My Internet connection has been down all day. I’m doing this through a dial-up. Argghhh! Posting may be light until my connection is back up.
Yesterday was my wife’s birthday. Here’s the menu for her birthday dinner:
Appetizer of ayvar and lipto with pumpernickel and celery sticks
Beef tenderloin
Pommes duchesse
Salad of mixed field greens, vinaigrette with tomato
Bogle Petite Syrah 2000
Birthday cake
Ayvar is a sort of relish of sweet and hot peppers with onions, garlic, and other seasonings. Lipto is a mixture of farmer cheese, paprika, and other seasonings. Both are Hungarian.
The addition of a teaspoon of tomato paste to a freshly made vinaigrette makes a nice change in the salad dressing. Add a little good blue cheese and it’s pretty near perfect.
The birthday cake was from Swedish Bakery. Chicagoans take note! You simply can’t go wrong with Swedish Bakery.
Dave, how did you make the beef tenderloin?
I had a pound and a half of tenderloin for four people larded as a roast. I seared it in oil and roasted it in a quick oven briefly until it reached an internal temperature of 130 degrees (very rare). Extremely easy.
Zounds, ayvar and lipto sound superb! any chance you might post the recipes??
I can testify that it was delicious!
Dave, when you say “had it larded”, do you mean at the butcher counter, you ask them to do this, and they do it, happily? Please tell me what to say to make this wonderful thing happen. It is as simple as: “Will you please lard this tenderloin to be a roast?” love, ann
ann:
Please tell me what to say to make this wonderful thing happen.
The little local chain, Happy Foods, where I do most of my shopping has a real butcher counter where they sell actual prime meats. The default condition there for beef tenderloin is larded as a roast—you have to ask them to cut it for filets.
I’ve been shopping there daily for about two years now after abandoning the major chain store where I had done my shopping for almost thirty years. I save about 30% on my shopping bills by shopping at the local chain, get fresher, better meat and produce, and actual service.