jsmeeker

Christmas Dinner 2009 Prime rib, twice baked potatoes, carrots, and a spinach gratin

OK. Here is my Gingerbread

Now I wish I had some of those pans! The ginger bread turned out great. Very moist. But of course, I forgot to take a picture of it. Didn't have my camera in the kitchen where I was plating the dessert. But I have some leftover that I brought home. I'll have some for a snack a little later and I'll snap a picture and post it here. Oh.. the lemon curd with creme fraiche and whipped cream folded into it worked pretty well. I wish I had known about this the other day. I probably would have made the Spiced Pear Upside-Down Gingerbread Cake.

My gingerbread is in the oven. I used the Cook's Illustrated recipe in 'Baking Illustrated'. To serve with it, I am going with the lemon curd idea. I will fold some creme fraiche and some whipped cream into it. Lemon curd is great in this case because I had everything I needed to make it! I'll let you know how it goes and will try to remember to snap a pic after plating a serving.

I want to make a gingerbread dessert for Christmas dinner. I don't want cookies of people. I don't want a house. What I want is a gingerbread that is like a sheet cake. The bread part seems pretty easy. Looks like it can be made like a quick bread. Cook's Illustrated has a recipe in my copy of 'Baking Illustrated'. I can use that, but am open to other suggestions. But once I have the cake, how to serve it? I gotta do more than put a slice on a plate. I think I need some sort of sauce. And some sort of "creamy thing". Ice cream? Or maybe just whipped cream? Finally, a garnish of some sort. a sprinkle of chopped, crystalized ginger, maybe?

Uniformity isn't bad. Conistency is good. It's something any place should stive for. Big chain, small local diner. High end dining or every day food. Would people like Per Se if it wasn't consistent? Of course not. People are certainly correct that picking some random local, indepedent place can be real hit or miss. Frequently, you have to endure some bad meals to find the gems. But finding those "gems" makes it all worth it. At least, it can for me.

It might be nice if they included snippets of judges tables sessions in the extras. Snippets longer than the quick one liners we see on the broadcast, but HOURS? No. Even a 30 minute segment? I dunno. For me, I think the blogs (Tom's in particular) are good enough for getting the real scoop on the decision.

So, what makes a pot de creme different than a creme caramel? I guess it's the caramel? Does a pot de creme have SOMETHING in the bottom (or on top, if served on a plate)? Usually, I associate pots de creme with chocolate and I don't think I've seen them with something else in there.

Is Jacques Torres going to confuse people? I don't think so. Is he intentionally trying to cash in on people's familairity with the Hershey product so that they kind of have an idea of what his item is like? I dunno. But here the thing. Hershey certainly has a trademark here. And one thing that trademark holders have to do is PROTECT that trademark. They need to defend it. They can run into troubles if they let a "little" guy like Jacques Torres does it, but then try to enforce it when some large entity does something similar. If you don't use it, protect it, etc. it can be considered abandoned. Of course, there are some possible counter claims here. One could claim that "kiss" has become generic in the way thermos or asprin did. Has that happened? I dunno. That's for the courts to figure out. FWIW, here is my source http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/metaschool/fisher/domain/tm.htm#6 If I didn't get something right, maybe Fat Guy can tell me what I missed. He is is a lawyer, afterall.

You certainly aren't the only ones now. A friend and I had dinner there last night. I had never been inside the hotel. My friend had only been to the bar before. We really liked the decor of this place. We wondered if the big propellers in the ceiling ever spin. We checked out the menu and I asked for the wine list. I knew what I was going to get, because I had heard/read about it. Not a printed book. Nope. Tablet computer. The list was all electronic. You could do "searches" by filtering my grape varietal, region, etc. etc. Then sort stuff. Like price, from low to high. You can even see an on-line version of this right here. Wound up selecting a bottle of pinot noir. The bottle of wine appeared. It was presented, then the sommelier left, then came back with it. Dunno what was up with that, but I noticed this happening at other tables, too. What we ordered was a 2007 International Sommelier Conspiracy Pinot Noir. The amuse was a lobster corn dog. It was just what it sounds like. A mini corn dog on a thin skewer. But it had some lobster in there. Served with a little mustard sauce. Tasty little bite to get things started. For a first course, I ordered the salmon tartare and my friend ordered the mixed green salad. Salmon was good. It had some Tom Olives. Something I wasn't familiar with. Our server explained they were just little tomatoes cured like an olive. And that's pretty much what they tasted like, My friends salad was nice. Very easy on the dressing. It was served with some phylo crusted apple slices. Very good. For mains, I got the squab and my friend ordered the scottish salmon. When ordering the squad, the server made sure I was ok with a medium rare temperature. I had never had squab before, but was aware that it was cooked more like duck than chicken. So, that was OK by me. Whatever chef thinks is best. This was great. Served with a spaghetti squash and piece of toast with some chicken liver puree on top. I love chopped chicken liver, so that was good. My friend really liked the salmon, too. She commented that the soy glaze was a bit salty. I agreed. I have a pretty high tolerance for salt, but this was a tad much. The fish was good, I think, even if it was cooked 'well done' as requested. We had one side with our meal. Parmesan creamed spinach. Also very good. For dessert, I ordered something that was basically peanut butter pie. Tall, narrow, rectangular slice. Really good. Super rich. Couldn't finish it all. My friend ordered a fruit plate. It was a plate of fruit, with some sort of sauce. Cant really recall the details on that. I also ordered a pot of tea, largely because they touted the tea supplier (Cultured Cup). I've detailed that a lot more in the Coffee and Tea forum Check was presented with a little tray of chocolates and house made jelly candies/gum drops. And a small bag of ginger snaps to take home. Overall verdict? Very good. Certainly worth a repeat visit. One of the better meals I've had in Dallas. I think it holds up very well against some of the long time big name places and places by long time big name Dallas chefs.

