Farmer’s Market

Title: Farmer’s Market
Location: 3rd & Depot, Downtown Morgan Hill
Description: Farm fresh fruits and vegetables, fresh cut flowers and more.
Every Saturday morning at Downtown Train Station (3rd and Depot) from 9:00 a.m. to 1:00 a.m.
Start Time: 09:00
Date: 2008-06-28
End Time: 13:00

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June 21st, 2008 Posted by Mark | Activities, Announcements, Good Eats, Gossip | no comments

July 4th Parade

Title: July 4th Parade
Location: Downtown Morgan Hill
Description: Northern Californiaâ€™s largest Independence Day Celebration and festivities and Santa Clara County’s Official 4th of July Parade
Date: 2008-07-04

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June 20th, 2008 Posted by Mark | Activities, Announcements, Gossip | no comments

Farmer’s Market

Title: Farmer’s Market
Location: 3rd & Depot, Downtown Morgan Hill
Description: Farm fresh fruits and vegetables, fresh cut flowers and more.
Every Saturday morning at Downtown Train Station (3rd and Depot) from 9:00 a.m. to 1:00 a.m.
Start Time: 09:00
Date: 2008-06-21
End Time: 13:00

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June 14th, 2008 Posted by Mark | Activities, Announcements, Good Eats, Gossip | no comments

Cooking Class – Mustard Glazed Beef Short Ribs

Mustard-Glazed Beef Short Ribs

June 9, 2008 – 12:07 ET

RECIPE COURTESY OF MICHAEL LOMONACO
Porter House New York
10 Columbus Circle
4th Floor
New York, NY 10019
212-823-9500

6 pounds beef short ribs, on the bone, cut into 4 portions
Fine sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 tablespoon unsalted butter
1 large onion, peeled and chopped
2 carrots, peeled and chopped
1 celery stalk, chopped
1 jalapeÃ±o pepper, seeded and chopped (optional)
2 cloves garlic, peeled and crushed
Â¼ cup tomato paste
1 cup red wine
3 cups low-sodium, store-bought beef broth
Bouquet garni: 3 sprigs rosemary, 3 sprigs thyme, and three sprigs oregano tied in a cheesecloth
Â½ cup Pommery mustard
Â½ cup honey

Preheat the oven to 350Â°F.
Pour the oil into a wide, deep-sided sautÃ© pan and heat it over medium-high heat. Season the short ribs with salt and pepper, add them to the pan, and brown them all over, approximately 4 minutes per side. Transfer the ribs to a large casserole or roasting pan.
Add the onion, carrot, and celery to the sautÃ© pan and cook for 5 minutes to lightly caramelize them. Add the jalapeÃ±o, garlic, tomato paste, wine, and broth to the pan. Bring the mixture to a rapid boil, then pour it over the ribs in the casserole. The liquid should not rise more than two-thirds up the side of the ribs and the ribs should not be entirely submerged. If you have extra liquid, maybe your casserole is too small and the ribs are too tightly packed; try dividing the ribs and liquid among 2 casseroles.
Put the casserole in the oven, add the bouquet garni, and braise the ribs approximately 2 Â½ – 3 hours. Pierce the ribs with the tines of a fork; if cooked enough, the fork will meet no resistance.
Remove the casserole from the oven and let rest for 5 to 10 minutes before transferring the ribs to plate or platter. Degrease the braising liquid, strain it, discard the solids, and reduce and reserve the juices for serving. The short ribs can be cooled, covered, and refrigerated for 1 to 3 days. Let come to room temperature before proceeding.
Prepare an outdoor grill with a drip pan to prevent-flare ups or preheat the oven to 350Â°F.
Combine the mustard and honey in a bowl and liberally brush over the ribs. Grill or cooks the ribs in the oven for 10 minutes, turning once, until the glaze is caramelized, dark, and delicious. If grilling, brush on more glaze as the ribs cook.
Serve the ribs family-style, passing the reduced braising liquid alongside in a sauce boat.

