Leftover Flank of Beef with Pink Mayonnaise

I’ve never thought of myself as much of a ‘barbecue’ kind of person. I don’t really attempt anything terribly ambitious on the grill. Although I own a reasonably nice North American style barbecue, I quite like the more rustic approach of a terracotta pot filled with smoldering charcoal and a simple steel grill placed atop it.

Either way, for the last week, I suppose because it’s been unseasonably hot, I have been perfuming my clothing with smoke and fire.  This past weekend was no exception. I acquired a healthy-sized flank of beef. In the past I have always approached lean, fibrous pieces of meat such as this with caution and delicacy. I will typically cover it in a flavourful rub that includes fennel seed, black pepper and allspice berries (bashed in my pestle and mortar) and then put it in a low oven so that it cooks extremely slowly, sometimes taking up to three hours to reach medium rare. This way, all the connective tissues breaks down and the rub penetrates deeply into the meat. There will be a dark and ever-so-slightly chewy crust on the outside, and the inside, pink and meltingly tender.

Yet, it’s a hot day and I’m not going to turn my oven on, so instead I marinated that great slab of meat for several hours in olive oil, bay leaves, juniper berries and garlic, then grilled it on a very hot barbecue for a very short time (until medium rare). I served it by cutting very thinly on the bias, against the grain. It was okay, but certainly not as tender as the oven method. My theory is that animals that come from the sea take well to very fast, hot cooking, and animals that roam on land require more consideration. A good New York strip steak does well in a very hot and fast cooking environment. Likewise, a well marinated lamb chop needs to be licked by flames.  However, you could get an equally wondrous result with the almost ‘sous vide’-like approach to very slow roasting. Fire has an undeniable romance to it, but to bring meat to perfection with flames and smoke is no easy feat. In fact, the best so-called Southern Barbecue that I have ever tasted was not fast and hot grilling, but slow and smoky roasting.

Nevertheless, what I’m more interested in are leftovers. Specifically, I’m talking about the leftover flank of beef that, once cooled, actually took on a nicer texture than from the previous night. How to dress it up? I think the best accompaniment to beef is horseradish. So that’s a good start. I had some leftover braised beets kicking around in the back of the fridge, Beets and horseradish: a match made in heaven...why not?

Pink Mayonnaise

Note: Olive oil has a very strong flavor and it can overpower a mayonnaise, yet I also don’t want to eliminate the taste all together, so I use a combination of olive oil and neutral oil, about a 1 to 3 ratio.

3 egg yolks

75 ml of olive oil

225 ml of neutral oil such as grape seed or canola

10 ml Dijon mustard

Juice of half a lemon

A pinch of cayenne pepper

30 g of finely grated, fresh horseradish

30 g of cooked beets, shredded on a box grater

A few crushed pink peppercorns

Salt to taste

First, make the mayonnaise base. It’s best to use a food processor to do this, but if you’re a glutton for punishment or an unmoving purist, a whisk and a bowl will do the job as well. I will describe the way I do it though. Place the egg yolks in the food processor along with the mustard, and turn on the food processor and whizz for about ten seconds. Now in a very (I mean VERY) slow trickle start pouring in the olive oil first. Go very slow for about thirty seconds, which will bring you near to the end of your olive oil, then pour in the other oil. You can go a little faster at this point. Keep going until it gets to the point when it is almost as thick as jarred mayo, then pour in the lemon juice and the cayenne powder, followed by the pink peppercorns, the grated horseradish and the shredded beets. Whizz for another ten or twenty seconds. The mayonnaise will immediately go Pepto-Bismol pink.

Beautiful.

Once everything is incorporated, season to taste with salt.

Sometimes mayonnaise doesn’t emulsify. This may happen to you. It’s a fickle thing that has a lot to do with the temperature of your eggs (you don’t want them too cold), or the freshness of your eggs, or how the stars have aligned. One small misjudgment at the beginning stage when adding oil can cause the whole thing to split.  There has been precisely two occasions when my mayonnaise stubbornly refused to emulsify. To this day, I am not certain why it happened. All the other attempts at homemade mayonnaise (and there have been many) have resulted in an excellent product. One of the mysteries of the ages I suppose…

To finish the dish, make some toast, slather it in your pink mayo, and load up with cold leftover beef. Slather some more on top and enjoy. A peppery, tangy wonder. Don't even bother with parsley or any thing green. Just keep it pink.

