Pairing Malbec

Frequent readers of this blog will notice that the end of many entries contains a note about wine pairings. We learned the potential of good pairing from What to Drink with What You Eat by Dornenburg and Karen Page before we started this blog. The right wine really can make food more enjoyable, and the same can be true of coffee, beer, and other beverages. We also learned that the color of a wine is far from the most important characteristic when making a pairing.

Careful readers will notice that we often cite a Mendoza Malbec as the perfect pairing. This is somewhat tongue-in-cheek, but Malbec from the Argentine region of Mendoza is so good that we are confident pairing it with almost all foods. The Malbecs vary a bit from each other (during our Mendoza visit we learned that over 250 vineyards produce that grape varietal in that small region, each with its own cultivation and vinting nuances). But they all have in common a complexity that allows for many different flavors to be brought out. And the wine is good enough on its own that a second glass after dinner will always be enjoyable.

Broquel

"Which Malbec?" one might ask. We have enjoyed dozens of different Malbecs, and all of them from Argentina or Chile have been splendid. We often buy Trapiche, which comes in several different preparations. It is one of the biggest vineyards, but we like it anyway. We recently had the Broquel, and found it to be extraordinary.

One time I (James) was in a restaurant where the only Malbec on the menu was from France. I had read that although the varietal was developed in France, its perfect expression was found only in the high deserts of the Andes, and this glass proved it. "Muddy" is the term sometimes used, and I concur.

The cartoon above is almost true, but we have not yet become quite that ridiculous. I write this one day after having made a special trip to our favorite local vineyard -- Westport Rivers, whose varied offerings we do enjoy year round -- and in fact enjoyed a Westport Dry Riesling with this evening's dinner.

Lagniappe

From Dornenburg and Page we learned something valuable about wine serving temperature: avoid the extremes: the rule of fifteen. A wine that is being kept in the fridge should be removed about 15 minutes before serving; a wine stored at room temperature should go into the fridge for about 15 minutes prior. When we remember either of these tricks, we are glad we did.

Turkey Tips Appleton

Appleton is two of my favorite places, though I have only been to one of them. Appleton, Wisconsin is home to many of Pam's cousins, and we enjoy visiting there -- almost always in summer -- every three years or so. When this plague ends, I hope to squeeze in a visit with all the Lauermans and Lauerwomen there. The other Appleton is an estate in Jamaica that produces one of my favorite rums: Appleton Reserve, a blend that is aged six-ish years.

Because Pam and I (mostly Pam) have been careful to map out our food purchases and meals, I knew that turkey tips were on the menu for yesterday evening, and I had only vague plans to prepare them with some kind of sauce. Previous successes were a barley soup Pam made earlier in this lockdown and a bourbon turkey bourbon I made last year.

This time, I knew that I had relatively few resources for a sauce, and somehow the term "deglaze" hit me in the middle of the afternoon. Whatever I did with this turkey, deglazing our indispensable cast-iron skillet would be involved. As would some sliced mushrooms we had on hand.

So I dethawed (as we say in our kitchen) the Dole & Bailey Bourbon Street Turkey Tips from Crescent Ridge, and cut them into what I would call tip-sized chunks, about 1-1/2 inches each. These are marinated and incredibly tender; as a substitute it might be helpful brine some high-quality turkey breast or tenderloins (if that is even a thing).

I started cooking organic, whole-grain Carolina brown rice because we have plenty of time on our hands, and let the marinated turkey drain while waiting about 15 minutes before starting the rest. I then heated a bit of olive oil in said cast-iron until it was quite hot. I added the tips and seared them on one side before turning and allowing to cook through but not overcook -- probably around five minutes total.

I then removed the turkey to a warm bowl and deglazed the hot pan with a generous splash of aged rum (in this case, Appleton) and added about 8 ounces of sliced mushrooms.  I reduced the heat and added a dollop of butter, a glug of Worcestershire, and a dash or three of Tabasco. I simmered until the mushrooms were softened and the sauce reduced.

We then plated the tips and spooned over the mushroom and sauce. The result was savory and tender; it was nice to have the more substantial rice; we usually use a very light basmati.

Regular readers will not be surprised to learn that this paired well with a Malbec, in this case Broquel (shield) Malbec from our favorite Trapiche vineyard in Mendoza. And in this case the pairing claim is not just me -- the tasting notes from Trapiche specifically mention mushroom sauce! We are fortunate that our wine tastes have become so narrow -- social-distancing now involves curbside delivery of Malbec by the case from a wonderful local shop, which was nice enough to find us this wine.

