Recipe: A Good Breakfast

So today, I woke up rather late, saw that my fridge was full of good ingredients. I made breakfast, which I usually don't do.

Nothing complicated, just scrambled eggs, a simple arugula salad, and bacon, with toasted sourdough bread.

The result: Nothing's better than having a slow Monday Morning: watching World Cup and eating comfort food.

A Good Breakfast:

Scrambled Eggs:

Ingredients:

2 eggs

1 tablespoon of European Butter

1/2 tablespoon Creme Fraiche (optional)

Generous portion of freshly ground pepper

Directions:

Break eggs into a small frying pan or small pot and add butter. Stir over medium heat until eggs clump. Do not stop stirring, or else eggs will heat too quickly and will harden to a rather rubbery consistency. If available, add a 1/2 tablespoon of Creme Fraiche. The Creme Fraiche will make the consistency of the eggs much smoother, and more mild. Season with salt and a generous amount of freshly ground black pepper.

Arugula Salad:

Ingredients:

Handful of Arugula

1 tablespoon of good extra virgin olive oil

1 tablespoon lemon juice

Salt and pepper to season

Directions:

In a small bowl, whisk olive oil and lemon juice together until combined. Add seasoning. Taste and adjust if needed.

Combine arugula with dressing, until each arugula sprig is coated evenly with dressing.

Cooked Bacon:

Ingredients:

Good Bacon (Not the crappy cheap mass produced kind, make sure you buy bacon with no artificial smoke flavors or no preservatives)

Directions:

Set flame to medium low. Add bacon to pan. Make sure that when placing bacon on the pan, bacon does not overlap with other strips of bacon.

When bacon fat begins to render off and one side starts to change color to a gold brown, flip bacon. Don't be hesitant to continually flip bacon. By frequently flipping bacon, you will be able to tell whether or not its burning on the other side.

The puddle of fat in which the bacon is cooking in, is truly a flavor element, and SHOULD NOT BE POURED OFF THE PAN. The rendered fat that the bacon is cooking in makes the bacon taste delicious.

When the bacon grease starts to show some white bubbles of fat, the bacon is just about ready. take it off the pan, and pat it dry with paper towels.

Recipe: Blackberry Slump

So I was reading through Saveur Magazine, and I came across this picture of a "Blackberry Slump" that looked so fricken good, I had to make it the next day.

A Slump is similar to a cobbler with more of a cake consistency.

Before the bad boys are covered in crumble topping

Before going into the oven.

I made some Vanilla Ice Cream the night before, and I ate it together with the Blackberry Slump.

Mixing together the hot slump with the ice cream was the bomb.

The Result: Superb dessert. The cake part of the Slump was extremely moist and rather decadent. The combination of the crumbled top with the blackberries was a superb match. What made the dessert special was the combination of the hot slump with the cold vanilla ice cream. Mixing the two together created a flavor amalgam that was truly special.

BlackBerry Slump

Ingredients:

(makes 8 servings)

2 1/4 cups flour

1 1/2 cups sugar

2 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into 1/2" cubes, chilled, plus 8 tablespoons melted and more for greasing.

1/2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoons kosher salt

1/2 cup dry white wine

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 eggs

1 pound fresh blackberries

Vanilla Ice Cream (see Good Ol' Vanilla Ice Cream Recipe from March)

To make crumb topping, combine 1/4 cup flour, 1/4 cup sugar and 2 tablespoons of chilled and cubed butter in the bowl of a food processor and process until mixture takes on texture of coarse bread crumbs, about 10 seconds. Refrigerate for about 30 minutes.

Heat oven to 350 degrees. Grease eight 6 oz. ramekins with butter and dust with flour; set aside

In a medium bowl, whisk remaining flour, baking powder, and salt; set aside.

In a large measuring cup, whisk together melted butter and wine, and set aside

In a larger bowl, whisk together remaining sugar, vanilla, and eggs until pale and thick, about 2 minutes. Add wine mixture to eggs and whisk until smooth. Add flour mixture, mix until just combined.

Divide batter between ramekins and top each with berries. Sprinkled crumb topping evenly over berries. Put ramekins on a baking sheet and bake until golden brown and bubbly, about 1 hour. Transfer to a rack and let cool for about 15 minutes. Serve with scoops of ice cream on top.

Damage done.

Recipe: Japanese Fluke Crudo

Crudo is a raw fish dish dressed in olive oil, sea salt, and citrus juice.

I just picked out some Japanese Fluke from the Japanese Supermarket. Any fresh sashimi grade fish can be substituted for this recipe.

Using a sashimi/sushi knife is the best way to go with cutting raw fish. If you don't have a sashimi knife, use a fish knife or any knife with an extremely sharp edge with a blade much skinnier than your average chefs knife.

For crudo, the better the olive oil, the better the dish will taste. I use Stonehouse Olive Oil, which is an extremely flavorful olive oil that is much more aromatic than your average olive oil. Use extra virgin at least.

Maldon sea salt is your best bet for the best quality sea salt you can buy. Texturally and flavor wise, its one of the best out there. Using normal sea salt works for this recipe as well, but once again, better ingredients make better food.

The crudo

Topped with some chopped shiso leaves with a bit more olive oil and several drops of balsamic vinegar (oops I spilled a little)

The Result: Your classic crudo flavor, with a bit of liveliness and earthiness from the shiso leaves. The fluke had great texture and the flavor combination of the lemon, salt, and olive oil was outstanding. The shiso leaves truly gave a surprising sharp earthiness that helped elevate this dish to a whole new level.

Ingredients:

Red Snapper, or any white fish that is sashimi grade

About 4 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil

Pinch of Maldon Sea Salt, or any high grade sea salt

Generous squeeze of lemon juice

Shiso Leaves (optional) for garnish

Couple drops of Balsamic Vinegar for garnish

Cut sashimi grade fish diagonally at about a 40 degree angle, cutting them at about 1/4 inch thick. When cutting, use only one stroke of the knife to cut through the fish. Repeat.

In a mixing bowl, combine olive oil with lemon. Add fish, and mix gently until every piece of fish is coated with olive oil mixture.

Add sea salt. If using Maldon Sea Salt, crush salt particles finely with fingers before adding to the fish. Taste test, and make adjustments if necessary.

Chop shiso leaves finely, and place in the center of the fish.

Dress with more olive oil and some balsamic vinegar.