I wasn’t going to bother doing this post except that the music was so special. Also, the picture works.

• the stuff on the plate last Sunday [afternoon]: some very fresh eggs from pastured chickens and bacon from pastured pigs, both from Millport Dairy Farm, seasoned with sea salt, freshly ground black pepper, and crushed dried red espelette peppers from Alewife Farm, sprinkled with chopped green garlic from Phillips Farms; several sliced Backyard Farms Maine ‘cocktail tomatoes’ from Chelsea Whole Foods Market warmed in a little house Whole Foods Portuguese olive oil, seasoned with salt and black pepper, and tossed with fresh oregano, also from Phillips Farms, placed on a bed of baby arugula from Alewife Farm; a garnish of micro red mustard from Two Guys from Woodbridge; some un-toasted slices of Pain d’Avignon seven grain bread (whole wheat and honey, plus sesame, sunflower and flax seeds, and oats) from Foragers Market, and some lightly toasted slices of a 2-day-old baguette from Bread Alone

• the music was an album of monophonic songs attributed to the 13th-century Castilian king, Alfonso X El Sabio (the Wise), ‘Cantigas de Santa Maria (Canticles of Holy Mary), performed by Jordi Saval and Hespèrion XX

It was a meaty dinner.

The first course was a do-it-yourself project constructed around a wonderful pork mousse that had been made on a Columbia County farm, Raven & Boar, installed at the Union Square Greenmarket for the first time ever on Wednesday. where it was selling its very singular produce, farm-made pork charcuterie.

• a small 3-ounce jar of Hudson Vally Charcuterie Mousse de Foie/Pork Liver Mousse from pastured heritage, whey fed pigs
• a bit of fresh ‘red streak mustard’ from Alewife Farm
• horseradish pickles from Millport Dairy Farm
• a few tablespoons of Organic Valley ‘Cultured Pasture Butter’
• thin toasts of 2 different breads, an elegant wheat baguette from Bread Alone, and a sturdy wheat and spelt loaf, Philadelphia’s Lost Bread Co. pane di tavalo (rustic Italian-style, charred crust with notes of coffee and cacao, baked with organic bread flour, spelt, malted barley, salt, water, yeast, which the bakers say they’ve modeled after a famous loaf from the town of Genzano, near Rome)
• the wine was a fruity California (Lodi) white, F. Stephen Millier Angels Reserve Lodi White 2017, from Naked Wines

The main course stayed with the theme, but with everything cooked this time.

• two 8-ounce local Dutchess County venison t-bone steaks from Quattro’s Game Farm, in the Union Square Greenmarket, defrosted overnight and brought to room temperature, rinsed, dried, rubbed with olive oil and a very generous coating of freshly-cracked black peppercorns, set aside on the counter covered with waxed paper for about an hour, then placed over moderately high heat in 1 to 2 tablespoons of a combination of butter and olive oil inside a heavy oval 11-inch enameled cast iron pan, cooked rare to medium rare, which meant little more than 2 minutes on each side, or until juices had begun accumulating on the top, transferred to warm plates to rest while the bottom of the pan was scraped with a wooden spatula to collect the juices and 2 tablespoons of a decent brandy (I used Courvoisier V.O. this time) added to the pan and briefly cooked over high heat, until it had almost become a syrup, the sauce poured over the meat, which was then garnished with micro red chard from Two Guys from Woodbridge
• just before the venison was being prepared, nine ounces of thickly sliced, meaty spring shiitake mushrooms from Joe Rizzo’s small farm near Ithaca, Blue Oyster Cultivation, purchased from his tables in the Union Square Greenmarket, were tossed into a large enameled cast iron pan in which 2 or 3 tablespoons  of butter had been melted over a high flame, the fungi seared until they had begun to brown, a little more butter and some sliced green, or spring, garlic from John D. Madura Farms added, the mushrooms salted now as they cooked a bit more, and when they were ready, some chopped parsley from Phillips Farms tossed in and combined with them, the mushrooms distributed between the 2 plates next to the chops, with a little more parsley tossed on top

