Duck Tales, A-Whoo Hoo!

Tonight marked the "real" first meal in our new place that was made using our own cookware from home. Have to say that I've felt naked the last month and a half cooking with other people's sub-par pots and pans. It definitely showed in my cooking, too; wasn't too proud of it. But, you do what you do to get by. Tonight was different, though. Tonight was good.  Real good. Nice to be able to bust out the All Clads again and go to work.

Broke in the kitchen and our new (old) pots from home and laid down a classic French recipe courtesy of Mrs. Julia Child: caneton roti a l'alsacienne and puree de pomme de terraa l'ail. Better known as roasted duckling with sausage and apple stuffing and garlic mashed potatoes. Also threw in some sauteed kale for some green. We lived off sauteed kale back on B.I. and have been very happy to find it out here at the farmer's market.

I was in the kitchen for about 4 hours, but it was worth it. Decided that we're only going to do a "cookbook" recipe once a week as that's just too much time to spend in the kitchen when there's other stuff to do around here and with Roo.

Anyway, back to the meal. It was my first time cooking duck, and although I do a roasted chicken in the oven every couple of weeks, I was still a bit intimidated. Piece of cake, though. I also made a real nice and very rich duck stock with the neck, fat globs and other parts and turned some of it into an even better sauce. The sauce asked for port wine, but we didn't have any so I improvised with some plum brandy mixed with red wine -- did the trick. I love the fattiness of ducks. I surprised me how much fat they carry. Good for them, even better for me. Oh and duck skin? Well shit. I wanted to sleep with it. Yeah, I said it.

Per the recipe, I used a baster to suck out the fat of the baking dish on a few occasions during cooking. That did not go to waste as I saved it all in an empty Illy coffee can that is now in the freezer just waiting for the next time we need some duck fat to add some love to a dish. Also made a 6 cups of stock out of the carcass after cooking was done. That is going to come in handy next time we make risotto or pasta sauce. Or, if we don't have any meat in the house and I'm desperate for some animal protein.

This was actually the second time that I made the garlic mashed potatoes from the Mastering the Art of French Cooking book and things turned out much better this time. Last time, they tasted too pasty as I didn't cook the flour long enough in the boiling milk after adding each to the garlic and butter saute. This time they were top 5 of my life. I've always prided myself on my mashers and have been making them without any kind of recipe for about 10 years. Milk, butter, sour cream, salt, chives and that's it. 30 minutes start to finish. Julia's recipe was quite a change. Quite labor-intensive for mashed potatoes, but so worth it. It was also fun following this recipe (and the duck and others from the book) as I learn something every time I cook one of her meals. It's a great book and very educational for the cooking enthusiast.The French know what they're doing when it comes to food. Their decisions with regard to providing nuclear capabilities to the middle east is a different story. Nobody's perfect. Take me for example, I'm the guy that picks up carcasses and tells them how much I love them while skin and fat hang from my teeth and face. This is who I am. And again, nobody's perfect.

IKEA hell and more bad eating

So I've been assembling IKEA furniture for the past 4 days. Part of me despises it and part of me actually likes it. Such a strange relationship. Kind of like my relationship with sausage ... I love it when I'm hungry, but when I'm done, I feel cheap and dirty. Take today for example: we went to the Auchan (grocery store to stock up on basics) and leaving the place I had to get a sausage and fries. They were gone by the time we were halfway home and we live less than 10 minutes from the store. The day didn't end there, though. This evening we walked up to a new electronics store to get a washing machine, light bulbs and a microwave. On the way home I was so hungry we stopped into "Snack Istanbul" and i got two gyros and fries. I contained myself until we got home, but they, like their sausage cousin from earlier, lasted no more than a good five minutes. Now I'm in bed typing with a glass of wine. What a pathetic fat P.O.S. I'm going running tomorrow.

Speaking of tomorrow, looks like we may have to make an IKEA trek in order to get bedside lamps and light fixtures. Dreading it, but it won't be so bad b.c they'll probably have sausage there, too.

The week that was and the end of the stone age...

Hopefully this will be the last of the entries made from outside the comfort of our home – at least by choice. Tomorrow is a big day. Not only should we be receiving our shipping container of all of our household items, but we will also have our home lit with the beauty of Internet connectivity. It’s been a long road to hoe, but the end is in sight. Keeping our fingers crossed that it all works out. Have to admit that being without Internet has been more challenging than originally anticipated. And it’s making Fantasy Football research and playing much too difficult. And for those of you counting at home, I did win my first Fantasy game of the 2010 season – thank you Peyton Manning for a big week.

