The Colony

Several bloggers including Cachagua Store, Lost City, Off The Presses, and Restaurant-ing through history
have mentioned The Colony by Iles Brody in the past year, so I dragged out my copy to give it look. The book is part history, part cookbook of the kind that gives you recipes in a simple paragraph.

In 1920 The Colony was a bit on the disreputable side. 667 Madison Avenue led to the bistro, a gambling hall and a somewhat secret maternity home. If you ventured through the door, it was assumed that “dinning” was the last thing on your mind. But many of the gamblers and their shady ladies were the cream of the society crop. They often told wives and associated about the food at The Colony and before long, people ventured to 667 Madison expressly for the food. One of those people was Reginald Vanderbilt who recommended it to his relatives and friends and soon The Colony was" The" place to dine.

The colony was filled with Kings and Dukes, actresses and bankers, and favorites of ours like Elsa Maxwell and Elsie de Wolfe. Each table had four waiters to do the customers bidding and one patron was notorious for tipping each waiter $100 (which is about $1000 in today’s economy).

Recently we have been offering up recipes for unusual vegetables and The Colony featured a recipe for chicory that we have never seen. Generally chicory is thought of as a cheap coffee alternative or in New Orleans a necessary coffee additive. At The Colony, it shined on its own.

Cream of Chicory Colony

Parboil a pound of chicory, drain and stew it for a half-hour in a lump of butter and juice of one lemon. Now mix one and one-quarter pints of Béchamel with it, and finish the cooking very slowly. Rub through a sieve, add some consommé, heat, and add some cream before serving. Garnish with chicory cut in fine strips, stewed and well drained.

I don’t know about you, but I am headed to the Farmer’s Market to find some chicory.

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The Pleasures of Slow Food

In his introduction to Corby Kummer’s The Pleasures of Slow Food, Eric Schlosser lays out the premise for the Slow Food Movement. It stands, he tells us:

“…in direct opposition to everything that a fast-food meal represents: blandness, uniformity, conformity, the blind worship of science and technology.”

The Slow Food Movement began in 1980 with a band of activist who wanted to celebrate the country foods that were in danger of being lost as artisans gravitated to industrial jobs. The spokesman was a fun loving Italian named Carlo Petrini. Passionate about saving foods that were quickly becoming undervalued or extinct and equally passionate about the globalization of fast foods, Petrini became a food warrior.

Today Slow Food counts seventy thousand members in more than forty-five countries. Kummer’s book highlights the movement for Slow Food, the artisans who make the food and the cooks who incorporate the passion of Slow Food into their cooking.

This recipe comes from renowned pastry chef Elizabeth Prueitt featuring the herbs and locally produced milks and cheeses in the San Francisco area.

Gougères


1 1/4 cups nonfat milk
2/3 (1 1/3 sticks) unsalted butter
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup bread flour
5 eggs
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 tablespoon minced fresh herbs, such as thyme or chives
1 cup (4 ounces) shredded Gruyère cheese
1 tablespoon heavy cream

Preheat oven to 350F. butter a baking sheet or line with parchment paper.

In a medium, heavy saucepan, combine the milk, butter and salt. Cook over medium heat until the batter has melted and the mixture comes to a boil. Add the flour all at once, stirring with a wooden spoon. Stir vigorously until the mixture is a smooth mass and pulls away from the sides of the pan, about three minutes.

Add the eggs, one at a time, beating vigorously until each is completely incorporated before adding the next. Fold in the black pepper, herbs, and three-fourths of the cheese.

Scoop out tablespoonfuls of the batter and place them 3 inches apart on the prepared baking sheet.

In a small bowl, whisk the egg yolks and cream together. Brush the egg mixture over each gougère and sprinkle the remaining cheese on top. Bake until puffed and golden brown, 30 to 35 minutes. Serve warm.

Carlo Petrini’s manifesto for Slow Food was finally translated into English and published by Columbia University. Slow Food: The Case For Taste is a must read for anyone interested in the local production and sourcing of food.

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LEMON MERINGUE BITES

I am a new convert for the little pre-made phyllo cups made by Athens (found in the frozen foods section). I have found many sweet and savory uses for the little time savers.

