Some Change Makes for a Little Excitment

So with the pork vs duck fiasco behind us, the pork meat actually made for a delicious dinner. Not only was the diner fantastic, but the guest had an amazing time. I think this was the longest Thursday we have had up to now, 1:30, especially considering that one of the guest had to wake up at 5:30. (as a follow-up to this, he woke up at 8...)

So for the recipes of the night:

Chilled Avocado Soup with Truffled Buttermilk Foam
1 1/2 cup of buttermilk (chilled and well shaken)

3 ripe avocados

1/4 cup of heavy cream

1 chopped chipotle chili

1/2 cup of crumpled pan fried panceta

3 table spoons of whit truffle oil

Salt & pepper

In a food processor add the buttermilk and the chopped up avocado and begin to mix. slowly add the heavy cream and the chipotle. As soup begins to thicken, turn power up on the processor and leave mixing for abou 2 minutes to make it smooth.

If you have a espresso machine at home, or if you have a whipper, add about 1/4 - 1/2 cup of additional buttermilk with the truffle oil. Create a foam that will go on top of the soup for additional flavor when served.

Sprinkle the panceta over the soup.

Pork Sirloins with Malbec Reduction Sauce

6 Pork Sirloins
1 bottle of Malbec wine (don't go for the cheap stuff, if you won't drink it don't cook with it)

2 shallots

4 tb spoons of butter

Sauce:

Melt 2 tb spoons of butter in a saucepan and add the chopped shallots. Stir until soft. Add one entire bottle of malbec wine and let reduce for about 20 to 30 minutes over medium heat. The wine will reduce by 3/4.

Pork:

Preheat the oven at 350°. Melt the remaining butter in a large pan over high heat and place the salted pork loins. Sear them for about 1 minute on each side. Place in over for about 10 minutes until well done. Remember pork should never be pink inside, always white.

To serve, cut the pork into inch thick slices and serve on plat in fan style. Then add the wine reduction over the meat. Sprinkle some sauce around the plate for added decoration.

Red Quinoa with Tomato, Avocado & Mozzarella
1 cup of red quinoa
2 chopped avocados
1 halved cherry tomatoes
1/2 cup of fresh mozzarella chopped in cubes.
2 cups of chicken broth
2 tb of butter

Previous to cooking the quinoa, rinse the quinoa thoroughly with water. Once clean, place quinoa in the pot under medium heat, add some salt and pepper. Begin by adding ¾ of a cup of chicken broth into quinoa and let it absorb the liquid. Continue to add more broth until the quinoa has slowly risen and absorbed all the liquid. Approximately 20 minutes.
Once cooked, add the tomato, avocado and mozzarella and stir in . The heat of the cooked quinoa will absorb the flavors of these ingredients and make a delicious dish.

The Healthier Side of Life

What an awesome time. Sometimes it is really fun to write in retrospect, why? Well because before every dinner I am always running. Always with the adrenaline levels high, yet the stress levels are low. The adventure begins the moment I step out of work. The dash to the market (usually Whole Foods, but after today I think Chelsea Market is by far the best place to go in New York City for crazy ingredients), running through the aisles to grab all the ingredients as quickly as I can. I always have a list written, ALWAYS, if not I will get distracted in the amazing truffle oil or the fresh sea bass or what not. I need to focus, this place is the closest thing to a playground that I have had since I was 6 years old. Veggies, check, fruit, check, meats or seafood check. Do I need some saffron butter? No, but at that gives me some amazing ideas for the future! Regardless, the point is I never have enough time to write in real time before the dinner. The moment we close the door after our last guest has left there is an immediate rush of "Wow, what a fantastic success!" And that is the energy we use to communicate with. So again... What an awesome night.

Challenges are always fun. And every week we receive people with different dietary needs or restrictions. Its part of our plan to adapt to others instead of other adapting to our food. At the end of the day I prefer for everyone to enjoy their dinners rather than leave a plate half full of food. So this time around, when I heard we had a vegetarian coming, I decided to have the appetizer dedicated to her needs, and it wasn't a salad. That morning while running, I had a crazy inspiration to make a ceviche, but instead of your regular ceviche I would make a veggie ceviche. In my head it made sense, now it just needed to execute it well.

As for the main dish, I wasn't going to sacrifice the protein for everyone, but I wasn't going to let our vegetarian suffer either. So I made a delicious zucchini pasta (imagine the zucchini cut jullien style, mimicking a linguini) as a side (main dish for our vegetarian) with turkey-bacon wrapped scallops. Imagine this combined with some amazing champagne, malbec and great friends, the perfect combination for a great night.

