Basic Meat Sauce - Page 321

I thought maybe I didn't chop the celery and carrots up small enough but the results were outstanding, so I guess it's okay.  I like this recipe because the long legs of it (about 2 hours worth) can be done ahead, and the base held in the fridge for up to a week.  At first I thought there was going to be a ton of sauce, but it cooks waaaaay the hell down.  I expect next time I'll double or triple the recipe and plan on a week of nightly meaty goodness.

This was a seriously good meat sauce and it made the house smell wicked delicious while cooking.  I love recipes with concepts like this, caramelizing the s**t out of some vegetables, cooking wines down to nothingness, and then giving some awesome herbs a bath for a few hours.

I'm wondering if the base can be frozen...

Advice: Make more than you think you need - lots more!

Slow Cooked Lamb Rack with Spring Favas, Malted Barley and Chanterelles - Page 153

Well, we're not really going to talk about the Favas and Mushrooms.  After committing to the Lamb recipe, it was discovered that fresh Favas and Chanterelles were not going to be in the cards.  Substitutions were done, compromises were made, the results were okay, but certainly not representative of what the recipe could be.

The lamb on the other hand, was unbelievable.  And the Basic Meat Sauce - Holy S**T!  I'll be making triple batches of that stuff.  We did a double batch of the lamb racks (we were expecting a couple more people).  By the end of the meal we were holding lamb "lollipops" by the bone and dipping it straight into the sauce.  There was much double dipping!  I'm almost glad we need to redo the Favas - it's a great excuse to make the lamb and meat sauce again.

The entire recipe was quite easy and well laid out.  We made the Basic Meat Sauce base the night before, and the Malted Barley Crisps just before searing the lamb.  The malted barley crisps gave us some trouble, as they weren't really holding together.  We messed around with it a bit and ended up with some good ones.

The lamb racks smelled amazing within seconds of hitting the hot oil.  We were easily able to sear two racks at the same time.  While they were searing we made a nice little bed of rosemary, thyme and garlic.

The most important timing was cooking the mushrooms such that they were ready just as the lamb had finished resting.  We started them shortly after the lamb came out of the oven.  We cooked the lamb to 130F and thought it was perfect - though some of our more squeamish meat eaters would have preferred a little more doneness.

Overall an amazing meal.

Advice: Make sure you can get fresh chanterelles and favas before committing to the recipe.  Make the meat sauce base the day before.  Also consider doing the crisps the day before so you can make sure to get them right.

Farrotto with Acorn Squash and Red Russian Kale - Page 93

My arm is tired.
Seriously, you have to stir this stuff for like an hour!
Ox made me do it because he was making the Chicken Simply Roasted in a Skillet - like that's complicated.  (We've made the chicken before and it was awesome, so we did it again.)

That said, this was a slightly complicated recipe, which required a lot of oven and stovetop coordination to make in conjunction with the chicken.  That said, by writing out cooking steps, oven temperatures and times, Ox was able to coordinate everything perfectly.

The acorn squash and kale marry very nicely in the dish.  Watch the Squash while you roast it, to make sure the top doesn't get too dark.  We had to move the shelf once to get it done right.  Also pay good attention while toasting the Farro.

The Farrotto followed the classic risotto method of adding warm stock slowly to the Farro and stirring almost constantly to prevent sticking and scorching.  It took a little more than an hour, but it's worth it.

Once done it was rich, creamy and mouth watering.  Another Sean Brock home run.  Served on the same plate with the chicken it made for a great meal.

Advice: Watch the roasting items carefully to avoid burning.  Stir the farrotto constantly to avoid sticking and scorching


.

Smoked Bacon for Beginners - Page 242

So some of you loyal readers (both of you) may have noticed a gap in posts.  You probably know that this is primarily due to the fact that in addition to being a culinary school dropout's food adventure sidekick, I am also the Super Tax Genius.  This is just a bit of a busy time for me.  What you may not have known is that the cooking has continued!  So, now that tax season is easing off a bit, I'm going to get caught up on the posts.  I'm also going to back date them on the blog calendar so the legions of future Ox and Brock fans will think we were dedicated and conscientious.

So the bacon...

What a big fucking, fuck up.

If you didn't know, Ox and I are (or were, in my case) both submarine nuclear operators.  We understand stuff like surface to volume ratios because it really kinda matters when it comes to a reactor.  Turns out it's pretty important when curing meat too.

I thought a 12 pound pork belly was a pretty big commitment for a first time trying to cure something, so I got this really cute 2 pound belly from Keegan-Fillion Farm. (This belly was the source of the skin for the amazing pork rinds from the previous post).  I figured at least a 1 in 3 chance we'd mess it up (got those odds waaaaay off) so I figured we'd go small for the first time.  Should have read the part about scaling down the amount of salt rub a little more carefully.   

Turns out the relatively high surface to volume ratio means that the extremely salty cure permeates every square inch of the bacon with a flavor that, contrary to what logic would imply, tasted far saltier than eating a spoonful of salt.  After over a month of work it was quite literally, inedible.

Now we've messed some things up from the book, but we've never not been able to eat the results.  I guess there's a first time for everything.  I won't bore you with the saga of how to fuck up bacon in only 57 steps, but here are some pictures:

This was a point of high hopes

This picture does not adequately capture the amount of rub used

Truly enjoyed the smoking part of this.  Was really excited at this point

I was also impressed with my jury rigged system to avoid having to hang it.

Aaaaand the next picture would be one of us spitting out disgusting chunks of cooked salt lick.  I'll spare you.