Cooking My Way Through Nicholas - The Cookbook

Filet Mignon Poached in Red Wine with Potato-Mushroom Rosti

2010-12-17T20:08:00.002-05:00

Hey everyone! Again, apologies for the little break.

Here is one we've been meaning to try for some time now. What scared me about this recipe was the rosti. I stink at making them. It all goes back to the day I proposed to Laurie (so I blame her). Here's the story of the 'best rosti I've ever had'...

Laurie visited me on a business trip in London, and since it was around the time of her birthday, I surprised her (at Jamie Olivers 'Fifteen' restaurant) with train tickets to Paris for the weekend.

It was her first time in Europe to begin with. She was super excited that I surprised her with a weekend in Paris as her birthday gift. Little did she know I had a ring in my pocket to propose. We get to Paris and the plan was that on the next morning, we'd do the Eiffel tower, and I'd propose at the top. Cheesy, now that I think about it. However, as we get to the tower, we see the crazy long line/wait! Problem: I had booked a photographer to do a little photoshoot post popping the question, and there would be no way possible that I'd make it to the meeting spot on time if I waited in that line. Uh-oh. Palms sweaty, we walked around for a bit. The time was ticking. We were crossing over the Seine on the Pont Alexandre III bridge, which is beautiful, and I'm practically shaking. An American tourist couple, saw that we were American and asked if we could take their picture on the bridge. I said sure, no problem as long as you take ours! I took their picture and then handed them my camera, told them how to press the button and said something like 'you sure you got it? this one's going to be important' while they looked at this nervous guy all funny. Then I got down on one knee and popped the question.

...and there was some disbelief...

...then some...'are you crazy!!'

and then we were 'engaged'!

Don't worry I'm getting to the 'best rosti I've ever had' part. -- So. We then went to lunch at a recommended place, Le Coupe Chou. It wasn't a michelin starred place or anything like that, but a good friend recommended it and it turned out to be perfect. Solid french food, in a quiet, nice, romantic atmosphere. I orded the duck, her the beef. It had been the first time I had been served tourneed carrots (albeit poorly)...I knew I was in Paris!

The side was a potato rosti...which I do not have a picture of, BUT, it was 'the best potato rosti I've ever had!'.

I came home and immediately tried to replicate this dish without success. Here is a link to cheftalk.com regarding my trials and tribulations with a bunch of pictures and an eventual partial success....I won't scare you, but this was my first attempt in 2008.

yeaaah....SO, needless to say I was nervous about getting this one. The filet poaching, no problem. The recipe is pretty straight-forward. The filet is simply poached in wine with some spices. For the rosti - first you cook some carrots, mushrooms, and shallot, with a few other spices and some sherry. Then, you use that mixture in the potato rosti...hence Potato-Mushroom Rosti

Here are some pictures prepping rosti...

Look at that brunoise. Perfect.

I don't recommend this OXO mandoline. It has a horizontal cutting blade that isn't very good. My next one will be a slanted blade commercial grade. When I need to mandoline sometime, I usually use my cheap 5$ mandoline and it does a better job, but doesn't have the fine julienne blade.

Then I prepped the filets. This was the easy part.

Now, the fun begins. I have to actually make the rosti! We purchased this new HD handheld video camera to use while trail running and I figured video would be better than photos for this one! So, here are a series of 3 videos that walk you through our process.

As 'not good' as that last video looked (Laurie, glass half empty)...due to use having some sticking problems...this was actually the best potato rosti I've ever made. It turned out in the end to be really good! Here is a photo.

And here is a final shot...to match the book.

Thoughts: Great dish! Easy recipe. I'll definitely make it again, and aside from the rosti this is an easy one to make for guests. While I do get the poaching of the filet, you still can't beat a sear on a piece of meat, and I missed that a little bit in this dish. I kept thinking...'should I sear it off first?' but then it would poach too fast and not get enough wine flavor, etc...so I just stuck to the recipe. One thing the recipe called for that I didn't mention up above was the veal sauce from the back of the cookbook. I didn't have any stock on hand, so just simple used a little bit of the poaching liquid as a sauce and it worked out great. The wine we used to poach was a 2006 Falernia Syrah from Chili.

The wine we drank was an Australian Shiraz called Mothers Milk. Lately we've been into these whacky-named Australian Shiraz's. The Molly Dookers and the like. They are reasonably priced and some of them are really really good, however, the gamble is some are really really bad. This one happens to be great and at 20$ a bottle, it's a steal.

Until next time...I see maybe a Rib Roast in our future. I'm also due for a visit to the restaurant, I haven't been since we had a spectacular meal at the Chef's table in September for our anniversary, and I keep seeing amazing new dishes on the menu.

Onion Fettuccine

2010-12-17T18:48:00.000-05:00

Here is a simple one we've been meaning to try for some time now. We we're making the red-wine poached filet mignon (next post), and wanted this on the side.

Onion + heavy creme + pot + heat, then, S&P + Chives = Wow. So simple, but a very elegant, flavorful side dish!

Believe it or not, Whole Foods didn't have chives! So, I used some green onions...worked out just fine.

Apologies for the poor presentation on this one.

Thoughts: This is one of the best recipes in the book. It's simple, different, and tastes great. It will be my go-to staple side dish for dinner guests!

Vanilla (nutmeg) Creme Brulee

2010-12-17T18:41:00.000-05:00

Wow -- it's been a while. For those wondering what we've been up to, it's not too exciting. Our other hobby is running, in particular trail/ultra-distance running, and that has signficantly been cutting into our cooking time! Let's just say that a box of pasta + whatever else is laying around tastes the best after a 10hr work day, followed by a long run. Not because it tastes good (anything tastes good after that), but because it's quick! (Boy, I'm starting to sound like Rachel R...I can't even finish her last name without wincing)

Nevertheless - We've still been cooking from the cookbook often, however many are 'favorite' repeats. We make the Osso Bucco often as well as the Pumpkin Agnolotti quite often.

We had some guests coming over for dinner, and Laurie wanted to make a simple dessert and be able to make it ahead of time. We choose the Vanilla Creme Brulee recipe, but wanted to make the 'nutmeg' variation on it. It's crazy, but in all the cooking we do, we've both have never made a creme brulee! That's sad!

The recipe, is simple, egg yolks, cream, sugar, nutmeg......

..in a water bath...

cover...bake....chill...dust...torch.... serve.

...only ours 'flopped'. We're not sure what happened, but they tasted really eggy and almost looked 'broken'. Perhaps I put too much water in the dish, and some splashed in the ramekins, we're not sure. We ended up making profiteroles instead. (our go-to dessert)

I'm determined to give this one another try though...I'm quite sure it was user error...and...just because I get to get my torch out of the garage.

One to match the book:

Thoughts: I need to give this one another try.

Heirloom Tomato Salad with Watermelon Water

2010-07-28T22:53:00.000-04:00

First off, my buddy Alex and his wife went to Nicholas and did the Chef's table last week for their anniversary, here is their writeup! We too will celebrate our 1st anniversary the same way next month. We figure it's the only thing that's going to top our month long honeymoon in Italy. They are also going to Alinea in Chicago next month for Alex's birthday!

Here's a quick one that fits this time of year perfect. Especially if you have a bunch of tomatoes from your tomato plants and don't know what to do with 'em! Even better if you have some basil growing. Luckily we have both. The dish is composed of tomatoes, grapes, balsamic reduction, watermelon 'water', and basil oil.

The hardest part is the basil oil. It takes ~2 days to make. It's made by combining grapeseed oil (I'm guessing because it's more neutral in flavor than olive oil) with basil and then letting it steep overnight, then strain overnight. Here are some pictures of the process. My blender broke (I KNEW I should have bought a waring, blend tec, or vitamix!) so I had to use my stick blender attachment to blend the basil.

I didn't have a coffee filter...so I improvised with a paper towel!

I then got the family together for a group photo...Balsamic Reduction is the black sheep of this entourage so he was left out of the picture.

Here he is...

While the balsamic was reducing, I made the watermelon water. The book calls for using a juicer, but I don't have one. Also, as I mentioned above, my blender is broke. So, I improvised again....and used.... a bowl and a fork! Sure, I probably could have gotten 'more' juice with a juicer, but this made enough juice for at least 4 salads.

Another family portrait!

Then, you basically toss the grapes & tomatoes with the basil oil and some salt, make a ring with the balsamic reduction, pile everything in the center, and spoon over some watermelon water.

One to match the book!

Thoughts: Aside from the basil oil, this dish was really simple, but the flavors balanced out really well! Laurie thought the balsamic would overpower something but everything blended really well, the way a salad should be. I have to say, even though the basil oil takes 2 days (albeit 5 minutes work each of those days) it is pretty awesome stuff. I can think of about 10 different dishes I want to use it in. If you're pressed for time, I'm sure substituting some fresh chiffonaded basil would be ok...but you 'should' try to make the oil, it's worth it! I think this is a really elegant summer dish that would be perfect for a 'little better than just a BBQ' outdoor dinner party. The one recommendation in the recipe is to be sure your ingredients are fresh and good...I couldn't agree more, this dish would epic fail say...in the winter, despite the availability of tomatoes and watermelon from third world countries....

P.S. we weren't as elegant this evening, and paired this dish...with a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for dinner...

Rack of Lamb with Vegetable Bayaldi and Artichoke Gratin

2010-07-25T20:12:00.000-04:00

I'm on a roll this weekend! Laurie is working overnights all weekend and she tells me she sleeps better during the day when she smells my awesome cooking. Well, I added the part about her telling me she sleeps better...and the awesome cooking...

In case no one has checked out my 'main' blog, I recently put up a post about our second Chicago experience that is worth the foodie read...This time we hit up Alinea (yep!), and the usuals. Check it out here! While I was waiting for my sauce to get happy, (shit, I think Emeril uses that term doesn't he? sorry), I made some pretty awesome sliders with quail egg, sriracha, and cabbage...check them out here.

So - This recipe is broken down into three different parts. The Bayaldi, the Artichoke Gratin, and the Lamb.

The Bayaldi was pretty simple. This dish came to mind as I had a buttload of yellow squash and zucchini from my CSA as well as a bunch of tomatoes that were ripe out on my back porch. Other than the eggplant, everything for this part of the dish was from the back yard or the CSA. Look at me...Mr. Farm-to-table. Just call me Dan Barber...(But I'll cut ya if you call me Alice Waters...)

I made the Bayaldi and the Gratin on Saturday as the book says you can assemble and cook it 1 day ahead..

I've never actually made a gratin before, but I eat the Parmesan one at Stage Left a lot. It's actualy pretty simple, just layer some thinly sliced (mandoline) potatoes with cream, S&P...bake. set. cut. heat. The only addition to this one was a layer of artichoke in the middle.

I recently read the book Knives at Dawn about Keller's boys doing the Bocus d'Or...and I remember one part about the sous chef turning artichokes. Well, let's hope Mr. Bocus never looks at me trying to turn one...

How can this be bad?

So I did those two the night before. Today I went to make the lamb, and figured it would be an easy sear-off and then I see a sauce...that I didn't make...uh oh. I didn't feel like scrambling to the store on a Sunday to get run over by old ladies looking for the brisket that's on sale, so I scoured the house for ingredients. Looking at the sauce recipe, it was basically the same way I braise my short-ribs, so I've done it about 100x and usually have the ingredients on hand. I had everything on hand, with the exception of lamb bones, and I doubt even if I did go out today to find them, I'd be hard pressed or I'd have to spend out of my ears for the now overpriced neckbones (what gives? come on people keep those good cheap cuts a secret, lamb shank, short ribs, lamb neck, etc...)

I did have some beef marrow bones in the freezer, so I used those.

We threw the Bayaldi and the Gratin back in the oven to reaheat, meanwhile I prepped the lamb and seared it off.

For as much as I like meat, I sure suck at butchering. Are there any classes or anyone willing to teach me?

I tossed the lamb in the oven, pulled the gratin and the bayaldi out and waited for a few minutes for it to hit 128 (MY sweet spot)

I plated everything and opened up this bottle of wine (that I'd used for the lamb sauce). This wine was not the recommended pairing, and to be honest, I don't remember why I bought this wine, but I had it...and it was cheap, and it actually paired well.

One to match the book.

Thoughts: Laurie loved the sauce, but she's very familiar with it as I use the same exact recipe to make my short ribs (see- Chefs-at-Nicholas, you and I, we're like 'this'). The gratin was really good too. Nothing fancy, innovative or mind blowing, but I dig artichokes, and I'd never had them in a gratin before, so that was nice. The bayaldi, well, I think I undercooked it. It's texture was a little too much on the tooth. The flavor was also lacking. It could be two things. 1.) everything in the balaydi, aren't really my favorite things to eat (eggplant, zucchini). 2.) I didn't S&P between every layer. I don't think the recipe said to...but if you have the book and are going to make this, please do, it will make it a lot better. Laurie's comment on the Bayaldi "How the heck can you put something like this next to something like that (the gratin) and expect anyone to look at the dish not think the gratin is awesome and the simple veggies are just there because you need them, if I see this dish, I'm headed straight for the gratin!"

Overall a simple clean dish. It would be good to make for guests since most everything can be made ahead.

I have my basil oil 'steeping' in the fridge for tomorrows Heirloom Tomato Salad with Watermelon Water....so expect a post on that soon!

Pickled Beet Salad with Crosnes

2010-07-25T18:51:00.000-04:00

Only no Crosnes...I'll get to that.

Long time no post huh? Well, that thing I call a day job has been keeping me busy as well as triathlon training. I actually did THREE recipes from the book this weekend...I'll give this quick one to you first. My cooking has been limited to quick pasta dishes and throwing a bunch of stuff from the CSA in a pan. Which kind of brings me to this dish...

We joined the The Student Sustainable Farm at Rutgers this year. They have a CSA program (for those who don't know what a CSA is, click here) that seemed right up our alley. It's still early in the season, but we've been getting some really good stuff. Lots of greens, beets, broccoli, carrots, etc... I began to collect a bunch of beets, and had to do something with them, then remembered this simple recipe from the book. I love me some beets.

The recipe calls for 3 different types of beets, some standard ingredients for the pickling liquid, and for the salad, crosnes. 'Crosnes are small pale tubers native to China and Japan, where they are considered a sign of good luck' -- well my friends, apparently the local Asian markets are all out of luck, as am I as I couldn't source any. No worries, I pressed on. (But I did get encouraged to try a health drink sample at the Hong Kong supermarket, and when I asked why it was so good, the nice girl said 'it will make you regular!' -- awesome.

I also didn't have 3 different type of beets.

I had these.

Which I roasted, to look like this...

And then make a pickling liquid with all of this...

Then I simply put 1and1 together..and had this!

Pickled Beets.

The remainder of the recipe was also pretty simple...pickle the crosnes the same way, toss from frisee with some pickling liquid. Although, I'm not clear of if it should be the liquid from the jar of pickled beets or some reserved left over liquid. I, unfortunately, didn't think about that and had to use the liquid from the beet jar.

One to match the book.

Thoughts: If you have beets, pickle them, with this recipe. Tomorrow, I think I'll simply just bring a jar of pickled beets to work for lunch and look like a fool eating them out of the jar. I loved the way it dressed the salad, but Laurie didn't seem to care for it much. Due to triathlon training and too much Scotch drinking, we didn't do the wine pairing. I'm way slacking in my Zraly's wine course....I need to get on that.

Extra! Extra! Nicholas Cookbook an IACP Finalist!

2010-03-30T19:53:00.000-04:00

Restaurant Nicholas: The Cookbook is a finalist in the IACP Cookbook Awards for Food Photography and Styling! Congrats! The winners will be announced April 21-24th it looks like.

Good luck guys! If it doesn't win over a Williams-Sonoma book...I'll go nuts.

In the meantime, cast your vote for it for People's Choice Award!!

Halibut with Cauliflower Puree and Morels

2010-03-29T22:20:00.000-04:00

Only we couldn't source Morels, so I use Crimini...

I apologize for the delay in posting as of late. My day job has been kicking my ass and Laurie is working overnights...so, most of our meals have been thrown together pantry creations that we can eat for a week, or dining out. It hasn't left us much time to 'experiment' in the kitchen. This weekend, however, I needed a 'good food' fix. On Friday, we went to a Glen Livet dinner at Stage Left, in New Brunswick, which was awesome. Saturday we went 'good' comfort food at Skylark Diner, (where we ironically were sitting across the restaurant from David Corcoran the NJ restaurant reviewer from the NY Times. Sunday...we decided to do a couple of recipes from the Nicholas Cookbook.

Laurie picked this dish for us to do this weekend. It was one of those weekends you learn quickly when you're married, that if your wife picks a dish...you do the dish. Nevermind that I'm not much of a seafood eater, I don't care much at all for cauliflower, mushrooms and well, fava beans? Ok, so how I feel about this dish is equivalent to how Laurie feels about Oysters! Nevertheless, I had a nice long 10 mile run yesterday, which means I'll eat just about anything.

