It was my first time seeing a hacksaw in a kitchen restaurant. For Incanto's offalphile chef Chris Cosentino, I suppose it comes in handy. Whether sawing off trotters or cutting open a rib cage to get an animal's heart, Chef Cosentino's serious work with animals undoubtedly requires serious tools. Or maybe the hacksaw is just a souvenir from his episode of Chef Unleashed at the Broken Arrow Ranch in Texas (in which he shot a deer, dressed it in the field after admirably getting choked up about the kill, and made tartare with its heart).
In any case, the hacksaw was the least surprising element of my visit to Incanto for Cosentino's 10th Head to Tail dinner. The major surprises came in the form of duck blood soup, tripe crudo, liverwurst and snails, lamb offal in a Thai larb-inspired entree (my favorite of the night), and desserts of chicken-chocolate cannoli and "fig newtons" with pig ears. Creativity, technique, and love enhanced both the subtle (tripe) and rich (liver, kidney) offal.
Each year Cosentino works hard to top all past H2T dinners. He plans the extravaganza months in advance. He makes a rough list of dishes early-on and continuously refines the dishes as the dinner draws near, up until the morning of the dinner. Photos below document this year's snout-to-tail dinner, which celebrated "Ten years of blood, guts, and tears!"
The evening's other food-inspired music included Catherine Cook hilariously portraying Julia Child whipping up a chocolate cake in Lee Hoiby’s one-act opera Bon Appétit.
According to an attendee, Chef Justin Simoneaux of Boxing Room "delighted the palate of attendees with an heirloom tomato salad, a choice of grilled California yellowtail with summer succotash or herb crusted pork loin with jalapeño grits, and a blackberry bouille trifle as a gastronomic finale."
This coming month (April 2013), take advantage of the opportunity to hear Opera Parallèle perform Leonard Bernstein's Trouble in Tahiti. Composed in 1951 after his first great Broadway success and before his now classic West Side Story. Expect artistic surprises and a cool setting in an experimental San Francisco theater. It promises to be an excellent and intimate spectacle that I myself won't miss after the past few were so phenomenal and unusual. Click to buy tickets for April 26-28, 2013.
If you need any proof that I'm a (proud) nerd, here it is...I just spent several hours researching nineteenth century French recipes from a cookbook circa 1890 by Émile Dumont which were set to music by Leonard Bernstein in 1947. I just had to know how a recipe, taken word-for-word, could make for a decent song. Although Rossini claimed he could set a laundry list to music, he never actually did it (to my knowledge).
Leonard Bernstein chose four of Dumont's recipes from La Bonne Cuisine - Manuel économique et pratique (ville et campagne), translated them to English, and set them to music. The following year, Bernstein’s La Bonne Cuisine: Four Recipes for Voice and Piano was premiered in New York.
The four recipes Bernstein set to music are:
1. Plum Pudding
2. Queues de Boeuf (OxTails)
3. Tavouk Gueunksis (sometimes spelled Tavuk Guenksis)
4. Civet à Toute Vitesse (Rabbit at Top Speed)
I've translated the recipes into English and I've included photos of the original recipes in the 24th edition of Dumont's La Bonne Cuisine. Although they're certainly with more wit and lyricism than most recipes today, Bernstein's work is still astounding.
Plum Pudding This recipe appears in the English Dishes section. Feeds 18-20 people.
A half glass of rum or brandy (of an ordinary glass goblet)
3 Eggs
A Lemon
Powdered nutmeg, ginger, cinnamon, mixed (all together about half a teaspoon)
Half a teaspoon of finely ground salt.
Remove all the skin and fat from the meat and chop it into small pieces (the recipe actually says into a "fine dust"). Grind it with the breadcrumbs and flour; stir in the milk. Beat the three eggs well (whites and yellows) with the nutmeg, ginger, and powdered cinnamon. Grind it well with the above paste; add the orange essence, orange peel, and candied orange cut into slivers; Corinthe grapes cleaned and washed; Malaga or Smyrne grapes (if you're using Malaga grapes, you must remove the seeds); and finally the glass of rum which you have mixed with the juice of the lemon, salt, and sugar. Mix it well with a wooden utensil until it stands up in the paste. Let it rest for five to six hours or even better, make the paste the night before.
