The Confabulist

New York Steak with Stilton and Balsamic Vinegar Reduction:

This month, we have a combined WBW and IMBB entry, whose theme is (naturally) pairing food with wine.  I took the easy way out this time, motivated largely by the fact that I had to prepare this meal on a weeknight and  so didn't have the time to do anything more elaborate.  Even so,  I've been meaning to write this entry for a long time, in part due to the urgings of a friend of mine who has always wanted to know how I prepare steaks.

Cooking a good steak is easy.  But the difference between a good steak and a great steak is not quite as easily to pin down.  I try to make incremental improvements to my procedure when I can, and welcome any suggestions for further improvement.

Personally, I feel that the grill is the best place to cook a steak.  Unfortunately, in my current apartment situation, I don't usually have access to one.  And I know that in many parts of the world, cooking with a grill is impractical part of the year.  Hence, I'll discuss the sear-roast method here. 

The General Procedure

Turn on your oven to 450 degrees F.  Salt and pepper both sides of your steaks thoroughly.  Put the burner on medium-high and let your pan heat up.  When it's hot (a few droplets of water sprinkled from your hand should sizzle away rapidly)  pour a tablespoon or so of olive oil into the pan and swirl it around.  Put the pan back on the burner and wait until the oil starts to smoke.

Put the steaks in the pan. Let them develop a nice sear on the one side, which will probably happen in 2-3 minutes, but be mindful and check regularly until you know your stove and your pan fairly well.  The surface of the meat should be a deep brown color, but no charring or burning should have taken place.  When you see this, flip the steaks.  Put a pat of butter on top of each, and slip them in the oven.

I've heard this called the sear-roast method.  If you use just the pan, typically, you flip the steaks and turn the heat down to medium.  What this often yeilds is a steak with a strong gradient.  Cut down the middle, you'd find gray/brown at the surface gradually turning pink, and then turning dark pink in the center (assuming you've cooked it to medium-rare).  The texture is highly varied.  A steak cooked properly using the sear-roast method, however, will give you a very thin layer of gray/brown where the sear is, and an even dark pink throughout.  I think this is much more professional and much tastier, as you get the entire steak at whatever temperature that you prefer, rather than just the center.

An Entirely Rational Discussion Of Steak Temperature

As far as steak temperature goes:  flavor, texture, and tenderness are highly compromised if you cook a steak at anything above medium. Medium rare is, of course, generally considered optimal.  Exactly what temperature is that, you may ask?  Well, I thought we all agreed on what those terms meant.  Then I found a couple of sites like this one who were spreading an entirely different gospel.  Apostasy!  All I have to say is this: if I'm in a restaurant and I'm paying you $35 for a steak, and I ask for it medium-rare, and you bring me something cooked to 150 degrees Farenheit, I'm sending it back to the kitchen, and spanking your ass on the way out.  And not in a fun way.

So who is responsible for this heresy?  I hope this doesn't make me sound like a wearer of tinfoil hats, but I think it's the government.  No, seriously!  A normal list starts with "Rare" and begins Medium-Rare squarely at 130 degrees F.  But you'll notice that all these lists omit "Rare" entirely, and start Medium-Rare at 145 degrees, which is quite close to the temperatures at the core of the sun and may reduce your expensive two-inch thick grass-fed dry-aged USDA prime black Angus Porterhouse to a trapezoid of steaming charcoal.  Medium Rare indeed!  What is this, some sort of culinary newspeak?  Clearly these government types are only interested in protecting your body.  They care nothing for the safety of your soul, which is obviously in jeopardy if you're eating 150 degree steaks on a regular basis.

(Editors note:  it turns out that up until the 1990's, the FDA had the same idea as everyone else regarding what was rare and what was medium.  Then they decided to issue new guidelines in an effort to combat food-borne illnesses.  Instead of just encouraging everyone to get their meat medium instead of medium-rare, however, they decided to change the scale, confusing everyone for no good reason. Your tax dollars at work!)

How to tell when your steak is done

There are four widely-recommended methods to tell when your steak is done.

