Dinner! 2002

[Jinmyo]

Suppli (deep-fried balls of risotto with saffron around a piece of lobster tail meat surrounded with butter).

Gai lan (Chinese broccoli) sauteed with butter and garlic.

Thin slices of rare leg of lamb with jus and braised tiny onions.

Polenta with crispy lardons from double-smoked local bacon and a wild mushroom gravy (from reconstituted dried porcini, morels, lobster, matsutake).

Pureed watercress soup.

Crostini with Stilton, a chevre fin I unfortunately discovered was past its prime and had to pull, and perfect camembert.

[pnapoli]

monkfish stew with chorizo, green peppers and squash served over yellow rice. yum.

[SpicyJenny]

Oh, yea, I love this! I'm always boring my email recipients with details on what I am preparing for our big meal of the day, which is usually around 2pm, in the Latin American tradition of having the large meal around then, followed by "siesta". I love describing what I'm going to have or what I had for "comida" of the day. At this time in my life, I'm only cooking for my husband and myself. I closed my restaurant, "Spicy Jenny's" last year. Sold it. In order to take care of stuff at home. It was a small restaurant, but we had daily specials that could subsitute for anyone's big meal of the day. I loved cooking in quantity this way, and always searched for new sources of inspiration. From cookbooks, of course, to whatever customers shared with me. I now do the same at home, what I did before and after the restaurant. And while my husband is the grateful recipient of my cooking, I look forward to a larger forum for sharing menu ideas, cooking techniques, recipe swapping. Whatever. Please, I hope this will be a popular discussion for all good foodies.

Edited December 13, 2002 by SpicyJenny (log)

[Rachel Perlow]

Lime-glazed Chicken Breast over a mixture of roasted vegetables (carrots, onion, pototoes, celery, tomato, mushrooms), drizzled with tehini

[Jinmyo]

Spinach, chopped, sauteed in butter, rolled in light green Napa cabbage leaves (blanched), sliced on the bias and set upright in a warm lemon "marmelade".

Lamb kidneys, very rare, sliced very thin, on crispy shredded leeks, with much pepper and lime zest.

Potage of leek and Yukon Gold potato with tarragon and croutons.

Ahi tuna steak (very rare) with mustard seed and panko crust with tapenade and small wedge of pomme Anna (salade nicoise joke).

Gorgonzola wrapped in ravioli floating in a chicken and lime broth with a bit of mint oil.

[torakris]

Dinners have been picking up.

Fri night

Thai style coconut curry with shrimp, cauliflower, red potatoes, and spinach

Jasmine rice

cucumber salad

Sat night

butternut squash risotto

spinach salad

Sun night

leftover curry, risotto, and pasta (Sat lunch)

[Toby]

"Drunken" pinto beans, hanger steak with serrano chile-lime-garlic salsa, sauteed spinach.

[Jinmyo]

Toby, I've just been speaking with someone making "drunken beans". They were simmered in water and chile oil. Then to be fried with onions, poblanos etc. and stored in the cooking water. Is this why they are called "drunken"? That is, no tequila or other booze?

[Toby]

No, I pretty much followed Rick Bayless' recipe in his Mexican Kitchen. I cooked the beans along with cubes of salt pork (he uses pork shoulder) for a couple of hours. Then fried diced bacon until crisp, removed bacon, drained off all but a few spoonfuls of fat and sauteed diced white onion and a lot (more than he uses) of sliced serrano peppers (or jalapenos) in the remaining fat, adding some chopped up garlic at the end, until the bacon was nice and brown. When the beans were tender, I added the onion-pepper mix and cooked for another 20 minutes or so. Just before serving, added around 1/4 cup (for 1 lb. beans) tequila and a big handful of chopped cilantro, plus the reserved cooked bacon pieces.

Edited December 16, 2002 by Toby (log)

[Jinmyo]

So why "drunken"?

[Toby]

The tequila. It makes the beans taste very mellow.

[Jinmyo]

So. My friend's recipe is a teetotaller bogus version. It's not about the moisture, it's about the tequila. Got it. Thanks.

[Jinmyo]

Steamed sa ho noodles rolled with dried shrimp and scallops with gai lan (Chinese broccoli).

Grilled rare rack of lamb rubbed with chiu chow chile oil.

Dashi with mussels.

Stir fried ong choy (Chinese "water" spinach) with silken tofu.

Gohan (Japanese white rice) with gomasio and optional green tea to pour over rice.

