A recreation of a romantic French meal

I have to tell you, Internet, tonight's dinner was one of my favorites. Recently, Alex and Jim had the idea of taking their friend Rick from Seattle to one of their favorite restaurants in the South End (Boston). The restaurant is a really cozy, soothing French restaurant called Gaslight. Brian and I also got invited there a while ago and I loved the layout of the place: big wooden booths, a sort of mysterious underground feeling to the place, nice bar. The food was pretty good, too, of course.  Anyway, Alex and Jim had something there on their more recent visit that inspired tonight's menu. As it was described to me, it was some sort of impromptu creation that the Chef made for them since the only vegetarian option on the real menu was something that Alex couldn't face, namely beet ravioli. So the Chef graciously threw together a roasted squash thing that involved smoked blue cheese and it just blew Alex's socks off- so much so, that he went on a quest to find smoked blue cheese to recreate the experience.

Naturally, he went to his favorite cheese shop, Formaggio's Kitchen, where they shocked him by telling him that "smoking" cheese was something that cheese makers do when they want to disguise an off flavor of the cheese, or to enhance an otherwise bland result. So Formaggio didn't have any, being a posh place that doesn't deal with people who make mistakes like that (I guess). They did have "smoked salt", though, so Alex bought some of that.

First Course

Alex, who is Head Chef tonight, came up with a four course menu that we ate in stages as we watched our current sci fi series, True Blood.  The first course was a simple salad made with mixed greens, carrots, red onions, parmesean cheese and a balsamic vinegrette.  Sounds simple, but since we ended up beginning dinner sometime after 9:30, we fell upon that salad like locusts on the proverbial plain. Or at least I did.


Our reviews:

Brian: B. "Salad happened."
Alex: B. "It was a salad. Red onions added a lot."
Jim: B. "It was a salad."
Deb: A. "I loved it. LOVED it. I don't usually put cheese in my salads and I forgot how good it can be. This is a definite drawback with being a veganwannabe. [Also, I was hella hungry.]"

Second Course

The second course was the much anticipated Squash Thing, or to be exact, "The warm squash salad with smoked blue cheese."  Alex made squash in the One True Way, as he calls it. That is, he roasted a butternut squash with olive oil until it caramelized. You just can't go wrong with that technique. He also dry sauteed some pumpkin seeds. This was a pretty simple meal to assemble: squash, pumpkin seeds, crumbled blue cheese and a bit of smoked salt.  The end result was delicious, though. I loved the combination of favors. Luckily, I opted out of the extra salt, because apparently that made it a bit too salty even for my saltophile friends. They recommend not salting the squash beforehand.


Our reviews:

Brian: A! "Total A. Delicious."
Alex: A- "The pairing with the blue cheese was really good. The pumpkin seeds texture wasn't perfect, but better than we have done in the past."
Jim: A. "If it didn't have the pumpkin seeds it would probably be an A+."
Deb: A. "If it didn't require cheese to taste that good, it would get an A+. Loved the pumpkin seeds and the weird combination of squash and blue cheese was surprising but so perfect."

Third Course

Yes, we're living like swells tonight. There is a third course!  This one is also unusual. I believe the recipe came right out of Alex's imagination. It's a tomato tart.  The crust for the tart is a variation of a savory crust that Alex and Jim has experimented with before, but this time they replaced half the flour with bread crumbs for a denser, more interesting texture. Jim thought the end result was a bit too sandy tasting, so you might need to experiment with the ratio to make it perfect.  For the filling, we were supposed to roast tomatoes for two hours, but being less ambitious tonight, we opted to use canned tomatoes. So it was a mixture of tomatoes, ricotta cheese, some other cheese, the name of which I can't remember...  alright, I fail as a good documenter. In my defense, I was trying to troubleshoot Jim's laptop at the time. You can't hand an IT person an interesting puzzle like that and expect her to care about what's going in the tart.  So, all I know is it looked like this as it was being made:











And it looked like this after it was cooked, maybe even more beautiful that this photo conveys. It was pretty impressive looking, actually. It's something you could serve to your mama with pride. Taste-wise, though, it needs a bit of work.->>


Our reviews:

Brian: B. "Cheese, crust, good. Tomato was... workable. Wouldn't want to make it, again, myself. Maybe some other vegetable besides tomato would have better."
Alex: B+. Tomatoes needed more roasting, they should have been drier. The crust turned out really good--flaky and buttery. It had a nice texture from the bread crumbs. The tomato flavor did not taste as rich as I was hoping for. It tasted like a good tomato sauce baked into a pie.
Jim: B+. I would definitely make it again with tomatoes roasted longer. (the recipe really requires 2 hours. ) I thought the crust was a little sandy, but it had a nice flavor.
Deb: B. Yeah, not my favorite. It was good, and definitely edible, but it tasted like milk to me. The ricotta cheese made it bland. I agree that it tasted like tomato sauce pie.

Fourth Course

Ah, dessert. For this, our favorite course of each Cooking Club menu, we return to the challenge of making cake pops. Brian originally had the idea and I think we have failed twice since then to actually make the damn things because of last minute missing ingredients. Tonight is the night, though. Even though we forgot to buy popsicle sticks, Jim saves the day by scrounging some skewers out of a drawer somewhere, so we're finally going to experience a true cake pop. I think I can speak for all of us when I say that we're all cake pop virgins at this point. (Ok, bad mental image. Moving on!)

I first discovered what the plan is (remember I was deep in the heart of diagnosing Jim's laptop throughout the beginning of this Cooking Club night.) when I overheard this comment:

"Ok, so we should take some of these cupcakes and crumble them?"

WHAT?!

Now that is just something you don't want to hear about your dessert. We took beautiful cupcakes that looked like this-->



<---And we did this to them! During this process, we mixed the cupcakes with cream cheese frosting which helped them hold their shape.








Then we stuck skewers in and coated them with a chocolate ganache that our go-to former choclatier (Brian) made for us. While we were watching an episode of True Blood and eating dinner, these beauties were in the refrigerator getting a nice hard coating.

Soon they will be mine...

Our reviews:

Alex: B+. The ganache was not a good pairing with the cake AND the frosting (too fucking rich). With one or the other, it would have been fine, but the two together were too much. Also, the cake tasted better when it was at room temperature.
Jim: A. A little too sweet. It needed a bit of sea salt, or at least bigger salt crystals. A less sweet chocolate in the ganache might have been good.
Bri: A+. I know not what this 'too rich' business is. I think a dessert is too rich when it glows in the dark. Now that our cakepop curse is lifted, we need to start experimenting with other combinations. raspberries in the cupcake, jam in the center, flavored ganache...
Deb: A. They were perfect. [And you know, having eaten the raw cupcakes the next morning with just the ganache...I really missed that frosting taste. Don't listen to Alex. They weren't too rich, trust me.]



And that was our night! Here's a gratuitous shot of Brian with his new t-shirt:

Do you see Beeker from the Muppets? Because I see Crow from MST3K.

WELCOME TO BURNING MAN 2012!!!

9/30:  Hello folks from the present and/or future!  It's Brian blogging; we're fresh from the matinee of LOOPER and full of time travel speculation and empty of food--this must change!

11/9 And hello Past Brian...this is FUTURE BRIAN, reporting in a month after the beginning of this post.  So much has changed!  Hurricane Sandy!  The election!  Banthapug!

No, seriously, Banthapug.

The theme tonight is either 'DELICIOUS' or 'FANCY PANTS', depending on who you ask. Alex feels he's gotten complacent, and wants to do some more challenging menus. Tonight we tackle cheddar biscuits with applesauce, fried green beans with fried mint and fried basil on a bed of tomato compote, quinoa risotto, and pumpkin cake pops!

Me again...don't get too psyched about those cake pops.  I'm just saying.  Trust me.  I'm from THE FUTURE.

Pumpkin cake pop recipe: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/melissa-darabian/pumpkin-cake-pops-recipe/index.html

Fried green beans with tomato compote: www.bravotv.com/foodies/recipiessomethingsomething

cheddar biscuits: bravotv.com/foodies/recipes/print/mini-cheddar-biscuits

First up, the cake for pumpkin cake pops!  Well, no, that's a lie, first up we nibble on plantain chips Jim picked up because a) they're crunchy-tasty and b) they're from Costa Rica, where good things come from.

