I didn't cook this....

But I wish I could...well - I will learn.

I went to my favorite Columbia restaurant for dinner on Saturday night. The pictures below do not do it justice, but you can see the magnificence in the food anyway. I have had three meals there and will not stop until I have sampled as much of the menu as I can. So far, I have had the POMEGRANATE HONEY MUSTARD GLAZED ROASTED ½ CORNISH GAME HEN with Fennel Sausage, Sage & Walnut Stuffing and French Beans. I was in awe. I hate stuffing. Loathe it. Ask my family. After this, I wanted more. It was .... incredible.

Second visit I had my first ever meal of duck. I ordered ROASTED DUCK BREAST Sweet Potato, Corn & Andouille Sausage Hash and Bourbon & Sage Glace. Medium rare was the recommendation and medium rare it was. I ALMOST licked the plate. I decided it would be poor form and held back. I knew what my next try was going to be and this time was last Saturday night.

I will NEVER have anything bad to say about Victoria Gastro Pub in Columbia. Let me tell you about it.

Made my reservation on Wednesday via Open Table. Love that app. Works like a charm. We were seated right away and it was a nice little table in the back. After taking drinks order and then the entreè order, we waited. Normally, things are not long here and dinner would have been out shortly after. We didn't order an appetizer since I knew dinner was going to be great and I wanted dessert. The biscuits came out.  They are amazing little bits of love and warm out of the oven they beg for butter. Again - I wish the pics would do this justice. It was dark and I failed to bring my camera.

After a bit a manager came up to the table with this plate of deliciousness....

It turns out that my dinner - the Pork Wellington - had been overdone a bit and they would not serve it to me like that.

CHECK IT - THEY WOULDN'T GIVE ME SUB-STANDARD FOOD!! How many places do you go to that will not only insist on perfection, but will let you know what's up AND give you an appetizer while you wait? I would have been delighted at the information, the cheese plate was icing...so to speak.

I watch Hell's Kitchen and I see Ramsay go bonkers over stuff that comes to the pass wrong. I wasn't sure how often that would actually happen when the cameras aren't rolling, but here at Victoria; they have quality control and it shows.

So this is an awesome plate and the honey goat cheese was amazing and the pickles are amazing and the other cheese was amazing....

BUT THEN....

...dinner arrived. I heard music and love and angels and little children laughing and puppies and....

it was so good, good isn't good enough. Amazing isn't good enough. Spectacular kinda scratches the surface.

I wanted MORE.

This is one of the BEST meals I have ever had in the world. Really. The world. You all know where I have been and eaten.

Afterward I tried an English Trifle and it was perfect. Not too sweet, not too big, flavors melded beautifully.

The staff there are great. Friendly without being overbearing, attentive without being in your business and genuinely interested in making your experience the best it can be. Our server this time was a guy who picked a St Bernardus Wit for me and it was perfect. He really did it right. I love going to a place and not feel rushed to turn the table over.

I will eat there again and again.

Thanks Victoria!

Cornmeal pancakes and ribs...

Well, I just finished the lunch that I had planned for yesterday. I am reading a book sent to me by my sister Kim. It is AB's Feasting on Asphalt - The River Run. One of the dishes that he had on that trip was some BBQ ribs over corn pancakes. I thought - hmmmmm.

Talk about filling. I found a recipe for the cakes on the inter-webbernets using the Googles (beware the Googles - they are everywhere!) and made them today after doing the ribs yesterday. I am stuffed to the gills. Four of the griddle born muffins (yes, they are more like muffins then cakes) and three ribs and I need a nap. It was pretty good, but I will say that when choosing the sauce, go with a more sweet than savory sauce for the ribs.

I have a couple pictures that I will throw in here, but no real walk through this time.

The batter - very thick. I wound up having to stir it too much so the resulting product was a little tougher than I would have liked.

On the griddle. Nuf said.

On the plate with the ribs. Yes, there's OJ. I am programmed from growing up at the Lewis house to have OJ with any kind of pancake.

Here's a top down view.

I'll do this again after I perfect the cornmeal pancake. Then I will give a full demo.

Have a good one.

Enjoy!

Friday night happieness...

One of my co-workers (who shall remain nameless - but he knows who he is) has been yammering ALL WEEK about steak, sauce, potato...yadda yadda yadda...blah blah blah....

I couldn't help myself.

Tonight, I bought a porterhouse.

Oven to 450º. Steak seasoned lightly with some secret seasonings (and of course salt) and combo cooked. I have AB to thank for teaching me to enjoy a steak that is not cooked over direct flame.

So - Here is the steak before the pan...The rub is just hanging out waiting for the pan...salt bringing water to the surface to help make that oh so good crusty crispy browned goodness....

