Shepherd's Delight

Somewhere in the world, lamb neck is probably a prized cut of meat. That doesn't appear to be so for the part of the world I inhabit. You can find the occasional lamb neck recipe in a British or Canadian cookbook, more still for Persian or Middle Eastern cuisine, and probably a smattering throughout the Mediterranean regions. But there are no preparations listed in the Joy of Cooking or Bittman's How to Cook Everything, so when I set out to prepare my lamb neck, the last of 2009's lamb, I had to wing it. I went with the dish that always seems to taste best when prepared out of necessity: Shepherd's Pie.

The lamb neck recipes I did find call for it in slices. Not feeling curious or ambitious enough to hack away at this particular part of the anatomy, I decided to braise the neck the same way I do shanks: first browning in hot oil in a cast iron vessel, then cooking slowly in an oven with mirepoix, wine, stock and herbs.

My buddy David Neevel has been showering me with the best Chanterelles that Oregon has seen in years, and so I wanted them to be as much of a component of the dish as the lamb. So instead of a chicken or beef stock for the braise, I reconstituted some dried porcinis. The lamb braised for about 2 hours at 300, and then it was late so I turned it down to 200 and went to bed. Somewhere in the night I shut the oven off, and then after work the next day, I processed the cooking solids and liquid through a food mill and then set about reducing it by about half.

Meanwhile, I pulled the fat and gristle (and spine!) from the neck and chopped the meat into chunks. Then, I sauteed my chanterelles at a pretty high heat, added salt to seep out the liquid, then reconstituted the saute with lamb and white wine. At the last minute I decided to add some large chunks of carrots to give the dish a little sweetness and texture. When the cooking liquid, now gravy, had reduced, I lazily thickened it with a little cornstarch slurry (I'm not eating wheat right now! Fodder for another post!) and incorporated it into my mushrooms. Let this cook long enough to take the crunch out of the carrots, and poured it into the bottom of my casserole.

Meanwhile, I had boiled up a couple of russets along with a big, knobby parsnip. Passed this all through a ricer and incorporated an unhealthy amount of butter, and spread it over the top. She baked at 375 for about 30 minutes and came out better than I even imagined. I feel like lamb always has to get the Mediterranean, Middle Eastern or Provençal treatment, and it was nice to give it the Autumn in Oregon treatment, worthy of my friend David, the Fungi Shepherd (he got the leftovers at lunch today).

Mancake

My best friend got married over the weekend. I played the Maid of Honor, which in this case meant helping with a few extra errands, giving a toast, and having permission to spend too much money on shoes. And organizing a bachelorette party. While the men roasted a pig on a spit and shot-gunned beers for 10 hours, about 17 of us had a really nice family-style dinner at clarklewis and, for dessert, indulged in an edible, nude effigy of Heather's fiancé Michael:

Pretty Excited About This Right Now

Home-cured guanciale, one of the jowls from last year's pig. Bathed in a salt-sugar cure for a little over a week, needs to hang in the fridge for 3-5 weeks. I am hoping to move it to the garage as soon as the temperature stays in the low 50's. Stay tuned...

Meat Hoarding

This time of year, I feel just like Indiana Jones in that scene from Raiders of the Lost Ark where he's running for his life behind a giant boulder, trying to escape the sacred temple from which no one has ever left alive. In my case, the boulder represents the 2011 half-pig and half-lamb slated to arrive any day now, in the wake of an already well stocked larder. It's the odds and ends like ham hocks and lamb necks, and even the really choice cuts like spare ribs I'm now desperate to cook, share, and consume as the inevitable day approaches that Laura Ohm calls to tell me our 2011 supply of meat is ready for pickup.

