always a bonus.

So this is a uhh nice transition piece, which seems to all kind of come together really well.

I'm a keep that one for the house.

Find a good spot to hang it in there.

[Music plays] I think you now, as you get more comfortable in your own skin it kind of translates to the canvas, I think.

You know, my palette has softened.

I guess I'm not as fierce as I once was in terms of pushing the envelope and being aggressive.

You know there was a lot more exploration ten years ago than there is now and I think a lot of that has to do with time.

The colors have really softened and my palette has really kind of becoming rich and well developed.

So, I'm excited about it.

So this catfish has sat in the marinade for at least an hour and now I'm dredging it in equal parts corn meal and ground up rice.

It makes this like, super crispy crust.

But the only thing is, because it's not a traditional batter it doesn't really want to stick to the catfish.

So we have to do it ahead of time and let it kind of harden so you can be sure it's going to adhere but it's awesome.

[Music plays] Buttermilk sorbet is something we almost always have on the menu here.

It's really easy to make.

It's almost embarrassing.

Okay you start with really high quality buttermilk.

To that I'm gonna add just straight up sugar and a little corn syrup.

This will help with the overall texture of your sorbet.

Now I'm going to put this on the stove and heat it really gently just to dissolve the sugar.

You want to avoid heating buttermilk really quickly or really hot because it will separate and totally ruin your final product.

Once the sugar has dissolved we're just gonna add some lemon juice to highlight the acidity and sweetness of the buttermilk.

Because the lemon juice or the heat can cause the buttermilk to curdle we're gonna strain it through a fine mesh sieve.

If you try to freeze a warm sorbet base you'll end up with an icy textured sorbet and you really want it to be smooth and creamy.

To chill this sorbet base down I'm gonna use an ice bath.

This is the quickest way possible to chill anything down.

After about ten minutes my sherbet mix is completely chilled and ready to be frozen.

So this is a little fancier than the ice cream machine you may have at home but essentially works the same way.

I'm just going to pour this in here and turn it on.

This should take about 30 minutes.

While my sherbet spins I'm going to show you how to supreme citrus.

You start by cutting the bottom and the top off.

And then you're gonna go and cut around, taking the skin and the pith off.

I'm gonna go in between each membrane and scoop out this really juicy flesh.

Now I'm gonna check my sorbet.

It's been spinning for about 30 minutes and it looks perfect.

If I was going to have this as an afternoon snack I would take a few spoons full of this sorbet, top it with this supreme citrus.

That's so bright.

Tangy, refreshing, a little sweet.

This buttermilk sherbet with citrus would make the perfect light ending to a rich winter meal.

[Music plays] Alright so you wanna drop the fish?

This is how I want it to look.

Alright so we have two new things to try tonight.

The first one marinated and rice crusted catfish.

Catfish is not something we've ever served here because I believe that people come here wanting to get something that they don't normally eat.

So it's served over kind of a cross between a warm slaw and a warm potato salad.

Then we're serving this with a tarragon pickle remoulade.

I'm interested to see how it sales here.

It all depends on how much y'all like it I think.

It's good.

Let's get this cleaned up.

We've got a hundred people tonight.

[Music plays] Hello, how are y'all?

Hi, before we have any questions let me tell you about what we got going on tonight.

It's the buttermilk catfish.

We're gonna serve it over a warm potato salad and slaw.

I'll try the catfish.

Alright, ordering two catfish and rib eye med split, a salsa and a fried collard.

That's an order fired.

The restaurant finally filled up.

On nights like this when it starts off really slow and then we get a punch are hard because all of a sudden all these tickets come in and everybody just gets flustered.

Look, this is a different ticket.

Just drop it.

Just drop the apple salad.

I mean the apple crisps.

Sorry.

Alright Picasso, can I get that catfish please?

Thank you.

And here you have the buttermilk orange pie.

It's delicious.

We just plated the last ticket and it's kind of a long night.

When you have a new dish that is popular it takes a little while to adjust and I'm not complaining because I'm very happy we sold all that catfish.

What did we end up?

We only did 46 people last night.

Yeah I know.

It was terrible last night.

When you plan on December being your biggest time it's like, not great.

Yep.

Alright, I think mamas going home.

Yep.

Daddy's waiting for you I'm sure.

Shut up.

I'll see you tomorrow.

[Laughter] [Music plays] When I moved into my parent's house I was going through some cabinets and I found my grandmother's butter churn and I thought, what a cool relic.

I thought it would be fun to actually churn butter and make buttermilk with my nieces and nephews.

You remember this mom?

I do.

I remember churning it.

I remember my daddy milking the cow.

Alright Iris you can take over.

I thought this whole thing would take about 15 minutes but it just goes to show you how little I actually know about some things because this churning butter took over a hour and almost never happened.

Okay, are you sure we don't have butter already?

What mom?

You got a lot of advice.

Here.

It took a full lineup of all my nieces and nephews and then my brother-in-law had to get involved.

Okay, it's closer.

Okay, you can stop.

Thank god.

So there's butter and the liquid left over is the buttermilk.

We're gonna add a teaspoon of already cultured buttermilk to that and let it sit out overnight and tomorrow we should have straight up buttermilk.

You have a camera Ben?

Yeah.

Alright so we're going to do this fast.

[Flo crying] Last year Ben and I made what I believe was probably the best holiday card out there.

We had our two little twin babies dressed in chef outfits.

We were faced with the daunting task of topping last year's card.

[Chef Vivian sings I've been working on the railroad] [Flo crying] My mom's turnip patch turned out to be a perfect backdrop for our Christmas card.

Flo, smile.

[Chef Vivian sings I've been working on the railroad] For more information on A Chef's Life visit PBS.org/food A Chef's LIfe is available on DVD.

To order visit PBS.org or call us at 1-800-PLAY-PBS