Food with Friends April

I have two very dear friends who will be celebrating 35 years of friendship.  (I have been friends with them for 27 of those years).  When my friend, N, mentioned this to me, I remarked, "I would like to host a dinner party to celebrate!"

Though she has been my friend all these many years, she has never been to my home.  She is one of those folks for whom you could visit their home at at any time and all would be in order.  This compared to EPA clean up requirements on my home.

Having this on the books gives me progress again of my non-resolutions of "more food with friends" after last year's disastrous year where work overtook life.

I'm thoughtfully putting together a menu.  This is a 'know it when I see it task' meaning I have to meander around food 'stuff' to determine what I want to fix, and how all of that sits with me.  It is one of the banes (and there are many boons) to being a highly intuitive person.  Unfortunately, there are many choices for food offerings, so winnowing selection down can be a time consuming task. And, once the selection is made, one has to fight the urge to see if there is some other combination of foods that will suit better. 

With the event being April 30, I wanted a dinner that was fancy but also gives a nod to spring.  To this end, I found a lovely recipe for a Beef Tenderloin Roasted in a Salt Crust.  This is served over a warm potato salad with spinach and gorgonzola and walnuts.  This fits the bill. However, it does represent a technique that I've not used before which involves wrapping the tenderloin in a salt crust (after browning).  I've read through a few recipes and it seems that the 'failures' fall into "too salty" and "overcooked", even though it was removed at temp reading, the meat in the salt crust continued to march toward a higher temperature--taking it from the desired cooking doneness  to an undesireable.  I'm seeing mixed reviews on saltiness.  I did see one method which wrapped the meat in parchment paper first prior to the salt crust.  I'm going to make some amendments to reduce my risks (parchment) and taking it out about 10 degrees cooler than my target temp.

I played around in my head on having a cold soup first course.  I've amended that to serving crabcakes with spicy avocado sauce reducing the portions from main course to first course.  We will finish up  with the cuban opera cake. 

I need to muddle my way through appetizers, and may simply have some very simple offerings.

Why not plan a food with friends gathering with your compatriots?


French Bread

Yesterday I made for the first time french bread.  I was motivated by purchasing at my local Salvage Store a Chicago Metallic Commercial baking pan for 2 French Loaves.  I've always assumed that French bread was fairly simple to make.  There is quite a bit of technique involved.  The Joy of Baking is a fabulous place to get started if you have a hankering to learn how to make this heavenly bread.




What I liked about this video (which I watched after I made my bread), is that it is a terrific exposition of both the craft/technique of making this bread.  It is TOTALLY different than any other bread that I have made.

What's the difference?  Well, it is a room temperature process.  Not using warm water.  Not using a warm place to rise.  I didn't fully understand this when I used the directions from FineCooking.  Rather, I used warm water (and they said to use tepid water, and I just didn't understand that reasoning.  Ignorance on my part).

The JoB video has great commentary regarding what one is trying to accomplish with the special techniques.  So while I undertook my bread baking journey partially ignorant, my end result was spectacular.  There are several different techniques out there.  Why not undertake a French bread bake?

More Amazon Surprises



Well the above is not such a great deal.  I noted that this vendor had a number of used items for $99,999.   each.  I reported them to Amazon.  I got an immediate and appropriate response back.  I've noticed this before--ridiculous prices on items by 3rd party merchants. However, none so ridiculous as this.

I'm a price checker.  Often I find the best prices on Amazon; however, I never buy anything of substance without doing a query on the internet. I needed a pair of sewing scissors.  I found, to my surprise, a significant discount offered through Ebay to include shipping.

I've been angling to get a nakiri-style knife.  I found something tangentially similar, through some serendipitous internet search,  from none other than Ken Onion. I just love his name!  I found prices from $159.99 to $69.99 for the $200 retail knife.  The lowest price was from Amazon.


