Abra

Wow, Elie, that's some gorgeous cotechino! Now I want to copy you - I've got the skin, got the fat, can get the butt, but what the heck is Amesphos, and did you use it? Did that apple cake taste as good as it looks? I did part of one more E-R dish, the Lamb, Garlic, and Potato Roast, minus the potatoes. The lamb was very good, although again I had issues with the directions. The pieces of shoulder that I used were ready to eat before the time that she has you add the potatoes and then cook it until they're done. Oh, and although I promised no more caponery, I did have enough of my capon-parm rind broth left to make a little French onion soup-type dish with bread and grated cheeses left over from the holiday dinners, and it was outstandingly good. My husband is a total convert to capon-parm rind broth now, so I see it happening again this winter.

The squash really appeals to me too, as I have quite a lot of squash on hand and have never made it that way. Elie, that cake looks almost like a halvah or fudge, with an appealing texture and internal crunch, as compared to the Barozzi which is very dense and fine-grained. This is the Barozzi as it looks today and while it has an alluring flavor, the texture doesn't do it for me personally.

I'm getting ready to actually buy a freezer, and wanted to bump this up for any new opinions, plus more discussion on frost-free vs. not. The Green Worlds, and I suppose most commercial freezers, don't claim to be frost free. Yet I can't imagine anyone putting up with a ton of frost in a commercial environment, so perhaps Dave is right and the ice age that has dawned in my freezer is an anomaly.

Then onward to Christmas dinner, ye merrymakers! I have almost no pictures of this dinner, which will save on bandwidth considerably. We started with a very appetizing version of caponata with fresh-baked bread, brought by our friend Jim, and the sliced tortellini pie. While enjoying that, we were, naturally, talking about what we'd eat next. Sparrowsfall was worried that the pasta he'd rolled and cut before leaving home was all clumped together, so on the spur of the moment, and with the Christmas Capon in the oven, we decided to re-make the pasta. This gave the guys a chance to play with the KA pasta roller attachment and strew flour about, and resulted in a delicious dish and general hilarity. Sparrowsfall con pappardelle Jim, resting from the rigors of pasta making and hoping for a glass of rosso di Montalcino. Once the pasta was cut and the water on to boil, we sat down to a little broth. LRK mentioned specifically that the broth from cooking the tortellini for the pie should be saved for another use, and I had a huge pile of Parm Reggiano rinds in the fridge, so I made a little broth with those, plus the neck and gizzards of the capon and a splash of white wine. Then on to the pasta, which was a creation of Sparrowsfall, ground crisped guanciale (only in this case he used my home-cured unsmoked bacon) plus an ungodly amount of olive oil-simmered garlic cloves. I almost wished that were the main course, it was so pungent and savory. Then the Christmas Capon. Hmmm. Issue time. LRK says to put it breast down in a shallow roasting pan, and she has you baste it a minimum of 6 times, adding white wine and Marsala each time. The poor bird was swimming, and the breast was more poaching than roasting by the time I figured out to suck a whole bunch of that liquid outta there. When I turned the bird, for the last 30 minutes, of course the skin had softened and split. Now, she has you chop the whole thing up and serve it on a platter with juices poured over, so it really doesn't matter, but it took me by surprise as this was my first capon and I didn't realize how fat they are. It tasted like...chicken. Very good chicken. Not special, though, in any presentation sense. Even the fact that it's stuffed with prosciutto was a bit lost in the liquid rush of it all. With it I served the Spiced Spinach with Almonds which was very good, and the Sweet and Sour Onions, which were inadvertantly transmogrified into onion relish. Reading the recipe hurriedly I had bought large white onions instead of the little guys, so I made and served it as a chopped relish, which was a very tasty save on a dumb mistake. Then we had Torta Barozzi which the chocophiles went nuts over. It's very intense, and no one guessed the mystery ingredient. You definitely need whipped cream with it to lighten it up a bit. I served it with slivers of leftover spongata and some cute little Spanish apricot tarts that Eden had brought as a gift. LRK says it's traditional to serve the torta with nocino, and I just happened to receive a bottle in the mail from eje just a couple of days before the dinner, and it really was an excellent pairing. Here's his nocino, shown with the last course a tiny cheese course of what should have been gorgonzola dolce but was really Valdeon, with a drizzle of Tuscan chestnut honey. Then tonight I recycled it all by taking the leftover parm soup and adding it plus all the juices from cooking the capon into the pot to make a broth with the capon carcass, then serving it with some leftover tortelloni, in brodo. And now I'm done with all things capon, if it please the court!

