the SIMMER blog

best bites of 2010: homemade division

We've got a few more weeks of December to go, but the year-end roundups have already begun -- and why not, right? Of course there's more eating to do, but there's plenty of previous eating to choose from. Like I did last year, I'm going to split things up into a few different lists. Without further ado, my 10 favorite bites of the year, made here at home:

1. Spicy calamari with bacon and scallions. Simple to make, super-delicious, what's not to love? Well, unless you keep kosher.
2. Dulce de leche ice cream. Rich and rich and rich.
3. Blueberry boy bait. Buttery and moist, one of the best cakes I've ever had, and simply perfect for sharing. The highest and best use of blueberries, in my humble opinion.
4. Cheddar shortbread. (The only repeat from last year, but just too glorious to skip.) 
5. Portuguese green beans. More delicious than you'd ever think green beans plus garlic plus cilantro could be. Bonus points: easy do-ahead for parties.
6. Scallops with cauliflower puree. I love a good scallop, and my favorite way to serve them is browned just right, sauced lightly with vermouth and butter, and served over this rich-tasting-but-good-for-you cauliflower puree, which only has a little butter and no cream at all. Practically health food!
7. Fig crostini. Sometimes, all it takes to make a delicious bite is a) good shopping and b) good assembly. I toasted thin slices of walnut bread from Bouchon Bakery, spread them with peppered goat cheese, and lay superthin slices of Brown Turkey figs over the top. Done and done. And then scarfed.
8. Celery salad with dates, walnuts, and pecorino. Summer salads are easy. Winter salads are more of a challenge. But this one is good any time of year, not to mention just plain good. Kicked it up a notch with a vinaigrette of sherry vinegar and walnut oil from Garces Trading Company.
9. Homemade duck prosciutto. Self-explanatory.
10. Fingerling potatoes browned in duck fat. Hm, looks like I never posted about this one... no time like the present! No trick to it, really: you halve the potatoes, put them in the pan with the duck fat, turn on the heat, grab your tongs, and wait patiently for the perfect shade of toasty brown to appear.

 

Stay tuned this week for my favorite restaurant dishes of the year, as well as some miscellaneous bites that didn't fit either of the other lists. (Pies-N-Thighs chicken biscuit, anyone?)

duck prosciutto: back to the beginning

And so we're back where we started, before the seasoning and the wrap and the rig and the unveiling and the results.

At the beginning, with just plain duck.

See how easy?

duck prosciutto: the seasoning

You don't just toss two raw duck breasts into some cheesecloth and hope for the best, of course. There is a first step to all this. That step? Salt. O. Rama.

 

Glass dish, kosher salt, bury 'em:

 

(yeah, I don't remember why I scored one and not the other... just for the heck of it, I guess)

 

(salt rain action shot -- clearly showing why I don't do action shots)

 
 

Cover with plastic wrap and put in the fridge for 24 hours. When they come out, they look like this:

 

Wash off the salt, dry thoroughly, and season with pepper. I also threw some Aleppo pepper onto one of them... should have been smoked paprika, but I didn't want to get too crazy.

 
 
 

duck prosciutto: the wrap

Usually on Wednesdays I'm wordless, so if I can't go word-free this week, I'll minimize:

Wrap duck in cheesecloth.

 

In slow motion:

 

then

 

much more after the jump:

 

duck prosciutto: the rig

The recipe was very clear: hang the duck breasts in the fridge for two weeks so air can circulate all around them.

Um, I don't have that much fridge. And it doesn't have racks, it has shelves, so... less stuff to tie stuff to.

Luckily, despite my general right-braininess, I have a decent grasp of spatial relations, and decided what was needed was a really deep bowl. Among other things.

 

After a fair amount of experimentation (did you know clothespins are absolute rubbish at holding things diagonally?) I hit upon the exact right answer:

 

(Calphalon skewers that came with a grill pan I no longer own: made of WIN)

And so, the wrapped seasoned bundles of duck were to be hung from these skewers for two weeks in the fridge. And this is what that looked like:

Tune in tomorrow, when we jump two weeks into the past. It's a wild(ish) ride!

(Yeah, this is a pretty typical look for my fridge. Goat cheese and piquillos at all times, with a fair chance of grapefruit and beer. The orange juice is the real outlier.)

duck prosciutto: the unveiling

So what came before the end, in my duck prosciutto process?

The meat had been hanging in the fridge for two weeks. During that time, I left it 100% alone. No poking or prodding or turning or checking. Just hanging. And occasionally when my hanging rig (more on that soon) slipped out of place, I'd put it back together. That's it. No more.

So the unveiling of the finished prosciutto was a very big moment. I wasn't sure what to expect, since I'd never actually tried making cured meat products, and I was worried there might be mold or spots or some other way of going horribly wrong.

