- Hey, guys, it's Selena. [shoes clack loudly]
I have learned so much about cooking the past two seasons,
but I still have so much more to learn,
which is why I'm continuing my lessons
with some of the best chefs all over the country.
[doorbell rings]
Guys, do you mind grabbing the groceries?
- Yes. - Yeah.
- Oh, yes. - What?
- Hi. both: Hello
- How are you? - Good.
Good. How are you? - Got your groceries for you.
Good. Got it? - We got it. Thank you.
- Thank you so much. - No problem.
You all have a good one. both: You too.
- He's so cute.
Holy moly, we're good for the whole year
with all these groceries.
- Oh, you got a note, too.
- "Selena, grab a large stock pot,
fill with water and heat to a boil."
The water's already placed in here.
- Okay, on boil? - Well, on high for it to boil.
- Perfect. - There you go.
- Okay. - On boil.
- I'm so interested in this.
What is this? [all gasp]
Oh, my God. Oh. - Oh, my God.
- I can't do this.
- What do we do? - Oh, my God!
- Wait, what are we supposed to do?
- I can't.
- Wait. Let's just do this. Okay, close it up.
- Oh, my gosh. Okay.
Oh, no.
I wanted to name one of them Fred,
and then I got emotionally attached.
- Aw. - No.
We just can't name them.
- Selena and Aarón-- take one.
All right...
[Selena Gomez's "Bad Liar"]
♪ Oh, I'm trying, I'm trying ♪
♪ I'm trying, I'm trying, I'm trying ♪
♪ Oh, I'm trying, I'm trying, I'm trying ♪
♪ My feelings on fire ♪
Aarón.
- Hello. How are you?
all: Good.
- We're good. These are my best friends.
That's Theresa, Raquelle, and Paige.
both: Hello. - Hi.
- Hola. Nice to meet everybody.
- Today I am joined by Chef Aarón Sánchez.
He is both a TV host and judge.
He's the owner of Johnny Sánchez in New Orleans,
an author, and a philanthropist.
- Are you guys stoked? Are you guys pumped up?
- I am very excited.
I'm nervous but excited. - Okay, cool.
So today I'm gonna teach you guys
how to make a seafood tower.
It's all about a seafood soirée, right?
It's about pure seafood deliciousness.
We're gonna have this beautiful
lobster mango ceviche.
It's gonna contain
these beautiful poached shrimp,
some beautiful crab ravigote
and, of course, accompanying salsas--
salsa verde
and a roasted tomatillo salsa.
- Yay. - Just 'cause I know you guys
are a little bit sort of heartbroken
about our little friends there in the cooler,
I thought that we would address that first.
Okay? - Okay.
- So now that we have this boiling pot of water,
let's add some seasoning 'cause it's gonna need that flavor.
It's gonna need that love, right?
- Yes. - So, let's add
some Cajun seasoning.
- Got it. - Be very generous with it.
So let's use about half of that.
- Eh-heh.
- Now, this is where you can have fun.
You can put any kind of citrus you really want,
but I'm gonna go ahead and put one lemon in there.
So let's take half a lemon.
- Oh, whoa, whoa, whoa. Hang on.
- What happened? - I just got the seasoning in.
What do I do? - Okay.
Let's take one lemon. - Okay. Thank you.
- I'm sorry, 'cause I'm like, on that chef mode,
and sometimes I go fast.
- No, no, that's good. I'm--I'm just not.
- [laughs]
All right, so let's cut one in half.
- Okay, yes. Let's do that.
Done. - Now to the pot.
Squeeze it and drop it in there.
- Yep. - Oh, that's a juicy lemon.
- Do you happen to have any bay leaf?
- Yes, I sure do. - Oh, my gosh.
- [gasps] - Good catch.
- All right, let's add a couple bay leaves in the pot.
- Boom. - Last step, some salt.
A generous little heaping. - Got it.
- Now, this is the part that's gonna break your hearts.
- Oh.
- We have to address our little buddies, okay?
Be strong right now. - Okay.
- Now, just pull them out and put them on a tray.
No big deal.
- Oh. - Yes, indeed.
Look at those little fellas.
- Come on, Sel, you got it. - Come on, we can do it.
- Oh, my God. Oh, my God. - Oh, my God!
- Hurry, hurry. It's done. We're good.
- One more, one more, one more.
- Oh, my heaven. - Ah.
- Love this. - Oh, my God.
- Okay. Now, here's the deal. Take some scissors
and just kind of take off those rubber bands.
- Oh. - [exhales deeply]
- Okay, there we go. This is great.
- Look at legs. - You're doing fantastic.
