IDEAS IN FOOD

Attention to Detail

It arrived today.  The new book, In Search of Perfection  by Heston Blumenthal of The Fat Duck.  I have only taken a brief glance at a few of the recipes and stories and come to realize something quite profound.  Heston packages techniques, ideas, concepts and innovations in an approachable box.  Yet, if you open the box and look inside you begin to uncover stuff you should have thought of, techniques you should be using, methods which should be followed.  I plan to spend more time reading this book like a novel, I do that with cookbooks, though for now I want to let others know that this book is certainly worth getting.  The food is what you might consider simple.  Do not let that fool you.

White Chocolate Martini Revisited

It's much too early to be drinking martinis, but somehow my work is never done. Poor me. I tasted the white chocolate consomme again this morning to decide what kind of alcohols to pair with it. The consomme is actually quite intense in flavor, sweet and soft on the palate and there's no mistaking the flavor of white chocolate. The curry leaves had faded into more of a background flavor, teasingly ethereal unless you happen to know what you're tasting in advance. Since I didn't have any curry leaves to muddle into the drink I decided not to highlight that combination. Instead I decided to play up the chocolate aspect balancing the consomme with Ketel One vodka for it's sharp, clean flavor and a bit of Tuaca to round out the  sweetness of the chocolate.

Tuaca is an Italian liqueur based upon cask aged brandy with added flavors of citrus and vanilla. It also has some wonderful caramel and butterscotch notes and added a nice complexity to the  drink. If you don't have the white chocolate consomme you could make this drink with some frothy white chocolate milk. For that you just bring eight ounces of milk, whatever kind you prefer, to a simmer and pour it over 4 ounces of chopped white chocolate and a few grains of salt. Whisk until the mixture is fully incorporated and frothy and either chill the milk or add the liqueurs and serve warm.  The warm version would be perfect on a stormy evening paired with a roaring fire and good conversation with someone you love. Chilled and made with frothy white chocolate milk it would be equally indulgent as an apertif or as a dessert. The consomme makes it lighter with more straightforward flavors but making it with white chocolate milk brings it home. It's all up to you and your pantry to make the perfect sip.

White Chocolate Martini

2 ounces white chocolate consomme or white chocolate milk
1 1/2 ounces of Ketel One Vodka
1/2 ounce of Tuaca

Combine in a shake with ice. Shake vigourously and strain into a martini glass.

While we're talking about cocktails, our recent house drink (at our house, not the Guest House) is a rum and passionfruit concoction. So for those of you who like rum...

Pyrat and Passionfruit

1 1/2 ounces Pyrat XO Rum
1 quarter of a lime
3 ounces passionfruit juice (We use Ceres)

Squeeze the lime quarter in the bottom of a small shaker and add the piece of fruit to the container. Cover with ice and add the liqueurs. Shake well and pour into a rocks glass.

White Chocolate Martini and a New Approach to Cocktails

With the emergence of the white chocolate consomme we began the avalanche thought process and ended up in the bar, in theory being able to turn the bar and cocktails on their heads.  The first thought is, yes a white chocolate martini which is crystal clear.  Next is one based on pumpkin juice and gin.  Then, as thoughts and ideas are happening I get an email, again from Sean who has just made carrot cake consomme for a new sorbet.  Now what if we used that consomme as the base for a cocktail?  Yes, that would be quite good.  Alright, lets break down a few more walls.  Would an artichoke and brown butter broth mix well as a cocktail?  Or what about a hot buttered rum made with brown butter consomme.  If we made clear chocolate mint water, think about the holiday libations.  Along those lines what about clear eggnog for a lighter version of the traditional holiday belly bomb?  Umeboshi, Galliano and tequila could make a great light cocktail on the rocks.  The doors have opened again.  What's in your cocktail?

Inspired by Others

Just because you hear something does not make it so.  I strongly believe and am continuously convinced that if something should not be, then it is a great place to launch an idea.

I received an email from Sean Brock yesterday asking if we had ever used transglutaminase with sweetbreads.  He had the idea of making a roulade of sweetbreads and was just beginning the process from idea to execution.  I had previously not tried cross linking sweetbreads before because I had heard that transglutaminase did not work with organ meats.  Well, upon hearing Sean's question I figured we should give it a shot, we had not actually tried to make a roulade or in our case a block of sweetbreads.  Guess what, it works.

Similarly, I was recently introduced to Johnny Iuzzini, pastry chef at restaurant Jean George.  Johnny has more energy than anyone I can recall.  His energy is contagious as are  his queries about food.  He is working on a new white chocolate sorbet which has a base of clear white chocolate.  Our discussions led me in the direction of white chocolate and toasted curry leaves.  As it turns out we made a sauce with those two ingredients last year, yet the spark today emerged from Johnny's idea of making clear white chocolate.  We have put together a clear white chocolate broth flavored with toasted curry leaves and brown butter.  My initial idea was to serve the broth with seared scallops, yet the sweetbreads end up being an equally natural fit.

In today's dish we serve the broth chilled with Asian pears and arugula with the crispy cube of sweetbreads on top.  Originally I wanted to serve the clear white chocolate hot, however the amount of dairy in my initial broth actually precipitates out of the clear liquid when it is heated.  Today we have adapted.  The dish is tasty and actually to two temperatures complement each other very well.

What is even more exciting is seeing what avenues these two chefs take with ideas which began as simple conversations.

Shola Olunloyo

Today we happily introduce a chef who drives to his own traffic rules.  He has also single handedly shown me that if you really put yourself out there you can do it your way.  We met Shola through this website and from his first introduction a culinary banter began.  The bouncing, sharing and dissection of ideas has allowed us to grow as chefs and people.  Shola's need to find the source, the reason, and the way inspires us and pushes us to just be better.  Along those lines, we have asked Shola to be the first of a number of individuals to open themselves up and share ideas.  Here is the what I can rightly call the beginning of our Culinary Conversations. Please feel free to leave questions and comments for Shola below. He doesn't have a current website but if you would like to get in contact with him, now's the time.

By Shola Olunloyo:

You are driving down a quiet scenic country road and suddenly you notice the scenery is going forward not backwards, that’s when it occurs to you that your career is going in the wrong direction. What do you do at a crossroads, when you question if you are doing what you are doing for the reasons you wanted to?
The answer is a profound change in direction, sublimated into the very essence of the art of in this case food and cookery. Philadelphia is a small town with lots of well meaning people who rarely exit their comfort zones, basically a meat and potatoes town. So many people who have rarely ventured into European Michelin Starred establishments have been convinced over the years that the delicious but cumbersome antiquated food at LBF is the best French food in the world. All the restaurants were serving variations of the same food, Pan-Asian was basically anything with the axis of evil, Soy, Ginger, Wasabi.
There was the requisite Tuna Tartare, calamari with a new novel crust, chipotle aioli, a copious use of truffle oil on everything, and umpteen variations of steamed mussels.

