Day of Cookery, Revisited

OK, so I admit it's been a while since I've posted anything, and for awhile I wasn't sure if I was ever going to post anything else, but after literally months of kicking myself in the ass about this, I've come up with heaps of things to write about, and well, to actually write about them. So here goes the first of several in a short period of time, about an event particularly dear to my heart that I organized over Christmas break in Pittsburgh.

So before I explain what the 'Day of Cookery' was (if you couldn't guess, it is a day that revolves around food), I have to tell a story about the origins of this event. About a year ago, I hosted a couple of couchsurfers from Paris, and while chatting over a home-cooked dinner, I asked them how they spent their vacations typically. Much to my surprise, instead of traveling, their families stay in Paris, convening to devote an entire day towards the shopping, cooking, and eating of delicious homemade food (though looking back--and considering the French food culture--I'm not that surprised anymore). They awake early in the morning, spend a few hours at the markets shopping, return to the kitchen to cook together for several hours, and then finish the day with a multiple-course meal which they take their time to properly and truly savor. And yes, all of this they do together as a group.

Well, I was so impressed with this idea that I so eagerly wanted to do it myself, but with my college friends with and for whom I had been cooking over the past year. Too often college buds didn't really participate in activities to build a sense of community - a lot of what friends do is just sit around and watch TV (which is the bane of my existence). So I thought it would be a lovely change of pace to devote one day to food, and nothing but food.

Unfortunately, college students are busy people. Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to suggest that we students actually study most of the time, but what with clubs, sports, social activities, and drinking....we are pretty busy folk. So the first challenge was to find a day that everyone would have completely free, and the second was to convince everyone to buy into the idea of doing nothing else that day. Much to my dismay (and to be honest I was a bit naive), not everyone wants to spend an entire day shopping, cooking, and eating (while the typical college student excels in the latter, the first two he lacks experience in), so this second challenge proved to be a difficult one. By after selecting the day after the last final exam of the winter semester 2010--and through much pleading, cajoling, and persuading--I managed to get around 20 people on board. A third challenge was to make sure that no one went home for Christmas as soon as school's out (as so many people do, unfortunately), but that's a rant for another day...

Anyway, I planned a five-course meal, replete with alcohol, and planned when we would organize. But what I failed to consider was that not everyone (myself included) would be inclined to awake early to go shopping on this particular day. As it turns out, with the last day of finals comes much celebrating. With much celebrating comes much drinking. With much drinking comes....much sleeping, and aversion to waking up.

So the day started out late, with just the five of us who managed to go shopping losing track of our goal and getting a leisurely brunch before considering walking into a market. After three hours of rushed shopping, we started cooking (and drinking again) around 3. The day continued to go downhill after that, too. By 7:30, me and my friend who were doing the majority of the cooking were passed out from exhaustion and insobriety, with only three and a half of the courses complete. To top it off, we didn't have a proper dining area, and everyone ate whatever they wanted, some of them combining all the courses at once on their plates.

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Now while that wasn't a complete failure (we all still had heaps of fun together, even though the spirit of the event wasn't really felt), this year I decided to ensure that it would be better through more extensive planning and--most importantly--more wisely choosing a date. Instead of having it the day after school ended, I had it the following Saturday (three days afterwards), and while a lot of people had already gone home by then, we still had a crowd of 14 (including my mother).

Now most hilariously of all (and what would be my biggest challenge, though easily thwarted), was that I'm currently living in Munich, and was only visiting Pittsburgh for two weeks. That is, I had to find someone else to host it (and the friend who hosted it last year was already home). And even after another friend had graciously offered, I still had to bring half of my kitchen equipment (which was conveniently packed away in my mother's house), and half of my mother's stuff as well. ---As a side note, I never asked her to take it, but she her shock at seeing great holes in her kitchen cabinets was smoothed over by my inviting her along. Thanks, Mom!--- And I even went to see my friend's kitchen before bringing the stuff over, so as not to duplicate equipment unnecessarily.

