Dinner! 2011

[Country]

As always, Prawn, beautiful work. And, I bet, absolutely delicious. The duck breast slices just right too.

[mm84321]

Grouse, Pumpkin Puree, Cabbage, Pancetta, Spuds and a scrappy red wine reduction:

Grouse looks wonderful.

Here is a partridge breast I cooked recently. It's sitting on some glazed chestnuts, a porcini and pear ragout, sauteed foie gras, and a sauce made from partridge stock, a little white port, madeira and a compound butter of foie gras.

Next up is wood pigeon.

[mm84321]

Why not post a pic of your own (typical) fillet? I've been filleting my own fish for thirty years or so and maybe I could learn something. mm84321's looked okay to me for homecooking.

I've only been filleting my own fish since this summer. I'm by no means perfect, but I am a lot better than I was around June. I think more time and experience will make me better.

[Keith_W]

No fancy plating this time. I wanted a good dinner and couldn't be bothered making things look pretty. The look of the ribeye by itself was driving me crazy ... couldn't wait to put all the food on my plate and go for it.

A beautiful Wagyu ribeye bagged with butter and a knob of blue cheese and about to go into the sous-vide machine at 52C for 3 hours. Beautiful marbling on the beef.

Out of the sous-vide machine and drying on kitchen paper.

Gave it a good char on the grill.

Finished and resting.

Sliced up and ready to serve. Perfect medium rare, so beefy, and so tender!!

Served with Hasselback potatoes and Vichy carrots (not pictured).

[mm84321]

Looks really great. How long did you rest it for? Doesn't look like you lost any juices from carving.

[Dakki]

Prawncrackers, that looks so good it's pissing me off.

Keith_W, lovely steak. Here's my own take on the ribeye (rib steak?), IMHO the best cut of beef.

Mushrooms sauteed in the beef drippings with a bit of garlic.

Photo taken in natural light, no post whatsoever. I'm pretty happy with how the browning turned out so I thought I'd post it as-is instead of messing it up with my hamfisted photo editing.

[Keith_W]

Yeah, no juices lost The steak was rested for an hour after it came out of the SV machine, by which time it was back to room temperature. I find that if I cook the steak straight from the SV machine, it is guaranteed to overcook. When you think about it, it is obvious why - out of the SV machine, the steak is already at its optimum temperature. Adding any more heat will cause it to overshoot your ideal point of doneness and it happens very quickly.

After the SV, I put the steak on the grill for 5 minutes until nicely coloured. I checked the temp of the steak at this point - 45C. I carved it straight away.

[heidih]

Seems like ages since I last posted dinner, haven't been cooking much lately because I sliced the top of my index finger off a few weeks ago. It was with a mandolin and although I managed to finish cooking that meal, it put me off cooking for a bit afterwards!

So it's time for a catch-up, a couple of simple to prepare dishes first to get me back into the kitchen;

Oh hell Prawncrackers - this is overwhelmingly appealing. And then you post this meal in the Chinese cooking topic. Splendid efforts!

[Keith_W]

Dakki, very nice I love mushrooms as an accompaniment for steak. BTW, you should consider carving up your steak (like mine) before serving. For some reason, it makes it seem more tender. I had no choice but to carve mine up ... that was 800gm of beef there, no way am I going to finish it by myself!

[C. sapidus]

djyee100 - that sounds like a killer salad.

Prawn - Glad that your finger is healing up and you are posting delectable meals again.

Gorgeous rib eyes all around, too.

Simple meal tonight - Vietnamese caramel pork ; steamed broccoli tossed with fried garlic; and jasmine rice.

[mm84321]

Tonight I made lamb chops. I marinated them over night with coriander, fennel, cumin, and some herbs. I made a puree of roasted cipollini onions with red wine. This was very good. Some arugula, too. The lamb jus was a touch too sweet after I reduced it. I'm not sure why. It was all good, nonetheless.

[mgaretz]

Simple meal tonight - Vietnamese caramel pork ; steamed broccoli tossed with fried garlic; and jasmine rice.

Bruce, that pork looks and sounds yummy - can you elaborate?

[rarerollingobject]

It got to 37 degrees Celsius in Sydney today (that's 99F!) so your humble RRO was both melting and requiring something refreshing and cold to eat; having found this cute lil wasabi stem on the weekend, I had it with salmon sashimi and cold green tea soba noodles with nori, green onions and a tsuyu dipping sauce.

I don't have a proper wasabi or even ginger grater so the texture wasn't quite right but it definitely packed a punch.

[nikkib]

Grouse, Pumpkin Puree, Cabbage, Pancetta, Spuds and a scrappy red wine reduction:

Grouse looks wonderful.

Here is a partridge breast I cooked recently. It's sitting on some glazed chestnuts, a porcini and pear ragout, sauteed foie gras, and a sauce made from partridge stock, a little white port, madeira and a compound butter of foie gras.

Next up is wood pigeon.

That partridge looks amazing!!

[C. sapidus]

Simple meal tonight - Vietnamese caramel pork ; steamed broccoli tossed with fried garlic; and jasmine rice.

Bruce, that pork looks and sounds yummy - can you elaborate?

Sure, and thank you. The recipe is "caramelized minced pork" from Andrea Nguyen's outstanding Into the Vietnamese Kitchen. Fry yellow onion until soft, add ground or minced pork and brown, and then add fish sauce, caramel sauce, and a little sugar. Stir and cook until the juices are gone and the pork fries in its rendered fat and turns reddish-brown. Finish with chopped scallions.

For more about the book, see an excerpt in the Daily Gullet.

