New Years Day Feast

We like to start out the New Year with a proper feast.

1) Honey Baked Ham
I love a properly cured ham. This Michigan based product is cured with honey.

2) Dungenes Crab
Great with the ham and cheeses.

3) Scalloped Potatoes
This dish is essentially multiple layers of sliced potatoes. I like to add other wonderful things to the layers. Like sautéed onions and garlic, Herbs de Provenance, sautéed mushrooms, and Cheddar and Parmesan cheese. And to kick it up a notch – fennel.
I top the whole thing off with a mixture of: {cream of mushroom soup, Italian red vermouth, heavy cream}. It is important to caramelize everything. The result is a wonderful complexity of flavours. So the yellow onions and garlic are caramelized.
I bake the dish (uncovered) until the top gets brown. Then add more of the mushroom soup mix and let brown again. Then add Parmasagn cheese and let it brown gain. By the was, the Parmasagn cheese that I used was from Wisconsin. It was not aged as much as a Paarmasagn Reggiano but it also was not as expensive. But this cheese was a lot like a Gouda.

4) Corn Bread Muffins
A gift from Evelyn.

5) Fresh Baked Honey Wheat Bread
A home run from Evelyn. Went great with the cheese and beer.

6) Garden Salad
I added Laura Chenel’s Chevre – an herbed goat cheese.

A proper feast needs proper cheeses:
1) Blue Du Bocage by Pascal Beillevaire
A pasteurized goat’s milk cheese. Pascal Beillevaire is a French cheese maker. The result is a wonderful blue that goes great with ham.

2) Cyprus Grove Purple Haze
This is a goat cheese made with lavender. From Sonoma County.

3) Cyprus Grove Truffle Tremor
This is a goat cheese made with truffles. From Sonoma County. Truffels and cheese is decadant.

4) Somerdale Champagne Cheddar
Somerdale is a wonderful British cheese manufacturer. This was a new cheese for us. Very nice.  I decided to go with beer with the ham. The Germans are big on bear and ham, so why not:

1) Stone 12.12.12 Cold Vertical Epic
Stone Brewing is always good. This is a spiced ale with 9.0 percent alcohol. What a wonderful brew by Stone. They release a new spiced ale every year.

2) The Bruery Saison Rue
A Belgian style farmhouse ale made in Placenta, California by The Bruery. It it 8.5 percent alcohol.

3) Alaskan Smoked Porter 2012
Evelyn got me this for Christmas. I have never tried beer made in Alaska. This one is from the Alaskan Brewing Company. It is 6.5% alcohol.

And last, but certainly not least: Evelyn’s Carrot Cake. This is absolutely the best Carrot Cake on the planet. Moist, rich, with great flavorShe tops it off with a cream cheese frosting.