Serves 4 to 6

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June 11th, 2008 Posted by Mark | Activities, Announcements, For Sale or Free, Good Eats, Gossip, Referrals, politics | no comments

Friday Night Music Series

Title: Friday Night Music Series
Location: Downtown Morgan Hill
Description: Free Live Music every Friday Night from June to September in Historic Downtown Morgan Hill from 7:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m.
Start Time: 19-00-00
Date: 2008-05-30
End Time: 21-00-00

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June 11th, 2008 Posted by Mark | Announcements | no comments

Cooking Class – Double Crust Apple Pie

Double Crust Apple Pie

June 9, 2008 – 12:03 ET

Double Crust Apple Pie

RECIPE COURTESY OF MICHAEL LOMONACO
Porter House New York
10 Columbus Circle
4th Floor
New York, NY 10019
212-823-9500

6 tablespoons (3/4 stick) unsalted butter
2Â½ pounds firm, tart apples, preferably seasonal local specials like Macouns, Northern Spy, or Granny Smith, peeled, cored, and sliced into Â¼-inch wedges.
Â½ cup sugar plus 1 tablespoon for dusting
Â¼ cup raisins
Â½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
Â¼ teaspoon ground clove
2 tablespoons freshly squeezed lemon juice
2 tablespoons cornstarch
Basic Pie Dough (recipe follows)
1 egg, beaten with 2 tablespoons water to make an egg wash

Put 3 tablespoons of the butter into a large, heavy-bottomed sautÃ© pan and melt it over medium heat. Add the apple wedges and sautÃ© until slightly softened but holding their shape, 3 to 4 minutes. Add Â¼ cup of the sugar and stir to combine. Add the raisins, cinnamon, and clove and stir.
In a bowl, combine the lemon juice and cornstarch. Stir the mixture into the apple mixture and remove the pan from the heat. Let cool completely.
Preheat the oven to 375Â°F.
Fill an unbaked bottom crust with apple filling and dot the top with the remaining butter. Top with a rolled-out top crust. Cut Â½-inch vents in a round-clock pattern into the top crust to allow steam to escape. Brush the top lightly with egg wash and sprinkle with the remaining 1 tablespoon sugar.
Put the pie on a cookie sheet or other low-sided baking tray to catch any spillage. Place on the middle rack of the oven and bake for 20 minutes, checking occasionally to ensure that the top is browning evenly. Rotate the pie 180 degrees to move the front edge to the back of the oven, and bake until the top is uniformly golden-brown, 15 to 20 more minutes.
Remove the pie from the oven and let cool for 20 minutes before slicing and serving.

Makes 1 pie, enough to serve 6 to 8

Basic Pie Dough and Double Crust Pie Dough

2Â½ cups all-purpose flour
Â½ teaspoon fine sea salt
Â¼ teaspoon baking powder
16 tablespoons (2 sticks) cold unsalted butter, cut into cubes, plus more for greasing a pie mold
About 1/3 cup ice-cold water
1 egg yolk, beaten with 2 tablespoons water to make an egg wash

1. Put the flour, salt, and baking powder in a stainless steel bowl, and use a pastry knife to mix them together well. Add the cold butter cubes and mix until the mixture begins becomes mealy and the butter forms plainly visible pea-sized nuggets.

2. In a separate mixing bowl, dissolve the salt in the water. Begin adding half the water to the flour mixture adding just enough to pull the dough together. Sprinkle the water over the flour slowly to ensure that only the minimum amount of water is used. Do not over-mix the dough; if it appears dry and is not holding together, add a few additional tablespoons of water.

3. Form the dough into a ball, flatten it, wrap it in plastic wrap, and refrigerate until ready to use.

If using another recipe that calls for dough, refer to that recipe at this point. If making your own pie, follow the remaining instructions for assembling and baking it.

4. When ready to use, lightly flour a pastry board and a rolling pin, and unwrap the dough. Divide the dough into 2 equal pieces, and keep the second piece refrigerated. Tamp down the dough with the rolling pin and gently begin to roll it out into a circular pie shape by rolling evenly outward from the center, working quickly, and turning the dough in 1/8 turns to keep the rolling even. When the dough is rolled out to an even thickness of about 1/8-inch and is about 12 inches in diameter, it is ready to be transferred to a 10-inch pie dish. I prefer to use Pyrex glass pie dishes; they transmit heat uniformly, donâ€™t warp like tins, and let you see just how the bottom crust in progressing during baking.

