Somewhere in the middle of all of this, I had a bad craving for pizza. More specifically, pepperoni pizza. My mother had just recently sent me a recipe to try out for pizza crust, and this seemed like the perfect moment to do so. To the question of, “Were we to make homemade pizza for dinner, what should we put on it? Besides pepperoni.” I got the response: “Pineapple.” And, we ended up with carmelized onion, coppa, pepperoni, fresh mozzarella and pepperoni.

The recipe we used for the crust was from Cooks Illustrated which advocates using a laminated dough. What is a laminated dough, you ask? It’s a dough you’ve rolled out, spread with softened butter, folded up to form a sort of pocket for the butter, rolled out again, folded over again, etc. There is some in and out of the fridge involved, but essentially you end up with a dough that has several layers of dough and butter. Layers of dough and fat makes flaky crust. I repeat: layers of dough and fat makes flaky crust. This is the same exact technique used in making croissants, for example.

So, laminated dough. Cooking method? Super hot oven and a baking stone. The dough came out nice and crispy. It reminded me of the dough used for Chicago style deep dish, since it had the flaky layers from the butter.

This definitely satisfied my craving for pizza; if you make pizza at home, serve it with a nice green salad and a glass of red wine. I promise you won’t miss take out.

So, we’re hosting Thanksgiving this year and we’ve been talking about the menu for the last couple of weeks. Some recipes from my family, some from Joseph’s family, some of our own. One thing that came up was a chocolate mousse pie, which was apparently a specialty of Joseph’s grandmother. In our version, we decided to make our own graham crackers for the crust. We borrowed the recipe from Smitten Kitchen but added some ground ginger and ground cardamom for a nice little extra something. Also, we are addicted to cardamom.

As the recipe points out, who even knows what’s in a graham cracker? What is the right combination of flavors? And then you have the texture issue also. Well, I have to say, this recipe is very, very close. The texture was right on. There was something ever so slightly different about these graham crackers and the ones we all had as children. It was suggested that perhaps the lack of wax paper enveloping them was the reason. I raised an eyebrow at that one.

Overall, however, the graham crackers were good. And, we were planning on using them in a crust, so the slight difference was not so important.

As for the pie we made, well, I can only say it was pretty amazing. And simple, too. We started by crushing up graham crackers along with some of the spiced pecans that we had made around the same time, added a little butter and made it into a crust. In a pie dish, distribute your crust evenly, then bake at 375 degrees for about 10-15 minutes.

Once your crust is done and cooled at room temperature, we filled it with chocolate mousse. Yes. Chocolate mousse. With dark chocolate. And port wine. It was heavenly. We had made the mousse early, let it chill in the fridge, then used in the pie. But, you could also pour the mousse into the pie crust before it has chilled and settled and put the whole thing in the fridge.

Top with homemade whipped cream to which you’ve added a little vanilla, about 1-2 tablespoons of sugar and some cinnamon. Yes, cinnamon. After this, we may never make whipped cream without a pinch of cinnamon in it for a nice enhanced flavor.

Next step: devour.

These spiced nuts are a holiday standby. They make a great snack and if you make them, they can be utilized in a number of delicious dishes. They’re saltiness makes them a perfect foil for sweets, and their slight spicy sweetness makes them the perfect addition to savory dishes. I’ve added them to everything from a roasted butternut squash salad with balsamic vinaigrette to mashed sweet potatoes topped in marshmallows and they’re a hit every time. This time, we have something special to recommend to you, but for now, you can just enjoy them as is.

150g whole pecans (about 2 cups whole)
3 tbsp granulated sugar
1 1/2 tbsp cinnamon
1 1/4 tsp salt
1 tsp ground nutmeg
1/4 tsp ground allspice
1/8 tsp ground cloves
1/8 tsp smoked paprika
1/8 tsp cayenne
1/8 tsp black pepper
1 egg

Preheat your oven to 225F. Mix all the dry ingredients except the pecans in a large bowl or plastic ziplock. Break egg and add to the spices, mixing well. Add the pecans, turning them to coat in your bowl, or shaking to coat in your bag. Spread the pecans in a single layer over a silicone baking mat that has been placed on a cookie sheet, or line a cookie sheet with aluminum foil and lightly coat with cooking spray to prevent sticking and spread the pecans there. Put in the oven for about an hour, or until the pecans are dry. I like to turn up the oven to 350F for 5-10 minutes at the end, just to get the pecans extra dry and roasted.

