Rosemary-Bacon Roasted Potatoes with Mustard-Bacon-Sauvignon Blanc Vinaigrette

I made these potatoes for my parents while I was in Pasadena and they loved them; my mom asked me to write down the recipe, but I did not. Partly because there is no recipe (I made it up as I went), but mostly because I forgot. I told Tracie and Bryce about the potatoes and they both said they wanted to see pictures. So I made them again the other night when Elizabeth's parents were staying with us. Here's what I did:

I took about two pounds of red potatoes and cut them into quarters (and the large ones into six pieces). I sliced two shallots thinly, then put that all in a bag with some olive oil, salt and pepper, and let it sit on the counter for a couple of hours.

I preheated the oven to 350 degrees and dumped the potatoes and shallots onto a pan. I chopped up a handful of fresh rosemary - as much or as little as you like - and added that as well.

While the potatoes were in the oven, I slowly cooked some thick bacon, so that it got crispy but not burnt, then broke apart the pieces and set them aside.

I mixed together mustard and Sauvignon blanc vinegar. (I brought a bottle from California with me, thinking it would be a nice souvenir... turns out they sell it at a nearby store in New York. Oh.)

See that bacon grease? Can you guess what we're doing with that?

Yep, we're stirring it in to the vinaigrette. I would recommend doing it slowly. The typical vinaigrette is supposed to have about 3 parts oil to 1 part vinegar, but I like mine much more tart - I usually do about a 2:1 ratio. You can decide for yourself.

When the potatoes were ready - about 40 minutes - I removed them from the oven, slid them into a bowl, and added a bit more chopped fresh rosemary. Then I added the bacon pieces.

Right before serving - I'm talking just a couple minutes - I toss the potatoes with the vinaigrette. I want to make sure to get them all covered, but I don't need the potatoes sitting in the vinaigrette for too long.

I served them with green beans and flank steak. Once again, everyone loved them.

This isn't health food. I wouldn't recommend making them every night. But when you have guests over whom you want to impress, or you just want some potatoes with a little extra zing and depth of flavor, these are a winner.

Merry Christmas

We can't have a tree this year because Hawkeye is still a Kitten Terror, so I'm using my photo from last Christmas.

I hope you have a very merry Christmas. If you don't celebrate Christmas, happiness in whatever you do celebrate, and if you don't celebrate anything, peace and joy.

Holiday Eating

I first read Charles Kuralt's America when I was 19. I've mentioned it before: Kuralt spent one month of a year in his 12 favorite American places. He spent December in New York City and wrote about some of the things he saw: I've wanted to spend a Christmas in New York ever since. The other night, Elizabeth and I went to Rockefeller Center to see the tree and the ice-skating rink. It was very cool.

Afterwards, we stopped in to Iron Chef House for dinner. I had hot tea and cold beer.

We started with an appetizer of Volcano beef: raw beef marinated in sesame and garlic sauce.

Elizabeth had the Monkey Roll (shrimp tempura and three different kinds of spicy sauce), and she generously scraped the avocado off of a couple of pieces so I could have some.

I had one of the evening's specials: a 1.5-pound lobster and veggies, stir-fried in sherry wine, black vinegar, ginger and garlic. It was delicious, if a little (a lot) messy.

One of Elizabeth's co-workers baked cookies for her, and I ate two of them when she got home. They were great.

Elizabeth's office closes the week between Christmas and New Year's, so to celebrate, she wanted to bring in cheesecake. I volunteered to pick one up from Junior's for her, as long as she promised to bring home any leftovers. It turned out, almost half the cheesecake went uneaten in the office. Which was just fine by me.

Elizabeth's parents stayed with us for two nights, so the night before they arrived in town, I picked up a big, 2.5-pound flank steak at a local market's butcher counter. I put it in a gallon bag and marinated it overnight.

The next night I cut the steak in two (I wanted to cook some of it much longer, for Elizabeth and either of her parents, in case they like steak well-done just as she does) and put it on the indoor grill.

 Seven minutes on each side.

 It turned out wonderfully. I got compliments (more like raves) all around.

When Elizabeth's mom learned that I had made chili a few days earlier, she got very excited and asked if there was any left. I said that I had just finished it that day for lunch. Her disappointment was obvious. "I'll make chili tomorrow night, if you like," I said.

I got a little over two pounds of ground beef, brisket and short rib blend from Paisanos and cooked it for hours in the slow-cooker with chili seasonings and onion. When it was ready I put out bowls of sharp white cheddar, pickled jalapenos, Fritos, red onion, diced pickles, and sour cream. I added everything except the last item to my bowl. It was great.

"You're two for two," Elizabeth's dad said.

The next day, for lunch, we went to Teresa's.

Elizabeth and her dad both got plates of potato pancakes as their meal. Applesauce for him, sour cream for her.

