John called me a few weeks ago and said “Do you want a whole artisanal Tennessee ham?” “Sure,” I said, on account of I’m not a complete idiot. “Why and how?” The band’s publicist, it turns out, during or after Bonnaroo, had been driving around and stopped at some joint in Gallatin for lunch. The ham sandwich–smoky, fatty, and piled high for $6–was one of the best he’d tasted. So he talked to the proprietor,…
Category: Awesomeness
I was out of town, so this link is a few days late. The new issue of Chronogram came out on the first, and in it is my profile of a Benedictine monk who makes extraordinary vinegars. I’ve been messing around with them a great deal in the kitchen, and they are a joy to use and to eat. photo by the not-at-all sour Jennifer May
John’s birthday party was Friday, and it was to be an all-finger food potluck. I didn’t have a ton of time to plan or shop, so I made do with things around the house, centering on two forms of duck from the freezer. I defrosted a moulard breast and two pieces of foie gras–both local–and went outside to pick currants. The pink and white currant bushes I planted last fall have taken off, loving their new environs and fruiting prolifically. I got just shy of two pounds of fruit from them both, doing a not very thorough job so there will be more to enjoy in the coming days.
What do you do when “burgers” is the request for dinner and there’s no ground beef in the house? Visit the chest freezer, for starters, to grab a bag of local, grass-fed stew beef. Then, because it’s so lean, a goodly portion of homemade prosciutto fat, and because a custom grind clamors to be bespoke, a handful of herbs (lime thyme, chives, oregano) and a clove of garlic. The result (plus a pinch of salt…
Friday night Mike and Claudia, our favorite celebrities, came over, but this time Mike cooked for us. It had been suggested by my wife that some Korean barbecue might be in order, since she had seen him make it on Bourdain’s TV show (he loaned us the DVD) and couldn’t shake the craving. (If you watch the Hudson Valley episode, you can see it too, as well as Mike’s then 10-year-old daughter completely pwning Bourdain…
So before I get to the Brooklyn post, I want to put up a little palate-cleanser. Today my lovely wife hurt her back choreographing a piece for an upcoming performance, and after suffering through the afternoon and a comforting dinner (to be featured shortly) she intimated that something sweet sure would hit the spot. So I suggested that maybe I might sort of be able to wrangle something along those lines while she put the…
Improvising dinner is a funny thing; sometimes–like two posts ago–it fails utterly in the absence of attentive preparation. Usually it works fine, especially when it treads familiar, well-worn paths of technique and ingredients. And sometimes it exceeds wildest imaginings, making for a perfect plate of food. Happily, last night was such an instance. I did the usual pre-dinner survey, pulling various containers and vegetables out of the fridge, and took stock. (I actually took stock…
Well, not really. Prince Edward Island, actually. But I was channeling our Belgian brethren, inspired by the bag of fat, juicy bivalves in the fridge and the memories of all the moules frites I used to enjoy at my favorite spot in République back when I got paid to go to Paris every fall. Sigh. Keeping it simple, I steamed them in beer with our very own carrots, beet greens, garlic mustard, and ramps. I…
So, after much finagling, Claudia and Michael came for dinner. I know that this has been something she’s been waiting for for ages, mostly because she lives in freaking Kentucky and has WAY too much time on her hands, and I’m all about charity. But we pretended that we were happy too, and there was only a small amount of awkward throat-clearing, foot-shuffling, and sidelong watch-glancing while I scrambled to make like a million courses to keep them amused.
I’m deep into working on an important project in the studio right now, so I was stressed out and impatient prior to their arrival (which, you know, always makes the food taste better) and even more so after they arrived, on account of she’s a giant pain in the ass. But, because I literally lie awake at night thinking about dinner parties, I even had something ready in the fridge: tartare of miso-cured Arctic char with ramps and crispy skin. I had rubbed the char with miso a couple of days ago (these were the trimmings from the sushi) and gave it a rinse this afternoon, then cut off the skin. The flesh I chopped super-fine–too much, really; it got a bit gluey–then mixed it with finely chopped ramps, and the skin I put in a hot skillet with sesame seeds until it was well-browned on both sides. Putting it skin-side down first helps keep it stuck to the pan long enough to stay flat, so that it makes a good cracker for tartare-eating. I also added sesame oil, usukuchi, sudachi juice, and white pepper to the mix for a nice complex flavor profile. Garlic chive, red mustard, and the crispy skin cracker all added contrasts flavoral and textural.
I took the bone from Sunday’s lamb leg and put it in our huge stockpot with some aromatics with a goal of producing many quarts of some highly flavorful and polyvalent stock. I love lamb with phở flavors; since there’s significant overlap with many Moroccan spices there’s a natural sympatico with the rich, gamy meat. So to the pot I added the following: a charred onion, a charred thumb of ginger, a carrot, some fresh…