We recently discovered that the local ShopRite, (Which, due to it's extremely high volume and ethnically diverse clientele, is pretty awesome) now carries good flash frozen fish. Yellowfin, Halibut, and a bunch of other stuff that is 'meh' at other places even though its fresh. I'm not sure why I mentioned it, because we ended up going to Wegmans to get the Halibut anyway,...but I digress...

The best part of cooking fish is for the most part, it's quick. This recipe was no exception.

We started out by boiling the cauliflower for the puree.

Then...we pureed it with some butter. Done.

Next we prepped the beans and the mushrooms...

and...done!

Almost lastly, we made the lemon caper sauce. This sauce consisted of using some carrot stock, which I had in the freezer (win!), butter, brown butter (which I also had in the freezer! double win!), lemons and capers.

Then, finally, the fish came last. This part always makes me nervous. I'm not sure why, but I have no issues cooking an expensive Wagyu steak to perfection without worrying about ruining it, but stick fish in front of me, and I get a little nervous.

The recipe called for breading one side in panko...but not just regular panko...ground/food processed panko. What's the difference you say? one is good, and one is awesome when used for breading. The next time you bread anything, grind up some panko.

Then we threw it in the oven for a few more minutes...

We cracked open the recommended bottle of wine (A Russian River Valley Chardonnay)

Thoughts: For a dish in which 80% of the components were on my 'usually don't eat' list, I really really enjoyed it. I must confess that I had a variation of this dish at Nicholas a few times so I didn't go into it completely thinking I wouldn't like it. I'd absolutely make this dish for guests, even those picky eating guests you never want to invite over. The wine pairing also went really well. We're filing this one into the 'cook often' folder. I think I'm officially a seafood eater, and I like it.

Up Next: Well...spring is here. There are quit a few spring recipes in this book we've been itching to get to all winter! I also need a Nicholas fix...Hey blog friends, my birthday is coming up on April 14th...throwing me a party at Nicholas is a good idea...just saying...

White Almond Gazpacho

2010-03-29T21:33:00.000-04:00

I bet you thought we died or something huh? Well, to make up for it, tonight I'm making TWO posts. This one is going to be a quick one...because I'm more excited about the next one!

I'm not quite sure why we haven't tried this one yet. It's really simple. When I think of Gazpacho, I think of summer, so perhaps now that the weather is warmer, it caught my eye.

Just about only components that needed 'cooking' in this recipe was the making of Garlic Confit. This is something everyone should do at least once. You get a few rewards. 1.) you get garlic confit, which is just about as good as candy 2.) you get garlic oil, which is about as good as garlic confit!

It's as simple as this: Put a few cloves in a pan, add oil, bring heat up to high, then turn on low for about an hour, turn off heat and let it sit for another hour...drain.

When done, you can use those leftover jars you collect for this sort of thing.

The next component that needed to be cooked, was toasting some bread and some almonds.

Then, blend the rest of the ingredients together and call it a day!

Almost...

First, you have to have a snack.

Then you have to strain the Gazpacho...which is actually harder than I thought. This is probably due to me not having a decent chinois and only a somewhat fine strainer. I used that strainer and some cheese cloth.

Laurie prepped all of the garnish for this dish.

And THEN we put it all together....

Thoughts: It was interesting. I've never had it at the Restaurant before so I can't really compare it. I think if I messed with the balancing of the vinegar, salt, and pepper I could get it spot on, but this one didn't knock it out of the park for me. I was really happy with the texture though, no grit and smooth. What did make it good was the garnish of grapes and such. Although, I don't think I'd serve this dish on it's own. It's not 'interesting' enough to serve as an amuse/small-bite, and it's just not a dish you could eat a giant bowl of as a first course. I think this dish would be perfect as an accompaniment on a dish of something else. Nicholas mentions grilled calamari or pickled oysters and I think that would be a great idea. This is 'half' a dish. In the picture in the book, you can't see the 'other' side of this dish to make it out, but it does appear to be calamari. Because of the pesky/trendy/artsy depth of field on the picture, it's hard to tell.

We didn't pair the wine with this dish. It was recommended a crisp white Spanish wine made from the Albarino grape. I didn't get to that chapter in Zraly's book yet!

Crusted Black Sea Bass with Banyuls Broth

2010-02-28T17:34:00.001-05:00

Or, as I like to call it 'Crusted Red Snapper with Sherry Vinegar Broth', because, Banyuls vinegar is impossible to source (locally--of course everything can be had on the internet) and I couldn't find Sea Bass either!

Please accept my apologies for the gap between posts. My new job has me working hard and traveling. It's also training season for us (wannabe runners), so I'm trying to be a little healthier...(read: 'Trying'). You'll also have to bear with some 'eh' photos as my laptop died in Boulder, CO last week and I had to buy a new one...that doesn't yet have any photo editing software on it.

Oh yeah! Before I forget, BIG NEWS. My Blog Buddy (MBB, it's kinda like BFF) Alex and I finally met...like face to face met (with our wives in tow to prevent any hanky panky). T'was not at Nicholas however, but at my favorite bar Catherine Lombardi, where I introduced him to some 'real' cocktails! Now, maybe we'll have some friends that don't look at us funny when we pull a random Tuesday night spontaneous 'Hey, anyone wanna devour the bar menu at Nicholas?'. Alex is a cool guy, but his wife is better looking. Just sayin'.

The dish: SO, my MBB Alex did this recipe and had a few hiccups, so I learned from his mistakes. As some of you readers know, I'm not the biggest fan of seafood in general. I just started eating it last year and while I do like 'good' seafood, 'good' is a REALLY high bar for me, so I'm a little nervous cooking seafood as I'm even picky at the best restaurants seafood. But...healthy(er), easy, blah blah, this recipe fit the bill.

I went to Wegmans and the Red Snapper looked pretty good so $18.19 and .91lbs later, I had me some fish. I cut the recipe in half for most things as it was only my wife and I.

The first step was making the broth.

As mentioned above, the recipe calls for Banyuls vinegar, which I substituted with half Sherry Vinegar, and half Red Wine vinegar. I would have used all sherry, but that Volpaia red wine vingar is THE best red wine vinegar I've/We've ever had. Volpaia is a little (VERY little) village on the top of a mountain near Radda in Chianti and while 'dining' at Dario Cecchini's (THE best beef butcher in Italy, and by dining I mean 'feasting' in the back alley of his Butcher shop) we had a chance to sample it, as that's what he uses, and it was worth the drive up the mountain!
Here is a video of us running up through Volpaia. It's one long video but I linked to the 'important' parts of the video.

And lunch at Dario's - The pictures at the end...tell me where I can get beef like that in NJ!

Ironically, while touring the kitchen at Charlie Trotter's, Laurie spotted that they also use this vinegar!

You can see it in the background!

See!

Ok, I know, I know, I the train is way off the tracks...but the vinegar is great!
Back to the recipe! The broth calls for all of the above pictured....simmered with water and mushrooms.

I failed to take a shot of everything in the pot, mea culpa, however Alex over at his blog has a good shot if you're curious.

In the meantime, I prepped my beans and tomatoes. The recipe calls for haricot verts and cherry tomatoes. But, we don't have any of those fancy haricot verts around here so, I just used some string beans, and these nice heirloom looking cherry tomatoes I found at Wegmans. (the haricot vert thing was a joke...)

Next up was the 'crust'. It called for toasting and grinding the following. (which, with the exception of the hazelnuts, I actually had everything in the pantry - WIN!)

(that's coriander on the bottom right by the way). I didn't know how to measure, as the recipe gave ounces and I wasn't sure if it was weight, or volume...I played it safe and just did it based on proportions, since I was cutting the spice rub down significantly. I would say you could half it and still have enough for 8 filets. I must not have toasted them long enough or something because when I put everything in the spice grinder (although it DID say to do it separate, but, I'm a rebel) it came out kinda 'brown sugar' moist like.

I figured it would still work so I plugged on through.

I strained my sauce/broth out (it was tasting GOOD at this point), and portioned and prepped my fish while the broth and pan heated.

Then seared the skin side first, pressing gently with a spatula, as instructed (...Because I didn't pay attention to my 'test' piece and it seared a little unevenly....what? you all run 'tests' on things like this don't you?)

Meanwhile, my broth was coming to a boil so I whisked in some brown butter (because brown butter makes everything better!), and threw in some herbs.

and BAZINGA! (that was for you Steph!)

One to match the book.

Thoughts: Knocked it out of the park! You see, Laurie was working a 12 hour shift this day. When a woman, your wife, works 12 hour shifts, the LAST thing you want to do is 'experiment' with a new recipe and have it turn out a flop when she gets home at 8pm...only to pour a bowl of cereal.......I'm a risk taker, but these are things you learn when your a newlywed. I took that risk and it was worth it. We both loved it (yes, me, my non-seafood eating self, loved it). The broth was REALLY good. I'm sitting here thinking what else I can use that broth recipe for! I'm also getting much better at 'tasting' my food. I tasted the broth throughout the process and was pretty good with 'adding a little more this and a little more that' to balance it.

I loved this recipe for a few reasons: 1. It was a VERY simple and quick recipe. 2. The flavor didn't taste like a simple and quick recipe. 3. There was practically ZERO prep/knife work, which is always the killer in some recipes. We didn't pair it with wine as the recommendation was a fruity California Pinot Noir, something we've had many times...and that whole 'healthy' thing. (I wish more good wines would come in half bottles!). If I had to say anything negative about it, it would be my skin not crisping up as much as I'd liked. I went to the cellar for my propane torch, but seemed to have misplaced it. (aka: Laurie lost it)

I think this is the/a perfect weeknight dish from this cookbook. The broth takes 45 minutes (of non attending), and the spice mixture can be made ahead of time, or, while the broth is simmering. This dish, even if you didn't make anything ahead of time, can be made in under an hour easy.

Up Next: Now that I grew a pair...I'm sure it will be a fish dish.

Fennel Crusted Tuna with Tabouleh and Citrus Vinaigrette

2010-02-06T12:05:00.000-05:00

Finally a fish dish!

It's snowing in NJ. My buddy Alex dubbed it Snowpocalypse. Which is the perfect word for describing how people in NJ act when they hear a forcast calling for flurries. Everyone runs to the store to buy ALL the milk, water, and bread because, otherwis,e they would die if they couldn't leave the house for a few hours before the plows came...

...It stinks for the restaurant business too...one bum Saturday night during the busy part of the year can kill a restaurant...I try to make it a point to at least venture out to one restaurant in bad weather. For one, you're helping the restaurant when they need it, for two, it's usuallly not crowded. Support your local restaurants!

In any case, our friend from Montana was in town, we figured we'd cook her and her boyfriend dinner. After our last dinner, which I was actually QUITE proud of, (you can see the post on that here) we knew we had to knock it out of the park again.

Here was out menu:

Curry Marinated Lamb with Curry Yogurt

Fennel Crusted Tuna with Tabouleh and Citrus Vinaigrette

Braised Short Ribs with Tamarind Sauce

Green Tea Poached Pear with a Pistachio Brittle

We have made the Lamb and Short Ribs before, so we knew at the very least, those would come out fantastic. You can't go wrong with Poached Pears, but we have never cooked tuna at home before!

This dish has 3 components: The Crusted Tuna, Tabouleh Salad, and the Vinaigrette. After looking at the recipe, the tuna was going to be the easy part as long as we scored good tuna, as it's basically just toasted and ground spices and a quick sear. The vinaigrette, believe it or not, was the time consuming (but not too hard) part of this recipe. So we started with that....

Laurie then juiced some oranges, lemons, and limes and reduced it down. The recipe calls for 2 hours, but since we cut it in half, it reduced down pretty quickly so while I'm not sure the exact time, it was under 2 hours.

Then it needed to be strained...

We placed the liquid in the fridge to cool it and use it later as it needed to be combined with some egg yolk, some more citrus juices, and some oil to complete the dressing. At this point, I'm hoping this dressing is worth it! (...as I passed by the bottled dressings in the fridge...)

Next up was the Tabouleh Salad. This was composed of Quinoa, and a number of various items from the produce section. From Fennel to Cucumber.

In the cookbook, Chef used red quinoa. Unfortunately, it's hard enough finding quinoa in the store, let alone red quinoa, so I had to settle for regular ol' quinoa. (If anyone knows where to get red quinoa in NJ, let me know!)

The salad was made! In the cookbook, the Chef says that this dish was made for summer, I can definitly see that with these flavors, granted it's snowing, but hey, maybe summer will come quicker now. It was very fresh tasting.

Now, comes the moment of truth, not screwing up the tuna.

We actually had a hard time sourcing decent tuna too. We settled on some thinner cut pieces at Wegmans after exploring various options. I suppose it's one of the reasons people like to eat out right? So they can eat things they normally can't find, or find good quality of?

Luckily, I have no problem sourcing spices! Here's a tip though. Buy spices in the bags...either from Asian or Indian markets. MUCH cheaper than McCormick. We made the spice crust ahead of time.

Here is what our kitchen and 'dining room' looks like pre-'service

You can see my short ribs cooling, the pears behind there poaching. The mashed potatoes warming....and the non-stick skillet heating. (hey, at least I found a use for that skillet) and our plates awaiting...

We seared off the lamb loin skewers and they went (all 15 of them) in a matter of seconds! Now..was the REAL moment of truth. While I removed the short ribs and reduced down the sauce, I prepped the tuna for searing...I know what you all are thinking...why am I worrying about this? Well, I'm just not comfortable yet cooking fish.

I wasn't happy with how these 'steaks' were butchered, and at 19.99/lb, I didn't want to square them up and waste any to get a perfect rectangle as I would in a restaurant.

And here we go! We were sure to get our guests nice and drunk first, just in case we screwed it up we could have quickly threw it out, and served up the short ribs!

And...Bazinga!!!

with one to try and match the book a little...

Thoughts: It was one of the best seared tuna dishes I ever ate, let alone cooked. The dressing, that I bitched out was perfectly awesome. When I first tasted the dressing, I was a little dissapointed as it was a little flat, but some more oil and some salt and then it just 'clicked' into perfection and was WELL worth it. The only thing that could have made this dish better was better tuna, although, this tuna was quite good. I'm not even a seafood eater really...and I had seconds. So did everyone else. The quinoa salad I should have served a little warmer, maybe at room temp as it was a little cool but the flavors were fantastic. I'd make it again for sure. I'd even make some fennel crusted tuna skewers with this dressing as a dipping sauce.

By the way, the wine pairing was a sparkling riesling. 4 stores - no dice. Our guests drank beer...and it worked out anyway. Although, I'm steadily making my way through Zraly's wine course...

P.P.S....Our dessert came out well too! Looked a little not so good, but tasted fantastic. I could have made the brittle a little thinner. Next time.

Pickled Oysters

2010-01-25T20:24:00.000-05:00

I figured it would be much easier to have a guest blogger on this one than to get my wife to eat another Oyster. She's had more than one bad experience and is not too fond of them.

So, when my blog-buddy Alex over at I Cook, She Eats, told me he was scouring the planet for Szechuan peppercorns and Oysters, I just knew I had a ringer for a guest blog!

Also, I spent all weekend massacring a Mole Negro Oaxaquano, and bit off more than I can chew, culinary wise.

Interestingly enough, I 'met' Alex because of Restaurant Nicholas. I found his cool blog (and a review of Nicholas) while I was googling around for info on Restaurant Nicholas. We started emailing a little over a year ago?....and while we haven't actually 'met' yet...I think our first blog-date (with our wives in tow) will be at Nicholas...

So, here is Alex's post, unedited.......................

Know your food: Oysters are bivalve mollusks, of the family Ostreidae. True oysters (the edible ones) are not pearl-producing, so forget finding a present for your girlfriend at your local raw bar. Like all bivalves, they are filter feeders, which means that they draw water into them, pass the water through a gill or other structure and pull out food and nutrients while expelling the water, which prevents excess algae growth. They're also delicious!

Stephanie and I love oysters. We are partial to the classic accompaniments - a squeeze of lemon for Steph, some mignonette for me. Our favorite place to get oysters is at Dock's Oyster House in Atlantic City, but we are definitely not averse to ordering them at other finer restaurants. Naturally, we've ordered them at Restaurant Nicholas, and we've been amazed at the balance of flavor and texture, generated by what appeared to be a surprisingly small amount of garnish. I was pleasantly surprised as to the secret of their amazing flavor - they are 'marinated' in a pickling brine! I love pickling food!

I get my oysters from Woolley's Fish Market on Route 9 in Freehold - as good of a fishmonger (that's for you, Steve) as you'll find anywhere. The guys there were nice enough to shuck them for me - I'm not proficient with an oyster knife and I didn't want to end up with one sticking out of my palm, unlike the cocky bastard in front of me who bought 10 dozen top neck clams & 2 clam knifes and said that he'd 'figure it out. I rinsed the oysters of dirt and muscle and shell and kept them swimming in their 'liquor', while I cleaned the shells for presentation by giving them a bath in some boiling water and scrubbing the hell out of them to have a smooth and clean inner shell.

