Magret de canard en gastrique de mûres, Yukon Gold smashed potatoes

seared duck breast with blackberry gastrique, garlic smashed potatoes

What do you do when sour, wild blackberries have conquered part of your back yard? Make them into a gastrique and pour it over some seared duck breast, of course! Make some smashed potatoes with duck fat and garlic, sprinkle some chives over the top, and voilá! A fancy French dinner.
Served with an '06 Yorkville Highlands Merlot. Organic, even.

Dessert was ice cream sandwiches, home made. You assemble them yourself, just before putting them in your mouth, so the chocolate cracker stays crunchy and the ice cream... well, it's messy and drippy. Once you've had an ice cream sandwich like this, there's no going back to those frozen, soggy things at the store.

Food competitions. Ugh.

I hate food competitions. I'm not talking about how many weenies a skinny kid can stuff down his gullet. That's real competition, since most weenies in stomach wins. But a chocolate torte vs a mousse vs a cookie vs ice cream, one winner take all? WTF?

Food is a blend between visual and performing arts. It should look interesting, or better yet, enticing, or best irresistible. It should burst upon your palate like a multi-flavored wave: an initial impact then immersion, then a lingering presence like the foam left by the wave's passage. It can have surprises. Pleasant, like passing a sea horse. Or not, like getting rolled in the sand and wrapped in cold, clammy kelp. Either way, who is to say that a sea horse is better than a clown triggerfish or perhaps a Flabellina iodinea? It's really a matter of personal taste.

Recently, a fellow ARC culinary arts student threw his plate into the ring in a statewide competition. First, he had to use Brand X Chocolate, since they were the sponsor. His dessert was pitted against a multitude of (I presume) desserts, all of which had to be made with Brand X Chocolate. Other than Brand X chocolate as an ingredient, what did these desserts really share?

So he threw his creation into the gaping maw of the judges, pulled the handle and waited for the wheels to spin, hoping that the stars would align, little lights glow in their heads, their ears rotate, and ribbons and accolades would pour forth to the clamor of bells and sparkle of lights.

They did not.

In the end, proud winners pranced upon the dais while the strewn bodies of losers littered the chocolate-stained floor.

Except that the losers didn't really lose, since they no doubt tested and re-tested their gustatory formulas on friends and family, perfecting them through many long hours in the kitchen. They and their friends felt their creations worthy of a ribbon, accolades, fame and fortune. That should be consolation enough, for the true competition was not the appeal of the dishes, but who best anticipated the whims of the judges.

Whole grain bread

Whole grain bread isn't simple. The challenge is to make the bread taste so good that you don't even think about health benefits. It's a bit more challenging to make than bread made with unbleached white flour, but with a bit of help from Peter Reinhart, it's coming along well. I kind of bent or ignored half his advice and developed my own technique based on his theories (and mine).

The bread is made from two parts: a pâte fermentée that gets renewed as new bread is made, and a soaker. I decided to let the soaker ferment a bit as well and care for it like a sourdough starter. My soaker bubbles a little but appears to have no leavening quality at all. That's not what I'm looking for anyway - I want flavor, and I get the leavening by adding SAF Instant yeast in the final mix per Mr. Reinhart's advice.

I use either four ingredients: flour, water, salt, yeast - or five by adding dark rye flour - or six by adding buckwheat flour - or seven by adding flax seeds  - or eight by putting sunflower seeds on top for a real multi-grain, complex symphony of cereal flavors. I've resisted adding sweeteners of any kind, not even agave. The goal is to let all the interplay of fermentation, whole grains and the baking process bring out the flavors inherent in the flour, without resorting to adding other elements.

This dough works better for large loaves, since this allows the crust to get thoroughly caramelized without overcooking and drying the interior. Although regular pains come out fine, they just don't have the same thick, crunchy crust.

The flour is 100% hard red winter wheat from Community Grains. The only place to get it, unfortunately, is at Whole Paycheck in the bulk section. The last time I was there, I cleaned out the bin and didn't even get five pounds of flour!

Corn dogs!

You're at the fair. It's summer. This is what you want. Corn dogs. Better yet, Jumbo Corn dogs. One of America's most beloved additions to the world's culinary culture. Served with ketchup, mustard, hot sauce, BBQ sauce...

So, with all the supposed American creativity going on here in the birthplace of corn dogs, why are they all pretty much the same thing? A large hot dog or Polish sausage with a stick up its nether end, battered and fried. Ok, they're tasty, but what if you were at the fair every day? Would you perhaps yearn for a flight of corn dogs, each one different? So different that you could eat them for at least a week and never repeat the experience? No, we're not talking calories or belly diameter here. Just flavor.

