Random Cookbook of the Week - Ad Hoc at Home

Last week's cookbook draw was Thomas Keller's Ad Hoc at Home, which is exactly the kind of cookbook you'd expect as a home cooking cookbook from a chef of Keller's level--i.e. a reasonably skilled and experienced home cook like me can make most of the recipes, but they're more labor-intensive and challenging than I have energy for on an ordinary weekday when I've already put in a full day at the day job and I still need to squeeze in an hour or two's writing time while also helping my daughter with her homework, packing her and my lunches for tomorrow, and hopefully at least having a conversation or two with my equally busy husband.

Still, it's a good cookbook, and the Potato Hash with Bacon and Melted Onions I made the last time it came up in my rotation is one of the most delicious things I've ever produced. Last week's effort didn't turn out so well, but I figure that's more my fault than the recipe's.

Marinated Skirt Steak

Marinade:
- 6 thyme sprigs
- 2 8-inch rosemary sprigs
- 4 small bay leaves
- 1 T. black peppercorns
- 5 garlic cloves, smashed, skin left on 
- 2 c. extra virgin olive oil

- 6 8-oz. trimmed outer skirt steaks
- kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
- canola oil
- 2 T. unsalted butter
- 4 thyme sprigs
- 2 garlic cloves, smashed, skin left on

Combine the marinade ingredients in a medium saucepan and bring to a simmer over medium heat. Remove from the heat and let the marinade cool to room temperature.

Put steaks in dish or resealable plastic bag, add the marinade, and cover the dish or seal the bag. Marinate for at least four hours or up to a day in the refrigerator.

Remove the meat from the marinade and let sit at room temperature for about 30 minutes before cooking; discard the marinade. Dry the meat with paper towels. Season with salt and pepper.

Preheat the oven to 350 F. Set a roasting rack in a roasting pan. 

Heat some canola oil in a large frying pan over high heat. When it shimmers, add half the meat and quickly brown the first side. Turn the meat and, working quickly, add 1 T of the butter, 2 thyme sprigs, and 1 garlic clove and brown the meat on the second side, basting constantly; the entire cooking process should only take about 1 1/2 minutes. Transfer the meat to the rack and spoon the butter, garlic, and thyme over the top. Wipe the pan and repeat with the remaining steaks.

Transfer the baking sheet to the oven and cook for 8-10 minutes, or until the center of the meat registers about 125 F. Remove from the oven and let rest on the rack in a warm place for about 10 minutes for medium rare.

I think I erred in trusting the time in the recipe over my own instincts for when the steak was sufficiently seared. I think if I'd let it go 30-60 seconds longer, it would've gotten a nice char to go with just barely medium rare innards. (I do like my steaks on the bloody side.) As it was, it was a bit too mushy and soft altogether. That said, the marinade imparted a nice subtle but distinctive flavor.

I also tried the book's buttermilk biscuits recipe. I won't post it here, but suffice it to say I still haven't quite got the hang of biscuits. These turned out a bit like hockey pucks, but I think even if Keller himself had made them they wouldn't be the elusive high, light, and fluffy Southern-style biscuits like my mom used to make. Once I achieve those, I'll post the recipe for sure...and I've just discovered you can order White Lily flour on Amazon! Maybe good biscuits are within my grasp after all, since I'm given to understand that the Yankeefied flour my local grocery store carries is too hard for a Southern biscuit.

Random Cookbook of the Week - Ad Hoc At Home

Mr. Fraser and I are foodies (though I'm not in love with that term). When I got an announcement via email that Maria Hines is opening a Southern Italian place to go with her fabulous New American Tilth and her intriguing Mediterranean Golden Beetle, we spent the next 15 minutes chatting about the relative claims of Northern and Southern Italian cuisine, their history in this country, and how much we looked forward to Hines' take. I'd rather have pizza from Serious Pie than anywhere else, we love to celebrate over the bread pudding at Boat Street, and after my first sale Mr. Fraser took me to Seattle landmark Canlis.

