Happy Belated Halloween!
I hope everyone had a great one...I know I did, which is why Saturday was a lot less fun. As a result, I was on a hunt for some comfort food.
First stop: lunch. I decided to try someplace I've been meaning to go for some time now, Cheesetique. This place RULES. I had the grilled cheese and cup o' soup combo, which was "Prima Donna and Belletoile cheeses grilled to gooey perfection with a homemade pumpkin sage pesto between slices of multigrain. Served with tomato soup and mixed greens" and a glass of Riesling. I felt extremely comforted after consuming this. Wouldn't you be comforted in the presence of all this cheese??
Next stop: Dinner! Since the most productive thing I did all day was sniff out a cheese/wine bar, I felt compelled to prepare something delicious of my own:
Boneless Ribeye with Gorgonzola Mushroom Sauce, Cauliflower Mash and Arugula Salad
I snagged the recipe from Giade de Laurentis of the Food Network. Hers was a little different, but I followed the basics of the sauce recipe and used boneless ribeye instead of petite filet.
Gorgonzola and Porcini Mushroom Sauce:
- 3 tablespoons olive oil
- 1/4-pound (about 1 cup) dried porcini mushrooms, soaked and strained (since Safeway did not have Porcini, I substituted dried Chanterelles and fresh sliced Cremini mushrooms)
- 1 shallot, sliced (about 2 tablespoons)
- 1 teaspoon chopped fresh thyme leaves (dried also works if your Safeway is as lacking as mine)
- 1/4 cup dry white wine
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
- 3 ounces (about 3 tablespoons) Gorgonzola
- 1/2 cup mayonnaise
- 1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
So first sauté the mushrooms and shallots til brown. Add white wine, thyme, salt and pepper and continue to sauté until evaporated. In the meantime blend gorgonzola, mustard and mayo in a food processor til smooth. Then mix the cheese mixture into the skillet with the mushies. The result was a thick, cheesy sauce. I read some of the comments other people left on the recipe page, complaining of separation of the cheese and mushrooms...I think the reason mine turned out so well was not using too much oil in the mushrooms, and completely evaporating the wine so that the mushrooms weren't in any liquid when I added the cheese.
We grilled the ribeyes with salt and pepper, sliced them and applied generous dollops of sauce.
Now, the cauliflower mash. I love this stuff! And much easier than mashed potatoes. Here's how I made it:
Cauliflower Mash
Ingredients
- 1 small head of cauliflower, cut into florets
- 2-3 cups of chicken stock
- extra sharp vermont white cheddar (as much as you like)
- 1 tbsp butter
- salt and pepper to taste
Fill medium sized pot with cauliflower florets, cover with chicken stock. Bring them to a boil for 10 min. Cover, lower to a simmer and continue cooking for 10 more min. Uncover and let stock reduce by half. Basically, no matter the order you do this, the point is to get the c'flower all nice and soft, ready for mashin'.
When it's soft, drain most of the chicken stock, leaving maybe a tablespoon. Add about a tablespoon of butter, salt, pepper and grate the cheddar into the cauliflower. Mash it up!! Consume. The End.
Then I threw together some arugula with lemon juice, olive oil, salt and pep and some french bread. The bread's main purpose was to slather it with the gorg' sauce.
I drank some Cline Zinfandel with this, which was VERY delicious. Nice and spicy to go with the smooth flavors of the sauce and califlower. Also, Cline holds a special place in my heart since we visited it last year during a trip to Sonoma, CA.
SOOOooooo that was my Saturday Steak Night! Sorry there are no pictures, things just got chomped up too fast to record it.
