Christmas Eve dinner is invariably the most elaborate and stressful meal I cook all year. It's a lot of work and I do always wonder if it's really worth the effort - though Mike, at least, seems to appreciate it. That said, my recollection of most Christmas dinners usually fades quickly, though some dishes (the roast from 2004, the amazing rack of lamb from 2008) are well worth remembering. This year's meal was OK. Everything was good, nothing was spectacular. Or maybe I'm just bored with cooking and eating, who knows? In any case, here are the recipes.

Mac & Cheese - made this for the kids, but they were too excited to eat anything at all that night. The only one who had some was Mika and she loved it.

Hors d'ouvres

Mixed Nuts
Blue Cheese & Caramelized Onions Squares
Persimmon Bread with butter

Meal

Mushroom Soup - an old favorite

Piperade on sun-dried tomato bread toast

Beef Wellington served with
Collard Greens with Bacon and
Buttertnut squash gnocchi with sage butter

For dessert my friend Lola brought a cake which I served with homemade Maple Walnut Ice Cream.

I'd say that my favorite dish were the blue cheese squares, though everything was quite good.

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I made this very simple hors d'oeuvre/appetizer for my 2010 Xmas Eve dinner and I think it was my favorite dish of the evening. It couldn't be simpler: just some caramelized onions and blue cheese on puff pastry - but boy, is it delicious. I plan to make it as often as I can!

The original recipe called for making your own bready dough, but I was running late with all Christmas dinner preparations and decided to use up the extra puff pastry I had around instead. It worked out perfectly, though I had to increase the cooking time from that of the original recipe for the pastry to be fully cooked. If you roll the pastry thinner, it'll cook quicker, however. These squares are pretty messy, so make sure to serve them with napkins.

The puff pastry I used is the one that Trader Joe's sells under its own name, which comes in two thick flat sheets. It's pretty good and I think only $4 for a $1 package. The blue cheese was Rosenborg Danish Blue, which I got for $4 lb!!!! @ Grocery Outlet. It's a delicious cheese @ an incredible price.

Blue Cheese and Caramelized-Onion Squares

The only fruit tree we have in our yard (not counting our fig bush) is a Hachiya persimmon tree. We hate it. Hachiya persimmons can only be eaten when they are completely ripe and soft, otherwise they produce astringents that will leave your mouth hurting for hours. And even then, they're not particularly tasty fruits.

There isn't much you can make with them either - persimmon bread and persimmon pudding is about it. I decided to make some of the former and serve it as an hors d'oeuvre for my 2010 Christmas Eve dinner just so I'd have something to do with these damn things. I'd made persimmon bread before and I'd never been too impressed, but this one is actually pretty tasty. You can't taste the fruit, but the fruit does help make it moist. I enjoyed it more than I thought I would, and I imagine I'll make it again in the future so I can use those damn fruits.

This recipe produces 2 loafs, you may want to half it. Even though my persimmons are quite big, I needed about 3 persimmons per cup of pulp, but that may be because they weren't fully soft (it's late December, for God's sake, they are usually gooey messes on the floor by now) and I threw away the harder parts.

Persimmon Bread

2 cups sugar
1 1/2 cups wheat flour
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1/2 cup oatmeal
2 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. ground cinnamon
1 tsp. ground allspice
1/2 tsp. ground nutmeg
1/2 tsp. ground cloves
1/2 tsp. salt

2 cups Hachiya persimmon pulp
1/2 cup apple sauce
1/2 cup vegetable or canola oil
3 eggs

Directions

Preheat oven to 350F. Grease 2 9"x5" loaf pans.

In a large bowl stir together the sugar, flours, oatmeal, baking soda, spices and salt until well mixed.

In a separate bowl blend the persimmon pulp, the apple sauce, the oil and the eggs until combined.

Add the persimmon mixture to the flour mixture and mix well. Pour into prepared pans and bake until a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out dry - about 1 hour (but check at 50').

Christmas Eve 2010 Menu

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I had originally planned on making a roast this year, but I wasn't really excited about the idea. Then I thought about making a crown roast of pork, but I was too late for ordering it from Galvan's, our local butcher, Costco didn't have it and the smallest one I could get a Draeger's was 16 lbs! I don't like pork that much.

Kathy suggested that I make Beef Wellington instead, and for luck of a better option, I agreed. I had made Beef Wellington for Christmas dinner in 2007, from meat I'd gotten @ Galvan's for close to $20lb, and it hadn't been totally successful. I overcooked the meat a bit and the crust came off when I was transferring it to the serving plate. Still, I figured I should give it another try.

This time, I decided to get the meat at Costco, where the investment would be smaller. Costco offered trimmed beef tenderloins for $17lb and untrimmed ones for $10lb. I decided to go for the latter not just because of the much lower price tag, but because I needed fat for larding the beef (Costco won't give you any fat, they say they're not allowed to). It proved to be a great decision. The untrimmed beef tenderloin roasts barely have any fat on them to begin with, and you will definitely need what is there to lard the roast. Indeed, if you do buy your beef at Costco look for a tenderloin that seems to be on the fatty side.

