Wednesday, June 22, 2011

"In Xanadu did Kubla Khan a stately pleasure dome decree.."

A few weeks ago, I called a holiday for myself which corresponded to a Saturday on which Blaine had done the same.  Initially we had plans to travel with another couple to a local casino for some event called "Indian Bingo" or some such.  Prospects of winning a gigantic jackpot attracted us to the idea.  In the eleventh hour, the other couple backed out of the trip.  This gave rise to our query: did we really, I mean really want to drive down there for a 7 hour bingo game?  After all, we were both off. So this was the stipulation: if we don't do what we had initially planned  for this rare free Saturday on which both of us had successfully dipped below the radar, we would need to accomplish something more beneficial than discovering hidden channels listed in the cable "On Demand" menu.  Blaine had been contending for a while with a problematic backyard.  I understand it had once been a stellar outdoor room, yet through a chain of events including a tremendously cold, freezing winter, the paradise had come to resemble the inner sanctum of Fred Sanford's digs in TV-land (that's his assessment, not mine).  Over time, the debris had been cleared away.  The center of the backyard features a concrete paved area in the middle of which is a square planting bed.  A fabulous palm tree lives in its center.  Around it was a hodgepodge of various plants and such.  The plan for the day: transform this section of the backyard into an extension of the patio sitting area where we both enjoyed spending time.  Blaine was already on a planting spree: pots and planters long retired had their pensions cut and were pressed into service again: petunias, evergreens, and a host of other plants to add color and personality.  So too this palm tree bed.  Years ago, I had made a raised bed in my own courtyard by using retaining wall blocks.  It had saved me the effort of plowing up the earth to achieve the depth for planting.  A load of blocks and 4 Canna Lilies later, we were dragging our injured push cart across the parking lot back to the vehicle (of course I had to select the one with the busted wheel to transport 2 tons of cast cement).  We excavated the random plants from around the palm tree, set out the blocks in three neat, interlocking rows, then carefully unstacked them, spread beads of cement, then re-stacked.  The mini wall framed the bed and gave the area a finished look.  Several bags of top soil  provided a happy planting area for the new Cannas as well as some of the salvaged flora.  While the bed was coming into its own, we moved our attention to the rest of the patio: cleaned, rearranged, repositioned.  The result: three unique sitting areas in one extended room full of plants.  Into each planter: a bamboo Tiki torch.  After all, the proper outdoor room requires the proper outdoor lighting.

"Where Alph, the sacred river, ran, through caverns measureless to man, down to a sunless sea."               