• some loose tender, sweet collard green leaves from Lucky Dog Organic Farm, only the stems below the leaves removed first, washed 3 times, drained (some of the water retained and held aside to be added, as necessary, near the end of the time the greens were cooking), chopped just a bit, then braised gently until barely softened or wilted inside a large, antique copper pot in which 2 cloves of garlic from Foragers Market had first been heated until they had softened, seasoned with sea salt and freshly ground black pepper, finished with a small drizzle of olive oil
• the wine was a Portuguese (Douro) red, Xisto Ilimitado Tinto 2016, from Crush Wine

 

• the music throughout the meal was the album, ‘Laurence Crane: 6 Trios, 2 Solos and 1 Quintet’, performed by the Holt Quartet

There were flowers on the table (primrose this time), as there often are in the spring, because, well…

The flounder fillets were beautiful; Warren had just fetched a fresh ‘bucket’ from the truck, and opened it in front of at least one very appreciative customer.

They were a little larger than I might have been able to handle in the kitchen before, but I had recently acquired a beautiful new pan that would help me to do them justice. I also had a generous amount of fresh mushrooms at home, and I knew I wouldn’t have trouble finding a wonderful green vegetable to accompany the entrée, before I left the market.

• two very fresh flounder fillets (a total of 19 ounces) from American Seafood Company, seasoned on both sides with sea salt and freshly-ground black pepper, sautéed fairly gently in a couple tablespoons of butter inside a large (13-inch), thick-walled antique tin-lined copper pan, flesh side first, turned after around 2 minutes, maybe slightly more, and the other side cooked for about the same length of time, removed and arranged on 2 plates, either covered, to keep warm, or, if it’s convenient to do so, placed inside a barely-warm oven, the heat under the pan kept low, another tablespoon – or better, 2, maybe 3 – of butter added, and when it had melted about 6 ounces of roughly-chopped yellow oyster mushrooms from Gail’s Farm in Vineland, New Jersey tossed into the pan and sautéed, stirring, until lightly cooked, the mushrooms seasoned with sea salt, freshly-ground black pepper, and a pinch or so of crushed dried Espelette pepper (only a medium heat) from Alewife Farm and 4 small thin ramps from Eataly Flatiron (I spotted them there and decided impulsively that I couldn’t wait for them to arrive in the Greenmarket), the bulbs chopped, the leaves sliced, plus a little more than a tablespoon of juice from a local Persian lime [yup, local], the gift of David Tifford of Fantastic Gardens of Long Island, added to the pan, everything briefly stirred with a wooden spatula, the mushrooms and their juices spooned on or around the flounder [the dish may need more butter along the way, so at least be aware]

There was also some brilliant rainbow chard,

from the folks upstate at Fledging Crow Farm:

• a modest-sized bouquet of rainbow chard from a farm new to the Union Square Greenmarket that very day, Fledging Crow Vegetables, (with a fascinating origin story), wilted inside a a large antique high-sided copper pot in a tablespoon or so of olive oil in which one garlic clove from Norwich Meadows Farm had first been heated and softened slightly, seasoned with sea salt and freshly-ground black pepper, finished with a little lemon juice and a tiny drizzle of olive oil

• there were slices of possibly the best loaf of bread I’ve ever tasted, ‘Pane da Tavola’, from Lost Bread Co., which is described as rustic Italian-style, charred crust with notes of coffee and cacao (organic bread flour, spelt, malted barley, salt, water, yeast), modeled after the famous bread of Genzano, Roma
• the wine was a French (Burgundy/Mâconnais), Les Grands Crus Blancs Pouilly-Vinzelles 2017, from Bottlerocket
• the music was Salieri’s 1786 operatic tragédie lyrique, ‘Les Horaces’, whose text is by Nicolas-François Guillard after Pierre Corneille’s Horace (it was commissioned by the Paris Opera, but the Queen is reported to have rejected it for Fontainebleau), performed here by Christophe Rousset and Les Talens Lyriques

About the music, which we really enjoyed, I’ll wager that, in the end, it will be recorded that F. Murray Abraham and Milos Forman were the ones who totally made Antonio Salieri’s posthumous career.

