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Dinner Party Menu: September

Okanagan Tomato Salad with Blue Cheese and Grilled Bread
Dried Cherry Stuffed Pork Tenderloin with Bacon and Sherry Vinaigrette
Steamed Green Beans, Roasted Red Potatoes
Brown Butter Apple Galette with Maple Whipped Cream

This menu ushers in the Fall season with market ingredients ranging from the short appearance of beautiful Okanagan beefsteak tomatoes, green beans still available at farmer’s markets, and the new-crop apples so fresh and flavourful. My thanks go to Julie who continues to inspire through her friendship, collaboration and a gorgeous website. While she has been traveling we have been keeping up, one way or another, with our monthly menus. The pork tenderloin recipe, including the photo below, is from her website with a few minor tweaks that I added while testing.

Note: This menu serves 4 people, except the apple galette that will serve 6-8…great for breakfast the next day.

Okanagan Tomato Salad with Blue Cheese and Grilled Bread
4 – 1/2″ thick slices crusty bread
1 large garlic clove, halved
2 tablespoons plus 1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
½ cup cherry or grape tomatoes in assorted colours, halved or quartered
¼ cup chopped green onions
3 medium heirloom tomatoes, cored, thinly sliced
½ small red onion, sliced paper-thin, soaked in cold water
2 celery stalks, sliced thin on diagonal
¾ cup coarsely crumbled blue cheese (I used St. Augur)

Combine 2 tablespoons olive oil, cut cherry tomatoes, and green onions in medium bowl and toss to coat. Season with salt and pepper. Set aside until ready to serve the salad.

Slice red onion, place in a small bowl and soak in cold water for ½ hour.

Heat grill pan or barbecue to medium-high heat. Rub bread with cut garlic halves and brush with 1 tablespoon oil. Grill bread until golden, about 2 minutes per side.

Overlap tomato slices in concentric circles on plates. Drain the red onion slices and scatter them and the celery slices over tomatoes. Season with salt and pepper. Spoon tomato and green onion mixture over. Sprinkle with crumbled cheese. Cut each slice of grilled bread diagonally in half and serve with salad.
Serves 4.

Dried Cherry Stuffed Pork Tenderloin with Bacon and Sherry Vinaigrette
As noted above, this recipe is adapted from Julie’s version and hers credits Charlie Trotter’s The Kitchen Sessions with Charlie Trotter. And so it goes with all recipes, often inspired by others and adapted in one’s own kitchen.

Roasted Potatoes
2 pounds small red potatoes, halved if on the larger side
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 teaspoon toasted sesame oil
salt and freshly ground black pepper

Dried Cherry Stuffed Pork Tenderloin
1 cup dried sour cherries
2 tablespoons fresh thyme leaves, minced, divided
½ cup water
1 20-oz. pork tenderloin, trimmed and halved (before halving, trim off the thin end and reserve for another use so that you have a piece of meat of even thickness)
2 tablespoons canola or grape seed oil

Bacon and Sherry Vinaigrette
½ cup uncooked bacon, cut into ¼” slices
½ cup red onion, finely diced
1 teaspoon minced garlic
2 tablespoons sherry wine vinegar
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1 tablespoon fresh thyme leaves, for garnish

1 lb. green beans, steamed

Preheat the oven to 400ºF.

Toss the potatoes with the olive oil, sesame oil and the salt and pepper. Place in a roasting pan or a sheet pan and roast in the preheated oven for 45 minutes or until golden, crispy and cooked through.

Prepare the dried cherry stuffing. Put the cherries and 1 tablespoon of the minced thyme leaves in a medium saucepan. Add the ½ cup of water and bring to a simmer over medium heat. Simmer for 5 minutes and then turn off the heat. Let stand for 15 minutes. Season with salt and pepper and set aside to cool.

To prepare the pork tenderloin: Starting from the end of each half tenderloin, cut a slit using a slender, sharp knife through the centre. You may need to do this from each end if your knife is not long enough. Turn the tenderloins on their sides and cut another slit to create an X in the centre of each loin. Insert your fingers on each end of the loin and using your fingers, stretch a hole through the centre. Stuff as much filling as possible into each loin. Season them with salt and pepper. Reserve any remaining cherries and juice to add later to the sauce.

Place a large, oven proof sauté pan over medium heat and heat until very hot but not smoking. Add the canola oil and then the stuffed pork loins. Brown the loins well on all sides. Place the pan in the oven and roast the tenderloins for about 25 minutes (the time will vary depending on the thickness of the meat) until the pork registers at least 150ºF. Allow to rest for 10 minutes before slicing. The pork will still be a bit pink inside. If you prefer it well done, cook for an additional 5 minutes or so.

