Maureen says:
Our blog hiatus is over--also, thankfully, are my carpal tunnel symptoms--and June has arrived in all its characteristic New England splendor: heat, haze and humidity; startling shifts in temperature; and thunderstorms replete with hail that, believe it or not, I missed when we lived in California.
On the Plate
We launched our Sunday Dinner program on May 20th, inspired in part Suzanne Goin's concept Sunday Suppers at Lucques (some of you may have seen her as a guest judge on season two of Bravo TV's series Top Chef).
Our version is a four-course, prix fixe meal ($28) that constantly evolves based on foods in season, local market availability and the whims of our chef. Once you select your entree course (poultry, beef or seafood), the Seriously Fun starters, salads and side dishes start coming and are served family style, as is Sous Chef Nellie Booth's dessert course.
Even though Tom and I try to sit down, no matter how late, and have dinner together on Friday and Saturday nights, it's the Sunday menu that's quickly become our personal favorite to share while we reflect on the week just past and discuss our plans for the week ahead. The menu is out of the ordinary, the ingredients couldn't be fresher and, as I've been overheard to say on occasion, it's the closest I've come to eating Tom's home cooking since opened for business (and maybe, just maybe, that's his sneaky way of getting me to work a third day on site).
We've also got another fun announcement coming up this month that isn't exactly food related. Keep your eye on the blog or sign up for the newsletter--we'll make the announcement in a few places.
On the Side
What we're reading: Michael Pollan's The Omnivore's Dilemma and next up, Barbara Kingsolver's Animal, Vegetable, Mineral
What we're watching: Not much, but the DVR is programmed to record season three of Top Chef (I am hoping that because it's based in Miami that some of the restaurants Tom and I love there are featured; during season one, a challenge was set in San Francisco's Frisson, where we celebrated the first anniversary of togetherness).
What else? I'm in the beginning stages of mapping out a book proposal (!). I committed, in writing (okay, email, but it still counts) to another writer-friend that I would, if nothing else, have the proposal completed by January. And then, when I shared the idea with a friend who's a photograph (Hi Matt!), he nodded vigorously and said, "Yes, in addition to everything else you've got going on, you should write a book."
Why the hell not.
Showing posts with label Sunday Dinner. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Sunday Dinner. Show all posts
Thursday, June 7, 2007
Sunday, February 18, 2007
Sunday Dinner
Tom says:
We took a break from the restaurant today to cook Sunday dinner for Maureen's parents down in Massachusetts. Sunday dinner is something Maureen and I both grew up having. In today's over-scheduled world, though, this is a meal, that for most of us, exists only in fond memory--nostalgia even--except on the rare holiday that ends the weekend.
Z will serve lunch Mon-Fri only, but dinner every night of the week. On Sundays we plan to open a bit earlier and offer our own interpretation of Sunday Dinner: a fixed price, multi-course menu where items except for the entree choice are served family style. Because today's world is overscheduled. Because dining options are limited on Sundays. Because, as Maureen likes to say, if it weren't for Sunday Dinner, I might have been any number of things in this world instead of a chef/restaurateur.
“Mom!” I yell, “Jacki won’t leave me alone and get out of the way!” Jacki is my sister, younger by two years. It is four o'clock on a late-summer afternoon in 1978. I am 11 years old and in the final stages of preparing for my first Sunday Dinner party, what my family now calls my debut into the world of all things culinary. The menu?
Hors d’ouevres:
Cheddar cheese straws
Insalata de Arroz (rice salad)
Gazpacho
Salad:
Caesar Salad (prepared table side in the old-school style with raw eggs)
Entrée:
Roasted bone-in Prime Rib of Beef
Twice-baked Potatoes
Steamed Asparagus
Dessert:
Chocolate Cream Pie (my grandfather’s favorite)
My mother brought out her wedding china, the good silver. Is it any wonder I fell in love with every aspect of entertaining at such a young age?
My mother wasn't just your classic stay-at-home mom. She was the enigmatic product of an upper middle class upbringing and the earthy-crunchy movement that seemingly defined 1970s California. She made everything and still makes most things today from scratch--bread, yogurt, granola and jam--and she always used local, natural ingredients. Cookies? Never store bought. Cakes from the bakery were for people who were unmotivated. Looking back on this now, it's unbelievable to me that I used to complain about having hot muffins or fresh-fruit turnovers at breakfast while my friends had PopTarts. She even taught cooking classes to the neighborhood kids.
