Honor Guard pork rib roast

The first big recipe out of Molly Stevens new book, All About Roasting: A New Approach to a Classic Art, was out of this world. For a festive Christmas dinner for the family we tried her honor guard version of bone-in pork rib roast. It is her alternative to the crown roast, which she says never cooks properly and is difficult to carve. No one can argue with her result, which lent itself to a dramatic presentation and a truly superb flavor.

I went to Whole Foods to order the roast ahead of time and was sent to the holiday order desk staffed by someone whose sole qualification seemed to be that she knew nothing about meat. Crown roast was on her computer and beef rib roast (which is what she completed an order for but we caught at the last minute), but not what I wanted. So I went back to the butcher counter (at Friendship Heights) and convinced Andres to take the order for two bone-in center cut roasts, eight ribs each, chine bone remove and ribs Frenched. He came through and tied two beautiful roasts for me, exactly according to specifications, weighing about 5 lbs. each.

The roasts are each brined in 5 c. cool water, 1/3 c. kosher salt, 2 Tbl. brown sugar, 1/4 c. honey, 3 sprigs fresh rosemary, 2 garlic cloves smashed and peeled, and 1/4 tsp. red pepper flakes. You dissolve the salt and sugar solely by stirring, no heating. I put each with its brine in a ziploc bag and "refrigerated" (outside on the screen porch) for a little less than 24 hrs. I took the roasts out of the brine, patted dry and let sit for an hour at room temperature.

Then the fun begins. Each roast gets seared on the fat side, about 5 min. Then you set them parallel to each other in a roasting pan, fat side out for each, so that the ribs interlace with each other in the way an honor guard will interlace their rifles over someone passing under. You tie them together this way (don't squeeze) and put the pan into a preheated 325-degree oven for about 1 hr 45 min, until the internal temperature reaches 140.

What comes out is a spectacularly beautiful golden brown roast that we presented to the assembled diners, rested 15 min., and then carved, one beautiful thick chop for each place (I used her dressing with dried apricots and rosemary as a cushion as she recommends.) This Niman Ranch pork had a marvelous flavor wonderfully enhanced by the brining and roasting, was totally tender and juicy and was a tremendous hit among all the pork fans.

The whole dinner was very festive. We had two kinds of shrimp as appetizers -- the shrimp seviche from the Barcelona cookbook and a very nice shrimp in North African spices (got to use my Aleppo pepper!) from Olives and Oranges. To accompany the pork, we had, along with the dressing, a potato-celery root gratin and roasted brussels sprouts in brown cranberry butter, with a lettuce avocado salad to follow. Dessert was a stunning stompe de noel, like a bouche, only a tree stump instead of a log, which was beautiful and very tasty.

Braised pork belly and glazed turnips

Finally normal supermarkets are carrying pork belly regularly, so I bought some when I saw it at Whole Foods and found a nice recipe in Molly Stevens' All About Braising. There's a lot of steps, but it's basically a simple recipe and I fixed it for us during the week.

You toast 1 tsp of coriander seeds (and 1/2 tsp of dill seeds if you have them, I didn't) and crack them in a grinder with 1 tsp black peppercorns then give it another pulse with 1-1/2 tsp coarse salt to make a rub for the pork belly. You apply the rub and wrap in plastic for a day or two.

When ready to cook, you brown the pork belly in olive oil, pour off some fat, then sautee chopped onion, celery, carrot for 10 minutes, add chopped garlic, 2 bay leaves, 4 cloves for 1 min., deglaze the pan with 1/2 c. white wine add 1 c. stock, bring to a simmer and put the pork belly back in. You put braising pan in a preheated 325-degree oven and cook for 2-1/4 to 3 hours, basting and checking every 45 min.

Then you let the pork belly cool in the braising liquid before removing. You score a cross-hatch pattern on the fatty side and cut into serving pieces (the recipe calls for about 2 lbs for 4 people and I had a little over 1 lb for 2). You strain the braising liquid and reserve 1/4 c. for the turnips (and if you can skim off any fat, use that for the turnips, too -- I couldn't).

To finish, you put the pork belly into a 425-degree oven to brown for 20 minutes. In the meantime, you take 1-1/2 lbs small turnips, peeled and cut into 1-inch wedges, and put into skillet with 1 Tbl butter (or pork fat), 1 tsp sugar, and the 1/4 c. reserved braising liquid and cook 10 to 12 min. until tender.

It all comes out pretty spectacular in a homey way and is delicious. Stevens' book has been consistently great and I'm looking forward to using her new cookbook, All About Roasting.

The connoisseur syndrome

It started, I think, with wine. The boomer generation traveled through Europe, learned to appreciate wine, and created demand for a vast and diverse assortment of wine. Now everyone is a connoisseur. Go into any wine store on a Saturday morning, and you will find scores of gray-haired, balding, slightly pudgy but prosperous looking men talking knowledgeably to attentive sales people about the respective benefits of wines from every corner of the globe.

We truly live in a golden age for gourmets and connoisseurs, with so many kinds of food and drink now readily available. But I worry it goes too far. I worry about my own penchant for getting enthusiastic about selecting the very best of everything.

