For some reason I had to make a meat pie tonight. Maybe, subconsciously, I was homesick, but I had to make the pie. The kind of pie I had at primary school, juicy chunks of meat in a thick rich gravy. Perfect food for the unexpected (at least for me) cold day we had today.
I had bought the chuck steak and puff pastry several weeks ago at Wholefoods and had placed both in the freezer to make when I had some time. I found out tonight that if you don't make the puff pastry yourself, this dish doesn't take long at all. It is simply a beef or lamb stew piled into a pastry lined dish and covered again with pastry. Bake for 15 mins. Serve with a relish or chutney if you want to be fancy or ketchup if you want to feel homey.
To my surprise the pie was exceptional. I was surprised since it was not only the first time I had made it, but I totally winged the recipe. I took a little direction and technique for making a classic Lamb Navarin and combined it with some extra ingredients from Ken Addington's (Executive Chef of Eight Mile Creek) Aussie meat pie to wonderful results.
It also helped that we opened a bottle of the Italian Castello di Fonterutoli, 1999 Chianti Classico we brought back from Italy last year. An excellent pairing.
3 lbs chuck steak diced in 1/2 inch cubes
2 tablespoons corn oil
1/4 cup plain flour
1 onion diced finely
2-3 carots diced finely
1 clove garlic, crushed
1/4 cup soy sauce
1/4 cup Worcestershire sauce
2 tablespoons tomato paste
3 bay leaves
2 cups veal stock (or chicken or beef)
Puff Pastry (I used Dufour, a local NY brand)
1 egg, beaten, to glaze crust
salt & pepper
1. Preheat oven to 375oF.
2. Heat oil in a frying pan until smoking. On high heat, cook beef in batches until browned. Remove and set aside in a bowl. Season with salt and pepper. Go light on the salt since the soy sauce will add more later on.
3. Discard excess oil, leaving sucs on bottom of pan. Add onion, carrots and garlic and saute on medium heat for 1 - 2 minutes. Return beef to pan and add flour. Stir until combined and flour starts to brown. You want to cook the flour for at least 5 minutes to eliminate the raw flour taste.
4. Add the soy and Worcestershire sauce and cook until absorbed. Add the stock, bay leaves and tomato paste and simmer until the mixture thickens like gravy. If the meat is tough you may want to continue simmering for a while, periodically adding water, until the meat tenderizes. Set aside to cool.
5. While meat mixture is cooling, like a baking dish with puff pastry. Cover with parchment paper and bake in oven for approximately 8 minutes or until lightly browned. Remove and allow to cool. This allows the pastry to deflate and crispen.
6. Add meat mixture to baking dish and top with remaining pastry. Brush top with beaten egg wash and bake a further 10-15 minutes (depending on size of dish) or until pastry is browned evenly.
Note: You don't even have to eat this the same day it is baked. Like any stew, this dish is better a day or two after preparation since the flavors have had a chance to develop.
I cooked at the James Beard House again last Saturday night and am only now getting to write about it. The last couple of weeks at work have been extremely busy, and while rewarding they have taken a toll on my writing and cooking.
Initially I approached last Saturday night's volunteering effect reluctantly. Saturday was on the verge of being warm, and with my shift starting at around 4pm I felt that my day would be totally wasted. Any regrets I had for volunteering vanished as soon as I stepped into the kicthen and started helping out. Cooking is definitely my passion.
I introduced myself to the guest chef, A.J. Voytko, his 22 year old sous chef Anthony, Rory (a friend of theirs and chef from Alain Ducasse) and Susie, another volunteer. With introductions out of the way we were off. 95 people were coming in less than 3 hours and there was much to do.
AJ described his menu as good food prepared simply. The menu itself was simple but AJ's attention was certainly in the details. For example, a dash of wasabi in the oysters, the shredded apple on the tuna, the dates under the lamb. While all of it was solid, there were some shining examples of his style.
I was blown away by the foie gras sandwich. Luscious foie gras mixed with stewed strawberries served on toasted challah. The three way sunflower salad was lifted out of ordinary by adding truffle oil to the vinaigrette. The three way reference made because the salad had sunflower root (sunchoke thinly sliced on a mandolin), sunflower shoots and sunflower seeds. The spicy lamb was aided by the jus and the star of the dessert medley was the goat cheese mousse topped with a stewed blood orange.
AJ definitely knows what he is doing and the title of rising star bestowed by the James Beard House is appropriate. But I am quickly realizing that the executive chef is nothing without his second in command, the sous chef. Anthony was amazing. He held the night together by finishing most of the dishes and passing them off to us for plating. At which point he moved on to the next course. His demi-glace for the spiced lamb was outstanding. It was rich red with an intensely complex structure attainable by only expert sauciers.
Hor'dourves
Oysters with Wasabi and Yuzu
Marinated Ahi with "Mint Family" and Green Apple
Foie Gras Sandwich
- Schramsberg Blanc de Blancs 1998
Simply Cured Salmon with Salad of Sunflower Three-Way, Lemon-Truffle Vinaigrette, and Crème Fraîche
- Foxen Viognier 2001
California Halibut with Five Onion Purée, Caramelized Parsnip, and Brussels Sprouts
- Honig Sauvignon Blanc Reserve 2001
Duck Two Ways with Fava Bean—Pistachio Baklava, Morels, and Red Wine Reduction
- Presidio Szasz Pinot Noir 1998
Four-Spice Crusted Lamb Loin with Harissa Gnocchi, Celery Root, Medjool Date, and Lamb Jus
- Gregory Graham Syrah 2000
One Phenomenal Study of Caramel
- Ferrand 10-Year-Old Ambre Cognac
It wasn't too hard to believe that tonight was the first night Joe and I ate a meal we cooked in over two weeks. It was good to stay inside and spend some time together, watch the rain fall outside and feel conflicted about the war. After last night going out seemed a weird thing to do tonight after the "shock and awe" campaign released today.