Last night, I had what I thought was a pretty good tea experience at a restaurant. I had dinner at Charlie Palmer at the Joule Hotel in Dallas. While looking at the dessert menu, they had tea listed at the top of the beverages page on the dessert menu. The note said the teas came from the Cultured Cup, the well respected tea shop in Dallas. I asked my server what they had. He brought out a nice wooden box. Upon opening, there were eight (or was it ten?) small jars filled with loose tea. The inside lid detailed what was there. A few black teas, some oolongs, some whites, a flavored tea or two. I guess there were some herb teas in there too. Each jar had a screw top lid, allowing me to open it up and take a smell. I usually don't like flavored teas (except certain types for iced tea), but their "Red Joule" seemed pretty interesting to me. I believe it's a custom blend made up for the restaurant. So, that's what I ordered. Not too long after, a runner brought out my cup and saucer. Then, they brought the tea in one of those small cast iron pots. I picked up the lid and sure enough, loose tea was in there. The teapot had an infuser basket in there to hold the leaves. I let it sit for a minute or two, then poured a bit out into my cup. Took a sip. Seemed like it was ready. So, I poured a full cup. I didn't add anything to this (they did bring a carrier with the typical line up of sugars and sugar substitutes) Really nice. Had a bit of red fruit flavor to it. I don't really ever order tea in a restaurant, but this was the best tea service I've had. Could it be improved? Sure. When the tea pot was brought out, I had no idea how long it had been steeping before it hit the table. 30 seconds? 4 minutes? Didn't really know. Ideally, they would actually measure out the tea and add water at proper temp right there at the table. And a timer set to the proper steeping time. Maybe that's a bit too much? I dunno. Still, I was happy to see they treated the tea selection with some care.

