Ruhlman's Twenty (12 page)

Garbure
(gar-BYR) is a soup packed with ingredients so that it’s almost a stew. It typically includes cabbage, bacon, and some form of preserved goose. The version here uses only winter vegetables. The hearty soup gets its seasoning and great body from bacon rind and its depth of flavor from sweating the garlic and onions beneath the rind.

2 leeks

2 tablespoons butter

1 large onion, cut into medium dice

2 to 4 shallots, sliced

4 to 6 garlic cloves, roughly chopped

Kosher salt

1 piece bacon rind large enough to cover the bottom of the pan (about 8 inches/20 centimeters across)

8 cups/2 liters water

4 celery stalks; 2 whole, 2 cut into bite-size pieces

4 carrots; 2 whole, 2 peeled and cut into bite-size pieces

2 bay leaves

2 tablespoons tomato paste/purée

2 potatoes (about 1 pound/455 grams), peeled and cut into bite-size pieces

¹
/
₈
teaspoon cayenne pepper

1 pound/455 grams white cabbage, cut into bite-size pieces

1 teaspoon fish sauce (optional but advised)

About 1½ tablespoons red wine vinegar or sherry vinegar

2 tablespoons finely sliced fresh chives

Cut the root end from each leek and trim the ragged ends of the leaves. Halve the leeks lengthwise and wash thoroughly under cold water, checking for dirt between the layers of leaves. Cut the leeks off where the pale green turns to dark green. Cut the white and pale green parts crosswise into ½-inch/12-millimeter slices. Tie the green leaves together with butcher’s twine.

In a Dutch oven or other heavy pot over medium heat, melt the butter. Add the sliced leeks, onion, shallots, and garlic, and cook, stirring occasionally, until softened, about 5 minutes. As the vegetables cook, season them with a couple of three-finger pinches of salt (1 teaspoon). Reduce the heat to low or medium-low, lay the bacon rind over the vegetables, and continue to cook for about 1 hour. Lift the bacon rind about midway through and stir the vegetables. After 1 hour, the vegetables should be very soft but still pale in color, not browned.

Add the water and bound leek tops, whole celery stalks, whole carrots, bay leaves, and tomato paste/purée. Raise the heat to high and bring to a gentle simmer, then reduce the heat to low and cook for about 1 hour.

Remove the leek tops, celery, carrots, and bay leaves from the pot and discard. Remove the bacon rind (it can be scraped of excess fat and reserved, then cut into strips and fried as cracklings). Taste the broth and season with salt as needed. Add the potatoes, raise the heat to medium and simmer for 10 minutes. Stir in the cayenne. Add the cut celery, cut carrots, and cabbage, return the soup to a simmer, and cook until the vegetables are cooked through, about 10 minutes longer. Season with the fish sauce (if using) and the vinegar. Stir the soup, taste, and adjust the seasoning. Serve garnished with the chives.

I like salads of cold, cooked vegetables with a tasty vinaigrette—they’re satisfying and nourishing and can act as a main course or a side. Here, green beans are the base to showcase other, sweeter vegetables. The sweetness of the onion, its sharpness tempered by blanching, holds all the flavors together. You almost can’t go wrong with any combination of sweet vegetables offset by a simple vinaigrette. The salad shows how the plain onion can be handled in different ways, blanching for the salad and roasting for the vinaigrette. Understanding how the onion works gives you great versatility in the kitchen.

The salad is seasoned with Espellete (es-pe-LETTE), a red chile pepper named for the French commune in the southwestern tip of France, near the Spanish border, where the pepper is grown. Like cayenne pepper, it’s dried and ground to a powder and used as a seasoning. It’s not as hot as cayenne and has a fruitier flavor. Espellete is available in specialty stores, but if you can’t find it, you can substitute cayenne pepper.

Kosher salt

1 large onion, thinly sliced

1 pound/455 grams green beans, stem ends picked off

2
Roasted Shallots

2 ears of corn

¼ cup/60 milliliters good red wine vinegar or sherry vinegar, or as needed

Freshly ground black pepper

½ cup/120 milliliters canola oil, or as needed

Espellete powder or cayenne pepper (optional)

Lemon Confit
, julienned (optional)

Bring a large pot of water,
salted for green vegetables
, to a boil. (You’ll boil the onions first, the green beans second, and then the corn, all in the same pot of water, so you’ll need a strainer or spider to remove the onion.)

Boil the onion for 1 minute. Using the strainer, transfer the onion slices
to an ice bath
and chill for about 2 minutes. Remove the onion slices to a paper towel–/absorbent paper–lined bowl. Boil the green beans until tender, about 5 minutes. Transfer them to the ice bath and chill for 3 to 4 minutes. Remove the beans to a paper-lined bowl. Boil the corn for 2 minutes, then immerse the ears in the ice bath until completely chilled, about 5 minutes. Add more ice cubes to the ice bath as needed.

In a blender, combine the shallots, the ¼ cup vinegar, a three-finger pinch of salt, and several grinds of black pepper. Process briefly, then, with the motor running, add the ½ cup oil in a thin stream. Taste the vinaigrette. If it is too sharp, blend in a little more oil. If it’s too sweet, add a little more vinegar.

Cut the corn off the cob, cutting deeply enough against the cob so that the corn comes off in planks.

Remove the paper from the bowl of the green beans. Toss the green beans with half of the vinaigrette. Taste and season with salt and pepper if desired. Arrange the green beans on a serving platter or on individual plates, scatter the onions over the beans, and drizzle with the remaining vinaigrette. Top with the planks of corn and scatter any remaining kernels around the periphery of the salad. Season with Espellete or Lemon Confit, if desired, and/or black pepper.

Roasting shallots makes them very soft and very sweet. They make a fantastic garnish and ingredient. Add them to soups, stews, or sauces, or purée them in vinaigrettes. Serve them whole alongside roast beef, pork, or chicken, or chop them to a paste and heat them with a little water and butter, seasoned with vinegar, for a quick pan sauce. They couldn’t be easier to prepare.

Shallots, unpeeled, roots cut off

Butter or canola or olive oil

Kosher salt

Freshly ground black pepper

Preheat the oven to 400°F/200°C/gas 6.

Put the shallots on a piece of aluminum foil large enough to enclose them or in a cast-iron pan. For each shallot, add about 1 teaspoon of butter. Sprinkle with salt and a few grinds of pepper. If using foil fold it around the shallots and seal tightly.

Roast until the shallots are completely soft and a knife can be inserted without resistance, about 1 hour. When the shallots are cool enough to handle, remove the skins. Store in the refrigerator for up to 3 days.