The perfect dish to make when you want to impress someone….
On Baubles, Bubbles, and Beautiful things:
Whole-wheat shells with asparagus, feta, and mint
Pappardelle with duck ragu
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Category Archives: Dinner
Guest Blogger: Calina Garcia
Hi folks,
While Eric’s in Copenhagen working at Noma (the world’s best restaurant!), I’ll be keeping you entertained with my amateur cooking attempts. There are no professional chefs in my house, but both my husband (Ed) and I LOVE to cook!
If you’d like to know more about me, Calina, you can check out my personal blog: Baubles, Bubbles, & Beautiful Things. I also contribute to the Seattle PI’s Inside Belltown blog.
Grilled Baby Octopus with Roasted Peppers and Potatoes
Chateaubriand with Colbert Butter, Fried Parsley, and Butter Poached Potatoes
Going back in time a hundred years or so to make something amazing. I wanted to make a chateaubriand for quite some time now but I didn’t want to make it with a bearnaise sauce as has been suggested by every modern book I have seen. I decided to look at my Escoffier book and that lead to this Colbert Butter Sauce.
It’s a compound butter with meat glace. The base compound butter for it is a Buerre Maitre D’Hotel which consists of butter, parsley, and lemon juice. I added a little dijon mustard to the mix because it was suggested by the book.
The piece of meat was about a pound and I had placed salt and pepper on it a week earlier then placed it in the refrigerator. I was ready to cook it so I removed it from the refrigerator then let it rest until it was at room temperature. I placed a cast iron skillet on the stove then set it as high as it can go. A little clarified butter in the skillet then I seared each side of the meat for about 2 minutes then threw the skillet in the oven 425F to cook to desired doneness. There are other methods to cooking a steak like this that I will be exploring soon, SOUS VIDE, but first I wanted to make sure the dish worked before I take more time to cook this.
The potatoes were cooked in whole butter with white wine vinegar, salt, fresh tarragon, and black pepper until tender.
The steak was out of the skillet so I started to build my colbert butter sauce. First, I through in some clarified butter with a minced shallot. I toasted the shallot then deglazed with white wine. I could have done red but I didn’t want to overwhelm the sauce or discolor it. I just need some flavorful liquid to deglaze…..wine is an easy choice. Once the wine was almost gone I tossed in the Beurre Maitre d’Hotel then added some glace de viande and tarragon to make it a Colbert Butter Sauce.
Parsley is fried in 3 seconds then topped with salt, pepper, and lemon. (For recipe click here).
The meat that was resting is sliced thin then everything is plated as shown.
Eric
Mofongo with Dungeness Crab, Saffron Buerre Blanc, Shallot Jam, and Cilantro Oil
Definitely going on the menu one day…….
Ingredients
- Dungeness Crab….two of them……fresh from a seafood market in Longbeach, WA
Mofongo
- Plantains….yellowish brown….there is a reason for this
- Garlic, minced
- Olive oil
- Adobo (my mix)
Saffron Buerre Blanc
- Butter
- White Rum
- Saffron
- Cilantro, minced
- White Wine Vinegar
- Salt, tt
Shallot Jam
- Shallots, minced
- Balsamic Vinegar…reduced
- Black Pepper
- Pectin
Cilantro Oil
- I’ll link this up shortly
Procedure
Mofongo
- Peel and bake the plantains in an oven at 350F until soft
- Remove from oven then mash together with garlic, olive oil, and adobo
- Mold then saute with olive oil until outside is crispy
Saffron Buerre Blanc
- Heat up a little clarified butter then add rum and reduce by 75%
- Add the white wine vinegar, saffron and salt
- Remove from heat then slowly fold in cubes of whole butter to thicken sauce
- Season with the saffron and cilantro at the end to adjust the taste
Cilantro Oil
- Mix cilantro with olive oil in a blender then strain
Shallot jam
- Slowly cook shallots in a saute pan then add balsamic vinegar and pepper
- Reduce mixture by half until balsamic vinegar is thick
- Add pectin to mixture, can it, and save until you are ready to use
This is pretty hard to pull off. I’ve been making mofongo for a long time so it takes practice.
Cedar Planked Salmon with Persimmon Duxelle and Wine Poached Potatoes
I learned how to do cedar planking in class the other day so I figured I would give it a shot at home. I talked to my Chef and asked him all the tips and things I should expect and I was off! This is version 1.0 of this and I will be doing this another time before I make this in Ohio for a catering gig during Thanksgiving (yup, it’s a big one).
I don’t make it out to home improvement stores very often so I headed over to one of the big box style lumber yards or whatever the hell they’re called and bought some pieces of cedar. They looked at me a little funny when I asked them to cut the pieces of wood to about 8 inches because they were untreated fence posts. The person who was cutting the wood asked me what it was for and I said it was for cooking…..another strange look. Anyway, I get the last laugh!!!!
