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One Block West sensational seasonal cuisine
25 South Indian Alley Winchester VA, 22601 540-662-1455
Newsletter for April 2004 Your source for what’s cooking at OBW |
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Closing for Apple Blossom Week |
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After nearly a year of hard work to find a look and a brand that represents what One Block West is about, we are nearly ready to unveil the results. On Friday April the 16th, we will launch the new One Block West at a party from 5 to 7 pm at which we will offer free food, Boo Snider on acoustic guitar, and a drawing for gift certificates. Please join us if you can.
Closing for Apple Blossom Week
As part of our makeover, we need to make some changes to the dining room that require us to be closed for a few days, so Apple Blossom is the perfect opportunity to get this done. We will be closed the week of April 27th through May 1st.
The March wine dinner on the 9th featuring the Corayo wines from Geelong, Australia was a great success. The dinners for April and May are now scheduled. We limit these dinners to 24 guests, so reservations are quite necessary.
On Tuesday April 20th, we feature the outstanding wines of Chrysalis Vineyards with winemaker Andy Reagan, a native Virginian and one of the Old Dominion’s youngest and most innovative winemakers. I just love Andy’s wines and they definitely prove that Virginia wines can compete with any in the world. The menu and pricing is still tentative. We plan to showcase Viognier, Chardonnay, Norton, and a real treat, America’s first varietally labeled Petit Manseng.
On Wednesday May 12th, Bill McKenney from Downey Selections will be at One Block West to help discuss Italian wines. Besides being a really entertaining guy, Bill is one of the most knowledgeable people in Italian wine that I know. Here is the perfect opportunity to learn about and taste our Gavi, Sagrantino, Super Tuscan Sangiovese, and Vin Santo.
This summer we will be having happy hour on the deck on Fridays. Boo Snider will be playing all your favorite songs and we will offer a special upscale grill menu on the deck only. The weather is still too nasty to open the deck and we’re busy painting and installing lighting and speakers. We hope to kick this off in mid-May, weather permitting.
The new spring lunch menu is almost ready to go. It should be in place in the next week or so, once we work out all the kinks in the new dishes. Right now our problem is we have too many dishes to fit on the physical menu!
Recently, we’ve been running Shanghai-Style Quail Stuffed with a mix of ground pork and a lot of oriental treasures with which you may not be familiar. Here are some:
Tree Ear Mushrooms. Not the most attractive things in the world, tree ears are little brown or black gnarled fungi that grow on rotting wood. With almost no flavor, they are favored for their crunchy texture and for their help in fighting atherosclerosis. Found in any Asian market, tree ears need to be rehydrated in warm water for a few minutes. Remove any tough parts and slice to use.
Fermented Black Beans. Small black soybeans that have been preserved in salt and spices, a few of these go a long way to adding flavor and color to a dish. Rinse in several changes of water to remove the salt and toss into any stir fry or stuffing. They are often added to what would be an otherwise fairly bland seafood dish for taste and color contrast.
I have many books on oriental ingredients in my library, the most prized of which is Bruce Cost’s Asian Ingredients: Buying and Cooking the Staple Foods of China, Japan , and Southeast Asia. Of course, nothing beats going into the oriental markets in DC and Fairfax and asking the old ladies how they use the ingredients.
Chef Ed to Demo at Terra Cotta Kitchen
Chef Ed will be demonstrating tips for “Apple Blossom Entertaining” at Terra Cotta Kitchen in Creekside on Monday April 26th (Apple Blossom Monday) from 6-8 pm. For details or to register, contact TCK at 540-723-8800.
During the three-week run of shad roe at the restaurant, a great many customers commented that they cannot achieve the same results at home as we do. Although sadly the season is pretty well over, here’s how we do it.
Shad Roe with Country Ham, Capers, and Lemon
2 strips of bacon 2 tablespoons of diced raw country ham 1 set of shad roe (two lobes are called a set) 1 tablespoon of pickled nonpareil capers with a little juice ½ a lemon
Preheat your oven to very hot, 450°F or hotter. Fry the two strips of bacon to render the grease. Remove the bacon to paper toweling and add the ham and cook until done. Remove the ham to paper toweling and pour the grease into a cold, ovenproof sauté pan. Eat the bacon. Place the roe vein side down in the cold pan. Turn on the flame and cook slowly for two minutes. If ever you hear an egg pop, the heat is too high and you should immediately remove the pan from the flame.
After two minutes, slide the roe onto a plate and turning the plate and pan towards each other, invert the roe back into the pan. The roe is too soft at this point to turn with a spatula. Return to the heat for another minute or two, minding that the heat doesn’t start popping the eggs. Place the roe in the hot oven for about 5 minutes for a large set, 6 minutes for a jumbo set. This will yield roe that is still pink and not overcooked.
Remove the pan from the oven and add the capers and country ham to the pan. Squeeze the lemon into the pan. Swirl to mix well. The show side of the roe is down in the pan, but the roe will now be firm enough to turn it over with a spatula. Invert onto a dinner plate and pour the pan sauce over. Enjoy!
We’ve been garnishing a lot of our dishes with microgreens (mustard, fennel, basil, Russian red kale) and sunflower and pea shoots from Claymont Community Farm in Charles Town, WV. When you see them on your plate, don’t ignore them—eat them! They are wonderful.
One other last word. If you’re on a low carb diet (or any other kind of restricted diet), let us know when you order. So many people are not eating our Russian fingerling potatoes and these beautiful potatoes are ending up in the trash. We would be happy to substitute for anything that you are not going to eat.
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Copyright © 2004 Shenandoah Food and Beverage Holdings, LLC |
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