That 'minor' detail taken care of, the other matter was the menu. The problem with the first Day of Cookery was my excessive ambition (and wildly out of control portioning). You see, each of the five courses I planned to make then were big enough to feed us all on their own, nevermind combined with one another. So this year I decided to severely reduce portion size, while vastly increasing course number. We had a grand total of thirteen courses (yes, 13), each of which was only a bite compared to the behemoths I made last year. This year, I also decided to have a more cohesive menu, with each course fitting nicely among the others, each subsequent course intensifying in flavor (like you do at a wine tasting with different strengths of wine, drinking from lightest to darkest) so as not to undermine any dish. The theme of the day was winter, too, as I'm more and more getting into seasonal cooking (another post on that to come in the near future). I spend a few hours preparing the menu, making sure that no two dishes emphasized the same ingredients, trying to incorporate as many different foods as possible, while using the 'waste' from one dish as the sauce or garnish for another (i.e. I made heaps of reductions. More on that below). After having done that, I prepared a grocery list and was ready to shop.

Kat (the friends who's kitchen I was using) and I embarked for the Strip District (the neighborhood of Pittsburgh full of independently-owned ethnic markets) at 7:00am sharp. This year, I also didn't expect anyone to come shopping with me, and perhaps only a handful to cook with me. Much to my surprise, Kat offered to come along, and for the next three and a half hours, we visited several stores, slowly gathering the $200 worth of supplies for the day (which, considering that was made into 14 meals, isn't bad, eh?). We decided to take it easy, though....after all, having a day devoted to slow food means we also can't rush while shopping. After arriving in the Strip while it was still dark out, we entered 21st Street Coffee the same minute they opened, their first customers. We had a lovely exchange with the employees, and then sat down to serenely sip our finely-prepared coffees as we watched the sun break the horizon. Shopping came and went without a hitch, finding just about everything on the list. We were, however, surprised at the 30-long queue at the PennMac cheese counter at 8:00am. Man, people love their cheese (as do I!).

The cooking plan

The relaxed pace continued when the cooking commenced at 11:30. Now just as I had meticulously planned each course, I actually took the effort to plan which order I would cook each course in, scheduling time in the oven and on the stove for everything in the most effective order, given how long each thing took to prepare and cook, and what needed to be done in order to start preparing another dish, and what needed to be done right before we ate. As it turns out, cooking thirteen courses is amazingly complex, given only one oven and four stove-top burners. Complex, though not impossible (as the picture shows).

Kat prepping the butternut squash

And indeed, carrying out the cooking was almost as easy as the plan made it to be. Throughout the day, various friends came to help cook as they pleased, with about seven different people contributing to the final meal in the end.

Another thing I decided to change from last year was how much I drank while cooking. And while I did in fact indulge during the cooking process (and kept a respectable buzz going throughout the day), I never felt ready for bed, forging through to the end of the cooking process, barely taking a break long enough to sit down.

After all the guests had arrived, we began putting final touches on each dish, warming those first few dishes that were to be served. One huge problem of a meal like this is making sure everything is fully cooked (though not overcooked) and warm when served. We solved this problem by mostly cooking everything before the first meal was served, then warming the food and plating them just before serving. This worked fine for most courses, as a lot of them were cold (or some of their components were), a lot of courses were soups or stews, which could be easily heated a few courses before, and some--like the crepes--were quickly made just before serving. We plated each course in the kitchen individually and brought them to the table, washing the dishes each time in between. It was labor-intensive, but well worth it, being able to savor each course on its own and leaving a comfortable space of time in between each course.

Pork spare ribs with granny smith apples, whole cloves, cinnamon sticks,
hard cider, and chili garlic paste

The meal began around 8:45pm and lasted until sometime around 1:00am. The first half of the meal went wonderfully - no one grew impatient, too full, or too drunk. Though sometime after the eighth course, we realized a tragic mistake we had made. Much to our chagrin, the delicious craft beer we had been drinking since the early afternoon was beginning to prevent us from eating anymore, taking up a significant portion of our stomach's capacity. Alas, by the ninth course, everyone was pleading to just hurry up and finish the meal: and that we did, combining three of the last four courses (save the last) into one plate, bringing the platters to the table for all to take as they pleased. The last (the dessert) we all dug into with our forks while it was still on the platter, not even bothering to serve it.