It was time to do something profound, a complete but temporary change in direction and the rallying cry, depending on how profound you wanted to be, was either…….FDR’s ”There is nothing to fear but fear itself” or the famous line from Risky Business with the young Tom Cruise “sometimes you just have to say what the ____ and take some chances”. Either way the message was the same and clear. I needed a forum to continue to cook, as it relates to income and on a different tangent, for creativity, exploration and opening up a conversation about food. That was Studiokitchen.
Thankfully there is no shortage of people in Manhattan who have no to time to cook and will gladly pay you upwards of $250 a person to cook a dinner party in their homes, however at that price point, the expectation was also of high level creativity, choice ingredients, lightness, modernism, and an intellectual component.

Buying really good food was and is still is expensive, Farmer Jones, Blue Moon Acres, Browne Trading for fish, D’artagnan the great meat negociant, driving to Lancaster and Bucks county to buy amazing vegetables. Even at the price point per person minimum of $150 in Philadelphia and $250 in NYC, there needed to be amortization or subsidization of expensive ingredients. This was when I recruited 8 very good friends and started SK as a weekly social dining experiment. It basically filled in all the blanks, a forum for the intellectual exchange and discussion of food and cookery but mathematically allowed me to bring down the cost of food for private chef work down by about 9%.
Anyone who works in the restaurant business knows that shaving 9 off your food cost is like winning the lottery.

It essentially started by trying to observe people’s expectations and the relationship between creativity and flavor. Every person involved in creativity needs an audience as a measure of feedback, SK provided that audience. Private chef work is highly lucrative but SK was fun. The premise was to have an atmosphere which encouraged a conversation about food, to get people to think about food differently, to expose them to ingredients, techniques or elements of various cuisines. It wasn’t always about new or cutting edge, there was a distinct attempt to clarify misperceptions about food and eliminate the proliferation of mediocrity. It is easy to come off sounding preachy or to alienate your audience so rather that force information on people, they were led to the water but not forced to drink.

The use of language to open up a discussion about multiple related subjects became quite effective while consuming food made with said items or techniques. Although attempts were made to make the food absolutely tasty, most walked away from the experience saying they loved the direct communication with the information source. Think about learning about wine varietals without drinking wine, it doesn’t quite work effectively.
Studiokitchen was like a restaurant with training wheels

How does one finance such a startup without having to answer to anyone? Good Credit. The answer is start with a significant chunk of cash, charge every single thing and pay it all off completely at the end of the month. The credit card companies, the idiots that they are continue to increase your limits and lower your interest rates in the hopes that you will go in debt. It was tough in the beginning doing it alone until it occurred to me to sell all of my bicycles. I was a serious cyclist for many years and I had amassed a collection of very expensive racing bicycles, mostly purchased at deep employee discounts.  At some point I decided to liquidate this into a windfall of slightly over 15 grand.
Initial emphasis was on good equipment. I like toys, but functional toys.
I guess was a bit spoiled because the batterie de cuisine currently includes….Vita Mix Blender, Thermomix, Imperia 220 electric pasta machine, 2 polyscience immersion circulators, Techne circulating waterbath, Achatz AntiGriddle, 20 quart mixer, Berkel Slicer, Bamix  Stick blender, Kitchen Aid Ice cream maker, Champion Juicer, Sodir deep fryer, Cooktek Induction Units, Oakton Thermocouple, Sper infrared thermometer, a ton of pots by Mauviel, multiple ISI canisters, Berkel Cryovac machine.

Respectable, but not quite Nathan Myhrvold’s home kitchen. As the private chef work expanded, I was always reinvesting about 40% back into equipment and other hardware such as china, the Pacojet fund and other technologies that come to be deemed requisite.
Even though I work mostly alone, I get a lot of offers from people interested in modern cooking who want to spend some time with me. I always ask them the same question, which came first?

A. The Chicken.
B. The Egg.
C. The Carrots and Coconuts sunny side up.

The answer is NOT important as long as you don’t say C.
I am finding out the few are interested in the basic foundations of cuisine, certainly there is something to be said for innovation but innovators and forward thinkers are grounded in the classics. Modernism to me is more effective when transparent. I take a lot of cues from other “artists”, architects and musicians primarily because of the creative process.
Inter-disciplinary conversations and explorations were the best part of Studiokitchen  dinners. Inspiration is all around us and we just have to expand our minds and venture outside the world of food every now and then. People always ask me “how do you combine certain ingredients or layer flavors and textures”
You think intelligently and you experiment and tweak till you get to your end point.
Restraint is just as important and you need to know when you have gone too far. Just because it’s really good doesn’t mean it can’t get better and just because it got better doesn’t mean it still can. End points are critical.

A fairly easy illustration is to listen carefully to one of the greatest bands ever assembled.
As you think of your basic components of flavor, temperature, texture, color, think of Julian Adderly, Bill Evans, Wynton Kelly, Paul Chambers, Jimmy Cobb, John Coltrane, Miles Davis. The album is “Kind of Blue” the 3rd track is “Blue in Green”, everything proceeds smoothly, perfectly, could not get better, Wynton Kelly and/or Bill Evans are smoothly rolling along on the Piano, the tune could pretty much finish unchanged satisfactorily but at exactly 2 minutes and 27 seconds into the song, either Coltrane on the tenor or Adderly on the Alto saxophone starts up and nails it, just nails it and as soon as he is in, he is gone and that quite frankly is how you have to think of everything you add to a plate of food.

I met Alex Talbot on E-gullet on a discussion pertaining to Paul Liebrandt’s cooking in New York City, which is how I became exposed to Ideasinfood. I have come to the conclusion that most of the chefs in America who talk about sharing ideas are full of it and that people actively practice the exact opposite of what they preach, in the sense of sharing sources, information and inspirations. Perhaps you need to be deemed worthy if you are outside the myopic tunnel vision (no pun intended) of NYC. I asked for some advice and information, which I expected to get no answers to and I was pleasantly surprised with a forthright response. He has greatly influenced the way I think about food not so much about new ideas but re-arranging your thought processes.

I met Alex and Aki at the worlds most prestigious dining mall outside Dubai, that would be the AOL/ Time Warner Center at Columbus Circle…hehe.
Though I had seen pictures of them on the site, he described himself as having a cowboy hat on. A cowboy hat ???????? like a Stetson, indeed. I could not reconcile the image of the food photography on the site with a cowboy hat and I kept thinking, why a cowboy hat? Maybe that’s his trademark,  I even almost convinced myself that it was because HAT stands for H.Alexander Talbot. My mother always said never to judge people by appearances alone and I asked myself what famous chef wears a cowboy hat, cooks complicated food, requires a special detour to go eat his food and whose cookbook everyone wants to buy…Marc Veyrat.

