two. ate.

Why?

- Syrian sweets at the ultra-cool International Food Bazaar in San Jose (2052 Curtner Avenue, San Jose, CA 95124)
- buying matzoh ball mix at Cosentino's (and that's all this year...one item, no line, in and out in 5 minutes...)
- perusing the beautiful fish, live blue crabs and mussels at 99 Ranch but buying 3 pounds of chicken carcass and one pack of chicken feet for our annual chicken soup (with aforementioned matzoh balls)
- a huge-ass bag of Korean extra-large chestnuts also at 99 Ranch for $2 (the not-so-good part...peeling them...ouch...wait, wait...the BEST part: eating them...)
- finding Karen's French Bakery Rye bread AND La Brea's Chocolate Sour Cherry bread (plus a crottin of La Tur, nicely runny)...all in the same place....

Posted by wjc at 05:41 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

Janet and I have many unique traditions around the Christmas/New Year's holidays: we make chicken soup with matzoh balls on Christmas Eve, eat deli food (shipped overnight from New York) and make baklava. I don't really know where making baklava started for us but it's kind of a pain in the butt to make but also kind of fun and ends up being nice to have around the house for the inevitable drop-in guests...

Almond baklava. A bit of pulverized almond (almond ground with sugar) marks the top of this one...
Filo dough, finely chopped nuts, sugar, cinnamon, honey, lemon and of course, butter. Lots of melted butter. Layering dough with melted butter sounds easy enough but filo dough often has it's own ideas. The key is to thoroughly THAW the dough then keep it covered while working with it. Peeling each sheet takes some finesse but once you do it a few times, it's pretty easy. 4-6 sheets go down then some of the nuts are scattered evenly across the dough...more layers, more nuts and so on. Cut before baking, a bit more butter, then bake.

Walnut baklava. Pulverized pistachio gives a little hint of green and identifies this as the "walnut" version...

The really sweet component is the syrup made of honey, sugar, water, and lemon juice. All of this gets slowly boiled for 15-20 minutes. Once the baklava comes out of the oven, it gets poured over all of it. You *could* eat it while it's hot but it's better at room temperature as the syrup really gets to soak in.

Posted by wjc at 10:41 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

While out shopping for baklava nuts today, I chose Whole Foods (a (now) national chain of "healthier food" stores) because they have a nice selection of bulk bin items including all kinds of nuts.

I have gotten to know (slightly) one of the people behind the cheese counter and she (no names here but...you know who you are) has always been helpful in helping me find the runniest, most pungent French cheese in the cases. Today, I passed by to say "hello" and inquired about the possibility of them (Whole Foods as a chain, or maybe just their cheese department which is conveniently located next to a *relatively* preserved meats department) making patés in the future.

What I got back as an answer was a screed of calm but mammoth proportions which roughly equated to, "Oh no, less and less people each day are eating paté because they are finding out the 'real deal' about it."

Uh, the REAL DEAL about WHAT exactly? Patés come in many types but she seemed to be generalizing around the FOIE GRAS aspect of paté. Ok, so PETA and other folks are applauding the foie ban in the state coming in a couple of years because of "abuse" of ducks. Uh huh...and how exactly does that match up with the abuse of chickens, kept in square cages barely able to move fed only to fatten? No one but no one decries their miserable existence.

I pressed her about "exactly what the deal was" with paté pointing out that there are many varieties: pork, duck, chicken *MEAT* patés (i.e., non-liver)..."yeah...we sell those...they're right over there...but paté will never sell in Northern California because people are just too hip to them and won't eat them."

I walked away feeling kind of like the WF I knew (and shopped at) just lost a bit of allure for me...and maybe has become a tad too uptight. Maybe they've always been that way; maybe it was just her...it left a sour taste in my mouth. The higher prices are sometimes worth it but add the attitude and it makes me think twice...

Posted by wjc at 04:41 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

When we were in France, we ate rillette (say "ree-ette") which is long cooked meat (usually pork) shredded and packed then sealed with some meat fat. It's been called an "old-school" appetizer of the highest order and is really delicious.

I decided to try my hand at making rillette and the method looked pretty straight forward: cook meat, shred meat, pack meat, store meat, wait for a week then eat. Well, except for the waiting part, it was a snap. Two pounds of pork belly, one pound of pork shoulder, salt, pepper, thyme, parsley, bay leaf, pork fat...it felt just like making sausage.

The pork (not the fat) gets cut into cubes and all gets piled into a heavy bottomed pan and covered with four cups of water. Roll a bouquet garni (thyme/parsley/bay) and add to the pot. Bring to a boil then slowly simmer for six hours. No need to add water as you *want* the water to evaporate and render the fat. And pork belly is pretty packed with fat.

