Recoil Rob

Of late one of my favorite sandwich fixin's is Hellman's Mayonnaise mixed with an Indian Pickle. I'm speaking of the Indian condiment, usually lime or mango pickle. You know, the stuff that smells like Kiwi Shoe Polish, you either love it or hate it. It's always too chunky to spread on a sandwich so I often take a jar and puree it a bit for convenience. Mixed with the Hellman's it has quickly become a favorite on sandwiches made with turkey, chicken, pheasant, any kind of white meat and sometimes even leftover hanger steak. Anyone care to offer up their favorite "bastard condiment"?

I had the livers from 6 pheasants last Sunday, I sauteed them in some olive oil, sage leaves, salt & pepper, and then coarsely chopped them. We did a risotto using some pheasant stock (chicken stock would do as well) and at the last minute stirred in the livers and some fresh sage chiffonade. It made a great primo piatti, it was followed by pheasant roasted with garlic & red wine vinegar and accompanied by broccoli rabe.

Of course you are correct, a poor choice of words on my part. We certainly do chew them to savor the flavor. I should have said "too large for a comfortable mouthful".

Thanks Kate, I'll give it a try next time. Please elaborate o the "sparkling water "technique, I haven't heard of that. FYI, if I'm ever short of rock salt to hold oysters or clams I take a sheet of aluminum foil that's about 2-3 times as long as my baking sheet and fold it into a 1' accordion fold. I then stretch it open enough to cover the sheet so it has peaks and valleys. You can then push the shells down onto the foil and it will mold the foil to hold the shells. Rob I don't know if this qualifies as "Italian" but Italian is my ethnic origin on my father's side and the preparation has garlic, fried fresh breadcrumbs, Italian (flatleaf) parsley and lemon juice. For my mother's 80th birthday party my sister sent us 6 dozen oysters (3 dozen Kumamoto and 3 dozen of a different and larger but equally mild variety whose name escapes me at the moment) from Seattle. We only had one proper Oyster knife between the three of us who actually knew how to shuck oysters. These babies were fresh and seemingly welded shut. After shucking 2 1/2 dozen we gave up and served them with a mignonette sauce, a cocktail-horseradish sauce and fresh lemons. Two of my siblings present for the feast cannot consume raw oysters even though they'd dearly love to so I promised to bake or grill the remainder the next day (secretly hoping the oysters would be less tenacious of life to yield more readily). The still defiant oysters required a short bath in sparkling water to "drunken" them up enough to open easily (I was amazed how well this trick worked!). This simple but absolutely delicious concoction is what I came up with from the ingredients left-over from our gargantuan food extravaganza of the day before. For 3 dozen oysters: 4 cloves garlic minced 1 to 1 1/2 cups fresh bread crumbs 6 tbl butter (unsalted) lots of fresh lemon juice minced Italian parsley (to taste) Sea salt to taste Turn oven onto low broil. Saute garlic over medium to medium-low heat in the butter until soft. Add bread crumbs to the mixture and fry for a few minutes. To this I added a few tablespoons of fresh lemon juice and some of the nectar from the oysters and cooked for a few more minutes. (There was no rock salt in the larder and the oysters would have spilled too much of the nectar onto the sheet pan unsupported by salt so I just poured off a small quantity from each oyster into the saute pan). Off the heat add the minced parsley and salt and stir. Depending on the size of the oysters spread a teaspoon size dollop (for the kumamoto) or more for the larger. Place under the broiler and watch carefully to insure that the bread crumbs don't burn, until the edgs of the oysters start to wrinkle (about 5 minutes maximum). Serve immediately with fresh lemon wedges. Now I'm hungry for oysters Kate ←

Thank you Susan, that's a good starting place. Here in NY I belong to two hunting clubs that stock birds from a preserve on farmland we lease. They are organically fed birds let out into the wild. Some, though not a high percentage, manage to over winter so there is a small population of wild birds (if they avoid predators and make it through the winter we consider them wary enough to be called wild). NY has native grouse and the woodcock come through but pheasants don't have as strong a foothold as the do in the midwest. Rob, I'd start with the Cassoulet Cook-Off. And, don't forget, you simply can't go wrong with any cassoulet recipe of Paula Wolfert's. Question, however. Your pheasants. Farmed or wild? Purchased or hunted (by you)? ←

I have a wealth of oysters from LI Sound and would like some new ways on cooking them. I see many recipes from France but few from Italy. I would love to hear of some Italian preparations for oysters. Thanks, Rob

I have been fortunate enough to find a great spot to harvest my own oysters here on LI Sound. These are of the Blue Point type, I'm allowed one half bushel per day. I usually end up with 60 or so of a size perfect for eating on the half shell and another 50 larger ones, really too big to eat raw in one swallow. We have perfected the cornmeal crusted, deep fried oyster, leftovers used in Po' Boys. I'd love to hear some recommendations for other cooked preparations. We've done the stuffed in the shell preparations (Oysters Rockefeller and the myriad of variations) and would like to try something different. I've done the cream sauce over rice thing but does anyone know of a recipe that uses oysters with pasta or some other kind of noodle? What about baked in a casserole type dish? No recipe is too involved, I like a good challenge. So tell me about an oyster dish you had in restaurant, read about or one that's an old favorite. How hard are the little guys to smoke?