Several times through the week, we will meet for a light something for dinner after work, which for both of us is usually late.  Weekends have shorter days and often leave some room for the extra special: meals enjoyed in private prepared by either or both of us.  When the temperatures are hot, or if it's pouring rain, we eat indoors, but on the nicer days, we're outside in the rejuvenated greenhouse, especially for breakfast.  Last weekend, I made Saturday night dinner and Blaine prepared Sunday breakfast.  Saturday evening was the prelude to Father's Day, so Rousses was packed with conscientious worshipers of Dad preparing to grill -- no express lanes open, naturally.  I was planning a light summertime dinner: tortellini with basil pesto, a Romaine salad with walnuts and ramen noodles dressed with a sweet/sour vinaigrette.  The overfilled grocery store had brought me late back home and caused me to run slightly later for my anticipated 6pm arrival in Broussard.  Everything fell into place however, as I unpacked and got started on dinner.  Being late makes me nervous, and when I'm nervous in the kitchen weird things happen.  All went smoothly until I had all the pesto bits in the blender.  Although the ingredients were grinding away nicely, I felt I had to speed along the process just a bit.  Crunch!  I had destroyed Blaine's favorite bamboo spatula I thought would be keen to use as a tamping device for the fresh basil leaves.  As retribution, the Universe caused my hand to slip up the handle of the hot skillet whose interior I was wiping clean of nut and ramen noodle debris in preparation to saute the chicken tenderloins to sit atop the pasta.  The side of my middle index finger knuckle was effectively singed.  On the bright side, no slivers of bamboo had ruined the bright green sauce, my finger really didn't hurt (that much), and we both enjoyed our lighter side dinner.  Before we retired to the living room to enjoy our Black Magic Napoleons from the Rousses bakery, we took a trip to the Broussard Albertson's in search of breakfast fare as well as something from Red Box.
Blaine makes eggs in a way we had discovered last Christmas Day at Hilary's (Channeling Ina: read her blog!).  She had prepared the most fabulous eggs in ramekins baked in a bain marie and seasoned perfectly with herbs, garlic, and butter.  If you like soft boiled eggs this is the way to do them without having to fuss with the shells.  No polite cracking with the bottom of a tiny spoon or the typical Teutonic knife decapitation method I use, a technique espoused in my family passed down from my German grandfather ("I wish he wouldn't do that.  It's so impolite").  The only variation Blaine uses is that the cooking is done in a toaster oven instead of the regular oven, and there's no bain marie.  With the proper timing, the yokes come out runny, but if the eggs are left in to set, it's still a tasty dish.  At Albertson's, Blaine found a giant fruit bowl with a generous amount of berries among the melon slices, shredded cheese, grits, bacon, and Texas toast. Upon our return to the house:  movie, chocolate Napoleon, and the remainder of a quiet evening amid the flickering Tiki torches.  
I was looking forward to the ramekin eggs.  "Shrimp and Grits!" Something completely unexpected.  It's considered truly Southern, shrimp and grits, but it's really something more of a treat than a staple.   "I was thinking about what to do with the grits, and shrimp came to mind," he said.   When I cook, I have recipes in my head.  I generally know what I'll be using, how much to use and what techniques to follow.  Blaine is a visual artist.  He cooks like he paints.  He sees what he has and adds what he needs, and it works out.  In German, we'd say er kocht nach Schnauze -- he cooks by his nose.  I love watching him cook and it's fun working as his sou chef.  His shrimp and grits were prepared with standard grits cooked with milk and thickened with grated cheese.  He rendered a generous quantity of peppered bacon and reserved the grease to cook the shrimp.  Shrimp and crumbled bacon were served in bowls atop the cheesy grits.  Ramekin eggs, shrimp and grits, and a sweet fruit salad enjoyed al fresco with plenty of Louisiana coffee drunk from colorful mugs.  We are both tremendously busy throughout the week.  When things slow a bit on the weekends, we are afforded a gift of free time to be savored bite by bite like a costly truffle.  Sitting back and looking out at the beautiful green space, I have come to realize that I don't have to be the Emperor of China to know I am one of the luckiest men alive.  
     
         

Friday, June 10, 2011

Forget the Cookies

At a recent social function at my shop, amidst the various offerings of tasty amuse bouche was a plate of cookies that were by far the winners of the afternoon's snack buffet. Here's how you make them:

2 egg whites
pinch of salt
1/4 tsp cream of tartar
2/3 cp sugar
1/4 tsp almond extract
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 cp pecan pieces
1 cp chocolate morsels

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Beat egg whites until foamy.  Add salt and cream of tartar.  Beat well, gradually adding sugar.  Beat till stiff peaks form.
Add almond and vanilla.  Fold in pecan pieces and chocolate morsels. 
Drop by teaspoonsfuls on aluminium foil on a cookie sheet.  Place in oven and turn off heat at once.  Leave overnight or at least 7-8 hours without opening the oven door.

