Tuesday, December 30, 2008
Christmas Dinner was Great
I owe you closure on our Christmas dinner. It came out pretty good. I had not tried a meal this ambitious in a while and so a lot of my rhythm and process in the kitchen was not well tuned. But, the results were delicious.
I had to modify a couple of recipes that were still in metric measurements as you can see from the scribbles in the photo. There are now updated on the web site.
I had to make a number of sauces, so started with them. While they cooked I did the rest of the prep work. And, I had made a few things in advance such as the Onion Confit.
The starter was Foie Gras Chaud, a nice salad of sauteed apples, endives dressed in a light vinaigrette and some quick fried foie gras. I screwed up the vinaigrette some, but the result was still tasty and we have enough foie gras left over (vacuum-sealed and frozen) to try again soon.
The main course was pan seared duck breasts with a classic bitter orange sauce, a vegetable terrine, and caramelized mushroom tarts. The links will take you to the recipes.
For the duck, I did not use a whole duck as the recipe calls for. Instead, I used a duck breast where I scored the fat with a knife and then pan fried it fat side down for about 6 or 7 minutes, flipped it for about 2-3 minutes and then placed in a hot oven to finish cooking while I plated the rest of the meal.
I was not completely happy with the vegetable terrine. While the flavor was fantastic, the consistency was different from I remember making at Sylvie’s house in Provence. I’m pretty sure we pureed the vegetables instead of simply “grating” them. I think that would give it a lighter and smoother texture. Still, can’t argue with the flavors from the three vegetables.
Other than the great taste of the reliable duck and orange sauce recipe, the huge winner in this dinner was the mushroom tart! This is a Tom Colicchio recipe that is just phenomenal. I made 4 tarts. I plan to warm the remaining two in the microwave to get them pretty warm, then pop them in the oven (perhaps with a bit of foil covering the pastry) to get them bubbly hot again. I hope they are good reheated this way.
Paired with our Tignanello—which was definitely ready to drink if not just a bit beyond—we had a great dinner followed by the Buche Noel.
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Friday, December 26, 2008
Bûche de Noël
On Christmas Eve I made our dessert for the Holidays, a classic French Bûche de Noël. I got this recipe along with detailed instructions and lots of photos from Cuisine at Home—a cooking magazine that focuses on recipes that are easy to prepare, and very tasty. Here are three photos of the result from different angles:
The recipe can be found here.
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Monday, December 22, 2008
Onion Confit
You’ve often heard that great food “layers flavors upon flavors”. A good example of that is the Mushroom Tart that we plan to have as a side dish at Christmas. One of the ingredients, that needs to be prepared ahead of time is an Onion Confit. It has great caramelized onion flavor complimented by some fresh thyme and chicken stock. The recipe comes from Tom Colicchio’s “Think Like a Chef”—a really great book. I prepared the confit on Saturday and it now sits in the fridge, developing even more flavor.
2 tbs. extra-virgin olive oil
6 onions, peeled and thinly sliced (about 12 cups)
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
1 cup White Chicken Stock
2 tbs. white wine vinegar
2 tbs. fresh thyme leaves
4 anchovy fillets, chopped (optional)Heat oil in a large deep skillet over medium heat until it slides easily across the pan. Add the onions and salt and pepper. Reduce heat to medium-low and cook, stirring occasionally, until the onions are very soft but not brown, about 30 minutes. Add the stock and vinegar and simmer, continuing to stir occasionally until the pan is dry and the onions are golden, about 30 minutes more. Add the thyme leaves and anchovies (if using) and mix well. Serve warm or at room temperature. The confit will keep in the refrigerator for about a week.
(I did not use the anchovies given my eventual use for this.)
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Saturday, December 20, 2008
Home Made Camembert
I mentioned we’d be having a home made Camembert cheese with our Christmas dinner. Here is the recipe for that cheese. I made it on 15 November. It made four rounds of cheese. We tried one in early December and while the consistency and texture was good, the cheese was not very well flavored. We tried another round last week and it was very good. I expect this cheese will be perfect on Christmas.
2 gallons whole milk from Shop Rite.
Warmed to 85° F.
1/4 tsp mesophilic culture, MM100.
1/8 tsp P. Candidum bacteria.
Tiny amount G. Candidum bacteria.
Let set for a few minutes and stirred bacteria into milk.
1/4 tsp of CaCl dissolved in 1/4 cup distilled water. Stirred in.
1/4 tsp of rennet dissolved in 1/4 cup distilled water. Stirred in.
Let set for 2 hours to clean break. Cut curds into 1/2” cubes (as best I can).
Stirred very gently for 5 minutes. Allowed to settle for 10 minutes.
Drained into cheesecloth-lined collander and allowed to drain for 15 minutes.
Scooped curds into molds on cheesecloth-lined drying rack in plastic container. Lift out cheese and pour out accumulated whey periodically.
After 2 hours, turn the molds over. After about 5 or 6 more hours, unmolded, turned and placed back in plastic box, covered to sit overnight.
Sprinkled 1/2 tsp of course salt on each side of each round and place in box in refrigerator with lid askew. Turned every day or two.
Some white fuzz started to grow at 5 days.
On 11/26, the rounds had a nice covering of white mold, so I wrapped all 4 rounds in cheese paper, put two in fridge at 40 degrees and 2 in fridge around 54 degrees. Plan to eat first two (54) in a few weeks and the other two a couple of weeks later.
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Friday, December 19, 2008
Vegetable Terrine
Let’s start off with the Vegetable Terrine. I’ve only made this once at that was at Sylvie Lallemand’s home-based cooking school in Provence. I recall that it was beautiful and made a good side-dish for a seafood recipe. For Christmas dinner, I’ll serve it as a side-dish with our duck, so may skip or modify the recommended sauce. Since this needs to set overnight in the fridge, I’ll make it on Wednesday. Obviously, I’ll update this post with photos next week.
I’ll put a photo here, once it is made!
Update: Here is the promised photo:
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