This was a stupendous value for a knife of this quality.  I would note that it is not a substitute for a chef's knife, but would be a great complement to deepening your knife bench.  Knives are like clothes.  If you have a good basis, then you can watch for exceptional deals that present themselves.  A good knife, well cared for, will last you a lifetime.  Cheap knives, like cheap clothes, are not worth the money.

Home Cured Corned Beef

Home Cured Corned Beef

My home cured corned beef, which I wrote about here, was excellent.  It had been in its brine spa since last Saturday.  Yesterday I rinsed it off and cooked it in the clay pot cooker.  It was the only time I've not awakened in the middle of the night parched.  I was so happy with the results, I don't know that I will ever buy commercially corned beef again.

This process was also a reminder that sometimes mysterious processes are really quite accessible to regular folk such as us!

I hope that you'll give this a try.


Corned Beef Curing

I plan to cure my own beef to make corned beef for St. Patrick's Day.  It is something that I have wanted to do, but just did not get organized about learning how to etc.  I remember seeing it in my Julia Child cookbook.  It is basically a liberal dry rub, but requires about 2 weeks and then 2 days to desalinate. I would call this the dry method.

Curing.  I'm using  Mark Ruhlman's exposition of how to do this using a brine method.  I would call this the wet method, and it takes about 1/2 the time.   Amazing Ribs also has a nice exposition which you can find here.  I'm a big fan of researching more than one method to ensure that I have a reasonably good understanding of the process. I'll experiment when I have more time--and in fact, I might just start the dry method concurrent with the wet method and have corned beef 2x in one month.

Here's another resource , at the Home Preserving Bible, for some technical information on brining liquid strengths and composition of curing liquids.

Cooking.  Well, curing is the initial stage. It still has to be prepared.  Last year I found Elise's method on Simply Recipes.  Frankly, I would not bake corned beef on its own as I suspected there is a high risk of failure for having an acceptably moist and tender outcome--and some of the comments on the site affirmed that suspicion.  Accordingly, I elected to conscript my Romertopf into service last year after years of sitting around unloved. And set off to find a method.

In researching clay pot methods, I found a fabulous method using the Romertopf cooker which has several points of intersection with Simply Recipes.  I used this last year, and I will not go back.

I'm looking forward to seeing how my curing experiment will fare.

P. S.  This is a picture of what it looked like, fast forward, on St. Patrick's day.

Service!

My text message said that my delivery from Amazon from UPS would be delayed a day.  That was not a problem.  I awaited package was some curing salt for making a DIY corned beef.  A new venture for me.

At 7:30 p.m. the familiar lighted outline of the big brown truck at the driveway (gated to keep the vermin in) alerted both me and the vermin that something was delivered.  The UPS driver was not our regular driver, and in fact the package had been placed on the wrong route truck. 

"I was not expecting you.  I got a text saying that my packaged would come tomorrow which would have been perfectly fine,"  I shouted as I jogged down the driveway.

The driver jumped out of the truck, package in hand.  "This was put on the Lanexa truck, and I called the regular driver and he gave me directions.  I thought it might be a birthday present, and I wanted to make sure it was not late and delivered today.."

I admired his good service.  "Tomorrow would have been just fine.  I appreciate your delaying getting home in order to deliver this.  That's exceptional service."

Out in the country our UPS drivers are like an extension of our family.  We've had the same driver for as long as I remember.  This driver was just like our regular driver:  friendly, enthusiastic and dedicated to service.


The Fickle Hand of Fate

The fickle hand of fate has not been idle.  One cousin, K,  recently passed (last week).  Another cousin, D,  is dealing with a double mastectomy recovery.  One of my husband's colleagues (with whom I graduated with from high school), has not yet emerged to consciousness following surgery ten days ago.

The fickle hand of fate can finger any of us at any time, for good or naught. Over time, none escape its grasp==and sometimes it is a double fisted grab and shake.

K's death resulted from complications of a brain shunt blockage.  I think of her as my 'little cousin'.  There was 5 years age difference between us, and as kids that is a large differential--not so much now being 5 decades and change old.  Nevertheless, the imprint in the brain is from those many years ago when she was baby then toddler, then child in my child hood memories.