Not to be talking to myself, but I need to update this. I'd been assuming that the Gosling's would be better than the 10 Cane, was 95% sure of that. But, having had HBRs 2 nights in a row, it's sort of a habit, so tonight I made one for myself. And since it was just me, I decided to make it with 10 Cane, thinking that it would be too light and sweet to hold up, but hey, give it a chance. It was so much better that it totally blew me away. It melted right into the other flavors of the mix, making it sweeter in the best way, and less sweet in that icky way, all at the same time. Alchemy. The next guests to get my HBR are gonna get lucky.

Renka, that's fabulous! And your photos are gorgeous.

We had panettone for breakfast on Christmas morning too. We had a Balocco pandoro with limoncello curd and a separate sugar dust packet, which I think is delicious, and also a Perugina Bacio which is chocolate-covered and isn't my favorite, although my husband adores it. Both of those were from PFI.

Why yes, I did have quite a few issues with LRK's instructions! Mostly I overcame them with no ill effects, but in one case it was a bit of a trainwreck. The food was mostly all delicious, though. Christmas Eve brought us the Unusual Tortellini Pie. Let me say first that this is a HUGE production to make, and I even bought the tortellini. Plan on two full days if you're making your own tortellini, and a day and a half otherwise. I made the ragu and left it chunky. I made the truly delicious dough with all its sugar and egg yolk, I made the meatballs full of ground prosciutto, I made the cinnamon custard and the Parm/egg goop, and at last I was ready to go. First, I did bring one problem upon myself. I was making one individual-size vegetarian pie, as well as the big one, and I didn't make extra dough, just rolled thinner. So although the bottom of the pie is supposed to have a 1" overhang of dough, I didn't have enough dough to manage that. Here's the pie with one layer of meatballs, cheese, tortellini with ragu, and the second layer of meatballs. And the measly overhang. Here I've added the final layer before closing up the pie, the cinnamon custard. And here's another issue with directions. The recipe calls for 2 1/2 lbs of tortellini, and says at the very end that you will only use 2/3 of the ragu. Actually, I only had room for 3/4 of the tortellini, even though I was using the correct size pan, so now I have a nice whack of tortellini in ragu in the freezer, but it was entirely unintentional. I closed the pie, but without the high, fluted edge she calls for, just a little edge, the type that browns way too fast. When put in the oven at the prescribed temperature the whole top crust, which is egg-washed, began browning way too fast and had to be covered with foil for a major part of the baking period. Then, although the instructions said to butter the edge of the pan and I did that really liberally, and my springform was even a non-stick one, the entire edge of the pie shattered in removing it from the pan. If you make this, be sure your fluted rim is not touching the edge of the pan at all, if you want it to survive springing the pan open. Despite the heart attack potential and the burst into tears potential of this little catastrophe, once FWED helped me pick off the offending broken bits, the thing was still beautiful. You're supposed to decorate it with cut out laurel leaves and set it on a bed of fresh laurel leaves. As you can see, I decided to use holly and berry shapes instead. It was messy to cut after only a 25 minute rest, and was messy to look at too, although the flavors and textures were wonderful. The crust is exceptional, both sweet and savory, and would be excellent with a fruit tart of some kind. If I had made homemade tortellini, I'm sure they would have been more exciting, especially if I'd followed Eden's excellent suggestion to make them with a spinach pasta, for some color contrast. It's really not pretty on the plate when warm. The chunks in the ragu were great, and I do recommend adding a couple of shanks if you can, as the special texture of their meat made for a nice textural contrast. The cinnamon custard, about which Mr. Eden said "you could just freeze this as ice cream" pretty much disappeared into the mix. That really surprised me, since the recipe called for 2 good pinches of cinnamon, and I used 3, not finding the original to have enough of a pronounced cinnamon flavor. However, Christmas morning I received emails from both the Eden and FWED households, mentioning how fabulous their take-home leftovers had been when eaten cold for breakfast, thus I confidently served it chilled before Christmas dinner. Now look: Wham, pow, that's a lot better-looking isn't it? I enjoyed the soft, flowing filling the first night, and thought it had marginally better flavor when warm, but I think chilled is the best way to show off your work. It looks a lot more like the BFD it is when sliced neatly. Starters were done by FWED, and were crostini with crisp pancetta, Italian stuffed eggs, and parm and pear slices with balsamico. My picture-taking really suffered during the meal itself, so you'll just have to imagine how nice that was before the Monster Meat Pie. With which we had Eden's delicious asparagus bundles wrapped in prosciutto. And the Salad with Tart Greens and Warm Balsamic Dressing. Know what? I think that was the best thing of the night. I had made a huge bowlful, just for the beauty of it, but I never expected the group to eat more than half of it. Every scrap disappeared and everyone exclaimed over it. Make it right away while we're still in E-R! It would be great for a NYE party. Dessert was the Spongata, which I thought disappointing, and a freshly made eggnog ice cream made by Mr. Eden. This was really dry. With coffee, almost as a fruit biscotto, it worked. But compared to the lush flavor and texture of the filling when fresh, I found the cake itself a bit dull. I will certainly make that filling again, but I'll be doing something else with it. Whew, I need a break from typing before posting Christmas dinner!

