Oh how I do love my charcuterie, on a recent trip to New York City I had the chance to imbibe in some of the best charcuterie I have had in years. Bar Boulud is one of Daniel Boulud's newest restaurant in New York City that specializes in classical brasserie cuisine in a casual environment. On the day I went, we arrived early so we were the first people in the dining room. It was clear after an hour though, that if we had not mad a reservation we would of been waiting at the door for quite some time as the restaurant filled up quickly and a crowd was soon gathered at the door waiting for open tables.
The entrance the the restaurant is simple, a full glass windowed wall, with a barrel sign with the name of the restaurant on it. After going through two heavy glass doors we were welcomed by a beutiful restaurant, narrow but with considerable depth to the room. There are a number 
The menu is very classical brasserie cuisine which seems hot right now in the restaurant scene. Classics like Croq
The charcuterie may be ordered individually with selection like Pate Grand-Mere, Lapin De La Garrigue (pulled rabbit and vegetable terrine), Fromage de Tete (head cheese terrine), Compote De Joue De Boeuf (shredded slow-braised beef cheek with onion confit and pistachio), Terrine de Poularde Au Citron et Coriandre (chicken terrine with lemon and cilantro), amongst others. The selection is slightly larger for dinner than is available for lunch. If you want to try a little of everything there are two options for a Degustation de Charcuterie, the small offering is $22 while the large selection
To round out the menu is a beutiful assortment of cheeses offered in a selection of three ($14), five ($21), or seven ($28). The dessert selection is classic French as well with a selection of petit fours ($8), Floating Islands ($8), and a selection of pastries like the classical Gateau Basque. There is also a selection of in-house made ice creams and a tropical fruit salad for those watching the calories, but if you are eating here why go for fruit, just make the sacrifice and try something truly amazing like the petit fours and Gateau Basque like we did.
I obviously tried the charcuterie, which was amazing. We also went with the Boudin Noir and Boudin Blanc, both very light in texture and perfect in flavor. It was truly hard to just go with the selection we did but it was lunch and there were more meals planned for later in the day. The wine list is simple but with exquisite selections. The only draw back to the meal might be the prices, but honestly you pay for what you get. The total meal with two glasses of wine each came to about $200 with tip, worth every penny or dollar I should say. I will certainly be back to Bar Boulud again.
Bar Boulud Website
Telephone 1-212-595-0303
1900 Broadway (between 63rd and 64th)
New York, NY 10023
Brunch: Saturday-Sunday 11:00am - 2:30pm
Lunch: Monday-Friday Noon - 2:30pm
Dinner: Sunday 5:00pm - 10:00pm
Monday-Thursday 5:00pm - 11:00pm
Friday & Saturday 5:00pm - Midnight
Late Night Charcuterie and Cheese Menu
Friday & Saturday Midnight - 1:00am
Sunday 10:00pm - 11:00pm
Sunday, April 27, 2008
Bar Boulud a Brasserie in New York City
Saturday, April 19, 2008
Chez Pierre Restaurant
In my last blog I talked about being impressed by a restaurant that has been open for over 30 years, but the results of the meal were not hot. Yesterday though, I went to a restaurant in Ganesvorrt, NY just outside of Saratoga Springs that has been open for 44 years and I had one a meal that showed the positive side of 44 years of experience.
Chez Pierre is a classical French restaurant that certainly makes no apoligies for being old-school French. The dishes remind one of French cuisine promoted in Escoffier's Le Guide Culinaire. If you want to remember the haute cuisine that I love, you must go here.
Located off of route 9 in Ganesvoort, NY Chez Pierre is an easy restaurant to get to. For some it may be too far out of Saratoga, but on the Friday night I went in, it was obvious that the location was not an issue to many as after 7 pm the place was packed. The restaurant is located in a cute mid-size building with a small Eiffel tower outside to let the diners know where to stop when driving by.
The dining room was quaint, nothing ultra modern, kinda plain maybe a little dated but perhaps some might say the cuisine is as well but I also love that about this place. It screams "local French bistro." Make sure you watch out for the floor when you walk in, there are multiple levels that could trip you up as it did to me.
The dining room was covered in white linen with pink cloth napkins and antique -type etched crystal water glasses. The bar seemed very classic French, one might think that Van Gogh was going to come sit next to you with a bottle of Absinthe. Sadly, the bar did not have any Pastis, which is the modern legal version of Absinthe, just without the wormwood.
