KK Millet

Scallop Gratin

Given that no one in my household is making any income at the moment, Christmas was necessarily a smaller affair this year. My family held ourselves to stocking stuffers and a couples Secret Santa, and RJ and I agreed that we would not exchange gifts (not that he listened, the bastard!). One of my favorite gifts I gave this year was a Christmas Eve feast for my mother-in-law, Patti, and her partner Roger. I planned out a multi-course menu and RJ and I worked out wine pairings from some of the bottles we brought back from Napa.

The menu included whipped brie from The French Laundry Cookbook and various bruschetta toppings from the A16: Food + Wine cookbook, paired with a 2005 Schramsberg Blanc des Blancs. This was followed by a bite of scallop gratin (see below) and a square of crispy roasted pork belly with apple compote from the The River Cottage Meat Book, paired with a 2006 Cakebread Napa Valley Chardonnay. We then had the FABULOUS arugula, beet, and fennel salad with olive dressing from A16 and Gordon Hammersley’s Roast Chicken (recipe to follow soon), paired with a 1997 Shafer Merlot (to die for!). Dessert was the vanilla walnut soup from the French Laundry (if you are skeptical, read this post from Carol Blymire) and crepes which failed miserably, though fortunately we were not hungry at that point!

Not all of our pictures came out very well – we were too busy cooking, eating, and enjoying one another’s company. However, the stars of the show have already become regulars in my kitchen, so if I don’t have pictures from Christmas Eve, I will share photos from other evenings when I made the same dish. For example, during our holiday feast, I made the following recipe using just one large sea scallop per person, rather than a handful of bay scallops, but below I have reproduced the full-size recipe from the Barefoot Contessa. I actually have never made it with bay scallops — usually I will just chop up the large ones, but I have since found out how much cheaper the little mini scallops are, and will certainly try them the next time!

Bay Scallop Gratin, from Barefoot Contessa Back to Basics

6 tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temperature
6 large garlic cloves, minced
2 medium shallots, minced
2 ounces thinly sliced prosciutto di Parma, minced
4 tablespoons minced fresh parsley, plus extra for garnish
2 tablespoons freshly squeezed lemon juice
2 tablespoons Pernod (In absence of Pernod, you might try adding minced fennel bulb to the butter mixture to add the anise flavor)
2 teaspoons kosher salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
6 tablespoons good olive oil
1/2 cup panko
6 tablespoons dry white wine
2 pound fresh bay scallops
Lemon, for garnish

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F. Place 6 (6-inch round) gratin dishes on a sheet pan.

To make the topping, place the butter in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment (you can also use a hand mixer). With the mixer on low speed, add the garlic, shallot, prosciutto, parsley, lemon juice, Pernod, salt, and pepper and mix until combined. With the mixer still on low, add the olive oil slowly as though making mayonnaise, until combined. Fold the panko in with a rubber spatula and set aside.

Preheat the broiler, if it’s separate from your oven.

Place 1 tablespoon of the wine in the bottom of each gratin dish. With a small sharp knife, remove the white muscle and membrane from the side of each scallop and discard. Pat the scallops dry with paper towels and distribute them among the 3 dishes. Spoon the garlic butter evenly over the top of the scallops. Bake for 10 to 12 minutes, until the topping is golden and sizzling and the scallops are barely done. If you want the top crustier, place the dishes under the broiler for 2 minutes, until browned. Finish with a squeeze of fresh lemon juice and a sprinkling of chopped parsley and serve immediately with crusty French bread.

I Want Chocolate!

Chocolate brownie

I realized over the weekend that my first blogiversary came and went with no fanfare, public or private. Indeed, it has been over a year since I started detailing my eating habits online, posing my food for pictures, and attempting to cook my way through an entire cookbook library. It has been a wonderful experience thus far, and it is sad to me that only a year into the project my posting frequency has fallen off so dramatically. I can keep explaining to everyone that grad school is frickin’ HARD, but that’s boring and obvious. With the holidays coming up, cooking and eating will no doubt become a priority again, and you will see it all here! Until then — we must celebrate with chocolate.

This amazing recipe comes from a cookbook I picked up in Les Galleries Lafayette in Paris. Whether my French language skills were advanced or pitifully wanting at the time, I could understand the cover photo of a pan of brownies with multiple spoons digging in, and the simple exclamation that makes up its title: Je veux du chocolat! (I Want Chocolate!) with little effort. So when I figured out that my blog’s one year anniversary had been achieved, I decided that I, too, wanted chocolate. Though the book contains myriad iterations of chocolate confections – mousse, cake, cookies, ice cream, etc. – this one has always been a favorite of both mine and my mother-in-law’s. It is quite simple to pull together, and is surprising in its rich cocoa flavor and dense, moist center.

