Seasonal change break feast
On a Thursday morning in late April my bestie called to say she rented a car because she needed to breath salt air – we’d be en-route to Newport, RI by noon. We’ve done this before but this was the first trip this year and the weather was just beginning to break from the frigid monotony 90+ days of sustained 30 degree weather. This was also a perfect excuse to bring my Bronx rescue pup, Little RhODy, to visit his name sake for the first time.
We’d be staying at my friend’s 5 bedroom, open door to all friend’s home, just off of the Ten Mile Ocean Drive where the cupboards, refrigerator and bread baskets are chock-a-block filled with the highest quality ingredients & groceries, a few good knives in a knife block, draws of utensils, equipment & a mother load of mixing bowls, platters, pots & pans, flat, & tableware galore.
The first thing I did was to sort out the bread basket where there was an opened bag of English muffins already going stale & a few packages of some kind of low calorie sandwich pita wrap, an orange or two & a perfectly ripe avocado. Amongst all this I found about half a bag of cipolini onions rolling around on the bottom of the basket, stray from their opened net bag. In a flash I was filling a sauce pot with water, tossing in a good pinch of course sea salt and the onions – as is, skins on to blanch them over a medium high heat with the intention of turning them into creamed onions, which would be the Pièce_de_résistance of this break feast.
Next I’d tackle the fridge. In addition to the standard fare anyone would expect to find in a well stocked refrigerator there were two bags of radishes, bags of salad greens, snow peas, cucumbers, various tomatoes, broccoli & cauliflower flowerettes in a bag.
With the onion boiling and a bowl for shocking them prepped I next got into making the Mediterranean, shepherd salad – cucumbers, tomatoes, course sea salt & olive oil. I threw a couple of left over black & green olives in also.
Then I made the snow pea & radish salad with a Mirin dressing. Simple as 1,2, 3 – especially if you like slicing. Then I blanched the asparagus, toasted sliced baguette, prepped & cleaned the cipollini onions for their veloute – made with the water they were blanched off in. I also cooked the broccoli & cauliflower in this salted onion water, thinly sliced half an avocado, rubbed the toasted baguette pieces with a fresh garlic clove and some tomato. I hand mashed the broccoli & cauliflower with a fork & a drizzle of olive oil & pinch of course sea salt & a grind or two of black pepper.
Last but not least I fried up an over easy egg and OH, steeped a screaming hot cup of English Breakfast tea and plated my beautiful break feast.