Dinner at RA

After Dragon.Con we stopped off at a restaurant downtown for a late dinner. I chose a place down the street from where I work called RA, a sushi bar. It has a great theme and layout, and the staff is very friendly, even if not always super attentive. I got a cocktail called a “Dragon Bite” which was very bright and refreshing, but could have used a double shot of Bacardi Dragonberry. S. ordered a Tuna Tataki starter dish of thinly sliced, seared ahi tuna served with an onion soy vinaigrette. Then she ordered a King Crab Roll with king crab mix, cucumber & avocado, rolled & topped with king crab, all served with an Asian pesto sauce which I think was predominately ginger and cilantro. She also had the Salmon Asparagus Roll which had kani kama crab mix, cucumber and asparagus rolled, all topped with raw salmon slices.

I had the house’s signature dish, the Viva Las Vegas Roll, which had kani kama crab and cream cheese rolled in rice and seaweed, lightly battered with tempura, fried and topped with spicy tuna, kani kama crab mix & sliced lotus root chips and finished with a sweet eel sauce and spinach tempura bits. Very good. I also had the Gojira (Godzilla) Roll, which had shrimp tempura, kani kama crab mix, cream cheese and cucumber rolled and topped with spicy tuna and spinach tempura bits served with sriracha & spicy mayo sauce.

The vibe was cool but the music was a bit off the mark. The in house DJ could not seem to settle on a particular decade to play from. Maybe he was trying to make everybody happy. But when you try to make everyone happy… Our server was a hottie, so that forgave the few minor sins we had to put up with, and it was a holiday weekend and a Saturday night. Overall we were very pleased. It is a little on the pricey side, and I’d like to see what the lunch offerings are. But, it is Midtown so expect to dig a little deeper.

The photo is from www.sincerelytrulyscrumptiousxoxo.com because mine turned out too dark and blurred to use.

Comida Sencilla and Happy Birthdays

I almost never stop for lunch during the day at work.  As a result, my prep person almost never stops, either.  I don't make her work through lunch.  I encourage her to take a break (when I remember).  She demures and just keeps working.  The other day I felt guilty because I caught her furitively sneaking bites of a banana while working.  So I took a couple of minutes and knocked together a quick meal for us both.

Since I was working with chicken thighs, I set a couple aside and rubbed them with salt, pepper, garlic and whole grain mustard.  I grabbed some leftover asparagus from the evening before and laid them inside the thighs, along with some shredded Swiss cheese, some shredded Asiago, and a wedge of brie, and rolled them up.  I seasoned with paprika and sea salt and gave it a quick sear in a skillet, then tossed it in the oven to cook through.  While it cooked I boiled some rice and tossed in some diced peppers and scrounged up some pickled onions, olive tapenade and balsamic glaze.  Took about 15 minutes and we had a hearty meal to sustain us through the next few hours of prep.  When I brought her the plate, Dulce laughed and thanked me.  She said it was very good, but she had to add some jalapenos to it.  But, she puts jalapenos on everything, so...  Bottom line: we both cleaned our plates.

Saturday was Mina's birthday.  She's a member of our marketing staff and a real sweetheart.  Off-handedly I said I would make a cake for her.  Saturday night Erika came into the kitchen and asked me when I wanted to bring the cake up to the office.  I must have had that look on my face, because she asked if I had made it.  Of course not, but I told her I was working on it.  Mina would be in at 9pm, she said.  No problem, I said.  Immediately my staff chefs and I began putting together quick cake ideas that could be ready in 1 hour.  I put them to work on an expresso cake that they promptly messed up.  I was going to make them throw it out, but they promised me they could fix it.  Unconvinced, I began my own cake, and the whole situation turned quickly into a chef competition "cake-off".

For my part, I made a chocolate sponge cake that baked up in about 15 minutes, then made a Kahlua-chocolate frosting and a brandy whipped cream.  I cut the sponge cake into three layers, then took a cookie cutter and cut circles into the cake layers and layered the frosting on the layers.  I reassembled the layers and filled the cut circles with brandy whipped cream, then frosted the outside, finishing with dollops of whipped cream on top.  While waiting for the other chefs to finish their bungled cake repair, I made some pink icing and swirled it around the plate, topped with some edible gold glitter, and for good measure set a shot glass of brandy on the side.
The other cake came out after 30 minutes, and the chefs covered it with thick chocolate ganache, layers of sliced strawberries, and more ganache.  We both finished within the hour and I took the cakes up to Mina's office.  When she came in she gleedfully knocked back the shot and cut into my cake first.  Her eyes rolled with decadent delight.  She told me later that both cakes were completely consumed before the night was out.

Lemon Oil Poached Salmon

For this dish I shaved some Meyer lemon peels and black peppercorns into some olive oil and let it set for a day.  The next day I lightly salted my salmon filet, let it set for about 20 minutes, put my probe thermometer into it, then submerged it in the lemon oil and covered it with foil.  I put the small pan with the fish and oil into a double boiler and put it on low heat on the
oven, with the temp alert set at 130F.  Then I cleaned, chopped, and boiled some parsnips, made a quick tomato, caper, mustard relish, sauteed my kale with shallot and cranberries (fresh, not dried), and sweated some blueberries in bourbon-maple syrup.