Speaking about football, our Huskers rolled through the Washington Huskies last weekend like a Midwest tornado. No Heisman for Jake Locker that’s for sure. Sorry Seattle and UW friends. We were very much hoping to see that game before the move to Lux came up, but it’s nice to know that Big Red took care of business. And to our Seattle Husker friends Jeff and Katie, we hope you guys survived. I’m sure we missed a good time. I’ll end the college football talk there as I hear KU didn’t fare as well.

So last Thursday, I had my first French lesson. It went well, but it ain’t gonna be easy. That same day was also the first dinner party we held in Lux. We invited our neighbors (and landlords) and I cooked from the old reliable cookbook in my head – Butternut squash risotto, radish crostini, simple salad – as the cookbooks were still somewhere floating through the Atlantic on a container ship. It went well and the neighbors are great. Cracked a few bottles of wine and really enjoyed their company.

Friday night we stayed in and had leftovers, and Sat morning we woke up and headed to Belgium and the Orval Abbey. Luckily we have organized friends over here who did the research to and found that this was only one of two weekends a year that the Abbey (a working Trappist Brewery) is open for self-guided free public tours. Thank you Sarah Jane and Maarten. Now I’ve been through a few breweries in the States in my time, namely the Miller Brewery in Milwaukee (thanks to Mike Johnson and a college spring break trip to Brew City and Marquette circa ’96) and to the Sprecher Brewery also in Mil-Town (and thanks to brother Jim O who like a true beer man had his rehearsal dinner there). But this, friends, was something completely different. The Orval Abbey was founded in 1070. It was later destroyed during the French Revolution but would re-emerge from ruins in 1926. In 1931 a brewery was established in the abbey to help finance the construction of a new monastery (last several sentences taken from the brochure we picked up at the front door). Basically, the brewery was a castle.

And a little more entertaining background from the brochure re: the “Name and the Legend of Orval”…

Around 1076, the Suzerain of the area in which Orval was situated was Countess Matilda of Tuscany (Italy). Seated beside a clear gushing spring, she accidentally dropped into the water her wedding ring which had been given to her by her deceased husband, Godfrey the Hunchback (really). In despair at having lost this keepsake from her husband, the countess prayed most fervently to the Virgin Mary. Soon, a trout came to the surface and returned the ring to her (more evidence that the Holy Family fly fishes). Filled with wonder at this miracle, she cried: “Here is the golden ring I was looking for! Blessed be the valley which has returned it to me! From now on and forever I want it to be called ‘aurea vallis’ or Orval – the golden valley.” The emblem of Orval – the trout and the golden ring – has perpetuated the charming memory of this legend. As to the spring, it still supplies water to the monastery and its brewery.

At the end of the tour, we were treated to a complementary beer in what seemed to be part of the loading docks. Really cool scene with a ton of people in there drinking and chatting in different languages that I didn’t understand, but all enjoying beer together. Although it had a strange “chemically” taste akin to a urinal puck, we all happily finished our beers and went looking for more. We left the Abbey and drove to a nearby restaurant and had lunch and another beer. Lunch was fab and we all had whole fried rainbow trout except for Sara who for some unknown reason got herself a grilled cheese sandwich (she is still the worst food-orderer ever). Following the light fish lunch we took a hike several kilometers back up to the Abbey on a trail that skirted into France. I liked what I saw of it – forest – and am looking forward to seeing more of it.

On Sunday we went to a natural foods expo where we bought lots of sausage and Rudy and I had our new favorite – a sausage baked inside a pastry roll. I’m sure I’ll learn the official name for it soon, but needless to say, since Sunday Rudy and I have had two more at the local “confection shop.” After Roo’s nap on Sun afternoon we drove down into France (only 20 km away) as our neighbor who owns a movie prop company was selling off a bunch of his inventory and we were in the market for lamps, light fixtures, etc. We never found the place and ended up blowing about 2 hours of our Sunday evening, but it was still fun to get out and explore (at least for Rudy and myself; Sara, unfortunately, had one of her “car moments” and almost drove us into oncoming traffic several times b/c she was so pissed about not finding the place. Ah the joys.).

Also on Sunday, I was scheduled to play my second Fantasy Football game, still don’t know if I won or not, but I should find out later today. H, if you’re reading this, please let me know.

Monday was a great day as it was the 33^rd b-day of my brother Cris. Happy b-day bro! Wanted to skype with him, but we couldn’t get our timing down. That night I made meatloaf from what turned out to be pork meat or some kind of beef/pork mixture. Now, I know my beef. I know that reddish tint that ground beef holds as compared to the more pink-colored look of pork. Well, this looked beef-red, but it was most certainly not cow meat. But no matter, it turned out great. Had some sautéed fennel, garlic, shallots and young leeks stuffed inside the meat and it was wonderful. Had to really exercise some self control in order to leave a helping for lunch today. Good boy.