All I ask is that once you unmold the perfection that is this dessert, and grab your fork and vanilla ice cream, you dedicate your first bite to the perpetuation of FromMyTable.com. A votre sante!

Gateau au Chocolat Fondant de Nathalie (Nathalie’s Melting Chocolate Cake), from Je Veux du Chocolat
(serves 8 at least!)

Please excuse the irregular measurements — I am translating from the French here!
7 oz. (200 grams) bittersweet chocolate (I used 70% cocoa)
1 stick plus 6 Tbs. (200 grams) butter
5 eggs
1 Tbs. flour
1 1/4 cup + 1 Tbs. (250 grams) sugar

Heat the oven to 375 degrees (190 C.) and grease an 8- or 9-inch diameter springform pan or tart pan with removable base.

Melt the butter and chocolate together in a microwave or double boiler. Add the sugar and set aside to cool slightly.

One by one, add the eggs, stirring well with a wooden spoon after each egg. Finally, add the flour and stir until smooth.

Pour mixture into the prepared baking pan and cook for 22 minutes. The cake should be still lightly trembling in the middle. Take out of the oven, unmold quickly, and let cake cool and rest on a rack until ready to serve. Bon Appetit!!

Old Bay Shrimp Pasta

Old-Bay-shrimp pasta

I have a new book called The Flavor Bible. It is very cool — it is an index of ingredients, cross-referenced with complementary ingredients. For example, if you were to look up “Cabbage”, you will get a list like this:

apples and apple cider
BACON
bay leaf
beef
bell peppers, red
butter, unsalted
CARAWAY SEEDS
carrots
celery: leaves, salt, seeds
Champagne
cheese: cheddar, feta, goat, Parmesan, Swiss, Taleggio, Teleme
chestnuts
(etc.)

The flavor pairings are ranked by how many chefs and food experts mentioned the pairing. Capital letters with an asterisk (*) are the “holy grail” pairings, like mint and lamb or white chocolate and raspberries. Capital letters are very strong, familiar pairings. Bolded are well accepted pairings, and the rest were mentioned by one or more experts. The book also supplies flavor affinities — several ingredients often used together such as mustard + shallots + oil + vinegar — and combinations to avoid, such as coffee and lavender.

I haven’t yet used the book as a reference for my improvisations, though I did use the principle. I was staring at some great looking shrimp and wondering what to do with them that I hadn’t tried before. The only thing I could think of, however, was Old Bay seasoning, since regardless of how I decide to cook shrimp, my dear husband always douses them with Old Bay anyway. Rather than fight his system, I embraced it.

I decided to use the cooking method for my salt-and-pepper shrimp and replace Chinese 5-spice with Old Bay, and the chiles, garlic and ginger with, um, more garlic. Then I used the same pan to make a shallot and white wine sauce The result was fantastic. A little spicy, but rich and buttery too. As it happens, when I looked up shrimp in the Flavor Bible, Old Bay seasoning appeared in bold letters. Definitely some wisdom in the new tome!

Old Bay Shrimp Pasta for 2

3/4 lb. shrimp, peeled and deveined
1 Tbs. cornstarch
1-2 tsp. Old Bay seasoning (to taste)
2 Tbs. olive oil
1/2 lb. spaghetti-like pasta
Butter
3 cloves garlic, chopped fine
1 shallot, chopped fine or sliced thinly
1 Tbs. flour
3/4 c. white wine
chicken broth (optional)
1 lemon
1 1/2 Tbs. chopped parsley

Put a pot of water to boil on the stove. In a small saucepan, bring oil and garlic up to a simmer over medium-low heat. Set aside.

Old-Bay-garlic-oil

Dry the shrimp on paper towels. In a medium-sized bowl, mix the cornstarch and Old Bay. In a large saute pan, heat 1 Tbs. of the garlic-infused oil, reserving the garlic solids. Toss shrimp in the Old Bay mixture to coat. Immediately place the shrimp in the oil, one by one. Cook shrimp until brown on one side (about 2 minutes), then flip to brown the second side (about a minute). Remove shrimp to a pan or bowl and cover with foil to keep warm.

