After the past week or so, I must say that I’m becoming a little concerned about the other gourmaniac. I mean, yesterday, I walked into the kitchen, and there she was hanging out with Georges Blanc again. I’ve found them together for lunch and I’ve discovered them cozied up together by the cutting board before dinner. No, not Georges in person, but his book Natural Cuisine. I discovered Georges Blanc back in the late 1970’s or early 80’s, when I purchased his book and cooked my way through a good portion of it. Back then some of the ingredients were either too exotic or too difficult to find in New England where I lived. But I loved the concept of cooking with fresh vegetables and an occasional fish, and no meat or even poultry. Seeing how Rosaria doesn’t eat mammals, Georges is a perfect fit for her. After her recent immersion in his cuisine, I googled Georges Blanc who has had a three star Michelin restaurant in Vonnas, France for years. Georges has done very well for himself, his local empire has expanded to a chateau which has ben converted into a hotel, spa, and conference center. Looking at his website, I must admit, I wouldn’t mind hanging out with Georges for a few days in Burgundy.
Anyway, I digress: the other gourmaniac and I are like bears waking up from winter’s hibernation. We’ re stretching and yawning, and of course we’re hungry. Yesterday, we made good on our mutual promise to move our butts and burn some calories. Afterwards, we had a late lunch of turkey burgers mixed with a little panko, chipotle, bird chiles and liquid smoke. As I grilled them, for some reason, instead of shrinking slightly they puffed up to almost softball proportions. When I brought them into the kitchen from the outside grill, Rosaria and I exchanged glances at the burgers and at each other. I can’t ever remember trying to wrap my lips around something that big sandwiched between a bun. Needless to say, after barely consuming these behemoths, we were ready to resume our winter hibernation.
Ah, I digress again; well not really. We were so full from our late lunch we couldn’t think about dinner until after nine o’clock, and even then it was with some reluctance that I gave into the other gourmaniac’s suggestion of some pan seared tuna and seaweed. Actually what precipitated that menu selection was Rosaria telling me that she was in the mood for some cold sake. We’ve had a beautiful bottle of sake on a shelf in the kitchen’s cookbook library for a while, and although it wasn’t chilled, we decided we’d open it up. But before we did, I wanted to photograph the bottle in a food setting. So with that in mind, Rosaria did the honors with the tuna* and I set up the shot at our kitchen island. Once I was pleased with the shot, I put away the camera and sat down to our late night light dinner. But first, we raised our sake cups to the brave people of Japan and to all those who’ve been tragically lost.
Afterwards, we yawned and stretched, and headed off to bed.
RMA
* The tuna log was briefly marinated in rice vinegar and ponzu sauce, then rolled in a combination of crushed black pepper and Japanese spices (Shichimi Togarashi) and quickly pan seared in sesame oil.
