Cooking a la Fronchie

The Bobcats gourmet club has a week to go until our next dinner, and we're hosting Chez Gateau. Theme is regional/rustic French. Menu shaping up as follows:

French martinis (a favorite of one Bobcat)
Light hors d'oevure, perhaps a little tapenade
First course of either onion soup or composed salad TBD
Tuna daube with green olives from Patricia Wells' Provence cookbook
Potato gratin
Vegetable dish TBD by Mr. Gateau
Cheese course
Massive amounts of dessert, including cake TBD, creme brulee, and honey-lavender ice cream
Wine, dessert wine, port, coffee, tea, etc.

Getting the ice cream going today.

Packages of Love

We have been invited to a Super Bowl party today where the guests are asked to bring either an appetizer or a dessert. The host said that he assumed I'd be bringing something including bacon, so obviously I have a rep to protect. So I am wrapping marinated artichoke hearts in bacon and broiling, one of the hit dishes at the Bobcats tapas dinner. Should be simple and tasty.

Los Gatos de Roberto do tapas

The Bobcats, or in keeping with our Spanish theme, Los Gatos de Roberto, gathered late-ish on Friday night for an evening of tapas, which may have been our most successful dinner yet, if only because we finally all seemed to get over our baser instincts to double or triple every recipe we prepared. Maybe it's just the long graze that tapas is all about, but we seem to have figured out how to supply a luxurious dinner without drowning in leftovers. It's just too bad we were all too focused on making fantastic food for anyone to have remembered to bring a camera, so no photos this time.

For the first wave, we settled into the living room with glasses of white wine sangria and a table covered with mostly cold dishes, though the hot artichokes wrapped in bacon were a clear hit, as were the cheese-filled empanadas. With those were wedges of manchego with slices of quince paste, green olives stuffed with white anchovies, and platters of jamon.

With the remnants of that on the table, we moved into the dining room for the more substantial dishes, these served with bottles of rioja and dry sherry. Two types of tortilla, one with chorizo and one without, were accompanied by garlic shrimp, sherry-garlic mushrooms, patatas bravas, white asparagus in vinaigrette, and meatballs in a caramelized apple-sherry vinegar sauce. We capped that off with three desserts -- milk custard (served plain, rather than fried, when the frying didn't go well), burnt orange caramel ice cream, and Mexican churros with chocolate dipping sauce.

It was delicious, but even as we enjoyed our desserts, we were planning the next gathering. On February 27, Les Chats de Robert will meet for country French.

Halloween Scene

The Bobcats held our first annual Halloween party last night -- we were lucky that Halloween fell on a Saturday this year (which led me to wish that Halloween get moved from the 31st to the last Saturday in October from now on). Our original idea was to have an all-pumpkin dinner, sort of an Iron Chef challenge, but we decided to expand to fall vegetables generally, and do a sort of Thanksgiving-if-you-didn't-have-to-make-your-family's-required-dishes with a couple of deep-fried turkeys at the center. For the first time, the Bobcat kids were invited, so the house was filled with various pirates, Jokers, bloody surgical patients, mermaids, spies, and tin woodmen.

We started off with sweetly spiced pumpkin empanadas, served with beer, fruit punch for the kids, and killer hot spiced apple cider spiked with Jameson's. I made a soup course of Mexican-spiced pumpkin soup with a lime crema that I doctored liberally with ground chipotles, cumin, cider vinegar, and maple syrup (following the good comments thread on Epicurious). Our main course included the deep-fried turkeys with gravy on the side, twice-baked potatoes, carrots with butter and thyme, zcornucchini bread, sweet potato pie, sausage stuffing, and I made a deliciously simple corn pudding.

We were, of course, stuffed by then, so took a trick-or-treating break around the neighborhood to get some exercise. Once everyone had returned, Wonder Woman (a/k/a Bobcat Stacy) led a riotous candy exchange while we drank white wine and coffee and plowed through a "devil dog" cake stuffed with orange cream.

Halloween never tasted so good.