That’s it. Moving forward, I’m hoping my posts will be more frequent and less lengthy. Oh, and they’ll also have pics embedded in each post. 

Sausage fest...

Today, Sun Sept 12th we took our first family car adventure. While not long by American driving standards, spending an hour in the car in Lux will likely get you into France, Germany or Belgium. We stayed just inside the Lux boarder as mom got us out of the house to attend the Fetes des Prunes -- a prune fest, no shit (or maybe yes, shit, depending on how much you like prunes). Luckily for all, no prunes were discovered, though we did find ourselves with an ample supply of sausage options. Like a frat bar on 1 dollar pitcher nights, a full on sausage fest. Between two different festivals, I had three sausages, a huge plate of fries and a really killer bowl of sauteed mushrooms.

The Fetes des Prunes was at Robescheier, Munshausen, where again, no prunes were detected. We did, however, see a "display of Ardennes Shire horses and forestry" which was really cool. The Shire horses are working draft horses that you see in the Budweiser commercials, only these are their badass cousins from the old country. Not the Hollywood fakers that we see in Superbowl commercials. These things were tanks. We watched as different horse owners (ranchers, I guess) walked their Shire horse through an obstacle course while towing a tree. Literally, the horse was dragging huge 15 foot long log around a course while a little dude in spectacles followed them with a clip board and stopwatch. Good stuff. It was just after seeing the horses that I ate my third sausage of the afternoon.

I should backtrack just a bit...before we even got to Munshausen, we stopped at a street market in the town of Clervaux for some sight-seeing and munching on local grub. It was there that I ate my first and second sausages of the day, along with the wonderful shrooms.

There was also a special treat in Clervaux -- a truly amazing photography exhibit of the works of Edward Steichen. Oh, and the exhibit was in a freaking castle no less. His are some of the most compelling and recognizable photos ever taken and have graced the pages of numerous Life Magazine covers and photo spreads. Steichen was born in Lux, but lived in America for part of his life if I remember correctly. Incredible photographer.

Out front of the castle was an old Abrams tank from WWII which was sole surviving tank from its battallion in the 9th armored division. It was retired in 1944 after protecting that very castle. Also very cool.

It's a few hours later and we're at home now and I'm happily reliving those sausages every 15 minutes or so with a tasty burb or two. I told Sara that I don't think I could get full on sausages and I stand by that statement. I really have no accurate guess as to how many I could plow through if given a good half-day or more of walking around festivals and street fairs eating and drinking beer, etc. If I were a betting man, I put the over-under at 7.

OK, now I have to figure out how to load pics onto this site so we  have reminders of what we've eaten and where.

One week in...

We’re a week in-country and not yet KIA, MIA or otherwise. Went to the farmers market yesterday with Roo and Sara (on lunchbreak) and picked up some veggies, fruit, bread and exquisitely over-priced fish. Something that would make the Real Housewives of Orange County just giddy.  Anyhow, wondering if we need to accept that we’re now in a landlocked country and that fish here may not be as good (or affordable) as fish in Seattle or fish on the coast of Ireland.

The fish I picked up at the much more chilled out Wednesday market as compared to the Saturday extravaganza was your basic Sole. Nothing fancy. A fish we eat in the States when we want fish and don’t really want to cook. A little butter, garlic, lemon and white wine cook for about 5 minutes and that’s it. Not an incredible eating experience, but good, easy and cheep, and of course something I should do more of in order to help curb the red meat addiction I’ve been a slave to my entire life.  No hyperbole there. I am truly addicted to meat. I dream about it. When I look at cows and pigs in a field or on a farm, I think they look really tasty and I’d like to off one of them and just start chowing. Case in point, when I was a kid, I wouldn’t eat PBJ like the rest of the free world. Nope, it was only Oscar Meyer ham on white bread for me. Ask mom, she’ll vouch. Just ate the crap out the stuff for years. Only started eating PBJ in college and due to budgetary reasons (i.e. the Ramen and PBJ diet in the dorms).

