So Many Side Dishes

On Sunday I went a little out of control with the side dishes. The main event was a mustard-garlic pork roast, from Epicurious, which turned out very very delicious. Clockwise from there is celery-mushroom salad from the NY Times, pain a l'ancienne from the Bread Baker's Apprentice, port-glazed pearl onions (Epicurious), and spiced wine cranberry sauce and baked acorn squash (both me). The celery mushroom thing was dressed in lemon juice and olive oil, and I thought it was surprisingly good, although Craig thought it was too lemony. The bread was amazing. This was the first time I'd made that recipe, and it was really quite easy (no kneading, no shaping), except for making Hollie into a wood-burning brick oven. Probably one of the best breads I've ever made. Craig really liked the onions, I just thought they were so-so, and also thought they shouldn't have been plated next to the cranberries, which were very tasty. The squash was dumb, underseasoned and undercooked, but that was OK because when I skipped that and my salad, I had room for another piece of pork!

Pan-Seared Steak

Last week I heard someone on the radio mention steaks and martinis, and I got a little obsessed.  We had the martinis with a cheese called Rosemary's Waltz, from MA.  It's a goat cheese with rosemary and juniper berries, and it was all right, but they could have seasoned it better--the herbs were just stuck on the top, and there wasn't much flavor in the cheese itself.

For dinner I made Cook's pan-seared strip steaks, and boy were they good!  They're so thick, you put them in a slow oven first to warm them through, then pan-sear and make the red wine mushroom sauce.  The potatoes were from the NYTimes, roasted with figs and garlic, and the brussels sprouts were pan-cooked with pecans.  This dinner was great!  The only thing I would change is to put the figs in with the potatoes a little later in the roasting--they got sort of hard.  We drank a wine Craig's dad gave him for his birthday, Robert Mondavi 2005 Cabernet, which was great.

Sockeye on Leeks and Shiitakes

Last night Craig got some wild-caught sockeye and served it over sauteed leeks and shiitakes.  I was really impressed at how tasty it was, as it was basically seasoned with salt and pepper only.  The leek and mushroom combination was so attractive, it probably should have been plated atop the salmon.  We enjoyed braised bok choi and white rice alongside, and celebrated the third Thursday in November with a Beaujolais Nouveau.  Granted, I have a strong affection for raw-tasting wine, but I think this year is particularly good.

Lentil Soup

I love the Cook's recipe for lentil soup, and I make it a lot because it's so easy and tasty. On Sunday I made the chicken broth, and I think I used too much bay leaf, but it was good nonetheless. I skipped the blender step--I don't have an immersion blender, and it's just too annoying/dangerous to put the hot soup in the blender. Lisa gave us the last of her beautiful garden chard (we use the same seeds--why is hers so much better???), and I sauteed it with currants and pine nuts. My hippie bread came out a little too crusty, but the inside was delicious.

Experimental Duck and Crazy Mushrooms

While at Wegman's in Rochester for Veterans' Day weekend, I picked up some crazy mushrooms I've never seen in a grocery store before. I got pom pom mushrooms and lobster mushrooms (I recommend an image search for those--the pom pom looks just like a bichon frise), and also a bunch of oyster mushrooms. I could finally make Jamie Oliver's grilled wild mushroom risotto, wherein he uses mushrooms I simply can't get at Stop and Shop, or even WF. The risotto is made with chopped rehydrated porcinis and the broth they were rehydrated in, and topped with the fancy mushrooms after they're grilled in a dry pan. I regret to say I was so distracted I failed to take a picture, but that was some goooood risotto! Lisa and Chris were over for dinner, and all four of us cleaned our plates. We enjoyed the last bottle of my great wine deal, the Alix Bordeaux Blanc, with this course.

