February 24, 2015 Dinner with Rosemary French Onion Soup, (New Recipe) Herb and Bacon Wrapped Pork Tenderloin, Cellentani Pasta cooked with anchovy butter and Kale and Fennel

February 24, 2015  Dinner with Rosemary  French Onion Soup, (New Recipe) Herb and Bacon Wrapped Pork Tenderloin, Cellentani Pasta cooked with anchovy butter and Kale and Fennel  

At 4:00 I received an email from Rosemary, a client, about getting together to discuss her case.

Rosemary is a wonderful cook and was the owner of Rose’s Table before it closed a year or two ago.  

I called her and we discussed meeting and when I told her my kitchen sink was still blocked and the kitchen a mess, she told me she had just made French Onion Soup and invited me over at 5:00 for dinner and to discuss the case.

So I grabbed a bottle of 2011 Cinq Cavas “Old Vines”Morgan (a French Beaujolais [100% gamay grapes] produced in Morgan, France that I bought at Costco in November 2013 for $10.99).  I thought an older vine raised Gamay that had rested in the cellar for over a year would go well with the pork tenderloin.

When I arrived Rosemary first prepared bowls of French Onion Soup which she had made with thin slices of onion, chicken stock, and Concha y Toro’s Chilean CabernetSauvignon/Merlot blend named Explorateur.  She lay three slices of fresh French baguette on top of each hot soup filled bowl and then lay a handful of grated Gouda cheese on top of the bread slices and baked them in the oven for a few minutes until the soup heated and the cheese melted.  On the table was a bowl of sliced radishes and cucumbers sprinkled with lime juice as a light salad a la Mexico. Rosemary's family is originally from Spain via the Canary Islandsvia the northern Yucatan Peninsula and finally L.A. and she seems to express all those cultural roots in her cooking. 

I opened and poured us glasses of Morgan, which was surprisingly smooth and complemented the soup’s smooth flavor.  It seemed that the soup had been cooking for a while, perhaps even all day, because of the softness of the onion threads and integration of their flavor with that of the broth.  We can rarely get this effect because we rarely have the time to cook a soup all day.

After a bowl of soup and a glass of wine, Rosemary brought a bowl of pasta baked in kale and fennel to the table and then a baking dish with a bacon and herb wrapped Italian Tenderloin roasted with halved heads of garlic and plated our dishes with slices of pork and a head each of garlic.  I served us the pasta, which I think Rosemary said was named Cellentani and that Smith’s was the only store in town where she has found it.  She also said that in Italy the dish is usually made with Rapini, but since she did not find any rapini, she used a combination of kale, spinach, and fennel.

Then she explained that the pork tenderloin was also an Italian recipe and it is usually wrapped in pork fat and cured in the fridge for up to 12 days.  In this case she wrapped the tenderloin with thyme and rosemary and fresh garlic cloves held together with slices of thick cut bacon.  Also, she had roasted this tenderloin after two days of marinating and dabbing away any excess liquid from the tenderloin as it salt cured.  The first bite of the bacon wrapped tenderloin was decidedly salty but that soon went away as I ate it with the pasta and vegetables and sips of Morgan.

Rosemary's Herb and Bacon wrapped Pork Tendrloin

Here is a recipe by Bobby Flay that seems to be close to the pork tenderloin dish.

Bacon-Herb Wrapped Pork Tenderloin

46 Reviews

Recipe courtesy ofBobby Flay

Total Time:

1 hr 50 min

Prep:

20 min

Inactive:

20 min

Cook:

1 hr 10 min

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Yield:

4 to 6 servings

Ingredients

• 1 head garlic, top sliced off
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 2 pork tenderloins (about 1 to 1 1/2 pound each) trimmed of excess fat
• Salt and freshly ground black pepper
• 1 tablespoon chopped fresh rosemary leaves
• 12 fresh sage leaves
• 1 tablespoon chopped fresh thyme leaves
• 12 (1/4-inch thick) slices bacon
• 2 tablespoons olive oil

Directions

Preheat oven to 300 degrees F.

Place garlic in a small ramekin, drizzle with 1 tablespoon olive oil, and wrap in foil. Bake until soft, about 45 minutes. When cool enough to handle, squeeze garlic flesh from head into a small bowl.

Arrange tenderloins on work surface. Rub the top each tenderloin with 1/2 of the roasted garlic and season with salt and pepper. Mix together the herbs and scatter half of the mix over the garlic on each tenderloin. Wrap 6 strips of bacon around each tenderloin and tie bacon in place with kitchen twine.

Heat oven to 375 degrees F.

Heat oil in a medium, skillet over medium-high heat. Sear the tenderloins until golden brown on all sides. Transfer seared tenderloins to medium roasting pan; place in the oven and cook to medium doneness about 8 to 10 minutes. Transfer tenderloins to cutting board and let stand 10 minutes. Remove twine before carving.

Recipe courtesy Bobby Flay, 2001

The pasta was also very special because Rosemary had made her own compounded butter with flat anchovies and butter and baked the fennel, kale, spinach and pasta in the anchovy butter. 

the baked Cellentani and vegetables 

Rosemary plated our plates with slices of tenderloin and a head of roasted garlic and a bit of the marinade/cooking juices from the pork and I added a scoop of the pasta dish and re-filled our wine glasses with Morgan and we enjoyed a delicious dinner.

To say the least this was one of the best surprise dinners I have ever had.

After dinner Rosemary opened a bottle of Mexican Licor de Herbos y Miel that I have never had but tastes a lot like the liquor made in San Sebastian with European juniper berries and herbs and flowers.  They both have a slightly licorice taste, although the Mexican licor was a little sweeter due to the addition of honey.  I am guessing that the Mexican licor is a knock off of the Spanish liquor, but that is just a guess. Unfortunately, I forgot to get a picture of the wine and licor bottles.

My final take on this is that Rosemary is a wonderful cook and her orientation to cooking is much different than Suzette and mine.  Rosemary tends to cook dishes that take a long time to develop their flavors, while we tend toward recipes that take less time to cook.  An exception was the Boeuf Bourguignon Suzette made for Valentine’s Day which took three days to cook.

Clients like Rosemary enrich the experience of practicing law immensely.  If someone was really clever they would hire Rosemary as their private chef, because Rosemary seems to love nothing better than to spend time in the kitchen prepping and cooking delicious dishes.

When I returned home, I found myself feeling lucky to have had a stopped up sink.

Bon Appétit