Staff Appreciation Lunch

A little bit of food is small thanks for the long hours of a systems upgrade, but it is a start. As I am busily working away at the June Bon Appetit I made a brunch like menu for the team. As we have no stove at work the trick is to find foods that taste good cold or room temp.

Menu
Sausage Fontina and Bell Pepper Strata (pg41)
Spinach salad with Pecorino, Pine nuts and Currents (pg49)
Cheddar Cheese Biscuits (pg12)
Giant Chocolate Cake (pg91)

I can't find my camara charger so I hope Bob Appetit will forgive me using their photo. I will give their new website a plug-it is much easier to find things than it was on epicurious!


Now the liberties I took with the recipes and some commentary.

Strata. Not much change although I did not have Fontina so I used a little more parm and a few other hard cheeses I had leftover. Very easy dish to make and not bad room temp. Probably a little better warm, but if you need to take a dish that looks and smells great to someones house this is a good choice.

Spinach Salad. I've now made this twice and it is a big hit. One person gave it 10 stars and my scale is 1 to 3. Both times I have substituted chopped dried cranberries for currents just because that is what I had in the house. I also used slightly different cheeses but in the same family. The dressing is simple but the shallots add something that makes this one a new regular.

Cheddar Cheese Biscuits. I am going to have to remake these. I decided to do a smaller version in mini muffin tins and while I adjusted the cooking time it was still too much and the biscuits came out dry. As an aside mini versions are great because you get more and people can take one if they just want a taste or a few if they want more. Eliminates the Phenomenon where people keep slowly cutting the food smaller and smaller.

Giant Chocolate Cake. Really can you go wrong with a big chocolate cake topped with chocolate ganache. I cooked mine in a 10inch removable bottom pan as I did not have a 12 inch round (or more honestly could not find it). This meant the cooking time to get to the center was a little longer. I also did not have the time to wait for the ganache to cool all the way, so it was a little messy but still looked good. I also did not do the flowers but served with some sliced strawberries on the side. Chocolate cake usually makes people just a little happier.