Quote:
Originally Posted by wjk_glynn
My favorite heart attack breakfast...
Take a warm butter croissant, slather in brie, then add bacon.
Yum!
Karl.
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OMG...that's quite good. I love that dish.
For a twists on that, try any of the following. You can do them all together or you can swap in/out individual ingredients as it suits you:
- add thin slices of Granny Smith apple,
- add a small touch of Silver Palate (or any other) sweet mustard (http://shop.silverpalate.com/Sweet-a...alate@Mustards) Dijon also works but it's a rather abrupt flavor and needs to be used sparingly until by trial and error you know how much is right for you.
- Swap out brie for St. Andre.
- Swap out brie for your preferred type of blue cheese, or if you aren't really keen on blue cheese, just toss in a few crumbles of it to add a bit of bite and another layer of flavor.
- Swap out the bacon -- pork: really any pork can be used in place of bacon -- for duck. I tend to shred, julienne, or dice the duck/pork, but sliced will do too if I'm not entertaining others or if it's on miniature croissant sandwiches)
Tweak the concept slightly and turn it into an appetizer/finger food for parties:
Carrs wafter as the base, spread room temperature brie or St. Andre on the cracker slightly thick, sort of like you would butter. Then spread some Silver Palate sweet mustard on the cheese. (Dijon works too, but you have to be more sparing with it.) Next, add a thin slice of tart apple (Granny Smith is my favorite). Add freshly cooked, crumbles of bacon top if you'd like, or don't. I like to finish with a tiny bit of something green and fresh -- a prig or two of dill weed, tiny bits tarragon, tiny bits of rosemary, a few thyme leaves.
(If you don't have time for thyme (stripping the leaves and then dicing them), but want the flavor, roll several (4-6) sprigs in your hand to bruise the leaves and then rub them against the apple slices. This should get you a hint of thyme flavor.)
When I do it with bacon, I use one of the techniques below. They are best done with good knife skills or a mandolin, but the food and the love you put into the dish matters more than the cuts and presentation. The main benefits of the fine cuts are (1) presentation and, more importantly, (2) to allow you better portion control, and, also important, (3) to allow you more control over the flavor profile.
- Cook the bacon by boiling it (separated slices in a pie dish with 1/4 inch of water+red wine so that the bacon doesn't brown or crisp) and then finely (1/16th inch) julienne the meat (reserve the fat for some other use) and same julienne cut on the apple. (the red wine can be the stuff that's been open for a few days and you don't want to drink it.) Place three or four apple pieces and two bacon pieces on top so that there's a bit of height to the presentation. Top with a small sprig of fresh dill weed or a couple julienne bits of tarragon.
- Cook the bacon so it's crispy and blend it in with cheese so as to create a bacon and cheese spread, which is what I spread on the cracker. There should be more cheese than bacon if using St. Andre. As the cheeses you swap in/out get stronger in flavor, more bacon can be added to the mix.
Well, that should be enough for you to get the idea of how to play with the basic flavor profiles and overall concept. When testing out various ways to use this concept, I will admit I just slice things thin and see what I think and then I "dress it up" when I serve it to guests, time permitting. The truth is that a rough and dirty approach -- slices of the ingredients piled onto a cracker -- works just fine for guests who just pop over. The key ingredients are the mustard and tart apple, everything else will just alter the taint of the profile, but will work fine with the apple and mustard.
One other idea: you could turn the whole thing into cream cheese, caviar and apple on a cracker if you want too. Swap out caviar for smoked salmon if you like. With either of those ways, mix a bit of mustard in with the cream cheese and spread it very thinly on the cracker to give the slice of apple something to hold on to and then "glop" more on top of the apple and sprinkle with a few sevruga eggs. Top with dill. Easier to prepare the warmer (but don't heat the cheese -- room temp should do) the cheese is because the eggs hold on to it better that way. Place the prepared crackers on a cookie sheet and chill before serving
Lastly, I don't know anything about your cooking skills, so please forgive me if I was too in-depth with my discussion. I didn't mean to insult you by going into all those specifics.
All the best.