Dinner #29 - Croquetas, Duck and Chocolate: A Beautiful Combination

It gets very difficult to create these menu's thinking "do all the dishes work together in perfect synchronicity?" Sometimes you just have to let go and go with it, sometimes I just have to trust my gut feeling for what a menu should be. Dinner #29 was a great example of this. When we created the menu, it was very difficult to see how the appetizer worked with the entree and the dessert. But the end product was fantastic. 

I won't bore you with the details, you see I have to write 4 more posts after this one, but I let the menu be kind of dictated with the ingredients this round. I walked into Dickson's Farmhouse in Chelsea market and my eyes landed directly on one piece of meat that I have never seen there before... wild boar pancetta! How do you say no to that. Well maybe its because I am a foodie through and through. But that is where the croquetas were born. Wild boar and goat cheese croquetas.

The duck breasts were right next to the pancetta so that was an easy decision. The dessert was an easy choice seeing as how we had a brazilian chocolate addict. We prepared the Brazilian "brigadeiros" warm  chocolate cakes. 

The croquetas were prepared in the traditional manner. Olive oil and pancetta grease was heated until smoking, 3/4 cups of flour was added and cooked for about 3 minutes. After this, 1.5 cups of warm milk and .5 cups of chicken broth were added and stirred for about 5-7 minutes. The pre-cooked pancetta and the goat cheese was added at the end and stirred for 2 minutes. The mixture was then allowed to sit and cool for about 1 hour and in the fridge for another hour. Then with a greased up hand, the croquetas were rolled out into small balls, dipped in eggs and then in the bread crumbs. Once all were rolled out, they were deep fried. about 2-3 minutes each. 

The duck was presented in two different styles as we had two different seatings for this special edition. One at 8 PM and one at 11 PM. We had a couple of friends that arrived really late after a broadway show. The second picture is how I served them, and personally my favorite.

Frozen "brigadeiros" were added to the cake batter before placed in the oven. Brigadeiros are basically condensed milk with chocolate (whats not to love?).

mmmmmmmmmmmmmm.... 'nough said.

From Worth Street to NoHo: Dinner for 20 People

December 16th marked an amazing night for Worth Kitchen. It was the first time that we were asked to take the concept outside of our 4 walls and into a brand new space. We had the complete and utter privilege of cooking in the amazing penthouse of Red Car, a well known and very professional post production house dedicated primarily to the advertising industry. It was a very natural fit for us and our guests were mostly all advertising professionals.

We are used to cooking and plating for 8 to 9 people on a weekly basis. Tamy is a huge help when we have these dinners, but the work usually is not so overwhelming. This time around, no amount of prepping could really prepare us for how crazy it is to plate 20 dishes all at the same time and have them served hot. Tamy was not only a huge help, she was indispensable. I am lucky to have found not only a life partner so great as her but such a strong support in the moments when I most need her.

What we both most loved about this dinner is the fact that the Worth Kitchen concept still survives outside of our intimate setting. 20 perfect strangers came together and for one night were great friends. I like to think that great food and wine can spark any type of conversation, and this case was not any different.

Our learnings: 1) Prep, prep, prep! I had everything cut and in containers the night before. The moment I arrived to cook, 70% of the work was already done. This made a huge difference in the final product. 2) At events of 20+ we will need more help, especially for the plating. Feb 3rd, we will need at least 2 additional hands in the kitchen! 3) Always have fun. I think this goes for everything we do and what everybody does. If you can do it with a smile on your face you already won!

The menu:
Amuse Bouche 
Butternut squash & rosemary with honey toasted pinenuts

Appetizer
Fennel salad w/ shallot & champagne vinaigrette, parmesan chips and valencia orange slices

Entree
Braised short ribs with barolo reduction, ricotta polenta & balsamic marinated portobello mushrooms

Dessert
Warm chocolate cake with a vanilla cream injection

Some quick pics...

A Tour of the World... With Part of My Thumb Missing!

So yes, dinner #26 was very fun and all. As Tamy mentioned we were being filmed for a very cool project.  I guess somewhere in between the lights, the camera, the focusing on the characters, the not focusing on the camera crew and producer, cutting up my veggies, is where I lost track of what I was doing and took a knife straight through the upper part of my thumb. Luckily the cut was not as bad as it sounds, and I managed to keep things together (literally) and continue on with the show!

