Sunday, December 28, 2008

Eric's studio Art


renesaince drowning
Originally uploaded by chuborupert
These are all originals by Eric Monasterio, as seen in his own apt/studio

star

escamas

fuego

figures

mountain

rough sea

juxtaposition

sunburst

color

bird on a wire

sun

giant lady

the one we want

light

renesaince drowning

rider

Eric's art

Pernil


pernil
Originally uploaded by chuborupert
I bought half a ham (11 lb) I scored the skin and fat on top then marinated it overnight in a rub of:

8 tbsp salt
10 peppercorns
10 cloves of garlic
6 tbsp oregano
the juice of one lime
1/2 cup olive oil
2 roasted red peppers

and put it on a roasting pan

ahi va el pernil

listo para el horno

I chopped some onion carrot and peppers hoping for a sauce, but with that much salt load it's probably not really worth it.

pernil adobado

I roasted it at 350 deg farenheit for 3 hours then turned the oven off for another half hour then removed and covered with foil to rest.
It looked like this prior to carving:

chicharron

pernil

Tasted great, moist and flavorful. In the future I would try to get a cut with more skin on it as the skin turned out crispy and perfect.

We served it with arroz con gandules, unfortunately no pics of that.

2 cans gandules undrained(pigeon peas)
2 cups sofrito (onion, cilantro, cumin, tomato paste, garlic, celery, carrot, salt, pepper, bell pepper)
2 tbsp achiote oil
http://eatingvideogames.blogspot.com/2008/07/achiote.html
6 cups of water
Salt to taste

4 cups of rice
roasted red bell pepper julienned

place first five ingredients in a large pot and bring to a boil, add rice and cover turn to low heat for 20 minutes, distribute ingredients and serve with roasted pepper as garnish.

(usually one should add some of the fatty portions of the pernil to this dish, but my timing was off)

feliz navidad!

Monday, December 1, 2008

A Boy Tries Escargot


Escargot
Originally uploaded by chuborupert
As documented by his younger sister, my son perused then menu and emerged with a sly grin.

perusing the menu

His Choice of appetizer... Escargot

fancy dinner for a kid

I later asked him if he knew what he was ordering and he nodded and confirmed that yes, he knew they were snails. Upon receiving them he inspected them.

looking it over

Going back for more snails

And he went with it.

Eat the snails

The reaction casual, he said he loved them, he ate them all and I guess I'm going to have to learn to make them.

Escargot gets a thumbs up