These sweet little beauties went together in (literally) minutes, thanks to the phyllo cups.
This filling recipe will fill two packages of phyllo cups and since they are so small, they chill quickly and will be ready to serve in short order. Two packages sounds like a lot of lemon pies, but it really isn't (the filling recipe was originally for an 8" pie). Hubby ate four of these after a big meal, so keep that in mind.
2 packages of phyllo cups

LEMON FILLING
1 cup white sugar
¼ cup corn starch
1 cup water
2 egg yolks, slightly beaten
2 tablespoons butter
1/3 cup fresh lemon juice
½ teaspoon fresh lemon zest
2 drops yellow food color (optional)

MERINGUE TOPPING
2 egg whites
¼ teaspoon cream of tartar
¼ cup white sugar
½ teaspoon vanilla extract

For filling, mix sugar, cornstarch and water in a heavy bottomed sauce pan. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly, until mixture thickens and comes to a boil; boil and stir for one minute. Stir half of this mixture into the beaten egg yolks (whisking like crazy to keep the mixture moving). After well mixed, pour the whole thing back into the original pan and boil (and stir) for one more minute. Remove from heat and stir in the lemon juice, lemon zest and butter. Spoon hot lemon mixture into phyllo cups.
For the meringue topping, beat (with electric mixer) the egg whites and cream of tartar until foamy then sprinkle in the sugar, a little at a time, while you are beating; add the vanilla and continue to beat until stiff peaks form when you lift the beaters out of the bowl.
Top the hot lemon filling with a spoonful of meringue. Bake in a 400F oven for about 10 minutes or until the meringue becomes golden and shiny (watch carefully). Cool on the counter until they are room temperature THEN put them in the fridge to chill. NOTE: Be careful when you separate the eggs; even just a speck of yolk in the egg whites will stop them from whipping correctly. Also, make sure you do NOT whip the egg whites in anything plastic. Any traces of grease or oil in the bowl or on the beaters will stop your egg whites from whipping properly.
Thank you all for your well wishes, regarding our cat Tabitha. She is walking around today and even has found her kitty voice again!! Thanks to lots of "ear licks" from our dog Chloe, Tabitha is well on her way to a full recovery.

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Lorenza’s Antipasti

Lorenza de’Medici runs famous cooking classes at Badia a Coltibuono. There is always an afternoon break featuring a glass of white wine and an antipasto. She reminds us that no matter how it has been mistranslated, antipasto is NOT something you have before pasta, but something you have before the meal. Of course, she is not opposed to you eating antipasto as an appetizer, a lunch, or even a midnight snack.

The history of antipasto traces back to the ancient Romans who featured antipasto as a stimulant before the main meal. It evolved from two very different cultural conditions – extreme wealth and the poverty of necessity. The wealthy use the antipasto as a prelude to a multi-coursed banquet. For the poor, antipasto was a street food eaten while working or shopping.

Lorenza’s Antipasti is filled with recipes to fulfill your antipasto needs, whiter that is a little snack or the beginning of a grand meal. After going through the recipes in the book, you will probably want to fore go the banquet and instead, make a long table full of antipasti. This recipe involves two of my favorite things, cheese and pears.

Tartufi Di Pere E Formaggio

300g/10 oz gorgonzola cheese
300g/10 oz/1 1/4 cups mascarpone
2 Bosch pears, not too ripe
Juice of 1 lemon
120g/4oz/1 cup freshly grated parmesan

Mix the gorgonzola and mascarpone cheese together until well blended. Peel the pears, then core and cut the flesh into small dice. Sprinkle with juice and combine with the two cheeses. Using a spoon, form the mixture into walnut sized balls then roll them in the parmesan to coat well. Arrange on a platter and refrigerate for a couple of hours before serving.

White wine, a roaring fire, Tartufi Di Pere E Formaggio, what could be better.

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The Cheese Course

I would rather have a cheese course at the end of a meal rather than dessert.

Janet Fletcher wrote The Cheese Course for those of you have never served a cheese course or eaten a cheese course. This book is a good basic primer, including how to pick cheese, how to serve it, and what to drink with it. If you eat cheese, you probably know how to do all this. Perhaps its best feature is just showing what a cheese course can look like.