The exchange of ideas is more infectious in person, within 3 hours of running around Manhattan and talking about food, thoughts and ideas had sublimated into well over $500 in purchases ranging from Japanese charcoal, implements for making shrimp Spaetzle, and fata paper. Note to self, if you are in Korin or JB Prince with Alex leave your credit cards home. Meanwhile I think I scared them both half to death with my driving. Unlike cooking, driving for me is about getting from point A to B ASAP.
So there you have it, one chapter in a free exchange of ideas.



Current Inspirations :

Ideasinfood
http://www.ltlwork.net/
http://www.designboom.com/eng/interview/ito.html
http://www.arvopart.info/ 

Goat Shoulder; so close

It has taken a bit of time to bring together the elements for this work in progress.  It is a braised goat shoulder served with a relish of tomato, olive, onion, tamarind and jalapeno.  The stick is a candied fennel branch rolled in goat cheese garnished with a tangle of watercress.  The one hitch in this dish is the candied fennel.  You have to eat it like sugarcane.  You chew and get bursts of fennel and orange with the saltiness from the smoked goat cheese.  The whole dish works, I am just not positive our guests will want to chew on a fennel branch.  Then again, I have been wrong many times before.  Perhaps if I put a fancy handle on the branch, similar to those used for poultry legs I could pull it off.

You See, We Were Inverted

Here is a preparation directly inspired by the banter in the movie Top Gun in two quotes. .  A warm shrimp bisque sits below  and perfumes a black truffle pudding studded with epazote and a roulade of shrimp and truffles.

Olive Brined Beef Cheek

Here is a dish we served last night.  It is olive brined beef cheeks with a parsnip and kola nut puree, tart cherry and red wine sauce, young marjoram and a roasted parsnip crisp.  What is even better is that is well received by all.

In Theory

It has been awhile since we have visited the category just before the bin.Today I was working on a whole glazed eggplant to be served in the style of roasted foie gras.  I grilled the eggplant to cook it and make the skin easy to peel.  I then soaked the eggplant in litchi juice to add some sweetness and balance the eggplant.  I then used the litchi juice to glaze the eggplant as I roasted it in the oven.  I then presented the whole eggplant sprinkled with ginger granules, shiso leaves and black pepper.  After I presented the eggplant I sliced it.  It was firm on the outside and tender on the inside.  Man was I happy.  I took a bite.  I tasted and chewed and took another bite.  Boy I am either stupid or dumb.  The eggplant may have been the absolute worst thing I have ever eaten.  The amount of bitterness I experienced is truly not measurable.  What is even better is as I stepped out of the kitchen Aki tried a bite because I mentioned it was not bad, just a bit bitter.  Yeah, misery seems to love company.  In theory the idea, concept and application of the dish is great.  In reality it has been retired to the bin.

Coffee-Fennel: a dish

The fennel braised in coffee turned out better than I imagined.  The fennel is tender while still retaining its distinct shape.  With regards to flavor, the fennel and coffee united beautifully.  Today we paired it with elk hangar steak, the whipped coffee-fennel braising liquid and candied fennel stalks, a byproduct for me which Aki grabbed and candied in an orange syrup.

Fennel Braised in Coffee

I am sure fennel braised in coffee has been done before.  I have had it as a cocktail,--anise and coffee--though I have yet to braise whole fennel bulbs in coffee.  Originally my plans were to braise these bulbs in a base of tomato, grilled onion, tamarind, green olive and jalapeno.  Yet, as I walked by the coffee pot with fennel in hand I just went for it.  The intense coffee and the sweet anise should blend nicely as the coffee penetrates and softens the fennel.  Now comes the point where we need to figure out how will use the fennel and the resulting braising liquid.

Freeze Dried Fruits

As chefs, inspiration often comes from hunger. This is something I realized, much to my dismay, during my blind basket final for the fine dining class in culinary school many years ago. When I'm completely stuffed to the gills it's very difficult to cook well. Perhaps going out for a cheeseburger and fries right before my final was a bad idea. Not that the dishes I created were bad per se, but they were incredibly light and delicate for an exam taking place in the late fall.  Chefs who I had worked with for the past two years were frankly amazed at the dishes I came up with and not necessarily in a good way. I simply had no appetite and could not stomach the idea of creating anything that wasn't extremely light. I could have cooked anything that they put in front of me but any kind of personal inspiration for creating late fall/early winter dishes was seriously absent that afternoon. It was a good lesson and one I never forgot. Although I work equally poorly when I'm starving, lack of concentration and an incredibly bad temper being early warning signs of low blood sugar, I make sure that I'm never full in the kitchen.

I know I'm in trouble if I can't find anything to eat. Today was one of those days. I was opening coolers, perusing dry storage, feeding the guests, and I just couldn't find a bloody thing to eat myself. It's a professional kitchen full of food and I was starving, for hours. It was not a positive state of affairs. Then I stumbled upon our cache of freeze dried fruits and vegetables.

I started with the corn which is amazing. It's incredibly light and bursting with sweet corny flavors. It's crunchy and fun to eat. Then I moved on to strawberries which are more tangy than sweet, chewy like an eraser ( I used to love to sink my teeth into those scented erasers in grade school) with a delicate crunch that melted and stuck to my teeth. I tried the raspberries and cherries but they were both incredibly tart and not for eating out of hand, at least not by me. The cherries were smaller and slightly  more chewy than the strawberry slices and the raspberries were lighter and crunchier than either of the other two fruits.  I went back to the corn and snarfed down half a pint in short order. Then it was back to the strawberries. I was mesmerized by the texture even as my tongue grew slightly raw from the acid's subtle attack. Concentrated fruits are highly acidic and one should definitely be careful about eating too much of them at once. Trust me on this.

Now I'm somewhat satiated.  I'm definitely not full because eating freeze dried fruits and veggies is like eating air.  I'm pondering how best to make use of these. Fall is in high gear and there is snow on all of the high peaks within sight of the property.  Fruit is becoming somewhat scarce in our neck of the woods. When we first picked these up, it was spring time and we were folding them into cake batters and pulverizing them into flavorful powders. But I love the textures, the crunchy and chewy. I'm a texture freak and now that there are less ingredients to play with I can focus on a way to harness these textures and flavors and make them work for me.

