Tag Archives: creamed spinach

Tursgiving 2014

24 Nov

We have had the pleasure of making some great foodie friends, and one of our favorites was a former coworker of Mike’s who started a Supper Club when they were working together.  We all get along very well, and bond over our fondness for food.  In the past few years, we have done many a dinner at a brand new restaurant opening together and have hosted many a dinner party with Mike’s friend (who also happens to be Mike) as executive chef.  It never disappoints.

Last year around Thanksgiving, our friendship was just forming but Mike invited us to Tursgiving, his annual Friend Thanksgiving dinner where he cooks for about 100 people (though there are only about 20 of us).

This year, we walked in to find hand-made gifts from our host: a wooden appetizer board with a wine glass holder, and a wine glass.

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And each was personalized for us.

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They worked incredibly well to be able to maintain eating and drinking at the same time (two things that should never be separated).

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Here is our host, Mike, showing off his handiwork (both the board and the food).

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Last year we didn’t know what we were in for, but this year we came prepared with empty stomachs.

The first thing out of the oven were these macaroni and cheese bites made by one of the guests.  They were a great way to star the meal.

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We also enjoyed mini wienies in crescent rolls.

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And my favorite part of the meal, short ribs on pita crisps with fontina cheese and pickled red onions.

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These were absolutely gourmet and could be served in one of the finest restaurants in NYC tomorrow. (They were also enjoyed by a fellow food blogger we befriended at Tursgiving, Maggy, who wrote about them with a recipe here)

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And don’t forget about the big platter of shrimp cocktail.

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And the stuffed mushroom caps.

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After all the nibbles, introductions, and friend-making, it was time to sit down to Part 1 of the main event.

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This was the Italian part of the meal, which started with tomatoes and fresh mozzarella with a basil vinaigrette.

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And then the homemade lasagna and meat balls.  This was second only to the short rib bites.  These were both awesome and bursting with flavor.  Mike really knows how to make Italian food.

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And as if that wasn’t enough food yet, it was on to the full Thanksgiving feast, including a 26 pound turkey that was herbed and covered in bacon for a full roast.

Here is the bird pre-cook wrapped in bacon.

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And here is the bird ready to be carved.

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Our carver went at the bird and we all looked on.

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Then there was a (really delicious) string bean casserole.

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Stuffing.

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Creamed spinach.

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Mashed potatoes.

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Brown sugar and butter roasted sweet potatoes (so good!)

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But by this time, my stomach had no more room. So I literally had one single bite of everything.  This was the most pitiful plate, but it was the best I could do.

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We had to leave before dessert, sadly, due to a family obligation, but we did get a homemade panna cotta with berry coulis (which was awesome) and I stole some of my contribution to the party: Grandma’s Meringue Chocolate Chip Kisses. (still one of my all-time favorites)

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I am still blown away that Mike prepares such a huge, extensive, and delicious meal for all of his friends.  We had a great time, with great food, and met some new great friends.  What an awesome day.  Can’t wait for next year!

Mike has graciously offered to share his recipes for his awesome turkey (which is based on his Grandmother’s recipe but with a twist) and the meatballs.  Turkey in this post. Meatballs in the post tomorrow.

Tursgiving 2014: Mike's Turkey

Ingredients

  • 24 lb Turkey
  • salt / pepper
  • 2 sprig rosemary,
  • 2 stems of sage,
  • 2 tbsp chopped parsley
  • 1 tbsp thyme leaves
  • 3 carrots
  • 3 celery stalks
  • 2 onions
  • 2 potatoes
  • 2 leek stalks
  • 1 large seedless orange
  • 6 tbsp butter separated
  • 1/2 cup white wine
  • 1/2 cup stock
  • 1 pack of bacon

