Last Night’s Dinner

I’ve mentioned before that I don’t have much patience for pastry, for the precision and measuring it requires, but I’m lucky that my husband does. A couple of months ago, we teamed up to make Gourmet’s Onion Tart with Mustard and Fennel, and it was a big hit with us.

Mike was really looking forward to revisiting the crust recipe once we got settled in and finally set up Big Red, and last night he did just that. For the topping, I sliced and crisped up two strips of Simmons Farm bacon, then softened three sliced leeks in the rendered fat. I mixed about half a cup of Renaissance Ricotta with about 2 oz. of young fresh goat cheese until they were well incorporated, and spread the cheeses over the crust, adding the leeks and bacon on top. I baked the crust in a 400 degree oven for about half an hour.

Though the texture of the dough was a bit stickier when raw than the first time Mike made it, he was really pleased with how it turned out, and so was I. It was light and tender when baked, with a great texture and flavor. I think we can safely add this crust recipe to our go-to list, as it’s easy to put together and will make a great base for a wide variety of toppings.

In another lifetime, I was all about celebrating St. Patrick’s Day. There were far too many black and tans at the Gaelic League, “shaking my shamrock” with my best girl at the Old Shillelagh, big boiled dinners of corned beef, cabbage, carrots and turnips, but honestly, I’m just not that into it anymore. Don’t get me wrong, I’m a fan of Irish food, drink and music, but I prefer my celebrations on the quieter side these days.

Still, I decided to cook up something green, a simple potato and leek soup with fresh watercress just wilted in and the whole thing pureed right before serving. It was inspired by the soup on Suzanne Goin’s St. Patrick’s Day menu in Sunday Suppers at Lucques, and I had originally planned to serve it with her “Gentleman’s Relish” toasts but in the end I went simpler and made cheddar and chive toasts instead.

I’m not sure if it was because I’m fighting off the cold that my darling husband is trying to share with me, but this didn’t quite hit the mark. I kept adjusting the seasoning, adding a bit more salt, a splash of wine vinegar, and finally whisking in a blob of sour cream (which, of course, decided to separate), and while the end result was okay, it wasn’t delicious. That being said, I’m having some of the leftover soup for lunch today – hopefully the flavors will have improved overnight.

I’ve been tweaking a lot of my favorite standards lately; last Saturday’s mac & cheese, for instance, was made with more bechamel than I have traditionally used, making it extra creamy and luxurious, and I also used a different blend of cheeses, adding a blue and a creamy cheese to the mix. When planning our meals for the week, I decided to reserve the remnants of a Poilane loaf I brought home on Friday and use it for one of our other favorite comfort food dinners - a savory bread pudding - and I decided to play around with my usual recipe.

We had a couple of leeks in the fridge that I wanted to use up, so I chopped those and sautéed them with half a pound of chopped thickly sliced pancetta. That got tossed with my cubed bread, along with a handful of chopped fresh sage. I fiddled with the proportions in my custard, combining six eggs with two cups of whole milk, one cup of heavy cream, a little kosher salt and a couple of tablespoons of Colman’s dry mustard. I added my cheeses to this - about a cup each of grated Parmagiano Reggiano and Mecox Bay Dairy Sigit (a really delicious Alpine-style cheese), then poured the mixture over my bread cubes. After a bit of tossing and squishing, I transferred the mixture to a buttered baking dish, added a bit more grated cheese on top and placed it into the oven, baking it at 375 until it was puffy and browned.

Though parts of the bottom got a little over-browned, this was probably my favorite bread pudding yet, rich and creamy in the center, with crisp edges and a crusty, cheesy top. I will probably use this base going forward, but I need to remember to let the pudding rest a bit longer once it comes out of the oven - that added creaminess makes for a molten hot center and steam burns on the roof of the mouth are no fun.

After a couple of late nights at the office which screwed up my meal plan for the week, I was back in the kitchen last night and ready to get back on track. It’s braising season, and while we often turn to that method of cooking for meats and hearty winter greens, I’ve wanted to experiment with other vegetables.

Mike had great success with the braised duck and carrots dish he made over the weekend, and as it happened that dish played a part in our meal last night, specifically, I repurposed some of the braising liquid which we had saved from that dish, added a bit of white wine and grainy mustard, and used it to cook my leeks.

I browned them in a little butter first, then placed them into a baking dish, nestled in a few sprigs of thyme and poured over just enough liquid to come up to the top of the leeks. I placed the baking dish into the oven at 325 degrees until they were very tender and the liquid was slightly reduced, about half an hour or so.

While the leeks were braising, I also crisped up six slices of Prosciutto San Daniele on a Silpat-lined baking sheet for about 20 minutes, turning them once halfway through cooking. To plate, I placed two slices of the Prosciutto down on each plate, topped them with half of the leeks and a little of the reduced braising liquid, and topped each stack with a poached egg and plenty of freshly ground black pepper, finishing with a sprinkling of crumbled Prosciutto.