But I digress, the sole I picked up from a mini RV parked in the middle of the square looked good. Strange though, as it was a whole fish with the skin removed. Must be something I don’t know about sole and having tough-to-remove skin. In any event, I douched my way through asking for 3 fish and when she wrapped them up it was 25 Euro. I about walked away, but didn’t. Got home looked at the fish and wondered “OK, do I just cook the fish whole or what? I mean, I paid for the whole thing, but I really just want the skinny, light, non-fishy tasting fillets.” Ended up filleting the fish and managing to get 6 very meager (but typical, at least in my experience) sole cuts. I looked down at the fish carcasses and noticed there was still a lot of meat in between the rib bones running the length of the spine of the fish. Now I’m thinking that I maybe should have cooked the fish whole and tried to remove the spine and rib bones in one easy pull before serving. Anyway, don’t think I’ll find out as like I said, it’s just not worth it for the price.

Sole ended up coming out very good and was paired with some boiled potatoes in butter sauce and spinach salad with some “Fruites de mar” which tasted like the ass-end of a carp. They looked like shrimp, but they had this weird, very dense consistency. Sara tells me they’re like that b/c they were ceviche style. I don’t know, but what I do know is that when my wife starts educating me on food we have major effing problems right there.

Tonight is more leftovers and some killer tapenades and breads we got from the market. Oh, and I just had to fry up a couple of mini steaks and some onions and green peppers for a steak sandwich, because really who are we kidding thinking that a jerk like me will be eating just bread, cheese, and tapenade for dinner? Come on now, kid.

In other news, Rudy and I went for a jog this morning. I always feel good about it when I’m done, I just wish I got it more often. But that means I’d have to jog more often, which tends to get in the way of eating or basically anything else. After cleaning up, we got in the car and headed to Naturata (a small chain of organic groceries in Lux). Picked up some essentials and headed back home without getting lost and dropping four-letter bombs because I’m driving in a bus lane or the wrong way on a one-way street. I need to do a better job in the foul language dept around Roo as we’ve already heard a few things come out of his mouth that are very ungentlemanly…and a few that even mom hasn’t heard yet. If anyone knows about the job I did with my youngest brother Mike and his early childhood language education, you know I probably should have lost my teacher’s license back in 1985. Then again, if a three-year old Rudy doesn’t lean out the window and yell “Hey lady, nice tits” to a passing shopper, then I’ll be happy in knowing that I’ve improved my curriculum since Mike.

Finally, recent kitchen music accompaniment has been the Sklar Brothers and their new Friday comedy/sports podcast. If you need some hilarity in your life, listen to their show Sklarborogh Country….you can get it on iTunes or at Earwolf.com (sweet name by the way).

And we're off....

While this is the first entry in the blog that may or may not chronicle our lives in Luxembourg for the next two years, we’ve been in Lux for several days already and have been on the road for just under a month now. If you are reading this, then you are family or friends we’ve told about this ‘attempt’ to stay connected to everyone via blog. Hate to disappoint before we’ve even left the gates, but this blog will be more for us than for you. The idea is that a few years from now, we’ll be able to print this whole thing off and have a nice photo and story journal of our times in Europe. That said, in order to make this fun and not a chore, we’ll do much of our writing quickly and without the delete/backspace button. The less bullshit the better… in the immortal words of Mike Tyson “…if you don’t like it, turn of your station.”

And as you can see by the title (and by our general eating habits, or issues, as we refer to them), the central conversation for this blog will be food. Thing is, there will be other things for us to keep a record of during our stay, so it won’t solely be about food – other things like booze and wine and maybe travel, oh and our kid, will probably come into play. And for the next few months, Football (note the capital F in homage to the real sport of football – American football) will be discussed, specifically my Fantasy Football team, the Cornhuskers of Nebraska in their final season of the Big XII conference before the move to the Big 10 in 2011, as well as the Jayhawks of Kansas led this year by Turner Gill, a former Husker that was an idol to my generation. Finally, observations of Eurotrash and their likely comparisons with good old fashioned American White trash may also be explored. I should also mention that the title really comes from Darren and Gwen whom we met in Kinsale. They are Irish, but just returned after 16 years in the States. Their blog Eating West Cork is about eating and living in the great town of Kinsale. They are great people, treated us to some great conversation over a pint of Murphy’s (black ice cream as they say) and we hope to see them again either here or there.

As I mentioned, we’ve been on the road for nearly a month now, but have only been in Lux for a handful of days. That being said, this entry will probably be 50X longer than any that follows as there is a lot for me to put down on paper. The first three weeks of our Adventure (must pronounce this in an overtly-Australian accent…long story involving bad reality TV) were spent in the heaven known as Kinsale, Ireland, a coastal holiday town in Co. Cork. We’ll likely be throwing up some pics of our stay in Ireland, but they won’t compare to what it was really like. We stayed in three different places during our time in Kinsale, each with its own charm and immediate access to different parts of town which is somewhat of a misnomer as anyone can cross town on foot in 30 mins. Needless to say, much Murphy’s Stout was consumed during that time of our lives. Probably the best beer we’ve ever had.

