December 14, 2013 Lunch – The Shed Dinner- poached Mahi Mahi, sautéed noodles and steamed Broccoli

December 14, 2013 Lunch – The Shed    Dinner- poached Mahi Mahi, sautéed noodles and steamed Broccoli

After shopping for towels and a few Christmas gifts at J.C. Penny’s home store, at around 9:30 we went to Santa Fe, mainly to attend a Stephen’s Consignment Estate Sale on Abeyta, near the corner of Acequia Madre and Monte Sol in a lovely house in the old East side neighborhood.  The house was stuffed full of antiques, art and books.  Stephen, told us that Mr. Hirsch, who owned the house was a great cook.  There was a prodigious collection of cooking wares, cookbooks, and serving pieces.  We tried to be judicious in our selection of items and Suzette returned several items.  I selected two cookbooks I did not have and have been wanting: Classical Italian Cooking by Marcella Hazan and the Gourmet Menu Cookbook for $3.00 each. 

 

I saw the best and largest (nine inches high) Mary Witkof bowl I have ever seen and bought it for $60.00.  Suzette bought a lovely blanket that looked like a Hudson Bay Co. blanket for Luke’s new room.  We both saw an Italian set of six appetizer plates, a platter, and a serving bowl with hand painted floral designs that we liked.  I bought the bowl for $20.00 and Suzette bought the platter and six plates for $28.00. She also bought a medium sized Calphalon stock pot and tape dispenser.

At around 11:30 we carried our items the two blocks to the car and, after packing them among the towels, decided we were hungry and drove to Owings Gallery and parked and walked to the Shed.  We were seated immediately and I ordered my usual, No. 5 (two baked enchiladas filled with beef with double posole).  Suzette satisfied her annual hunger for Mexican food by ordering Chicken enchiladas with a side of sour cream, which was lucky because the chili was really hot (Robert at Owings Gallery had warned that the chili at the Shed was really hot).  We both ordered Negra Modelo’s and I ordered a Mocha Cake to be thawed out for dessert.  The sour cream and the beer hlped blunt the force of heat in the chili enough to dig our way through our enchiladas with a little help from the chocolate Mocha Cake after lunch.  The Mocha Cake is the Shed’s best dessert, two frozen dark chocolate and mocha mousse layers topped with fresh whipped cream.  It will be served frozen rock hard and be very unappetizing unless you order it when you order your food, in which case it will be thawed out enough to be cool and smoothly delicious.  

We had called T.R. and Linda on our way up to Santa Fe and they were going to be at Terra Nova, a new shop in the rail yard, where she works.  So after stuffing ourselves on Mexican food we drove over to the rail yard area and found the shop at 530 Guadalupe.   The reason we wanted to see them was so we could discuss Marrakesh, where we intend to go in April and where they have a home.  Linda and T.R. were both at the shop and we spent a lovely hour discussing where to go in Morocco and whether their home would be refurbished by April.  They have just returned from Marrakesh but stayed in another house.  Luckily, they are returning to Marrakesh in February and intend to fully refurbish their house by April. T.R. is a trader.  He specializes in Moroccan textiles and olive oil (www.nomadsofsantafe.com).   They also own a house in the jungle just north of Sayulita, Mexico they constructed from an ancient Balinese teak wood house, where we stayed at a year ago (www.retreatsofmexico.com).  So it looks more and more like we will go to Ireland in April and join up with Willy and travel to Morocco for a week and perhaps Southern Spain for a few days.

When we got home, we rested for a while watching a movie and then we began dinner around 7:00.  We decided to poach the fresh Mahi Mahi I had bought at Costco yesterday ($6.99/lb.).  Since we had PPI squash and chard and noodles, Suzette threw those items into a skillet and heated them.  We also de-stemmed the flowerets from a stalk of broccoli and steamed it.  Suzette makes a lovely poaching medium with water, white wine , butter and lemon juice.  I went to the basement and fetched a bottle of the 2009 Antonini Ceresa Grillo di Sicilia Indicarione Geografica Tipica.  It tasted great, like a lighter rueda; flowery but with character.  I bought a case of it from Connie Nellos at Quarters on Yale the other day for $3.99/bottle and am very happy.

 

I loved peeling the delicate flakes of Mahi Mahi from the filet and eating them with bites of the squash, sweet potato, chard mixed with the noodles and broccoli and delicate poaching broth with sips of wine.

 

After dinner I made a pot a beef and barley soup in our new pot.  I chopped and sautéed one medium onion, 2/3 cup each of carrots and celery, 1/2 of a red bell pepper and ½ of a PPI sweet potato for about ten minutes in 1 1/2 Tbsp. of butter.  Then Suzette added 8 cups of water and I diced 6 oz. of PPI rib steak and added the last Tbsp. of Pho paste for its brown miso and beef flavoring and 1 cup of hulled barley and a handful of fresh oregano leaves from our indoor plant and some salt and pepper  and simmered the soup for an hour until the barley popped open and the soup thickened.  I added another two cups of water and we put the soup in the garage to cool.  Tomorrow we will see what we produced.  This was my first time to make beef and barley soup.

Friday evening, the 13th we went to Debbie and Jeff's for a pizza and salad dinner party.  We met two lovely couples, Bill and Sissy and Rick and Andy, and Debbie served a lovely dessert of chocolate cake topped with a scoop of vanilla e cream.  We took a bottle of Chianti Superiore that I also bought two cases of from Quarters that I enjoyed very much because it had a light fruity taste.

Bon Appétit