The spices in the marinating mixture were star anise, black peppercorns (in place of the Szechuan peppercorns I couldn't seem to find) and whole cloves. Those went into the pot with some rice vinegar, sugar fennel and carrot trim to simmer. The trim came from my semi-awesome brunoise, of which I have another lame stylish-type picture (I'm taking these pictures in Digital Macro mode, and they seem to be alright. It'd be better if I knew what all the numbers and acronyms on my camera meant). The pickling mixture was then strained, combined with the brunoise, poured over the oysters and stuck in the fridge. After they cool, I spooned them back into the shells, topped them with some minced chive and red onion and a dollop of creme fraiche, and prepared to chow down.

Like my blog buddy Rob likes to do, a picture to try and match the book:

I've got to give tons of credit to Chef Nicholas and Peter Zuorick, as this recipe came out exactly the way the dish tastes when made at the restaurant. Everything was in perfect balance, and the flavors were out of this world. Here's Steph and I, toasting the bittersweet end of football season with the hope of even more success for our J-E-T-S next year. You can tell we really love our oysters since we devoured 2 dozen them even though we were stuffed from all the food we ate during the game.

This is definitely a recipe that will be made again (and again and again) in the future!

.......................................
Ok, it's Rob again. I will mention that I so graciously offered to make a secret drop-off of Szechuan peppercorns I just scored, in the parking lot of Wegmans. (See the effort we go through to source some ingredients!)

THANKS Alex!! I owe you one! You're pictures are looking awesome!

Roasted Organic Chicken

2010-01-18T17:38:00.000-05:00

As I begin to write this post, I'm sitting here drinking a glass of Alsace Gewurztraminer while my chicken stock is on a low simmer and my chicken thighs are confit-ing, I'll tell you why in a little bit, but first, I have to report on my most recent visit to Nicholas.

Let me attempt to draw everyone a picture. Contrary to popular belief, we are not heirs to any fortune, nor Wall street moguls. I make a decent salary as a computer geek on my un-college-educated background, and Laurie has been studying her ass off (and not working) going through nursing school for the past year. She then spent a few months scouring NJ for 'the' perfect nursing job. She lands it after MUCH hard work. It's 3, 12 hour shifts a week in the NICU. She comes home Thursday at 8pm after a 12 hour shift and has her first 'real' paycheck in hand. I say "Laurie, you should go out and splurge on a nice handbag, something expensive, something you wouldn't normally buy". In her nursing scrubs, at 8pm, after a 12 hour shift, she says, "Let's go to Nicholas instead!" (the car was still running!)

THAT, my internet friends, is why I married my wife.

That and because she makes statements like this.

So, she throws on something presentable, we get into her fancy new Mini Cooper and I break every speed law to get there at a reasonable time where I won't piss off the kitchen ordering a 20 things from the bar menu so late in the night.

We arrived at 8:50. (It's a 40 minute drive from our house). There was one table left in the bar. Awesome! Coincidentally, it was the first night of the truffle tasting menu! Since I was going to order a few things from the bar menu that were on the truffle tasting menu anyway, I decided to go with that. Laurie decided she wanted some comfort food after a long day of work and ordered a few things off the menu (with some 'suggestions' from me) and also the "Roasted Organic Chicken". Normally I'd kick her in the ass for ordering 'The Chicken' dish at a good restaurant (with the exception of Blue Ribbon!), but I was completely on-board as I knew we were planning on cooking this soon, and it was her night.

Dishes we ordered (hey, don't laugh, we like to 'taste' a lot!)

Laurie

Portobella Carpaccio
I thought to myself, really? A 'mushroom' carpaccio? Seemed a little contrived. I was wrong. This was an awesome dish. The vinaigarette was fantastic.

Lamb Tartar
Laurie hates lamb. She really does. AND she hates really rare meat usually. But, we both agreed, this dish was THE best dish of the entire night. I'm not quite sure how, but the croutons mixed with the tartar, were the exact same size as the lamb, and remained PERFECTLY crunchy. The Harissa Vinaigrette, was just awesome. There was a quenelle of something pretty good on the top too. I asked, but the server just said it was a quenelle. I'm guessing most people don't quiz the servers.

Butter Poached Lobster

A Laurie stand-by favorite.

Roasted Chicken

What can I say, imagine the best roasted chicken, with chicken confit, and mashed potatoes. At this point, Laurie, bless her, was falling asleep at the bar table, but absolutely loved it. I'm glad we are making it!

Rob (Truffle Tasting Menu)

Foie Gras (and Truffles)

I'm actually not the biggest Foie fan, but this was good. Laurie, who hates foie too, and I vowed never to ask her to try another foie dish after having her try what I thought was the (second*) best foie dish ever, at Jean-George, tried it, and thought it was good too.

(*the first best is at Stage Left, with the French Toast)

Cauliflower Panna Cotta (with Truffles)

Good, but I thought it was the weakest dish of the night. I understand though. The tasting menu is pretty extensive and this is a pretty good dish to put in, as it can all be prepped ahead of time. It's basically a play on a creme brulee dish with some cauliflower puree with lots of creme and butter, topped with a veal demi-glace-ish geletin with truffle shavings in it, served chilled. Perhaps because it was up against the best dish of the night, the Lamb tartar, that I didn't love it.

Hand-Rolled Garganelli (with a Truffle Sauce)

This was one I was going to order initially. I love garganelli with truffle. I order it at least once a week from Catherine Lombardi. This was a very refined, and very 'Nicholas' version of one of my favorite all around dishes. It didn't dissapoint.

Chicken Confit Pot Pie (with Truffles...do you see a theme here?)

You may laugh. Chicken Pot Pie...at Nicholas? Really? OK...My statement of the night.

You know you are at Nicholas, when you order a chicken pot pie... the chicken is confited...and the carrots inside, are...

all. perfectly. tourneed!!!

Yes. I notice things like that. Other things that I notice? Bar ice quality, Bar napkin quality, C-fold hand tower quality in the bathrooms. Those things set restaurants apart. I may be a piss-ant customer who doesn't put a dent into the bottom line of any restaraunt, but I'll pay a few bucks extra a drink, to have a quality bar napkin.

Cheese
Truffled cheese and a few others. We were both full at this point!

Desserts we both shared

Coconut Tapioca
Great - Can't wait to make this for guests out of the cookbook!

Brioche + Toffee Bread Pudding, Black Truffle Ice Cream
I was stuffed at this point, Laurie, was half asleep at the table, and we were the only ones left in the bar. I really hate being 'that guy' holding up and inconvienencing staff, but we were both eager to try this dessert as we were curious about the black truffle ice cream. First, the toffee bread pudding and banana crisps could have been a dessert themselves. The truffle ice cream was actually really good, but a little 'too' truffly for me after having my previous courses all truffles. But, very well executed.

We each had a wine by the glass to start (Wouldn't that be a cool name for a blog? 'My life on the Wines by the Glass list'), and then it was suggested a Barbaresco half-bottle with my truffle tasting. Awesome, I love earthy Barbaresco's and this was a very reasonably priced half bottle! (...and very good too). Laurie didn't drink as she was very much tired as is was.

Bottle line, it was STILL much much cheaper than a fancy handbag! (although, I have a feeling she pulled a fast one and she'll still end up with a new tricket come next pay check! I'm on to you Laurie!)

The service was exceptional, even in a crowded bar. One of my new years resolutions was to be better with names, but, I failed on rememberng our waiters name. Mea Culpa.

Speaking of resolutions, one of my major ones was to Learn more about wine. It was suggested to me, that night, to pick up Kevin Zraly's "Windows on the World" complete wine course book. The next morning at 9am, I did, and it's awesome. Hence me drinking a Gewurztraminer from Alsace as I type (French white's are the first class/chapter). I recommend this book (so far) to anyone wanting to really learn about wine. My major problem, if you haven't noticed, is that when I get into things, I have to take them to a level most won't. That's what scares me about learning about wine, I'm hoping it won't consume me (and hope actually, more of the opposite!).

If you think I talk alot, catch me after a cocktail at the bar.

So, back to the actual cooking of this dish. Roasted chicken. To me, it's almost as American as apple pie. Michael Ruhlman wrote a great article last week and referenced simple, roasted chicken. I'm with him. Roast chicken on a Sunday night is great. So, last week, we lined a cast iron skillet with bacon, threw a Griggstown chicken on top, stuffed it with a lemon and threw in some carrots and potatos put it in a 425 oven and did exactly what he suggested. Drank a bottle of wine and had sex. Then ate...and it was fantastic.

This Nicholas recipe is a bit different. It takes that awesome simple roast chicken to the next level (as all his dishes do). It first involves brining, then drying, THEN roasting. It also includes a great sauce. It's not hard, just requires you to think about it ahead.

We started with the best chicken we could find, a Griggstown Chicken. Griggstown Quail Farm is local to my work, near Princeton on my way home and has the best quality chickens in the state. I'm not actually sure if it's certified organic, or whatever tree-hugging Alice Waters 'thing' it is, but all I know they have great chicken. Sure, they are 14$ a chicken, but you know what? We use EVERY part of that chicken, and end up saving money in the long run. To you guys buying expensive shitty Purdue chicken breasts...imagine getting 2 'good' chicken breasts, wings, legs and thighs, then a quart of chicken stock for 14$. Way worth it. (Griggstown also carries duck fat, veal demi-glace and a buch of other awesome stuff's).

I'm getting good at butchering a chicken.

We brined the chicken for 24 hours, then let everything dry out for 24 hours. We made a spice rub for the thighs that are to be confited.

After that was done, We started on the chicken confit. I didn't render chicken fat (as I threw out the scraps needed for it, by accident) but had a load of duck fat to use, (and some bacon fat too)

Doesn't everyone have at least a quart of duck fat handy? If not, you should. You haven't had breakfast skillet potatoes until you've had them with some duck/bacon fat.

The sauce, which Laurie says was/is the best part of the dish, consisted of chicken stock, made into a brown chicken stock with some roasted bones and tomatoes, a sherry deglaze, etc. etc... Quit the lengthy process if you are trying to make everything, from scratch, on a Sunday. But I figured I already had the stock in the freezer.

I went to go into the freezer to pull out some chicken stock, and low and behold, I had forgotten I'd used it for a Mexican chicken soup the night before. DOH!

I reached for the Better than Bouillon, but thought better. I would have never did this dish justice if I would have actually used it. Instead, I pulled out about 3.5lbs of chicken parts I've been saving and put a pot of stock on! While I was making the stock, I threw the carcass in the oven to roast/brown it for the sauce as well. I know the recipe for Chicken stock in the book says 40 minutes or so, but I just don't feel right not having chicken stock barely simmer for less than 2.5-3 hours, so I did just that. I also figured out a trick for easy skimming. Use your steamer insert to keep down all the chicken parts and mirepoix! After 3 hours, I had the clearest chicken stock I've ever made!

This big skimmer I picked up at the Hong Kong supermarket helped out a lot too (1.99)

After that was done, the sauce had to be made and simmer for 2 hours. There was certainly a lot of time to read my Windows on the World wine book AND drink wine. We did. We also made a video since some of you seem to dig a glimpse into our kitchen. I just like it because I imagine our kid Laughing at Mom and Dad's stupid blog one day.

To our future children. If you reading this, know that you were probably conceived while a pot of chicken stock was simmering on the stove.

The recipe, like most in the book, calls for celery root, however what I thought I had in the bin in my refrigerator, turned out to be not celery root, but a rotten thing that vaguely once was a celery root, so I substituted some celery.

After some simmering and a few strains here and there, the sauce was made.

As well, some potatoes whipped...

...and turnips, carrots, and squash, blanched (then thrown in a pot with some butter to heat through)

Notice how my baby carrots are cut perfect? Even more perfect than the aformentioned tourneed ones in my Pot Pie? That's because I bought them in a bag!

So that's it. All of the major components were done, and it was only 8pm! It was time to open up our second bottle of wine, this time, our suggested pairing a Grenache based Cotes du Rhone (which, I've yet to read about in my book, but our lovely friend Scott at Marketplace Wines recommended it)

At this point, we were admittedly a little tipsy.

And very very hungry. We had been drinking wine and snacking on....don't laugh, string cheese all day.

We browned and roasted the chicken, and let it rest, while doing the same with the confit.

Becuase of that drying out overnight, the skin crisped up PERFECTLY.

And the confit, we'll it's confit, I don't have to justify it.

And finally, after making every component of this dish on the same day, we feasted.

My apologies for the horrible knife work in slicing in my plating.

Thoughts: When I say we feasted. We feasted medeivel times style, with our hands. It's a roast chicken to the next level, while still being a roast chicken dish. I don't expect home cooks to aways cook a dish like this when they want to roast chicken. I'd expect most to follow Ruhlman's method, but everyone should try it at least once. I unfortunately ruined the best part for Laurie and over salted the sauce. I enjoyed it, but she said I was a tad heavy on the salt. The veggies and potatoes were good, nothing special as they weren't meant to be the stars of this dish.

There are a few takeaways from this dish I'd like to point out:
1. Brining, and drying, are worth it. They are simple steps that if you 'are' planning ahead, are must-do's. Test it out the next time you make something as simple as chicken wings.
2. Butcher your own chickens and try not to buy things already butchered. The benefit is you'll have a reserve of chicken stock making parts, in a pinch, and THAT is worth it!
3. Yes, if you're roasting a chicken, a 14$ chicken, is worth it. We had a lot of things on hand, but look at the ingredeints used...this is a 30$ or less trip to the grocery store that would feed 4 people, easily. Afterall, it's chicken.

4. A sauce can make or break a dish, unfortunately I oversalted mine a bit, but use good quality ingredients in a sauce...the best stock you can make/find.

Braised Osso Bucco with Roasted Vegetables in Lemon-Parsley Butter

2010-01-10T18:03:00.000-05:00

As I mentioned in one of my previous posts, one of my new years resolutions was to have more guests over. Since I was cooking a recipe from the Family Meals section of the cookbook, I could think of no better guests to have over.

My parents.

My parents, are meat and potatoes people, always have been, always will be, so this was the perfect dish for them. Ironically, the last time we had them over, we pretty much had the same meal (only I served with risotto and a gremolata)

Believe it or not, not everyone carries veal shanks. It took us a 40 minute drive and TWO stores (Whole Foods AND Wegmans) to get 4 shanks. At a premium too! I'll tell ya what, if this is family meal at Nicholas, where do I sign up to wash dishes?

This recipe consists of a few different components:

A fairly ordinary braise of the veal, roasted carrots and potatoes, and lemon-parsley butter (for the carrots and potatoes)

We started off tying and searing the veal. Which means, 'take the batteries out of the smoke detectors, and open the doors due to having NO exhaust fan'

Becuase I know you guys like my videos so much, I figured I'd give you a tour of a day in the life of the Timko kitchen. Our rather sad little house/kitchen.

After browning, I had to prep some mirepoix, and sweat it, add some tomatos and brown...

I bet you are wondering why I'm wearing a chef coat in my own kitchen huh? For that, I'll let Laurie explain.

Here's Rob's new get-up. Why? Because he wants to be a Chef. No, just kidding. It's because I'm tired of trying to stain fight every shirt he ruins while cooking so I told him to wear his Halloween costume (pictured below). It's impossible for him to cook without splattering, splashing, squirting SOMETHING on his shirts. So...enjoy the new look. P.s. I find it kinda sexy anyhow. ;)

Back to the cooking...

For some reason, it always feels good to use homemade chicken stock.

A few hours later, we pulled the veal from the oven.

And let it rest...while we served up some snacks.

We also started cooking the vegetables. I don't have any pictures of the lemon-parlsey butter, but I'm guessing you can figure out what's in it!

I added to the recipe for the vegetables. I was recently at a friends house for beef stew, and saw him cook his potatoes this way, in a cast iron pan, and it was so simple and ingenious, I wondered why I've never done it that way.

I used some uncured peppered bacon and lined the pan, before adding the carrots and potatoes.

Then tossed them in the oven.

They came out looking like this. What a great way to cook root veggies. We then tossed with the lemon-parsley butter.

The wine pairing suggested was a Brunello di Montalcino. Yay. For once, we were very familiar with this wine as we spent all of September eating and drinking our way through Italy. Montalcino was one of our favorite places, and Brunello, our favorite wine. (we brought back a few good bottles to open on our anniversary)

Here are some pictures I took from September...

Montalcino is a very small 'walled' town (although, it's a rather large area surrounding it, where the wine is grown)

We didn't tour any specific vineyards there, and opted to just taste every single one at once...

From 1euro pours, to 25euro pours...