Remove the baking sheet from the oven and let the pecans stand until they come to room temperature. The pecans will keep, in an airtight container, for 3-5 days, but are best when eaten the same day.

Ever since we were in San Francisco earlier this summer, we’ve been thinking about making our own croissants. We had eaten, of course, at the famous Tartine bakery while out West, and had dreams of tackling what amounts to one of the more difficult pastry recipes.

After some research, we came across this recipe on The Daring Kitchen website. The recipe is Julia Child’s own croissant recipe and contains 57 steps. (!!) Clearly, this was daring, but we decided to take the plunge anyway.

I am going to say this here: croissants are not difficult. They just take time.

In fact, the more I think about it, for so many recipes that we post, whether our own, those of others, or adapted from various sources, time is an essential ingredient. Yes, there are 57 steps. Yes, you have to rise your dough at least a bazillion times. Yes, there are two separate occasions at which you can refrigerate your dough overnight. Yes, you have to work quickly with cold butter. But, really, when you read over the recipe, you should notice that none of the techniques are particularly difficult. In fact, they are mostly mundane baking techniques and tasks.

The trick is achieving the right temperature for your butter so that it spreads evenly throughout your dough. This is what gives you flakiness.

It is important that you respect the times outlined in the recipe. In the past year or so, I have really found my wings with baking. I average a bread or two a week; I try to make all our bread for home myself. We’ve done breads, rolls, crusts, popovers, etc. And, one theme that keeps coming back is this: low and slow fermentation yields the best results. You simply cannot replace this step and get the same texture and depth of flavor.

So, invite your friends for brunch. I can guarantee your guests will be completely satisfied when they discover that you are serving homemade croissants.

Having eaten with us before, our friend requested that we prepare some of her favorite dishes (“the fish” as it is often referred to, our 48 hour short-ribs, and our chocolate mousse). We agreed, riffing on ourselves and filling in the gaps with some new items in our rep.

Our tasting menu for the evening:
“Baked Potato Skins” – Potato, cheddar, and smoked red Dorset cheese fritter, crème fraiche, chive foam, bacon drizzle
Smoked Octopus – braised and smoked baby octopus, spiced yogurt sauce, endive, celery, arugula in vinaigrette
Red Mullet – pan seared red mullet, spice bread and butter sauce, toasted walnuts, anise candied oranges, basil
“Apple Toddy” intermezzo– jellied bourbon, spiced apple sorbet, candied lemon peel, honey tuile
Short Rib – 48 hour sous-vide short rib, guava chili sauce, parsnip, garlic, celeriac puree, goat’s milk panna cotta.
Chocolate Mousse – anise biscotti, amaretto chocolate mousse, espresso granita, whipped cream

I’m going to share with you our “Apple Toddy,” which we served in a shot glass.
Let’s break it down:

Bourbon Gel:
200g bourbon
3g agar

Apple Sorbet:
4 honey crisp apples (or 2 granny smith and 2 honey crisp for a more tart sorbet)
1 cup simple syrup (equal parts water and sugar, heat gently to dissolve)
Juice of 1 lemon
Sugar to taste
¼ c bourbon
Cinnamon, clove, allspice, nutmeg

Honey Tuiles (shamefully lifted from Ladies Home Journal):

Begin well in advance by coring, skinning, and coarsely chopping your apples. Place the apples in a large bowl and puree them with a stick blender. If you prefer, you can use a blender for this step, though you should add the simple syrup with the apple pieces and may have to stop frequently to push the apples down into the blades. Please don’t try to run the blender while pushing things around inside it, it just isn’t a good idea, as my slightly worse for wear mixing spoon might tell you. Add the lemon juice, simple syrup, and bourbon and mix well. Taste. Does it need more sugar? More tart? Add sugar or lemon juice depending on your preference. If you had very sweet apples you may not want to go overboard with the lemons trying to get your sorbet to a tart place. You’ll end up with lemon sorbet, which, while tasty, isn’t what we are aiming for here. Season with the spices to taste. I like ½ tsp cinnamon, and ¼ tsp each ground clove, allspice, and nutmeg.

