Salty Apron

Today, I moved to poissonnier and made the arctic char dish, for 7 customers to be exact. Arctic char is such a beautiful looking fish.  Unfortunately, our recipe pairs it with a chickpea cake that tastes like complete ____ and a radicchio that’s just not tasty.  Granted, it was my first day making the dish so one needs to consider that there is likely some error in my execution, but the reality is that every person in our class hates the chickpea cake.  The cake tastes dirty, the texture if gummy, it’s not attractive in appearance, and it’s just not a good pairing for the lovely char.  I would never dare speak for our chefs, but I have a good idea that they aren’t disagreeing with me here, at least not in whole.

On a brighter note, I want to share Chef Peter’s very practical “trick” for helping fish and sticky items not stick to a pan (this is for regular pans, not nonstick pans).  Yes, the obvious is that you need to get your pan really hot, the oil needs to be hot, and you need to leave your protein alone for a bit until it gets to a point where it wants unstick itself in the pan prior to you flipping it. But, Chef Peter also reminded me of something he learned.  “Season” your pan, in a sense.  Put it on heat, pour in some oil and a couple tablespoons of salt, and let it sit over medium heat for a few minutes. Then, take a dish towel and rub the salt and oil in the bottom of the pan. Then, wipe it all out, and start your searing process as you would normally  i.e. heat your pan, then throw in your oil, wait until it’s hot, then put in your protein to sear it.  When I did that, the skin got crispy and brown on my char (without having to cheat and use flour) and it stayed intact.  Thanks, Chef.

Changing gears, one condiment I love is salsa. I think salsas are super versatile. They pep up any meal. For me, they can go on breakfast, lunch or dinner; they can be sweet or savory or both; they can be spicy or not.  But, the best ones are fresh.  When I was in Hawaii, we made a breakfast salsa to go with our egg, bacon and opah lettuce wrap.  Here’s the super simple salsa, followed by the recipe:

Papaya, pineapple, tomato salsa:

Ingredients:

1/2 of a papaya, small dice

2 rings of fresh pineapple, small dice

1 teaspoon of minced red onion

1 roma tomato, seeded and small dice

2 tablespoons cilantro, minced

juice of 1 lime

salt to taste

red chili flakes or fresh chili finely minced, to taste

Directions: Mix altogether in a bowl and serve immediately.  This salsa doesn’t really keep as it starts to break down, so make only as much as you’re going to eat in one sitting.

And, the breakfast wrap:

Mmmmm, I’m craving breakfast now.

There’s no argument that I’m not the most patient person in the world.  But, I was losing my patience today and I think it could have been avoided.   I appreciate that the-powers-that-be at FCI decided to have our class try a new menu and apparently a more complicated one (I appreciate the confidence in our class!), but I really believe no one tested the recipes as written prior to giving them to us, and if they did, the recipes are just not very good.  As one of my fellow students said today, “If you’re going to give us a harder menu, at least give us a good one.”  My sentiments exactly.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m always up for a challenge, especially in the kitchen.  But, being a former teacher, I never gave my students very limited time to try to perfect – for their final exam – something that I hadn’t even tried myself and something that I’m still very much working on into their practice days.   When I have only 2 days to perfect each dish prior to the final exam, I don’t expect the instructors to still be changing the menu 2 days into that practice – and not be happy with all of it.

So, FCI, do your students a favor: experiment with your recipes and make sure to clearly articulate how you want them done BEFORE giving us the recipes so you’re not cutting into the students’ practice time.  It’s great if your idea was to allow us creativity in changing the recipes (I don’t think that’s true in the restaurant level, however), but we also know that we have limited time to get the recipes excellent.