 

[image of the people of Fledging Crow Vegetables from thegoodfoodcollective.com]

Gosh, this pasta is so good. Then every other Sfoglini product is as well. It’s just that, well, hemp is pretty special, even without the absurd extra-culinary associations someone who grew up in the American no-no land is never going to shake.

• eight ounces out of a box of Sfoglini hemp reginetti, boiled until just before it would have reached the point when it was al dente (about 10 minutes), drained and served with a mushroom sauce composed of roughly 6 ounces of chopped oyster mushrooms from Gail’s Farm in Vineland, New Jersey, cooked until almost soft in a large tin-lined heavy copper pan with a couple tablespoons of rich ‘Kerrygold Pure Irish Butter‘, 2 smallish chopped ‘yellow shallots’ from Norwich Meadows Farm and 2 medium-size cloves of chopped garlic from garlic, also from Norwich Meadows Farm, and 2 teaspoons of chopped thyme from from Trader Joe’s Market on 6th Avenue added to the mushrooms and cooked until fragrant and soft, at which time another 2 tablespoons of butter was added, and, once melted, a tablespoon of coarse stone-ground flour (Oak Grove Mills Whole Wheat Flour from the Blew Family of Oak Grove Plantation, from their stand in the Union Square Greenmarket) introduced and stirred to make something of a paste, before a third of a cup of Noilly Prat Extra Dry Vermouth (I didn’t have an opened bottle of white wine handy) slowly poured into the pan while being slowly stirred with a wooden spoon, cooked until the mix thickens, some chopped parsley from Phillips Farms stirred in, before adding a couple tablespoons remaining from the very rich, complex juices of a chicken entrée prepared the week before, the whole mix seasoned with salt and pepper before the cooked pasta was turned into the pan and mixed with the sauce, the completed dish served in 2 bowls, with some grated  ‘Parmigiano Reggiano Bonat 3’ from Buon Italia sprinkled over the top, a bit of micro red mustard scattered around the edges
• the wine was an Italian (Tuscany) red, Castello di Gabbiano, Chianti Classico, 2015, from Philippe Wines
• the music was François Couperin’s four ‘Concerts Royaux, “..ensemble pieces for a mixed consort of instruments…”, composed in 1714 and 1715 for, obviously, the king (Louis XIV in his very last years), and published in 1722, here performed by Christophe Rousset leading Les Talens Lyriques

A fish bake.

Although there were some obvious differences and some less than obvious even to me, after I spotted the little fillets in the fisherman’s family’s stand, I almost immediately thought of this meal as a modest salute to the Great Lakes of what are generally describe as one’s ‘formative’ years.

I brought home exactly one dozen of these fresh beauties on Monday, but no more, although they were not expensive, since I was already worried about fitting them into a single non-reactive pan.

Because of the difficulty – or at least the anxiety anticipated with the idea – of turning over that many thin fillets more or less at the same time, I decided I would bread then bake them, obviating the flipping challenge. This is when I really started sliding, mentally back into the Midwest, since this is not how I usually cook fish of any kind.

Half an hour before I expected to begin their cooking I removed the perch from the refrigerator and placed them on a plate on the counter.

Then the process began in earnest, my excitement now including that of seeing them lying inside the perfect pan, a French antique I had recently bought and had re-tinned, exactly for times like this.

• twelve small coastal white perch fillets (a total of 15 ounces) from P.E. & D.D. Seafood in the Union Square Greenmarket, submerged first in a mixture of 2 tablespoons of melted butter and 2 teaspoons of juice from a Chelsea While Foods Market organic lemon, then rolled in a mixture of roughly half a cup of homemade    breadcrumbs, sea salt, freshly ground black pepper and a large pinch of crushed dried habanada pepper [a paprika or another dried chili, or even crushed mustard seed would also work], arranged inside a very heavy antique low-sided,13″ tin-lined copper pan and set in an oven preheated to 500º, baked for roughly for a very few minutes, because of their size, or until the breading was crispy and golden brown, removed and allowed to cool for a couple minutes before serving, garnished with micro red mustard from two Guys from Woodbridge [the recipe was adapted from Livestrong.com]

