Cyrus made this! It’s loosely based on the veal tenderloin and wild mushrooms recipe in the Les Halles cookbook.
Veal blade steak was browned, then finished in the oven; while a sauce was made from sliced mushrooms, a finely diced shallot, garlic, red wine and chicken stock.
This is just a fairly standard sort of risotto. I trimmed the asparagus tips off for garnishing, and chopped the stems thinly. I finely chopped the zest of a lemon, and set aside the lemon juice for deglazing. As an underlying flavour base, I used 4-5 shallots diced finely.
I blanched the asparagus stems in water, and once they were finished; cooled the water down with a block of frozen chicken stock from the freezer.
In the main pan, I heated some garlic infused olive oil; and added the lemon zest. Once that was fragrant, I added the shallots. When the shallots softened, I added four small handfulls of risotto rice to the pan; which I gently fried until it started to get a little colour. At this stage, I deglazed the pan with the lemon juice. Once the lemon juice evaporated, I started to incorporate the chicken stock. When the risotto was about half complete; I added the asparagus stems to the pan, and moved the asparagus tips into the stock to warm through.
Once the risotto finished; I put it into a couple of bowls, and topped it with freshly grated parmesan and the asparagus tips.
Next time around, I’m going to pass on blanching the asparagus – the idea behind that was to get some asparagus flavour into the chicken stock. It didn’t make that much difference flavourwise, and it was a bit brutal texture-wise.
I’ve started playing the guitar again (There was a song that I just had to learn. This is usually how I end up starting to play the guitar again).
On day 2, I’ve got blisters on my blisters.
(Although, if you hold your ears right, you can almost hear the song.)
This evening, there was a fireworks display in Wellington, celebrating the Chinese New Year which begins on Wednesday.
This year, will be the year of the Rooster.
Cyrus is back! And he came forth bearing gifts!
As a “Cyrus is home” present, he gave me a brand spanking new digital camera. It’s much smaller than my film cameras (and my old digital) so now I have no excuse for not carrying it around with me.
He also procured a couple of table lamps, and laundry hampers (they’re like giant springs wrapped in a fine mesh) and a diabolical looking rack for holding paper towels.
He’s also been taunting me with my birthday gift [Yes, a birthday gift in addition to the camera. I’m.. astonished].
Oh! And most important of all, he bought some bottles of catnip bubble solution for the cats. The cats still aren’t 100% certain what to make of bubbles; but it’s still fun to watch.
I have nothing important to say today!
Check back tomorrow, and there may be something then.
[Even moreso if her royal catness isn’t being a complete pratt and jumping all over my keyboard]
Gosh. Looks like February just snuck up out of nowhere.
On the flipside, that also means it’s almost my birthday!
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