Just ask Kristen Bell.

 We also debate who has and does not have dishwashing skills (with only a tiny bit of shaming involved), and huddle around the Roku looking for a music channel to listen to.  Soma FM has "Secret Agent: the soundtrack for your stylish, mysterious, dangerous life".  Boo to the yeah, cowpokes.

T-shirt tally:  I'm in my Random Celtic Knot shirt, Jim's in a polo shirt, Deb's in her pro-Obama shirt (Foreshadowing!!), and Alex wins with a "Jesus is ATOMIC" shirt that was once owned by someone in a Vacation Bible School.  Which maybe had a mad scientist theme?  We think?  Oh, so many questions...

We have fresh apples (love Fall so much) and set to work making applesauce after a quick pause to change the radio station to 'Lush: Sensuous and Mellow Vocals, Mostly Female, With an Electronic Influence'.  The first song is by "Merkin Dream", which, for people who know what merkins are, is a VERY puzzling name.  Two minutes of that and we're on to 'Indie Pop Rocks!', which might as well be called "WERS-FM, the Roku version".  (That line goes out to our local readers--go Camberville!)

Jim is setting to work on the cake while Deb and Alex pare apples for the 'sauce.  I'm pondering why, even after seeing the movie, I still can't hear the word "Looper" without thinking of Mr. Hooper from Sesame Street.  When a character sticks in my memory, he really really sticks.  (Also, the thought of Mr. Hooper as a time traveling criminal is very entertaining).

And look at those shelves...there was no way that was a profitable business

Indie Pop Rocks lasts for 1/2 of one song before giving way to the "Motion Sickness" channel on Mog.

Butter and spices are heating in a pan for the applesauce as Jim is creating a Pumpkin Pie Spice from scratch, with the help of myself and the internet!  The biscuits have to wait for the cake to be baked, which seems backwards unless you're versed in Kitchen Science (or just, like, have read both recipes and know how to prioritize).

Gordon Love-Hewitt...far more attractive with his own nose, or with Bruce Willis's?  I didn't recognize him as the actor from 'Dark Knight' until this moment, folks, so I got no horse in this race.   

I'll just put up this picture of him and let you judge.

Apples set, Deb moves on to the green beans.  We go off the recipe early and often.  "It calls for two cups....but hey, they're green beans!"

I sniff Jim's milk.  Helping!  (It's good, btw.)  (Not anymore.)

To Deb's shock, Alex confesses he has not yet tasted the butter & spice mixture.  And a compliment about a previous recipe--Jim is using the maneuver I tried last week.  He's chilling the butter to make it better in the batter!  (I'm so in love with that sentence...)

At 5:55 it's Alex--applesauce, Jim--cake batter and Deb--beginning to chop the tomatoes for the tomato compote.

We now have a tiny bit of a sodium-showdown, or showdium, as Deb tries to discourage Alex putting salt in the applesauce.  They discuss the difference between saltED and saltY, and seem satisfied with the conclusion.

Cake's in the oven, Jim moves on to the biscuits after a little mise en place clean-up! 

With Alex as the surfing member of our cooking team, we quiz him about the surfing training sequence in the Chasing Mavericks trailer we just watched today.  He can hold his breath for about a minute and a half, roughly, he thinks, which is only 4 1/2 minutes less than the film's main character--unlike the movie, he has not had a coach with a timer yelling at him about his lung capacity.  We're getting him one for Christmas.  Oops, spoiler!

The movie's dramatic breath-holding scene.  (No, SERIOUSLY.)

There's a break as I take Rommy for a walk and we explore the smellier parts of South Boston. (e.g., all of it.)   When I get back, Our Intrepid Team has the cake out, is in the process of popping the biscuits into little muffin tins, and has the tomato and risotto on the stove.  We consult the cake pop recipe and realize we might have trouble--we don't have cream cheese for the frosting!  Or heavy cream to make a chocolate ganache.  We discuss options--Alex proposes orange-chocolate, which sorta fits thematically because the pumpkin cake IS orange, so orange + orange....anyhow.  Another thought is toasting some coconut and mixing it with the melted chocolate, then dunking each ball that way.  "Why don't we make a ganache out of the 1/2 and 1/2, the unsweetened chocolate and the confectioners sugar and some Fluff, then mix in some toasted coconut...maybe even fry the coconut!  Hah?  Hah?"  Outwardly I'm the face of confidence, dear readers, but between you and me I'm scared. (Almost as if I knew what was going to happen...)

