October 1 Meal: A Little Bit of Italy

Last night was the first night of my Bon Appetit for a year challenge.  On the menu were: Roasted Veal Shanks with Rosemary, Braised Red Cabbage with Vinegar, and Warm Pear Buckles with Tangerine Cream.  To round out the meal I made a sauté of corn and potatoes with oregano and our friends brought a fabulous bottle of wine and roasted garlic bread.  So, let me tell you a little about these dishes.

Roasted Veal Shanks with Rosemary

The first lesson learned during this challenge is that some meat is very expensive.  The recipe, which came from an article about the Friuli region of northeastern Italy, calls fortwo 2- to 2 ½ lb. veal shanks and makes 6 servings.  We decided to halve it, which was fortunate for our pocketbooks!  Shaun picked up 2 lbs. of veal shank from our friendly butcher, Cliff, in Carrboro.  He was shocked to find it totaled $26!  Also, the meat was cut into smaller portions, rather than one large shank.  That did not end up being a problem, though.

If you’re like me, you may not know what exactly a veal shank is.  Chow.com told me it is the lower portions of both the front and rear legs.  This was a slow-cooking dish and started with browning the meat on the stove.  Alongside the veal, a sauté of carrots, celery, and onions makes the kitchen smell amazing!  Everything goes in the oven with some white wine and chicken stock and pretty much takes care of itself.  After the meat is done all the vegetables get put into the processor, making a thick sauce.  Unfortunately, I over-salted the sauce a bit, so by itself it was a bit much, but was nice combined with the veal.

Overall, this dish was delicious.  The meat was fall-off-the-bone tender and had a buttery, rich quality.  That being said, for a lot less money I could make a pot roast with the same qualities.  We also tried eating the marrow inside the bone.  Anthony Bourdain always makes it look so delicious, but to us it was a bit like eating plain butter.  Here are our ratings:

Yumminess: 7 out of 10

Cost: Approx. $33 for 4 small servings

Time: Bon Appetit said 1 ½ hrs. prep and 3 ½ hrs. total, but I spent maybe ½ hr. in what I’d call “prep” and 2 hrs. cooking, so my total time was around 2 ½ hrs.

Was it worth it?: It was definitely worth trying something new, but this won’t be in our regular repertoire.

Braised Red Cabbage with Vinegar

This dish was also from the article about Friuli, Italy.  It may not sound that exciting, but it was the star of the night in my opinion.  One head of red cabbage, some onion, garlic, caraway, chicken broth, and red wine vinegar and voila, a plain vegetable turned into a tangy tongue-pleaser.  The cabbage starts out purple and white (picture below) and ends up all one royal purple color.  The recipe claims that it is for 6 servings, but those would need to be very large servings.  After the four of us ate second helpings we still have 4 servings left.  Not a problem though, because it will make a great side to some of the other dishes coming up soon.

Yumminess: 9 out of 10

Cost: Approx. $4.50 for 8+ servings

Time: Bon Appetit said 45 minutes prep and 1 hour total. I spent maybe 20 minutes in “prep” and 42 minutes cooking, so my total time was around about 1 hour.

Was it worth it?: Absolutely!  It was economical and great-tasting.  This one’s going in the recipe book.

Warm Pear Buckles with Tangerine Cream

This recipe came from the R.S.V.P. section from a restaurant called Ford’s Filling Station in Culver City, CA.  It creates individual desserts for everyone in your own personal ramekin.  Even after doing some Google research, I’m not sure what a “buckle” is defined by.  The most common characteristic is a fruit mixture with a crust.  This crust tasted like a combination of a sugar cookie and pie crust, which I believe is the result of a combination of cream cheese, a lot of sugar, and butter.  How could that be anything but good?  Instead of regular cream cheese I used Neufchatel to save a few grams of fat.  You’ll have to forgive me some substitutions like this since the amount of butter and cream I’ve totaled for this coming month is embarrassingly high.  I learned a lot about the number of pear varieties when shopping at Whole Foods for this dessert.  I think there were at least 6 different kinds!  The recipe recommends Anjou or Comice, and the latter was the one I found.  The addition of ginger made the mixture spicier than I expected.  While Shaun appreciated that spiciness, it wasn’t really something I enjoyed.  The ruling at the table was that the crust was amazing, but maybe a different fruit would enhance the experience.  Perhaps peaches? 

Then there was the Tangerine Cream, which deserves its own description.  It was simple to make and refreshingly citrusy.  Tangerines were not available at any of the 3 markets we checked, so I went for a tangelo.  It tasted close enough to what I remember tangerines to be.  I put a dollop of cream on top of each buckle and it contrasted nicely with the spicy pears.

Yumminess: (Me) 5 out of 10 (Shaun) 7 out of 10

Cost: Approx. $8.75 for 4 servings

Time: Bon Appetit said 1 hour for prep and 3 ¾ hrs. total. I spent maybe 20 minutes in “prep,” 2 hrs. chilling dough, 30 minutes cooking, and 15 minutes cooling, so my total time was around about 3 hours.

Was it worth it?: I would love to try a different fruit with the same crust.

These three dishes are a great example of ones that I would usually pass over without trying.  I’m glad that we tried something new with the veal and was pleasantly surprised by the cabbage.  It was certainly a great start to the challenge and excites me for what’s to come.  Today’s meal was Roast Chicken with Parsnips, Golden beets, and Jerusalem Artichokes with Beer Pan Juices, Peel-and-Eat Spiced Shrimp with Chipotle Remoulade, and German Chocolate Brownies.  I’ll let you know how they were tomorrow.