The Cheese Course is about the cheese and the recipes are a kind of afterthought for accompaniments such as breads, vinaigrettes, marinades, and fruits. The recipes usually feature a single cheese with an accompaniment like this one.

Basque Sheep’s Milk Cheese with Poached Quince

2 quince (about 1 pound)
1 cup sugar
1/4 teaspoon cardamom seeds, crushed in a mortar or spice grinder
2 cups water
1 pound Pyrenees sheep’s milk cheese

Quarter, core, and peel the quinces. Cut each quarter into 4 slices. In a medium saucepan, combine the sugar, cardamom, and water. Over moderate heat, bring to a simmer, stirring to dissolve the sugar. Add the quince, cover and adjust the heat to maintain a gentle simmer. Cook until the quince are tender and rosy pink, about 2 hours. Let cool in the liquid, cover, then refrigerate.

Divide cheese and quince evenly among 8 individual plates.

Quince is a favorite fruit to accompany cheese. The French like prunes in Armagnac. I make figs in Cointreau. What ever you choose, skip that sweet dessert and have a cheese course instead. OK fine, have the cheese course and then, HAVE dessert. That may be the best plan.

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Boulestin’s Round-the-Year Cookbook

A meal worth eating must take at least an hour and a half; apart from that fact that it is not healthy to eat quickly, there is the point of view whit which we are concerned – the point of view of the pleasure of the table, to which leisure, anticipation, enjoyment contribute equally.

X. Marcel Boulestin

X. Marcel Boulestin began his career in France as a ghostwriter, followed in short succession as a writer, translator and collaborator. Though a Frenchman, he was a lifelong anglophile, finally moving to London. He moved away from writing and followed his other passion, cooking.

In November 1911 Boulestin opened his first restaurant, Boulestin's in Covent Garden. He became a forceful restaurateur who almost single handedly popularized French cuisine in the English-speaking world. His knack for writing came in handy as he authored numerous cookbooks, including Boulestin’s Round-the-Year Cookbook. In 1937, he became the first television chef, appearing on an experimental BBC program.

Here is a recipe for an often-overlooked vegetable featured in his January offerings.

Salsifis Sautés

Take a bundle of salsify, scrape them, wash them well in cold water and a little vinegar. Put in a saucepan a handful of flour, add water, little by little, mixing all the time. When you have enough liquid to cook your salsify, salt and cook on a moderate fire for about half an hour. They should be soft, yet firm. Drain them well and fry them in butter for a few minutes. Add salt, a little lemon juice, and finely chopped parsley.

As for the newer fashionable, shorter dinners, Boulestin says,

"One dish above all must be a star turn, the shining center against the proper background, the climax of which other things, discreetly and effectively, prepare the entrance, increase the value – a dish which your friends will gracefully remember, reverently mention for ever after, and possibly try to imitate in their own houses. “My dear, you must give me the recipe…”

Try making this salsify your star for January.

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GREEN CHILE PORK LOIN ROAST

We love this recipe, not only because it is easy and tasty, but because of it's excellent leftover possibilities. Green chile roast leftovers make great cold sandwiches or it can be torn apart and tucked (hot) into warm tortillas (with a little bit of the chile gravy & some pepperjack cheese) for a great leftover transformation (it is one of those recipes that tastes even better on day two).


4 pound boneless pork loin roast
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
7 ounce can of Ortega fire roasted green chiles
1 tablespoon chili powder
1 teaspoon ground cumin
¼ teaspoon dry red pepper flakes
1 teaspoon onion powder
½ teaspoon garlic powder (not salt)
½ teaspoon black pepper
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon brown sugar
1 Reynolds roasting bag + 1 tablespoon flour
Place the tablespoon of flour in the roasting bag and shake it around (per roasting bag instructions). Place the bag in a roasting pan (set aside).

Mix all of the dry ingredients and rub it all onto the surface of the pork roast. Brown the roast in the vegetable oil (both sides). Place the browned roast into the roasting bag and put half of the green chiles on top of the roast and the other half under the roast.

Seal the bag tightly and make a few small holes in the top of the bag to let steam escape. Bake in preheated 325F oven for 2 hours (see note). Thicken juices and serve over pork slices.

NOTE: I have not tried it, but I see no reason why you could not use a roasting pan that has a tight lid instead of the plastic roasting bag.