The basic corn dog has a flour/corn meal batter, baking powder/baking soda, salt, pepper, milk (or buttermilk) and oil (from frying). They can have egg, bacon drippings, sugar... Plus sauce.

Chef Ray at ARC once made corn dogs using Toulouse style French garlic sausages. I ate too many, and I wasn't the only one. Proof that there's room for creativity in the dog-on-stick realm.

So, after my three days at the fair, where I diligently inspected more booths than you could shake a (corn dog) stick at, I started thinking... corn dogs for a week... two weeks...

Day 1:
Basic corn dog: standard batter, beef hot dog. Get this part done and end your jonesing for the traditional.

Day 2:
Green chili corn dog: Green chili/pork/tomatillo sausage in Chili/fresh corn batter. Cilantro mayonnaise.

Day 3:
North African dog: Spicy lamb merguez sausage in Corn/cilantro batter. Harissa sauce (red peppers, chilis, garlic, olive oil...)

Day 4:
Clucking Corn Dog: Chicken mousseline in garlic/parsley corn batter, dipped in beer batter and fried again for crunch. Served with aioli.

Day 5:
Salmon dog: Thin-sliced salmon fillet, doused with lemon-dill sauce, rolled, wrapped in nori (seaweed), rolled in rice, dipped in wasabi tempura batter. Served with tempura dipping sauce.

Day 6:
HogDog: Italian pork sausage with fennel, wrapped in bacon, lard batter. Served with bacon dripping - basil mayo.

Day 7:
Squash Dog: zucchini with burdock (gobo) root inside, rosemary/garlic/sage paste, blue corn/quinoa batter, garlic aioli. All organic, of course.

Day 8: 
SheepDog: ground lamb, bulgur wheat, pine nuts, cinnamon, sesame seed batter, tahini sauce.

Day 9: 
DimSumDog: ground chicken, garlic, chives, five spice powder. Rolled in dim sum dough (like for char siu bao) and steamed. Black bean/chili sauce for dipping.

Day 10:
Melanzana: Grilled eggplant round, Parmesan cheese, Pecorino romano cheese, Garlic paste. Onion-Parmesan batter. Marinara sauce for dip. Alternate: use polenta instead of corn dog batter.

Day 11:
Molé Dog: sage/turkey/garlic/chili sausage, chocolate/chili batter, five chili sauce for dipping.

Day 12:
Fire Dog: Habanero/onion/pork sausage, bhut jolokia pepper batter, habañero chili relish.

Day 13:
Wimp Dog: Potato/turkey/chive sausage, parsley/chive batter, lemon thyme sauce. This is sort of medicinal, to help people get over the fire dog.

Day 14:
Mastiff: One pound ground beef/pork bacon sausage, horseradish batter, beef jus for dipping. This is so they don't leave hungry.

There are still a few more options, but two weeks of corn dogs should keep anyone happy. If you make any of these, please let me know how they came out.

What Apple Eats

The Apple Apple.

This is an apple from Apple. It's organic, of course. If you work at Apple HQ, they're free. If you're invited by an Apple employee, they're also free. No, it's not a Macintosh; it's a Royal Gala. (?!) Go figure.

The Apple cafeteria is really spiffy. There's a wood-burning oven for pizza, a burrito station where you can custom order the burrito of your dreams, Northern California style. Roast chicken, both for in-house dining and to-go awaits, not far from the roast beef station. There's an incredible salad bar. For dessert, you can have a really nice coffee flavored cake or sorbetto. There are gleaming steel and plastic machines capable of brewing your favorite blend from Starbucks.

Maybe you can have other things on other days. I don't know, since I was only invited there once for dinner, by a friend who is an employee. "Lunch is even better," I was told. There were a lot of covered grills on the patio, apparently put to use only during the midday meal. There was also a full wood-burning oven on wheels, giving new meaning to the term "to go". I never did find where it actually goes, though. It was just parked next to the grills.

That's the only way into this sanctum in Cupertino. The general public has to content themselves with the Company Store, where they can buy clothing apparently not available at the normal Apple Stores. I don't know, since we arrived six minutes too late and they would not even let us in for a look. So, I got a look at a lawn, some trees and a cafeteria. I could also see balconies where the Malus Elite no doubt gather to concoct exotic blends of silicon and software to amaze and delight the faithful.

Just so you know you're at Apple, there is an iPad built into the wall. If you try to turn it on, it will say, "This iPad is disabled". Rather cryptic, but then I should have known better than to stick my fingers into strange iPads. Below it is a "beer bash" button. I have no idea what it did, and didn't want to get my friend fired by pushing it to satisfy my curiosity. Does it bash beer? Is a beer bash like a monster mash? Does it run Lion (OS 10.7)? Only the inner cognoscenti are privileged to know these deep secrets; my friend was sworn to secrecy and could not utter a word.