I've promised him that if I ever make the New York Times bestseller list, I'm flying him down to California so we can dine at Thomas Keller's French Laundry. We have two Keller cookbooks-- the daunting French Laundry Cookbook and Ad Hoc At Home, which is comfort food, Keller style. That is to say, comfort food to daunt your average home cook.

I like to think this cookbook challenge is making me a touch harder to daunt, so I plunged in and attempted...

Potato Hash with Bacon and Melted Onions

- 12 oz applewood smoked slab bacon (I used thick-sliced uncured bacon from Skagit River Ranch, which you MUST try if you're in the Seattle area. It is the bacon of the gods, I swear.)
- Canola oil
- 3 lbs Yukon Gold potatoes
- Kosher salt
- 1 thyme sprig, leaves only
- 1 c. Melted Onions (recipe below)
- Freshly ground black pepper
- 1 T. minced chives (I forgot these but it still tasted delicious)

Preheat the oven to 200 F.

Cut the bacon into lardons about 1 inch long and 1/2 inch thick. Set aside.

Pour about 1 1/2 inches of oil into a large saucepan and heat to 300 F. set a cooling rack over a baking sheet and line the rack with paper towels.

Meanwhile, square off the sides of the potatoes to give them a rectangular shape and cut into 1/2-inch dice. They may not all be perfectly square, and a bit of skin left on the cubes is also fine.

Add half the potatoes to the hot oil and cook for about 8 minutes, until tender and a rich golden brown; they will not be crisp. Remove from the oil with a wire skimmer or slotted spoon and drain onto the paper towels. Repeat with the remaining potatoes.

Pour 2 T water into a medium saucepan and set over medium heat (the water will keep the bacon from crisping as the fat begins to render). Add the bacon, reduce the heat to medium-low, and let the bacon render its fat for 30 minutes. The bacon will color but not become completely crisp. Using a slotted spoon, transfer the bacon to paper towels to drain. Drain the excess fat from the pan, leaving just a film of fat to cook the potatoes; reserve the extra fat.

Add half the potatoes to the pan, sprinkle with salt, and add half the thyme. Cook for 3-4 minutes to crisp the potatoes and heat through. Add half the onions and fold in one-quarter of the bacon. Transfer to a large bowl and keep warm while you cook the remaining potatoes, adding some of the reserved fat to the pan if necessary, with the remaining ingredients. Season to taste with salt and pepper. 

Transfer the potatoes to a serving bowl, add the minced chives, and garnish with the remaining bacon.

I know, I know, it just looks like potato hash. But, trust me, it tastes like what all the other hash you've ever eaten only aspires to be.

I paired it with sauteed rainbow chard and medium boiled eggs, the latter mushed in with the hash as we ate it. And it was the perfect Sunday night dinner.

Here's how to make the melted onions. Keller tells you to put the herbs into a sachet, but my local grocery doesn't carry cheesecloth, so I just pulled the bay leaf, thyme, and garlic clove out when I was done and used freshly ground pepper instead of whole peppercorns. I also halved the recipe, since it was all I needed.

Melted Onions

- 8 c. sliced onions
- Kosher salt
- 8 T (1 stick, 4 oz) unsalted butter, cut into 8 pieces
- 1 Sachet (1 bay leaf, 3 thyme sprigs, 10 black peppercorns, 1 garlic clove, smashed and peeled)

Put the onions in a large saute pan, set over medium-low heat, sprinkle with 2 generous pinches of salt, and cook, stirring from time to time, for about 20 minutes, until the onions have released much of their liquid.

Stir in the butter, add the sachet, cover partially, and cook slowly over low to medium-low heat for another 30-35 minutes. The onions should look creamy at all times; if the butter separates, or the pan looks dry before the onions are done, add a bit of cold water and stir well to re-emulsify the butter. The onions should be meltingly tender but not falling apart or mushy. Season to taste with salt.

Once cooled, the onions can be refrigerated for up to 3 days.

These are almost, but not quite, like caramelized onions, and they have a sort of sweet pungency reminiscent of roasted garlic--quite a transformation for butter and plain yellow onions, believe me.