Slight Change in plans...

OK, the soup posting is coming, I promise. But I've had a couple recent dinners that just required a post.

1. Spanish lamb shanks with fried potatoes. I'd picked up some lamb shanks from Hannewald Lamb at our farmer's market, knowing I'd enjoy them on a chilly fall day. Well, that day came yesterday. Now, these don't cook in 5 or 10 minutes--they take 2-3 hours to get good and tender. So, I figured I'd brown em and get them started braising soon after I got home. I hadn't really decided exactly how to fix them when I started--I just knew they'd need 2-3 hours of wet cooking, low and slow... The classic is probably a Provencal preparation--with onion, carrots, tomatoes, herbs de Provence (rosemary, thyme, etc.)--and I figured I'd do something along those lines. Chopped up the onion, and went for carrots--to discover we were out. But I found a couple red peppers (sweet variety) that needed a use. And the Spanish smoked paprika happened to be out on the counter. So, I knew we were going Spanish style. After browning the shanks, I sweated the veggies (peppers, onions, and garlic) for a bit, added a can of tomatoes (here is one place canned is actually better, or at least much easier, than fresh), and deglazed with some inexpensive but tasty (fruit driven) Portuguese wine. Back into the pot went the lamb, and into the oven for 2.5 hours. As the meat neared completion, I parboiled some waxy blue potatoes from the market, then fried them in goose fat (rendered from a large stewing goose from the market--more on that in the soup post). Along with a Spanish onion, and a hit of paprika, yum. The gelatin had cooked out of the lamb, making for a thick, beautiful sauce, and the tomatoes and onions and garlic and peppers just merged into a massively flavorful part of that sauce. It was true cold weather food. Paired iwth a 10 year old Spanish tempranillo from Valdepenas, it made for a great dinner.

The other recent amazing meal really was just a way of approaching steak--did up some home-trimmed strip steaks, and topped them with a couple market quail eggs each, fried so the yolk was still runny--made for a great sauce--and a batch of shiitake mushrooms, also from the market, fried in olive oil and finished with a splash of soy sauce. The steaks themselves were actually not all that high quality of a meat--but grilling them added some flavor, and the accompaniments over the top made for a great flavor profile. I should say that these steaks come from strip subprimals that I can get from time to time at a great price--which is nice--but it also means 12-14 steaks arrive at a time, and even when frozen, you end up eating steak fairly often (and inexpensively, at under $4/lb.) So, it's good to have some alternative ways to eat them, to keep from getting bored. And this was one that worked. Paired with a mixed mash of rutabaga and potatoes--not bad at all.

Steak with blueberry gastrique

Dinner tonight involved rather inexpensive T-bone steaks from Busch's. Being as they were not top quality, I figured they could use some help. And, it's blueberry season here in Michigan. So... in spite of my wife's apprehension at the combination of blueberries and beef, I took the risk. And it turned out very well. I started by chopping up half a large shallot, sweating it in butter. In went a cup of blueberries. So far, traditional. Then, the "surprise"--throw in some maple syrup instead of sugar for the sweetness. I've never seen these together, but stood to reason they should go well together. And they do, it turns out. Added some port and red wine vinegar to the mix, and cooked it down. Yum! And, it turned out to pair well with a remarkably inexpensive merlot, the 2006 from Dona Sol. I normally American wines under $4, such as this one. So, I was surprised to find it drinkable, even pleasant. Now, complex and age-worthy it is not. but as a simple wine to pair with a lower quality steak with a fruit sauce, yes. It wasn't over-oaked, it had recognizeable fruit, and all in all, was a real surprise.

Flank Steak, Korean Food

Last night was time for a lovely grass-raised beef flank steak. Marinated with soy, hot pepper, garlic as primary flavors, it cooked up on the grill pan very nicely. What a great cut of meat! With some Israeli couscous and corn, and a nice fruit-driven Spanish wine, yum.