More Grilling

I just can't bring myself to turn on my oven or stove. It's too hot. After work today was a quick trip to replenish my propane supply, and then it's grilling again. A fresh sage leaf pressed into the eye of a small pork chop, with some oil and salt is all that is required for the main.

To accompany the chops: green and fat local asparagus from Kensington market, picked that morning. Both sweet and crisp, asparagus this fresh is an altogether different vegetable than the flaccid stalks languishing in the grocery store.  I also brought along some button mushrooms, large enough that they won't slip through the grate, a little oil and salt, and then just tumble directly on to the hot grill for ten minutes or so. And a few russet potatoes, wrapped in foil to bake; split open and steaming, I mash in butter with the back of my fork: a flash of a childhood memory.

I also made a radish salad that is reminiscent of a Fergus Henderson recipe. In his 'Nose-to-tail' cookbook, he applies the philosophy to vegetables, making use of the whole root including the greens, this salad only works with the freshest of radishes.

Radish salad

1 medium bunch of radishes with fresh and green leaves
15 ml olive oil
10 ml lemon juice
1 generous pinch of caraway seeds, toasted briefly in a dry pan
20 g of feta cheese
Salt and pepper

Remove the leaves from the radishes and clean thoroughly, removing any icky bits. Get the leaves in a mixing bowl. Then clean the stalks of the radishes, and leave some on the smaller radishes: they look attractive. For the larger radishes, slice thinly. you're looking for a mix of thinly sliced radish disks and a few split whole radishes with some stalk remaining. This adds a bit of visual interest. Toss the radishes in with the greens.  Then get the oil, the lemon juice, the caraway seeds and a pinch of salt and pepper and beat together until combined (go a little light on the salt because the feta is salty). Dress the salad with the dressing and serve with some crumbled feta.   

Pizza Baked in a Barbecue

I have been suffering the embarrassment of riches known as a vegetable glut. I tend to get over-enthusiastic in the green grocer and buy more than my small family can possibly eat. This included a logjam of dodgy-looking zucchini, a smattering of slightly soft artichokes, and a pile of peppery arugula that was about one day away from complete wiltage. In the past, when I have more veg than I know what to do with, I invariably throw it all into a soup. Yet a quick check out the back window revealed a blazing sun, a straw-like lawn and ruddy, perspiring children. Hot soup simply did not seem apropos. Usually plan B is pasta, but I was still digesting the spaghetti from the previous night..so what to do?

A wander through Kensington market provided the answer. I found some fresh pizza dough in the bakery and I have been hankering to get my BBQ pizza stone going. Problem remedied.

I opted to make two pizzas. One pizza, while tasty, was a bit pedestrian. Simple tomato sauce, crispy bacon and mozzarella cheese (pictured at top). This pizza did not solve the vegetable glut, but it would be consumed lustily by the kids. The second pizza was a veritable farmer's market. In fact, this pizza, groaning under the weight of all those vegetables, threatened to collapse whilst placing it on the pizza stone. Happily in the end, it held together, affording the grownups a superlative herbivorian experience.

Vegetarian Barbecue Pizza

500 g of fresh pizza dough
50 ml of tinned tomatoes
1 medium ball of buffalo mozzarella
4 baby artichokes, cleaned and poached till tender
3 zucchinis, sliced into thin medallions
1 small red chili, deseeded and sliced finely
1 medium onion, sliced
50 g of grated cow's milk mozzarella
A handful of fresh argula
The juice of one lemon
Some olive oil
Some fresh thyme
A bit of flour for dusting
Salt and pepper