When the parsnips were tender I creamed them with some cream and the leftover fennel beurre blanc and pureed until very smooth.  I took the blueberries and spooned them over our desserts, which was an eggnog flan.  I caramelized the peeled Myer lemon slices for garnish, and squirted a little juice onto the kale.

This is the look I'm going for on this dish

The temp alert went off at 130F, but the fish carried over to 140F and that was far hotter than I had planned.  Although still moist and flavorful, the salmon was cooked through 100%.  I'm thinking that in order to get the kind of look and texture I want, I need to seep it longer, but not let it go over 100F, and hopefully not carry past 115F-120F.  There was nothing wrong with it, except that it lost it's rich orange orange color, was too flakey to make a good presentation, and had those little white fat spots all over it.  But it was still good. 

The sweetness of the parsnips was offset by the bitterness and sharp tang of the kale and cranberries, and everything was spiced up by the tomato/caper/mustard relish.  The eggnog flan and blueberry/maple topping was just the right dessert, too.  Finished with some Graham's 10 Year Tawney, and it was quite delicious.

New Year's Day Dinner

Began 2013 with a simple yet tasty dinner featuring Steamed Lobster Tail atop Caramelized and Curried Cream-Roasted Fennel, with Sauteed Spinach and Mushrooms, Toasted Corn, and Fennel-Cream Beurre Blanc Sauce.  We had a fair sparkling Moscato to go with it.

Chocolate Strawberry Display

I was asked to make up a chocolate strawberry plate for a bachlorette party at work.  I thought of ways to make it nice and creative, and to really "wow" the ladies and make it special.  I dipped the strawberries and drizzled with white chocolate, then put them on sticks and arranged them in a vase filled with mint and lettuce, with some red grapes and rambutans for garnish.

Not as beautiful as I'd like, but a nice beginner's start.

Reunion Dinner

Our friend Linda came over on Friday night.  We haven't seen her in a long time, and she admits she is just now begining to poke her head out after a couple of years of baby-induced isolation.  We'd planned just a little get together, to let her finally see our house, to catch up, and to enjoy a nice meal.  Dinner was pretty simple, and took me about two hours to put together.  I did all the main work before she arrived so we could concentrate of socializing as I finished a little sauteeing.  Then we were able to sit down and enjoy good food and good company.

I started with a Kabocha Squash Bisque, drizzled with Sage Oil.  I like using kabocha over butternut squash for a couple of reasons.  The flesh, once roasted, seem smoother and finer to me.  It purees perfectly.  It is also less sweet and has a richer, nuttier flavor.  It takes flavors like curry and chili and melds wonderfully.  I made this bisque with just a little butter, cream, coriander, cayenne, and rice wine vinegar.  The sage oil was just crushed sage leaves seeped in warmed olive oil until infused.

Our next course was a miso/sake glazed ahi tuna, seared and sliced over a roll of sushi rice, with a pile of wakame seaweed salad and honey-chili avocado relish.  The relish was super simple:  I diced some avocado, sprinkled with a touch of salt, and drizzled a blend of honey and chili powder, then tossed.  Because of its nature, honey will prevent an avocado from oxidizing the same as lemon juice, and it provides a great alternative flavor.  For fun and flourish I added a rambutan(that spiny-looking thing) to each plate.  The fruit was a nice palate cleanser after the dish.

After that I finished off the sushi grade grilled salmon, dusted with cumin, coriander, chili powder and garlic, and set it atop the creamed leeks, celeriac, and red onions.  I usually match celeriac up with salmon these days, and generally it is pureed, as with mashed potatoes.  But this time I shredded it and creamed it with the leeks and onions.  The results were very pleasing.  I topped the salmon with a spoonfull of heirloom tomato/dijon mustard salsa spiked with a little white balsamic vinegar.

All of that would probably have been enough, but I went one dish farther and did a red wine/balsamic braised short rib (I used a piece of chuck flap, which works excellently for braising).  I sliced some king trumpet mushrooms and braised them in the beef's liquid for about 20 minutes, then reduced and strained the braising liquid to make a sauce.  I oven roasted tiny tri-color potatoes with oil, garlic, and smoked salt, and sauteed a bunch of red swiss chard.  The meat came out fork tender, the potatoes were perfect, the chard provided a nice bitter bite back against the somewhat sweet sauce, and the mushrooms added a beefy complement to the short ribs.  Of course the beef and sauce were very dark, as were the mushrooms and the chard.  Not the best photo, but it tasted darn good, for sure.

We retired to the living room for more catching up and dessert.  A simple yet flavorful Caramel Vanilla Creme Panna Cotta, with Caramelized Seckle Pear and an Amarena Cherry.  I made the caramel sauce for the bottom of the dish, and let it set up in the fridge, but bein impatient I added the panna cotta too soon and it melted and combined.  Still, very good.  A little too stiff, however.  I cut back the gelatin quantity by 1/3 from the recomended amount, because I was making the panna cotta with 36% heavy cream.  It was still a bit too much, since the panna cotta was not as smooth and spoonable as I wanted.  Flavors were all there, anyway.

