Red Cabbage Peperonata

With all the cooking I get to do both at home and at work, it’s no surprise that a lot of my guy friends are great cooks too. Let’s just say our football parties are often a celebration of more than one type of pig skin. We’re always trying to outdo ourselves from one week to the next, borrowing ideas from each other and trying to improve on them.  Recently, one of my friends brought an amazing sautéed pepper dish and I was so inspired by it that I built off of it to make a special for Bennett’s.

Red Cabbage Peperonata
Makes 4 servings

1/2 lb  mini sweet peppers

1/2 lb red cabbage
6 tbsp olive oil
3 tbsp white balsamic vinegar
4 cloves garlic, smashed and chopped
1 tsp red pepper flakes
1 tsp dried oregano
1/2 tsp salt
Pinch black pepper

De-stem and de-seed the peppers and rough chop them on a bias.  Chop the red cabbage in roughly the same size as the peppers. Sweet pepper size may vary, so make sure you have about the same amount of chopped red cabbage by volume as you do of the chopped peppers.

Over high heat, heat 4 tablespoons of the oil in a large sauté pan until it is smoking. Add the peppers and toss once to coat with the oil, then let sit until they start to brown.  Toss once more and let sit again approximately one minute. Add the cabbage. Toss again and cook until cabbage is browning.

Add the remaining oil, vinegar, garlic, red pepper flakes and oregano and toss again. Cook for approximately one minute, remove from heat and finish with the salt and pepper. Serve immediately or store for later use.

  
One of the great things about peppers is their versatility. They are such great complements to so many different ingredients that I often have a hard time narrowing down what I want to serve with them! At Bennett’s, we served it with a simple and succulent petite filet and some creamed corn. What will you serve it with? Let me know in the comments!

Porcini-Balsamic Glazed Short Ribs

I was recently invited to a wine dinner at DeLille Cellars over in Woodinville, a small suburb of Seattle. The invitation came from my friends Charlene and Greg Steinhauer, who are regulars at Bennett’s. We took a tour of the winery to see how DeLille has managed to continue producing great wine year after year after year. As a fellow business owner, it’s always fascinating for me to see the ways other people are able to cultivate the dedication and enthusiasm that is required to remain successful, particularly in an environment as competitive as the wine industry.


After the tour, we all sat down to dinner and began my favorite part of any evening: great conversation over really good food and wine. As we talked, Charlene told me about how much she had loved the short ribs at Bennett’s and that she wishes that they were on the menu again. When the wine was poured, Charlene raved about the DeLille D2 Bordeaux blend and how it should be on the wine list at Bennett’s. Although separate recommendations, they gave me an idea. We’d never incorporated a drink into the special at Bennett’s before, but this seemed like a perfect opportunity: beautiful braised short ribs with a luscious wine. Judging from the response, we should do these pairings more often!

Porcini-Balsamic Glazed Short Ribs
4 servings

3 cups balsamic vinegar
1.5 oz porcini mushrooms, powdered
3 tbsp salt
1 tbsp fresh ground black pepper
1 tbsp granulated garlic

8-4 oz boneless short ribs

Heat the vinegar in a medium saucepan on medium-low heat, uncovered, until reduced to one third, to about one cup. Remove from heat and let cool.

Mix the reduction with the remaining ingredients in a large bowl until thick, about the consistency of cake batter. Rub the glaze into each of the pieces of short rib. Pre-heat the oven to 550 degrees F. Cook short ribs for about 15 minutes, or until the glaze is caramelized. Reduce heat to 250 and braise for two hours, until soft and tender. Remove from the oven and let rest a couple minutes before serving.

At Bennett’s we served these short ribs with some kale chips and a potato gratin that had artichokes and jalapenos. What would you serve this with? Let me know in the comments about side dish or wine pairing ideas!

Beef & Pork Chili

The chili with seasonal greens panzanella, sprinkled with
a bit of Flagship cheese.

There's really nothing like a great chili recipe. It's like a classic rock standard. Any person can mess around with it according to their tastes and come up with some amazing flavors. I've played with a lot of chili recipes over the years. I've never quite been fond of beans in my chili; if you've followed this blog for a while you know my favorite part is usually the meat (often pork). So, of course, for my chili recipe, I started with both beef AND pork and went from there. You might think some of the ingredients seem odd, but this chili is pretttty darn good!

Beef & Pork Chili
Serves about 5 (2.75 quarts)

3/4 lb uncured bacon – pork belly
1 tbsp canola oil

1 red onion, finely chopped
1 yellow onion, finely chopped
3 garlic cloves, peeled and rough chopped
1 poblano pepper, seeded, fine dice
1 large jalapeño, seeded, fine dice

I'm talking about BIIIIG flavor.