I served the Emeril's recipe I linked to above to two sets of guests over Christmas, and it was universally praised. It's quite sweet, but very nicely spiced and rich, and with the Gosling's had a good depth of flavor as well. I made it just as written, with the 3 oz of rum per small mug, and nobody asked for it to be more dilute, although I had thought it might be too strong. This is a very nice recipe to have in your collection, and since I made a double batch, I'll be serving it to people through the New Year.

Thanks, Wendy. I'm going to make and test it now. I've been cooking the entire day, and a little HBR testing sounds just about right.

Right now I'm leaning toward this recipe, which seems basic but good, using the Gosling's. Feel free to steer me in another direction, except the ice cream one, because I am NOT going to the store again tomorrow.

For those of you that have been waiting for recipes from Chefpeon, here are the oatmeal lace cookies and the Swedish thins recipes, in Annie's words. The macaroons, however, are a deep, sweet secret. Annie's Swedish Creams 1 cup (8 oz) butter, softened 1/3 cup heavy cream 2 cups all purpose or pastry flour 4 Tbsp. granulated sugar Combine the butter, sugar and heavy cream with paddle attachment on mixer (doesn't have to be smooth). Add the flour. Add color if desired. Mix til all incorporated. Form dough into flat disk in plastic wrap and refrigerate for about an hour. 1/4 cup (2 oz) butter, softened 3/4 cup powdered sugar **1 egg yolk 1 tsp. vanilla Mix egg yolk, vanilla and powdered sugar together. add butter and whip til creamy. **If you're concerned about raw eggs in your buttercream, you can either leave it out, and sub a couple Tbsp. warm water in place. OR you can heat your yolk to 160 degrees by whisking constantly in a bowl over simmering water. OR you can make a typical french buttercream. Roll out dough disk to about 1/4" thick. Cut out desired shapes. I like ovals. Toss the shapes in granulated sugar, place on baking sheet and bake at 375 for about 7-9 minutes. When cool, sandwich together with buttercream. Lacy Chocolate Oatmeal Cookie Sandwiches (from Nick Malgieri's, "Cookies Unlimited") 1 stick butter (4 oz), melted 1 cup oatmeal, finely chopped, but NOT ground to a powder in the food processor. NOTE: grind the oats, THEN measure. 1 cup sugar 1/2 tsp salt 1 large egg 1 tsp. vanilla extract 1 tsp orange juice (Personally, I just use a 1/2 tsp. freshly grated rind, sometimes more) Put butter in bowl, then add remaining ingredients, one at a time, mixing as you go. You don't need to use a mixer for this, just do it by hand. You can then bake off the cookies right away, or you can refrigerate the batter. I like to refrigerate the batter, because I find it easier to deposit onto the pans when it's a little firmer. Also, they won't spread so much and so quickly. Use no more than about a teaspoon of batter for each cookie and allow about 3 inches of space in between each cookie on the sheet. I like to bake on parchment or silpats. Bake cookies at 350 degrees until they have spread out and are darker on the edges than the middles. Personally I like to bake them uber-crisp. Mine are dark around the edges and a deep golden in the center. Any lighter in the middles, and they're kinda soft. For this cookie, crisper is better. These cookies have a tendency to be round-ish but not perfectly round. The non-uniformity of the chopped oats and any flaw or bend in your baking pan will determine how round the cookies end up being. So my advice is to use as flat a pan as possible! Generally though, the roundest cookies will be in the center, and the weird ones will be on the outsides. Melt some chocolate. It doesn't have to be tempered. I like to use bittersweet, but you can use semi-sweet or milk if you prefer. Personally I think the bittersweet together with the orangy kind of flavor in the cookie is a killer combo. With a small offset spatula or knife, spread a thin layer of melted chocolate all the way to the edge of one cookie and sandwich together with another cookie. I like to match up all my cookie pairs in advance so when I'm doing the sandwiching I don't have to hunt around for similar shapes. Goes quicker that way. Place cookies in fridge to set quicker, then store at room temperature.