So last night, after working late we went with some friends to Jean-Georges' new restaurant 66 located in Tribeca. This was close by, and perhaps not so surprisingly given the war and the heavy rain, we were able to get a table for 5 at 9:30. In fact while we were waiting, Jean George himself greeted us in his chef whites as he thumbed through the reservation book.
66 is definitely highly stylized. The interior design is beautifully white with cloudy resin tabletops and wall dividers. Salt water aquatic tanks (fish tanks would be to ordinary a descrition) separate the large open kitchen from the buzzing dining room. Waiters are excessively attentive in their soviet block uniforms, whisking away dirty plates and replacing them with clean ones between mouthfuls of food.
With 5 of us we sampled a large variety of dishes and concluded that a few menu items were worth noting. The scallion pancakes were perfectly fried triangles of delicate onion with a tempura like coating. The Lobster Hargow dim sum were excellent with large plump peices of lobster and 4 types of colored roe as jewels in its crown.
The impressive entree was the chilli prawn with lilly bulb. Sweet firm prawns with a spicy chilli sauce tempered with the cool crunch of the lilly bulb. From the choice of desserts, the Ovaltine pudding was interesting, but the winner was clearly the complex vietnamese chocolate ice-cream served in a Chinese soup spoon. If you can afford a $12 cocktail you shouldn't pass up the opportunity to have the cumquat mojito.
Doesn't it sound good? Well it was, until the point in the night when we caught ourselves having fun and immediately felt awkward and guilty. A response we all recognized as one we had months after September 11 whenever we went out for dinner, to a bar or were simply enjoying ourselves. "They" tell us our lives must go on. I suppose this is yet another internal conflict we need to resolve.
There are two grocey stores I like in Manhattan, one real (Wholefoods in Chelsea) and one virtual, (FreshDirect.com). The Wholefoods in Chelsea is quite amazing, albeit slightly pricey. For an organic focused store, their range and variety is outstanding and the quality of produce better than anyone else in the city. I realize that this is quite a statement but one I feel qualified to make. I have had done a lot of cooking and sourced both plain and exotic ingredients uptown, downtown, east and west and nothing comes consistently close. Dean & Deluca, Fairway, Eli's, China Town, Little Italy, Union Square farmers' market, Balducci's and Healthy Pleasures -- I have tried them all.
The only problem with Wholefoods, apart from getting cruised in the aisles, are the long lines. No matter how much effort Joe and I place in planning our weekend trip to Wholefoods we always manage to get there at exactly the same time every visit. The "Crazy but fast" timeslot marked in red on the cashier's handy little time planner.
I was there on the Sunday before the huge snow storm a few weeks back and the line wound back past its usual starting point beside the bakery, around the prepared food section, past the frozen food section, along side the beer bottles, past the OJ and dairy cases and stopped in the corner shelving bottled water! Somehow the line managed to move quickly and with the shoping experience so good, standing in line doesn't seem so bad.
Now FreshDirect is my utopia. It merges my day job as an Internet professional with my passion for food. It would also allow me to simplify yet another part of my New York life. As much as I love grocery shopping at Wholefoods, it's a pain in the ass doing it without a car. Trying to hail a cab, arms loaded with heavy bags is ridiculous, even worse is lugging it all on the subway and then up three flights of stairs. Unfortunately, FreshDirect for me right now is merely a dream since they don't deliver to my area. I have begged and pleaded to no avail.
While I am unable to use FreshDirect's services right now, the planets controlling my work aligned and I was able to visit their processing center this week. Can you tell I was excited just to see this place?
The center is huge and that's no exageration. 300,000 square feet of climate controlled space broken into mini climates that we as consumers would never consider necessary for our produce. For example, bananas and tomotoes are stored separately to prevent the gases from one being absorbed by the other. Groupings of produce have their own micro climates since one temparture zone isn't satisfactory for all produce and would increase spoilage rates.
But that's only produce. Most things are prepared to order, including coffee, chicken, beef, pork, fish and deli items. For instance, long processing lines cut huge sides of beef into smaller and smaller segments, by the time it reaches the end of the line, the cut is exactly as you specified on the website. Its then placed into a "boat" barcoded and sent on its way via a complex system of conveyer belts, chutes, trolleys, pulleys and carousels that wind up, down and around the warehouse to join your other items picked or prepared somewhere else.
I haven't even mentioned bread yet. An item they can't make enough of despite the fact they bake 500 loaves an hour. The enormity of this undertaking astounded me. Not only are there logistical complexities that require understanding, but then you have to add employment, training, computer systems, deliveries and most importantly cleanliness. The place is super clean. They appear to have thought of everything, even then the special non-porous floor tiles that can be easily disinfected, something they do every day.
I should say that as a professional whose job it is to build websites, FreshDirect's is the best in the industry and sets the standard for design, branding, usability and most of all information architecture. I do love this site and am impatiently waiting to actually use it to purchase my daily groceries.
So until they deliver to my area, I need to spread the word. If you are lucky enough to be within a golden polygon (a delivery zone) buy your groceries from these guys. The produce is great and the customer service outstanding. You will never have to look at that carton of OJ and calculate how much extra weight it will add to your shopping bags and whether you have the strength to haul it up and down subway stairs. Best of all you can keep them in business and help them expand into my zipcode.