As mentioned, the menu is very old-school French. Escargots with garlic and herbs, Beef Wellington, Veal Oscar, Tournados Henri IV, Chateaubriand, Steak Diane, Frogs Legs Provencal, Couquille Saint Jacques, Supreme De Poulet "Valdostana", Paupiette de Veau, Filet of Sole Marguery, and I could continue with dishes that excited me.
With our bread was delivered a nice slice of Pate Grand Mere. A nice pork terrine with liver added to it. It had a good texture to it and a wonderful flavor. The bread seemed a bit "white breadish, not very classical baguette in my opinion. The accompaniment of packaged crackers detracted from the quality of the bread course to me as well.
It was really hard for me to choose what to order. I wanted frog's legs and escargot, but my dining companion didn't want either, so I we got the Couquille Saint Jacques and the escargot, both were by-God amazing. The escargot came in these small ceramic mock snail shells and the Couquille was served in an actual scallop shell with some beautiful swiss cheese browned on top.
For entree, I went with the Paupiette de Veau, (veal pounded out thin and rolled with cheese and ham). Cooked perfectly and served with a beautiful sauce. A bit heavy for a summer night, as were most items on the menu, but one does not goto this restaurant to eat seasonally, you dine here to eat the food of La Varenne, Antoine Careme and Escoffier. The sides were orange glazed carrots which were perfectly cooked until soft and Potato Dauphinoise. Both sides were very flavorful.
If that was not enough, I had to go for dessert, I usually don't go for the basic desserts like chocolate mousse, but if there was a place to get mousse, this was it, it was phenomenal, like airy and rich with chocolate and lacking in graininess. My espresso was served in a percolator, it was disappointing, cold and as such lacking in flavor. The Grand Marnier at the end of the meal made up for the espresso though.
Our server was great, it was obvious she had been working there for some years and knew her stuff. The service was a bit slow at times in the meal as the room was packed and they were a little understaffed, but the timing didn't make me uncomfortable, she preformed well for the issues dealt to her.
If there was to be a restaurant in the area I live in now that I had a standing order for a weekly dining reservation, this would be the place. It made me feel like I was at a local French restaurant that I should know everyone's name as well as their family member's names. I may not be back weekly, but I will certainly be a regular.
Website - http://www.chezpierrerestaurant.com/
Hours - Serving Dinner Tuesday - Friday, 5:30pm - 10:00pm
Saturday, 5:00pm - 10:00pm
and Sunday 5:00pm - 9:00pm
Racing Season Schedule - 7 Days, 5:00pm - 10:00pm
Chez Pierre Restaurant
979 Route 9
Gansevoort NY, 12831
(518) 793-3350 or (800) 672-0666
Email: chezpierre_12831@yahoo.com
Tuesday, April 1, 2008
Hiro's Japanese Restaurant In Albany, NY
It's not often one sees a restaurant that has been around for thirty-plus years. It is even less often one sees a Japanese restaurant around for that long, but there is one in Albany, NY that has the unique distinction. Hiro's Japanese Restaurant on Central Avenue is a main-stay that has been brining in patrons far and wide from the New York Capital District since 1972.
I have driven by this restaurant for many years and I am ashamed to say that I have only recently taken the time to go in for a meal. Seeing the restaurant from the road I have always remembered people telling me that I needed to have reservations in order to visit so I think this kept me at bay. I just happened to be driving by this past week and decided on a whim to stop by when I saw the "open" light on.
Having an early dinner is usually odd to me, even on a Sunday, but on this particular day dinner was to be had at 3:00pm which luckily was their opening time on Sundays which is a great thing for an early dinner or a late lunch. Their sign upon entering also stated that they serve lunch Tuesday-Saturday earlier in the day.
We were greated by a nice young lady who asked us if we were interested in the dining room or the cooking table. I had not known this, but Hiro's not only serves traditional sushi, but they also feature two Teppanyaki tables. Teppanyaki for the uninitiated is what many refer to as a habaci grill. It is pretty much a large flat-top grill where a "chef" puts on a show for the crowd. If you have ever seen a Bennihana, you have seen this style of cookery. As for myself I get little joy or excitement from watching this show-over-flavor American version of Japanese cookery, so we opted for a regular table.
