Separation

Some vinaigrette's are easy and some are not. A lot of of our recipes use very few emulsifiers to bind our dressings together with the idea of keeping our flavors as pure as possible. But this often results in line cooks (and myself) breaking the vinaigrette. So we used to start over and try and re-emulsify. Thanks to cooking for engineers we saw a better way to start over. Of course using a basis from chemistry we force the separation to speed up using a zip lock bag. Hanging the bag allows for a complete separation and when the mixture is finished we cut a small whole in the bottom of the bag and allow the mixtures to drain into separate containers and then we can start anew. It is a great method for separating any liquid.This is our pomegranate vinaigrette. A constant source of frustration.

NC Snow

We've been really busy recently until we had a NC snow day. It doesn't happen often in NC but when it does it sure shuts things down, including our restaurant. I came in with our dishwasher only to work on a few things and make sure all was well. I thought I'd let the rest of you see our fantastic view from the window in our kitchen. I hope all had a happy sledding day. My children sure did!

Valentine's Day

Valentines day is right around the corner. I thought I'd post the menu.

Amuse Bouche

Dark chocolate dipped Hazelnut with Fleur de Sel

Soup

Lobster Bisque

with house made crème fraiche

Salad

Rocket ArugulaGreens,

Raspberry-Vanilla vinaigrette, sweet pickled fennel,

whipped Saint Andre cheese and toasted almonds

Appetizers

Grana Padano Crusted Asparagus

with Garland Farms Shaved Truffle

Crispy Fried NC Oysters

with bacon-tomato ragout and fresh shaved horseradish

Entrees

Chateaubriand For Two

Served with sauce Béarnaise, Roaring Forties Cream,

Sauce Bordelaise and roasted fingerling potatoes

Lavender Dusted Wild Striped Bass

with sorrel cream and braised baby spinach

Berkshire Pork Osso Bucco

Creamy Guilford County Grits, bourbon jus

and bacon-thyme Brussels Sprouts

Dessert

Banana Split For Two

Roasted and bruleed banana, banana gelato, raspberry sorbeto,

bing cherry compote, chocolate ganache and almond brittle tuile

National Truffle Fest

We are really lucky to live with in close proximity of so many farms. But we are even luckier to be 30 miles from the oldest truffle orchard in the US. Garland Farms Truffles is right down the road in Hillsborough, NC. We are featuring their truffles in our New Year's eve menu but even more exciting they have started the First Annual National Truffle Fest to take place in March of 2009. At the Biltmore of all places! And they have asked me to be one of the chefs to participate. This is a huge honor for me and I am truly thankful and excited. For those of you who love truffles, you should definetly come. The website has all the details. And please stop by and see me if you decide to check out the event.

Harissa

Right now I can't get enough of our Harissa aioli or our harissa in general. I put it on a lot of things I eat for meals. A staff favorite is our harissa aioli with our french fries. While it traditionally is very spicy, ours is not. We try not to kill our guests with heat. Anyway, I hadn't posted any recipes in a while so I hought I'd share ours. Make this at home and it will keep for a good while. you will find endless uses for it. Burgers, Chicken, fish etc.

Harissa

Piquillo pepper	150 G
Tomato Paste	100 G
Cumin	50 g
Coriander	50 g
Carraway	50 g
Crushed Red Pepper	15 G
Salt	20 G
Smoked paprika	20 G
Lime Juice	3 ea
Olive Oil	300ml

Toast cumin, coriander, and carraway. Grind in the spice grinder until powder. Grind Crushed Red pepper until powder. Place all ingredients in the food processor and puree until super smooth.

New Year's Eve 2008

I wanted to post our New Year's Eve Menu. We are offering a 4 course menu for $55 a person. Reservations are filling up some make yours' early. Feel free to contact me through the Blog with any questions.

