Chefs Get to Make the Holidays Special – for others.

The holidays are notorious for taking chefs away from friends and families. It just so happens they tend to be one of my favorite times to work. This year for Thanksgiving I was especially lucky to have the opportunity to work for a wonderful family in California. For the family, Thanksgiving is the holiday where they all get together, parents, siblings, extended families, in-laws and close friends, all are welcome. The matriarch of the family has always done the traditional family dinner, using the family recipes passed down among the generations.

I flew in on Tuesday afternoon and we went over the family recipes, planned our shopping trip and wrote out our prep and cooking schedules. I was there mainly to facilitate the true chef for this event, the matriarch who has done this dinner for years. By incorporating my organizational skills and the tricks I have learned, the family’s traditional Thanksgiving meal went smoothly and everyone was able to sit back, relax and enjoy, letting me worry about the food and getting it out on time. Being able to do this for the family made my holiday special. There is no better gift than helping others enjoy fine food in the company of those they love while preserving a great family tradition.

Christmas was just as rewarding working locally for clients who open their home to family and friends who don’t have any place else to go. The gathering was filled with laughter and optimism for the New Year. I prepared a traditional prime rib, using a slow roast low temperature method. It never fails, but is often hard to do unless you have two ovens since it takes a long time and ties up your oven at a very low temperature (recipe is listed below). We also prepared a Yorkshire Puddings (I like to think of them as popovers on steroids), asparagus with Hollandaise, twice baked potatoes and finished up with a decadent chocolate soufflé with a white chocolate sauce.

Throughout this crazy busy season, I did get to spend one very special day with my family. Giovanni (my nephew) turned six on the 21st and we had a special Scooby Doo mystery birthday party complete with Chef Brook’s Scooby Doo cake, Happy Birthday Gio!

Slow Roasted Herb Crusted Prime Rib
(Serves 6 to 8)

3-rib standing rib roast (7 pounds) trimmed to 1/8 inch fat (ask your butcher for ribs 10-12 sometimes referred to as the loin end)
Small bunch of fresh; oregano, thyme, chives
3 twigs of rosemary
¼ cup of stone ground mustard with horseradish
¼ cup of Dijon mustard
A good quality sea salt or kosher salt
Fresh ground pepper

Preheat oven to 200º
Heat a large roasting pan over two burners set at medium-high heat. Place roast in the pan browning on all sides, about ½ a cup of fat will be rendered (set aside if you are making Yorkshire Puddings) approximately 6 to 8 minutes. While browning, chop in food processor the leaves of; oregano, thyme, chives and rosemary, add the mustard to make a paste.

Remove roast from pan, set wire rack in pan, liberal salt and pepper the roast. Tie the meat to the bones between ribs 1n 2 and 2 n 3 (this helps to keep the meat from pulling away from the bones and makes for an even uniform cooking). Liberally rub the herb mustard paste all over the roast, set on rack in roasting pan cooking in 200º oven until a thermometer registers 130º (for medium-rare), about 3 ½ hours (or about 30 minutes per pound). Let stand for 20 minutes before carving.

Carving tip; even though it is pretty to carve the roast from the rib for more even slices carve the roast off the bone then place cut side down and carve the roast across the grain into nice thick slices.