Mr. Roast Duck, with fresh sage and thyme

Overall, the night was a success (though we did have one casualty who had to nap between courses 9 and 13), having all of the food thoroughly enjoyed, without too many leftovers (though enough for some people to take home) or too expensive or a bill (we split the bill evenly among us).

I learned a lot about cooking large meals, as well as coordinating the cooking of different dishes efficiently. Also, it was my first in-depth experience with reductions, which (as any Michelan-star restaurant owner will tell you) work wonders. In fact, it was a running joke among us that I would open up a restaurant names 'Reduction,' there were so many reductions being made that eve.

Making butternut squash ravioli

I highly recommend that anyone try this. To be honest, it is not for the light of heart. But for the avid cook, it is an opportunity to test yourself to the fullest, as well as a chance for you to provide the most delicious and interesting meal you can cook for your friends! If you want to give it a shot, but aren't sure how to proceed, feel free to shoot me an email. Hope you enjoyed reading about this day of days! Indeed, this has already become an annual tradition among my friends and I. Hopefully you can enjoy it, too

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Here's a look at the menu, as well as a list of principal ingredients in each course:

1. Chilled Kale Salad (with Balsamic Onion Garnish)

2. Gravlax with Sweet Summer Pickle 

3. Creamed Butternut Soup

4. Braised Shredded Rabbit (with Stewed Vegetable Purée)

5. Butternut Squash Ravioli under Spinach White Sauce

6. Miniature Beef Wellingtons (with Stock Vegetable Mash)

7. Savory Crepes with Mushroom Cream and Balsamic Reduction

8. Duck Rabbit Wintry Vegetable Stew

9. Fennel Salad (with Mint and Red Onion)

10. Appley-Cinnamon Pork Spare Ribs (with Chili Sauce)

11. Pear Risotto (with White Cheddar)

12. Slow-Roasted Duck with Stewed Cranberry Sauce

13. Linzer Torte (with SoCo Whipped Cream)

1. soup: kale, lemon juice, apple, cream; garnish: lemon zest, balsamic-soaked onion

2. gravlax: salmon, parsley, dill; garnish: yellow squash pickle, red pepper pickle

3. butternut squash, cream, maple syrup, honey; garnish: maple syrup, cilantro

4. rabbit, red wine; purée: carrot, red potato, onion, garlic, celery, thyme, rosemary; sauce: red wine, rabbit stock

5. ravioli: white flour, eggs, butternut squash, maple syrup, honey; sauce: spinach, cream, butter, roasted red peppers

6. wellingtons: beef tenderloin, duxelles (mushrooms, garlic, onion), pâté (beef liver, onions, butter), puff pastry; mash: carrots, celery, onions, thyme, rosemary, parsely

7. crepes: white flour, eggs, whole milk; sauce: mushrooms, cream, butter, onion, garlic;reduction: balsamic vinegar 

8. solids: duck and rabbit meat, sweet potatoes, turnips, leeks, carrots; stock: beer, duck and rabbit bones, carrot, celery, onion, thyme, parsley, rosemary

9. fennel, red onion, cucumber, mint, balsamic vinegar, olive oil

10. pork spare ribs, granny smith apples, cinnamon sticks, whole cloves, chili-garlic paste, hard cider

11. rice: arborio rice, pears, white cheddar cheese; stock: white wine, pears, cinnamon sticks

12. duck breast (roasted with lemon, orange, garlic, onion, sage, thyme); sauce: fresh cranberries, apples, orange juice, orange and lemon zest, cinnamon sticks, whole cloves, hard cider

13. dough: almond flour, white flour, butter, white sugar, cloves, cinnamon, nutmeg; filling: red currant jam

Chilled Kale Soup (Course 1)

Braised rabbit (Course 4)

Savory Crepes (course 7)

Linzer Torte (Course 13)