• just under a pound of small sweet Natasha potatoes from Phillips Farms, scrubbed, boiled unpeeled in generously-salted water until barely cooked through, drained, halved, dried in the still-warm large vintage Corning Pyrex Flameware blue-glass pot in which they had cooked, tossed with a little Trader Joe’s Italian Reserve extra virgin olive oil, seasoned with salt and pepper, and tossed with some home grown basil from Barry’s Artsy colleague Becca

• some super sweet flat kale from Lani’s Farm, wilted inside a large antique copper pot in which one halved garlic clove from Norwich Meadows had first been allowed to sweat in a little olive oil until pungent, seasoned with salt, pepper, and a drizzle of fresh olive oil
• the wine was a French (Loire) white, Sancerre, Sommet Doré 2017, from Astor Wines
• the music was Lully’s 1683 tragédie en musique, ‘Phaéton’, Christophe Rousset conducting Les Talens Lyriques and the Chœur de Chambre de Namur

Lemon pasta, what a concept.

But then so is something called, ‘porchetta’, which preceded the pasta.

• four ounces of Principe Italian uncured roasted porchetta rolled in pancetta from Chelsea Whole Foods Market, drizzled with a little olive oil
• baby arugula from Alewife Farm, drizzled with a little olive oil
• slices of Pain d’Avignon seven grain bread (whole wheat, honey, sesame/sunflower/flax seeds, oats) from Foragers Market

I had prepared this delightful filled pasta at least twice before, but it’s always a little different.

• twelve ounces of fresh ravioli rounds from Luca Donofrio‘s fresh pasta shop inside Eataly’s Flatiron store (filled with ricotta, lemon zest, marjoram, nutmeg, and mascarpone), boiled carefully until barely cooked through in a large amount of well-salted water, drained, some of the pasta water retained, then slipped into a large antique high-sided tin-lined copper pot in which 2 or 3 tablespoons of Organic Valley ‘Cultured Pasture Butter’ had been melted, stirred over medium-high heat along with some of the reserved pasta water until the liquid had emulsified, then almost a tablespoon of lightly crushed pink peppercorns (Fr. baie rose, It. bacca rosa), which are actually not pepper, from Dean & DeLuca [where I had discovered it in their beautiful little tins in their Prince Street shop way back in the early 80’s] added, the pasta arranged inside 2 shallow bowls where it was topped with the zest, or la scorza, from half of an organic Whole Foods Market lemon, and garnished with micro red mustard (micro mostarda rossa) from Two Guys from Woodbridge

 

• the wine for both courses was a California (clarksburg) white, Richard Bruno Clarksburg Chenin Blanc 2017, from Naked Wines
• throughout the meal we enjoyed was the gorgeous music, and epic cultural, geographic, and historical tour of the 14th-century Muslim world and some of the lands beyond, from the album, ‘Ibn Battuta: Le Voyageur d l’Islam (The Traveler of Islam), 1304-1377’, produced by Jordi Saval and Hespèrion XXI

The most significant thing about this breakfast is that I managed to get 6 eggs to the table with every yolk intact. This is not always the case on Sunday mornings. Yay me.

• joining the eggs, which were from the pastured hens at Millport Dairy Farm and here dusted with freshly ground black pepper, sea salt, a pinch of crushed dried red Espelette pepper (a French basque variety that has largely replaced black pepper there over the last 4 or 5 centuries) from Alewife Farm, and some dried Sicilian fennel pollen from Buon Italia in the Chelsea Market, was 4 thick slices of bacon from pastured pigs, also at Millport Dairy Farm; 3 halved Backyard Farms Maine ‘cocktail tomatoes’ from Chelsea Whole Foods Market that were warmed in a little bit of some very good Trader unfiltered Joe’s Italian Reserve extra virgin olive oil and scattered with one small chopped Norwich Meadows Farm scallion and a little home grown basil from Barry’s Artsy colleague Becca; local (regional) Organic Valley ‘Cultured Pasture Butter’, also from Whole Foods Market, on a small plate to the side, for the toast; micro red mustard; lightly toasted slices from a loaf of Gran Daisy Pugliese bread from Foragers Market
• the music was Marc-Antoine Charpentier’s 1670  ‘Leçons du Vendredy Sainct’ (Passages for Ash Wednesday), René Jacobs conducting Concerto Vocale

The best steak.