Okay, now onto happier thoughts.  I made a really easy chocolate ganache that you can use for garnishing or as a sauce.  Use a really good dark chocolate or bittersweet chocolate for this.  The recipe is super simple:  Bring 12 oz. of cream to a boil and pour it over 8 oz. of chocolate cut into chunks.  Stir until all the chocolate is incorporated into the cream, so you have a semi-thick sauce.  Cool it over an ice bath.  If you need to thin it out, simply add in a little more cream (cold is totally fine), and stir.  You can add vanilla to it, cayenne or any ground chili to it, or just about any other flavoring if you want to add another  dimension to the ganache.  We use the ganache to garnish the side of the plate for the banana-chocolate tart (see above).  But, the sauce can be used over bananas, ice cream, tarts, etc.

I also liked Chef Peter’s white dessert sauce (I’m not sure what he called it). It is also simple: sour cream, creme fraiche, and sugar.  I’m not really sure of the proportions of each, but I think you can get it right if you start with a little sour cream, a little creme fraiche and a couple tablespoons of sugar, whip that up until all is incorporated and then adjust the taste (meaning more or less of any of the ingredients).  It’s a nice tangy sauce that’s heavier than whipped cream, and if you want to use 2 or 3 sauces on something, this sauce is a nice compliment to the sweeter sauces like caramel or chocolate.

Today was our last day of level 5. Since David was gone, I was officially sous chef as well as 1 of 2 on dessert.  Thankfully, I had Ian’s pork and mushroom ravioli in the fridge from the day before for the “scoobie snack”, and all I had to do was make a mushroom broth for the amuse bouche.  Bobbie and I are on dessert for the first couple of days of the new menu and so we tried to prep for tomorrow’s new desserts while feeding restaurant goers who came in for the old menu.   We prepped the dough for the apple baba and we made a chestnut ice cream.  I don’t like the chestnut ice cream; the pureed chestnuts in a can are kind of gross and don’t really taste like chestnuts.  Bobbie thought it tasted like refried beans.  Hmmmm. Next time, I might take the long way: roast fresh chestnuts, puree them, and then add them into the base for the ice cream (yes, impractical, but chestnuts are in season now…chestnuts roasting on an open fire…).

Tonight, I had to use up the boneless pork leg parts in our fridge at home, so I decided to stuff them, roll them, sear them and then braise them.  I’ll explain my recipe and then show the pictures.

First, I pounded out the boneless pork leg parts.  My meat came in 2 small parts, which were perfect for 2-3 people.  Then, I stuffed them with chopped fresh spinach, grated pecorino, and golden raisins. I probably should’ve added some nuts to the stuffing for textural contrast but I forgot until the pork was all tied. Next time!  Then, I rolled them up, tied them, seared them in olive oil on all sides, and then took them out of the pan. In the searing pan, I added chopped onions and garlic.  Then, I added some way too strong oregano, and then deglazed with about 1 1/2 cups of sauvignon blanc. I reduced that a bit and added 1 small can of whole peeled organic tomatoes (the 14 oz. can, not the 22 oz. one).  I brought that to a boil, added some red chili flakes and salt, and then put the pork bundles back in the braising liquid on low simmer.  I simmered the small bundles for approximately 45 minutes, basting them every once in while.  After that,  I strained the liquid because the oregano was killing me it was so strong, then added in more tomato, a bit of sugar (my dirty little secret when canned tomatoes are too acidic) and reduced it a bit to make a nicer jus. I sliced the stuffed pork bundles; jus’d them up; chopped some more fresh spinach for the top; and had a lentil, feta, parsley and lemon salad as a side dish.  Yum!

If I could do it over, I’d braise the pork about 15-20 minutes less. The pork was very cooked and it didn’t need to be that done. The dish was still great, especially with the contrast of sweet and salty from the golden raisin and pecorino stuffing. But, it would have been excellent had I not overcooked it.

Here’s the sequence of pictures:

Stuffing the pork:

Rolled up:

Tied:

In the braising liquid:

Finally, the finished product:

One of the things that we started to do in our kitchen – that I love – is to use different color cutting boards for different prep ingredients. We use the blue cutting board for fruits and vegies and we use the red cutting board for meat only. Even though we throw the cutting boards in the dishwasher at the end of the night, using different colors still makes me feel better about preventing cross contamination, since it’s not always practical to send the boards through the dishwasher when prepping several different things in a row and hand washing them in between. It’s pretty easy to find different color boards out there today.  And, if you’re a freak like me about not cross-contaminating things, this is very simple thing to do.

