Celebrate 2021 with Hummus, Wings and Poutine Recipes from Thee Red Fez
Thee Red Fez's former owner has dropped some favorite recipes to help us all welcome 2021 with some old favorites.
Poutine at Thee Red Fez.
It’s finally 2021, but we’re still missing a lot of things. We’re missing our friends, we’re missing our families and we’re missing visiting our favorite places to hang. We’re missing fancy dinners inside restaurants, we’re missing some of our favorite bars that have either closed permanently or are hibernating for the winter, and we’re missing breaking bread with strangers who could have become friends. But there’s one thing we won’t miss, and that’s the year 2020. Goodbye and good riddance. Long before COVID-19 hit, we already missed Thee Red Fez, which closed permanently in 2019, but the ghosts of the beloved Providence bar and restaurant have been spotted on social media.
Kevin Berglund, former owner of Thee Red Fez from 2012 to 2019, who worked there from the beginning in 2001 and now runs the Instagram account @dedfezpvdsecretsthereof, has resurrected a few treasured recipes from the iconic restaurant. He contacted former cooks, including Mike Lingwall, who is now at Durk’s Bar-B-Q for some details. Lingwall originally nailed the Fez’s famous poutine after a happy accident. Thee Fez’s fries were smothered in fried Mexican cheese (queso de frier) and chourico-based gravy, and the result was nothing short of spectacular. It was a twist on the traditional, a Mexican/Portuguese version created by serendipity after Lingwall’s failed attempt at creating chourico in house, says Berglund. The sausage came out too crumbly, so they turned it into a gravy topping for poutine and it remained on the menu until Thee Fez closed. Friends of the Fez have been asking for recipes for their favorite dishes, and Berglund has delivered.
See below for three recipes from Thee Red Fez, including poutine, hummus and eleventeen-style wings. Cook them up at home and have your own socially-distant, single household shindig in loving memory of the heart of the historic parking lot district. It still beats on.
Thee Red Fez Poutine
Prepared french fries or tater tots
One small yellow onion
8 cloves of garlic
1 small jalapeño
Quarter bunch cilantro
1.5 Tbs gochujang
1.5 lbs chourico (we would make own or use Gaspar’s brand)
6 oz beer
1/2 cup flour
1/2 Tbs sweet paprika
1/2 Tbs salt
1/2 Tbs black pepper
3/4 quarts heavy cream
1/4 quart whole milk
Queso de frier cheese
Heat pan to medium heat, add minced onion, garlic, jalapeño and cilantro. Cook for a couple of minutes, then add gochujang and crumbled chourico, and cook for ten minutes or so. Add beer, flour, sweet paprika, salt and pepper, and stir and cook for five minutes. Stir in milk and heavy cream and cook until thickened. Add salt and pepper to taste.
Prepare french fries by chopping potato sticks and frying them in hot canola oil in a skillet (or cheat and use frozen fries or tots, we wont tell). Once cooked through, reserve on plate and soak up extra grease.
Cut queso de frier cheese in cubes and deep fry it on the skillet using canola oil.
Place cooked fries on plate and pour poutine sauce over the top, then add fried cheese cubes.
Hummus
1 24 oz can of chickpeas, drained
pinch of rough chopped parsley
3 Tbs of chopped garlic
4 oz of well mixed tahini
1/3 cup fresh squeezed lemon juice
1 Tbs kosher salt
1 Tbs black pepper
Add all ingredients to blender and slowly add 1/2 cup olive oil as it blends to a smooth and creamy consistency. Thee Red Fez used Roland’s brand of tahini.
Eleventeen-style Wing Spice Rub
4 Tbs star anise (ground)
2 Tbs crushed red chili flakes
1 Tbs Spanish paprika
2 Tbs Coleman’s English mustard powder
2 Tbs coriander lightly ground
1 Tbs cayenne pepper
3 Tbs garlic powder
1 Tbs cardamom powder
1 Tbs red New Mexico ancho chili pepper
1 Tbs ground cumin
2 Tbs kosher salt
For the wings, Berglund recommends Baffoni’s Poultry Farm. Rub the wings generously on both sides with the wing rub and bake them. Slather with Thai chili sauce by Mae Ploy. Add chopped scallions and “whoop there it is.” The rub can be used on all sorts of meats.
