Tasca Brava

Tasca Brava
607 Glenwood Ave
Raleigh, NC
(919) 828-0840
http://www.tascabrava.com/

I went to Tasca Brava with a friend for a drink and to try some American tapas. The converted restaurant was once just another older house on Glenwood. An old closet has been fitted with wine racks to store the proprietors lovingly selected Spanish wines. The dining areas are decorated with care. The chair seats are upholstered in a blue velvet print; above the doorways are decorated with flower pots arranged on wrought iron holders, reminiscent of Madrid side streets.

Ironic to the picture perfect decor otherwise, the menus were the nice, large, faux-leather covered type frequently used, however, on the front a Tasca Brava logo had been glued to partially cover the original logo of Bistro 607 (the restaurant that existed in the location prior to Tasca Brava).

While my friend and I were there for tapas with the idea of a little something to nibble on while enjoying a drink, the "tapas" at Tasca Brava (including things like pan roasted asparagus with olives, octopus & goat cheese mashed potatoes, wild boar sausage cooked in a wine) seemed more like side dishes that would be featured on the side of a great meal rather than the pinchos that I experienced when I was in Spain.

With my friend being a cheese lover, and myself wanting Serano Ham, we ordered the $16 "Spanish Sampler" plate. It came with some chorizo, a few thin and moist slices of Serrano ham, Marcona almonds, and three different Spanish cheeses: one goat, one cow and one sheeps. The jamon & chorizo were of the highest quality. Sometimes Serrano ham can be sliced thick and the gamey-ness can overwhelm, the paper thin slices at Tasca Brava were succulent and delightful with the slight game after-taste. The chorizo was very tasty, full of smokey paprika and heat from other peppers. The olives were also very well done, with several different varieties, each with a distinctive taste in a little dish. The $2 roll I ate though was a disappointment, being dense and bland, the accompanying garlic butter was a nice touch, but the roll did not improve much with its addition.

I had the house made sangria ($6/glass). The chilled wine drink was luscious and thick and almost creamy from the fruit juice emulsion with the wine. Very Delicious!

All in all, I give Tasca Brava a B+ . While it is not budget friendly, the food is extremely well done with obvious care and pride.

The Oakwood Cafe

Oakwood Café

oakwoodcaferaleigh.com

300 E Edenton St
Raleigh, NC 27601
(919) 828-5994

F. & I were in luck this Friday. We got to eat at the Oakwood Café. I’ve longed to eat there – I wanted to go for their lunch menu (cheaper) and I work in Durham. Therefore, I hadn’t had the opportunity to go for lunch. Unfortunately, the Oakwood Café is only open for lunch on workdays. So, Friday I was off of work for Spring Break, and F. always gets off early… so we went!

We started off with an appetizer of a single beef empanada. I cannot rave enough about this empanada – crispy fried oil bubbles delicately adorning the hand sized empanada, filled generously with perfectly spiced beef. We couldn’t eat it fast enough.

F. then ordered the Beef Milanesa, a large but thin breaded and fried piece of steak. He had it with Fries (the frozen type, nothing remarkable) and a salad (with a thick & tasty homemade ranch dressing).

I had the Churrasco Steak. It was about a 1.5” thick ribeye type cut, beautifully tender with a tangy chimi-churri sauce on the side. With it I had fried yucca and plantains – both were delightful.

Overall, I give Oakwood Café a B+ Go and give it a try yourself!

Pineapple Pavlova

In April's Gourmet this month, they feature a Berry Pavlova (meringue with lemon curd topped with ... you guessed it: berries!). My F. doesn't care overly for berries though, so I made ours with pineapple. Though not as photogenic, this Pineapple Pavlova was really divine.

First comes making the meringue:

3 egg whites

pinch of salt

3 tb. cold water

1 Cup superfine granulated sugar

1 TB cornstarch

1 ts rice wine vinegar

Let the egg whites come to room temperature for a half hour and mix cornstarch and sugar together. Then, add the egg whites to your mixer on medium with a pinch of salt to arrive at soft peaks (about 6 minutes). Add water, and re-arrive at soft peaks (another 3 min. or so).

On medium high speed, gradually add tablespoon by tablespoon of the sugar mixture to the egg whites. Let the mixture go for another minute after incorporating all the sugar mixture. Add the vinegar and continue to mix for another 5 min. or until glossy with stiff peaks.

Spread the mixture onto parchment paper and stick in a 300 degree F oven for 45 min. When the time's up, open the oven door and let the meringue cool undisturbed for an hour.