Happy and safe eating!

Tomorrow, I get to play sous chef again and start prepping for a new menu.  I’ll be glad to get away from the rabbit and osso buco.

Tonight, it’s another “all in” dinner night, in an attempt to use the last of last week’s CSA box: romanesco (the green cauliflower looking thing in the picture at top); purple cauliflower; yellow carrots; rutabaga; sweet potatoes; and celery.  We have celery coming out of our ears.  Celery is really great for stocks and soups, but I’m so over trying to use it in everything just to use it.  If I have one complaint about Mariquita Farms, it’s that they go really heavy on the large bundles of celery and cauliflower week after week.  These are pretty boring vegetables for me to work with.  But, alas, they will make a delicious roasted vegetable medley with garlic and olive oil.

I’ve also been marinating lamb shoulder chops in some dijon, lemon, fresh tarragon that was also in my vegetable box, garlic, salt, pepper, and olive oil at room temp for about an hour.  I’m going to pan sear those in my cast iron pan a few minutes on each side and then finish them in the oven, if needed.  Here they are marinating.

I love marinating lamb in herbs, mustard, onion, salt, pepper and olive oil, as well.  It’s really super quick and very tasty.

I’m not sure how I feel about leaving my lamb out at room temp for that long, since I’m such a bacteria-phobe. My knowledge about “storing temperatures” for raw foods makes me cringe at what I’m doing, but then I’ve also read many recipes that call for marinating at room temp IF  you need to marinate something quickly (1 hour or less) vs. several hours to overnight.  I’m hoping my lemon juice will not only help to tenderize my meat, but to act as an anti-bacterial.  We’ll see later 🙂  So, I’m off to get the chops on the hot pan before I gross myself out.

One last comment, I’m pairing my roasted root vegetables and lamb with a 2007 Valduero Crianza, which is an Italian red table wine.  It’s very drinkable right out of the gate, with or without food. I really like this red. If you’re into Robert Parker ratings, it has a 90/100.  And, the price point isn’t horrible: around $25/bottle, depending upon where you buy it.

What a fun tour of Love Apple Farms on Thursday (see http://www.growbetterveggies.com/)!  FCI put together a special tour for our class of 9 with the owner of the farm and Chef David Kinch, who is also a dean of FCI. We spent about an hour touring the gardens and picking and eating fresh vegetables.  Then, we went to their “classroom” and nibbled on several different herbs, some cheeses they made at the farm, and their hard cider.  I love the concept of farm to table and I do agree that the food tastes incredible. It has to; it’s at its freshest. It would be so awesome if everyone could eat that way, instead of just the wealthy and those who own farms.

There were some fascinating herbs that I had never tasted before.  Like this one: Huacaty.

It smells like an herb I used to smell in Berkeley – ha!

I also really liked the quilquina, which tastes like a strong cilantro and is really fragrant.

The salad burnet was great and would be lovely in an herb salad.

The yarrow was also tasty and has an interesting history as an herbal medicine, the parts of the herb being used for different purposes – everything from clotting blood (the leaves) to treating phlegm to being used as a pain reliever and fever reducer.

We use the flower of the borage (in my hand of the picture featured at top) at Commonwealth to decorate different salads, and it’s gorgeous.

We also tasted a myriad of vegetables and being a vegetable fan I was surprised I hadn’t tasted a few, like this one: malabar spinach.

I love spinach, but I didn’t really love this spinach. The leaves had a consistency of okra when I ate them: gooey and slimy. In my eating world, gooey and slimy should never be adjectives used to describe vegetables, so when that happens, I usually avoid that vegetable. It was also kind of bitter. Not a fan.

The farm was incredibly lovely:

It makes me miss growing up in MN and Iowa, in MN when I used to work with my dad at Cal’s market (Cal had a farm and we worked at his vegetable market where everything was picked that day and brought to the market early in the morning) and in Iowa where my cousins and I would spend summers at my grandparents’ corn farm.

