Camacho Watcho

Perhaps it looks like I covered a lot of recipes with this post, but they were made within two dinners on consecutive nights. The first was a lamb feast I made for some friends and the second was a roast chicken meal that I made on Easter.

We started our dinner on Saturday night with the recipe for Asparagus and Mushroom Tarts. These were so simple and yet so amazingly good! Just thaw a sheet of puff pastry, cut it into squares…a quick sautee of shitake mushrooms and add in asparagus, gruyere, creme fraiche, thyme and lemon zest. Pop them in the oven and serve. I can still taste the bright thyme and lemon paired with the sharp gruyere…definitely a great recipe!

After the tarts we moved on to dinner, which was Roast Leg of Lamb with Tarragon-Mint Butter, Garland of Spring Vegetables, and Saffron-Scented Couscous with Pine Nuts. After a minor blip with the lamb (therefore turning me into a major kitchen b*tch for a couple minutes), I got things under control and it turned out moist and tender. The red wine-orange gravy was the icing on the delicious herb butter-rubbed lamb. The same herb butter is used in the vegetables, which tied everything together nicely. And, although the couscous didn’t stand out as a star, it rounded out the meal perfectly. Overall, I really enjoyed this menu and will definitely use the lamb as a go-to recipe.

The next night I prepared the Roast Chicken with Matzo Stuffing and Cauliflower-Spinach Puree. The recipe for the chicken itself, stuffed with lemon, thyme, rosemary and shallots, was very good. The meat turned out moist and the skin was crispy with a nice coating of herbs on top. The one change I made was to put the chicken directly into the roasting pan (I don’t have a roasting rack) and added water to the bottom of the pan throughout the cooking to keep it moist. I also basted the chicken 2-3 times with the pan juices while it cooked. The cauliflower-spinach puree and the matzo stuffing were nothing special. The puree did have a nice lemony zing to it but the matzo stuffing turned out mushy and just made me long for my mom’s light and fluffy sage dressing.

Tags: challenge, Food, recipes

This entry was posted on Thursday, April 16th, 2009 at 5:27 am and is filed under Food. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.