Fred's kitchen notes

Here I am again.

So now for the menu. Here’s what we had:

Aperitif:

- Olives medley

- Walnuts

- Grissini

Washed down with Prosecco di Conegliano.

Lunch:

- tortellini in brodo

- roast turkey with potatoes and a carrots and butternut-squash puree

- endive, apples, walnut and cheese salad

- Strawberry charlotte

For these items, we drank an American wine. For the first time, I decided to try something new and asked the wine guy at Austin Liquors in Shrewsbury, MA whether he could recomend a wine that would remind me of an Amarone or a St. Emilion and woyuld not cost me an arm and a leg. He told me to go for a Chateau St Jean 2007 Cabernet Sauvignon. Sure, it’s nothing close to what I was asking for, he said, but if I like those wines I mentioned, I would be very satisfied with this one. Well, he was damn right. We really enjoyed it. And for 15 USD, I enjoyed it even more. Anyway, back to the food. Let me tell you about ho to cook those things.

Tortellini in brodo:

I have to admit that I cheated a bit on this one. Could not really bother to make the tortellini meslf, so I bought them “dry” from Barilla. But I made the soup meself.

- I bought two beef ones, some leeks, an onion, carrots and parsley

- I boiled the bones in ~ 4 litres of water (start with cold water) for about 4 hours. A lot of fat will come pout of the bones. Remember to regularly remove it, or your soup will be quite heavy.

- chop the leeks and the carrots and the onion(s) in half. Pass them in a frying pan woth olive oil for about 5′ and throw them in your beef stock

- cook for another 30-45 minutes.

- pass the whole thing through a sieve and cook the tortellini in the remaining stock

- add a spoonful of miso (gioves a nice twist to the soup)

- serve with some minced parsley and some grated parmigiano.

Rosted turkey:

This one is simple. We got a 14 lbs bird. Just shoved it onto our roaster and into the oven, at 350F for ~ 4 hours. Once the temperature in the breast was ~ 80C, we switched off the oven and let the bird cool down for 15′ at room temperature.

Roast potatoes:

Very simple as well. I cit hte potatoes in small cubes and brought them to the boil for about 5′. Removed the from the ater, put on an oven tray and shoved them in hte oven, close to the heating block, for ~ 40-45′.

Carrot and butternut squash puree:

- boiled ~10 carrots together with a medium sized squash until sift.

- added nutmeg (maybe half a tsp), salt, pepper and a drop of olive oil

- pureed the whole thoing until smooth and homogenous

Gravy:

This one was done by Hanne. still, very simple. Mix two soup spoons of flour with some of the bird’s juice in a small sauce pan, until the flours becomes kind of a thoink cream. Then start slowly pouring the rest of the liquid.

Finally, we also ad the salad, for which i have no picture and the cake mmmh cake Here it is

We finished woith coffee and tea and chocolate

Well, that was my christmas lunch menu. We enjoyed it, and that’s what counts.

Next, new year’s dimmer

Bye bye!

Fred