So this post and the few others that I will be rolling out over the next few days. I also am messing around with new layouts so if anyone has any suggestions or likes and dislikes feel free to share them. Anyways, above is my version of crepes with chicken and morels – except morels weren’t in season so I ended up getting a mix of mushrooms.

Thee look like they are Alba Clamshell, Brown Clamshell, and Velvet Pioppini. I was very disappointed that Morels weren’t an option but these ended up being a nice substitute, a totally different taste but very good. All and all these were really really good. There was a cream sauce and while I’m generally not a fan of cream sauces (or anything involving dairy that isn’t ice cream) I did put a bit in my crepes and it really was quite good – another recipe that I will definitely have to make again.

This was another pretty straight forward recipe (contrary to popular belief there are some somewhat, if not very, straight forward recipes in the Bouchon cook book. In fact the hardest thing was attempting to truss the chicken because for one reason or another I’d never done it before (apparently I rarely make an entire roast chicken). Despite it’s simplicity it was really good. The chicken was brined for 8 hours (another thing I’d never done) and then roasted.

The other part of this recipe was the mushroom ragu. It consisted of a variety of mushrooms, shallots (which are going to become a theme in the next few posts), and wine if I’m remembering correctly – I don’t have the book in front of me. Honestly there was nothing bad about this dish. Yes it was a little time intensive because the chicken was brined but that’s more an issue of impatience than anything else. A quick easy meal.

Next up: Crêpes with Chicken and Morels

This dish was simple and amazing. Again I forgot to take pictures through out the making of this one (that seems to be becoming a trend with me that I need to curb) but I suppose there wasn’t much to take pictures of. The stock consisted of, among other things, shallots, garlic, wine, mustard, and saffron. After allowing those to simmer and then steep I brought the broth up to a simmer and then added the mussels and allowed them to cook for a few minutes covered. After they were opened it was in with the parsley and then into a bowl for my dining pleasure.

Random factoid: when I was little (5 or 6 years old) mussels were my favorite food (as well as raspberries, not eaten at the same time of course).

Worst presentation ever. This recipe sounded good when I read the title, I like garlic sausage and I like lentils – it should have been good. What I failed to notice which I only saw once I was reading though the recipe was that you’re supposed to poach the sausage. Unfortunately for me, I don’t like poached sausages (cooked on a flat top or on a grill or really anything other than a liquid I love) so I didn’t really enjoy this dish. I did enjoy the lentils alone but together I just wasn’t a fan.

I also (clearly) didn’t really understand how to plate it nicely so it doesn’t look the best. To add insult to injury I was having also some camera issues (my battery decided to fail and then a few days later come back to life) and ended up using one of my mom’s cameras (which actually doesn’t take bad pictures at all but the whole situation left me a bit frantic).

All that said, things are looking. My camera is back to working (or rather, it’s battery is back to working) and next up with have mussels (which was my favorite food when I was little – I was weird) with saffron.

First came the red wine reduction, of course I didn’t think to take a picture before it had reduced but in the pot is carrots, garlic, leeks, bay leaf, onion, thyme, and of course red wine. After that more of the same was tossed into the reduction.

The beef is then placed onto a “nest” of cheese cloth on top of the vegetables so the vegetables and herbs wouldn’t stick to it and then beef broth was poured over it. After that was done cooking the whole thing got strained a few times and the beef and the resulting broth was put in the fridge for a few days.

The day that the dish was eaten the mushrooms, carrots, lardons, and fingerling potatoes were all cooked and added to the beef and stock. There were also glazed pearl onions that I had made the day I made the broth but I forgot about until after this picture was taken. I added them to the pot to heat them through and then a few to my bowl but, turns out, it tastes better with out the pearl onions. Though this recipe for Boeuf Bourguignon isn’t bad it definitely isn’t my favorite. While the flavors are complex the liquid is very, very thin which isn’t what I look for in a good stew. That being said the beef was extremely tender and flavorful which, no doubt, was due to the cooking techniques laid out in the recipe.

On to the macarons. This is the first time out of many many attempts that  have successfully made macarons! There is still a lot of room for improvement and I’m debating on making another batch today but this is by far the best batch that’s come out of my oven. The butter cream is different than what I normally make in that Keller calls for whole eggs instead of just egg whites. I don’t think it’s necessarily better than my usual egg yolk-less butter cream, it’s just different. I made regular vanilla (as called for in the book) as well as raspberry butter cream and both tasted very good.

While the fat was rendering I made the “green salt” that is called for in the recipe. Instead of putting salt on the legs, laying whatever other seasoning you want on them and putting them in the fridge overnight, Keller has you grind herbs, salt, and peppercorns together in a coffee grinder and then rub a measured amount onto the meaty side of each leg (and refrigerate overnight).

The next day I put the wings (with the salt rinsed off) in the duck fat and baked them for 10 hours overnight (my mom’s first response: “They can cook that long?”) and came out with this

Those, after cooling a bit, went into a baking dish, cooled a bit, and then into the fridge….

