Fall endives

Can you feel the air getting a bit cooler ? Can you see all the kids going back to school and the haloween supplies invading the shelves ? There's no mistake, the fall season is upon us once again and it's time to start rethinking the way you eat.

So should you return to soups and hot pots right away ? maybe not just yet and I have the perfect recipe for that time. Fresh enough for the summer and hinting towards a more autumnal flavor palette. I call this recipe the Fall endives.

For this recipe for 4 people you will need:

- 4 big endives
- Liquid 15% thick cream, 500ml
- Maple flavored breakfast ham, 2 big thick slices
- Fresh Italian parsley
- Goat cheese, 1 roll
- Walnuts
- Raisins
- Apple cider vinegar

First remove the endive leaves one by one and cut them in 3 or 4 pieces each, place them in a large salad bowl and sprinkle them with apple cider vinegar.

Dice the ham and cook it in a pan until it becomes light brown and release a maple aroma. Reserve it on the side for now.

Pour 500ml of cream in a saucepan, add a little bit of cut parsley (you decide the quantity), the whole goat cheese roll and put the pan over medium heat. Stir often to avoid sticking and to avoid an ugly skin to form on the cream. Once the cheese is almost melted, add the previously cooked ham and continue cooking until the cheese is completely melted. I recommend continuing to cook it for a few minutes so that the ham flavor spreads in the cream.

When you are satisfied with the mix, pour it directly over the endives. Add walnuts and raisins as much as you like.

Et voila, the hot mix entering in contact with the crunchy fresh endives is delicious and makes for a perfect inter season dish.

If you want to be adventurous, replace the goat cheese with blue cheese. I would usually recommend Roquefort, but it's an expensive cheese to be melted, so you can go with Bleu De Bresse or even the other brands. If you like to use local foods, you can replace raisins with dried cranberries.

DIG IN

World's 50 most delicious foods.

Ok check this link out...
http://www.cnngo.com/explorations/eat/worlds-50-most-delicious-foods-067535?page=0,0

I am sure there a million items left out of the list but I am overall pretty satisfied with it... also Tacos and Fajitas are higher than poutine and maple syrup :)

Anything you feel should have been included in the list?

Coming up...

We are currently working on our "Back to School" special... stay tuned. In the meantime please post your favorite student meals on the comments section below. We might take them and re-invent them into something you can actually serve to a grown up.

Bizarro Double Down (Poulet Charlotte)

Last week when we presented one of the recipes on the blog my friend Nick suggested making a Double Down sandwich. For those of you who don’t visit Colonel Sanders too often, this is a KFC sandwich. It consists of two chicken breasts instead of bread, bacon and “colonel sauce”. This thing was a huge scandal due to the amount of sodium, fat and calories in it yet it was also a big success in the US and in Canada where it is only available for short periods of time.

Pierre accepted the challenge but suggested doing a healthy version of it. And we set to make it this past weekend. Now, making a healthy version of such a dirty dish is a difficult task. We also found ourselves very short on time and having to shop in a small neighborhood grocery store instead of a nice big pretentious market or grocery store. Because of this “complications” the results are not extremely healthy but they are delicious and slightly less damaging than the actual double down. Also to make it feel fancy we gave it a silly name “Poulet Charlotte”. Tell me you can’t picture an extremely pretentious French waiter offering “Poulet Charlotte” as the plat du jour.

What you need

5 skinless, boneless chicken breasts. Sliced in two lengthwise.
1 cup of milk
1 cup of white flour
1 cup of dried bread crumbs
1 cup of wheat bran
2 tablespoons of roasted sesame seeds
1 tea spoon dried parsley
½ a tea spoon of espelette pepper powder
10 slices of good quality bacon
5 slices of provolone cheese
5 basil leaves, minced
5-6 eggs
2 garlic cloves, minced and crushed.
Extra virgin olive oil
Salt and pepper