Edited November 14, 2011 by C. sapidus (log)

[mgaretz]

Simple meal tonight - Vietnamese caramel pork ; steamed broccoli tossed with fried garlic; and jasmine rice.

Bruce, that pork looks and sounds yummy - can you elaborate?

Sure, and thank you. The recipe is "caramelized minced pork" from Andrea Nguyen's outstanding Into the Vietnamese Kitchen. Fry yellow onion until soft, add ground or minced pork and brown, and then add fish sauce, caramel sauce, and a little sugar. Stir and cook until the juices are gone and the pork fries in its rendered fat and turns reddish-brown. Finish with chopped scallions.

For more about the book, see an excerpt in the Daily Gullet.

Thanks Bruce. I will have to get the book. I copied the recipe for the caramel sauce from the link above, but is it something you can buy in an Asian market?

[mgaretz]

Tonight we had chuck roast, cooked as per Douglas Baldwin's suggestions in his Sous Vide for the Home Cook. I started with a nice piece of boneless, Angus, chuck roast. Seared it for 2 minutes per side on the BBQ, bagged and vacuum sealed with a light sprinkle of 21 Seasoning Salute (a Trader Joes spice blend) and a touch of fresh ground pepper. In the bath for about 28 hours at 130F. I took it out of the bath, dried with paper towel and back onto the hot BBQ for another two minutes per side.

OMG! One of the most flavorful and tender pieces of meat ever!

I made a jus from the bag juices by heating them in a small sauce pan with a little more 21 Seasoning Salute, pepper and salt. Didn't bother to strain it so it was a bit cloudy, but yummy! Served with some steamed broccoli from our CSA and salad (not pictured).

The picture was taken mid-meal as everyone was so hungry that I forgot to take a picture until we were half-way through!

[Hassouni]

Thanks Bruce. I will have to get the book. I copied the recipe for the caramel sauce from the link above, but is it something you can buy in an Asian market?

I go to Vietnamese and other Asian markets a lot and have never seen it, but it's really easy to make at home and keeps pretty much indefinitely.

Tonight we had chuck roast, cooked as per Douglas Baldwin's suggestions in his Sous Vide for the Home Cook. I started with a nice piece of boneless, Angus, chuck roast. Seared it for 2 minutes per side on the BBQ, bagged and vacuum sealed with a light sprinkle of 21 Seasoning Salute (a Trader Joes spice blend) and a touch of fresh ground pepper. In the bath for about 28 hours at 130F. I took it out of the bath, dried with paper towel and back onto the hot BBQ for another two minutes per side.

OMG! One of the most flavorful and tender pieces of meat ever!

I made a jus from the bag juices by heating them in a small sauce pan with a little more 21 Seasoning Salute, pepper and salt. Didn't bother to strain it so it was a bit cloudy, but yummy! Served with some steamed broccoli from our CSA and salad (not pictured).

The picture was taken mid-meal as everyone was so hungry that I forgot to take a picture until we were half-way through!

That looks amazing, I've never seen chuck served like that, it looks really steak-like. I'm starting to think maybe this sous vide thing is all it's cracked up to be.

[mgaretz]

That looks amazing, I've never seen chuck served like that, it looks really steak-like. I'm starting to think maybe this sous vide thing is all it's cracked up to be.

I was a skeptic too. I tried the "beer cooler hack" with a throw-away styrofoam cooler and wasn't impressed with the results. Tried again with a stock pot on the stove and me being the PID controller. That steak came out great so I took the plunge and got a Sous Vide Supreme. It's been great, especially for meats, fish, chicken and eggs. Haven't been too impressed with it for veggies yet.

[Hassouni]

I'm intrigued about fish....what do you use SV for with fish?

[mm84321]

Experienced plucking my first bird today. A Pheasant.

I diced the liver and seared it quickly in duck fat, then added minced onion to the pan, then mixed all together with some diced foie gras and stuffed it in the bird. Roasted for about 25 minutes. Made a jus from the roasting pan. It was good.

[threestars]

Nice recipe outcome of the bird!

I miss eating broccoli. I will definitely buy tomorrow at the farmers market and steam some.

[mgaretz]

I'm intrigued about fish....what do you use SV for with fish?

Salmon and shrimp so far. Perfect way to cook both without the risk of overcooking.

[ScottyBoy]

ARG! Prawn and Keith are killing me!

[djyee100]

I copied the recipe for the caramel sauce from the link above...

The recipe may sound complicated because Nguyen is giving you a blow by blow account of what happens in the cooking process. But the caramel sauce is actually very simple. You're mixing a simple syrup of sugar and water and letting it burn to a certain point. Believe me, I've accidentally burned caramel when prepping desserts, and it's easy to do. I encourage you to give the sauce a try.

When I make Vietnamese caramel sauce, I fill a stainless steel bowl with ice water and keep that in the sink. It's there to cool down the sauce when you want to stop the cooking action. Just make sure it will fit your pan comfortably.

I start the sugar-water mixture on high heat until it boils. Then I lower the heat to medium and let it simmer. When the mixture begins to smoke, that's when I watch it carefully. You want the caramel to darken to the point that it looks like black coffee with a reddish cast to it. I'll even move the pan off the burner to get it under better light--once I see that black coffee/reddish cast look, the sauce is done. I pop the pan into the icewater bath, and add the last of the water to the mixture. Ta da. It's done.

A jar of this sauce will keep indefinitely at room temp in the pantry.

And for dinner here--

A winter salad of greens (mesclun, arugula, frisee), thin apple slices, bacon, shavings of sharp cheddar, and toasted walnuts. For the dressing, a white wine vinaigrette. This was a good combo, I'd make it again.