1/4 cup apple cider vinegar

3 1/2 oz can adobo chipotle peppers, pureed
1/2 tbsp ground cumin
1-1/2 tbsp chili powder
3-1/2 diced tomato (about 5 tomatoes
1 cup lager beer
1 tbsp kosher salt
1/2 tbsp. Maximus/Minimus Seasoning Blend
3 lb beef brisket, whole boneless, trimmed and cut into ¾-inch cubes
1 oz unsweetened dark chocolate, rough chop
1/2 tbsp honey

1 tbsp corn flour

Grind the bacon in a food processor until “pebbly,” not quite a full paste. In a large sauce pan over medium heat, very thoroughly brown the bacon in canola oil until fully rendered, about 20 minutes, leaving no white in the bacon and a deep, dark color is achieved (without burning).

Add all the red onion, yellow onion, garlic, poblano pepper and jalapeño to the pan and reduce the heat to medium, cooking about 20 minutes until vegetables are fully sweated through and softened.

Add the vinegar and cook for about three minutes or until the acrid smell reduces. Make sure to scrape the pan regularly to loosen any bacon or vegetables stuck to the pan.

Add the remaining ingredients except the corn flour, stirring well to combine. Bring it to a soft boil on medium-high then reduce to a simmer. Cook about 2 hours until the brisket is very tender, stiring occasionally to avoid sticking and adjust the heat as necessary. When nearly done, about 5 minutes before, sprinkle the corn flour on the chili and stir thoroughly to avoid clumping, then let cook for the last 5 minutes on very low heat.

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Please try this at home! I'd love to hear what you think and what changes you might make!

Pepper Capponata Conchiglioni with Rockfish

Sometimes, once just isn’t enough. Your first visit to New York. A bite of steak. A glass of amazing wine. With things like these, one taste deserves another. Do you ever feel that way with ingredients that you’ve used? Those grapes from last week’s lamb special did that for me. There was something about their sweetness, their depth of flavor. I knew there was so much more I could do with them.

So, I set about to another recipe. This local pepper capponata with rockfish and pesto really turned out well. Try it at home and let me know what you think!

Pepper Capponata Conchiglioni with Rockfish
makes 4 servings

Capponata:
1 eggplant
1 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil, divided
Salt and pepper to taste
1 large onion
1/2 fennel bulb
1 red bell pepper
1 yellow bell pepper
pinch of crushed red pepper
1/4 cup tomato paste
1 1/2 Tbsp red wine vinegar
1/4 cup roasted grapes

Dill Pesto:
1 tsp chopped garlic
1/2 cup Italian parsley, stemmed
1 Tbsp dill, stemmed
1 Tbsp preserved lemon
1 oz Beecher's Flagship cheese
1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
Pinch of salt
Dash of black pepper

1 1/4 cup conchiglioni pasta

2 lbs rockfish
2 Tbsp canola oil
Salt and pepper to taste

To make the capponata, pre-heat the oven to 350 F. Wash all the vegetables and cut into a medium dice, keeping all ingredients separated. Toss the eggplant in 2 teaspoons olive oil with light salt and pepper.  Roast in the oven until lightly brown and soft, about an hour.

Increase the oven temperature to 425 F. In a large roasting dish, toss the onions and fennel with 1 teaspoon olive oil, light salt and pepper. Sweat in the oven until translucent, about 15 minutes. Add the peppers and crushed red pepper. Roast until soft and lightly brown, but retain shape, about 15 minutes. Add the eggplant to  the dish and stir in tomato paste, red wine vinegar and roasted grapes. Finish by seasoning with salt and pepper to taste. Set aside.

For the dill pesto, simply combine all of the ingredients in a food processor and purée until smooth. Set aside.

Bring a pot of slightly salted water to boil and cook the pasta about 8 minutes. Drain noodlesand mix into the capponata. Do this near serving, so the noodles don't get soggy in the capponata.

Cut the rockfish into four equal pieces and sprinkle both sides of each piece with a little salt and pepper. Heat a little canola oil in a sautée pan and cook fish until done, about 4 minutes a side.

Plate with the capponata conchiglione pasta on one side of the plate and the pesto on the other, then lay the fish near the edge of the pasta so the fish has one end on the pesto sauce. Voilà!

Please, try this recipe out at home and let me know what you think in the comments!

Curried Lamb Leg with Roasted Grape Relish and Smashed Chickpeas

I know. Lamb is really cute. But you know what else it is? DEEElicious. It may make some people think of spring lamb, but I think of autumn grills and winter braises. Lamb represents the richer end of the red meat spectrum, so it’s perfectly suited for long marinades and slow cooking. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. As much as I love sitting by the fireplace in the depth of winter with a hearty roast, we’re still just crossing the border into fall. Let’s save the deep roasting for later in the year. That doesn’t mean we can’t have succulent lamb now, though!

