I had done three of the four dishes before so I thought I'd be, you know, proficient, heh, which just shows how much I know. Still, the earlier trial-run allowed me to get my timing right...okay, "right" is generous; It was a great thing that I had friendly, patient family around me, not hungry guests. I began cooking supper at 6:00 PM, and we got up from table, sated, at 10:00PM. As 9:00PM approached, we were plying family with apertif.Dish by dish...first, the cucumbers were tasty. I forgot to put the last couple of mint leaves to decorate it, and the effect was less minty fresh than last time. This recipe is a simple one and worth remembering--it is simple to do and refreshing to eat. We served this as a starter course while the chicken rested and the peas cooked. The picture shows the table just before we sat down.
The peas were a great hit...yeah, those FIVE Tablespoons of butter, mmm, good! I also used frozen peas--baby peas in fact--and I used canned "holland onions" which were soft AND peeled. In this recipe, last time I had trouble with the lettuce--then, I used Boston lettuce, and the result was lumpy green ick. This time I used two leaves of Romaine lettuce. These were tasty and had some character. The technique I learned--we used it for the mint and the lettuce--of rolling the leaves up and then slicing them into strips is likely to be useful for all those times when I have to obtain slices of green stuff. I still have no idea how big a "small" bouquet of chervil is.
The technique for roasting the chicken was good, but the flavor itself was a bit flat--I think it was the bird, not the technique. I usually buy organic birds from Whole Foods and, pressed for time, I bought a "smart bird" from Lunds. But I'm not convinced the one side-other side technique produced a bird that was incrementally better. It might be interesting to compare the taste of two birds roasted at the same time, one this way and one our traditional way.
The big hit in our household was the fresh fruit dessert. I substituted fresh mango for fresh peach, and whatever. It was fantastic. Mind you, with 1/2 cup of sugar and 1T of cointreau even cardboard would taste fantastic.
The Vegetarian had a spare meal. She liked the peas, the cucumbers and filled up the hollow spaces with a baguette that the Resident Breadman produced eariler in the day. We served a pinot noir that wasn't really worth the calories.
2 comments:
I carved the chicken using a method provided by the NYT for turkey. See here: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/21/
dining/21carv.html
This works as well as using a scissors to cut the back out, but yields smaller and easier to serve portions.
There was a step in this recipe that required boiling down some juices. That's a technique I don't think I've mastered. Mostly things just boil away, or remain too watery to know how to serve. Pour it on the meat, and it just runs off into the peas, or whatever.
Agree on all points: chicken was flat, peas and dessert were great. A little more salt in the chicken spices might have helped.
It was not unusual for the 'plat' in a multi-course meal in France to arrive without a starch, so perhaps it's not surprising that one was not included here. May need watch for that in future recipes, though it could compromise the integrity of the menu.
(The chef may have more more worried about the time than the diners. Everything arrived hot, and pretty much as expected.)
Thanks for the carving notes -- we'll use them next time. We just sort of hacked at it this time.
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