Sorry for the time-delay on the blog! As much as I would like to hide in my kitchen and only cook when life is in crisis, unfortunately that just isn't possible, time and emotions just didn't allow this week as our family went though some tough stuff. I was supposed to cook a whole extended Rosh Hashanah dinner, and it didn't happen. I managed to get out 3 Gourmet recipes for the holiday. I had 2 of 3 successes.
As I mentioned last Sunday made the Chicken and Rice Soup, page 122 ahead of time and just made it without rice becasue I wanted the home made soup, to use with Chicken Soup with Almond Matzo Balls, page 123. The home made soup turned out great. I made it in my crock pot and it was so easy. Fresh Carrots, and the white meat from the chicken chopped and put back in. The chicken soup with the matzo balls in the recipe calls for canned chicken broth, which is why I combined the two recipes! I think Ruth let me down for the first time though. The Almond Matzo Balls were awful!!! It was a unique flavor to begin with, matzo, almonds, dill and cinnamon made for an intersting but not bad flavor. These balls ended up more appropriate to be used on the PGA tour and have Titleist stamped on them ( to quote my father-in law). The Spud hated them and Coco is too sweet to say anything. Ruth Reichl thanked Muriel Resisman of Fair Lawn, NJ for this recipe and said this recipe made refined cousins, of the delicatessan matzo ball. Well I am sorry they included it! I did rush the recipe a little, and didn't let the batter sit for as long as it said, but still.... Thank goodness for cell phones and my mother-in-law keeps the good old box of Manischewitz Matzo Ball mix in the house and bailed me out of the Matzo ball disaster.
The upside of this quest to cook tradtional Jewish this week was that I finally found a new fish market, and not just any fish market - an amazing one. I have been in the one in Chelsea Market in NYC, and they have nice fish, but it is pretty pricy and the selection is limited. Gone are the days of the old fashioned Italian fish market, Apicella's in Hoboken as well. ( they wouldn't have had what I needed anyway.) I found the Sea Breeze Seafood Market at 541 9th Ave @ 40th Street, New York City. I cannot say enough about this market, they had almost every fish or shellfish you could ever ask for, they are reasonably priced, and the service was excellent. I bought about 10 pounds of Carp, Pike and Whitefish for $27 and they filleted and ground all the fish for me and gave me all the bones, heads and tails.
As you might guess from those ingredients, I made Gefilte Fish, page 73. I must say it was a fairly easy recipe when you get the fish market to do the hard work. It was an excellent recipe, that actually called for Whitefish only, but I made it with the traditional mix of fish. If you don't know what gefilte fish is, the best decription I can provide, is if you took Fish Tartare, and then poached it. Like a fish dumpling. I happen to like my Gefilte fish salty and not sweet, so I left out the carrots and added some salt. It was very good, and different from it's jarred version, and well worth it.
It was a lovely Rosh Hashanah dinner with our loved ones which was the important part. Have a Happy and Healthy New Year!
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There is an Epilogue to the disaterous matzo balls, is that today my mother-in-law's trash was dropped in her driveway and the squirrels got into it. While she was watching, the squirrels picked up a matzo ball nibbled it and then tossed them into the bushes. Even squirrels wouldn't eat them!
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