Thursday, August 22, 2013

"Damn near local"

Ask any chef and they will tell you, that given the choice, they would rather use a fresh local product over a product that has traveled thousands of miles and was picked months ago. Sometimes, however, we have a recipe we are working on that really needs a little something something that is not available at the local farmer's market such as finding olives in Central Minnesota( not gonna happen) so for this unfortunate, yet all too common, occurrence I have coined the phrase " Damn near local".

First all, my definition of local maybe different than yours but it's my blog and I am defining local as anything grown, brewed, produced, baked, raised, etc... within 150 miles from home. So yeah, a beer from Duluth could be considered local but some of my favorite cheese from eastern Wisconsin isn't.

So here is the first in the "Damn near local" series, my take on the Italian summer classic salad panzanella. Just a reminder I really don't cook with recipes so what follows is more of a guideline let your taste buds be your guide!

 Damn near local panzanella - Tuscan style bread salad 
- makes enough for about 3 people as an entree

About 1/2 loaf of old cibatta bread  - don't worry if it is hard this salad was developed to use up old bread.
3-4 very ripe tomatoes, large diced - if the tomatoes are not insanely ripe don't make this salad!
1/2 of a red onion cut into rings
take the bread and place it in a large bowl then cover it with water. Let the bread soak up enough of the water to make it soft but not so long that it turns into mush. Remove the bread and squeeze out the excess water. Tear the bread into bite sized pieces and place into a large bowl.
After the bread has been soaked and squeezed you can start adding the rest of the ingredients. Here are the local ingredients included in mine - tomatoes, red onion rings, peeled and seeded cucumbers, parsley, basil, thyme, grilled and chilled chicken breasts. I also use a locally pressed virgin sunflower oil in the vinaigrette which is very easy - equal parts oil and vinegar with some Dijon mustard.I used 2 T oil and white wine vinegar and a T of Dijon. Helpful hint - when making dressing test it on a slice of cucumber to give a taste of how it will taste on the salad -if you just test it on a spoon or *gasp* your finger, it will,should taste too tart.



After adding all the local ingredients I added a couple of ingredients that make this "damn near local" as they were from outside the 150 mile limit -  cheese and olives. The cheese I used is one of my favorites, Montamore from Sartori in Plymouth WI. The olives were Kalamata from Greece - so definitely not local.

Once you have all the ingredients in the bowl, drizzle the dressing on and toss.

So the final score of the ingredients:
bread - Clearwater MN. aprox. 20 miles
tomatoes - Sartell farmer's market - 3 miles and backyard 20 feet
onion - Big Lake MN - 20 miles
sunflower oil - Pierz MN - 30 miles
herbs - backyard 20 feet
cheese -Plymouth WI. 330 miles
kalamata olives - Greece - nowhere close
white wine vinegar - France - again not from around here but really good

so out of the 8 ingredients, 5 were from within the 150 mile limit so I think that makes this dish 
"Damn near local"!




Saturday, August 10, 2013

Duluth Minnesota - Napa of the North?

This past weekend we ventured north for our 25th anniversary and spent time in the, admittedly self -proclaimed, "Craft brew capitol of Minnesota" Duluth (The Mayor, His Honor Don Ness, called dibs).
We met up with daughter # 1, a Duluth resident, who did a commendable job acting as our concierge for the weekend.

Before I get into the details of our dining adventures, I would like to go on record as saying I believe that Duluth is in the throes of an American city renaissance. Sure it still has many of the problems that a city of 90,000 people has but long gone is the Duluth of the late 70's and early 80's that I used to visit that was a depressed mining and logging town and always seem to be grey. 
The Duluth of today has a vibrant arts scene with a young Bohemian edge to it. The Duluth of today has an explosive tourist season with festivals just about every weekend it seems. One such festival, The Tall ships, brought in an estimated 15 million tourist dollars to the city in one weekend! But then there is the Blues Fest, the Reggae Fest, and in the winter there is even Bentleyville, the largest free walk-through holiday light display in America.

As I mentioned before Duluth claims, tongue in cheek, to be the "craft beer capitol of Minnesota" at last count I believe there are 8 or 9 breweries in the Duluth - Superior area, with my favorites being Lake Superior Brewing Company, Bent Paddle Brewing Company and Fitger's Brew House, not that the others are bad, I just haven't tried them yet!