Bobcats go Italian

On September 26th, the Bobcats (our brilliantly named Gourmet Club) convened for our second dinner, this one exploring a broad swath of Italy. Upon arrival, apple martinis were pressed upon us, which I feel is always a good start to an evening. With garnish, no less.
Shortly after that, we launched into a little antipasto, and by "little" I mean "enough to feed the Roman Army." These included various meats, cheeses, olives, capers, artichoke hearts, melon wrapped in prosciutto with mint vinaigrette, and more drinks.
We were feeling little pain and wanting for nothing when we moved into the dining room for a little pasta. Aren't we a nice looking group?
Mr. Gateau made fresh linguine with basil-sundried tomato-olive pesto, using basil from our garden, and topped with Reggiano Parmesan.
Just when we were congratulating ourselves of showing restraint with the pasta portions, out came the main courses. Our hosts had prepared the central dish, osso buco with gremolata. I'd made risotto Milanese to go with that (done in the Crock-Pot, which works great; unfortunately I hadn't timed it well and by the time we ate, it had gone mushy). We also had chicken cacciatore, zucchini stuffed with parmesan and prosciutto, and just in case we hadn't had enough, Caesar salad and garlic bread. Sample plate below -- note the vast number of surrounding vessels holding alcoholic beverages.
But wait! We weren't done yet. Out came the cannoli, the tiramisu cheesecake (because tiramisu alone would not have been filling enough), the amaretto cookies, coffee, amaretto, and sambuca.
A good time and a good feast was had by all. How could it be otherwise? The Bobcats will reconvene on Halloween, Bobcat offspring included, to do a pumpkin (and other fall vegetable) feast, with a centerpiece of deep fried turkey. Costumes required.

An orgy of steak

Last night our intrepid group of carnivorous friends dined at Peter Luger, the celebrated Brooklyn steakhouse. For anyone who hasn't eaten there, dismiss any images you have of a dark, elegant room with masculine touches, refined service, and limousines lining the street outside. Luger is smack in the middle of Willamsburg, Brooklyn, just past the on-ramps for the Williamsburg Bridge. The front-of-house personnel are notoriously surly (and poor John had to endure this when Mr. Gateau and I were 30 minutes late and he had to ask them to hold our table), and there is a distinct lack of ambiance. In fact, the lights are so bright that I got better photos of the food than I ever have before -- see below. I suspect that any bartender who cracks a smile when he give you your drink will be sacked on the spot.

But the food is sublime. I've eaten in most of the great New York steakhouses, and they're good, but nobody matches Peter Luger for steak. It doesn't have that gamy flavor of over-aged meat (inexplicably popular, to me), and the famous appetizers and sides are equally excellent. We had the classic Peter Luger meal of tomato and onion slices topped with their steak sauce dressing (basically, it tastes like barbecue sauce mixed with cocktail sauce) and thick slices of grilled bacon for appetizers (why oh why is this not widely copied?).
John, our appointed Wine Guru, selected a terrific bottle of Sequoia Grove Cabernet.
We shared "steak for 4" perfectly medium-rare, and had that with the crispiest onion rings, hash brown potatoes, and luscious creamed spinach. See before:
And after:

As if that were not enough, Luger is famous for offering all desserts "mit schlag," absolutely perfect whipped cream. They don't stint. With our truly scrumptious pecan pie, hot fudge sundae, and coffee (and port, let's not forget the port), our waiter, Karl (center front if you click the Peter Luger link up at the top), plunked down a bowlful:

Is it any wonder we are all swearing we will never eat again. Until next time, of course.

L'Shana Tovah, all of youse!

I somehow accidentally managed to make the best Rosh Hashanah dinner of my life this weekend. First, I didn't buy a brisket until Friday afternoon, and never made it to the good kosher butcher with the first cut brisket, but just bought the only big one they had in the supermarket. On Saturday, I cut up a large number of onions, seared the brisket on both sides with salt and paprika, and doused it liberally with the onions, Worcestershire sauce, red wine, garlic, and pepper. That braised its way into pure meaty nirvana -- for once holding together in beautiful slices and not falling apart when I cut it.

With that I made kasha varnishkes, also with plenty of onions, and for once did not overcook the bowties. I also made a carrot and sweet potato tsimmes that came out fantastic, much to my surprise because it was really improvised. I had no prunes, so I used raisins, and instead of honey, grated orange and lemon zest, and orange juice for sweetening, I used orange marmalade, brown sugar, and orange juice. It came out sweet and tangy and neither watery nor dry. I wonder if I can ever replicate this feat. The secret ingredient may have been my grandmother's enamel dutch oven, which was just the right size.

For dessert we had brown sugar-apple cake with vanilla ice cream, right out of the oven. I know, it's not honey (again) but it was a sweet ending anyway.