#2 x #2 or Peaceable's Adventures in the Kitchen

I didn't start the stock in time. I broke a beloved dish. I totally missed that we were supposed to cool the custard before serving. I nearly set my hair on fire when I lighted the calvados, and I stood so long in front of the 425º oven, custard-tending, that my gold necklace began to heat up; I nearly dropped the pan of near-boiling water and wobbly custard goo as the necklace scorched my tender skin. The Niece, to tell the truth, enjoyed the spectacle of the whirling, dish-dropping, frazzled, hair-on-fire, neck-grabbing, yelping Chef. She wished she had a camera on her to take some candid photos.

I have new insight into why the French prefer to be alone in the kitchen with a door that can be shut.

And then, to top it all off, my long initial post on the subject was somehow over-written by my subsequent post on Charlotte pans. "Scribble, scribble, scribble, eh, Mr. Gibbons?" chortled the Prince Regent long ago to the author of "The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire." "Grumble, grumble, grumble, eh, Peaceable?" would be my modern take. So here I am, rewriting something that I was satisfied with before, that peculiar exercise in memory.

In any case, despite all that, we all agreed that we loved the custard even though it was served hot because the important text, "remove from pan and let cool" had not managed to pierce into my consciousness. In terms of preparation, it took me two tries to get the caramelized sugar to "coat the bottom and sides" of the cake pan I used as a substitute for a 4-cup charlotte mold. That would be two goes with a 20-minute clean-up in between (Man, that caramelized sugar is tough stuff!) Our mother, of course, makes fantastic custard sans caramel sauce; It isn't just "French children and their parents" who grew up on and "love this eggy custard." I used whole milk for this, with a pang of guilt. I'm going to try it again with 2% or skim. The Niece and I agreed that the desserts last week and this were too sweet; I'm going to make caramel custard again, but I will cut back on the sugar in the egg goo rather than forgo the caramel. I'm also going to cut back on the sugar in subsequent desserts. Fat, sugar, long pre-prep times...what else can I change to make these recipes function for me?

I also loved the soup, but I made it (Quelle horreur!) with Savory Choice Liquid Chicken Broth concentrate ("Fresh homemade flavor made from natural ingredients") rather than the fond de volaille, and, done this way, it was relatively easy. Under sibling pressure, I decided to make the chicken stock after all, but I started way too late. So, preferring to eat supper sometime before 9:30 PM, I aborted at the point where I removed the chicken, with the 1.5+ hour final simmer remaining. The stock spent the night on our front porch and is frozen rock solid. Now it requires a several hour defrosting AND a 1.5+ hour simmer before being useable, sigh. I liked making the bouquet garni from scratch, but the whole process seemed pretty fussy for eight cups of chicken stock! Was the flavor worth it? I'm going to make this soup again later this week to use up the stock and see. I may use a standard MN cabbage with no butter wilt rather than a Sa-VOY cabbage (I asked for a SA-voy cabbage and was primly corrected by the produce man at Lunds) with scald and butter wilt. Because, God forbid, I should be systematic about this.

Another BIG hit in our crowd was the baked golden delicious apples. I used less than 2T of butter on eight apples so it wasn't too bad, as these things go. Personally, I could have skipped the meat and just feasted on baked apple, mushroom sauce and whole milk custard. We used a cut of thin-sliced beef instead of veal, and I was disappointed. It wasn't tough, but neither was it particularly flavorful. I think chicken would have worked as well. But everyone else enjoyed the meat. They were full, but would have enjoyed more. I substituted a blend of 2/3's cup of low-fat sour cream and 1/3 cup of low-fat yoghurt for crème fraiche--so only around 100 calories per serving rather than crème fraiche's 10,000,000.

The Resident Breadman made lovely rolls as a side starch. These were a bit soft for our tastes, but we happily used it to sop up all the mushroom sauce. Among us, we downed nearly four bottles of bon vin rouge: two French--a Minervois and a burgundy--plus an Italian red and a Malbec from Argentina.

Our neighbors, Larry and Julie, joined us. They are betting that we don't get past recipe #5. The Son also joined us, a pleasure, of course. The Daughter had to work Christmas hours.