The plate suggested the New York steak house classic: Steak and potatoes, with something green on the side. There were even chives, but they weren’t to be found on the baked potato, and the vegetable proved that everything green is not spinach. Actually, I think everything was very different.

We don’t eat out much, and I think neither of us has been to a real steak house more than once in our lives.

In fact, we don’t eat beef of any kind very often, but when we do it’s normally a steak, and the steaks I’ve chosen more and more are of a single perfect cut, the sirloin cap steak (aka ‘rump cover’, ‘rump cap’, or ‘culotte’ in the United States, and ‘coulotte’ in France, ‘picanha’ in Brazil). There are reasons for this, and we’re reminded of them every time we’re able to enjoy the texture and the flavor of this great cut.

I’m noting right now, for my own records at least, that for once no fancy micro greens showed up for dinner. Maybe it was an unconscious obeisance to the sturdy fare served in the classic steak houses that still remain in this city.

• one perfect, frozen 23-ounce picanha/culotte steak from Sun Fed Beef in the Union Square Greenmarket, defrosted, brought to room temperature, seasoned on all sides with sea salt and a generous amount of freshly-ground black pepper, seared for less than a minute on the top, thick, fat-covered side inside a dry oval heavy enameled cast iron pan, then the 2 long sides cooked for 3 or 4 minutes each and the ends briefly seared, removed from the pan at the moment it had become perfectly medium-rare (checking with an instant-read thermometer), carefully cut crosswise into 2 pieces of the same weight, arranged on warm plates, a bit of juice from an organic Chelsea Whole Foods Market lemon squeezed on top, followed by a drizzle of a little of Trader Joe’s Italian Reserve extra unfiltered virgin olive oil, scattered with scissored fresh chives from Phillips Farms, the steaks allowed to rest for about 4 minutes before being served

• just under a pound of La Ratte potatoes from Mountain Sweet Berry Farm, halved lengthwise, tossed with olive oil, a small amount of crushed dried habanada pepper, sea salt, and freshly-ground black pepper, roasted inside a large seasoned Pampered Chef ceramic oven pan, cut side down, inside a 400º oven for about 20 minutes

• one not-so-large bunch of high tunnel-raised cavolo nero (aka lacinato, Tuscan kale, or black kale, among other names) from Norwich Meadows Farm, wilted briefly inside a heavy antique medium size tin-lined copper pot in a tablespoon or so of olive oil after several halved cloves of garlic, also from Norwich Meadows, had first been heated there until fragrant and softened, the greens seasoned with sea salt and freshly-ground black pepper and drizzled with a little more oil
• the wine was a Spanish (Catalonia/Priorat) red, Sao del Coster Priorat 2015, from Crush Wine & Spirits

• the music was Bernhard Gander’s album, ‘Bunny Games’, the music performed by Klangforum Wien, here meaning Hsin-Huei Huang, Krassimir Sterev, Emilio Pomárico, Johannes Kalitzke, and Sylvain Cambreling

 

[image of Gander’s album cover from KAIROS]

When I saw the beautiful fillets at the Greenmarket, I immediately checked to see when I had last cooked hake. Using this blog’s index, I learned that it had been over 7 months back.

I decided to bring one home.