Chill in the fridge for at least 4 hours, and then mix in your ice cream making as per the manufacturer’s instructions.

Measure out 3g of agar and cover with 1/4c of hot water. Allow the agar to hydrate for about 10 minutes. After the agar has hydrated, boil it with an additional ¼ cup of water in a small saucepan, stirring frequently, until it has completely dissolved, about 10 minutes. If you boil off too much water, or your saucepan is too large and the water is too shallow, add a bit more. We want to have at least 1/4c of water left at the end, and we don’t want to get anywhere close to boiling the pan dry. Keep the mixture very warm! Agar sets at a relatively high temperature. Place your bourbon in a mold (we used a terrine) and dissolve 1/4 c of sugar in your bourbon by stirring well. If you find you still have some residual crystals, you may need to heat your bourbon gently to dissolve. Add the water and agar to the bourbon and mix thoroughly. Chill. The gel should set rather quickly in the refrigerator. Once the gel has set, de-mould and dice the gel. Place the diced gel in a small container and cover it with equal parts bourbon and water.

Finally, prepare the honey tuiles found here.

Place a spoonful of bourbon gel in the bottom of a shot glass and place a scoop of the sorbet over it. Garnish with a tuile.

We won’t lie. This is the grown up version of a jello shot. Playful and sophisticated. Go ahead, try it. When was the last time you felt haughty consuming a jello shot?

When I got home from my shopping excursion, I started on the tomato confit, which is a really simple recipe. I like to cut up my tomatoes into cubes or small pieces. I also remove most of the seeds, using only the flesh of the tomato. You can make tomato confit with any type of tomato you like, but I prefer to use heirlooms, if not for the fact that you can get a nice colorful blend of tomato pieces: red, green, yellow, purple. This time around, I added a few cut up tomatillos and groudcherries to the tomatoes, for a nice addition to flavors and textures.

For tomato confit, combine the following ingredients in a baking dish:

5-10 heirloom tomatoes, cut into cubes
5 tomatillos, cut into cubes
1/2 c. groundcherries (cape gooseberries), husks removed
4 cloves garlic, smashed
Salt and pepper
Olive oil

I use just enough olive oil to make sure all the tomato pieces are covered generously. Remember, confit consists of cooking items in fat at a low temperature. Place your baking dish in the oven, set at 275 degrees, and walk away for an hour or two. When your tomatoes are soft, sweet, when you almost have a tomato jam, you are done. Let the mixture cool and place in a jar. You can put this on everything. No, really.

When it came time to figure out the pork, I asked Joseph to mix up a spice blend for the meat. I was going to sear the meat, then finish it in the oven.

Here’s what he came up with:

1 tbs. mustard
1 /2 tbs. honey
Rosemary
Basil
Garlic
Tarragon
Celery Salt
Salt and Pepper

We rubbed this all over the meat, then seared in a very hot pan to brown the outside. Once all sides are browned, which should only take you about 10 minutes, place in a very hot oven, about 450 degrees, and let it complete cooking. When the internal temperature of the meat hits 145 degrees, take it out. Let it rest for about 10 minutes on a cutting board. Then, slice and serve immediately.

Recently, the guideline for internal temperature of cooked pork has been lowered to 145 degrees, down from the 160 of the past. (See this article.) Personally, I like rare meat and just over 145 is great for my taste. You can, naturally, cook your pork to a higher temperature than that, but I would strongly recommend you stop cooking the meat when the internal temperature hits between 145-155 degrees. Remember, your meat’s temperature will rise a bit while resting. Also, you will end up with a nice juicy piece of meat with a great texture when you cook it to a slightly lower temperature. I find 160 yields dry, tougher meat.