Instructions

    Day before...
  1. Take the turkey the night before roasting and with 4 tbsp of butter and the parsley and thyme salt and pepper and stuff in between the skin and flesh of the breast meat
  2. Lather the rest of the mixture on top of the bird and cover it all with the bacon (layer strips, intersecting and woven if possible)
  3. Cover and let sit in fridge over night
  4. Morning of...
  5. Preheat oven to 350 degrees
  6. Salt and Pepper the inside of the bird and stuff with some of each of the vegetables and the rosemary and sage... whatever doesn't fit throw into the roasting pan along with your liquids
  7. Cover with aluminum foil and cook bird for an hour
  8. Then uncover and baste then cook for another hour until bacon cooks
  9. Baste every half hour
  10. After an hour (hour 2 of cooking) take the bacon off and leave it in the pan and try and stuff some into the cavity of the bird.
  11. Cook for another 2 hours and keep basting every half hour
  12. When 4 hours is up, take the juices out of the pan with your baster and remove the turkey from the oven
  13. Quickly cover with aluminum foil and place on the counter on top of a towel and cover with heavy towels so the turkey slowly cooks for the rest of the day until you are ready to carve it (do all of this swiftly as to not let too much heat escape)
  14. Tips:
  15. I like to put the bird in the oven at 730 so it's out by 1130 then carve by 5... it gives you the whole day to have the oven on for your sides or lasagna or whatever dessert you may want!
  16. When you uncover to carve take the juices and throw them into your stock pot so you have a flavorful broth to make your gravy
  17. After bird is carved throw some of your gravy onto the bird and serve!
http://nycnomnom.com/2014/11/24/tursgiving-2014/

Happy Thanksgiving Week!

 

 

 

New Opening: Heartwood

26 Apr

Every time I find out that I know someone, who knows something, who is opening a restaurant, I am both excited and concerned.  Excited because I am fascinated by the business of opening a restaurant and love being one of the first to try a new place. Concerned because if it sucks, or is even just average, I’m going to write about it and that someone, who knew someone, may read it.

So when I heard that Mike knew someone who knew someone who was opening up Heartwood, in the space previously occupied by the famous Donatella, I was even more concerned.  Lately, I feel like Chelsea has been opening restaurants that excel in abundant averageness. The old standbys have gone away, and now it seems like a revolving door of places that are just okay.  The area has spot after spot of places to get something to eat, and definitely something to drink, but no place you go out of your way to dine at if you don’t happen to be passing by while hungry.

But the pedigree sounded pretty great:

  • Nick Mautone from Gramercy Tavern
  • Nick Fiorentino, former bread baker at Daniel
  • Bradford Thompson, from Lever House and Miss Lily’s

Heartwood just opened on Monday, but it already got a bit of buzz on Eater, so we checked OpenTable for a reservation as we walked across town towards the restaurant…made one for 5:30 .  We got there a bit early, and it turns out the kitchen doesn’t open until 5:30, so we had a drink at the bar.

The space has a great look that’s right up my alley, with mason jar chandeliers and a comfortable dining room.

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Soon after we ordered, a bread basket was whisked to our table, outfitted with the house brown butter and a spicy mustard, as well as some nice rustic slices of bread and delicious salty pretzels.

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Now THIS is how bread baskets should be served.  Too many restaurants treat their bread baskets as an afterthought, but it was obvious that someone who truly cares about bread put this together, and it was a great opening scene.  The brown butter was slightly sweet, which was actually really fantastic, especially with the salty pretzel.  Turns out it’s sweetened with agave, which I usually don’t like, but was excellent here.  The mustard was SUPER spicy apparently (sinus clearing, in fact).

We ordered the skate fingers, which were tempura fried skate that was supposed to be served with jalapeno tartar sauce.  Since I cannot have peppers, they made a parsley aoili for our dish.

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I absolutely love sweet and sour chicken from Chinese restaurants, with that perfect golden crisp. This reminded me a lot of that kind of crisp, but a much cleaner flavor and the light skate inside was delicious.  It was perhaps a tiny bit on the greasy side, but I didn’t mind it a bit.  The aoili we had was pretty good, but it was made great by adding the tart acid of the lemon to the dish. That really made it sing.

