Dîner de Fêtes / Festive Dinner

Dîner de Fêtes / Festive Dinner

Les Croquettes de Morue sur un Lit de Verdure
Salt-cod cakes served with greens

Le Chapon de Noêl aux Marrons
Stuffed Christmas Capon with Chestnuts
&
Les “Racines” d’Hiver Braisées
Braised Winter Root Vegetables

La Crème Paysanne
&
Les Pescajous du Luchonnais

This is a festive winter dinner menu I made several time. I wrote it many years ago for a series of cooking classes untitled “The Demystification of French Cuisine” that I taught at the Café Capriccio Cooking School in Albany N.Y — someday I will retrieve my notes on that topic and will share them with you. Meanwhile here are the recipes for this menu. I think you will agree that it is a well balanced, not heavy, fun to cook & fun to eat menu! So try it and let me know. I have also included some historical background for dinner conversation!

First Course:
Les Croquettes de Morue sur un Lit de Verdure

Salt-cod cakes served with greens

Morue, a.k.a. baccalaú or salt-cod, is my favorite fish. I like the texture, the taste, the convenience, the flexibility. The use of cod can be traced as far back as the Upper-Paleolithic. And closer to us there is evidence that Basque fishermen came to the coast of Newfoundland to fish for cod way before Columbus had set foot on the American continent. Their first motivation had been to catch whales, but then they switched to fishing cod. It was safer and more lucrative.
There are many different ways to accommodate salt-cod; today we will make croquettes. This is a basic recipe that you will be able to reuse with other ingredients.
I like to serve the “croquettes” with a tossed mixed green salad dressed with a simple vinaigrette. (see my famous simple salad)

Ingredients:
1 small chopped red pepper
1/2 chopped Jalapeño pepper (optional)
1 cup chopped fresh parsley
2 eggs
1 bay leaf
3 cloves of garlic
1 whole medium onion
1 chopped medium onion
2 grated (raw) big russet potatoes
1 tablespoon saffron
salt and pepper to taste

The day before:
Rinse the filets and soak in plenty of cold water for about 12 hours, changing water three or four times.

The next day:
Place desalted cod, one onion and one bay leaf in a stock pot with plenty of water, bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer for 10 minutes. Drain and discard onion and bay leaf.
Mix all raw ingredients in a bowl, shred the cod in it. Mix it well. Shape the mixture into little cakes, use a ramekin if texture is too loose, and fry in a hot pan in olive oil about 5 minutes on each side (but that is going to depend on the thickness of the croquettes. I usually eat the first one to check texture and seasoning, and to judge the doneness).

Entrée
Le Chapon de Noêl aux Marrons

Stuffed Christmas Capon with Chestnuts

&

Les “Racines” d’Hiver Braisées

Braised Winter Root Vegetables

Our main course is going to be a capon stuffed with chestnuts, sausage and all kinds of delicacies. Capon is such exquisite poultry that it is saved for special occasions. Good, real capons are rare and difficult to raise and therefore difficult to get. Capons are a very ancient tradition: the creature came to us via the Romans, and the Romans learned how to fatten chickens from the Island of Kos in Greece — were Hippocrates (460-377 BC) lived and worked. The people from Kos, unlike the Romans, kept their chickens inside and gave them only selected grains and milk so they were getting fat quickly and their flesh incredibly delicate. Everybody in Rome started doing the same, keeping their chickens inside and so on, but it got to the point where so many people were doing this that Consul Caius Favius was obliged to pass a decree forbidding this practice for sanitary reasons. So now all the chickens were put back in the streets where they were easily distracted and didn’t focus on eating anymore, so they were not getting fat. Along came a veterinarian who had the idea to castrate the chicks so they would get bigger — and it worked!
Today we will serve the capon with winter root vegetables ­­ — they are delicious though much neglected and I also believe in using seasonal produce.

Le Chapon de Noêl aux Marrons
Stuffed Christmas Capon with Chestnuts
(You can find capon at the very fine purveyor D’Artagnan. A 12 pounds Capon will feed about 12 people.)