Ingredients:
- Untreated cedar planks…..soaked in water for a while (don’t ask how long, I’m still working on that)……then rubbed with a little oil before cooking
- Sockeye salmon
- Rub for salmon….smoked paprika, oregano, salt, pepper, cumin
- Mini-Dutch potatoes
- Parsley Salt
- White Wine
- Water
- Black Pepper
- Persimmon
- Mushrooms, minced
- Parsley, minced
- White wine vinegar
- Shallots, minced
- Clarified butter
Procedure:
Salmon
- Rub salmon with spices…..rub it…..yeah
- Heat oven to 300F
- Place salmon on planks after you have rubbed planks with olive oil
- Cook until done
- Baste with a little clarified butter for that nice shiny appearance
Potatoes
- Place potatoes in a shallow roasting pan with 50% water and 50% wine…….This is where most of you will tell me I’m out of mine mind…..this is where I’ll tell you, “try it”.
- Place potatoes in oven at 300F
- Cook potatoes until they are tender….this one takes a while….so use the smaller potatoes as shown
- Finish with parsley salt
Persimmon
- Slice tops of persimmon and scoop out seeds
- In a small pan place shallots, clarified butter, and white wine vinegar on medium heat
- Deglaze with white wine
- Add minced parsley, salt, and pepper
- Remove from heat once liquid is almost gone and place in a small bowl lined with paper towels
- Stuff persimmon with mushroom mixture
- Place on baking sheet and cook until done……..you can blanch and remove the skin (it’s what I will do next time)
Enjoy,
Eric
Stuffed Turkey Breast
Here is a different way to do your turkey this Thanksgiving. Slice the breasts off the raw turkey, take the carcasses and make a stock then make a nice gravy to cover…..its’ good 
Once you stuff it roll it and truss it, like so:
Then cook it, slice, and serve.
Equipment:
- Twine
- Roasting Pan
Ingredients:
- Turkey with breast removed
- Celery, small diced
- Onions, small diced
- Parsley, minced
- Pine nuts, toasted and crushed
- Unsalted peanuts, toasted and crushed
- White wine vinegar
- Mirepoix, medium diced
Procedure:
- Butterfly turkey breast
- Mix together rest of ingredients then stuff into turkey and truss, as shown above.
- Place in roasting pan and cook at 325F
- 45 minutes before it’s done place mirepoix in roasting pan
- Cook until desired temperature……….I don’t feel like getting in a debate on how you long to cook a turkey. You make it every year, cook it your way.
Enjoy,
Eric
Monday Night Dinner
I need to buy a presentation pan for fish…..yikes!
Anyway, cooked some dinner up last night while I’m on my little break between quarters. I just need to keep up the practice so it doesn’t really matter who is there to eat it or not. The good thing is that there were people there to eat the food I made so that’s a plus! They left full and happy…..actually, they didn’t leave because it was for my wife and roommates…haha.
Menu:
Ciabatta Garlic Bread with a Blood Orange Compound Butter (Click)
Portobello and White Asparagus Pasta with a White Wine Cream Sauce (Click)
Poached Sockeye Salmon Buerre Blanc, I poached the salmon with a blood orange court bouillon (click)
Chocolates from Chocolopolis (click)
Beef Wellington with a Prosciutto Reduction Sauce
I’ve been visited a few deli’s lately so I wanted to take little bits and pieces from each store and put together a meal. I think a Beef Wellington is a meal in itself so there is no need for other unneccessary starches or vegetables…..it was stuffed with mushrooms and it has a nice puff pastry so there you go. The sauce for this is a monster and I actually licked my plate when I was done. This is restaurant quality stuff right here. Super indulgent, great quality, and sure to put someone in a food coma.
Equipment:
- Sauce pan
- Baking sheet
Ingredients:
- Beef Wellington (A&J Meats)
- Glace de Viande (The Swinery)
- Prosciutto Ends (De Laurenti’s)
- Mirepoix……….50% onion, 25% celery, 25% carrot……small dice for this
- Red Wine
- Fresh Rosemary
- Black pepper, to taste
- Clarified Butter
- Whole Soft butter
Procedure:
- Place a little clarified butter in sauce pan then sear each side the prosciutto then remove each piece from pan
- Place onions in pan and caramelize then add carrots and celery
- Deglaze pan with red wine
- Add rosemary, pepper, and Glace de Viande (a very small amount)
- Simmer, DO NOT BOIL, for about an hour or two.
- Skim the fat off the sauce as you are cooking.
- When you have reached desired consistency of the sauce then strain it and place back in pan
- Pre-heat oven to 400F then cook Beef Wellington to desired doneness.