With a bold marinade, a healthy sear and a little time to finish in the oven, lamb is a great transition from summer to fall to winter.  Throw in a couple of summery flavors and you’ve got this great blend of seasons on your plate!

Curried Lamb Leg with Roasted Grape Relish and Smashed Chickpeas
Serves 4

Chickpea Smash
1 ½ pints Dry Chickpeas
¾ Cinnamon Stick
1 ½ tsp Fennel Seed
Pinch Whole Black Peppercorns
1 ½ tsp Whole Cumin
3 tsp Kosher Salt, divided
2/3 cup Extra Virgin Olive Oil
Pinch Lemon Zest
½ tsp Lemon Juice
1 tsp Freshly Ground Black Pepper
½ cup  Chicken Stock
½ cup Smoked Flagship

Lamb Marinade
3 Tbsp Garlic Clove, very roughly chopped
2 Tbsp Madras Curry Powder
2 ½ tsp  Whole Dried Oregano
½ tsp Cayenne Powder
4 Tbsp Olive Oil
3 Tbsp Seasoned Rice Vinegar
1 ½ tsp Kosher Salt
4 trimmed legs of lamb, 7 oz each
2 Tbsp Canola Oil

Roasted Grape Relish
4 cups de-stemmed, halved red and green grapes
1 Tbsp Canola Oil
3 Tbsp Extra Virgin Olive Oil, divided
1 tsp Kosher Salt
2 Tbsp Capers in juice
3 Tbsp Seasoned Rice Wine Vinegar
1 ½ tsp thinly sliced Red Onion
Dash Freshly Ground Black Pepper
Pinch Kosher Salt
1 Tbsp Mint, very coarse chiffonade
1 Tbsp Italian Parsley, very coarsely chopped

Soak beans overnight. Rinse and sort well. In a wide stockpot, cover beans with cold water.  Create a cheesecloth satchel with the spices, except the salt, and add to the pot.  Bring to a boil, lower heat to medium and cook until done but not mushy, about 1 hour. While cooking, remove starch as it rises to the surface. The last 15 minutes of cooking add 2 teaspoons of the kosher salt. Strain the beans and reserve 1/3 cup of the cooking liquid.  Combine beans, reserved liquid and olive oil in a food processor and mix coarsely, leaving plenty of chunky texture. Put mixture in a large bowl and mix in lemon, ground pepper and remaining salt. Transfer it all to a large pan and combine with chicken stock and Smoked Flagship cheese over medium heat until cheese is melted, stirring regularly.

Combine the garlic, curry powder, oregano, olive oil and kosher salt for the marinade. Add the lamb and toss to coat well and marinate for 3 – 8 hours. Preheat oven to 425 degrees F and heat a medium sauté pan over medium heat. Once hot, add 2 tablespoons of canola oil but don’t let it get hot enough to start smoking. Remove lamb from marinade and put it in the pan, searing until a nice, caramelized crust forms, about 3-4 minutes. Turn the legs over in the pan and cook for a few more minutes. Transfer lamb to the oven either in the same pan or an oven safe dish and finish for about 4 minutes, or until it reaches an internal temperature of 130 degrees F. Remove from the oven and let the meat rest for about 5 minutes.

Preheat oven to 200 with convection fan on high. Toss with 1 tablespoon of olive oil, 1 teaspoon of salt and the canola oil. Pour onto a baking sheet and bake. Check at an hour that they’re not over-cooked. It will likely take about 1 1/2 to 2 hours. Remove grapes and toss them well with all remaining ingredients.

Plate by spooning about ¾ cup of the chickpea smash into the middle of the plate. Spoon 3 tablespoons of the relish alongside the chickpeas. Cut the lamb in two on a bias and place on top of the chickpeas, next to the grape relish. 

I recommend making the roasted grape relish while the lamb is marinating so you don’t have to worry about conflicting oven temperatures. The pictures here are with the lamb sliced, but in playing around with it, I decided I liked the two big chunks of lamb described in the recipe better. Let me know what you think in the comments!

BBQ Planked Salmon with Roasted Corn Risotto and Fresh Herb Salad

Wow, Seattle has really thrown us a curve ball in terms of weather, hasn’t it? It seems like we’ve actually got a full-on summer now, albeit a little later than usual.

I am more than fine with that though, because of the bounteous options that result from summer overlapping autumn like this. There’s a crazy explosion happening right now, where the fresh flavors of summer are still happening right alongside the earthy delights of autumn. That’s where this recipe comes from.

Fresh summer salmon with delicious roasted corn meets a light autumn risotto and hearty lobster mushrooms.