- We've seen a lot on this show.
We've never seen this.
- There's a first for everything.
- Taking the blazer off.
- You're doing great, Selena. I'm very proud of you.
- Thank you. - It's all good.
Let's grab our shrimp, okay? - Okay.
- These little bad boys have been dispatched,
so don't worry.
Now, what we're gonna do
is just put your little sort of scissors down the middle.
And what we're trying to do is just devein them
but keep them in the shell.
- So I just cut the middle, and the poop is gone?
- Yeah, the poop sac is what we're trying to get out of.
- And the shell's on. - With the shell on, exactly.
'Cause when you leave the shell on,
it actually reinforces the flavor of the shrimp.
And by the way, we're very blessed to live in Louisiana,
where we have the best shrimp in the whole world,
as well as beautiful crab meat,
which will be all part of this seafood soirée.
- In the nicest like, way, endearing way,
you remind me of my dad.
- Aw, you're so sweet. Gracias.
- Of course. - Well, you know,
you and I are both Texas kids, right?
I'm from El Paso.
- Oh, I'm from Grand Prairie, outside of Dallas.
- Oh, wonderful.
I think it might be time to put our little guys in there.
- Oh, my God. - I believe in you.
It's gonna be easy. - Paige?
- All right, just grab them. - What?
- The water's boiling. We're fine. Come on.
- Oh... - Together we will conquer.
Ready? - Whoo!
- Just drop them in there very softly, okay?
Headfirst. - Headfirst.
- And then cover it with the lid, ladies.
- Oh, my God. - Aah!
- All right, cover it with the lid.
Lid, lid, lid on. - Oh, my God.
- It's all good, ladies. All right, cool.
- That was crazy.
- Very proud of you, very proud of you.
- RIP, Fred. - Okay.
So, basically, it takes about seven to eight minutes
to get them in a happy place, okay?
- Great. We're timing it.
- So, as our lobster's cooking,
let's address the salsas,
which I think will be a gentler subject.
[laughter] All right, so...
you should have some tomatillos
and some beautiful Roma tomatoes.
- Okay.
- Everyone say "tomatillos" with me.
all: Tomatillos. - Oh, wow.
- So both of these salsas have the same ingredients,
with the exception of the tomato and tomatillo.
One's green and one's red.
Selena, can you take those tomatillos
and peel the shells off? - Yes.
- And then maybe get, like, a little bowl of water
just to kind of get some of that little funk off.
- Yeah. It's sticky.
- And then, take those Roma tomatoes
and slice them right in half. - Okay.
- Put them on this tray, flesh side up.
Let's do four, and let's go ahead
and do the same thing with the tomatillos.
'Cause they're smaller, I would do all the same amount
that you have there cleaned, ladies.
- Okay.
- Let's go ahead and get some onion.
- Red onion or white onion?
- White onion. - Okay.
- We're gonna take some cloves and garlic.
- Oh, they're in the fridge.
- And then get those chili serranos.
- Serranos. - Or jalapeño.
- Oh, we got a new garlic container.
- That's what you broke? - Yeah.
- Oh, this is a new--
[glass shatters] Oh.
- Oh, my God.
- She broke that.
- So let's do one onion, ladies, quartered.
Look at you, Selena. Go.
You go, girl. - Selena, go.
- Thank you.
- Selena Go...mez. - No.
- [laughs]
- So each one of those trays
is gonna get the same ingredients.
- And how many cloves?
- Four or five cloves of garlic for each tray.
- Okay. - Are we making salsa?
- Yeah, he said that in the beginning.
- Where have you been? - I just want to make sure.
- Okay. - Now, this is where it's gonna
get interesting, okay?
For the tomatillo, for the green one,
I'ma do one jalapeño and one serrano.
But you can do one serrano-- [all gasp]
- It's okay, it's okay. It's okay.
- Oh, my God, we've got an injury.
- It's okay, it's okay. - I'm gonna get a Band-Aid.
- Are you okay? - Totally.
- She cut herself. - Made my heart drop.
- But also, she was so calm.
- Take your time. Take your time, mama.
- Yeah, it's fine.
- You okay, honey? - Yes, I'm perfect.
- So now that we have our serranos,
this is what my tray looks like.
Can you see that, Selena? - Yes.
- You have the little fingers tucked back?
- Yeah, I was trying.
Do you mind? - Wonderful. Okay, cool.
So now all we're gonna simply do is let's season this, okay?
- Okay.
- Take a little bit of olive oil, salt and pepper.
- Pepper I think is right there.
- All right, wonderful.