The building and dining room have started to show their age a little bit and sitting near a window seat gave me a bit of a chill. I was a little put off by the vacuum cleaner that one of the servers kept trying to run when we first came in, but one of the other servers, probably more seasoned kept trying to stop him.
The menus at first look were nice, but limited compared to what is offered at many of the numerous Japanese restaurants now found in the Capital District. As with my personal tradition, I decided to order a couple cooked items from the (stained) menu as appetizers and go with a sushi/sashimi combination dinner. An interesting offering is the personal choice to add a multi-course experience to the meal. I suppose to some this might seem like an "extra" but in most Japanese restaurants these days this "option" is part of any dinner entree one might order. Usually one gets a crisp greens salad with a ginger dressing and miso soup and a piece of orange. This option included that, along with pork katsu and green tea ice cream.
The first appetizer was mushroom terriyaki, a dish of button mushrooms stir-fried with terriyaki sauce. Not all that exciting, but not bad. It could of had a variety of mushrooms, especially shitakes or something else in the Japanese realm along with some ginger/garlic and some green onions, instead of leaves of iceberg lettuce.
The second appetizer was a vegetable tempura, at first glance it was attractive, the batter looked light but then I took a few bites. The broccoli had a large amount of raw batter inside, and all of the pieces were pretty greasy which is odd for tempura. The final appetizer was stir-fried spinach with bonito flakes which I actually enjoyed except the portion size was absurdly small.
The pork katsu arrived next, it was nice in contrast to the other appetizers. Very crispy exterior with a contrasting softness of onions and pork on the interior. The sauce on the outside was a nice contrast to the fried texture. Again, presentation took a side seat here with the katsu sitting on a piece of iceberg lettuce. Perhaps some shredded shiso or daikon radish may of added to the dish.
The miso soup was OK, generic and lacking in the normal bites of tofu or shitake I am used to, there was however some wakame seaweed present. The salad was truly unexciting as it was a combination of shredded lettuce, celery, cucumber and a chunk of iceberg lettuce with an odd watery dressing on top.
My entree as I mentioned earlier was a sushi/sashimi combo. Four pieces of sushi along with 2 pieces of salmon sashimi, 2 pieces of tuna sashimi, 2 pieces of mackerel sashimi, and a piece of nondescript white fish along with a tuna roll. The fish was very fresh, the rice was properly cooked. The presentation was a bit plain but was not unappealing, again some shredded daikon or shiso would've been a nice touch instead of batons of cucumber and is pink pickled ginger popular anymore? The white ginger without coloring seems to be the more popular way to go over the odd looking pink stuff. My dining partner had the Salmonyaki, I'm guessing Salmon Terriyaki. It seemed very over cooked, again sitting on a bed of iceberg lettuce. Someone surely must have stock in iceberg lettuce in this place.
A great end to the meal though was the green tea ice cream, which ever brand Hiro's purchases should be purchased by everyone else in the area that serves it. The green tea they offered was hot and flavorful as well. A request for bottled water during the meal gained an odd look and a glass of tap water was brought to the table. In a day when there are so many warnings about drinking tap water thee should be the option, not to mention a loss of potential revenue for the restaurant for such a simple item to carry.
My server was excellent, she was attentive and cheerful. She had a smile on her face the entire time and any requests were fulfilled quickly. The woman behind the sushi bar who I assumed to be the owner came over and said hello to us and thought we were someone else from a local newspaper who ironically just happened to give a review for the restaurant a couple weeks ago.
The prices weren't all that bad for the average Japanese restaurant. Two people, with three appetizers (very small however) along with two entrees, soup, salad, pork katsu appetizer and ice cream came up to just around 75.00 with tip. It may seem a little high for lunch in the Capital District but sushi/ sashimi is always expensive no matter where you go and although the appetizers were a bit small, it was still quite a bit of food.
Hiro's Japanese Restaurant
Albany, NY 12205
Reservations suggested, especially for the teppanyaki tables as they only have two.
Hours: Lunch, 11:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m., Tuesday through Friday. Dinner, 3 to 9 p.m. Sunday, 5 to 9:30 p.m. Tuesday through Thursday, 5 to 10:30 p.m. Friday and 4:30 p.m. to 10:30 p.m. Saturday; closed Monday.
Monday, March 24, 2008
Boy That is Some Funky Food Mr.
