World Enough And Time

Before I get carried away with whatever the hell I’m going to write about, you should all head over to Diana’s to read my guest post about my Grandmother’s best of all time pie crust and make it for yourselves. It’s fast, easy, and is guaranteed to kick the ass of whatever recipe you’re using now.

So what am I going to write about? Well, I was going to write about something from a while ago because it tasted good and the pictures are pretty, but instead I’ll cover tonight’s dinner while it’s still fresh in my mind. It also tasted good and you can let me know if you think the pictures are sufficiently attractive.

I spent much of the day churning out more ceramics, since it’s been months and months since I worked with clay. I was feeling it too; I made a bunch of good new pieces in the six hours I spent there. I had the foresight to defrost a couple of lamb chops before heading out, and got home in plenty of time to make dinner, which was a welcome bonus. These chops are lovely, and the meat is very tender and highly lamby, but as you can see there’s a pretty high ratio of fat to meat. Since I wasn’t pressed for time, I spent a couple of minutes cutting out all of the luscious meat and tying it up into two little roulades, saving the bones or stock of course. I do this with rib eyes, too; it’s a nice way to wring another meal out of a piece of meat, and makes for more elegant eating.

Speaking of elegant eating, those are chanterelles foraged by a friend there in the background.

We loves us some sautéed zucchini around here–it’s one of the kid’s favorite dishes–but this time I figured I’d do something different and made it into a gratin with milk, stock, and smoked gouda. It was not the worst decision I’ve ever made.

And I also made a pot of polenta. There was some beautiful and 100% homegrown ratatouille in the fridge, but not enough to heat up and use as a side, so I stick-blended it smooth along with a bit of wine and mustard. Once the roulades had cooked, and been followed by the mushrooms in the same pan, I poured in a splash of wine to deglaze it and then added the ratatouille purée and a handful of capers to make a sort of ketchup.

In a perfect world, that sprig of parsley would have been turned into a bright green oil with some rosemary in it for good measure, and the ratatouille ketchup needs some tinkering to be as good as it wants to be: grilled flavors, maybe, or olives for a tapenade slant. But on the whole, this was a pretty good weeknight dinner given that I didn’t actually have a plan when I got started. Having the luxury of a little more time than usual made all the difference.