An Unplanned Holiday Meal

I know this is really late enough to be embarrassing, but I really wanted to share our Christmas Eve dinner with all of you, mostly because I pulled this one out of my hat all by myself and with basically no advanced preparation. Believe it or not, it is entirely possible to make a delicious and impressive holiday meal more or less on the fly.



See, when we did our meal planning for Christmas week, we did so with Christmas Day's shenanigans in mind but completely forgot about Christmas Eve until AFTER we'd done all of our grocery shopping. I think that J would have been fine with just eating one of our planned meals that evening, but I simply could not allow Christmas Eve to go by without something special on the menu. Luckily, my job gives me a lot of time off around the holidays and I knew that I would be home all day Christmas Eve, giving me plenty of time to plan the meal, make a grocery store run, and cook.

I spent most of my free time on Monday and Tuesday thinking about it. I knew I wanted ham, because that just screams Christmas to me, but I also knew that I didn't want to just buy a ham and bake it. Baked, glazed, spiral-sliced ham is probably one of the most delicious food inventions I can think of, but I wanted to do something different. Something creative. Something a bit more sophisticated. I had the time, I thought, so why not use it to my advantage and experiment a bit? Of course, I also didn't want an entire spiral-sliced ham sitting in the freezer afterwards, because after all, there's only two of us.

I knew I had some puff pastry shells sitting in the freezer, and for some reason that stuck in my mind. I suspect it was partly because I'd seen Ina Garten make a simple appetizer of deli ham and swiss folded up in a sheet of puff pastry on her show over the previous weekend, and I just couldn't stop thinking about how deliciously easy that would be. I wasn't quite satisfied with repeating that idea, though the pastry component kept knocking around my head.

Similarly, I got myself latched onto the ham and pineapple combination, which is nothing new for sure but is definitely always delicious. I had several thoughts on that - ham and pineapple skewers, perhaps, brushed with a sweet chili glaze and broiled until caramelized and crunchy on the outside. Or ham steaks dusted with cinnamon and ancho and pan-seared, topped with sweet and sour pineapple chutney. Or maybe a riff on Ina's dish, adding thin-sliced pineapple rings to the ham and cheese puff pastry filling, somewhat reminiscent of Hawaiian pizza. Nah, none of that really rang true either.

At the same time I was considering sides. I still had some kale leftover from the farro salad a few days before, and some prima donna cheese, and thought that the addition of a potato would make a pretty fantastic gratin. And of course, once potatoes came onto the playing field, there were ideas for her-roasted potatoes and mashers and croquettes to contend with. Even sweet potatoes starting kicking around in my head, vying for attention, crying about how a chipotle-lime sweet potato mash would be a killer pairing with that ham steak idea, or how some sweet potato steak fries would be easy to make if I already had the oven/broiler on for those skewers. And then there were green veggies options - sauteed spinach, salads, green beans, broccoli. About the only side I was sure of from the get-go was my mom's orange and maple glazed carrots, because I love them dearly and feel no Christmas season is complete if I haven't had them at least once.

So, Christmas Eve arrived, and there I was with two days-worth ideas for mains and sides and not a single, satisfying, cohesive menu among them.

That morning I sat down with some paper and a pencil and wrote out all of the ideas that I'd narrowed down from the masses, and started drawing lines and sketching permutations, exploring the potential of each possibility. And an hour or so later, after a bit of brainstorming and a new main dish on the menu, I was off to the store with shopping list in hand and a meal planned that was simple, festive, creative, and (I hoped) delicious.

And so it was.

Sauteed Ham and Pineapple w/Black Pepper-Brown Sugar Glaze
in Puff Pastry

Maple-Orange Glazed Carrots

Simply-Dressed Arugula Salad
(red wine vinegar, good extra virgin olive oil, dijon, minced chives, salt and pepper)

Potato and Young Kale Gratin
with Prima Donna and Fresh Chive

The meal may have tasted fantastic, but the most rewarding part was sitting down on Christmas Eve with the man that I love, and enjoying a meal that I'd put together from the ground up with all the love and joy of the season as the secret ingredient.

I hope that you all had a wonderful holiday season, and I have nothing but high hopes and good wishes for all of us in the year to come.