Then it was on to the experiment. A while ago, Jamie Oliver made a warm duck and pumpkin salad, that I wanted to try. The recipe wasn't available on the web, but it seemed simple enough. He roasted pumpkin wedges and a whole duck, then served them together with a lot of cilantro and some mint in an Asian dressing. It seemed so weird I just had to check it out. I used a pumpkin and an acorn squash, roasting them in wedges. I toasted the pumpkin seeds for garnish, but they were incredibly bitter, so I tried toasting the seeds from the acorn squash--delicious. When Craig came home I had him taste the pumpkin to see if it needed anything, and he nearly spit it out--also incredibly bitter. Who knows--I was really glad I had that acorn squash though! Jamie just seemed to throw the cilantro on, stems and all, but I thought that could make for some messy eating, so I coarsely chopped the cilantro and mint, and dressed it with a mixture of lime juice, olive oil, chili oil, sesame oil, sugar, and soy sauce. I had brined the duck in OJ and roasted it whole, pulling off the meat for the final presentation.

The whole thing was surprisingly delicious--I would absolutely make it again, with another backup squash, of course! We drank a Borgo Magredo Friuli 2007 Pinot Noir.

And dessert. I had poached pears, and planned to serve them with sauce from frozen CSA raspberries and vanilla caramel. Maybe there was something in the air that night, because not only did I have an amazingly bitter pumpkin, but I could not make caramel sauce to save myself! I've made caramel so many times with no trouble, but Saturday night it just wouldn't work. After wasting a whole lot of sugar, I finally got a runny approximation, then discovered that Craig, who was just wonderful about keeping up with the dishes (essential in a kitchen the size of ours), had been a little overzealous and washed away the vanilla bean guts that were reserved for the caramel. So not vanilla, and very runny, but still good. If it had been thicker, I don't think it would have looked like the pears were bleeding.
Craig chose a Quinta Infantado Ruby port for this course, and it made a delicious end to a meal that was more difficult than it should have been, but tastier than I would have expected.

Latin Chicken in a Pot

On Friday Craig made one of my favorite cold-weather meals.  It's Rachel Ray, Latin Chicken in a Pot.  Chicken thighs cooked with rice, topped with avocado cream and a salsa fresca.  Craig accidentally put the salsa in the food processor, so it was a little too smooth in texture, but the meal was really good.  He put lacinato kale alongside--I've had so-so experiences with the lacinato variety and tend to avoid it, but Craig did a great job--probably was more patient and cooked it longer than I have.

Puttanesca, Stir fry, and Veggie Soup

Craig made the best pasta sauce on Friday night! All I really needed was a bowl of the sauce and a big spoon, and I would have been happy. It was a quick puttanesca, and the recipe called for an entire tin of anchovies, which made both of us raise our eyebrows, but it was really tasty. He served it atop whole wheat spagetti and next to CSA greens, braised in chicken stock and some of the water from the canned crushed tomatoes. We enjoyed the 3 Mollusk house red and turned off the porch light so we wouldn't have to share with trick or treaters.

Our CSA ended last week, but we won't be seeing the last of our CSA squash for a while. Saturday night I tried subbing butternut squash for carrots in a stir-fry. It was actually pretty good. Also in the mix were pak choi, daikon, kohlrabi, shiitakes, and edamame. I made up the sauce, and actually did a pretty good job, and both of us thought the squash was pretty good.

My weekend project was vegetable soup from Epicurious. I made the broth on Saturday and we ate the soup for dinner on Sunday. I had never made a vegetable broth before. It came out really well, with a nice delicate flavor and a perfume I would attribute mostly to the celeriac. I was able to use both green and dried beans from our garden, which was fun. It also contained lacinato kale, red pepper, potatoes, carrots, and shallots, and I threw in a parmesan rind. On the bowl is a slice of my first hippie bread of the season (I bought a new oven thermometer), which came out really well--wheat berries are the secret!

Pizzish

On Wednesday night we had a couple of stops on the way home, so we needed a quick dinner.  I topped an Iggy's pizza crust with sauteed bacon and leeks, chevre, and parmesan.  After it came out of the oven, I topped that with arugula and sliced daikon radish tossed in lemon juice and olive oil.  Craig was a little surprised to find his salad atop his pizza, but he agreed that it was a very nice quick meal--and a sneaky way to get soft cheese into Craig's salad!