Stout Hearted (or Guinness Record)

St. Patrick's Day was supposed to be a night where I made a quasi-Irish themed dinner that we've been planning for a while. Instead, after a brief visit to the doctor in the morning, it turned into me being in incredible pain and spending most of the day wandering around the apartment, unable to sit or lie down. Finally I ended the evening with a heating pad on my back eating Chinese take out with Jen on the couch.

It was the saddest fake holiday since Jen and I spent a Valentine's Day in New York city eating take out from the "Cooganelli's" Italian menu from our local Irish pub and watching a special on Russian mail order brides.



Tonight started off with the use of the leftover colcannon and batter from the cheddar potato batter I used for the asparagus potato tart from last weekend's St. Patrick's Day festivities.

I combined the two (in some proportion) and added some panko along with a little extra shredded Irish cheddar. Then I formed them into little balls, covered them in panko, pan-fried them, and finished them in the oven.

I served them over some red kale which I tossed with olive oil, sauerkraut, and pickled beets.



With dinner I had a Smithwick's. I'd purchased this as to remain authentic but as with the Harp and the Guinness I think I just don't like Irish beer. At least I don't like the Irish beer that makes its way to our shores. I'm sure there's plenty of good stuff over there in Ireland but all three of these certainly leave me wanting more. Well, more of something else.



For the main course I made this pot pie with beef, Guinness, and cheddar based on Jamie Oliver's recipe. Jen has been wanting to make/eat this for a while now so tonight was the night!

I didn't really change much except that I didn't pay any attention to the quantities and I did add some peas at the very end, right before forming the pie. Basically it's a simple beef stew with cheddar cheese incorporated into it and baked with puff pastry dough.



For a side dish I made beer-braised cabbage with Guinness. I stewed some garlic, onion, and cabbage with butter then added the cabbage, Guinness, mustard powder, Worchestershire sauce, and a little brown sugar, salt, and pepper.



For dessert I used up another bottle of Guinness by making these Guinness chocolate brownies. I used a basic brownie recipe and added Guinness Extra Stout to it. While they were still warm I scooped up some vanilla ice cream to serve on top.

But that wasn't the only dessert.



After talking the other day I determined that I haven't had an Irish car bomb in over ten years. I also determined that that was a very good thing. I think even then I had done it out of duress. While I enjoy many different foods and beverages I've never been a fan of any beverage that forces you to chug. This is probably why I'm not a big fan of doing shots.

The same thing makes me cringe at the idea of food-eating contests. Even thinking about one of those hot dog eating contests makes me feel like I'm going to gag. I don't even have to watch it. I just imagine that skinny Japanese guy and those bulky Americans sitting at that table in front of mounds of hot dogs and not only does it make me feel physically ill but it makes me think that maybe I'll never eat food again.

My memory of my last (and first) Irish car bomb was that it was actually pretty tasty. So it was that I determined I would make Irish car bombs but I would sip mine slowly. Seeing it is so sweet from the Bailey's Irish Cream it would make a nice after dinner drink to accompany the brownies.

Jen reminded me that the Bailey's would curdle quickly (hence the reason this is meant to be guzzled in one gulp). That's why I elected to pour myself a tiny amount of Guinness, Bailey's, and Jameson which I would rotate through slowly over the course of forty-five minutes.

Jen did hers the natural way and ended up with a curdled mess toward the end. Just watching her suffer through it reminded me of why I had no desire to do such a thing. The whole thing just looked like a chore.

Except, unlike most chores, when you are finished you are seized with the urge to go: "Whooooooo!"

Black & Tan Success and Premature Reubens

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I've read the tutorials. I've studied the instructional videos. I've rolled my eyes at everyone's rigid, unbending opinions of how it must be done. So, tonight I was ready, again, to try to make a black and tan.

Again.

My previous efforts with Guinness Extra Stout hadn't worked so I reverted to the regular Guinness Draught. I did use the one out of the bottle and a lot of the tutorials have claimed that the only real way to do it is by using the Guinness out of the can.

