Passover Feast: P2 Veal Brisket

I know, I know, this does not look appetizing.  We should have taken the picture after it was cut and put on the serving plate, but this is the roast straight from the oven.  I promise, it is much more presentable once cut and tastes INCREDIBLE! This roast is tender, moist and has a ton of flavour! This recipe came from the Toronto Star but changed it slightly.  

Ingredients:

3 tbsp olive oil

5 onions, halved, sliced

about 4 Ib (2 kg) brisket (you may use veal or beef)

salt and pepper to taste 

1 tsp paprika

3 tsp Montreal Steak Spice

1 cup cola 

1 cup pearl onions 

Directions: 

1.  Pour oil into dutch oven big enough to hold brisket flat. Heat on medium-low.  Add onions.  Cook, stirring occasionally, until soft and golden, about 30 minutes. Scrape onto plate. 

2.  Season brisket on each side with salt, pepper, and Montreal Steak Spice.  Raise heat to medium-high.  Brown brisket well on both sides.

3.  Arrange brisket fat side up.  Sprinkle paprika over top.  Drizzle cola gently over top.  Strew onions and their juices over meat.  Place pearl onions around meat.  Cover pot with foil, then lid.

4.  Transfer to preheated 350ºF oven.  Braise 2 1/2 hours, until meat is just tender, basting twice with cooking liquid.

5.  Scrape onions off meat into liquid.  Transfer meat to large tub.  Pour contents of pot over top.  Cool. 

6.  When cooled, slice meat thinly against the grain and transfer to serving dish. Pour sauce overtop and arrange pearl onions around the meat. 

Photography by Ruzan Orkestar

Passover Feast: P1 Potato Latkes

I see it now...my family lined up in the GE kitchen, palms sweaty with anticipation. Padma Lakshmi enters the kitchen and greets us "Hello Chefs!" She then continues to tell our challenge: "Your challenge today is to work with your family unit to create a traditional Passover meal for eight people. What's the catch? You must buy all your ingredients and cook everything in 4 1/2 hours! And your time starts...NOW!"

Now I know that you see challenges much more intense on Food Network, but for me and my family, creating our passover meal this past Thursday felt like our very own episode of Top Chef!...except we didn't have the full GE kitchen. Our tiny little kitchen would have to do to fit all of us.

A Passover meal truly is a labour of love. Most Passover dinners tend to take several days of cooking to get everything ready in time, but it is possible to do it in under 5 hours on the day of. There were certainly a few mistakes along the way (everything from buying the wrong cut of meat to making enough potato latkas to feed an army) but in the end, my family and I made a delicious meal that already has me thinking about next years Seder!

The next several following entires are recipes from our Passover dinner. The menu included:

• Veal Brisket
  
• Potato Latkes
  
• Gefilte Fish
  
• Barbecued Chicken
  
• Green Salad
  
• Roasted Carrots
  
• The various items on the Seder plate including homemade charoset
  

Potato Latkes

This recipe makes a LOT of potato latkes, so if you are feeding a small group, I suggest you just make half. I got this recipe from what I like to call "the mother of all cookbooks," but is actually entitled The Pleasures of Your Food Processor. Most of our Passover recipes came from this book because, like I stated in my entry on the book, it has recipes that never fail!

Note: For a passover dinner, I suggest you make this recipe ahead of time and re-heat the latkes in the oven before serving.

Note: I made my potato latkes lacy because I like the texture, but you can simply process the ingredients till they are coarsely chopped if you prefer.

Note: I used a Cuisinart processor to make these

Ingredients:

6 large potatoes, peeled

1 onion (or 2 depending on how large your potatoes are)

5 eggs

1 tsp salt

1 tsp pepper

oil for frying

Directions:

1. Insert shredding disk attachment into processor. Cut potatoes to fit feed tube. Grate, using light pressure. Empty bowl and place potatoes in a colander. Rinse under cold water to remove starch. Empty into a large bowl while squeezing out excess moisture.

2. Grate onion using medium pressure. Add to potatoes and add eggs, salt, and pepper. Mix well. It's best to use clean hands rather than a spoon to mix this.

3. Pour oil to about a 1/8" depth into a large skillet. When hot, drop in potato mixture by small spoonfuls to form pancakes. Brown well on both sides. Drain well on paper towels.

Photography Ruzan Orekstar

*See a new potato latke recipe here!

Spring Produce Guide

Running late for class so I don't have time for a big write-up or pictures, but here is a really handy Spring Produce Guide from Food Network.  Check it out!

Happy Passover!

The first night of passover begins tonight at sundown. Do you have your seder plate ready?  Martha (of course) has a great Passover guide on how to do the seder ritual. My passover dinner is tomorrow night so I'll be sure to take pictures to show you how my family will celebrate this year! My dads side is Jewish and my mums side is Christian, so come Sunday I'll have my Easter celebration as well! The best of both worlds! 

Thank You!

I would just like to send out a great big thank you to Jaky who wrote a lovely little write up about my blog in his blogs first blog awards! (Wow! I just wrote the word "blog" 3 times in one sentence!) That was so sweet to have mentioned me and I am really so thankful! While I'm at it, thanks to everyone who has commented on my posts and on Facebook about my blog. It really means a lot to me to have all of you writing such nice things to me and I just want to let everyone know how much I truly appreciate it! 

Note: You can get the thank you card above from enormouschampion. Check out their etsy shop!