Beer Pairing Tasting Menu

Eventually I'm going to get a lot better about cleverly naming these meals - but for now, it's a beer pairing menu. And I've finally landed on it more or less. I've already started preparing for it this weekend (hence the lack of posting) and here it is:

Grilled cheese - green apple, walnut yogurt cheese, toasted chocolate broiche, village cheese, olive, bacon, persimmon chips with butter and cayenne

Dim Sum - duck confit steam bun

Oktoberfest - Kangaroo Sausage, Sauerkraut air, purple mustard, cheddar cider soup

Surf and Turf - Pumpernickel Brown Beer Pudding with Vanilla Chantily cream, salted butterscotch and blood orange duck skin and frog leg tempura

Margarita Pizza - crust, pineapple gelato, lime juniper gelée, taquilla caviar, salt foam

Thanks to everyone who's signed up! We've got a full house! I'm already planning the next one and I'll be posting the dates for that one soon!

Cheers! And wish me luck!

Next Two-Week Dinner open for reservations

November 08, 2009
4 p.m.

This time around I'll be making a 5 course meal, paired with 5 different beers. There will be a constraint - just like I had last time. But instead of divulging the challenge now - I'd rather have my guests guess during the dinner and then I'll fill everyone in when I post my final images.

I have 6 open spots for Sunday afternoon/night. The cost will be either 40 or 45 dollars 30 or 35 (including beer) depending on whether I'm able to get a few rare ingredients or not. Remember - you are only paying for the cost of the ingredients for this meal. I think of this as my own cooking school - so I do not charge for my time.

The meal will last between 2.5 and 3 hours.

I'll be posting a menu shortly - first I need to find out whether my butcher has any kangaroo or ostrich in the shop before I finalize my last dish. Each course is loosley based off of some of my favorite things to eat while drinking beer. I'll be seeking to bring out certain flavor combinations in these "comfort foods" that will sing with the different types of beer we've chosen.

Here's a teaser -

Pumpernickel Brown Beer Pudding with Vanilla Chantily Cream, Salted Butterscotch and Blood Orange Shrimp Tempura

Sign up now!

Sweet Potato Soup with Pumpernickel Croutons

Every time it rains in Los Angeles I think, "Soup!" I don't know about other Los Angelenos, but when October rolls around I start longing for stormy weather. Sigh.

Ingredients

2 sweet potatoes, roasted at 350 degrees for an hour and a half
2 small potatoes (red, white, new)
1 yellow onion
1/4 c. Earth Balance or butter (more to taste)
1 tsp. nutmeg
2 tsp. cumin
1/2 tsp. salt
1 clove garlic

2-3 slices pumpernickel bread (preferably old)
2 T. olive oil
1 T. Earth Balance or butter

2 fistfuls of Italian flat leaf parsley
1 clove garlic
3 T. olive oil



Toast pumpernickel slices in pan on medium heat. Crumble toasts and place in blender with 1 tsp. of Earth Balance. Pulse until the toasts become crumbs. Sautée in pan with 2 T. olive oil till crunchy (few minutes). Remove from blender and set aside.

Add parsley, 1 clove garlic and 3 T. of olive oil to blender (no need to clean it out from making the crumbs). Blend until nice and electric green. Pour in to bowl and set aside.

Chop onion and sautée until golden. Meanwhile, cube the potatoes (it's up to you if you want to peel them...I did) and poach in boiling water until golden. Combine cooked onion, boiled potatoes, roasted sweet potato, garlic, 1/4 c. Earth Balance, nutmeg, cumin, salt and pepper in blender (Vita Mix!) and blend, increasing the power to high to make sure it's properly puréed. Taste the soup to make sure the spices and salt level is to your liking - you may have to add more spices to give it the nutty kick you want.

To serve spoon puréed soup into bowl and top with pumpernickel croutons. Sprinkle parsley sauce around croutons and top with a pat of butter if you so please.

Chocolate Zucchini Cupcakes with Strawberry Frosting

So Friday we had a baby shower for one of my co-workers and I decided to try my hand at making cupcakes. Now - truth is - I've never made cupcakes from scratch before. The closest I've ever come is making Soda Pop Cupcakes back in the day. So this is my attempt. There are a few things I would do differently next time - but I've left the recipe exactly how I made it - and I'll put in parenthesis what I'd do differently next time. The original recipe for the cake was from postpunkkitchen. Of course I altered it...

