Holiday Hijinks

The holidays are a time for getting together with friends, family, and loved ones to celebrate. Usually it’s a bit unclear as to what’s being celebrated, as everyone has their own individual beliefs and values, though food always plays a large part. In many cases, it plays a gigantic and gluttonous part. My dinner was no exception as it contained an unseemly amount of courses.

http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Amazingly-Good-Eggnog/Detail.aspx
http://www.pillsbury.com/Recipes/ShowRecipe.aspx?rid=46242
http://recipes.howstuffworks.com/swedish-meatballs-holiday-recipe.htm
http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Cajun-Crawfish-and-Shrimp-Etouffe/Detail.aspx
http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Cioppino/Detail.aspx
http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Apple-Avocado-Salad-with-Tangerine-Dressing/Detail.aspx
http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Roast-Goose-with-Stuffing/Detail.aspx
http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/saras-secrets/crepes-suzette-recipe/index.html

I cooked the majority of this monstrous meal the day of, with the exception being the eggnog and prepping the stuffing for the goose. It started off as a royal pain, but the payoff was more than worth it. The eggnog was one of my favorites, but it can be a bit tricky to make because you need to make sure that the eggs don’t coagulate. You avoid this by stirring constantly over a very very low heat or using a double boiler (a smaller pot with the eggs inside of a larger pot filled with water). It’s the same technique as making hollandaise sauce for Eggs Benedict. Even after doing this though, it will still probably taste like a sugary abortion. Chilling it overnight really brings all the flavors together and thickens the drink. As for the rum, I like to use good dark rum like El Dorado. Even though it’s technically a mixed drink, it’s almost as alcoholic as a cocktail, so the rum is really important. I garnished each glass with a pinch of nutmeg and cinnamon with a cinnamon stick thrown in too. The result is way better than store-bought and if you’re going to punish your liver and arteries at the same time, it better taste good.





For hors d'ouvres, I served Crescent Bacon-Cheese Tartlets. Here, I cheated a bit by not making my own bread, but it was still delicious. To be honest, I cheated a lot here since my cooking assistant, Jenny, did most of the work here. All I did was cook the bacon and take the finished product out of the oven. The combination of bread, egg, cheese, and bacon tasted like a mini quiche, while the crescent roll flavor added an extra level of sweetness. It was a great start to the meal, but I was really glad I skipped out on the assembly since it takes a bit of time to hollow out a home for the cream, egg, cheese, and morsels of bacon.







Along with the Tartlets, I served Swedish Meatballs. Both meatballs and gravy I made, but this one was really easy. The whole thing, start-to-finish, couldn’t have taken more than 15 minutes. I had barely any leftovers of these as the accompaniment of lingonberry preserves and gravy with the fluffy texture and flavor of rare meat was too much to resist. I really don’t know what the difference is between Swedish and regular meatballs, but the former feels like more of a holiday staple. My Scandinavian side of the family would always make Swedish Meatballs and Lefse so there was something tasty to eat as we all tried to dodge the intimidating plate of Lutefisk. That’s gelatin cod and if you didn’t know what it was before, you should count yourself lucky.







Next came two soups I made. One was a Cajun Crawfish and Shrimp Etouffe, where I substituted crab for crawfish (it’s a bit hard to come by in Manhattan supermarkets). Unfortunately, this came out tasting fishier than any Etouffe I have ever had. It was also too thin and too pink. When I think of a good Cajun Etouffe, it should be thick, red, and performing a fine balancing act between pleasurably spicy and oh-god-I-need-some-milk-now spicy. My spice level was right, but there was something else really lacking in the flavor that I can’t place.



The Cioppino more than made up for it. I used shrimp (1 lb), bay scallops (1.5 lbs), mussels (3 lbs), cod (1 lb), and squid (1 lb) instead of what the recipe suggested. The squid was one of the highlights of the dish since the strong basil, wine, and tomato flavor really permeated the chewy meat of the squid. Mussels with this flavor is a classic, like in Mussels Marseille, minus the Pernod. Every ingredient came out perfectly cooked and flavorful. Luckily, I made so much that I had enough leftovers to last almost two weeks.





