So as I may have alluded to earlier, I’m in California visiting some friends and family. And like I said before, I would cook for my family and friends.
Thursday, July 3, 2014 – Like I said last time, I doing an appetizer month in preparation for cooking a meal for my family. This was that meal. I planned and prepared the meal, with my mother acting as sous chef.
This one was entirely my mother’s idea. She noticed that my meal plan was lacking in vegetables, so she made a salad. (Strictly speaking, it’s a salade composee, although she was probably just mimicking something she saw at an upscale restaurant.) We’re looking at some lightly sauteed lettuce leaves, topped with raisins, arranged with apple and tomato slices. The idea of raisins on lettuce was actually kinda brilliant.
Time permitting, I would have whipped up a vinaigrette to go with this, but this was a spur of the moment type thing, and I didn’t feel like making a vinaigrette so late in the game. The raisins provide a strong flavor, so probably a more neutral vinaigrette would pair best with this salad.
You all remember the soup I made last time right? This is that same soup. Except this time, I doubled up on the butter and flour, and I cooked the roux for a full 5 minutes instead of just one, to give it the extra roux-i-ness. I’m actually kinda excited about this, because (to my memory) this is the first time I’ve cooked a roux for a substantial amount of time without burning it.
As it turns out, with the double amount of roux, I didn’t need as much cream. So even though I made a note last time to double the cream (to a full pint), I only used 1.5 cups of cream. And in addition to the salt, pepper, Frank’s, and wine, I also took Carol’s advice and melted in some parmesan cheese and soy sauce.
The soup was good, but there was a bit of an odd flavor to it. I’m guessing it was the chicken stock I used. I got it out of a can, and it tasted kind of off. I guess that’s why the chefs all say to make your own stock (or to doctor up the canned stuff).
So my mother did most of the heavy lifting for these potatoes. I took care of the mis en place, chopped and boiled the potatoes, sauteed the garlic, and handed it off to my mother with instructions (“I trust you”), and then went ahead to cook the roux for the soup. (The soup and the potatoes were happening in parallel.)
I looped back at the end to taste and season the potatoes. I accidentally oversalted the potatoes to start, but I was able to cut the saltiness down by adding a bit of the milk. Overall, the flavors came out right, but it would have been better to not oversalt to begin with. (I made a note in my, well, notes to be careful not to oversalt the potatoes next time.)
We made a bit of a tactical mistake with the potatoes though. Earlier, I sauteed the minced garlic in the butter, then simmered it in the milk, then left the garlic milk for my mother to use in the potatoes. Unfortunately, I neglected to inform her that there were pieces of garlic in the garlic milk that needed to be added to the potatoes, so she got the milk but left the garlic behind. Oops. As of yet, we don’t have any confirmation that actual garlic is better than garlic paste from a tube.
As for those steaks, after failing to thoroughly cook steaks back in January, I vowed I’d make a proper steak next time. The first step was to make sure I had something that could get hot enough to properly sear a steak. Fortunately, we were able to dig out an old induction hot plate from my mother’s kitchen, and that paired up with my trusty stainless steel saute pan meant I could finally output enough heat to cook steak.
The next step was to get a cut of meat that was much better than sirloin. This time, I bought some nice ribeye steaks. I decided to marinate them the morning of. I didn’t have a marinade recipe on hand, so I just improvised one from first principles, using a some olive oil, a tablespoon of white vinegar, some salt, black pepper, and a dash of Frank’s, and marinated them for about 8 hours.
I cooked the steaks for 2 minutes on each side, twice (for a total of 4 minutes on each side). I quickly discovered that the center of the pan was hotter than the edges (the induction ring was probably fairly small), so I had to rotate the steaks. One of the steaks was rare, while the others were somewhere between medium and medium-rare. Overall, a success.
Overall, the meal took 2 hr 42 min to prepare (“2 hr 42 min of love”). Pretty quick compared to the recent meals I was making, but I prolly still have room for improvement. The mis en place took well over an hour, and that’s where I need more practice.
The portions were also way too big. (It didn’t help that everyone at the table had already had a pretty sizeable lunch.) I previously noted in my notes that the soup recipe feeds 4, and the potato recipe feeds 4. Apparently, that’s only if people eat just soup (which is pretty filling) or just potatoes (which is also pretty filling). Clearly next time I should halve the recipes. (Unless the soup or the potatoes is the only appetizer.)
And we had 2.4 lbs of steak between the 4 of us. Which is way too much. Maybe something closer to 1.5 lbs of steak would have been more fitting.
Oh well, you live and learn. It was still delicious anyway! And now we have leftovers.
Saturday, July 5, 2014 – Like I said last time, I wanted to make a savory dish for the July 4 party (which took place on July 5), because the “adults” don’t like desserts. So I did.
This is the same meatball dish I made in June, except with a few differences.
One, instead of using a food processor to chop up my own lamb, I bought ground lamb from the super market. Second, instead of searing the hell out of the meatballs, I seared them just enough to get them brown on the outside, then simmered the meatballs to doneness. This had the effect of making the meatballs more tender.
Third, I melted some parmesan on top of the meatballs, and then garnished the whole thing with chopped mint. This made the meatball dish much prettier in terms of presentation.
Lastly, I doubled the amount of mint in the recipe (roughly speaking–I eyeballed it). Now I can taste the mint in the meatball recipe, but I’m not sure if the recipe wants even more mint. Flavorwise, I think I nailed it though, so I’ll stick with this amount of mint. (If I can remember the eyeball-ness I had this time.) Also, I forgot to puree the mint in the sauce, so I just simmered solid chunks of mint. It was fine though, since the simmering apparently incorporated the mint flavor just fine.
The Safeway in Almaden didn’t have Cento, so I just used Safeway brand. Not sure if these tomatoes are better, or if I just seasoned it better this time. Flavorwise, I think I nailed it though. 10 out of 10, would make again.
Bonus: “How did you make the soup so creamy?” “I added cream.”