A last minute booking this weekend for a private dinner for two, celebrating a one year anniversary of dating. Planned for outdoors at our patio table, the weather turned cooler and damp, so we moved the place settings inside, turned on the background lighting, put a candle on the table, and away we went.
A tiradito, a ceviche with the fish cut in strips like sashimi, rather than in cubes. The fish, abadejo, the “pink ling”. The cure, a mix of lime juice, passionfruit pulp, chili oil, salt, and white pepper. Garnished with bits of navel orange, cilantro leaves, and a brunoise (very fine dice) of shallot and limo chilies.
Bodega Chandón Rosé, N.V.
An iteration on one of the dishes that I was playing around with back in June. The early version was a warm salad of grilled hanger steak with cherry tomatoes, burrata, pistachios, frying peppers, and a cocoa and mustard vinaigrette. I wanted to turn it into a more substantial, and hot dish. So here we have the grilled hanger steak on the bottom, sliced, surrounded by small cylinders of olive oil roasted potato, salt roasted cherry tomatoes, grilled frying peppers, toasted pistachios, and in place of the burrata, shavings of reggianito cheese, and then slightly warmed arugula tossed with a cocoa and dijon mustard emulsion, which is also drizzled over the steak below.
Finca Las Moras “Los Intocables” Red Blend, 2019 (Syrah, Merlot, Bonarda)
And, a take on a cake we’ve made many times before. The original is a lemon and cherry olive oil cake, and we usually glaze it and serve it in slices with some liqueur macerated cherries over it. Cherries aren’t in season, so I went with strawberries in the cake, and made individual sized cakes, then dusted the whole plate and cake with powdered sugar rather than a gloopy glaze. Topped with more strawberries that were oven roasted in a little bit of limoncello, honey, and vanilla.
A simple, fun, romantic dinner, and the couple who came loved it all.
In the “news” end of things, now that vaccinations are more prevalent here, as well as that I, and anyone who’s helping me in the place, have been fully vaccinated, I’m planning on re-opening Casa SaltShaker starting early to mid-September. It’s going to be more casual for now, probably with three or four course dinners, like this one was, and at a price range that’s more amenable for folk who live here. Tourism isn’t restarted yet – our borders are still closed after a year and a half, with no predictions on when they’ll be reopened. But, look for announcements of dates available here, and on our social media pages!