Into the pan....of course you KNOW I was going to use cast iron. It retains heat like no-one's business and you can get it space shuttle hot without worrying....AND you can put it right into the oven. Anyway - side one!

Two minutes...by the way, it's an electric stove cranked up to make maximum heat! If you have gas, same same. Maximum heat. Two minutes later:

THEN into the oven. If you want rare, 2 minutes per side in the oven. If you want medium rare, three minutes per side in the oven.

When you are done, serve with steamed veggie (I chose broccoli today) and a baked potato.

It was guuuuuuud! (and rare by the way)

Enjoy!

I hate playing catch up ---

Yet I seem to procrastinate more than I should. Never the less...in my bid to get as many as I can put up before I start going crazy again, here be some deliciousness from the portable aisle.

Tamales. I love tamales. The first time I had them was at a Christmas get together at the home of the Lujan's. Esther would spend an entire day making these things and i used to think that they were oh-so-simple, why can't she make more? For me! By the dozens. What an amazing food. It's portable, nutritious, delicious and not as simple as I thought.

So, I basically whined about not having them until I saw AB make them. He made it look simple again. Well - simple from the aspect of not as hard as I imagined, but not as easy as you might think. Getting the meat done is easy. Getting the husks ready was easy. Getting the masa dough together was easy. Oh - and I LOVE the fact that there is lard in this application. Yes! ANIMAL FAT! Only the best for my healthy snacks. Don't get in a tizzy about it though. You can't beat the stuff for flavor and texture. Anyway - I digress. Putting the dough on the husk without ruining the husk and ensuring that it's spread properly and that you have enough room to properly roll the tamale....THAT'S tricky and takes practice.


So, with that, I'll make this disclaimer: I didn't take enough pictures. I'll have to add more the next time that I make them.

The meat is braised for a couple hours in a broth of stock and spices. The meat is then pulled out to cool a bit and then once cool enough to handle, shredded with a couple forks. The liquid from cooking is reserved for later use. The meat is then cooked a bit with some added aromatics and some of the liquid until the liquid is absorbed. It winds up looking like this:

After the meat is ready, the masa is made. Masa dough is made with - creatively enough - masa flour which is a corn flour. No gluten and VERY fine. The masa is mixed with the lard, some soda, some salt, and enough of the reserved liquid to make a moist dough that can be spread with the palm of your hand without breaking apart, but is also not too wet. You'll get it if you do it. You can see that it looks almost like cookie dough. The feel is different though.

The husks come to you dried. You must rehydrate them with hot hot water which takes about an hour. Once rehydrated, I stacked them into a container for easy access. Yeah, I took pictures late in the game. This one is the left over and had mostly dried back up.

I did three at a time. Three to a bundle that gets ties together. Oh - and DON'T FORGET THE STRING.

So, like I said, three at a time laid out in front of me with the masa in a bowl and the meat in a bowl so that I can dish masa, spread masa, dish the meat, roll the goodness and tie them up and move on.

You can see that the husks are thin and this is why they tear easily. Anyway, they get rolled into the bundle and set aside until ready for steaming.

Steam them for about 25 minutes or until you can see the dough start to pull away from the wrapper. Remove - CAREFULLY - and set aside to shove quickly into your face. They are really filling.

You can get just over a couple dozen with the application I used and that will feed up to 6 very happy people.

When I get more pictures, I will add them and the details that go with them.

Enjoy!

Almost forgot -

I promised someone a good method to making clarified butter. I have done this and it works nicely.

This is not my trick. There are a BO-zillion ideas about clarified butter I am sure. This one is from AB. I like it. I use it.


_______________________________________________________

Melt a pound of butter in a heavy saucepan over low heat and slowly cook until the bubbling ceases and the liquid turns clear, 30-40 minutes.

Strain and cool, being sure to leave any solids in the bottom of the pan.

Or, once the butter has cleared, remove from heat and add two inches of hot tap water. Since it's less dense than water, the now clarified butter will float to the top.

And in a few hours in the refrigerator will solidify it into a big yellow Frisbee that you can lift out and use. Use it immediately or wrap in wax paper and refrigerate or add foil and freeze it for up to 2 months.

Simple tonight...

It's a workday tomorrow so tonight is an easy meal, but good. I had already prepared the bird this past weekend.

Quite simply, it's 40 cloves of garlic (not 40 HEADS, cloves. One little piece off a head is a clove in case you didn't know), one disassembled chicken (I don't use the wings - those buggers get saved for hot wings), some Olive Oil, fresh thyme , a little flour and salt and pepper.

Turn on the oven to 350 and peel the garlic cloves. Use the bigger cloves and save the little ones for something else. You might need three heads. DON'T use Elephant garlic for this. It isn't really garlic. It's more closely related to leeks. Honest. Check this if'n you don't believe me.

