Christmas Food Feast 2010

True to form (and compulsion), Ham Sandwich and family kept it on the foodie tip this Christmas, with several days of festive food and drink. We started off on Christmas Eve with our now-traditional Feast of the Seven Fishes. This year's menu included:


Garlic-butter glazed salmon (caught by H.S's brother, up in Michigan)
Lemon and herb stuffed whole trout (also caught by said brother)
Prociutto-wrapped scallops
Sardines in Salsa Verde recipe here, with sardines instead of anchovies
Crab cakes
Shrimp cocktail
Crab salad
Salmon dip
Farfalle pasta with tomato sauce
Assorted cheeses, olives, and breads




We also experimented with cocktails from Imbibe! a book of old-tyme drink recipes. And maybe the folks of 1862 had a different idea of what tastes good, but I would argue that Hot Buttered Rum is not very delicious. However, the Vanilla Punch we made on Christmas Day (with brandy, sugar, lemon, and vanilla extract), was quite enjoyable.


For Christmas Day dinner, we went with a Mexican theme and made Pork & Pozole Stew, Chile & Corn Tamales stuffed with Queso Fresco, a simple mixed greens salad with black beans, avacado, and a honey-lime dressing, and Mexican Eggnog. The best part of prepping all of this was hitting up the Mexican grocery store, Las Maravillas, on 5th Ave in Victorian Village--Mexican groceries are a treasure trove of cheap, bulk dried peppers, as well as those random, hard to find Mexican cuisine ingredients like epazote, Mexican oregano, and pilloncillo (Mexican brown sugar).

Pork & Pozole Stew (tamales are in the background)


Mexican eggnog


The Ham Sandwich lucked out on food-related Christmas presents this year, recieving the ice cream maker attachment for her KitchenAid mixer from her sister and brother-in-law, and a super-awesome food dehydrator from her very attentive boyfriend. She also got a stocking full of utensils, including a new and much-needed, silicone-wrapped wisk. The dehydrator came out for a test drive yesterday and turned out homemade apple chips and banana chips:

And they were totally awesome. I might never buy dried fruit again...

Finally, the weekend wrapped up with an ambitious French Apple Tart project, courtesy of Saveur, via Sara Moulton:
You'll notice that the tart at the top of the post is different from the one immediately above. The former is mine, the latter is Sara Moulton's....I had some difficulties in keeping my apples from breaking in pieces as I arranged them in "rose petals," but it nonetheless turned out fairly close to the picture, and, more importantly, just as delicious. It was, on the whole, pretty easy to construct, and creates a rather striking impression.

Now, after a whirlwind weekend of cooking and baking, I'm looking forward to a little downtime...and maybe some experimenting with homemade jerky...

I hope all of you had a Merry (and Delicious!) Christmas! Happy New Year!

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