Meanwhile... make the lemon curd!

1 C sugar

6 TB room temp. butter

2 whole eggs

2 egg yolks

1/2 C fresh lemon juice

Cream sugar and butter together over medium speed in your mixer. Then, add the eggs until incorporated. Finally add the lemon juice. (The mixture may look lumpy)

Put the mixture in a heavy bottomed saucepan. Stir constantly over medium low heat. The butter may separate out a little before it's all warmed. No worries, keep stirring over medium low heat until the mixture reaches 170 degree F. This will take 25 minutes or so, so get comfortable. Once it reaches 170, you're good to go with delicious lemon curd.

Then it's easy as pie to assemble. Remove the meringue onto a dish, spoon lemon curd in the center crater of the meringue and then top with pineapples.

The Pavlova is really fabulous. There's a layer of the meringue that's crisp and brittle, and then the center is luxuriously marshmallow-y. Enjoy!

Potatoes Gribiche

Recently, one of the blogs, The Wednesday Chef , featured a recipe that is also on another blog I read, Chocolate and Zucchini. And since this latest reference to this recipe, I've found myself desiring it: Potatoes Gribiche. Potatoes tossed in a sultry smokey paprika vinaigrette spiked with pickles and salty. The thoughts whirled until I had to make it. At 1am, bien sur.

While the original recipe is much larger - I was only cooking for myself at past midnight. Also, I lacked the shallot & capers the original recipe call for. However, I fancy my recipe was quite tasty in it's own right.

Warm Potato Salad

1. Roast - 2 hand size Yukon gold potatoes cubed & tossed in olive oil, sprinkled with salt and pepper at 425 F for a half an hour.

2. Mix - 1 chopped hard boiled egg, three minced baby dill pickles, 8 manzanilla olives, 1 ts. sherry vinegar, 1/2 ts. Dijon mustard, 1/2 ts. dried onion, 1/4 ts. granulated garlic & 1/4 ts. smoked Spanish paprika

3. Toss them together & Enjoy!

Chicken Wings: Three Ways

Every so often, F. and I like to fry. We'll do fresh fries every other week or so. For the final four though, we did a wing night. I put together a variety of sauces and F. trimmed all the wings.

The best way to cut the wings is to:

-Separate the drumette from the wing portion by cutting down to the bone, paralel to the drumette, and then twist the bones out from each other.

-Cut away the wing tip and discard those bits (the only purpose I can see for them would be to save them to make stock with).

The sauces we used:

L to R: North Carolina's Bone Suckin' BBQ sauce, Asian, then the classic Buffalo

First, we fried the wings in some paprika & garlic seasoned flour

We had to fry the wings in three batches, which worked out well with our three sauces. After frying and draining them on a paper bag, we then just tossed them in the bowl with the sauces until they were covered.

Spring Herb Garden

So today I planted my spring herb garden. Last year I was in an apartment with no outdoor access, unless and open window counts. This year, F. has a screened in porch, where I have planted a few herb plants: rosemary in the large pot and basil in the smaller pot, then cilantro, thyme, & parsley in the windowbox planter.


Here is hoping these herbs do better than my herbs last year. I grew my herbs from seed last year, so they didn't even become as hardy as these herbs here. The ones this year I picked up at Whole Foods ready to be planted into larger containers.

Fruit Love

Nectarine Turnovers

I had F. go to the store for me to buy some things, including nectarines. He brought back fruits that were as hard as a baseball and smelled... well, of nothing. I left them on the counter for a few days in the fleeting hope they would ripen and when they didn't, I knew I would be making fruit-something rather than eating them plain as planned.

So I let a sheet of puff pastry thaw from the freezer.

Began a caramel sauce (1/2 C of water to 1 C of sugar... letting it cook alone without stirring for 15 minutes or until golden) as if making a tart tatin or something.

Instead of arranging the fruit prettily about as in a tart tatin, I added the peeled and chopped nectarine and let it cook in the caramel sauce for about ten minutes.

The fruit released a lot of juice, so I found it much too liquidy to put all in the puff pastry. So I strained the caramel/fruit mixture and reserved the caramel.

Then, I added the goozy fruit mixture to the middle of the pastry, brushed the sides with butter and folded them up, rolling together the ends where I could.

I brushed them with butter, and put them in a 350 oven for 15 minutes - they emerged looking very edible.

With some ice cream and the reserved caramel sauce all over ... even more edible