My favorite part of the meal was the main course, a stuffed roast goose, which I accompanied with an apple avocado salad with tangerine dressing. The goose came out of the oven smelling strongly of the stuffing, with which it had been cooking for six hours. Its amber skin was crispy, yet fatty. The dark meat was very tender and the wings were so large and drumstick-shaped, that it was hard to tell them apart from the legs. For the gravy, I probably added a bit too much fat, but it still worked. The gravy in the recipe was really off so I ended up using close to a cup of wine and a tablespoon of tomato paste. Rendered goose fat, pan drippings, white wine, and tomato danced with goose flesh and fat in my mouth. It really varies depending on how much fat you have left in the pan and how much you add to the gravy, but there should be a lot since a goose is a very fatty bird. Even though the stuffing pre-cooking looked like it was mostly apples, it came out very bready, as would be expected from stuffing a whole baguette into a bird. The currant flavors came out in the stuffing, but also came through in the bird. Albeit time consuming, I really recommend this dish especially if you like dark meat, since that’s all a goose has. The pictures below detail steps in the cooking process.

Stuffing:



Attempting to brown with my tiny pan:



Making it pretty:





Later on:





Finished:





Gravy, Salad, Stuffing, and Carved:









Last was the dessert. Of all these recipes, the Crepes Suzette was the most complicated and took up most of the prep time. It was composed of an orange sauce, a grenadine sauce, the crepe itself made from fresh batter, the Grand Marnier added to flambee, and a dollop of vanilla ice cream.



The butter had to be browned to give the crepe batter a nutty flavor before adding the rest of the ingredients.







Since I didn’t have a crepe pan, it was a bit difficult to flip the crepes at first, but after a while I realized that it’s easier to just lift the crepes up with a spatula and use your hand to flip them over.







After all the sauces and crepes were made, I prepared each one individually. First, I threw in just enough butter to grease the pan, chucked a crepe on top, spooned a few orange slices on top, and topped it all with about 1/8 cup of Grand Marnier. Then came the fire. It either flared up all at once or I had to move the pan to the side to catch the burner’s flame. You probably can’t do this on an electric stove. After the flames subsided, I plated it, sprinkled some grenadine sauce around the side, and placed a small dollop of vanilla ice cream on top. I loved how there were so many different flavors in this dish. There were the very alcoholic oranges, the ice cream, the grenadine, and my favorite, which was the taste of orange liqueur permeating the thinly drenched pancake.



So that was my gigantic holiday feast. Excess was definitely the name of the game and such gluttonous extravagance kept me stuffed for the better part of 24 hours. It was one of three great meals I made over the break. The others were Julia Child’s Boeuf Bourguignon and Lobster Thermidor I made after being inspired from watching Julie and Julia. That though, is a story for another day.

Dinners at Dijon

There is very little French food in Ithaca and Dijon is one of those few restaurants. It is actually the only French restaurant I know of in Ithaca, so if you happen to know some others, please let me know. My experiences there have varied greatly, but I really like the menu, so I keep coming back. Also, they do take-out, making it, in my opinion, the best and most expensive take-out in town.

The first time I went to Dijon, I walked in without making reservations. This was a grave mistake because even though all the tables were empty, they said that all were reserved. Next week I made reservations. After being seated next to the noisy kitchen, we ordered our food. To start, I got the escargot (I don’t think it’s on the menu anymore). The presentation was very interesting, with some being encased in a mini bread bowl and others floating in a sea of berries and butter. Initially, I though it was a dessert. However, a few bites in, I discovered that the berries worked very well with the dish. Their tartness cut the fat in the butter. Unfortunately, the bread was stale and hard. Though the presentation was novel, they need fresher bread. I had this with a glass of Cotes du Rhone, which was pretty mediocre, but I got it by the glass so I shouldn’t have expected much.





In addition, we still hadn’t received our bread, so I asked the waiter for some. When he came back, he threw a few stale slices right on the table, gave us a bowl of whipped butter, and left. I looked around the room to see if anyone else was treated this way and they were! I don’t know if they’re trying to be environmentally conscious, or if they’re just cheap, but they dump your bread right on the table instead of giving you a basket.

Next, I got a glass of Bordeaux for my second course, the crispy duck leg confit with pumpkin and bleu cheese risotto, toasted walnuts, and fried sage. The risotto was very mute, with the bleu cheese present in a few clumps around the dish and the pumpkin flavor barely noticeable. It was a texture with little taste. The duck confit was crispy on the outside and overcooked on the inside. Even though the wine helped it a bit, it still wasn’t a very good dish, which was disappointing since I love duck, risotto, pumpkin, and bleu cheese.





