May 12, 2017 Lunch – Greenhouse Bistro and Bakery, Dinner - New Recipe Mussel Bisque

May 12, 2017 Lunch – Greenhouse Bistro and Bakery,  Dinner -  New Recipe   Mussel Bisque

I went to Los Lunas today with Aaron to visit with Mike Ogas at the School of Dreams Academy.  He was in a meeting when we arrived at 10:45, so we drove to the Greenhouse Bistro for lunch.

We ordered and then decided to walk through the gardens.  I showed Aaron the organic garden, the herb garden, and the orchard and the we returned to a table under the portal at the education building where the waitress had placed our plates of food.  We decided to split a beef shank braised in green mole sauce and a Felix Verde Salad from the .May Specials menu.  The beef shank in green mole was stewed with diced potatoes and was in a very thick mole sauce made principally with tomatillos and Mexican spices.  The salad was the show stopper.  It included fresh chopped lettuce from the Center’s garden, julienned carrots, halved grape tomatoes and fresh shucked garbanzo beans and was dressed with a cilantro infused olive oil dressing.  We ordered slices of grilled baguette freshly baked in the on premises bakery.

We shared our lunch and the ordered a cream brûlée and an apple tarts or dessert and shared those also.  The Apple tart was delicious, a rectangular slab of fresh apples stewed in spices and sugar until well softened, laid on a base of puff pastry.  The cream brûlée was technically well executed with its traditional thin crisp shell of burnt sugar.

We loved our al fresco lunch.  We then called Mike at SODA, who was available to meet, so we drove back to the campus and met with him and delivered the school’s CO’s and discussed plans to build the next expansion of the facilities.  Aaron, Marty Suazo, and I own a company called Railway Land Co. that provided the development services to locate the school at its current site just south of the Los Lunas Railrunner station.  We are currently working with the school to arrange the financing to build the next facility expansion that we discussed today.

I then drove Aaron back to his house and went home and worked until 5:00, when Suzette arrived.  We grabbed a bee and went to Willy’s apartment to remove notices from his door.  We then went to the roof garden area and sat and drank a Red Stripe beer from his fridge.

Revived a bit from the pressures of the work day, we decided to go to Costco to buy mussels for the new Mussel Bisque recipe Suzette wanted to make since today is the Seafood Fiesta.  We bought a 5.85 lb. of mussels and also bought a Dungeness crab for our Sunday Mother’s Day Champagne Brunch, and package of Italian shaped pastas,Nutella, mayonnaise, and a case of cans of tomato paste, which Suzette needed for the Bisque recipe.

When we returned home, I put the mussels in a large bowl filled with ice and ice water to soak and hopefully release some of their muddiness.  I the chopped a carrot and two shallots and fetched the open bottles of old undrinkable white wine from the fridge, which Suzette used to make a court bouillon to cook the mussels in.  I the shucked the mussels while a Suzette made the bisque with the Court bouillon, a T. of tomato paste, 1 tsp. of dried thyme, a bay leaf, the ½ cup of minced shallots, the ¼ cup of diced carrot, which she cooked for twenty minutes and then puréed in the food processor.  She then returned the bisque base to the pot and added the mussels and heated the soup and adjusted the seasoning and added some cognac.

While the soup was cooking Suzette chopped about 1 cup of the diced fresh fennel bulbs we chopped up yesterday and sautéed them in butter in a medium skillet until softened and browned.  Suzette then fetched the bag of fresh chopped fennel fronds from the fridge and we scooped the bisque into bowls and garnished it with the braised fennel bulbs and the beautiful green chopped fennel fronds.  I chilled a bottle of Italian Cantina Fontina Frascati, which was not quite as dry as I had thought it would be. It actually had a fruitiness, which complemented the slightly pungent flavor of the fennel, cognac, and mussel broth.

We were both tired and went to bed at 9:30.

Bon Appetit