I'm sitting here watching No Reservations with Anthony Bourdain on the Travel Channel right now. He is in China and eating some Peking duck and it just reminds me how much I miss going to China Town in New York City. There is nothing like seeing those golden brown lacquered ducks hanging in the window in the temperature danger zone, sometimes you just have to say screw the rules and go for the good stuff. For any of my students who may be reading this, you will be tested on my lectures and the text not my personal food rants.
I have had the opportunity to eat a number of "odd" foods in my lifetime, Turkey 
Fries (fried turkey testicles) when I cooked out in Yosemite, along with alligator meat for the same event. I've also cooked Kangaroo, Elk, Bison, Reindeer, Wild Boar, Bear, Ostrich, Wild Duck, Rabbit, Hare, Suckling Pig, Rattlesnake and I'm sure some others I can't recall right now. I will say I am glad I have never had to cook any insects, but I have had the chance to eat some.
There is a couple shops in Chinatown in NYC that sell candies made from insects. My first introdu
ction to this odd sort of candy was from baby candied crabs which wasn't too odd (when I had ingested large amounts of alcohol) but became odd to me the next day ironically. Imagine stopping into one of the less "western" shops in NYC and seeing fried worms, maggots and other insect things. You thought these things only showed up on Andrew Zimmerman's show, but you can find them in NYC as well. I however have forgotten the shops these "foods" were contained in.
Lucky for all of you that ummmm care to try bugs, I am going to New York City on Friday in an effort to find this shop. To balance out this trip I also happen to be going to Bar Boulud for
lunch to research some modern charcuterie and then I am going to WD-50 for dinner so that I can eat some fun new-styled food by chef Wylie Dufresne, that funky chef judge guy on Top Chef last week.
So I hope to have some picture for you guys after this weekend of some creepy crawly foods. For those of you for a different adventure I will make sure to take my camera into WD-50 and Bar Boulud. I wish I had more time actually to stop into Dim Sum Go-Go but that might have to wait until next time.
Sunday, March 23, 2008
Cooking And Dating: A Guy’s View In the Kitchen (From NY Times)
I was looking up something on the net and came across this article from the New York Times published in 1996. It reminded me oh so much about years of dating women who got nothing about my obsession with cooking and it was nice to read an article by someone who shared my disdain for women who have an ambivalence for food. I have a hard time dating anyone who doesn’t at least somewhat share my obsession for food and cuisine. Until I find that person, I’ll remain the table of one so as to no longer undergo the experiences as described below, enjoy.
Cooking And Dating: A Guy’s View In the Kitchen
COOKING GUYS are different from Young Women.
This is a much remarked-upon phenomenon, the Mars-Venus stuff, and one which causes considerable difficulty for Guys, although probably also for Young Women. But what until now has not been fully understood, by this Guy, anyway, is how this concept applies to a particularly, and unexpectedly, treacherous area: cuisine.
There are Guys who have reached a state of evolution, sometimes what’s called a certain age, at which they are real foodies. We are talking about having more knives than the Turkish army, and sharper; keeping the Larousse Gastronomique at hand to check references; settling down in the easy chair of an evening to browse through "The New Professional Chef," the cookbook of the Culinary Institute of America, and owning pots and pans in the exact size and composition for each task (cast iron, enamel-clad cast iron, copper-lined with a combination of zinc and tin, Calphalon, and so on).
Such Guys view food as a celebration of life, an art form, an expression of warm feelings, a precious gift and offering. A fully objective analysis would also disclose what the military calls collateral effect: this could impress babes.
Some Young Women, it seems, view food as a hostile entity whose sole intent is to produce fat on their thighs.
What we have here is a hidden discontinuity.
In large part, this is due to the fact that Guys approach food as they do most things. Like, for example, war. Or its corollary, sports. When a Guy starts cooking, he wants to be the Joe Montana of mousse, the Michael Jordan of julienne, the Cal Ripken Jr. of roasting. I mean, this is serious stuff.
Consider the following.
A Guy is having dinner with a Young Woman, nice place. She is suspiciously poking a fork at the goo on her pan-roasted free-range chicken with garlic and rosemary. What he is not noticing is that she is herding it into concealment under a radicchio leaf.
"It’s not bad for something based on a roux," the Guy casually notes. "Personally, I would prefer to do it as a reduction sauce."
Reduction, what, the Young Woman is thinking. The gravy is on sale?