Get an oven proof skillet hot with 2 Tbs of the oil. Salt and pepper the bird, coat with flour and place in said skillet to brown. You should know by now which pan is being used in my kitchen. Dense, oven safe and the most full of awesome skillet there is.

See those thighs in the middle? That's what you are shooting for.

Once browned nicely, add 1/2 cup of oil, the garlic and about 10-15 sprigs of FRESH thyme and clamp a cover on the concoction. It then goes into the oven for about an 60 - 90 minutes. Start checking at the lower amount of time. Nothing worse than dry fowl. It's foul.

I know what you are thinking. ALL THAT GARLIC?? It isn't horrifying, it won't scare off vampires and it won't make your breath any worse than it already is. When garlic is cooked like this, it gets sweet and buttery.

When the chicken gets to an internal temp of about 160, pull it out and let it rest for a few minutes. Remember carry over will bring that temp up some. I chose some long grain rice and a nice french loaf to accompany. That now soft and buttery garlic? Check it out. The slice on the left has one clove of garlic, like you see on the right piece, spread over it. Yum.

Enjoy.

Leek and Potato soup

I have always liked soup in winter. The thing is that they have always been kind of typical soups....Chicken, beef vegetable, chili (yes it's a soup more than a stew)...that sort of thing. But I always wanted more. Something I could make that would be simple, good and filling on a cold winter evening. I stumbled across this soup in a restaurant and decided that I wanted to learn to make it. I was even more pleased when I found that Alton Brown has an application for it.

Needless to say, I tried his first. There is a very popular Julia Child application and that is next. I need a bunch of leeks though.

I'm out. I guess they are my new favorite allium. So good and full of yum.

So, here is the soup. It isn't difficult and it allowed me to use my Christmas gift from Jeremy. You start with the leeks, trimmed and split. They need to be washed first. If you want to know why they should be washed...please note the number of devices on the cutting board here <-----

Now please note the amount of dirt that came off them...

No joke. Wash your leeks. And behind your ears. That's what mom says.

They go into a pot to sweat and cook down for about 20 minutes. Of course they are chopped roughly.

After cooking them down for a while, add some vegetable stock and the potatoes. This cooks for another 20-25 minutes, or until the tubers are tender.

After cooking down, hit it with the immersion blender. Mine is a shiny new red KitchenAid model. It is sweet! Convertible - the head comes off for easy washing.

Then some salt to taste and white pepper is preferred to black (I have no white pepper here - grrrrr) and garnish with scallions.

It was oh-so smooth and delicious. Not only that, but filling.

I also did something out of scope of the application - I added cod to it. I was only able to get a fillet which I won't settle for again. I would prefer a decent size hunk to sit in the middle. The fillet broke up after being cooked in the milk (separate pan - I was concerned that the fish would affect the soup if I cooked it in the same pot) and it wound up being in pieces. It wasn't bad - the flavor was still good. I would prefer a larger chunk so I could place it in the middle and pour the soup over it.

Next time. I will make this again. Very good. Like I said, next time Julia's recipe.

Comfort Food ROCKS!

Today, I made meatloaf. No biggie, right? Usually. But this was a little different for me. I did my own thing with the application and I think it turned out pretty good. I like a dense meatloaf so avoided a lot of filler to lighten it up. Here's what I had:

Meatloaf Software -
½ a pound each of ground chuck, lamb and pork
1 egg
1 leek - just the white and a smudge of the green - about 3 inches worth
4 green onions - wilted leaves removed if any
1 clove of garlic
A small bunch of fresh parsley
1 heaping tsp ground thyme
¼ scant tsp ground cumin
4-5 oz (roughly) garlic flavored toasted bagel chips

Glaze Software
½ cup ketchup
½ heaping tsp ground cumin
a dash of Worcestershire sauce
a dash of hot pepper sauce (I used a habenero sauce I picked up in Jamaica)
1 (+ if you like) Tbs honey

Prep -

Preheat the oven to 325° F

The meat and egg go into a bowl. I use Clyde. It's easier.

The leek gets halved and rinsed. Trust me - you want to rinse. Look for my post on the Leek and Potato soup. There's a picture there that gives a good reason why. Here's what your leek half should look like --->

Both halves get sliced down their length into several pieces and then chopped for small pieces. One half gets set aside with the parsley which you will chop coarsely. The other goes with the rest of the vegetables. Finely mince the garlic clove. Finely chop the green onions. Place all into a sautè pan with a drizzle of oil to cover the bottom and a pinch of kosher salt. Sweat the veggies until softened.

While the vegetables are sweating, place the bagel chips into your food processor along with the spices and process until you have a fine mix. Don't be crazy about small bits that might be larger. Once the vegetables are done, add them to the bowl along with the reserved leek half and the parsley.

Add the crumb/spice mix, a good healthy pinch of kosher salt and some freshly ground black pepper. mix on slow speed until combined. You don't want to crush the meat. If doing by hand, just mix, don't squeeze the mixture.

