Archives Under "delicious" (RSS)
Out Standing In A Field And Cooking…Again.
3 September 2008 | Ten 01, delicious | No Responses
We did it again, faithful readers. We rolled up into a vineyard and cooked a bad-assed meal. At Adelsheim Vineyards in Oregon wine country Chef and I cooked up a 5 course plated dinner for some lucky people. They had hor de oeuvres at the winery while we set up our food and the service staff set up the table. Nestled between rows of grape vines sat our al fresco kitchen, which was equipped with two low propane burners (the kind used for outdoor turkey frying,) a large charcoal grill, and ample plating space. The guests were enjoying Gazpacho shots, arugula pesto prawns, and hamachi tartare while I drank beer and spit cusses at the grill. I had one hell of a time getting that thing lit. It took a side towel soaked in lighter fluid, but I got that fire rolling. The guests strolled up in the waning evening light as the charcoal sputtered and spat to life. Spring Lamb Chops marinated. Chef seared scallops as the girls plated the first course. I scurried about, feeding chef clean pans and regulating fires and helping plate. The servers bussed and poured and ran the plates when each course came up. When it was time for the duck tits, the sheet pan flat top was again created, and the sizzling fat filled the air with a delicious smell. They were sliced and hit the plate with a scrumptous plop. The fading light mingled with the gasps of gastronomic pleasure, the breeze wafted sweet smelling smoke and aounds of merriment across the vineyard. The lamb chops hit the grill with a satisfying sound, that fucker was hot. Chef kicked me off grill duty as I blackened some of the chops. Fucking pastry chefs trying to grill, shit…
Caramel Mousse Cake.
27 August 2008 | Ten 01, creative presentation of the week, custard, delicious, plated dessert | No Responses
I ran this dessert as a special last weekend and it sold pretty well. With milk chocolate sauce and hazelnut praline, it looked sharp and tasted delicious. The chocolate base is Tony’s truffle sponge, almost a brownie but with egg whites folded in. The central crunchy layer was a caramel candy filling, which I augmented with a little milk chocolate and feuilletine. The mousse was a new recipe, one I found on Cuisine French. The recipe caught my eye because it assumed a certain level of knowledge and technique. For example, step three in the recipe states “prepare a custard with the milk, sugar, constarch, and egg yolks.” That’s my kind of recipe. The praline garnish, I’m embarrassed to say, is isomalt. This synthetic sugar always makes me feel like a cheater, a corner-cutter and a hack. It is a beautiful garnish however, so I guess it’s OK. I learned how to make those over ten years ago now. Hmph….I’m getting old. Meanwhile, it’s business as usual at the restaurant, things have been picking up. The Oregoinian released an excellent review of us last week, and we’ve been seeing increasing numbers. I couldn’t find the review online…even without mention of the desserts-it was a good one. 
Pork Confit…Kind Of.
20 August 2008 | eating, delicious, pig | No Responses
I guess we were really braising, in duck fat, since the meat had already been brined and roasted. Left-over pork loin rejuvenated into a barbeque sandwich. I had some duck fat in the fridge, so I brought it to a boil on the stove and threw in the pork. We covered it, and in a 210 F oven it cooked for 4 hours. The resulting meat was tender and flaky and tore up easily for sauce slathering and sando assembly. The sandwiches provided no photo opportunities as they were quickly munched down by the hungry inhabitants of our household. Jaybill was available to pose with his barbeque sauce, which was delicious. I used some of Chef’s chorizo vinaigrette to make a paste with mayonnaise, we spread that on the toasted buns. The tastiest morsel of the meal was found on the side of the dutch oven we used. An incomprehensible ducky-pork flavored paste stuck to the inside rim. It was like eating candy.
Hamburger Heaven.