Around hour five, there was only pork and rendered pork fat in the pan and it started to brown ever so slightly. By the end of the hour, the kitchen smelled like I was cooking carnitas (which it could have easily been...). Kill the heat, stir in salt, pepper then let it cool until warm...and let the shredding begin. Actually, I drained the rendered fat and saved it since it would come in handy later...

I used two forks to pull the meat apart (for a while) trying to preserve the natural threads of the meat. That got tiring and used my fingers.

The pork shreds nicely if it's still a bit warm...

All of this mixture got packed into five 8 oz. snap ring jars which I felt were small enough to provide 2-3 portions each plus they'd make good sized gifts to boot. The meat is packed semi-tightly as you can see here:

Lovely...

Ready for sealing...

While all of this action was taking place, the rendered pork fat started to set up. Rather than use strips of pork fat to lay over the top of the rillette, I used the rendered fat confit-style to seal the tops of the jars. Since most of the flavor is in the meat, the fat (in any form) is just used to seal the meat, keep it moist and preserve it for a while.

The semi-liquid fat flowed and sealed the top of the rillette nicely...

To finish...wiped everything up - the whole process gets kind of greasy - attached the rubber snap rings and got them ready for a long sleeep in the fridge.



Ready to go...just three days left...

They'll spend a minimum of three days in the fridge. That will allow the flavors marry and mingle. By Wednesday, we should be ready to devour.

Posted by wjc at 11:41 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

For the 6th year in a row, I have had the honour to be part of the chef's staff at the Poubelle Winter Feed. For those just joining the broadcast, this is our friend Tom's annual Winter dinner party celebrating his birthday. The only twist is that he (and we) cook for a houseful of friends.

This year's affair broke some records and achieved some milestones:
- this was the tenth annual Winter Feed
- we made 20 dishes this year, a new record
- Tom's mom came out to the dinner for the first time (his father, a professor in St. Louis, had to finish up the fall semester back there...)
- Tom turned 40 this year

For me, it was the third time of being the lead sous-chef on the kitchen crew and the second time of having the same crew (Tim, Meriko, Derrick) which made it an even more familiar kitchen. Here's the crew and Tom at the end of the evening...

We fed 38 people, made 50 souffles (more on that in a minute), grilled a whole bunch of quail and all had a rewarding, tiring, foot-numbing good time.

Check out the "Continue reading about..." URL below for some intimate details. Also check out Tom's Butter Pig blog, a set of pictures by LeeAnn and some by Melissa...you can match up the photos to the menu below....ok, onto the details...

For the past few years, there has been an apps, "seafood", "meats" and dessert course for the Poubelle Winter Feed. Those two in the middle have quotes around them as we also do compilmentary vegetarian dishes for our friends who are, not surprisingly, vegetarians. This year, things were a bit different with a larger apps course (complete with a second-year-in-a-row "fussy individually plated dish"), a sorbet interlude and a few less desserts...kind of. (Most of the dishes below are pictured here...).

Apps
1. Gougères
- Pate a choux and cheese pastry (paired with Kir Royale - champagne and currant liquor)

2. Foie gras terrine (pain de mie, watercress salad, truffle oil)
- the whole reason why this party started in the first place, ten years ago. I got to plate this this year and Meriko and I ended up taking the watercress and turning it into a bouquet

3. Butternut squash soup

4. Dueling Souffles
This was the "fussy individually plated dish" for the year (we did a French Laundry-inspired "steak and eggs" dish last year...).

So..two souffles:
- a stout, sharp cheddar and onion souffle
- a mussel souflee (with a meyer lemon, saffron, chardonay cream sauce)

Two souffle batters, 50 tiny foil souffle cups, lots of checking the oven for doneness, lots of happy people...I cooked off the mussels earlier in the day in a straight "moule" style, steamed with shallots and white wine. They were then chopped finely and the pot liquor reserved for the souffle batter.

5. Strawberry salad with jicama, spinach, cukes, light vinegarette w/ lime
We did this last year and it is quite possible the most refreshing salad ever. Tart and a hint of sweet...

"Seafood" course
1. Lobster rolls (with Sauce Americaine)
Earlier in the day, Tim and I wrestled with these, assembling and rolling up about 36 of them. Filo dough is a pain for the first five minutes and then it gets kind of fun. Kind of. The sauce on the other hand was a large quantity of lobster stock reduced down to practically nothing (for a moment, we thought we had taken it TOO far). A large knob of lobster buttter was added until the sauce was thickened and beautiful.

2. Herb Gnocchi (with summer squash, zucchini, red onion, small tomatoes, and basil)

3. Sesame Crusted Fish With Lime Ginger Cream
Tim had the "guest" dish this year which was a bit of a production getting all the component bits together but once plated...damn, was it good. Go here and scroll down to see it come together...

