Free the Animal

Odds & Ends

First, foremost, and most importantly, Beatrice et moi are going to dinner at Fraises et Tartines Friday night. No, it's not a posh-chic downtown restaurant -- though I'll be first through the door if my friend Julie ever decides to open a restaurant. She did steak au poivre for her & hubby last night, in observance of Bastille Day (better than flag waving, any day). And last week, we got an invite for her bruschetta burgers, but had already made plans.

She's been emailing me about Paleo, as she wants to do a Paleo compliant meal for me -- in spite of my protestations that she prepare what she likes -- and blog about the experience. I'll certainly highlight it here, because I know it's going to be good.

Next, I just found that my local Whole Foods has a new free range egg section.

They've got local, free range chicken, quail, duck, goose, and ostrich eggs. Amazing. I got away with a dozen chicken eggs, and they even had a photo of the chickens pecking around in a field, no doubt boosting nutritional content from eating all the bugs and various things they eat on the ground (dirt too, probably). It's TLC Ranch, a mere hour away in Watsonville, CA.

Anyway, I got away with this particular dozen, the most jumbo I could pick out.

I can't wait to try. I've got some Trader Joe's "cage free" eggs and I'm anxious to see the difference in the yolks and the taste.

And, finally, the blog should cut over to the new WordPress design tonight. I'm going to have to likely go to a custom DNS rather than domain parking setup, which means that full propagation might take 24-48 hours -- though it's never been my experience that it takes that long.

We'll see. And I'll see you at the other end.

Lunchtime Burger Salad

Not a burger and a salad, a burger salad. From time-to-time in a pinch, I'll get one of Carl's Junior Low Carb Six Dollar Burgers, without the cheese or catsup. Not a bad option and only about 5 grams of carb.

Of course, you can do your own lettuce wrap burger, or, you can just make it a salad (click for the hi-res image).

Very simple. Lettuce of your choice, lay on a heaping tbsp of mayo (important, otherwise to dry), then your burger (this had shrooms, garlic, yellow onion and pine nuts in it) on the mayo, garnish with onion, tomato (these were delicious heirlooms), dill pickle (if you haven't run out), and mustard & catsup (Trader Joe's: some sugar, but no HFCS and no unpronounceable ingredients).

Cobb Salad

Well, what I didn't know is that there's a history to the Cobb Salad, invented by Bob Cobb, owner of the Brown Derby in Hollywood, CA.

A couple of nights before, we had decided to collaborate with friends for Friday, and since Julie makes such amazing bacon bits, I suggested a Cobb. So here was the starting palette, with the Bing Cherries there for the dessert (click on it for the hi-res).

There seems to be a lot of variations on the Cobb, and this was no exception. I couldn't source Roquefort without going to Whole Foods, so I went with blue. I also made blue cheese dressing per this recipe, pictured above, and I cut it down by 1/3 so as not to have leftovers. My second attempt to make mayonnaise failed, just as the first, so I was left using 2/3 cup of Trader Joe's expeller pressed canola oil mayo.

Chopped up the romaine and watercress, dressed with about 2/3 of the blue cheese dressing, plated, then used the remaining 1/3 dressing to mix up with the 5 oz. blue cheese crumbles for the centerpiece (click on the photo for the hi-res version).

Oh, man, was it ever good. Then, later after a few hands of cards, cherry smoothies, consisting of about a pound of cherries (all that were in the bowl) 3/4 can chilled coconut milk, 1/4 can heavy cream, 1 tsp honey, 1 tbsp Artisana coconut butter, and a dash of vanilla.

New Zealand Frenched Rack of Lamb

That was dinner last night for friends. I chose to do the rack on the grill, indirect, low, with a temp probe. This rendered the air around the racks around 250, just where I like it in order to get that medium rare right to the edge and not just the center.

