I had put this dish together before, early on New Years’ Day, as a lunch.  I revisited it as a dinner, with a few enhancements, tonight.

•  shiitake mushrooms from Bulich Mushroom, sautéed for a few minutes over medium high heat before the addition of garlic from Migliorelli Farm, minced, thyme from Manhattan Fruit Exchange, chopped, and one scallion, also from Manhattan Fruit Exchange, julienned, the mix lifted into a buttered baking dish, followed by six eggs from Knoll Krest Farm cracked over the top, seasoned with salt and pepper and dotted with halved cherry tomatoes from Shushan Hydro Farm, sprinkled with shredded cheese (Swiss Le Gruyère) from Trader Joe’s, the surface drizzled with a bit of heavy cream, the dish then baked in the oven for about 15 minutes, or until the whites were set and the yolks were still barely runny
• the cooked eggs were served on toasted slices of Trucio bread from Sullivan Street Bakery
• the wine was a Spanish red, Flavium Premium Bierzo 2008

The meal was pretty Italian, except that here the Bietole is kale, not chard, and the lamb chop was definitely more than 1/4 inch thick.  Also not Italian was the fact that I bought prepared Fagiolini, which I had never done before, but I was curious, and fresh beans certainly can’t be found in January. They were delicious, but of course I couldn’t just serve them as they came out of the jar.

• one thick juicy lamb chop from 3-Corner Field farm, seasoned with salt and pepper and brushed with a mixture of olive oil, minced garlic from Migliorelli Farm, and chopped rosemary from Queens County Farm, pan-grilled and finished with lemon and olive oil
• cooked tiny Italian beans (‘Fagiolina del Trasimeno’) from Eataly, warmed with olive oil in which thinly-sliced garlic from Migliorelli Farm had been heated until it began to brown, served with chopped minced mint from Manhattan Fruit Exchange in the Chelsea Market
• a mix of green and purple kale, along with a few leaves of Tuscan kale, from from Tamarack Hollow Farm, wilted with olive oil in which thinly-sliced garlic from Migliorelli Farm had been heated
• the wine was an American red, Waterbridge Syrah 2012 Columbia Valley

Very simple.

Before enjoying this entréee we shared some cured wrinkly black olives and good bread sticks.  Afterward, there were two cheeses, and thinly-sliced Rustica Classica from Eataly, toasted. The meal was assembled, not really cooked.  Because of the mushroom thing, plus the fact that it was served warm, and accompanied by a red wine, it still seemed appropriate on a very cold evening.

• mushroom-filled ravioli rounds (kept in the freezer until the package was cut open and its contents dropped into a large pot of boiling salted water) from Giovanni Rana, drained and mixed in a pan with julienned green onions from Manhattan Fruit Exchange which had been briefly-heated there in a bit of olive oil before a bit of pasta water was added and the mix then emulsified for a minute or so before being tossed with some toasted pine nuts, and sprinkled with shaved Parmesan cheese and upland cress (Live Gourmet) from Whole Foods
• the wine was an Italian red, Tormaresca Neprica 2012 Puglia

Yes I know, the presentation looks a little more precious than that which you might normally see on this blog, but the chives were actually there for a purpose, even if they could have been cut into smaller lengths (although probably not chopped small).  I’m a little sorry about the heavy disguise of the fish, even if there was none of that beautiful patterned bass skin to show this time.  I’m thinking that I could have gotten away with fewer pieces of lemon in any event.

After picking out the last two fillets in their container, I talked to the people in the stall of our new Wednesday Greenmarket fish vender, Hampton Bays’ American Seafood.  I must have gotten discombobulated, because I do not remember how exactly they had identified my fish, that is, what kind of bass it was.  I only remember that ‘bass’ was a part of the name, so here is what I did with ‘the bass’.

• minced garlic from Migliorelli Farm heated with a little olive oil until beginning to brown, julienned three-inch pieces of scallions from Eataly and quartered cherry tomatoes from Shushan Hydro Farm added, the mix cooked over low heat for less than a minute before removing the pan from the heat and the vinaigrette kept warm until it could top the fish, which had been seasoned, coated with some oil, topped with halved lemon slices and baked at 350º
• Brussels sprouts from John D. Madura Farms, tossed with olive oil, freshly-ground black pepper, and a generous amount of salt, and roasted at 400º [there was some juggling of temperature and oven levels in order to accommodate the different requirements of fish and vegetable]
• the wine was a New Zealand white, Wither Hills Sauvignon Blanc Marlborough 2013

Leftovers.