I loved it there....

Laurie loves Gelato....everywhere.

But I digress...

This is the bottle we picked up at the local wine store. Nothing special, but they didn't necessarily have a large selection.

We served it up with a little spoon for the marrow...Again, I apologies for not plating and taking pictures like a pro, it's tough when you have hungry guests waiting and looking at you like you are crazy taking pictures....of food.

Thoughts: A great, simple family meal. The reduced town sauce was fantastic. I think I over-reduced (got too caught up talking with the family) and made a much thicker sauce than I was supposed to, but nonetheless it was awesome. The recipe was nothing out of the ordinary, or unique even. You can find the same recipe in a few different cookbooks, but, that just means that it's a great meal, and perfect for the 'family meals' section of the book. Like I said before, if this is family meal at Nicholas, where do I sign up to wash dishes? The only issue I had with this dish is the shank falling apart a little bit when plating, probably because I braised a little too long or didn't let them rest long enough. My guests didn't mind. We were so caught up in conversation, I didn't bother to keep checking them as they were braising...I'll take good conversation over 'perfect' done osso bucco, anyday.

The wine pairing was good, but, the bottle of wine picked out, was just ok. It's no 2004 Casanova di Neri Brunello di Montalcino Cerretalto, that we have squirriled away....

Up Next: I think I'm going to try the roasted chicken or the wine poached filet...

Gnocchi á la Parisienne

2010-01-04T23:15:00.008-05:00

Since I got my Kindle for Christmas, I've been reading the book Knives at Dawn, the story of the US team in last years Bocuse d'Or. I was inspired and thought up this awesome dish in my head and mulled it over before I went to bed pretty much every night last week. I finally gave it a shot...and let's just say I threw it out and we ended up at Stage Left eating a burger that night. Needless to say, I was bummed, and also intimidated about trying this gnocchi recipe on Sunday.

I REALLY needed the confidence. You see, this is one of my favorite dishes at Nicholas. About a year ago, I tried to replicate the recipe a few times. I talked to chefs, asked my foodie friends, and even though I got the basics down, I still failed and it just didn't hit the mark. Here is the post of my previous failure before I had the actual Nicholas recipe. I almost felt like Nicholas in the story he wrote for this recipe about his 'quest' for this airy, pillowy gnocchi.

Sunday comes. At the supermarket we figured we would pick up something for lunch and dinner the next day. Laurie suggested we make chicken tacos with a chili powder that I made. I said, "That's an awesome idea, but let's braise the chicken tonight while cooking the gnocchi, and shred it for the tacos". I improvised a recipe while in the Goya aisle, figuring it's only shredded meat for tacos and nothing could be as bad as my last 'improvisation'. Well, this dish tasted so good, that we scrapped the gnocchi on Sunday night, scrapped the taco idea and ate this awesome improvised chicken dish! I redeemed myself!!! Rick Bayless himself even commented on my recipe/dish! Here is a link to that recipe on my personal blog for those who are interested. What does this have to do with this gnocchi dish? Well, it gave me back my confidence to give it a try tonight! That, and I just wanted to brag about my recipe.

This dish is comprised of a few components, the gnocchi, artichokes, snap peas, and fried leeks, with an artichoke butter sauce made from the artichoke braising liquid/broth.

We tackled the artichokes first. The recipe calls for making a simple broth with chicken stock and mirepoix, then simmering the artichokes in the broth. The recipe also calls for baby artichokes. I couldn't find any baby artichokes, and I know Alice Waters is putting a spell on me right now....but....

This part was pretty straight forward. I then strained it, reduced, and reserved some of the liquid for the sauce.

Next, Laurie handled the sugar snap peas...

...While I fried the leeks.

They came out a little darker than I would have liked, but I snacked on these all throughout the night while cooking!

Now, came the fun (or nervous!) part. The gnocchi.

We made the dough (thank god for our Kitchen-Aid). We halved the recipe.

It's a pretty straightforward Pate a Choux dough with a secret ingredient or two. The hardest part was stirring the milk and flour in the pot for 12 minutes!

We setup our station.

There is one key element that I noticed in Nicholas's recipe that I didn't do the last time I tried to figure this recipe out on my own. That's the temperature in which you cook the gnocchi. I'm not going to give it away...but I will say, this is definitly the secret of this dish.

I don't have pastry bags, so instead, I used some zip-lock sandwich bags to pipe out the gnocchi. This is definitely a two person job.

I actually made a video to show you a few tricks that I figured out to get nice looking gnocchi.

Check it out!

Here is what they looked like in the pot.

If you don't have one of these 'spiders', drop everything and go pick one up for 2.99 at the asian market. This is one useful tool.

So far, so good!

Laurie made the artichoke buttersauce that I mentioned earlier, while I finished up the gnocchi in a pan with some oil and butter.

As soon as I saw them in the pan, I KNEW we nailed it.

...and we did!

One to match the book...

Thoughts: Laurie thinks it's the best dish we've made out of the book so far. We order the gnocchi almost every time we go to Nicholas, and this tasted exactly like it, even with the canned artichokes. The light airyness was spot on and the sauce was really good too. We ended up eating seconds with heaping spoonfuls of the remainder of the sauce (one of the benefits of cooking at home!). I will say, this is a pretty involved dish that takes two people to make it go smoothly. However, we did make this dish, on a Monday night, after working from 7-6, going to the Gym, running, and THEN coming home and cooking. We started at 7:15 and ate at 8:45. My sous-chef and I work awesome together!

Truth be told, we were going to actually go devour the bar menu at Nicholas this week, but a foodie friend of mine invited us to go to Uproot in Warren, so we'll have to wait for Nicholas until next week. I heard rumors of a menu change too...It's a good thing this came out awesome and will hold us over until our next Nicholas fix!

We didn't end up finding the wine pairing, which was a Ribolla Gialla. I really wanted to try this wine. We went to three stores and no one had it. I know a certain friend who is going to email me after I post this and yell at me for not asking him...and I'd like to say, 'I know, I'm sorry', in advance.

Next up: I said seafood the last 4 posts and didn't pull through....so I'm not sure I know what's next yet.

P.S. Laurie and I, in traditional Nicholas fashion, before bed, pulled out some Banana Bread she baked the other night...

Banana Bread

2010-01-02T14:26:00.000-05:00

First, I wanted to let everyone in on a really great podcast/radio show...

Mark and Francis recently interviewed Nicholas Harary regarding the book, and what do you know, they mentioned this blog! Pretty cool huh? Here is a link to the podcast. The blog gets a mention at around minute-30. Also, if you do a search for shows on the site, Nicholas has been on the show quite a few times and they are all pretty good listens.

Oh yeah, HAPPY NEW YEAR! Most of you don't know me personally, but, I've been told on more than one occasion, I'm a bit maniacal. I'm not sure I can disagree. For example, I do make New Years resolutions, and, come hell or high water, I ALWAYS keep them and meet my goals. Always. For instance, a few years ago, the reason I started cooking was based on a resolution. Last year, my resolution was to start running. Prior to last year, I've never attempted anything athletic in my life. I never ran unless I was being chased. Well, Laurie and I ran in, and finished, the NYC Marathon on Nov. 2 2009. This years resolutions that are culinary related are as follows:

- Learn how better to use my Norton waterstones to sharpen my Chef Knives

- Learn more about wine. I'm a cocktail guy, I can taste 10 differently made martinis, and let you know the brand of gin used, the brand of vermouth used, and also the proportion of gin to vermouth! I do drink a lot of wine, but I'm afraid If I say I'm going to learn more about wine, I'll be maniacally obsessed and want to learn EVERYTHING about wine. Since it is such an extensive subject, it would consume me. I'll need to tread a little lightly (...and drink a little more!).

- Spend more time and money eating at local restaurants in town. We have a plethora of good eats in town due to it being a rather blue collar, and ethically diverse town. Click here for a cool old post I did regarding it.

Lasty,

- Have more guests over for dinner/drinks.

The last one, that one is going to be tough. You see, my house is VERY small. Size: 818 sqft
Year built:1936. There are downfalls to being an overly ambitious 22 yr old who bought a house when real estate was at it's highest 5 years ago...and that is living with the fact that you pass by about 20 houses, double the size, for half the money on the way to work everyday! So much the the American Dream! But, I digress...I had 4 people over once for dinner, and we couldn't move. But, this year is the year. Somehow, I'm going to manage to figure it out, even if I do have to setup a table in my garage!

Speaking of which, yesterday was the first day of the year. We played it low key this year and spent New Years eve with some good friends, eating chili and watching the Twilight Zone marathon (To Serve Man, naturally, is my favorite episode!). We kicked 2010 with a 5k Running Race. Afterward, we planned on showering, getting into PJ's and sitting on the couch all day reading. We raced, came home, showered, and sat down on the couch at around 2:30pm. 3pm rolls around and as I'm thinking about my resolutions, we get a phone call from a friend, inviting us over for a small dinner party at his place. Suddenly, sitting on the couch all day seemed not all that interesting. There was one problem though. We have to bring SOMETHING. I thought fast, grabbed my shoes, and headed out to the store for some bananas to make banana bread! Laurie has made the pumpkin bread quite a few times, so felt comfortable she can whip up a few loaves of bread, shower, and get ready before 7pm. The recipe calls for a few ingredients: Bananas, Eggs, Sugar, Flour, Salt, Baking Soda.

We got a chance to use our new blender, which performed great!...

...And our Kitchen-Aid. Every time Laurie uses it, she says how much easier it is to quickly whip up recipes like this. I'm not sure what we did before we had it.

That's it. Simple. Laurie even had time to whip up some brownies AND change her outfit about 20 times.

And off we were to a dinner party, with fresh baked bread in hand!

Thoughts: The taste was spot on. Very moist. It's a very simple recipe that is easy to whip up in a pinch. The best part, is you can make a loaf for yourself too! Our loafs came out a little darker than the books, not sure why, but I'm betting it's probably the bananas we used. In the book Nicholas explains how the banana bread take-home came about, and I must say, it's the perfect take-away OR 'take-to'...someones house/dinner party.

Up Next: I'd really like to do a fish dish!

P.S. Our dinner host made a fantastic beef stew, an even better caesar salad, and opened up some great wine. A good time was had by all.

Asparagus Crostini with Parmesan and Truffle Vinaigrette

2009-12-28T20:32:00.000-05:00

So I didn't go out and buy a black truffle yet. BUT, I wanted to make this dish anyway. I also had a nice little bottle of black truffle oil that we brought back from our honeymoon in Italy.

It's was a Monday night, and I've been working pretty long hours with my new job, but nothing winds me down more than cooking after work.

When I first read this recipe, I thought it was a little too involved for a simple hors d'oeuvre. I then broke it down, and it's actually pretty easy. Once again, you can make everything ahead of time and just toss them in the oven when guests arrive.

Here are the ingredients (minus the optional chopped black truffle)

I think (and Laurie agrees) that the Champagne Vinegar is the one key ingredient that makes the dish.

It's really composed of 3 parts. The crostini, the vinaigrette, and the asparagu -- all of which can be made ahead of time. Combine, shave some cheese over, and pop them in a 350 oven for a few minutes.

And that's it folks.

One to try and match the book's pic.

Forgive me on this one for my lack of photography skills, between the poor kitchen lighting and my lack of a good close-up lense, it was the best I could do. You professional food photographers have it easy, you don't have to ever worry about the food getting cold!

Thoughts: Want to know how to 'wow' that pesky vegetarian you invited over for dinner? Make them this to start off. Non-Vegetarians will really enjoy it, and that non-vegetarians pain in the butt spouse they brought, will love it! Win-Win. We ate about 15 of them and a bowl some Cabbage, Ham and White bean soup that Laurie made.

Up Next: I bet you guys are thinking 'Ok Rob, enough with the easy stuff already' -- So, I think I'm going to give either a fish dish a shot, or maybe, just maybe, the Hen Egg Ravioli. I just wish I could bring myself to buy a black truffle. Nothing looks better than a few shavings of black truffle on a dish (other than a few MORE shavings of white). Anyone have any input on the Oregon Black Truffles I mentioned in my previous post? I'd really love some feeback before I shelled out 75$.

Perhaps I should do a full-on Nicholas at Home 'Black Truffle Menu' dinner and invite a few people over who can 'donate' to my truffle fund? Haha. Any takers?

Chocolate Soufflé

2009-12-27T18:29:00.000-05:00

A little late, but Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays everyone!

Santa didn't bring me a black truffle unfortunately, so those truffle dishes that I want to do right, will have to wait until I find a good source for them online. My buddy Alex gave me the heads up on some Oregon black truffles. Has anyone ever used/tried them? How to they compare to Italian? At 50$ (+22$ shipping) for 3oz they sure seem like a steal. They are also more 'local' than Italian, so I should get some Alice Waters karma kudos points too, no? Haha.

What Santa DID bring however, was some giftcards and such (and an Amazon Kindle). That called for braving the gift-card crowded stores this weekend and picking up a few things. Here is what we scored:

A Molcajete

While I love all kinds of cuisines, I really enjoy Mexican flavors. My guacamole's always fell flat because you just can't make a good guacamole without a molcajete. This one is pretty hefty. You can't tell the size, but it's about 8 inches around and weighs like 15lbs. It's made of hand carved lava rock from Mexico. I'm in the lengthy process of seasoning it now. I did the rice, salt, then some garlic, cumin, S&P...anyone have any other seasoning tips? This will also come in really hand for Salsas and Pesto.

Then, I got the creme-de-creme. Finally. The long awaited.....BLENDER. I did some research and I just couldn't justify 500$ for a vit-a-mix or a blend-tec. I saw that my buddy Alex picked up a Kitchen-Aid, and did some research. It turns out this blender got very high remarks (actually I think the best) from Cooks Illustrated, and at 99$ plus a 20% off Bed Bath and Beyond coupon, and some giftcards, it was a steal! I can't wait until I get to use it!

I also picked up a few smaller items. A new cheapie hand-held mandoline to replace my fancy expensive OXO waste-of-money standing one that works horribly and is a bitch to clean. Some little seafood forks were also had. These will be perfect for bone marrow too! Laurie, had to get something as well. We'll NEVER use it...but she had to have it. Some snowflake pancake thing that will collect dust in the back of the drawer.

What does all that have to do with Chocolate Soufflé? Not a thing. Sorry. The Soufflé was pretty basic, no trickery or trade secrets. Sugar, Eggs, Chocolate. Some confectioners sugar to top it off. The 'secret' is to use a good chocolate. The recipe calls for valrhona. This dish was all Laurie.

Her double boiler setup

I'm not quite sure what we did before our kitchen-aid, but probably the same thing we did before we just bought our blender...we complained a lot.

You see this picture? Don't do it this way. It's a bad example. Don't put a bunch of ramakins in another dish then put them in the oven, if you do, pre-heat the bigger dish in the oven, then just place the ramakins in the dish while it's in the oven. Even better, make a small water bath in the pre-heated dish to keep the temperature consistent. If you don't pre-heat the dish, your cooking time will be off and you may run into problems.

...and one to try and match the book.

Thoughts: It's Chocolate Soufflé, how can it be bad?! The dish as a whole is a little boring for me to order at a restuarant, but I will tell you that I scarfed it down mighty quick at home! We 'paired' it with some espresso chip Edy's ice cream. The rose just enough, but we still should have filled them up to the very top. Next time. I think this is a classic dessert that's pretty easy to 'whip up' in a pinch.

Up next: Trying to get my hands on some truffles without paying a hand+leg. I'd like to do a fish dish next too. I'll have to see what's fresh.

Braised Pork Belly

2009-12-20T20:48:00.001-05:00

Well, Laurie and I are back from our culinary adventure in Chicago. Who goes to Chicago when it's 5 degrees out and snowing? People who like to eat (us), that's who. We spent 4 days trying to hit as many good eats as possible. ALL of Rick Bayless's places exceeded expectations, from Xoco, the 'fast food' place to Topolobampo the fine dining menu, to Frontera, the in-between. I recommend Hot chocolate and churros from Xoco, and the Chicken soup (I forget the menu name) from Frontera/Topo. We were disappointed by Charlie Trotter's place, it just didn't hit the mark for us. Service was outstanding, but the food was just not memorable, no matter how much I wanted it to be, for the money spent. The wine pairings were great though (we choose the wine pairing with the tastings). Chicago deep dish pizza? I'll take NY. The Publican and The Violet Hour hit the mark for us. Our bartender at the Violet Hour, (the one from Morristown NJ!) was one of the best bartenders I've come accross. He just got it. I wish there were more places like that in NJ. Enough about Chi-Town...if you are a foodie, it's an awesome city. Click here for some pictures of our trip. (btw - we flew out of JFK - Jet Blue. Terminal 5. The restaurants there and the whole setup, is WORTH driving through Staten Island for. Seriously. Our flight was delayed for ~4 hours due to weather in Chicago, but we passed the time eating and drinking. Terminal 5 has a great selection of fine-dining restaurants now!! We ate at 5ive Steak. The bar made a surprisingly perfect manhattan too! (with Rye even!)