Pam noticed this bonus right away -- a map to the vineyard!
(See our Malbeclipse story for more detailed direction.)

Putting the Marsala in Chicken Marsala

When I go to familiar restaurants, I often debate (with myself) whether to get "the usual" or try something new. At nearby Crispi's Italian Cuisine, the result is usually a a quick decision to have the chicken marsala, because it is always satisfying. I never even really thought about making it myself, and was actually uncharacteristically uncurious about what it actually is.

That all changed a couple nights ago, as I contemplated what to do with  mushrooms remaining from the hash I had made recently (about which I apparently have yet to blog).  I found this delicious recipe, for which we already had all the required ingredients except for the Marsala fortified wine itself.

Photo: AllRecipes. Food photography is difficult, as I've often noted. Here is another example. The AllRecipes photo is  far better than anything I could have taken. I'm not sure how their version turned out so orange, though.

The rest of the story is simple: I followed the recipe without any modifications, and it was delicious. I do need to share something amusing from the web site, though. Listed as the "most helpful critical review" is this gem:

     January 22, 2003

This was good but not great. I'm terrible at flattening meat and poultry so I didn't bother. I didn't add mushrooms either as my fiance hates them. The chicken was tender and flavor pretty good but I like the marsala dishes more from my favorite Italian restaurant. My fiance was neutral on this. I doubt I'll make it again.

In other words, "I did not make chicken marsala." Pouring Boone's Farm over fried chicken does not count.

Lagniappe

In researching the Marsala wine, I figured out that Pinot Noir would probably be the perfect pairing, so I bought a bottle. When I got to the kitchen, I realized that there was a bottle of Malbec already open, so we used that instead. (Already-opened wine left over from the previous day is a rarity in
Casa Hayes-Boh.) The Malbec worked very well, but I now know both my food and wine selection the next time I am at Crispi's.

Chicken Breasts in Cherry Sauce

I adapted this recipe from the New York Times Cooking Pages recipe Duck with Cherries and Red Wine Vinegar. Besides substituting chicken for duck, I also substituted Dr. McGillicuddy's Cherry Liqueur for the Cognac (it seemed like the thing to do when I found the almost empty bottle in our liquor cabinet).

I was pleased to discover that we had all the other ingredients on hand (or at least reasonable facsimilies thereof) so I didn't need to do any shopping.

I started by grinding the fennel, clove, peppercorns, and bay leaves in our handy spice grinder. Our allspice was already ground so I just added that to the mix after. The breasts were seasoned and left for several hours to meld.

I started the sauce ahead of time as well with red wine vinegar, Malbec, sugar, chicken broth, cayenne pepper, fresh ginger and salt.

Once it was time to prepare dinner it didn't take long. The chicken breasts were placed in a skillet and cooked on each side for seven minutes. I finished the sauce with butter, more sugar, whole (pitted) cherries, and the cherry liqueur. 

The chicken breasts were sliced, plated, and served with cherries and sauce. I air fried some frozen sweet potato fries as a side dish, which made for a very colorful presentation. The meal was paired with the same Malbec I used in the sauce.

Very tasty!

Pasta and Poppies

We had bought a large bag of spinach leaves at Costco last week in order to make a family favorite: Mashed Potato Casserole (which is detailed on this post) while our adult child was visiting. There was still an awful lot of spinach so we had been looking for ways to use it before it spoiled. I found this super simple recipe in our good ol' 365 Ways to Cook Pasta. 

There are only six ingredients in this one: butter, garlic, spinach, poppy seeds, fettuccini, and shredded Parmesan cheese. 

While the pasta cooked, I crushed a garlic clove and added it to 4 T of melted butter in the indispensable cast-iron skillet and sautéed. The spinach was went in next and cooked until wilted, then 1 T of poppy seeds was added. Once the pasta was cooked it was tossed in a bowl with the spinach mixture, topped with the Parmesan and served with some crusty bread. I imagine this would pair well with a buttery Chardonnay, but we had it with Malbec because...Malbec.

Photo added by James, who did nothing for this meal except shopping
and eating, but who wanted to give this post a bit of color.
Lacking a photo of the meal,   I found this other
poppy reference, with Miss Judy Garland.