Cooking aside, what I was completely unready for was the flavor. The simple rub gave a beautifully rounded, aromatic flavor. The combination of the herbs, the slightly pungent taste of mustard, and the sweetness of the honey not only made a great crust on the outside of the tenderloin, but tasted wonderful. We served it with tomato confit on a slice of homemade Asiago cheese bread, and a sautee of Brussels sprouts, onions and mushrooms.

All in all, this was a great Fall time meal. It is simple to make and packed full of flavor.

When I first moved to New York, I was amazed at how everyone here got bacon, egg and cheese sandwiches from the corner deli for breakfast. It was a thing. An established thing. A mostly weekend, thing, but you get the point. And here I was unaware of this thing, as I was with Bialys. I never had Bialys. I didn’t grow up with Bialys. And, I didn’t grow up with bacon, egg and cheese sandwiches. Clearly I missed out on some things earlier in life.

The point is this: the combination of salty, cured pork, egg, cheese, and starch is a world unto itself. And, the classic quiche Lorraine is part of that world. Oh, that beautiful, beautiful world.

As the name suggests, quiche Lorraine comes from the Lorraine region of France/Germany. I use the slash, because while the Lorraine region is part of France today, it has, over its long history, gone back and forth between French and German ownership. In fact, quiche is originally a German dish which was adopted and now is mostly associated with French cuisine. As such, it is one of the standards of bistro fare, invariable served with a green salad in the cafes of France.

For this lovely, light quiche Lorraine, we used the following ingredients:

Crust
1 1/2 c flour
6 Tbs. cold butter
2 Tbs. olive oil
1 Tbs. water
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. black pepper

Filling
5 eggs
1 cup creme fraiche
5 slices thick cut bacon
1/2 lb. Comté cheese, grated
Fresh herbs
Nutmeg
Salt/Pepper

For the crust:

While I normally make dough by hand, I use a food processor for this crust. The reason is that it is much easier the cut up the butter while incorporating it with the rest of the dough at the same time in a food processor. And, this makes making a crust so easy, that you should never have an excuse for not whipping up a quick crust for your tarts, quiches, etc. This is my go-to recipe that I use for many different fillings. Simply put everything into your food processor and pulse it until you have a crumbly mixture. This should only take about a minute or so. If your dough is too dry, add a bit more olive oil. Never add more water, it will make your dough hard after baking.

When you’re done pulsing, be aware that your dough is not going to be a cohesive ball, but rather a dry, crumbly pile of stuff. This is exactly what you want. I pour out the contents of the food processor bowl onto a sheet of plastic wrap, and shape the dough in a ball with my hands. It should hold together every so slightly. Once you have a ball, place this in the fridge for at least 30 minutes. Now is a good time to preheat your oven to 375 degrees.

Now mix up your custard. I start by rendering the bacon slices. I used very thick cut, cured bacon from our local market. Traditionally, quiche calls for “lardons” which are thick cubes of pork fat (with a little meat on them) that are everywhere in French cuisine. Thick bacon is essentially the same thing. Once you bacon is cooked, set it aside on a paper towel to drain.

In a bowl, combine eggs, creme fraiche (I use homemade, for which we posted a recipe here), grated cheese (although, save a bit for the top), herbs, a pinch of nutmeg, and salt and pepper. This is your basic custard. I then cut up the cooked bacon into small pieces and mix into the custard. Creme fraiche is an important ingredient here, it’s what makes your quiche light and fluffy. If you see a recipe that calls for milk or regular cream, just walk away. Go for the creme fraiche, you will not regret it. The texture of the cooked custard will be exactly what you’re looking for in a quiche: soft, delicate, light, fluffy.

