Baron d'Apcher
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Posts posted by Baron d'Apcher
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What inspires you to make the elaborate patterns? Do you use a boiled water crust?
Hopelessly dated cookbooks, dinner party showmanship and classical sensibilities. Cold water shortcrust.
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Pâté en Croûte.
Pork, pork tongue, fat back, pistachio and currant.
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I choose not to take pics during the course of dinner (poor lighting, less food savvy-guests may roll their eyes, congested table...) but was able to snap one of the tableware from my view during the 1st courses which sought to channel something from Babette's Feast. Early 1970's Danish service plates bought in Denmark; cusp of early 20th century hand blown French bistro wine, absinthe and cordial glasses; Finnish flatware; antique milk bottle carafe, artisinal ceramic bowls; smoked Danish sea salt.
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Nordic Opus.
Heritage Bird
Pickled radishes, pickled herring, aquavit, liver & anchovy pâté, 1 and 2 day salt cured sockeye salmon
Higher latitude study of getting pickled:
Purple cauliflower, cheddar broccoli, romanesco, Krogstad Aquavit (Portland, Oregon) in ice with clippings of neighbor’s shrubbery.
Turkey leg frikadeller with golden beets and cranberries. B-sprouts to follow.
Roasted breast with prunes and apples
Æbleskiver (to be dipped in chestnut honey and/or quince jelly)
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Will make the frikadeller with the legs from a heritage turkey (don’t care much for the tendons. Made kofte for Turkish themed TG08). Some pork, 5% bread panade, juniper, orange zest, rosemary and such. Meatballs will be roasted in a 450F degree oven and simmered in fortified turkey stock until tender. Stock will be reduced to a thick glaze and supplemented with ¼’ed Brussels sprouts, golden beet wedges and a few dried cranberries here and there. The liver (depending on the size/quality) will either be incorporated into the frikadeller or cooked into the sauce in the “saupiquet” manner to thicken it.
Stuffing is more conceptual than traditional. Handsomely whittled root vegetables (rutabaga, turnip, parsnip, carrot), pearl onions, butter, pearl barley cooked in water/stock, a fine dice of dried rye bread soaked in milk and wintry herbs.
Jansson’s Temptation drifts slightly from the regional authentic prescribed by the Swedish matriarch; thinly sliced potatoes soaked in milk/cream and assembled like a gratin Dauphinois with a middle layer of caramelized onions, anchovy (couldn’t find the tin of sprats) and capers deglazed with red wine vinegar rather than the standard potato batons of Southwester Sweden..
Full documentation will follow. Last year’s Old World meets New World wasn’t too shabby.
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Nordic theme.
Glögg with Nedrod's pear wine
Salt cured salmon
Herring pickled in my red wine vinegar
Danish liver and anchovy pâté
Pickles (romanesco, cheddar broccoli, purple cauliflower)
Nordic rye bread
Jansson's temptation
Turkey leg frikadeller with Brussels sprouts, cranberries and golden beets
Roast turkey breast with apples and prunes
Barley stuffing
Cheese
Æbleskiver
Rice pudding
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Cornish hen timbale with summer's end ragout of sweet corn and plum tomatoes. Had to use a jar since a metal timbale could not be found.
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Gosling's Rumpkin. Rum-cider dispensed through the tap.
Gourd Marnier. GM-cider in there.
Heraldry
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that's still a LOT of beef.
½ a cow is indeed a lot of meat. Unless you are ready to braise/simmer/cure the less tender cuts (almost half of the creature), it will be a lot of frozen ground beef, which is a shame and cheapens the value of an animal, particularly one that has led a pretty good life as far as cattle go. Dry aging increases flavor but reduces yield. All the primal cuts require agile butchering to remove sinew and such while keeping a high yield but will eventually oxidize and smell like a wet dog. A whole sirloin for 2 is quite an eating endeavor. Freezing will compromise the quality and flavor. Better off splitting it between a few other families and enjoying it as it is best rather than freezing.
The primal and sub-primal cuts from the front quarter:
Flatiron (have to split it to remove the sinew). Roast/grill, stew or cure whole and poach like corned beef.
Teres major (next to the flatiron). Roast/grill. similar to tenderloin.
Brisket. Cure and poach for corned beef.
Short ribs. Braise, on or off the bone.
Flank & skirt. Cut thin and cook quickly over high heat.
Chuck. Roast/grill, grind or stew.
Shank. Cure off the bone and cook like corned beef or simmer/braise.
Collar. Braise/stew.
Ribeye/chops. Dry age, roast/grill, on or off bone.
Deckle/caillotte. Roast/grill
Tongue. Cure and simmer
Cheek(s). simmer, braise
Trimmings. Grind.
Hind quarter:
Top sirloin & tri-tip. Dry age, roast.
Tail. Braise/simmer.
Shank. Cure off the bone and cook like corned beef or simmer/braise.
Sirloin/NY strip/porterhouse (with tenderloin). Dry age, roast/grill, on or off bone
Tenderloin. Roast/grill.
Top round. Roast beef, served cold or cooked slow and moist (can be very dry)
Silverside. Roast/grill.
Eye of round. Roast/grill.
Bottom round. Roast/grill.