Homebody Pork Chops

Having settled in for an early weekend, I was looking forward to grilling some locally-raised pork chops from Crescent Ridge, and hoping to do so without getting dressed up enough to go to the grocery.

During my first scan of recipes on Big Green Egg (yes, I was too lazy to get the printed cookbook from the shelf -- it's been a long week), I noticed something involving sriracha. I did not think we had any, and was beginning to consider recipes that would involve a run to Stop & Shop.

I did eventually check the fridge, however, and found that we had almost everything on the list for Sriracha Pork Chops. We had no bouillon or broth, so I used extra lime juice and sriracha. We had parsley (for scallops I prepared last week), which I substituted for the called-for cilantro. Last week I could not find fresh ginger at said Stop & Shop (I know, right?), so we have a little tub of partly-dried ginger. It seems to be working well, though I'll get the real stuff next time I see it.

In progress; in the foreground are small potatoes that had been roasting with olive oil, Old Bay, and a little water to prevent scorching (based on prior experience). I left them uncovered for the last 10 minutes or so.

NOTE: no measuring cups or spoons were involved in this recipe. It's marinade, not a cake.

ALSO NOTE: I do not play ziplock bags (called reclosable bags in the recipe for copyright reasons) for marinade. I just used a plate. I wrote this line prior to cooking, and now I am rethinking it. I do not like to waste plastic bags, but a tight bowl would have been a better option than a plate. I do not think the marinade did as much tenderizing as it could have. 

Completing the no-going-out-required program: brunch was berry waffles, which I can almost always make with ingredients on hand, and Pam noticed we have small potatoes that I can roast with some Old Bay once I heat up the Egg for the porkchops.

Plus, it is a cliché, but last weekend I visited Bolton Orchard and made some ... wait for it ... apple sauce! Pam had recently found an old-school apple corer at a yard sale.

Although the peeling apparatus does not work well, the coring and slicing are fantastic, and made short work of a half-peck of apples. I had put them in the slow-cooker for a few hours last weekend. We enjoyed some hot then, and the rest cold this week.

The end result was scrumptious and -- unlike much of what I have cooked lately -- fairly photogenic. The combination of flavors, textures, and temperatures was just right, and of course it all went very well with Malbec.

Pork Chops & Apple Sauce! (Plus potatoes and Malbec)

Having a Brady Bunch scholar in the house means that my weak imitation of Humphrey Bogart's "pork chops and applesauce" line (though he never said it and I could not remember that he was the guy we all think said it) led quickly to the definitive use of the line by Peter Brady.

Salmon a la Pamela almondine

We recently discovered that our favorite fishmonger (Kyler's Catch) was indeed open. We should have known since the place has always been impeccably clean. They have done everything right in order to keep the retail side of their business going: masks for employees, sneeze guards, and chairs spaced six feet apart for waiting. It is also still impeccably clean. James donned his own mask and went over on Friday evening and brought back salmon and scallops. I was in charge of preparing the salmon on Friday, and he made dinner with the scallops on Saturday.

I poached the salmon in some leftover Malbec we had in the beach house refrigerator from the previous weekend. I also added some orange slices to pan. Meanwhile, I toasted some sliced almonds in some butter and honey. Once the salmon was cooked I divided it onto our plates and topped them with the almonds. Mashed potatoes made for a dandy side dish and a garnish of orange wedges completed the meal.

I had no recipe for this. I put it together with ingredients we already had. We both enjoyed the meal and will likely make it again, that is if we ever have leftover wine again. Once a bottle gets uncorked at our house it is unlikely to get re-corked. The only reason we had some in this case was because last Sunday we opened a second bottle. Fortunately, we also had a full bottle of the same wine to drink with the meal.

James wore this special nautical-themed face mask for his trip to the fish monger

Pasta with Mushrooms, Fried Eggs, and Herbs

New York Times Cooking doesn't generally fool around with clever names for its recipes. The name of the dish typically accounts for most of the main ingredients. And so it is for Pasta with Mushrooms, Fried Eggs, and Herbs (although it also has some cheese, not accounted for in the name).This was a bit more complicated than I expected. It required two skillets, as well as a pan to cook the pasta, so there were a lot of dishes to wash afterwards as well. I was amused by the recipe's admonishment "red wine not optional" as James and I so often enjoy a Malbec with our meal. This time though we paired the food with a red blend that had a bit of a kick, and frankly weren't thrilled with it. Perhaps if we had just stuck with our old favorite we would have enjoyed it more. The dish wasn't bad, but it is unlikely we will have it again. Too much work for the a dish we didn't really love.