Thank goodness there was only this:

 

Mmmm, prosciutto-licious.

Skin-side view:

Meat-side view:

Tomorrow, we'll go a little further back in time.

duck prosciutto: the results

So I've made a slight shift in my blogging plans: what I'm going to do with the duck prosciutto is start at the end instead of the beginning.

Bear with me. All will be revealed in time.

I'll show you the results, then we'll go back step-by-step instead of forward step-by-step, but at the end of it all, when you read back through the posts from most recent to least recent, you'll see the whole process unfold forward.

And so, in the not-as-well-known-as-they-used-to-be words of the X-Files end credits: "I made this!"

 

How was it? Very tasty. Very salty, and fatty, but tasty. The hardest part is cutting it thin enough. The thicker you cut it, the chewier it is, and it's more pleasant sliced thinly. I'm not one to invest in a meat slicer, so a sharp knife and patience is the best I can do.

Cut it while it's cold, but wait to eat it until it warms up.

Also, it's worth noting that I now have WAY more duck prosciutto than I need to be eating on a daily basis -- and so alternate uses are definitely helpful.

Two magic words: duck lardons.

 

Cube. Render in a warm pan, then toss in some green vegetable -- zucchini, green beans, whatever you've got -- to find the right balance between healthy and delicious.

But how did the duck breast go from raw to totally prosciutto-fied?

As I said, all will be revealed.

 

pending duck

Just a quick note to let you know what's coming up. I've taken a turn into a different corner of the food world: charcuterie, or salumi, or drying-meat-out-instead-of-cooking-it-like-in-olden-days.

I'll give you step by step, so this is where it starts: 

More in the days to come...

best bites of 2009: other notables

And then we came to the end! Last post of 2009.

Lots of delicious bites I had this year weren't exactly restaurant food, nor were they exactly homemade, so I wanted to include them in some other way. And here they are! Included.

 

1. Red chili Capogiro gelato -- it's almost TOO hot, but that's perfect, because it's also creamy and rich, and you would think it cools itself but it doesn't. Worth trying at least once! 
2. Nduja from Boccalone-- Yes, it's spicy meat paste. Sausage, really, but softer and spreadable. Good for nubbing into a sauce for pasta or just spreading on bread.
3. Apples with goat cheese and honey-- My friend Sara made these for her birthday party and they are really, really delicious. Totally nicking them for my next shindig.
4. Duck wonton with Gary Farrell Pinot Noir -- At the Sonoma Wine Country Weekend, there were about 60 restaurants and over a hundred wineries, so we couldn't get around to them all, but I sure was glad we got to this. I can't remember what table offered the duck wonton (A La Carte catering, maybe?) but it was right next to the Gary Farrell table, and the food with the wine was just a tremendous little burst of awesome. Went back for seconds. And then some.
5. Ricotta, pistachio, and basil crostini at Tria's Fermentation School. Three great tastes I would not have pegged as tasting great together, but... they totally do.
6. Sarcone's Special.
7. The goat cheese sandwich at 'wichcraft. If I had to choose between this one and the Sarcone's Special for the rest of my life, it'd be a really, really tough call. Luckily, I don't have to pick!
8. Mozzarepas. At my first two or three NYC street fairs I made sure to eat these, because I didn't know when I'd see them again. Luckily for my hips, I realized quickly they appear at EVERY SINGLE street fair in the city. Therefore, there'll always be another chance.
9. Russian Teacakes made by my mom for Christmas. In case you wonder where I get the Overdo gene, she made more than a dozen types of cookies for Christmas this year. The fact that I still gravitate toward the Russian Teacakes even though they cannot be discreetly sneaked (powdered sugar! everywhere! and I wear a lot of black) speaks to their irresistibility.

And that's it for 2009. Let's see what wonderful tastes and smells and flavors 2010 brings, shall we?

enchiladas (un poco mas)

Okay, one more, then I'll shut up about enchiladas for a while.

Things I have put in enchiladas:

• canned black beans with shredded chicken and roasted red peppers

• Rancho Gordo yellow-eye beans, leeks, and leftover tarragon cream sauce

• homemade ropa vieja with leftover frozen Trader Joe's lentils

• BBQ chicken and homemade refried beans

• frozen corn and white sweet potatoes

• Rancho Gordo Christmas Limas and braised scallions

• leftover pot roast and fresh tomatillos

Things I would totally try putting in enchiladas given half a chance:

• pork shoulder cooked in sriracha and garlic (this is how I braise chicken thighs)

• string cheese

• leftover fried chicken (deboned)

• duck

• white beans and bacon

• did I mention string cheese? just, like, a whole slab of it.

Obviously there are also various amounts and types of garlic, hot peppers, cheeses, chili powders, and whatnot involved. And there's no reason the sauce has to be tomato sauce, but that's generally how it goes.