Cassoulet, cassoulet, yes, know I see.... Alrighty then, as soon as the temps drop a few degrees here in SE NY it's Cassoulet! Whose recipe do you prefer to work off of for cassoulet? Thanks, Rob

On Sunday I make enough for the whole week, pour it into a large Tupperware, let it congeal and cut it into portions. In the am I put a portion in a bowl , cover with plastic wrap and pop in the microwave for 2 minutes, stir and eat. I'll grant you it's not as creamy as fresh made but I save that treat for the Sunday I make it.

The last few years I've been making pheasant confit, using the legs and thighs of pheasants. I'm using the basic recipe from "Charcuterie". In that recipe, after the meat has simmered in the fat, one removes the pieces to a container and covers them with the fat for aging. Left is the pot is the pinkish liquid which, if left with meat can sour it. It is recommended to strain this liquid and cool it which, because of all the natural gelatin it contains quickly comes together into a sort of aspic. In the book the authors recommend using it in a vinaigrette for salads, but no much else. I've tried that and it did nothing for me. I've reduced and clarified the amount I had, sort of like a demi-glace, does anyone have any other ideas for it's usage? Thanks, Rob

There can be much confusion between the names of several fish caught in NY waters, bonito, bonita, false albacore and little tunny. True bonito and false albacore are very similar looking fish with completely different table qualities, bonito being excellent and false albacore usually released to fight again. Here's a link to telling them apart. Bonito are excellent on the grill with a soy base flavoring, and as the referenced link explains, can be substituted for mahi mahi or bluefish in many recipes.

I've done pheasant legs,here's the thread... http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showto...457&hl=pheasant

If you're buying them in a store they'll skin them for you.

American eels grow up to 4-5 ft, (at least I've seen them that big while scuba diving) but the more common size is 2ft. The are delicious if properly prepared. I made eel for one of the 9 Xmas Eve fish dishes last year, I used eel instead of flounder for a Sicilian sweet sour dish. The eel needs to be skinned, usually accomplished by putting the head on a hook or nail, cutting the skin around the neck area and peeling the skin back inside out towards the tail, like taking off a sock or condom. They have "Y" shaped bones so the meat is filleted off each side and cut into pieces 2-3"long, floured, egg dipped, breaded and deep fried. They are arranged on a plate and covered with a sauce of white vinegar, sugar, raisins, pignoli, capers and bay leafs, left to marinate at room temperature for a few hours before serving. The vinegar sauce nicely cuts the fatness of the eel. I adapted the recipe from Bugliali's FOODS OF ITALY.

It's true that in this age of the internet one can Google a dish and get 100 good recipes so I'm of the opinion beginners should get books primarily focusing on technique and apply it to the recipes gleaned from the internet. The ones that started me off 30 years ago were both Pepin books, LA TECHNIQUE & LA METHODE, Anne Willan's LA VARENNE PRACTIQUE and Bugliali's CLASSIC TECHNIQUES OF ITALIAN COOKING. All these books are technique heavy with recipe variations and will start you off with a good foundation upon which you can adapt all those recipes on the web. They have many pictures, especially the Pepin Books. These are still the books I turn to when attempting something new.

I cut my teeth on Pepin's Technique & Methode , and Lavernne Practique by Anne Willan, great references for adapting recipes. For the entire old school recipe I second Masterpieces of French Cuisine (Amunategui) and there's also Entertaining in the French Style by Roger Vergere sp?

Quite interesting, I Googled it (actually syneresis) and it's the same process by which whey comes out of yogurt. I may have to try that some day, thanks.

FYI, in "Charcuterie" it's stated that one cup of Morton's Kosher weighs almost 8 ounces,whereas one cup of diamond Crystal weighs 4.8 ounces, hence the importance of weighing your salt when used for preservation.

Back in the early 1980's a friend threw a pig roast at his family farm in the Catskill Mountains of NY. One small pig and about 30 people. My friend was looking to meet women and a party was a good idea. Quite a good time and the word got around so it became an annual event. 5 years later, at the last one, we had 500 people, built a stage and had 3 bands playing all weekend, and I was in charge of cooking 3 150-200lb pigs. I welded up some spits and such. We got our pigs from a local farmer, the came with skin on, heads on, feet on, fat and kidneys still there. Quite a scene. This was the last one because he met the woman he married and didn't want the hassle any longer. Some years later I threw a smaller party for about 70 people at a friends house in the city of Yonkers, 1/2 mile from the Bronx border. I ordered my pig from the local Karl Ehmer pork store. It cam in the same way as before, whole, skin on, feet and head intact, immaculately clean, all the leaf lard and kidney fat, everything you could want, about 150#'s It was wrapped in a large sheet of plastic so we sat it up in the front seat of the Toyota Celica, just like a person, and drove it home. And my point is, if you want to get the benefits of a "whole hog" you need the skin, feet, head, fat, everything, and cut it yourself. Can be done at home with a little research. And though I haven't tried them recently, Karl Ehmer was very helpful and may still provide a whole carcass from their farm and processing plant in NY.