Cenas Sin Recetas

For a special dinner to mark our anniversary, we looked in Laura Arnold's Best Simple Suppers for Two, because there are two of us. There we found a recipe for Caprese Salad with Basil Pesto. We knew we would need to modify the recipe because it called for prepared pesto. We also thought it would be nice to use the pesto we prepared for the salad to make a pasta pesto. 

In the end, the recipe for one dish had become merely a menu suggestion and shopping list for two dishes we already knew how to make. So we set off on a small shopping trip. We rarely go to the grocery together, but we decided to make an occasion of it and we visited Fieldstone Market in Marion with a short list. Because we already had pine nuts on hand, we just needed fresh mozzarella, basil, tomatoes (we remembered this place always has great ones), parmesan cheese, and fettuccine. 

We returned to the small galley at Whaling House, where we each put together two nice, simple dishes. On a platter, we had mozz, tomatoes, a drizzle of basil-infused olive oil, and a sprinkling of dry basil. Pam blended some of that oil, fresh basil leaves, chopped garlic scapes and pine nuts until they made a paste. I combined them in a bowl with fettuccine, a small scoop of the water from cooking the fettuccine, some freshly shredded parm,  and lemon zest. These combined well with a a baguette from Fieldstone and a Gewürztraminer from Westport Rivers. As we dined, Pam remembered to light the candle we first lit together 35 years ago at a church in Baltimore, and that we light on May 9 of each year. (And that I failed to include in this photo.)

Flashback for the next day: While we were in Fieldstone, Pam noticed a small, whole chicken and some fingerling potatoes. We bought both, with vague plans to prepare them in our upright chicken roaster -- a great little pan that we first wrote about in the 2011 Just Peachy post on this blog. (It has been featured many times since then, especially since we get roasters from our friends at Maribett Farm. 

In the middle of Tuesday afternoon, I rinsed the chicken and removed the package of giblets from the middle. I glanced around the kitchen and decided to fill the central well of the pan with some margarita mix and tequila, which would moisten the inside as the bird roasted. I then applied some lime-infused olive oil, dry thyme and oregano, and a bit of salt. I placed the small potatoes around the base of the pan and roasted at 450 for 15 minutes before turning down to 300 for an hour. At the end of that time, my eyes and our Thermapen agreed that it needed just a bit more cooking, so I increased the heat to 425 for another 10 minutes. The result was a perfectly cooked, very tender and savory chicken. 

Simple chicken, without a recipe. The candle is not the one mentioned above;
it is an "everyday" candle on a sun-moon-star candlestick that was the gift
of a generous colleague. 

It paired well with Malbec, as most things do. A prefect start to our 36th year! 

Classic Grilled Cheese with a Twist

We knew it had been a while since we posted a new recipe, but we didn't realize how long! Seems we've gotten lax about finding a recipe, making a shopping list, enjoying (or not) a meal, and then writing about it. For this long overdue post I went to Grilled Cheese, Please in search of something easy, yet enticing.

In addition to shredded cheddar this sandwich has bacon,sliced tomato, and red onion. The onions were sliced and soaked in cold water while the bacon baked (we've recently taken to making bacon in the oven on a foil lined cookie sheet which makes clean up a lot easier). Once the bacon was done the sandwiches were assembled and then grilled on the stove top. The recipe called for sourdough bread, but I just used plain white bread since I had some leftover from the loaf I'd bought for a recent breakfast of french toast. The sandwiches were hearty and full of flavor and texture. We ate them with a side dish of mashed potatoes, and paired with Malbec.

Scallops and Broccoli

Our adult kid Harvey has become quite good at finding gifts for us that connect to our interests, such as rare nautical prints that are at once unfamiliar and immediately fitting for our home. They came through again this Christmas, with the Bruce Beck's 1989 Official Fulton Fish Market Cookbook.

This is our kind of cookbook -- rich in cultural context, in this case relating to the New York institution whose name appears on this cookbook and no other. The book also has sea-creature illustrations that relate to Harvey's own interest in animal-related illustration art.

With the famous scallops of New Bedford just a few blocks away, we decided -- as readers of this space know we often do -- to look for a new way to prepare these buttery mollusks. We have tried many variations on creme sauces, so I decided to try something a bit different. I found one of those recipes for which assembling the ingredient list gets the cook most of the way through the cooking process.