Switching gears, one of the recipes I made as patissier last week was a lemon curd, or custard, that we put in a tart shell and then did a few other things to it. I don’t love all the particular components of that dessert, but the lemon curd is the bomb. You could make your own tart shell, fill it with the curd and then top the curd with berries. Or, you could use it as a “pudding” in a dessert glass and top it with whipped cream for something really simple and homey. If you love lemons, this is the recipe for you – and it’s easy. I think it would be amazing with Meyer lemons, as you really get the lemon flavor in this recipe. Here’s the recipe with a few of my changes:

Lemon Curd, Yield 8 servings:

Ingredients:
2 eggs
4.5 oz sugar
zest of 1 lemon
4.5 oz fresh lemon juice
3.75 oz butter, cubed
5 to 7 oz sour cream, drained (I’ll explain why I didn’t include an exact amount here)

Directions:

1) Heat 2 inches of water in a sauce pan
2) In a medium stainless steel bowl (do not use aluminum here, as it will react with the acid in the lemons), combine the eggs and the sugar with a wire whisk and whisk until the mixture becomes light yellow/verging on white
3) Add the zest and lemon juice and then add the cubed butter
4) Put the bowl over the sauce pan that has the hot water in it on the stove
5) Turn the flame down to very low and cook the mixture, stirring almost constantly, until it turns a bit thick. The end result of the whole recipe is to make a custard, or curd, looking mixture, so when it’s over the heat, it needs to start to thicken before you take it off the heat, as you’re going to add in sour cream after it’s cool, which will make the mix less thick. This process will take roughly 5-10 minutes of stirring over the water bath
6) Strain the lemon curd through a fine sieve and cool over an ice bath. You want to cool this immediately and then refrigerate until right before you’re going to use it
7) Right before service, whisk some sour cream gently into the curd. I didn’t use the exact amount called for in the recipe, as it depends on how lemony you want the dessert and the texture and color you’re going for.  Eyeball it somewhere between 5-7 ounces of sour cream. The sour cream may need a little help breaking up in the curd and becoming smooth, so keep working at it until it’s smooth. This should only take 1 minute or so. Serve in a tart shell or a cold custard glass, top with whipped cream and berries.

Aside from almost breaking the $5000 ice cream machine, today was a successful day! I made vanilla ice cream, which was delicious. The secret in the recipe is adding creme fraiche after the custard has cooled and right before you put it in the ice cream machine. It gave it a really nice mouth feel and a little tartness to cut the sweetness of the sugar. I think most ice creams have way too much sugar. And, this is saying something from a woman who is nearly addicted to sugar. I must be getting wiser in my old age 😉  I know that’s partly what makes it good, but I always think if you use quality and fresh ingredients, you don’t need to hide them with loads of sugar, salt, etc.

Speaking of using fresh, quality ingredients… I was wondering what I was going to make for dinner tonight. I had so many different vegetables from our CSA box last week that we needed to use up. So, I took a cue from my husband, the “leaf to stem, all in” kind of cook, and made a vegetable “stir-fry”, pictured at top. I think the purple cauliflower, along with the sweet potatoes (from the CSA box today, which means uber fresh), and the greens is a definite winning combo.

So, here’s a quick and tasty way to use up all those aging vegetables in your fridge…Decide which should be in the pan first. Always go for the ingredients that take longest to cook, of course, but do it AFTER you season the pan with some onion and peppers. You’re looking to build flavor and that can’t happen if you throw everything in at once. I always use a wok on high when I do stir fries, as I think it keeps the vegetables at their best; they cook quickly without losing their beautiful crunch and vitamins and minerals (I don’t do vegetables the “French way” – yuck). After the onions, red bell peppers and red jalapeno, I added the diced sweet potato. I let that sit for a few minutes while I was dealing with my other dish (a lamb taco dish), mainly because it needed some time to cook. Next, I added garlic and the green beans.