Sweat the onions on a medium heat in the about 10 ml of olive oil until they start to soften and colour slightly, about 10 minutes. Then remove the onions and put aside. Add some more olive oil and turn the heat up slightly. Add your zucchinis, season with salt, pepper and a pinch of fresh thyme and sautee until the zucchinis start to colour and become tender - about five or six minutes. Then put them aside. Dust your hands and work surface with some flour and roll out your pizza dough to the desired size (don't even attempt to make it perfectly round - it is much more appealing when it is an irregular shape). Place it on a pizza peel or some kind of implement for which you can slide it easily onto a hot pizza stone on the BBQ (without burning yourself). Then start loading it up: first hand-crush the tinned tomatoes and spread around on the dough. Over the tomatoes, spread your softened onions. Then start laying down the thin zucchini medallions-they will completely cover the dough like roof shingles. Then chop and scatter the tender artichokes on top of the zucchini, sprinkle the chilies and place quarter inch thick slices of buffalo mozzarella here and there. Fill in some of the gaps with the grated cow's milk mozzarella and finish with some olive oil and a sprinkling of maldon salt. Bake in a very hot BBQ on the pizza stone for about 10 minutes or until the dough has become crispy and your cheese has melted. Then carefully remove it from the BBQ and get it on to a large board to rest for a few moments. In the mean time, toss your arugula with some salt, pepper, lemon juice and oil. Ratios can be determined by your personal preference - I like mine really lemony. Then get your dressed arugula and scatter atop the blistering pizza. It will wilt in a pleasant way. To avoid burning the roof of your mouth, wait a few moments before consuming. I never have the patience. I will spend the next few days nursing a burnt tongue - well worth it.

Pantry Spaghetti with Tomato and Tuna

Tonight the pantry played an important role in my nourishment.

I returned home after a long day of work to an untidy kitchen and a near empty fridge. In situations like this, a well stocked pantry is like a quiver full of arrows. The only ingredients in this dish that did not come from the pantry were a bit of old spinach I found lurking in the back of the crisper and the last of the fresh parsley. The rest of this meal could be assembled in a fallout shelter during Armageddon.

Take note, when working with tuna it is best to work with what is called 'light' tuna as opposed to 'white'. Light tuna is a darker colour and typically is derived from a species of fish called a skipjack. These fish, because they are smaller, hold less mercury in their flesh than the white albacore tuna (there was actually a study conducted on commercially tinned tuna that determined this fact beyond a doubt). Also, I really try to avoid large apex predator fish - that means swordfish, large tuna species, marlin etc. Recently, I have seen line-caught tuna being advertised in a tin, but I have not been able to find this product yet--definitely a good thing.  When it comes to eating: little fish are better for the ocean, better for our health and I think they taste better.

Bonus: whole wheat pasta makes dinner really healthy.

Spaghetti with Tomatoes and Tuna

300 g of whole wheat spaghetti
1 tin of light tuna packed in olive oil
1 tin of San Marzano tomatoes
2 anchovy fillets
1 generous pinch of dried chili flakes
1 clove of garlic, sliced thinly
1 half an onion, chopped
1 small palm-ful of brined capers
1 handful of cherry or grape tomatoes
1 small handful of baby spinach
10 ml of tomato paste
50 ml of white wine
Olive oil for sauteeing


Get your pasta in some boiling salted water. Now, in a frying pan, sautee the onions in about 10 ml of olive oil until translucent (about four or five minutes), then add the chili flakes, garlic, and anchovies. Frizzle on a medium heat for about four or five minutes then pour in the wine and the tomato paste. Reduce the wine by about one-third.  In the mean time get your tin of tomatoes open. Strain the liquid out of the tomatoes and then start adding the tomatoes to the hot pan by squashing them in your hands (don't wear a white shirt when doing this). You want a pulpy pile of tomatoes - not soupy. The remnant liquid in the can be set aside and used to loosen up the sauce if need be. Toss all the ingredient together and allow the tomatoes to break down a bit, say two or three minutes. Then drop in the capers, the cherry tomatoes and then the spinach and allow it to wilt a bit. Finally, open and drain your tuna and get it into the sauce. Don't break the tuna up into a million pieces, be gentle and attempt to keep largish chunks whole. The tuna just needs to heat through. Drain the pasta and toss the pasta in the sauce gently so as to keep the tuna from completely shredding. Finish with another drizzle of olive oil and fresh parsley. Additional chilies are perfect if you like it spicy. Don't even entertain the thought of sprinkling cheese on this. Just don't do it.

Post Script: Yes, Chris, that is your tea towel.