4. Curried Cauliflower Gratin

Interlude
1. Black Raspberry and Rosemary Sorbet
Our interlude...scooped *carefully* into a whole buttload of tiny sake cups the day before, this was very flavorful and a nice break to the meal. It was an interesting trick to get all 50 or so of these cups back into an overstuffed freezer covered up enough so they wouldn't soak up any of the other flavors from the freezer. The gyrations we went though were hilarious but untimately worth it.

"Meats" Course
1. Grilled Quail, Sauce Foyot
Oh my...again, quite a production getting these prepped but worth every feather-plucking, quail-stuffing, wringing-hands-over-grilling minute. These were stuffed with a mixture of sliced prosciutto, bread cubes, porcini, and lemon zest - trussed and pinned then grilled over an open fire. Janet got into the act providing light for the soon-to-be fully-deboned and consumed quail.

2. Artichokes and Mushrooms
These were fired quickly in white wine then butter and some stock added to create the sauce. These literally disappeared the moment they were put out...since I cooked them off, I only got to taste for seasoning, alas...

3. Wild Mushroom "Cassoulet"
Of all the dishes Tom has invented, this one is the most innovative and deceptively delicious. Deceptive from the fact that it tastes like it has a bunch of meat in it (true cassoulet has lots of diffeent meat in it) but has absoultely none. The dish is completely vegetarian. Smoked peppers and a severely reduced vegetable stock (lots and lots and lots of mushrooms) plus all of the other "trad" cassoulet ingredients (white beans, crumb crust...) make this dish, that has been done several of the years I have been working Tom, a real delight.

4. Rack of Lamb with Mustard Spatzle
OK...for some pretty good reasons, *I* own lamb at these dinners. It started five years ago when Tom asked me to "french" 8 racks of lamb (for that year's party). I had never done this before but got the hang of it right away. Even though my hands were destroyed from all of the cutting and scraping and pulling, they (the racks) looked beautiful. And since then I have prided myself on the utter clean-ness of the rib bones so they roast "white" when they're done. This year I frenched 8 more racks making that a total of 34 racks frenched for this party in the past five years.

So..."owning" this dish also means firing, finishing and plating them. This year, I had help from Derrick and he made excellent use of the huge round ceramic dish we plated them in. The mustard spatzle and flash sautéd winter vegetables plus a reduced red wine sauce rounded this one out.

5. Green Beans, Hazelnut Beurre Blanc

Dessert
1. Dobos Tort
A multi-layer sponge cake creation with a sectioned sponge cake and caramel top. Butter creme, bourbon, cake....oh.

2. Fruit Tarts
Tom does some kind of fruit tart every year. Always delicious, and they always disappear quickly.

3. Cherry and Prune Clafouti
I LOVE claflouti and make it at home with either apricots or figs dredged in honey and cinnamon. A claflouti is a semi-stuff custard with pieces of fruit scattered throughout. We did two: a classic cherry and a prune one which has a different name but we called it claflouti anyway.

4. Chocolates
Tom put togther a Mignardise which is exactly the opposite of an amuse-bouche (the little sampling of food from the chef at more upscale restaurants to whet your appetite) in the form of three chocolates: truffles, mendiants and white chocolate and fruit "bark".

Posted by wjc at 10:40 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

For those of you who don't know us, we eat at the Left Bank Restaurant in Menlo Park on the first Friday of every month, at 8 pm. We have been doing this for over three years. Why the Left Bank? Because their food is consistently good, hearty bistro fare.

Earlier this year, the restaurant made a major change to it's menu. They put some decently innovative dishes on, took some of the long-time ones off and generally modernized the selection. The food remained excellent and they left enough of our favorites on as well.

Eight weeks ago, they radically changed the menu and we heard that Roland Passot decided to go in a more classic brasserie/bistro direction. Gone were the semi-California-style dishes...in came classics: rillettes (duck, rabbit, salmon), coq au vin, boudin blanc and noir, duck l'orange and more...and for us, it's a hit.

Last month, the boudin noir took centre stage. It was cooked perfectly - soft, creamy. It even had Janet (who kind of recoils at blood sausage) tucking in to bits of it. This month it was the coq au vin for me, the lobster-chanterelle starter for Janet..

So...coq au vin is not a dish that is done very well by lots of places. Over cooked, over sauced, weird reductions...so I was a bit hesitant. However, the Left Bank's rendition blew my mind. A little cast iron pot with two legs and a thigh nestled among a really small bed of pasta with onions and other veg and a sauce was rich and fragrant and tangy. Oh god...this was good and it just got better as you went to the bottom of the pot. Taste: complex; feel: simple comfort food. Janet's lobster dish was very similar in feel: a very succulent dish with some simple and very satisfying touches. A piece of baked lobster with sauteéd chanterelles with a light, almost Americaine sauce.

When we went to Paris a month ago, we thirsted, lusted, dreamt of bistro-style food. Of the nights I cook, I tend to cook in a very bistro-influenced manner. And now, we've got our regular haunt following suit.

Posted by wjc at 11:32 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)