Check out the new sandwiches in the Bakery!! Crisp, slender baguettes in a cute paper wrap all ready for you to pick up! Those Bakery girls are so creative! Today’s sandwiches are filled with smoked pork loin and arugula leaves.
This is my husband Frank’s favorite new Serious Pie pizza: prosciutto cotto and green garlic pesto. We ate this last night at Serious Pie, Westlake. Kinda makes you want to run over there for lunch, doesn’t it?
We tested this chocolate cream pie for the upcoming Dahlia Bakery Cookbook today, and we’re pretty excited about it. Like the best chocolate pudding ever in a really crisp pecan pastry shell.
from previous week of testing: rhubarb crostatas perfect for spring and
Jackie’s favorite strata with sausage, mushrooms, and chard.
Here’s what’s happening this week in farm land:
Hurray for this week’s volunteers- Dev Patel and Annie Koski-Karell (Serious Pie) and Joe Lyons (Seatown)!!!
This week we will be spreading many, many, many stinky pounds (2,000 to be exact) of pelleted chicken manure on the recently furrowed rows and then raking them down to prepare for planting.
Planting arugula, parsnips and beets, pulling the mulch off the strawberries, planting a new herb raised bed, thinning tomato, eggplant, and pepper starts, and doing some spring cleaning of the sheds to get ready for this summer.
All the compost has been spread and all quads have been furrowed. New rabbit fencing going up next week. The greenhouse is working beautifully and all our seedlings are growing to beat the band! The roof and windows are on the barn, and this week we should be getting our electrical permit after which drywall will start going up. Lettuce, spinach, and radishes are in the ground.
(Editor’s note: photo is from Spring 2010)
Dekyi plays shuffleboard!!!
Editor’s note: Dekyi is playing shuffleboard at our new Bravehorse Tavern space in South Lake Union- scheduled to open very soon! Ting Momo, which will also open soon, is located right behind the Tavern, and that’s where you’ll find Dekyi hand-shaping her delicious Tibetan dumplings.
When Amy sent all of us this photo by email, my favorite comment was from Brian W (Bravehorse Tavern’s new chef) who said: “We can’t keep Dekyi out of the bar. She’s always like ‘who wants a boilermaker?’ “ Maybe you have to know Dekyi to LOL at that one!
5:55 Meet at SeaTac Airport
9:30 LAX
10:00 Venice Beach for sunglasses
11:00 Langer’s Delicatessen for their famous #19 pastrami and rye, a beef brisket French dip, and French fries. (The best pastrami and rye either of us had ever had.)
11:30 Phillipe’s to try their beef and pork dips (no au jus needed as they dip them for you.) Really loved the horseradish mustard on the tables.
12:30 Wurstkuche. Probably the coolest space of the day. We tried their bratwurst and Italian sausage along with a couple of beers from their mostly German and Belgian beer list. Read the rest of this entry »
Cure-master Keenan at Serious Pie Virginia received a whole goat today from Oregon’s famous Anderson Valley. From the goat carcass, Keenan will be making whole leg goat prosciutto. From the belly, he’ll be curing pancetta. Keenan will transform the remainder of the goat into a dry aged salumi!
Curing times for the different cuts vary, but you can start seeing some of Keenan’s handiwork appearing on the Serious Pie Virginia menu in 3 to 6 months.
You know it’s spring when the first slender, crimson stalks of rhubarb push their way out of the ground. Here’s rhubarb in my garden (above).
Here’s our pastry sous chef, Katharine (above), dicing up a case of rhubarb in the pastry kitchen in South Lake Union. I expect there must be rhubarb crisp or crostata or sorbet on the menus of the Tom Douglas joints by now.
Pastry chef, Garrett Melkonian, who’s working with me on the development of recipes for the upcoming Dahlia Bakery Cookbook, has lately been producing amazing desserts in Matt Costello’s kitchen at the Inn at Langley, as part of Matt’s gorgeous multi-course dinners. (This is a TDR almuni duo by the way, because Matt used to work for us also). Garrett texted me from the ferry with this photo (above) of his “snow covered rhubarb: jasmine poached rhubarb suspended in its own gelee, rhubarb sorbet, chocolate branches, crumbled salt and pepper meringue, tarragon, yogurt snow.”
After being at the Natural Products Expo in Anaheim, CA all last weekend, Carol Baush, the brand manager for Rub with Love, and I re-toxed with some In-N-Out burgers and fries. I opted for the strawberry shake with my meal. The burger/fry/shake combo combined with an adult beverage at the airport terminal was a recipe for a nice little snooze on the plane ride home!
Hey all you vegetable lovers, here is the farm report from across the mountains:
Woohoo! It has been a very busy off-season what with perusing tons of seed catalogs, plotting plots, getting 320 yards of Cedar Grove compost delivered and spread, tracking down composted chicken manure, peat pots, and supplies. Miles of new irrigation has been laid and new rabbit-proof fencing is in the works.
The barn is about halfway finished, structure is up, should be completed about mid to late May (hopefully). It will have a big two compartment sink and an 8X8 walk in, which should help keep the produce in much better shape for transport. Also, will have a bathroom (yeah!) and a couple spare bedrooms for farm laborers- that’s all you friends, family, and staff, hopefully.
The greenhouse, a 12×8 kit model has been built and is just awaiting the electricity. Together with a trusty team, I’ve started approximately 1300 tomatoes (see photo) and also 200 eggplant and 450 peppers along with many, many other assorted vegetables. I am not sure if they are all going to fit, but it will be so much nicer than trying to keep all the seedlings going in the spare room at the farm!
The upper garden bed, across from the house, has been tilled up, and it is now larger than the bed down below! Yikes!! The irrigation has been laid and the new fence started. And three new raised beds for herbs have been built. I believe that there is now about three and a half acres under cultivation. That doesn’t sound like much but it is actually twice as much as last year.
The raspberries, blueberries, and strawberries look like they all survived the winter and are starting to bud out. I am very anxious to see how they produce on their first full year. No buds yet on the apricots. Most of the herbs look good, will pull the mulch off in the next week or so.
RSS SubscribeWelcome to Family Meal, a blog that examines all things new and noteworthy in the world of food, wine, and dining.
At family meal, otherwise known as staff meal, there’s no hierarchy; you’re breaking bread with your friends. For those 30 minutes, everyone is equal- and hungry. Family meal is our version of the water cooler- but with better food.
I’ll be sharing my thoughts, tips, and observations, and, in the spirit of family meal, I’ve invited our creative, energetic staff- everyone from line cook to bartender to bookkeeper- to have a say. I hope you’ll add your own comments and join in the conversation.
-Tom Douglas
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