Marc's folks recently were in town for a long weekend, which again gave me the opportunity to experiment with some non-Marc friendly foods. When it's just the two of us, it doesn't make a ton of sense to try out recipes that have ingredients that Marc wouldn't normally be excited about. Once we move up to 4 people, the game changes a bit.
The weather wasn't super warm that weekend and I was in the mood to make a soup of some kind. I found Tyler Florence's French Onion Soup recipe from one of my cookbooks – Tyler's Ultimate, and thought that would be a good place to start. After looking over the ingredients, I decided to change it up a bit by sautéing some pancetta along with the garlic and onions. It ended being a good call and everyone liked it. What was also excellent was that since Walla Walla onions were in season, I was able to get the sweetness of those onions to compliment the smokiness of the pancetta. We also had some tarragon growing in the back, so I threw in some of that. No idea how it was going to turn out, but it ended up being a really nice way to start off the meal.
I also was able to make some seafood (yeah!) so since salmon is still very much in season, I decided to make one of my favorite recipes with a twist. Like Marc, his parents do not like mushrooms and this favorite recipe of mine is very 'funghi-intensive.' So instead of 'Seared Salmon with Roasted Corn and Shitake Mushrooms' which is from Danny Meyer and Michael Romano's Union Square Café Cookbook, I substituted lentils for the mushrooms to see how it would work out. The lentils I purchased ended up not needing an extensive pre-soaking before cooking so that made things easier. Basically I just cooked the lentils 75% of the way and then threw them in with the corn. And shockingly enough, Marc really liked the dish with the lentils! Score! Of course, I did substitute Walla Wallas for red onions. I know, I have a problem. I love these things.
Finally I was thinking about making the Tyler's Ultimate Spinach Salad that I am a huge fan of, but opted to go in a completely different direction. I broke out Tom Colicchio's Craft of Cooking book, which I had not used in a long time, to make Chickpea Salad as a starter. Since we had that surplus of tarragon growing out back, I opted to throw in some along with the rosemary and thyme. Even though there were a fair amount of ingredients, it was actually pretty easy to make. Normally chickpeas need to be soaked overnight but again, the internet saved the day with this quick soak method (read 1st paragraph of this recipe).
Of course, we drank some great wine from Chateau St. Jean, Gary Farrell and Bella. And you know cheese was in the equation as well as some chocolate peppermint pot-de-cremes (taken from the chocolate peppermint tart recipe here).
Switching gears, I also wrapped up The Nine by Jeffrey Toobin. Compelling read regardless of your political leanings; to me, the most interesting part came when both Sandra Day O'Connor and William Rehnquist were contemplating retirement and what went on behind the scenes.