It is always a joy to cook for friends and to experiment with foods.  I love having dinners like this, for the company and for the chance to play in Jack's Kitchen.

Birthday Dinner

Last weekend I did a very nice dinner/wine tasting for a couple celebrating the wife's birthday.  They had 20 very good friends over and we did a seven course round of small plates with some very nice wines.  Sommelier John Sousa provided great background and notes on the wines.  We started off the evening with a pair of appetizers: Local Grilled Peach Tart with French Chantilly and Savory Sage and Sundried Tomato Cheesecake Bite on Spiced Flatbread; with a Henri Giraud Hommage Grand Cru Brut, a Billecart-Salmon Champagne and a Spottswoode Sauvignon Blanc.

Once all the guests had mingled and caught up, we ushered them into the dining room where we went course by course through our tapas-inspired small plate dinner.  Thas was a great solution to those who wanted to try a great variety of food with the various wines, but not get filled up.  Everyone was able to have just a few bites of great tasting, flavor-packed foods and not be overwhelmed by standard dinner portions.

We started with:

Cardamom Dusted Mango Lhassi Shooter

Followed by:

Baked BBQ Pulled Pork Spring Roll with Firecracker Coleslaw and Candied Peach Bite

And then:
Brandy Braised Stuffed Chicken Thigh with Dried Figs and Apples and Blackberry/Maple Glaze


All served with a 2007 Felsina Fontalloro from Tuscany

Next we served up a lovely Champagne Poached Lobster Claw and Body on a Bed of Fresh Frisse Lettuce, Heart of Palm, Roasted Red Pepper and Mango Slaw with Tarragon Citrus Vinaigrette.  John chose a 2007 Paul Hobbs Chardonnay from Russian River Valley to go with this dish.

Then it was time for the Chimichurri-Rubbed Flat Iron Steak, Asiago Potato Croquettes, Wilted Spinach, and Roasted Red Pepper Coulis.  We did our best to cook the beef to the requested temps, which were everywhere from "red and warm" to "medium well".  Based on the plates that came back empty, I'd say we did a good job.  With this dish they had a very nice 2007 Keenan Cabernet Sauvignon out of Spring Mountain, Napa.

The Sesame-Seared Sashimi Salmon on a Phyllo-Wrapped Cream Cheese Pillow, Orange-Glazed Asparagus, Celeriac Puree was a show-stopper.  Everyone loved the little phyllo cream cheese pillows, and the salmon came out moist and perfect.  The wine was a 2009 Sotor Pinot Noir from Mineral Springs, Oregon.

What kind of birthday party would it be without cake?  We offered some Assorted Chocolate Truffle-Cake Pops, which had rounds of richly flavored truffles stuffed inside moist and yummy cake pops.  I left off the little sticks because I thought it would look tacky.  I made some extra to leave for the kids, who didn't get to come to the party, but they were so popular the guests ate them all.

In the end everyone had a great time, we go lots of compilments on the food and wine, and looks like we are scheduled to do this menu again for a holiday dinner in November.  I can't wait to cook up a few new goodies for them to try.  I have a creme brulee cake pop in mind which ought to be just awesome.

The ladies I got to help with the plating were fantastic and really made the evening go smoothly.  And John's classy and entertaining wine tasting elevated the dinner to an evening I am sure no one will soon forget.  So much fun!



Maggie was having too much fun making cake pops!



Dolores takes plate-up very seriously!



Brookhaven Market

Kicked off the new season of local farmer’s market with a visit to the Brookhaven Market on Dresden Ave. Originally we were going to visit the Atlanta Food Truck Park, which hosts a farmer’s market on Saturdays. But when we arrived, there were only four vendors set up, and not a single one had fresh produce. It was more like a mini flea market, with someone selling jewelery, someone selling crafts, someone selling pound cake, and someone selling iced coffee drinks. It is a young market, so maybe it will develop, but on this day is was very disappointing and we did not stay more than a few minutes.

We next opted for the Peachtree Road Farmer’s Market, held every Saturday on the grounds of the Catherdral of St. Philip. It claims to be the largest produce only open air market in town, and hosts numerous chef demos every Saturday. For some reason, they were no open this Saturday; they ran their market in the evening the previous Friday.

Getting desperate and annoyed, we finally found directions to the Brookhaven Market which was happily A)open, and B)small, but bustling and featured a number of diverse vendors. It is set up in the parking lot behind two restaurants (who are both customers as well of many of the produce vendors). I think there were about 12 vendors, so it didn’t take long to go through, but we did amble and talk with the people at the tables. There was a Jamacian couple who made fresh Mojito and Ginger Tonic juices, bottled and ready to mix with your favorite alcohol, or just drink straight. A Middle Eastern woman selling hummus, nan, and chutney. Produce vendors with assortments of fresh vegetables, still dirty and smelling of the gardens. This included a guy selling scarlet turnips, which I had never heard of but were quite mild and slightly sweet, even raw. A woman selling beer soap, the peach guy with crates of SC peaches, a woman selling assorted bread loaves made from freshly milled grains, a guy selling pasta and Italian breakfast cookies.

