Duck Cooking class at Terroir

Hi all,


As you all probably know, Barb and I enjoy good food, no it does not need to be expensive food just plain old good food. That can be a great burger or it can be something incredible coming out a restaurant like Per Se or The Fat Duck. The one place it's not likely to come out of (unless it's my Gran’s chicken pot pie) is my kitchen. No, I am not a bad cook but its not often something I make really is a stand out. So, when I noticed Chef Tim Payne of Terroir (www.terroir-restaurant.com)in Longmont offered cooking classes I vowed to make it to one.


Chef Payne offers one or two classes a month on different items, class size is limited to three and they fill up fast. Barb, Elena, and I managed to get spots for a class on Duck. We all showed up around 9 am on Saturday morning at Terroir Restaurant not really knowing what to expect. We were greeted warmly and we all moved into the kitchen. Chef Payne explained that he was not going to teach us recipes (though he did send us home with a few) as there was already tons of cookbooks out there, but was more going to focus on techniques.



The first thing we did is watch him break down the duck, and then we each got our own and we did the same with his help when needed(so glad he seems to have no end of patience as I had to get a lot of help deboning the legs). From there, he showed us how to make a duck “sausage” which we stuffed into the leg meat and trussed up to cook.







We also cooked the duck breast. He showed us the best way to cook it for it to come out well.(I have cooked duck before and it always seemed very greasy but this did not seem that way at all). And we made a duck “pate”. Over the next couple of hours we spent time talking and learning how to make all these things as well as how to render the fat for use and seemingly an endless amount of great information.

Chef Payne cutting some Black Truffle to add to our dishes yum








After everything was said and done, we all sat down family style and shared the meal together and my, my what a wonderful lunch it was and we all took home leftovers.






The cost of the class was $65.00 and came with a $10.00 gift certificate to the restaurant. I for one plan on going again as soon as we can find a open weekend and class I want to see.

We cooked the duck breast the next day at home, and it came out really good!


Thanks for stopping by, we haven’t made it to a restaurant in a bit as our last three attempts were thwarted by sickness or weather. We are planning on going out tomorrow night but once again snow threatens, so we will see. Once we make it out we will get a new review up as soon as we can. If you have any questions or comments feel free to leave them here or send them to us at jonathan or barb @milehigheater.com


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A talk with Terroir's chef Tim Payne

Hi all

We had a chance to ask a few questions to Tim Payne chef at Longmonts Terroir restaurant. If interested in our previous post of our meal here it is located at our post




1. What attracted you to cooking?

I simply love food. The whole cycle of it, from ordering and menu planning to prep to the finished product, plus since we use so many small farmers we stay connected with the supplier side. It is very satifying.

2. What is the philosophy behind your cooking, or in your kitchen?

Make everything from scratch, let the ingredient shine and utilize all of the culinary influences within America when making menu changes. Our kitchen is one of respect, it is a small team and we work very closely together, and everyone brings good experience to the table when executing our ever changing menu.



3. What is the biggest influence on the way you cook?

What fresh, local and if not local, small farm organic ingredients are available. The seasons are very important too.

4. Is there a chef living today you would like to work with?

Melissa Kelly (Primo Restaurant in Maine) on the east cost, Frank Stitt down south ( Highland Bar and Grill in Birmingham, Alabama), Judy Rodgers (Zuni Cafe) out west, or Hugo Matheson at the Kitchen in Boulder

5. Is there a particular ingredient you like to cook with more than others?

I love fresh pasta in all of its forms, from filled pasta such as agnolotti to fresh cut pasta like fettucini to gnocchi. We will always utilize these in our menu. I love seafood as an individual ingredient though particularly scallops.

6. If stuck on a desert isle and could have one meal from then on out what would it be?

Gnocchi, followed by an arugula salad, followed by seared scallops, followed by braised short ribs followed by sorbet. I would always be full.

7. Is someone asked you for two Colorado restaurants to try other than your own what would you suggest?

Aji in Boulder is one of our favorites and I would tell them to go to the Rioja in Denver.

8. How about one restaurant any where in the world?

The French Laundry of course. Other than that Restaurant Daniel or Blue Hill in New York City or The Zuni Cafe in San Francisco.

9. Would you be willing to share a recipe with us?

Gnocci


4 large potatoes (russet preferably)
2 eggs
2 cups of flour
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
1 tablespoon chopped thyme and parsley

Bake the potatoes at 450 until soft. Remove the potatoes, slice open and pass through a food mill or potato ricer onto a clean work surface lightly dusted with all purpose flour. Allow steam to die down from the warm potatoes. Make a well in the center and place 1/4 cup of flour in the middle then crack both eggs and place in the middle. Place 1/2 cup more of the flour, the herbs and salt and pepper on top of the potatoes. With a pastry knife or spatula chop the the mixture until it is mixed and resembles pebbles, bring the mixture to a ball and place 1/2 cup more of the flour and gently fold (do not knead) just until the flour is incorporated. If the dough is tacky or sticky place 1 tablespoon more of the flour and repeat the process until it is not tacky or sticky. Let the dough rest for five minutes then divide the dough into 5 balls. Take each ball and gently roll out into a snake approximately 1/2 inch wide the slice the snake into 1/2 inch pieces and place on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper and set aside. Once all of the dough is rolled out the gnocchi can be frozen immediately or placed into lightly boiling salted water. Once the gnocchi float then can be strained out and incorporated into whatever sauté or sauce you choose. We change our ingredients seasonally and it generally consists of a vegetable that can be sautéed immediately without prior cooking (such as sugar snap peas or mushrooms) or a heartier vegetable such as butternut squash that we parboil until al dente that is lightly sautéed with garlic then deglazed with vegetable stock, seasoned, mounted with a small dab of butter, fresh herbs then the gnocchi is added and once plated finished with fresh grated cheese. If you do freeze the gnocchi, once the gnocchi are frozen individually the can be collected and stored in an airtight container for as long as a month. Cook the frozen gnocchi from this state, do not thaw then cook the gnocchi.