• The color test:  Cut into one of the steaks and judge by color.  Plenty of sites will guide you in this method.  The problem with it is that you must cut rather dramatically into the steak, which lets the juices escape. Don't let the juices escape.
• The finger test:  This method has you poke the steak with your finger or with some other instrument.  With some practice, you can tell whether or not it's done from the springiness of the meat.  To give you some assistance, some proponents compare the feel of the steak to the springiness of certain parts of your body, e.g., parts of your arm or your hand.  The disadvantage of this method is that it is somewhat inexact.  Besides, it takes practice to get the hang of it, and in the meantime you'll be ruining a bunch of steaks.
  
• The meat thermometer: Clearly the easiest and most exact.  The only disadvantage is that you do pierce the meat, so there is some juice loss.
• The USDA method:  Use a portable mass spectrometer to confirm that the combustion process has removed all hydrogen and oxygen atoms from the meat, leaving only carbon atoms that can be safely consumed.

Personally, I use the finger method to get a rough idea of how a steak is doing, but a meat thermometer in the final minutes on one of the steaks to get a more exact reading.  I'd recommend picking up a simple, instant-read, digital thermometer like this one or this one.

Remember that a piece of meat will continue to cook after it's pulled away from its heat source.  Its temperature will continue to rise from 5 to 10 degrees afterward.  So the tricky bit is to take it out just before it's done.  This is easy enough if you're using the thermometer method, but a bit trickier otherwise.

Balsamic Vinegar Sauce:

1 cup balsamic vinegar
1 frond rosemary, intact
2 tbsp brown sugar
1/3 cup beef or veal stock
1 tbsp butter
1 tsp salt
Freshly ground pepper

Put the vinegar, stock, and the rosemary in a small pot over medium heat until it begins to steam.  Adjust the temperature so that it continues to steam, but not boil excessively.  Let it reduce by half.  Add the brown sugar and the salt and stir until they dissolve completely.  Let the mix continue to reduce slowly until it begins to thicken; there should be less than 1/4 c of liquid left; perhaps as little as 1/8 c.  Remove the rosemary frond and pepper to taste.  Remove from the heat.

When you're ready to serve, bring the sauce back up to temperature.  Break the butter up into 4-6 pieces and whisk them into the sauce.  Serve immediately.

The reduction takes some time, so don't leave this until the very end.  I usually try to have the reduction complete before I put the steaks on.  Then, while the steaks are resting, I whisk in the butter.

Though extremely simple to make, this sauce is, I think, very delicious and quite professional in appearance.  When done right, it's full-bodied and velvety, but neither vinegary nor overly sweet. It pairs well with intensely flavored meats such as lamb and venison, but I've had similar sauces at restaurants on more delicately flavored meats such as rabbit and chicken (links?), so don't be afraid to try that as well.  I even use a variation of this sauce as a dressing for certain kinds of salads (e.g. here, under "Baked Goat Cheese Salad").

Other tips:

• Don't smother the steak in this (or any) sauce.  A good steak is its own reward, and if it isn't, buy a different cut or from a different store.  This sauce is intended to be dripped in small portions alongside the steak, and it should be thick enough that it doesn't just spread over the whole plate.
• After removing the steaks from the pan to let them rest,  pour out any fat that remains in the pan.  Put the pan back on the heat on top of the stove, and use a bit of white wine, red wine, or balsamic vinegar to degrease the pan, scraping up any bits left on the pan.  After this reduces to a teaspoon or so of liquid, pour it into the sauce.
• After letting the steaks rest, whisk any juices that have escaped the steak into the sauce just before you whisk the butter in.
• Several useful variations:  instead of stock, use pureed fruit or unsweetened fruit juice.  I've used blueberries, blackberries, and even fresh strawberries in this role.  If you use pureed fruit (as opposed to juice), the sauce won't appear quite as professional, but it will be fruitier.  If you use juice, consider putting in a handful of the corresponding fresh fruit towards the end of the reduction phase.

And the wine is...

The featured wine for the evening is the 1999 Louis-Laval Cabernet Sauvignon.  We have a special relationship to this wine, as Louis-Laval was the winery that Rebecca and I worked at for a few weeks while we were in Australia, before going to graduate school. 

The pairing, of course, is a no-brainer to some degree (Cabernet with steak!  Who'd have thought!), but there's more here than meets the eye.  There's something about the dusty backpalate on our favorite Hunter Valley reds that marries particularly well with the sear on a good steak.  In addition, the prominent acids we expected from this wine would mean, we hoped, that it would fare well against the sauce.