I'm back from Las Vegas. As is typical, I had some good eats. I didn't really take my camera many places this time (sometimes, intentionally leaving it behind) and when I DID take it, I usually forgot to take any pictures. In any case, here is a run down of the food. Most all of this is from memory, and supplemented via web menus, if available. Posted more or less in the order I actually visited these places. Mix -- THE Hotel at Mandaly Bay http://mandalaybay.com/dining/mix.aspx My friends and I went round and round and back and forth on what we were going to do out first night in town. Mix was the original plan. Then, we go this idea to go a "bar crawl" at Venetian/Palazzo after stumbling upon a special promotional event. But in the end, we decided to head all the way to the south end of the strip. Perched at the very top of THE Hotel at Mandalay Bay is this one Michelin star restaurant by Alain Ducasse. Decor is very funky/modern. Glass "bubbles" hand from strings and run around the perimeter. Hard surfaces. Very contemporary. Oh, and then there is a the view. And what a view it is. The BEST view is really from the adjacent MIX Lounge. But it was just a few steps away from out table. Between courses, we walked over there. Flat out amazing. Anyway, on to the food. Our party actually managed to agree to a tasting menu. Out of the two offered, we select the "Grand Tasting Menu", shown below. (or at least, it's close to what we had. I didn't snag an actual menu. but my notes show that this seems to be right) “Amuse Bouche” SPICY CRAB SALAD, GUACAMOLE, HEART OF PALM & CILANTRO TENDER POTATO GNOCCHI, PUMPKIN AND CRISPY BACON SEARED SCALLOPS, SWEET CORN FRICASSEE ROASTED MAINE LOBSTER “AU CURRY”, COCONUT BASMATI RICE COLORADO RACK OF LAMB, JAPANESE EGGPLANT AND TOMATO, NATURAL JUS PRE-DESSERT MIX CANDY BAR The amuse was vegetable. Artichoke heart, eggplant, and I think tomato. Drizzled with some balsamic. This was an OK start. The crab salad was good. Had a strong black pepper kick to it. Next up was the gnocchi course. This was really great. Hit the mark with the cool weather that night. Seem just right for late fall. My notes (i actually took some notes because they provided a little note pad and "golf" pencil at the table) remind me that the viognier/roussanne blend was really nice. The seared scallop was OK. Ours had some pork belly with it. After that was the lobster course, which I found to be just OK. Note says a nice wine with it, but doesn't indicate type. Final savory course was lamb. It might have been rack of lamb, but it wasn't served with a bone. It was like a little filet. Perfectly cooked. Well seasoned. Really good. Out of the savory courses, the lamb and the gnocchi were the best. The pre-dessert was liquid. Served in a cocktail glass was a lime/coconut foam floating on top of a mango puree. Foam was warm. The mango cold. Drank it so you would get both the warm and the cold together. I really liked this. It was much larger than I usually see in a dessert amuse. Given the location and what not, I think this was ideal. The "mix candy bar" was some sort of chocolate thing. It was paired up with some sort of lime/coconut sorbet that was a bit grainy. Candy bar was good. Paired with a port. I really don't like ports much. Final item was some fresh baked madelines. Overall, pretty good. Expensive. But a decent amount of food. And there was that view. They are really cashing in on that location and turning out much better food than they could get away with. One tip.. If you don't want to eat, but want to see the view, the adjacent MIX Lounge doesn't charge a cover before 10:00 PM. Silk Road -- Vdara Hotel http://www.vdara.com/amenities/silk-road-restaurant.aspx On Friday, I made plans to meet up again with Las Vegas local and fellow eGullet society member John Curtas (TheDininingAdvocate). Always looking for something new to try, we went to the only opened a week Silk Road in the only opened a week Vdara Hotel in the just opened and much anticipated CityCenter project. MGM Mirage has been building this place for several years and I've seen the steady progress on it over several trips to Las Vegas over those years. Finally, I had a chance to go in! Silk Road is the only restaurant in this non-casino hotel (or, really, I think, hotel/condo). It's run by Martin Heierling. He runs Sensi at the Bellagio next door. That's a restaurant that I am a big fan of. Decor is very "George Jetson". At least, I think that's what it's like. Or maybe, it's what they 1970s called "modern". Started off with some Fried Mystic Oysters with Sichuan Pepper, Salam Leaves, Citrus & Wasabi Dip. These were really nice. Perfectly cooked. Still had that nice, fresh, briny oyster taste. Next up were Silk Road Burgers -- Char-Grilled Black Angus Beef, Condiments & Seasoned Fries and the Kataifi Crusted Shrimp with Avocado & Watermelon Salad, Spiced Cucumber & Ginger Preserve. Burgers were really just a couple of sliders. Good, but I didn't think they were anything to get too excited about. My shrimp, though, were really good. There was some sort of broth at the bottom. Light. But very flavorful. The restaurant also sent out Charred Marinated Beef Carpaccio with Crisp Cheese Twinkies, Mushrooms, Dukkah & Baby Arugula. These weren't so good. Pretty salty. Just too strongly flavored. Dunno what it was, exactly, but we really didn't care for these. For dessert, we split the pineapple bingets. These were good. Light. Drizzled with some honey tableside. Not too sweet. Good way to finish the meal. Well, actually, it would have been better if they didn't decide to test the fire alarm during the later part of the meal. But they did. Super annoying. Yeah, it's new, and I guess maybe they were still kind of finishing up stuff in the hotel, but still. Not really what you want to deal with during lunch. Vintner Grill -- Off Strip http://www.vglasvegas.com/ When I go to Las Vegas, I pretty much focus on the strip. But this time, we wanted to do one dinner OFF strip. And not even in some off strip casino. We wanted a true local restaurant. So, we piled into the rental car at Paris and drove west. All the way west to Summerlin. Thats a good distance form the flashy strip place. In fact, the location of Vintner Grill is a bit unusual. It's on the back side of a non-descript, two or three story suburban office building. When you're GPS tells you "You have reached your destination", you may think it's lying to you. But look for the signs that say "VG". Follow them to the back. And you're there. My party had a reservation for the chefs table. We presented ourselves to the lovely host and were taken back to the kitchen area where there was a high table surrounded by stools. After a bit of a wait, our server appeared. The way it works there is that you can either order off the menu or you can have them put together a multi