I recently celebrated my seventh wedding anniversary and the hubby and I celebrated with two different, equally fabulous dinners. Jon and I are extremely lucky; our anniversary always falls during Downtown Dining Week, so on the Saturday before our anniversary we had dinner at Osteria del Mondo and it was tremendous.
For dinner on our anniversary a few days later, we opted to celebrate at home. Jon has incredible culinary skills and when he decides to make a special meal, it's remarkable. He met me at the market and started designing our dinner (he doesn't use recipes) at the meat and seafood counters, where he chose a nicely marbled boneless rib eye and halibut fillet.
At home, he seasoned the cuts of meat and fish and grilled both, leaving expert grill marks. Rice fragranced with Herbs de Provence and chunks of applewood smoked bacon was served with fresh green beans with caramelized onions to accompany the surf and turf. The meal was plated extravagantly and was garnished with fresh lemon. He selected a bottle of Pinot Noir from Oregon and it was a meal fit for a queen. It was gorgeous and because I'm a nerd, I took pictures.
As I enjoyed the expertly prepared meal, I gave my compliments to the chef as we toasted both the meal, and our anniversary. His reply? "It's not Osteria, but it's not bad for a simple meal."
Simple? Thinking about my fine meal as simple almost made me laugh and I asked him to explain why he thought his efforts were simple. After some thought, his answer was that it took a mere 45 minutes from to start to finish.
The foodie philosopher in me began to think about all the other ways the meal the was simple. The simplicity of the ingredients -- excluding oil, butter, salt and pepper, there were only seven ingredients. The simplicity of the preparation techniques needed -- he steamed, sautéed, and grilled -- basic skills in any chef's vocabulary. The simplicity of the clean up - he only needed one pan for the rice and one for the green beans, everything else went on the grill.
It was his attention to detail that took the meal from good to great. We truly eat with our eyes and the time spent making the meal look as luxurious as possible was time well spent. As I shared a kiss with my chef, I thought about another KISS: Keep it simple, stupid.
