March 13, 2018 Lunch – Salad with cheese Knackebrod Dinner P- Roasted Pork with Apples and Onions Tapa with steamed asparagus and potato soup

March 13, 2018 Lunch – Salad with cheese Knackebrod Dinner P- Roasted Pork with Apples and Onions Tapa with steamed asparagus and potato soup

I ate ½ onion bagel with cream cheese slices of red onion, Lax, and capers for breakfast.

Then at noon I went to the covered beds and picked a basket of lettuce to which I added 1 chopped Roma tomato, ¼ sliced cucumber, a few slices of red onion and 1 hard boiled egg.  I sautéed a small handful of roasted potatoes and Cornish game thigh in a skillet to warm it added that. Finally, I added the last eight kalamata olives.  It was a beautiful salad.  I sliced slices of Manchego cheese and piled them on to two round knaekebrod I had bough at IKEA and melted it for 16 seconds.

Suzette arrived late, so I cut the whole Five pound pork sirloin into chops except for the tenderloin tip that I butchered into pieces by removing the tendons.  I also put a bottle of 2016 Bieber Pere & Fils Sabine Rose from Aix-en-Provence into the freezer.  I forgot to mark this bottle but I think it is from Trader Joe’s and probably a $5.99 or $6.99 bottle.

I also sliced an apple and an onion.  When Suzette arrived she had worked 12 hours straight she she rested while I cooked the pork dish.  I decided to see if I could shortcut the recipe. I sautéed the apple and onion slices in 1 T. of butter and 2 T. of olive oil until they were golden brown.  I then added the pork and about 1 T. of Oregano leaves.  I salted and peppered the meat and ladled the cooking liquid over the meat and placed the sauté pan into a 300 degree oven for twenty minutes.

At this point Suzette was revived and went into action.  She fetched the asparagus from the fridge and cut the tough ends off and filled the steamer with water and steamed the asparagus.  She then went to the garage and fetched the PPI Vichyssoise I made on Sunday, while I made ½ cup of chicken stock and fetched the cognac and poured glasses of rose wine.  She ladled Vichyssoise into bowls and we ate a bowl of the cold soup.

She then took the sauté pan; from the oven and added the chicken stock to the pan and reduced the sauce on top of the stove over medium heat and then added the cognac and lit the cognac for a flambé effect.

When the asparagus and pork dish were ready, she served us each a plate with seven or eight asparagus and we each ladled the pork dish onto our plates.

The dinner was lovely and complemented by the rose that was one of those special French roses from Coteaux D’ Aix-en-Provence that are intentionally made as a rose, not a by ptoduct of other wine production.  The wine was 52% Grenache, 23% Syrah, 14% Cabernet Sauvignon, 8% Cinsault, and 3% Rolle.  A serious rose’.

We loved it with the pork dish with its creamy amalgamation of apples, onions and pork bound together by chicken stock and cognac with more than a hint of oregano.  This is one of our favorite pork dishes and is found on page 236 of Andre’ Tapa Cookbook.  We shortened the cooking time by
almost ½ by cooking the apples and onion together initially, increasing the heat in the oven to 300 degrees, and not removing the ingredients from the sauté pan at the end and simply saucing the entire dish.

After dinner Suzette wanted to eat some of her quince tart.  I asked her to heat it and to go to the garage for a container of Reddi-Whip whipped cream, which she did.  I made tea and poured us cognacs and suggested we micro-grate some lemon zest onto the whipped cream garnished tart, which gave the dish an extra lemon zip.

I finished my second piece of tart with a bit of Trimbach Maribelle Brandy.  We went to bed a little after 10:00 after watching the election returns from the Pennsylvania 18th Congressional District election in which it appeared that the democrat Conor Lamb won.

Bon Appetit