Ingredients:
1 Capon
1 Cheesecloth
1/2 stick Butter

Farce/Stuffing:
1 LB very good Bacon (no nitrates)
1 LB thin Sausage (plain)
1/2 LB ground veal
1 LB Mushrooms
25 Chestnuts cooked and peeled
2 medium onions diced
1/2 cup Armagnac (or cognac)
2 eggs
1/2 cup chopped Parsley
Salt & Pepper to taste
Lightly sauté onions, then add mushrooms, then bacon, then sausage, then 1/2 of the chestnuts. Flambé with the Armagnac. Place in a bowl, add the ground veal, the parsley, the eggs, salt and pepper. Mix well and stuff the Capon and saw it back.

Roasting:
Preheat Oven to 450 º
Butter or oil the roasting pan, place the capon in the oven and roast at this heat for 30 minutes. In a sauce pan melt 1/2 stick of butter and let it cool. Reduce the oven temperature to 325º, baste the capon with pan juices, and drape it with a piece of cheesecloth, soaked in the melted butter. Roast the bird, lifting the cheesecloth and basting every 20 minutes for about 2 1/2 hours or until thermometer registers 180ºF and when juices run clear when thighs are pierced with a skewer. Then remove from oven and from pan and let stand while you make your “jus.”

Jus:
1/2 cup Armagnac (or cognac)
2 cup chicken broth
2 finely chopped Shallots
30 Chestnuts
Remove all fat and burned pieces (if any) from roasting pan. Put the pan on top of a warm burner. Spread shallots in the pan and move around quickly. Flambé with 1/2 cup of Armagnac (make sure the fan is off when you flambé). Add the two cups of chicken broth, make sure all the caramelized juices are lifted off the bottom of the pan then add the chestnuts. Let simmer gently for a few minutes. Carve the Capon, display on a nice dish with the stuffing. Transfer the sauce to a dish, and serve!

Les “Racines” d’Hiver Braisées
Braised Winter Root Vegetables

This is a very simple dish that will enhance the flavor of your capon.
When I want to be fancy I “turn” the vegetable into olive shapes. Otherwise I cut them into 1/2 inch dice.

Use carrots, turnips or rutabagas, and parsnips -celery root is also an option. Put all your roots in a roasting pan with a little butter and water, salt and pepper, and braise at 300º in the oven until tender but not mushy!

Dessert:
La Crème Paysanne
Light Custard

&
Les Pescajous du Luchonnais

Do you still have a little room for dessert? Sorry, but I will skip the bûche de Noël —
I am not very found of it, I find it too sweet after such a meal. The pescajous will probably remind you of fried dough, they literally mean “little fishes.” This delicacy is unheard of beyond a 25 mile radius of my home town. Pescajous are served on all religious holidays. The biggest challenge about them is to be able to fill up a basket before anybody sees you making them. If just one person sees you, believe me, it will take you a long, long time to fill up that basket! Unless you can convince the little scavengers to wait for the crème paysanne to dunk them in!

Crème Paysanne

Boil 4 cups of whole milk then flavored with vanilla and rum.
In a bowl, separate 12 egg yolks from the whites. Reserve the egg whites and put the yolks in a bowl with 1 1/2 cup of sugar; whisk until it forms a ruban. Gradually add the warm milk. Mix well, keeping the pan on a very low heat and stirring continuously -making a figure 8- with a wooden spoon until the cream coats the spoon. Let cool off, and keep it in the refrigerator; cover to avoid skin formation.

Pescajous du Luchonnais

4 cups of flour
a pinch of salt
2 teaspoon Yeast
3 Eggs ( yolks separated and whites will be beaten)
1/4 cup melted butter
1 cup Milk
1 cup Sugar
2 teaspoon Vanilla and Rum

Put flour, salt, sugar in a bowl.
Proof the yeast in a little bowl.
Beat the egg white.
Mix egg yolks, vanilla, rum, butter and proofed yeast. Mix this into the flour mixture and add the beaten egg whites slowly.
Let the dough rest and rise for a couple of hours.
When ready to cook, heat 1 quart of oil (safflower or peanut oil) in a wok.
Turn the dough onto a generously floured surface, cut small pieces with a knife and shape by hand into 2 inch squares, 1/8 inch thick, and dip them into the hot oil fry them until golden (a few minutes are sufficient). Fry no more than 4 or 5 at a time and you will get best result if you keep moving then around in the oil with a skimmer. Take them out and place on an absorbent paper towel to remove excess oil and start piling them up in a basket; Sprinkle caster sugar as you go along; they are better warm, and do not forget to dunk them in the crème paysanne!
Bon Appetit!