A Simple Late Spring Supper

Another unseasonably warm May evening had me beating a path to the barbecue. This time, I wanted to capture something of Southern France - after all, the sun that shines on me is the same sun that shines on Provence, is it not?  A whole chicken - roasted as if it were Sunday supper. I wanted a proper oven-roast, but given the wondrous weather it had to be en plain air, so I roasted the chicken within the BBQ. Why not? It can get extremely hot in the small space under the lid, quite like a wood-fired oven. A cast iron pan is essential for something like this. To further dampen the effect of bottom-up heat, I placed the cast iron pan atop a ceramic pizza stone. This baffles the direct heat somewhat allowing for more of a baking action than a grilling action.

To take the 'roast dinner' concept a bit further, I filled the bird with a simple bread and onion stuffing. Lots of sage delivered some Tuscan, earthy notes and the addition of simple sauteed ratatouille brought it back to the land of the ancient Mistral.

Roast Chicken Provencal (on a BBQ)

1 whole chicken, preferably a smallish hen
1 bunch of sage leaves
1 bay leaf
1 bunch of fresh thyme
250 g of stale-ish bread, cubed
1 slice of streaky bacon, cut up into lardons
1 onion sliced
1 clove of garlic sliced
150 ml of white wine
15 ml olive oil

Get the olive oil frizzling in a pan on medium heat. Add the lardons and the onion and allow them to cook down a bit, then add the garlic, a solid pinch of fresh thyme, and about the same amount of sliced sage and a couple of bay leaves. Once the garlic starts to take on a little colour (about five minutes), pour in half the white wine. Burn off the alcohol (another four minutes or so), and then take the pan off the heat and let it cool slightly (also discard the bay leaves). Get your cubed bread into a large prep bowl and fold in the onions mixture, follow that up with the other half of the wine and a generous seasoning. Then, scrunch all the ingredients with your fingers. Now prep your chicken. Slide some whole sage leaves under the skin of the chicken. Then season the cavity and fill with the onion-bread stuffing. Securely truss the drumsticks with some butchers twine to ensure you keep all the goodness inside the bird. Season the works very liberally with salt and sprinkle some fresh thyme on top. Now, get it into the cast iron pan.  

Turn your BBQ up to full whack and let it preheat. If you have a thermometer gauge on your BBQ you're looking for about 500 F. Now get the pizza stone in the BBQ and the your pan on top of that. Try to avoid parking it right in the middle of the grills - set it up to one or the other sides. Now kill the burner immediately under your pan, but keep all other burners on full power. Now close the lid and walk away for awhile. The chicken will require about one and a half hours to cook. You will occasionally have to open the lid to regulate the temperature and feel free to baste. Some people say that basting a roast chicken will effect the crispiness of the skin. I just can't help myself. I like to baste.

Stove-top Ratatouille

3 medium zucchinis, cut into quarter-inch medallions
Half of a large red onion, chopped roughly
A generous handful of grape tomatoes
A pinch of herbs de Provence
15 ml olive oil

You'll notice there is no  eggplant in my ratatouille; reason being, I simply didn't have any. Is it still a ratatouille? I  would think so.

Get the oil in the pan and once hot, add the onions. Allow them to sweat down somewhat, then add the zucchini, the herbs de province and season with salt and pepper. Shake everything around so that the oil coats everything. After about six or seven minutes, drop in the tomatoes. You want them to warm through and just start to pucker a bit, then you're done.

Put the whole roast bird on a platter, untie the legs and pull out a goodly portion of the stuffing. Tumble the colourful ratatouille all around - summer on a plate.

Spicy Grilled Chicken with Marinated Shiitake Mushrooms

With the sun radiating this kind of warmth in mid-May, I tremble at the thought of deep July. I'll likely be cowering in the shadows of my dim home, air conditioner whining away on full whack. For now, the best thing to do is bask in this Floridan May. So much for the great white north.

With two-thirds of the Victoria Day weekend behind me and enough yard work to cause permanent injury I opted for something grilled on the fire with bright and spicy flavours. Hot weather often makes me crave the food from hot places. I'm not terribly well-versed in the foods of Asia, I tend to inelegantly blend the flavours of India and Thailand (the two types of Asian cuisine I love the most).  Nevertheless, I certainly like working with ingredients like ginger, lemon grass, chillies, fish sauce, soy and cilantro among many others. I find the best way to really bring out the heat and vibrancy locked within these exotic ingredients is to bash the hell out of them in my pestle and mortar.

