I Discover I Own Nary A Butter Knife

One of the best things about getting married (so many years ago now) was registering for gifts. For poor college students, it really is The Jackpot. When, in one fell swoop, can two crazy kids in love get pots, pans, dishes, silverware, camping gear, board games, and crayons?

*Sigh* Those were the days. When I had not-chipped serving platters, a gravy boat, a sugar-and-creamer set, and plenty of butter knives for any spreading emergency.

I've been working on a café menu, which consists of coming up with food ideas and testing them as well. Yesterday, Brent and I tried an Italian grinder recipe I'd seen in my issue of Food + Wine mag. Of course, you know me, I never make the recipe as is...and besides, I can't find mortadella at my local grocery store anyway. I'd have to settle for salami, proscuitto, and capicolla. The recipe also came with a garlic aioli, made from scratch, natch.

And I love aioli (aka Fancy Mayo). However, I opted for roasting a couple of heads of garlic and pureeing them with three tablespoons of mayonnaise as the spread for my Italian grinders. And to my never-ending delight, this spread was the perfect condiment for this sandwich, and it's terribly easy to make. It occurred to me that it would be just as easy to make in large quantities and use as the default spread on any sandwich I might serve at South Market Bistro (just trying out names, readers, nothing set in stone).

Then. I worked on this today.

A cranberry-orange preserve recipe, also found in F + W mag. The idea is that I'd use this gem as a toast spread for the breakfast crowd, and then mix some with mayo for a roasted turkey sandwich at lunch. A Thanksgiving sandwich, if you will. The final product, shown above on a slice of toast, is darker than I like, but I suspect that was because I used mostly brown sugar in the recipe (as opposed to the white it calls for, but that I was totally out of). However, I am quite pleased. The cranberry-orange is rather tart, but goes well with a little salted butter on the toast. I haven't tried the turkey sandwich, and I'm going with an extra sharp cheddar cheese, and I'm sure that will work nicely as well.

Thanksgiving All Year-Round!

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To Thine Own Self, Be Food

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