I memory serves me one of Tom Colicchio's all time favorite Top Chef recipes was Dales rack of lamb cooked in duck fat from the finale of season 3.

I actually did clarify it with egg whites first but then I decided I wanted it reduced more, moving towards a demi glace. After the further reduction some more solids precipoitated out of the liquid and i wanted them strained out. I ended up using a coffee filter and it took about 30 minutes for the cup of liquid to drain through. In the end I had to help along by twisting the filter like a pastry bag. I got the results I wanted but thought there must be an easier way. Thanks, Rob

I've tried to strain reduced stocks with paper towel, coffee filters, Jaques Pepin recommmended a paper napkin. They all bog down and the flow just stops dead. Cheese cloth is not fine enough for small particles. What do you use?

When Saveur did it's Pesto article I tried their procedure with a mortar, best pesto I ever made. It took about a hour though and since that day I've used a blender.

I'm a bird hunter, primarily pheasants which are known to have tough legs with a lots of tendons. So much so, most hunters just take the breast meat. A few years back I tried to confit some of the leg/thigh pieces, I used a couple of the D'Artagnan containers of duck fat mixed in with rendered pork fat. I was pleased with the results. The meat was nutty and falling off the bone, a bit bland and gray, but made some nice dinners and rilletes Two years ago I saved about 20 leg/thigh joints and bought my duck fat from Hudson Valley Fois Gras. I live within a couple hundred miles so I was able to get a 7.5lb. tub, about 1 gal., of rendered duck fat UPS'd to me overnight for about $35.00. The confit turned out better, perhaps a little salty and one dimensional. I used the method from Polcyn & Ruhlman's "Charcuterie". I kept it covered in the fat for about 5 month in the back of the fridge after drawing off the clear juices from the bottom. We ate it gradually, sometimes by itself, a few pieces in cassoulet, some rillets. After it was all eaten I strained the fat back into the tub and put it in the deep freeze. Last week it was time to confit last years kill, approximately 12 lbs of pheasant legs/ thighs, close to 35 pieces. This time I used a little more spice, lots of garlic and bay leaf. I also added almost 2 tsps. of pink salt which "Charcuterie" recommended if planning to keep the confit longer than a month. I let it cure a full 48 hours then rinsed, patted dry and packed into a stainless container. I melted last years fat which already had some flavor in it and was just enough to cover the legs. I placed it in an electric oven set on warm, after two hours the temperature of the fat was taken with a laser type thermometer, it was right at 169˚K, perfect temperature for cooking. Last year I used a different oven that would only go down to 185˚F and the meat separated from the knuckles and crawled up the bone. After 8 hours of "poaching" at 169 I pulled a piece and it was perfect, just the right amount of salty spicy, nutty goodness. We had four pieces for dinner that night over an arugula salad with some crusty bread. Absolutely delicious, the thighs are meaty and it pulls right off the bone like good BBQ. The legs still have those tendons but all the meat just strips out fro between them. I removed the pink liquid from the bottom, packed the legs back into the SS container and covered all with melted fat, it is now aging in the back of my fridge, should be perfect for the holidays. The little bit of pink salt did wonders for this batch. Last year, although tasty, the legs were an unappealing gray color. This year the meat stayed pink and much firmer, also due to the longer cure. I have reduced the pink liquid, and clarified it. In "Charcuterie" Ruhlman & Polcyn say it ca be used in a vinaigrette. I tried that last year but wasn't impressed, any other recommendations for it's use? I can't recommend Hudson Valley Fois Gras highly enough, quality products at a reasonable cost, and the fat was much more flavorful than the smaller containers. I needed some extra fat to cover my confit, I called and my tub was there the next day.

I butcher my own deer every year, or at least every year I get one. Properly gutted and handled I treat it no different than good beef. I've seen guys drop ff a 125lb deer at the butchers and come back with 10 pounds of steak and 70 pounds of ground meet, just protein. A waste. I usually take one whole hind quarter and have it custom smoked at Nodines Smokehouse, make a seriously good ham dinner. The other is roasted whole using bacon for a fat covering or I have BBQ'd whole hind quarters. It's an impressive piece of meat and it seems a waste to cut it into thin steaks. I usually have cut the backstrap area into rack of venison and do it like rack of lamp. Alternately it can be done Florentine style, simply pan roasted and drizzled with EVOO and herbs. As for the shanks, you can certainly make Osso Deero but I find just a slow braise and they are excellent. The tendons melt down and there's a reason to stay home and cook on a winters day. BTW, although I have made my own sausage adding nothing but pork fat, most of the neck meat is chunked for chili's or stew, not ground. The shoulders are boned out ad make some nice small steaks and rolled roasts. Finally all major bones are browned for stock. Just be sure to degrease.