13 August 2008 | eating, Ten 01, creative presentation of the week, delicious, food | No Responses
It’s a Chorizo burger, actually. People who don’t enjoy this are stupid. Tomato bacon jam, pickled shallots and fried hen egg. The Chorizo sausage has a good spice, and egg yolk melting all over everything is a fucking mouthgasm. Easily takes this month’s Creative Presentation of the Week. Created one night for staff by line cook Mark, we knew it was a keeper. Sitting tall on the bar menu this burger is the best thing you ever tasted. I recommend dipping each bite into srirachanaise, and washing it all down with cold whiskey. Man, we’ve been putting out good food. Peep this Squab. Seared and served with crab-zucchini salad and Hollandaise? Yes, Please! How about an english pea crepe to sop up that sauce? Delicious!!
The Latest Dessert Menu.
30 July 2008 | Ten 01, delicious, plated dessert, dessert | 3 Responses
So I took the chocolate flour-less cake recipe that I used for Chocolate Whiskey Cake, and I piped and swirled some NY Cheesecake batter into it and I’m calling it Marble Cheesecake. I discovered this process by mistake at Carlyle, where I had the two batters ready at the same time. Funny how stuff comes together sometimes. I learned one recipe from Tony, and one from Mark, it’s as if I delivered their bastard child. The creaminess of the cheesecake flirts with the fudge-like chocolate, blackberry coulis and delicate horseshoe chocolate garnish sells it. Pretty cool looking I thought, and hell of decadent. I used this cake for a recent off-site event, and it was well received. Some people even want it for their birthday. Right now Bramble-type berries are so good in Oregon, and these blackberries are no exception. Viridian farms delivers, and the berries don’t disappoint. Take for example their blueberries, which are an integral part of the Lemon Blueberry Tart, below. This is an extremely simple dessert, pate sucre, lemon curd, the blueberries and coulis, a bit of chantilly. It’s selling well. I didn’t know how it was going to work until I had it on the plate. Simple and delicious. I’m also using their raspberries for the new Bread Pudding set, with raspberry caramel ice cream, a different but delicious frozen treat. Also new this menu is Funnel Cakes. I wanted to try these again to see if I could actually produce them, instead of just piping a few like I originally did. I can. I can also serve it with roasted banana anglaise and call it a day.
Oustanding in the Field
21 July 2008 | Ten 01, delicious, food | 4 Responses
We cooked at the Outstanding in the Field event at Domaine Serene Winery. The bus rolled up and set up the table in the middle of the vineyard, then we showed up and cooked on the hillside. Adam and Chef shucked over 200 oysters while the rest of us cut up melons. Soon after I cut my finger opening a bottle of truffle oil for the confit garlic and mushrooms. The sun baked us as the guests toured the vineyard and the servers scurried to ready the wines. The scene was set for an epic five course, including great food, wine pairings, and good company. As always we came prepared. We served up herbed melon salad with goat cheese and prosciutto. We heated the duck confit and cherry farro in a nearby oven, everything else was precariously perched on screaming hot grills. Chef seared of the duck tits and I grilled the pork loins. Our farmer from Sweet Briar Farms double fisted the meat as it was sliced up, gleefully telling all it was one of her pigs they were about to eat. It was as sweetly serene service, I drank chilled red wine and nibbled on everything. After the pork and lyonnaise potatoes we chatted and drank. People came up and clapped us on the backs and cheersed us as we watched the sun settle low on the trees. One guest was quoted “…fucking fantastic,” she would travel the country for three more Outstanding meals. A sepia coated everything as Chef told me to start the dessert. Everybody quickly plopped the cheesecakes on the plate while I mixed the berries and balsamic reduction. People ate, the elation was audible. 
Cooking and Eating and Such.
26 June 2008 | ramblin', Ten 01, delicious | 2 Responses
I made a bunch of pastries for an off-site event a few weeks back. Eight hundred some-odd tarts, cakes and candies. I felt like I was back in the hotel for a minute. Boo-YA!! Summer is in full swing and I think it’s aiming for my head. Busy nights, multiple parties, off-site events, wedding cakes…all that jazz. The restaurant launched a new website this week. We had a professional photographer come in and shoot some pics of the food. He had this crazy light/pup-tent set up in the private dining room. His Mac instantly showed the photos so he could adjust and tweak the food and equipment. The detail his images captured was amazing. I wanted to lick his monitor….Jeezusss. Anyhoo…still eating pretty good. Check out this dinner Arturo made me the other night. I’ve got it pretty good.
