Rhode Island 100 mile

Happy New Year Everyone! For our last post of 2008, we’re offering up our top ten list of favortite things from 2008- granted, not all of them are local but we feel they should be included in the list:

10. O-ya restaurant in Boston.
9. Butter.
8. Shallots.
7. Zucchini blossoms.
6. Eataly (Turin, Italy).
5. Sakonnet vineyards.
4. Clio restaurant in Boston.
3. Narragansett Creamery.
2. Farmstead/La Laiterie in Providence.
1. Local Farmers.

…see you in 2009!

-Josh and Ingrid

…it seems as though Ingrid and I have a new tradition on Christmas Eve…as part of my gift to her, I present her a multi-course dinner (but don’t tell her anything about it). We started ding this last year, so this was my second go-around. I decided to do an all seafood affair, none of which I’ve ever cooked before…this is what I came up with:

Course 1: Salad Greens with Grilled Baby Octopus. I had never cooked baby octopus before…when I was at the fish store getting the other ingredients, I saw these little guys behind the counter. I ended up simmering them for about an hour in a liquid consisting of water, a carrot, thyme, garlic, onion, celery, wine and peppercorn to soften them up. They were then grilled for about 5 minutes and added to the greens which were tossed with the reduced cooking octopus broth.

Course 2: Mussel Risotto with Baby Spinach and Kumquart Confit (Laurent Tourondel’s “Go Fish”). This dish seemed a little strange at first, but once it all came together, it turned out to be excellent!

Course 3: Citrus Braised Endive with Scallops (Thomas Keller’s “Bouchon”). I chose this recipe because I had never cooked with endive before…besides letting the endive sit in a bed of salt for a day, this recipe didn’t take much time to prepare- the endive was braised for only about a half hour in a orange juice and honey mixture which was then reduced to make the sauce. The scallops were seared in clarified butter and placed on top of the endive…simple and tasty!

Course 4: “Clam Chowder” (From Thomas Keller’s “French Laundry Cookbook”). This was hands-down the best thing I have ever made. It’s basically a deconstructed clam chowder served over a cod cake and seared cod loin. Excellent.

Course 5: Chocolate Terrine with Creme Anglaise and Pistachio. Deadly.

-Josh

…The wintertime farmer’s market has started again! Ingrid and I braved the snowy conditions on Saturday and headed to the market which is now held at the Hope Artiste Village on Main Street in Pawtucket, RI. This market is a lot bigger than last year’s and has a wide selection of goods from local growers/producers including meat, eggs, cheese, vegetables and baked goods. In addition to the market, the Artiste Village houses a bunch of really cool galleries and businesses to check out as well…we’ll definitely be heading up there Saturdays this winter!

-Josh

…apparently in the current economic landscape, lobster prices have plummeted, resulting in a glut of inventory from the October harvest in Maine. Prices are now comparable to many other foods including steak and other seafood…so when in the mood for something from the sea, consider lobster to help out our local lobstermen! More on the subject from an article in today’s Boston Globe.

-Josh

…sorry for the delay in posting…we’ve been a little busy lately…we’ll try to offer up some more posts in the upcoming weeks. Thanksgiving was fun in the ri100mi household…we had 8 guests come over for dinner…sans turkey again this year. Our first choice was to try to get some partridge, but the minimum order was for 20 birds so that didn’t work out. We settled for a locally produced pork shoulder which was slow cooked out on the grill with braised leeks and wild rice stuffing. Here’s the entire menu:

* Musico Cantones
* Carrot and Golden Raisin Puree, Cheese
* Foie Gras de Canard, Brioche
* Beet Salad
* Turnip and Pumpkin Soup, Candied Seeds
* “Peas and Carrots”
* Pasta, Squash Blossom Sauce
* Slow Roasted Pork Shoulder, Wild Rice Stuffing, Braised Leeks
* Assorted Desserts

We started the turnip and pumpkin soup on Tuesday night. A sugar pumpkin was roasted and mashed and cooking oil reserved. The turnips were cooked and pureed with cream using an immersion blender. To serve, we warmed the pumpkin and placed a spoonful on the bottom of the bowl and the warm soup was poured over the pumpkin and garnished with a couple drops of the reserved oil from the pumpkin. This tasted way better on Thursday than it did on Tuesday.

Ingrid making her pasta for the pasta with squash blossom sauce. We found a farmer at the market this summer who had boatloads of squash blossoms, so Ingrid made a creamy curry sauce out of them which we froze for the winter.

This is the first step in the process for making the Musico Cantones. Walnuts, pistachios and pine nuts are boiled in a honey, sugar, water and rosemary solution and then transferred to a series of two other pots for the same process. After the final boil, the nuts are refrigerated in the solution for 24 hours.

The nuts are then drained from the solution and fried in sunflower oil until caramelized.

They are then sprinkled with a star anise, pepper and coriander spice mix and then allowed to cool which creates a spiced candy shell on the exterior. These turned out to be a big surprise…I did scorch the first batch of walnuts because the oil was too hot, so adjustments were made and everything turned out fine. (From the new El Bulli cookbook).

Making the dough for the brioche.

Hot brioche out of the oven.

The “Peas and Carrots” ready to be served…these are lobster filled chive crepes with a carrot ginger emulsion and pea shoot salad on top. (From the French Laundry cookbook).

- Josh