Click to enlarge

Since I was determined to serve this with Malbec and we did not have any white cooking wine open, I decided to substitute ginger brandy for the wine (this was whisked together with the salt and sugar in a small bowl). For the chili oil, of course, I used chipotle-infused olive oil from our friends at Lebherz. 

I do not exactly avoid broccoli recipes, but I tend to find something else when broccoli presents itself. Since the rest of the family was ready to embrace this healthy option, however, I did, too. I blanched the broccoli as instructed, meaning I put it in boiling water for just under a minute and then drained it and plunged it into cold water. I then left it in a colander until the rest was ready. The broccoli emerged crisp but not too crunchy -- just right for me!

I then heated plenty of salted water, to which I added the linguini once I had everything else prepared. I had never trimmed scallops in the way described here, but I will from now on. I then sauteed the scallops in oil for just a minute, then the broccoli for another couple before adding wine mixture. I then drained the linguine and tossed it with the scallop mixture; we did not add soy sauce at the table as suggested, and we did not miss it.

This was delicious, and on the light side since it had no cheese or butter. It was scrumptious as leftovers.

More Jam Chicken

Perhaps because we had enjoyed the sriracha hot jam chicken so much just a fortnight ago, I bought another roasting chicken -- this one organic and free-range -- during pre-blizzard food shopping yesterday. I was prepared to repeat the make-shift "recipe" I had used before, but true to the spirit of this project, Pam found a nueva receta in one of our oldest cookbooks. Clarification: the book is old, having been printed as I graduated from high school, but it is new to us, a thrifty find librarian Pam made on the free-to-good-home bookshelf in our university library.

On page 314 of the 1981 ring-bound edition of The New Cook Book from Better Home & Gardens, she found "Chicken with Currant Glaze." My first reaction was to think about the small remnant of a package of currants in our cupboard, but this was quickly made moot by the second line of the ingredients list: "1/3 cup red currant or raspberry jelly." Remembering that I had also purchased a nice local raspberry jam, I knew we had a winner for a hearty dinner I could prepare between bouts of blizzard shoveling.

Again using the upright roaster, I put Canadian whiskey in the well this time, and then prepared the chicken (with a simple rub of olive oil and a dusting of salt and black pepper. I roasted it for just over an hour, until it reached an internal temperature of 165F. A sign of changing standards is that the book calls for a temperature of 185F, which we now know as "dry" and which explains a lot of over-cooked poultry in our pasts.

At that point, I whisked together in a saucepan the ingredients for a proper sauce: the jam, 2 T lemon juice, 1 T butter, a dash of cinnamon, 1 T water and 2 t cornstarch. Pam kept mentioning that this book was for novice cooks, and I should have paid attention to one of its beginner tips. As I should know by now, the cornstarch works best when mixed with water and then added. I could not whisk out the clumps that were formed. I did make a nice, thick sauce, though, and passed it through a sieve before brushing it on.

Baking for about 15 minutes more at a moderate 350F, the glaze got just a bit crispy. The result of the cooking method and the selection of humanely-raised chicken was an exceptionally succulent meal. It paired well with the mashed potatoes I refried during those final 15 minutes and with the Malbec we selected.

Monger Simplicity

"What's char?" I asked, as I noticed something new in the Kyler's Catch fish counter. The young fishmonger's eyes lit up: "Delicious!" and "I'm not quite sure." She had been asking her manager about it, and could only recall that it is some sort of "cross" between a salmon and a trout. That did not sound quite right to her as she said it, but it seems to be not far from the truth. She could tell me that she had been enjoying a lot of it lately, and that customers to whom she had recommended it had come back happy.

Image: Fish Choice

As she handed me the wrapped fish, I asked how she prepares it. She said that the flavor is so good that she just uses a little salt and pepper. She said perhaps some minced garlic as well, but I decided to try the simplest option first. I even eschewed Old Bay, which I'm usually tempted to sprinkle on everything. I pan-fried the fillet in olive oil, skin-side down until mostly cooked through, and then turning it. The fish is quite delicate, and flaked apart somewhat as I did this.

