For some time I’ve been telling myself that I should devise a way to indicate, at least for my own information, those meals that worked out particularly well, meals, or plates in some cases, that were absolutely scrumptious. I’m going to try something out for the first time with this post: I’ll use a red asterisk above the first line of text for those special cases. This meal deserved it, perhaps even more for my having begun it with no special expectations. There wasn’t anything really new in the ingredients or the processes, and yet each of the 3 elements in the main course was absolutely delicious, and each was a perfect compliment to the other 2. The cheese and the fruit were equally excellent, although I had nothing to do with making either, and the wine was absolutely extraordinary!

• * one small (12-ounce) duck breast from Hudson Valley Duck Farm, the fatty side scored in tight cross hatching with a very sharp knife, the entire breast then sprinkled top and bottom with a mixture of sea salt, freshly-ground black pepper, and a little turbinado sugar, left standing for almost an hour, then seared/pan-fried inside a small oval enameled cast iron pan over medium heat, the fatty side down first, for a total of 9 minutes or so, turning once, draining the oil after the first few minutes [to be strained and used in cooking later, if desired], removed when medium rare, cutting it into 2 portions to confirm that the center was of the right doneness (and, as usual it was still undercooked, so the 2 halves were briefly returned to the pan), then left to sit for a couple minutes before being finished with a drizzle of juice from an organic lemon from Whole Foods Market, a little chopped rosemary from S. & S.O. Farm, and a drizzle of olive oil [NOTE: the tenderloin had been removed from the breast before it was marinated, but seasoned like the rest of it, then fried very briefly near the end of the time the larger section was cooking]

• * a handful of fresh mizuma from Alewife Farm scattered on the plate and dressed with olive oil , sea salt, and freshly-ground black pepper

• * one medium head of Treviso radicchio from Tamarack Hollow Farm, washed, the liquid drained and wiped off, cut lengthwise into four sections, arranged one cut side up on a medium Pampered Chef unglazed ceramic oven pan (after securing the leaves with toothpicks), covered with lots of thyme branches from S. & S.O. Farm, seasoned generously with sea salt and freshly-ground black pepper, drizzled with 2 tablespoons of olive oil, baked in a pre-heated 400º oven for 10 minutes or so, turned to the other cut side and returned to the oven for around 8 minutes, then turned uncut side up and baked for about 2 minutes more, arranged on the plates, drizzled with a very small amount of balsamic vinegar

There was a small cheese course..

• * ‘Bigelow’, a goat cheese from Ardith Mae, very thin toasts from a loaf of ‘8 Grain 3 Seed’ bread from Rock Hill Bakery, and a few chopped leaves of rosemary from S. & S.O. Farm

..and fruit.

• * Niagara grapes [vitis labrusca ‘Niagara’] from Troncillito Farms

 

• * the wine Throughout was a California (Napa Valley) red, Camille Benitah Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley 2015, from Naked Wines 
• the music was Carl Nielsen’s 1901-1902 Symphony No. 2, Myung-Whun Chung, conducting the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra

Say it fast: ‘coda di rospo inguazato con broccoli romanesco‘.

We had returned from  a month in Berlin only 4 days earlier, where ‘monkfish’ is called Seeteufel [‘sea devil’], a response to its appearance when hauled from the sea. I’ve been enjoying using German names to describe food normally not specific to German cookery, but I wasn’t tempted this time, especially if I was also going to include the name of the vegetable that accompanied this wonderful dish.

And while both the German and the Italian names (the latter translates as ‘tail of a toad’) describe the fish itself better than the English, ‘monkfish’, none of them comes close to describing the taste of its flesh, its’ tail’, which is so much more pleasant than its scary mug.