Deb shows off what she's "learned under my tutelage" by heating chocolate in the microwave, pouring in cold 1/2 and 1/2....and suddenly there's a mini-disaster as the chocolate solidifies around her spoon like frat boys swarming a tray of free jello shots.  She reheats the chocolate, stirs like a madwoman, adds Fluff (!), and continues stirring while Jim obtains the coconut.

A new invention, "shiitake bacon", comes out of the oven--it's going to go on top of the risotto.  It's mushroomy?  Yay?  Deb is working with the tomato coulis and pondering how chunky it should be while we ooo and aahhh at the sight of the biscuits out of the oven.  With the lack of cream cheese we've given up on the "pop" part of the cake pops, so Jim is spreading the chocolate glaze as a frosting.

Please note, we are cutting the unsweetened chocolate with Fluff on the day of Somerville's big Fluff Festival!  Hometown pride, yo!  We are in touch with our inner fluffers...oh, that didn't sound right. 

On Mog, a band called 'Hot Chip' is singing a song that I swear has someone singing "Homina homina HOMINA homina" over and over again.  And people wonder about the value of a music degree...(on the other hand, they're still better than Karmin.  BOOM!  Take that, alums of the school I work at!)

We've reached the beginning of the plating!  Deb celebrates by tossing tonight's basil in the frying oil, with explosive results!  Well...splattery, anyhow, thanks to the high water content of the leaves.  It's all okay after a few seconds.

OR SO I THINK.  We point no fingers, but, um, FIRE!!!!!!!

The INFERNO

The coconut was overlooked and went from toasted to flaming in a surprisingly short amount of time, and from flaming to fire-wrangled by Jim to the bottom of the sink with water poured across it remarkably quickly after that.  Some cooks might be discouraged by the YARD HIGH FLAMES, but are we?  (Yes.)  Ha, it is to laugh! (A nervous laugh.  With a lot of twitching.)  More coconut goes in the oven, and this time Jim hovers an inch from it watching it like a cat watching a mousehole during an Obese, Slow and Proud Rodent Convention....except when he's picking out the Very Prettiest Biscuits to be our food models.  All work and no play, you know...

[Jim]  I just have to point out that while the flames are flaring high into the sky and I'm calmly, coolly asking Alex for a hot pad, what does he do??? He goes for his camera.  See how much he values you, dear readers?  He'd rather let my kitchen burn down than deprive you of a great pic illuminating our night.  [/Jim]

Have I mentioned that that's Jim's homemade goat cheese grated on the green beans?  Jim made the cheese, that is; Jim (to my knowledge) has never created a goat. 

NOT made by Jim

After supper and an episode of True Blood with a lot of nekkie fun and a sad lack of Gramma's ghost returning to demand that all these skanky reprobates get the heck off her lawn, it's rating time!

Our Meal!

BISCUITS
Alex: A!  Cheesy and wonderful
Jim: A+!  Alex is crazy, they deserve an A+
Deb: A-, they needed more cheese but they were damn good
Me: A.  Cheesy biscuits make me happy.  (The love you're going to have for Gangnam Style is the sign of someone who likes flaky, cheesy things, Past Self).


APPLESAUCE
JIM: A--a little more seasoned than I would normally make it, but I thought it was delicious.
ALEX: I haven't really had homemade applesauce before.  It's pretty damn good.  I'll give it an A-...I mean, it's still applesauce.
DEB: That was delicious! I'd make that again, so I guess that would be an A.  And so easy to make...why would we ever buy that crap?
Me:  It still seems like a silly thing to do to perfectly good apples, but as sauce goes, this was one of the best of them.  B+

GREEN BEANS
ALEX: A.  I thought the sauce had a really, really nice flavor; I thought the beans had a great texture; the fried basil was amazing, the shallots also great, and the grated goat cheese!  As it mixed with the tomato sauce it reconstituted into creamy cheesiness.  I really liked it.
DEB: If I grade on the basis of taste I'd definitely give them an A.  It was a perfect meal......except for the health factor, where deepfrying anything is definitely a bad idea.
JIM:  A+!  The combination of everything was just awesome.  It was the perfect vehicle for my cheese!
 Me: B+ This was great...but...I have reservations about tomato sauce and green beans.  Replace the green beans with pasta, and this would have been an A+++.