I had the corned beef sandwich. I did not care for the beef - it was as rubbery as any corned beef I have ever tasted. At least it wasn't fatty, though, and once I slathered mustard all over the sandwich, it was edible. (Plus I got an order of Teresa's fries, which are always crispy and delicious. But I didn't get a usable photo of them.)

The next day there was some leftover chili and I had an idea: I was disappointed in that Fritos Crunch Burger I had at Slater's 50/50 back in Pasadena. So why not make my own?

I got some high-quality ground beef, formed it into a patty with my burger press, grilled it, and let it rest for a few minutes with a slice of cheese on top.

Then I piled on plenty of Fritos - enough to actually give the burger crunch, as the name of the Slater's burger implied but did not deliver.

And then I poured on the reheated chili.

And topped it with Thousand Island, which doesn't seem necessary, but I wanted to get all the details right.

I had no complaints about this burger. The Slater's burger utilized a better bun than the egg bun that I used here, but this was better in every other way.

The Blind Donkey

Would it surprise you if I were to write that this location on Union has been many things over the years? Probably not, right? Probably not.

It was Dish a couple years back, a restaurant I wanted to like - the food was pretty good - but just couldn't because of the cold vibe. (In addition to other things, one night the owner personally greeted every single customer at the bar except Elizabeth and me, which did not seem possible without it being intentional.) It was Cafe Brenart, a restaurant that fancied itself an art gallery as well. It was not for me, though I admit perhaps that says more about me than the place. It was Cafe Atlantic, where a few years ago I had the second-best Cuban sandwich of my life on one occasion; on another I had the single worst Cuban meal of my life. 

Now it is The Blind Donkey, from the creators of several other bars in Southern California. I visited it three or four times over my stay in Pasadena. Their specialty is whiskey but I have not ordered a whiskey in almost 9 years and I did not on any of these occasions. But the list looked pretty nice.

It looks great inside, no question about that.

Q: Is there anything better than a bar that shows Big Trouble in Little China?

A: Only a bar that shows Captain Ron or Hudson Hawk.

(I once revealed to Elizabeth that I had a Captain Ron movie poster on my bedroom wall as recently as the age of 24. She shook her head in a very disapproving way.)

On this occasion, Bryce and I sat in the corner of the bar, by the table shuffleboard.

Something jumped out at me right away.

"You have Blue Paddle on tap?" I asked the girl behind the bar, who has been a friend of mine for many years. "This isn't a joke?"

"Yep," she said, "we're the only ones in Southern California who have it."

I believed her. I have never seen it on tap in Southern California; I don't believe I have ever seen it in bottles here. From New Belgium - the makers of Sunshine Wheat, my favorite beer in America - Blue Paddle is a Czech-style pilsner with a slightly toasted flavor.

Bryce and I each had one, and he agreed with me it was delicious. We ended up having more than one. We'd already decided to hit up Musha for dinner, but we still wanted to browse the food menu. 

There were plenty of things that looked good and I made a note to return and have food at some point. 

Eventually, a few nights later, Tracie and I were out watching basketball and our thoughts turned to dinner.

"Let's go to Blind Donkey," I said.

Well, somebody was too thirsty to wait for me to take a picture... Whatever. I have no one to blame but myself: I created many Blue Paddle fans during the trip. 

We ordered fries, the grilled cheese on a stick, and fried pickles. (Tracie said she'd never had fried pickles before, so that had to be done, although to be honest I probably would have ordered them even if I'd been alone.)

It's pretty dark in Blind Donkey, which gives it a wonderful atmosphere, but it was also crowded and I wasn't going to use the flash, so these pics aren't great. Hopefully they get the job done. 

I won't bloviate: these were the best fried pickles I have ever had. The pickles were encapsulated by the crunchy beer batter yet I could still taste the pickle inside. 

 The grilled cheese on a stick was disappointing. As Tracie put it perfectly: "This is more like fried cheese on a stick." I didn't dislike it and we ate it all, but it just wasn't what I was expecting. It tasted like a heavily-fried mozzarella patty, rather than a grilled cheese on sourdough.

And then there were the fries. As my friend explained (I hope I get this right, I was a little tipsy), they are blanched then frozen, fried a second time and stored in the walk-in, then fried a third time when ordered. If we don't count Pommes Frites here in New York City, these might well be the best fries I have had in many years. Most of them were crispy on the outside and soft inside. 

They deserve a better dip than regular ketchup - an aioli or herbed mustard would be the perfect complement - but that's a secondary complaint. My favorite fries of my entire life were the Belgian fries at Dive! in Century City, gone now these 14 years. No other fries I have eaten have come as close to Dive!'s fries as these potatoes at Blind Donkey.

I am kicking myself for not eating here until the penultimate night of my trip. But I'm guessing Blind Donkey will be here longer than the previous establishments and I'll have the chance again some day.