Poussin Control

Once again, I make a valiant return after a lengthy departure from regaling y'all of culinary wonderment. What's my excuse this time? Nothing. I have started a new job since last we adventured into the world of tasty foods! I am the Chef de Partie (lead lunch line cook) at Swift's Attic downtown on Congress between 3rd & 4th St. It's a Modern American Small Plates concept. Modern American in that we are constrained to no one central culinary genre and small plates meaning everything is shareable, not family style, more like tapas. It is great!

Our executive chef Mat Clouser - @SwiftsBlade on twitter - has come up with some really ridiculous food. Oxtail, ham hocks, squid AND octopus, pork cheeks, I could go on, but you'll just need to come check the place out. We are open for lunch 11-2 M-F; dinner 5-10 M-W and the kitchen rocks to midnight Th-Sa. We are closed on Sundays.

Now that we're all caught up, the wife and I had some friends in last night for dinner. I finally have weekends off so I took this as an opportunity to hit up the downtown Austin farmer's market to get as much of the mise as I could. They did not disappoint. 

The beginning:

 

We started the night with some tasty appeteasers. I made a pork rillette (basically braise pork until spoon-tender, then mix in the KitchenAid with a paddle attachment until it shreds, adding the reserved braising liquid until it's a spread) with which I served an apple bourbon mustard, cornichons, and crostini. Killer. 

For a lighter fare, I served farmer's market fresh strawberries - sidebar: we picked up a pack of these when we walked by the booth and Summer said, "We have to get those strawberries, I can smell them from here". There were that fragrant - with basil from our "killer basil plant", reduced balsamic vinegar, and house made ricotta. Yes. I made ricotta cheese. Yes. It was delicious. RECIPE:

2 cups milk (whole preferred)

1 cup heavy cream

.5 t salt

1.5 T white wine vinegar

Bring milk, cream, and salt to a boil over medium heat. Remove from heat. Add vinegar. Sit 1 minute until curdling begins. Pour into double cheesecloth that has been dampened with warm water and is sitting in a strainer over a large bowl. Allow to sit at room temp for 20ish minutes. Longer for thicker, shorter for thinner. So good. So easy.

Next, we had a very simple salad of herbed spring mix, orange supremes and a bacon sherry vinaigrette. I phoned in the salad, cause this was dinner:

 

Here's where the farmer's market really shined. Let's start with the brussels and work our way around. Baby brussels sprouts that were blanched and shocked earlier, got tossed in a hot pan with bacon fat, olive oil, salt, and red pearl onions. The fresh sprouts had a peppery quality to them that was both surprising and yummy.

Next is what I called "Spring-stuffed Squash Blossoms". I made a filling of brunoise (very small diced) carrot, celery, garlic scape and artichoke hearts with lemon zest and parmesan. That got carefully piped into amazing little squash blossoms (that were surprisingly being sold for $1/5 - they go for like $48/case from a produce purveyor). I just popped em in a super hot oven for like 10 minutes and they were ridic.

The star of the show. Poussin. These were picked up from a guy named Sebastian, whom runs Countryside Family Farm in Bastrop, TX. They are quite young, thus incredibly tender and juicy. I stuffed them with a half lemon, garlic scapes, celery, onion, carrot, thyme, and parsley stems. After rubbing the skin with olive oil and S&P, I placed them in a 450º oven on top of more garlic scapes, for about 20-30 minutes. They rested for another 15-20 minutes after coming out of the oven and were spectacular! I deglazed the pan with white wine, added stock, mounted with butter, and seasoned appropriately to create a nice little pan sauce to have with the chicken.

All-in-all, the meal was really great, but the best part was hanging out with some really great friends and having an awesome time. My blogging may remain somewhat infrequent in the coming months, but I promise to try to get on it whenever possible - as long as y'all promise to come eat at Swift's as soon as you can!