So, now having craftily insinuated that he can cook, the Guy is gratified when the Young Woman innocently suggests that perhaps, sometime, he might like to make dinner for her. He is saying to himself, "Heh, heh."
Indeed, as the great M. F. K. Fisher noted of bachelors, in "An Alphabet for Gourmets" in 1949, "The wonderful dinners they pull out of their cupboards with such dining room aplomb and kitchen chaos" demonstrate that "their approach to gastronomy is basically sexual."
For some reason, on the appointed day, the Korean market on the corner has stocked a couple of boxes of currants, almost never seen, among the standard raspberries and strawberries. Currants, cassis, making the connections, remembering a meal in Paris, a magret of duck, sliced in an arc, a piquant cassis sauce.
"If there are currants on the market," the predatory chef says as they come out of the subway at Broadway and 79th Street, "perhaps we’ll do a magret."
A what? The French detective?
Right, currants still there. Down Broadway, to Citarella at 75th Street, where there are approximately 700,000 carnivores shrieking to be fed. The Guy takes No. 127 from the ticket machine and elbows into poultry position. Half an hour later, the Young Woman’s eyes are rolling around like marbles. Finally, a breast of duck, fresh from the Hudson River Valley, is secured. This is a monster hunk of meat; these ducks must be the size of Great Danes.
Back uptown, quick into a gourmet mart to paw through the herb box for fresh rosemary. None. Never mind, Broadway Farm, on Broadway by 85th Street, is sure to have it. What, no cassis vinegar at Zabar’s? Well, there should be an old bottle in the cupboard. The first Korean market has most necessities, but the one further up always has shelled peas, which go with the rosemary, and fabulous teensy-weensy little haricots verts. By now, they have walked 15 blocks, in a driving rainstorm, accumulating grocery bags. What kind of a loon is this? the Young Woman is thinking. He can’t buy everything in one grocery store? The Guy is scooping up a gnarly knob a little bigger than a softball.
"What’s that?" the Young Woman asks in alarm. "That thing is ugly."
"Celery root, what the French call celeriac," the Guy explains, grabbing a bunch of containers of heavy cream and a brick of unsalted butter.
The cooking technique the magret requires is to basically fry the living daylights out of it, to get rid of the fat, but the meat winds up pink. Copper saute pan, bought years ago from Dehillerin, the terrific restaurant supply store in Paris by the old Les Halles. Patricia Wells goes there to treat herself when she’s finished a cookbook. Pat Wells? Probably the only American to be a regular on French television as an expert on French food. The thing is, the cooking duck releases huge quantities of fat, which must be constantly siphoned off with a basting tube.
"Fa-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-t," the Young Woman observes. It was truly amazing, the Guy would reflect later, how many syllables could fit into a three-letter word, particularly when spread over six octaves.
"Right, ducks are real fat," he agrees amiably. "That’s how they can float in icy water."
The duck is working. The Guy deglazes the pan with the cassis vinegar and then throws in the berries. A big glob of butter into a frying pan with the fresh rosemary to finish the peas after a 1-minute, 37-second boil. O.K., the celeriac. And the food processor, the original, the real thing, the Robot-Coupe, used in French restaurants but later deracinated. Hardly anybody knows that. Celery root, some turnip, touch of mustard, big pour of cream for the texture. Yeah, cream; throw in some more.
"What are you doing?" the Young Woman asks.
Dimly, somewhere back in the far Neanderthal reaches of the Guy’s brain, there is a tingling. These are the old synapses, the innate instincts that over the eons have warned Guys of the approach of saber-toothed tigers, bosses and ex-girlfriends. Danger lurks.
"Celery, this is celery," the Guy explains urgently. "Cindy Crawford, Naomi Campbell, that’s all they eat, celery."
"Not like that," the Young Woman replies, with considerable accuracy.
So, O.K. Guys get obsessive. But be fair; there are two sides to this.
The other side is the ambivalence with which the modern Young Woman views food. Above all, there is the question of appearances, and we’re not just talking about thighs. The Young Woman is trying to be thin to be pleasing, and the Guy is force-feeding her like a goose being raised for its liver. There are actual documented cases in which Young Women have delicately picked at a perfectly good meal in public, then sneaked home to gorge on junk food.
This ambiguity almost inevitably manifests itself when a Young Woman tells a Cooking Guy that her favorite foods come from something called "The Moosewood Cookbook," which strangely appeals to many otherwise admirable women. This is not a book about food. It is about vegetables. This book is not even printed in print. It is tricked up to look as if it has been handwritten to give you a warm icky feeling, instead of an actual meal.