And now, Selena, we're gonna go into the oven with this--
500 degrees, rock and roll time.
- ♪ How many people does it take to open an oven? ♪
- That's why I've been sitting down.
- So here's one thing that we need to do
to finish up one of our salsas, okay?
You should have these dried chilies, these chili árbols.
Can you find those? - Yes.
- Can you put, like, a little small pot of water
and just get it boiling?
- I got you. - I got my--
What is it? Sous chef.
- Sous chef. - Sous chef.
- Sous chefs, exactly.
So, while we're waiting for that water to boil,
we're gonna revisit our buddies, okay?
- Oh, our buddies. - Let's grab them out
and put them on that tray, okay?
You're doing great. - Oh, my gosh.
- Good job, guys. - Oh, my goodness.
- And right into the fridge, ladies--or freezer, freezer.
- Go, go, go, go, go. - Aah!
Nice, Paige.
- Now let's do the same thing, ladies,
with the shrimp. - Yes.
- But be careful, Selena.
Throw them in gently. Don't splash it.
- You got it.
- Now, these are gonna take three to four minutes to cook.
Probably about five, just to be safe.
- Bye, guys.
- Let's start making our ravigote,
which is this really cool dressing
that goes with crabmeat.
So, let's pull out a bowl.
- I heard we're making rabid goat salsa.
- Let's pull out mayonnaise. Let's pull out some mustard.
- Yellow mustard or spicy mustard?
- The spicy mustard, the creole mustard.
While you're fishing for all that,
let's take out the shrimp.
Shall we? - Yes.
- And they're gonna go right into the freezer.
- Aarón, when did you start cooking?
- I come from a cooking family.
My mom had a restaurant in New York City.
And I came to Louisiana when I was very young
to learn from a very famous chef named Paul Prudhomme.
And he sort of formed my opinions about food
and life very much.
You know, cooking has been a fabric of my life,
my whole time.
I love taking care of other people.
That's my jam. It's my love language.
- I love that. - You know what I mean?
Now, Selena, I need you to help me out and tell me
when that small pot is boiling, okay?
- So it is baby boiling.
- All right. Let's take about four of those chilies
and add it to that water really quickly.
- Three. - Turn off the heat
and just let them soak with the lid on,
'cause they're gonna get soft, they're gonna get pliable
and it's gonna be easier to make our salsa.
Now, let's work with our ravigote.
Let's do about 1/2 cup of mayo.
- I'm totally eyeballing.
- Now, two tablespoons of mustard,
one tablespoon of vinegar.
And then your favorite hot sauce.
Add a couple sprinkles of that in there.
And now we're gonna add a couple cracks of pepper.
- Okay.
- Some salt, lemon.
This always works well.
If not, you can use your hands.
So now let's take some chives. - Okay.
- Slice them as thin as you can.
So maybe, like, two tablespoons.
- Ooh, nice. - Good job.
Look at that little wave. - Thanks, guys.
- At this point, let's do a nice little mix.
- This is so much fun. - Taste it.
Tell me what you think.
- It's, like, good.
both: It's really good. - Yeah.
- Oh, yeah. We're in a good place here.
So let's take some crabmeat, ladies.
- Ooh, crabmeat.
- Mmm. Sweet and beautiful.
Louisiana's in the house.
Put it all into that bowl. - Oh.
- All of it in that bowl.
You want to gently fold it in there
and make sure that wonderful ravigote
is in every little crevice, okay?
- Ooh. - All right.
So let's put this to the side.
Now, let's look at our vegetables
in the oven, shall we? - Yes.
- They should be nice and charred.
[smoke alarm beeping]
I'm gonna show you what mine look like.
So you can see what you're trying to go for.
- So sorry. The alarm's going off.
- Oh, no. - Help!
- This gets better by the minute.
[beeping continues] - Where is it?
- I think it's coming from when we opened the oven.
[beeping continues] - What am I doing with this?
Like, what is this gonna do?
- Oh, did we not turn the--
- Oh, it stopped. - You bring a pillow?
- It's gonna do more-- - Ay.
- [laughs] Selena, you're doing great.
- I feel like I need a drink after that.
- Yes, and I'll join you.
- Perfect. - Great.
- 'Cause we're getting to the finish line very shortly.
- We're gonna have mimosas. That's what we having.
- Ooh, okay.
- We'll have some orange juice for Sel.
- Should we put it in these? - Yeah.
- So let's take those vegetables out.
What do you think, Selena? - Yes.
- They look great, guys. - Nice.
- While those are cooling down,
let's take our lobster out, okay?
So make sure you guys get your little mimosas on.
I'm gonna get ready for the next little batch here.