I spoke for a while with a woman who was selling assorted jarred soups, dips, and raw vegan chips she made in her dehydrator. She made them from flax meal, ground almonds, pureed yellow squash, and some other stuff. I tried a sample and thought it was quite good. I have a friend who is raw vegan who I expect to see in a week or so. If I haven’t gotten into them myself I will probably give them to her to enjoy.

I also spent a little time talking to a man who was selling farm-raised chickens and eggs. His eggs were about the same as the organic eggs I buy in Kroger, but his his chicken was around $4.60/pound. I still can’t get past this, and I think a lot of other people can’t either. I get why they cost what they do, but it is still to hard to swallow, buying a whole chicken for $20-$25. For the market to become sustainable someone is going to have to bite the bullet and pay up, but on this day it wasn’t going to be me. We also sampled some local goat cheeses which were pretty good, if not outstanding.

As a bonus, behind the market in the greenspace of an apartment complex I found a small vegetable garden set up for the residents. It was neat and well tended, with a garden bench at one end for people to sit and just be at peace in the garden. More and more, in tiny spaces and available niches, people are generating an excited energy about gardens, local produce, fresh ingredients, handmade products, and sustainable foods.

It is a nice little market that, while it didn’t hold anything outstanding or especially unique, was a pleasant and cozy addition to the character of that neighborhood.

Dinner and The Movies

My friend Calvin invited me to participate in an “Iron Chef” style themed-menu cook-off with him over the weekend. He was a little sparse on the details except to say that there would be about 20 guests at a dinner party for one of his clients. The theme was “food and the movies” and the idea was for each of us to present a menu where each dish reflected the theme of a certain movie. I whipped up a menu and sent it over to him, certain he would send it back with budgetary restrictions, but he didn’t. He said it looked good, and that cost wasn’t really a concern with this party. The host would pay whatever was necessary to get a top-notch dinner.

I’d put in a lot of hours at work for the week and asked Calvin to pick up most of the menu food for the evening. He’d said we’d have a couple of guys to help us prep things, and I assumed we’d be working out of the clubhouse kitchen since the host lived in a country club community. Some stuff I had to pick up myself on Friday because I wanted to cook and roast it overnight. I got all the ingredients, but then life and wife intervened and I didn’t get anything done on Friday night.

I got up around 4 am Saturday and began cooking my meats and smoking sugar plums for a sauce. That and a few other things kept me busy until it was time to go to the Spartan Race in Conyers. I pulled all the meats and let them chill while I went and ran the race. The race took longer than I planned and I had to rush back home, hop in the shower, scub off the mud and blood, get dressed and pack all the food. I high-tailed it over to the address Calvin gave me and found out we were not cooking at a clubhouse, but at someone’s home. I arrived a half hour late, but got right to work. The help Calvin suggested was coming never came and I had to do everything by myself. I worked on a tiny space on the counter top and Calvin and I had to share stovetop space. I finished up the components of my four dishes just as the guests were sitting down.

Calvin and I took turns taking out our dishes and explaining the plates and their connections to the movies. Calvin did a clam linguini inspired by “The Little Mermaid”, a grits and short-rib dish via “My Cousin Vinny”, a shrimp trio on cedar plank hommage to “Forrest Gump”, and a Royale with Cheese burger with vanilla shake ala “Pulp Fiction”.

My dishes were: “From Russia With Love” which had a potato hash tower wrapped with smoked salmon and topped with salmon roe, frisee salad, vodka cream sauce and borscht vinaigrette; “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon” with a saffron-poached tiger shrimp crouching over a tamarind-glazed slice of bbq’d eel on a bed of green tea tapioca pearls, honey braised carrots, smoked plum sauce and lime chili pickle; “One Upon A Time In Mexico” with chipolte roasted pork tamale, adobo salsa, “riced” jicama and stewed tomatillo; and “Spaghetti Western” with BBQ chuck roast, BBQ marinara, calico baked beans, fresh fettuccini noodles and piavi cheese.

The guests scored us on presentation, taste, and tie-in to the movie. Calvin ended up winning but I didn’t care, it was his party and his guests and it was all in fun anyway. I got reimbursed for my expenses and a nice little wad of cash for helping him out. We cooked and plated and ran food and cleaned and packed up and it was 1am before I left their house and headed home. I had to unpack and unload it was after 2am by the time I was able to go to bed.

Everyone had a great time and we got lots of compliments and handshakes and back-pats on the food and the originality of our concepts. It certainly was fun to do and I always learn something while doing these kinds of gigs(ie, you can never be too organized!). Hopefully we will get to do something fun like this in the future.