Mentioning "Moosewood" is the culinary equivalent of a Young Woman giving a Guy the Gabriel Garcia Marquez novel "A Hundred Years of Solitude" so that he can really get in touch with his emotions. Again, a well-meaning gesture, but one that is fundamentally misinformed. If Guys were truly in touch with their emotions, particularly those whose nature is to be nasty, brutish and short, they would go around punching people out. It has taken centuries of being repressed to get this far. Don’t mess with something when it’s just starting to work. Guys have nothing against vegetables. Vegetables have their place. It is right next to the meat.
There is a way out of this dilemma, expressed in the old Hegelian dialectic of thesis, antithesis, synthesis: Call out for Chinese.
Saturday, March 22, 2008
Culinary Books I Have Been Reading Lately
It's been awhile since I have talked about the books I have been reading. As I have been working on my thesis I seem to have my nose stuck in the same few books each day, but I have also picked up a number of other great books the last few months.
Let's lo
ok at some books I have been reading for my thesis research. In reading some of the titles you might get the direction as to where my thesis is going. A particular favorite of the books I have been reading in Food in the USA: A Reader by Carole M. Counihan. This book is a collection of articles written about, well food in the USA. There are some regional writings, political and cultural writings (how the heck did Coca-Cola become the national drink of America?), food as the American identity, and a number of other great topics.
Putting Meat on the American Table: Taste, Technology, Transformation by Roger Horowitz is an interesting way of looking how meat has become such a large part of the American diet. It also explores how, what was once such an expensive item, has become a relatively cheap and affordable, albeit generic form of protein consumption.
A really 
enjoy this book by Carol Fisher, American Cookbook: A History. Have you ever wondered why your grandmother's cookbook looks so different from the cookbooks of today? Well you'd be amazed at the cookbooks from the 17th century. It is great to see where the cultural influences have come from that drove the different cookbooks that have proliferated in our country. Originating from English roots, most of our books were influenced as such with irritation toward French cookery until we became enemies with England and friends to France.
These nex
t few books are from a series called Food in American History. These are written in a very academic manner and are not for the causal reader. These books however are some of my favorites in my library. American Indian Food by Linda Murray Berzok explores the pre-Columbian era and the cultural exchange that change the American Indians in both positive and negative ways. Writte
n without bias, this is how a text of this sort should be written. The second book which is certainly a favorite is Food in Colonial and Federal America by Sandra L. Oliver. Ever wonder where some of our cultural food items came from? Did you know that the reason we took up coffee drinking was to boycott English tea imports? Did you know the reason we don't eat lamb like some of our English ancestors was as boycott as well? It was more important to have wool from our sheep than it was to eat mutton. Food in the United States, 1820s-1890 by Susan Williams brings us into the 19th century and introduces us to the ethnic influences many of us are accustomed to.
One last book I will share with you from my research is an easy to approach book that will make you c
hange the way you think about dining and eating in the United States. In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto by Michael Pollan identifies all of the issues that have burdened the USA over the last century in the food industry. Today many think of fast food as normal food, Olive Garden as traditional Italian, Taco Bell as traditional Mexican and my disgust can go on and on. Corporate dining has homogenized our food so much that we can goto TGI Friday's, Applebees, Houlihan's, Ruby Tuesday's, any of those theme steak houses like Outback, Bugaboo Creek or otherwise and pretty much get the same meal. We have come to think about food in this country in terms of calorie, nutrient, carbohydrate and fat consumption while not caring about the food itself. We eat food wrapped in plastic that say cheese on them, but share about as much in common with cheese as a bowl of glue. This book is a must read, it will make some of you cry for those who still know how to cook. This is one of the books which made me rethink the way I eat today.
I will toss two more books in here just to share a non-academic or food writing book. I hav
e been wanting to buy Alain Ducasse's Grand Livre de Cuisine and the dessert version for some time. These books are an extensive exploration of many of Ducasse's modern take on French classical cooking along with his personal recipes. It reminds me of Le Guide Culinaire, b
ut without the attempt to codify cuisine as Escoffier was attempting. This book to me though is an important asset to any professional chef's library or any serious home cook that enjoys cooking French cuisine. Do yourself a favor and buy these books from Amazon.com. I purchased them foolishly from a private bookstore that is a favorite of mine to promote a local business in Boston, but at $250.00 compared to $114.00 used from Amazon, I think I should have waited until I came home, so much for impulse shopping. You can purchase both the desert text and savory text for the cover price of the savory text alone. I have both now though and even at the higher price I am extremely happy I own them.