While the pork is in the oven, prepare the bacon sherry vinaigrette. Render the bacon in a medium sauté pan over medium heat. Add the red onion and garlic and cook for a few minutes until the onion is translucent and the garlic is fragrant. Add the remaining 1 tablespoon of minced thyme and cook for 1 more minute. Remove from the heat and add the sherry wine vinegar. Add any leftover cherries and juice. Slowly whisk in the 2 tablespoons of olive oil and season to taste with salt and pepper.

To serve, place ¼ of the potatoes and ¼ of the steamed beans on a dinner plate. Slice the pork tenderloin into ¼” thick slices and place 3 slices on top of the roasted potatoes. Spoon some of the bacon and sherry vinaigrette over the pork and around the plate and season with some freshly ground black pepper. Garnish with fresh thyme leaves. Serves 4.

Photo with thanks to Julie at KitchenCulinaire

Brown Butter Apple Galette with Maple Whipped Cream
This recipe is adapted from a Food 52 version here.

1 recipe pie dough
5 large apples or 6 medium, kept whole and peeled
3 tablespoons salted butter
½ vanilla bean, scraped of its seeds
½ teaspoon vanilla extract
1 egg
3 tablespoons heavy cream
3 tablespoons turbinado sugar
2 tablespoons apricot jam, strained

Crust:
1 ½ cup flour
1 tablespoon sugar
¼ teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon lemon zest
¾ cup cold unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
½ teaspoon vanilla mixed with about 3 tablespoons very cold water

For the pastry: Combine flour, sugar, salt and lemon zest in the bowl of a food processor and pulse to combine. Add the butter, and pulse again until the butter is in small pieces. The mixture should be the texture of very coarse cornmeal. A few larger pieces of butter is fine. (Alternatively, combine the dry ingredients in a large bowl and cut the butter with a pastry cutter or 2 knives.)

If you’ve used a processor, pour the ingredients into a large bowl. This step enables you to slowly add the liquid and lightly combine it with the dry ingredients so that the dough does not get overworked as it sometimes does in a processor. Now slowly add the vanilla and water, stirring with a fork just until the mixture starts to come together as a dough. Add a little more water if necessary. The amount of liquid depends on the type of flour you are using. Using your hands, work the dough together until it forms a ball. Wrap the dough with plastic wrap and refrigerate for an hour or so.

Take the pastry dough out of the fridge 10 minutes before rolling it out.

Heat oven to 400° F. Place a pizza stone or sheet pan in the oven to warm up. To make the brown butter, melt the butter in a small saucepan. Swirl it around a few times. After 2-3 minutes, it will start to smell nutty. Watch carefully as it will brown quickly. It’s ready when the sizzling quiets down and you see little brown bits drop to the bottom of the pan. Cool. Whisk in vanilla bean seeds and extract and set aside.

Cut a piece of parchment paper that’s about a 10″square. Roll out the dough into about a 12″ round. You can trim the edges slightly if you like, but this is meant to be a rustic tart. Roll dough onto your rolling pin. Unroll dough onto the piece of parchment.

Peel the apples. Using a very sharp knife or a mandoline, very thinly slice about 5 circles off of two opposing sides of the apple. Stop once you hit the core. Repeat with the remaining apples.

Starting about 2″ in from the border of the rolled out dough, make a circle with the apple slices, overlapping them. Continue with a second layer that overlaps the bigger circle. Do a third and smaller circle, then a fourth. Finish it off with a few discs in the middle in a flower pattern. Brush all exposed apple surface with the brown butter vanilla mixture. Fold in the outer border of the dough.

Whisk together egg and heavy cream. Brush exposed border of dough with a thin layer of egg wash. Generously sprinkle the turbinado sugar all over the apples and the dough.

Remove hot pizza stone or sheet pan from the oven. Quickly slide the tart (keeping it on the parchment) onto the hot surface. Bake until apples are tender and golden brown and the crust is crisp, about 40-50 minutes. If crust is browning too quickly, cover galette with tin foil.

Warm and strain the apricot jam. Brush surface of the cooked apples with warm jam. Serve with maple whipped cream or vanilla ice cream.

Maple Whipped Cream: 2 cups heavy cream, about 2 tablespoons pure maple syrup. Whip cream to soft peaks and add maple syrup to taste.
Serves 6