1999 Louis-Laval Cabernet Sauvignon          ($??)

Just smelling this wine takes me back to Australia.  Although we only had one bottle of it while we were there, to some degree it's reminiscent of our favorite Hunter Valley reds.  It smells like tart fruit with a hint of anise, like a cherry-tarragon sauce I used to make.  The acids give it a nice round swell at the beginning, and balances the cherry reduction flavor that makes up much of the wine's fruit.  Towards the end we find the anise, leather, and finally, that dusty finish that reminds me of the dirt road that winds down alongside the vineyard from the top of the hill, past the winery buildings, and to Roy's house.  Cheers!

WBW #15: Less than 250 Cases

The theme of this month's WBW, hosted by San Francisco's very own Gastronomie, is small production wines.  The goal is to find a wine of which fewer than 250 cases were made.

I had a bit of trouble finding a small production wine at a reasonable price, but eventually I came up with this gem from the Santa Barbara wine region.  Just 125 cases were made.  As you can see, I bought bottle 897, which I hear is one of the better ones.

Santa Ynez Vally Syrahs are often dark, rich, and compelling.  This one is no exception.  It's smooth and lush and largely faultless.  Despite its softness, it can in no way be described as flabby.  But I found myself wishing for a little acid, or some soft tannins, or just a little something something to give the tasting experience more of a profile.   

--//--

 

2004 Margerum Syrah Purisima Mountain (Santa Ynez Valley)          ($32)

Huge nose.  Menthol and berries at first, and then, after some air, salty Dutch licorice.  The palate is smooth and lustrous, with a slick mouthfeel and flavors reminiscent of blackberries, boysenberries, and plums.  The 14.5% alcohol is noticable, but under control.

WBW #14: New New World Pinot Noir

This month's WBW theme is "New-New World Pinot Noir" -- that is to say, Pinot Noir from someplace other than Europe or California.  This is a taller order than one might expect.  Pinot Noir is a notoriously difficult grape to grow, and finding microclimates with an affinity for it isn't easy.

My first stop was Chile.  I holed up with the 2004 La Mision Pinot Noir from Vina William Fevre.  Fevre is a French winemaker with large holdings in Chablis.  He branched out to Chile in the late '90's.  I have a certain impression of (some might say "prejudice against") Chilean wines.  They can out-California California.  Sometimes they can be super-ripe, over-hot, and structureless.  I've had counterexamples, of course, and quality is improving all the time, or so I hear, but  I seem to prefer wines from cooler climates generally.

This wine is has an soft, warm, smooth mouthfeel that is characteristic of warm-climate Pinot Noir and a slightly tart sour cherry/cranberry palate, and a bit of an alcohol flare in the finish.  This tart-sour bit saves the wine, I think, from being devoid of interest.  But this is not the sort of wine that I'd prefer to be drinking.  I must concede that it's a fair contender among Pinots in its price range ($9).  But I wasn't quite satisfied.

K&L (despite their fantastic selection) didn't have much in the way of Pinots from areas other than Europe, the U.S., and New Zealand.  New Zealand wasn't specifically prohibited by our host, but I do feel that choosing a Kiwi Pinot Noir would be cheating somewhat; New Zealand Pinot Noir is better established in terms of its worldwide reputation than California Pinot Noir, so it's difficult to consider it "New-New World"

I thought that perhaps I could satisfy the spirit of the law if not the letter by trying a bottle produced in an area not normally known for its Pinot Noir.  Not much Italian Pinot Nero makes it to these shores, and since one came recommended by K&L's very helpful staff, I thought I'd give it a whirl.

2004 EKK Pinot Nero Dell'Alto Adige          ($19)

A completely different face of the Pinot Noir grape.  Minerals!  Yes, you heard right.  Crisp, tart, and minerally, this tasty wine reminds me far more of a good German Spätburgunder than of anything Burgundian.  The mouthfeel is clean and borders on effervesence.  The palate is simple and cherrylike -- little complexity here -- but what a joy to drink!

 
Around the internet:

Here's a fascinating article on the rise of Pinot Nero.