The first stop on our dining adventure was the Northern Waters Smokehaus (www.northernwaterssmokehaus.com). This place is so great                                                          
 They are a basically a smoke house that sells sandwiches, delicious, delicious sandwiches.
Among our picks were the Sitka Sushi - wild Alaskan -house cured gravlax- cucumbers, shredded veggies, pickled ginger, cilantro, chili sauce, and wasabi mayo served on a fresh hoagie.
The Cold Turkey - sage maple smoked turkey, Swiss cheese, on a stirato roll  (basically an Italian style baguette) with crayo (craisin- walnut-garlic mayo).
The Hedonist - country style liver pate with Dijon, mayo, onions, lettuce, and Cornichon pickles on a hero roll.Oh and by the way it was awesome - I didn't want it to end
Sitka Sushi

The Hedonist

The evening brought the opportunity to visit a restaurant that I had heard so many good things about and that I have wanted to try for a long time, The New Scenic Cafe ( www.sceniccafe.com ).


The New Scenic Cafe is located about 10 miles up the scenic highway 61 has been called one of the most beautiful drives in the U.S.. Andrew Zimmern called it the "American Amalfi coast" on his Travel Channel show.

As this was a celebration of our anniversary and our daughters were with us, we went all out and ordered appetizers, entrees, and desserts. I want to apologize up front for missing and some poor quality photos but I was way to busy eating to worry about pictures!

For our starters we had pan seared scallops with a spicy citrus glaze and curried blue mussels.
No disrespect to the scallops, they were cooked perfectly which is very difficult to do, but the mussels were so fricking good! They came with a sauce of red curry, cider, cream, and cilantro as well as two slices of grilled cibatta bread which is not nearly enough as you want mop all that sauce.

As great as this place is, it does not have the snootiness that you find in some top places and that is reflected on the menu as well. One of the menu sections is sandwiches and we ordered two of them.

The first was the asparagus and egg - with gruyere cheese, frisee lettuce, butter, and lemon basil aioli on grilled cibatta.
The second was the grilled chicken breast - with asparagus, brie, and lemon basil aioli on cranberry walnut bread.
grilled chicken (side view )

Our entrees included the ratatouille lasagna - halloumi cheese, eggplant, zucchini, quinoa pilaf, garlic chips and a red wine reduction

and the seared duck breast - perfectly cooked duck breast, apricot curry, strawberry, micro greens,sided by a creamy leek and spinach tart with a bleu cheese mousse.

I can't begin to tell you how wonderful every thing was and do it justice - the photo sure don't but remember, we also ordered dessert!
Daughter # 2 ordered a salted caramel tart - a chocolate pastry, filled with salted caramel, topped with ganache, and cream fraiche.
as you can see - Daughter #2 doesn't like whipped cream so she declined the cream fraiche
The two desserts I didn't get photos of were the seasonal pie (raspberry/rhubarb I think) and the turtle cake -brown butter caramel, toasted pecans, ganache, and whipped cream. 
For my dessert I chose the Sauternes parfait. This was simply fantastic with a unexpected surprise. The tulip glass was layered with a dessert wine gelatina, caramel whipped cream, caramel creme, topped with hazelnut toffee. what was so cool was that the toffee acted just like caramel-y flavored pop rocks! which of course caused much laughter and looks from neighboring tables! 
Yeah it was as good as it looks!


Our last dinner was at another independent North Country gem - the family owned Duluth Grill (www.duluthgrill.com) 
Pulling into parking lot you get the feeling of driving up to an old Denny's or Sambo's reminiscent of road trips with the parents in the 70's
Like much of the Duluth, this place has a funky, hipster(in a good way), self reliant vibe evident in the large vegetable planters and cafe crew wearing shirts printed with the saying "vegetable fresh from our parking lot". 
The menu here is huge! It features all day breakfast and some cool twists on classic diner fare.
Our choices included the A.L.T wrap(avocado, lettuce, tomato) , house made cheesy cauliflower soup with homemade onion rings, the Asian peanut burger (grass fed beef, basil, cilantro, house made peanut sauce, all topped with an over easy egg and rooster sauce drizzle), and the Bahn Mi Duck burger (hand pattied duck patty, Sriracha mayo, house made pate, and pickled carrot and daikon slaw). 
As good as all this was, for dessert we ordered a rhubarb crisp and  a strawberry pie made withe the sweetest tiny little strawberries I have ever tasted.
Other items on the menu that caught my attention were Lake Superior whitefish, Scotch eggs, and the Medieval gryos made from braised lamb shanks.

Our last stop was back at the Northern Waters Smokehaus, where I picked up some smoked lake trout as a gift and some of their house cured lonzino for Friday night deck nights- just a plug for www.livingthedecklife.blogspot.com !


I have not visited a place that takes such pride in their food and beverage scene since I visited Napa. The restaurants and breweries are justifiably proud of what they do and really deserve your patronage.
Now if they could just do something about the winters!



The American answer to Italy's Amalfi Coast