Os à moelle grillés: Marrow bones

On Rue Dauguerre last fall, the night the Beaujolais Nouveau was released, I sat at the banquette at Le Plan B, next to a well dressed gentleman who was diving into a plate of marrow bones. Cross cut ones, like in the picture below. With a tiny spoon. Very much enjoying himself.  

Julia has a recipe of sorts for marrow bones (MAFCI p. 19), but it's for poaching them quickly to get the marrow for sauces, like sauce Bordelaise. (You can pull the marrow from stewing bones for this as well, like Osso Bucco.)

The fleur de sel is crucial. I got some when I was in La Rochelle--raked from the Atlantic salt flats nearby (and very expensive, for salt). When J first had it, she was skeptical, but one taste and she became a believer.   

You can either split the bones length-wise or crosswise. But because I buy dog bones at Fareway, they are always cross-wise. And they are not as long as I would like. The longer they are, the longer they take to roast. 

There's a great video of the master, Fergus Henderson, roasting them at Saint John's Bread and Wine. I ate there a couple of times when I was in London, but never had the marrow bones. Next time. J bought me his classic cookbook, The Whole Beast: Nose to Tail Eating some years ago. Often she does not much like the offal/abats, but she lapped up the marrow bones. And then it occurred to me: She's a rancher's daughter.

This photo of Le plan B is courtesy of TripAdvisor

Serves two as a first course

Preheat oven to 450º

• 8 beef shank bones cut crosswise, 2 to 3 inches. Or two bones cut lengthwise, 6 to 8 inches long
• fleur de sel
• pepper from a mill
• toast made from good French bread
• Parsley
  
  
  1. Put the bones in a half sheet pan and roast. Begin checking in 15 minutes until a paring knife inserted penetrates easily. Don't overcook or the marrow will melt away. 
  2. Serve with fleur de sel, pepper in a mill, and slices of grilled bread garnished with a chiffonade of parsley.

This photo of Le plan B is courtesy of TripAdvisor

Sauteed liver: Abats 101

There are all kinds of 'abats'--organ meats. (French for slaughterhouse is abattoir.) But liver is the easiest and fastest and healthiest and, well, easiest to take for many people.

Julia has liver exactly right when she says it "cooks hardly more than a minute on each side. Overcooked liver is gray, dry, and disappointing—perfectly sautéed, it is a rosy pink when you cut into it."

The photo shows pork liver, my favorite, cut by the Meat Lab into lamelles, a little thicker than the usual. So it took about two minutes a side.

A lot of paper towels or newspaper will help--to blot the liver and dredge it. If you put it on the counter it makes a huge mess.

• 4 slices (about 1 pound) calf's or pork liver sliced about ½ inch thick
• Salt and freshly ground pepper
• ½ cup or more seasoned breadcrumbs or flour in a plate
• 3 tablespoons butter and olive oil combined, or clarified butter

1. Heat the butter and/or oil over high heat. Season the liver on one side with salt and pepper.
2. Dredge the liver in the bread crumbs or flour. Knock the excess of each slice and put each in the skillet.
3. Cook about a minute on each side, or until it's springy to the touch, golden on the outside and pink on the inside (poke and peek until you can feel the doneness). Be sure to remove the slices in the same order you placed them, so they cook evenly.

Julia has some nice variations. But the best for me is the simplest: plain with Dijon mustard. But it takes only a couple of minutes to chop a bit of that precooked bacon that's always in the frig, adding some scallion and stock or wine and mustard to the drippings to make a sauce (which thicken quickly with the crumbs or flour).

Timbales de foies de volaille -- Chicken liver custards

This is very much a Ladies Who Lunch kind of thing. 1950s hats and white gloves. I love it. Definitely a Madmen thing. But then MAFC is really an early 60s thing: published in 1961 (vol. 1 p. 174).

It reminds me of when we went to this time warp French restaurant in midtown Manhattan called Le Périgord a couple of years ago, with my daughter-in-law. Founded in 1964, it looked like it had the original carpet and the original waiters. I loved the dessert cart, with classics never seen today, like floating island. The fixed price lunch menu had a dish very much like this one.

Just rich enough to whet the appetite yet light; easy to make; stays warm well; inexpensive ingredients; elegant presentation. And less than 10 minutes into the oven. It also has a million variations, with (and I quote from Julia, p. 174) "ham, turkey, chicken, sweetbreads, salmon, lobster, crab, scallops, mushrooms, asparagus tips, or spinach."

Serves 4 as a first course

Preheat oven to 350º

1 tablespoon butter
1 tablespoon flour
1/2 cup boiling milk
1 cup chicken livers, pressed down (about 8 ounces)
2 eggs
3 tablespoons heavy cream or crème fraiche
1 tablespoon port, Madeira, cognac, sherry, etc.
cooking spray

1. Heat water in a kettle
2. In a small saucepan, make a béchamel sauce by melting together the butter and the flour, stirring until they foam, without coloring, about 2 minutes. Off heat, beat in the milk and seasoning. 
3. In a food processor or blender on high, puree the livers, eggs, and seasoning for 30 seconds.
4. Add the béchamel sauce, the cream, and the wine and blend for 15 seconds.
5. Spray four 1/2 cup ramekins and place them in a skillet or baking pan. Divide the mixture into them and pour boiling water around them, so it comes at least half way up the sides of the ramekins.
6. Place in the oven for 25 minutes or until a needle or knife comes out clean and the timbales have just begun to shrink from the ramekins. 
7. Run a knife around the edge of each ramekin to loosen the timbale. Invert a serving plate over each and invert to unmold. 
8. Garnish with one of the sauces below. 