RISOTTO:
Alex: The risotto itself is like a B+--it was good base.  The shiitake bacon I'd give an A. THAT was really good, I'd make mushrooms like that many many times.
JIM: I would give that an A.  The shiitake is pretty amazing, and I thought the risotto was good.
Deb: I'd say the risotto itself was a B--I don't like plain risotto--but with the bacon it was an A.  It needed much more shiitake bacon.



CAKE
Jim: I'm giving it a B.  I think the cake itself could have been a little sweeter and a little punchier.  But, of course, if it had been mixed with cream cheese icing the way the recipe called for it may have been enough.  The combination of chocolate and pumpkin was good, though.

Deb: That would be a B or B-...I think I just wouldn't want to make it again.  I'd say it tasted something like a breakfast bar.  Kinda healthy!  To not BE healthy but TASTE healthy is pretty bad!
Alex: I like the texture; it has potential.  But, it's not really very good.  I'll give it a C+.
Me:  An unsweet cake is like decaf coffee or an impoverished Romney...it's a sad flightless bird that makes you feel pity, perplexity and a tiny bit of scorn.  B-

 

Nuit Deb - pas de déconner

Greetings Hallie and other humans.  Tonight’s dinner is brought to you by Deb, and will consist of over the top mushroom quiche, apple-walnut cake, and a “kale dish” (optional).  Alex (blogging!) is going to opt in for that one, insofar as I have any say whatsoever in the situation.

Why, our very own Jim, in the orange!  He's so fancy!

Jim’s open studios is going on this weekend, which is pretty much the most exhausting days of standing around you’ve ever seen.  What?  You missed it?  Don't worry, you can buy his work on etsy!  Go do it now!

So, now we’re at one of these questions that characterizes cooking club:

“This apple cake isn’t very sweet.  And when are we supposed to add in the apples?”

Brian that makes that sound that’s like Scooby Doo saying “I dunno!”

Awesome.

Apple cake.  Now featuring 100% more apples!

Puritans.
Not fucking around!

Anyway, Brian is now regaling us with tales of his history club (nerds…) adventure to the graveyard, which is apparently so over-stuffed with corpses (like, 25,000 in that tiny little graveyard next to Park Street) that when they were building the T station, skeletons kept falling on the construction workers.  Damn, yo.

“The puritans did not fuck around.  They made scientologists look normal!”  Apparently, they used to hang teenagers for saying unkind things to their parents, and didn’t think that women had souls.  Ouch.

“Oh yeah, and the jungle gym is where the gallows used to be!”  Brian says this is the best history tour he’s ever been on – I find it hard to disagree based on his retelling!

Deb, also
not fucking around.

Deb, drinking her beer, asks us how hungry as we are.  And…do we want a pizza?  She’s really dying to get out of this recipe, which apparently requires 90 minutes in the oven.  Unfortunately, nothing has been prepared yet, so…we’re going to be eating at maybe 9:30 or so.  Ah, well!  The joys of cooking club.  We suspect that the reason it needs to cook so long is so that it cooks slowly, and gets custardy and not crusty and frittata-y.  You know, to be gentle with it.

Brian: “we’re going to be so fucking gentle, we’re going to punch this quiche in the crust…with love.”

Deb: “So say we all!”

Anyway, it’s political season here at the cooking club, and we (well, I) am enjoying the general shitshow that is American politics.  Case in point, Mitt Romney’s extremely evil looking son:

Watch out, world!  I'm not fucking around!

I have to say, I’d hate to be on television.  I’m sure that I’d be picking my nose while trying not to fart and would have this insane look on my face.  Man, I’d be a terrible politician.  I can’t even sell pottery to people for six hours, let alone kiss babies and shake hands and shit…for 18 months.

Assembling quiche!  Yes!  Apparently, the dough must be cold, which makes it much harder to work with.  It’s one of the great conundrums, like how the Shaggs ever managed to make an album and get it produced.  