Hi, my name is Robin and I am a meat hoarder. I believe in conscious consumption of meat, and supporting sustainable farming, and value, so I purchase my animals in bulk. Aside from chicken, I rarely by meat at the grocery store, and I love the indulgence of walking into my garage, reaching into my deep freezer and playing Russian Roulette with a dinner party menu. But in committing to buying a half lamb, half pig and 1/8 of a cow every year, I'm biting off more than I can chew, literally speaking (as well as figuratively). Yet, I can't stop. The thought of not having an endless supply of ground beef for impromptu sloppy joes, or pork chops to marinate in kim chi and sear in a cast iron skillet gives me anxiety. But, in an ironic twist, so does the reality of having to buy a supplemental freezer this year because I have too many quarts of frozen lard from 2009 to make room for the new supply.

Yesterday, I pulled out a pig jowl and started the 5-8 week long process that will result in guanciale, Today, I decided to conquer the pork belly, or at least start a management plan for it. Last year, I opted out of having my belly turned into bacon at the butcher's in lieu of taking a whole, uncured slab--my naked canvas, if you will. Well for all of my excitement to make my own bacon, Chinese red-cooked pork and rillettes, a 7lb pork belly stayed in my freezer for 11.5 months. So a cold, rainy Sunday gave me the excuse I needed to consult some cookbooks for ideas.

Then, I made a list of the pork belly recipes I was interested in and the corresponding weight of pork belly I would need.

I disrobed the belly. Leaner than I was expecting. There goes the homemade salt pork.

And then, I took out the old Foodsaver, weighed and labeled my pieces, and voila, several manageably-sized slabs of belly, ready for braising or curing or larding.

And then they went back in the freezer, because I'm still working on a defrosted hock and a pound of sausage in the fridge. But now, I have it all at the ready, as soon as I want them, whenever that may be. It's progress.

Frittatas Are The New Sandwich

Thank god for a frittata. Until recently, my frittatas were whimsical and almost always centered around a breakfast milieu. Then, I became the organizer of the Egg Club at work. Every Tuesday, Mark from Farms comes and delivers eggs to about 20-odd customers. My reward for receiving, paying out and distributing the eggs is a free dozen each week. Some weeks, the eggs are gone fast; a baking project or a deviled egg plate will make quick work out of 12 eggs. But generally I have a surplus of organic, pasture-raised chicken eggs on hand and frittatas have become a way of life.

In the early summer when I was on the East Coast, I shared an incredible sandwich with my friend Kelly at Saltie in Williamsburg that basically changed my position on potatoes (previously: indifferent). It was a thick piece of oily focaccia, halved crosswise, sandwiching a Spanish tortilla, slathered in a romesco/aioli concoction. Eggs+potatoes+bread+condiment=a lunch to remember. As my understanding goes, fritattas and tortillas cousins from Italy and Spain, respectively. Both are deep-dish omelets, though fritattas are deeper and may contain a kitchen-sink list of ingredients including meats and leftover pasta. Tortillas, I believe, are strictly potatoes and onions. I have yet to make a tortilla because, frankly, I think there's too much technique involved for my patience at the moment, and I usually have too many ingredients on hand to allow me the luxury of focusing only on potatoes. Frittatas, or at least the ones I make, are versatile and forgiving. The filling-to-egg ratio is never the same twice, the stovetop-to-oven times will vary, but I always end up with a dish that can cover breakfast and/or lunch and/or dinner and/or standing in front of the fridge looking for something to eat.

