Humble food for humble folk...

  

Inspired by this article , i ate the most humble meal that I could muster. Preserved (dried and salt cured) duck, stir fried greens, a bowl of rice with a dollop of preserved spicy tofu.

I was deeply touched by this man and his quest. His journey reminded me so much of my humble ancestry as well. Though I have never visited my ancestral village, I have seen pictures and it looks just like his! Anyway, it reminded me so much of my humble ancestry and that served as inspiration for dinner.

The duck, by the way, was cured by my very own father in the back yard on the laundry line! It's his annual ritual. When I was a wee lad, I think fondly back to the look on those horrified kids whenever they would visit. I lived in a multi-culti neighbourhood anyway so when the Italians and Greeks were making tomato sauce and wine and salami in the fall, my dear ol dad was out dryin meats. (pork, beef and duck)

Not so humble food...

  

A few nights later, I wasn't feeling so humble anymore and so I decided to make something fabulous for dinner.
Voila! Pan roasted duck breast drizzles with a lemon-ginger dressing and served atop organic mesclun greens with a side of mango salsa. Despite its cheeky name, the Cono Sur Pinot Noir was a perfect match for this dish. It has a fruity and elegant bouquet which complemented the duck rather well. This is an atypical pinot and works quite well as an everyday pinot. It has the right elements when the occasion or meal does not call for Shiraz or Cab Sav. I suspect it would be nice with salmon as well. At less than $10 a bottle, it's a definite steal! Save your Richebourgs for a special occasion. hahahhaha :)

Torched Creme Caramel

  

I've recently become obsessed with two classic French bistro dishes: Confit de canard and creme brulee. Having recently caved in to a bout of intense kitchen gadget envy, I lashed out and bought a torch. With my new torch in hand, I decided to tackle the creme brulee first. As simple as it may seem to whip up the custard for creme brulee, I honestly hadn't made more than a couple of attempts at it over the years, neither of which resulted in a qualified success.
Goodness knows what once compelled me to use low fat milk instead of cream and on another occasion, over whipped eggs led to a frothy (but relatively tasty) mess.
No such disaster awaited me this time, dammit!
Remembering the big hardened clumps of brown sugar i still had in my cupboards, I decided to melt down one big chunk into caramel. I was a bit worried that the end result might become too "burnt" and I would end up with dark molasses but I managed to keep a watchful eye on it and avoided the pending doom.
I halved Julia's classic recipe from "The Way To Cook" so as to avoid being forced to eat one giant creme caramel or a dozen little ones all by my lonesome. In the end, I made 4 small creme caramel and 2 creme brulee. Not bad for a week's worth of dessert. Et voila!

Sunday Lunch and Tasting

As is our habit of getting together for lunch and tasting some newly discovered wines, four of us spent Sunday cooking and languishing over some fresh new discoveries.

Being that it was lunch time, I thought that I would make something brunch-like. I whipped up a simple spinach fritatta. I think I need to drop a few shavings of asiago or perhaps some mozzarella next time. Anyway, I was pretty happy with the way it turned out. S kept ribbing me about bringing a full bodied red and cooking a frittata. "The two have absolutely no connection.", I firmly exclaimed.

R did his usual and brought meat. We all joked about it being dog or something weird like that. Of course we were being facetious, since that would be totally incongruous to a dog owner such as him. He wanted us to taste it and figure out what it was and so that's what we did. I guessed correctly and declared it "bison". He pan fried a crusted bison filet mignon and whipped up a brandied cherry sauce to drizzle over it. Bison is a lot leaner than beef and so was a bit tougher than we had hoped. Perhaps next time we should cook it rare.

S baked a basa fish fillet in a papaya salsa. It turned out pretty pretty nicely and it would be perfect fare for a warm sunny day. I'd never had papaya on fish before and am not sure that it works, although it didn't taste "bad". It's a nice light dish and perfectly in keeping with lightening up our otherwise usually heavy lunch.

K served up some roasted lambchops and was oh so proud of his grilled zucchini, even though i had to show him how to slice it without endangering his fingers.

We drank 2 whites and 3 different reds, not all of which I remember the names of:

WILDASS Chardonnay.

BERONIA Rioja (pictured above)

A Semillion Chard from Ontario

Something French and rare (expensive)

and an Aussie Cab-Shiraz.

All delicious, next time I will be sure to jot down some notes and the names of all of the wines.

Screw you, winos!

CLOUDY BAY
Sauvignon Blanc 2004
Marlborough, New Zealand

I was thrilled to discover the return of Cloudy Bay Sauvignon Blanc to the LCBO this week. I've been searching high and low for these delicious whites for years and was never able to find them except when they was astronomically priced on the wine list of high end restaurants in the city. So prized and popular were these bottles that I can only ever remember briefly spotting them at an LCBO here many years ago only to seethem disappear of the shelves faster than you could pull a cork.
Much has been written about the decline in popularity of the big, oaky, buttery chardonnays and the corresponding shift in taste towards the more elegant and crisp whites like Sauvignon Blancs, Reislings and Pinot Grigios. The time is ripe for the re-emergence of the wine which put New Zealand on the map and the maker who almost single handedly accounted for it, Cloudy Bay.

I was doubly surprised to see that Cloudy Bay has not only returned but returned with a progessive new enclosure, a screwcap! Good for them, if it means that more of their wines will be saved from the ravages of corkage and we don't have to deal with those god awful plastic corks, then let the screwing begin! Of course this also means that we can now enjoy it over several days rather than be forced to drink it all in one sitting (which is not always necessarily a terrible prospect).

Here are some notes as I am tasting:

-pale straw colour with a slight greenish tinge
-fresh melon scent
-fresh and fruity, crisp and zippy
-right balance of crisp acidity and fruity freshness

Spinach and Tofu Miso Soup

I was thrilled to have stock saved from poached (organic grain fed) chicken breasts which was made a couple of weeks earlier and frozen. I decided that this week's dinners will be accompanied by a spinach and miso tofu soup, in the Chinese tradition of serving soup to accompany the meal albeit with a slight Japanese twist. Miso soups are usually made from a stock of steeped bonito fish flakes or from kombu and carry the briny flavour of the sea. Using chicken stock, allows the soup to take on a homier comforting flavour. Adding enough ingredients and the soup could become an entire meal in a bowl.
I used what I had available in the fridge (button mushrooms, green onion and a block of extra firm tofu) and bought a bunch of spinach to complete the dish.

Ingredients:
4 cups of chicken stock
2 TBSP white miso
6 button mushrooms, thinly sliced
2 scallions (green onions)
1 block of extra firm tofu cut into small cubes.
1 bunch of spinach.

First, I blanched the spinach separately and squeezed it together into a tight roll which was then sliced into smaller blocks. Each 'block' of spinach was then placed into a separate bowl.

To prepare the soup, bring the chicken stock to a boil.
Add in the cubed tofu and mushrooms.
Use approximately one ladleful of stock to dissolve the miso in a separate bowl and then add the dissolved miso back into the stock. I tend to err on the cautious side of salty and add the miso in small increments until the flavour is to my liking.
Once the soup is boiling again, stir well and then remove from the heat. It is at this point I add in the chopped green onions. They tend to retain their oniony freshness this way.
Ladle the soup into the bowls with the spinach and serve.

Mmm, delicious on a cold winter night.