SHF #11, Coffee: Molasses-coffee cookie recipe

Milk and cookies

My first Sugar High Friday!  In an interesting coincidence, the first blog event that I participated in since my move back to San Francisco was IMBB #17, whose theme was Tea, and for which I also made (among other things) a dessert.  But where an Assam-infused creme brulee was intriguing and at least slightly exotic, coffee creme brulee is pretty much old hat.  In fact, the use of coffee in desserts is fairly well explored.  So did I work to find some exotic and unfamiliar way to use it?  Nope.  Instead, I made the first dessert you ever had:  milk and cookies.

Molasses-coffee cookies

Here I tried to make the chewiest possible molasses cookie with coffee flavors as a strong counterpoint.  I cut back on the spices that I'd normally put in (ginger, cloves, etc.) in order to let the main ingredients take center stage.   The coffee adds considerable adult interest to this already tasty cookie.

Ingredients:

2 1/2 cups all purpose flour
2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp ground cardamom
1 1/2 sticks butter, melted
1/2 c dark brown sugar
1/2 c granulated sugar
1 large egg plus one yolk
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/3 c unsulphured molasses
2 tbsp coffee liqueur (e.g. Kahlua)
3 tbsp instant coffee

Directions:

Grind instant coffee into a fine powder using a mortar and pestle (or coffee grinder, or what have you).  Whisk flour, spices, soda, salt, and coffee together in a medium-sized bowl.  In another bowl, cream the butter, brown sugar, and granulated sugar together for 2 or 3 minutes using a mixer.  Add eggs, vanilla extract, liqueur, and molasses and work them in.  Add dry ingredients and and work them in. 

Grab about 2 tablespoons' worth of dough and roll it into a ball.  Roll this ball in granulated sugar.  Place on a lightly greased cookie sheet.  Bake for 12-14 minutes.  Be aware that the cookies will not feel as though they are done when you take them out.  They should barely be starting to set at the edges (and I do mean barely) and should still feel very foamy in the middle when you remove them from the oven.

Coffee "Milkshake"

This "milkshake" is designed to go with the cookies, so it's purposely not very thick -- a bit more "milk" than "shake".  For some reason, I felt like the use of coffee ice cream was cheating, but I suspected that adding too much coffee would make the resulting shake less creamy and too watered down.  So instead, I opted to infuse the milk with coffee directly, and add only a little coffee to the end result.  The result was a very tasty milk-like beverage with nice coffee overtones, rather than a thick coffee milkshake or something like a frappuccino. 

1 cup whole milk
1 cup heavy cream
1/2 cup cold coffee
2 scoops vanilla ice cream
3 tbsp kahlua
Cinnamon for garnish

Heat the milk and the cream in a saucepan to 205 degrees F, or just below boiling.  Pour the milk along with 5 tablespoons of ground coffee into a french press.  Let steep for 4 minutes.  Press the result and let sit for 30 seconds.  Pour the result into an airtight container and place in the refrigerator until it cools.

Combine all liquid ingredients and blend with a traditional or a stick blender.  Sprinkle with cinnamon  and serve.  This recipe makes 2 shakes.

IMBB #17, Tea: Assam Creme Brulee Recipe

Living in Chinatown means never having to say that you're out of tea.  In fact, we have so much tea that for this month's IMBB, we decided to create a whole tea menu rather than a single dish!  Even so, one of the dishes stood head and shoulders above the others.  I've provided the recipe for it below; it's the last of the three dishes, so if you're feeling impatient and want to get to the good parts, you can just skip to the end right now.  Hey, that's okay, I won't be offended.  No, really, I'm sure you're very busy.

Cold Corn and Honeydew Soup with Lobster

I've made this dish several different ways, and I've been happy with it every time, but I'm convinced there's an even better soup in here waiting to get out.  It usually draws raves, but I know I can do better.  You'll have to wait until I'm completely satisfied with it before I give you the recipe.  I'll outline the general procedure, however, if you want to experiment with me.

Here's what I did this time:  Begin with six ears of corn.  Cut the kernels off of four of them and throw them in a blender or food processor.  Turn it on and leave the room for a few minutes.  Throw the corn liquid through a strainer.  A wet mass of corn will stay in the strainer.  Don't be afraid.  Roll the corn mass around in the strainer with a deft wrist motion and more of the liquid will strain.  Eventually you will wind up with a relatively dry mass of corn mush in the strainer. Put this back in the food processor.  Core half of the honeydew melon. Throw this in the blender along with the corn mush.  Blend this for a few minutes as well.  Strain this in the same fashion.