Four days later and this is the end product. It was nice as it came together really quickly. Once the duck confit is made the rest of it isn’t particularly complicated or time consuming and it makes for a very tasty dinner. Hell the sauce even held up well for leftovers today (though I did add some chicken stock and warm it up on the stove).

This was actually my first time working with Belgian endive and possibly my first time eating it. I almost cut my finger (and that would have been a horrid cut – I’m not used to our pairing knife) when I was attempting to partially core them in preparation for salting them overnight to draw out the bitterness. Thankfully the next day I was a bit more cautious in my producing of little endive match sticks

After cutting the endive it went into a pan with juice, garlic, and something else (I don’t remember off the top of my head right now) and simmered (with a parchment lid) for 40 min. I don’t have an after photo but it looked a lot like that but slightly more transparent and wilted.

This was the end result. I wasn’t too impressed with my scallop cooking skill or lack there of. It’s interesting becasue when I was younger (10 or so) I would make scallops all the time. Once very week or two, they would be my weekend snack every few weeks so I got really good at it. Then I got tired of scallops (and seafood in general to an extent) and all of that scallop cooking know how somehow flew out the window. That being said, I’m very happy with the endive.  I have a feeling Keller doesn’t have Bouchon serve the dish with that much of the braising liquid but it was tasty and there wasn’t much direction on that point in the book so I left that up to interpretation.

Saturday I made the first of about 140 dishes in the Bouchon cookbook, Skate with Fennel Onion Confit and Tapenade Sauce. Of course I wasn’t thinking far enough ahead to take pictures of the entire process so a don’t have too much of a photographic backbone to build a narration on. It wasn’t a particularly changing dish for me so much as it was time consuming. Normally when I cook something with a lot of components I give myself a good amount of time to work with so I won’t be ravenous while I’m making it or waiting for it to finish cooking. That wasn’t so much the case Saturday. The fennel onion confit (which was amazing) had to cook for a few hours which was easy enough – chopped the fennel (which I’d never worked before) and the onions, put them in the pot with their braising liquid and a bouquet garni and covered it with a parchment lid. Then came peeling three cloves of garlic for the garlic confit which I needed for the olive tapanade and I think I’ll need it for something else I’m making this week.

Once all of that was finished (or near finished) I started on the skate wings (which my mother didn’t realize were fish until the butcher at city market told her otherwise…despite having gone out to dinner with me when I’ve ordered them). Keller instructs you to cook the four wings at the same time in two pans. While I could have done that it just wasn’t going to happen so I did it in two batches. All and all I think it turned out really well.  There were no major mishaps either, which is always useful.

While the endive and garlic were on the stove I started on the raspberry sorbet. In the book it says “Raspberry or Blueberry Sorbet” but as I really don’t like blueberries, raspberries won out (despite the fact that it’s the end of their season here in Portland). This was the first time in a long while that I’d made raspberry sorbet (normally I go for peach) but I will say, I really need a chinois. I do have a small fine mesh strainer (it’s not a skimmer, it’s deaper than that) but it took forever to strain out all of the seeds. That being said, all of the work was worth it because while it was simple it was amazing. Also can I just say, taking pictures of sorbet – not easy at all.

These are always my least favorite posts the write, the “Welcome to my blank slate of a blog, please stay I swear I’m interesting!” posts. That being said they have to be done (at least for me they do) so here goes. A week ago I finally decided to cave in and buy both The French Laundry and Bouchon cookbooks from Amazon.com (normally I would buy from my beloved Powell’s but this time the Amazon “we have the ability to give you an amazing discount” price won out over the Powell’s “we’re local and you love us” loyalty factor). Why did I finally buy them? Well I’ve been wanting both for years and after dealing the Julie & Julia movie trailers drip their “you must cook through a cookbook” mojo into my brain along with thoroughly enjoying the French Laundry at Home blog I decided that I’d have a go at cooking through the Thomas Keller’s Bouchon cookbook.

I was thinking about this project last night and I was really a bit conflicted. There is already a Cooking Bouchon blog and I do feel a little bad that I bought that domain name (I didn’t realize it was the same name until after I had bought the domain name). At the same time I was feeling as if I was copying Carol (who did French Laundry at Home and is now cooking through Alinea). That being said I’m not doing this blog to copy anyone or to be trendy, I’m doing it because of all of the things that I do that involve making things (Knitting, Spinning, Weaving, etc), cooking is the only one that allows me to eat what I’ve made. It’s also, right now, the only one that really makes me feel accomplished which is something I really need right now. I’m currently on medical leave from Sarah Lawrence College (as of right now I plan on going back in the Winter of 2010) and I need something to make me feel like I’m at least a little bit successful. I’m hoping that this project can be that thing. I’ll write a bit more about the general logistics of my project and how I intend on posting (ie. my reasoning on not posting recipes from the book and how much of this I’ll be posting versions of on my other blog) on the about page but other than that, we’re off!

Next up: Raspberry Sorbet