As far as quiche goes, you don’t need to get more complicated than this. The favors of simplicity, here, are astounding. Before adding onion, mushroom, broccoli, and a litany of other vegetables to your quiche, try it out as a basic recipe. You may never go back to those overcomplicated vegetable pies.

Once your custard is ready, take your dough ball out of the fridge, roll out and place in a tart pan. This dough almost invariably will crumble apart and you have to work it with your hands. This is okay. This is what you want. You are not going to have the perfect, once piece pie crust that you get from the frozen food aisle. But, you will also always have an amazing crust with great, soft, almost ephemeral texture.

Pour your custard into the shaped crust, and top with a bit extra grated Comté. Then, bake in a 375 degree oven until the top is brown and a knife comes out clean.

The hardest part of quiche: you must let it sit before slicing into it. The eggs need to set completely. The crust needs to set completely. Walk away. Leave the house. Run some errands. Take the dog out. Clean the bathroom. Do some laundry. I don’t care what you do, but resist the urge to cut into the quiche immediately. Let it set for at least 30 minutes before you cut into it. You will get better slices and less hassle.

As is tradition, serve your quiche with a simple green salad with homemade vinaigrette. It’s also good to have with some fresh fruit.

As Fall begins, it’s a great time to invite your friends over for a hearty season welcoming brunch. I can guarantee they will love this dish.

Amuse: Cheese plate. Wheat bread with homemade mascarpone, honey foam, fried sage.

Appetizer: Tortellini in Brodo. Fresh pasta, homemade ricotta, chicken jus gel, heirloom tomato confit, Provençal olive, olive oil.

Fish: Lobster boil. Lobster, tomato water with fresh herbs, roasted corn, fried crackling, Sriracha crème fraiche.

Palate Cleanser: Cocktail sorbet. Asti and Elderflower liqueur.

Meat: Duck two ways. Duck breast, stone fruit, cucumber and tart apple slaw, crème fraiche and mint, raspberry gastrique. Duck mousse, seeded onion bread, new pickle.

Dessert: Bread pudding, salted caramel ice cream, almond, hazelnut and pecan praline, brandy apple compote

Cheese selection

Cocktail: Kir royal

Clearly, these events are a lot of work, but it is incredibly fulfilling to do it. It’s a chance for us to make dishes that we normally would never have made, and to develop recipes and menus.

And, the biggest pay off is that we get to invite people into our home and feed them. There is something incredibly special about making an entire meal from scratch and sharing it with friends both old and new. The feeling of accomplishment and happiness in having shared our joy and enthusiasm for food with others usually hits me as we clean up after the meal, and it makes me realized how worth it the work is.

From the menu above, our recipe for duck pate:

3/4 lb. duck livers
1/2 c Vidalia onion
3 cloves garlic
1/4 c dried apricot
1/3 c dried cherries
1/4 c sundried tomatoes
1/3 c balsamic vinegar
1/3 c port wine
1 Tbs. brown sugar
4 Tbs. Butter
Splash of cream
Sprig of fresh rosemary
Sprig of fresh thyme
Olive oil
Salt, Pepper
Nutmeg
Juniper

Making a pate or mousse can be relative simple. This is a basic recipe that you can alter in many ways to achieve different outcomes and flavors. I use the same base for making chicken liver pate, as well.

Start by heating some olive oil in a pan and add fresh herbs. After about a minute, add onion, garlic and any other aromatics you like, such as ginger or other herbs. Often, I will throw some bacon or other tasty pork products (OTPP) into the pan as well to render some fat and add flavor.

Cook down the aromatics for a bit, then add the livers and dried fruit. You can also add mushrooms or other vegetables that work well in pate. I let this cook for a few minutes, until the livers are just undercooked, then I add the rest of the ingredients except the cream, which I throw in right at the end. Let your wine and vinegar cook down a bit and taste the mixture for seasoning. When you are happy with the flavor, and the livers are cooked through, splash some cream in the pan and take it off the heat.

Now, just process the mixture in a food processor and put in a terrine or mold to set in the fridge.