So there you have it, go forth and read. I have a large number of other purchases I have made recently for both personal reading and academic research. Hopefully I will get a chance again soon to share a few more of my readings with you, until then happy reading!
Friday, March 21, 2008
Classical Five Course Gastronomique Menu For One
So I entered another one of those illustrious American Culinary Federation competitions I love to participate in. The latest entry was another cold food entry. This particular one was a five course tasting menu, prepared hot and shown cold. The requirements for the category was to prepare two appetizers, consommé, salad course and an entree.
As I love reading Le Guide Culinaire and I instantly thought of the classical French style of cooking, I decided to prepare a five-course menu right out of Escoffier's design. I knew that some of the ideas might be dated because of the time when the book was written, but I wanted to do it all the same. As Fritz H. Sonnenschmidt, Certified Master Chef, A.A.C. was one of the judges for the competition, I knew that the research put into the classical menu would be appreciated.
I took a couple of student's from the school where I teach at and one of them took pictures of my dishes, so if she is reading this thanks Christina Luckette. I also took Valerie Inman along with me, another great student from one of my Food Prep classes. I think both of these girls will be great chefs some day in the culinary community.
So I will expalin the menu here along with the pictures that Christina took. My first course was
medallions made from the chicken breasts served with medallions of mouselline forcemeat made from the legs. The version I made was with a chipolata garnish which includes glazed button (chipolini) onions, chipolata sausage, olive shaped carrots, and diced caramelized salt pork. The sauce was a demi-glaze sauce made from chicken stock. Some issues I had with this course is that I didn't place the breast medallions on top of the farce medallions. Otherwise I think the course came out well, so did the judges.
My second course filet de sole a l'andolouse. I went with this one as I had served it awhile ago at one of the restaurants I worked at and loved eating it. The dish is half a lightly cooked tomato with risotto with pimento inside and a paupiette (silet of sole rolled with forcemeat) with pimento sitting on top. The whole thing sits on a base of pan-friend eggplant and it is accompanied by beurre noisette (brown butter). The judges each seemed to have issues with the eggplant for some reason. One stated that for the amount of eggplant there needed to be more sauce, another stated an issue with the eggplant in general, but all the comments made sense. This course was my least favorite of all the courses, it just seemed clunky to me.
My third course was a consommé, Consommé Talleyrand. I have no picture of this course. The consommé was made from chicken stock, the garnish was quenelles of pheasant forcemeat, cockscombs and julienne of truffle. I think I needed some work on the truffles, but the judges all seemed to like this course.
My salad course came o
ut pretty well, needed some work as well but I liked it a lot. I prepared Salade Opera which consists of julienned chicken breast, truffle, salted ox tongue and celery tossed in mayonnaise. The salad has a bouquet of asparagus tips in the center an then slices of rooster kidney and gherkin bordering the salad. I prepared a pate en croute made with an herb dough and dried cranberries, salt pork and ham in the forcemeat.
My final course was a Filet de Bouef Bouquetiere. The dish is a roasted filet of beef surounded by bouquets of glazed carrots
, diamond sliced haricot verts, butter coated peas, hollandaise coated cauliflower and small chateau potatoes. The sauce was a gravy made from the pan drippings in the manner of an Espagnol sauce. The beef was undercooked on this course, could've been sliced thinner as well. The vegetables should have ben plated together as we do not serve food this way anymore unless we are in a French restaurant presenting by tableside service.
Overall the presentation went well, I ended up with a silver medal. I had fun coming up with this menu as it was something different and I don't normally see a menu like this displayed. The show itself had a number of great pieces displayed. We don't often see as much cold food displayed these days at ACF shows but this show had probably about sixty or more entries. The show did not have any gold medals for cold food, there was one other silver medal and the rest was either bronze or certificates. This show has its own medals as well that they give to those entries that did not receive an ACF medal which was a nice touch,e specially for those just starting out as it encourages them to continue competing. I will certainly attempt this category again some time soon if I can find an ACF show with a cold food salon close to me.