I also decided to try a new recipe this time, and came cross this one at epicurious.com. It was perfect! On try 2 (on try 1 I forgot I had the tenderloin in the oven and by the time I remembered it it had cooked to over 160F, the meat was delicious and perfectly fine for eating but I was afraid it wouldn't stand being put in the oven again, so back I went to Costco for tenderloin #2) the Beef Wellington came out *perfect*, it was perfectly cooked medium rare and the crust stayed on it without any problems. I have to say that armed with this recipe, I've mastered this dish! :-)

This recipe calls for a 3 1/2 lb tenderloin which should serve 8 people without any problems. However, Costco didn't have any tenderloins that weighed under 5 lbs - so that's how much I bought. Note that a heavier tenderloin is merely a longer tenderloin, so you do not need to increase the cooking times. Just keep the ones in the recipe and you'll be fine.

If your tenderloin is over 3 1/2 lbs, however, you will want to make more duxelles (mushrooms). Indeed, I'd say to just go ahead and double the recipe below - better to have more than necessary than not enough. I didn't have enough for my filet, so I left a part without it and it wasn't as good.

Beef Wellington is supposed to be covered with Pate de Foie Gras, which 3 years ago I got at Ratto's in Oakland. Well, they no longer carry it and couldn't tell me where else to get it, so rather than rush all over town looking for it, I just got some duck pate from Lucky's. I can't remember the brand, but it was very good, it tasted very much like pate de foie gras. The package was only 5.5 oz or so, but I felt that was enough for my beef, though a bit more would have been nice.

As for the pastry I used Trader Joe's frozen/defrosted puff pastry. I used both sheets to wrap the tenderloin and half of an additional sheet to decorate it. For a 3 1/2 lb tenderloin, you can definitely do it with 1lb puff pastry.

Finally, I made the sauce for the Wellington in advance and it as too thick when I tried to reheat it. I wasn't thrilled by the flavor, so I didn't serve it and I wouldn't bother making it next time. I'm skipping it from this recipe, but you can look for it at the original recipe site.

Beef Wellington

4 lbs or larger beef tenderloin, untrimmed

2 1/2 Tbsp. unsalted butter
12 oz mushrooms, finely chopped

8 oz duck pate, at room temperature

1 egg, separated
1 tsp. water

1 lb puff pastry plus additional for garnish

Directions

Remove tenderloin from fridge and let rest at room temperature for 1 hour.

Preheat oven to 400F.

Trim fat from surfaces of the tenderloin. Place fat back on top of the tenderloin and tie it securely with multiple pieces of string. Put tenderloin on roasting pan, fat side up, and cook until an instant thermometer register 120F, about 20-25 minutes. Remove from oven and cool completely (1-2 hours at room temperature). Remove and discard fat and strings.

Meanwhile, melt butter in a medium-size pot over medium-low heat. Add the chopped mushrooms and cook until the mushrooms are nicely dry, about 15 minutes. Season with salt and pepper and let cool completely.

Spread pate over the top and sides of the tenderloin. Press mushrooms on top of the pate. Set aside.

Lightly grease a roasting pan or baking sheet.

Beat the egg white in a small bowl. In another bowl, beat the egg white with 1 tsp. of water.

Flour a working surface and rolling pin and roll puff pastry sheets until they are large enough to encase the tenderloin. One and half pastry sheet should be enough, but use 2 if your tenderloin is large enough. Carefully lay puff pastry sheets on top of the tenderloin and lift to envelope, folding pastry under the tenderloin. Brush egg yolk to seal.

Place wrapped tenderloin on roasting pan or baking sheet. Brush top and and sides of the tenderloin with the egg white.

If desired, roll more puff pastry and cut into decorative shapes with cookie cutters. Place shapes on top of the wrapped tenderloin and brush with egg white. Cover tenderloin with plastic wrap and place in the refrigerator for 1-2 hours.

Preheat oven to 400F.

Place roasting pan with Beef Wellington in the oven and cook for 30 minutes. Reduce oven temperature to 350F and bake for 10 more minutes. Remove from the oven and let rest for 15 minutes before serving.

Christmas Eve 2010 Menu

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I was searching for a starch to go with my Beef Wellington for my Christmas Eve 2010 dinner and I wanted something different. This Butternut Squash Gnocchi recipe got great reviews and had the advantage that I could start preparations the day before. It was a bit time consuming to make, but pretty simple and the results were quite good. The gnocchi hit a good point between denseness and lightness - even though most of them were rolled by my 6 and 8 year old daughters, novices at this art -, they were subtly spiced and tasted very good. They are very rich in the butter, however, so I think they work best as a side dish. I'd make them again, I think.