We served the pate with new pickles, the recipe from Michael Ruhlman’s Charcuterie cookbook. I followed his basic dill pickle recipe but added various small hot peppers to the brine so the pickles came out spicy. My one change with this recipe is to add a little less salt to the brine, as the pickles came out ever so slightly too salty for my taste.

The bread was based on the dinner roll recipe from Cooks Illustrated, but I topped them with poppy seeds, sesame seeds, diced Vidalia onion, and a brushing of egg before baking.

For a while now, I’ve been baking bread and have held the baguette in utmost esteem amongst its glutenous brethren. There is something very magical about a great baguette. The bread you can eat on its own. The texture and flavors enough to satisfy the palette. And, yet so versatile. And difficult to make right.

Having gone to grad school in France, I am extremely comfortable reading French, and took to scouring the web for recipes from the source. I stumbled upon this [in French], a site that caters to artisanal bakers.

According to the site, the method to achieving the baguette is fairly straight forward. And there is a specific ratio of ingredients to adhere to. In fact, the mumbo-jumbo below the recipe is a copy of the French law (YES, Law!) that stipulates that in order to call a bread “de tradition francaise” it must only contain the following: flour, water, salt and yeast. No additives, no extras, no additions.

Here, the ratios are important. The basic numbers to remember are these: 1kg flour. 700g water. 25g salt. 15g yeast.

Now, as you probably already know there are different kinds of flour in the world. The flour used by the French is a Type 55 flour which has about 10% gluten. This does not exist in the US. The closest thing I have found is King Arthur’s French-Style Flour, which I gather is really somewhere between types 55 and 65 French flours and has about 11.5% gluten. I am by no means an expert in all of this, so check out this site or this site for more information about the differences in flour.

Back to the ratio. I cut the base ratio in half and the recipe worked just fine. Using my kitchen scale, I was able to make sure all the numbers were exact.

The recipe I found on that French site has 8 steps:

1. Measure your ingredients: 1kg flour (preferably French Type 55 or French style flour, but a bread flour will do even though it is much higher in protein), salt, yeast, and water.

2. Mix VERY LITTLE! The fact that the dough is mixed very little is part of the identity of this bread. If you are using a mixer, the recipe says: maximum 5 minutes. If mixing by hand, just until you have a smooth dough. I definitely recommend the mixing by hand method here. It’s important with bread baking to learn about how dough should feel. I could tell how these breads were going to turn out well from the second my dough was in its first ball, my sense of feel told me so. Also, hand mixing will avoid overworking the dough.

3. Weigh the dough while it is at 25 degrees celcius. This is presumably to know that you are within the correct proportions to conform to the law. I more or less skipped this (for now).

4. Let the dough rise for three hours. The first hour, fold the dough over itself several times every twenty minutes (thus, on three separate occasions). After the first hours, let rise for an additional two hours. Do not fast track the rising here. Part of the character of this bread is a full, slow fermentation.

5. Divide the dough evenly. Here, I weighed the dough and divided the weight by three to make sure my three baguettes were going to be even. I also like to make small balls out of the divided dough, then let them sit for about 15 minutes under plastic wrap before I shape.

6. Roll into shape.

7. Proof in shape for 30-40 minutes.

8. Bake in a 250 degrees Celcius (which is roughly 485 Fahrenheit) oven for 25 minutes. Here, the recipe stipulates you must only use a stone oven. Naturally, I used my new French baking stone, the newest addition to my arsenal of bread making items.

While I am no master baker, the three loaves I made came out light and airy with a nice crispy crust that shattered like glass. Before I even had a chance to ask Joseph if he liked the bread, we had basically eaten an entire baguette plain. I guess I had the answer.

For dinner, we ended up making steak sandwiches on the baguettes. We grilled a nice NY Strip with just a little salt, pepper and cardamom on it. To serve, we spread some roasted garlic on toasted baguette, then added slices of grilled peach, fresh tomato, the steak, a shaving of Pecorino and some fried sage. Serve it with a nice green salad and homemade vinaigrette for a great meal de tradition francaise in your own home!