Well, kids, we managed to pull it together and wedge in a FABULOUS July KTC event!
In spite of our smaller group-size, we had an absolutely mah-velous time at
Chez Meg for a
David Lebovitz-inspired brunch adventure. The menu included these delectable delights:
We were a smaller-than-normal group, but had even bigger-than-normal fun, woo! In attendance were Meg, William, Joyce, Jessica, Damian, Shawn, Fernando, and Henry (Rick and Anne’s Henry). And Meg’s brother Fred joined us for lunch! Did I miss anyone?
Meg got our morning started off right with a finely-executed mimosa station – Yum!
And some wonderful pastries from
Essential Baking Company, served with Meg’s own homemade strawberry freezer jam (OMG so delicious!!)…
Here’s William showing us how it’s done…
I got started on the goat cheese custards using yolks from these beauties…
Then we added some really cool vanilla paste, courtesy of William…
And mixed it up with some heavy cream and 8 oz of goat cheese…
Then we poured the custard into ramekins…
We poured some warm water around the half-full ramekins to create a
bain-marie, and into the oven they went!
Meanwhile, Joyce (was it Joyce?) was hard at work frying up the thinnest bacon I’d ever seen.
Meg hadn’t been able to find sustainably-sourced prosciutto, so we improvised, using a sustainably-sourced, thinly-sliced bacon that she’d found via
Bill the Butcher (I think…?).
And now, for your viewing pleasure, bacon porn…
Jessica put the red wine syrup together…
Fernando cleaned up these gorgeous local strawberries for the goat cheese custards…
And Damian sliced fennel for a simple fennel salad with the unexpected addition of chopped kalamata olives.
Next up were the crepes. Here’s a video of Henry showing us how it’s done using William’s fancy-pants crepe-maker…
And the results were wonderful-look how thin they are! At this point, they have only been cooked on one side – we’ll cook the other side when we add the crepe filling.
Joyce got to work crumbling up a bunch of bacony deliciousness. She says her fingers may have, at one time or another, been that greasy before, but that she felt thankful that she couldn’t remember the occasion. We felt even more thankful to have crumbled bacon to put in our crepes!
Henry triple-washed and then squeezed spinach, to which we added grated Gruyere cheese and the crumbled bacon. This would be the filling for the crepes [
Again, no real recipe here, just spinach, salt, pepper, Gruyere cheese, crumbled bacon]…
We measured out
9 ounces per crepe.* Each crepe returned to the griddle, cooked side up, and we topped it with the filling. Then, we crimped the edges of each crepe to make a rustic-looking sort of galette or tart.
*For the record, kiddos, Meg pointed out an error here: "
…that “9 ounces” of filling included the weight of the pyrex bowl; it was actually a little over 2 oz of filling. Personally, I thought it could have used a bit more. Maybe 3 oz? And I agree with William – it needed a bit more bite…maybe some red pepper or hot paprika..."
Also for the record, I would be totally down with trying these with red pepper!
Here’s the finished product—
oh la la!
We put some eggs on to fry in these cute little egg rings, reserving one to make
chicharrón de huevo for Fernando, who prefers his fried eggs to be extra-super-duper-crunchy-cooked.
And now, even if you weren’t in attendance, I’m pretty sure you can guess what comes next…
If your guess involved plopping those beautiful eggs right on top of the finished crepes, you win!
(Best. Eggs. Ever.)
But actually, we all won, because it was a heavenly combination. We quickly readied the table…
And then fiddled around just a teeny bit with our food and the blasted camera…
Meg’s brother Fred joined us for lunch, and we all had a wonderful time. Topics of conversation included
Betty White’s muffins, so you know we had a ton of fun! The crepes were delicious, and that super-thin bacon was the crispiest thing ever!
Next up, the goat cheese custards. These were supposed to cook for 15-20 minutes and cool completely. It actually took them more like an HOUR to cook, maybe a bit longer.
Nevertheless, I daresay they were definitely worth the wait and a terrific alternative to regular flan/custard/crème caramel kinds of desserts. The goat cheese really adds an extra depth of flavor and a different density. Would be marvelous to try as cheesecake! Feast your eyes on these…
No gratuitous kitty photos this month, folks – sorry! Seems like Meg’s kitty-cat had recently had surgery and wasn’t feeling spry enough to hang out with a big group of crazy cooks like us.
Pobrecita!
Looking forward to seeing you all at Anne and Rick’s on the 22nd – Until then, Kissers! oxox
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