Whether fiori di Sicilia does or does not belong in panettone, 3/4 tsp is really a lot! I can't imagine using more than 1/4 tsp in anything, and mostly I only use a couple of drops. Otherwise it will definitely be bitter.

That's a bummer about Noble Court. We haven't been there since it changed hands a year or so ago, but it used to be one of our favorites.

I have a craving for that old fashioned and probably passe drink, hot buttered rum. Actually, I'd like to serve it to guests over the holiday. I've searched all the threads that might pertain, but get mainly passing references and offsite links. Is it that nobody drinks it, or that it's so easy to make that no recipe thread is deemed worthy? Please, if you have a really excellent recipe, be so kind as to post it here, for me, and for future HBR seekers. And by the way, I have 10 Cane and Gosling's Black Seal. Which would be better to use in such a sweetened concoction? I have good butter, too, being more of a cook than a mixologist. Or if you have some mind-blowingly even better hot rum drink, I'd love to hear about that too.

At last I've got a menu together. Nothing like waiting until the last minute for inspiration! Christmas Eve dinner for 7 I'm making the Unusual Tortellini Pie, the Salad of Tart Greens with Warm Balsamic Dressing, and the Spongata. Guests are bringing the appetizers and vegetables, as well as homemade eggnog ice cream to go with the spongata. I have the Baroqu Ragu all made, and I followed the directions to hand mince the meats, but maybe my mincing skills are deficient, or maybe mincing chicken thigh meat is just really friggin' hard, but my sauce has a lot of texture. I did simmer it about 2 1/2 hours - no way it was done after the prescribed 45 minutes, so the meat is as tender as it's ever going to get. I'm wondering if I should pulse it a few times, or just leave it chunky. Any opinions? Also, in recipe deviations, I added a couple of good meaty slices of beef shank, for the marrow and the gelatin and the melting meat. Then Christmas morning will be all panettone. We have 4 different kinds from Italy, and I might bestir myself to scramble some eggs to go with, or I might not. Christmas dinner will be for 6, and I'm making the Christmas Capon, Sweet and Sour Onions, Spiced Spinach with Almonds, and Torta Barozzi. Guests are bringing appetizers, homemade bread, and homemade pasta with guanciale. Oh, and thanks to a timely trade of libations (my vin de noix for eje's nocino) I will be serving his nocino with the Barozzi, which is evidently traditional. That cake, by the way, is a PITA to make and used up just about a dishwasher full of dishes. It reads easy, but it's fussy. And it's really flat now that it's done and looks underwhelming. I'm keeping the faith, though, and will serve it with whipped cream and any leftover spongata there may be. Is anyone else doing holiday meals from the E-R?

Wow, thanks Pontormo! I have everything in the house to make Alberto's Baci except the pistachio paste itself. I might be done baking cookies for this year, but then again, I might have to make an exception for these.

I have access to that organic Sicilian pistachio paste, but I'm probably the only person on the planet who doesn't care for the Korova cookies. Too much chocolate for me. However, I love the idea of using the pistachio cream that way, and it's making me think about what other dough I could substitute. But not to worry, despite my taste in cookies I am definitely in favor of world peace!

Barcelona, will you tell us how you cooked the marrow beans? I have some that I haven't tried yet.

Has anyone made the Unusual Tortellini Pie? I'm thinking of making that on Christmas day. Or maybe Christmas Eve. Am I the only one who doesn't have their holiday menus together? The Torta Barossi is on there for sure, and the Spongata, with maybe some sort of gelato that marries the two, between the two days.

And even if I'm the only person in the world with this question, is it pronounced nyudi, or nudie?

Heinz, what are the ones dipped in chocolate? They're really pretty.

Wow, Judith, how long did all that pasta take you? That's an amazing amount to make in one day! I love the idea of pear and ricotta together with pancetta.

This is so timely for me as I have four large and semi-ripe plantains in the kitchen ripening. Does anyone know of a traditional Christmas or Hanukkah dish involving plantains?

I recently made one of Paula Wolfert's daubes that calls for lining the casserole with pork rind. I did not boil it first, left it whole and draped it like a pie crust, and then after several hours of cooking, just slipped it out, diced it up fine, and threw it all back into the daube. You want it all in there, for the beautiful melting texture.