• Coulis de tomate: The sauce in the pic is a simplified coulis consisting of summer tomatoes cored, seeded (not peeled) then food processed and frozen. 
• Sauce Aurore: Double the amount of béchamel (step 2) and reserve half of it. Add 1 tablespoon tomato puree or tomato paste, and optional chopped fresh herbs. (MAFC I p. 62)
• Sauce Madère ou Porto: Add 1 tablespoon Madeira or port to 1/2 cup demi glace, brown sauce, or leftover sauce from braised meats (MAFC I p. 75)
• Sauce Estragon: Stir one tablespoon chopped tarragon into 1/2 cup bdemi glace, brown sauce, or leftover sauce from braised meats (MAFC I p. 75). Off heat and just before serving, beat in 1/2 tablespoon butter.

Stephen Yang for The Wall Street Journal

Lamb neck, Collier d'agneau.: La clapassade d'agneau sauce grisette

Reglisse is licorice. Yes, I know this is a bit bizarre, but read on. I was in Paris a few years ago eating with my dear colleague Tiane at an art nouveau restaurant called Le Bouillon Racine on the Left Bank near the Sorbonne (Rue Racine). It opened over a hundred years ago to serve working class and petit bourgeoisie a lovely meal in a elegant setting for a good price, so the food was mostly soups and braises--the first fast food, in a way. The place was a cafeteria for Sorbonne professors for many years, but rather recently reopened in restored fin de siecle glory, green and glass.

I was intrigued by the souris d'agneau a la reglisse. Literally mouse of lamb with licorice. The "mouse" is a small shank, which resembles a rodent in shape and, well, color. I had to try it, and it was delicious, with a hint of sweetness I sometimes like in lamb (think mint sauce) and that amazing licorice flavor.

Then just last week I heard a program about a new dish of lamb and licorice, this time using the neck or "collier." It was on Carnet Nomade, one of my favorites on France Culture radio, a program about the city of Montpellier having had a competition to choose a dish that would (in the best french sense of Le Marketing) be the city's culinary signature, as cassoulet is for Toulouse or brandade is for Nimes. They called the dish (before it was even chosen) La Clapassade (which means something like 'cup of stones'). The winner: A student of linguistics from Quebec, Michel Otel, who made it from signature products of Herault province, including a licorice candy called grisettes. I had to try it (I stayed last year in Montpellier for a few days with a professor of linguistics from the university. Fate.)

But where to find suitable licorice? They don't just melt in the black ropes we eat here. They use licorice root, which apparently french children used to (still do?) eat in sticks, which look like bark, and which you can simply drop into the braise (see the video below of the creator of the dish preparing it). Fortunately, our amazing Wheatsfield coop has an "herbal" section that included licorice root, though it was chopped, so I had to wrap it in cheesecloth before adding it.

Oh, and of course where to find lamb neck! The answer is, as so often, the ISU Meat Lab. They have it in slices about an inch thick. The French apparently will bone the neck for a large braising piece, or cut the meat off the bones. But simpler is faster. And I guess you can substitute another fatty, bony cut, like breast of lamb (Denver ribs or lamb ribs) or, as in Paris, shank.

J and I think this is a winner. And it's definitely 10 minutes or less active time, though divided into two, five minute segments, about eight hours apart. As with most braises, this is even better warmed up the next day. And the leftover sauce is amazing on, well, leftovers. But if you pour this over rice or noodles or polenta, you'll have little sauce left, it's so good.

Serves 2-4

3 pounds lamb neck slices, bone in (four slices about 1 inch thick)
1 packet dry french onion soup mix (I use Knorr)
1 cup dry white wine
1 cup chicken stock (homemade if possible. See this blog)
1 ounce licorice root, tied in cheesecloth
2 tablespoons honey
1/2 teaspoon Kitchen Magic (optional)
4 small carrots, peeled (optional)
2 small parsnips, peeled and halved (optional)
5 sprigs thyme (optional) OR lemon or lime zest (optional)
Green olives (optional)
2 tablespoons Wondra

1. In a slow cooker, place the lamb neck slices, the soup mix, wine, stock, licorice root bag, and honey.
   
2. Stir in the optional Kitchen Magic and top with the optional carrots and parsnips, and one sprig of thyme.
3. Cook on low for about 8 hours.
4. In a small saucepan, stir together the Wondra a two tablesoons of water, white wine, or stock.
   
5. Using a strainer, carefully pour the liquid from the slow cooker into a gravy separator (which I didn't do for the pic above :-(). Wait 15 seconds, then pour the stock into the saucepan and place over high heat, stirring, until thickend slightly. About one minute. Correct the seasoning.
6. Using a spatula, carefully place one or two lamb slices on each plate (they are fall-apart tender). Arrange the optional carrots and parsnips. Pour sauce around and garnish with thyme sprigs, zest, or green olives. Pass the extra sauce or reserve for another use (delicious on leftovers).