• one thick 19-ounce hake fillet from Jan at P.E. & D.D. Seafood Company, washed drained, halved, dried, dredged in seasoned wheat flour from The Blew family of Oak Grove Plantation in Pittstown, N.J., browned on both sides in olive oil inside a large heavy antique oval copper pan over medium-high heat, removed, and, ensuring there were a full 2 tablespoons of olive oil in the pan, adding one chopped  ‘Expression Sweet’ onion and one tablespoon of chopped garlic, both from Norwich Meadows, the alliums cooked, stirring, for 2 minutes, followed by one and a half cups of a good low-sodium vegetable stock, 2 tablespoons of juice from a Chelsea Whole Foods Market organic lemon, and 4 or 5 sprigs of fresh thyme from Trader Joe’s Market on 6th Avenue, the fish returned to the pan and cooked, in this case, because of its thickness, for 7 or 8 minutes, arranged on 2 plates and garnished with micro red mustard from Two Guys from Woodbridge
• six Maine cherry ‘cocktail’ tomatoes from Whole Foods, slow-roasted inside a small antique rolled-edge tin oven pan with a heaping teaspoon of dried Italian oregano from Buon Italia, half a tablespoon or more of Trader Joe’s Reserve olive oil, and 2 bruised cloves of garlic from Norwich Meadows Farm

• several handfuls of delicate young flat purple mustard greens from Alewife Farm, greens that should ideally have been wilted for only seconds in a little live oil in which 2 cloves of sliced garlic from Norwich Meadows Farm had been allowed to sweat, seasoned with sea salt and freshly-ground pepper, then finished on the plates with a drizzle of olive oil, but in fact, while I thought I had turned off the heat soon enough to save their shape and freshness, they had somehow managed to continue cooking, in the process pretty much losing both; they were still delicious however

There was a small cheese course.

• three cheeses, a maturing ‘Mammuth’ goat milk cheese (camembert style) from Ardith Mae, a
  semi-firm Riverine Ranch water buffalo ‘farm stand cheese’ (no name, since their terrific cheeses are constantly being reinvented, and cheese isn’t easily standardized in any event), and an Italian caseificio ‘Bocconcino di Alta Langa’ (Piedmont) goat milk cheese from Eataly
• slices of a delicious polenta boule from She Wolf Bakery

 

• the wine was a California (Clarksburg) white, Miriam Alexandra Reserve Prince Vineyard Chenin Blanc, from Naked Wines
• the music was the Missy Mazzoli album, ‘Vespers for a New Dark Age’, with her ensemble Victoire, percussionist Glenn Kotche, synth producer Lorna Dune, and virtuosic vocalists Mellissa Hughes, Martha Cluver and Virginia Warnken

It was going to be pasta, and I had a few ounces of oyster mushrooms left from the meal prepared the night before. To show off the mushrooms better, Barry and I both decided that a good conventional wheat pasta might be better this time than one made with a vegetable, or a more-strongly flavored grain.

So great. And there could definitely be a red wine.

For a little pizzazz, visual and taste, all I had to do was reconcile what was in the larders with whatever it seemed might work well with the pasta and mushrooms.

• one sliced ‘yellow shallot’ from Norwich Meadows Farm heated in a little olive oil inside a large antique copper sauce pan until softened, 4 ounces of sliced oyster mushrooms from Blue Oyster Cultivation tossed in and stirred for a few minutes until the mushrooms had softened and begun to brown, then a pinch or two of crushed dried, ripe red shishito peppers (some of the pepper turn out to be hot, just as the fresh shishito do) from Lani’s Farm, tossed in, half of a pound of an excellent artisanal Puglian pasta,‘I Tipici’ Orecchiette Agricola del Sole, from Eataly, that had just finished boiling until al dente, added, along with almost a cup of reserved pasta water, the pasta stirred over high heat until the liquid had emulsified, a good handful or more of lacy mushroom greens from Campo Rosso Farm added and stirred around with the pasta, a few ounces of freshly grated Parmigiano Reggiano (aged 24 months) from Chelsea Whole Foods Market stirred in, the pasta arranged in broad shallow bowls, some olive oil drizzled around the edges and scissored fresh chives from Phillips Farms tossed on the top
• the wine was an Oregon (Willamette Valley) red, Kings Ridge Pinot Noir 2016, from Philippe Wines
• the music was Donizetti’s 1835 romantic opera (libretto by Giuseppe Bardari, based on Andrea Maffei‘s translation of Friedrich Schiller‘s 1800 play, ‘Maria Stuarda’, with Giuseppe Patané conducting the Munich Radio Symphony Orchestra and the Bavarian Radio Chorus