All right, so, we're gonna make a sauce
for the lobster ceviche.
We should need agave nectar... - I got it.
- Mango nectar or mango puree.
- Oh, that's in the-- Yeah, in the jar.
- We should need that mustard again, that little Dijon.
- Dijon.
- Aji amarillo,
which is that chili puree from Peru.
- We're missing the chili paste.
- That's it. - This is yellow hot pepper.
- Yeah, that's it. That's it. - Oh, got it.
- No one ever listens to me. - There's a reason.
- Salud. Wait till you see how we put this together.
You're gonna be so impressed. - We're very excited.
- Hey. - All right, here we go.
Yellow Peruvian chili paste.
Let's do one nice heaping spoonful.
Órale.
Same amount of mustard.
And then we're gonna do the same amount
with the agave nectar. - Okay.
- We're gonna add a little bit of salt.
- Okay.
- And then mix those ingredients and start to add
half of the amount of mango nectar
that you have there.
Not too much. That's good, that's good, that's good.
Perfect. Let's get one lime, ladies.
And we're gonna use one of these little contraptions here,
the microplane or zester. - Mm-hmm.
- Just 1/3 amount. Okay? - Okay.
- Let's take that same lime
and squeeze all that juice into that sauce.
Okay? Now we're cooking with gas.
So I'm gonna show something that's very old school,
which is called "supreming"
or cutting segments out of an orange.
- Okay.
- So just cut one end of the orange--
same thing on the other side, so you have two flat ends.
- Yes.
- Now, run your knife right on the outside of the skin
but without going too much into the actual citrus.
- Okay.
- Take your small knife, and you're gonna literally
just run your knife in between those little segments.
You see those little lines in between each part of that?
- Yes. - And it should come loose.
- Oh. - All right.
Once you get a good amount of that done,
kind of just chop them up into smaller pieces, okay?
- Okay. - And then...
add that to our mixing bowl. - Okey-dokey.
- And then to that, we're gonna start to introduce the lobster.
- Oh.
And then we're gonna finish our salsas,
and then we can start to assemble the tower.
So we're literally very close, okay?
- The tower.
- Now, do you have the lobsters close by?
- Yes.
- Let's go ahead and grab an extra towel.
Now, this might be a little bit squeamish, okay?
- Okay. - Okay, now grab the lobster.
Just rip off the claws. There you go.
[person gasps]
[light music]
You take your towel and then grab the tail.
And then just yank out the meat.
- Oh! - Yeah, yeah.
- Sounds like the chiropractor. - Now let's remove the head.
And that's what you want. You want the tail meat.
And you want the claws.
Let's repeat it with the other one.
- Okay.
♪ ♪
- Ooh, nice.
- And then now take your towel
and then just put some pressure on it, okay?
[crunching]
There you go.
And then start peeling the shell away.
And you should be able to get the meat off.
- Mm! - Nice.
- Yeah, ándale!
- He's so excited.
- Órale! Eso! - Órale!
- Me encanta.
[laughter]
- Okay, got it. - Perfect.
Go ahead, girl. What, what, what?
All right, let's go ahead and dice this up.
- Okay.
- Now, let's add that to our bowl.
Looking good, feeling good.
- I love this. - All right.
Now let's grab the mandoline, and let's grab a red onion.
- Thank you. - Oh, sorry.
- Let's just peel that onion, if you don't mind.
You can also cut it in half, too,
'cause we're not gonna use the whole thing either.
- Okay. - Nice.
- Now, take that little mandoline, okay?
- Mm-hmm. - Let's do one slice.
- Okay. - There you go.
- Let's do one more little pass and then that should be enough.
Let's put the onion that you have in a little bundle.
And here's a little tip.
You can put a little bit of white vinegar,
just to soften it up with a touch of salt.
And what that does--it takes some of the abrasiveness
of the onion away.
So let's add that to the bowl.
At this point, we're gonna take a little bit of scallion
and just use the green. - Yes.
- And now we're just gonna slice that
into very small pieces.
And then now we're gonna add that to our bowl.
- Yes. - Okay.
Now we're gonna just slice a tomato.
Dice it the best you can.
Okay. And add that to our bowl as well.
And now we're gonna finish it very simply with some cilantro.
- Cilantro. - So get some fresh cilantro.
- Look at her chopping the cilantro.
- Look how beautiful it is. That's impressive.
So that's good to go.
Now all we're gonna simply do
is buzz up our salsas.
- Yeah. - Paige, blender duty.
- Let's take the roasted tomatillos, remember?
- Yep. - Yes.