2 1/2 cups grated, peeled, fresh zuchini

2 ripe bananas, mashed well

1 cup canola oil (next time I would do half oil and half applesauce plus 1 tsp. cherry flavoring)

3 cups flour

2 cups sugar

1 tsp. salt

1 tsp. soda

1 tsp. vanilla bean paste

3 or 4 tbsp. chocolate powder

1 cups semi-sweet chocolate chips (I wouldn't put this in next time...too rich)

1 cup chopped cherries

In medium sized mixing bowl, combine zuchini, bananas, oil, and vanilla. Stir well or beat with electric mixer if you want to be fancy. In large bowl, combine all remaining ingredients except chocolate. Add wet mixture to dry, mix well and add chocolate chips. Pour into lightly greased and floured bundt pan. Bake at 350 for 45-60 minutes, until toothpick or knife inserted comes out clean. Let cool upright 15 minutes, then invert onto cooling rack. Allow to cool 30 minutes before tasting. Enjoy!

Strawberry Frosting

1/2 c. Earth Balance or butter, softened

1/3 c. almond milk or any sort of nut milk

3 c. powdered sugar

1 c. freeze dried strawberrries

1/2 tbsp. coconut oil

Put freeze dried strawberries in food processor along with powdered sugar and blend until the strawberries are pulverized in to a powder. Meanwhile cream together the Earth Balance, coconut oil and milk until it's combined (next time I'd double the amount of Earth Balance and milk to make the frosting less sweet) Add the powdered sugar and strawberry mixture little by little until it's the right consistency and flavor. I used a piping bag to frost the cupcakes. Enjoy!

Lentil and Tomato Stew with Italian Parsley Sauce

The other night I was wondering around my HUGE kitchen trying to figure out what to make. I had virtually no fresh vegetables except half an heirloom tomato. Then I noticed a bag of lentils sitting unassumingly at the back of my pantry. I had shamelessly ignored these lentils for a good half a year. I believe the last thing I made with them was a total chalky disaster. But I decided to try one more time, mostly out of necessity.

I am glad to say that the second time is the charm, in this case. The stew turned out to be rather flavorful and fulfilling. It was raining the night I made it - which is and added ingredient that I'll happily take whenever it decides to show up here in ever sunny California.

1 c. dry lentils

2 c. water

1 large carrot, minced (you can always add more if you really like carrot)

2 garlic cloves, minced

3 tbsp. Earth Balance or Butter

1 heirloom tomato (or any tomato....I only used half because thats all I had)

2 tsp. salt

Boil water in medium sauce pan. Add lentils, carrots and garlic and simmer, covered, over medium/low heat. Lentils will vary in cooking time depending on many factors including age - so start checking them after the 15 minute mark and cook (covered) until they taste right to you. My lentils took around 25 minutes to cook thoroughly. Turn heat down to the lowest setting and add tomatoes, salt and earth balance. Cook for another 2-3 minutes just until the tomatoes soften a tad.

Do not add tomatoes or any other acidic ingredient until the very end. Also - do not add salt until the very end because it causes the lentils to stay a tad harder and take FOREVER to cook through.

And that's pretty much it. I drizzled a little parsley sauce on top as well. Yum!

Parsley Sauce

1 c. olive oil

HUGE bunch of flat leaf parsley

1 garlic clove

pinch of salt

Purée everything together until it becomes an electric green sauce. Add more garlic if you are a garlic fiend.

Sweet Potato Brulée with Olive Oil Gelato

So I have a few leftovers from last Sundays/Mondays meal. Tonight I made a dessert from the filling I used in the Fig Brulée and the Gelato from the final course. Here it is:

1 Sweet Potato

1/4 c. Earth Balance

1/4 tsp. Anise oil

4-5 Ginger Snaps

Granulated Sugar

Raw Olive Oil and Coconut Gelato

Roast sweet potato in oven at 350 degrees for an hour to an hour and a half. Remove sweet potato flesh from skin and blend with remaining ingredients.

In blender or food processor blend ginger snaps till they become crumbs. Pat ginger crumbs in to ramekins and bake at 350 degrees for 10 minutes. Fill ramekins with Sweet Potato Mousse. Sprinkle with granulated sugar. Torch or throw under the broiler for a minute or so. Top with a scoop of gelato and a sprig of mint. Enjoy!

Monday Night's Dinner - Obispo House

Beet & Portabello Walnut Paté on a Pumpernickel Crouton with Lemon Cashew Cream.
Gin Mini Shot with Cucumber Caviar.