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We had been seated at one of the few 2-tops in the back near the pizza oven, which was tucked away from the crowd.  I thought it was a really fantastic seat… nice and quiet and with a perfect view of the action.

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Apparently, the pizza oven is a Stefano Ferrara that was previously gold plated.  But it turned out a perfectly crusty pizza even though it is now repainted red.

We ordered the “When Peter Luger Goes Out For Pizza” which was topped with braised short ribs, creamed spinach, and horse radish.  While I have no idea how they are getting away with that name, I am very glad that someone was genius enough to put this pizza together. All the ingredients went so well together, were so well balanced, and made for a truly lovely and flavorful pizza.

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It was also served with shisito peppers and smoked flake salt. I don’t know if this was just for this pizza or comes with all, but I added a bit of salt to the pizza and it brought it to a whole new level (I love salt).

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The upskirt shows a lovely bit of char.  The pizza wasn’t all that crispy at the inside, however, the flavor of the dough and toppings were so good that it didn’t matter in the slightest.  Great pizza.

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We also decided to split the “Crisp Skin Chicken” which was described as coming with “day old bread sauce” and soft herb salad.

But when it came out… it looked a bit scary, as indicated by Mike’s cautious finger below.  Why scary?  See that shade of orange?  It’s a very particular shade.  It’s the shade of death. (Not quite death… but a very, very itchy mouth potentially filled with blisters).

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It did look beautiful, however.

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The waiter apologized for the mistake and offered to leave it for Mike to eat and they would make me a new one.  We were already over-stuffed, so Mike said he was fine just eating the pepper-free one that was to come.

I was also a bit surprised to see that they described what looked like parsley garnish as an herb salad.  Nothing wrong with that at all, but perhaps something that was billed a bit strangely.

It took some time for the new version to come out, and the waiter apologized to us again that each time it takes 15 minutes to prepare and it would come up as soon as it could. I could tell he was upset about the mistake.  He was upset he couldn’t get the revised chicken up sooner and that the mistake happened.  Poor guy.

But when the chicken did make it’s entry without peppers, it was worth the wait. When a chicken is billed as “crispy skin,” it certainly should have super crispy skin.  Too often I’m disappointed by chicken skin in restaurants, but this was not one of those times.  It was perfectly crisp and somehow the meat inside was super moist.  And the pan jus with it was a really fantastic sauce.

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Our waiter was kind enough to apologize for the mistake again and offered to buy us dessert.

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We chose the chocolate caramel brownie pie.

It was SO rich, but that dark chocolate in a very rich crust was great, and the caramel reminded me of the salted bourbon caramel sauce I love from Fat Toad Farm.  The cherries on top were a bit off-putting when eaten alone.  They tasted a bit, maybe, medicinal?  And I couldn’t quite put my finger on it.  But when our waiter told us that they are soaked in SoCo, it all made sense.  I think they should probably mention this, because wrapping my brain around “cherries in SoCo” made them taste more like that and less like medicine.  The pie itself was really great though.  A nice balance of sweet and bitter, which a lovely texture and delicious crust. And that caramel… give me more of that any day!

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As we were leaving, we had a pretzel left in our (now second) bread basket (it was just so good).  I sheepishly asked if they could give me a to-go bag for the one pretzel to have for breakfast tomorrow, and the waiter nicely came back with a box of TWO pretzels for tomorrow.  One of my favorite touches of fancy restaurants is when they leave you with a parting gift, so this made me incredibly happy.

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And the best part? Our entire meal, including 3 drinks, came to under $100.  It felt like a gourmet meal and I was pleasantly surprised when the bill came.  (Love when that happens!)

So as it turns out, I had nothing to be afraid of.  Not only was this restaurant way above average, but Mike and I left there abuzz about how good our meal was.  Not only was it great quality at a great value, but the food felt special, different, and inspired. That doesn’t happen very often.  So not only is there now a great place to go in Chelsea, I would say it’s worth a trip to Chelsea just to visit this great new restaurant.

