Food Blog

One of the difficulties of cooking for yourself all the time is you never really know if others are going to enjoy your food. When I was on the east coast I was met by two unique cooking challenges. Both required cooking for some very discriminating palettes.

The first was unexpected but luckily I was prepared with some great ingredients. I friend of my parents Alfredo deBonis, a professional chef who runs cooking tours in Italy was dropping off a cheesecake around the time we were eating dinner, and we were going to invite him to stay.

I had just got back from the shore with a bunch of soft-shelled crabs, some scallops, and 1/2 dozen oysters. I dusted the crabs with Panko (japanese bread crumbs) and made the mistake of trying to use some sea salt my mother had, was more like the rock salt you throw on your driveway in the winter. I pan-fried the crabs in some butter and oil and that was it. The scallops got some dill, were browned quickly, and then doused with some maderia. The oysters got breadcrumbs and some oregano and were pan-fried in butter.

Alfredo ate it, so I guess that’s an endorsement.

The second challenge was to cook for a large group of cousins in Lake George. We weren’t sure how many we were feeding at the start of it but it turned out to be 15 or 16 adults depending on how many teenagers sneaked over from the kids table. This was to be a major challenge since these people are very well-traveled, and are all very good cooks themselves. And the group includes a Frenchman and an Italian. Meals up at Lake George are always great and I had some major pressure on me to match them. To add to it all it was hot, as they say Africa hot. The kitchen in this giant Adirondack house is big, but very busy.

I decided to do the Pork with cherries, Asian pear and peppers since I had kitchen tested it I did about three quarters of them with anaheim peppers, and the rest with poblanos. I didn’t know how many people ate hot stuff up there.

We had 5 good sized pork lions, some green beans and I had some potatoes and mushrooms. As the day progressed I realized the number I was feeding was growing and many kids would have to be fed as well. Fortunately I didn’t have to worry about feeding the kids. I sliced the loins into medallions and got around 23 of them, which I figured would be enough. I let them sit for an hour in some hearty burgundy, the house wine up there. I pan seared as many as the medallions as I could at once in 2 big iron pans and sauteed a huge batch of sliced fingerling potatoes, eggplant and shitake, portabello and oyster mushrooms in some butter and oil and threw it in the oven while I finished the medallions with pitted, chopped cherries, diced asian pear, peppers butter and some cream. Finally someone remembered to put on some water for the green beans.

Meanwhile the kids meal was being prepared all around me. While it may have looked confusing, the cousins helping me had much experience in a busy kitchen cooking for large groups, and they worked with the efficiency of pros.

One of the best rewards of being a cook up there is you get to jump in the lake before anyone gets to eat. Very satisfying.

Everyone loved the meal, although I wish I had given the dish with the poblano quite a bit more heat. Spicewise it was fairly lame.

The next day I only acted as consultant to a fabulous meal with a starter of gazpacho which was incredible, and a main course of filet mignon done on the grill. My only contribution was to quote Alton Brown, give the meat a quarter turn at one point and poke the meat with my finger and declare it done. The full count that night was 33 including the kids.