We took on the challenge of cooking the beast, beef brisket to be exact.
The girls didn't waiver. Everyone jumped in to help. We had a Padma Lakshmi recipe of beef brisket with bacon and red wine. This recipe was a long slow braise. I started it earlier in the day. Our brisket was very good and very tender. My lovely apprentices did a wonderful job in the kitchen. All very eager to learn and many great questions were asked.
I have to say when you have been cooking a long time, you will have moments when you look back and see what you would have done differently. Maybe this is just the perfectionist in me but I see things in hind sight that I should have caught before hand.
The pan that I braised in should have been larger. The size of your pan is crucial when cooking. You would be amazed at this. Having taught cooking classes. My students were always amazed even baking cookies, if you crowd them on the pan so they touch when finished baking, they will not bake off as well.
You may remember a line from the movie, "Cooking with Julia" where she discovers cooking mushrooms or chicken?? in a pan without crowding it and the benefits of proper browning and what it brought to the sauce later. (or you may not remember this remote detail:-) from a random foodie movie) I love these kind of details in movies. These are "Ah Ha!" moments in cooking and baking.
I wished I would have removed the lid toward the end to thicken the sauce and allowed the hot air to make a glaze on the meat. Looking back I would have also trussed the meat, tying the bacon in place around it so it would have been easy to turn often. Although not critical to cook the meat, it would have taken it from very good to amazing! Cooking the meat evenly, basing it in the juices and ultimately would have made a glossy sheen on the meat that would have been both beautiful and delicious.
If you have spent anytime in the kitchen you will have experiences such as the time you bake the most amazing pan of cookies, cooked to perfection, golden brown buttery goodness and then in the next blink you will turn around and burn the next batch to a crisp resembling lumps of coal. This is all par for the course and completely normal. This reminds me of the fact that, as with most things in life, so much is held in the details. Tiny little details make or break us.
(sorry for speaking of cookies twice- I must have cookies on the brain today)
Our last cooking class was held the day after Father's Day. (which we had hosted the whole family at our home that day) so I think back in retrospect I should have waited a week for this class for myself to be re energized and ready to go, on my game. As important as great cuts of meat, garden fresh veg and extra virgin olive oil and etc. are to recipes there is one other main, crucial, more-important-than-anything ingredient that is absolutely, most definitely necessary for success: This ingredient is passion! You have to have a passion to make something amazing, go the extra mile. Passion takes energy, not just knowledge and commitment. Passion takes you through to the final details and carries you to the end. It will make success in your endeavors and this will cause delight, not frustration to your time spent creating delicious foods
All this to say...we will live to braise another day. And we will all braise well.
I love all you girls and can't wait to cook with you again.
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