An Untraditional Easter Dinner......
I knew that I would be in no shape to cook today. I worked Thurs-Saturday preparing for a wedding. Yesterday was the actual wedding and I'm always exhausted when I get home. Standing on my feet and serving chicken cordon bleu with a choice of mushroom sauce or chipotle cream sauce ( and asking each person what they want and then explaining over and over what chipotle is) wears me out, not to mention the loading and unloading at the actual wedding site. Anyway, I cooked a bunch of things last Wednesday in preparation for today.
I did throw this foccacia dough together yesterday morning. This is the best damn foccacia I've ever made. The recipe comes from August 2004 of Fine Cooking and its Peter Reinhart's recipe( Bread Bakers Apprentice). It's a very wet dough that spends the night in the fridge for a long slow rise. The next day, you dump it on a parchment lined pan, dimple it and add more olive oil. Then it rises again for a few hours until its ready for the oven. It was so flavorful from the long overnight rise. My MIL couldnt stop eating it.
Back to Wednesday, I made 2 lasagnas. My MIL stays away from marinara sauce, so I made her a smaller lasagna with bechemal. I used the bechemal sauce from the latest issue of Cook's Illustrated. For Robin and I, I made a big batch of homeade marinara using San Marzano tomatoes that Robins friend brought us back from an Italian market in Windsor, ON. I used some bechemal on the bottom as well. Both lasagnas are spinach and mushroom.
I also made some hot fudge sauce . I loved this hot fudge, it will be my go to recipe from now on. I had bought some Hershey's single origin choc. bars that were reduced and they were perfect for this recipe. I threw together and ice cream pie using a ready made keebler crust and bryers light heath bar ice cream.
I also made a blueberry/raspberry pie for my MIL. I used the pillsbury crust and I swear I'll never do that again. I HATE the smell of them. They stink while they are baking( I know its the lard in the crust). Next time, I'll stick to the pate brise recipe that I normally use.
posted by Randi at 4:45 PM
6 Comments:
Hi Randi,
I love Peter Reinhart's focaccia too - I use the pain a l'ancienne technique, it sounds like you do too. Sometimes I add fresh chopped rosemary to the dough.
And I also love Martha's pate brisee. Now that I've tried it, I don't want to go back to store bought!
9:01 PM, April 08, 2007
The focaccia looks delish. Happy Belated Easter :)
8:22 AM, April 09, 2007
Wow, the lasagnas must have been outrageous. They sure look awesome! Even tho i'm not a pie eater, that looks extraordinary, Randi! I thought Pillsbury didn't used lard in their stuff. Maybe i'm mistaken though, i have not used their crusts before...
Hope you had a gooooooooooooood Passover, too! I'm SO ready for a nice chewy bagel...
Great foccacia there as well and below, that tres leches cake! YOWZA!!
11:36 AM, April 09, 2007
Don't feel too bad, we had spaghetti carbonara and leftover birthday cake.
12:12 PM, April 09, 2007
I won't defend the poor quality of the Pilsbury crusts, but I use them because they're already made! So I'm sacrificing some taste for not having to roll them out. I make mixed berry pies and cobblers often, since all I do is use the frozen berries out of the big bags from Costco, mix with some cornstarch and Splenda, and pour them in the crust. Not exactly gourmet cooking. That foccacia bread looks divine!
9:58 PM, April 11, 2007
Your foccacia looks great! I love to rise my dough in the fridge like that.. it really makes a difference. I do it with pizza dough all the time... and it's delicious.
Lasagna is such a great make a head..
your ice cream pie looks so good!
6:18 PM, April 13, 2007
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