course meal. They'll ask you if there is anything you like or don't like. So, that's what we did. One friend mentioned something on the menu that looked good to him. Then, we said "just start brining food". All of us (expect my friend who drove) opted for wine with the meal as well. I really wish I had taken notes here. I'm pretty sure I'm going to forget some things. Started out with a salad of burrata cheese and some greens (frisse, I think) with a pice of grilled bread and a tomato jam. Really nice. Cheese was a good sized portion. Soft. Creamy. Rich. I had never had this before, but I became an instant fan. I do recall the type of wine. It was a rose Cava. I think the next course was the lamb ribs. They were braised and served with some sort of apricot dipping sauce. IMHO, not so great. Lamb seemed very under seasoned to me. Not much flavor. After that, I remember a seafood course. Striped bass. I think this was served with a cauliflower puree that was really good. After that, it was a meat course. Some sort of beef. Can't recall exact cut, but for some reason, I want to say it wasn't filet. Earlier, I had mentioned one of my dining companions expressed interest in one of the entrees. That was osso bucco. They told him that it really wasn't suited to tasting portions. But no matter. they brought out a full order for the table to share, along with the beef course. Really good. It wasn't the typical cut used for this dish, though. It was more from the end of the shank. Got a lot of meat this way. Very tasty. I think that was it for savory courses. I might be missing one, though, Looking at my photos from the trip, I have one of a fish course. Maybe this was it instead of scallops? Or did we have both? I dunno. I can't remember. I may also be confused as to where we got that cauliflower puree. Looking at the photo, it might have been with the fish. They actually told us when the meal was all over that they had planned to work a pasta course in there, but decided not to at some point during the meal, figuring they might just kill us. Two different desserts came. Thankfully, they cut the portion sized down. One was a strawberry shortcake. The other was a lemon cheese cake. A wine was served with this (French. Not a sauterenes, but something like that made from a different grape) worked well with one of the desserts (I am pretty sure it was the lemon cheesecake). But it didn't work well at all wit the other (shortcake). My friend made a comment about it and an additional wine appeared. IIRC, it was a late harvest rieseling. Much better match with the shortcake. Overall, one great meal. Only one dish fell a bit short (those lamb ribs). Warm, friendly service. We were treated great. Really, I can't recommend this place enough. It's totally worth the trip out there. If you have a car, go. If you don't, rent one for the day. (It will probably be cheaper than a round trip cab ride from the strip) Mon Ami Gabi -- Paris http://www.parislasvegas.com/casinos/paris-las-vegas/restaurants-dining/mon-ami-gabi-detail.html I had two breakfasts here during my trip. Both times, out on the patio. Despite the cool to cold weather, they had plenty of heaters. Couple those with a sweater and a bit of sun, it was perfectly comfortable. Typical breakfast foods, with some non breakfast stuff tossed in (cheeseburger, French onion soup, steak frites). One meal I had waffles. Light. Crispy. Pretty darn good. Next time was some scrambled eggs with bacon, toast, etc. etc. Eggs were a bit under seasoned and bacon was not crispy. I really like this place for breakfast. While masses of people line up and wait for the buffet, we were able to be seated right away. I certainly recommend this for anyone staying at Paris or any of the nearby center strip properties. Society Cafe -- Encore http://www.encorelasvegas.com/#/dining/societycafe/ A friend and I stopped by here on Saturday night for a drink and a snack while some other friends were at the Garth Brooks concert. We sat at the bar and ordered up some drinks and something to eat. 'Lollipop'Chicken Wings and tuna tacos. Both were really good.The chicken wings were prepared using the "drummete" part, and cut so that most of the bone was exposed. Deep fried, then dipped into a traditional Buffalo style sauce. The chicken itself had a lot of flavor. Sauce was good and what you would expect when getting Buffalo wings. The tuna tacos were mini "taco" shells. But they weren't made from corn tortillas. Rather, it was more of a flaky pastry dough. It was filled with a tuna tartare. Tasty. Bartenders were friendly and had no problems making me a Negroni. FIRST Food and Bar -- Palazzo Shops http://palazzolasvegas.com/first.aspx By the time my friends go out of the Garth Brooks concert, we needed a late dinner. We selected FIRST Food and Bar in Palazzo (really, it's in a new part of the Palazzo shops. Or is it in a new part of the Venetian canal shops? I dunno. In any case, the place isn't so easy to find. It's really out of the way, down a long hallway that really doesn't have anything else opened up. Place was pretty empty at 10:00 PM or so. I have heard many good things about this place, so I had pretty high hopes. For me, it wasn't so great. Not bad or anything, but not quiet as good as I hoped for. This plate touts itself as a late night place. But when we ordered donuts for dessert, we were told the machine was down for cleaning. Bummer. I don't see my self making an effort to make my way back here. Emeril's Fish House -- MGM Grand http://www.mgmgrand.com/restaurants/emerils-creole-cajun-restaurant.aspx On Sunday, all of my friends that I was hanging out with left. But some other friends were arriving that afternoon. We wanted to try to get together for dinner Sunday. Since they were staying at MGM, I figured we could just go some place there. I called them maybe at about 4:00 PM or so. They wanted to eat right away. I quickly got changed and raced down to the MGM. While I was making my way down there, they selected Emeril's for dinner. I had been here twice already. This third meal was OK. Better than my last one here, but not as good as my first experience, where I was at the chef's table. I chose the short tasting menu. I think it was just 4 course. I don't recall all of the details, other than that I had some steak tartare, some fish course, a beef course, then bread pudding for dessert. I honestly am not sure if there was a course of scallops in there or not. My dining companions liked what they had. They ordered up a plate of fried calamari before I actually made it to the restaurant. Not bad. Light, crispy. Cooked just right. No "rubber bands" like you get far too frequently. A few people had a soup. Some type of lobster bisque, if I recall correctly. They really raved about that. FWIW, I've always found that Emeril places have a pretty nice level of service.

