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January 7, 2008
...for tomorrow, we dine
Maybe it's the suck-tastic weather drawing out my nesting intstinct, but, boy, have I been cooking up a storm lately. Today I roasted a leg of lamb that I'd been seasoning all weekend. I just did what Alice Waters said to do.* I salted and peppered it on Saturday afternoon, then took it out of the fridge on Sunday after we got back from getting hammered on Bloody Marys at Sandi and Skippy's. Then I had a nap, and by the time we got back from getting hammered on wine and hot tubs at Stef and Martin's, it was too late to cook the thing, but I didn't want to re-refrigerate it, so I put it out on the ice-cold service porch. This morning I cooked the sucker at 375 for a little over an hour, and it was FABULOUS. It was *so* lamby. I sort of snacked on it all day. We ate it at room temperature for dinner tonight with what I was hoping would be a sort of risotto pancake.
On Friday I made some risotto. I can do this with my eyes closed, but this great new Alice Waters book encouraged me to not be so smug, and I followed her basic recipe to the letter, and I'll be damned if it wasn't the best fucking risotto I've ever made. Anyway, there was a bunch leftover (I served it with some pork chops), so I was thinking I might make some fried risotto balls. Of course, I couldn't find a recipe. The Enoteca book had this recipe for a sort of pancake thing, so I winged it based on that. I chopped up a handful of pistachios and tossed it together with a bit of gruyere and jack cheese, and put a little fresh thyme in (it rocks to have cool stuff laying around in the fridge.) I got some butter hot in a pan and made a disc out of half the risotto. Then the cheese and nuts went on top, then another disc of the risotto. Sadly, it didn't get stable enough to flip easily, but it did wind up browning very nicely. The gooey cheese and salty nuts were great with the now-sticky leftover risotto. I think what would have helped this would have been a dip in breadcrumbs. Do you know what I'm getting at? If anybody has a recipe for something like this, I'd be quite grateful.
It's nice finally having barstools in the kitchen. I can sit at the stove and read and drink and nurse my risotto without my feet getting all impatient.
Tomorrow is chicken salad for lunch, using the breasts of the crappy mass-market chicken I used for the broth for the risotto. (If anyone can tell me where in Vallejo I can get a non-Foster-Farms chicken, I'd be oh, so grateful. I am SO spoiled with my Rosie chickens that are ubiquitous in Berkeley.) Also, there will be cold lamb to snack on.
And the ducks are arriving tomorrow. I ordered some Moulard breasts and some legs from Hudson Valley. Yes, and a two-pound bucket of duck fat. One of the breasts is going to get cooked up for dinner tomorrow, the other one will probably get made into prosciutto, the legs are going to be turned into confit, and I may just roll around naked in the duck fat.
Or not.
*Alice Waters expresses no opinion as to whether or not getting hammered is essential to the roasting of a leg of lamb. I added that part to the recipe myself.
Comments
It is early morning and I am dying to eat pretty much everything you have or are about to cook. Especially the lamb. Can I come live with you?
Posted by: grace at January 8, 2008 6:48 AM
My Williams-Sonoma risotto cookbook has a recipe for risotto balls (suppli), which does involve rolling them in breadcrumbs. Want me to email it to you? I've never made it and can't vouch for it, but their risotto pancake recipe is pretty good (you just drop big spoonfuls in a frying pan and smash them with a spatula; I seem to recall they held together pretty well).
Mmm, now I'm hungry. Time to go make bread.
Posted by: Margar at January 8, 2008 11:59 AM
I am, without a doubt, the luckiest man alive.
Posted by: Nathan at January 8, 2008 1:37 PM
OMG. This was seriously the best meal that I've ever eaten at home. Seared duck breast with a walnut oil/shallot vinaigrette, scalloped potatoes and a beautiful green salad with garlic vinaigrette. The description doesn't do it justice, but trust me, my wife is a goddess.
Posted by: Nathan at January 8, 2008 9:19 PM
My dear, as time passes it becomes ever so apparent that you and your hubby are ever so made for each other.
And might I say, what a wonderfully sensuous post.
Bon Appetit
Posted by: Bob at January 9, 2008 10:06 PM