Now for all of you reading this, and I really hope there are a lot of you reading this. Please let me know what you think about the recipes. If you try them out, let me know how they went. I would love your feedback. We finally fixed the feedback options below, so you can leave it as anonymous if you would like. Oh, and by the way, thanks for reading!

Here are the recipes:

Veggie Ceviche

2 green tomatos

10 baby corns

1 red onion

1 white pear

1 cup of edamame beans

6 limes squeezed

1/2 cup of fresh orange juice.

3 tb spoons of fresh cut cilantro

3 tb spoons of fresh thyme

3 tb spoons of fresh rosemary

The preparation of this is quite simple, the only real trick is in you mastery with the knife. All ingredients must be sliced very very thin, to the degree in which its almost transparent. Nothing is cooked, steamed, or baked, thats what the citric acids of the lime and orange are for. Begin by placing the lime juice and the orange juice in a mixing bowl. Then cut the red onion as thins as you can place it into the juice mix. After that, cut and mix the rest of the veggies as thin as you can and mix it with the onions. The baby carrots might be more difficult to slice, so try to at least cut in half. The edamame beans is the only veggie that you have to steam, but after steaming cool quickly by rinsing through ice cold water. Split the edamame in half (can be done easily by hand). Once all veggies are mixed in, add the chopped cilantro, thyme and rosemary. Let the mix sit in a fridge for about an hour, this will allow the lime juice and orange juice to seep into the veggies.

Zucchini Pasta

1 green zucchini

1 yellow zucchini

1 lemongrass

3 servings of spaghetti (about half of a box)

Salt

water

Another very simple dish to prepare where the most important part of the preparation is the actual cutting of the veggie. Cut the zucchinis jullien style (into long thin straw like pieces) and steam for about 4 minutes in salted water with the lemongrass (cut in half longwise).

Cook the past in boiling water with salt (do not worry about adding a lot of salt, this will flavor the pasta) to al dente.

Mix the zucchinis and the pasta together. To serve, twist the pasta with a large serving fork onto the plate and make sure the zucchini (which will be soft and flexible) is wrapped around to give it the feeling of additional pasta.

You may see this plate, a pasta with no additional sauce as bland, but the taste all lies in the preparation of each ingredient. You will end up with a very flavorful combination.

Turkey bacon wrapped Scallops

18 Scallops

9 pieces of turkey bacon

3 tb spoons of fresh thyme

3 tb spoons of fresh rosemary

1 cup of orange juice

4 tb spoons of butter

4 tb spoons of olive oil

1 shallot

3 tb spoons of aged balsamic (about 12 to 15 years)

For the sauce, chop the shallot up and place it into a sauce pan with half of the butter melted. Add a pinch of salt then the orange juice with the olive oil. Let the mix reduce a bit. Very simple, but the olive oil and the oranje juice should create a great flavorful mix.

For the scallops, cut the bacon in half lengthwise (most turkey bacon is very wide) and wrap each scallop with the raw bacon. Put a toothpick through the bacon and the scallop. Heat up the skillet and place the butter to melt. Salt each scallop with a small pinch of sea salt and a mix of rosemary and thyme. Place the scallops in the hot skillet salted face down and repeat mixture on the other side. Cook each side for about 5 minutes (bacon will cook through, do not worry).

When serving the scallops, be sure to remove the toothpicks (thats what I am actually doing in the picture above). Sprinkle the orange sauce on each scallop and the aged balsamic after that. Sprinkle some on the empty plate for decoration purpose.

Celebrating Independence through food!

One of the unexpected results that we have created through this great experiment of ours is the reevaluation of human connections. We have created a catalyst for communication to happen in person and through the virtual world in which we all live in and where you are reading this right now.

After reading our close friend and last weeks guest’s comments about her experience at Worth Street (http://latinasypunto.wordpress.com/2010/07/04/bringing-the-online-world-to-the-real-world/) I realized that we are officially trying to bridge the gap of interactivity and personal interconnectivity that the internet has created. Then today my mom sends me a text message with the following message (translated from Spanish to English) “People are in great need of support from others. With great need to connect and further understand ourselves.” This reverberated through my head… are we really that simple creatures that all we need in order to satisfy some of our basic humans needs is to connect with other and find support in them? Well, if our Latina blogger friend is right, then I am very happy to offer a “real” connection to all of you out there. We are all about the connection, the joy that it brings to enjoy a great dinner amongst friends.