NOTE: Most recipes tell you took cook a boneless pork roast like this for 20 minutes per pound, however, we like our pork cooked longer than that. Thirty minutes per pound will give you very tender pork but still slice-able (not quite to pulled pork tenderness). If you don't care for pork done this way, figure 20 minutes per pound.

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River Run Cookbook

One of the best Southern restaurants in America is in Plainfield, Vermont. The man behind the restaurant is from Brewer, Mississippi. Jimmy Kennedy met his wife, Maya, in New York City, but they didn’t find their true calling until they moved back to Maya’s hometown of Plainfield and moved into the Post Office.
Well, the Post Office was gone by then, actually they just moved into the building.



There they opened up River Run, served up a mean breakfast, gained a loyal following and wrote a cookbook: River Run Cookbook. River Run is a hard place to describe. It is tiny, filled with two dozen mismatched chairs and a few tables. The main meal is breakfast, Southern breakfasts including fried green tomatoes, jambalaya, fried potatoes, and even traditional granola and pancakes. My favorite is the fried catfish with grits, eggs and biscuits.

Many times after breakfast, Jimmy would turn the restaurant kitchen over to someone else who would keep cooking into the evening. I can’t recall ever going to Vermont with out going to River Run. It is a great hang out for writes, too. Lorrie Goldensohn, who wrote one of my favorite books about the poet, Elizabeth Bishop is a regular. Two other regulars contributed to the River Run Cookbook, David Manet wrote the foreword and Howard Norman wrote the afterward.



Southerners love their casseroles, a fact that surprised Maya Kennedy on her first Christmas in Mississippi. This is Jimmy’s mother’s casserole and a holiday favorite. My mother made a similar variation every Christmas.

Corn & Oyster Casserole

4 cups crushed saltines (about 90 crackers, or 1/2 box)
2 pounds canned creamed corn
1 pound fresh or canned oysters
Salt, to taste
Freshly ground black pepper, to taste
4 tablespoons (1/2 stick) unsalted butter, cut into pieces

Set oven to 350 degrees.

In a 1 1/2 casserole dish that is abut 4 inches deep, sprinkle some crumbled saltines-just enough to cover the bottom. Then, ever so gently, spoon or pour some of the corn over the crackers, just enough to cover. Next, place the oysters an inch or so apart on top of the corn. (If the oysters are really big, cut them into chunks.) Sprinkle with salt and pepper. Repeat this layering process until you reach the top of the dish, making sure you finish with cracker crumbs. (You may have a bit of creamed corn left over.) Dot with butter.

Bake until the top is browned and the sides are bubbling a little, 35 to 45 minutes. (A glass dish will take the longer cooing time.)

Don’t even think of going to Vermont without going to River Run. If it going to be a while, you can order River Run Sauce online. And when you go, cross the street to visit Ben Koenig’s Country Bookshop.

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Pears

My favorite fruit is the pear. As a child we lived in many a cold and inhospitable climate. There were weeks of long frozen days and nights. Each year, my Father’s sister sent a box of pears from Harry & David. They came in a thick two-part cardboard box that was almost as exquisite as the pears. Each pear was wrapped in a lovely deep forest tissue paper. Pears are the best fruit to mail as they ripen off the tree. When the pears arrived, they were hard green globes that needed days to sit and ripen. It was almost more than one could bear, waiting for those pears to ripen.

Linda West Eckhardt wrote a small, exquisite book, Pears, about my favorite fruit (well, she didn’t actually write it because of me, though I like to claim it). Pears are extremely versatile. The make great desserts, they are the best in preserves and chutneys, they provide a lovely accompaniment to meats, and they are an unexpected side dish. On of my favorite was to use pears is to lighten up a potato gratin.

My love of pears is matched by my love of mashes and purées. Most cooks limit their mashes to potatoes with a bit of milk. Don’t get me wrong, I love mashed potatoes, but there are a myriad of other choices. Try this one the next time you have pork.