One side note: I've used fresh turmeric in this recipe. Turmeric in its fresh form looks quite like ginger - a craggy root with a fibrous skin. The difference is that the flesh within is a bright golden colour. Treat it as you'd treat ginger. It has a subtle flavour but imparts a beautiful colour. Take care though, its juices can inadvertently stain your countertop or your shirt.

Spicy Marinade

2 finger chillies, stem removed, and roughly chopped
1 thumb-size knob of fresh ginger, peeled and roughly chopped
1 thumb-size knob of fresh turmeric, peeled and roughly chopped
1 clove of garlic, peeled
Zest of 1 lime
A healthy bunch of washed and dried cilantro, chopped roughly
10 ml of light soy sauce
15 ml of sesame oil
10 ml fish sauce
5 ml lime juice

Get the chillies, garlic, ginger, turmeric, zest and cilantro in a  mortar and bash it until it is starting to come together as a paste, then add in the wet ingredients: lime juice, soy sauce, sesame oil and fish sauce.  Continue bashing until you have a wet paste with some texture to it.


Grilled Chicken and Marinated Shiitake Mushrooms

1 whole chicken, broken down to breasts and leg quarters
1 measure of spicy marinade (see recipe above)
1 dozen or so shiitake mushrooms
1 small bunch of cleaned cilantro for garnish

(Optional)
1 bunch of fresh asparagus
1 cup of brown rice

Take about three-quarters of the marinade and slather it all over the chicken, try to sneak a bit under the skins of the breast - the flavour will really penetrate that way, then let it rest in the fridge for about an hour and half. Remove the tough stems of the shiitakes and set them aside to flavour a vegetable stock on another day. Then toss them with the remaining marinade. The mushrooms don't require as much time in the marinade - about a half hour will suffice. They will become quite wet as the soy and fish sauce will draw the moisture out of them. Nothing to get anxious about. Before grilling, just pat them dry with some paper towel. Do the same with the chicken when it's ready. Then grill the chicken on a nice low and even fire - flare ups will probably occur, so just pay attention. The mushrooms only require about 5 minutes per side, so time it so that they're not going on until the chicken is almost done. Take care not to lose your precious mushrooms between the grills. I find putting them on a bamboo skewer reduces this risk, just make sure the skewer is well soaked or it will burn like a roman candle.

I chose to serve this with some simple grilled asparagus and some healthy, albeit, deliciously nutty brown rice. Of course, scattered leaves of cilantro adds a bit of fresh green perfume to the plate. Lime wedges would be welcome as well.  But don't feel confined by this arrangement. This dish would work perfectly well with a refreshing green salad, maybe with a miso dressing. Or just put it on toast - it's all fine by me.

Farfalle Carbonara Revisited

I have been informed that my eldest daughter's school is attempting to assemble and publish a family cookbook as a fundraising item. It goes without saying that I jumped at the opportunity to contribute. The instructions were to document recipes for dishes that your children like to eat, and perhaps write an accompanying anecdote along with the recipe. I hit a bit of a creative block right out of the gate. Frankly, my youngest daughter is going through a stage were she generally hates all food except for yogurt, french fries and toast. Perhaps that's exaggerating matters, my youngest will certainly eat her bacon butterflies. She's not fond of the peas in the recipe and will attempt to eat around them; however, by lucky accident I have observed that she generally ingests a lot them quite inadvertently. 

So here's my first attempt at writing a recipe that involves actual measurements and instructions. It may not be completely accepted in North America yet, but measurement by weight and in metric is the rule, not the exception in Europe - so I have employed this approach. These kinds of measurements are more accurate and with the help of a $30 electronic scale, recipes are a cinch to follow. So, here goes - a proper recipe with proper instructions - be gentle; it's my first.

Farfalle Carbonara (alternatively known as Bacon Butterflies)

Our girls are always keen to eat their ‘butterflies with bacon’.  Fresh mint or basil makes for an excellent accompaniment; however, given young children’s general suspicion of things that are green and leafy, the herbage should be left to the side. Grownups can dress their own plate. Also note, steamed broccoli looks very pretty perched atop the pasta and knocks it out of the park for nutritional value (if you can get your three-year-old to choke it down). Bonus advantage – the sauce can be prepared in the time it takes to boil the pasta!