If there's one thing I like to ignore it's the rigid opinions of food "experts" on the internet.



Success! After many tries I was able to achieve a decent Black and Tan! I guess technically it should be called a Half and Half but I don't care. The dark beer floated on top of the light beer.

I'm the best!



Tonight I broke St. Patrick's Day convention by doing the unthinkable. That's right, making Reubens on March 16th! Since we'd cooked up a bunch of corned beef over the weekend it was time to enjoy our favorite day after St. Patrick's Day dinner the night before the actual holiday. We do, however, realize that this means we have to come up with something else "Irish" for tomorrow so that we can put this week of pseudo-Irish eating to an end.

Jen declared these Reubens the "best ever" which is pretty high praise. There was something quite good about them but I can't really figure out exactly what it was. The sauce was simply mayonnaise, ketchup, Dijon mustard, and hot sauce. I did use half Irish cheddar because I didn't have enough Swiss for the entire sandwiches. Maybe that brought them to the next level.

At any rate, our week of "Irish" cooking is about to draw to a close. Who knows what wonders will await us!

One thing is for sure: I bet none of it will be authentic.

St. Patrick: The Patron Saint of Beverage Failure

I figured that I have all week to try to master the art of the Black & Tan so tonight I took another stab at it. I actually spent a good amount of time yesterday reading about techniques and watching a few instructional videos on how to properly make this drink. After doing all this I went to my workshop and crafted my secret weapon:



What I crafted was this: a bent spoon. With this I would be able to dip lower into the glass and catch the Guinness closer to the point of impact. In my research I discovered an intense and angry debate on which beer was the best to pair with the Guinness: Harp or Bass. I don't really care for either of these beers and in order to piss both sides of I chose to use Smithwick's.

The result, after all of this research and creation of special instruments was . . .



. . . a disaster. Well, I've got four more nights this week to have some more tries at it. Part of it, I realized, was that I was using the Guinness Extra Stout so I'm going to attempt it again with the Guinness Draught and see if I can achieve better results. I certainly can't achieve results any poorer.



The actual preparation of dinner tonight literally took fewer than five minutes. I purchased a frozen pie shell on my way home, got home, threw all the leftovers from our weekend get together into the pie shell, tossed it into the oven, then left to go pick Jen up from the train station.

When I got back I turned the oven back on and finished it. In the pie was the chopped up remaining corned beef, bangers, potato, cabbage, onion, and carrots. Then I poured with the remaining potato-egg-cream mixture from the asparagus tart and topped it with some shredded Irish cheddar. I had intended to do this in filo dough but I only had give minutes and this was the best I could manage.

On the side I tossed some mixed greens with lemon, olive oil, and the remaining Cashel blue cheese.

It ended up coming out really well. It was kind of an odd dinner but given the time allotment it was passable. This was one of the few nights where it's taken longer to write the blog entry than to cook dinner!

30 minute meals? Pfft! I've got 5 minute meals and that's without a crew of minions doing all my grunt work. Take that, Rachael Ray!

St. Patrick's Day: The Prequel

This year we decided that there were too many traditional St. Patrick's Day dishes that we wanted to make and they couldn't all be contained in just one day. We knew that in order to enjoy all of these foods we would have to get started early.

When I say traditional I am, of course, referring to tradition in the United States. I don't know anything about authentic Irish cooking. I'm pretty sure it involves a lot of potatoes. Other than that I'm shamefully ignorant of what goes on on that island.

Ireland is an island, right?



Yesterday we had a few folks over and Jen fulfilled her normal role in doing all the baking and dessert making for the get together. This is her formed soda bread before she popped it into the oven. Sadly I was not clever enough to get a picture of it after it was baked. I was also not bright enough to get a picture of the Seaside Cheddar, Cotswald (not Irish, I know), or the Cashel Blue. Just imagine, if you will, some fantastic-looking soda bread (two varieties) cheeses, and a plate full of Kerrygold butter. Can you picture it? There. Isn't it spectacular?