- Now we're gonna simply add that to our blender.
Okay, cool. - Yummy.
- Let's take a nice good handful of cilantro.
- Okay, yeah. - Okay.
Now we're gonna buzz that up.
[upbeat Latin music]
♪ ♪
Did you puree it?
- Oh, wow. - Cool.
- Really?
- Awesome. - Oh, the smell!
- Oh, my goodness. - That makes me want to cry.
- How good does that smell, ladies?
- So good. - For real.
All right, let's put that into a container,
'cause we're gonna have to blend the red sauce, ladies.
We haven't done the red sauce yet.
- I wish we could have that aroma
just in the house, you know?
- Someone needs to make tomatillo salsa candles.
- Like a diffuser.
- All right, let's address the red salsa.
- All right. - Let's take our tomatoes
and all that stuff and put it in the blender, okay?
- Okay.
- Now all we need to do is grab some of those chilies
that have been soaking in the hot water.
Let's grab two.
And then let's put one more bunch of cilantro,
lime and we buzz up, okay, Selena?
And we're good.
- I, like, really want one episode
for her to forget to put the lid on the blender.
- Oh, my--like, right now? - That was about to happen.
- Damn it! - [chuckles]
[blender whirring]
- ♪ Let it go, let it go ♪
♪ What, what, what? ♪
Perfect. Perfect, Selena. Pull it out.
We'll put it in one little bowl.
- Nice. - Okay.
Now, let's get all the ingredients out
so we can make this magical tower.
I think we should do that. - Let's do it.
- Now we're gonna bring this puppy out.
It's about to be seafood soirée on the ultimate level.
The tower of power. - Tower here.
Tower. - Yes, come.
- Selena, I have a question for you.
- Yeah? - I don't know if you can tell,
but I'm a very adorned man.
I have tattoos,
and I want to know if you have any, by chance?
- I actually have-- I think it's 14 tattoos now.
- Are any of them love related? - One to my fans.
One of my fans came up to me and said that she hopes
that I love myself first and put myself first.
- Aw. - And it was really sweet,
and I got it tattooed on the back of my back.
[laughter]
- I love that. - The back of my back.
- On the back-- - Don't worry.
All right, all we need to do is assemble the platter,
and we're good.
[Selena singing in Spanish]
- Yum. - That looks so good.
- Now, here's how we gonna finish this thing.
Remember those lobster claws, right?
- How could we forget?
- Take the back end of your knife
and then just give it a couple whacks.
♪ ♪
[laughter] - On her face.
- Seafood in my eyelash.
- You know what you should do is take a napkin and cover it.
I'm sorry. - Chef probs.
- Selena, yours looks impressive.
- Yeah, I'm really happy with it.
- This would not have happened season one.
That is for sure. This is some season three work.
- Facts. - I love it.
- When can I eat it?
- You can eat whenever you want, darling.
I'm gonna eat, too, 'cause I think it's delicious.
- Yay. - All right.
- Yes, yes, yes.
- I'm starving. - Mmm.
- It's so good.
- You're making me do my happy dance.
- I'm so hungry. - Same.
- Man, come on, ladies.
- The salsa is amazing. Wow.
- Aren't they good? - Yeah.
- Guys, we did that. - That is good.
- We did good. - [chuckles]
- So I actually was wondering
about your charity organization.
Can you tell me about it? - I appreciate you asking.
Our youth is our most valuable commodity
that we have in this world. - I agree.
- So, when I started cooking 25 years ago,
I felt that there was a disparity in Latinos
getting management positions in the kitchen.
So I decided to start this scholarship
called the Aarón Sánchez Scholarship Fund.
And basically, they go to the best culinary program
to be chefs and leaders in the culinary world.
And you, young lady, have been so gracious with your donation
to make sure that that next generation is provided for.
- Oh, I really-- - So thank you so much.
Thank you so much. - You're very sweet.
- It's been honestly my pleasure.
I just want to say thank you so much.
This was so interesting, at first
because I didn't know the things were gonna be alive.
But this has, like, been a pleasure.
And I'm so honored to be able to cook with you,
and thank you for been patient with us
and for everything that you do for your community.
- Thank you. Continue being a beacon
and somebody that so many people look up to.
Your energy is infectious.
What you stand for is beautiful.
So I'm happy and honored to be sharing this kitchen
with you today so thank you.
- Thank you so much. - Thank you, ladies.
all: Bye. - You were awesome as well.
The best sous chefs ever.
- Whoo! - Whoo! Love that.
- Gracias. - Bye, thank you.
- Wow, he is such an angel.
[Selena singing in Spanish]
♪ ♪