Once the rack got to 120ish, internal, I went full high on both burners, brushed both sides lightly with the glaze I had reduced from beef stock and bit of lard & duck fat (and very slight bit -- 1/3 tsp -- of chopped jalapeno that I later strained out). Then, we turned 'em a few times as the temp rose to about 125-128 internal, then let 'em rest for about five minutes before slicing, glazing, and garnishing with freshly grated parmesan.

And a final close-up (click on 'er to enlarge).

Cooking and More Cooking

This is dinner, two days in a row. Saturday at the parent's-in-law in Vista, CA, I did a prime rib low & slow, along with a slow beef broth reduction containing fresh garlic, shallot, and jalapeno pepper, strained at the end.

My sister-in-law prepared a nice salad with toasted sunflower seeds. I dressed it with EVOO and fresh lemon.

Rounding out the meal was chopped cauliflower sautéed in coconut oil, which was a big hit.

Returning home in San Jose yesterday at 1pm, I decided later in the afternoon to cook dinner for our friends who were some hours behind us in their own drive up I-5 from LA.

I had a tri-tip in the freezer, so that made it an easy choice. Took the bike down to the local market for some cauliflower, a parsnip, garlic, shallot & jalapeno pepper. Again, a slow beef broth reduction with the shallot, garlic and pepper sautéed in leaf lard.

Rounding it out was a cauliflower and parsnip purée. Simply boil 'em up in proportions you like, strain, and pop in the food processor with butter & cream to taste. Didn't get a photo but I will next time.

And, finally, tri-tip done a nice medium rare, low & slow style.

Another Crustless Quiche

This one was way better than my last crustless quiche.

What I did differently was first, to use 1/2 cup of potato flour instead of coconut flour. This resulted in a wonderfully crusty skin. Carbs? Well, 1/2 cup of the flour is about 60 grams or so, discounting the fiber (about 5 grams). This gets cut into 12 portions, so you'll get 5-6 grams per slice. No big.

The other thing is that I used Swiss cheese instead of cheddar. The traditional French recipe calls for Gruyere, but that's about four times the price and it's not four times as good.

On the next go I'm going to try to make an actual crust with the potato flour, eggs, leaf lard, etc. I might try tapioca, and that's only about two-thirds of the carbs in the potato flour.

...Well, I'm off to catch a cruise ship in downtown San Diego.

Grilled Carne Asada

My father-in-law, Sam, grilled this up last night. The veggies were grilled too.

It was a great dinner, after having spent very nearly the entire day by the pool.

Real Chicharrónes

Picked up this morning by my father-in-law from a local Mexican market, Los Reyes, in Vista, CA. So good. Crunchy, but chewy all at the same time.

I Get So Much Help

As per usual, today, being a traveling day, I fasted from last night's meal (damn me that I didn't get a picture of the main course; it's quite special that Robert actually ground the curry himself, and I've been a bit obsessed thinking of it) until tonight.

So, bygones, and a mistake I'll not repeat; here's tonight's break-fast after a long drive.

 

Upon arrival, there was a roast beef with some onion having spent a lot of hours n the crock pot. In addition, squash cut into great big chunks as you see ( me likey) , carrots and cauliflower. They had organic, unsalted butter on hand, which I made substantial use of.

I had a second plate just like this. A couple more scotches/rocks, and I'm done.

Deviled Eggs & Salmon Roe

Just about to head out and hit the road, but not before this. Friends down the hall were kind enough to prepare dinner for us last night and served up a wonderful witefish in a curry sauce featuring home ground curry spices. Nice, and I wish I'd had the presence of mind to snap a photo.

I didn't come empty handed and presented this bit of an appetizer. Really super easy to make. I followed this recipe from Cheeseslave, and yep, this is a great way to get vitamin K2, MK-4, the form of K2 made by animals for other animals.

What I did differently from the recipe was that I included about a rounded tblsp of finely chopped shallot, and instead of mustard, I chopped about a rounded tbsp of nori (dried seaweed, such as you see as garnish) that's included in the egg. This one is definitely a keeper, for me.

