Cucina Testa Rossa

La Vue de Ma Fenêtre ~ Police on Rollerblades

Policemen on Rollerblades in front of l'Opera, Paris ~ February 2007

Can't outmaneuver these guys! And given the traffic jams and transportation strikes in Paris, this is probably faster than the metro. Maybe it's time to dust off my big purple pair that I used for all of a week back in 1994 when I was determined to make those Friday Night Rides across San Francisco that were so hugely popular back then. Determined that is, until I fell directly on my tailbone (less padding than now) right in front of the Chestnut Street morning express bus headed downtown filled with handsome men in double-breasted suits and wingtips. The searing pain was outmatched only by the sheer embarassment made doubly so because I fell trying to do a fancy little jump turn onto the sidewalk in front of above mentioned bus. That'll teach me to try to show off!

How *Not* to Cook a Turkey

If you didn't get your fill of what the French consider a very "bizarre bird" and have a hankering to roast up another turkey over the holidays, here's what not to do...

My Paris flatmates, John and Pierre, announced a few months ago that this year Thanksgiving was going to be in San Francisco and some of their closest French friends were flying in for the week to experience this crazy American tradition up close and personal. Naturally I couldn't pass up this opportunity so I hopped on United, San Francisco or bust. Actually it was "bust" coming back to Paris but that's another story that requires copious amounts of cocktails, but I digress. Hop on over to KQED's Bay Area Bites to read more about this bizarre burned bird... or just read it below.

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We didn't get started cooking until about 3pm (so much for our 4pm start time) because we first had to do a few things... such as scour the oven. At some point in the wee hours of the previous morning, someone decided it would be a good idea to go crazy with the oven cleaner. Not such a good idea in the light of day. Then Pierre popped and poured some champagne and announced that we could now begin cooking.

So a frantic scramble ensued to make the cornbread muffins for the stuffing, prepare the glaze for the turkey, get the cranberries going, prep the sweet potatoes and green beans, and make appetizers that would last 6 hours until dinner! I made my standard go-to app that I learned at Farallon: toasted brioche (round Hawaiian rolls in a pinch), topped with smoked salmon and a dollop of lemon creme fraiche to calm the hungry crowd.

The stuffing was finally ready so we filled up the turkey, rubbed olive oil, salt, pepper and paprika on the turkey, and - drumroll...here is what NOT to do - glazed the turkey. I should have waited until there was about an hour left of cooking. I wasn't thinking. I was tired, frazzled, exhausted from waking up at 4am from jetlag, a bit tipsy from the bubbly and distracted by all the hilarity going on around me that I just slathered that bird with abandon and sent him on his way.

An hour later, I checked on the turkey and it was charred, completely burned black. I wanted to cry. I was distraught. All that work and I ruined the turkey. ARGH! Pierre kept telling me it was OK and filling my champagne glass. John, who'd just emerged from a nap, had a clear head and the smart idea to baste it, cover it with foil and turn down the oven. So we did and continued to cook it for another few hours. I was still inconsolable.

Flora made the cranberry sauce with sugar, orange juice, orange zest and fresh grated ginger. There are no cranberries in France so this dish was most intriguing. So much so that Pierre decided they would be exponentially better mixed with vodka. They hijacked half my bowl of cranberries, pureed them and made cranberry martinis! Amen and pass the ice. When life hands you cranberries, make cocktails I say! As long as it diverts attention from the charcoal lump of a turkey...

Pierre snipped the ends off mounds of green beans while I cut up the sweet potatoes and chiffonade'd the sage. A quick toss in some duck fat and it was good to go in the oven. The green beans I blanched, then sauteed and tossed with toasted sliced almonds and crumbled Roquefort. I was praying everyone would be so enamoured of the rest of the meal they wouldn't notice the cardboard dry turkey meat. When it was time to take it out, I cringed, dreading the inevitable.

