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February 28, 2009

Field trip to Sid Wainer & Son, New Bedford, MA

If you ever want to take a fun foodie field trip, check out Sid Wainer & Sons, a specialty food purveyor in New Bedford, MA. Sid Wainer supplies 23,000 restaurants daily; if you live in New England, you've probably seen their trucks on the road. But you don't have to be a restaurant to enjoy Sid Wainer's goods. The Gourmet Outlet is open Monday-Saturday from 9-5 for retail business. (Don't let the word outlet fool you, Sid Wainer's is not a discount store.) Saturdays are especially fun at Sid's. The chefs cook up a storm and provide samples and recipes to give you ideas on how to use the products. There are samples on weekdays too, but on Saturdays they go all out.

We chatted with one of the chefs while he prepped Eggplant Rustico, a layered casserole with panko-crusted fried eggplant, roasted cherry tomatoes and garlic, basil, fresh mozzarella, and pecorino romano. Boy did it look good. We grabbed recipe cards so we can try it at home. The chefs and the entire staff are so helpful. They are always willing to give you ideas about how to use an ingredient that is new to you. If they don't know about a particular ingredient, they find someone who does.

The cheese room is my favorite part of Sid Wainer's. Bring a warm coat because cheese room is very cold. Seriously, the people who work in the cheese room wear heavy coats. If you aren't dressed warmly, you won't be able to stay in the room very long. There are over a hundred cheeses; you'll want to look at all of them. The cheese room makes my head spin and my mouth water. I could spend my life savings there. One of the cheeses they had out for tasting was a Roquefort Crusted Chevre. Blue cheese crusted goat cheese. Does it get any better than that? Yup, I had to have some. I also spotted a truffle cheese. I've never had truffles and I've always wanted to try them, so that went into my basket. And a small piece of ricotta insalata.

The produce room always has something I've never seen before. On Thursday I checked the website and saw black garlic featured, so I was looking forwarding to seeing it. I've read about it recently. Alas, there was no black garlic out, but I did see my first ever fresh garbanzo beans. And baby brussels sprouts. Keffir limes, and more. Hmm, why didn't I pull my camera out in the produce room?

Here's my loot from the trip:

fresh dill, Roquefort Crusted Chevre, sourdough bread, aged balsamic vinegar, heirloom cherry tomatoes, ricotta insalata, truffle cheese, chorizo

Grab your friends and take a road trip.

Posted February 28, 2009 2:15 PM in Foodie Field Trip | Comments (5)

February 26, 2009

Top Chef 5: it's a wrap

I wanted Carla to win and I think she could have if she hadn't let Casey influence her so much. My heart sank when Casey said sous vide. What a huge mistake! Carla didn't need the judges to tell her what she did wrong, she knew.

Once that went down, I was sure that Stefan would clinch it. Stefan skills are top-notch. It cracked me up when Stefan picked Marcel but said something about Marcel being a jerk (I can't remember his exact word, but whatever it was, it described Stefan to a T). Ohmigod, that dessert was so ugly. It looked like 1980s bad wedding food. Stefan's squad looked luscious. I wanted to reach through the TV and get me some of that. I knew that he would rock the alligator challenge that Hosea threw at him. Stuff like that doesn't phase him.

Hosea was a surprise. I find him unmemorable. Maybe it's not him but it's because Top Chef's coverage of him has been all about his whining. Did he actually win any challenges? He did put out the best meal last night and that's what it comes down to.

Posted February 26, 2009 9:36 AM in Miscellaneous | Comments (1)

February 22, 2009

Strawberry Tartare Redux

Here I am talking about Strawberry Tartare for the second time in a week. That's because it is really that good. This time, I have the recipe for you.

Last night we got together with some friends for an evening of great food. Five couples, one appetizer, three stews, three breads, many bottles of wine, one dessert, a bottle of port, and lots of laughs.

Last Friday, as soon as I tasted Marcy's Strawberry Tartare, I knew that I wanted to make it for "the gang". And as luck would have it, we had a dinner scheduled for last night. Our dinners always have a theme and last night was soup and stew night. I was going to make Brazilian Seafood Stew, but we didn't have an appetizer or dessert on our menu so I ditched the stew in favor of an appetizer of Strawberry Tartare and a dessert of Molten Chocolate Cakes (more about them coming soon).

Marcy served it on Chinese soup spoons and I used to have some, but they went to Goodwill long before it became fashionable to serve small bites on them. But, I have a set of these mini martini glasses, so that's what I used.

The recipe makes about 16 tablespoons of tartare. I was serving 10 and wanted each serving to be about 3 tablespoons, so I doubled it. I also used grapeseed oil, because my walnut oil was rancid. Yikes, rancid walnut oil smells horrible.

You'll notice that one serving doesn't have goat cheese, that's because one member of our group doesn't like goat cheese. She enjoyed it thoroughly without the goat cheese. If you don't like goat cheese, but like blue cheese, try it with blue cheese.