Homemade Membrillo, Pork Roulade

I love membrillo (quince paste) and have seen other bloggers make their own, but assumed I'd never have access to the fresh fruits to try it myself. As such, I'm not sure I can adequately communicate my excitement when I discovered fresh quinces at Iavarone on our last shopping trip. I think I considered it for all of 5 seconds before picking out three firm, unblemished fruits and dropping them into our cart. Homemade membrillo would be mine, after all!

That afternoon I took myself away to the kitchen to deal with my quinces. A quick search online taught me that quince were similar in texture to apples, but harder and drier, and had a tough core and skin that must be removed. This was an accurate description, and the fruit was easy to peel but difficult to cut. With a little elbow grease I managed to get all three fruit cored, sliced, and diced, and into a large saucepan they went along with some cold water, a squeeze of fresh lemon, and about a cup and a half of white sugar. From here it was easy - I just cooked the fruit over medium heat until it softened and turned a dull red, which I must say took a lot longer than I expected, close to an hour and a half. The fruit never really broke down, so when it was done I took my stick blender to it to create a smooth, slightly grainy paste. The flavor was lovely, sweet and floral and aromatic, but subtle. I poured it into a tupperware container, and after sitting in the fridge overnight it had stiffened properly into a firm, sliceable block of membrillo.



There's something really beautiful about this stuff, isn't there? Shiny and jewel-like with that lovely knobby texture on the surface, it spreads like a jam but can be cut into cubes or slices with ease. Its sticky, mind you, but I don't mind getting a little messy for something this tasty.



Now, the obvious thing to do with membrillo is to eat it with a good manchego cheese, perhaps some marcona almonds, a few water crackers. But, J and I being who we are, we had to come up with something more interesting. We had a bit of prima donna cheese in the fridge (because when do we not?) and a small pork tenderloin, and after a bit of thought came up with the idea for a quince-glazed pork roulade filled with grated prima donna and herbs.



I took a knife to the tenderloin and used a lengthwise accordion cut to create a large, thin, flat surface with the meat. A 1/2 cup or so of the membrillo was warmed up on the stove with an equal amount of water and a sprig of fresh rosemary, and kept on the heat long enough to infuse the glaze with a subtle evergreen aroma. I seasoned the pork with salt, freshly ground black pepper, a sprinkle of garlic powder, and some chopped fresh rosemary, then spread a thin layer of the glaze all over the meat. I grated some prima donna, about half a cup, and piled it near the middle of the meat, leaving an inch or so around all the edges to try and prevent leakage during cooking. Then a quick roll and tie with some butcher's twine, and it was ready for some heat.

The roulade was seared on the stovetop first, then placed in the oven at about 450 degrees to roast. I brushed it with the glaze 3 or 4 times as it cooked, creating a golden brown sticky-sweet crust.

Meanwhile, J made some simple panko-crusted zucchini slices but cutting two small zucchini into 1/2" slices, seasoning with salt, pepper, and paprika, and dredging with egg and light, crisp panko crumbs. They were lightly panfried in some vegetable oil and then left to drain briefly on some paper towels as I removed the pork from the oven and set it aside to rest and let the juices redistribute and the filling firm up a bit.

Once untied and sliced, the pork retained its shape to yield lovely spiral slices with a thin layer of sweet and savory cheese filling. To plate. we dolloped each serving with a bit of the remaining membrillo glaze and a bit more freshly grated cheese, with the fried zucchini alongside.




My goodness, this was good. The combination of flavors - salty, tangy, sweet, herbaceous - was just fantastic on the mild tender pork. The meat itself could have used a brining period prior to cooking, and next time that's what we'll do, but the concept behind the dish was definitely sound. The slightly sweet, crisp zucchini slices made a nice fresh-tasting foil to the richness of the meat, and all together it made for a fantastic meal.

And the best part is, I have plenty of membrillo leftover to enjoy. I wonder what else we can make with it?