My Petit Déjeuner (mon breakfast)

My Petit Déjeuner (mon breakfast)

petit dej

I have to share my enthusiasm for my breakfast. I even think about what I am going to eat for breakfast before falling asleep! And I got an acute case of breakfast obsession since my good friend Chef Pierre Landet gave me a jar of his homemade divine plum jam. Pierre is executive chef at the NYC Tribeca restaurant Cercle Rouge. He made the jam with his mother’s recipe for a very special occasion that we will discuss another time. But let me tell you about my breakfast routine, indeed a routine because the format is always the same, only the fruit and the topping of the bread vary.
I wake up early, make myself a cup of tea and get into my daily yoga practice. These days I am brewing a “Russian Caravan” tea from the Park Slope Food Coop. This pleasantly dry & flowery blended Chinese tea gets my taste buds off to a right start. When I am done with tea and practice, I make coffee; always organic and always light roast (also called American roast). I usually get whatever is on sale in that category at Porto Rico Importing Co. I like that company, their quality is consistent and their prices fair. Do not ever offer me French Roast coffee, I will turn it down, I dislike it with a passion, i consider it an aggression to my taste buds!

tartine

Nicole’s Tartine à la Confiture de Prune de Pierre Landet
(recette Madame Landet mère!)

Anyhow, while coffee is percolating I toast my thick slices of rye bread and I eat a seasonal piece of fruit. I either get the Pain de Seigle from Balthazar or Amy’s Organic Miche at the Park Slope Food Coop. They both are a combination of wheat and rye organic flours, I find the Balthazar crustier and more complex, the taste stays in your mouth long after you have eaten the piece. Then, before the toast is cold but not while it is too hot, I apply a thin coat of either pasture butter, or Ben’s cream cheese or fresh goat cheese followed by the careful and even spreading of the sweet toping.
Pierre’s jam arrived at a really good time; I had just finished my special jar of raw honey made by my friend & Bourg d’Oueil mentor Joseph Garcès. So Pierre’s luscious plum jam provided not only the gusto satisfaction but also the emotional ingredient missed from Joseph’s honey. Voilà ze story:

Chef Pierre Landet

Pierre Landet is from the Toulouse region, but his brother Benoit & wife Laurence own the Hotel-Restaurant Le Faisan Doré in my hometown of Luchon (you know the center of the Pyrenées and possibly the center of the world!). It is my brother Jean-Louis’ favorite hang out and mine too when I am in town.

Pierre is a great chef, he cooks genuine Southwestern French country food. His homemade patés and terrines are outstanding, especially his Terrine de Foie Gras which is out of this world. I also have a soft spot for his funny chicken wings, the REAL French fries and I have to mention the stuffed suckling pig; that is a fire work of flavors and texture.

But let’s return to my tartine (though it is a French specialty to talk about a past or future meal while eating); the very slightly caramelized plum jam, flavored with vanilla and brandy, became a marriage in heaven when it encountered the crunchy, but still moist bread. I usually have 2 slices but sometimes I need 3 to complete the ritual properly!

Alright, merci to Pierre Landet pour la confiture and merci to his maman! It is quite late I must go to bed, tomorrow is the 2nd Bay Ridge Farmer’s market and I have to go early, last week it was all sold out by 11am! I have to make sure I can have breakfast without rushing! I forgot to mention that I really don’t like having breakfast out, nothing beats my petit-déjeuner bi-continental!

Ah! and in case you wonder:
YES, I dunk my tartine into my coffee!

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