February 14, 2014 New Recipe - Valentine’s Day Dinner - Sautéed Sweetbreads with baked Spaghetti Squash and Steamed Asparagus

February 14, 2014 New Recipe - Valentine’s Day Dinner - Sautéed Sweetbreads with baked Spaghetti Squash and Steamed Asparagus

Yesterday I bought 1 ½ lbs. of sweetbreads at Pro’s Ranch Market ($2.99/lb.).  Today I read Julia Child’s Mastering the Art of French Cooking to find out how to prepare them.  After lunch, I unwrapped them and soaked the two sweetbreads in ice water for several hours.  When Suzette called at 5:00 p.m. we discussed what to cook for dinner.  We tentatively decided upon steak and baked spaghetti squash, so I sliced the spaghetti squash in half and put butter in it and baked it on a cookie sheet in the oven for forty minutes at 350˚ on a convection setting.  Suzette arrived by 5:30 p. m. and took over on the cooking.  I asked her to read Julia Child’s instructions for cooking sweetbreads.  Suzette saw that it was recommended to cook them within 24 hours, so we decided to cook the sweetbreads for dinner with the spaghetti squash and steamed asparagus.

I changed the water and removed as much of the filament encasing the sweetbreads as possible while Suzette made the recommended marinade of olive oil, lemon and parsley.  As I cleaned sections of the sweetbreads, I tossed them into the marinade.  After about an hour I had cleaned all of the sweetbreads and the squash was roasted; so we began to cook. 

Suzette started by slicing and sautéing about 1/3 lb. of white mushrooms in oil and butter.  When they were cooked she removed them to a bowl and heated butter and the same skillet and made a béchamel sauce with flour, milk and cream.  The cream curdled because the skillet was too hot so we strained the sauce, then she added the mushrooms back to the skillet with the béchamel for a mushroom cream sauce.

She then heated butter and a little olive oil in the large skillet and added one chopped shallot and three cloves of garlic. She put flour in a pie pan and I dusted the sweetbreads in the flour and laid about half of them into the large skillet with the heated butter and shallots.  After we sautéed the first batch of sweetbreads Suzette put them onto the cookie sheet and into the oven to keep warm and poured the browned butter and shallots into the other skillet with the mushroom cream sauce.  We heated more butter and sautéed the rest of the sweetbread in the large skillet and steamed the asparagus.

I went to the basement and fetched a bottle of Bernard Fouquet Vouvray Brut Sparkling Wine that we had bought at a wine fair in Vouvray last summer.  I cannot tell you how unique and wonderful sparkling Vouvray is.  It is made with the method traditionnelle from 100% chenin blanc grapes.  It is dry, like a brut, but with the slightly sweet flavor of the chenin blanc grape.  We loved it with the greasy sauce and delicate sweetbreads.  We agreed that I over-floured the sweetbreads because they were a little doughy.  Next time we will correct that.   Also the thicker pieces were not thoroughly cooked, so Suzette heated them in the microwave for 2 minutes, which cooked them and heated them. And they were great.   A great Haute Cuisine French meal.

We ate small bowls of vanilla ice cream and a cookie for dessert.  I had to have a small glass of Trimbach Maribelle plum brandy to wash down the grease from our traditional French meal with all that butter.

Bon Appétit