TO COOK IT -- Grease a cake pan or a large bowl; don't use a pan or bowl that's too big because you want the dough to fill it; cover it with a thick cloth soaked in boiling water, which you will attach with a string. Put leather into the boiling water...(more to follow)
Queues de Boeuf
This recipe appears in the Beef section.
Ox-tails is not a dish to be despised. First of all, with enough ox-tails, you can make a fair stew. The tails used to make the stew can be eaten breaded and broiled, and served with a spicy or tomato sauce.
Click for the original recipe in French.
Tavouk Gueunksis
This recipe appears in the Turkish Pastry and Sweets section.
Tavouk Gueunksis, breast of hen; put a hen to boil, and take the white meat and chop it into shreds. Mix it with a broth, like the one above for Mahallebi.
N.B. Mahallebi is described on the same page as a rice porridge with milk and sugar.
Civet à Toute Vitesse
This recipe appears in the Game section.
When one is in a hurry, here's a way to prepare rabbit stew that I recommend: Cut up the rabbit (hare) as for an ordinary stew: put it in a pot with its blood and liver mashed. A half pound of breast of pork, chopped; twenty or so small onions (a dash of salt and pepper); a liter and a half of red wine. Bring this quickly to boil. After about fifteen minutes, when the sauce is reduced to half of what it was, apply a fire, to set the stew aflame. When the fire goes out, add to the sauce half a pound of butter, worked with flour...and serve.N.B. In Bernstein's piece, nutmeg and a glass of eau-de-vie (fruit brandy) are left out.
Click for the original recipe in French.
If you're looking for more information, note that while the recipes are commonly thought to originate from Dumont's La Bonne Cuisine Française, - Manuel guide de la cuisinière et de la maîtresse de maison, I searched that book and there is no recipe for tavouk in that cookbook. Exotic foreign dishes like tavouk were only added later (and the title became Fine Cooking, instead of Fine French Cooking).
Choose the right Haggadah, read at a fast clip, and make sure everyone has a copy. Continuously announce which page you're on to the guests because we smell the delicious food that hasn't been served yet and we're zoning out with dreams of eating it soon.
Raid your local salad bar for carryout containers so that your wonderful guests can take their portion home (instead of overeating or hiding your disgusting food in the plant behind them) without worrying about returning your Tupperware.
Don't hide the Afikomen too well. You'll look like a cheapskate and nerd.
Invite someone that plays guitar and has memorized the entire Camp Tawonga/Camp Tamarack/Camp Maas songbook for a sing-along during dessert.
Make sure everyone takes their meds before attending, unless they're more fun at a party without their meds.
Same as above but with alcohol.
Make up a ridiculous activity and convince your guests that it's a tradition. "Oh, you never did that at your seder as a kid?" Perhaps along the theme of pestilence. You'll all laugh about it after your scars have healed.
I just about died when my friend made David Lebovitz's chocolate orbit cake (Thank you, Purnima!). Pure genius and now officially my favorite chocolate cake. So when I was looking for a Passover dessert, I couldn't believe my luck. I found David Lebovitz's Chocolate-Covered Caramelized Matzoh Crunch. It's easy to make and I'm sure it will be snapped up at Passover Seder.
Don't make the same mistake I did! As David recommends, don't use the best chocolate for this. Toll House dark chocolate chips worked better than Tcho and Callebaut. "[D]on't be tempted to get all fancy and eschew chocolate chips and chop up some top-notch chocolate for the coating. Since chocolate chips are designed to hold their shape and harden firmly after they’re melted, here you have my permission to break open a bag of semisweet morsels and dump those little devils over the whole she-bang instead."
P.S. Which matzah brand do I prefer? I tried this recipe with Yehuda Matzos (egg) and with Streit's Matzos (egg). The latter was too mealy and tasted like a tea biscuit (apple cider is in their ingredient list). The Yehuda is the one that tasted more like toasted bread. I prefer Yehuda.
N.B. I had dark brown sugar on hand so I used that instead of light brown sugar along with real butter and chopped almonds. I found it too bland without the almonds. Gluten-free, kosher, and margarine info is available on David's blog.
