Brisket on the Egg

Wine:

Quivira 2007 Sauvignon Blanc
Beringer Cabernet Sauvignon 2002
Shotfire 2005 Barossa Shiraz
Frog’s Leap 2004 Cabernet Sauvignon
Vin Du Bugey-Cerdon “La Cueille”
Movia Sauvignon 2005


We had Bea, Billy and Kevin over for dinner. We wanted try a Smoked Brisket in our egg. We started cooking it (low and slow 200 degrees) at 10am. I had purchased the brisket, of course, from Harvey Guss. It was a giant slab. 12.8 pounds! When it was finished 10 hours later at 8pm surprisingly it was still a little tough. Oy! Bea reminded me to cut it across the grain and on the smaller end it was fine. We decided that we would then braise the brisket before we next served it. Two days later we braised it in beef stock with fresh tomatoes and it came out perfect! Moist, tender and retaining the smoky flavor. It was a good recovery! We still have a lot of left over brisket and plan to make a pasta sauce from it,

We started with Hummus and Pita Chips from Joan’s on Third. They are just great.

We then had a wonderful new soup. It is from the Moro East Cookbook. The soup is Tomato and Fig Soup. I would never had thought of putting those two ingredients together in a summer soup. It was fabulous! It is made with fresh and dried figs and the best summer tomatoes. Delicious!

With the Brisket we served the sinfully good Bacon-Potato Gratin from the Sunday Supper at Lucques Cookbook. Bacon is my favorite seasoning. We published the recipe in our July 8, 2008 Blog.

For dessert we made a Fig Upside Down Cake. Joy and Brenda gave us the recipe. It is easy to make and perfect! We published the recipe in our Aug 4, 2007 Blog.

Did I say we drank lots of great wine!




Tomato Soup with Cumin and Figs
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From Moro East by Sam & Sam Clark
This soup is based on a recipe from Fra Juan's restaurant in the monastery of Guadalupe. It is strictly a summer dish, an interesting Spanish twist on a classic tomato soup. While serving this soup at the restaurant, a waiter over¬heard a customer say it was the best tomato soup she had ever had. Of course, it was a moment when the ingredients did shine. It was at the beginning of August, after a heat wave, and British tomatoes tasted as good as they get. The allotment figs were superb, too. It's a thrill to find recipes that have been cooked for hundreds of years, but in the end this means nothing unless the ingredients are at their peak.

Serves 4

6 tablespoons olive oil
1 kg flavorful tomatoes, roughly sliced
1 medium onion, chopped
1 green pepper, chopped
150-300ml water
3 garlic cloves, chopped
a little caster sugar (optional) ^
2 1/2 teaspoons cumin seeds, lightly toasted in a pan, then crushed
5 or 6 ripe, plump fresh figs, finely diced
400g tin of chopped plum tomatoes, drained of juice (we used fresh tomatoes)
a drizzle of extra virgin olive oil, to serve
lOOg dried figs, chopped

Heat the olive oil in a saucepan over a medium heat, add the onion and green pepper with a good pinch of salt and cook gently for 15-20 minutes, stirring occasionally, until softened. Add the garlic and continue cooking until sweet and golden brown. Add two-thirds of the cumin and cook for 1 minute more. Now add the tinned tomatoes and dried figs and simmer gently, uncovered, for 50-60 minutes, stirring now and then. When the mixture is rich and concentrated, put in the fresh tomatoes and increase the heat slightly, then simmer for 15 minutes more. With a handheld blender, whizz until smooth, then pour in enough of the water to achieve a consistency like double cream. Season well with salt, pepper and sugar if necessary.

Stir half the fresh figs through the soup and use the rest to garnish each portion in the bowl, along with the remaining cumin and a drizzle of extra virgin olive oil.