In addition to wine, you can become a connoisseur of single malt Scotch and small-batch bourbon. Now you can also choose from a selection of finely crafted gins and vodkas, as well as tonic water and bitters.

The same holds true for coffee and tea, for salt and pepper, with vast new categories of special products becoming available. I'm currently reading and enjoying a book about olive oil, Extra Virginity, to review for the Washington Independent Review of Books, and I'm sure it will stimulate me to pay more attention to oil provenance and cultivars (the equivalent of varietals for olives).

Where will it end? Will it ever be possible just to have a cup of coffee, without knowing which bean it is, where it comes from and how exactly it was roasted? Will we ever feel free just to salt and pepper our food without knowing what sea basin or pepper tree they come from?

I'm supposed to pay attention to where my meat was raised, what it was fed, how it was slaughtered and how far away all this took place. I have to decide whether I want ultra-pasteurized organic milk or non-homogenized raw milk and whether I buy it in a carton or a glass bottle with a deposit. I buy heirloom beans with exotic names in amazing shapes and colors.

Yes, it's all fun, kind of a game, really. But I think it's easy to get carried away and perhaps a little too precious.

Coffee

For a long time, I drank only decaffeinated coffee because there was a bad chemical reaction in me between whatever chemicals stress releases in the body and caffeine. Now that I'm older, mellower and working at home in a much less stressful situation, I'm increasingly drinking more regular coffee. Although decaf has improved, regular still tastes better and there are many more choices.

I've grown to abhor Starbucks coffee. They have convinced people that over-roasted mediocre coffee is the way it's supposed to taste. No wonder they have to have so many gunky drinks to hide the flavor of their coffee. Although I will drink a cup of coffee there to be sociable, I've decided to simply not get their packaged coffee. I've ended up throwing out the crap I bought a couple of times when I wavered in my resolve and gave them another chance.

Oddly enough, my favorite local coffee is not some trendy micro-roaster, but the old-line M.E. Swings Co., which used to have an iconic shop on 17th St., across from the Old Executive Office Building. David Pursglove took me there once when it was still open, praising the quality of the coffee. Fortunately, Swings is still recognized for its quality and has fairly good distribution around town. I can get it in packages at Broad Branch and in bulk at Rodman's. Bought some Decaf Colombian at Rodman's and ground it there, though my favorite is the regular Mesco blend.

Mayorga is another good local roaster, and distributed through Marvelous Market, though the choice isn't always great. Quartermain I avoid because they have adopted a dark roast policy, hoping, I guess, to capture the crumbs from Starbucks' table. They have retrenched and I expect them to go out of business. Other trendy micro-roasters tend to fall into the over-roasting trap -- perhaps they are compelled to because people think that's what coffee should taste like.

My brother, surprisingly, while he would not call himself a coffee gourmet, has a flair for finding flavorful coffees. He has determined that the Eight O'Clock coffee available at Costco has great flavor, and sent me a sampler from Old Bisbee Roasters in Arizona as one of his thoughtful Christmas gifts (the other was BBQ from Jack Stack in KC). They are deliciously fresh-roasted and I've liked the two I've sample so far. I'm sure I'll end up ordering some, too, though obviously it's not locavore.

Eating is not always about the food

I like good food and don't like to eat bad food, let alone junk food, particularly when I go to a restaurant. But sometimes there are other priorities than just the food. I meet regularly with a couple of groups of writers and it is the company rather than the food that makes the meeting worthwhile. In fact, the food takes a decidedly back seat, and we trade the comfort and convenience of some oldline eateries for fancy fixings.

The one meeting is with a group of about 70 published authors in the DC area convened a couple of times a year by Dan Moldea. It's a group that fits with a little squeezing into the Rathskeller at Old Europe, a Washington standby that hides its Bavarian identity behind a European facade. Dan has a deal with the restaurant for a prix fixe menu at $25, with a choice of pork schnitzel, trout, chicken or steak in the entree, preceded by salad and followed by apple strudel for dessert. This is not award-winning cuisine and if it is Zagat-rated, I'd probably rather not know the rating. But I like a breaded pork schnitzel and the cottage fries and red cabbage that go with it and it's the chance to mingle with a group of writers that counts.

More recently, a smaller group of us, a kind of subset of the Moldea group, has begun meeting for lunch on a monthly basis. The initiator of this group picked Hamburger Hamlet, a pre-franchise hamburger joint on Old Georgetown Road. It is the kind of place where only the brave venture any dish besides the namesake hamburger, which is pretty good, has all the fixings and decent fries. Someone else suggested a Portuguese restaurant which has white tablecloths and a more sophisticated menu, but he was voted down, unanimously.

An earlier writers group I belonged to met regularly at the Democratic Women's Club, an historic building at Dupont Circle, which served a hot meal buffet style for just $16, but they had to shut down their kitchen operation and the group itself is fairly moribund.

Bottom line is that for some meals, even when the creative muse is involved, humdrum food can fill the bill. It's easy, quick and doesn't distract from the purpose at hand.