Dinner, however, is where my mother excelled and Sunday Dinner was her crown jewel. The leftovers from that dinner generated another 2-3 dinners that carried us through the first half of the week. Sunday's roast leg of lamb was curried with rice on Monday and turned into Scotch Barley Soup on Tuesday. Strangely enough, as good as Sunday dinner was, I always looked forward to these 'leftover meals' and it's the creativity she applied here that most strongly influences my menu recipes today.
That first dinner party wasn't exactly a success. Instead of a teaspoon of dry mustard in the rice salad, I used a tablespoon, but everyone, even my sister, overlooked the mistake (obviously I didn't and still don't seeing as I can recall the exact error almost 30 years later). But the Sunday Dinner I cooked yesterday--NY strip loin roast, sauteed brussel sprouts with maple-cured bacon, and pan-fried red bliss and yukon gold potatoes--that was a success. Maureen's mother said that one of the best parts about it was that she didn't have to make it. If that's your feeling about Sunday Dinner as well, then soon enough you'll be able to have our favorite meal of the week with us at Z. We, of course, look forward to serving you.
We took a break from the restaurant today to cook Sunday dinner for Maureen's parents down in Massachusetts. Sunday dinner is something Maureen and I both grew up having. In today's over-scheduled world, though, this is a meal, that for most of us, exists only in fond memory--nostalgia even--except on the rare holiday that ends the weekend.
Z will serve lunch Mon-Fri only, but dinner every night of the week. On Sundays we plan to open a bit earlier and offer our own interpretation of Sunday Dinner: a fixed price, multi-course menu where items except for the entree choice are served family style. Because today's world is overscheduled. Because dining options are limited on Sundays. Because, as Maureen likes to say, if it weren't for Sunday Dinner, I might have been any number of things in this world instead of a chef/restaurateur.
***
Gazpacho? Check. Cheese straws? Check. Prime rib in the oven? Roasting away. My grandparents are arriving in an hour and I still need to set the table and arrange the centerpiece of roses from the garden.“Mom!” I yell, “Jacki won’t leave me alone and get out of the way!” Jacki is my sister, younger by two years. It is four o'clock on a late-summer afternoon in 1978. I am 11 years old and in the final stages of preparing for my first Sunday Dinner party, what my family now calls my debut into the world of all things culinary. The menu?
Hors d’ouevres:
Cheddar cheese straws
Insalata de Arroz (rice salad)
Gazpacho
Salad:
Caesar Salad (prepared table side in the old-school style with raw eggs)
Entrée:
Roasted bone-in Prime Rib of Beef
Twice-baked Potatoes
Steamed Asparagus
Dessert:
Chocolate Cream Pie (my grandfather’s favorite)
My mother brought out her wedding china, the good silver. Is it any wonder I fell in love with every aspect of entertaining at such a young age?
My mother wasn't just your classic stay-at-home mom. She was the enigmatic product of an upper middle class upbringing and the earthy-crunchy movement that seemingly defined 1970s California. She made everything and still makes most things today from scratch--bread, yogurt, granola and jam--and she always used local, natural ingredients. Cookies? Never store bought. Cakes from the bakery were for people who were unmotivated. Looking back on this now, it's unbelievable to me that I used to complain about having hot muffins or fresh-fruit turnovers at breakfast while my friends had PopTarts. She even taught cooking classes to the neighborhood kids.
Dinner, however, is where my mother excelled and Sunday Dinner was her crown jewel. The leftovers from that dinner generated another 2-3 dinners that carried us through the first half of the week. Sunday's roast leg of lamb was curried with rice on Monday and turned into Scotch Barley Soup on Tuesday. Strangely enough, as good as Sunday dinner was, I always looked forward to these 'leftover meals' and it's the creativity she applied here that most strongly influences my menu recipes today.
That first dinner party wasn't exactly a success. Instead of a teaspoon of dry mustard in the rice salad, I used a tablespoon, but everyone, even my sister, overlooked the mistake (obviously I didn't and still don't seeing as I can recall the exact error almost 30 years later). But the Sunday Dinner I cooked yesterday--NY strip loin roast, sauteed brussel sprouts with maple-cured bacon, and pan-fried red bliss and yukon gold potatoes--that was a success. Maureen's mother said that one of the best parts about it was that she didn't have to make it. If that's your feeling about Sunday Dinner as well, then soon enough you'll be able to have our favorite meal of the week with us at Z. We, of course, look forward to serving you.
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