The food in Kinsale was killer, too. Jimmy Edwards is a wonderful restaurant and bar in the center of town and we ate there three times (in the bar, not in the dining room). Their seafood chowder cannot be beat in our eyes. We loved the place so much, we even celebrated Rudy’s second birthday there. We had a bunch of wonderful Irish men and women helping us sing happy birthday to little man. Those people are some of the greatest people in the world.

Other good eating in Ireland was done at Fishy Fishy which is probably the most well known of the nicer dining establishments in town. Again, we decided to eat at the bar rather than in the restaurant – it’s easier for your 2-year old to make a scene in the bar (esp in Ireland).

During our stay in Ireland, we ‘somehow’ made friends with Ken, the proprietor of a great wine shop 1601 right in the middle of Kinsale.  We saw Ken’s face more than any other person’s in town. He took care of us, steered us quite nicely to the cheap, but good bottles of wine. He even gave Washington some love and carried a few wines from K Vintners in Walla Walla. I could go on and on re: Ireland, but I’ll stop there. Needless to say, if any friends plan to take a vaca in Ireland, make Kinsale a stop on your list – I’ll put you in touch with some good leasing agents and some great condos.

So we arrived in Lux on Thurs, Sept 2, 2010 at 11am local time thanks to a 6am flight out of Cork (not fun with a little one, but Rudy was in really good form and took it like a champ). After having a couple of bags lost, we got in our rental car and headed to our home at 36, Montee de la Petrusse in the very cool and very old area of Lux known as the Grund. Our relocation services had the place decked out in serviceable temporary furniture, so we didn’t walk into an empty house which was great.

Rudy and I got settled and then took naps and Sara walked to work to check in. Her commute has dropped from 2 hours to 5 minutes (on foot no less). Not bad. When we got up Sara was home and we drove over to Auchan grocery store to stock up on provisions and some necessary items. We got there at 715 pm and they close at 8pm. Needless to say, a nice clerk found us in some random isle and said something in French and tapped her watch. We were the last ones out of the store – they literally shut the door behind us. The girl at the checkout was pissed. Sorry check out girl whose face I wanted to punch in, but those are the breaks. Sometimes you get a-hole Americans who can’t wait til tomorrow to by toilet paper and food for themselves and 2-year old. Oh, and note to all of you reading at home, yes , the grocery closes at 8pm. Hell, that’s when I do my best shopping; when there are less jerks to push my cart around. Oh, and here’s the kicker, not open on Sundays, either. Really? Really.

Our first full day in Lux we went to city hall and did a bunch of paperwork (i.e. registered at our commune, did some customs stuff, bought garbage bags (really), etc) all with the help of our wonderful advocate from the relocation service that Amazon uses. Then we went to the bank and got our account set up and credit/debit cards in hand, etc.

The next day, Saturday, was a huge farmers market right in the center of town. I mean, huge. Like Portland, OR farmers market huge. It was incredible. Fresh fruits, veggies, meats, fish, cheese….you name it. We did most of our food shopping there and had to lug bags and bags of it home (fortunately only a 10-15 min walk).

Been eating in since getting here. Some of the meals were pretty quick and dirty and couple were old staples. The first real sit-down meal we had a few nights ago was a roasted chicken stuffed with dates, fennel, onion, apples, garlic and finished with some lemon wedges under the skin. The two family staples, mashed potatoes sautéed kale with garlic, onion and white wine finished things off. Good end result. Musical accompaniment during cooking was Pearl Jam’s Backpacer album, which I’ve owned for a little while now, but really did not like it at first. I must have been in a sour mood the first time I listened to it because it was much better than I remembered. I’d still toss out a third to half of the album, but the songs I’d keep are really good, classic PJ, which I love.

Last night, did a pumpkin, pea and chantrelle mushroom risotto – another of the old guard. Always reliable and easy to make – esp without my cookbooks which probably won’t arrive for another month or more with the rest of our stuff. Had a nice spinach salad on the side with some nice Luxembourgian Riesling (of which they are very well known). Music support in the kitchen was provided by Stevie Wonder. A good time was had by all.

Tonight will be leftover night: risotto, mashed pot, kale and then a nice recipe I got from Robbie via the NYT that is a Radish-Garlic-Anchovie bruschetta type thing. Again, no recipe on hand (and no internet) so I’ll have to wing it.

Earlier today, Rudy and I made our first solo trip to the Auchan grocery store (meaning: without Sara who has some French chops, rusty albeit, but much better than my douchebag American communications. Note to self, start those French classes yesterday.

More to come as things happen.