Changing gears for a minute, I wanted to address a question I'm sure some of you are asking. 'Why?' Why is someone doing a blog like this? Well, I thought about this for a while. I LOVE to cook & I LOVE to eat...but unfortunately, I'm not a chef and don't have a restaurant. The closest I can get to the feeling a chef must get when he cranks out 100 plates of a dish that people just love, is cooking for myself, my wife, and a few friends, and sharing the experience and pictures with 100+ people on the internet. Half obsessive, half ego I suppose. If I could fit 100 people in my house, though, I surely would try. Unfortunately, my barely 1200sq/ft cape cod can only accomidate 4, for dinner!

In any case, while we were away, we received some requests to do the Braised Pork Belly recipe. As if I didn't eat enough pork in Chi-town. Pork belly is the not-so-new trendy dish at many fine-dining restuarants, but, no one can deny that it's usually quite tasty. For good reason too, it's bacon. I don't believe I've ever had this dish at Nicholas, but the recipe sure looks good so we figured, what the heck. I've cooked pork belly a few times before -- Once from a Jean-George recipe that came out just okay, and once from a Momofuku/David Chang recipe that came out fantastic. This recipe is a braised pork belly, over napa cabbage with some peanut-coconut dressing, and some gingered pluots (more on the pluots later)

We drove to the only place around (within 20 minutes) to actually get pork belly. Hong Kong Supermarket. I'm usually a little weary about the quality of some things here, but there is no denying they always have whatever obscure ingredient I need. All of the ingredients for this dish cost me about 15-20 bucks. On a side note: They seem to always keep the whole store at 30 below zero so if you go, be prepared with a coat, even in the summer. Brrr.

The recipe calls for 1lb of pork belly. This was a little suspect, since when I picked out what I thought was a reasonably sized slab...it came to 3.73lbs. Yikes, no worries, I'll just make extra, I figured.

So, I came home and took out my tape measure, and portioned into 5x3 inch pieces as per the recipe. That whole 3.73lb slab yielded...2 portions. Granted they are pretty big portions. Use your gut if you are making this recipe for guests. I doubt that 1lb would feed 6 people even if the portions are small.

I'm not sure I tied the ends right, but I consulted my wife, who gave the OK.

I started getting excited when we made the braising liquid. Just getting together the ingredients made my hungry. This was going to be good braise, and one like I've never done before.

...and in the pot the bellies go...

Look at that. How can that taste bad? I think you can put a shoe in there and it would come out pretty good.

When it comes out, it looks...well...just as good to me!!

Here is what the pork belly portions look like. I threw them in the fridge on a sheet pan with a rack to dry so they will crisp up on final preperation.

I wouldn't whip up this dish if you have guests coming over in a few hours, but the recipe is layed out so that you can do most everything ahead of time, and just toss it together ala minute when your guests arrive. I'm finding many of the recipes in the book are layed out this way and I love it. I always want to have awesome food when I have guests over (it's the only way I can get people over my house!), but I don't want to be slaving over a stove the whole time. With this cookbook, you can have a 5-course quality dinner, most of which can be made ahead! I did the pork belly and gingered pluots on one day, and kept them in the fridge overnight.

This brings me to the gingered pluots. Or rather, the lack of pluots. A pluot is similiar to a plum, and the recipe states you can substitute plums if you can't find pluots. It's not pluot nor plum season, and no store around here carried either, so...not wanting to do something half-assed, I still wanted to do 'something' rather than just leave this component out. I'm going to catch shit for it, but, since it's just an accompaniment, and not a integral part of the dish, here is what I did.

DOH!

I had the idea to substitute something else that is in season, but here is why I'm a desk jockey and not a chef...I couldn't come up with any ideas. Do you guys/gals have any ideas on what I cold have subbed?

These do look kinda sad

We did the above cooking on Saturday. If you live in NJ, you know that a giant blizzard (the first of the year) had started in the morning. So, we also decided to make a pot of chili to stay inside and be cozy all day. Click here for how that came out! We prepared with a trip to the grocery and wine store the day before. Most people get milk and bread and water, we get slabs of angus chuck and wine. Our house smelled fantastic. It was the first time I made my own chili powder from dried chilis too!

Believe it or not though, with all the cooking we did that day, we didn't end up eating anything we cooked (yet), except for stealing tastes of the chili!! We ended up taking our new 4x4 Jeep out in the blizzard to one of our favorite restaurants, Stage Left for a burger (THE best burger in NJ) with my Mom, Dad, and Sister. Due to the weather, they were running a deal of half priced bottles of wine over $150, so we figured having THE best burger in NJ, with a nice bottle of wine at retail store prices, in a blizzard, sounded even better than our chili. So we threw the pot of chili in the fridge and headed out at around 7pm! There is something about driving in the worst weather conditions that makes a man happy. I drove to Sayreville to pick up my family and we trekked into New Brunswick.

What a great spontaneous night! It was especially good, knowing that I had a whole pot of chili and pork belly waiting in the fridge for the next day....

Now, Sunday is here, and it's time to finish this dish. What was left was to make the dressing, and prep the cabbage, then sear off and cook the pork belly in a 400 oven for a few minutes...

Here are the ingredients for the dressing. Don't knock my Jiffy.

The result was a little better than my last run in with using crappy Jiffy.

Mixed with the napa cabbage and some chopped peanuts, I have to say, the slaw was pretty tasty.

The pork belly needed a few more minutes than the recipe called for in the oven. Actually, I sould have lowered the temp a little bit and cooked it for even a bit longer to render some more fat out. For the record, this was a pretty crappy cut of pork belly, way too fatty for a dish like this, but I did manage to get a few good cuts.

...and finally, one to match the book.

My Thoughts: The best part of this dish was the slaw and the gingered plums (even though they were from a can!), the braise was awesome, but the cut of pork belly I had, was not. I knew it going into the dish, but figured I'd give it a whirl anyways. Such is life when purveyors won't deliver to your house (believe me, I've tried). The flavors were really good. I'm definitly going to make this dish again when I come across a better cut of pork belly. Asian supermarkets are good for finding off-the-wall ingredients, but be cafeful. We didn't pair the suggested wine with this (a Riesling), I simply forgot when we were stocking up at the wine store this weekend, however we did finish off a bottle of Spanish Priorat throughout the day (which we opened with the Chili we had for lunch). I'm eager to try this dish at Nicholas. I'm also going to try, once again to get some better sources for ingredients, especially meats.

Up next? Laurie made the Chocolate Souffle' today too but it might be a few days until I can find some time to get a post together. I put a black truffle for Christmas list, so if Santa brings one I'm going to try out the couple of dishes that don't require actual truffle (just truffle oil), but it's listed as optional. Those dishes are Hen Egg Truffle Ravioli, Risotto with Truffles, and Truffle Egg Custard wth Truffle Creme. Maybe Santa will bring an ice cream maker too.

I can't wait until Spring, there are so many great spring recipes in this book!

Braised Short Ribs with Tamarind Sauce

2009-12-05T22:00:00.000-05:00

Here is what it looked like outside my kitchen window this afternoon.

I don't know about you guys, but to us, snowing means braising, and braising means short ribs. I'm certainly no stranger to braising short ribs. I usually just do a simple braise in mirepoix and red wine with some tomato paste. This recipe is a little different. The short ribs are braised in a pretty strong flavored liquid of tamarind paste, lot's of spices, and some pickled mango and papaya. It's served with horseradish whipped potatoes.

First, I have to tell you guys about my early Christmas present. Today, we went over Laurie's grandfathers (85yrs old) house to celebrate a birthday. He doesn't cook much anymore, so we asked if he had any cast iron pans. You guys know a good seasoned, old cast iron pan is top of my Christmas list this year, even above of a blender. Well...triple score! He mentioned that some of these pans may even be from his wifes mother/grandmother. They are smaller pans, but, we take delivery of a bigger 8 or 10inch pan from this 'collection' on Tuesday when Laurie gets it from her mothers! FANTASTIC. Remember those little Emeril pans that I explained were our favorite pans? I think they just got the bump.

Let's get back to the recipe and some cooking. As with most of the recipes in this book, it calls for toasting the spices before grinding them. I used my new favorite pan.

If this book has tought me one thing, it's that toasting and fresh grinding spices, is a great idea. We ground up the spices in our trusty (crappy) coffee grinder and used it to make the pickled mango and papaya, which was basically just some sugar, vinegar, and some of the spice mix. The mix will be used for seasoning the ribs as well as using in the braising liquid.

Next up was making the braising liquid of Tamarind paste, water, and the spice mix, along with a few other things like brown sugar, tomato paste, and some garlic and ginger. It called for blending it in a blender....but, I don't have one. My boat motor blender would have to do. And, it did.

The recipe then called for my favorite part in braising, and that's the browning of the meat.We used some Wegmans overpriced short ribs that were already trimmed up nice for us. It's 1.99 short ribs from the local Mexican Supermarket, or 4.99 already tripped USDA Choice from Wegmans. My wife likes the boneless Wegmans ones better and since we were there...

After the ribs were browned nice and good, Laurie poured the boiling braising liquid over the ribs in the pan.

We covered, popped them in the oven and then Laurie made me a Sazerac Cocktail.

(properly of course, thoroughly chilled, no ice, peychauds bitters, and an absinthe rinse)

The short ribs called for a 2.5-3 hour braise. I sipped my Sazerac and wrote up the Agnolotti post.

I missed taking pictures of her boiling the potatoes for the whipped potatos, but rest assured, she did. About 1.5 hours into the braising.

I babyed that Sazerac for almost 3 hours until the ribs were done!

I was surprised how much the braising liquid reduced. Perhaps it's because it was braised at 350 and I'm used to 275-300ish? Or my Le Creuset's lid doesnt fit right...or something. In any case, a fork-to-mouth taste indicated they were already awesome. The recipe calls for cooling down the ribs while making the whipped potatoes, so, we did...

...In the backyard, on our snow covered table. Then Laurie got to making the potatoes. I had absolutely nothing to do with the potato portion of this recipe other than photographing, tasting, and eating them!

The Horseradish Whipped Potatoes were pretty simple, just some potatoes, butter, milk and butter. We used our ricer, which is a gadget I bought for a particular recipe way back thinking we'd never use it again, and we actually use it quite a bit.

After the potatoes were just about done, I set to making the sauce, which was just the braising liquid and some pickled papaya blended in. I removed the ribs, threw the pickled papaya in and hit it with the boat motor again. We plated, then opened a bottle of the recommended wine, which was a 'bold America Syrah'. We kinda did an innie-minnie-miney-moe with the 4 choices from the wine store.

Then, we ate.

And one to (try and) match the book.

Thoughts: This is a BOLD dish. We loved it. It felt like something that should have been out of the 'Family Meals' section of the book. We really couldn't imagine it being on the menu of a fine dining restaurant at first, because it's so hearty and comforting, but then we thought about the flavors. They are pretty strong. The short ribs and sauce were spicy and had a lot of layers, so much in fact the pototoes, which normally would have been overpowering, balanced really well. This brings us to the wine, which was really...bold. It certainly stood up to it. I can't imagine another wine that I ever tasted standing up to this dish. I'd never drink it on it's own, but it worked really well for this dish. It's an easy enough dish to make for company, however, if your company is a little pickey about strong, spicy flavors, you might want to re-think. To a foodie, it's a perfect flavor and boldness.

Next up: Not sure. We are taking a break and heading to Chicago for a few days on a spontaneous, purely culinary, getaway. As in, we booked reservations before we booked our flights, and the only reason we are going, is to eat! (Charlie Trotter's, Bayless, Publican, Voilet Hour...any other suggestions are welcomed!! We'd hit Alinea, not that I'm all that into the molecular gastronomy thing, but, it's booked...anyone have any juice?)

How about we take a request for the next recipe for when we get back?? Post you're recommendations below. If you don't have the book yet, either go buy it, or maybe point us to a particular protein, veggie, or flavor profile. I kinda feel like we should do a dessert, but I'm waiting to pick up a good deal on a used ice-cream maker (and get the recipe to that damn awesome looking dish on the dessert title page!)

Pumpkin Agnolotti

2009-12-05T19:06:00.000-05:00

My blog buddy Alex and I were talking about some recipes in the book and we both seem to have the same tastes. He made the agnolotti a few days ago. This particular recipe was also on the my wifes top 10 list too. Tis' the season for fall/winter squash!

I was a little nervous about this recipe. It's not too complicated, ingredient wise, with basically just a filling of squash, pumpkin, sweet potato, and the standard pumpkin-ish spices, however making the actual agnolotti intimidated me. I've made ravioli a few times before, and it was certainly a learning curve that I finally got the hang of, but agnolotti seemed a little tougher. We made the carrot stock a few days ago, so we had that already on hand.

The first part was pretty easy. Roast some squash and a sweet potato.

I small diced the remaining squash bits and set aside with pumpkin seeds (not the roasted ones, the green, fresh hulled ones) for the garnish. I was pretty excited about this. Why you ask? Because I just got my knives back from the sharpener! I have a few good/expensive knives, and I use them a lot. Sharpening is a bitch for me. I have a set of Norton waterstones, but I'm not the best at them yet, although I'm determined. It's a 2010 resolution. I googled "Knife Sharpening near New Brunswick, NJ" and the only thing that came up in the entire NJ was a guy who does it on the side in South Brunswick. Ironically, I can see his address from my work office window! SCORE!!! Warren's website is http://www.niceandsharp.com. He did a fantastic job! 24hr turnaround time too. He even made me up a list of all my knives and sharpened angles. Check it out. For 7$ a knife, I thought it was a steal. I plan on taking a class with him in the future. (Santa, are you listening?)

While the squash was roasting, we popped open a fun bottle of Pinot we happend to find at our favorite wine store. We never see good half-bottles so we scooped this one up. The last one. Mark Pascal, I'm putting this on here just for you, so you don't bust my chops about the Smoking Loon from the other night...

When the squash were done (which happened to be a little bit longer than the recipe called for). We made the filling. It was supposed to be pretty easy. Squash+Sweet Potato+Canned Pumpkin Filling+Honey+Spices in...a blender. However, if you've been following this blog, you know damn well I need a blender. We had to batch it up and use our little food-pro. I need a blender. Santa? I have to say though, this little food-pro has been through a lot, and still does the job. I don't hate my food pro, it does more than it's job. I hate that I don't have a blender. Oh yeah, I also don't have a pastry bag/piper, so a ziplock it is.

I threw that in the fridge and setup my pasta making station, (you kitchen has 'station's' right?), as to minimize the mess.

I made the pasta dough. I won't lie, I've done the 'well' method, and have made pasta by hand 100 times. I'd rather throw everything in the kitchen-aid with the dough hook on and drink wine. The pasta dough recipe was pretty standard, however I did have to add an extra egg yolk. I probably only needed a half an egg yolk, but I needed a little more nonetheless.

I let the dough rest, and in the meantime I started making the brown-butter for the brown butter sauce. I know this is a separate recipe in the book, but I'm including it in this one as it's just butter...

It starts like this.

...and ends up looking like this.

...After it cools in the fridge. You think cookie dough is good? Brown butter is the cookie dough of foodies. Ok, bone marrow is the cookie dough of foodies, but you get the point!

I set it aside for later and started to 'make-a-da-pasta'. (when you read that, doesn't the scene from the move Big Night run through your head? it does mine!)

Thank god I have the Kitchen-Aid pasta roller, I used to hand-crank! The filling of the pasta was pretty tricky. It took me a while. In the cookbook it describes to basically just fold it over, pinch it and cut it, however in the pictures and in my experiences, agnolotti aren't that simple. There is an extra 'fold' that makes a little pocket. I researched and practiced, and I think I've got it. Rather than show you a bunch of pictures of this orgami-like pasta making, I have made a video. I didn't have time to put music to it, but imagine that the Pearl Jam station on Pandora is on in the background, because it was. (and I don't even like Pearl Jam much, but that station is just awesome!)

If you noticed, my sous-chef is doing what she does best. On facebook, texting, and emailing. Figures she bails on the hardest part of the dish! I'm sure her virtual crops in farmville on facebook needed to be cropped or something. One of these days the blackberry is going to go in 'da-pasta' water...

So that's it. The first few came out crappy, but I think I got the hang of it by the end. The recipe makes A LOT of agnolotti...I got tired, but you can make more than enough to freeze.

I know the picture doesn't look like the book....because the books pictures have a filling that's GREEN. I'll have to get the recipe to THAT particular pasta in another way...just like the desserts on the dessert title page and back cover, and the white flan-like thing in the middle of the pea soup! Nicholas, Peter, are you listening?