On our walk home, Mike and I talked about how we hope that they will soon start serving brunch, and how that bread baker would make some excellent breakfast baked goods and that adding an egg to the pizza would be incredible.  Also, I cannot image anything better than a short rib hash made with the incredible meat they serve on the menu twice (once on a pizza, and once as a main).  I’m glad to have been able to try dinner there, and I look forward to going back for many more meals.

Total Nom Points: 8 out of 10

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Mike’s Birthday Dinner 2013: American Cut

15 Oct

If you have been reading the blog for a bit, you know about our holiday/birthday surprise tradition.  This year, Mike requested steak for his birthday.  I was torn… I LOVE Keen’s and our meal at Peter Luger’s was pretty legendary. Where could we go that would be special for his birthday? I debated Strip House (where Mike has never been) and Porter House (where neither of us have been).  I even made a reservation at Costata, Chef Michael White’s new(ish) steakhouse.  I was leaning very heavily towards Costata after reading about the steaks being aged for 40 days or more.

But then American Cut hit my radar.

Opening just two weeks ago and with Iron Chef Marc Forgione at the helm, this steakhouse came with pretty great reviews from their Atlantic City location.  I tentatively made the reservation as soon as the reservation lines opened up, but held onto my Costata reservation just in case early reviews weren’t so good.  We also tried one of Chef Forgione’s restaurants for brunch, and we were not all that impressed.  I did a search and couldn’t find much, but what I did find was pretty good, so I took a chance and canceled Costata and off to TriBeCa we went to try American Cut.

The inside was pretty sexy, actually.  It was almost deco, almost rat pack… but somehow modern.  The seats were big (without being oversized) with comfy leather and tables that had a stripy grain and a lacquered look.  It looked like the kind of place that you could (and should) sign all of your 6 figure deals.

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The bread course starts things off quite well with an “everything” biscuit and vegetable cream cheese.  A little too well actually.  This biscuit is fantastically delicious and the everything crunches perfectly on top.  Unfortunately (though not too unfortunately), it’s quite a large biscuit and fills you up faster than you want to be filled up at a steakhouse with all the offerings.

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Mike started with the “wedge salad.”  This was flavored beautifully with a piece of bacon on top that was more like a porky crisp.  It had a great, light blue cheese and a really flavorful dressing.  The one really weird thing that I couldn’t get past was that while they called it a “wedge,” it was really just the chopped ice burg with a single large leaf across the top. Now it tasted GREAT… but a wedge has to be a wedge.  Call me a purist.

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I started with the bone marrow app.  I don’t know why I keep doing this to myself though… I REALLY love bone marrow but it’s just too much.  Every time I get it I’m overwhelmed.  It’s just so damn rich. And this was certainly gilding the lily with the addition of Burgundy Escargot (which was fried crisp) and Short Rib on the plate.

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The taste was great, and I absolutely love the fresh parsley with the marrow, but it was just too damn much.  Overkill. Also, the toasted bread tasted great but it was so sharp that it really cut up in the inside of my mouth. I hate that. Not that it stopped me from eating it though. What do you take me for? Like I wound waste one morsel!  (Sorry waistline)

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As for the main course, we tried two sides, including the latkes with apple, sour cream, and gribenes (crackling chicken skin with fried onions, similar to a pork rind but a Jewish variety).  This was heaven in a fried stack.  The potato pancake tasted like potato and was perfectly crispy.  Then the sour cream and apple were a great compliment (as always) and the gribenes was a nice twist.  Great side.  Highly recommended.

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We also tried the sunchoked spinach with fontina and smoked salt.  This was a nice side akin to creamed spinach, but not quite as heavy and with a nice cheesy flavor. (We took a good amount home with us and it made for awesome leftovers inside an omelette the next morning!)

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I got a steak from the specials.  This was a small filet minon with a “hunter’s sauce.” Our waiter instantly qualified this as “JUST a red wine sauce with wild mushrooms.”  By qualifying it as “JUST” a sauce kind of took away from the cool sounding “hunter’s sauce” but boy this was not JUST anything.  The filet was perfectly cooked with the tender, flavorful mushrooms.  The sauce was just glazed enough to stick to the meat and create a depth of flavor that really upped the ante on the filet. (Typically I choose anything other than filet because I prefer a richer, more deeply flavored steak that can only come from marbleized fat).