I would set your sights on something at CityCenter, which is scheduled to officially open on December 14. Michael Mina, Julian Serrano and the Maccioni family are all scheduled to open restaurants at City Center, but I would go for the top if I was you and make a reservation at Pierre Gagnaire restaurant. Pierre Gagnaire's restaurant "Twist" is at the Mandarin Orientel and is open now. The rest of the places are at the Aria resort, which doesn't open until next week.

I'm off to Las Vegas on Thursday, Some dining plans set, others not quite so set, and some are changing. We have a reservation at Vintner Grill (off strip) Friday night. Saturday night, we are planning on a late meal at FIRST Food and Bar at Palazzo after some of the people in my group see Garth Brooks at Wynn. We did have plans to go to Mix on Thursday night, but it seems that we are changing that to do a "bar crawl" type promotion at Palazzo/Venetian. We'll probably just eat as we go during that. Some of the stops are actually are restaurant bars/lounges. Other than that, not much is set. One thing I want to check out is the recently opened Mandarin Orientel in City Center. Will probably hit their all meals restaurant for breakfast one morning. Should be interesting. The lobby level for that hotel is on the 23rd floor.

Yup. I sure do.

I made some chopped chicken liver today. I used 1 lb. of livers. I ate some of it, but since it's so "rich", I have plenty leftover. How long can this stuff really keep in my fridge?

Butter It's very popular in my family.

Pecan Pie. Recipe from Cooks Illustrated. I always have "shrinkage" issues with my crusts! Plated with Bourbon Créme Anglaise (for the curious, I used Knobb Creek)

Richard, What made you get the commerical Vita-Prep over the consumer Vita-Mix?

to prepare at home? Mussels. I also love, love, love osyters. But I've never bought any at a store to take home. Typically, I can't finda good selection aroundhere anyway in stores. So, I tend to eat oysters only in restaurants.

Normally, I am very traditional when it comes to Buffalo Wings. I have to have the traditional style sauce described here by many people (including me). Frank's, butter, etc. etc. But what I want to do now is riff slightly on that. No, I don't want honey mustard or garlic or terryaki or anything like that. I want to stick to chile (pepper) based sauce. I want to make a chipotle based sauce. If I have a can of chipotle peppers in adobo sauce, what do I need to do to transform this into a sauce for wings?

Did you serve it with a bottle of Champagne?

Maybe they will start to carry the bonded. When I first saw Laird's Applejack there, they just had the regular stuff. Then, one day, the bonded stuff was there, too.

I had not seen Rittenhouse in my favorite Dallas liquor store before. Today, I was there to stock up on some stuff, one of them being rye. I thought of buying Sazerac, but then saw the priced and decided to go down to where they keep Wild Turkey, Jim Beam, etc (why it's separated is beyond me). Then, I saw the name. I looked at the bottle. It wasn't bonded. just the regulat 80 proof stuff. But I still picked up a bottle of it. $16.99 for 750 ml. I'll make a Manhattan with it, first. Then try a Sazerac.

Not sure if they are "best" but I certainly have some favorites I really like Heath Bars (i really like toffee) Little Debbie Fudge Rounds (goes way back to Mom packing them in my lunch when I was in school) Coca-Cola (even if it does have HFCS) So, I have a candy, a baked good, and a beverage.