If I rehydrate these I'll have intense flavor but lose the texture.  I recently rehydrated some dried figs in Harney & Son's Indian Nimbu Tea. The natural honey profile of the figs and the deep fruity flavors of the tea were a beautiful marriage. Then we pureed the two and folded the result into a cake batter. It was incredibly figgy with that delicate crunch from the seeds. I could definitely rehydrate the freeze dried products and create intensely flavored consommes and infusions.  That would actually produce some pretty cool custards, sodas, vinaigrettes, purees, etc. The fruits and vegetables tend to lose a good bit of flavor to the rehydrating liquid so that could be a good use of product.

I suppose we could pulverize them and then rehydrate them and then spread them into thin sheets and dehydrate them for a version fruit leather or use the powders to create intensely flavored tuiles or crackers.  Darn, I have to start getting ready for dinner service. I've got too many ideas and too little time at the moment. We'll keep playing with this, if anyone's got any suggestions we'd love to hear them.

PS: We get our freeze dried products from Just Tomatoes and they have a line of organic products that are fabulous.

Salt and Pepper Kampachi

We cured some beautiful Kona Kampachi with salt and a blend of peppers: grains of paradise, smoked lampong and long.  The fish took on a silky texture with undertones of the various peppers.  Today we were working on a means of highlighting the fish while balancing its richness.  We paired it with our ginger granules, young shiso and lemon vinegar vinaigrette. 

What is in a Word?

In trying to execute our first rendition of ginger salt I have come across a technical and verbal road block.  It looks like salt and has the texture of coarse salt yet it is not ginger salt.  I brined the candy ginger for a short period of time and then dried it and chopped it coarsely.  I then placed it in the dehydrator to to, well, dry.  As the ginger concentrated and the hardened, emulating the texture of salt I, actually Aki noted it's great, it's just not salt.  In my haste to go from idea to execution I did not allow enough salt to penetrate the candied ginger to allow the salt to come through as a distinct characteristic.  Instead, we have intense ginger granules with a seasoned background.  So,  I do not have what I set out to create, I can try that again, perhaps even find a suitable salt solution ratio.  For now we have the concentrated ginger, which looks like salt but at days end is ginger.  Now I just need to find another name for this seasoning, because while it is not ginger salt it needs to be integrated into our cooking.

Another Point of View

One of the reasons Aki and I work well together is because we can look at the same ingredient and see do different outcomes.  The blending of our styles and approaches to ingredients and techniques enables us to achieve an interesting and exciting balance in our cooking.  We have also noted that we are inspired by the world around us.  Walks in the woods are good for both of us as are reading books.  Yet, the interaction with other chefs, a quick phone call or a quizzical email to share ideas usually leads to great discoveries.  These are what we have referred to as our culinary conversations.  Over the next several weeks we will be publishing the thoughts and ideas of our contemporaries here, in hopes of furthering culinary thought and development.  Each Sunday morning we will upload their post as written.  We can use the comment section on the post to flesh ideas out further.  These individuals have been kind enough to take time out of their hectic schedules to share in the concept of culinary conversations and the importance they provide in developing and executing ideas.  If all goes well, we will have the first conversation next Sunday.

A List; Now Use It

I came across an interesting list by a gentleman named Tom Peters.  The list is called The Pursuit of Luck.  The ideas and concepts expressed in the list are interesting and moving in many different ways.  As I thought about them, an idea struck me.  Tom has many more ideas, lists and the like on his website, free stuff he calls them.  Free stuff is great, but we need to do something with them.  Actively.  If we just collect ideas and inspirations and do not actually generate anything concrete, what the heck is the purpose of sourcing out new information?  It's not enough to just sit around and discuss ideas, we need to carry them through to fruition so that greater things can be developed.

Use the lists as stepping stones to walk over obstacles, do not just stand on the banks discussing the flowing river.

Chow Fun

Sometimes food just looks right.  I spent part of this afternoon working on taming the intense bite of black radish.  At times I enjoy the spice and heat of the radish though its intensity can often be too aggressive.  In looking to make the black radish more approachable, I shaved it into wide strips and then poached it in a broth of brown butter consomme with the addition of some maple syrup and salt.  The radish's flavor mellowed and became balanced with the flavors of brown butter and maple.  When the radish was still al dente, I pulled it off the heat and let it cool.  Looking at the cooling strips of radish my mind instinctively saw chow fun noodles.  Hence, our black radish chow fun.  Now comes the exciting part, how to serve it.

Ginger Salt

So here is something interesting.  I picked up the new book from Michael Mina the other day.  Actually it arrived in the mail as most of our books do.  I opened the book and just began thumbing through the pages as I like to do with new books.  It gives me a quick glance at the book and either entices me to read further or set it aside for when my new book supply dwindles. 

Here is the rub.  As I turned the pages my head began to spin.  The book is organized in trios, an approach Mina takes to dishes at his eponymous restaurant.  The book has a lot going on.  At first I became daunted by the organization and complexity of the recipes.  Mind you I have not sat down and begun reading the book, I am just turning pages.  This is just my first reaction.  And I paused.  I came across a recipe for ginger salt.  In the book, Mina minces candied ginger and blends it with Hawaiian pink salt.  I found that to be quite clever and it sparked a number of ideas. 

What if instead of mincing candied ginger and blending it with salt, we soak the candied ginger in a salt solution, drain it, mince it and dehydrate it?  We will then have a sweet and salty ginger salt similar in texture to sel gris.  That excites me.  In fact, we could then extrapolate further and try soaking other dried fruits in the salt solution, adding some sweetener if necessary and then mincing and drying again.  We could make apple salt, apricot salt, strawberry salt, pineapple salt, the list goes on like the imagination.  And then, what if we used something like miso instead of salt in the solution?  Imagine the possibilities. 

So, I will go back and sit down with the book and take the time to delve into the writing and recipes.  If I am able to gain such a profound (at least for me) inspiration from just tripping over a recipe for a seasoning I can only imagine what other ideas will be inspired and unlocked from really paying attention.

The First Sketch: ideas in the raw

I have broken down and invested in a scanner.  I have been wanting to put sketches on the site for some time now, actually since the beginning, and have stumbled along the way, not satisfied with the results.  Today my scanner arrived and my pile of sketches, different and the same as my notes began to become digital.  This first sketch is really just a raw idea.  It is a loin of fluke wrapped in strips of cabbage or kimchee, flavors of pancetta or another salumi/dried cured meat and pineapple and fermented black bean sauces.  The rest needs to be developed.  Actually it all needs to be developed, but this is one approach to our dishes.

