When I awakened I made tropical fruit salad with a papaya, a pineapple, three mangos, and four oranges sectioned plus the juice of two limes.
I then butchered the whole filet Mignon into about a dozen steaks steaks and cubed the rest for Boeuf Bourguignon.
Since we were on a foodie roll after Suzette finished wrapping and freezing the filet Mignon except for two we kept for dinner, she decided to make a special salad for brunch.
It is hard do put into words how wonderful the meals were today.
Brunch was a replication of the incredible salad we first discovered Spiaggia, in Chicago 20 years ago. We had taken Willy on a train ride to Chicago and were staying at the Drake. We were looking for a decent restaurant near the hotel and somehow we picked Spiaggia across the street at 980 N. Michigan Ave. We did not have reservations so had to sit at a table in the Café, a small bar and dining area attached to the restaurant. We ordered a Smoked Salmon Salad that neither of us will ever forget. It was a pile of greens garnished with slices of roasted fennel, smoked salmon, and fresh orange slices. There were dots of infused basil surrounding the salad and the salad was dressed with a light orange mayonnaise dressing. It elevated Smoked Salmon as an ingredient to an entirely higher level than we had ever imagined. It was nothing short of amazing.
Spiaggia is consistently rated among Chicago’s best restaurants. For example it is the James Beard Chicago winner for 2020 for its wine Program.
Suzette wanted to make the salad for lunch. We had all the ingredients except fennel, so Suzette made an excellent substitution of croutons made from French Hard Rolls I had bought at Pastian’s this week . Also Suzette also found a bottle of basil infused mayonnaise in the garage fridge and that was strongly flavored with basil, she lightened the basil flavor by adding additional mayonnaise and orange juice to it for the dressing and eliminated the infused basil dots.
She cut hearts of Romaine lettuce into strips. I sliced Lax and cut the slices into bite sized pieces and peeled and sectioned an orange and then Suzette constructed the salad.
Such a special dish deserved a special wine and I found it in our wine refrigerator, a Gruet 2010 Grand Blanc de Blanc. The wine had an amazing richness and depth of flavor. You could tell that it was at its maximum flavor just before it turned to sherry. Exceptional and a lucky find.
But that was just one-half of this amazing brunch. Suzette went the garden and snipped a handful of chives and fetched the PPI Vichyssoise from the garage fridge and filled soup bowls with Vichyssoise and garnished them with fresh minced chives.
We savored every bite of the salad and soup and every sip of the bubbly champagne. I believe that Suzette equaled the Spiaggia standard.
After lunch we took a nap for an hour and then worked in the yard. Suzette watered the yard and beds and cleaned out several beds in the formal garden. While she was working I took a shower and then pruned the rest of the Roses in the back and front yard and dug up some more weeds in the garden paths.
We then watched some news and the White House Press Conference and at 5:00 I decided to roast root vegetables for a dinner of filet Mignon, Roasted Root Vegetables and steamed asparagus.
I fetched four Brussels sprouts, a parsnip, and a turnip from the garage fridge and peeled them and diced the parsnip and turnip and quartered the Brussels Sprouts. I peeled and diced a carrot and a medium onion and Suzette peeled and I cubed two Yukon Gold potatoes. Suzette pre-heated the oven to 350 degrees and after I tossed the vegetables with salt and olive oil, I covered them with aluminum foil and placed them into the oven.
I then lay down to read and Suzette took over the vegetables, tossing them after 30 minutes and removing the foil so they would stop steaming and start roasting for the last 15 or 20 minutes.
Suzette called me back to the kitchen around 6:00. We decided to pan sear the filets. She asked if I wanted sautéed mushrooms and I said, “Yes.”
So suzette sliced four white mushrooms and I minced a T. of shallot and a clove of garlic. Suzette sautéed the shallot and mushrooms and then removed them from the pan. I went to the garden and picked six or seven sprigs of thyme, from which Suzette plucked about a tsp. of leaves. She took my suggestion of sautéing the steak (New York style) in butter, thyme, and garlic. Suzette also steamed about two dozen stalks of asparagus and I fetched the Béarnaise Sauce from the fridge and fetched a bottle of Trader Joe’s 2018 Platinum Oakville Cabernet Sauvignon. I noticed a rather chalky flavor, like the grapes had been grown on the eastern hills of Napa Valley east of Silverado Trail.
I am noticing that isolation has intensified my senses of smell and taste, which is an unexpected pleasure. With nowhere to go and the lack of activity, savoring food and wine seems to have taken on a greater importance.
Suzette plated the plates with the mushrooms garnishing the steak. I put a wedge of Béarnaise on the steak and rubbed some onto the asparagus and had the best meal I had had since brunch.
We watched 60 Minutes that had several interesting features about the coronavirus virus. We spoke to Willy and then Luke and then I lay down at 8:30 and went to sleep.
I awakened at 11:30 and wrote this blog entry, cleaned some pots and pans, and then finished dinner with a cup of chai and an ounce of Calvados at 12:30.
Suzette is exploring Zoom and by the end of the week we may be able to see people we are speaking to on the phone.
Bon Appetit
No comments:
Post a Comment