Pour the liquid into a saucepan along with 1/2 cup of white wine.  Add the core of four or five lemongrass stalks and some fresh ginger.  Bring to just below a boil.  Add a handful of good quality white tea (we used Drum Mountain White Cloud) and let steep according to the tea's instructions.  Refrigerate until cool.

In the meantime, remove the kernels from the remaining two ears of corn.  Add commensurate amounts of cucumber and honeydew melon in very small dice.  Salt to taste.

Remove the cool soup base.  Add freshly ground cardamom, white pepper, and a dash or two of cayenne pepper.  Whisk in 1/2 cup or more of plain yogurt.  Add lemon juice and a judicious amount of salt.

To serve, pour the soup in the bottom of a wide, flat bowl.  Mound the vegetable mixture in the middle, and top with chunks of lobster.

Everyone seemed to like this incarnation very well, but I couldn't help but feel that it didn't quite live up to its potential.  I remember liking the original version, which doesn't add tea or cook the soup at all, a little better than this one.  I think cooking removes this soup's freshness, which is one of its primary assets.  It seems to kill the color as well.  The hints of white tea in the soup were definitely interesting, however.  Maybe I can figure out a way to add tea flavor to the soup base without cooking it.

Duck Bastilla

Bastilla is a perfect dinner party dish.  It's unusual, impressive-looking, tastes great, and though it requires a fair amount of preparatory work, much of it can be done ahead of time, and it doesn't take long to cook once assembled.

The filling of a bastilla consists of meat (traditionally pigeon; we usually use chicken) and scrambled eggs along with ground almonds and spices.  For this variation we added ground Lychee Black tea and cut back on the sugar a bit.  In the end, the tea flavor didn't come through as much as we wanted, however.

Assam Creme Brulee

Ingredients:

4 egg yolks
2 cups whipping cream
1 tablespoon rum
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup Assam black tea
Raspberries

Directions:

To begin with make sure you are using a good quality Assam tea.  We used Assam Sessa Estate, Second Flush.

Mix cream and sugar in a saucepan.  Heat the mixture to just below a simmer.  Add the Assam and let steep for 7 minutes.  Strain out the tea and pour the mix back into the saucepan.  Whisk the egg yolks in a large bowl.  Add the cream mix to the yolks a bit at a time so that the yolks don't curdle, whisking as you do.  Add the rum and the vanilla.

Pour the mixture into five ramekins.  Put the ramekins into a shallow baking pan and fill the pan with water halfway up the sides of the ramekins.  Bake 30 minutes or until the center of the custard is nearly solid.  Refrigerate for at least two hours.  Press brown sugar through a strainer to create a thin layer of sugar on top of the custard.  Broil until the sugar melts and covers the custard -- this shouldn't take but a minute or so.  Refrigerate another hour or two.  Serve topped with raspberries.

Evaluation:

The Assam adds an incredibly rich flavor to the custard that is difficult to describe.  It's surprisingly coffeelike, actually, but it's where it's different that it's most interesting.  The musky, earthy flavors are quite beguiling.  When such a simple variation can make an old saw like creme brulee be described as "beguiling", it's definitely worth taking notice.

IMBB #14: Orange You Hungry?

Orange is the theme of this month's IMBB, and what a theme it is!  An inspired bit of  lateral thinking by Foodgoat has left us with a  color, not an ingredient, to work with this month.  I am, as always, very curious to see how other people approached the theme.  Until then, here's my attempt:

Vertical food:

Some say it's trendy, some say it's already passe,  but I  think it's here to stay.  There's something special, something uniquely gratifying about vertical food.  Is it a protest against the entropy of the universe and the disorder and decay that seem to dominate our lives?  Is it the phallic nature of these towering constructions that is the source of their appeal?  Or is it a destructive impulse?  Is it that we take pleasure in toppling, dismantling, and then consuming the creations that our hapless hosts have  painstakingly built for us?  Perhaps.  All I know is, some food tastes better when it's taller than it is wide.

The recipe below should make four salads.  You may wish to increase the amount of the dressing you make, though, to suit people's preferences.