Decadent

Perhaps it was last night's hard frost and the residual crisp morning air balanced by a hot latte which sparked thoughts of chocolate and baked goods.  As luck would have it a new book was waiting outside the kitchen door, equally affected by the hard frost, looking to be brought inside and put to use.  Mind you, the book is now lying on the counter next to me as I write this.  It has character.  I have only thumbed through the book, pausing to examine pictures and recipes, my mind full of sparks ignited by the clever ideas.  I only wish I had the time right now to sit down and read through the history woven through its pages.  This book just asks to be used. I can see it in a few months with the pages worn down and many of the recipes having become standards from which we can then use as is, or extrapolate from.  What book am I talking about?  It is The Essence of Chocolate: Recipes for Baking and Cooking with Fine Chocolate by John Scharffenberger and Robert Steinberg. 

Time to stop writing and to start filling the guest house with the scents, aromas and pleasures to be produced from the guidelines within these pages.

Autumn Gut Check

Working through a season is the way I would imagine running a marathon would feel. Not that I've ever run one, it's not one of my best sports.  But I know that it takes stamina and endurance. The marathoner has to pace him or herself to get through the entire course. There are times when you feel exhausted and it becomes a huge effort to keep putting one foot in front of the other. Then you get a second or third or fourth wind and it gets easier and enjoyable to continue moving on. You can take a breath to enjoy the scenery or appreciate what a finely tuned machine you've become. Sometimes there are obstacles to leap over or or sidestep or collateral damage from the stumbling of others near by. The rest stations are never placed exactly where they are needed, but close enough so that you can still reach them on that last burning breath. There are difficult stretches and then there places that are long smooth and almost relaxing.

We're in one of those easier stretches this week. There are no guests here at the moment and we've had a few days off (or as close as we ever get to off). This slow time has been a mixed blessing because it allowed us to relax a bit. Relaxation can work against us because that's when we realize how tired we actually are. Usually one of gets sick or borderline sick as soon as we have some time off. Thank goodness our immune systems are strong enough to hold out until we can afford to take a little time to recoup. It's time to take a breath and evaluate where we're standing. It's time to break out of a few ruts and breathe some new life into our kitchen and our writing. To that end we're working on a series of guest blogs from people who we think have something interesting and important to say about food.  We believe that occasionally a fresh perspective will do all of us a bit of good.

We're stretching our wings a bit this fall, consciously looking backwards and sideways and upside down in addition to straight ahead. During the height of the season we focus on moving forward day by day.  Now we can afford to take a breath and see what's all around us.  Seasonality tends to return us to past cycles. Here in Colorado this means revisiting previous flavor combinations and ingredients inspired by the damp, chilly winds, the return of the migrating wildlife, red and gold leaves drifting across the muddy pathways in the woods, the smell of woodsmoke and the sound of gunshots punctuating the late afternoons and early mornings. This year we're going to try and share our kitchen with old favorites and new inspirations brought to life. A reader comment made me think about the way we treat food for hunters. Sometimes I do equate simple tastes with unsophisticated palates.  Other times I like to use the idea of simple tastes to reinvigorate a sophisticated or jaded palate. But I need to be more conscious of how I'm doing both of those things and more importantly why.  It's definitely something to ponder as we create new dishes to pair with the changing seasons and new arrivals.

As for the bagels and cream cheese, yesterday they were lost in the delivery zone. It was a terrible thing, mostly because Alex had been anticipating their arrival all day long. Federal Express guarantees the sender 3pm delivery. What that translates to in Pagosa is usually delivery by 6pm. At 7pm there was nothing but rain and darkness on our doorstep.  Russ and Daughters was closed and we had no tracking number to follow up on. The moment where he finally gave up hope was a gloomy one.  But we rallied, inspecting the refrigerator and whipping up a riff on pasta puttanesca bastardized with sausage, jalapeno, and little pillows of melting mozzarella cheese. Life's too short for small disappointments to become large ones. The rain spattered down and we ate well and drank good red wine and thoroughly enjoyed our evening at home. The smoked salmon and bagels? They're just something else to look forward to tonight.

Podcast with Silverbrow

Alright, so we finished our first podcast with Anthony over at Silverbrow.  We had some technical difficulties at first, Skype did not like working through the satellite system at work, but we worked it out.  Here is the podcast straight from Silverbrow, and here is a means to download our voices through itunes.

Oil and Vinegar

Great ingredients inspire.  We make many of our own vinegars and infuse a number of oils for different dishes.  Recently we were given a call from Tyler over at Mikuni Wild Harvest.  He had some incredible vinegars we should try, a raspberry, lemon and apple cider.  The producer of the vinegar is Jean Marc Montegottero.  This gentleman also produces incredible oils from pistachio to argan to pinenut.  The vinegars arrived and man are they good.  We also received some of the new oils.  The argan and pistachio oils were particularly impressive.  We have used the lemon vinegar to simply dress watercress which we served with apple crisp ice cream and smoked roe.  The raspberry vinegar, that is just bouncing around my mind and palate.  Well, we figured we would share these tasty culinary inspirations.  Oh yeah, and if you speak with Tyler, congratulate him on being one of Food and Wine   magazine's taste makers under thirty five.  In supplying such ingredients it is really no surprise he was chosen.

Sometimes You Just Need a Fix

And we get a rest.  It is strange not having a new group of guests followed by another and another.  Actually, I am a bit out of sorts.  We have gotten used to the continued work so without guests for a few days I am unsettled.  In fact, part of the unsettled nature is the fact that one of our two full time house keepers has flaked and one of our key wait staff read the schedule wrong so that she planned a side job right when we will fill the whole guest house with a hunting party.  So, even with a breath of air we are scrambling to fill some upcoming staffing voids.  Such is life.  Which leads me to the fix.  Now that we actually have a moment to ourselves we have called upon Russ and Daughters to ship our a smoked salmon, bagel and cream cheese fix.  So while we have the time we are going to eat large in God's country.  That said, if you need a fix give them a call.  The shipping will take some of the wind out of your sails, but at day's end it is well worth financial effort, picking up the phone and dialing is not that much effort.

Buttermilk and Brittle

Here is the chilled Madagascar prawn dish with curried brittle cashews, celery leaves and clear buttermilk.

Questions Anyone?

We'll be doing a podcast with Silverbrow this coming Monday. He's open to questions, so if there's anything you want to know about us, here's your chance. You can read about it here and send along any questions to Anthony via comment or email. We're looking forward to it, and hopefully now you will be too.

Surprise

What a day.  I have been caught up in my own ignorance allowing it to raise my hackles and boil my blood.  Do not let life do that.  Step away.  And so I looked across the kitchen at the beautiful new book Aki bought for me and I just thumbed through the pages.  The simple beauty of ingredients, a natural appreciation for food, that is what inspires me and was reawakened by the book Kaiseki: The Exquisite Cuisine of Kyoto's Kikunoi Restaurant. 

How Light Can We Make Raclette?