As experiments go, this was a big success – the leeks were sweet and meltingly tender, the crisp Prosciutto lent a nice textural contrast and welcome saltiness, and the yolk of the egg created a rich and silky dressing that brought it all together beautifully. Mike’s only complaint was that he would have liked more leeks, and I agree. I’m definitely going to make this again, and I’m looking forward to trying it with fennel, endive, and other vegetables.

I know what you must be thinking: risotto again, Jen? Well, yes. You know I love the stuff, and I guess since the whole bacon & egg risotto thing reverberated around the internet, I’ve been a little risotto-obsessed. It’s such a wonderful carrier of flavors, and you can dress it up or down in a multitude of ways. I guess you could say it’s the food version of the little black dress, and I’m always eager to find new ways to accessorize.

Abby’s sweet potato risotto got me thinking about doing a version with roasted squash, and I can think of little that pairs better with roasted squash than fresh sage. I used leeks as the onion-y component of my basic risotto recipe, and added a cup of mashed roasted squash (the sign at the greenmarket said it was Calabaza) to the pan after I added the vermouth and before I began to add my chicken stock.

I fried a handful of large sage leaves in butter until they were crisp and added the sage-infused butter to the cooked risotto off the heat, just before finishing it with grated Parmagiano Reggiano and a splash of heavy cream. I grated a bit more cheese on top and crowned each serving with a couple of the crispy fried sage leaves. The resulting dish was like autumn in a bowl, the squash slightly sweet, the risotto creamy and comforting, and the fried sage providing a nice contrast in texture as well as a wonderful woodsy aroma and flavor.

Julia Child’s Potage Parmentier - the little black dress of soups. Every time we make this, I am amazed at how the combination of potatoes, leeks, water and salt leaves us slurping the very last dregs out of our bowls. How is it that a recipe so simple, so spare, is so unfailingly delicious?

I did guild the lily just a bit here, giving my leeks a brief sauté in butter before adding the potatoes, water and salt, and I melted a couple of healthy blobs of sour cream into the soup after pureeing, but those additions are hardly necessary. While the recipe as written lends itself to embellishment, it stands on its own as a true classic.

I try to make our meals as visually appealing as they are tasty, but sometimes things just don’t work out as I had hoped they would. On those occasions, I usually just don’t write up the meal or post the photos, but Mike has encouraged me to do so – it’s a truer representation of what really goes on in our kitchen, and putting it out there is a good way for me to talk about what worked and what didn’t, as well as to work out what to do differently next time.

When I was surfing around yesterday trying to gain some new ideas for the black sea bass we would be having for dinner, I came across this recipe for Black Sea Bass en Papillote on Leite’s Culinaria. We had leeks and some gorgeous heads of baby cauliflower at home, so I decided to use those along with some artichokes to accompany the fish.

I decided against packeting the fish and vegetables; I love the skin of black sea bass, and I wanted to get it really crispy, so cooking it in a really hot pan was the way to go. Our filets were on the small side, so I decided to give them a very light dusting of flour before putting them into the hot pan, hoping this would help them hold together better. I scored the skin, seasoned the filets on both sides with kosher salt and black pepper, and set them aside for a bit while I worked with the veggies.

I sliced and cleaned two leeks and placed them on a foil-lined baking sheet. I quartered three of the heads of assorted baby cauliflower (leaving the outer leaves attached), and added a box of thawed frozen artichoke hearts (next time I am definitely using fresh ones, but we can’t get them in our neighborhood, and I had these on hand). I seasoned the vegetables with salt and pepper, tossed them with a bit of olive oil, and placed them into the oven to roast – 400 degrees for about 20 minutes.

We generally use our cast iron skillet for searing just about any sort of meat, fish or fowl, but I decided to try searing the fish filets in our nonstick skillet instead. I got it really hot, added a couple of tablespoons of olive oil, and added the fish filets (which were lightly coated with flour) skin-side down. The fish cooked for about 3-4 minutes on the first side, then for another minute or two on the second side, and they did get gorgeously crispy.

I drained the excess oil from the pan and deglazed it with a cup or so of white wine and a blob of Dijon mustard; I added a couple of tablespoons of fresh thyme leaves and whisked in a tablespoon of butter off the heat. I plated the black sea bass filets on a bed of the roasted veggies and spooned the sauce on top. I was incredibly pleased with the flavors and textures here, but unfortunately, everything looked sort of… brown.

Now, I’m not a huge fan of boiled or steamed vegetables, but I think one of those methods might have been the best way to keep the vibrant colors of the cauliflower intact. However, I was so happy with how the fish turned out that I will probably use this method for cooking delicate filets going forward; and though the little mustard-wine pan sauce I made was tasty, I’m not convinced the fish needed it – perhaps just a squeeze of fresh lemon juice and some chopped fresh herbs will work better. Live and learn!