For some reason, I followed an online recipe for my first attempt rather than going with my inspiration for this whole project, Eric Ripert. I know, I seem to be obsessed at this point, but he really cooks how I want to cook and the recipes work!

So, I didn’t make the sauce or any of the accompaniments. I just wanted the duck preparation from him. It was like making a steak: pan sear then finish in the oven. So simple. So perfectly cooked.

I cut the wings and legs off the duck and put them in the freezer for another time. I cut the breast off, leaving the bones attached. I seared the breasts skin-side down in a hot pan, on high heat, for about 6 minutes. I drained off the fat, turned the breasts over and put it in a 400° oven for 9 minutes. Took it out, let it rest for 8 minutes. Carved it off the bone, sliced it and served it over israeli couscous with pine nuts and parsley.

Now, full disclosure here…I have a cold. I can’t taste a damn thing. This is killing me. However, texture is everything right now. The texture of the duck was *PERFECT*. I will do this again when my sense of taste and smell returns (god, I hope that’s soon!). I do need to figure out how to render out the fat though, there was too much between the perfectly crispy skin and the meat. This duck challenge is fun.

I simmered lemongrass, ginger, shallots, garlic, lime rind and chicken (I didn’t have any chicken stock made but I had a couple of drumsticks in the freezer so I tossed those in). I let that simmer for about an hour. It would have been better if I had much longer but I didn’t and it was quite flavorful even after such a short time.

Next I skinned the salmon and put it in a dish with garlic, cilantro, a little oil and a splash of white wine. I turned it a few times while I was working on everything else.

I didn’t have any vermicelli but I did have spaghetti so I broke a handful of that into thirds and boiled it up. When it was done I tossed it with cilantro, shallots, lime juice and a little olive oil.

I removed the salmon from the marinade and dried it off. I wanted the flavor but since I was going to be searing it on high heat, I need to get the garlic off as much as I could so it wouldn’t burn. I heated canola oil until it was almost smoking and added the fish. I let it cook on the first side for 3-4 minutes, until it had a nice brown crust starting to happen. Then I flipped it an only kept it about another minute on that side.

To serve I put a small pile of sugar snap peas, cut into 1/2 inch pieces. I placed the pasta on top of that. Scattered some sunflower sprouts from our wonderful microgreen and mushroom folks at the farmer’s market around the pasta. Topped that with the salmon.

I strained the simmering broth and ladeled that over the pasta. To add some crunch I added a few more sprouts to the top, not in the broth. Then a generous squeeze of lime juice over the whole thing.

1/2 lb italian sausage
1 chicken cut into 8 pieces

1/2 a yellow onion, thinly sliced
1 fennel bulb, thinly sliced
2 celery stalks, chopped
3 cloves garlic, thinly sliced

2 1/2 cups white wine

8 oz orzo

I used my oval dutch oven for this…you need something big enough to nestle the chicken down in in one layer and it’s all done on the stovetop.

First, brown your sausage. Let it leave the fatty, cruchy bits in the pan. Remove the sausage w/ a slotted spoon. Then brown your chicken in the sausage fat. See, it’s good already! Once the chicken is browned, remove that too.

Add your onions, celery and fennel and leave it the heck alone for as long as you can stand it on medium heat. Don’t let them burn, per se, but get all that flavor toasting in the pan. Once the bottom of the pan is so browned you can’t stand it, add just enough wine to deglaze (abot 1/2 a cup). Let that simmer just a few minutes.

Nestle your chicken pieces down into the fennel-onion-celery goodness, add your sausage back in, add your garlic then pour the rest of the white wine into the pan. Depending on the size of the chicken and the pot, you may need more than 2 cups. You want it to come about 1/2 way up the chicken pieces. Cover and let it simmer on low or medium-low for about 30-40 minutes or until the chicken is cooked through.

Serve over orzo tossed with some butter and olive oil.

It’s warming, filling, delicious and perfect for a cold night.