We then put the pot of salted boiling water on, and made the garnish which was just the squash and some pumpkin seeds. I'm getting good, I don't even need a spoon anymore. Hot butter and oil are no match for me. For you loyal followers of this blog, we of course used our favorite little free-emeril pan.

Then Laurie finished up on facebook or writing back to Miss and started on the brown butter sauce. Man, this thing has a lot of butter. We cut it in half, and it was still close to a pound of butter! You basically need to heat up the carrot stock, emulsify a lot of butter, then whisk in the brown butter, and hope it doesn't break.

We tossed the agnolotti in simmering (not full on rolling boiling) water, and in 1 minute 30 seconds, they were done. We then tossed them into the sauce, and plated. We trekked to Wegmans to find truffled cheese which the recipe lists as optional and at 10$ for few microplane swipes, we hoped it would be worth it!!

We then cracked open the recommended pairing of a bottle of Vin d'Alsace, Edelzwicker from our favorite wine store, who came through this time, and made up for the Smoking Loon incident of 2009.

And...here is one to match the book...

Thoughts: Laurie said it was the best dish we've made from the book thus far. I'm not sure I agree on that, however, I will say it's the best homemade pasta-anything I've ever made in-house. The extra fold in the agnolotti is what seperates itself from Ravioli. It gives it a, how do I say this, a better, 'toothy' feel...to quote my bearded friend Kevin from Top Chef. The filling was great, and the sauce was good too. The wine, I was not the biggest fan of, however it did pair well. Lauries favorite part, was the part that she thought she would hate the most, which were the pumpkin seeds. They added a great texture component. I know it sounds weird, but I don't think these would be as good if you made them in standard ravioli shape. The cheese was a good addition, but I don't think it added 10$ worth of flavor, and I also didn't add much sage to the dish either as I think that would overpower it for me.

Up Next: It's snowing out as I write this, and something is braising in the oven (as well as a Sazerac in hand). Stay tuned. I'll have that post up tomorrow.

Is there any recipe that any of you guys/gals reading would like to see us do? We are heading to Chicago for a few days on a strickly culinary trip next week (Charlie Trotter's, Bayless, Publican, Voilet Hour...)...but when we get back, we'll be full-on cooking again. I need an ice-cream maker to tackle some of the desserts, if someone has one they want to get rid of. I'm not paying Williams-Sonoma price, but if you had one you were going to yard-sale because you never use (and look me in the eye, you know damn well you never use it)...I'm interested.

Carrot Stock

2009-12-05T17:24:00.000-05:00

We want to make the agnolotti dish from the cookbook, soon. So, while we were making stock a few days ago, we also made some carrot stock.

We were pooped from our stock making and also knocking out a few recipes that day. We made a LOT of chicken stock. So much in fact, that I had no more tupperware to store it. So, I put it back in a pot, half covered, and kept it at a VERY low simmer overnight. In the morning, it had reduced by about 1/3, darkened a little and was pretty damn rich. We used it to make the carrot stock!

Pretty simple, just some chicken stock and carrots (lot's of them), with onion and leeks.

Simmering for 3 hours...

...To get a cup or so of stock. But, let me tell you, it was VERY flavorful stock.

It actually made more than a cup. Since I only need 1/3 cup for the recipe, I saved a whole cup, then used the rest mixed with some chicken stock to make ramen the same night I did the chicken satay. Let me tell you, AWESOME ramen. Super awesome flavored broth. Between the carrot stock, which already had a reduced chicken stock base, to the addition of some more chicken stock and some soy sauce...this broth was awesome. Laurie drank it out of the bowl!!

Way worth it if you are already making chicken stock, and not just for the agnolotti. I can see using this stock in a bunch of other things...risotto, soups, etc...

Sous Vide Turkey Breast

2009-12-04T13:20:00.000-05:00

...only I did it with legs.

Everyone gets a free supermarket turkey, right? And...most of us usually don't know what to do with it, especially if you are only two people in one household. Well, every year I do a bunch of stuff with it. Usually grind it up to make turkey burgers, chili, meatballs, or sausage. Last year, I followed Grant Achatz's sous-vide turkey leg recipe and it came out pretty awesome. This year was no different. I ground up the breasts for turkey burgers, I choose the breasts because Laurie likes a lean turkey burger. I used the carcass and wings for stock/gravy, and I used the legs/thighs for the sous vide turkey recipe out of the book. I figured last years came out good, and I was going to vacuum seal anyways, so why not? The major differences between Achatz's and Nicholas's recipes are brine vs. no brine, butter vs. buttermilk, and thigh vs. breast

There is something, dare I say, fun, about breaking down your own meat/poultry. Perhaps I watch too much Dexter?

So after breaking down the turkey, I threw the legs in a brine, as per the recipe. I don't brine much, not becuase I don't understand how great brining is, it's just that I usually don't think to prepare food the night before. The next day I got out my super-thermo-immersion-circulazer...state of the art!

It's funny, I don't sous vide much, but when I do, I have NO problems keeping an absolute consistent temperature. I think the key is the biggest pot you have, with the most water, and dial it in before you throw anything in it.

Here she is, after being taken out of the brine and all buttermilked and herbed up. When I bought my 40$ foodsaver vacuum sealer, Laurie said "Great, another gadget we won't use much", but, like our free emeril saucepan, we use it ALL the time.

Takin' a bath.

I also threw the carcass and wings in a roasting pot with some mirepoix to roast for the gravy. I forgot to snap a picture of this, but imagine a carcass and wings, in a pot, with some mirepoix...in the oven.

In the meantime, Laurie treated me to a perfectly made Sidecar.

When I say perfect, I mean, double strained (I don't care much for ice chips), Half rimmed glass (only on the outside), and a flamed orange peel.

I kept an eye on the turkey to make sure it stayed between 165-170 in the water bath, and it did. I didn't have to adjust it once! The carcass and wings finished roasting, so I started on making the stock/broth for the gravy. We used our previously made Chicken Stock to make turkey gravy. I know...it's somewhat sacrilege, but I didn't have time, nor bones, to make a full-on turkey stock.

After some time, which was a little more than the recipe stated as I had bone-in thighs, not breasts, (but hey, it's sous vide, you can't overcook right!?), the turkey was done.

I have to say, sous vide may taste great, but it's always pretty unappealing out of the bag. Especially skin-on poultry. I actually like my thighs a little higher temp than the recipe calls for, but I knew I was going to throw it under the broiler to crisp it up a little bit while Laurie made her dijon brussel sprouts. We opened up a bottle of the suggested wine pairing which was a young pinot, a basic Bourgogne Rouge.

The gravy was fantastic! I mean, really really good. I would say, and Laurie would confirm, that this is the best gravy we've ever had. We liked it so much in fact, we decided to shred the meat and have open faced turkey sandwiches!! Afterall, this IS in the Family Meal section...who needs haute turkey legs?

Thoughts: It was great. I mean, how can sous vide turkey in buttermilk with gravy be bad? The recipe was pretty simple. Even though it took time, there wasn't much prep. I would, however, do it with the recommended breast though. Here are my thoughts. Sous Vide-ing is mainly used to cook meat to a perfect temperature without overcooking, I think this works MUCH better for lean meats where overcooking is the biggest issue. Tenderloin, breasts, fish, etc... I think that fattier pieces, such as shortribs, thighs, pork belly...while they won't come out any worse than regular cooking methods, I don't think they come out all that better than a simple braise.

The wine pairing was nice. As I mentioned 100 times, I wish I knew more about wine. The good thing about this book is it's gotten me to try a few wines that aren't really all that 'common' or standard. Granted, for this specific recipe, a pinot isn't all that uncommon, but I'd never had one from France and specifically a Bougogne Rouge. I like trying new things, but I'm always worried that the wine won't go well with the meal, and now I have the confidence via the book, to try these wines.

Next up: Pumpkin Agnolotti - Tonight...off to find some truffled cheese!

Chicken Satay Skewers with Peanut Dressing

2009-12-01T19:52:00.000-05:00

Who doesn't like chicken satay skewers?

This seemed like a simple enough recipe so we figured we'd do it as a kinda-snack followed by some ramen for dinner. It's basically marinated chicken, with a sauce, or 'dressing', made from a small list of ingredients. Looking at the ingredients as I pulled them from the fridge, I was a little nervous.

Do not adjust your monitor, yep, it's Skippy and Heinz. Ok, Ok, sure I COULD have made my own peanut butter, but, well, you have all heard me gripe about not having a blender or good food-pro before. So yeah, I'm pretty unsure about this one from the get go. But nonetheless, I pushed on and marinated the chicken in some soy, brown sugar, and a little bit of chili sauce.

We then, skeptically, went to work on the 'peanut dressing' which calls for first, cooking the ketchup before adding the rest of the ingredients.

It just...didn't look too appealing. If we whisked it up really good, it didn't look bad, but it 'broke' really easily. The taste was actually pretty good, but, after 10 seconds of whisking, it broke in about 10 seconds into some ugly red oil/peanut butter mixture. We pushed on. As a friend once told me while we were offroad motorcycle rally racing...P.O.R. or..'Press/Push on REGARDLESS'. so POR we did.

I'm loving using more grapeseed oil than olive oil for things like this. I can get a really good sear. I also read an interview with Thomas Keller recently, where he promoted using more oil than not on things like this with the reasoning of getting a more even sear, and not worrying about the amount of oil, because whatever you're cooking isn't really going to pick it up anyway. I'm sold.

Time to plate....so we cut up some scallion, and bring out the 'dressing'. It looked, well...it didn't look good. I whisked some more, and before I got the camera, it started 'breaking' again.

I'm not sure what I did wrong with the dressing, perhaps the Skippy or maybe my brand of chili sauce?

In any case, here is one to match the book...I even had a glass plate. Although, it's not as sharp as I would like. I was a little bummed by the sauce breaking to fiddle with my camera on this one, sorry guys.

Thoughts: The marinade is great! The chicken was good, but the sauce, well, not so good. I guess the flavor was ok, but the consistancy was just unappealing no matter how I tried to thin it/thick it with water. I'll get to this one again though...does anyone have any suggestions?

P.S. We ended up using the extra chicken and making some ramen with some of the carrot stock from the book and some chicken stock...MAN. Delicious!

Steamed Spaghetti Squash with Tomato Stew and Arugula Pesto

2009-11-29T16:57:00.000-05:00

What do you do, when you've been making stock all day, and have been snacking on such things as roasted bone marrow, and shrimp tempura?

Go vegetarian!

I promise, that will be the first and last time you'll ever hear me say that. In any case, we decided to do this squash dish last night too, in the midst of making stock and gnoshing on guilty pleasures. I'd likely never order this dish off the menu, but, hey, I wonder what it would taste like...if I did.

It's a pretty simple recipe from the book. Everything can be prepped ahead of time, and nothing needs to be done overnight. It's basically a puree of roasted tomatoes, stewed with mirepoix and then some roasted spaghetti squash on top. I also get a chance to use some of that veggie stock I made. Some arugula pesto on the side. I've made spaghetti squash dishes before, and well, they were...just ok.

Funny story: The recipe calls for oregano leaves. My wife and I had a total brain fart and forgot what oregano leaves actually looked like!

After looking at the tomato roasting going on here...I know it had to be much tastier than my dish. Garlic, thyme, oregano, some oil...

It was almost a shame to puree! Which brings me to my woe is me story. I need a damn blender already. The problem is, I want to get a good one, and well, good ones are pretty expensive. This small little 1 cup food processor just isn't cutting it. Literally. When we made the pesto, (which, if I'd had a mortal/pestle/mocajete, I'd have sooner used that!) I wished it were a little more blended.

Anyone recommend a really good blender?

Woe is me. We laid out our mise en place, and were ready to rock. (hey, notice that cup of homemade veggie stock sitting there!)

See how anal I am? I layed out the ingredients in the order in which they are added...

About this time, I realized we had no wine. So, I trekked out to my favorite wine store, the one on Rt. 18 in East Brunswick by the A&P, Marketplace Wines, in search of a good Voignier. Unfortunately, they only had the below. Nothing from the Rhone, which from my googling, is the first choice.

Smoking Loon. What the heck. It was 8.99....and after opening it, it was OK.

Side note: Everyone at this store is always knowledgeable and very helpful, they know about wine, and they know about beer, and well, I know about spirits, so I never had to ask about spirits...but I'm sure they know about them too!! In any case that liquor store is expanding, and building a new building in the parking lot across the street doubling in size. This is awesome. It's the best liquor store around me, and always (with today's exception) has what I need, with a good selection of wines, and a really good selection of spirits.

So, what did it look like done?

My wife and I had a plating competition. Well, I didn't 'compete', but she always wants to make it a competition. Even so, naturally, I won. She claims I used all the squash. pfft. sore loser. (but see my note below about the amount of squash)

One to match the book. Now...I think this one matches the book the best yet!

Thoughts: For a vegetarian dish, it was really really good! I had strong doubts as seperately, everything tasted...'just ok'. But all together, even with the arugula pesto, it tasted like a dish that worked really well if you got everything in on a single bite. Strange how food does that. I dug it a lot. I'm not turning vegan, but now, I think I'd order this off the menu! The wine paired well, even though it wasn't the greatest bottle of Voignier.

We bought what we thought was a medium/small squash, and it only fed 2 of us. You can see above the little tupperware that it filled. If you are making for more people, or didn't snack on bone marrow and shrimp all day, I'd advise to pick up a few squash or a much bigger one. Perhaps we got a runt!

Next up: Not sure...but I'm making some carrot stock as I type this now, and my blog buddy Alex over at icooksheeats just made the agnolotti dish (and, while he says I have good pictures, he's a much much better writer than I am), so I think I'm going to give that a whirl!! Tis the season for squash!

P.S. - Anyone else besides Alex and I cooking from this book? (or reading my blog for that matter!) I know it's a local thing and I'm sure you folks in Cali aren't spying the book on the shelves at B&N, but I have to say, find a way to order this book or click here. It really is a great cookbook! I'm not just shilling because it's local...and as far as I know, the restaurant doesn't even know about me or this silly blog.

P.P.S - How can I make this blog better?

Shrimp Tempura with Spicy Soy Sauce

2009-11-29T15:40:00.001-05:00

My wife and I pledged to make stock all day. This means we were essentially stuck in the house...all...day. We decided to pick some comfort food to make while in the kitchen, so to better pass the time. I raise my hand with a quick 'oooh oooh roasted bone marrow!', and because she hates it, and knows I don't care much for shrimp, she says 'Shrimp Tempura with Spicy Soy Sauce' from the cookbook!

Who wins? We both do. I made roasted bone marrow.

Yes, I know it's completely unrelated to this dish, this cook book, or this restaurant. But I know damn well someone in the Nicholas kitchen, as well as anyone following this blog, understands my love for snacking on bone marrow. If not, hit up Blue Ribbon in NYC late night (around 2am is good) and order the bone marrow to start, some fried chicken, and some sweetbreads.

Laurie, made the Shrimp Tempura. It was a simple tempura batter with some cake flour, and the sauce was a mixture of the following, with some chili's and some corn starch to thicken it.

This has to be my most used pan in the kitchen. For real.

I'm not sure if those are Thai chili's but they were 1.99 for about 150 of them from Hong Kong Supermarket.

We got 41-50 shrimp and halved them. I won't lie, these were frozen, so don't tell the food Nazi's...I know. A little part of me is crying too.

We really got the most out of this pot of oil this week! From the Potato Pancakes to some sweet potato chips I made, to the shrimp. I don't feel bad throwing it out now.

A blender...I need. A deep fryer. I do not. I'm also getting pretty good at oil burns on my arms/hands.

We did the first few on skewers for the picture, and then just threw the rest in. Hey, we're cookin' all day, this is snack time! Popcorn tempura shrimp.

Laurie ate them as such.

The look on her face is about the same look I have when eating bone marrow on a piece of toasty bread, so we are even!

One to try and match the book.

My thoughts: Well, I tasted them, and I'm not a shrimp guy...they were pretty snack-worthy. I think they are a pretty good hors d'oeuvre, but may be a bitch to do it with guests waiting. I suppose if you prep everything before hand and just throw them in the fryer it would be easier. They are pretty good though, and the sauce, while not too spicy, was pretty good too.

Up next: We made a hot starter out of the book last night too...stay tuned.

Chicken Stock

2009-11-28T22:34:00.000-05:00

Like I mentioned in my previous post, this weekend, we're making stock.

Making chicken stock is one of my favorite things to do. Why? Well, I'll tell you why. First thing is first, I get to go to Hong Kong Supermarket. HKS is the coolest place on earth. Every time I go, I see something different I want to eat or cook with. Why do I get to go there? They sell chicken carcasses from the butchered chickens, 2 for 1$. Neck and all. Also, I can get a package of chicken feet for a few more bucks. Second thing, I love an excuse to sit on the couch and smell something cooking all day. Lastly, homemade stock is just awesome.