300g of Farfalle (bowtie) pasta

3-4 litres of water

6 slices of good quality streaky bacon

200g of frozen peas

10 ml of 18% cream

10 g unsalted butter

100g of grated parmesan cheese

3 egg yolks

10 ml olive oil, plus extra for drizzling

1 or 2 generous pinches of salt

First, get your pasta going. If in doubt, follow the directions on the package of farfalle pasta. This recipe serves four so you’re generally looking for about 300g of dry pasta to about 4 litres of well-salted boiling water. Taste your water – it should taste like the sea. Once you get your pasta going, get six strips of bacon frizzling in a pan on a medium heat. Cook the bacon until crispy, about five to six minutes on each side. Once the bacon is done, set it aside to drain on a paper towel. At the point that your pasta is about 75% cooked (in and around nine minutes), you will need to 'steal' some of the pasta water.  Using a mug or measuring cup, carefully remove 250ml of starchy pasta water from the pot and put that aside. Now get your peas into the boiling water along with the pasta. You want the peas to cook for about two or three minutes. While the peas are cooking, get three egg yolks into a bowl and beat them with the cream and about one-quarter of the parmesan cheese, then put it aside. Chop the bacon strips up into small pieces. We’re almost ready to assemble everything – remember, once the pasta is out of the water, it will rapidly start to cool – so you need to act fast. Strain the pasta and peas and get them into a large serving bowl. Add the bacon and the olive oil and toss so that it doesn’t get too sticky. Then pour in about 50 ml of the starchy pasta water and then fold in the egg yolk mixture and butter. If you feel slightly anxious about using raw eggs, fret not, for the yolks will cook in the residual heat of the pasta. Next, pour in the rest of the cheese and toss everything together. If it seems too dry, keep adding starchy pasta water until you’re happy with the consistency (if it gets too watery, feel free to tip in another generous glug of cream or more grated cheese). Once satisifed, bring the entire steaming bowl of pasta to the table and serve family-style with additional parmesan and herbs on the side. A bit of crusty bread would not be unwelcome.

Duck and Morel Pie

Remember that 'defeat' I suffered at the hands (wings?) of a duck? Well, tonight I exacted my revenge. My sweet revenge. The medieval punishment for any animal miscreant: end up in a pie.

I had one and a half breasts and one leg of duck leftover from the previous night's dinner. Not really enough to feed a pile of people, so I made this as chef's perk only. Anyway, as I mentioned, the duck had been slightly over-cooked, so there was no point in re-heating it the next day and over-cooking it more...or was there?

I pulled out the pressure cooker, cut up the duck meat and got it together with some chopped shallots, a chiffonade of fresh sage, a bit of garlic, a bunch of morel mushrooms (re hydrated from dried), along with the re hydrating liquid (leave the grit behind), the leftover duck demiglace (now a wobbly blob of gelatinous yum), a bit of duck fat (I always save and strain every last drop), some fresh thyme, a cup of red wine and a cup of water along with the usual seasonings. On went the pressure cooker lid, and up went the fire. This does not need long at all given that the meat is already half way there. I say about 25 minutes will suffice.

Once done, I opened up the pressure cooker (my favourite part of the ritual - you never know what you're going to find in there.) Inside was dark and tender and unctuous. I started mashing stuff together with a fork. Then I transferred this extremely rich ducky mess into a meal-sized ramekin. Next, I carefully piled the leftover mashed spuds on top, smoothed it all out like a potter at his wheel, and with the tines of my fork, sculpted little crop circles; a whimsical pattern derived by my unconscious mind. The Pièce de résistance? Duck fat. It's always going to be duck fat. I melted a bit in a small prep bowl, dipped in a brush and glazed my pie till shiny and beautiful.  To finish, I sprinkled with flakey Maldon salt and did a few cranks on the pepper mill. Into a 400 degree oven for ten minutes, and a further five or so under the broiler.  Take that duck!