Last night I looked up char on my phone, learning just enough to confirm that the monger's impression about the fish is generally correct. This morning I took a closer look online and found that Fish Choice describes char as "closely resembl[ing] salmon in appearance, but are closer genetically to lake trout." I also learned that its high fat content means that it is well-suited to broiling, baking, or smoking. I will be exploring these options in the near future.

I will also be exploring the Fish Choice web site, whose goals are similar to the Cod & Country cookbook we have cited on this blog several times. It is intended for the fish industry but is accessible to general readers, providing a good combination of ecological and culinary information.

For a simple, quick evening meal, this basic char was perfectly paired with some Aunt Annie's mac & cheese (made with cream instead of milk) and a nice bottle of, you guessed it, Malbec.

Finally, a word about fishmongers. We enjoy supporting local businesses whenever we can, especially those such as Kyler's that are mentoring young workers who take pride in learning their industry.

Chicken in a Packet

One of our earliest posts was for Asian Fish in a Packet. We have since adapted this recipe on a number of occasions to incorporate any ingredients we had on hand. Over the weekend while browsing some cookbooks I discovered a recipe for Chicken in Foil in Cooking Seafood and Poultry with Wine. It is essentially "Chicken in a Packet", and of course includes wine!

I already had everything the recipe called for, so no shopping was required. The only substitution I made was Malbec for Burgundy. This was very easy to prepare. It bakes much longer than fish, but is just as tasty and tender. It also made the whole house smell good. There were some chickpeas and liquids still in the packet after we ate, so we tossed that into some leftover chili we had and ate it for lunch the next day.

Especialidad de la Casa

Meaning "Specialty of the House" -- this was the title Pamela suggested when she said I should include this dinner on the blog. It implies something a bit beyond the usual post, as no recipe was involved.

Rather, the concept for this dinner evolved in real time as I considered what to do with a few different leftovers. I set the chicken breasts (about one and a half of them) that were thawed but not used earlier in the week onto a plate and poked them with a sharp knife. I doused them with soy sauce and then smothered them in sriracha and returned the plate to the fridge for a couple of hours. 

When it was time to cook, I heated oil in our indispensable cast-iron skillet over a high flame while I sliced the chicken into thin strips. I then sprinkled liberally with dried thyme and when the chicken was seared and nearly cooked through, I thinly sliced a crisp, granny smith apple and stirred it in. As I usually do when cooking with apples, I sliced the top and the bottom off, discarding them, and then used a corer to make 8 sections. I sliced each lengthwise into two or three thin slices, leaving the skin on. By discarding the tops, I get about half the skin and most of the flesh, making for a nice compromise on texture.

Apple-chicken-thyme, in progress

I then added a bit more oil and a cup of cooked rice that was already in the fridge. Once heated through, I plated this and opened -- as one might guess -- some Malbec. This was so simple and delicious that we will savor today's leftovers (with a shared quesadilla) and will put this in the Casa Hayes-Boh dinner rotation!

Rice Pizza

Rice Pizza? What could that be?

Following some nice tortillas Sunday and Asian carry-out on Monday, we found ourselves with a bit of a surplus of rice at Casa Hayes-Boh, and took to the cookbook shelf to see how we might use it. My first inclination was to reprise the Tabasco-enhanced Country Captain Chicken we had enjoyed a couple of weeks ago, but since chicken had been featured in both the Asian dinners and the leftover Asian lunches, Pam suggested pulling the essential Jane Brody's Good Food Book from the shelf.

I found a lot of entries under "rice" in the index, including all kinds of items about rice -- its preparation, nutrition, measurement, and so on. But I also found the intriguing "Rice-Crust Pizza" on page 480 and decided to give it a try, modifying the quantities, mainly by sheer guesswork.

I began by beating one egg and combining it with the cooked rice (we had just a bit more than a cup and a generous pile of shredded mozzarella). I applied olive oil to a glass pie pan and pressed this mixture into it. I then placed the pan in a 450F oven for 30 minutes.

Then I combined tomato sauce (after opening the wrong can, I pureed one can of diced tomatoes and a can of tomato paste to get a thick sauce), dried oregano and basil, and freshly minced garlic. When the crust was somewhat browned, I spread this sauce on generously (having once worked at a pizza place where sauce was rationed, I do not like to skimp!). I then added some sliced mushrooms (and favorite topping would do) and freshly shredded parmesan.