I cannot tell you how to make a frittata, I can only tell you how I make mine. I start with a 6" seasoned cast iron pan. It can feed one to four people, depending on how many eggs you're using and what else you're serving (a lettuce salad is always a good idea). I pour a good measure of olive oil in the pan and give it medium heat. Soften some onions or leeks (1/4-1/3 cup) and slowly add the rest of your ingredients, seasoning with salt and pepper as you go: sliced or diced cooked potatoes, sweet bell peppers, cooked greens, steamed broccoli, pancetta, smoked trout, etc... I've never measured the volume, I just use common sense. It hasn't failed me yet. It's not a good idea to rush any part of this. Keep the heat low and let the filling ingredients cook slowly. Whisk your eggs in a bowl (3-5 eggs, depending on how much filling) and instead of adding milk as you would with scrambled eggs, add a tablespoon or so of water. I don't know why I started doing this but I believe it adds a little volume. Add a pinch of salt and if you're using cheese, incorporate it and/or fresh herbs into the eggs. Pour into your pan and take this one opportunity to quickly and gently incorporate the eggs with the filling. Not too much though. Then, turn the heat to low and let it cook. This is when I turn on the oven to 350 and clean up the kitchen, or take a shower, or (sigh) check facebook. If you keep the heat low, this frittata can stay on the stove for up to 20 minutes. What I love most about frittatas is how much time they buy me to do other things while they cook. Occasionally tilt the pan and release the edges of the omelet with a dull knife, letting the uncooked eggs occupy the vacancy on the sides. When there is still some uncooked egg in the center but it's too viscous to move, place it in the oven: center rack. Then, turn the oven off. Then, turn on the broiler. The radiant heat of the oven will continue to cook the frittata from its peripheries, and the broiler will, well, broil. Don't burn it, just let it finish cooking and give it some burnish if you wish. The frittata is done, but I prefer to let it cool significantly. I don't think there's any better way to eat one than at room temperature, with a salad or in this case, an heirloom tomato and basil salsa. The pic below pretty much sums up the all too short summer and getting up with the early light just so that I have more time to do nothing in particular.

Oh Yes It's Ladies Night

HAL & DK1

Labor Day Visit

Labor Day weekend I was visited by my mom Betsy and her husband David on the tail end of their RV trip cross country. They left Florida back in July, drove across the states and into Canada, over to Alaska, back to Canada and then down through the Pacific Northwest. I have to say that they make the prospect of retirement look somewhat appealing, provided you can share every waking moment with someone in a confined space with zeal, which naturally, I could not. I am instead looking forward to sharing my twilight years in a barn with all the cats and dogs the County will let me legally possess--provided the barn is up to code.

On Monday evening I prepared a somewhat eclectic mixed grill featuring lamb ribs and grilled pouisson. I decided to do a rub on the ribs and because I never remember to write anything down, I just took a photo:

Clockwise from top: nutmeg, cardamom, black pepper, cinnamon, cumin, tumeric, coriander, chiles and a couple of clove right in the center. I toasted everything just till the coriander started to pop (no idea, really, if this is blasphemous in the world of curries and rubs) and ground down with a good measure of salt, then rubbed them on my lamb ribs and let it all sit for the better part of a day. Later, I put the ribs in a shallow baking pan with about 1/2 cup of water and cooked them, covered tightly, in a 325 oven for 1 1/2 hours. Which was how long I needed to figure out what to do for a glaze. Had there been some pomegranate molasses in the pantry I'm sure I would have tried something, but instead I made a simple sauce of honey, yogurt, lemon juice and, at the last minute, preserved lemons.

I tossed the cooked ribs in this and then finished them on the grill, which, incidentally, was being occupied by my spatchcocked pouissons. The birds had been seasoned with salt in the morning and spent about an hour marinating in black pepper, garam masala, yogurt and some other stuff (this, I did not capture on camera). I also smoked a small eggplant that became a puree with walnuts, cilantro and yogurt (yes, I bought a huge thing of yogurt at the store earlier that day, ok?). I don't remember eating it, but was told that it was good by my mother, who I can recall licking the bowl while making inappropriate noises.

We also had a bi-colored (purple and red) potato and yellow bean salad dressed in a mustard vinaigrette and a simple cucumber and dill salad (cucumber, dill, white vinegar, sugar, salt, yum). Betsy ate everyone's bones, as is customary. We all had a bit too much to drink and the night ended with mom dancing to Pet Sounds and lamenting that she was born to dance, although she had been too much of a nerd to ever listen to Elvis, or the Beach Boys or the Beatles. But now that she's hearing songs like "Play That Funky Music, White Boy" in fitness class, for the first time, perhaps there is some hope.