More Eating.
11 June 2008 | eating, pastries, Europe, delicious, food | No Responses
In Beaune, France, I visited real pastry shop. Near our hotel there was a spot with delicious smelling individual pastries, all smart and clean and made similar modular molds and built in frames. I bought a triple chocolate mousse cake. The delicate chocolate garnish on top caught my eye, and the barely gelatine-ized mousses melted easily in my mouth. I felt myself getting closer to Paris as I ate my little cake in the park. My mecca of food and cooking was on the next horizon. I felt it all deep-like. We visited the local cheese shop, the smell of moldy funk filling the air, the streets. Viva fucking France, Man!! For lunch, we wandered an open air market We bought cheese, bread, tapanade, and fruit. We ate by the merry-go-round and people watched. Our dinners were good in Beaune, everything from snail shaped foie to burger and fries and carpaccio. We played cards at night and talked while drinking local wine. We woke early one morning and boarded a train to Paris. I knew soon I would be eating at Pierre Herme’s shop, the epicenter of my pastry dreams. A few days later, in a jewelery shop style setting, precise desserts were handed to me by white gloved employees who openly mocked my poor French. OK, maybe they didn’t have white gloves, but I couldn’t get my mind around this perfect pastry shop. I could barely take it in. I was all jittery, starstruck. Perfect soldier-like rows of macrons and chocolate masks. 60 euro boxes of truffles and what looked like loaves of quick-bread. I ended up buying a chocolate dome called Plentitude and two macarons. The two cookies we ate while walking through the Tuileries Gardens outside the Louvre. One cookie was olive oil, the other salted caramel. Kate found a huge wrought iron spider. Later, inside the Musee Dorsay, I ate the chocolate mousse dome. We saw several great paintings and cool sculptures. I saw paintings by Van Gogh and Degas. Pierre Herme’s mousse cake left a more lasting impression than either. Fractal shapes of uber-thin chocolate fit into a seemingly random pattern, covering the dome. Underneath, a glossy ganache coated a luscious dark chocolate mousse and a crisp cookie base. I went back a second time, and bought more delicious stuff. More macarons of course, and in Luxembourg Gardens, I ate another dome. This one had a creamy salty caramel center and milk chocolate mousse. A chocolate macaron made a base for the tempered chocolate hemisphere. I have got to get me one of them molds. I also visited Laduree in Paris, and had a fine meal. Seared Foie with crisp brioche and foie fat. Veal Sweetbreads with parsnip puree. Kate had Scallops with Black Rice. My first taste ever of sweebreads left me drooling and the foie was cooked perfectly. Kate cleaned her plate and we ordered dessert. An opera cake sort of, and a chocolate passion fruit tart. Both were cleanly executed and delicious…but I still had Pierre Herme’s in tongue-memory. The macarons we bought on the way out weren’t nearly as good. I could feel myself getting fatter and I didn’t care.
NY Cheesecake…Kind Of.
