Our Picks

Dinner tonight at Prescott’s Provisions.
 

 
Dark Horse - scotch, amontillado sherry and cardamaro.
 

 
Grilled pork shoulder and belly with lentils and apple balls
 

 
Beets with grapefruit Cambazola pistachio and yogurt
 

 
Romaine with blue cheese, red onions and skinned tomatoes 
 
 
 

thanks again
 
@Darienne
 
I think your  chocolate squiggles cookies brought back memories .  
 
my mothers were  a variant of the polvorones , as these were my favorite cookie while I lived in Spain.   only at Christmas !
 

 
and she made them w pecans.
 
thank you all again

"Location, Location, Location" Dept:

This is the local Weight Watchers office in my city. On the left, a burger joint; on the right, fried chicken.
 

"Location, Location, Location" Dept:

This is the local Weight Watchers office in my city. On the left, a burger joint; on the right, fried chicken.
 

We were pleasantly surprised with the meals served during the flight with Qatar Airlines!
And overall servise was excellent.... 
 

Hi, guys, I´m new here. I discover this forum a few day ago and it's amazing.
I leave some of my recent work. 
P.S. Sorry for my bad english.

This year's payload, clockwise from high noon: checkerboard cookies, lemon cream sandwich, tahini cookies, chocolate sandwich cookies with gianduia, ginger sandwich with dark chocolate filling, linzer cookies. Oatmeal cookie in the center. No spritz cookies, alas. To the post office I go.

Spiced Copper River Sockeye Gravlax with Aquavit, Spring Asparagus, Capers, Chive Blossoms, Lemon, Olive Oil and Rye Croutons-

@blue_dolphin, beautiful pitas.   

 
Made baguette dough at 70% hydration on Sunday and baked last night.  Saved enough dough for Matt to have a pizza tonight.  
 

Sliced this morning for breakfast. 

Secrets of the Butcher      by    Arthur Le Caisne
 

 
Secrets of the Butcher: How to Select, Cut, Prepare, and Cook Every Type of Meat
 
I think I noticed this book in a review in FineCooking.   I have it from the library.  I have a small number of " Butcher" books myself
 
including the Granddaddy of them all : Cutting Up in the Kitchen: The Butcher's Guide to Saving Money on Meat & Poultry well worth it used.
 
SotB is an outstanding book.  Ill offer some snaps for review purposes only.  They may be hard to read , as the light in the Kitchen is not the best
 
there are drawings in the book , no pictures.  but very nice drawings.  each animal type is covered , including game and offal.  Ill concentrate on Beef. but what you
 
see is similar for other animals.
 

 
several interesting pages on breeds.
 

 

 
feed and cuts
 

 
and what breed might do for your standing rib roast
 

 a huge amount of very interesting stuff , such as above
 

 
pepper types , and a similar exposition on salt  ( not pictured )
 
each cooking type and style is covered in detail.   I became a bit concerned that SV might not have been included , but 
 

 
near the end there are some Rx's.   almost all of them ' Classics '  Beef stew , Standing Rib Roast , Beef Bourguignon ( recommending Burgandy Wine ! )  and one of my absolute favorites :
 
Blanquette of Veal.   I used to make this using Julia Child's  Rx in Mastering the Art often..  This dish seems a bit old fashioned these days ...  there are some interesting 
 
" up-dates ' to the Rx in this book.
 
 Veal is out of favor in my area, and I learned some interesting things about today's veal from this book.  Ill use that info when I try to find some veal for BoV
 

 

 
I liked this book a lot , and have learned a lot so far.  the breed info is frustrating  as Im not going to find any of them @ Stop & Shop
 
but it did remind me of the Belted Galloway breed.  And there is a Family Farm with many of them near by.  most of the meat goes to high-end restaurants
 
but they recently opened a FarmStand  w some of their beef Fz.    Ill be taking a closer look at their offerings to be sure
 
this book is so outstanding  I ordered a personal copy for myself from Amazon.  and I do my very best not to buy books these days.
 
well worth it I feel
 

Another favourite side is potatoes with dill or shebu aloo. 
I cut small potatoes into roughly 1.5 cm cubes, mustard seeds, dried chilli, asafoetida, turmeric, chopped garlic, chopped green chilli, and chopped dill.

 
Heat some oil, splutter the seeds and dried chilli, chuck in the garlic and green chilli, stir quickly then pile in the potatoes and powders, plus a little salt.  Make sure it’s well mixed, lower the heat and pop on a lid. Stir occasionally.

 
When the potatoes are nearly done, add the dill and mix well.

 
This is not a saucy dish, so I serve it with one that is. Seen below with fenugreek chicken from the other night, green beans poriyal, chana dal and steamed rice, plus a paratha and a blob of mango pickle.

Is anyone watching The Final Table on Netflix?  
 
The stadium/set, lighting, music and sound effects are over the top but at least the gimmicks stop there and no one has to cook an entrée from Cheetos outside during a windstorm with only a cigarette lighter and one hand tied behind their backs.  
The talent is pretty amazing - multiple Michelin stars amongst the contestants alone and while there is relatively little interaction shown between them, the contestants all seem to respect each other, as do the expert judges.  
The international mix of contestants, judges and cuisines is interesting.  My favorite bit is during that second phase of each episode when the 3 bottom teams cook for the expert judge and he/she visits each team while they're cooking.  
Anyone else watching?

My mother always made these around the holidays: 
 

 
 
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH...    "Holiday nibbles."
 
Nevermind.