Crisis averted! While it baked a further ten minutes, I set about to open the inevitable Malbec, breaking a corkscrew in the process. We have been cursed with poorly-made corkscrews and can-openers of late, but we are not to let a simple failure get between us and a nice wine pairing. After a miserable attempt with channel lock pliers, I retrieved our spare cork  jack from the car and wrested the cork from the bottle.

Victory is ours!

We then removed the small pizza pie from the oven. Having the cheese IN the crust made for a nice extra bit of crunchity goodness. We'll be doing this again, I'm sure!

Coq au Velouté

Note: The Hayes-Bohanans met in French class, when we were Hayes and Bohanan, respectively. Pam went on to some level of competence in the language while James was not a stellar student and was lucky he remembered to switch to the Pass?Fail option just before the deadline. We both gained a lot in the long run though, namely each other, as the New York Times has reported. All of which is to say that I can barely pronounce the title of this blog post, though I did prepare the dish.

Its more pedestrian title in the Tabasco Cookbook is Chicken Hash, but the rich sauce makes that seem like rather an unworthy label. It is a fairly basic hash, except that it is baked with a complicated sauce. In other words, it is a dish with relatively few ingredients that will use every dish in the kitchen.

A velouté sauce in the book is similar to Emeril's version, except that the good people of McIlhenny call for a bit of their pepper sauce and the use of TWO saucepans. The hash itself simply requires boiling and chopping a couple of chicken breasts and potatoes, and then adding them to sliced mushrooms, chopped onion and yellow bell pepper, and parsley cooked in butter. The velouté  is poured over this and baked.

The result was amazingly delicious for a chilly evening. Sadly, a week has passed by before I got a chance to write, so we are not exactly sure which Malbec we had with it!

CCC: Chicken Corn Chowdah

The recipe for Easy Corn and Chicken Chowder I found on All Recipes was indeed easy, and I think it was easier and yummier than what I found on our cookbook shelf. 

I departed from the recipe in three rather minor ways. First, this includes "rotisserie chicken," which we are starting to notice in a lot of "easy" recipes. We find it just as easy -- especially because we are working at home even. more than usual these days -- to cook the chicken rather than buying it from under a heat lamp at the local grocery. We also have greater assurance of the quality and provenance of the chicken. A couple hours ahead of dinner, I boiled breasts from Commonwealth Poultry, adding a bay leaf to the water. I then had time to cool and shred (using two forks in a bowl as always) before adding the chicken according to the recipe instructions.

I did not include a carrot because I did not have one. The method of incorporating flour was something I had not seen, and I did indeed end up with a paste of flour, butter, and aromatic vegetables in a small pan that I set aside to cool while I chopped things for the main soup pot. I used tiny red potatoes with skin on, rather than russets. I also used only one kind of corn.

After boiling for 15 minutes (with heat a bit too high, resulting in some scorching), I added 2 cups of half-and-half, rather than the 2-1/2 cups called for. I notice this amount in a lot of recipes, and never buy a second carton to get the extra half cup.

The result: very creamy, a bit decadent in fact. It went well with corn bread baked by Pam and of course some Malbec.

There's The Rub!

The Big Green Egg combines ancient Chinese design with less ancient Southern U.S. enthusiasm for slow-cooked barbeque*. Careful readers of this blog will notice that we acquired our own Big Green Egg about two years ago, and have made extensive use of it as a glorified Weber-style grill. I mean no disrespect: the difference really is glorious!

Still, we have not tapped the full potential of the Egg until yesterday, when I used it for the first time as its developers in Georgia (USA, not Europe) intended. Good friends were spending part of the weekend at our beach-proximate house, so Pam opened Mary Kay Andrews' Beach House Cookbook for something worthy of the occasion.

She found the perfect recipe, with a title almost as long as the cooking time -- Smoked Pork Butt with Beach House Barbecue Sauce. It calls for applying a rub to a 4-6 pound pork butt or shoulder (notice my restraint with the butt jokes) and cooking it low and slow -- roughly an hour per pound at about 250F. She provides a recipe for a sauce to be prepared near the end of this cooking time.

As we made a grocery list, Pam noticed that the rub would be similar to the chipotle rub we recently purchased at Salem Spice -- a place that every serious cook should visit some time! So I set up the Egg with plenty of charcoal, started the fire and then nearly closed the vent to keep the temperature in the 250-300F range. I rinsed the pork butt, placed it in a small roasting pan and slathered it with olive oil. I then rubbed each side with the marvelous chipotle mixture. I then repeated the rub, with Pam's help sprinkling the powder as I turned the butt, as it is a job for more than two hands.

