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Dec. 27th, 2005 12:24 pmMan, with the holidays and work and life stuff, haven't updated in a while. Thought I'd update on the Christmas dinner, though. It's a tradition of mine to do a themed 4-course meal for Christmas dinner. This year it was 10 adults and 3 kids (the kids, as usual, basically just ate dessert, then noshed on Mac&Cheese). Unfortunately, I don't think there were any pictures of the dishes themselves this year. There are some prep-pictures as I cooked, but (and I consider this a compliment) everyone was eating the meals and not taking pics.
Theme:
Halloween Christmas (based loosely on Burton)
Appetizer:
Apple Cider Cheese Fondue. Cider mixed with white wine, mozzarella, and smoked provolone, heated, served with diced cuban bread and granny smith apples.
Salad:
Mexican salad with dual-color tortillas. Homemade corn tortillas with amarillo and cumin (orange color), and unsweetened cocoa powder and chili powder (dark brown), cut into strips, then deep-fried. These provided halloween colors on top of the salad. Also, a homemade dressing of olive oil, orange juice, garlic, wine, and other spices.
Main Course:
Pumpkin-seed crusted mahi-mahi, pan-fried, with key-lime cream sauce over white-wine-chicken-broth risotto. Pumpkin seeds were food-processed into crumbs, and dusted over the fillets along with spices and a bit of flour. Pan-fry both sides of the fish in olive oil to a golden brown, then stick the whole pan in a 400-degree oven for 10 minutes. Sauce was white wine, key lime juice, garlic, and cilantro, reduced then strained clear, with heavy cream added and reduced again.
Dessert:
Orange mini-crepes, filled with chocolate mousse. Again the halloween colors. Crepes made with triple-sec (and a bit of orange color), rolled into a horn-of-plenty shape, filled with homemade chocolate mousse.
---
The homemade tortilla thing was an improv. There are orange and blue-black tortillas, made with colored corn, but I couldn't find any. So, it was either punt the salad, or make the tortillas myself. I picked up some masa and tried my hand. I am convinced tortilla making is an art like knitting -- only old grandmothers are experts at it because they've been doing it nonstop for 50 years. It was a good thing I planned to make the strips and fry them because there wasn't a single round tortilla in the batch, and most looked more like maple-leaves. Fresh tortillas tasted so good, though, that I'm thinking of getting a real tortilla press (instead of a rolling pin and masa-dusted foil) and trying this again.
Theme:
Halloween Christmas (based loosely on Burton)
Appetizer:
Apple Cider Cheese Fondue. Cider mixed with white wine, mozzarella, and smoked provolone, heated, served with diced cuban bread and granny smith apples.
Salad:
Mexican salad with dual-color tortillas. Homemade corn tortillas with amarillo and cumin (orange color), and unsweetened cocoa powder and chili powder (dark brown), cut into strips, then deep-fried. These provided halloween colors on top of the salad. Also, a homemade dressing of olive oil, orange juice, garlic, wine, and other spices.
Main Course:
Pumpkin-seed crusted mahi-mahi, pan-fried, with key-lime cream sauce over white-wine-chicken-broth risotto. Pumpkin seeds were food-processed into crumbs, and dusted over the fillets along with spices and a bit of flour. Pan-fry both sides of the fish in olive oil to a golden brown, then stick the whole pan in a 400-degree oven for 10 minutes. Sauce was white wine, key lime juice, garlic, and cilantro, reduced then strained clear, with heavy cream added and reduced again.
Dessert:
Orange mini-crepes, filled with chocolate mousse. Again the halloween colors. Crepes made with triple-sec (and a bit of orange color), rolled into a horn-of-plenty shape, filled with homemade chocolate mousse.
---
The homemade tortilla thing was an improv. There are orange and blue-black tortillas, made with colored corn, but I couldn't find any. So, it was either punt the salad, or make the tortillas myself. I picked up some masa and tried my hand. I am convinced tortilla making is an art like knitting -- only old grandmothers are experts at it because they've been doing it nonstop for 50 years. It was a good thing I planned to make the strips and fry them because there wasn't a single round tortilla in the batch, and most looked more like maple-leaves. Fresh tortillas tasted so good, though, that I'm thinking of getting a real tortilla press (instead of a rolling pin and masa-dusted foil) and trying this again.
