Selective Palate

Happy Valentines Day all! I know many people don’t like this holiday much but I actually find it nice. I know you should show your love all year long but I think it is nice to set aside a day of the year that you are allowed, no required to be all lovey dovey!

I also never turn down an opportunity to get or give gifts! Now I love flowers as much as the next girl. I mean they are pretty and smell nice. But let s be honest, they don’t last all that long and they cost a fortune (especially this time of year) for something that is going to turn rancid and ugly and end up in the trash! Now plants are very nice if you can manage to keep them alive. I love plants but I manage to kill everything. I am not the green thumb in this house, M has that duty.

I tend to like more practical things.  In past Valentines Day I have been the recipient of such goods as beautiful chef’s  knives, exceptional cheese, Laouille steak knives, etc… he does good doesn’t he! This year was no exception!

BEHOLD, MY NEW BEAUTY!

Isn’t it beautiful! It arrived today in the biggest box you could possibly imagine, with enough packing material to ship a small child! It is a massive 2′ x 1.5′ and weighs in at whopping  18 lbs! The thing is massive and takes up a good chunk of my counter, but oh isn’t she sweet! I am waiting for my “Mystery Oil/Cream” that Boos recommends so I can use it but until then I can think of all the things I want to cook, any ideas?

Oh on a side note I also got an awesome cookbook and a brand new shiny lasagna pan! But that was not for V-day it was a happy accident! All in all I’d say I am having a good month so far!

This year we didn’t exactly have the coin to go on a vacation but we managed to get some travel in even if it was local. One thing M and I like to on a nice weekend is take a drive through the mountains with the top down. I like to do what I have dubbed “The Loop”. We start going south out of town then we hang a left and climb up a mountain, go around a mountain, and eventually come down a mountain and we end up north of town. Like how that works, welcome to Vermont!

Along the way we stopped at a state park named Texas Falls; falls yes Texas not so much! But it is 1 of my favorite spots to just hang out. It is also, 1 of the first spots we found when we moved here and there is a great story that goes with it but I am not ad liberty to tell it .

There was some kind of wedding taking place this day so we could not get a good picture of the falls, but I can say they were nice.

There is also a blue berry patch that we often stop and pick our own leaving our money in a box left for just that reason and we end up stopping whenever we see something cool.

This year with all the rain we managed to see quite a few waterfalls just along side the road and it made for very nice views as we climbed the mountain. We stopped a couple of times and got some pretty shots. It was a coolish day the sun was in and out with a little rain. We did have to put the top up towards the end of the day but we had a good time none the less.

Here is a view from the top of 1 mountain we climbed that day. It is 1 of my favorite roads. You have to drive (either direction) a very steep and winding road. You are actually riding the side of the mountain and it gives you a weird feeling as you look down and realize you are just hanging off the side of this mountain and there is nothing stopping you from going over except this tiny guard rail. Its pretty cool. (And yes Amity this is the road where I believe you said it “made you week in the knees”!) By the way they close this road in the winter for good reason.

Towards the end of the drive we find ourselves in a nice little town with 1 of our favorites restaurants and a creamy stand! For those not in the know up here they call soft serve ice cream, creamies. It is fitting no?

Well since this is a “FOOD BLOG” I guess I should tell you all about our early evening dinner. If you ever find yourself in Bristol Vermont (about 45 minutes south of Burlington) The Bobcat Cafe should not be missed. We really enjoy this place. The food is always good, never pretentious, and the atmosphere is very comfortable. We have never had a bad time here. Over Christmas I even took my dad for a few drinks and snacks on our way home from Burlington. Even he loved it with its antique bar great selection of wines and home brewed beer.

When we arrived it was fairly early so we were not in the mood for a huge dinner though we deffinately could have gotten our fill. M ordered a small bucket of wings. Now M is quite the wing afficiando and is very picky when it comes to chicken wings and this is 1 of his favorites. They give a good size portion and they are perfectly crispy however, they do their sauce a bit different than other places. It is more of a savory chili sauce. M asks them to heat it up a bit and they have no problem with his request. They are saucey, spicy and crispy served with a side of house blue cheese. He ordered a side of herbed fries with a chipolte mayonaise. Not exactly the healthiest meal but it sure was tasty!

I was a little chilly so I ordered their steamed little neck clams in a bacon potato ale chowder. Yes it was as good as it sounds. It was a good size portion of the steamers bathed in the goodness that is bacon and cream! I think I might have licked the bowl. I topped it off with a nice glass of Chardonay and was more than satisfied.

We finished our meals and took a short walk on over to the creemee stand for dessert. We enjoyed it with a view looking over the mountains. Vermont is really pretty and though “you can’t [always] get there from here” it is a nice place to call home.

Talk about taking a hiatus and with no warning! This summer has been crazy to say the least. Between work and play I have had no time for much of anything. But rest assured I have still been cooking, dinning out and taking lots of pictures! I know I promised a run down of the Burlington Jazz Festival back in June so I will give you a brief summary…. AWSOME! OK I will elaborate a little on that. We only went 1 night and we only heard 1 band but the night was wonderful. We ate at a small French style bistro called Luenig’s Bistro right on Church Street Burlington and listened to a 1940’s era jazz band that even played a few French toons. It was definitely memorable to say the least.