A special Sunday dinner in the late fall and early winter used to be raclette.  Really it still is.  The cheese, usually of Swiss origin, is melted until bubbly and served with hot steamed potatoes, cornichons, olives, mustard, salumi a bit of salad on the side and an ice cold glass of milk.  Well as a kid it was ice cold milk, my parents drank red wine or beer.  The dinner warmed the body and the soul but killed the stomach.  At meals end everyone around the table was stuck in their respective chairs.  Recently, I have wanted to serve raclette, at least its essence just not the belly bomb.  Today we fine tuned a slow cooked salmon dish topped with black olive gomasio, arugula leaves whipped raclette (the cheese and its accompaniments) and some tarragon.  Here we have captured the flavor without the heaviness.  It acts as a great seasoning and balance to the fish.

Chocolate Marshmallow Pie

Sometimes a pie is more than just a pie. Cooking for people with simple tastes can be a blessing. Especially when it allows us to indulge our own inner children and cravings. A chocolate dessert was called for and with these crisp autumn evenings I had pudding on my mind. Chocolate pudding to be exact. It's a childhood favorite, devoured in diners with a tower of whipped cream and a crisp wafer cookie. Instead of the cookies I decided to put the pudding in a pie crust.  The smell of woodsmoke riding on currents of cold air evoked images of campfires and roasting marshmallows.  It was a quick leap to blanket them over the top of the pie and broil them to a delicious gooey topping.

And yes, these two pictures look different because in my impatience I put the pie too close to the flames the first time and set the whole thing on fire. Sound familiar? Blackened marshamllows were never my idea of a party. Not to worry though, a quick stint in the refrigerator and the burnt marshmallows peeled away. Thank goodness for the do-over! The guests loved it and cleaned their plates. It tasted as decadent as it looks. It was rich and creamy, loaded with bittersweet chocolate, contrasting with the delicate buttery crust and finished with sticky marshmallow-y goodness. But what a sugar rush, I was bouncing off the walls for hours after eating this one.

Other Buttermilks

OK, we have made clear buttermilk.  It is based on cow's milk.  Now the question is, is there other buttermilk to be had?  How incredible would sheep or goat buttermilk be?  What kind of applications and uses would these distinct milks have on our preparations?  And then, what if me made them crystal clear?  Now the question is where to find the other buttermilk?

Potato Gnocchi

In trying to best serve and present dishes we go through a series of preparations and presentations.  Here is our most recent approach to serving potato gnocchi in foie gras consomme.

Layers and Clarity

I have examined the use of our broths, waters and consommes as the vehicle for cooking ingredients.  We are able to use them as the frame work for a dish, a clean, focused, flavorful building block from which a dish can begin.  Then it dawned on me like many simple things do, what if we used these broths not just as poaching or braising medium but as the cooking medium for grains, legumes and pastas.  What if we began making paella with a paella broth?  What if we made our sunflower seed risotto with brown butter consomme rather than water?  Could we elevate and punctuate the flavors of our dishes?  I believe so.  Think about foie gras poached in foie gras consomme or served in foie gras consomme. 

Now we shall begin the examination of layers and clarity in the evolution and refinement of our food.

What Does it Taste Like?

The question we often get is what does it taste like.  Here is a discussion of the extended menu we served this past Saturday.  It is in the discussion forums of Opinionated About Dining.  Here is the link to the discussion with pictures of Keyah Grande, the food and those darn Versace plates. (note, a registration to the forums is necessary to enter.)

Chuck called ahead and requested a tasting menu.  We knew he was coming and knew he enjoyed food.  What you see is what we cooked.

Apple Crisp Ice Cream and Smoked Char Roe

Here is the finished dish which combines smoked wild char roe and our apple crisp ice cream.  The other components of the dish are watercress dressed with lemon vinegar and aromatic spiced walnut brittle.

Some Books

We have not taken the time recently to mention enough of the books which are catching our fancy.  Well, here is a brief list. 
Grand Livre de Cuisine, Pastries and Desserts by Alain Ducasse in English
El Bulli 2003-2004, by Ferran Adria  in English
White Slave, by Marco Pierre White
Made in Italy: Food and Stories, by Giorgio Locatelli
Happy in the Kitchen, by Michel Richard

Apple Crisp Ice Cream

Today is our first day off in seven weeks.  What that means is we have no guests, I could sleep in and by noon today I was back in the kitchen working out ideas which have been lying dormant or at least buried for sometime now. 

The first dish or base ingredient I began working with was an apple crisp ice cream.  Not too far of a stretch there, apple crisp is often served with ice cream, why not make it one.  The stretch is this ice cream is going to be the base or medium for the wild char roe which is now in season.  We have made an apple crisp with aromatic spices and an oatmeal streusel topping.  We baked off the crisp, I ate a bowlful and the rest is cooked in heavy cream and milk.  I pureed the mixture, chilled it down and am going to churn it tomorrow.  We will serve the ice cream with a large dollop of either the smoked or natural roe, that is the one variable, a young watercress salad and a spiced walnut brittle.

A few other works in progress consist of biscuit ice cream, stuffing consomme and roast chicken cotton candy.  We shall see how they all work out.

The Tale, the Taste and the Backstory

So, how much information is too much?  It's a serious question.  These days as we prepare food and serve the guests in our dining room, the question is how much do the guests actually want to know about the food?  Let me give you an example.  We had three separate parties come for that long tasting menu we did the other evening.  Actually we had two parties who had requested a tasting and one who happened to be staying with us that evening, with no idea about the food we do.  Now here is where it gets interesting.  One of our guests was truly into food, arriving early to spend time in the kitchen with us.  That particular diner wanted to know all of the details about what we were doing and how we make it happen.  The other  culinary guests were following a trail, searching for the out of the way places that might have great food in the South Western states, a path which led them to our doorstep.  The third visitor was there to check out the property and did not know anything at all about the food.  We showed him the menu and offerd him as few or as many of the courses as he wished. Our solo diner encouraged him to try the entire menu, but he demurred. After looking things over, his response was that he would have a salad, an appetizer, an entree and a dessert.  Within those boundaries, he would put himself in our hands.  Then he went off to relax in the guest house, put his feet up and catch up on life.

Meanwhile, in the kitchen we continued to prepare for the evenings menu.  The guest who was there to learn about our food watched as we began trimming sheets of cuttlefish and portioning fish for dinner.  As he watched Alex trimming the large sheets of cuttlefish that we would be frying later in the evening,  he asked the diner what he thought about the size of the sheets we were preparing for dinner. Due to their small size, normally there is no way to create a large square of cuttlefish like the ones we were prepping for service that evening.  It actually had not crossed his mind that the size was unusual.  He wasn't thinking about the fact that they were the largest sheets of cuttlefish that he had ever seen. He was wondering how they would taste when we finished them. He was pondering how we would present them that evening and how they would taste when they were crispy on the outside, moist and tender on the inside.  It's not always necessay for people to be aware of all of the subleties that go into the preparation of a dish. It's simply necessary for them to enjoy the finished product, in this case a luscious and delicate sheet of beer battered cuttlefish served with liquid chorizo, Thai basil and a thin yuzu disc.