- About 5 minutes before it’s done baste the outside of the Wellington with clarified butter
- Remove Wellington when you are done then let rest
- Take pan with sauce and fold in whole butter into sauce then pour directly over Wellington and serve.
Enjoy,
Eric
Tuesday Night Dinner for Friends
Chateau Rosti (Click for recipe)
Aioli on Artisan Olive Bread (Click for recipe)
Grilled Corn with Butter and Basil
Shawna’s Salad
Fried Pork Chop (Click for recipe)
Hot and Sour Soup
It’s 90 degrees outside right now so what better way to make yourself sweat even more than with a nice hot and sour soup!!! I learned how to make consomme in class this past week so the first thing I wanted to make with my new technique was hot and sour soup.
Mindy and I fell in love with this soup after going to a few Chinese restaurants in Seattle. This recipe isn’t traditional so don’t punch me in the face or yell at me if it’s not. This is an interpretation! I go for taste with everything that I do so if I can achieve something close to the same taste but with a little twist then that’s all I’m worried about. I’m not the type of person that freaks out when OMG I FORGOT THE SO AND SO INGREDIENT IN THAT ONE THING THAT I WAS FIXING….not me. When that happens it leads me to create something a little different. No worries!
Anyway, this is a great soup for those cool days, hot days, or whenever you want a great soup day……every day!
Hot and Sour Soup
Prep Time: 20 minutes
Cook Time: 1 hour and 15 minutes (includes time to make consomme)
Equipment Needed:
Stock Pot
Strainer
Cheesecloth (optional, don’t tell my Chef)
Coffee Filter (optional, seriously don’t tell her)
Ingredients:
- 3 quarts chicken consomme (Click here for recipe) You will make a few substitutions for the consomme. Instead of regular pepper add Toasted Sichuan Pepper and Coriander. Use a chicken stock
- Oyster Mushrooms
- Bamboo Shoots
- Firm Tofu, medium diced
- Green onions, sliced thin
- 1 Chicken Thigh with skin removed and sliced thin
- 1 Jalapeno, minced
- 1/2 tsp. Cayenne Pepper
- 4 drops sesame oil
- 3 tbsp. cornstarch or 1 tbsp. gelatin
- 3 tbsp. rice vinegar or white wine vinegar
Procedure:
- Place consomme in stock pot and heat up to 180-200F
- Stir in mushrooms, bamboo shoots, tofu, chicken thigh, jalapeno, and cayenne pepper. Cook for 7 minutes
- Stir in cornstarch or gelatin
- Stir in sesame oil and rice vinegar
- Strain the soup through strainer and coffee filter
- Place a few mushrooms, bamboo shoots, tofu, and chicken thigh strips into bowl
- Pour soup in bowl then garnish with green onions then serve
Enjoy,
Eric
The Lost Halibut
(Click each picture to make it larger)
About two months ago I made some halibut with extremely large halibut steaks (click for recipe). These things weighed about 2 pounds each and were extremely fresh. I did two recipes, one with a three pepper rub served with a mango pineapple dressing and this one, the insanely spicy halibut with a mango pineapple dressing. I didn’t post it because I don’t know too many people that like extremely spicy food. Well, here it is…..go with caution my friend.
Ingredients:
1 large halibut steak
Fish Rub
Italian Sea Salt
Cayenne Pepper
Aji Mirasol Pepper, ground
Chipotle Pepper, ground
Urfa Biber
Mango pineapple dressing (click for recipe)
Rub the halibut steaks with the salt and pepper rub. Heat up some grape seed oil then cook the halibut about 4 minutes on each side. Serve with mango pineapple dressing over the top. Serve.
Enjoy,
Eric
Sooooooooooooie Caroline!!
(Click each picture to make it larger…….This is with my new fancy camera…….funny note: I found my camera that I lost…..ta-da)
My friends, Fuzzy and Richard, told me they were going to be cooking a whole pig for a friend’s 50th wedding anniversary. I think before Richard finished saying, “we’re going to cook a whole pig”, I jumped in and asked if I could help. I was anxiously waiting for 3 weeks for this to happen and finally we cooked that sucker up yesterday (Friday).
Richard told me to be at his house at 7:30AM because we had to run a few errands and pick up the pig from another friend’s bar. Richard and Fuzzy ordered a 75lb. pig and 5 18-20lb pork shoulders from Kapowsin Meats in Graham, WA. From the bar we drove over to Vic’s Tavern where they had the area staged for us. Now, Richard told me a little bit about his grill but I had no idea how awesome it would be in person. Fuzzy designed it on the back of a bar napkin about 10 years ago and it’s the only one of its kind IN THE WORLD!!!
