Cory and I put together a menu based on a wonderful dinner that we had in San Francisco. That particular dinner started with a delicious "breakfast salad" (as we referred to it) that had bacon in it and was served with a poached egg. The egg yolk mixed with the dressing to make it rich and creamy as you mixed the salad together. We also had braised beef cheeks that night, and decided to try recreating the dish with short ribs, which are a little more accessible at the local market. Cory made crab cakes for an appetizer, which made me very happy, since one of the things that I miss about Baltimore is the ready availability of crab cakes, crab dip, crab soup...basically crab meat in many incarnations. They were quite delicious. Diner ended with black-forest upside down cake, based on a recipe from a magazine that sounded good. Pictures, recipes, and comments below.
Mini Crab Cakes:
Ingredients; chopping alliums
Lemon zest and mayo for sauce
Mixing and shaping crab mixture
Salad:
Dressing ingredients; mixing the dressing
Bacon!
Draining the bacon and the frisee
Poaching the eggs, plating the salad
Cutting into the egg and tossing the salad
Braised Beef Short Ribs with Horseradish-leek Mashed Potatoes:
Meat!
Browned beef, vegetables for cooking with the meat
Chopping veggies and softening them
Braising liquid ingredients, adding liquid to vegetables
Adding beef stock, meat, and seasonings for the long cooking process
Vegetables for serving with the meat (notice Cory's artwork)
Mushrooms and bacon for serving with meat
Mashed potato ingredients
Prepping the leeks
Sauteeing the leeks; making hte mashed potatoes
The final product
Close-up view of the dish
Black Forest Upside-Down Cakes:
Ingredients; mixing the dry ingredients
Prepping the cake batter; the "upside-down" cherries
Before and after baking
Pureeing remaining cherries for sauce; reducing sauce in saucepan
Cherry sauce, and finally...Dessert!
Ratings (Average between Liz and Cory):
Crab cakes: 9
Frisee Salad: 8
Short Ribs with Horseradish-leek potatoes: 9
Black Forest Upside-down Cake: 7
*See recipes for specific comments
Recipes:
Mini Crab Cakes
Ingredients:
4 ounces cream cheese, room temperature
1/2 cup mayonnaise
1 large egg
1/2 teaspoon finely grated lemon peel
4 teaspoons plus 2 tablespoons chopped fresh chives, divided
1/2 small onion, minced
1 clove garlic, minced
1/4 teaspoon coarse kosher salt
1 tsp Old Bay
1 Tbsp Dijon mustard
1 lb fresh lump crabmeat, picked over, patted dry, coarsely shredded
1 cup panko (Japanese breadcrumbs)
For sauce:
1/2 cup mayonnaise
1 clove garlic, minced
1 Tbsp minced chives
1 tsp lemon zest
pinch salt
Beat cream cheese in medium bowl until smooth. Mix in mayo, egg, citrus peel, 4 teaspoons chopped chives, coarse salt, and old bay. Fold in crabmeat.
Shape mixture into balls (about 2 Tbsp mixture each). Fry in hot oil until browned, turning once.
Arrange crab cakes on serving platter; top with sauce and sprinkle with chives.
Frisée Salad With Poached Egg
For the salad:
1 head frisée, tender light green leaves only, washed and dried (about 6 cups), or 6 cups mixed baby lettuces, washed and dried
1 leek, cleaned and sliced (white and light green parts only)
1 tsp butter
3 slices bacon, chopped and cooked until crisp
2 large or extra-large eggs
1 tablespoon vinegar (any kind)
Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
For the dressing:
2 tablespoons white balsamic vinegar
2 Tbsp olive oil
Salt to taste
pinch sugar
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
1 small garlic clove, minced or pureed
1. Cook the leeks in 1 Tbsp butter until tender. Set aside.
2. Poach the eggs. Fill a lidded frying pan with water, and bring to a boil. Add 1 tablespoon vinegar to the water. One at a time, break the eggs into a teacup, then tip from the teacup into the pan (do this in batches if necessary). Immediately turn off the heat under the pan and cover tightly. Leave for four minutes. Lay a clean dish towel next to the pan, and using a slotted spoon or spatula, carefully remove the poached eggs from the water. Set on the towel to drain.
3. Whisk together the vinegars, salt, mustard and garlic. Whisk in the oil. Toss with the lettuce until thoroughly coated, and distribute among six salad plates. Top each serving with a poached egg. Season the egg with salt and pepper to taste, sprinkle with bacon and leeks and serve.
Braised Beef Short Ribs (Gourmet, October 2006)
Ingredients:
For short ribs:
4 (8-ounce) pieces bone-in beef short ribs
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
3/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
4 medium carrots, finely chopped
1 medium onion, finely chopped
2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
1 (14-ounce) can whole tomatoes in juice, puréed in a blender with juice
1 1/2 cups dry red wine
4 cups beef stock
2 sprigs fresh thyme
1 Turkish or 1/2 California bay leaf
1 tablespoon red-wine vinegar
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
For vegetables:
20 pearl onions (5 ounces)
1 1/2 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 tablespoon red-wine vinegar
2 cups chicken stock or reduced-sodium chicken broth (16 fluid ounces)
4 medium carrots, cut diagonally into 1 1/2-inch pieces
3 thick bacon slices (preferably applewood-smoked; 1/4 lb total), cut crosswise into 1/4-inch pieces
8 medium fresh white mushrooms, trimmed and quartered lengthwise
Braise short ribs:
Put oven rack in lower third of oven and preheat oven to 250°F.