Again, we return to the diner who was not expecting the food to be anything other than simple Southwestern fare.  For his menu we began the evening with our frozen vinegar martini and then shared the wild char roe and grilled potato ice cream.  After these first two dishes, the wary diner just nodded and said he might be able to eat a bit more before the entree.  He was letting us pitch. He did not eat all of the courses, although he ate a few more than he had originally intended.  What he did do was relax and enjoy the meal. He did not have the back story on the ingredients or on the chefs.  All he had was the atmosphere in the dining room and what we set before him.  That was more than enough to complete the experience.

The other two parties went the distance and by evening's end they were talking and comparing notes of meals past, present and future.  They had eaten at a lot of the same reataurants at different times.  It was intersesting to hear the comparisions. The couple, as far as we know, was there for the food, the ambiance, and the meal.  We had been reccommended to them as worth the trip. So they had come to dine and we were glad they had done so.

We had three separate parties enjoying the same menu with three different levels of expectation and three different experiences.  None of them had actually tasted our food before.  They had varying degrees of exposure to what we do  and who we are.  In the end they all had an enjoyable evening. The next morning they joined us for breakfast. We served fresh fruit, scones and one of the house specialties, Eggs Alex. The thread that tied these two meals together? Flavor. We are a flavor driven kitchen whether we are preparing an intricate tasting menu or a country breakfast. Sometimes the pairings may seem odd or outlandish but for us it all comes down to how things taste. Food has to taste good or there's no point to what we do. That's why it doesn't matter if we cook for foodies or cowboys, because if they're willing to open themselves to what we do, we know we'll win them over in the end. It's all about flavor.

Wild Char Roe: 2006

I have written about blis caviar  before, though being a new year with a new season of roe I figured I would just place a casual nod in the direction of Steve who makes, no,rather crafts these incredible roes and syrups and salts and vinegars and, I am trying to convince him to do a few other things.  He has taken the leap of faith with us and woven some of our ideas into his handy work.  But, what I am truly getting at is just how amazing his products are.  Steve makes a wild brook trout roe which while I truly enjoy it, its scarce supply and demand from other chefs allows us to wait for the coming of wild char roe.  And it is here.  The wild char roe is golden yellow, slightly larger than the brook trout roe with a creamy nuttiness.  We are using both the lightly smoked version and the natural.  Both are great, it just depends on how you are using them.  Anyway, I just wanted to let folks know that the wild char roe is being made, it is amazing and it blows the doors off other caviar's and roes.  We have a few pictures of some dishes we did featuring this caviar  last year in the Wild Char Roe photo album.  Oh yeah, where to get this stuff?  Check out Mikuni Wild Harvest.

October 7, 2006

Last night we served some folks who wanted to eat.  These are our antics.  Now, it is time to get breakfast ready for them.

Vinegar Martini
spruce, black walnut, noble sour vinegar

Grilled Potato Ice Cream
smoked wild char roe, golden purslane, chives

Tuna
comte, red ribbon sorrel, onion syrup

Madagascar Prawn
clear buttermilk, celery leaves,  brittle curried cashews

Beer Battered Cuttlefish
thai basil, liquid chorizo, yuzu disk

Mozzarella Yuba
ginger-scallion, passionfruit, ground olive gomasio

Sunflower Seed Risotto
jumbo lump crabmeat, matsutake mushrooms, fiore sardo

Warmed King Salmon
pistachio cotton candy, watercress, jalapeno-apple dressing

Petrale Sole
foie gras bacon, woodear mushrooms, membrillo-tomolive

Turbot
tamarind cavatelli, olive leaf arugula, black radish

Potato Gnocchi
foie gras consomme, red mustard, argan oil

Slow Cooked Pork Tenderloin
butternut squash, marinated leeks, olive caramel

Braised Lamb Neck
whipped baked potato, young marjoram, roasting jus

Hangar Steak of Grass Fed Beef
hollandaise sheet, preserved perigord truffles, broccoli florets

Fourme d’ Ambert
smoked dr pepper, chorizo poached pear, epazote

Hot Cheesecake Ice Cream
port melon condiment, grains of paradise

Artichoke Cake
blis elixir, rose water panna cotta

Vahlrona Chocolate Brownie
parsnip ribbon and ice cream, tart cherry-kola nut

Coffee and Biscotti
as bubble tea

Curried Cashew Brittle

The last few weeks have been mostly cold and rainy, with a few brief days of heat and sunshine. There were just enough warm days for the bugs to hatch and begin a fresh onslaught which is thankfully starting to fade away. The cold, damp weather brings to mind curry rice. It was one of the few dishes that my Mom would make when I was growing up. Always in the winter, she would make curry with either chicken or shrimp. It was her specialty and we all loved it. The curry was made in a big orange Le Creuset stew pot which was also used for my Aunt's beef stew, another winter specialty of the house. Mom's curry was extremely thick with chunks of potatoes and carrots, thick pieces of sweet onion, juicy hunks of daikon radish and tender chicken or shrimp.  It was always served with plain steamed rice. We would continue to eat it for breakfast or lunch until it all disappeared, but the first appearance was always for dinner. It would cook all afternoon, the sweet, spicy smell permeating the house and pulling me back to the kitchen again and gain to peer under the lid and perhaps snag a potato if no one was around.  For some reason we never ate curry in restaurants. It was strictly considered home cooking. Mom made it rarely enough for it to be a treat and often enough for me to associate it with cold winter days and weekends at home. It was years before I realized that curry wasn't strictly Japanese and that there was a wide range of global curry dishes to tempt my palate and my culinary skills.

Flipping through a cookbook the other day I was looking at recipes for spiced nuts. I think the recipe was for curried almonds which seemed a bit coarse and heavy for my palate. Buttery cashews came to mind as the perfect vehicle for letting the rich flavors of the Madagascar curry powder we had on hand shine through. I quickly threw together a batch of nuts that was aromatic and delicious. There was great balance of sweet and spice, salt and earth. Alex ate a few and said, how about making this into a brittle?