How to make it

First of all you will need to set an assembly line on your counter. First put a tray with all your sliced chicken breasts on your first station. Second station is a bowl with the milk. The next station is a plate with the white flour. The 4th station is a bowl with 4 eggs, scrambled with some salt. In the next plate mix the bread crumbs, bran, sesame seeds, dried parsley, espelette pepper and some salt and pepper. Run each of the chicken halves through each of the stations so that they get completely covered in all of the ingredients. Once they are all nicely breaded put them in a baking sheet making sure you know which half matches the other. For optimum crunchiness you want to put them either in a baking rack with a drip pan underneath or some sort of baking sheet with holes in it. We used a fancy sheet that Pierre uses for pizza crust and it worked wonderfully. Brush or spray some oil on the rack / pan and also on top of the chicken breasts and throw them in the oven for 10 minutes at 375 degrees. Take them out, flip them, brush this new side with more oil and throw them in the oven for another 10 minutes. While the chicken is cooking fry the bacon a bit to get all the grease out but without it getting too crunchy (unless you are American and you like it that way). Once the bacon is done you should also make an aioli to substitute the colonel sauce. The aioli is very simple to make, put an egg yolk in a non-reactive bowl and beat the hell out of it while a very slim string of oil is being poured into the mix constantly. If you are very dexterous or you have 3 hands you can do it yourself, otherwise you should ask one of your little friends for help. In total you will probably use about a cup of oil. Once the mix has a mayonnaise like texture you are done beating and you can mix the garlic, salt and pepper and the minced basil leaves.
By now your chicken should be almost ready and your kitchen shouldn’t be on fire yet. If it is on fire please call the firefighters and do not mention our blog. So once the chicken is ready it’s the fun time to assemble the double downs. The first layer is one half of the chicken breast, then spread some aioli on it, put 2 slices of bacon, a slice of cheese, and the matching half of the chicken breast on top. If you are not as OCD as Pierre and me you may not use the matching parts of the breasts. Once your 5 “sandwiches” are assembled put them in the oven for 5 minutes on bake and 5 minutes on broil. Take them out of the oven, let them cool down a bit and… eat.

Now, as you can see there isn’t anything healthy about a sandwich with chicken instead of bread, bacon and cheese but our version has fiber, we didn't deep fry it and the bacon we used had no preservatives so Foodgang 3 KFC 0 ! Score is not up for discussion ok?

So even though this recipe is delicious like that there are a few things that can be changed. First of all my initial idea was to use cayenne pepper instead of espelette but I forgot my cayenne pepper at home. In terms of the dried breadcrumbs I would probably do ½ cup of dried bread crumbs and half a cup of panko. I was also not too happy with provolone as the cheese choice, I would have gone with a nice gruyere and Pierre suggested aged cheddar. Also you may want to spread aioli on both “slices of bread” for maximum moisture. As is the case with every recipe we post, by no means should you ever follow the recipe exactly as the best kind of cooking is experimental using the ingredients you like the most and as much as you like. That way if you don’t like the dish you know it’s your fault and not mine.

Having nothing else to say… DIG IN !

Street food controversy in Montreal - Foodgang's position

The other day, I stumbled upon an article on food trucks and street food, and if you've been watching any of the cable channels related to food, you know that food trucks are more popular than ever and are finding very interesting ways to innovate your eating experience. Here is the article:

http://www.cyberpresse.ca/vivre/cuisine/201108/15/01-4425991-cuisine-de-rue-les-partis-municipaux-divises.php?utm_categorieinterne=trafficdrivers&utm_contenuinterne=cyberpresse_vous_suggere_4425984_article_POS1

In short it says that some municipal parties are very open to the idea, while the one in power believes the restaurant offer is sufficient.

If you live in Montreal, does it feel like you're missing something ? does it feel like someone is raining on your parade and not letting you enjoy what the rest of the world is raving about ? If you're part of the Foodgang, the answer is a big YES.

My first question is why does the municipal government feel they need to control the forces of competition in the restaurant market ? Yes there are a lot of restaurants in Montreal, but there are also a lot of clients ! If anything, street food would create a new market. Let's say I'm walking in the old port at 3pm and need a snack, I will probably not stop at a sit down restaurant, thinking it's too big or expensive for the purpose, but if there is an offer for quick street food, I might go for it instead of waiting for dinner.