Mother's Day Roast Duck

During the week you may have noticed that I cook relatively light, simply fare. On weekends, I step it up a bit. On special occasions and holidays - well, I try to pull out all the stops. Whenever I have one of these special feasts, upon its conclusion, I like to reflect on the merits of the cooking. The kids are in bed, the guests have left, and I will pour a small tumbler of fine Canadian whiskey and take a comfortable seat by the hearth. At this point,I will perform a mental post-mortum of the meal. There are only two outcomes as I see it: wins and defeats. For wins, the meal, in taste, texture and optics, turned out how I anticipated it to. Really, this is the sign of any good cook, i.e. the food tasted exactly how it was envisioned...or at least a very close facsimile thereof. Sometimes, a win is accidental. Perhaps the meal didn't go as hoped, but through a happy accident it went in another, equally excellent direction.
Then there are the defeats. I'm not looking for perfection, but if the food wasn't within a certain margin of error for me, than I will chalk it up as a learning experience..and a defeat.

I hate to say it, but in my heart of hearts, my Mother's day dinner was a defeat. My guests didn't think so; the plates came back clean (and I don't own a dog). But the meal, or at least parts thereof, did not turn out close enough to my vision. The meal was roast duck with duck demiglace and several accompanying sides. Needless to say, the garnitures were satisfactory. I made a celeriac remoulade - predictably delicious. I also made mash potatoes for which I replaced the usual butter with rendered duck fat. Dare you ask if that was delicious? Of course it was. The green salad was right on point. The problem was with the duck. First let me tell you about the demiglace - perhaps the one highlight of the night that prevented my confidence from completely disintegrating like dandelions in a gale.

Duck Demiglace

This amazing little elixir tastes magical, but really, the only tricky requirement is that you have a good amount of time set a side to produce it. I had two relatively large ducks at my disposal. I broke them down to leg quarters, breasts and carcasses (no small feat, I've never actually broken down a duck and they definitely have a different anatomy than chickens!). I took the carcasses, which included necks and wings and got them on a cookie sheet along with three or four star anise, six or so juniper berries, some peppercorns, one or two cloves and a good whack of salt.  I roasted them in a 350F oven for about an hour. The fat will render and you'll have some beautifully browned duck bits (the house will smell like heaven). Next, I took them out of the oven and got them into my superfluously large stock pot. (The rendered fat can be filtered and set aside for other uses - don't ever throw away duck fat!)In the pot should be one whole onion, skin on, three or four whole garlic cloves, skin on, a carrot or two, cleaned and split, a bunch of fresh thyme, bay leaves, a few peppercorns and enough cold, clean water to cover all the bones. Do not salt this! It is going to reduce and there is still residual salt from the bone roasting. I cooked this concoction, at a bare simmer for about eight hours. You can do this overnight for which an electric slow cooker would be very effective - but if you can sleep soundly knowing the gas is on, put it on the lowest simmer burner overnight (I take no responsibility if you burn your house down). After the eight hours, I strained all the solids out of the stock, and then got it into a clean sauce pan and then put it on a gentle simmer. Do your skimming at this point as the stock begins to reduce. Because a lot of the fat and scum was rendered out in the roasting process, you don't have to skim as much as if starting from raw. Anyway, I reduced this liquid (which stared out as a good four or five litres), down to a single cup. The amount of flavour packed into that dark, and slightly viscous potion was amazing. You don't want the thickness of gravy or a glaze, but there needs to be a bit of 'gravity' to it---like a nice rich jus. Once you've got it down to this level of reduction, you shouldn't even need to add salt. Get it in the fridge until you need it (it will set solid because of the rich gelatin in it. A little heat and it will loosen up again, perfect in a gravy boat along with the duck). 

Roast Duck

Then there is the duck itself. Like I said, I had two whole ducks, for which I isolated the leg quarters and the breasts. Here's the thing about ducks: they're not easy to roast. The breast will dry out before the leg is tender. A very young duck, perhaps during a crisp autumn evening may be roasted, albeit very slowly and with the understanding that you will be eating well-done duck breast. It acceptable to overlook this fact if you are enjoying the quaint rusticity of a whole roast wild fowl. On the other hand, the problem can be easily remedied by simply separating the breast from the leg. Cook the leg longer in a low oven and then pan sear the breasts. Time it so that the cooking of each conclude relatively simultaneously. Even better, confit the legs. In theory, this sounds excellent. I figured I get an A for effort in knowing all this. However, I pulled the legs out of the oven too early and whilst pan-searing the breasts, my daughters got into an all out brawl over who grandma loves best, which necessitated some officiating on my part - the duck breasts payed the price for this distraction. I don't tend to blame my kids for cooking mishaps, but..oh hell, of course I blame the kids for cooking mishaps - who doesn't?  In any event, the duck legs were about 15 minutes away from complete tenderness and the duck breasts were about six minutes too far gone. In other words, a wee bit tough; higher than average levels of mastication required. It seemed a lot of effort, for what appeared to me, a mediocre pay off. Nevertheless, like I said the guests ate with gusto - my mother-in-law, who's duck is usually overcooked anyway, proclaimed it as delicious. My own mother, savaged her plate like she hadn't eaten in days (and perhaps she hadn't) and my dear wife, mother of my children, had two helpings.

