Truffle Mutt

3rd Annual Book Club

Yes, it was my third annual catering job for the book club gathering.  But, no I didn't serve this cake.  The picture is just for optical stimulation, because I forgot to take my camera with me for the evening.  This silly little cake actually thinks it's a pie, but it was really good, if not the most beautiful of my creations.

This years book club event was my biggest success, with a stray away from the less familiar Thai and Chinese cuisines.  But, as always, it was a blast to plan - everything from the food and garnish to the plating and dessert.

So what was on the menu?

The first course consisted of crispy mini potato skins, stuffed with aged Gouda and double smoked farmers sausage, drizzled with crème fraîche, smoked paprika infused olive oil and a scattering of chopped chives.  They were beautiful and they tasted fantastic.

And served along side was this recipe for sweet pea and sun dried tomato's on endive spears.  I owe trying this recipe to Cara and Joni, because without them I never would have been able to get past my fear and loathing of mushy peas.  Retch!  But this was worth it!  This simple recipe packs an unexpected amount of flavor and it's *all* good.

And lastly a duo of crostini's.   A rich wild mushroom sauté on top of a Gorgonzola smothered crostini and the other a lightly melted Brie topped with two slices of sweet fresh cherry tomato.

Then for dessert...

A baked Alaska filled with the most intense and addictive caramel almond ice cream.  I haven't been so enthralled by ice cream since Haagen-Dazs banana nut!  I was distraught when they took it off the shelves last year, but then I realized it was in my health's best interest.  And since overcoming the withdrawal my life has almost returned to normal.  And now this!  A reason to relapse - I may never eat anything else again. 

And then lastly I relied on a stand-by.  Pierre Hermé's lemon cream in Chinese tea cups topped with a tuile curl cookie, whip cream and a single berry.  They looked so great that a tear came to my eye when I remembered I had no camera. 

Weekend Dinner

I don't know about you, but the weekend is my time to cook.  During the week I rarely take the time to cook a big dinner - who am I kidding, I rarely take the time to cook a small dinner.  It seems like we walk in the door Jason makes something quick and then it's off to the dog to the park.  There's just not much time for food and that means cheese smokies, hamburgers and a lot of ketchup.  And even though it's super yummy Stonewall Kitchen - Country Ketchup, when it starts becoming it's own food group there's just too much ketchup.

And it was on Saturday night, with another hamburger dinner looming on the horizon, that I snapped out of my gastronomic drought.  Luckily the fridge was well stocked, so I was able to jump into action without having to leave the house.  The first course for the night was a mixed green salad with blood orange vinaigrette and fried Kofalotiri cheese.  The sweet & sour dressing and bitter greens were the perfect accompaniment for the salty Greek cheese.

Toss the salad with the dressing before starting the cheese, then the salad can be quickly assembled and served while the cheese is still hot.  Cut the cheese into the size you want to serve, but make it about 1/4 to 1/2 inch thick.  Heat a non-stick frying pan over high heat and add the cheese to the hot pan.  The cheese will start to melt immediately, but don't worry it will hold it's shape.  Let the cheese melt for several seconds and brown before flipping it and browning on the other side.  The cheese will still be quite firm.  Arrange it on the plate and then add the dressed greens.  Serve immediately.

It's All In The Tomato

I love tomatoes. 

I know they're not exotic but in the world of vegetables there's just no match for a tomatoes versatility.  Freshly sliced and layered on toast or used to round out the flavor of a winter braise, the tomato spans all seasons, preparations and regions of the world.  It is a wonderful thing.

And I love bruschetta.

I've eaten it a more than a few (thousand) times yet I've never attempted to make it.  The truth is I didn't trust the recipes - how could a few everyday ingredients make the aromatic rich tasting bruschetta that I get from the Italian market?  It couldn't - right?  So, I kept on buying it and was  perfectly content thinking I was making a sound choice.

And then it happened.  I had been at my favorite tomato booth at the Market, Gull Valley Greenhouse and I had a cache of vine ripened, hand-picked, ruby red tomatoes at my disposal.  Now, on it's own this circumstance would not have inspired bruschetta, but when an unexpected dinner guest arrived, that's exactly what happened.  And suprise me it did...  A few carefully selected ripened ingredients and I can make a killer bruschetta.  Who knew!?  Certainly not me. 

A Ducky Pizza

Of all the things on the evenings book club menu apparently these little duck pizzas won by popular demand.  Of course, I find that understandable because who can resist anything that comes as a pizza?  I know my favorite pizza (before the restaurant closed that is) was the Chef's Gone Mad special at Royal Pizza, a mountainous combination of spaghetti, meatballs and layers of melted mozzarella cheese.  This concoction might sound gross, which is what I thought prior to the night I was brave enough to try it, but it was great.  But I digress.   