Eating Out and Away

Mark Sisson has up a decent guide to eating out. He's right about the Mexican. While I might could go for the carnitas, or even the home made chicharrónes, I usually go for the fajitas, in the same style Mark suggests: ditch the tortiallas, rice, & beans. Gor for the grilled meat, veggies, guac & sour cream.

This is precisely what I did last Friday evening at a very old and popular Mexican restaurant.

Sunday we went to visit my dad & mom for fathers day. Got there about noon and I hadn't eaten since those fajitas right above. A bit hungry, and as it turned out, mom had made ground beef stuffed cabbage the night before, no rice. Perfectly primal.

I think I'll be giving this one a go. Ideas for variations include trying it with ground lamb, veal, or a combo. I also have one pack of ground venison left over from my brother's kill some months back, so this dish is a definite candidate.

Fast forward a few hours, mom set out some snacks.

Artisan salami, pickled herring, a camembert, smoked oysters, assorted veggies & cheese, and chicharrónes.

I'm very fortunate to have parents and other family who have seen the benefits of the primal, real food experience.

Saturday Dinner - Grilled Tri-Tip & Celery Root Purée

I finally got a grill that allows me very good temperature control, such that I can do the low & slow to achieve rare & medium rare roasts from edge to edge and not just the very center. It's a Char-Broil Infrared Gas Grill. Highly recommended. Essentially, I was able to easily create an indirect heating environment of only about 250 degrees. I used a temperature probe as well to know internal temperature. Then, once the meat was at 115 I used direct heat on high and turned the meat until 125. Then let rest. If you have juice draining after a couple of minutes, you know it's enough to make the fat juicy. Of course, the juice was reintroduced to the sauce.

To accompany the roast was a celery root purée which I've been dying to make correctly for about a dozen years (click the image for the full size). Tried a couple of times with bad results. You must have a full-fledged food processor. I'll not even go into the various ways I've tried. You must have a food processor to do it right.

Here's the recipe that I used. The changes I made were that I used 2 cups of whole milk (organic pasteurized is fine; you're gonna kill the milk anyway) and a cup of organic heavy cream mixed with the water for cooking. I also used a full stick of organic butter, along with 1/2 cup of cream (melted together in a saucepan) for the finish in the food processor. It came out smooth and really wonderful. Yep, there's one small russet to go with the 2-3 pounds of celery root. For 6-8 servings, it's a pretty minimal amount of glucose.

The sauce was a reduction of my standard bone stock and I didn't do much with it other than add a bit of red wine, and a pinch each of sage & rosemary. Because I was concerned with having enough for everyone, I thickened with about a tsp of potato flour right at the end instead of reducing more.

Our neighbor prepared a wonderful green salad with onions, real bacon bits, and dressed lightly with olive oil and fresh lime. I was remiss in not getting a photo, but, I did eat an entire plate of it after the above had been finished off.

Almost Paleo Country "Biscuits" & Gravy

This is one I came up with concurrently while thinking of last night's meal. I was actually a late comer to the love of country buttermilk biscuits & gravy, but fall hard I did. "Twas a time when, all the local cafes I frequented existed in a mental hierarchy based exclusively on my judgment of the quality of their country gravy.

But since going toward paleo two years ago, getting closer 18 months ago, and finding my stride and expertise now, it has been a rare cheat treat that I've maybe fixed only 3-4 times, all right up here in...the open country.

Well, I'm here to say that the gravy problem was easily solved, so, no more need of flour and starches and other nefarious ingredients. Seriously: coconut milk, country sausage, and whatever spices you like. Simmer and reduce gently. I used just a couple dashes each of chives, rosemary, parsley, and savory. I also added a quarter cup of heavy cream and 1/4 tsp of Kitchen Bouquet, just for color. Regular readers know that I do a lot of coconut milk curries (just use search to find them). In this case, fortunately, there is not a hint of coconut flavor. It works excellently.

Biscuits are a much harder problem. I was very limited in choices, here. No coconut flour at the local market, so, for six cupcakes, I used four jumbo eggs, 4 tbsp coconut milk, 1/2 cup of buttermilk, and 4 tbsp cottage cheese. (Note: that was a full can of coconut milk, and the remainder went with the 1/2 pound of sausage.)