Frying up the Crab Cakes

This is a variation on crab cakes I’ve done in the past. This time I only sauteed up shallots and garlic and threw a little chopped arugula in at the last few seconds. Added salt, pepper and chopped thyme. The hardest part of the crab cakes is getting the crab meat out of the shells, the rest is a cinch! The key is to not touch the cakes in the pan until the are crispy brown on the bottom or else they’ll completely fall apart. Put the patties in and walk away. I also used semolina flour to dredge them in instead of white flour. I like the texture better.

Crab Cakes on Arugula

I just drizzled a quick dressing of shallots, lemon, salt and olive oil over the cakes and salad.

Yummy!

What I had no problem finding at all was chanterelles. I went out for about 30 minutes and came back with close to 10 pounds. I went out the next day and came back with a few more. I sure wish those were dryable! I know I can sautee and freeze them but it’s just not the same flavor. Nevertheless, we ate like kings…whatever kings ate chanterelles!

We had Thanksgiving dinner that was very similar to previous years: Chanterelle Stuffing and Roasted chicken then Warm Mushroom Salad the next day. Can’t beat it.

There is a recipe in The French Laundry Cookbook for “Clam Chowder” which, of course, is nothing like clam chowder because it’s Thomas Keller’s twist on a classic dish. It’s cod cakes with cod and clams. It’s a fantastic dish, I’ve made it before, actually following the recipe. It takes hours. It is not a dish for a weeknight after work.

I used it as an inspiration for these cod cakes though. This made 3 servings.

• 1 1/2 lb cod
• 4 potatoes
• 1 large shallot
• 1/2 bulb fennel
• 2 cloves garlic
• 1 stalk celery
• 2 c. white wine
• herbs
• peppercorns
• 1/4 stick butter

• Peel, dice and boil potatoes…preferably yukon golds, I used whatever I’d gotten from my CSA. Drain and mash up in a bowl with 1/4 stick of butter.
• Dice and saute in olive oil: shallot, fennel, 1 clove garlic, celery. When soft, add to potatoes.
• Trim true cod down so you have small, pretty, rectangular filets. Set those aside.
• Cut the trimmings down to 1-2 inch pieces and put in a sauce pan with some herb sprigs (I used marjoram), 6 peppercorns, a clove of smashed garlic and a cup or 2 of white wine. Simmer until fish is cooked. Remove fish from pan and smoosh it up in the bowl w/ the sauteed veggies and potatoes.
• Add salt and pepper and put the mixture in the refrigerator for a bit so you can handle it.
• Once the mixture is cool, heat up olive oil in a pan and form patties out of the potato-cod mixture.



• Place them in the heated olive oil and then walk away…don’t touch them until they are truly browned or they will fall apart and become potato-cod hash.
• When brown, flip and leave them alone again.
• Remove from pan and place on paper towels to absorb extra oil.
• While the cod cakes are browning, cook your cod fillets up in olive oil with just salt as seasoning. Cod is beautiful on its own, you don’t need anything else.
• I served them on top of a kohlrabi puree (like mashed potatoes only better). Or you can serve atop salad with a nice lemony vinaigrette (caesar salad is good, so is a butter lettuce salad with lemon-shallot dressing) – salad, then cod cakes, then cod filet on top.

Preparation time: 45 minute(s)

Prepping potatoes for the campfire

There’s no reason not to eat well when you’re camping. I packed my CSA and garden veggies, chicken and eggs up and hauled them to Lassen National Park for a weekend camping trip. Before we left I cut the chicken into pieces and put it in a ziploc with wine wine and herbs so it was all ready to go.

Grilling chicken and potatoes

I always pack my knives with me wherever I go so it’s quick and easy to prepare everything. The potatoes go into foil with onions, garlic, butter, salt and pepper.

Campfire dinner: Chicken, potatoes and homegrown tomatoes

The tomatoes don’t need anything but salt! When they’re straight from the garden, they need no additional flavoring.

Searing albacore

When we go to my dad’s cabin, we cook many nights over the campfire but we also have a propane-fueled kitchen so I can get even fancier with my dishes. We had seared albacore with an orange-reduction sauce.