Today, we spent the day at Stone Barns making no purchases and annoying farm animals as I tried to work on my skills utilizing the aperture setting thanks to the long-awaited Mostly Photo show. I'd say now my photography skills have increased to 13 (out of a possible 1,000).

Tonight we feasted on leftovers from last night's kick off to National (American) Irish Week 2011^*!

^*Trademark jenandnate.blgospot.com.



I made this asparagus potato tart with filo dough. It was based on a recipe by Jamie Oliver. Basically I brushed 5-layers of filo with butter and put them on a cookie sheet. Then I boiled some potatoes, mashed them together with some shredded Tipperary cheddar, eggs, nutmeg, cream, salt, and pepper. I put the mashed potato mixed and topped with some lightly steamed asparagus, topped with olive oil and baked in the oven.

Since it was based on Jamie Oliver's recipe it turned out like proper bloke's right proper quiche. Best mates.

I served it with some mixed greens tossed in lemon, olive oil, salt, and pepper. Jen thought there was too much lemon. I thought it was a nice compliment to the asparagus. I find it unusual that someone who has never had a drink of water that she did not squeeze some sort of citrus into is so sensitive to the same juice in her salads.



The main course was boiled corned beef, cabbage, onion, potato, carrot, and Irish bangers. I added bangers to the mix last year and I don't think I'm ever reverting to bangerless boiled dinner again. They are a fantastic addition.



I also made a variation on colcannon but very simple and vegetarian. Essentially it was just mashed potatoes with cabbage, olive oil, and a lot of butter, salt, and pepper. I also put in some of the remaining kale in the fridge toward the end of the cooking to give it a little color.



Jen made this fantastic ice cream with some leftover brown bread from the freezer. She crumbled it up, baked it in the oven with some sugar, then made a basic custard, chilled it, and folded it into some whipped cream. She added some whiskey to the whipped cream and then crumbled up the brown bread to add it to the ice cream. It didn't require the use of an ice cream maker and came out really good. I think we will be using this technique again soon.

There were also several failed attempts to make black and tans throughout the evening. I think I'm going to use the rest of the week trying to make one properly. Given my lack of enthusiasm for the beverage this should be interesting.

I don't expect much success.

Prelude to St. Patrick's Day

Tomorrow we're doing a little early St. Patrick's Day dinner. Tonight, I decided, to do something a little lighter and more meat-free. At the store I picked up a few items to make a very non-Irish meal so that we wouldn't be burned out on Irish cuisine (and by that I mean fake American-Irish cuisine) before St. Patrick's Day.



I started off with a non-Irish beer, this Hairy Eyeball Ale from Lagunitas. This is maybe the most unusual tasting beer I've ever had. At 9.0% alcohol it reminded me of what gasoline might taste like. It seems like a petroleum product and doesn't even feel like it's making contact with any surface of your mouth, but rather, hovering in some sort of anti-gravitational state within.

Now, I don't want this to sound like I'm bashing this beer. I actually enjoyed it very much. I have always liked the smell of gasoline. In fact, as a young child, I was often yelled at by my father, because I liked to take the gas cap off of his pickup truck and inhale the fumes. My cousin enjoyed doing this as well and so far neither of us have died or contracted a life-threatening illness.

So far.



I got a nice piece of hake which I pan seared and finished in the oven. I served it with dinosaur kale that I wilted in a pan with olive oil, garlic, salt, and pepper. I also boiled these wee bee pee wee mixed potatoes from Arrow Farms in Chelsea, Massachusetts. I just like to say, "Wee Bee Pee Wee."

Wee Bee Pee Wee.

After the hake was roasted I removed it from the pan, added white wine, lemon juice, capers, and a pat of butter than I poured over the top.

And with that simple white fish dinner it's time to let the early Saint Patrick's Day feasting begin. Be prepared for an onslaught of bastardized (and completely invented) Irish dishes!

Be warned: there will be no green beer.