The only picture I had was of the pizzas in the dressing room because I got distracted and forgot to take a picture when they came out of the oven.  So you'll just have to imagine them with bubbly cheese and a frizzled green onion garnish.  Pretty huh?    

I owe my last boss credit for giving me the idea for this combination.  We were good food buddies and would often swap stories, recipes and restaurant recommendations during our work week.  I talked about cookbooks and restaurants, while her stories often revolved around weekend family get togethers where her adventurous brother would make some fantastic meal.  One weekend in particular she was being sent by her brother to collect a crispy duck from Chinatown for crispy duck pizza night.   
Being an amateur duck enthusiast I'd never eaten crispy duck before (okay so I'd never even heard of it) so my boss took pity on me and let me try a mouthwatering morsel and I still remember it as my most fond fowl experience.  I was hooked.   

The Chinese theme was therefore a welcome one, providing me the perfect chance to create a crispy duck pizza of my own.  I probably could have made the duck myself, but I took mercy on the rest of the people living in the condo building and decided not to smoke us all out.  Plus why mess with what Gee Gong already does so well.  So, off I went to Gee Gong's Restaurant on 206 Centre Street SE, where I purchased my duck and an equally delicious piece of bbq pork.

Let's Get This Party Started

It's been difficult getting back into the swing of things since January and I needed a serious kick-in-in-the-you-know-what to get me going.  Lucky for me my Mom was able to provide that well needed boot when she hosted her monthly book club and recruited me to provide the food.   

The book taking centre stage for the evening was The Jade Peony, which is a story about an immigrant family living in Vancouver's Chinatown.  Naturally I wanted to keep with the Chinese theme so I set out to design the menu and table design for the evening.  I started a few weeks ago with the planning and the menu ended up looking like this:

• Sichuan Shrimp nestled on rice crisps with herbed aioli (pictured above)
  
• Sweet Crispy Duck Pizza's with caramelized onion and sweet soy tomato sauce and melted mozzarella cheese
  
• Baked Brie topped with an Asian mint pesto
• Smoked Salmon Pate drizzled with apple teriyaki sauce and crispy capers

• Sesame Creme Brulee served in Asian soup spoons with caramelized sugar and sesame Florentines
• Green Infused Tea Cheesecake with white chocolate and fresh raspberries
• Chinese Egg Custard Tarts paired with strawberries marinated in a dark anise syrup

To start off the posting frenzy that will cover the evenings eatables, let's take a look behind door #1...

Sichuan shrimp. 

The sauce for these shrimp turned out better than I expected with a perfect balance of sweet, sour and spice.  The original recipe from The Food of China calls for the shrimp to be served hot but for my purposes I cooked the shrimp in the sauce and then chilled them before service.  It was quick to put together and would also make a great stir-fry sauce.

Soup to Cry Over

And not because of how fabulously scrumptious it was but because of the crazy, paint peeling strong onions that went into it.  Whew!  Those were some nasty red onions.

I used a couple of recipes for inspiration combining both red onions and leeks in a creamy puree.  Both recipes called for caramelized onions, but I do not process the ability to caramelize onions.  Without fail I end up with either a pale mushy mess, or crispy fried critters, but never anything in between.  Which is probably why the soup was a little bland, so to make up for it I added a couple of handfuls of dried and fresh mushrooms.  I topped it with a rye bread, garlic and Asiago crouton and a strip of crispy proscuttio ham. 

My Test Kitchen

The weather in Calgary has been miserable.  I've lived here all my life and was completely unaware that we had a Monsoon season here on the prairies.  The one upside to the yucky weather was the lack of guilt I felt barricading myself in the kitchen for the entire weekend.   

I had a dinner party on Saturday night, a brunch on Sunday and a dessert on a Sunday night.  I turned my kitchen upside down making oven roasted tomatoes, stuffed manicotti, apricot tarts, Manhattan clam chowder, roasted tomato soup, grilled ham and arugula sandwiches and a trifle.  My kitchen was a mess and I enjoyed it immensely.

For dinner on Saturday I wanted to try recreating an appetizer we'd eaten at Ideale while we were in San Francisco.  It was an appetizer of paper thin Braseola sprinkled with arugula, capers and shaved parmigiano with a light drizzling olive oil.   The combination was simple in design, yet wonderfully complex in flavor and it seemed easy enough to attempt a recreation in my kitchen.

But first I had to go shopping.  I had to track down arugula, which is ridiculously hard to find here, and pick up Braseola.  So I was off to the Italian Supermarket on 20th Ave NE.  It isn't a huge store, but it's got most of what you'd expect, it's less expensive than the other Italian stores in the area and it's got the best people.  It has such a sense of community that I feel like I've stepped into Italy when I cross the threshold.  While I was at the deli counter ordering my Braseola, prosciutto, capiccola and Genoa salami the butcher kept feeding me samples.  This turned out to be an effective marketing tool because I ended up buying much more than I had planned.