Tonight, we got lazy, and ate out. Korean food was the choice du jour. I'm a big fan of kimchee, that wonderful hot, fermented, pickled cabbage like product. The rice and beef be-bim-bop was tasty--made wonderful by the runny egg broken over the dish. And Julie had barbeque short ribs, which were wonderfully smoky, with lots of sesame flavors. In all, delicious food.

Strip Steaks

By traditional thought, NY Strip steaks are among the most expensive cuts of meat around. It's not uncommon to pay upwards of $15/lb. for ready-cut steaks at the meat counter. Often, these are trimmed poorly, cut thin, or otherwise less than ideal. But, if you have a good slicing knife and a steady hand, you can buy the subprimal and cut your own. That has two big advantages: 1. it's cheaper--we can find it for as little as $3-4/lb. 2. You can cut and trim the steaks to your liking. I happen to like relatively thick steaks, so I can work these to my liking.

So, tonight, I cooked up strip steaks, did a mushroom-sherry-cream sauce, mashed potatoes, and some spinach flash sauted in garlic adn olive oil. The steaks were very nice, as always, the sauce a good taste, and the potatoes OK. But the spinach was a real winner. It came from the farmers market, so was very fresh. I heated a pan rather hot, added in olive oil, threw in the garlic, and the spinach. I tossed it quickly, for less than a minute, and pulled it off the heat and out of hte pan. That kept it from becoming just soggy. Yum.

Flank steak

Nothing too interesting tonight. Flank steaks just make a nice week-night meal. Quick cooking, reasonable price, lot of flavor. The secret to making this rather tough cut of meat really good is three-fold. First, marinate it -- I really like a mix of soy sauce, oil, brown sugar, tons of garlic, some hot pepper, maybe mustard. Overnight in that tenderizes it a bit, and adds a lot of flavor. Second, don't take it past medium rare. about 4 minutes on a side is about right on a grill pan, maybe five. More than that, and you're making shoe leather. Finally, you must, and I mean, MUST cut this across the grain to make thin strips. Yum. With a bit of Israeli couscous and green beans, a nice, tasty meal. And, as this came from the Farmers Market, it was locally produced, grass-fed cattle. We also finished off last night's wine -- the Aphillanthes vin de pays. It held up OK, but remained rather boring and simple. Looking forward to something better later in the week.

Filet and Jazz

Last night, Julie and I had tickets to see Wynton Marsalis, so we needed a quick dinner; I also wanted to do something kind of nice, since it was a sort of mid-week date night. This made for an easy call--filet mignon steak with a nice mushroom sauce, plus some couscous and green beans on the side. There's nothing like a beautifully pan-seared, well-seasoned rare steak. That seared, brown crust is such a wonderful contrast to the soft rare meat inside. (An aside--cook these beyond medium-rare, and you've wasted good food and good money. So, please don't.)

Thanks to having a good boning/trimming knife, the steak didn't cost a fortune, either. Precut, trimmed filet can cost upwards of $15/lb. Not everyday eating. But, buy a beef tenderloin vac-packed, and cut your own steaks, you get the same thing, and can pay as little as $4/lb--about the same as a nice beef roast. Plus, you can cut them to whatever thickness you like -- a big bonus. All it takes is cutting off a bit of connective tissue and fat, separating the three muscles that comprise the subprimal, and slicing to your desired size. Five minutes, and it's done. And, you can turn the trimmings into a nice beef stroganoff or stirfry.

So, all of this was lead in to one of the best concerts I've attended in recent years. I've long been a fan of Wynton Marsalis--this is the 3rd or 4th time I've seen him play live. He's perhaps the most talented trumpeter alive today -- that rich, mournful tone is one of a kind. But it was especially cool to see his band this year--it turns out that I know one the trumpet players in the band. Ryan Kisor and I performed together in several honor bands across Iowa during our high school years. Of course, he was always the better trumpeter, and has now grown into a true powerhouse. In addition to playing awesome section work, he stole the show as solo on a big piece--such a dark, clear tone! In spite of not getting home until after 11 at night (not much fun when the alarm goes off at 4:45 in the morning), what a great evening!