Thanksgiving 2013

The Menu

Egg Custard with Parmigiano Reggiano and shaved White Truffles w/ Chips

Breakfast. 

Simple, rich egg custard with shaved parm. The parm sunk to the bottom as custard set. I torched the cheese quickly to lightly caramelize and seal before serving. 

A lovely, unctuous and decadent treat.

Suggested beverage: Krug Vintage Champagne 

Roasted Rome Apple with Cranberry Compote, Creme Fraiche and Cranberry Syrup

The counterpoint to the first course.
Light, sweet and sour. The mint brought it all together.
Perhaps my favorite dish of the day.


## MISSING COURSE ##

I ended up without a picture of the Turkey pies, which was probably for the best. They were the one semi-fail of the day. While the filling worked out perfectly, the store-bought puff-pastry didn't achieve either the flakiness or the airiness I'd hoped for.

##    ##

Stuffing "Bread Pudding" with Blackberry Old-Fashioned

This, on the other hand, was a big winner. Stuffing was made from sausage, chanterelles, foie gras mousse, pork pate, onion, carrot, garlic, stale sweet batard cut into chunks and a lot of rendered turkey fat from the Turkey Leg Confit. This was then baked and finished.

Blackberry Old-Fashioned was 1oz Rittenhouse Rye, 1/4 oz blackberry demerra syrup, lemon rind, angostura bitters.

They worked perfectly together.

Carrots (confit and roasted) with Ginger

Another absolute keeper.

Nice local heirloom carrots. Half cooked sous vide with rendered duck fat and ginger in vac bag, the other slow roasted with lemon and ginger. Finished with ginger creme fraiche.

The combination of the wide range of different carrot varieties and the different cooking techniques exposed the huge range that carrots have. Love it.

Little Gems with Dungeness Crab, Avocado, Bacon and Pickled Carrots

It's crab season.

And I love crab.

This was an attempt to take a really stale dish (the crab and avocado salad) and do something tasty with it. And it worked wonderfully. The pickled carrot was key, as was going with a very smoky bacon.