The one strange thing about Nicholas's chicken stock recipe, is that it only has it simmering for 30-40 minutes. I've made stock a few times before, and every recipe I ever saw, had stock simmering for 3 to 4 hours, if not more! I'm not sure if this is an error, or just the way the restaurant does it, but I'm going to error on the side of every other recipe until I hear otherwise. Otherwise, it's a pretty standard stock recipe.

I rinse the carcasses really good, and I take some good kitchen scissors, and trim as much fat/skin off as possible, less I have to skim. I also cut the carcasses up a little bit, so they fit in the pot better, as well as don't get air pockets under them and float to the top.

The recipe doesn't call for them, but I add them anyway.

I set up 2 pots for stock for maximum stockup on stock!

After I bring it to a simmer, I throw in the veggies.

Tip: I use this powdered sugar thingie to skim. It's the only thing its good for other that sifting powdered sugar!

Now, I won't lie...these pots simmered (ok when I say simmer, I mean BARELY simmered, a little bubble here and there) pretty much all day, or for about 6 hours while we cooked some other stuff that I'll be posting ;)

Then, we strained. Same method as the veggie stock. Cheese cloth in a strainer.

This is what is left...yum. Whatever un-neutered bastard street cat that gets into my garbage tonight, is going to feast!

The final product:

Every time I make stock, it comes out less and less cloudy! This one is pretty good! One day, I'll have a kickass consommé grade stock...one day. I'll use some of this to make carrot stock tomorrow.

I feel much better knowing that I'll be using homemade stock for the recipes in this book. It doesn't feel right doing them with boxed.

Up next: On top of the 2 stocks, we made 2 dishes from the book today...I'll be posting them tomorrow! Stay tuned!

Vegetable Stock

2009-11-28T15:20:00.002-05:00

It's that time again to 'stock up' on stock. Here is a link from my personal blog, of last years stock making fun.

I figured we would do some chicken and some veggie today. The Veggie is done first, so I'll post it first.

If you have never made your own stock before, you should. Do a taste test. Heck, have fun with it, do a blind taste test with your family. What is that you say? Your family doesn't think that would be fun? Ok Ok so maybe we are a little abnormal.

In any case...Laurie was a great prep/sous-chef today! Her knife skills are about 100x faster than they were last year. The recipe calls for the basics, onion, carrot, celery(root), and some herbs and spices.

We substituted black for white peppercorns, and we used up all of our celery root for our chicken stock (which is still on the stove, so I'll post later!) so Laurie substituted just regular celery, albeit a bit less. About a little under half less.

After about 40 minutes on a low low low, barely, not even, maybe, a bubble, simmer, I layed some cheese cloth over a bowl, inside a strainer, and strained away.

A quick taste test, and yep, it's better than any boxed stock, and you won't die of a sodium overdose from this one!

We doubled the recipe and came up with 2 quarts that we will save in pint tupperware. We need to get some of those cheap tupperwares...we go through tupperware like crazy and always get the expensive kind. I need like a 100ct. of those chinese-food pint ones. You figure that Hong Kong supermarket would have some right? nope. Santa? do you read our blog?

The chicken stock is on the stove as I post this...I will then make some carrot stock to squirrel away.

Curry Marinated Lamb with Curry Yogurt

2009-11-27T22:16:00.000-05:00

Here is an easy one. We did this as an hors d'oeuvre for our recent 'ultimate Nicholas dinner #1'

Get some good lamb loin. It will cost you. But, everthing else in this dish is super cheap.

Trim it up as per the recipe.

Get some good curry and toast it up, but here's a tip...DON'T leave your favorite little Emeril pan on high heat for 10 minutes while prepping, before you toss the curry in. Because...you know what happens? You'll cry. Not because your curry will burn, but because your eyes and nose will...and your wife will hit you, repeatedly, for being such an idiot.

Marinate the lamb with some oil and such as per the recipe...then use the rest of the curry for the yogurt.

My curry wasn't as strong a flavor as Nicholas', or, I didn't toast enough the second time around (after I burnt it the first time) so I added a bit more.

When your guests arrive....simply plate the sauce...and sear the lamb!

Ok, I won't lie. That plate, I bought just to plate this dish as the dish in the picture was black, and I saw this one for 1.99 at target. It's plastic. (We're getting better at the swoopy spoon sauce plating thing too huh?)

I should have used a bigger pan to get a more uniform 'square' sear like the picture in the book, but, I had a guest sitting at the table. These only take a minute or two.

One to match the book (although from the other angle, sorry!)

Closing thoughts. Super simple. Super delicious. Don't overcook. Don't leave the stove. Don't burn the curry. I always soak my skewers too, but since these only take a minute or two, I don't think it's necessary. The lamb loin was fetched for about 12$ at Whole Foods. I want a cast iron pan for Xmas. But...not a regular ol' new Lodge one. I want someones grandmother to pass away....I mean, I want one that's been used by someones grandmother for 50 years, hasn't been washed, and is well seasoned.

I'll throw this dish into my regular rotation for sure. You can prep way ahead of time, and it takes 2 minutes to cook.

Next up: This weekend is a cooking extraveganza. Plan on at least 3 new posts/recipes by Monday.

Potato Pancakes with Bacon and Quince Puree

2009-11-25T15:25:00.002-05:00

As some of you might have seen, we cooked a pretty big dinner, all out of the cookbook, for a foodie friend of ours. One of the Hors D'oeuvres we made were the Potato Pancakes with Bacon and Quince Puree. We decided on these because we also needed quince for the Suckling Pig dish. Also, we had these at the cookbook release dinner and enjoyed them.

Here is what quince look like. They were tough to find, even in season, but we managed to source the last few from Whole Foods.

There aren't too many ingredients in this recipe. Which, in my opinion, makes for a good hors d'oeuvre. Who wants to be cooking a 20 ingredient hors d'oeuvre. That, and being able to eat it in a single bite. What I was worried about here, was the execution. Things like this usually just (literally) fall apart for me, and deep frying at home, is not something I do all the time.

While there weren't too many ingredients, the prep was pretty lengthy. Lot's of peeling and grating (I should get +5pts for not grating my knuckles!). I've never made any sort of potato pancake, latke, tater-tot etc...before so I was intrigued at the process listed in the recipe. It said to soak the grated potato in a bowl of water for a few minutes, remove carefully, then dry thoroughly (I did so in a kitchen towel, and twisted it to squeeze all the moisture out). Then it says, and this was the intriguing part, to carefully pour out the water, and then reserve the starch that settled to the bottom to mix in to the potato. I was sure this was not going to happen...and it was awesome when it did! Too cool!! I'm not sure why I was impressed with this process, but I was.

See all this white starchyness!!

Here is what it looks like getting mixed in...

So the dish is composed of the actual little potato pancake, composed of a few ingredients...potato, egg, and onion, quince puree, and bacon. The quince puree was fairly simple since we had to poach quince for the suckling pig dish. The puree tasted a lot like applesauce. So much in fact, if you can't get quince for this dish, it's not in season, or you want to be a wimp and shortcut the process...get a decent applesauce as a substitute.

So, you mix, then you roll this thing into a log...and freeze. Unwrap. then cut into disks. Don't make them too big, you want them to be bite-sized. Also, before you freeze, the mixture is really really wet, squeeze it out a little bit. You want it to hold shape pretty good before rolling it in the saran.

Cut pretty fast, becuase they were defrosting pretty quickly on me. But, I also didn't freeze overnight or anything, I started this dish the morning of our dinner.

If they do smoosh a little, reshape with your fingers while they are on the parchment/freezer paper....save the ends too...I used them as 'testers' (aka: a reason to eat 2 while cooking!).

Refreeze.

Now....oil time.

I used peanut oil, as I had a giant jug of it from the Hong Kong supermarket. If you don't have a fancy deep fryer and are doing it in a pot, heat your oil to temp a little ahead of time. I find this helps to really dial it in as it can be finicky to get the perfect temp. INVEST in a candy thermometer. Heck, a cheap one, 7.99 will do. Don't fill the pot more than halfway either. Someone also taught me a trick to keep the temp up, is as soon as you throw a few in, crank up the heat, until it gets to temp again. We batched 4 at a time, and didn't have any problems. In fact just the opposite. Pefect color!

Here is the finished product after plating with the quince puree and bacon.

Closing thoughts? Double, or even triple, the recipe and freeze in a baggie after cutting the rounds. It will be such an easy hors d'oeuvre the next time you decide to make it (and you will!) if you just needed to fry and top with quince and bacon. These things are like 'Haute' Tater Tots!! The quince puree and the bacon are the perfect bite. We ate too many! Don't be scared with deep frying at home, these are worth it.

Next time? I'll triple the recipe, and use applesauce as a substitute.

P.S. Chef Harary, if you happen to be reading, I have a bone to pick. I really love the photography in the book. It ranks up there with the best cookbooks out. This poses a problem though. It makes ALL the food look so good, I want to cook it...BUT, not every photo has a recipe!! For instance, the desserts. There are 3 awesome looking desserts (2 on the desserts chapter page, and 1 on the back cover) that do not have recipes in the book. What a tease!! Let's make a deal. I finish 50 recipes, and you email me the missing recipes (or come over and cook them ala Keller, or Ripert/Richman). Deal?

P.P.S. Speaking of food photography. I'd like to give a shout out to my buddy Gregor Halenda, the photographer who did Johnny Iuzinni's dessert book. The photography in that book is just awesome. If they had an award for best food photography in a cookbook, this book wins it, hands down. I actually was flipping through the book at the store when it first came out, and I was telling my wife "Look at this photography! It's awesome, for once, everything is in focus, clear, with no crazy depth of field where only 1 seed or bean is in focus, it's perfect! I wonder who the photographer is?!" ...and I checked and realized I rode motorcycles with this guy!

Next up. The curry lamb, I promise. Then I might see what we can do with sous-viding some 'free' supermarket turkey. I actually did this last year following Achatz's recipe and it came out awesome. Otherwise, the turkey will end up sitting in my freezer (next to my free supermarket ham) until next Thanksgiving.

Have a Happy Thanksgiving everyone!! Laurie is baking pumpkin bread all day. Her first delivery was a success, getting such facebook comments like...
"Laur that was some of the BEST pumpkin bread I've ever had!!! Warmed up with a little butter!! Mmmmm!!" and "the best pumpkin bread ever thanks to l.timko, big cup of coffee"

Pumpkin Bread

2009-11-23T17:26:00.000-05:00

Hey, Laurie here. Chef Rob is at work. So it's just me. This will be a short and sweet one...

So...we were going to take the week off from blogging due to the holiday and not wanting to over-eat (riiiight)...but there was a perfect recipe for this time of year. No worries, we are also doing write-ups on the Potato Pancake and Curry Lamb we made, but wanted to get this in, just in case anyone was planning on making the following for Thanksgiving (and...you SHOULD!).

Pumpkin. Bread...Enough. said. My chef was at work for the day (as most people usually are), so I decided to tackle this one myself. I feel as though I'm more of the "baker" anyhow. This has to be one of the the easiest, yet most delicious bread recipe I've ever made. If you have a stand mixer (we asked Santa for one last year), even better, it practically cooks itself! You basically just do the normal 'blend the dry ingredients, blend the wet and then combine', and voila! Perfectly moist, scrumptious, flavorful yet simple pumpkin bread. The only note I'd like to add, is the cooking time. (and due to our mushroom disaster of 2009, we had our oven temp checked...it's perfect). The recipe yields either 5 mini loaves or 1 large loaf. 30 minutes for the minis, followed by a pan rotation and 30 more minutes. I took them out 20 minutes after the rotation...so 50 minutes total. They were golden brown on top and passed the toothpick test. Enjoy and happy holidays!

We don't have one pic to "match the book" this time...but I did a little gift wrapping.

...Rob here again...Just got home in time to try this. I have to say, it's actually a little better than the last loaf we got from Nicholas! It's a little less dense, and a little more 'fluffy' and light. I love it!

Up next, I promise I'll do write-ups on the Potato Pancake and Curry Lamb.

Braised 'Pulled' Suckling Pig with Cinnamon Jus, Swiss Chard and Poached Quince

2009-11-22T13:51:00.000-05:00

What can I say? I knew it wouldn't take me long to want to do this dish. It's my favorite dish at Nicholas. It's the dish I recommend everyone get their first time there. When I looked at what it took to make it...I didn't get discouraged, I was excited...heck, at least NOW I have the recipe!

Nicholas gives two different recipes for this dish in the book. One for a whole suckling pig, and one for a pork shoulder, just in case...you know, you don't want to cram a whole pig in your home industrial sized commercial convection oven! The problem (somewhat) is, you need pig skin to complete the dish, and this may be hard to source for some. Luckly, I live in one of the coolest towns in NJ. South River. Why is my town so awesome? Click here to find out, but basically, we have a plethora of ethnic food and markets. I knew the Mexican supermarket, 'Bravo', carries nice whole skin-on shoulders. I would just skin the shoulder, and use that, bone in and all!

I invited another foodie friend over to partake in this. I figured I'd try a few Hors D'oeuvres and I have a ton of Roasted Butternut Squash Soup left over. I'll make seperate posts for each Hors D'oeuvres and edit this one to link them, later.

Skinning it was pretty easy.

Then I got my spices together by toasting them in my trusty emeril pan. Next up, my trusty new spice grinder...second use in two days!!!

And...

wait for it...

It f*&king broke already!! I can hear the "I told you so's" through the internet...I know I know.

In any case, I managed to get this pig rubbed and wrapped for the night.

Pretend I'm sleeping right now...with dreams of pulled pork, dancing in my head.

...

The next day, my sous-chef started the braising.

Pretend she is relaxing.

...

So...now comes the fun part. I braised the skin, and now have to lay it in a sheet pan, put the pulled pork on top, and compress overnight. The skin was pretty fragile. Maybe I braised it too long, but it tore in two when removing it from the braising liquid. Also, it shrunk quite a bit. At this point I'm thinking we might get a good 4 'picture perfect' portions out of it. I didn't do the best job getting all the fat off and such when I skinned it from the shoulder either.

Piling on the pork.

Made some Jus.

One thing I'm not sure of, is the recipe is listed two times. One for a whole pig and one for just a shoulder. In the pig recipe, it says to pour some reduced jus into the meat, but in the shoulder one it doesn't. I did anyway. I'm sure it can't hurt...but if anyone else is making this, be sure to read and understand both recipes before starting, since it will flip back and forth between the two.

I then wrapped it tight, as instructed. It needed some weight...and since Laurie just graduated nursing school she won't be needing THESE anymore. At least they'll be good for SOMETHING.

Ok, now pretend I made myself a pulled pork sandwich on an onion roll with the extras, and went to bed. Here's is a visual to help you.

Sleep.

The next day, I stopped at Lowes hardware and picked up some 2" PVC couplers which seemed the perfect makeshift ringmolds, for the time being. (note: they really only carry 2" and 3" pvc and not that sweet spot 2.5"). I made some adjustments to them with the dremel by removing the inner lip. Then I took it too the bench grinder to put a sharper edge on to make it easy for cutting. You could avoid most of this by just getting PVC pipe and cutting it, however these couplers were a little bigger and nicer size since they are measured to the outter diameter of the regular 2" PVC pipe.

That last image there...THAT is when I really started to get excited. I was a little unsure of how good the excecution would be on the skin part. I'm a little more optomistic at this point!! You can see the little 'edge' that I put on the ring molds.

Then, I vacuumed sealed them up. The recipe says to unmold them before sealing, but I don't see how it would keep as good as shape and didn't want to find out. The pork was compressed really well, so I'm sure it would have held up, but since I still have that nervousness about things falling apart in the pan, I packed the ring molds more, and sealed them just like that. It can't hurt right?

I write these blog posts sometimes in between doing these recipes. So, I've been writing this post on and off for a few days. The pork has been sitting vacuum sealed in the fridge the past two days. It's now Saturday, and our guest is going to be here pretty soon. We prepped the rest of the dish. It took us a while to source Quince, but to anyone in NJ, Whole Foods and Delicious Orchards has them, but call first, we got the last few at Whole Foods.

We also prepped the swiss chard and parsnip puree.

We had a little bit of a tough time getting the flavors of the parsnip puree right. We are picky and we've had this dish at the restaurant quite a few times, so we wanted it perfect. A little more salt and a little more syrup fixed that. I love the nutmeg flavor in this dish.

Laurie Made Proper Sazeracs...

I was going to need a good cocktail to pull off this dish.

It's game time! Our guest arrived, and we served the first few dishes which I will make separate posts about, to keep with the one recipe per post format. Here is the menu we made up, as well as some pictures of our dinner.