Now on to the food! We ate at Luenigs Bistro on Church street. We started off with gourmet sliders. A trio of mini burgers each different and unique; venison with apple and onion ragu, lamb with frio gras, and beef with south west flavors. Over all it was very good. My favorite of course was the lamb with the frio gras. It was rich and decadant; perfect for a small bite. The venison had great flavors but unfortunately it does not take much to over cook such lean meat and it was on the dry side.

Gourmet Sliders (font: Venison, middle: Lamb, back: Beef)

For entrees I had softshell crab tempura fried atop a a lightly dressed mesclun and herb salad and topped with an avocado, corn and mango salsa. It was perfect for a summers night. It was a special that evening and not on their regular menu which is a bit more French.

M had a spiffed up classic; filet mignon topped with flash fried onions and drizzled with a red wine reduction atop the most sinful mashed potatoes around. They were roughly mashed leaving their red skins scattered throughout and blended with cream, butter and crab!

Filet with Sinful Potatoes

For desert we each got our own, M was not in the mood to share. He got the sugar pie and I a pinot noir sorbet. The sugar pie was something neither of us has had before but from what I gather pretty popular around here and in Quebec which we are not all that far from. It is sweet but not as sweet as you would think. It is similar to carmel in the center with a cookie like crust. Served with ice cream it was quite nice. But honestly I really enjoyed my sorbet. It was not overly sweet or overly “winey”. It was a nice light treat after a pretty big dinner. We also enjoyed our desserts with a nice small bottle of Canadian Ice Wine; a weakness of M’s, who has now turned me into a fan.

We rested after diner finishing our wine listening to the music until they had just about finished and enjoyed a nice walk on Church Street back to our car. It was a very nice night and I am sorry it has taken me so long to recount it for you.

After all this time, I have so many photos and meals to write about I am sure I will busy for some time recounting everything. Now as fall is creeping in it is time to settle down a bit. Spend some quality time at home next to the fire (yes I have had it going already!) and enjoy the cooler weather and the bounty of fall. Soon my farmers market will be closing for the season. I am sure I will have much more time to blog.<–>

This once a week deal is really not working so well I know. This blogging thing isn’t as easy as it looks!

Well this week though busy has been great so far. I am so happy to have our farmers market back. I knew I missed it but I didn’t know how much. Now up here the market starts in the beginning of June but we don’t start seeing any real produce until towards the end of the month. So this Saturday I headed on over (its across the street, how cool is that!). I lucked out with some great finds. I came home with a lunch of locally produced aged goat cheese, with freshly baked croissants. In addition, I was able to score some fresh butter lettuce and radishes and the biggest score of the day was a fresh ham steak from a local farm who raise their livestock from birth with no hormones/antibiotics, fed on food from the farm! It is really amazing. We had the cheese with the croissants and saved the produce and fresh ham for Sunday dinner.

Saturday night we decided to go to Jazz Fest in Burlington and we had an awesome dinner at Luenigs and enjoyed great music from Trio Gusto with Mike Martin. They were fantastic and we really enjoyed ourselves. So much so that I will follow up with another post all about it!

So on to Sunday Dinner!

With everything being so fresh I didn’t want to cover up any of that flavor so I kept it really simple. I started with a short brine on the pork. A combo of brown sugar, kosher salt, cloves, coriander, and black pepper corns and water. Once the brine cooled I soaked the pork for about 2 hours. It was only about 2 pounds so it didn’t need much. Once out of the brine I mixed up a rub consisting of toasted coriander seeds, cumin, garlic, salt and pepper mixed with a drop of liquid smoke and a drizzle of (fresh from the farmers market) cold pressed sunflower oil. By the way this stuff is like liquid gold. It has a nice nutty taste and is light and really full of flavor. You could of course use olive oil and no one would be the wiser! I ground all this up together in a mortar and pastel until a nice paste formed. I slathered that all over the ham steak and let that sit for about an hour as I got the rest of dinner prepped and ready to go.

First, I pre-heated the oven to 450 and placed my grill pan in the oven to heat up. I don’t have an outside grill so I use this set up whenever I want the same effect. Then I began work on the salad. The butter lettuce was picked that morning so as you can imagine it was a little dirty; I gave it a good washing and let it dry while I cleaned and sliced the radishes nice a thin and sliced some vidalia onions very thin as well. I threw it all in a bowl and that is where it sat waiting its dressing. Again I went real simple here. The dressing was nothing more than 1/4 cup lemon juice, 1/4 butter milk, 1-2 T. fresh dill, salt and pepper, and of course a drizzle of the Sunflower oil. It made a great light and tangy ,perfect for the salad. I held off tossing together until ready to serve. Then I began a light BBQ sauce to serve with the pork.

My mother used to make this sauce when I was a kid. In fact I had never even had store bought until I was grown and out of the house. I still prefer mom’s!

