Guilty Pleasures

If you're anything like us, you're still working on your Christmas list, and New Year's Eve is still just a twinkle in your eye. So here's our gift to you: the perfect event for your rapidly filling calendar.

At 6:30 p.m. on Tuesday, Dec. 29, Bistro 185 is hosting their Pre-NYE Guilty Pleasures Champagne Dinner. Five courses with all the premium, pre-resolution ingredients you crave are paired with five distinct champagne pours for $80 (plus tax and gratuity).

Read on for more on this decadent dining experience, plus a recipe from sous chef Kevin Moore.

Course 1: Caviar and roasted marrow board with pickles, jams an dips paired with
Larmandier-Bernier Latitude 1er Cru, Extra Brut

Course 2: Seared scallops with foie gras sauce and butter-poached fungi paired with

Domaine Bott-Geyl Cremant D'Alsace

Course 3: Veal sweetbreads with corn pudding*, red onion and pickled mustard seeds paired with

R.H. Coutier Tradition

* recipe follows

Course 4: Lobster endive shoots, vanilla and pomegranate seeds paired with

R.H. Coutier Rose

Course 5: Dry-aged beef carpaccio, toast, truffle and quail egg paired with

2013 Dashe Late Harvest Zinfandel

Call for reservations.

Bistro 185, 991 E. 185th St., Cleveland, 216-481-9635, bistro185.com

Bistro 185 Corn Pudding

Ingredients:

5 eggs

1/3 cup butter, melted

1/4 cup white sugar

1/2 cup milk

4 Tablespoons cornstarch

1, 15.25-ounce can whole kernel corn

2, 14.75-ounce cans cream-style corn

Procedure:

Preheat oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit. In a large bowl, lightly beat the eggs. Add melted butter, sugar and milk. Whisk in cornstarch. Stir in corn and creamed corn. Blend well. Pour mixture into buttered casserole dish. Bake 1 hour.

Cocktails for Kids

Crop Rocks' Steve Schimoler, chef and owner, and beverage manager Ryan Wilkins 

Guzzle for a good cause this Friday, Sept. 18 at 8 p.m. when the Gala speakeasy fundraiser takes over Steve Schimoler's new On Air Studio (part of the new trio of Crop venues in the Flats that also includes Crop Sticks and Crop Rocks).

Benefiting Cleveland Clinic Children's, the event features hors d'oeuvres by Crop Rocks, craft cocktails by representatives of the United States Bartenders Guild and live music by Brazilian jazz quartet Moises Borges and the David Thomas Jazz Trio.

Crop Rocks beverage manager Ryan Wilkins shares his Silk Road cocktail recipe, which he will serve on Friday to complement the Asian-influenced cuisine.

"We're trying to incorporate some Asian flavors and ingredients not only because they fit [Crop Sticks ] thematically, but because they go well with the food," says Wilkins. The drink features vodka, yuzu (a mild Asian citrus fruit) and fresh shiso.

If you're unfamiliar with the herb, you're not alone. "It's not a direct parallel to a more common herb in Western cooking," Wilkins explains. "It has a very vibrant, slightly spicy flavor with a little undertone of bitter. [It's like] a cross between cilantro and arugula."

Though shiso makes an appearance in a few other Crop Sticks cocktails, "This time I wanted to work with the shiso flavor but in a cocktail that would be very smooth and balanced without aggressive acidity," he says.

Order up on Friday or try your hand at mixology with the following recipe:


Silk Road

2 ounces Chopin Potato Vodka
3/4 ounce oleo-saccharum syrup (see recipe below)
1/4 ounce yuzu juice
small handful shiso leaves
small pinch salt

Dry-shake shiso leaves to bruise, then add other ingredients. Shake well and double-strain into chilled coupe glass. Garnish with microshiso leaf.

Oleo-saccharum syrup

Peels from two grapefruits and four limes (remove bitter white pith with a sharp paring knife or peeler)

3 cups sugar

3 cups water

Combine sugar and citrus peels in an airtight container and allow to macerate overnight. Remove citrus peels (straining sugar through sieve if necessary) and add sugar to medium saucepan. Stir in water, then simmer until sugar is dissolved. Cool. 

Tickets to the Gala are $40 presale or $50 on the day of the event.

Summer Must-Eat: Spring Pea Tortellini

Lockkeepers Spring Pea Tortellini

Just in time for fresh peas from the farmers market, Lockkeepers executive chef Alberto Leandri shares his recipe for this fast and elegant Spring Pea Tortellini.

Ingredients

For the tortellini:
1/2 cup ricotta cheese
1/4 cup grated Parmesan
3 tablespoons pea puree
1 egg
1/4 teaspoon fresh ground black pepper
1 egg mixed with 1/2 teaspoon water
Fresh pasta

For the sauce:
1 leek, julienned
1/3 cup tomato sauce
1 cup chicken stock
2 tablespoons butter
2 tablespoons parmiggiano
4 oz bacon
1/3-cup panko breadcrumbs

Directions

In a bowl, mix the ricotta, peas, parmiggiano, 1 egg, salt and pepper.

Roll out fresh pasta dough by hand or using a machine, or using premade fresh pasta sheets, cut the dough into 3- or 4-inch squares with a square cookie cutter. Place 1/4 teaspoon filling into the center of each square. Brush egg wash on the bottom half of the square and fold over diagonally to seal. Fold the two bottom corners around your finger, then turn down the top edge to form a tortellini.

In a 350 degree oven, cook the bacon until crispy (about 15 minutes) and let cool. When completely cool, process in a food processor with panko bread crumbs until the blend is fine.

Cook the tortellini in salted boiling water for 3-4 minutes while making the sauce.

In a pan, heat 2 tablespoon of extra virgin olive oil with leek, season to taste, then add chicken stock, tomatoes and butter and boil for a few minutes. Drain the cooked tortellini and add them to the sauce. Add parmiggiano. Serve topped with bacon crumbs.

Lockkeepers, 8001 Rockside Rd, Valley View, 216-524-9404, lockkeepers.com

Celebrate the Fourth with some combustible Cleveland cuisine

Fire in the sky? That happens every summer. Fire on the water? That hasn't happened around here in 40 years.

So to honor Cleveland's environmental achievement, why not bring a little piece of the 1969 Cuyahoga River fire to your backyard BBQ? All you need to do is catch a bass from our beloved Cuyahoga and follow the simple steps below. It'll be a real burning river feast (not to be confused with this).

Burning River Bass

1 lb. Small mouth bass filet (from Cuyahoga River)

2 Orange slices

½ tbsp Orange zest

Dried fennel

Olive oil (do not use motor oil for authentic 1969 flavor)

Bottle of Sambuca

Salt & Pepper

Cut thin slits in filet. Sprinkle salt & pepper over cleaned fish, and brush on a coat of oil. Squeeze orange over fish and sprinkle on orange zest.

Place on bed of fennel and bake in oven at about 350 degrees F for 6-9 minutes, depending on weight and mercury content. Flip halfway through cooking, adding more orange juice and zest. After cooking, place on serving dish (don’t use paper plates) and evenly pour ½ oz. of Sambuca to fish. Light on fire and serve. Then drink the rest of the bottle of Sambuca to kill any germs.

The EPA recommends you only eat this once a month. Seriously.