John kindly helped me pick off the charred skin and, to my absolute disbelief and joy, underneath the skin was the most moist, juicy, delicious turkey I'd ever made! I've only made two but you know what I mean. The charred skin must have formed an impenetrable seal that kept the turkey from drying out. It was delicious and I was estatic! I didn't ruin the turkey after all so more champagne was poured and toasted. I brushed a little more glaze over the now-naked turkey and around 9:00pm, we finally served to our French friends a traditional American Thanksgiving dinner. Ok, I brought French wine from Burgundy....all in the name of fostering Franco-American relations :)

We were so hungry that we dispensed with prayers and sharing things we were grateful for and dove right into the meal. Dessert was a berry crumble that I learned at one of my first cooking classes at HomeChef. It's the best crumble recipe I've ever had anywhere, ever. We lumbered to the couches in the living room where I promptly fell asleep. Happy Thanksgiving! And if you still want to make a turkey for Christmas, now you know what not to do!

Le Menu de Thanksgiving

Champagne Veuve Cliquot

Saumon Fumee sur Brioche Grillee avec Creme Fraiche Citron

1999 Puligny-Montrachet 1er Cru "La Garennes"

Haricots-Verts avec Amandes et Roquefort

Patates-Douces avec Sauge et Grasse de Canard

Cranberry Sauce

Dinde Roti Farci

Dessert de Crumble de Fruits Frais
(I was too tired to take pictures at this point...)
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Les Recettes - The Recipes
The turkey, glaze, cranberry and stuffing recipes I adapted from Shiela Lukins' "Celebrate!". That, along with her "New Basics", are my first go-to books when I need inspiration.

Cornbread Stuffing

1 package Jiffy Corn Muffin mix. Yes, a box mix, spare me the flame mail. When you have 3 hours to pull together an entire Thanksgiving dinner, you do what you have to do. Cook the muffins according to the instructions then crumble them into a bowl.
1 head celery, small dice
1 large onion, small dice
1/2 bunch parsley, finely chopped
1 cup dried apricots, chopped
1 cup dried cherries
2 tablespoons butter
1 package of mild Italian sauages, casings removed, sauteed, broken into bits
1 cup Swansons chicken broth

1. Saute the celery, onions, parlsey until opaque

2. Add cherries, apricots and butter and combine

3. In a large bowl combine sausage and cornbread and add in the celery-dry fruit mix.

4. Add the broth slowly mixing as you go. Don't let it get soggy, add just enough to moisten it.

The Deadly Maple Ginger Glaze

Olive oil
1/2 large onion, finely diced
2 tablespoons fresh grated ginger
3 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1/2 cup fresh squeezed orange juice
1/4 cup molasses
2 tablespoons maple syrup
2 tablespoons honey
grated zest of 1 orange

1. Heat a sauce pan with olive oil and add onion, ginger and garlic

2. Cook, stirring, until onions are opaque

3. Add the remaining ingredients and bring to a boil

4. Simmer and reduce for 10-15 minutes until thick and syrupy

5. Let cool.

Orange Ginger Cranberries

2 pounds of fresh cranberries (2 pounds was about 2-1/2 bags so rather than have a half bag of cranberries that I would never cook again until next Thanksgiving, I just threw in 3 bags, turned out fine)
4 cups sugar
2 cups fresh squeezed orange juice
zest from 2 oranges
2 tablespoons grated fresh ginger

1. Comine all the ingredients in a large heavy saucepan and cook over medium heat until the berries start to pop open, about 10-15 minutes.

2. Skim the foam off as they are cooking.

3. Let cool and serve as a side dish

note: you can also puree some of this, strain it, combine in a cocktail shaker with vodka and ice and have your self a fabulous martini!

Charred, Burned, Torched Turkey a la Laura

1 turkey
stuffing
glaze
oranges cut in 1/8s
1/2 bottle white wine

1. Wash and dry the turkey

2. Coat outside and inside cavity with olive oil, salt and pepper (and paprika on the outside)

3. Fill the cavity with stuffing

4. Place the oranges around the turkey in the pan

5. Add white wine to the pan

6. DO NOT glaze the turkey yet like I did below in the picture or it will burn (trust me on this one!)

7. Baste every 20 minutes with the wine and juices in the pan

8. Wait until there is about 1 hour left, brush the glaze on the turkey, cover with foil and finish cooking.

Bon Appetit!