I used to season the pan with both garlic and onions in the first round, but the garlic tended to burn, so I’ve learned to throw it in later, although you run the risk of it staying a bit “raw” if you don’t get a lot of heat on it or for a very long time. After the beans and garlic, I added the purple cauliflower, and lastly I threw in the romanesco greens that I cut off the head of the romanesco the other day.  That’s the “leaf to stem” part of Carnet’s cooking.  5 or so minutes into this layering, I went for the sauce. My sauce wasn’t really a sauce, but more of a light coating of flavors.  Here’s what I used:  a bit of kosher salt, 1/4 c. of wheat free tamari (soy sauce), a couple of tablespoons of rice wine vinegar, 1/2 of a lemon, and 3 tablespoons of my favorite hot sauce – The Pepper Plant original.  Here are the brands I like (no, I don’t get any endorsement money for these):

We discovered The Pepper Plant hot sauces on a trip with some of our best friends. We were in search of breakfast and we found this little cafe off the beaten path in Sonoma, I believe. I can’t remember the name of the cafe because it wasn’t anything special, but they had this hot sauce at the table. We love it so much, along with their chipotle and habanero sauces. The sauces don’t have a lot of crap in them and they are all sensational on eggs – transformative really.

I digressed from school today, but there’s not really much to tell.  It was a slow day in the restaurant, which was good for me, as I needed to try to understand how to make the several components to my dessert, and I needed time to perfect one. I had to boil my sugar-honey-lemon-water mixture 3 times in order to get the right consistency and color for the pulled sugar component. But, finally, I got it and my sugar tuiles turned out well.  Tomas, it’s your turn to burn your fingers tomorrow!

A thanks to Ian and Rachelle for walking me through different steps of different components due to recipe changes or no written recipe to follow, and thanks Chef Peter for getting me back on track with my blogging nightly 😉

It was fun having Chef Peter back in the kitchen and also expediting. He has a ton of stories from his time in restaurant kitchens. Not preachy; just life lessons. I like that way of teaching.

Tomorrow I move onto patissier with Tomas – that should be fun. I get to pull some sugar, make some ice cream, make some caramel and make some caramel date souffle-type cakes (pictured, above). Then, the following day, I’ll make a lemon custard tart, almond brittle and candied pineapple (I actually think candied pineapple is disgusting because why would you take a perfectly delightful fruit and heap a mound of sugar on top of it?). I’m excited to be on patissier for 4 days, as desserts and pastries are not my strength, mostly due to the need for precision measurements and/or baking time.

Since I don’t love either the rabbit or the osso buco recipe, I’ll post a recipe that I made for my dad and Maren when I visited several weeks back, which I do love (and so did they!). It was a prawn and lamb kebab, which is an unusual riff on surf and turf that I had a few doubts would work. But, it was delicious! My dad and I love lamb and we love prawns, and this was a dynamite combo. I’ll also post a fried green tomato recipe for the last of the tomatoes that people are picking from their gardens right now. I paired the kebabs and tomatoes with 3 dipping sauces: a smooth chimichurri sauce and a harissa sauce for the kebabs, and a sour cream chipotle sauce for the tomatoes.

Here is a pic of the 3 dipping sauces:

My kebab pictures don’t really do the dish justice, but you’ll get the idea of how they’re suppose to look from the pics. I’d post a really cute picture of my dad and Maren but I’m not sure they want to be plastered on the internet 😉

The first pic is of the raw kebabs after I mixed all ingredients and right before they hit the grill. The second pic is the finished product with a harissa sauce and fried green tomatoes on the plate.