Protein Power

In keeping with my goal to go higher in protein during at least one meal, I prepared one of my personal favorites: Steak Tartare. I’ve been off red meat almost completely for several months, but I decided this was a good way to kick off a powerful protein diet. I made a small salad of tomatoes and cucumbers with a lemon vinaigrette to start with. Then I finely chopped some garlic, parsley and red onions, mashed a little bit of anchovy I found in the very back of the fridge, bowled up some roasted tomatoes and Worchestershire sauce, sauteed some mushrooms, and daubed a little whole grain dijon mustard on a plate. From the store I bought some top round sirloin, very lean. I seasoned around 6 ounces with a little sea salt and stuck it in the freezer for about 10 minutes. I diced the very cold and firm meat into cubes and ran it through my meat grinder on a medium grind setting (I know the purists want to finely chop the meat by hand, but I went the grinding route, sue me). I formed the ground meat into a thick patty and pressed a well in the center. Into the well I laid an organic egg yolk. It made for a very pretty plate, I thought. After the salad I sprinkled the various condiments onto the patty and the yolk and used my fork to fold over the raw ground meat until everything was well combined. It tasted awesome, and pretty gourmet for workout fuel.

Not something I’d do very often. I still want to make red meat a rarity in my diet. But nothing wrong in being a little decadent in the pursuit of health and fitness.

Valentine's Day Dinner

Even though we were both pretty busy last week with work and school, S. and I carved out some hours on Tuesday to celebrate Valentine’s Day together. I did what I do best: cook; and she did what she does best: set the mood for romance.

While she set the stage upstairs I worked in the kitchen and in less than an hour made up a tasty ahi tuna and strawberry salad with heart of palm and zesty orange vinaigrette, her favorite honey-glazed smoked salmon with white lentils and asparagus sauteed in more orange vinaigrette with a kumquat relish on top, and chocolate-dipped strawberries paired with Rose Regale sparkling wine. Originally I was going to make creme brulees, but time escaped me.

The only thing I’d change would be using brown sugar to make the relish. It caused the bright orange kumquats to darken too much. They still tasted great, but I really wanted that splash of color to offset the green asparagus.

Holiday Party

For the seated dinner party I did recently, I composed a menu I thought would appeal to the host and be suitable for the occasion of his holiday party. I did a couple of back up menu options and he ended up blending two menu choices. He stressed how important the timing was going to be. Last year he did a very nice, very expensive dinner, but the dishes were so slow in coming out of the kitchen it was after 11:30pm before they got their entrees. There was an average wait of around 50 minutes between courses! He was very clear that he wanted to start around 7:30pm and for dessert to hit the table at 9:30pm. I told him that would be no problem, that the only thing we would be waiting on would be the diners, we would be doing things on their schedule, set and ready.

When guests arrived they noshed on some appetizers and sparkling prosecco to begin with. The apps were chef’s choice, and I created a trio of tasty amuse bouches:


• Roasted Apple with Caramel Sauce and Bleu Cheese Crumbles in a Phyllo Tart Shell
• Pulled Pork with Manchego Cheese and Spicy BBQ Sauce on Roasted Tortilla Chip Crisp
• Duck Confit with Fresh Thyme, Roasted Garlic and Quince Jelly
The Apple was the favorite with the ladies, and the guys liked the BBQ the best. Everyone ate the duck and all said it was good, but no one ate the quince jelly. I don’t know why.

When the apps had been devoured, the official welcome had been offered by the host, and everyone was seated (around 7:45pm), we got right to the first course:




Roasted Butternut Squash with Root Vegetable Timbale, Topped with Seared Scallops

I did such a good job on this dish at Thanksgiving I decided to add it to this menu. I smartened up and used only one scallop per bowl, since two sea scallops was really too much. Almost all butternut squash and only a splash of cream, with a mix of sweet potato, celery root, turnip and red onion in the timbale. Tasting it in the kitchen as we reheated it for service, even I had to stop and say: “Wow”. Lots of compliments on the flavor and what we did not serve I packed up for the hostess to have the next day. My only reservation was that the soup was too thick, almost like a pudding. But it went over well.







Mixed Greens with Dried Cranberries, Golden Raisins, Burgundy-Poached Seckle Pears, Candied Pecans and Pomegranate Vinaigrette


Trying to get a nice blend of sweet and sharp, and to cleanse the palate of the soup, the salad went very well with the chardonnay the host had chosen for this course.














Grilled Salmon Filet with Blood Orange Beurre Blanc, Pink Peppercorn-Crusted Beef Filet with Bourbon-Vanilla Sauce, Kabocha Squash and Porcini Mushroom Ravioli Tossed with Browned Butter and Sage, and Roasted Baby Vegetables

A complicated dish to assemble because of the number of people who wanted different temps on their meats. We pulled it off by laying out the plates on every available surface and running around with pots and spoons. I cooked all the salmon the same degree of doneness, and it remained very moist. I chose a sashimi grade of salmon, which has more fat and flavor. The beef was teres major, which was convienient because it enabled me to cook whole pieces to the desired degree of doneness. The homemade ravioli came out the best I had ever made it, and I only lost one piece to breakage while reheating, and that was the extra piece. All my portions were exactly on the money, with no extras. Once the dishes hit the table the guests switched to a pinot noir which I had recommended for the meal. Plates came back to the kitchen clean, except for a few who didn’t eat their vegetables. Because of the meat temps, we should have made a seating chart so we would know who got what temp. That would have made our plate-out faster and more efficient.