Tower of Orange:

• 1/2 small papaya
• 4 small (orange) tomatoes
• 1/3 head savoy cabbage
• 1 lb fresh salmon fillet
• 5 slices thick cut bacon
• 3 (orange) bell peppers
• 1 c chopped pea shoots
• fresh basil
• fresh tarragon

Render and reserve the fat from the bacon.  Chop the bacon into bits.  Sprinkle salt and pepper on the salmon fillet and pan-fry in 2 tbsp. of the bacon fat.  Remove the skin from the fillet and shred the salmon with two forks.

Chiffonade the basil and mix with the papaya.  Chop the tarragon and mix with the shredded salmon. 

Take a 16 oz plastic cup -- you know, a "beer cup" -- and cut out the bottom.  Grease the inside with nonstick spray or olive oil.  Turn the cup upside down on a flat-bottomed plate or bowl.  Drop a few tablespoons of each mixture into the cup and pack it down gently with the spoon.  We alternated the orange layers with the non-orange layers like so:

• Orange bell pepper
• Pea shoots
• Bacon bits
• Orange tomatoes
• White bean ragout
• Papaya/basil mixture
• Savoy Cabbage
• Salmon/tarragon mixture

But of course most any order will do.  Spoon the dressing around the sides of the cup and gently remove the cup.  The resulting tower is surprisingly stable and very impressive.

The 16 oz. cup results in a relatively large salad.  If you're serving this as part of a three or four (or more) course meal, you may wish to use a smaller cup.

White Bean Ragout:

• 1 can Cannelloni beans (or other white beans)
• 3 tbsp "bacon bits" (see above)
• 2 sprigs of thyme
• 4 cloves of garlic, finely diced
• 1/2 cup stock

Saute the garlic for 4 minutes in 1 tbsp of olive oil.  Add the beans, the stock, the thyme, and the bacon and cook over a medium heat for about 5-8 minutes or until the bean mixture begins to thicken.

Curried (Orange) Tomato Dressing:

• 6 cloves of garlic, rough chopped
• 1/2 of a sweet onion, diced
• 8 (orange) tomatoes, rough chopped
• 20 or 30 coriander pods
• 3 cardamom pods
• 20 or 30 cumin seeds
• 3 or 4 peppercorns
• 2 sprigs of thyme
• 1 cup dry white wine
• 1/2 cup vegetable stock
• apple cider vinegar

Toast the spices in a dry pan until you can smell them.  Grind them using a mortar and pestle or a spice grinder.

Saute the onions and the garlic in 2 tbsp of olive oil until the onions are translucent.  Add the ground spices and saute  for two more minutes.  Add the tomatoes and saute for two minutes.  Add the wine, the stock, and the thyme, cover, and let simmer for 20 minutes.  Let cool and puree.  Add vinegar to taste.

The result should be somewhat aggressively spiced and tart.  It may look like a soup, but it's really a salad dressing, so don't be afraid to add just a little more vinegar.

Conclusions:

I had fun making and eating this salad.  The various textural elements worked well together, I thought, and the flavors meshed satisfactorily.  The curried tomato dressing was quite good.  I do feel as though one or two of the flavors could be a bit more intense.  I may trade mangoes for the papayas the next time, for instance.

I count this as a definite success, if only because it has increased my confidence regarding vertical plating of salads.  The assembly was easy and fun and trouble-free.  And it was fun to eat, too!  This will definitely enter my dinner party repertoire.

Paper Chef #5: Stuffed Squid, Savory Cheesecake, and Proscuitto "Candy"

When I first read the ingredient list for this month's Paper Chef, I was a little worried.  Prosciutto, sherry vinegar, and goat cheese are all fairly common items around here, but I've never really noticed green garlic in any of the stores that I frequent.  I called four or five nearby grocery stores just in case.  Sure enough, no one carried it.  Most of the produce managers had never even heard of it.  It looked as though we'd have to substitute regular garlic, which annoyed me.

Our last hope was the Irvine Farmer's Market, which just happens to be across the street from us.  Rebecca went there to investigate while I did some final kitchen cleanup.  I was expecting her to come home empty-handed, so I was quite surprised to see her bearing green garlic from three different vendors!  As a side note, they called it "young garlic" or "fresh garlic" instead of "green garlic"; if you're calling around for it, you might try these terms when the produce manager says "no, we only have the white kind".