Pear and Spinach Purée

2 pounds spinach, stemmed
2 large dead-ripe Comice or Bartlett pears, cored, peeled, and quartered
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
2 tablespoons half-and-half
Salt and freshly ground nutmeg to taste
1/2 small ripe Comice or Bartlett pear, cored, peeled, and cut into a fan shape with the stem intact, for garnish

Fill a 4-quart soup pot with water and bring to a rolling boil. Drop all the spinach in by the handful and stand and watch the pot. Yes, it will boil, at which moment you should instantly dump the spinach into a colander and run cold water over it until it is cool. Use your hands to squeeze out all the excess water. Place the spinach and pears in a food processor fitted with the steel blade or in a blender and purée.

Melt the butter in a 12-inch skillet until it foams, then add the spinach purée. Cook and stir until it begins to boil, then add the half-and-half and season with salt and nutmeg.

Serve in a cut glass crystal bowl, swirling the top. Garnish with the fanned pear half.

Serve this up as a side dish and your family will rave.

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Nela’s Cookbook

Another Stolen Post From Famous Food Friday

Famous Food Friday today is featuring Nela Rubinstein. OK, fine, she is not a household name and her fame comes from being married to Maestro Arthur Rubinstein, so maybe we will call today’s endeavor, Near Famous Food Friday. What ever you call it, Nela Rubinstein can cook. I am sure Arthur Rubinstein was no big box of chocolates to cook for or to live with for that matter. (I am always leery of men who refer to themselves as “Maestro”.)

Robert Redford, Sydney Pollack, Nela and Arthur Rubinstein

Nela Rubinstein was a friend of the noted hostess and publishing heir, Blanch Knopf. Knopf sent Rubinstein a contract for a cookbook that she refused to sign for 37 years. It was not as easy as pulling out her box of recipes and transcribing them. Growing up with a Lithuanian mother and Polish father, Nela Rubinstein had recipes not only in her native tongues but also in Russian, French, Italian, Spanish, German, and English. Measurements ran the gamut from “cup” and “teaspoon” to “garniec” (a kind of bucket) to “une bonne poignée d’ail” (a good fistful of garlic) and she insists on referring to “1/2 cup” as “1 deciliter”. After much transcribing and testing, the recipes ended up in the capable hands of Judith Jones.



Here is a simple fruity chicken dish. Rubinstein tells us that the easy and fragrant dish combines three simple ingredients that improve each other in the cooking – chicken, prunes, and butter.

Chicken with Prunes

1 roasting chicken, about 4 pounds
Salt and pepper to taste
8 tablespoons butter
1 tablespoon oil
1 cup (1/4 liter) chicken broth or use 1/2 Knorr chicken bouillon cube dissolved in 1 cup water; plus enough additional broth to cover prunes and raisins.
24 dried prunes
1/2 cup (1 deciliter) raisins
Rice


Wash and dry the chicken, and salt and pepper it inside and out. Put a 2-tablespoon lump of butter in the cavity and truss the bird. Place it in a low-sided roasting pan greased with the oil. Add the cup of chicken broth to the roasting pan.

Preheat the oven to 350F. Into a medium bowl pour enough boiling chicken broth to cover the prunes and raisins and let them soak. Roast the chicken for about 45 minutes or until half done, basting it often by rubbing it with the remaining 6 tablespoons of butter, the later spooning pan juices over it. Turn the chicken when basting it, so that it will color evenly.

When the chicken is half done, add the soaked prunes and raisins to the pan with their soaking liquid, basting the bird well and often then and thereafter. When the chicken is done, in about 1 1/2 hours, the pan juices should have the consistency of a light syrup. If they don’t, siphon off the juices and boil them down rapidly.

Carve the chicken and serve it over plain boiled rice surrounded by the prunes and raisins, with the pan juice pored over.

As for cooking she said "I was a frustrated artist and it was my way of creating."

What beautiful creations they are.

Arthur Rubinstein, Nela, and Their Children Eva and Paul, 1942

Moïse Kisling (French and Polish, 1891-1953)

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THE BEST BANANA-PINEAPPLE BREAD I'VE EVER EATEN!!

I've tried, literally, dozens of banana bread recipes, over the years, and this one is, by far, the BEST I've ever eaten. It is quick and easy (one bowl); it is moist from the 2 cups of mashed bananas and some crushed pineapple, it is sweet from brown sugar and has just a hint of cinnamon and coconut extract. You have to try this one!!