My second question supposes that it does have an impact on the traditional restaurant industry. If you are in any business, aren't you supposed to adapt to your clientele's demands ? Why not open a food truck branded in the colors of your eatery ? The truck and restaurant location then become mutual marketing tools feeding each other...

So what are YOUR reactions, how is it like in YOUR city ? I think it would be interesting to exchange on this topic.

Watermelon Gazpacho

A few months back Pierre and I visited this Spanish restaurant in Toronto called “Embrujo Flamenco”. I had always been intrigued by it so we finally gave it a try. The place was far beyond my expectations, all the food was delicious and the ambiance was fantastic. But the little gem that caught my attention the most was this incredibly delicious Watermelon Gazpacho. I have to admit, when I read it in the menu my first reaction was “EW”. But mainly because the idea of cold tomato soup seemed like an aberration to me and then combined with watermelon even worse. However this restaurant proved me wrong and I loved it. It came in a small glass; it was smooth, bright red, refreshing and with this extremely delicious olive oil splashed on top. After what can only be described as a bull fight in my mouth I decided to give it a try a few weeks ago and prepare my own.

Ingredients

7-10 medium sized tomatoes
2 cups of watermelon, peeled and without seeds
1 small green pepper (or half a big one really)
2 garlic cloves
½ a small onion, peeled
Worcestershire sauce
Extra virgin olive oil (Preferably Spanish)
Salt and pepper

How to make it

You should start by putting 7 tomatoes in the blender along with the green pepper, the onion and the garlic cloves. I suggest cubing the tomatoes and the pepper before putting it in the blender so that the juices provide liquid and everything blends easier. Blend the mixture well and then pass the mixture through a fine strainer and put it back in the blender along with the watermelon, a dash of Worcestershire sauce, 2 tablespoons of olive oil and some salt and pepper. Blend the mixture again and of course, try it. After this point it’s all up to you and your palate. You may want to add more tomatoes, more watermelon or anything else. I found that my gazpacho was tasting too much like watermelon and did not have enough of a kick so I added another tomato and a bit more Worcestershire sauce and blended it again and that did the trick. Just remember to strain the mix again if you add more tomatoes so that it does not get chunky. Chill the gazpacho for a couple hours in the fridge and serve it in small glasses, martini or wine glasses. Once in the glass decorate with a nice splash of olive oil and enjoy.

A note on olive oil:

Olive oil is a staple on every kitchen, we all know how delicious and nutritious it is. But the differences among the brands of olive oil available are gigantic. For my experiment I used Moli d’Oli which is incredibly good oil from olives cultivated in the Priorat county of Catalonia, Spain. Now, this oil brand will be difficult to find in North America and it is also about $25 CAD for half a litre so you may not want to go that crazy with your oil. The Priorat county is an origin denomination so if you find oil from this region you can almost be sure you struck gold. In general it is important to use good quality oil with a strong almost bitter flavour; otherwise it will be as using regular vegetable oil on your recipes. I tend to like Spanish oil the best, Italian and Greek oils are easier to find but they tend to have a very mild taste that gets lost when combined with other things. There are a couple Spanish brands that are good quality, budget friendly and widely available in Canada and the US. These two brands are Ybarra (now known as Y ) and Carbonell. Please always go with “Extra Virgin” as the difference it makes is gigantic. So go nuts, test oils and... DIG IN !

Precisions on the Basque Verrine

I recieved a request for clarification !!! Thank you for your interest :-)
So the whipped cream I used was in fact sweetened.

The beauty of that dish is the odd encounter between the bitterness of the cheese, the sweetness of the jam, the kick of the Espelette pepper and the smooth texture of the whipped cream.

The problem is that if you use unsweetened cream, it turns everything bland and ruins your effort. If you're making the whipped cream yourself at home, you can make it lightly sweetened. If you're buying it from a store, well you have to go with te amount of sugar they put in. That could be a great opportunity to learn and make your whipped cream yourself.