As always thanks for coming by our Colorado food blog and if have any questions or comments please let us know at jonathan@milehigheater.com or barb@milehigheater.com.
And if you happen to check out any of the restaurants we have mentioned let them know you heard about them from our blog!

Jonathan and Barb



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Terroir

Hi all!

Barb and I went out to Terroir in Longmont last night and had a very nice dinner. The chef there is Timothy Payne.


Coming into the restaurant had a very nice open feel the tables were placed far enough away from each other to not feel crowded and overall just a very comfortable feel. The room also has bar seating running down one side and in the back. The kitchen is half open so you can watch them working to create the wonderful food you're about to be served. When we arrived we were greeted and promptly seated and asked about our drink preferences, when the drinks arrived our server told us about one menu subsitition (flank steak instead of hanger steak) but forgot to tell us what the soup de jour was. We had to hear that when she greeted another table, but that was the one and only service problem we had and that was such a minor thing. Before the small plates came out we were served some very fresh focaccia bread that was wonderfully soft and had a very pleasing taste.

The menu they have changes often and looked very good over all. We started out with 2 small plates.



The first one was a Gnocchi (a potato dumpling pasta) with golden west sugar snap peas and garlic. The sauce had a wonderful slightly sweet taste with a hint of citrus. The peas were perfectly cooked they still had the nice crisp freshness that I just love. The longer this sat the better it became as the gnocchi soaked up some of the sauce and the creamy rich texture of the gnocchi was just fantastic.



The second was Gambas-Ai-Ajillo. Chili and white wine sauteed shrimp with 2 pieces of that wonderful focaccia bread that had been grilled. The sauce was very rich and had a definte buttery taste but the wine and the chili really came through and blended so well that we both ended up using the bread to help soak up some of it just to enjoy more of it. I am not much into having spice just to add heat so am always cautious of sauces or items that have chile and the like but this sauce was just fantastic and the little bit of heat it did give felt very pleasant and didnt send me running for water.

Next came our main courses.


The first was Grilled Flank Steak with a crispy potato cake, heirloom tomatoes and a chimchurri sauce. The steak was cooked pretty well but in my opinion even though the sauce was good it really took over the dish. The bold herb and vinager taste jumped out and grabbed your taste buds as soon as you put it in your mouth and was strong enough that the meat really didnt have room to have much flavor. That being said the sauce was very good with the parsley sweetening up the vinager and blending into a nice strong taste. A second problem I had with this dish was the first few pieces I had were fairly chewy and tough. Now I know flank steak is a very lean cut of meat but when served in a restaurant I do expect it not to take 5 min to chew down. Luckly after the first couple pieces the rest were fine and the potato cake had a nice texture and a satisfying taste. Overall I did enjoy the total package of the dish.




The second dish was a Pork Loin Chop. Long farm pork with a potato (both normal and sweet) hash with tochey farms greens and a great peach compote. Ok YUM (yes I am back to the yum word again, lol) The peach compote was just fantastic. The sweet flavors of the peached blended in so very well with this very tender perfectly cooked pork chop that Barb almost had to fork duel me for it. The presentation looked great and the hash had a great flavor this was defintly our favorite of the evening.

Next came deserts and they had several options the first one we had was:



A Vanilla Creme Brulee. This was well done with a nice fresh vanilla taste and a nice crispy top.

The next:



Was a Strawberry Rhubarb Crisp with a scoop of strawberry ice cream. Before I go further I must admit to being a Rhubarb crisp snob so maybe should of gotten something else. This desert had a very strong strawberry smell that hit you right before you took a bite and really strawberry was the main focus as I could taste very little of the rhubarb and there was also little crisp. I am not saying this was bad it had a nice strawberry taste that pleased the taste buds and lol not a bit was left over when we were done, but it was lacking in the rhubarb and crisp area.


Overall, I would reccomend Terroir. The atmosphere is comfortable and the food well thought out and executed and I am pretty sure we will be going back the next time we want to go out with friends in the Longmont area and for me going back to a restaurant a second time is the mark of a good restaurant. What we rated the restaurant overall was a 7.3 before the .1 decuction for the soup of day missfire. so a 7.2 overall. If this sounds low at all given my mostly overall praise please look at our rating system explanation a few posts back. Basicly it comes to this a 7.2 is a pretty darn good rating while nothing we had made me go OMG thats just incredible two of the items I would say were great and everything is very good. The cost for the meal was $73.

Well thats it for now as always thanks for coming by and if have any questions or suggestions, please let us know.


Jonathan & Barb