Several images are from a dinner in December at Benu. A few are from recent meals at Monsieur Benjamin and Mama Ji’s. The rest are scenes from our kitchen.
As usual, click a picture on the mosaic for a larger-sized version.
Short ribs.
Chicken wing stuffed with abalone and abalone liver mousse.
Steamed Japonica rice with powdered scallion.
Grilled veal short ribs, seasoned with sesame seed, perilla seed and pine nuts.
Asian pear and Napa cabbage kimchi.
Broccoli rabe with garlic and lemon.
Shrimp tempura, jellyfish, seaweed
Arctic char amandine, haricots verts, brown butter.
Anchovies and parsley.
Kohlrabi kimchi.
Barbecued quail from Wolfe Ranch.
Monkfish liver steamed in rice wine, with toasted seaweed and chili.
Chicken with tree ears and Chinese mushrooms in a clay pot.
Chrysanthemum leaf and scallion salad.
Ginkgo flour “tortilla”, matsutake mushroom, pine needles, 10 year old aged pine syrup.
Butter lettuce salad, French breakfast radishes, chervil.
Milk pudding, salted caramel sauce, peat
Black truffle steamed bun. Basically a play on Peking duck – stuff the bun with quail, top with condiments and enjoy.
Butter with orange blossom honey and ginseng. Not shown are some sprouted grain rolls.
Xiao long bao with lobster coral, house-made soy sauce, vinegar.
Coconut chiffon cake
Salted walnuts, dried persimmons, sweet rice cakes
Chicken meatballs with ricotta and lemon.
Sea urchin marinated in fermented crab sauce, with thinly sliced celtuce
Whipped ricotta cheese, chestnut honey, chopped pistachio nuts.
“Shark fin” soup – Dungeness crab, ham, egg white and black truffles.
Marinated mussel, root vegetables.
Endive salad with walnuts, mustard vinaigrette and apple.
Omija sorbet, olive oil
Blood sausage, sweet rice, squid ink, shiso.
Thousand year old quail egg, cabbage juice, ginger.
Caviar with hand-pressed sesame oil, sesame leaf and daikon.
Quail liver mousse, au jus, black truffles.
Left: Pickled crosnes and pearl onion. Right: XO sauce, house-made soy sauce.
Pernil – Puerto Rican-style roast pork.
Pickled long beans with pork and chile peppers.
Spicy fermented bean paste with tomato, served with crudités.
Sauternes.
I’ve never committed to a regular blog posting schedule in the nearly 13 years this blog has been in existence, but I suppose I should start doing that, no? That should be my New Year’s resolution…or one of them, anyway.
So here’s to a beginning of sorts.