 

Thursday, June 2, 2011

Seafood Lasagna and Rustic Caesar Update

"Potato soup or French Onion, babe?" was my question I texted last Friday night as to which would be preferred for dinner on Saturday.  At the time I asked, Blaine was standing in his kitchen laboriously de-heading some 30lbs of fresh shrimp just caught that day, thanks to procurement efforts of a client.  Plan change. No soup.  Seafood lasagna paired with our friend Hilary's Rustic Caesar.   A quick trip to my neighborhood Rousses assured efficient assembly of all the bits.  It's a humble assortment of ingredients for the lasagna, but for the salad, I used Romaine and Endive -- still not necessarily ultra chic, but you know.  At the checkout, everything went through without question.  I was so pleased not to land another Chatty Cathy.  I said it before: one of my most intense pet peeves is being subjugated to superfluous commentary on my groceries by a cashier.  Here's how I see it: if you sell it in the store, and you're ringing a customer, you should know what it is and whether it's vegetable or mineral.  Most importantly: no comment is necessary.  It is of no interest to me whether or not you've ever eaten it, have no clue how to prepare it, what it looks like to you, or how it compares to what you generally serve your family on weeknights.  As the Romaine hit the scanner, I saw it coming.  I could read it in her face.  "What's this?" I wanted so much to tell her it was a single lemon, since that would grant me a bargain, but I had a lemon in my order as well, and it would have been more difficult to convince her that the lemon was Romaine.  Blaine later referred to it as "weird lettuce".  Next time I'll be prepared.  Then the endive.  Same question.  Facetiousness took my soul, but prudence checked my tongue.  "Dead birds" I was yearning to explain.  "Endive."  "How you spell that? N-dive?" (the punctuation was spoken: "the letter n, dash, dive?").  Always an adventure.
  
In rough form, here's how one prepares the dish:

Shrimp
Scallops
Krab (I refer to this as "crab with a K".) 
Sliced Green onion
Clam Juice
Chicken Broth
Grated Parmesan
Milk
Whipping Cream
Lasagna Noodles

Prepare the lasagna noodles in the customary fashion.  In a skillet, saute the onion in butter.  Add broth and clam juice and let simmer.  Add seafood and allow to cook until shrimp turn pink.  Strain, reserving cooking liquid.  With 1/2 cup of butter, prepare a blond roux.  Add 1 1/2 cup milk and the reserved cooking liquid.  Allow to simmer and thicken.  Turn off the flame and fortify the sauce with 1 cup of cream and approximately 1 1/2 cup of grated Parmesan.  Add seafood to the sauce and prepare the lasagna strata as usual.  Bake at 350 degrees for 20-30 minutes.  

Visit Hilary's blog, Channeling Ina, for the details of preparing the Rustic Caesar.  It was a perfect starter for the seafood dish, and the N-dive gave just the right bit of pepperiness and added texture.  For a whole shredded head of weird lettuce and two dead birds, I doubled the dressing quantity.  

After dinner: carrot cake and coffee enjoyed sitting in over sized leather chairs, four feet sharing an ottoman. Movie choice:  For Colored Girls.  Life is good.            

Happiness is a lemon slice

I suppose it's a good thing to befriend the bartender, especially when he's good at what he does.  And that's exactly what we've done by becoming regulars at O'Charley's.  Although it's a chain restaurant, our frequent flyer status has stripped away the impersonal atmosphere of most chain joints.  The two-for-one martini sweetens the pot even further, and add to that this little potable, and you have a win-win: the Happy Raspberry Surprise.  We had started off our Martini affair with what the menu calls an Apple Martini or some such.  Several visits later,  we spotted a rather intriguing flavored potion on the drinks list involving Italian lemon liqueur.  Although it wasn't a bargain cocktail, the bartender held the glasses under the bar and inserted the premium booze anyway, explaining apologetically that he was only allowed to use lemon juice --  our little secret.  This started off the cocktail creativity behind the bar.  On our next visit, we requested the same martini with the imaginary shot of Italian, only this time, he took Blaine's suggestion to make the drink with blueberry vodka.  And thus the birth of the signature Martini incorporating said flavored vodka, chambord, and the secret lemon sauce.