[Belmont3]

Dinner:

Tequilla-Lime mainated tenderloin, set atop wild rice polenta and roasted jalapeno rounds, garnished with a ancho chile sauce and guacamole quenelles, topped with fried tortilla shreds

[Miss J]

Jinmyo, may I ask for more info about the chiu chow chile oil?

Okay, so it's not really dinner, and I've already mentioned this on the food diary thread, but what the hell:

Christmas mulled-wine-and-nibbles party:

Samosas fried in ghee with tamarind chutney a la Suvir (I hope)

Prawns in the shell steamed in sake, served with nuoc cham

Crostini 1 - gorgonzola/mascarpone/marsala with figs

Crostini 2 - sauteed kale with pancetta

Gougeres

Bagna calda with lots of veg (fennel, endive, cherry tomatoes, yellow peppers, radishes, blanched sugar snap peas, blanched yellow beans)

Sausage rolls (request from the bf, for whom there can be no Chrimbo gathering without sausage rolls)

Teeny blinis with smetana, trout roe (very pretty) and garlic chives

Sichuan strange-flavour peanuts

Chocolate-covered toffee, mince pies

Mulled wine

I have lots of food left over. (It's not my fault, both my mother and my grandmother are known for the same thing. It's hereditary.) Look for "101 creative uses for leftover nibbles," coming soon to the Dinner thread.

[Jinmyo]

Jinmyo, may I ask for more info about the chiu chow chile oil?

Miss J, it's kind of smoked with ground chiles in, uh, oil.

edit:

I purchased it. Here it is:

An authentic hot chili sauce originated in Chiu Chow, China. Prepared from the finest preserved chili, this sauce is hot!

Edited December 16, 2002 by Jinmyo (log)

[Jinmyo]

wild rice polenta

Is this polenta with wild rice stirred in?

[Belmont3]

Jinmyo,

Yes it is then we , then we cooled it in a sheet pan and used a cookie cutter to cut out same-sized rounds of the cornbread and polenta.

[Jinmyo]

I see. Did you reheat in a skillet? If so, what kind of oil?

[Belmont3]

Actually if the truth must be told, we cut out the rounds and stacked them together , one on top of each other , with some butter between, then wrap for storage. We then would reheat in the microwave for about 1-1.5 minutes after the tenderloin was grilled and ready to plate.

[Jinmyo]

Belmont3, I understand completely. I like the crust one gets on polenta on flatop or pan with some butter so I'd probably go with that though.

[Priscilla]

Lessee...the other evening friends over two nice pieces of CAB top sirloin whose cooking residue then browned shallots and then was deglazed with red wine and then was enriched with butter. Big pile o' twice-cooked frites, mayonnaise. Salad of surprisingly inspiringly nice red leaf, and as you know, red leaf ain't themost inspiring of veg. Baguette from a Vietnamese French baker.

[Bond Girl]

I have a tendency to make the same things over a few times and trying different variations of the dish. So, the current favorites of the months are:

*Roasted chestnut soup with fried Jerusalem Artchokes and truffle oil.

*Tuna Tartare with cilantro, basil, scallion, chilli oil and pink Hawaiian sea salt

*Raw citrus flavored scallop sashimi

*Wild mushroom risotto

*Pan seared striped Bass with parsnip mashed potatos and sauteed quince and apples (Am still trying to find the missing ingridient for the right balance. There's something that's rather blah about this one!)

*Roasted Cod with sake miso glaze over rice.

[mixmaster b]

Suppli (deep-fried balls of risotto with saffron around a piece of lobster tail meat surrounded with butter).

Gai lan (Chinese broccoli) sauteed with butter and garlic.

Thin slices of rare leg of lamb with jus and braised tiny onions.

Polenta with crispy lardons from double-smoked local bacon and a wild mushroom gravy (from reconstituted dried porcini, morels, lobster, matsutake).

Pureed watercress soup.

Crostini with Stilton, a chevre fin I unfortunately discovered was past its prime and had to pull, and perfect camembert.

This whole dinner sounds wonderful!

Can you say a bit more about the Suppli? I have never heard of them. Do you dip the lobster in butter, then form a risotto ball around it? I wonder if another ingredient could be subbed for the lobster.

Also, was it leftover risotto, or made specifically for the dish?

Thanks!

[Stephanie]

My favorite winter beef stew. It consists of stew meat, roasted garlic, assorted root vegetables (parsnip, rutabaga, carrot, potato), red wine, beef broth, thyme, sage, parsley, and pepper. Throw together in a Dutch oven and simmer for 1 hour.

The red wine that went into it was a Cavas del Valle 2000 Malbec. Spicy and sturdy--flavor did not disappear that a less-strong wine like a Merlot would. Good drinking too.