Well, for the show we had a great menu planned and let me remind you that we have had this menu ready for two weeks. This was the dinner that was cancelled at the very last minute due to my family emergency.
The menu was the following:

Phylo stuffed with feta cheese and capers accompanied with tri-color olives and mint sauce

Lamb sausage and eggplant stuffed pasta shell with fresh tomato sauce

Lamb chops with bordelaise-style sauce and mushroom and chipotle risotto

Warm chocolate cake with melted brigadeiro (brazilian chocolate candy)

The picture speak for themselves!

Green Olives, Sun Dried Tomatos & Kalamata Olives

Stuffed phylo with feta and cappers

Lamb sausage and olives stuffed in a large pasta shell

Lamb chops with delicious reduced stock with mushroom & chipotle risotto

Warm chocolate cake stuffed with brigadeiro accompanied by chocolate and vanilla sauce

This was the photo taken seconds after cutting the finger. You can see in the background the blood... luckily no food got contaminated.

A Night Full of Nuts... Oh and Food As Well

There is very little more that I could add to dinner #22 that Tamy has not mentioned in her previous post. In fact, I won't even give it a shot as she pretty much created a great example of how that night went down. The truth is that it was truly a night full of surprises and one for the record books. I have never laughed and cried so much in a very long time. And agreed, there are many variables and excuses that helped, but there is a lot to be said regarding group chemistry and energy. Call me esoteric or what you will, but there was some amazing energy in that room that night. It seemed as if everyone gathered around were long lost friends... all it took was half an hour to get to know one another and then all of a sudden friends were catching up on everyone's lives. BUT, none of the guest had ever meet each other, nor did they have anything in common, no shared thread. 8 people, completely different, but coming together in almost perfect harmony.

Energy, that inexplicable force that draws us together, the pure essence that we cannot see, nor taste, nor smell but we can feel it. That is how dinner #22 can best be defined... that plus the fact that we were all completely nuts!

And now for the menu:

Appetizer:
3 Spreads on quinoa crackers.
- Spaghetti squash with pine nuts
- Smokey artichoke with pistachios
- Goat cheese and walnuts

Entree:
Lamb kabobs with pistachios on a bed of almond basmati rice
Brussels Sprouts cooked in pancetta oil and honey

Dessert:
Warm chocolate cake with a serving of pecan/Madeira caramel

As I dish the spreads, I try to create some sort of design with the goat cheese and walnuts, only to realize that I probably would not make a great pastry chef. However it tasted delicious. 

I finally figured out a great recipe and use for the quinoa. About a month ago I tried to make quinoa cakes, which proved not as successful as I had envisioned. This time around I created crackers and they came out delicious. The (red and white) quinoa crackers are topped with almonds, accompanied by the three different spreads. The recipe is not that hard but a bit long for the crackers. If there is enough demand I will post the recipe here.

The raw kabobs just before they went on the grill. You can see the the pistachios all over the meat. The recipe is very easy straight forward, but we had secret ingredient that came straight from Greece. 2lbs of ground lamb with a cup of chopped up pistachios, salt, and the special spice mix (it included mint and marjoram). Mix all the ingredients together, then roll into separate pieces and place the stick through it as above. Grill the meat for about 10 minutes on medium high heat. Make sure to turn the meat continuously to make sure all the meat is cooked through.

The final presentation of the meat laying on a bed of basmati rice with almonds and brussels sprouts sauteed with pancetta and honey. The mix was very different but absolutely delicious. When preparing the brussels sprouts, make sure to cut them in half and peel off the top layer of leaves. The pancetta was cooked first in order to release all the grease. I removed the 4 pieces of pancetta sauteed the sprouts then added it back chopped up into tiny pieces for flavor.

The warm chocolate cake was a great finale to the dinner. What really made this plate special was the pecan/Madeira caramel that we served apart (but meant to mix together). This recipe is simple. 1 cup of Madeira wine and about 1/2 cup of sugar. Let the mixture boil down to a caramel. Add the pecans and let cool down a bit in order to get a smooth caramel texture.

And this is the nutty group! Thank you all for making this such an amazing night!

A very special call out to the wines of the night need to be made! The following were the top three wines of the night in no particular order:

An unfiltered white from the Alsace region of France. The Binner was Amazing!

An amazing red from Lebanon, yes I know Lebanon. Spectacular and full bodied. Chateau Musar

The Donati was the clear winner of the night. Nobody expects the flavors that come out of that bottle. Its somewhere in between a sparkaling white and a beer. Don't believe me? Get one at Frankly Wines!