Sauteéd Fennel, Leeks, Brussel Sprout Leaves, Zucchini, and Pancetta on a bed of Pistachio Cream
**Though every dish in this meal happens to be vegan based - there are two which have different kinds of meat as one ingredient. One of my guests was a vegetarian - so I easily made her dish sans carnage. The bowl on the upper left has no pancetta.

Filet Miñon marinated in a Coffee Chocolate Rub, Pear and Pumpkin Purée, English Peas, Pasta Spheres in a Macadamia Rosemary Pesto, Pink Peppercorns, Cherry Coffee reduction

Portabello Mushroom marinated in a Coffee Chocolate Rub, Pear and Pumpkin Purée, English Peas, Pasta Spheres in a Macadamia Rosemary Pesto, Pink Peppercorns, Cherry Coffee reduction

Figs stuffed with a Sweet Potato Anise Mousse, bruleéd, sitting atop a bed of Ginger sand flanked by Purple Potato Chips and Fried Rose Petals with Sea Salt.

Lemon Sweet Corn Cake soaked in Elderflower syrup topped with cut rose petals and strawberry powder.
Olive Oil Raw Gelato with Pear and Tamarind Carmel and a fried Stevia leaf, 22k Gold.
Pine Bud Extract, Figg Seeds, Coconut Dark Chocolate Ganache, fried Stevia Leaf, 22k Gold.

All photos courtesy of Laurel Dailey Photography.

Shots from Prepping Monday Night's Dinner

I made the same meal the next night for my old roommates. It was great. Laurel shot the whole evening including all the courses. These are a bunch of shots from getting everything together.

Tyler's Birthday Dinner - October 5th

So the night went off without a hitch! Enjoy!

Beet & Portabello Walnut Paté on a Pumpernickel Crouton with Lemon Cashew Cream.
Gin Mini Shot with Cucumber Caviar.

Sauteéd Fennel, Leeks, Brussel Sprout Leaves, Zucchini, Pancetta on a bed of Pistachio Cream, topped with Purple Potato Chips

Figs stuffed with a Sweet Potato Anise Mousse, bruleéd, sitting atop a bed of Ginger sand.

I don't have photos of the last two entrées because they didn't turn out...I'm still learning! I may invest in a soft-box set up so that I can keep tinkering with still-lifes and food photography. But don't worry - I have tons of photos from Laurel from the next night when I recreated the same meal for paying customers (my old roommates!).

Cucumber Caviar

There's a great instructional about how to make these. I followed that to a tee. I got the scale off Amazon just like the guy suggests (it's GREAT). I also got syringes off Amazon too - though my husband ran out and got me an oral syringe from Walgreens that worked well for larger caviar too. I got my chemicals from the same place that I got my beet powder.

All the following photos are courtesy of Laurel Dailey Photography.

Beet, Portabello & Walnut Paté

My little patés waiting to be dusted with beet powder! I can't take credit for this recipe - I used one from allrecipes.com I made a few adjustments but basically it's exactly the same.

Beet & Portabello Mushroom Paté

1 cup walnuts
1/2 cup minced shallots
1/2 cup unsalted butter (earth balance)
3/4 pound portabello mushrooms, chopped
1 tablespoon roasted garlic puree
1/4 cup chopped fresh Italian parsley
1 tablespoon chopped fresh thyme
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon white pepper
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Spread walnuts in a single layer on a cookie sheet. Toast for 10 minutes, or until fragrant and lightly browned.
In a large saute pan, cook shallots in butter over medium heat until translucent. Then add chopped mushrooms, garlic, parsley, thyme, salt, and pepper. Cook, stirring often, until most of the liquid has evaporated.
Process toasted walnuts and olive oil in a blender or food processor until mixture forms a thick paste. Spoon in the cooked mushroom mixture, and process to desired texture.
Pack mixture into well-oiled ramekins or bowl. Cover with plastic wrap, and refrigerate for a few hours or overnight.


Above image courtesy of Laurel Dailey Photography

I pressed the paté in to molds and after they set and dusted them with beet powder.

Elderflower Syrup

The shot above shows the little bundt cakes after they've been soaked in elderflower syrup.

Elderflower Syrup

1/2 c. sugar
1/2 c. butter
1/4 c. elderflower syrup

Put all ingredients in a sauce pan and heat until the sugar dissolves. Pour over bundt cakes while they are still in their pan and let soak for a few hours.