5. Lightly butter the tin, lift the dough with the rolling pin by partially rolling the dough up on the pin, center the dough in the tin, and unroll. Pierce the dough in several places with the tines of a fork.

6. Roll the second half of the pie dough into a round shape slightly larger than the pie pan. Fill the bottom crust with your chosen fruit filling. Cover the filling, such as apple, with the top half of the pie dough. Using both hands, crimp the edges of the two crusts together to seal. With a sharp knife, make several cross-hatch slits in the top crust. Brush with the egg wash and bake in a preheated 375Â°F oven for 35 to 40 minutes. Remove from the oven and cool for 20 minutes.

Makes 2, 10-inch pie crusts, enough for 1 double pie or 2 bottom-crust-only pies

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June 10th, 2008 Posted by Mark | Activities, Announcements, Good Eats, Gossip | no comments

Poker Night

Title: Poker Night
Location: Mark & Lily\’s
Description: First poker tournament of the summer
Start Time: 20:30
Date: 2008-06-13
End Time: 00:00

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June 9th, 2008 Posted by Mark | Announcements, Poker | no comments

Cooking Class – Maryland Style Crab Cakes

Maryland-Style Crab Cakes

June 9, 2008 – 12:04 ET

RECIPE COURTESY OF MICHAEL LOMONACO
Porter House New York
10 Columbus Circle
4th Floor
New York, NY 10019
212-823-9500

1 pound fresh jumbo-lump crabmeat, preferably blue crab, picked of shell fragments (see Note)
1 sweet red pepper, stem and seeds removed, cut into small dice
1 sweet yellow pepper, stem and seeds removed, cut into small dice
1 tablespoon minced fresh garlic
1 to 2 jalapeÃ±o peppers, seeded and cut into small dice
1/3 cup chopped cilantro leaves
1/3 cup mayonnaise
3 tablespoons Old Bay seasoning
2 cups fresh white breadcrumbs
1 teaspoon fine sea salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
Olive oil or vegetable oil
Chili Mayonnaise (recipe follows)

Put the crabmeat in a bowl. Add the red and yellow peppers, garlic, jalapeÃ±o, cilantro, and mayonnaise and stir together gently. Scatter the Old Bay seasoning, Â½ cup of the bread crumbs, and the salt and pepper over the mixture, then stir gently but thoroughly. Cover the bowl and chill in the refrigerator for 20 minutes; a cold mixture is easier to work with and shape into cakes.
Cover a work surface with waxed paper and sprinkle half of the remaining breadcrumbs over it. Scoop up and divide the crabmeat into 4 to 8 equal portions and place each mound on the workspace. Roll 1 portion of crab in the crumbs, pick it up, put it in the palm of 1 hand, and pat it with the fingers of your other hand into a tight, trim, disk-shaped cake, approximately 2 inches in diameter and Â¾-inch thick. Repeat with the remaining portions, making sure they are the same thickness to ensure that they cook at the same rate.
Spread the remaining breadcrumbs out on the work surface and pat the cakes, 1 at a time, in the crumbs to coat them evenly on all sides. Put the crab cakes in a single layer on 1 or 2 plates, cover loosely with plastic wrap, and refrigerate for at least 1 hour and no more than 4 hours, so that they firm up enough to keep them from crumbling when cooked.
Pour enough oil into the bottom of a wide, deep-sided, heavy-bottomed sautÃ© pan to cover the surface. Heat the oil over medium heat until hot but not smoking. Add the crab cakes gingerly, being careful not to crowd the pan. (You might need to cook the crab cakes in 2 batches.) Brown 1 side, approximately 3 minutes, then carefully turn the cakes over with a spatula and brown them on the other side, another 2 to 3 minutes. If browning the cakes in batches, transfer the cooked cakes to a nonstick cookie sheet and keep in a warm oven; add some more oil to the pan and let it heat up before browning the second batch.
Divide the crab cakes among 4 to 8 plates and drizzle some chili mayonnaise decoratively over each serving. Serve at once.