Hanger steak (if you get it). Roast/grill.
Trimmings. Grind.
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Fig pâte de fruit en croûte. The lid broke up a bit and the pectin didn't set properly, but it was a worthwhile prototype.
How I roll
Sweet Sarcophagus
Port holes
A wedding dinner’s caboose
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Soupe de pistou à la mode de Sète
Late summer squash, squid and ink crozets.
Pistou
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Hure de Cabillaud
Cod’s head soup (beta version).
A resourceful stew of cod collar, cheeks & tongues
with handsomely turned potatoes, turnips, leeks and shallots.
Tongues & cheeks
Cod’s head soup (2.0, special lobster edition)
With some smoked guanciale, lobster roe and claw scraps here and there.
More potatoes, pickled carmen peppers and fennel pollen.
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There's a review in this weekend's New York Times Book Review of a book called FOUR FISH: The Future of the Last Wild Food, by Paul Greenberg. The reviewer is Sam Sifton, the Times restaurant critic. Among other things, he calls out the Monterey card:
Along the way, Greenberg raises real-life ethical questions of the sort to haunt a diner’s dreams, the kind of questions that will not be easily answered by looking at the Monterey Bay Aquarium’s seafood-watch card. In truth, he shows, there is rarely such a thing as a good wild fish for any of us to eat, at least not if all of us eat it.Having read said book and attended a lecture by Mr. Greenberg at the Pew Charitable trusts, it would appear that Mr. Moonen also read the book (or at least heard of it) and then decided to add another fish to formulate his ambiguous theory; the brief interview in no way isolates specific fish species which Mr. Greenberg's does.
Mr. Greenberg is a dedicated, prolific writer/angler and deserves credit for the # fish theory.
Mr. Moonen's theory is consistent with his spastic Top Chef performance.
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Peach and rosemary-frangipane tarts.
With candied marcona almonds.
(would have benefited from a peach glaze on the fruit)
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Poultry pâté pantin, special District of Columbia heraldry edition.
Cornish hen, pork, liver, foie gras, pistachio and dried apricot.
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Feijoada de Monte Agradável
(Mount Pleasant Feijoada)
Caipirinhia with sugar cane sticks
cebiche and plantain chips
Feijoada. Black beans cooked with smoked ham hocks; my linguiça, cured pork belly and rum marinated pork shoulder (salted beef could not be readily found).
Farofa. Manioc toasted in bacon fat, with bacon, marcona almonds, raisins and orange zest.
Couve mineita. Collard greens and my red wine vinegar.
Paõ de batata doce. Sweet potato and sweet, potato breads
Ice-cold, cheap Central American beer.
Mangoes
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This looks fantastic. Great job.
What is "soffritto made from lardo"? And what is the ginger brine?
Soffritto: slivered garlic browned in rendered lardo slices with olive oil, dried chili and lemon zest with which the asparagus, mushroom and cipollini are heated up.
The brine simply has fresh ginger in it.
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Confucius style, ginger brined and roasted.
With noble wheat berries, manicured asparagus, some cipollini onions, a few fluted mushrooms and soffritto made from my lardo.
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-Follow the recipe exactly and you'll be fine.
Recipes are developed by particular human beings in a particular place and time. Measuring techniques vary from person to person (eg, flour by volume), measures themselves vary from place to place (US gallon vs Imperial gallon), ingredients can even change in size (chickens and chicken parts are now much larger than they used to be) as well as qualitatively (pork is now much leaner than in the past).
Any chef worth a damn uses metric units of weight in their recipes. Poor results are likely a matter of execution and unfamiliarity with terms/technique (ie,rissoler), theory and practice.
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For those with experience using nitrite in pâtés, what percent of the meat portion is required to maintain a nice pink hue?
.25% nitrite of meat weight.
Easter Pâté Pantin, special Greek Orthodox edition.
Game hen, duck, pork, chicken livers, lardo and pistachios. Should be rewarded with orchestra seats to the rapture.
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This is a very desperate and pathetic attempt to retain control (Communist style) of what is known as an iconic cuisine of the world. Hopefully the Italian Government will realize the error of their ways before it’s too late or else the world of cuisine will leave your country back in the dark ages at the expense of your great Chefs and the enjoyment of the consumer.
Indeed. They have overlooked a couple facts.
1. Nitrates are naturally found (in very high concentrations) in celery, beets, spinach, radishes and cabbages.
2. Italy is shaped like a boot because they couldn’t fit all that crap into a sneaker.
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An edible monument to Washington, DC’s 5 cent bag tax (which has reduced bag consumption by 87%) and the achingly inane whines against it that are being ranked on water coolers in any progressive office where tolerance, paychecks and science fundamentals have evolved since the 1860’s.
5 scented suckling ham in aspic with ink truffle découpage.
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In honor of Armistice day 2007, a suitable accompaniment for the RMS Wellington Lusitania was German U-Boat potato salad. Gassy mustard not pictured.
Starboard view
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The Terrine Topic
in Cooking
Posted
Pâté en croûte pendaison de crémaillère, Édition spéciale imposte.
Housewarming pâté en croûte, special transom edition.
Pistachio, pig's tongue, dried figs, pork shoulder, fatback, pig's heart.
New address.
Inside.