4 June 2008 | creative presentation of the week, delicious, plated dessert, dessert | 1 Response
People go nuts for this dessert. Eyes pop out of people’s heads. It changes worlds. Even Chef cleaned his plate and he rarely does with sweets. So it’s this month’s Creative Presentation of the Week. Just a little New York Style Cheesecake with Balsamic Strawberries and Hazelnut Scone. As I look at the plate now, I marvel at how I put TWO leaves of mint. C’mon dude! It’s a basic cheesecake recipe I learned from Mark Metzger at the Vail Cascade. I used it also at Carlyle for the cheesecake three ways. Thanks Mark!! The balsamic strawberries were Chef’s idea, and after some tinkering we reproduced them. Look at those babies! All glistening and shit. The “crust” on this cheesecake comes form of scone. I always liked scones for strawberry shortcakes and this dish had strawberries so I thought, what the F. Toasted hazelnuts and sugar crust it up. It’s a little weird, sure, but damn yummy. My faithful readers need these recipes. So…here:
Metzger NY Cheesecake
1 1/2 # cream cheese at room temp
6 oz sugar
Pulp of 1 vanilla bean
3 eggs
1. Preheat the oven to 250 (200 for convection.) Place the cream cheese, sugar and vanilla pulp in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a paddle. Beat on low speed for 5 minutes
2. Scrape the bowl thoroughly with a spatula.
3. Add the eggs, one at a time scraping thoroughly between each addition. The more careful you are here, the better your end product. Add and scrape!! Visualize that nipple in the bottom of the mixing bowl, and scrape it well!!
4. Transfer the batter to a square flexible mold.
5. Bake in a water bath for 25 minutes, then rotate the pan, and bake for another 15 minutes.
6. At this point, the cheesecake should be set on the outsides, and slightly jiggly in the middle. Open the oven door for a sec, then close it and turn the oven off. Set a timer for 45 minutes. I finish all of my custards this way, it works really well. Thanks Alton.
7. Chill the cake for at least 3 hrs before attempting to de-mold and slice. I usually flash mine in the freezer for about 25 minutes to get a clean square.
Balsamic Strawberries
3 cups balsamic vinegar
1 cup honey
granulated sugar to taste
2 vanilla beans scraped
2 pods toasted star anise
2 1/2 - 3 cups hulled local strawberries
1. Measure the balsamic and honey into a pot and whisk to combine. Whisk in the the sugar 1/2 cup at a time until you reach the desired sweetness. Remember the strawberries have a good sweetness as well.
2. Scape the vanilla pods into the pot and bring the mix to a boil.
3. Add the berries and kill the heat. Cover and steep for 25-30 minutes until berries are tender but still slightly firm. They will carry over, so…
4. Create an ice bath with water, ice and two vessels. Stop the cooking process.
5. Carefully pour the steeped berries and liquid into the ice bath. Try not to agitate the berries as they cool, they become very fragile.
Scones
I left the scone recipe at work. Eat your fucking cheesecake. Here’s a good scone recipe for you. And here’s a picture of some ice creams.
Thanks Arturo.
28 May 2008 | Ten 01, squab, chef, people, delicious, pig | 2 Responses
Here’s a pork loin sandwich created by Ten-01 sous chef Arturo Lopez. Brined and slow roasted pork loin with provolone, pickled shallots, and pea tendril salad. Arturo puts such love and concentration into everything he cooks, I love when he cooks me food. For example, on this sandwich, he puts the shallots in between the slices of cheese so they don’t slide around. He thinks about shit like that. He’s got the love, simply put. He always sends extra food my way or over to the dishers. Like Thai-Style Pork Ribs. Lately I’ve been enjoying the new Lamb set, with the ever-delicious goat cheese gnocchi (which Arturo always makes) and artichokes. I watched him cook me one up the other night. He knew it was for me but he still bent over it in concentration, standing up the pieces just right. Arturo is the kind of chef who watches all day. He even observes when I don’t eat, and then brings me some food. “I saw you ate some fries but…” He knows the mise on my station, so he’s always asking me if I need this or that, and if I know about today’s party. He’ fucking on it. Chingon. I’ve learned so much working with this him that I feel like I’ve known him for years. He humbly knows all I know, and if he doesn’t know he can still do it better than me. He’s always got a better way, from the simple to the complex. Chef and he have been working together for a long time, and I can see why. It’s like father and son almost. Also coming off Arturo’s station is Chef’s new Squab Dish (below.) The legs are meticulously de-boned and stuffed with foie-gras torchon. Then they get bacon wrapped. I haven’t eaten this one yet, but I’m keeping my fingers crossed.