Enough ranting and self-promotion… and now for the recipes of our patriotic night:

Corn on the Cob with Chili Butter

6 Sweet corn on the cobs
3 tb spoons of Butter (room temperature)
2 tb spoons of chili powder (I used chile de arbol for additional spiciness)

Boil (or steam) the corn for about 5 – 7 minutes, until nice and tender. Drain them from the pot and quickly pass them through ice cold water. This will stop the corn from continuing to cook. Place a wooden skewer through the bottom and serve.

While the corn is cooking, prepare the butter. Place the soft butter in a bowl and sprinkle the chili powder on top. With a spoon, begin to mix the chili into the butter by pressing into it. After about a minute of mixing and pressing you should end up with a red colored mix.

When serving, the corn, add a piece of butter to the top.

“Pulled Pork” Chicken with arepas

2 chicken breast with bone

For the arepas: (not traditional recipe)
1 ¼ cups of chicken broth
1 cup of water
2 tablespoon olive oil
1 ½ cups masa harina (special flour for arepas purchased at Whole Foods)
½ cup of fresh parmesan cheese
1 t spoon cumin

For the BBQ style sauce:
1 tb spoon of butter
2 tb spoons of chipotle
1 cup of white wine
1 yellow onion
½ cup of whipping cream
½ cup of goat cheese
1 tb spoon of liquid hickory smoke

Boil the chicken in salted water. About 10 minutes. While chicken cooks prepare the sauce and the arepas. Both should take about 10-15 minutes to prepare. Once chicken in ready, drain and keep the broth to use it in the arepa mixture. Pass chicken through cold water and begin pulling the chicken meat from the bones. The result will be like shredded chicken. Keep in a bowl.

For sauce, chop up the onion and place into sauce pan with melting butter. Cook until sof. Add the cup of white wine and let sit for 5-7 minutes as it reduces. Add remainder of ingredients, and mix well. Once prepared, place through food processor or blender until liquid. Return the sauce into the saucepan and mix chicken into it.

For the arepas, bring the broth, water, salt and 1 tb spoon of salt to a boil in a saucepan. Pour the broth mix into a separate bowl and let it cool a bit. Mix in the masa harina and the cheese ands tir until you get the consistency of a batter. Let mix set and cool for some minutes.
Once cooled, begin to form small balls and flatten. My trick was to place ball inside a zip lock bag and flatten with a cutting board. Then cook in hot pan with remaining olive oil. About 1 minute per side.

To serve, place one arepa on plate, serve chicken and add another arepa on top.

Fried Zucchini

2 zucchinis
1 cup of panko bread crumbs
2 eggs
2 cups of cooking oil for frying (canola)

Cut zucchinis julienne style, thickness as preferred but about ½ inch thick. Heat the oil in a frying pan. In two different bowls add the eggs and the bread crumbs. Beat the eggs thoroughly and pass the zucchinis into the eggs and let them soak. Then place on top of the bread crumbs until covered. Place into the hot oil and let fry for about 1 minute. Remove zucchini and let them sit on a paper towel while you cook them all in order to collect and residual oil.

3 Cheese Mac and cheese

2 tb spoons butter

1 leek chopped (only white and pale green portion)

2 shallots, chopped

1 ½ cups dry white wine

½ cup whipping cream

1 cup Taleggio cheese cut into small cubes

1 cup of mascarpone cheese

½ cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese

1 tablespoon sliced whole black truffles

1 pound small elbow macaroni

¾ cup of sliced prosciutto, chopped

Crumb topping

1 cup fresh panko breadcrumbs

2 tablespoons butter

This recipe is full of very delicate flavor, and you need to be careful not to overpower one or the other. Begin by cooking the pasta in salted water until ‘al dente’. While pasta is cooking, melt the butter in a saucepan, add chopped shallots, leeks and a pinch of salt. Once soft, add the white wine and let it reduce for 10 minutes. Then add the cheeses into the mix along with the cream. Pasta should be done by now, so drain and sauce to pasta. Remove from heat.

I like to have my prosciutto a bit crunchy, so I toasted it a little on a separate pan then added it to the mac & cheese. For the truffles, slice them thinly and mix into the warm pasta, this allows for the full flavor of the truffle to be released without overpowering anything.

For the breadcrumbs, on the same pan that you toasted the prosciutto, melt the butter then add the breadcrumbs. The crumbs absorb all the butter and then begin to toast until brown.

When serving the mac & cheese, add the bread crumbs to the top.