This is not an exact recipe but more like a method and a taste as you go kind of sauce. But here ya go, just don’t tell mom I gave out her secret!

Melt about 1-2T. butter in a sauce pan then add about 2-4 cloves garlic minced, 1-2 T. onion minced and saute until fragrant (NOT BURNT!) to this add about 1/4 cup brown sugar and let it get all carmally. To this add a few gluggs of beer, any kind really, whatever you like to drink. You could sub out hard cider or just stock if you don’t want the alcohol. Let this bubble away and add some tomato paste, I add a good squirt from the tube I would say about 2 tsp. Stir in and then add about 1/2 bottle of catchup and 1/4 cup red wine vinegar. This is usually where my mother stops, I however like things with a bit of a kick and I added 1 tsp. of cayenne and a couple good dashes of hot sauce. And don’t forget the salt and pepper! That’s it; it’s real simple and lends itself to experimentation. Really its hard to screw it up!

Ok Lets put this meal together!

Now that the “grill” is hot I gently laid the ham steak in the pan and closed the door. Cook on this side for about 10 minutes. I got some nice grill marks and accumulated some nice juices in the pan which I used to baste the steak as I turned it over and cooked for another 5 minutes or so. I took the pork out of the oven and let it rest while I took some corn on the cob I had handy and just placed them on the grill pan and put them in the oven.

By the time the ham steak had rested, the corn was done and I tossed the dressing with the salad. Serve with the sauce on the side and dinner was done!

Wow I have been gone a long time. I know, no warning, no explanation, I am horrible! Well let me fill you in real quick. I had some business I needed to take care in the old dirty south. Actually I used to live right outside Atlanta and I went to visit friends, family and yes take care a few things I left behind when I moved up to the north country. It was a bit hectic, I had a lot to do and people to see and not a whole lot of time to do so. But over all it was a nice time except for the flight back (which I will get to later) and even had some time to go out for a bite and a show at an Atlanta landmark!

My good friends Mark & Becky took me to Shakespear’s Tavern. We had a wonderful time. We saw a Hamlet and it felt authentic, like this is how it was supposed to be played. The players mixed in some humor in the otherwise dark tragedy and I have to admit the “authentic” english fare made it that much more fun. I took some photos but I had my flash turned off so the pics did not come out so great. But I have to say the food, which was served caffiteria style at the back of the theater, was quite good. They also offered a good selection of beer and wine. Over all if ever in the Atlanta area I recomend this. It’s something a little different than the regular touristy stuff and clubbing the city has to offer, plus it is kid friendly!

Afterward we were still a little hungry, after all we were there for over 3 hours. On the way home we tried out a late night sushi restaurant located in Buckhead called Bluefin. We split a few rolls and a great sashimi appitizer of white tuna in a light yuzu/ponzu vinagrette and a small seaweed salad. They had a nice saki list, though not much to chose from for 1 person. But over all it was very nice and they are open and serving a full menu till 2am!

However, we were not exactly drinking much that night considering the night before we had all gotten together with our pal Amity and belly danced the night away at a fantastic Mediterranean joint in Alpharetta called Cafe Efendi. If you ever get the chance I recomend the Iskander and Adana kebab, oh and the Baba Gannuj! Fantastic night, from what I remember!

Lastly, before I left we held a BBQ where Becky and I went crazy with the food. I am waiting for our friend Mark (another Mark) to get me the pictures and I will tell you all about it. We had everything and that girl Becky can cook! The 2 of us in the same kitchen was insane but the guests sure liked it! We ate and drank our fill then they sent me on my way to go back home to Vermont.

So my ride home left me sick and sitting on a plane for hours. It’s not a long flight but the computer system went down in Baltimore so that left us and many other planes stranded just sitting on the tarmack. I didn’t land in VT til after midnight and couldn’t wait to drive the hour home to get to bed!

By the morning I was not feeling any better and desided I needed a nice gental elixer to soothe my turbulant tummy. I whipped up a Sweet Ginger Tisane. This is a great alternative to tea. It works hot or cold over ice and dare I say with a boost of vodka on another occation. This set my tummy staight and it was very tastey to boot!

Recipe:

6 cups water
1/4 cup peeled and chopped fresh ginger
1/3 cup fresh lemon juice
1/2 cup firmly packed fresh mint leaves
6 tablespoons dark honey (or to taste, I used about 4 T. and that was enough for me)
1 lemon, cut into 6 wedges

Combine the water, ginger and lemon juice in a sauce pan over high heat and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat to low and simmer for 5 minutes. Remove from heat, add the mint, and let steep for 5 minutes.

Filter the mixture through a fine-mesh sieve, pressing down lightly on the ginger and mint. Discard solids.

Stir in the honey and serve hot or iced, garnished with a lemon wedge and some extra mint if you like!

CHEERS!

For anyone who likes wine I have a treat today. An old friend of mine who is a chef in NYC and a wine connoisseur has volunteered to guest blog today. He has written a great post exploring the complexities of a mid range Chianti. After reading it if you don’t want a glass your a nun!

So without further ado…

~Eric G.