J for John

Jordan Champagne and a 2004 Ridge Buchignani Ranch Carignane

One of my favorite things to do when I am back in San Francisco is to spend time with my Paris flatmates John and Pierre who now spend much of their time in the City by the Bay. And for once we were all in the same city for John's birthday so that alone was cause for celebration. When at the store I couldn't decide on what champagne to by. We always have Veuve Cliquot so I wanted something different but still special. I was about to give up and reach for the orange label when the beautiful Jordan bottle caught my eye. Of course! J for John!

fromage d'affinoise, fourme d'ambert and chevre cheese, roasted cashews, baby organic tomatoes, olives stuffed with citrus, rosemary flat breads and gorgeous strawberries.

I was inspired by Patty's Boeuf Bourgignon, so I decided to make a moroccan lamb tagine. To speed up the cooking time and add a depth of flavor, I first roasted the carrots, potatoes, and butternut squash (400F for about 30-40 minutes).

I tossed the lamb lightly in flour then browned the lamb cubes and set aside.

I added the garlic (pick out the green ones!) and onions to the same pan and continued to brown them. I added quartered mushrooms then deglazed with an inexpensive Syrah.

I combined the lamb, onions, and mushrooms and added half way up with (fat free, low sodium) chicken broth and covered the rest of the way with the red wine. I brought it to a boil then lowered it to a simmer. Add a handful each of halved dried apricots and prunes. Cover the pot and cook for 20 minutes. Add the roast vegetables and cook for another 10-15 minutes.

Serve in a bowl over a bed of spiced cous cous and top with chopped parsley.

Pierre's favorite dessert is a simple piece of chocolate so I decided to serve chocolate from both homes: Pascal Pinaud, our Paris neighborhood patisserie and Joseph Schmidt, a San Francisco chocolate legend.

Bon Appetit!

A Ferry Building Farmers Market Dinner

The Ferry Building and Farmers Market are the closest thing to crack while still being legal that I can imagine. I start shaking as soon as I swing open the huge glass doors and stare ahead at the culinary nirvana I've just entered. Whenever I come to town, the Ferry Building is at the top of the list, as it is when I have to cook a special dinner and last week was just such an occasion. Our friend Patty reached that fabulous milestone of cinquante (fifty - sounds much prettier in French) celebrating with a sixty mile bike ride and her youngest daughter was heading off to college the next day so celebrate we did with a Ferry Building dinner from appetizer to dessert. Click here for the dizzying array of farmers market delights.

The Best Clam Chowder Period

Hod Island Clam Chowder before....

and after....

The Ferry Building has been written about ad nauseum but I feel obliged throw a few more words into the vat of accolades. After too many 30-second conversations over Fourme d'Ambert or Redhawk at Cowgirl Creamery, Stephanie and I finally were able to sit down for a real conversation uninterrupted by ringing registers and clammoring customers. The location of choice was Hog Island Oyster Company dining "al fresco" with a view of the bay. Their three cheese (Cowgirl of course) grilled cheese sandwich and clam chowder with *real* clams was psychotically better than I could have possibly imagined. The clam chowder was creamy, crunchy with veggies and actually tasted like clams. The unctulous, oozy grilled cheese sent my eyes rolling to the back of my head. Amen and pass the rosé.

Greeted with a Sunset

Sunset over the hills from the SFO airtrain...

Buona Pasqua et Vin Aigre

What does an award-winning Italian chef make for family and friends at Easter? We know what he makes for Christmas, but Easter? Why lamb chops stuffed with prosciutto, fontina and wild mushrooms in a red wine sauce of course! Not to mention 3 types of pasta and one enormous chocolate easter egg!

I spent Easter with M & B who for the past 3 years (well 13 really) have opened their home to me, fed me, and helped me pack at 1am when I was in a complete melt-down. M, comme d'habitude (as usual), created the menus, delightful and dazzling wrapped in an Easter bow. The night before we filled plastic eggs with a few coins, some chocolate eggs and reese's peanut butter cups and hid them throughout the house for the kid's (not mine!) easter egg hunt.... Click here for more easter feast...

Belly Up to a Bellybar

Qu'est-ce que c'est le "Bellybar"?! Got a hankering for dill pickles and peanut butter? Or does the mere scent of a saltine send you running for the door? Well hold on to your breast pump, help has arrived... Click here to find out how!