Old-bay-shrimp

Add pasta to boiling water. In the same pan used for the shrimp, add a tablespoon of butter and let melt over medium heat. Then, add the shallots and garlic and cook until softened, about 2-3 minutes. Sprinkle flour over the shallots and stir over heat for about a minute. Raise the heat to medium-high and add the white wine. Let boil until reduced and slightly thickened — should be pourable but also thick enough to coat the back of a spoon. If you don’t seem to have enough sauce to coat the pasta, add in a half cup of chicken stock and let boil for a minute or so until proper consistency is regained. Swirl in butter to your taste.

Old-bay-sauce

Add cooked pasta to sauce in the pan, and toss to coat. Add shrimp and sprinkle with parsley and squeeze of lemon juice. Plate and serve. Delicious!

Pot Roast

There is a great scene in Wedding Crashers where a middle-aged, pajama-clad Will Ferrell yells to his mom (who is in the kitchen) from his seat in front of the TV, “MA! The meatloaf! We want it NOW!” Whenever I make the retro dishes that RJ loves so much — Meatloaf, Beef Stroganoff, Mac n’ Cheese, Pot Roast, I always think of that scene. Something about being that faceless mother figure with a boy who only eats meat and noodles. Strange, I know. Anyhoo… this pot roast is full of retro goodness, complete with slow cooker appliance and a can of Campbell’s soup. I may be more than a little hypocritical, given this previous post and my known distaste for processed food products, but for some reason I just really wanted to try this recipe. And it came out really well. I feel shame…

I have a couple versions of pot roast in my arsenal, but this one is great for the slow cooker. The tender meat and the beefy-tomato sauce basically epitomize comfort food, especially when draped over fresh linguini pasta (from Dave’s). Even my recalcitrant husband ate up all of his carrots since, as he said, they were the perfect size. Finally, the swirl of balsamic vinegar added right before serving added just the right amount of acidic zip to wake up the palate. I highly recommend this recipe for two reasons: dinner #1 and dinner #2 (aka Leftovers). Dinner #2 involves stirring shredded leftover pot roast into a homemade tomato sauce with red wine and lots of garlic. A healthy dose of parmesan cheese and a side of garlic bread are all that’s needed to round out the meal (for RJ anyway — I would recommend some salad or greens as well!). Here’s a look at that ragú on cheese ravioli:

Easy Pot Roast with Rich Tomato Gravy, adapted from The 150 Best Slow Cooker Recipes
(Serves 6-8)

3-4 lbs. beef pot roast (cross rib, rump, or chuck roast)
1 Tbs. vegetable oil
2 onions, thinly sliced
3 stalks celery, peeled and thinly sliced
3 large carrots, peeled and cut into 1/2 inch cubes
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 tsp. dry mustard
1/2 tsp. dried thyme leaves
1 tsp. salt
1/4 to 1/2 tsp. cracked black peppercorns
2 Tbs. flour
1 can (10 oz.) condensed tomato soup
1/2 c. condensed beef broth (undiluted)
1 Tbs. Worcestershire sauce
1 Tbs. packed brown sugar (optional)
2 Tbs. balsamic or red wine vinegar (optional)

Pat roast dry with paper towel. In a skillet, heat oil over medium-high heat. Add roast and cook, turning, until brown on all sides, about 5 minutes per side. Transfer beef to slow cooker insert.

pot-roast-browned

Reduce heat to medium. Add onions, celery, and carrots to pan and cook, stirring, until vegetables are softened. Add garlic, mustard, thyme, salt and pepper and cook, stirring for one minutes. Sprinkle mixture with flour and stir. Add tomato soup and beef broth and stir to combine, cooking until thickened. Stir in Worcestershire sauce.

pot-roast-sauce

Pour sauce mixture over roast, cover and cook on Low setting for 10 to 12 hours or on High setting for 5 to 6 hours. Remove roast from slow cooker and place on serving platter. Stir in brown sugar and vinegar, if using, to pan juices. Pour sauce over roast or serve in a separate sauceboat.

pot-roast-done pot-roast-gravy

If you want to plan ahead you can cook the vegetables and sauce the night before, and store it in the refrigerator. The next morning, brown roast (this step may also be skipped if you are really pressed for time, though the browning really adds flavor), put the meat in the slow cooker, then pour the sauce over the beef.

Another option would be to cook the whole recipe the day before you’re serving and store the sauce and meat together in the fridge. The next night, slice the roast and place slices in a casserole dish, covered with the sauce. Bake in a 350 degree oven until warmed through (or simmer on the stovetop until piping hot).