Even though I didn’t have a good experience my first time there, I wanted to give Dijon a second chance. I got the boeuf bourguignon and brought it home. This was incredibly dry and flavorless. It felt like chewing on rubber with none of that characteristic rich sauce that I have come to know and love from the dish. It is usually braised in burgundy, but this was just a stew with a thin broth. When I looked at the receipt, it said “beef stew”, so I’m a bit confused what they were even trying to do here.

Still, I wanted to give Dijon a third chance. A friend had been talking about mac and cheese all day, so that’s what I was in the mood for. I got their roasted free range chicken with truffled macaroni and cheese and carrots vichy to go. When I got there to pick up my food, they said it would take a bit longer than originally anticipated. To make up for this, they gave me a complementary glass of wine. The dish itself was fantastic. The pasta was al dente with that earthy taste from the truffle oil and generous slices of black truffles mixed throughout the mac. Also fantastic, the roast chicken had a crispy, yet moist skin that paved the way to the tender and moist chicken underneath. Both components were intensely flavorful.





The last time I got food from Dijon was again take-out. This time I also got lucky, ordering the chicken liver mousse with garlic toasts. They had a great liver taste, but were very creamy and were textured like a mousse. Accompanying the livers were garlic crostini, which were a bit too crispy and thick for my taste. However, the all paled in comparison to their crispy skin salmon over ragout of white beans, chorizo sausage, tomato confit, and grain mustard-cream sauce. It had perfect black crispy skin, as the name would suggest, but was wonderfully moist on the inside. What I expect from perfectly cooked salmon is that texture where the fillet is divided into flakes and each one readily yields to the fork. That was how this was done. The sauce was also great and it reminded me of a mustard cream sauce I make myself. I think the mustard we use is also the same, Maille old style (http://www.maille.us/pages/product.aspx?pid=10). It worked very well with the salmon, making it an incredibly rich dish. As if this weren’t enough, a white bean ragout with chorizo was mixed into the soup of mustardy cream. The dish was very flavorful and definitely the best I have had at Dijon.

As a whole, I like the menu at Dijon, but they lack the skill to make many of the items that they list. The only ones I really like were the chicken and the salmon dishes. I will probably keep going back to Dijon because those two were so good and I want to see what else they can do well. The fact that they offer take-out is very appealing since it gives me a better option to choose from when no one feels like going out to eat. Whenever I do get take-out, the service is great and the food stays hot all the way home. So I would say, go out to Dijon, but be careful what you order since their dishes vary greatly in quality.

Luscious Libations

On September 5th, I attended the 3rd Annual Ithaca Brew Fest and it turned out to be the most fun I have ever had in Ithaca. The sun was shining and the beautiful blue sky and picturesque Cayuga Lake were accentuated by the extensive variety of offered food and drink. The event took place at the Big Pavilion at Stewart Park, which was packed to the brim with thirsty tasters. Upon entering at 3PM, the staff gave my friends and me 20 drink tickets, a 2 ounce tasting glass, and a tasting guide.



First I had to eat and luckily there were a multitude of options available. The first table I saw was Wegman’s bratwurst and mild Italian sausage. This came with peppers and sweet caramelized Vidalia onions and the sides were potato salad and cole slaw. It was very tasty and the onions were incredibly sweet. They made the dish.



Next came the beers, the first of which I had was Middle Ages’ Wailing Wench. It was hoppy and tasty, but not incredibly memorable.



The next was Sly Fox’s O’Reilly’s Stout. It had great body and a very smooth finish. Its head was magnificent, as you can see, and it left an aftertaste of coffee.



Then came Butternuts’ Snapperhead IPA. This was a little sweet, then bitter, but altogether not very tasty or memorable. I didn’t like it too much.



Captain Lawrence’s Smoked Porter was incredible. I could drink this one all day. It was complex, rich, and oh so flavorful. I assume that they got the smokiness from a charred barrel, but I really have no idea. See the browned head on top and you can almost taste how smoky it was. This was probably my favorite beer at Brew Fest.



