Of all the things I thought I'd never try, headcheese is right up there at the top of the list. But a new restaurant opened in our neighborhood and it's gotten excellent reviews (The Publican). We love the other 2 restaurants owned by the same group (Avec and Blackbird). And the specialties of the house are beer and pork, two of Matt's favorite things, so a trip to Publican was really a no-brainer.
The beer list is staggering, over 100 bottles, plus over a dozen on tap - I don't know anything about beer but Matt was really impressed and over the night ordered 3 different beers (which was perhaps 1 too many - these are not Budweiser's, but big, strong porters and ales, serious beer). One, a vintage ale, smelled absolutely lovely. I don't like beer at all, but this smelled so great I had to take a sip and it was actually pretty good. I kept picking up his bottle and smelling it and thinking how nice it would be to have a candle that smelled like that. Kind of malty/woodsy/spicy. They have a nice wine list too and I ordered 2 glasses (which was perhaps 1 too many - they were served in little carafes which were actually 1.5 glasses, so 2 glasses becomes 3).
For appetizers, we decided to jump right into the house specialties and get a lot of pig. We ordered pork rinds and the charcuterie plate. I think I've tried pork rinds maybe once in my entire life and they weren't great and I generally think of them as white trash food. These were nothing like that - light, crispy, spicy, not a hint of grease, and melt-in-your mouth. And surprisingly they went well with the shiraz I was drinking. The charcuterie plate included the aforementioned headcheese, a terrine of foie gras and duck, lardon, pork pie, 3 different mustards, some pickled asparagus, cornichons and caper berries. Generally not things I'd order, but when nearly every review of the restaurant raves about the charcuterie plate, you kind of have to trust they know what they're doing and it'll be good. Besides, Matt was picking up the tab so if I didn't like it, I could just go back to eating the awesome crusty bread they served with sweet goat butter.
We both just sat there for a moment when they brought the plate to the table, taking it all in. Neither of us had ever tried most of the stuff on the plate and it was a little intimidating. Sure, we'd had asparagus, cornichons and caperberries. And mustard. But that's about it. So Matt starts with the lardon and I teased him for being a wuss, since it was the least adventurous thing on the plate - it's basically thinly sliced pork lard (but really, it has the consistancy of butter and tastes the taste is much more subtle than bacon. Think "essence" of bacon that melts in your mouth). I jumped right into the duck and foie gras terrine. It was really tasty - wrapped in bacon, studded with fig and pistacios. I adore figs, and that sweetness just worked so well in the terrine. Then I moved on to the headcheese.
Now, I have to confess, I had no idea what's actually in headcheese. The name is not promising, but I assumed that it's one of those foods that has a weird name that doesn't have anything to do with the actual incredients (like, "welsh rarebit" which was originally "welsh rabbit" which actually turns out to be melted cheese on toast and doesn't include actual rabbit. Or Welshes). I decided I'd just think of it as "sausage" and dig in. And it was, not surprisingly, good. Especially with a dab of the grainy mustard and on bread. It did pretty much just taste like a mild sausage. But the terrine was my favorite, I think I got the better part of that.
The rest of the meal was less adventurous and even tastier. Matt ordered country ribs. You may think you've had good ribs, but trust me, unless you've had these, you haven't really ever had ribs. These rate as one of the most wonderful things I've ever eaten. If I had to choose one food to have on a desert island, it might just be these ribs. They were tender, moist, perfectly cooked and seasoned and practically fell apart but not mushy. Crazy good. The menu lists the farm they came from (Slagel Farms in Fairfield Illinois) and I suggested we write them a thank you note for providing such incredible piggies.
I deviated a bit from the pig theme, ordering the half chicken with frites (although it includes 3 huge slices of grilled summer sausage, because everything must inlcude pig). It was very good chicken and the frites were fabulous (I'm very picky about my fries), but after the ribs, anything else just fell a bit short. It's really not fair to compare anything else to those ribs. And after all the other food, I couldn't even come close to finishing half a chicken. The leftovers will make a nice lunch later today.
Matt got a charcuterie cookbook for Christmas and when we got home I looked up headcheese. It's probably just as well I did it after dinner. According to the book, headcheese is "not a cheese at all, this delicacy is pieces of cooked meat from a calf's or a pig's head combined with the gelatinous cooking liquid. Once cooled and formed in a mold it is easily sliced and eaten at room temperature." The recipe in the book calls for: 1 pig's head, 4 fresh pig trotters or hocks, and 1 cured pork tongue. We will not be making our own anytime soon. I mean, really, if we have a taste for headcheese any time soon, it's much more time and cost-effective to just go back to Publican and have it there. Although the thought of Matt coming home with a pig's head and trying to figure out how to cook it is kind of amusing. If it ever happens, I'll be sure to get video.
By the way, one chapter heading in the charcuterie cookbook is FAT: The Perfect Cooking Environment. Best. Cookbook. Chapter. Title. Ever. HA!
So once again the holiday season has passed. As they go, this one was a very nice one, no drama (for a change) and very relaxing. I was home for several days and I'm sure there's a permanent indent in the couch the exact shape and size of my butt, since that's where it was planted most of the time. It was a little strange being home for Christmas, in the house in Elmwood where we grew up. I kept looking around with that feeling of deja vu, it was so familiar and yet different. The house could not have possibly shrunk, but it feels like it did. Did we really have 5 (and for one year 6) people living there, sharing 1 tiny bathroom? Was my bedroom really that small? I can picture where my bed, desk dresser and bookshelves were, but how did they all possibly fit? When we were little we ran through the dining room and did cartwheels in the living room - how did we not break our legs on furniture? How did a couch, 2 chairs, 2 coffee tables and a TV fit in that room? It honestly never seemed that small, it just felt cozy.
Since I've gotten home I've been quite the cook. In the last few days I've made homemade salsa, guacamole, BLT dip, loaded baked potato soup and chicken/mushroom/spinach enchiladas with homemade tomatillo sauce. I usually don't have the time to spend assembling ingredients and cooking multi-step meals, but the last few days have been less busy so I decided to take advantage. I got the Mexican Everyday cookbook for Christmas and was inspired to try a few things. It's a great cookbook - the recipes are complex without being complicated. So far, so good and tomorrow I'm making chicken tortilla soup.
Here's a picture I took just before Christmas, at Daley Plaza, of the tree, with the Methodist Temple in the background:
Happy New Year!