Surprisingly, we actually did have some hare leftover after the feast; I think it was because I hadn’t reduced the proportion of the remaining recipe ingredients to match the smaller weight of the hare I had used.  In truth, what we had left from the earlier dinner was hare ragù, but what a wonderful readymade for new dinner, and I don’t remeber how many times I’d thought of preparing such a rich sauce from scratch, just to be able to serve it on pasta.  I’m always especially on the alert for things I might serve on very good egg noodles, so the rich game sauce resting  in the refrigerator was doubly appreciated.

I also still had a small amount of braised red cabbage I had cooked for an earlier dinner, some of which had already found its way into a second meal, so this would be the dish’s third appearance.

To freshen up the plate, in addition to some chopped parsley on the ragù, I added some fresh, peppery cress.

• hare ragù remaining from a dinner two days previous, served on boiled Pappardelle Antica Madia, from Eataly, and finished with chopped parsley from Whole Foods
• upland cress (Live Gourmet) from WF , not dressed
• sweet and sour red cabbage with fennel remaining from still another earlier dinner
• the wine was a Spanish red, Juan Gil Jumilla Monastrell 2012

This meal may be the one I repeat in our kitchen most often.  It’s a Mark Bittman recipe which I cut out of the New York Times 15 years ago (Note: I’ve learned to use only about two thirds of the suggested amount of olive oil;  any more than that and you’ll probably find the potatoes swimming in it at the end).  The formula can be prepared with many different kinds of fish, basically any white fish.  Bittman:  “Monkfish works very well . . . . But other fillets will give similar results, including red snapper, sea bass, pollock, wolffish, even catfish.”  I make one other alteration to the recipe:  While I almost never peel potatoes anyway before cooking, I definitely do not when preparing this dish.

• monkfish tail from P.E.&D.D. Seafood, and black oil-cured olives, roasted on the top of a bed of sliced and seasoned German Butterball potatoes from Mountain Sweet Berry Farm which had been roasted previously in a generous amount of olive oil along with 15 or so fresh bay leaves from Westside Market
• cavalo nero from Northshire Farm, wilted with olive oil along with garlic halves from Migliorelli Farms which had first been heated in the oil
• The wine was a Portuguese white, DAC, Dão 2013

[I forgot to sprinkle the parsley on the sauce before taking the photo.]

 

This meal was a very big deal for both Barry and I.  Our guests were very dear to us, and the meal we had chosen to share was pretty special.  We’re both very fond of game, and I have often cooked it, often deer or quail, farmed, either here or in New Zealand, and once I prepared a brace of grouse from Scotland (including offal canapés). but I have never cooked hare. Barry and I had thoroughly enjoyed it prepared by others, many years back, once in a restaurant in the Umbrian hill town of Gubbio, and once in a great restaurant which is no longer with us, Chanterelle.

Unless you hunt, or have a generous friend who hunts (I never have hunted, and my hunting Stepfather is no longer with us), if you want to cook it yourself, it’s impossible to obtain wild rabbit (Jackrabbit, or hare), or any other true game meat originating in the U.S.  The FDA doesn’t trust any domestic source for game, but apparently has no anxieties about approving it if it comes from elsewhere, or at least not game birds and hare shot in Scotland.

This winter I finally decided, expense – and carbon footprint – be damned, that I would order a wild hare from Scotland, pay for its airfare, and serve it on one of the feast days of the season.  Because of changes in our own schedule, and the plans of our two guests, we didn’t end up sitting down to my Lepre in Salmi, or Jugged Hare, until January 4.  It wasn’t quite a calendar holiday, but it was great fun, and the company was splendid.  The meal gave me at least one scare before I got it to the table, but I think I’ll call it a success, and the menu I had planned gave us some excellent excuses for sharing some great wines.

The hare course was preceded by a crab salad of Peekytoe Maine crab leg meat, Srirache sauce, lemon, and mayonaise from The Lobster Place, and toasts of Rustica Classica from Eataly.