• two 9-ounce monkfish tails from P.E. & D.D. Seafood, prepared using a David Pasternak recipe which includes M’hamsa Couscous from Tunisia (purchased at Whole Foods), olive oil, sliced garlic John D. Madura Farm, two 400-gram cans of really superb Mutti baby Roma tomatoes from Eataly (which are also available at Whole Foods), and cracked Sicilian green olives from Whole Foods, and 2 whole dried Sicilian pepperoncino from Buon Italia

• one small head of Romanesco broccoli from Alewife Farm, broken up into florets, tossed with a little olive oil (not too much, to ensure a slightly crispy, slightly carbonized finish), salt, pepper, and one crushed section of a dark dried habanada pepper, the mix spread onto a Pampered Chef unglazed ceramic pan and roasted at 400º for about 25 minutes, some slices of a fresh habanada pepper added to the pan a few minutes before the broccoli was removed from the oven, the mix stirred and arranged on the plate
• the wine was an Italian (Sardinia) white, La Cala Vermentino di Sardegna 2015
• the music was that of Carl Nielsen, including several chamber works the Symphony no 1 in G minor

It was our first weekend back in New York. Berlin was still in our heads and our hearts, so while our regular Sunday home routine meant bacon, eggs, and toasted bread, this time it was Spiegeleier, geräucherter Speck, und frisches Multikorn-Brot.

But in a nod to our very local, New York tradition, there were also Habanada peppers, micro greens, and some herbs, although all but those peppers are now a part of German cookery as well.

We ate breakfast very late, at about 3, which would have put us on schedule for a German supper (going to have to work on that part)

• the bacon was from Flying Pigs Farm the eggs from from Tamarack Hollow Farm, the luscious ‘8 Grain 3 Seed’ bread from Rock Hill Bakery, the purple micro radish from Windfall Farms, the fresh Habanada pepper from Norwich Meadows Farm, the fresh thyme from S. & S.O. Farm, and the dried Sicilian oregano from Buon Italia
• the music was Antoine Busnois, ‘Missa O Crux Lignum’, performed by the Orlando Consort

It was the first meal that I had actually cooked in over a month. Because of a little sleep deprivation and the inevitable jet lag which followed on our two flights from Berlin (a total of 12 hours), I didn’t want to be too ambitious, but I did want it to be a proper welcome back.

Also, it was my first visit to the Union Square Greenmarket since early October, and it was a Saturday, even under normal circumstances the most bountiful market day of the week. It was mid-November, but the stalls were overflowing with vegetables and virtually every other fresh summer or fall comestible: I felt like a kid in a candy store!

I had never seen such a variety of seafood available at one Union Square fish stand! Eventually I realized that much of the explanation lay in the fact that I’m never there as early as I was yesterday morning (I lay that entirely on the 6-hour time change  in my sleeping schedule).

I bought a single one-pound section of a striped bass fillet from P.E. & D.D. Seafood, and since I was restocking  the larder after a hiatus in the kitchen, a lot of other things, including these yellow broad pole beans from Norwich Meadows Farm.

• one 16-ounce striped Bass fillet from P.E. & D.D. Seafood, divided into two sections and scored with several very shallow slashes on the skin side to prevent curling, placed in a teaspoon of olive oil inside a ceramic pan skin side down, scattered with a little chopped thyme and parsley from S. & S.O. Farm, a pinch or two of super-pungent dried Sicilian oregano from Buon Italia, and two small slightly crumbled dry Italian bay leaves from Buon Italia, salt, pepper, a sprinkling of some homemade dry bread crumbs, and a drizzle of olive oil, the pan placed in a 425º oven for about 10 or 12 minutes, when it was removed and an organic lemon from Whole Foods squeezed over the top
• a scattering of purple radish micro greens from Windfall Farms
• yellow flat (‘Romano’) pole beans from Norwich Meadows Farm, blanched briefly, drained and dried, then reheated in oil in which two small habanada peppers had been warmed until fragrant, finished with salt, pepper, and a drizzle of olive oil
• the wine was a French (Coteaux de l’Ardèche) white, Grand Ardèche Chardonnay 2015, from friends
• the music was Mozart’s 1787 opera, ‘Don Giovanni’, in a 1997 recording of Claudio Abbado conducting the Chamber Orchestra of Europe and the Ferrara Musica Chorus, with Uwe Heilmann, Patrizia Pace, Soile Isokoski, Bryn Terfel, Carmela Remigio, Simon Keenlyside, Ildebrando D’Arcangelo, and Matti Salminen