Rules Shmules

I am completely incapable of following the rules when it comes to food. I almost never actually follow a recipe, even when I'm baking, because I'm always tweaking flavor components and finishing methods, and I can't remember the last time I made any sort of traditional ethnic dish the way it is traditionally made. I've always gotta get my little hands right down into the heart of a recipe and futz with things to get the result I want, which I suspect won't win me any fans from the militant-accuracy set. But I don't care. Know why? Because my food tastes GOOD.

Please, please excuse my horrible photography - I'm still experimenting with my digicam and don't have anything resembling the right set-up to take well-light or focuses photos. I can guarantee you, my next gift to myself is going to be a tripod, closely followed by the materials to make myself a lightbox.

Take these enchiladas, for example.

In my admittedly-non-extensive experience, your standard enchiladas are made with corn tortillas, either cheese, meat, or perhaps bean filling, and topped with a simple red chili sauce and shredded white cheese like cheddar or jack. And I like standard enchiladas. I really do. I almost always go for some kind of enchiladas when we go out for tex-mex, my favorite being the ubiquitous combination platter of one cheese, one chicken, and one bean enchilada with rice and refritos. I love me some enchiladas, I do.

However, when it comes down to it, I've never been a huge fan of corn tortillas unless they're in chip form. I've even made my own homemade corn tortillas, and while I liked them and would make them again (with the proper tool for flattening them out, anyway) they're still just not my favorite as a yummy filling and sauce delivery system. I generally prefer flour tortillas for almost everything, but since we've recently been trying to replace as much of our carb intake as possible with whole grain alternatives, this time around I used some really delicious multi-grain tortillas made by Mission brands.

Also, since I always like a combination of different kinds of enchiladas on my plate, I figured, why go to all the trouble to make three different kinds of enchiladas of individual fillings? I'll just mix 'em all up in the whole batch.

And then, instead of using a basic white cheese for the topping, I used a mix of a couple of sharp artisan cheeses we picked up at the Italian specialty store the week before. Once again, I've given my dinner an identity crisis. I'm surprised my food doesn't grow legs and run away screaming as soon as I bring it home, just to avoid the emotional trauma.

Anyway, despite all these deviations form the norm, let me just tell you that these were some seriously delicious enchiladas. J made the chili sauce from scratch, and I wish to God I was paying attention when he did because although he followed this recipe by Emeril to begin with, he changed it all over the place and I have no clue how. I really hope he can remember what he did because I want him to make some more of the stuff that I can jar and keep in the pantry for future deliciousness. The filling itself was a mixture of some smoked pulled pork that we'd made much earlier in the summer and have had bags of in the freezer ever since (didn't do THAT the right way either because we couldn't keep it int he smoker long enough to get that uber-tender pull-apart texture, so we had to finish it in the crock pot with some bbq sauce to finish it... I know, I know, we should both turn in our pitmaster-in-training badges) plus some cooked black beans and some of the same cheese I used to top them with. It was a perfect combination, smoky and sweet and decadently cheesy, but without the grease that always seems to accompany the cheese enchiladas I get in restaurants. The finished enchiladas tasted sinful, but really weren't all THAT bad for you. Not healthy, but not that bad.

I'm not going to try to write a recipe here, because really once you have all the different components - tortillas, fillings, sauce, cheese, all of which you can alter to fit your own tastes - making enchiladas is all about assembly. Each enchilada ought to have the same amount of filling, and with a combination of fillings like I used, you want to have the same amount of each thing in each tortilla so that the flavor will be consistent. You want to pack the filled tortillas into your baking dish pretty tightly so that they stay rolled neatly and get all hot and soft and gooey when they cook. You want enough sauce both below and above the tortilla rolls so that they won't stick or dry out, but not so much that it ends up drowning in sauce and turning into something you have to slice, because at the end of the cooking process, after the whole dish cools for maybe 5 minutes, you want to be able to lift each roll out individually to serve. I've learned how to achieve these things just from trial and error and having quite a few dishes of enchiladas just disintegrate when I dipped a spatula in to serve, and this time around I got it just right.

We ate them with some quick homemade yellow rice (long grain brown rice cooked in chicken stock with saffron, tumeric, and chili powder) and a big 'ole dollop of sour cream, with sliced green onions sprinkled over everything. They were perfect - warm, savory, spicy, and comforting.

And I really, really wish I had some more right now.