Fare for the family table
No, this is not a photo of the bustier Madonna wore during her “Who’s That Girl” tour…..get your head out of the gutter, will you please?
What it is, is something even more spectacular, and I think you’ll have to agree, that upstaging one of the material girl’s bustiers, is a mighty impressive feat.
So…what is it, exactly?
Before you read any further, I suggest you sit down.
Yeah, you heard me….sit down.
I feel a bit silly writing about another braised dish given the onset of spring, but this dish is so good, I couldn’t let it wait till autumn. I have also been re-thinking braises, and how they fit into my annual cooking calendar as of late. I don’t know about you, but I have always viewed braises as cool weather dishes, and generally never cooked them between May and October. Of course, there has never been a written rule as to when it’s OK to serve a stew or braise, but like wearing white shoes or pants before Memorial Day, it just wasn’t done without having to endure the derision of the food elite.
I have found that these days, many chefs (myself included) are tossing out certain cooking rules and instituting some new ones. I recently read where Suzanne Goin, the fabulously talented chef / owner of “Lucques” in Los Angeles decided to “break the rules” and keep her braised short rib dish on her menu year round because it was in such high demand from her customers. So I’m thinkin’ if it’s OK for famous chefs in posh eateries to braise in warm weather, then it’s OK for us too.
Spring has finally sprung here in the northeast, and to celebrate, the girls and I whipped up this fabulous, rustic sponge cake the other day, and topped it with a deluge of freshly whipped cream, and a delicious gathering of macerated berries.
This is another recipe from the quite wonderful cookbook Cooking with Shelburne Farms: Food and Stories from Vermont (Shelburne Farms Books) by Melissa Pasanen and Rick Gencarelli. I’ve had my eye on this recipe for a while, waiting for warm weather and fresh berries to make their debut this season. It is a great, casual dessert that can look quite stunning if plated with a little care. The base cake and berry mix can be made in advance, with the only last minute thing to wrangle being the whipping of the cream.
The recipe will make one 13″x9″ rectangular cake, or 2 – 9″ rounds. We made the two rounds, ate one immediately, and froze the other which the girls finished later in the week as a birthday cake for their Dad…that’s my kinda two-fer!
This is a dish that I could eat a few times a week for the rest of my life and be quite happy indeed, thank you very much. It is richly flavored and exciting, studded with garlic, olives, and capers, yet light and easy to toss together on the fly. It is also one of those dishes that gets better with time, so definitely plan on making a large batch so that you can enjoy it again as left-overs a few days later. In fact, the dish is so good the next day, that a few of the kids packed it cold for school lunch, and brought home nothing but a tupperware full of bones!
Imagine my surprise when my lovely wife returned home from an appointment last week with a bag full of the most beautiful asparagus I’d ever seen. Upon further inspection, I noticed that the stalks were enormous, nice and thick and long enough to stretch from the crook of my elbow to the tip of my fingers. Interestingly, the cut ends were wrapped in wet paper towels….these were no ordinary spears bought from a store, but rather cut fresh from a friend’s private stash that very morning (insert hallelujah chorus here).
That night, I roasted then briefly and served them with an orange hollandaise sauce, they were sublime.
In celebration of Jody Adams’ decisive first and second round victories in Bravo Network’s latest “Top Chef Masters” competition, I thought we’d cook a dish today from her terrific cookbook (co-authored by her husband, Ken Rivard), In the Hands of A Chef: Cooking with Jody Adams of Rialto Restaurant. This dish is a bit of a departure from Jody’s typically mediterranean offerings, but as a nod to asian-fusion style cooking in the style of a “bourride” (a Provencal fish stew), it is a real winner. I’ve taken a few liberties with the dish only to use up a few ingredients I had in my fridge that I thought would work well here, but the soul of this light and delicious dish is all Jody.
How many of you would like to treat your Mom to a special little something this Mother’s Day? One that is so pink, and sweet, and light that it’ll tickle her all over. One that is so beautiful to behold that she’ll think you slaved away for hours in your kitchen making it for her, even though it can easily be done in under an hour (hey, play that angle up if you want, your secret’s safe with me). Sound good? Then pull up a chair my friends, because your Mom deserves a little of this goodness.
With a brief return of Winter weather here in the Northeast (it was 35℉ when I went for my morning run the other day), I couldn’t help but reach into the freezer to pull out our one remaining pack of Daniel Boulud’s short ribs for dinner. I am fairly well convinced that if you look up comfort food in the dictionary, you’ll find a description and picture of these ribs. With the exception of Duck Confit, or perhaps a really good cassoulet, there is no shorter route to my heart than to place a helping (or two) of these ribs in front of me. This recipe is from Daniel Boulud’s Cafe Boulud Cookbook: French-American Recipes for the Home Cook, and is one that you will make over and over and over again, I guarantee it.