Prawn and lamb kebab: (Credit for the basis of this recipe goes to Bon Appetite magazine and Silvena Rowe, a chef in London at Quince, but of course I changed some things)

Ingredients:
1 lb. ground lamb
1 lb. prawns or large shrimp, chopped into small pieces no more than 1/8-1/4 inch
1 tsp kosher salt
4 garlic cloves, minced
1/2 cup minced fresh cilantro
1 tsp. cumin
1-2 tsp. dried Aleppo Pepper flakes (you can use other red chili flakes, but I love Aleppo since it has a citrus and light smokey elements to it)
fresh black pepper, to taste
olive oil to rub on outside of kebabs prior to grilling
skewers

Directions:

1) Soak skewers in cold water for about an hour, if using wood or bamboo skewers (skip step if using metal)
2) Gently combine all food ingredients in a bowl until thoroughly mixed.
3) Place about 2 tablespoons of lamb-prawn mixture in your hand and roll into a 2″ long oval (or oval-ish). You want it to hold it’s shape around a skewer.
4) Slide skewer into center of oval and gently press the lamb-prawn mixture to the skewer.
5) Repeat steps 3 and 4 until all ingredients are on skewers
6) Brush all skewers with olive oil on all sides and grill on medium-high, turning until brown on all sides and meat is just cooked through. The chopped prawns will cook faster, so if you like your lamb med-rare, do a test skewer and see how long it takes.
7) Serve with Harissa sauce (recipe below) and/or Chimichurri sauce.

Harissa sauce (credit for the basis of this recipe goes to Tyler Florence and the Food Network, but I changed a few things, according to my taste):

Ingredients:

2 red bell peppers
1 teaspoon cumin seeds, toasted
1 tablespoon coriander seeds, toasted
1 teaspoon caraway seeds, toasted
1 garlic clove
1-2 Thai red chilies or other red, spicy chili, seeded
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
2-3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 lemon, juiced

Directions:

Roast the red peppers either over an open flame on underneath the broiler until charred on all sides. Wrap in plastic wrap or a plastic bag and allow to sit for 10 minutes. When they have cooled enough to handle, peel or scrape the charred skin off peppers.

Toast the cumin, coriander and caraway in a small skillet over low heat until fragrant. Then grind to a powder in spice mill or a clean coffee grinder. Put the peppers into a food processor along with the spices, garlic, chiles, salt, olive oil, and lemon juice and pulse to a puree.

Fried Green tomatoes:

Ingredients:

Green tomatoes, cut in slices about 1/8 inch thick
Dry spices: garlic powder, cayenne, paprika, salt and pepper
3 breading bowls, 1 for each ingredient: 1) panko, 2) all purpose flour mixed with the dry spices noted above, 3) 3 eggs, beat.

Directions:
1) In a pan big enough to hold 4 slices of breaded tomatoes without touching each other, add enough vegetable oil (canola is probably best or any oil that has a high smoke point) so that you can “deep fry” the tomatoes. Bring it 350 degrees Fahrenheit (if you don’t have a candy thermometer, you’ll need to guess. On my dad’s electric stove it was at medium-medium high on the gauge. Don’t let the oil smoke- that indicates it’s way too high).
2) Dip the tomato slices first in the flour/dry spice mix and completely cover on all sides.
3) Next dip the floured tomatoes in the eggs and completely cover.
4) For the final dip, cover the floured and egg’d tomatoes in the panko crumbs.
5) Fry until golden brown on each side. You’ll need to flip them after 1-2 minutes. If your tomatoes take longer than that to start to turn golden, your oil is too low. If they immediately start to brown, the oil is too hot. You may need to do a test run with 1 or 2 tomato slices if you don’t have a candy thermometer to tell you the temp of your oil.
6) Serve with your favorite dipping sauce. Ours was an olive oil mayo mixed with dried chipotle pepper, dried ancho chili powder, a squeeze of lemon and lemon zest from 1/2 of a lemon.

I won’t post a chimichurri sauce recipe, as it’s different every time I make it and it would be too hard for me to give exact quantities. This one is really all about your taste. But, the basics are: use 3 fresh herbs (I like mint, basil and flat leaf parsley, but you could throw in cilantro as one of them), add in some acid (either red wine vinegar or lemon), add in some red or white onion, salt, pepper, 1 garlic clove, some olive oil, and pulse if you want it chunky or puree if you want it smooth. Go easy on the acid to start with, as you can always add more. It’s sort of like a pesto without the nuts or cheese, which makes this a great vegan condiment.

Enjoy!