December 5th (Kitchen day 77...)

So, it finally happened...

I cut myself with one of my knives... Pretty badly actually. As I said earlier I was planning on making an incredible dinner tonight. I did, but I also cut off a bit too much. Literally... >:(

I won't start off this post with a photo of the damage, (I will post a photo though) I don't want you to stop reading immediately......

First, dinner!

So I made a super, super tasty meal:

Pork Tenderloin

A Rosemary infused Pork Tenderloin, 

with Golden Beets

& a Mushroom/Rosemary sauce

Key Lime Pie

Fresh squeezed Key Lime pie,

with homemade Vanilla Whipped Cream

I should have used a sprig of rosemary for a garnish...

Until tonight, the best pork loin I've ever had was at Aurum in Steamboat Springs. Now I can say that the best was today. Rosemary is by far the BEST herb for seasoning. Honestly I'm going to name my first daughter that. You can use it in anything, sweet, savory, spicy. I should have maybe used a bit in either the whipped cream or the pie, next time! Right up until I cut my thumb I was having a blast. So for the prep:

Pork:

1. Heat oven to 375 degrees F.
2. Rinse and dry pork tenderloin, season with salt and pepper.
3. Chop up 2t fresh rosemary, place in a small bowl with 1oz olive oil and heat in oven 3 mins to infuse flavor. Rub tenderloin with the rosemary and rosemary oil. Chill 1 hour.
4. In a hot, oiled cast iron pan, sear the outside of the pork, don't burn. Make sure all sides are a nice golden brown, remove from pan. Place on a baking sheet and bake for 30 minutes.

Sauce:

1. Deglaze the cast iron pan with some hot milk. Add 3T butter and stir, keep on very low temp.
2. Sauté mushrooms in a pan and when they are nice and golden, add to sauce. Keep on low.
3. AFTER COOKING PORK: Add any juices from baking sheet and from cutting pork (after resting) to sauce and reduce, I used some beurre manie (equal parts butter and flour) to thicken it quickly.
4. Serve with pork.

Golden Beets:

1. Peel and medium dice the beets. 
2. Heat 1T oil in a pan, sauté the beets for 5 minutes, season. Reduce heat to medium, add 2T water and simmer for 10-15 minutes until done.
3. Remove from heat, season with olive oil. Serve.

Key Lime Pie & Whipped Cream:

1. Whip 6 egg yolks and 1 can sweetened condensed milk (14oz).
2. Add the zest of 4 Key Limes and 6oz Key Lime juice.
3. Pour into a graham cracker pie crust (I had one leftover from last Thanksgiving) and bake at 350 degrees F for 15 minutes.
4. Cool 1 hour.
5. Whip cream with 1t vanilla extract and 2T sugar.
6. Serve pie with whipped cream.

The limes are what ruined me. I had already cut and zested them, about 8 for the juice, and decided I needed just a bit more juice. Grabbed one more lime, went to cut it, and immediately realized I also cut the end of my thumb off. Found out that my knife is actually sharp though! I didn't think the tool was working... 

Kitchen Day 77!

I did want to write a bit more about the day in the kitchen today. Sitting here, with my destroyed and throbbing thumb, I am tired. As I said before we made Indian food today. Here are some photos, I didn't remember to take them until we were almost done.

 Keenan's Tandoori Chicken, nice and smokey!

 I made Samosas with Megan today. Apparently they are the best fried, it wan't clear in our production that was the case :(

Rigo's take on Tandoori Chicken. He used more sauce than Keenan did. This was definitely a favorite dish of the day!

So now I'm going to bed. It might be a full on blizzard tomorrow so I'm going to have to wake up early and clean off the cars. I'm also going to try and get my production sheet done then, typing with this thumb is one thing, writing is a bit more difficult, I have to hold my hand to ensure the skin isn't stressed and pulls the liquid bandage off. 

Here is the photo, I will update with a better, more gruesome one tomorrow! :P

This was after I realized I could make a tourniquet with a hair tie, it went right through all the layers of skin. It was definitely bleeding so fast that the liquid bandage would just run off. During cooking I had to reseal it, even without using the thumb your skin moves a ton! I did find out it isn't impossible to live without a thumb, just super difficult...

Here is is after a few days in bandages. It's a pretty sizable hole in there! The hardest thing is getting used to holding things without a thumb. Today I picked the stems off spinach without it, go try to do that and let me know how it goes!!! :'(