We cleaned up and got reorganized and laid out the dessert plates.

Cayenne-Spiked Chocolate Truffles with Cinnamon-Ginger Dust, Almond Toffee Crunch, French Chocolate Mousse and Raspberry-Port Drizzle

So quick and easy to make that I rushed and piped the mousse too soon and it deflated a little. The dessert plates went down at exactly 9:30pm, just as the host had requested. We hit all our times perfectly and I was very pleased. They enjoyed a Graham’s 20 year old tawny port with the dessert and those plates came back scraped clean, too. We made coffee for those who requested it and proceeded to clean up and load the van. The guests stayed at the dining table, and several people came into the kitchen to compliment me and the staff. The host said everything was terrific. We were gone and out their hair around 10:30pm. In my later analysis I discovered that my actual costs were only 2% higher than I had estimated they would be, and the discrepancy came from some paper products I forgot to account for and needed, adding coffee, and overbuying on ice. My food costs fell in exactly where I wanted them to. From both a learning experience and a practical exercise, I was very pleased with how everything went and how all the food turned out.

I had to reshoot all the pictures of the food after the event. We took a camera but got so busy that we forgot to snap any photos.

Non Traditional Thanksgiving

Without a big family to feed this year, or very many guests to entertain, I decided it would be a good opportunity to make a Thanksgiving Day dinner that wouldn't be found just anywhere. It could contain a few traditional holiday elements, but also be a little unorthodox. I don't know of too many fish-based Thanksgiving dinners, so that's what I set out to do. I went to my friendly neighborhood Buford Farmer's Market and bought everything for just under $50 on Wednesday afternoon. I was expecting the store to be packed with last minute shoppers, but it was actually very easy to get around.

Thursday morning I made a little quesadilla of crumbled queso and Honey-Baked Ham (the one must have on my wife's dinner list) and we enjoyed that with some picante sauce and back-to-back "Fringe" episodes on Netflix. I made my way into the kitchen in the afternoon and put together our meal, just the two of us.

First up I made an escolar ceviche salad with wakami seaweed, pineapple and samsutra oranges. That was really awesome and cleansed out palates for the next course.

I whipped up a very simple but very delicious butternut squash soup with two spice-crusted seared scallops. I used turmeric in the spice and I don't think I will do that again because it gave the scallops a yellow coloring I didn't care for. But they tasted great.

Next course was coriander and ginger seared tuna, sliced and served with an heirloom tomato and heart of palm salad with a little crumble of Bulgarian feta. Really nice but I overcooked the tuna a little bit.

For the entree, I kept it simple and made it a crowd-pleaser (that is, what S. likes best). Smoked salmon filet, green bean casserole and mashed potatoes. The potatoes were some fingerlings I was just trying to use up, and they were good, but not fluffy. I played around with the idea of a sauce, but opted to just go with the salmon as is.

We finished up with pumpkin pie (store-bought) and some fresh whipped cream (homemade). And later, more ham. Not your everyday Thanksgiving, but we were thankful, anyway.

BCSE

^{Photo lifted from the web, since I am too busy to stop and snap a shot of my own…}
A wise man once said: “If at first you don’t suceed – Oh, just give it to me, for crying out loud!”

Among the daily battles I’ve been fighting in order to get the food quality up from where it was has been the Battle of the Chicken Salad and the Battle of the Tuna Salad.

These are two pretty straightforward products but I was appalled at how awful they were. My first day I had every one of the prep staff take a spoon and taste the concoction one of them had just made. They all dipped their spoons in and tasted and all nodded in ageement that it was good. I looked around with unabashed amazement and told them that I simply did not believe them. There was no way they were telling the truth if they said that mess was actually edible. More lessons on seasoning, flavor, balance, yada-yada-yada.

The prep person assigned to make all the cold salads, including chicken and tuna salads, asked me to taste two big bowls she’d made and was preparing to send out. I tasted, but reserved my comment. I asked her what she thought. She said she thought it was good. I looked at her steadily without saying anything and she added that she didn’t actually taste any of the salads because she didn’t like the flavor of chicken salad or tuna salad. I raised my eyebrows and asked (because I wanted to be sure I understood): “Are you telling me you don’t taste your food before you send it out?”

“No, I make it the same way all the time so I really don’t need to, and I just can’t stand the taste of this stuff anyway.”