First, a note on prosciutto.  I don't know why it's so often served in paper-thin slices, wrapped around other food items.  I can only assume that cutting it thinly is a way to stretch it, since it is so expensive.   I think it's usually too chewy to be enjoyed this way.  I prefer to get a few thickly cut slices , dice them small, and then saute them to get some caramelization (well, okay, technically it's a maillard reaction, but who is picking nits?).  This is the procedure that I used in the main dishes.

Green Garlic and Goat Cheese Cheesecake

In this savory "cheesecake", green garlic bulbs are minced and sauteed until they are mildly sweet.  They are then mixed in with goat cheese, mascarpone, and eggs and poured on top of a shortbread crust in a springform pan and baked in a water bath.  While the cheesecake is in the oven, a maple/sherry vinegar gastrique is prepared (caramelize some brown sugar, add a bit of maple syrup, then dissolve the result in an equal volume of sherry vinegar), diced prosciutto is sauteed, and the two are combined for the topping.

The result is served warm and as a result has a texture more like a heavy souffle or a light quiche than a dessert cheesecake.  It wasn't nearly as good cold; I suspect it would need some sugar in order to succeed as a more traditional cheesecake, if not enough to make it actually sweet.  I haven't provided an explicit recipe because I feel it could do with some tweaking, but  I thought it was a promising direction, and the guests seemed to agree.

Squid Stuffed with Seafood and Green Garlic Risotto

The risotto is straightforward:

1. Saute 2 cups chopped green garlic and the 1/2 cups diced prosciutto in olive oil.
2. Add 3 cups uncooked Arborio rice and stir, cooking until translucent.
3. Add 1 1/2 cups white wine and a shot of Pernod.  Stir until it is mostly absorbed.
4. Add a cup of hot seafood stock.  Stir until it is absorbed.  Repeat ad infinitum.
5. When the rice has about three minutes left, add two cups or more of mixed seafood chopped into bite-sized pieces.   Shrimp, mussels, lobster, crab, and scallops all work well, but feel free to use whatever is available.
6. At the very end, crumble in 6 oz of goat cheese, diced fresh herbs (I used tarragon and the green ends of the garlic) and stir through.

This risotto is good enough to stand on its own, but of course this is Paper Chef -- we had to take it one step further.

1. Take your washed and cleaned squid bodies.  Stuff them 1/3 full of the risotto.  You read that right!  The squid bodies will shrink quite substantially, so if you don't want them to split during cooking, be careful!
2. Bake in a covered, lightly greased casserole for about an hour.
3. In the meantime, add 1 cup of seafood stock and 1/2 cup of white wine.  Reduce by half.  Add a tablespoon or two of sherry vinegar and 1/2 cup of heavy cream.
4. Plate the squid bodies atop a small mound of risotto, and ladle a tablespoon or two of the sauce on top.

We didn't have enough squid bodies to go around, so the other servings were topped with seared fresh ono fillet.  That is one tasty fish.  It is no accident that "ono" means "good to eat" in Hawaiian.

Prosciutto and Goat Cheese "Candy"

The purest expression of the ingredients was prepared by Rebecca.  A green garlic and goat cheese puree, a dab of the sherry vinegar gastrique, and a piece of a date are wrapped in proscuitto -- thin slices this time.  The ends are pinched like little candy wrappers.  The little packages are then sauteed briefly to crisp the prosciutto.  The result is a tasty little morsel that's greater than the sum of its parts.

In Summary

This was a fun menu to work with.  Despite the fact that all three of the dishes featured all four of the Paper Chef ingredients, none of them tasted alike.  In each, the key ingredients are experienced in different ways.  Green garlic, for instance, is suffused throughout the fluffy goat cheese mixture in the first; in the second the coarsely chopped pieces can be eaten individually, and the minced green tops lend an herbaceous note to the finished product.  While it's the textural elements of the goat cheese that's strongly experienced in the cheesecake, they are completely absent in the risotto, where the cheese's primary contribution is a perfect tangy-sour backdrop to the seafood flavors. 

What will enter my permanent repertoire?  The prosciutto candies are good appetizers (though we served them as dessert).  I'll continue to work on the savory cheesecake -- it has the potential to be quite good.  I'll buy ono when I see it, despite the general consensus that mahimahi is better.  The goat cheese - seafood risotto is an excellent combination that I've never had before and was, in my opinion, the catch of the day.  I may try to develop this into a signature dish.