I brooded silently, staring into my wine glass trying to understand what when wrong. Such is my pain. A lesson learned - duck is a fickle beast that requires a deft touch. Next time, I'll let the kids fight it out and save my Solomonal insight for the birds in the oven.

Homemade Artichoke Antipasto

Sometimes a certain type of cooking can really seem daunting, and then in a surprising turn, become achievable with little effort. This happened the other day when I had to do something with artichokes. You see, I've been buying up all these baby artichokes because I think they're beautiful and really fun to prep. There's also the fact that they are utterly delicious. In any event, I had way too many artichokes sitting in my fridge that needed to be used immediately. I've never really been one to make jars of preserves. I've had some forays into my own charcuterie and I do own many mason jars, but I've never made jam, or canned a tomato. So why not just jump in to the fray and make a jar of artichokes in a chili garlic brine? That's exactly what I did and while expecting disaster (given I went at this with no experience or recipe), the results were startlingly good. Here's what I did:

Take at least eight baby artichokes and clean them so that they still retain the stem and have not been split. I find that the baby artichokes are tender and young enough that the purple, thistle-like choke that one usually finds within an adult artichoke is really quite edible at this stage in the plant's development - so there's no need to remove it. Anyway, once you've prepped all your artichokes, get them into some gently simmering water with plenty of lemon wedges, a few bay leaves, a few pepper corns, a few sprigs of time, a few whole cloves of garlic and a really generous pinch of salt (the water should taste salty, but not too salty). Let the 'chokes simmer for about 15 minutes or so until they start to get tender. Then turn off the fire, and leave them in the poaching water until it is cool enough to touch. In the meantime, sterilize a mason jar and lid components in some boiling water or in the oven. This recipe is not meant to last the winter in a pantry - it will be refrigerated. I sterilize the jar just to buy a bit more time in the fridge. This is by no means a true preserving method! Once the artichokes are cool enough to handle, take them out of the liquid and carefully slice each of them lengthwise. Then into your jar should go the garlic cloves from the poaching water, along with some fresh bayleaves (don't re-use the ones in the poaching water -they'll have lost their flavour), some generous peelings of lemon skin (without the pith) and a few basil leaves. Pour a little bit of the poaching water into the jar, followed by a drizzle of olive oil and a teaspoon of chopped red chillies, and then carefully stuff  the artichokes about half way up the jar, then add more cooking water, more oil, some more basil leaves and more chillies, then more artichokes until you reach the top. Get the lid on, and very slowly turn it upside down. All the liquid that was on the bottom will flow to the top. Count to five and then slowly turn it back. This is a gentle way of distributing the different flavours through the jar. Then get it into the fridge. Give it 24 hours for all the flavours to mingle.

When I've bought preserved artichokes from the store they are either in salt water brine, or in pure oil. I didn't want mine swimming in oil, but I wanted some of the flavour from the oil, this is why I mixed up a combination of salty-lemony water with drizzles of oil. The water and vinegar do separate somewhat within the jar, but given the starchy, salty quality of the now-cooled poaching liquor, the oil seems to remain suspended in it rather than all pooling at the top. I have no idea of the science behind it.  It may sound odd, but the result was most excellent. 

Since I've made them, they have gone in salads, on pasta, and as a simple side dish.  They'd work on pizza in a pinch and would be most glorious on a humble piece of grilled bread. So far it's been in the fridge for a week and still looks and smells fine. My guess is that given the salt content of the water and the initial sterilization of the jar, I can leave them in the fridge for many, many weeks; like any other jar of olives or pickles.

Of course, this little recipe has got the juices flowing and I'm now looking at my mason jars as more than rustic tea light holders and as vessels to fill. Let the adventure begin!