wild cod en persillade- april 25, 2010

There's nothing better than exploring a city through its foods. Anyone who has ever traveled with me knows that I first pick out where I want to eat breakfast, lunch, and dinner and then I figure how to fill the time and work up an appetite in between meals. And when you come to new york city to visit me...you had better believe I'm going to take you on a tour to show off the most delicious and interesting foods that new york city has to offer!

This weekend with my friend, Margaret, in town visiting me and Annie, we traversed the city for its most exciting offerings, enjoying everything from montreal bagels to macarons and lobster rolls to bacon cupcakes (yes! maple bacon cupcakes!)

On her final day in the city, we visited Chelsea Market to poke around (and sample super yummy popsicles from people's pops) and so I could pick up the necessary items for this week's menu.

How does one properly draw an end to a weekend culinary journey through the streets of nyc? I'll tell you how. End it with this meal:

Menu: April 25, 2010
- wild cod en persillade (p 95)
- cream of cauliflower soup with red beet chips (p 127)
- grilled asparagus with prosciutto, fried bread, poached egg, and aged balsamic vinegar (p 156)

We had the distinct pleasure of welcoming our friend, Phil "I'll prove to you my mouth is way bigger than you by sticking this gingerbread house chimney covered in red hots into my mouth" Powers.

We started by preparing the cauliflower soup. It was pretty straight forward: cut up the cauliflower and leeks, add in some cream, milk, and water and allow to cook until the cauliflower is tender, and puree. Interestingly, the recipe called for a dash of yellow curry powder. Surprisingly enough, the finished soup had no curry taste at all. Just creamy cauliflower deliciousness.


We fried up some beet chips, sauteed a few pieces of cauliflower, and added homemade garlic croutons to bring texture to the soup. The final product looked and tasted absolutely phenomenal.

Next, we got working on the cod. It was such a simple recipe: brush on a tiny bit of dijon mustard and bread with homemade breadcrumbs and fresh parsley. Sear in a pan for a minute, and pop into the oven for another 8 minutes and voila! flavorful, tender, flakey cod. I improvised a bit and breaded the entire fish rather than just one side.

While the cod was in the oven, we cooked up the asparagus and took our first stab at poaching eggs. It was a bit touch and go at the start but we finally figured out the right water temp, rate of water swirl, and fishing method to create perfectly poached eggs. We were so excited about successfully poaching the eggs that we forgot to finish the dish with the balsamic vinegar. I guess that gives us an excuse to give it another go on this dish! Luckily, the dish didn't feel like it was missing anything at all- with the crisp, green asparagus paired with the salty, smokey prosciutto and the velvety, creamy egg yolk all mixed in together in every bite.

For dessert, we devoured an entire box of delicious macarons from Madeleine Patisserie. First, the boys had a competition to see who could correctly guess the most flavors based purely on sight. It was an intense match but in the end, everyone came out winners. Incredibly stuffed winners.

We were very pleased with this meal. Hunter stated that it's one of his favorites. He's nervous about next week...scared it might be a let down after how awesome this week went. Fingers crossed that we'll continue to pick out the good recipes!

Phil's soup plating-

Yuck or Yum
- wild cod en persillade: d-"i really enjoyed this dish. The fish had great flavor and texture and was such a quick dish to prepare!" h-"I like that it didn’t have a fishy taste. It was super moist and very flavorful. I can’t imagine it being any better" p-"Perfectly done."
- cream of cauliflower soup with red beet chips:d-"I LOVE cauliflower soup and this was certainly an outstanding soup. The beet chips didn't really do anything for me except to add a splash of color to the dish. I liked the flavor and crunch the croutons brought to the soup." h-"Incredible. I’d be okay with swapping out the cauliflower florets with more croutons and the beet chips probably could have gone in the oven to crisp up for a few minutes." p-"The soup was good…those croutons MADE the soup. The smell of the kitchen after they were made was incredible. I didn’t know that garlic and cauliflower even go together."
- grilled asparagus with prosciutto, fried bread, poached egg, and aged balsamic vinegar: d-"mmm...good. I'm interested to try this again with the balsamic vinegar, though I think it may not be necessary since i enjoyed this dish so much." h-"The asparagus was a little “al dente” for my taste but still good." p-"asparagus could have been cooked a bit longer, but it was still good. Poached eggs could have used some seasoning"