11.21.2009

Hors D’oeuvres
Potato Pancakes with Bacon and Quince Puree

~
Curry Marinated Lamb with Curry Yogurt

Starter
Roasted Butternut Squash Soup

Main Course
Braised Pulled Suckling Pig with Cinnamon Jus
Swiss Chard and Poached Quince

Dessert
Selection of Sheep, Cow, and Goat Cheeses

~
Followed by cocktails and a digestivo at
Catherine Lombardi Cocktail Bar

Here goes nothing! After serving the first dishes, we were ready for the pork. We had already prepped our quince and chard, and had the parsnip puree heating on the stove.

Oven pre-heated to 350. We un-molded the pork. I was pretty happy with how sturdy it was.

Laurie said it looked like cat food.

I then tossed it in the oven with the shard...

and in a few minutes...

They were decently easy to flip over. I used 2 spatulas to do the flip. I was really happy with how the skin crisped up!

Plating, was a little more of a challenge. This dish is tough to get it as refined looked as it's served in the restaurant. Especially with a guest waiting while you snap pictures and hope you get a good one!

The Jus 'broke' a little bit. I'm not sure if it's because I didn't skim fat, or what. I'm not good at the swoopy spoon brush affect with plating the parsnips either.

And of course, here is one to try to match the cookbook.

So, how did it match up? Well, the flavors were all there. They pretty much hit the mark with the restaurant. I think all in all, it was quite a success! However, this is one of those dishes I'd like to do a few more times to get it more refined. I have to say that even though this dish took a few days to prep, it was super easy to excecute with a waiting guest at the table. Everything can be made well ahead, and all you have to do is sear and throw in the oven for a few minutes with the chard.

Our guest really enjoyed it. He is a NYC foodie, but we had taken him to Nicholas to have this dish before. He said we nailed it pretty good. He even gave us a gift.

And at his request we signed his menu...

(hey, we were a Sazerac and a bottle of wine in!)

Then we proceeded to the best cocktail bar in NJ, Catherine Lombardi, for some awesome cocktails.

P.s. you like that cheese plate huh? 1.99 at Lowes in the tile section.

Stay tuned for two more posts today showing the Hors D'oevres details!

New York Strip Steak, Scallion-Potato Cake, Oven-Dried Tomatoes and Roasted Portobello Mushrooms

2009-11-19T20:55:00.001-05:00

Nicholas, You had me at bone-marrow-horseradish butter.

Sure, this dish I might not order on the menu, given it the standard "steak and potato" dish next to a plethora of other great dishes...but, throw in bone-marrow-horseradish butter...and I'm sold.

Also, this dish seemed like a pretty easy dish. My wife and Sous-Chef, well, she's been craving steak for a while. She's mentioned "let's do steak" a few times, which means..."give me steak or I will kill you while you sleep!"

So for this one I have to say that my Sous-Chef, Laurie, did most of this dish while I was at work. She started out by prepping the tomatoes, since they can be done way ahead of time.

And....done.

Mmmm. Home run.

Remember, I'm getting photo updates while I sit behind my desk at work.
Next up. The Scallion-Potato Cake. I'm not going to lie, I was a little nervous about Laurie doing this. We didn't have a good ring mold, and I'm ever so nervous about shit that can fall apart in the pan. Luckily, we had a cool potato ricer that we use all the time.

Looks good to me! I received this picture while I sat at work...I was getting excited now.

Last of her prep, was the mushrooms.

Nicholas. My Sous-Chef says..."Epic Failure"

We aren't sure where or if we f**ked up. Those portobello's were taken out even 38 minutes early. Laurie said "The mushrooms weren't smelling nice anymore, and I checked...and this is what they looked like, 38 minute early". Oh well. I'm not a fungi fan unless it's truffles anyway. We'll give it a try again since it looked good to start, but I think we'll keep a better eye on them.

So, I get home...and the bone-marrow-horseradish butter was up to me, as well as the steak (which, were resting at room temp when I arrived...a good sous-chef is priceless!). We get to the butter, which is what sold me on the dish to begin with. I love bone marrow. Sure, it's getting cliche' nowadays with some restaurants serving it and Anthony Bourdain listing it as his last meal request...but, I can relate. I had the bone-marrow dish at Blue Ribbon late night in NYC...and it was one of the best dishes I've ever had. Period. These bones were soaked for 24 hours and then we made the butter.

Alright....now that everythign is prepped. It was time to actually get going! We cracked a good bottle of..

...and went to work. The wine recommendation was a Napa Valley Cabernet. We love Hendry wines and while this wasn't specifically a Cabernet, it did the trick!

and...of course..one to match the book.

Our thoughts were: This is a dish I probably wouldn't order at Nicholas. Not because it's not great, but because there are so many more interesting options than steak and potato. If I'm in the mood for a steak, I'll hit up Stage Left, Steakhouse85, or Manhattan Steak House. I want a steak steak. However, this dish was good. I wouldn't say it's the best so far, but when you eat like we do, strip steak isn't usually our first choice. The marrow-butter, the potato-cake, and the tomato, however, were awesome. Laurie and I are already thinking about other dishes we would use those in!! I'd like to eat the butter on an english muffin, but Laurie thinks otherwise. (I'm glad I have so much of it in the freezer anyways...for when Laurie leaves me on a 'girls' night...). The tomatoes, would really be awesome in a brunch frittata with some goat cheese. I think next time we'll make the potato-cake a little thinner, but don't get me wrong, the cake came out great. If I had to pick anything I thought would fail, it would be the potato-cake. Things like that just always end up falling apart in the pan for me. I'm really glad it didn't. Well...that's it for tonight!

Carol, on her blog, does a 'music to cook by' thing. While we didn't cook to music, as I write this post, slightly buzzed, I'm listening to Rob Zombie, Bob Dylan, and Zepplin.

As I mentioned in the last post...we've been 'working' on another dish in the book for a few days...we have a guest coming over on Saturday and we should have a new post on Sunday regarding it...stay tuned!!

Moroccan Braised Lamb Shank

2009-11-16T22:03:00.003-05:00

Tonight, my sous-chef called out. I'm in the weeds...

...Actually. It's 'girls night at the Thai restaurant'...so I'm home to fend for myself. What I usually do in this situation is shamelessly gorge on fast food, or if I'm feeling it, make and scarf breakfast foods until I get sick. Tonight, I'm going to make a lamb shank.

a. lamb. shank.

I have this impulse buying problem. I see something...and I buy it. Usually for no real reason. "I'll use it". This happens at the supermarket too. So much, in fact, Laurie HAS to go with me to prevent me from coming home with a bag full of things we'll never use. This time, she failed. I bought a lamb shank. A. single. lamb. shank. Why? who knows. Everyone loves lamb shanks right? Besides, they didn't have lamb neck, AND it was on sale...AND the last one.

It just so happens, there is a recipe for Moroccan Braised Lamb Shank in the cookbook. Looking at the ingredients list, it contains about 100 different spices (not really). I thought to myself. "Self, there is no way you have all those ingredients in the pantry". But, miraculously, I did. From the Lavender, to the Cardamom to the Star Anise. Awesome! I also have some carrots and couscous. My only ingredient substitute was for the Cardamom. The recipe calls for green Cardamom, and I had black. Some quick research and it seems I can substitute, however it might be a little 'smokier' in flavor. We'll see. I also cut the recipe down a little bit to accommodate for my lone leg.

What I didn't have was a spice or coffee grinder. Believe it or not, I don't even have a coffee maker other than a french press. Also, because I have a french press, I don't have a coffee grinder. Why? you ask? Because it seems the only coffee grinders up to the real task of getting an even grind enough to make perfect coffee, are burr-type grinders, and those are expensive...and no one has bought me one for Christmas yet.

ta-da - I do what I never do, and bought a cheapo coffee grinder to only use for spices. For 17.99. You all can say 'I told ya so' when I end up throwing it across the room!

Let me get to the food. The recipe is simple, just a simple braise. However, it calls for toasting a bunch of spices then grinding them.

I got out my trusty little saucepan and went to work. Can I tell you a quick story about this saucepan?

I won a free lunch with Emeril. (click for pic) 'The' Emeril. We trekked into the city and had lunch with the man. (who, despite me wanting to not like him, was really cool) and we got 2 bags with Emeril 'stuff' that included 2 of these small, but heavy, pans. We had plans that evening to go out in the city with some friends, and my wife and I had to cart these pans all over! From drinks at Pegu Club to Blue Ribbon late night. By the time we were drunkenly hopping subways to get home, I was about to throw these pans out. "We'll NEVER use them!" I said. I'm glad Laurie talked me in to keeping them.

We use them ALL THE TIME.

So after I toasted (man my house smelled great!), I used the grinder. It worked...but yeah, the grind is pretty inconsistent. It will have to do for now, but...Santa, take note: Burr grinder for X-Mas.

I browned my lone lamb shank. (somewhere, there is a 3 legged lamb running in circles).

Remember when I said I had no ventilation? Here is some proof...

I sweated some shallot, garlic, and ginger...added a magic potion of liquids (nothing special, just some soy, rice wine, stock..) and finished off the braising liquid, and tossed it in the oven.

Oh yeah, my dish-washer also called out!

So after washing some dishes, for the next couple of hours, I relaxed and started editing pictures and writing this blog post. A few hours later (shorter than the recipe time, probably due to it being lonely and the temp in my oven not being consistent) I checked it, and it was done. I don't know about you, but anything braised is pure comfort food to me.

While I let it cool, I steamed some carrots, and made some couscous. I also took some of the braising liquid and brought out my "favorite little sauce pan" and started reducing just a little. The recipe didn't call for it, but, I like a little thicker sauce, and I had some time.

I plated and sauced

...And one to match the books photo.

This was the perfect home-alone-and-have-a-lamb-shank in the fridge dish. I've made dishes with the same spices before, but toasting them and fresh grinding them just brought out some really great flavors! My wife returned from 'girls night' just in time to taste (and do another set of dishes!). She doesn't care for lamb at all, but I made her taste it, and she liked the sauce and flavors as well. I wish I had some leftovers for tomorrow.

Oh yeah, I didn't pair it with wine tonight. It called for a Ribera del Duero, which unfortunately I couldn't justify spending 40$ on a bottle of wine for myself. Well. I could have...easily...but...well. It was a rough weekend of imbibing. If I were to make it again, and be by myself in the same 'not wanting to spend 40$' predicament, a bottle of Bogle Petite Syrah would also go real well.

Up next? I might be feeling confident...suckling pig? Or perhaps a cold starter...

Until next time!

Roasted Butternut Squash Soup

2009-11-15T20:44:00.001-05:00

My first real post.

So. My wife and I started cooking a couple of years ago. We figured if we were going to get married, someone better learn how to cook! Well, it turned into an obsession for us. Moreso I cook, she eats...but I digress. It was kind of a New Years Resolution. If any of you know me, I ALWAYS accomplish my resolutions. Also, I have this hyper-focus, overdo-everything, 110%, type disorder. You can follow my personal blog, and view archives to follow that story. I won't write a book about here, but I just wanted to paint a picture of our kitchen. Or, even better, show a picture so you know what we have to work with. We accumulated a decent army of cookware, mostly through gifts, or bargains at TJMaxx and Marshalls (great source for Le Crueset & All-Clad!). Our house is a very small cape cod. Thank god the kitchen is an OK size.

We have a few....well...let's just call them 'obsticals' in the kitchen. The major one is there is no exhuast fan. None. I've been too lazy to cut a hole in the wall and install one. We use a stand-up 19.99 fan, pointing out the window...and we save money on our smoke-detector batteries, because they are rarely in! The other issue, is our house is so small, we can at most have another couple over for dinner without it being too crowded. We had two couples over once, and we had no place to sit!

In any case, I guess I should get into the cooking and also explain why I chose this particular recipe first.

I wanted something fairly simple that could all be done in one day, as well as something that would fit the season. After spending all day dealing with the leaves in my yard, I've finally given into the thought that summer is over and it's officially...fall. Strangely though, it happened to be 70 degrees today!

It doesn't get much more fall that butternut squash and cranberries.

We also chose this recipe is because we just had the dish a few days ago at the restaurant. I remember it well, and I thought what better way to compare than to compare something fresh in my memory.

The ingredients for this recipe were pretty easy to seek out at the local market which is always a plus. The squashes were a little on the small side, so I got two. I couldn't find lemon oil (I really didn't look all that hard), but I have some lemon extract that I could get by with, or since the recipe calls for a very small amount for plating, I can twist a few peels like I would over a cocktail.

The recipe also calls for chicken stock, and provides a recipe, however, I will be using box or Better than Bouillon this time around as I haven't gotten around to making another batch of homemade stock. Rest assured however, I'm a seasoned stock maker. Here is a post I made last year, of my "stock making weekend extravaganza!"

This recipe doesn't call for any really special equipment either which is good, because due to our space limitations, we try to keep the gadgetry to a minimum. I actually don't even have a standard blender! My stick blender (boat motor!) will have to suffice.

Ok, so back to the cooking. While looking through the book, I noticed I saw grapeseed oil being used over olive oil. I've heard of grapeseed, but have never really looked into "the right oil for the right job". Turns out--grapeseed has a much higher smokepoint than olive and there are arguments that say it's about 20% better for you. It's also pretty cheap. Who knew. Glad I do now.

Pretty straight forward recipe. No super-secret ingredients or process. No molecular-crapstronomy. A good butternut squash soup.

The key...is in the garnish, plating, and presentation. So, we poured ourselves some wine...

We took the advice of the pairing (Nicholas gives pairings for each dish). Which was a German Riesling Kabinett. (you'll learn quickly, that I drink a lot of wine, but I'm not a wine guy, I'm a cocktail guy. I usually like to put my trust into the sommelier...now...cocktails, they are another story...)

Then...we plated & poured ourselves some soup.

And...my attempt to match the photograph in the book...

That's it folks!

So, how was it? It was perfect. My wife is picky. I can tell when she is being honest, or just being nice...like...this morning...she said my pancakes that I made, were good. She was just being nice. Tonight, she said it was spot on what we were served at the Restaurant. A few thoughts to anyone making this recipe. Watch your liquid/squash ratio. We didn't quite have 4lbs of squash, so adjusted our stock/water and it turned out good. You 'can' get away with lemon extract as a lemon oil substitute. I then micro-planed cinnamon to finish the initial plating. Also, I didn't have microgreens for my greens garnish, so I used some fresh thyme, but I took it out before eating.

Up next? Who knows...Laurie has a 'girls night out' tomorrow which means I usually just cook myself breakfast foods until I get sick...but I have a lamb shank I need to get rid of...perhaps...the 'family meal' recipe braised Lamb Shank with Couscous. Stay tuned.

Since this is my first post, it would be awesome to get some feedback on format, things I left out, things people would like to see, or, if anyone else is cooking with this book--your input as well!

Introduction

2009-11-15T00:56:00.006-05:00

Restaurant Nicholas is my favorite restaurant. I also enjoy cooking at home, photography, and blogging (see: my other blog, and my chef's table review) . When I heard Nicholas Harary was coming out with a cookbook, needless to say I was excited.

After looking at the cookbook, I became even more excited. I have many cookbooks. I'm a cookbook addict. Old, New, Good, and Bad. The fact is, while I have all of these cookbooks, there aren't many cookbooks that I actually use! Many have great photography and list some great dishes, however, the recipes are not home friendly unless you plan on spending 7 days on one part of one dish. For example, Thomas Keller's, The French Laundry Cookbook. Others, like Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking, have delicious and simple recipes, but lack pictures. Nicholas - The Cookbook, is the only cookbook I've found that combines the two. The photography, quality of the book, and dishes are on par with The French Laundry Cookbook, and the recipes are easily executable by a home cook. Restaurant Nicholas is the only NJ restaurant to get 4-stars from the New York Times. It's obvious that Chef/Owner Nicholas Harary and his wife do things 110%, and this book is no exception. My only negative of the book, if I had to be picky, is the cocktail section being a little weak. I'll let Dale DeGroff's "Essential Cocktails" be my bible for libations.

I'm going to use this blog as a 'showcase', if you will, to cook my way through every recipe in the book. I will not list recipes. Buy the book! I will also not advertise or profit or do anything silly like that. I just love cooking, and this is one of those "110% self challenges". My wife, of course, will be my sous-chef...and I might even have another Nicholas fan guest blogger from time to time...

Disclaimer: I'm good at a lot of things. However, grammar and writing, I am not. But, I'll try to give it my best.

I'd like to note, the "blogging your way through a cookbook" idea, is not unique. I'm not breaking any grounds here. Julie Powell did it with Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking. Julie's blog later developed into a book, and then a movie. I'll reserve my opinions on both. Carol Blymire has done it with Thomas Keller's The French Laundry Cookbook and called it "French Laundry at Home". Carol is currently doing it with Grant Achatz Alinea Cookbook, "Alinea at Home". Carol's blogs are simply awesome.

I'm excited because Nicholas - The Cookbook, in my opinion, is the perfect balance between Kellers and Child's books, which is exactly what I've been looking for in a cookbook. Ironically, it happens to be dishes from my favorite restaurant.