Note that I doubled the original recipe, both because I thought I'd need more gnocchi than I did (I served less than half of what I made) and because the smallest butternut squashes at the supermarket were 2lbs. Also note that the original recipe says to serve with additional Parmesan cheese, I thought they were best without it.

Butternut Squash Gnocchi with Sage Brown Butter

-1 2lb butternut squash
-1 Tbsp. olive oil
-1 1/2lbs Russet potatoes, peeled and quartered
-1 cup Parmesan cheese
-2 eggs, beaten
-1 Tbsp. grated nutmeg
-1 tsp. salt
-4 cups all purpose flour

-1 cup butter
-1/2 cup fresh sage, chopped.

Directions

Start the day before you want to serve the gnocchi.

Preheat oven to 400F. Cut the squash in half lengthwise and discard the seeds. Place squash halves on baking sheet, cut side up, and brush with oil. Roast squash until it's very tender and browned in sports, about 1 1/2 hours. Let cool. Scoop flesh from the squash, put into a blender of food processor and puree until smooth. Transfer to a medium saucepan and place over medium heat. Cook, stirring constantly, until all the juices evaporate, about 5 minutes. Set aside to cool.

Meanwhile, bring salted water to a boil in a medium saucepan. Add potatoes and cook until very tender, about 20 minutes. Drain and mash the potatoes. Cool completely.

Line several baking sheets with wax or parchment paper. Lightly flour them.

Once the squash and the mashed potatoes are cool, mix them together in a large bowl. Add Parmesan cheese, eggs, nutmeg and salt and mix well. Gradually add the flour, mixing until combined. Knead dough until it's almost smooth and holds well together, add more flour if necessary.

Flour a flat working surface and your hands. Grab a piece of dough and roll with your hands into a 1/2" thick rope. Cut rope into 1/2" long pieces. Roll each piece along the back of the tines of a fork dipped in flour. Place each gnocchi on the prepared baking sheet. Repeat with all the dough. Cover the gnocchi with plastic wrap and put in the freezer until the following day.

The next day

Bring salted water to a boil in a large pot. Add gnocchi (you will have to do this in 2 or more batches) and cook until they are floating and are very tender, about 15 minutes. Drain. This can be made up to 8 hours ahead, Place on baking sheets and refrigerate.

Cook the butter in a large pot over medium heat for 3 to 4 minutes. Add the sage and cook, stirring, for 1 minute. Add the gnocchi and cook until heated through. Remove and serve.

Christmas Eve 2010 Menu

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I just came back from lunch @ Creekside Bistro, the new breakfast/lunch venture in downtown San Leandro from the former owners of Planet Coffee. The little cafe serves coffee drinks, breakfast items and sandwiches and it's open from 7:30 AM to 4:30 PM, basically for breakfast and lunch. It's located in the Creekside Plaza Office Park near BART. Unfortunately, it faces an inside parking lot which means it's not accessible or visible from the street. Fortunately, that means there is nearby parking.

The little restaurant looks like your standard office park cafeteria. It's nicely decorated and comfortable and the outside patio will provide a good dining alternative during warm months.

The lunch menu is a bit limited and consists of the soup of the day (artichoke today), five salads, nine meat sandwich (mostly cold) and six vegetarian sandwiches. Most items are $6-$9.

I had the roasted tri-tip sandwich ($7.75), which came with caramelized onions, Provolone cheese and mayo (I had them skip the veggies) in a rustic baguette. It was sensational. The perfectly salted meat tasted roasted and the onions provided just the right amount of sweetness, the cheese helped bring them together and the bread as just resistant enough. It's a great sandwich and it made Mike jealous. My only complaint is that it wasn't big enough, specially for the price. I remained hungry.

Mike had the Grilled Black Forest Ham & Gruyere sandwich ($7). This wasn't as successful. I think the main problem was that the black forest ham was very one dimensional and none of the ingredients added any dimension to the ham. Mike would definitely not order it again.

Both sandwiches came with a small scoop of potato salad, which Mike thought was very good, with a nice tangy flavor. I'm not a potato salad eater myself, and would have appreciated another choice.

I didn't see any desserts available, but I didn't ask about them. A couple of moderately-priced choices would be good.

In all, it was a good lunch (great for me, OK for Mike) and I'd go back for that tri-tip sandwich.

Creekside Bistro
500 Davis St.
San Leandro, Ca
510.352.3300
http://www.creeksidebistro.net/

Marga's San Leandro Restaurant Reviews

We went to Little Namking a couple of weeks ago, after speaking out at a city council meeting (which, according to Mayor Tony Santos constitutes "brownshirt tactics"). We hadn't been there in many years, which is really a shame, as the food is quite good and nicely priced.

We shared the chicken chow mein, lemon chicken (which Mika wasn't thrilled with but she was in a bad mood to begin with) and some beef dish. The portions weren't huge but sufficient for 2 adults and 2 kids. We had no leftovers.

In all, a good meal but not superior enough to the ones we get at our nearby New Hong Kong to justify the extra distance.

Original Review

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