It is nearing that time of year – the time when the CSA box begins to deliver produce that can be creatively put to use for an entire meal. Tonight’s dinner was based nearly entirely on the CSA box, which we get from our terrific farm, Harmony Valley Farm.  The Grilled Caesar Salad with Steak and Blue Cheese was filling, flavorful, and healthy!

As I unpacked my CSA produce box this week, I realized I had the making for this immediately on hand.  The large, leafy green head of Romaine lettuce and the purple scallions were exactly what was needed for this dish.

First, the greens were grilled over our charcoal grill.  Not for long, mind you, because you don’t want the greens to wilt away to nothing.  You merely want to toss them in olive oil, garlic, salt and pepper and pop them on the grill for about 2 minutes – long enough to get nice, smokey char lines, while still maintaining most of the crispness.

Once pulled off the grill, a toss with your favorite caesar dressing, some croutions and chopped scallions makes it nearly perfect.  However, to make the dish completely perfect, we topped it off with sliced top sirloin steak, grilled to medium rare, and then we added something that sent it over the top – an Artisan Blue Cheese from Castle Rock.  Rich, creamy and pungent, this cheese also came from our CSA program, as a part of the cheese shares that we opted into this year.

And, of course, our Shiba Inu Jimbo, convinced that he was on the verge of starvation, cared only about the grilled sirloin!  (Though he thought the Blue Cheese was pretty worthy as well).

We here at Cuisine Capers know our cuts of meat. We encounter them often. So we don’t take it lightly when we announce that we’ve now named the tri-tip roast the perfect cut of grilling beef available.

But Tri-Tip?  This is not a cut that is easily found in our parts.  But fate was smiling down happily on me the other day at Jenifer Street Market in Madison.  I was gazing fondly at the meat counter, when what should appear in my line of vision but a Tri-Tip.  I scrutinized it for a moment or two, then made the plunge.

It was a mid spring’s eve, and it was a perfect night for grilling. So grill it we did. First, we through your basic spices on the roast – garlic, onion, cumin, salt, pepper…. anything you like to put on your beef works here.  It sat at room temperature for over an hour, getting ready to meet the grill.

The grill master made one side of the charcoal grill hot, while leaving the other side devoid of direct heat. The tri-tip was placed in the direct heat for about 5 minutes on one side, then flipped for about 5 more minutes on the other side. Then the beef was moved over to the other side of the grill, devoid of direct heat. The top was placed on the grill, and there it continued to cook away, until it reached approximately 125 degrees.  After resting, it was sliced into thin-to-moderately sized slices.

The end result was fabulous. Moist, tender, perfectly grill-roasted, with the most robust beef flavor imaginable, this has now entrenched itself into our repetoire as the go-to beef dish of the summer.  Served alongside a simple salad of spring greens, along with grilled spring onions and asaparagus, this made for a noteworthy spring meal.

Bolognese alla Carbonara Bucatini

I’m not too sure what to call this recipe, for it is not a traditional bolognese, and it is certainly not a traditional carbonara.  On the other hand, it combines elements of both of these dishes into a hearty, satisfying pasta fitting for Sunday dinner.

I start with a base of good quality Italian Sausage, crumbled.  Into that goes diced pancetta, onions and garlic.  This is browned, and the richness of this sauce starts right at the beginning with the addition of cream to the meat as finishes browning.  Allow the meat to absorb the cream completely.  Follow this by adding red wine and allowing the sauce to simmer.

 Add coarsely chopped tomato once the sauce begins to simmer.  The key to this sauce is that it is not a tomato sauce.  It is a sauce with tomatoes in it.  This is an important distinction, so keep it in mind as you add the tomato.  Let the sauce simmer for up to two hours, adding cream as you go to maintain desired consistancy.

The carbonara portion of the recipe comes as you being to put together the dish for serving.  In a large bowl, whisk together eggs and cream.  Add cooked, hot pasta to the egg mixture and toss thoroughly to coat the pasta.  Then add the sauce to the same bowl, tossing to complete.

Serve topped with grated parmesan cheese and chopped basil.

Orechiette with Sausage, Beans, and Mascarpone

There are few episodes of “Everyday Italian” that I watch that do not inspire me to make something… immediately.  We affectionately call Giada the “Skinny Italian Chick” around these parts.  We watch her Food Network show, get really hungry, and refuse to believe that she eats more than the mere bite or two that she savors as she cooks for the cameras.