 In a large bowl, whisk together:
3 large eggs
1¼ cup canola oil
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 teaspoon coconut extract (don't leave out)
2 cups of ripe mashed bananas
1 (8 ounce) can crushed pineapple drained
2/3 cup brown sugar, packed
1 cup white sugar

After it is well mixed, stir in:
3 cups all purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 cup chopped pecans

Mix well with wooden spoon and pour into two greased 8" x 4" x 2" loaf pans. Bake at 350F for 60 minutes or until toothpick tests clean. Cool in pan for 20 minutes before removing to wire rack. Wrap hot banana bread in plastic wrap and let it cool.

 Hubby loves this bread toasted and slathered with butter!!

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Flavors of Chile

Someone gave me a small promotional cookbook that was produced to highlight the cuisine of Chile. Flavors of Chile is a kind of a glorified church fundraiser cookbook in a slick format.

There is no exposition and a few typos, but basically, it is quite a nice little cookbook, featuring some easy and interesting recipes. It makes me want to eat more Chilean food. The book is heavy on seafood, but offers a good mix with vegetables, and sweets. The plain little translations of the recipes are a bit funny.

Sometimes, you find some really nice little cookbooks in the guise of a publicity brochure. This apple dessert is an easy take on a tarte tatin and really deserves a better moniker than "apple dessert". Keep in very thin and serve with a bit of cream.

Apple Dessert
Postre de manzana
6 cups apples, peeled and cored and in thin slices
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 a lemon, its juice
2/3 cup brown sugar
5 tablespoons unsalted frozen butter, in lumps
1/2 cup oatmeal
1/2 cup flour
1/4 cup grated coconut
1/4 cup chopped walnuts
Pinch of salt

1. Preheat oven to high heat. In a bowl, mix the fruit with half the cinnamon, lemon juice and 1 tablespoon sugar. Pour the mixture into an 8 inch square or 9-inch round baking tin.
2. Place the rest of the ingredients in a food processor, including the remaining cinnamon and sugar, and process for a few seconds until coarsely mixed. Spread the mixture over the apples in the tin and bake for 30-40 minutes, until the top is golden and the apples are cooked. Serve warm or at room temperature.

You just never know where you might find nifty little recipes.

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Cocktail-Supper Cookbook

The 1950’s were big on planning and cooking “ahead.” God forbid one might muss one’s coif worrying over last minute preparations. Marion Flexner offers up a totally new type of meal, the Cocktail-Supper and of course wrote the Cocktail-Supper Cookbook.


What you might ask makes a “cocktail supper” different from other entertaining? Flexner explains it:

"You don’t need a kitchen to cook in. You don’t need a dining room to eat in. With modern know-how, whether your kitchen is the last word in efficiency or a makeshift affair…you can prepare and serve delectable and outstanding meals.

The era of the formal seated dinner party with numerous courses of rich dishes, served perhaps by butlers and maids is drawing to a close. Today you can serve what you want when you want where you want.

And so the cocktail supper, big and comprehensive or small and intimate, has emerged as the most practical and inexpensive way of entertaining a group."

So, if I understand it correctly, a cocktail-supper is a small buffet with drinks, lots of drinks. Themes seem to be popular with the cocktail-supper, Flexner offers up such fun filled events as the Erin Go Baaaa-aa-a, the Hungarian Rhapsody, and the Spanish Fandango.

Here is a truly one of the best meat sauces you will find. It is from the spectacular Kentucky Derby themed cocktail-supper.

Pride-of-the-Bluegrass Mustard

2 tablespoons dry mustard
1 1/2 tablespoons flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
3 tablespoons sugar
5 tablespoons cider vinegar
9 tablespoons beer
2 tablespoons melted butter

Whip all the ingredients until smooth in a blender. Or make a paste of dry ingredients with vinegar and add beer slowly. Stir in butter. Pour mixture into double boiler and beat with a wooden spoon until the consistency of a thick cream sauce. It takes about 4 minutes of constant beating.

Try it one ham or any pork, corned beef, or even chicken and be sure to make a cocktail!

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Twelve Company Dinners

I pick up cookbooks for different reasons. I tend to always add French and Southern cookbooks (though there is often little difference in them), I like books with a specific focus such as terrines or preserves, and I have all of Elizabeth David and M.F. K. Fisher, but I often buy editions I don’t have as a kind of culinary “overkill”, and I am often overly taken by cookbooks with spectacular photography, but Twelve Company Dinners was a first. I bought it because of the author photo!