Now I have a another good reason to look forward to our local strawberry season.

Strawberry Tartare
adapted from Tea Time Magazine
makes about 1 cup

1 cup finely diced strawberries
1 tablespoon honey
1 teaspoon aged balsamic vinegar
1 teaspoon walnut oil
1 teaspoon orange zest
1 teaspoon fresh squeezed orange juice
8 teaspoons crumbled goat cheese

In a small bowl, combine all ingredients except goat cheese and stir to combine. Let the tartare sit at room temperature for one hour for the flavors to marry. Strain mixture through a fine mesh sieve. Discard liquid. Place in Chinese spoons or mini glasses and garnish with goat cheese crumbles. Serve immediately.

Posted February 22, 2009 4:44 PM in Recipes | Comments (2)

February 15, 2009

Personal chefs eat well when they hang out

On Friday, I got together with two personal chef buddies: Marcy and JoEllen. Marcy and I are both members of Personal Chefs Network. We met JoEllen at the Gluten-Free Culinary Summit.

Marcy made us a lovely lunch (she wouldn't let us bring anything) and we spent the afternoon chatting about different aspects of our businesses. It's great to get together with other personal chefs. Even though our businesses are different, there is so much that we can learn from each other. We talked about the food that we cook for our clients, networking, the software that we use, using social media to promote our businesses, and a whole lot more. All of a sudden it was 4pm and time for us to go. I'm sure that we could have chatted for many more hours. That just means that we have to get together again soon.

Here's what Marcy prepared for us for lunch:

Strawberry Tartare: strawberries, aged balsamic vinegar, honey, goat cheese. This was so delicious that we each had seconds, the excuse was that we needed to have seconds so we could take a picture. Marcy's going to be in big trouble if she doesn't share this recipe.

Corn Chowder: based on Jasper White's recipe but with Marcy's tweaks. We gobbled this up before taking pictures of the nicely plated soup. Marcy sent some home with me, so I enjoyed it again for lunch yesterday.

Chicken Salad Veronique: with a lemon yogurt dressing. Light and delicious.

Linzer Cookies: heart shaped of course. Delicate cookies bursting with raspberry filling. Perfect with a cup of tea.

Posted February 15, 2009 12:45 PM in Business & Networking | Comments (2)

February 14, 2009

Valentine's Day dinner at our house

Tonight's Valentine's Day dinner was simple and delicious.

I wanted fish, so I picked Braised Cod Puttanesca from Fine Cooking. Tom loves Israeli couscous, so I picked Toasted Israeli Couscous with Pine Nuts and Parsley from Epicurious. And a tossed salad.

One beauty of this meal was that it took less than 30 minutes to make. I don't want to spend the rest of the evening writing this blog post, so I'll just link to the recipes.

Toasted Israeli Couscous with Pine Nuts and Parsley: I halved the recipe, even halved, it makes a ton, but we both love this stuff, so leftovers are welcome. I used just 1 tablepoon of butter.

Braised Cod Puttanesca: The recipe calls for red snapper, but I used cod. I cooked 3 cod fillets (leftovers for lunch for me!), but didn't scale down the sauce ingredients.

What about dessert you ask? Well, we're full right now, but if we want dessert later, it will be Warm, Soft Chocolate Cakes by Jean-George Vongerichten and Mark Bittman. I'll use the Bitten suggestion of dusting the pans with cocoa powder rather than sugar. (And if you use the cocoa powder and chose a gluten-free chocolate, these cakes are gluten-free.) The cakes will take just a few minutes to mix, and are done in 12 minutes.

Posted February 14, 2009 7:38 PM in Recipes | Comments (0)

February 6, 2009

How come I never thought of this?

I'm a traditionalist when it comes to pizza, no pineapple, ham, bacon, or broccoli on my pizza please. Today I discovered a new pizza topping that is sure to make a repeat performance. This morning I was at the deli buying prosciutto for a recipe I am testing. While I was chatting with Kelly, my favorite deli gal, about how much we both love prosciutto, she mentioned putting it on pizza. Boy that sounded good. How come I never thought of that?

Tonight's pizza was a Boboli mini crust, topped with tomato, cheese, and prosciutto. Simple and delicious. If you haven't topped your pizza with prosciutto, you must try it.

Posted February 6, 2009 9:26 PM in Tips, Techniques & Tools | Comments (1)

February 1, 2009

Gluten Alert: Heinz says that their organic ketchup IS NOT gluten-free

Given the recent news about high fructose corn syrup (HFCS) containing mercury, if you are a Heinz ketchup user, you might have switched to Heinz Organic Ketchup to avoid HFCS. I just learned that unlike Heinz original ketchup, Heinz organic ketchup is not gluten-free. So if you need to be gluten-free, stay away from this HFCS-free ketchup.

Posted February 1, 2009 6:12 PM in Gluten-Free, Miscellaneous, Tips, Techniques & Tools | Comments (0)

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