The other day I was certain that I had had my fill of pasta for a few days.  We had been binging on Italian-like foods, and I was a bit tired of it…  until I watched the Skinny Italian Chick make her Orechiette with Sausage, Beans and Mascarpone.  I did not make the recipe as she made it.  As is usual, I borrowed heavily from it and modified it to our tastes.

1 pound orechiette pasta
2 tablespoons olive oil
1/2 pound bulk Italian sausage
1 small onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, chopped
1 can cannellini beans, drained and rinsed
1 tablespoon Oregano
1/2 cup mascarpone cheese
1/2 cup grated parmesan cheese
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil over high heat. Add the pasta and cook until tender but still firm to the bite, stirring occasionally, about 8 to 10 minutes. Drain pasta reserving 1 cup of the cooking liquid.

In a large, heavy skillet warm the olive oil over medium-high heat. Add the sausage, garlic and onions. Break up the sausage into bite-sized pieces as it browns.
Continue cooking until the sausage is golden and the onions are tender. Add the beans and oregano cook for 2 more minutes. Add the cup of pasta cooking liquid and stir, scrapping up any brown bits from the bottom of the pan. Add the mascarpone and parmesan cheese and stir until it dissolved into a light sauce. Add the salt, pepper, and hot pasta. Stir until coated and serve.

I’ve made a beef roast or two in my time.  My repertoire ranges from a quick yet elegant tenderloin to an extremely slow roasted brisket, braised in a tangy liquidy base.

This weekend I was in the mood for a slow roasted cut of beef.  Not a stringier brisket, and yet not a fattier prime rib.  I headed to the local butcher shop, Kens, in Monona, in search of the perfect cut of meat.  I found a five pound sirloin tip roast and knew that would do the job.

My idea was to roast it like a prime rib – put it in a blazingly hot oven for a short period of time to sear it, then drop it all the way down to around 225 degrees and let it go for a few hours.  In preparation, I did a little bit of searching to see who else in the blogosphere was making their roast beef in that manner.  I found Elise, who is always doing something interesting.  While the method wasn’t quite what I had in mind, she did add an element which I would not have if I had not found her entry.  She put the beef roast directly on the oven rack.

Well, ok, I could add that to the mix easily enough.

And so I pulled the roast beef out of the fridge and let it warm up at room temperature on the counter for about 45 minutes.  I turned the oven on to 500 degrees and let it heat up well in advance.

I cut slits into the roast and studded it with garlic – a trick which I have resorted to often, with good results.  Then I rubbed the roast with rosemary, Penzey’s smoky sea salt, pepper, cumin, and a Penzey’s roast beef seasoning.  It was popped into the very hot oven, which was left at 500 degrees for about 20 minutes.  I had placed a pan on the rack immediately underneath the roast to catch the drippings.  In that pan I placed beef broth, onions, and garlic.

Then I dropped the temperature to 200 degrees and let it go.  Using my temperature probe, I monitored the progress.  After about 3 hours, it began to get up to around 120 degrees.  I had planned on leaving it in for at least 4 hours, and so I turned the oven off completely, without opening the oven door.  This held the oven temperature nicely, and the roast ever so slowly inched its way up to 131 degrees.

As I estimated that my roasted root vegetables would be done shortly, I again turned the oven up high, to about 450 degrees.  The roast temperature rose to 135 degrees.  At that point I pulled it, let it sit a very short amount of time, the sliced it.  I had made a pan gravy from the drippings, broth, onions and garlic that had simmered in the drippings pan, adding some red wine as a finish.

This was perfectly done, melt in your mouth tender, with the best flavor I have ever tasted out of a beef roast, bar none.  This will be repeated, there is no question.

Served alongside roasted root veggies – turnips, potatoes, sweet potatoes and onions, with some cauliflower thrown in for good measure.

Gorgonzola has rapidly become one of our favorite cheeses. We cook with it, we eat it after dinner as a cheese course with wine or port, and we always have it on hand. Much of the reason for this is because we are fortunate enough to live close to one of the top Gorgonzola producers, Hook’s Cheese, in Mineral Point, WI. Read more about them here!

So, what did I do with my latest hunk of Hooks Gorgonzola cheese?

First, I made a Gorgonzola Buffalo Burger. Lean, grilled to perfection, then liberally topped with fresh spring greens (heavy on the arugula!), bruchetta and gorgonzola, this burger can quickly become addicting. Put the gorgonzola on the burger while it is still on the grill so that it becomes a bit oozy. You won’t regret it!