I have a very vivid memory of K being but a young child and being in a full body cast at one of our family reunions.  Here was this tow-headed, bright blue-eyed child swaddled in a cast. But cast or no, she was immersed in all activities--not shuttered away, or overly protected.

She was born with spina bifida, hence requiring the shunt, and the surgeries, and the arm braces and the wheel chair.  But she never let that tether her spirit nor inhibit her independence. The shunt was required to drain brain fluid.  Recently it had become blocked, and necessary surgery not completed in time to negate the ill effects of the built up pressure in her brain.  Prior to surgery she coded three times. In my aunt's relaying that information to one of my uncles, he interpreted it, and then it was communicated that she had died.

I harbored a hope that once she awakened from surgery, there would be a great laugh about the mixup.  Unfortunately, she never awakened from the surgery.  No laughs, just tears as the family awaited results of brain tests which confirmed that she had suffered irreversible brain stem injury from some combination of the coding and the pressure build from the excess fluid. She was taken off of life support and she died peacefully surrounded by her family.

Despite her health circumstances, my aunt and uncle ensured that she led a life that enriched her and allowed her to flourish.  She worked for 20 years as a receptionist for a nearby nursing home. She was wry and witty, and she touched the lives of all that she met.

 She has always been my hero, as are her parents who created a loving, supportive home for her. Once off to college, then family, profession, I only saw her during infrequent family reunions.  Fortunately we had one just last fall.

I was able to spend some time at the hospital with her and my aunt and uncle and the many friends that came to visit. I saw K's brother, T, for the first time in decades and met his wife and one of his daughters. He has three children (I met one) and grandchildren.  My other cousin,  D, recovering from a double mastectomy sat with me for a couple of hours as we talked to our aunt who was enduring--with grace, courage and humor--the insufferable wait to determine the MRI tests.  


So even though I have few adult memories as our lives went different ways, I still feel close to my cousins. And as we get older and slog our way through life often we are reconnected by the gravitational pull of life's significant events.  These events serve as a galvanizing force that quickly aligns our orbits harmonically so that we be a mini universe of love and support for all of the heavenly bodies that converge.

But only for a short time.  The gravitational pull of life's ordinary requirements quickly suck us back in.  We must feed the dogs; cut the grass; go to work; and make our way in life.  But the power of our connections with others ensure that when we are fingered by fate for a life transitions,--birth, marriage, divorce, health issues, death--the heavenly bodies of our friends an families will enter our orbit to see us through such a transition be it a fleeting or permanent one.

My husband's colleague is perhaps the most tragic of all of these events.  Undergoing surgery to correct spinal stenosis, he apparently suffered a stroke during the operation.  He's my age.  He has not recovered consciousness, and has had to be moved to another hospital.  He's the primary breadwinner, and this circumstance is becoming a dire one in so many ways. 

It's not hard to look about and cultivate perspective when we feel consumed with the troubles of life.

Plan to Eat


I found this wonderful program, Plan to Eat With the program, grabbing, organizing, manipulating, and printing recipes could not be easier. I have been using it for a little while, and I have found it to be easy to use, robust in its platform, rich in features, and just a huge time saver when it comes to helping to plan meals.

I will not lie to you, I've never been so organized as to plan my meals.  However, for large dinners (Thanksgiving and dinner parties) it is a great way to aggregate recipes and create a shopping list.  Further, yields are easily managed to scale up (or down) recipes.  Sure, there are many programs that offer these items, but for me, this one has the right features, right platform and right price (I paid a full year @ $39(.

If I were the organized-about-my-regular-meals type, this would be a great way to execute on that.  For now, I know when I see a great recipe I can get it, have proper attribution from where I got it, and have it easily searchable.  There's a great 30 day trial. You can click the link below and determine if you have an interest.
Simple Meal Planning - Plan to Eat