Consommé Celestina al Tartufo ~ Consommé Celestine et Truffes

What does an award-winning Italian chef make for his Christmas dinner at home? Why French consomme, of course! When I left for cooking school almost 3 years ago, I sold most everything - car, furniture, etc. - and gave up/away what was left including my apartment so whenever I come back to visit, I stay with my good friends M & B. I used to work with M at a Huge Software Company down on the Peninsula and B is the award-winning chef/owner Bruno Quercini of Pane e Vino Trattoria on Union & Gough. Needless to say I eat very well when I come home. Click here to read more about the extraordinary cuisine of one of San Francisco's finest...

Seulement moi...

self portrait, december 12th, 2005 2:15am, procrastinating packing....

Thank you all so much for your many kind emails of empathy, sympathy, and offers to try to fix my laptop. From what I can tell I lost most everything for the past 8 months, May 30, 2005 to be exact and that is the same day I installed AOL on my computer. I hope it is merely a coincidence as I don’t need another reason to add to my intense dislike of AOL.

It is also day I moved into Chateau d’Enfer (Chateau from Hell), that uber-swanky chateau I cooked at last summer that surreally (is that a word?) morphed into Amityville Horror only the evil ghosts were the proprietress and her sleazy sidekick. I mentioned it a bit last summer but the experience was just too dreadful to write about but hopefully now I can begin to tell the story, unravel the threads of this enigma without sending my blood pressure skyrocketing and me screaming to the therapist’s couch. But I digress...

Back to my Laptop d’Enfer. If you sent me an email in the past year, it’s gone, adios, sayonora, along with all my contacts and my calendar which that alone has sent me into a tailspin missing appointments, deadlines, etc a la gauche et droite (left and right). So if you have sent me an email or we have a lunch date, would you pleeeeeze resend me your email or remind me of an upcoming evenement (date) because if you don’t, guaranteed I won’t be there. Once I leaped into my 5th decade, the ol’ grey matter turned to a sieve and is cyphoning memory cells by the billions.

So my Laptop d’Enfer is in the (hopefully) capable hands of the Gateway elves who are (hopefully) rescuing my bits and bytes as I type. We shall see…… Until then, bare with me here on the other side of the world. Losing my laptop is like losing an appendage as I was glued to it. An acquaintance of mine took a picture of her husband’s laptop, wrote “The Other Woman” across the top of the picture, and stuck it on the fridge. Kind of like that....

I am typing this on the Eurostar (aka the Chunnel), slicing my way through the Normandy countryside after a day in London. Since moving here, I quickly grew to love the train system and would hop on a train over a plane any day. Heck, I would take a bike if I could avoid Charles de Gaulle airport, the most dreadful airport in a first-world country. Sorry, but I really despise that airport. It reminds me of the Habitrail I had for my hamster in 6th grade with all the tubes and ramps and wheels. Sorry, back to London.

I stayed at the Cumberland Hotel across from Marble Arch. I found it at the last minute on the Eurostar web site for £99 which has to be the best deal in uber-cher (expensive) London. The Cumberland was recently renovated and the lobby is more Museum of Modern Art than Hotel Lobby and the rooms were surprisingly comfortable, practical, roomy and chic. I straggled in late and exhausted so a quick call to room service for an also surprisingly good Caeser’s Salad and I called it a day.

You’re probably thinking “what does this have to do with the title?” Absolutely nothing. Laser focus is not my strong suit and am distracted by most anything. Undiagnosed A.D.D. no doubt. The title refers to my experience at Heathrow airport last week. I flew from San Francisco to London Heathrow and then was to connect to Paris. Our plane from SF parked at Heathrow's Terminal 3 and I had to transfer to Terminal 1 which required a near-2 mile hike then a bus ride across the airport dodging 767s, gas trucks, luggage trains, etc. I arrived at Terminal 1 after throwing out my back trying to yank my overstuffed carry-on onto the transfer bus. After clearing passport control and another ½ mile hike I filed in to the snaking security line.

I had a 3-1/2 hour layover and wanted nothing more than to collapse into a big overstuffed armchair in the red carpet lounge and have someone ask me if I’d like something to drink. It was not to be. When I reached the conveyor belt, I reached for my laptop.............and nothing. Check purse. Nothing. Check carry-on again. Nothing. OH. MY. GOD. WHERE WAS MY LAPTOP?!?!? OH MY GOD I LEFT IT ON THE PLANE!!! I FREAKED OUT! In a panic, I knocked over my carry-on that had a 6-inch file stuffed with scraps of recipes and food articles from the past 4 years. Papers scattered everywhere, followed by my leopard print bra, and bottles of wine and olive oil went rolling off through the metal detector. I burst into tears, mortified, and a barrage of profanity ensued that made even the cranky security guard's eyes big as saucers.