Chocolate-Covered Caramelized Matzoh Crunch
Makes approximately 30 pieces of candy
4 to 6 sheets unsalted matzohs
1 cup (230g) unsalted butter, cut into chunks
1 cup (215g) firmly-packed light brown sugar
big pinch of sea salt
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup (160g) semisweet chocolate chips
1 cup (80g) toasted sliced almonds (optional)
1. Line a rimmed baking sheet (approximately 11 x 17″, 28 x 42cm) completely with foil, making sure the foil goes up and over the edges. Cover the foil with a sheet of parchment paper.
Preheat the oven to 375F (190C).
2. Line the bottom of the sheet with matzoh, breaking extra pieces as necessary to fill in any spaces.
3. In a 3-4 quart (3-4l) heavy duty saucepan, melt the butter and brown sugar together, and cook over medium heat, stirring, until the butter is melted and the mixture is beginning to boil. Boil for 3 minutes, stirring constantly. Remove from heat, add the salt and vanilla, and pour over matzoh, spreading with a heatproof spatula.
4. Put the pan in the oven and reduce the heat to 350F (175C) degrees. Bake for 15 minutes. As it bakes, it will bubble up but make sure it’s not burning every once in a while. If it is in spots, remove from oven and reduce the heat to 325F (160C), then replace the pan.
5. Remove from oven and immediately cover with chocolate chips. Let stand 5 minutes, then spread with an offset spatula.
6. If you wish, sprinkle with toasted almonds (or another favorite nut, toasted and coarsely-chopped), a sprinkle of flaky sea salt, or roasted cocoa nibs.
Let cool completely, the break into pieces and store in an airtight container until ready to serve. It should keep well for about one week.
If matzah ball soup is the "chosen" soup, what better way to spice up your Passover seder than Lisa Klug's matzo ball martini? This debauchery is only one of many suggestions for a unique Passover Seder in Klug's Hot Mamalah. Self-described as an arsenal of cocktails, appetizers, and attitude, Hot Mamalah is Klug's follow-up to Cool Jew.
Klug reinterprets Passover's traditional four questions (aka Ma Nishtana) and reassigns them from the youngest child to the hot nerd, honorary Heeb, adorkable, and to the schmoozer. Indeed, why should just one person (the youngest child) at the table get to have all the fun?
For "Why tonight do we eat only matzah?" the possible answers include: "We ran out of cardboard." For "Why are we all reclining?" the right answer may be sciatica. Below is the excerpt from Hot Mamalah.
In Glen Park's Manzoni restaurant, I tasted a delicious Carpaccio di Salmone - basically an Italian version of gravlax. In addition to great flavor, it was beautifully soft. Although I didn't get a detailed recipe, the owner told me he marinated it for two days in milk and oranges.
So when I saw sashimi-grade salmon at Whole Foods, I thought I'd give it a shot. Jetlagged at 3AM, I could not find one recipe online that cured salmon with milk. So I ran an experiment - one piece of salmon with the citrus and milk and one without the milk.
I used two tablespoons of kosher salt per 1/2 lb of salmon and a bit less of raw cane sugar, a handful of chopped dill, as well as a few orange and lemon slices. I put those ingredients all around the salmon, and covered one of the salmon slices with St. Benoit's whole milk. I sealed the dishes with plastic wrap and put them in the fridge with water bottles on top of the plastic wrap. Pulled them out two days later, and this is what I had for breakfast at 4:30AM on Saturday (still jetlagged).
The milk-cured one definitely had a more velvety soft texture, which made for a sumptuous mouth feel. However, it was a little more flabby so the presentation was not as nice. It was also a tad sweeter, so I may try less sugar in the milk-cured version next time. Overall, both were delicious.
It was my first time seeing a hacksaw in a kitchen restaurant. For Incanto's offalphile chef Chris Cosentino, I suppose it comes in handy. Whether sawing off trotters or cutting open a rib cage to get an animal's heart, Chef Cosentino's serious work with animals undoubtedly requires serious tools. Or maybe the hacksaw is just a souvenir from his episode of Chef Unleashed at the Broken Arrow Ranch in Texas (in which he shot a deer, dressed it in the field after admirably getting choked up about the kill, and made tartare with its heart).