The next thing that I really like to do with gorgonzola is create a gorgonzola compound butter. It’s easy to do. You merely need to take a stick of softened butter and 3/4 of pound of slightly softened gorgonzola. Blend it in your food processor and add your ingredients of choice to the blending. For this particular butter, I added scallions and garlic. Spoon it out of the food processor and onto a sheet of saran wrap. Hand roll it into a log and put it in the refrigerator.

Penne with Grilled Beef and Arugula

And I stand by the theory that she does not eat her own cooking.

Recently, I made a dish that was inspired by one of her shows. Here’s what I did:

• Grill a sirloin steak to taste.
• Make a bunch of Penne.
• Whisk some whole grain mustard with some basalmic vinegar , olive oil, grated parmesan cheese and chopped garlic.
• Tear up some arugula and basil.
• Slice the steak into bite-sized pieces
• Toss everything in with the warm, drained pasta.

Braciole with Farfalle

It’s always a dilemma when a holiday like Valentine’s Day comes along. The desire to make a special meal is strong, but on the other hand, we make so many “special” meals routinely that it’s really hard to come up with something truly special.

We discussed it a bit, and actually came up with two possibilites – Braciole or Tenderloin stuffed with goat cheese. Both sounded good, so we decided to make two special meals this weekend. The Braciole was made on Saturday, with the tenderloin following the next day.

We served the braciole with Farfalle tossed with the tomato sauce that the meat had been roasted in. This made for a richly roasted sauce which was flavored by the meat and the bits of stuffing that had fallen out of the meat as it roasted.

Ingredients:

1 (1 1/2-pound) flank steak
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1 teaspoon onion powder
Salt and pepper to taste
1/2 cup dried Italian-style bread crumbs
1 garlic clove, minced
1 cup grated blend of Romano and Parmesan cheese
4 tablespoons olive oil
Pepper to taste
1/2 cup chopped spinach
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
1 cup dry white wine
3 1/4 cups Tomato Sauce

Lay the flank steak flat on the work surface. Pound to make it thinner and sized consistently. Sprinkle with garlic and onion powders, along with freshly grated pepper, to taste.

Mix breadcrumbs, garlic, cheese, and 2 tablespoons of olive oil together. Sprinkle the bread crumb mixture evenly over the steak to cover the top evenly. Add pepper to taste, then place chopped spinach evenly over the mixture.

Starting at 1 short end, roll up the steak as for a jelly roll to enclose the filling completely. Using butcher’s twine, tie the steak roll to secure. Sprinkle the braciole with salt and pepper.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

Heat the remaining 2 tablespoons of oil in a heavy large ovenproof skillet over medium heat. Add the braciole and cook until browned on all sides, about 8 minutes.

Add the wine to the pan and bring to a boil. Stir in the marinara sauce. Cover partially with foil and bake until the meat is almost tender, turning the braciole and basting with the sauce every 30 minutes. After 1 hour, uncover and continue baking until the meat is tender, about 30 minutes longer. The total cooking time should be about 1 1/2 hours.

Assure the puppy that the food will get done eventually, but that she may as well relax, because she’s not getting any when it does get done.

Remove the braciole from the sauce. Using a large sharp knife, cut the braciole crosswise and diagonally into 1/2-inch-thick slices. Spoon the sauce over and serve.

We’ve pretty much gotten settled down into our new house. Time to get back down to cooking!

Dinner tonight was a beef brisket. It’s a great meal to make when you want to slow cook your dinner. I brown the brisket in the pot, take it out, add onion, garlic and a bit of tomato paste to the pot, and saute until softened. Then it is just a matter of adding a touch of red wine and and some beef broth, adding the brisket to the pot, and putting it in the oven at 250 for extended hours (anywhere from 5 to 7 has worked out great).

You are left with fork tender beef, along with a nice sauce to serve up with mashed potatoes.

Beef Brisket with Parmesan Garlic Mashed Potatoes and Green Beans

PS: More pictures of the puppy, for those who care, below!

Well, it wasn’t really the first dinner we prepared in the new house, but it was the first “real” dinner we prepared. We had decided we were going to celebrate the move in style, and so we prepared a special meal, accompanied by special wines.

On the menu was a tenderloin with a red wine sauce, parmesan au gratin potatoes and buttered carrots. This was paired with at 1998 Andrus Reserve from Pine Ridge.

After dinner came the snickerdoodles and a 1994 Cockburn Vintage Port.

And Toshi the Pup, after being in a snit due to being chastised most of the day for her antics was rewarded with the leftover tenderloin and carrots. This didn’t do much to alleviate her snit, however.