Latest posts
-
tomato, feta; garlic/lemon/herbed chicken, trombetta
Categories: Meals at homeBecause I had brought some terrific Bulgarian-stye feta cheese home from the Union Square Greenmarket, and because the mix of small heirloom tomatoes I’d picked up a number of days earlier was now perfectly ripe. A basket of small heirloom tomatoes, about a pound, a mix of shapes, sizes, and colors, from Eckerton Hill Farm…
-
smoked sturgeon, gold beet; soft shell crabs, haricots verts
Categories: Meals at homeThe table was awaiting the guests, but I had forgotten the genial service plates (very large, very shallow, very plain, clear glass) that I had found at a thrift shop long ago. Aside from the fact that this would be one of the first dinners we would be sharing with friends since the epidemic began,…
-
duck breast; roast turnips, leek; cabbage, juniper, balsamic
Categories: Meals at homeThe little halved duck breast resting on the far side of the plate looks undersize here, but its wonderful, assertive flavors survived the power of turnips leeks, and cabbage, lending another understanding to the early 20th century obsession with a “balanced meal”. one 12-ounce breast of duck from Hudson Valley Duck Farm, the fatty, skin side…
-
reverse seared ny strip steak; celeriac/potato frites; kale
Categories: Meals at homeIt was delicious, not innovative, but a take on a classic. Think steak house, a good cut of beef, maybe onions, fries, and probably creamed spinach, only here it’s a reverse seared very good local NY strip steak, topped with spring garlic; oven frites, but including celery root and some seasoning peppers; and the green…
-
lemon/rosemary/anchovy-roasted lotte; potatoes; chard
Categories: Meals at homeIt happened again. The second appearance of this astonishing dish was as delicious, simply assembled, and good looking as the first. I had used the same lotte recipe for the preparation (in the U.S., it’s usually called ‘monkfish’) just a few weeks ago, but yesterday at the Greenmarket I was seduced by two perfect ‘tails’.…
-
wine-braised goat shanks; polenta; collards; fig ice cream
Categories: Meals at homeEsto no es una mole There was no chocolate, and it’s pretty clearly a European formula. The headline read, “Wine-Braised Goat Shanks with Tomatoes and Oregano“, so it just screamed holiday dinner. It was December 25. The recipe was new to me. I found it on a Seattle-based locavore food site, ‘Edible Seattle‘, where it…
-
lemon/rosemary/anchovy-roasted lotte; potatoes; greens
Categories: Meals at homeIt was my first stab at this wonderful, shockingly simple dish, and the recipe had been sitting on our bookshelf for over 15 years. It’s from ‘Italian Easy London River Cafe’ (page 131 in my copy), one of my favorite cookbooks. It also ended up looking far more interesting than the formula would have suggested…
-
storione affumicato carpaccio di barbabietola; ‘magic meal’
Categories: Meals at homeIt was my 80th birthday, and the dinner – including the wines – was as exceptional as the occasion. I might say that in this latest appearance, our storybook ‘Magic Meal’ was actually upstaged by the first course, but I won’t, out of huge personal sentiment – and loyalty to both a great restaurant (Al…
-
dijon mustards and cognac beef stew; white polenta
Categories: Meals at homeThis was one of the tastiest, most successful winter entrées I’ve ever put together. Even if Sunday wasn’t actually very wintry. Earlier in the month, on the first cold day of the season, I had brought home a package of prized beef cubes, frozen, from some of my favorite people in the Union Square Greenmarket,…
-
grilled herring fillets, mustard-oregano sauce; boiled potato
Categories: Meals at homeoiled and seasoned grilled and plated We both really like herring in virtually any form. This disposition, grilled fresh fillets, is probably less familiar to most fans of clupea harengus (Atlantic Herring) but it’s one of the most satisfying – and it makes a wonderful entrée. The dinner we enjoyed this past Saturday almost duplicated…