“Well,” I said. “That stops today. Right now. From this moment on you have to taste every dish you make and you have to get at least two other people to taste it also.” This isn’t punitive, it’s sensible. I pointed out to her that was the reason Chef and BD and I were always calling on each other to taste one another’s soups, sauces, marinades, salads, dressings… It wasn’t ego or “taste this, dude, it’s awesome’. It was because we needed to know if it tasted the best it could. Handing her a spoon, I made her taste each salad in turn. She put the smallest samples on her spoons and slipped them over her lips. She made a couple of little gagging motions that made me want to clock her right in her jaw (metaphoricallly… metaphorically). She shrugged and said it was okay. I asked her how much would she pay for sandwich made with these salads and she said she wouldn’t order chicken or tuna, she’d have a hamburger. I gave her a scalding look, trying to decide if she was being a smart-ass or an ignoramous.

Slowly, deliberately, I took the bowls of sloppy, amatuerishly chopped and mayonnaise smothered salads and scraped them into the trash. Extreme, I know, but sometimes the best way to get across the point that people are producing garbage is to actually shovel it into the garbage right in front of them. I trashed 2 1/2 hour’s worth of labor on her part (which, btw, should only have taken her about 30 minutes – but one crisis at a time, please) while she and the rest of the staff watched in silent shock. Across the tables BD grinned and said: “Niiiiiiice!”

I turned back to T and said: “Let’s begin again. I’m going to teach you step by step how to make these dishes and how to do it more quickly. I’m going to treat you as if it is your first day and as if you don’t know anything about cooking or food whatsoever. Based on the dishes of your’s I’ve seen, that is the only conclusion I can come to. If that’s wrong, then I apologize, but I can only go on what I have seen.” I made her follow me with a notepad as we went into the cooler and collected all the ingredients. I demonstrated how to clean and cut the chicken, mark it on the grill and bake it in the oven. How to drain the canned tuna and prepare all the mis en place. I showed her how to lightly sautee the finely diced onions to take the sting out of the flavor and allow more sweetness to come through. I taught her how to balance sweetness from the onions and some smoked chili powder with sour from lemon juice and sharpness from mustard, melding it with the right amount of mayonnaise and seasonings. I demonstrated how to shred the chicken instead of hacking it into huge chunks, how to fold in the tuna and not reduce it to a cat food paste. Most importantly, how to taste and season, taste and season. In 30 minutes we had two new bowls of salads and the vote from all the tasters was “Wow, very good”. “Now this,” I told T, “is a salad I would pay for.” We sent it over to the bistro and rolled out more prep for the day.

The next day J makes chicken salad. He pretty much follows the recipe I showed T, but makes a few changes, showing some initiative and thoughtfulness. He calls me over to taste. Okay, it’s not fabulous, but it is miles away from the crap they were making. I make a couple of very small adjustments and tell him it is a go, it is a salad I’d pay for. A little later I get a call from the manager of the bistro. He tells me the chicken and tuna salad we sent over the day before got rave reviews, and they saw a 25% increase in the sale of chicken salads and a 15% increase in tuna. The one he got earlier this day was pretty good, but could we just make more like the kind they had the day before? Could that just become the house salad recipe? One customer had bought 4 chicken salad sandwiches to take home for the family for dinner. Chicken salad… for dinner! She proclaimed it the Best Chicken Salad Ever. I wouldn’t go that far, but it was pretty good. I hung up the phone and told T when I saw her the next day what the response had been, and explained that right there was an example of why we always do the best we can, always prepare our food like we are feeding our own families, and how making food that people will buy is the difference between having a job and looking for a job.

She said she understood, but I’m not convinced she does. Not really, down in her gut. There’s a place for everyone but if you are not going to engage your brain or your heart then maybe you should find a job where those things aren’t required. I promise you will be unhappy trying to skate by in this kitchen.

Chef told me I have to create some kind of recipe for my Best Chicken Salad Ever. I hate recipes, by the way.

Sesame Ahi Tuna

When I come across a photo or a description of a dish I think I would like to have, I often think also of how I would change it or improve it. I came across a photo of a tuna dish from a restaurant in Hawaii, I believe. There was little information, but the image was striking and caught my eye. It was a dish of seared ahi tuna with wakami salad and daikon. It has a ponzu sauce of some kind, and what looks like a fruit relish or salad in the background.

Tuna, especially raw tuna, is always a hit in our household, so went to the market and got a few ingredients to try and copy this dish, with a few original touches of my own. I cooked some sushi rice with a little salt, sugar and rice vinegar, made a glaze of honey, red pepper paste and ponzu sauce which I brushed over a slab of sushi-grade ahi tuna, then packed two sides with roasted sesame seeds. I heated a skillet with a little sesame oil and seared two sides for twenty seconds each. I made a sugar plum/mango salsa and spooned it into a half an avocado, shredded some daikon root and pickled it in a coriander/star anise brine and mixed it with some seaweed salad. Lastly I sauteed some enoki mushrooms and some pea sprouts and made a sauce of reising vinegar and ponzu sauce, which I let reduce to a near syrup.

I spooned the rice into the center of the plate, thinly sliced the tuna and wrapped it around the rice, topped with the seaweed/daikon salad, added the fruit salsa and the mushroom mix and drizzled it all with sauce.

My in-house critic and consumer of all things tuna devoured the dish and proclaimed it delicious, and except for the sauce being a little saltier than I wanted, I was very happy too. I could have arranged the tuna in a different manner, closer to the original image. Overall I thought it came out very well.