I greased the cupcake pan with bacon drippings; and by the way, if you use bacon drippings, then always cook your bacon on very low heat. I'm patient, and my bacon never smokes, and so my drippings are always pretty pristine for later use. Also, the sausage was too lean, and so 2 tbsp of bacon dripping went in there, too.

350 degrees, and I initially tried 15 minutes, but a knife poke revealed way too much moisture. So, I kicked it up to 400 for another 10 minutes, which did the trick. I rested for 5 minutes in the tray, and then another 5 minutes turned over on the counter, letting moisture steam off. In the end, about as firm as quiche.

The biscuits are the weak link, and I'm anxious to try various things when I get back home, such as the cauliflower pizza crust, coconut flour, or some combination. For those who like country gravy on their scrambled eggs, this approximated that. If I can get the biscuits up to the texture I'd like, then I'll go the the trouble. Otherwise, I'll probably just do plain omelets with the country gravy poured on top.

Skillet Fried Pork Chops and Roasted Brussels Sprouts

This was perhaps my favorite preparation in quite a while. I really devoured it, even to the point of gnawing at every little bit of flesh on the bones of those chops.

Fist, though, let's talk about the roasted Brussels sprouts -- roasted with whole garlic and onions and tossed in a shallot & balsamic vinegar reduction -- a preparation I can't take credit for. This one was linked to at Mark's Daily Apple quite some time ago and I fixed it once. However, I blended a couple of recipes I found and ended up cutting the sprouts in half and also blanching them prior to roasting.

That was okay, but I decided to do it pretty much exactly by the recipe this time out, only I didn't have red onion or fresh rosemary. I used yellow onion and dried rosemary. Still, it came out fabulous and, if you don't like Brussels sprouts, I very much encourage you to give this recipe a shot.

So, now for the pork chops. Standard, bone in. I fried them in the skillet with mostly quite a lot of coconut oil and a bit of bacon drippings. I cooked them on low until pink and moist inside, then poured off most of the fat, turned up the heat and browned them well, leaving lots of good bits in the pan. I set them aside to rest, then deglazed with a real nice chicken stock, which I found at the local supermarket and was actually free range organic with no nefarious ingredients whatsoever.

Soon as the deglazing was done, I added more stock, a half-handful of chopped shallot, and a hefty handful of fresh blueberries. I crushed the berries, turned up the heat, and let it reduce. Once it neared completion, I added about three tbsp of fresh organic cream to finish it off and smooth it out. Finally, as I plated the chops, I added back in the drippings from resting.

In case I hadn't mentioned it, we're up at our cabin in Arnold, CA (Google Maps) for the week as Beatrice, junior high school counselor, just finished out the year.

Finally, if the photo presentation looks a bit improved, I've got to give inspirational credit to my friend and neighbor, Julie Olson, who does wonderfully artistic food blogging at Fraises Et Tartines. Her and husband Trevor are in Paris just now, and I'm horribly jealous.

A Sunday Brunch

Earlier today, I did a twitpic of the brunch Bea, I and friends down the hall prepared. Now, here's the plated version.

The quiche was crustless. Seven eggs, a cup of heavy cream, 1/2 cup coconut flour, 1/4 cup water, sea salt & fresh ground pepper.

Separately, about 10 slices of fairly thin sliced bacon, 1/3 cup chopped onion, 1/2 small package of baby spinach. I cut up the bacon, got it frying, added the onion, and at the very end added the spinach. Set it out on a paper towel, then all on the chopping block to chop finely.

Melted leaf lard in my fry pan, poured in the egg mixture, dropped in the bacon mixture, then a cup of grated New Zealand grass fed sharp cheddar, and then I gently stirred it all into the mixture.

About 30 minutes at 350 and a 5-minute finish at 400 to get a decent crust on top. Let rest for 10 minutes or so.