Art of Simple Food - meal 2

Another hit parade for Sunday dinner.  This week was all about shallow-frying.  We shallow fried pork shops and cauliflower.  Both were divine.  The recipe for the cauliflower called for making a sauce.  And that sauce was fantastic - a combination of garlic, onions, scallions, & tomato paste.

We also made a lemon tart by combining two recipes - lemon curd and pate sucree.  The lemon curd was made with 3 parts Meyer Lemon and 1 part Blood Orange.  I have to admit to never making a lemon tart before and thus was pretty anxious about it.  Will the curd set? Will the tart shell fully bake?  I realized that anxiety is the opposite of simple.  If you own the process, not the outcome, then you'll probably enjoy more journeys in life.

art of simple food - meal 1

So week one was three aces!  Braised chicken legs, pan-fried potatoes, blanched asparagus, and tangerine ice.  

The braised chicken legs needed four ingredients.  The potatoes only 2!  Each were fantastic.  The potatoes were so tasty that my 4 year old asked, "Daddy, can I have this for my birthday dinner?"

But the highlight was the tangerine ice.  I used tangelos and organic sugar.  Then each hour, we took the mixture out of the freezer and scrapped from the edges in.  After four hours, we let it freeze for four hours.  REMARKABLE.

mixing it up by getting simple

Conventional wisdom has it that adding to your cooking repertoire requires complex technique, esoteric spices, & unique heat transfer (sous vide anyone).

That's one way, but probably a much harder way.  A friend gave us a cookbook around the holidays - "The Art of Simple Food."  I love Chez Panisse Vegetables and actually I love Chez Panisse.  I don't consider it to be the 'best' restaurant in America, but it's my favorite one.  

Anyhow, my repertoire is growing a little stale.  How many ratatouille, poulet a roti, & bolognese can one family eat?

So, as Spring begins, I'm going to make a meat, vegetable, sauce & dessert from this book each weekend.  Let's see how it goes.

something coming up...

don't look now, but the tulips are pushing out of the soil.

not too long before ramps and asparagus.

have hoof will travel

So I need about a 1/2 dozen pig's feet in April.  Not smoked, not cured, not jellied - just raw pig's feet.  This is something you can easily find in Chinatown, but it's probably from a factory farm in Iowa or, perhaps even China.  We bought Duck eggs a year ago in Chinatown.  And after coming home saw the "product of China" label.

But thanks to Steven, I found Stephanie at Veritas Farm.  She's a short 2 hours from us and had heritage, humanely raised, pig's feet (frozen, of course).  "Um, yeah I have them but why would you want them?"

"Well, I need them for xue riezi."

"Ah, okay, Anu."

Well, nevermind, we made an agreement for the feet.  Now, I don't have a car.  Stephanie doesn't deliver to New York City.  Thank goodness for farmer's markets.  Our favorite farmer, Ray Bradley, happens to be a good friend and neighbor to Stephanie.  

Now, he'll bring the feet down to Grand Army Plaza.  And I'll pick them up.  How's that for low-carbon footprint.

more on the feet in recipes this April.