Baked trout, tomato salad

"I came here to this store specifically to look your trout square in the eyes."

Both men behind the counter laughed. What a weirdo, they must be thinking.

"These fish on ice look happy to be here."

The men are so amused with me. Apparently they usually only get Cranky McCrankpots around there. Or maybe they both appreciate a guy who knows exactly what he came for, that's different too. 

That was two days ago, it looked better then.

Ugh, ya got me, and my guts spilled out.

The stuffing inside the fish keeps it moist should I overdo it, and the salad share ingredients but not completely. What happens to the mint that cooks inside the fish is completely different from the mint that stays fresh and touched with dressing, the corn changes in there with herbs too. 

Dressing made here.

The stuffing is ad hoc with ingredients on hand. It's like Chopped over here. And I must say it exceeds expectation. I held off tasting it because it is kind of gross inside there and when the flavors bloomed in my mouth so perfectly balanced with butter, vermouth, lemon, onion, sage, rosemary, black pepper, corn, mint, basil and shrimp. It was like an ace restaurant experience right there in my dining room. 

This is an excellent meal that I would be proud and pleased to serve anyone, even to someone who claims not to like seafood, for whatever reason, I believe this can change one's opinion.

If you would say, and I've heard this more times than is reasonable, "I do not eat seafood." Then I would shoot back at you, kindly of course, "It's freshwater trout. Not the sea, nanner nanner nanner so eat it!

At the table.

A bloke I know showed me how to do this, so adroitly he didn't miss a single tiny bone, and I go, "Oh, Man, that's like Jerry the cat, or more probably Tom, in the cartoon who picks through the trash bins with the lid to the bin like a waiter's serving tray." 

I've not been able to do it that well.

Blue cheese iceberg, strawberry poundcake, Weld

The man above owns the house and I said, "Come here and see what this lens does to this room." 

I was on the floor kneeling using the chair seat at the end for platform, the lens is a few inches from the plate. He answered, 

"If I get down there I won't be able to get back up."

"I'll help you." 

So the two of us were on the floor using the same chair for a table sharing the camera viewfinder.

That's what I made.

This is the chef who helped. He is no longer a chef but retains his mad cheffery skills. He cubed an avocado, limed it up, and sprinkled black pepper all over. 

And then we put on our accents and amused ourselves, in cartoon French-English, 

"It iz a mountain. And dis iz le detritus. And this is the snow upon the mountain. And dis is l'avalanche."

And indeed, the salads looked like little landscapes. The guests repeated they had not seen the likes of it before, they are so encouraging. Most are already familiar with the simple blue cheese dressing iceberg at Emilenes that I learned from for this, but they remarked they found the combination of detritus excellently unfathomable. 

But that comes from various salsa frescas minus the onion and garlic and chiles and harsh things, just the nice things that children would like then pair that with blue cheese. That's the odd part. And not mix them. They must do that.  The watermelon touches the blue cheese by accident on the plate and delivers a surprise. They go! And so do the grapes. They're in control, the mixing unforced.

The pecans are burned on purpose, but only slightly, I kneeled there patiently watching to assure it, so that they give up their nut-meatiness and dissolve in the mouth leaving a faint charred pecan flavor, and the croutons are large toasted cubes with irregular rough surfaces, made of my own sourdough bread.

Who does that? 

The chef pictured above asked what type of sourdough I used and I told him my own, I baked it this morning, his jaw dropped and he said he wouldn't attempt sourdough. I told him the culture was collected out on the balcony and he looked at me as if I were quite mad. 

But all of that is common. I guess they didn't do such things in his hotel and his catering.

Salad with avocado and apple, blue cheese dressing

That's it, you must make your own dressing or forever be a dummkopf. It is why I would easily win any salad competition amongst my peers. You should see what they served me, I felt sorry for myself. This is blue cheese and cream. Easy as that. It could be blue cheese and mayonnaise. It was almost blue cheese milk and yogurt, but the yogurt I have on hand is purple and that will not do. 

Meatball with angel hair pasta, lettuce

Beef gravy with red wine. Blue cheese dressing.

The dressing is made with incredibly strong Roquefort recommend by the guy at Tony's market. It is not pleasant by itself, was not good with potato either, but it is fine here diluted and still very strong, still too strong in my opinion, but I think it would get an A+ from most men due to its uncompromising assault on the senses. 

Salad with avocado, radish and sausage

At first it was all... 

And then it was all...

And then it was like...

On top of that it was all like...

And we LOLed all over the place...

Can a sausage be croutons? 

No, it cannot.

Why not?

Because crouton means crust. A crust of bread, and this is not a crust of bread, or any bread for that matter. So this must be a salad with sausage. Chorizo. Green chorizo. 

Well I'm pretending it is croutons. Salad with sausage-croutons. They're crusty.

Iceberg lettuce, blue cheese dressing

How'djew do that? 

It is a secret of the culinary arts held by their high priests upon pain of...

Show it to me.

Very well then.

Thin with milk, or cream, yogurt what have you, mayonnaise is already a complete salad dressing, or be different than everyone else, go out on a limb and consider wine or pickle juice, chile sauce, something to challenge the profile.

Green salad with shrimp and pecans

This is a big pile of blue cheese I picked up at Sam's Club, and Boy, is it ever strong. 

The blue cheese dressing at Emil-Ene's has a very clean blue cheese flavor. I applied my finely-tuned analytical powers and discerned its components were most likely blue cheese diluted probably with milk, possibly with water.  My friend insisted it must have mayonnaise because he used to make it at another restaurant where he worked years ago. Online recipes confirmed many recipes do indeed call for mayonnaise. Others called for sour cream. None that I read called for buttermilk. I tried all variations including my own mayonnaise but I kept coming back to the purity of Emil-Ene's. The restaurant is known for its stark simplicity and for its fantastic steaks. There is nothing elaborate or even faintly pretentious about the place. Therefore, my new recipe for blue cheese dressing is 1) a strong blue cheese 2) milk. Here I used the remnant cartons of Half & Half, heavy cream, and buttermilk, but frankly, milk is just fine. I recommend it. 

The pecans heated for 45 seconds in the microwave. 

Frozen shrimp. Water brought to the boil then cut off. Frozen shrimp de-shelled and dumped in the hot water that was no longer boiling. 

Sourdough hotdog buns. 

The Aerogarden greens. 

Flatiron, iceberg lettuce quarter, blue cheese dressing, refried beans, tortillas

I concluded Emilene's blue cheese dressing is blue cheese + buttermilk. My friend said he used to make it and they used mayonnaise too. My mayonnaise has a lot of mustard and garlic so I included it. It was excellent.  I did not use the cream cheese pictured because when I opened the package I saw I'd have to trim it heavily and I didn't feel like it, plus it would have diluted the flavor anyway without adding anything significant. So I tossed it. 

This is one of my favorite new things. If you ever see flatiron cut in your grocer's cooler, just toss it in your basket. You won't regret it. The thing is, the dry rub is entirely extemporaneous so it never tastes quite the same any two times, and that is the glory and the power you wield as extemporaneous cook. Anything less, and you are slave to proven recipe. 

Tortillas were made with regular masa harina (powdered alkaline-treated corn meal) and pressed in a common cast-aluminum press, heated in a hot pan for seconds, as much time as it takes to press the next tortilla. One cup hot water + 1 and 3/4 cup masa harina = 13 small tortillas.