Steaming clams in white wine and garlic

Alongside the albacore were clams that I steamed with white wine, garlic, butter and parsley.

Grilling the one porcini we found

Every year we go to to the cabin we find ONE porcini. Just one. Every year. It’s wonderful and frustrating at the same time. It gives us the hope we’ll find more and we never do. Unfortunately there are cows that are left to roam wild and they eat the mushrooms! I bet that beef tastes fantastic.

Gorgeous grilled porcini

We sliced and grilled the porcini over the campfire, just like we do every Thanksgiving trek. It’s the only way to eat porcini as far as I’m concerned.

Next time you head into the woods, don’t pack trail mix and hot dogs. There’s no need. If you prep beforehand, you can have just as wonderful a meal as you would at home….plus, everything tastes better in the mountains. I have no scientific evidence for this but it is true. Try it!

Summer Pasta Sauce

White Sea Bass in Broth

I picked up my fish from my Seafood CSA (CSS – Community Supported Seafood) yesterday. It’s fun to have no idea what I’m going to cook until after 1:30 when i pick up my fish! Surprise! I came home and pondered for a while. Stared into my fridge….I had a fennel bulb and a chunk of garlic. I almost always have chicken broth since another CSA I’m in gives me 2 dozen eggs and 2 chickens every 2 weeks. The recipe started coming together in my head.

This serves 2 people and could easily be scaled up.

I put a quart of chicken stock on low heat and simmered it with about 2 inches of ginger root, sliced and one fennel bulb, sliced. That simmered about an hour. Reducing by about 1/4th.

Meanwhile, I took the 2 yellow potatoes I had and sliced them as thinly as I could. I don’t have a mandoline. Well, that’s not true, I have one and haven’t the foggiest idea how to set it up or use it. So I use my wicked sharp knife instead! I put the slices into a bowl of ice water where they remained until I was ready to fry them up.

I whisked together:
1/4 cup white miso
2 T seasoned rice vinegar
2 t soy sauce
a dash of cayenne

Grapeseed Oil

I brushed that over the sea bass fillets. This is not chilean sea bass. It’s locally caught white sea bass. It’s more of a cod texture…actually, it may be a type of cod?? Not sure! Sustainable, green-listed fish :)

Cut the fillet into 1/3-1/2 pound pieces. Brush the miso paste onto the top and bottom of the fillet. Set these aside for a few minutes.

Frying crisps

Fill a semi-high-sided pan with about 1″ or so of grapeseed oil (or other high-heat oil). I love the shade of green that the grapeseed oil has. It just looks cool. Bring the temperature of the oil up to 350°. I’ve had this candy thermometer for years and I don’t think I’ve ever used it. Glad I had it though! While waiting for the oil to heat over medium-high heat, remove the potato slices from the ice water and dry them thoroughly with paper towels. You don’t want them wet or you’ll get splattered with hot oil! Carefully drop the slices into the hot oil a batch at a time. I put about 10-15 slices in at a time and it didn’t drop the temperature of the oil dramatically. Let them dance around in the oil until they are brown. Remove carefully and place on paper towels to drain the oil, I also dabbed the tops with papertowels, then sprinkle with a nice finishing salt. I used Shinkai Deep Sea Salt and it was perfect.

Things got a bit hectic when I was trying to do crisps and fish at the same time. Put the sea bass into a quite-hot pan with a little olive oil. I wanted a nice crust on the outside of the fish and a pretty raw center. This fish was caught the day before, it was beautifully fresh. Sear for 1-2 minutes on each side.

Place the fish in a shallow bowl. Strain the simmering broth into the bowl. Sprinkle with chopped scallions. Serve the crisps on the side.

We drank, oddly, a pink wine with this. I hate pink wine typically but this one was light and citrusy and paired rather well.

Salad with miso vinaigrette

Simple as can be. Get some lettuce, top it with some thinnnnly sliced radishes, add dressing.

I served this alongside Soba Noodles in Dashi.