Margo Rieman looked like she would make fine dinner company, in fact, twelve dinners. The jacket blurb said Rieman was born on a farm in Utah. She traveled the world on a tramp steamer, wrote for fashion magazines, managed a jazz band and wrote a mystery. She lives(d) in New York City with her husband and two dachshunds. She is shown with the dachshunds that are described as “remarkable” but her husband is nowhere in site. He seems to have not been remarkable! She is also photographed with a drink and a cigarette but no food.

The premise for this book is to provide twelve dinner party menus with as much of the guesswork removed as possible. Rieman provide foe each dinner, a menu, a shopping list, a detailed and timed progression of activities and the recipes.



Since it is the late Fifties, many of the ingredients come from cans, which might be one of the reasons Rieman is photographed sans food but fortified with drinks.

She recommends for gourmets a dinner of Lamb Shashlik.

The menu includes:

Brandied Pâté (made from canned pâté and canned mushrooms)
Hot Cheese Balls (made with jarred cheese and canned deviled ham)
Lamb Shashlik
Kasha
Hot Yeast Rolls (made from a boxed mix)
Green Salad (made from actual lettuce)
Chocolate Rum Roll (a recipe from Dione Lucas)

Shashlik

4 lbs. leg of lamb, cut in 2” X 2” squares
1/4 cup sherry
2 onions
2 tbs. oregano
1 large eggplant
6 tomatoes
charcoal powder
1/4 cup olive oil
1/2 tsp. salt
1 clove garlic
24 tiny onions or 6 medium
6 green peppers

Make a marinade for the lamb by chopping fine 2 medium onions. In a bowl, crush onions with salt to extract a little juice. Then add garlic, olive oil, sherry and oregano. Stir well, then marinate lamb overnight in this mixture. Thread long skewers with lamb, eggplant squares, green pepper squares, tomato quarters and onions, either small onions or medium ones cut in quarters. Try to put four of each on the skewers. Sprinkle with charcoal powder and broil eight minutes on each side, sixteen minutes in all.

The instructions are very detailed, but here is the gist:

Day before
BEGIN SASHLIK

Morning or day before
MAKE PATÉ

Morning
MAKE CHEESE BALLS
MAKE CHOCOLATE RUM ROLL

Afternoon
PREPARE SALAD

5:30 PM
CONTINUE SASHLIK

6:00 PM
BEGIN HOT ROLLS

6:05 PM
PREPARE KASHA

6:30 PM
Get dressed for dinner

6:55 PM
Back to the kitchen as guests arrive at 7.
CONTINUE ROLLS

7:10 PM
If some of your guests have arrived
REMOVE PATÉ FROM REFRIGERATOR

7:15 PM
CONTINUE CHEESE BALLS

7:40 PM
CONTINUE SHASHLIK

7:45 PM
CONTINUE SALAD

7:48 PM
TURN SHASHLIK

8:00 PM
FINISH SHASHLIK

8:02 PM
CONTINUE ROLLS

8:15 PM
RETURN TO KITCHEN FOR ROLLS
START COFFEE

9:00 PM
Guests finish eating.
TAKE COFFEE AND CHOCOLATE ROLL TO TABLE

Wow, I’m not sure, but if I had to keep all those times together, I might just lose track of dinner all together.


And she seems so laid back in the picture!

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Ultimate Venison Cookery

I find it a bit unusual that in the Untied States where we love to eat “everything”, that there is little commercial venison. It is a popular and available meat in most of Europe and the Untied Kingdom. There is a special affinity for farming venison in Scotland. Much of the salient cooking expertise comes from great Scottish cooks like Lady Claire Macdonald and Nicola Fletcher.

Fletcher collected thirty years of farming, butchering and cooking venison into a marvelous book on the subject. Ultimate Venison Cookery is just that – the ultimate book on the subject. If you love venison, this book is a must. Fletcher explains in detail the parts and cuts of the deer. She gives sound advice on the issue of marinating or not citing a cookery book she was reading as a draft. It bore a misprint urging the reader to use marinades, “with desecration and with a purpose”. Fletcher found it to be more of a prophecy than a misprint. Many marinades, she notes, take on the air of a pickling brine than a marinade. Marinade lightly with a purpose and not a desecration.


