Recipes: Mac & Cheese, Green Beans with Gorgonzola Butter and a Warm Chocolate Budino

Not the prettiest plating, but oh well

Again, not the best plating
nor the best roasted almonds

Lovely dinner with friends this past weekend.  Surf & turf (sirloin and lobster) with four-cheese mac & cheese, green beans with gorgonzola butter, and Chateau St. Jean Cinq Cepages and Ramey Chardonnay; followed by a warm chocolate budino for dessert.

The Four-Cheese Mac and Cheese recipe was interesting.  It was in Food & Wine Magazine's June 2012 issue (p. 114) and is a recipe from Slows Bar BQ in Detroit.  In interesting I mean that it called for extra-sharp cheddar cheese, Muenster cheese, Swiss cheese and cream cheese -- AND Tabasco sauce and ground mace.  What's ground mace?  It's a spice obtained from the dried aril (net-like sheath) which covers the nutmeg seed.  The recipe was good, but I really prefer my America's Test Kitchen Classic Mac & Cheese recipe.

I found this Grilled Asparagus with Gorgonzola Butter recipe, but since I wanted to serve green beans, I modified the recipe.  We blanched the beans, and in the future, I would actually saute the beans in the mixture of butter, Gorgonzola cheese, lemon juice, basil, and garlic altogether.  Nix the olive oil because the butter is enough.  And make sure to add salt to taste.

For dessert, I wanted to try out the Warm Chocolate Budino recipe (Food & Wine Magazine's April 2012 issue, p.56)  because I had ordered one at Private Social a couple of weekends ago.  This one turned out pretty nicely -- I love the flavors of chocolate, roasted almonds, vanilla ice cream and olive oil altogether.  (Note: Private Social's dessert had an olive oil ice cream, but this recipe calls for vanilla ice cream with extra-virgin olive oil drizzled on top.)

Bon Appetit!