Amuse Bouche
Beluga Caviar, Caramelized White Chocolate

First Course
Chicken and Wild Mushroom Consommé Royal
Truffled Custard and Garland Farms Shaved Truffle
Or
House Made Salmon Gravlax Salad
Arugula, Pommery Mustard, Red Onion, Dill, and Crème Fraiche

Second Course
Caprese Terrine
Overnight Tomatoes, Chapel Hill Creamery Mozzarella, Basil, and Reggio Emilia 100 Year Balsamic
Or
Scallop Coquille St. Jacques
Chantrelles and Grana Padano

Third Course
Prime Ribeye Filet Wellington
Truffled Mousse Pate, Spinach, Puff Pastry, Tellicherry Peppercorn and Brandy
Or
Atlantic Day Boat Grouper
Sweet Potato Crust, Raspberry Compote, Japanese Forbidden Rice,
Haricot Vert
Or
Pan Roasted Pheasant
Calvados, Mascarpone Polenta, Creamed Watercress
Or
Butternut Squash Ravioli
Caramelized Shallot, Sherry-Cider Broth, Beech Mushrooms and
Green Apple Reduction

Fourth Course
Chocolate and Hazelnut Tart
Mascarpone, Grand Marnier Syrup, and Candied Orange
Or
Caramelized White Chocolate and Key Lime Parfait

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!!!!!

Today is my wife's birthday. No I won't reveal how young she is but we have a pretty long running tradition. Due to my chosen profession it is hard for me to be at home on a regular basis. Especially for birthday's. So every year I cook my beautiful wife a delicious french toast breakfast. I use nice crusty bread and dry it out overnight. My french toast batter is similar to a crepe batter allowing for a slightly thicker crust. Instead of maple syrup I top it with vanilla creme anglaise and mixed berry coulis.

So HAPPY BIRTHDAY SARAH!

Long Time, No Blog

Despite a "poor economy" and an election I have been really busy. So, I haven't been posting much and I apologize. We have been working on some pretty fun stuff. A quick update our dinner menu is updated on our website so please check it out. I would have to say our pheasant is probably or best seller of the new items.

Striped bass out of Virginia is gorgeous. I am a big fan of striped bass and I pretty much always serve it skin on. We press the fish into the pan skin side down to get the best and most even crispy skin. If you really want to learn great techinique for this read The French Laundry. Here we are serving it with a blood orange sauce, slow roasted sweet potatoes and haricot vert. The blood orange sauce is a variation on Alinea's yuzu pudding. You really get a straight flavor of blood orange.
We have had a lot of success with our small plate features and we have continued running most of our specials as small plates. I think it's funny what we call small plates in America. The majority of the world eats small plates as their main course but in the States we tend to eat much larger portions. So small plates have a much different meaning here than in other countries. But I love this style of cooking. It's a lot easier to get creative and really adapt your dishes when you aren't having to load so much food on the plate.

This is another small plate salmon dish. can you tell I like seafood. This is sweet spiced salmon with pomegranate red onion marmalade and roasted root vegetables.
We usually sear our scallops at the restaurant. The caramel richness you get from a seared scallop is pretty much unsurpassed by any other seafood. But this time we strayed away from that. Mainly because duck fat is delicious. I know that may sound like an absurd comment but it is true. get some duck fat and cook just about anything with. So we opted to poach our scallops for a small plate in duck fat. We have large amounts of rendered duck fat on hand because of our duck confit. To cut to the chase: Duck fat poached scallops with black currant sauce and wilted baby arugula:
I thought it was kind of cool how the currants actually look like caviar.

Fall Menu

We have been running a lot of special items which are sooon to appear on our Fall Menu. Coq au Vin, butternut squash risotto, etc. The new menu begins this wednsday. I'll post the final version here.

Tart Tatin and the Economy

I haven't posted in a while, but we have a new dessert menu and one of the things we keep looking at is how to keep up with the fears of the economy. Se we came up with a small version of a tart tatin. I love apples in fall, I love deep rich caramel, and I love hot cinnamon. It works. Here is our petite tart tatin.