Egg and mushroom onigirazu. 

Made this a few days ago, à smoky manhattan twist
 
The Meat Hook
 
1,5 oz of Rittenhouse 100 (I used Bullet) 
5/6 oz of Punt e Mes (I used noilly prat)
1/3 oz of Ardbeg 10 (I used Laphroaig 10)
1 bsp of maraschino 
 
 

Stars of my Weekend. 
At the front we have Snowdonia Black Bomber. A proper punch you in the tongue sharp Cheddar that I cannot live without. 
9 O'clock is Fromage d'Affinois sort of a quick Brie, only about 30 days old, super soft and one of my favs - husband hates it. 
12 o'clock is an American (by way of the Netherlands) Midnight Moon goats cheese, its tied as my fav semi hard goats at the moment. 
5 past 12 sees an Australian King Island double Brie.. a bit of a 'Meh'. 
Jambon Serrano for me, biscuits and hurt your eyes spicy sausage for the husband. 
Unpictured, grapes, lots and lots of liquid grapes. 
 
( I'm a cheese lover not a connoisseur - so forgive my rubbish descriptions) 
 

Plating-
This was the moment of truth. I really had no experience with unmolding such a precious dish of gel. Limited experience in cutting Jell-O shots does not serve as the proving ground for unmolding foie gras in ice wine jelly.
I let the cold mold sit in a shallow bath of hot water for about 30 seconds. I knew from the test with the lime Jell-O that hot water did the trick in unmolding gelatine. But this gelatine was different--it was made of wine encapsulating a heavy interior mousse. I feared that the soft walls of gel would collapse without the support of the metal sides of the mold.
A plate was placed on top of the mold, the whole contraption inverted so the plate was on the counter and the mold on top. And then this gentle beauty slid out from its cover-
You can see a hint of something curious encased in the cocoon of ice wine jelly. And now the garnishes. First, a sprig of bay gently tucked underneath-
A few spoonfuls of warm, not hot, wild huckleberry compote-
And the bread-
A touch of fresh thyme-

As seen in Whole Foods.  Fish contains fish.  Who would think?

 

Gratin Dauphinois (based on Bourdain’s Les Halles recipe - subbing Jarlesberg for the Gruyere; Potatoes sliced thinner at 1/8” thick) cooked in the CSO on Convection Bake for 40 minutes at 325F; rested for 10 minutes before serving. Husband approved!

United club at Narita had better food by comparison.


 

I tried making pita breads for the first today.  The pita from Shaya uses the same dough for both pizza and pita.  I've already made a couple of pizzas so I figured I should give this a try, too.  
In the oven:

 
And out....nice chewy interior:

I was kinda amazed that the pitas actually puffed up like they are supposed to and it's encouraged me to try these again and improve my dough handling.  I liked that he says to slap the dough down on the hot stone (or steel) like you're giving it a high five but I was a little afraid I might actually smack it and burn my hand to I was a bit too tentative.

A bit more progress this week, kitchen units are all nearly prepped and ready to be fixed in place. We had a delay of a couple of days while the plasterers finished off the skylight reveals. 
 
And the thing which has made the most difference to the feel of the place is that the decorator has done a first coat of paint to all the walls and the ceiling. It’s transformed a building site into something which is starting to feel like the space it will become. 
 
Second fix electrics start on Tuesday so we may even have some light at night time soon!
 

 
The blue protective film on the window stops the camera getting a decent read on the wall colour but we’ve gone for Hague Blue by farrow and ball. It’s a very deep colour but there’s so much glass in the room that it can probably take it. 
 
 

I'm getting an early start on planning my Holiday cooking and baking.  (I know, I'm already getting some comments from family and friends that it's only late October and it's too early to talk about such things).
 
I thought I'd start by showing my collection of past issues of Bon Appetit that my parents collected over the years.  I bring them out every season to go through the recipes that I've tagged with bits of paper and stickers.  Some of the covers are tattered and torn, taped back on, and over the years I've cut out some of the recipes.  While I've read these every year, some dating back to the  1970's, I always seem to find a new recipe to find.  What are you planning to make for the Holidays this year?  Are you introducing some new dishes, staying with the classics or updating them with some new tastes and textures?

Faloodeh - Persian frozen noodle dessert.
Flavored with rose water, lime zest and an Amarena cherry.

Rose water and lime is an amazing flavor combo.

Grape salad is about as simple as can be. White grapes, black grapes, red grapes, all cut in half. Chopped pecans. Dressing is my late mother-in-law's "fruit dip" -- a blend of a 7 oz jar of marshamallow cream, an 8 oz block of cream cheese, and a tablespoon of lime juice.  Put as much as you want on the grapes, put the rest in the fridge to dip apple slices or other fruit in later.
 
Apple cranberry walnut crisp -- This is a recipe I saw somewhere over the weekend. Roughly chop a cup of fresh cranberries. Add in a cup of chopped walnuts. Peel and slice four or five apples. Add a cup of sugar and a tablespoon of lemon juice, stir it all up and let it sit a bit. The recipe called for a double crust, but as Child B has celiac disease, I just put it straight into a deep dish pie pan and covered it with a GF crisp topping of butter, brown sugar, oats and Bob's Red Mill GF pancake mix.
 
Curry spread is Da Bomb for leftover turkey sandwiches!  My recipe came from the grandmother of one of my friends. Here 'tis, and sorry it's hard to read.

 
And I saw a recipe last week for mimosas with apple juice. Just know I'm trying that! See you Friday!