I must confess that I did not follow the recipe for last night’s dinner very closely:
- I substituted onions for leeks. I know, they not the same thing at all, and I probably missed out on a subtle flavor difference. I made this switch for a purely selfish reason: I need to practice chopping. My twitchy knife skills scare me and anyone within view, so I take advantage of any opportunity to chop onions, which are my most challenging victims. As much as JG tells me to “just use the hand chopper,” I feel the need to be able to chop an onion without getting all shaky, lest I become even more unwieldy with a sharp object. So I used onions. So sue me.
- I mistakenly interpreted that two leeks equal two onions, but I should have used only one, since our dinner was very onion-y. Oops. I accidentally used a second onion that was intended for another dinner. Sorry, JG.
- I was sure that I wouldn’t be able to find creme fraiche anywhere, so I optimistically cleaned out a glass jar to make my own, as Luisa, the Wednesday Chef, instructs. Unfortunately, not only does my local grocery store not carry creme fraiche, but they also do not carry heavy cream that is not ultra-pasteurized, so that plan went out the window. I used regular old sour cream, instead.
That said, whatever dish I ended up making turned out to be very tasty, so I will count this one as a success. After I spent an embarrassing amount of time chopping onions and mushrooms, the dinner pulled together fairly easily, and our house had a pleasant aroma of butter and white wine for the rest of the evening. I wish I had thought to use vegetable stock and thereby create a wholly vegetarian meal, but it was close. We ate the ragout over egg noodles, and JG commented on the little kick of cayenne pepper. I was quietly pleased with myself; I managed not only to preserve all of my digits in that marathon of chopping, but I also made a dinner that did not involve a casserole dish or baking. Sure, it included pasta, but we’re taking baby steps here.
I triumphantly added the recipe to the binder for future iterations, with notes to budget more time for chopping and make the effort to hunt for creme fraiche. My favorite part about making this ragout was seeing the labels on the packages of mushrooms from neighboring farms. It’s a dish after Kennett Square’s own heart.
8 comments
Mmm… I have been craving mushrooms lately, so this looks delish!
Have you taken a knife skills class? AS and I took one a few years ago. It was expensive, but it was a super fun date and gave us tons of chopping confidence. (He is still the better chopper, though, so he often acts as sous-chef.)
A binder! What a brilliant idea! I currently have a whole bunch of loose recipes in a pile in the cabinet and it constantly cascades all over the floor. I am sometimes lacking in common sense.
I’m proud that you retained all of your fingers AND created a delicious, onion-filled meal. Also, now I am starving even though I had lunch 2 hours ago and I still have to be at school until 5:30 without a snack. Could you bring me some mushroom ragout, please?
I have a recipe binder too! It’s sorted into type and genre (breakfast, appetizers, sides, entrees [American, Mexican, Italian, etc.], drinks) and is so handy no matter how much Tim makes fun of me for it.
That recipe looks like another one that I am going to need to try!
That sounds delish. I’m going to file it away. Thanks!
I think I’ll have to try this one with veggie stock - yum!
Do you have a good chopping knife? It makes a HUGE difference.
It looks tasty….too bad mushrooms make me want to die.
mmm. sounds great! This will definitely go on my list of recipes to make. I am really bad at chopping too - I like the idea of a knife skills class though!
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