Makes 6 to 8 crab cakes, enough to serve 4 to 6 as an appetizer, or 4 as a main course.

Chili Mayo

Â¼ cup dried ancho chili powder
Â½ teaspoon ground cumin
Â¼ cup boiling water
1 tablspoon lime juice
1 cup prepared mayonnaise
Salt and pepper

â€¢ Place the chili powder and cumin in a bowl, add the boiling water. Stir and let cool.
â€¢ Add the lime juice
â€¢ Stir in the mayonnaise
â€¢ Season with salt and pepper to taste
â€¢ This chili mayo may be covered and refrigerated for up to 4 days

Makes about 1 Â¼ cups chili mayonnaise

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June 9th, 2008 Posted by Mark | Activities, Announcements, Good Eats, Gossip | no comments

Cooking Class – Making the Best French Frys

The Best French Fries

June 6, 2008 – 0:32 ET

RECIPE COURTESY OF MICHAEL LOMONACO
Porter House New York
10 Columbus Circle
4th Floor
New York, NY 10019
212-823-9500

French fries are a real treat, one that recalls American food and French or Belgian bistro cooking all at the same time. Theyâ€™re also one of the most enduringly popular foods on the planet. Who doesnâ€™t love French fries?

Great French fries are rare even in restaurants, so imagine how much pleasure can be had by cook and â€œdinerâ€ alike when theyâ€™re made at home. Itâ€™s not as difficult as you might think: The key is double-frying the potatoes, once to ensure the inside is cooked and remains fluffy; a second time to achieve maximum crunch.

French fries neednâ€™t be just a side dish. I love serving them as an hors dâ€™oeuvres along with dipping sauces like curried or chili mayonnaise, or making them the focus of a decidedly decadent fondue by serving them with a pot of melted Cheddar cheese sauce.

Special equipment: Stove-top fryers can be dangerous because of the open flame, so I recommend that you only make these with an electric deep-fryer with an adjustable thermostat. Buy the biggest one you can afford so you can cook a large quantity of fries (or egg rolls, or whatever) rapidly.

3 pounds Idaho or russet potatoes, well washed and scrubbed
Peanut or vegetable oil, for filling a fryer. If you dare, add 50% beef lard or suet to the oil for more robust flavor

Preheat the oil to 245Â°F.
Either by hand or using a French-fry cutter, cut even fries that are Â¼-inch-square and 5- or 6-inches long, gathering them in a bowl of cold water as you work.
When the fryer is hot and ready to cook, drain the fries of all water and pat thoroughly dry with paper towels. This is critical. Water and salt are the enemies of frying oil. The fries can sit on paper towels for a few minutes, in a single layer, to air dry if youâ€™re not sure youâ€™ve gotten all the water out. Once dry, add just enough fries to the fryer basket to fill it halfway. This will insure even cooking without allowing the frying oil temperature to drop too much, which results in greasy fries.
This first fry is also called blanching since itâ€™s not meant to add any color. The fries will only be par-cooked and their color will only change from raw white to slightly creamier color. The batch of fries is done when they appear to be a more yellow-white than raw-white color, approximately 5 minutes. Remove each batch, drain of all oil, and spread out on paper towels to cool.
After all fries have been blanched, they will hold for several hours. Refrigerate them, covered, if you like, but do not freeze them.
Bring a fryer to 365Â° to 385Â°F. (It can be the same oil, but only reuse it once.) Cook the fries in batches. Do not overload the fryer, each batch should fill the basket halfway. Fry each batch to a rich, golden-brown color. Time will vary from 2 to 3 depending on the fryer and the speed with which it reheats. For crispier fries, fry a bit longer. Drain and salt each batch as soon as its done, and keep them covered and warm while you fry the remaining batches.
Serve the fries piping hot alongside the dish of your choice, or on their own.

Serves 4 as a side dish or hors dâ€™oeuvres

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