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Mike got the “New York City Cut” which was a 20 ounce bone-in ribeye with pastrami spices and smoke.  This was a very well cooked steak with a nice char and delicious spices.  And this was QUITE a portion.

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Mike chose to order some maitre d’ butter on the side and every steak is served with their own steak sauce, which was good but somehow unnecessary with how good the steak was.

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By midway through our meal, a little piece of me was regretting the biscuit. As good as it was, it was SUPER filling.  I am not sure if the same delicious biscuit could be executed in all it’s fluffy inner and crunchy outer goodness in a smaller portion, but it made it difficult to finish the meal. Though to be honest, I would do it all over again exactly the same way. Nothing wrong with leftovers! (Which they packaged up for us and then gave us a claim ticket to get from the coat check. Nice touch.)

We took a good amount home so we could have room for dessert.  We chose the Cracker Jack Sundae with popcorn ice cream. (Though I was very curious about the HB&J that came with hazelnut butter and concord grape semifreddo, as well as the AC Carbomb which was chocolate bread pudding, Jameson butterscotch, bananas, and Guiness ice cream.)

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I really enjoyed this sundae.  A mild, popcorn flavored ice cream (that could have been a bit bland on its own) was enhanced by a caramel sauce and pieces of crackerjack that by some miracle of food managed to stay entire crispy even when borrowed deep in this sundae.

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Our meal was finished with 2 little sweet bites.  I wish they told us what exactly they were, but I would venture to guess that the chocolate one was a chocolate mint cookie (that tasted a bit like a Girl Scout’s Thin Mint) and the other tasted like a Lintzer cookie with what I would assumed was raspberry and nuts.  (I preferred the latter).

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These tiny guys were quite good, but it hit one of my biggest pet peeves: 2 people… 1 of each cookie.  It forces you to nibble a little bite off of each to allow the other person to try it. Thank goodness I like my husband, otherwise we would be fighting over each morcel. Come now… serve 2 of each… 1 for each patron. Don’t make us split a thimble of cookie.

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But truly… this is nit picking to its extreme. Our meal was fantastic.  There were a few minor faults and hiccups along the way, but the food was great.

The service was pretty good. We did both notice, however, that the entire main course was served to our neighboring table while 3 out of the 4 of them were away at the bathroom.  That shouldn’t happen, but our service overall was pretty good. Though I certainly appreciated the warmth of the manager over the odd coldness of our waiter.

Throughout the meal, a waft of a delicious smoke would tickle our noses. We finally asked what it was and our waiter guessed that it was the Plank Smoked Old Fashion with Woodford Reserve, caster sugar, nicks bitters, and a maple wood smoked glass. He described the process of making it: they would invert the glass and fill it with the smoke before pouring the drink into it.  We entertained the idea of stopping at the bar to try one as we handed over our credit card and waited for a bit.  It didn’t seem like all that long, but the manager came up to us and let us know that the credit card machine had crashed and it would be  a few minutes.  He offered to buy us a drink, and Mike instantly perked up and asked for that Old Fashion.

I immediately felt bad because I had noticed at the very beginning of the meal that the drink in question was actually quite pricey at $20.But hey, he offered!

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And boy oh boy am I glad he did!  We were more than happy to split the drink and it was everything as good as it smelled.  I am not the person to EVER spend $20 on a cocktail, but this one would have almost been worth it.  The ice ball drove me nuts by bonking me in the nose every time I took a sip, but it didn’t stop me for going back for more.  The smokiness was just absolutely awesome and the cocktail was so well balanced and so well mixed.  Impressive.

So we added at least $20 extra to the tip and walked out of that restaurant feeling absolutely great.

Good job Manager!

Good job Chef Forgione!

Great job American Cut!

Total Nom Points: 8 out of 10

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