Meatloaf Wellington

Julie's told me her mom use to make meatloaf Wellington for the family when she was a kid. Apparently she stuffed the meatloaf with mushrooms and cheese and then wrapped the thing in Pillsbury croissant dough. Mmmm. It sounds decadent and delicious and silly. I'll have to get in tough with her mother and find out weather she baked it for a while before she put on the dough. Its a little harder to sear out a bunch of ground meat like you can a filet. We used to sear out the whole filet on the grill, put duxelles all over the top and then wrap it so the heat of cooking the pastry would finish off an already cooking piece of meat. A meatloaf Wellington would have to be no so huge I can imagine. So it wouldn't fall in on itself. Meatloaf is not fabulous rare either. But I can imagine a juicy, cheesy meatloaf with crisp pastry. It does sound great. Hearing about it makes me also want to do a beef bourguignon pot pie. I haven't made those in a long time.

Smothered Pork Chops

Smuthud. Smuthud'um with mushrooms and onions in a big cast iron pan filled with the sauce and five big pork chops. I put it in the oven and got it bubbling and we ate it with mashed potatoes and broccoli. And the best part is that they was s-m-u-t-h-u-d.

Il Piatta

I hardly ever go out any more. I just don't. It's too much fun to cook to go out for dinner at this point in my life. It's too expensive and a lot of the time, weather it's a great or mediocre place its just not that good.

It was my anniversary dinner and we went out. We went to Il Piatta and what a nice time. Matt has really kept that place in great shape. By doing nothing except keeping it exactly the same. All the old dishes are there that I've loved for years, and new ones. Everything was just great. The help was super friendly as usual. And the food was just out of this world. It was a threefur $20. Which I wasn't expecting so the meal was so economical.
We had Caesers. The gnocci with wild mushroom creme. This loosy juicy scampi risotto that was fresh and lemony and had an excellent fume quality. Hanger steak medium rare and tender. The pancetta wrapped trout that was a solid, delicious array of flavors and cooked flawlessly.

Just a great dinner. We washed the whole thing down with a Barolo. Happy Anniversary. Yum.

story about atole tamale

There was a dish I had to make once, some ultra indigenous quail course for a wine dinner. I made a blue corn tamale with apricots. Nothing could have been more real version of Northern New Mexican. Made with blue corn atole flour, locally dried Chimayo apricots, New Mexico Wild Flour honey. The quail was marinated in apple cider vinagar, sage, and home smoked chipotle. The tamale came from the pot. Freshly steamed we opened it. It was the best we could do. My staff and I were totally committed. The quail was oven warming. The course was picking up. We tried a tamale. It was steamy hot. It was ready and it was authentic. And it was indigenous. And it tasted liked a perfectly steamed apricot flavored energy bar. I said nothing. I love quail that way. Yes,...the quail went so good with the wine, yes, ...thank you...I’m so glad the tamales are good. Thank You. There are times I say nothing, and luckily no one sees what I see. I hope.