This is the image I based my own version on:

Can It, Already!

I've wanted to get into canning and preserving, but I've been putting it off for a while. During the height of summer I didn’t see the point in canning stuff via the boiling method since that won’t keep low acid foods for more than a few weeks. I’d rather just eat my peaches, tomatoes, cucumbers and other vegetables and fruits fresh instead of canning them and putting them in the fridge for a week or two. There’s plenty of fresh food stuff available now to enjoy.

The other reason is because I lacked a pressure cooker for proper cannning. When canning low acid foods, the best way is to use a pressure cooker to get the internal temps up around 250 degrees. This is far higher than can be achieved with the boiling method (212 degrees max), and is guaranteed to kill off all little nasties that might cause spoilage, enabling me to keep summer food stores for a year or more. Sweet, fresh, Georgia peaches in January, blueberry jam at Christmas, garden-fresh tomato chutney and salsa during the winter… this is my real goal. Plus the ability to use my own recipes and ingredients, and to know what all went into it.

I’d been putting off getting a pressure cooker because it seemed an extraneous purchase while I've been so busy. But I saved some cash here and there, got a $10 gift card to Walmart, and seized the chance when a Presto pressure cooker went on sale. I bought the cooker, a basket for jars, and a dozen pint canning jars. I’ll go back and get some wide mouth jars as well. Added the supplies I already had for boiling/canning, I think I’m ready to start processing the summer’s harvest for storage. This kind of canning will also allow me to ship jars of goodies to family and friends.

Tomato Aubergine Salad

I was going to do this as a hot side for my salmon, roasting the tomatoes, but the heirlooms were so gorgeous when freshly cut I decided to do it as a salad.

I peeled and sliced some eggplant from the garden, brushed the slices with olive oil and sprinkled with salt and grilled both sides. I cut them up and mixed them with diced garden tomatoes, chopped kalamata olives, minced red onion, minced garlic, basil chiffonade and a teaspoon of olive oil to distrubute the flavors. A little sprinkle of sea salt and a drizzle of lemon-thyme vinaigrette that I had in the fridge in a nest of bibb lettuce. Tasted great.

Figs

Summer is the season for figs here. Greenish orbs that soften into purplish fruits called “turkey figs” are most common where I live. I don’t know if that is a reference to Turkey, since figs are of Middle Eastern origin, or if it is some farmer’s reference to poultry preferring the prolific fruits. I do know that figs are among man’s oldest cultivated trees and have played a significant role in mythology through the centuries.

Figs are also delicious, whether fresh or dried or jammed. They are full of natural sweetness, a good source of fiber, iron, calcium and potassium. They have been shown to help control diabetes and lower triglycerides, helping to lower the risk of heart disease.

I once needed to finish off a plate with something eye catching and there were some fresh figs in the cooler. I cut several in halves, soaked them for 30 minutes in a mix of balsamic vinegar and honey, and seared them cut side down on a hot skillet. I left them without moving them until the balsamic mixture had reduced to a syrup, and carefully lifted the figs out and arranged them on the plates. The sugars had caramelized on the cut sides and the figs and softened without going mushy from the heat. I poured the remaining balsamic syrup over figs. It was the hit of the plate, and even though some dishes came back with other components still on the plate, there was not a fig in sight. I used balsamic figs all the time on entree plates, salad dishes, as sides to cakes and ice creams and other desserts, and as stand alone appetizers.

Decatur Farmer's Market

This market is small but nicely placed across the street from the courthouse, in the government triangle that also houses all the county courts and offices. It is set in a tiny green space with a huge magnolia tree with wide-spread branches and tons of shade. The vendors get to set up their tables on the nice soft grass and benefit from a steady cross wind that comes from the unique angle of passing traffic on the streets. In one corner there is a twisted apple tree covered in tiny little fruits that may or may not make it to maturity. I think the tree just grew there, one of the many wild apple trees that pops up in unusual places.

There aren’t many vendors, but it is almost all food. One woman was selling soaps and lotions, another home-made pottery. One table was covered with colorful and misshapen heirloom tomatoes, two people were selling goat cheese made from local goats. The peach guy was there and I bought another week’s supply of peaches. He confirmed that next week would be the last week he would be at the markets. The peach harvest is moving north now. There were bread and salsas and pickles and a two-man band playing blues and oldies rock songs. It took about 10 minutes to circle the few vendors and see everything, which was a little disappointing because I thought Decatur, which is a much more green and bohemian-type town, would have a bigger and more vibrant market. I stretched out the time by chatting with a few vendors and standing in line for several minutes for peaches.

My friend Jenya was going to be doing a raw food demo at the market. I wanted to attend but my schedule prevented it. I did see her pull up and start unloading and went to say hello. I haven’t seen her since she left for Arizona but now she is back and looks great. I was sorry I couldn’t stay, but promised to contact her and catch up.

A quiet and shady and southern with some unique elements. I may go back later in the early fall and try again.