Empire’s American Strong Ale was hearty, strong, and tasty. At 9.0% ABV, its name was truly indicative of its strength.



Then I took a break to eat more. I had a few bites of Razorback’s pulled pork before throwing the dried and flavorless mess in the garbage. Half of why I threw it away was because I was full, the other half was that it was just too nasty to consume.



The gluttony continued as I sampled McSorley’s Irish Black Lager. It was the smoothest dark beer I have ever tasted. I guess it should be expected that such skill comes from such an old brewery. My friend told me that it’s the oldest in NYC and that it began in 1854.



This might have been my third favorite beer. Leinenkugel’s Sunset Wheat was a smooth and tasty hefe-style brew that tasted like someone squeezed a whole orange into the beer. My Midwestern family loves Leinenkugels, but before I tried the Sunset Wheat, I was a bit weary of the brand whose sales rival Budweiser out there. Maybe it got the flavor from the coriander that it’s brewed with, but that sounds a bit fishy to me. Even if they’re lying about what goes in, it was a magnificent brew.



McSorley’s last beer was so tasty I had to go back to try their Irish Pale Ale. It was very smooth. Now I’ll have to make a trip to that brewery at some point.



I went into the Pavilion to try a few samples. Nothing was worth noting except Wegman’s macaroni and cheese. They made it with Ithaca Nut Brown Ale and it was delicious. The cheddar and ale swam in my mouth and danced on my tongue. If I weren’t so full, I would have gotten a whole portion instead of just a sample.



Wolaver’s is a certified organic brewery and I tried their Oatmeal Stout. It was crisp and sweet, but the oatmeal flavor was a bit muted.



The Blue Moon Belgian White is a nice classic wheat beer. It’s not the most complex, but a good value and your best bet if you want a cheap wheat beer.



New York brewery is not listed in the tasting guide, but they still made their appearance. Though the bottles were tacky and the lines short, their lager was very smooth. It wasn’t amazing, but much better than I expected from the way they presented themselves.



Spaten’s Optimator was very alcoholic, but also very palatable.



Another of Spaten’s is one of my favorite beers and I was surprised that the Munich brewery was here at all, but I guess they want to start establishing an American presence. This beer is Franziskaner Weissbier and its smooth rich flavor makes it one of the best wheat beers I know.



Wagner Valley’s Oatmeal Stout was the way an oatmeal stout should taste. It was very dark, rich, and oaty. This was definitely in my top 5 for the day and the long line for it proved that others thought the same.



Next was Excelsior by Ithaca. The name suggests something orgasmic, but all I got from it was hops. It was a bit disappointing.



Rooster Fish was the next brewery I visited and I tried their Hop Warrior. This was accurately named. It was very hoppy, but with very interesting fruity undertones as well.



Then I tried Southern Tier’s Imperial Mokah. It was strong, smooth, and sweet with a very distinct coffee flavor.



Saranac’s Imperial IPA was full bodied and hoppy with a fruity taste. This was also in my top 5.



The Horsehead’s Pumpkin Ale tasted like biting into a slice of fresh pumpkin pie. It was the best pumpkin ale I had ever tasted.



A crowd favorite was one of my least favorites. The Hot-Jala-Heim by Horseheads Brewing was brewed with hot peppers and is aptly described as a “Chili beer”. I don’t like spice in my beer though, so I hated this one despite its originality.



Bellwether makes hard cider and I tried their Liberty Spy. It tasted mossy and almost rotten, like an apple past its prime.



OMMEGANG’s beer was rich, flavorful, and peachy. Unfortunately, I didn’t get the name of this one.



After taking a break to admire the lake, I tried Yuengling’s Porter, which was pleasantly dark and heavy, but still crisp and smooth.





I went back to Rooster Fish to try the Firehouse Blonde. It was a very refreshing beer.



The festival drew to a close as the clock reached 7PM and all the kegs were tapped, so I tried some of the pizza that everyone had been raving about. The people who made it brought a huge oven with them to make these thin hand-made-on-the-spot pizzas. I got the garlic, herb oil and asiago pizza. It was cheesy and oily, with just the perfect blend of seasoning.



My friends and I then made a trip to the breathalyzer to compare scores before calling a multitude of people to find someone sober to drive us. It was a magical day and if there’s anything that will bring me back to Ithaca after I graduate, it will be Brew Fest.

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