•  The wine with the crab salad toasts was a really wonderful Slovenian white, Batič Zaria 2009

The plan I used for the hare is one I found in Antonio Carlucci’s book, only slighlty altered, and with an adjustment, for the treatment of the loin, by David Waltuck.  The hare I prepared weighed 3.25 pounds, dressed (or, truly, ‘undressed’).  This is the recipe.  In order of the ingredients shown on that PDF, these are the sources I used:

• The wine used for the marinade was an Italian red, Baccio Chianti Reserva 2009
• the two small carrots were from Rogowski Farm
• the onions were from Hoeffner Farms
• the celery ribs were from Migliorelli Farm
• the garlic was from Migliorelli Farm
• the thyme was from Manhattan Fruit Exchange
• the rosemary Queens County Farm
• the sage leaves from S. & S.O. Farms
• the hare was from Fossil Farms
• the pancetta was from Buon Italia
• the lamb’s liver was from 3-Corner Field Farm
• the brandy was Le Courvoisier
• the unsweetened chocolate was from Buon Italia
• the parsley [would have been] from Whole Foods

This was served with the hare and its sauce:

• coarsely-ground cornmeal polenta with butter
• cavalo nero from Northshire Farm, wilted with olive oil and garlic halves, from Migliorelli Farms, which had first been heated in the oil
• The wines with the hare were, in succession, an amazing Italian red, Etna Rosso Calabretta Azienda Vinicola 2001 from Flatiron wines; and a great Argentinian red, Luigi Bosca Cabernet Sauvignon 2011 Maipu, Mendoza, from Chelsea Wine Vault.

The meal had to be quick, and it had to include vegetables I already had on hand, because, other than my purchase of the scallops at the Greenmarket that day I had given no thought to what I would be making for dinner in the evening.  I had been concentrating only on the fact that I wanted us to eat earlier than usual, in order to give me time to prepare much of the next night’s much more elaborate meal, of hare, ahead of time.

• scallops from P.E.&D.D. Seafood, dried, seared briefly on both sides, finished with torn leaves of a basil plant (Full Bloom Market Garden, Whately, Mass.) from Whole Foods
• German Butterball potatoes from Mountain Sweet Berry Farm, boiled, finished with olive oil, salt, pepper, and chopped parsley from Stokes Farm
• Maine cherry ‘cocktail’ tomatoes from Whole Foods, slow-roasted with olive oil, dried Italian oregano, and quartered garlic from Migliorelli Farm
• the wine was a California white, Estancia Chardonnay Monterrey County 2012

It was New Year’s Day, but there were only the two of us.  We decided on a mini version of a traditional (traditional, somewhere anyway) roast beef holiday dinner, but we did manage to extend it into several courses.  After some good rosemary bread sticks, we enjoyed some more of the linguine and crab pasta prepared the night before, heated in cazuelas for twelve minutes in a moderate oven.  We followed the pasta course with steak and braised collards, and finished the meal with a dessert of several cheeses, thin toasts of Rustica Classica from Eataly, and Bosc pears (from Migliorelli Farm).

• ‘Linguine with Crab, Lemon, Chiles, and Mint’
• the wine with the pasta course was an Italian sparkling, Lamarca Proseco

 

• tri-tip steaks, from Dixon Farmstand Meats, briefly seared, placed in the oven for a few minutes, finished with lemon, oil, and chopped parsley from Whole Foods
• collard greens from Lucky Dog Organic, wilted in oil in which halved garlic cloves had been warmed
• the wine was a Portuguese red, DÃO Alvaro Castro 2011

 

Eggs. While they weren’t really going to be for breakfast, but rather more like lunch, the day before the first day of the new year I picked up some Shiiatake mushrooms at the Union Square Greenmarket.  I had spotted this recipe from Food52  on line the day before that.  It looked very good, it could be done without fussing, and I was happy that I had all the  ingredients on hand, except for the mushrooms (a wee bit smug about that), and, finally, everything could be cooked inside one of the ancient, well-seasoned iron pans which I  ‘inherited’ from some Australian sailors in Newport nearly half a century back.  It always gives me great pleasure to use one of my Wagner pans (no relation).

And so at some time around 2 o’clock the next afternoon we ate our first meal of 2015, ‘Baked Eggs with Mushrooms and Gruyere’.  It went very well:  The dish was delicious and, while they were barely runny inside, the yolks were totally contained by the mushroom mix, and nothing was lost on the plate.

• the mushrooms were from John D. Madura Farms, the garlic from Migliorelli Farm, the thyme from Manhattan Fruit Exchange, the cheese (Swiss Le Gruyère) from Trader Joe’s, and the eggs from Knoll Krest Farm
• the toast was from a whole wheat baguette purchased at Dean & Deluca the day before