His idea was to convert the nuts I had already made into a brittle. I decided that since the nuts were already cooked that it would be better to start from scratch. This way I could cook the raw nuts in the caramel and they would season each other for a maximum flavor impact.  I added salt, curry powder and baking soda to the mix for a brittle that actually lived up to it's name. It was sweet and spicy, delicate and crisp, and yes, it still stuck to my tongue and teeth. Caramel will do that. Little did I know that as soon as my back was turned, Alex would grind the stuff up to make it into tuiles...although I wasn't entirely surprised when I made the discovery. The brittle itself was special, spicy and warming,  with a range of textures from the roasted nuts and caramel. The tuiles are delicious too. You can use the recipe to make either but I suggest that you enjoy a few pieces of the actual brittle before you grind it up. But be warned, it's addictive stuff. If you give in to temptation there might not be enough left to transform into delicate, ethereal crisps. It's okay though, because the recipe is so easy you'll be able to make these again and again without thinking twice about it.

Curried Cashew Brittle

1 cup of sugar
1/2 cup of agave syrup (or corn syrup)
1/4 cup of water
1 1/4 cups of cashews (broken pieces are fine)
1 tablespoon of butter
1 teaspoon of salt
1 teaspoon of curry powder
1 teaspoon of baking soda

Line a sheet tray with aluminum foil and butter liberally. Set it aside. Combine sugar, agave and water in a heavy saucepan and bring to a boil.  While it's cooking, combine the salt, curry and baking soda and set aside. Continue to cook over medium heat until the mixture reaches 250 degrees F. Add the nuts and continue to boil, stirring often until the mixture is golden brown and reaches between 290-300 degrees F. or hard crack. Carefully add the butter , the caramel may spit, and swirl to blend.  Add the salt-curry-soda mixture and stir well. The mixture will lighten and expand in the pot. Once everything is fully incorporated, pour the caramel out onto the buttered, foil-lined tray and set aside to cool and harden.  Break into pieces and eat immediately or wrap the candy and keep in a cool, airtight container for up to a week.  Alternatively, you can grind it up in the food processor, lay it out on a silpat and melt it down in a low oven to make delicate tuiles.

Chorizo Poached Pear

He we have thinly sliced pears which have been poached in chorizo water.  The sliced pear encloses a knob of Fourme d' Ambert cheese.  We garnished the dish with ground chorizo, smoked Dr. Pepper and epazote leaves.

Brittle Cashews

My problem with peanut brittle is its allure to many others, it sticks in your teeth for days.  The taste and flavors are great, I just hate picking the stuff out of my teeth.  Well, we were working on a dish which in my mind needed peanut brittle and Aki took some liberties.  She made a curry flavored cashew brittle.  I tried it and was really pleased with the tastes and spices and balance in flavors.  The only problem is that I am still picking it out of my teeth.  So, when she left the kitchen I took some liberties.  I ground the brittle into a fine powder and melted it back together into brittle cashews.  The picture here is me demonstrating why I destroyed Aki's brittle.  The actual usage of the brittle will be a thin wafer to be served with some shrimp, clear buttermilk and celery leaves.

It is Just Darn Funny...and food related as well

Here is a link to someone using post it notes for something funny.  Check out today's Savage Chicken.  I pitty the fool that does not try this link.

Pistachio Cotton Candy

This morning we began work on a number of new dishes, ideas for the fall.  I  continued with the some  earlier thoughts which sprang from the process of making a pistachio sugar in hopes of making a pistachio cotton candy.  The cotton candy would be a delicate sweet and salty topping for something.  I wanted to play off the sugar filaments with some crunch so we made a fresh relish of apple and jalapeno.  The combination of the pistachio sugar and the relish is quite tasty.  A few sprouts of cumin rounded out this initial trial with pistachio cotton candy.  We have some work to do, though I like the direction this dish is going.

Hot Whipped Baked Potato...and white truffles

And so I have just a quick note of inspiration.  We took the whipped baked potato and made it hot.  Nothing extraordinary there, unless we top it with a mountain of shaved white truffles.  The idea was sparked by an email I just received and the mention of the beginning of white truffle season.

Liquid Baked Potato

We have been called upon to make baked potatoes for some of our guests recently.  I am not against baked potatoes and all the fixings.  They can be tasty if not leaden in the belly.  That is another subject all together.  With the talk and execution of baked potatoes swirling about I began thinking of capturing the essence of the potato and the fixings bar.  We began with a broth.  We clarified the broth.  It was golden, clear and when heated turned cloudy.  S!@t!!!  OK now what?  The broth screams baked potato with flavors of butter, scallion, sour cream, cheddar cheese and bacon.  It works.  And so I thought of a cold preparation.  We placed some smoked roe in a glass dish and poured the baked potato over the top.  The broth stayed clear for a moment and then a Pastis effect took place.  We topped the cod preparation with potato gnocchi poached in the liquid baked potato and topped with mustard greens and Fiore Sardo cheese.  The diner eats the  warm gnocchi and then removes the lid and eats the cold roe floating in potato broth.  Pretty tasty, though I must go back and figure out how to get the micro particles out of my baked potato.  While we were working on this first dish, I began thinking about how light we could make a baked potato.  Well, we were able to make it light, fluffy and intense.  Now what the heck to do with it.?

The Wedding

Truth really is stranger than fiction. We had a party of six coming in tonight. They made 6:30 reservations last Monday and as we were explaining that the doors open at 5:30pm and that they were welcome to come up early for cocktails, they mentioned that they were coming in to celebrate their civil ceremony. Well isn't that sweet, congratulations, and we look forward to seeing you on Sunday evening to celebrate your special occasion.

Fast forward to tonight just after 5:30 pm when the happy couple arrived with her parents. As we greeted them at the door, they announced that they were going to get married here, on the flying deck before dinner, and did we have any aluminum foil that they could use to make a ring? As Alex went off to get the foil, they explained to one of our servers that the wedding would be next year but they were having a civil ceremony now for insurance purposes. As a matter of fact, his parents, due to arrive any second, didn't even know that they were planning the ceremony for this evening. It was a big surprise! For us too. Apparently in Colorado you do not need anyone to officiate a civil ceremony. All you need is a marriage license, a witness and the bride and groom.

So, as I write this they're getting married out on the deck using a piece of aluminum foil for a wedding ring.  Frankly his mother does not look pleased. But then again, since she didn't know that she was coming to witness her son's wedding ceremony this evening, who could blame her for being a bit disgruntled?

Honest to goodness, this is really happening. Who could make this stuff up???

A Mistake is Just an Unrealized Success

It is essential to take advantage of opportunities.  Many of our breakthroughs in the kitchen have come from mistakes.  In making mistakes we are able to look at food, ingredients and life from an unexpected angle.  It is from these new angles that we see what was previously obscured.  Thus I reiterate the fact that a mistake is just an unrealized success.  Take advantage of failure, you will be surprised at the outcome.