For years now I’ve been fixing the same little feast for valentine’s day: rock Cornish game hen, Uncle Phil’s long grain and wild rice, and flourless chocolate cake.
It’s inspired by the very first meal I cooked for Jackie, just a few days after we started dating.
This year I made numerous mistakes in timing and measuring—kinda weird, since I slept so well last night. Fortunately, a modest amount of scrambling and fixing managed to make everything come out delicious!
Some years ago we got this glorious orange Le Creuset braising pan, and since then I’ve been inclined to braise everything I don’t grill. Contents today: venison rib chops—something that probably would grill very well, but Jackie likes the way I braise it, so that’s what I’m doing.
I was preparing a honey-mustard glaze to put on a ham. The recipe called for dijon mustard, honey, and dark brown sugar—that last, presumably, to make it caramelize nicely. The new jar of honey I opened had crystalized rather completely. So I skipped the brown sugar, and just put in twice as much honey.
It was delicious.
Now I’m trying to decide whether it’s worth updating the recipe, given that I can’t expect to have crystalized honey on-hand all the time.
For the first time ever, actually took the time to properly caramelize the onions, meaning that this batch of French onion soup was a real success.
A couple of days ago Jackie braised some wild-caught venison, and today there was just a bit left that she included in some fried rice that she served as a side dish along with the wild-caught sockeye salmon that I cooked (cumin and zaatar as seasonings).
No pics, but trust me: A lovely and very wild main meal of the day.
Copper River sockeye salmon cooked in coconut oil with a soy-ginger-mustard-maple glaze. Cahokia brown rice. Sautéed red onions and red peppers. Delicious!
Have you ever seen a more lovely loaf of bread? 🍞
Rice Philip: ½ shallot, chopped, 1 T minced garlic, 1 cup bone broth, 1 can chicken breast meat, ½ cup brown rice. Soy sauce to taste after serving.
The sort of thing Jackie might say on any ordinary day (such as today):
“Consider using a shallot as your allium in today’s lunch.”
(To be fair, just yesterday I told her I wasn’t using the shallots, assuming that she’d gotten them with some particular dish in mind.)
The very first breakfast Jackie ever cooked for me was some Tassajara Bread book pancakes. (They’re special because you beat the egg whites and fold them in, which makes the pancakes super light and fluffy.)
Jackie is away to attend a tapestry weaving workshop, so today I decided to make my own pancakes.