I placed the pan (without water, as would be required in some smokers) in the Big Green Egg and then simply did my best to keep the temperature in range for the rest of the day. This required very narrow openings in the upper and lower vents, and I probably should have checked the temperature a bit more frequently than I did. Still, I never let it get about 350F nor below 195F, and really kept it near 275F for most of the five-plus hours. The delicious rub meant that we were that house that was whetting appetites throughout the neighborhood. Low and slow.

I was proud that I managed to follow the advice in the Big Green Egg cookbook: monitor the temperature but to not monitor the meat itself. I did not open the Egg for more than five hours. When I did open it, the thermometer read exactly 200F in the center of the thickest part, and no more than 208F elsewhere.

Near the end, I whisked together the following over medium heat for about a half hour:

6 cups ketchup
6 cups apple cider vinegar
10 ounce Worcestershire sauce
3/4 cup brown sugar
2/3 cup dry mustard
1 stick unsalted butter
6T black pepper
1/4 cup Tabasco (a lesser hot sauce would also be fine)
3T salt

Actually, I did not do this, as it would have made the better part of a gallon of sauce. So math-team James divided each of these items by 6, making plenty of sauce for our purposes.

Results: Everyone loved this. Our friend Rob, who is the most expert grillmaster I know, was astonished that I had done gotten the slow-smoke method down so perfectly on my first try. And our friend Lisa, expert on all kinds of herbs and spices, pronounced the combination of rub and sauce perfect.

Needless to say, this paired very nicely with Malbec, and also with home-brewed American Pale Ale.

Pam followed this with divine apple enchiladas, which she will be posting soon.

Next time: With results like these, we will definitely have a next time. Instead of the perfectly suitable slaw I bought at the local deli, I will prepare -- probably the night before -- my cilantro-lime slaw.

*Note to New England readers: Barbeque (spellings vary) is a word of Taino (indigenous Puerto Rican) derivation referring to a variety of methods of cooking meats over wood or charcoal fire. It is not, as our university uses the term, a word meaning any food eaten out-of-doors.

Table Extended

When choosing a dinner to serve a visiting author, famous for his writings on Latin America, we wanted something new and interesting but also easy to prepare. We therefore returned to Extending the Table, where we found a simple chicken dish simply called Gingery Meat Stew on page 243.

I began by making the rice over which the stew would be served; had I paid better attention, I would have prepared it later, but I turned off the heat in plenty of time, so the rice could be held on the stove top. To prepare it, I heated 1-2 tablespoons of olive oil in our stainless-steel saucepan. I used a special oil infused with blood orange, which would give the rice continuity with the main course. I toasted 1 cup of basmati rice in the oil, then added 2 cups of water, bringing the mixture to a boil. I covered it and left it on a very low boil until all of the water was absorbed, about a half hour.

I then heated some of the same infused oil (instead of the margarine mentioned in the book) in our indispensable cast-iron skillet, where I sauteed one small, finely minced onion; 1/2-inch of grated fresh ginger; and about a half-teaspoon each of cumin and turmeric. (The recipe calls for a "dash" each of ground coriander and turmeric, but the different spice mix in greater quantity seemed to work quite well.)

Once the onions were a bit brown, I stirred in one 15-ounce can of organic tomato sauce, one sliced onion, and one teaspoon of chili powder. I heated this until bubbly, and then added 1/4 teaspoon salt and one tablespoon honey (instead of the teaspoon of sugar called for) and one pound of organic, boneless chicken breast, cut into 1-inch pieces. (The recipe calls for beef or chicken.) I added about a cup of water (not in the recipe), covered this and let it simmer for about an hour.

As we enjoyed conversation in another room, I actually neglected to check on this as often as I normally would have, so that it ended up slightly blackened. It seems to have benefited from my neglect, the result being a thick sauce resembling marinara but with chunks of succulent chicken and a lot of complexity.

This paired very well with a very complex 2009 Malbec from Hinojosa wines in Argentina. The wine was selected in a local shop the day before, based on a sign that read "excellent" and the coincidence of naming with one of our favorite musicians. The author, by the way, dubbed the result "a fine meal."

The ginger was on hand, by the way, because we will soon be using it in the bottling of our own ginger-infused wheat beer. If that beer is successful, it will be a good excuse to extend the table for this gingery dish again!