After staring at the almighty grill and taking a few pictures Richard and Fuzzy got to work. They butterflied the pig and chopped it in half. At 9:30AM we raised the pig and shoulders on the grill that was heated up to 295-305F. We let it cook for 8 hours. All the meat was cooked skin side up then it was flipped with about 2 hours before serving. The pig was ready around 6 and Richard and I spent about an hour chopping down approximately 165lbs. of meat into smaller bite size pieces while Fuzzy soaked it in his spicy apple cider vinegar sauce.
7PM came around and everyone was ready to eat. We served over 100 people and had enough leftovers for another party that happened today. If you ever want Fuzzy to cater for you his price is $10,000 in the State of Washington……..he only does this for family and friends and you better be a good friend otherwise he isn’t cheap.
Thanks Richard and Fuzzy!
Fuzzy’s N.C. Apple Cider Vinegar Pork Sauce
5 gallons of Apple Cider Vinegar
4 cups crushed red pepper
1 cup salt
Fuzzy’s Hot Mustard Sauce
6 cups dried yellow mustard
10 ounces honey
1 cup apple cider vinegar
Go make a pig now!!!
Andouille Stew
That new camera can’t get here fast enough!!!
Ingredients:
1/2 stick of butter
1 lb. Andouille Sausage, cut into 1 inch slices (Proctor Farmers Market from Cheryl the Pig Lady)
5 aji dulce pods, diced (from my secret source)
5 fresh garlic cloves, minced (Wallingford Farmers Market)
1 ear of corn with corn removed from husk
1/2 sweet onion, diced
20 ounces chicken broth
1 pinch of Italian Sea Salt
1 pinch of Urfa Biber
10 ounces stewed tomatoes
Fresh cilantro and oregano (I have a new tip on how to use this in recipes, stay tuned)
In a large stockpot place the stick of butter in on medium heat. Place the andouille in and the cook for about 4-5 minutes then add the aji dulce, corn, and sweet onion then cook for another 3-4 minutes. Add the garlic, chicken broth, sea salt, urfa biber, stewed tomatoes, cilantro, and oregano then cover and let the ingredients stew together for 20 minutes. Remove from heat then serve over rice!
Enjoy,
Eric
Red and Yellow Coconut Curry Served With Curry Infused Angel Hair Pasta
(Click each picture to make it larger)
I’ve been looking for ways to stack food and I’ve gone a few different places that I won’t mention because their metal food stacking rings were about $12 each. I needed a few different sizes and I certainly wasn’t going to spend $60-70 on rings to make my food touch the sky so I went to Home Depot instead. PVC pipe is my friend and for $3.85 I purchased all the rings I need for now, 7 total!
Oh yeah, I made some food! There it is in the pictures above. Look nice? Try it for yourself.
Ingredients:
Curry
2 tbsp. Red Thai Curry Paste
2 tbsp. Yellow Thai Curry Paste
2 10 ounce cans coconut milk
4 tbsp. molasses
Cook 5 ounces of coconut milk and curry in two separate pots on medium heat and reduce mixture by half then it is ready to serve.
Fried Stuff
Sugar Snap Peas (Capitol Hill Farmers Market)
Chanterelle Mushrooms (Capitol Hill Farmers Market)
White Flour
1 egg
White Flour Mixture with parsley, oregano, salt, and pepper
Place the peas and mushrooms in the white flour then move them over to the egg then finally into the white flour mixture then deep fry those fantastic ingredients in grape seed oil (Oh yeah, grape seed oil from Apres Vin) for about 3-4 minutes.
Curry pasta from Pappardelle Pasta (Pike Place Market)
Serve with a little cooked spinach (from the Capitol Hill Market) sauteed with a little butter, salt, and pepper.
I chopped up a bit of Pineapple Mint and some Curry Leaf as a garnish over the sauce (Nomad Garden!)
Mix it all together, serve it!
Enjoy,
Eric
p.s. Audrey and Dan, you missed out
Sweet, Sour, and Spicy Stew
(Click each picture to make it larger)
Take your tastebuds on a trip with this stew. Ugh, that sounds so damn cheesy it’s ridiculous. Rainbows, butterflies, and unicorns!!!! Please try this stew, I know it’s summertime but it’s worth it.
Ingredients:
2 mini-cattle chuck steaks. Yes, mini-cattle (click)
salt and pepper
4 tbsp. butter
Sear each side of the steaks for about 2 minutes on each side by placing salt and pepper on the steak then placing then heating the butter in the pan. Place steak in crock pot……..go to next step!
Stew
4 carrots, peeled
3 celery stalks
1/2 sweet onion
6 ounces tomato sauce
2 roma tomatoes
4 yukon gold potatoes
1 cup valencia orange juice
3 tbsp. molasses
1 tbsp. crushed red pepper
1 tbsp. salt
1 1/2 tbsp. dried tarragon
Combine all ingredients together in crockpot. Cook in crock pot for 4-5 hours. Serve with white rice.
Enjoy,
Eric