Once mixed, place the meat into a 10 inch loaf pan and push it into the corners like you would normally. Here's the thing though - get some plastic wrap or waxed paper and place in the bottom of the pan so it overlaps the sides. The meat goes on this. I failed to take a picture but you will push the meat into the pan thusly <-----

Once in the pan, pop the meat out with the bits of the plastic or wax paper that are hanging over the sides and place the meat onto a sheet pan lined with parchment paper. If you are using a probe thermometer (and you SHOULD) place it into the loaf at a 45° angle ensuring that you only go halfway through the loaf. Don't touch the pan.

This goes into the hotbox which should be preheated by now. You did allow the oven to completely heat, right? While this is starting to bake, make the glaze.

Mix all the ingredients. Taste it. Adjust if you want. Taste again till you like the sweet/spicy balance and put it on the loaf about 15-20 minutes into the bake time.

It looks like this in the oven.

It looks like this on the plate. I didn't do mashers this time since I am fresh out of Idaho potatoes and didn't feel like venturing out.

I liked it overall. I will make a sandwich out of it tomorrow to see how it fares between slices of bread. I need to make some bread. I am sick of buying whole wheat. That's another blog topic.

Doing it again, I will add a little more garlic. I wanted a bit more in there. If you try this, let me know what you think.

Have a great week and thanks for dropping by.

New year - (hopefully) more food

Last year midsummer or so, I decided to order some items from King Arthur Flour company and at the same time I signed up for their email list. Yeah - so I am convinced that some of the poundage I lost earlier in the year and have since re-located, is directly contributed to the oh-so-good and amazingly evil concoctions that come out of that place in Vermont.

This first one to catch me up is from this very baker's haven. It is a simple application for making a batch of frighteningly easy to make (and eat) sticky buns.

Here are the basics.

The dough is assembled in a standard method for sweet dough. Mixing the ingredients by hand will require a heavy duty spoon until the dough starts to come together then you will need to knead. HA! Kneading is needed. HA!

Yeah - I am sick.

I use Clyde. You all know who Clyde is. The dough hook, medium fast speed until the dough is sticky and forms a mass that comes off the sides of the bowl but will kind of gather on the bottom. It will be sticky to handle. If doing by hand keep working it until it is at this point.

Once done, leave it in the bowl, covered, to rise. It needs to double in bulk. The cooler the room is, the longer it will take to rise. The cool thing is that this also has the effect of making the dough smoother and the final product much finer to eat.

After the rise, put it into the refrigerator for 8 - 24 hours. Hey - I said easy, not instant. You want quick, go to Cinnabon (disclaimer - this was NOT an endorsement) The dough can stay there up to three days.

After the time in the fridge, pull off about a third of the dough to make a batch. The rest stays in the fridge. I separate the rest into two little packets that look like this.

That's one packet. Not two. I mean, I make two extra packets but thought I really only needed to show the one. What's the point of taking a picture of two. So, yeah.

Ok, I decided that I didn't take enough pictures of the process. I'll take more when I do these again and post an update. (Anyone that believes that, please wave your hand.)

When you are ready to make the rolls, the pan must be prepared. Melted butter, brown sugar (KAF has a thing that they call Sticky Bun sugar, but I haven't ever purchased it. I tend to make some brown sugar fresh right before I make the buns), chopped pecans and maple syrup. The syrup gives it an extra amount of yum.

So, pull out your wad of dough (remember, three batches out of one dough) Flour the counter lightly and put your ball-o-dough onto it. Spread it out into an oval with your hands and then roll it out into a 10X18 (roughly) rectangle. This might take a couple tries. I have found that if the dough really starts to fight you, walk away for about 10 minutes and come back at it. Don't be freakish and break out the ruler though.

Once rolled out, it is sprinkled with the filling (cinnamon sugar mix or KAF has a filling called Baker's Cinnamon filling that is supposed to be good but again, I haven't ever purchased) and rolled. Here is where I wish I have a couple more pictures. When rolling the dough up, use your fingertips and work quickly as possible. It takes practice. You want to get as tight as possible in those inner rolls, but again don't get OC about it.

Once rolled divide into eight equal pieces and place into the prepared pan. Allow to rise until puffy. While they are rising preheat the oven. They will look like this:

I am lucky enough to have a warming drawer in my over (at home) and I set it to warm and let them rise in there.

After the nice rise, they go in the hot box for 40 minutes and they will look like this:

Let them cool about a minute or two. Not much longer because if they get too cool you can forget taking them from the pan easily thing. The sugar on the bottom will fasten itself to the pan like a gold digger to a New York banker.

When you turn them out, you will have the lovely deliciousness seen here.

Hope it was worth the read. Thanks for dropping by. More to come.