They practically carried me through security and I threw myself on the mercy of the United customer service agent, tears streaming down my face. She called the gate that I arrived in, gave them my seat number, and asked them to check my seat for the laptop. She then told me I had to wait a half hour. A HALF HOUR?! I’ll have committed hari-kari by then. She tried to reassure me but there was no comforting to be had. I asked her to call the United business lounge in San Francisco airport. I knew I didn’t leave it there but I had to do *something*. I just couldn’t sit around and WAIT. The amount of patience I have on a good day would fit in a thimble and today, well fugetaboutit. But wait I did as there was nothing left I could do other than get arrested or committed which wasn’t far off.

About 20 minutes later the customer service rep motioned me over to the desk. I bolted over. She told me they found the laptop and that I had to go back to Terminal 3 to get it. Heck, I would have gone back to San Francisco’s Terminal 3 to get it, I was so elated. At the United Customer Service desk in Terminal 3, the agent kept telling me over and over how lucky I was, how most people never get their laptops back, blah blah blah. Did I need to hear this? NO! Just give me my damn laptop and let me get a cocktail!

So why all this drama over a laptop that crashed, you ask? Well, this isn’t my laptop that crashed. It isn’t my laptop at all. It is a loaner laptop that a software company I am consulting to loaned me until I could get mine fixed and it took no less than 4 days and 38 emails back and forth between the SVP Marketing and the CFO. I was finally granted permission to leave the premises with a laptop after the SVP Marketing personally vouched for me as well as the VC partner that funded them! So can you IMAGINE if I had to go back and tell them that I LOST their new laptop?! I would have rather died....hence the melt down in the security line. That and the fact that I slept a total of about 8 minutes on the 11-hour flight and in the previous 24 hours. I tried to take a sleeping pill but it fell on the floor and I couldn't find it so I knew right then it was going to be a l-o-n-g flight.

In case you picked up on the word 'consulting' as opposed to 'cooking', I am sacrificing myself to the hi-tech gods to finance my culinary career that has cooled quicker than crème fraîche. I naively thought I could live on minimum wage and while my life is far from extravagant (other than the city I happen to live in) and I sure as the devil don’t shop like I used to, actually I really don’t shop at all other than for new silicon molds, cookbooks, cooking magazines or various and sundry other kitchen gadgets, but there is no way I can live on minimum wage again.

Actually that’s not true. If I had to, I could do it and I did do it. On less actually. I lived on 8 euros a day including phone and subway my first few months in France but to have and to want are two diametrically opposed forces and, had I moved to New York as planned, would have had to share an apartment in the Bronx with 8 people. Fine at 20. Unacceptable at 40. I’m just too old to live like I’m back in college nor do I want to. By the grace of God I didn’t have to as The Man called me over the holidays and offered me a consulting project that I couldn’t refuse.

So every morning I thank the Good Lord for providing me with such abundance, put a smile on my face, and remind myself that this is, as my friend Christine says, just a seat in a game of musical chairs and once in a while we just have to sit down. So cooking is relegated to evenings and weekends for now until my pocketbook can once again bare the burden of a culinary salary or no salary at all as is most often the case in this métier (profession).

The moral of this story? Aesop would have a field day with me here..... Well there are a few. 1. Don’t leave your laptop on a plane. duh. 2. Back up your computer at least once a month. duh. And 3. if you plan on doing the quixotic and leave your steady, well-paying job for a life of culinary adventure, have at least 3 years of saving stashed away unless of your course you can move back into your old room at the folks, or have a friend with a 6,000 square foot house with a wing of guest rooms or are 20 years old and can live with 8 people in the Bronx.

After I retrieved the loaner laptop, I trekked back to Terminal 1, went through security again (they saw me coming and cleared a path to my friends at the conveyor belt scanner who I could tell were ready to alert security should I have another melt down) and high-tailed it to the BMI business lounge where I poured myself a big fat martini straight up extra dry and chased it with 2 beers. Cheers!