My favorite holiday terrine is from the Duchess of Devonshire, but this winter, I have been using a variation of Nicola Fletcher’s venison terrine.

Venison and Apricot Terrine

75 g dried apricots, chopped
3 tablespoons brandy
500 g minced venison
350 g minced belly of pork
1 teaspoon fresh ginger, grated
2 allspice berries, crushed
6 juniper berries, crushed
100 ml dry red wine or port
2 tablespoons olive oil
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
175 g thinly slice pancetta or streaky bacon
1 egg, beaten

Mix apricots with the brandy and cover and leave to soak for a couple of hours. Mix together the venison, pork, fresh ginger, allspice, juniper berries, salt and pepper with the wine or port and the olive oil. Cover and marinate overnight or as long as you can.

Preheat the oven to Gas 4, 180 C, 350 F. Line a terrine or loaf tin with the pancetta or streaky bacon, keeping 3 or 4 rashers for the top. Beat the egg into the marinated venison mixture, then use just under half to fill the base of the terrine, pushing a 1.25 cm ridge up all around the sides of the terrine. Spoon the apricots into the hollow created by the ridge, then cover with the rest of the venison mixture to encase the apricots completely. Smooth over and cover with the rest of the pancetta or bacon, folding over any stray strips.

Cover with tin foil, place in a bain marie and bake in the oven for 1 1/2 – 2 hours or until a skewer inserted into the middle comes out clean. Remove from the oven and place a weight on top, then chill. To serve, run a knife around the edge of the tin and turn the terrine out.

It makes a delicate and wonderful terrine. I have made it with and without the apricot layer and both have been well received. Now may be the time to befriend a hunter so they will share their game next November.

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Memoirs & Menus

Georges Sprunt had a childhood few people could even imagine.


Born in the twenties to a family that settled in Shanghai at the turn of the twentieth century. Known as the Paris of the Orient, Shanghai’s foreign residents lived in palatial estates with a retinue of servants.




At the time of Sprunt’s birth, there were seventy social and sporting clubs for the small foreign community. The Shanghai Club had the longest bar in the world measuring 110.7 feet by 39 feet.


The city was inhabited by writers and movie stars and opera singers like Mary Pickford, Will Rogers, Douglas Fairbanks, Anna Pavlova, André Malraux, Emily Hahn and Noel Coward.

Amid his eccentric family Georges Sprunt learned Chinese cooking from a stern master chef. Yiddish dishes came from his grandmother who claimed to be Polish or Russian depending on the day. Russian cooking came from his aunt and opera singer and an exiled czarist colonel. An eighty-year-old Iraqi matriarch with iodine skin and aquamarine eyes taught him to make a curry. He learned another way to make curry from an Indian princess who attended the coronation of King George VI, sold the family jewels and modeled for Balenciaga. Madame Sacati, known as the Tiger of the Japanese Gendarmerie, taught him Japanese specialties. Legendary chef, Henri Carpentier, taught him the secrets of his potage St. Germain on the condition not to divulge it until the chef’s demise.



Needless to say, Georges Sprunt’s Memoirs & Menus is a fascinating document of remembrances through recipes.

Squab Nanking Style

2 squabs quartered
1/3 cup soy sauce
2 tbsp. sherry
1 clove garlic minced
2 tbsp. oil
2 tsp. brown sugar
1 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. five-spice seasoning
1/2 cup shredded smoked pork or ham
1/2 cup chicken stock
1 lb. fresh spinach or 1 pkg. frozen spinach (thawed)

Soak cleaned squab in soy sauce, sherry, and garlic for 30 minutes. Drain well, keeping sauce. Heat oil in skillet. Fry squab for 10 minutes. Add pork, spices, seasoning, and stock. Cover and simmer for 30 minutes. Remove squab to a heated dish. Add the well-drained spinach to the juices in the pan, adding a little more stock if necessary. Cook spinach until just tender. Place squab on top and serve.

Memoirs & Menus is a highly entertaining and fascinating romp through a unique culinary upbringing.

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