Brian discovers The Shaggs.

To cleanse his palette, Brian has chosen to play “Take On Me” and dance like this baby:

Meanwhile, Deb has given up on the dough and put it in the freezer.  I’m not sure what impact this will have, but it…uh…quiche!  I love quiche!

So, Brian’s new favorite teacher brought him back a Green Tea Kit-Kat from Japan.  I’m quite interested in how this is going to turn out…much like the intensity of our quiche dough.

Deb: “In the future, we will all be wearing jump suits.  It’s obviously going to take over.”

Hoo boy.  We’re having quite a quiche adventure here.  “I don’t want to depress you guys…”, Deb begins, and I basically just stop paying attention then, because I've already been a bit jaded.

I'm not going into that pan!  I'm not fucking around!

At this point, we reflect on our cooking club successes and failures over time, and what we've learned.  How do you know if something is done?

Jim: “Our general cooking policy is to poke it with a stick, and if it moves, it’s not done yet.”

And how can you judge your progress as a cook?

Brian: “I made eggs this morning – without a recipe!”

Fear us, O Internet, for we are Not Fucking Around!  Anyway, I'm now being called off to make some kale, so...

The OED (not fucking around) suggests that you rename
your candy from "Wazoo" to anything that doesn't
mean "anus".  Fruity anus, sprinkled with crunchies. :-(

Jim here!  Deb comments that it’s all Hubway’s fault that their house is full of dessert.  Hubway is a system where you can take a bike from the rack, ride somewhere else and leave the bike in that rack.  I’m not sure how that relates to delicious sweet goodness, but I think it involves Trader Joe’s...and today is not the day to tell Deb that she’s wrong.

The great wazoo debate erupts.  Deb claims that wazoo is a river somewhere.  Bri insists it’s the tuchus, the heinie, the thing that the poop comes from.  After much discussion (read that as argument), cooler heads prevail and we consult the interwebs.  It turns out the OED has the answer.  Bri for the win!  Now that we’ve discussed the Poopchute, it’s time to get back to talking about food.

It’s now 10 PM and we haven’t eaten yet.  Hungry Jim is picturing all his friends like this:

Nom Nom Nom.  Did you know that Spam is actually not terrible if it’s fried and covered in mustard and ketchup.  That’s how hungry I am people!!!!  I want spam.  I’d even eat it raw.

libération de la quiche

The quiche is out of the oven.  Unfortunately, the lame vague website we got the recipe from says we have to wait till it’s warm.  “How long do we have to wait,” Deb asks, “It’s been 4 minutes already”  Deb has successfully removed the spring form ring so now it’s all I can do to not bury my face in the piping hot quiche.  GIVE.  GIVE GIVE GIVE!!! 

Fail quote of the night:  “It’ll be easier and faster”  Nope, too late for that.

The crust is like shortbread without butter.  It also all over the keyboard as it’s really crumbly.  I hope IT Deb isn't reading this right now!

Alex is back to the blog!  Hey-o!  So, in the time that Jim was fantasizing about spam, I was making Kale!  Delicious coconutty Thai kale with lime juice and soy sauce.  And how did it turn out?

Mushroom quiche, coconut-lime kale and apple cake.

	Deb	Alex	Jim	Brian
Kale	Too tart for Deb!  B+.	A-.  I like the tart and coconutty!	For kale, an A-.	B+.  But an A+ for any other vegetable.
Quiche	A-.  I’d make it again, it’s a little runny though.	B+.  The crust is a litte floury tasting, and it’s quite runny.  But so rich!	B+.  We should have prebaked the crust!  Not that we had time…and it needed more time to get less runny.	B.  It’s got potential, but it’s a runny crumbly mess.
Cake	I actually think it’s really good…for breakfast. B+…but I’d make it again.	C.  Too spiced, too dry, not sweet enough.  You could call it a bread.	B.  The cake part tastes a bit dry.	[After being guited into tasting it…] C-.  It is dry.  Except for the wet and uncooked part I just tried.  Not enough sugar…nuts on top…bland like a sara lee cake with no frosting or ice cream.
Cooking Club	Priceless.	Priceless.	Priceless.	Priceless.