Pat beef dry. Heat oil in a wide (12 inches in diameter) 3- to 5-quart heavy pot over moderately high heat until hot but not smoking, then brown beef on all sides, turning with tongs, about 8 minutes. Transfer to a plate and sprinkle with 1/4 teaspoon sea salt and 1/4 teaspoon pepper.
Add chopped carrots, onion, and garlic to oil in pot and cook over moderate heat, uncovered, stirring occasionally, until softened, about 5 minutes. Stir in 1 cup puréed tomatoes (reserve remainder for another use) and bring to a boil over moderately high heat. Add wine and boil, stirring occasionally, until sauce is thickened, about 8 minutes.
Add veal stock, thyme, bay leaf, vinegars, and remaining 1/2 teaspoon sea salt and 1/4 teaspoon pepper to sauce, and bring to a simmer. Skim fat from surface, then add beef along with any juices accumulated on plate and cover pot with a tight-fitting lid. Transfer to oven and braise until beef is very tender, 4 to 5 hours.
Cook vegetables while beef braises:
Blanch pearl onions in a wide 2- to 3-quart heavy saucepan of boiling water 1 minute, then drain in a sieve. When just cool enough to handle, peel onions with a paring knife, trimming root end just enough to leave onions intact.
Heat butter in dried saucepan over moderate heat until foam subsides, then cook onions, stirring occasionally, until brown spots appear, 3 to 5 minutes. Stir in vinegar, then add chicken stock and carrots and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer, covered, until vegetables are tender, 20 to 25 minutes. Uncover and boil, if necessary, until liquid glazes vegetables.
While vegetables are simmering, cook bacon in a 10-inch heavy skillet over moderate heat, stirring occasionally, until lightly browned, 4 to 6 minutes. Add mushrooms and cook, stirring, until mushrooms are tender and bacon is browned and crisp, about 4 minutes. Transfer with a slotted spoon to vegetables in saucepan.
Assemble dish:
Transfer a short rib to each of 4 soup plates and keep warm in oven. Pour sauce through a medium-mesh sieve into a large bowl, pressing on and then discarding solids, then skim fat from sauce. Boil sauce, if necessary, until thickened and reduced to about 3 cups. Season with salt and pepper. Add about 2 cups sauce to vegetables (reserve remaining sauce for another use), then spoon mixture around short ribs.
Horseradish-leek Mashed Potatoes
3 large potatoes
1 leek
3 Tbs butter
1 tsp salt
1 tsp pepper
1/4-1/2 cup half and half
1 tsp prepared horseradish
Peel and cube potatoes. Add to a pan of salted water and boil until tender. Drain and reserve.
Meanwhile, clean leeks and slice thinly, using only the white and light green parts. Melt butter in a skillet and saute leeks until tender.
Mash potatoes with salt, pepper. Add half-and-half until they reach desired consistency. Stir in leeks and any butter in pan. Add horseradish to taste.
Note: I would definitely serve these mashed potatoes again, with other beef dishes or roasted meats.
Black Forest Upside-Down Cakes (Everyday Food: January/February 2010)
1/4 cup (1/2 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature
1/3 cup plus 3 tablespoons packed light-brown sugar
1 1/2 cups drained jarred sour cherries (juice reserved)
1/3 cup all-purpose flour (spooned and leveled)
1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon coarse salt
1 large egg yolk
3 tablespoons whole milk
1/4 cup heavy cream
1/4 cup plus 1 Tablespoon granulated sugar, divided
2 tsp cornstarch
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Place 1 tablespoon butter, 1 tablespoon brown sugar, and 1/2 teaspoon cherry juice in the bottom of each of two 8-ounce ramekins. Microwave ramekins until butter and brown sugar are melted and bubbling, about 1 minute. Arrange cherries in a tightly packed layer in the bottom of each ramekin.
In a small bowl, whisk together flour, cocoa, baking powder, and salt. In another small bowl, stir together 2 tablespoons butter and 1/3 cup brown sugar with a wooden spoon until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Stir in egg yolk, then flour mixture and milk. Divide batter between ramekins.
Place ramekins on a rimmed baking sheet. Bake until a toothpick inserted in center of a cake comes out with only a few crumbs attached, about 30 minutes. Let cool on a wire rack, 20 minutes.
While cakes are baking, prepare cherry sauce. Puree remaining cherries in food processor with 1/4 cup liquid. Mix cornstarch with additional 2 Tbsp liquid to make a slurry. Add pureed cherries, cornstarch mixture, and remaining reserved liquid with 1/4 cup sugar and pinch salt and bring to boil, reducing until slightly thickened. Taste and add sugar as needed. Chill until ready to serve.
In a small bowl, beat cream and 1 tablespoon sugar until soft peaks form. Run a paring knife around edge of each cake and invert onto a plate. Serve cakes with whipped cream and cherry sauce.
Notes: The concept here is good, but the chocolate cake is a little dry. I might try this again with a different cake batter, or just do the cherries as a topping and use my favorite flourless chocolate cake recipe from my America's Test Kitchen cookbook.
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