Bennett’s served it last week, and will continue to do so through the week, only now they’re using wild Bristol Bay Sockeye salmon as part of DineOut for Bristol Bay to help them save their wild salmon runs in Alaska.

I hope you enjoy the recipe – let me know how it works out for you!

BBQ Planked Salmon with Roasted Corn Risotto and Fresh Herb Salad

Serves 5

5 cedar plank boards

2 cups cleaned and torn (1 to 2-inch pieces) Lobster mushrooms
10 tsp canola oil
2-1/2 tsp Old Bay

2 lbs salmon, trimmed, cut into 5 equal pieces
5 tsp canola oil
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

Roasted Corn Risotto (recipe follows)

Fresh Herb Salad (recipe follows)

Preheat the oven to 425°F. Set cedar planks in water to soak for at least 1 hour.

While the planks are soaking, prepare the mushrooms. Toss the mushrooms with oil and Old Bay. Bake on a baking sheet until they begin to brown and start to soften, about 8 minutes. Set aside.

Prepare your grill by scraping it, oiling it, and heating it to medium-high. Put the wet planks on the grill for a few minutes. Brush the salmon with the oil (about 1 tsp per piece) and add a sprinkle of salt and pepper to each side of each piece. Place the salmon on the planks and cover. Cook until the juices turn opaque and solid on the top of the fish and it is just cooked through, about 8 minutes.

To plate, scoop some Roasted Corn Risotto into a bowl, then lay the salmon on top. Top with the Fresh Herb Salad and place the mushrooms around the bowl.

ROASTED CORN RISOTTO

2 ears of corn, cleaned and kernels cut off the cob
2-1/2 tsp canola oil
pinch of Kosher salt
pinch of freshly ground black pepper

7 to 8 cups low-sodium chicken stock
2-1/2 Tbsp unsalted butter
2 Tbsp olive oil
1/2 cups minced white onion
1/2 tsp Kosher salt
2-1/2 cups Arborio rice
1-1/3 cups dry white wine
1-1/2 cups freshly grated Parmigiano Reggiano
2/3 cup Beecher’s Brad’s Parmesan, large grated
2/3 cup cream
1-1/3 Tbsp freshly chopped fresh Italian flat-leaf parsley
2-1/2 Tbsp fresh lemon juice
1-1/3 Tbsp grated lemon zest

Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

Preheat the oven to 425°F.

First, prepare the corn by tossing it with the oil, salt and pepper. Place on a baking sheet and roast until done and slightly brown (about 20 minutes).  Set aside to cool.

Heat the stock to a simmer in a medium saucepan.  If using an unsalted broth, add 1/2 teaspoon Kosher salt. Reduce the heat to very low. 

In a large heavy-bottomed skillet at least 10 inches wide, heat the butter and olive oil over medium heat.  Add the onion and salt.  Cook slowly for 8 to 10 minutes, stirring often with a wooden spoon until softened.

Add the Arborio rice to the pan and cook, stirring constantly, to coat the rice with the oil, about 3 minutes.  Pour in the white wine and cook, stirring constantly, for 2 to 3 minutes or until it is mostly absorbed.  Ladle 2 to 2 1/2 cups of the stock over the rice and stir constantly.  (Adjust the heat to maintain a gently simmer.)  When all of the liquid has been absorbed, (your stirring spoon leaves a trail showing the bottom of the pot), ladle in another 1 ½ to 2 cups of stock, again stirring until the liquid has been absorbed.  After the third and final addition of stock, after the liquid has been absorbed, taste the rice for texture to determine whether it’s al dente and pleasantly creamy.  (If you prefer a softer risotto, add more stock until it has the desired consistency.)

After the last ladle of stock is added, remove from the heat and stir in the cheeses and cream.  Fold in the parsley, 1 1/4 cups of the roasted corn, lemon juice and lemon zest.  Taste and adjust seasoning with salt and pepper. Serve immediately.

FRESH HERB SALAD

1/2 cup shallots, thinly sliced
2 pinches of Kosher salt
2 Tbsp + 1 tsp sherry vinegar
1 tsp lemon juice
3-1/3 cups canola-olive oil blend
pinch fresh ground black pepper
1/2 tsp sugar

1/2 cup rough chop mix of fresh dill, chive, parsley and basil (tear basil, don’t cut)

Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

Place the shallots in a medium bowl. Sprinkle with a pinch of salt, cover with the vinegar and stir until well combined. Let the mushroom mixture sit for at least 15 minutes. Strain out the shallots and set aside, leaving the vinegar in the bowl. To the vinegar, add the lemon juice, canola-olive oil blend, remaining salt, pepper and sugar.

Before serving, in a small bowl, toss the reserved shallots and with the mixed herbs and vinegar dressing. Salt and pepper to taste.