The Breslin: It has the feel of a beautifully reimagined lived-in pub, where offal is served alongside stout. Horns on the wall, carved wooden pigs perched on stands, and iron buffalos lining the glass between the booths all gave us an idea of the meat-laden menu to come.
Appetizers: The Bone Marrow and Parsley Salad came with three large sections of veal marrowbone, roasted just until the marrow was cooked through in the interior and crisp on both ends. The parsley dressed in lemon and olive oil was a refreshing complement to the richness of the marrow, which had to be retrieved from the inner depths of the bone with a tiny spoon.
Anchovy Soldiers: Toasted strips of bread lathered with a spread of anchovies and garlic. We dipped the soldiers into an accompanying "soft" boiled egg cooked so that the outer white had barely congealed, leaving the interior white runny and the yolk molten.
Whitefish salad: Arrived dressed in Henderson's much-loved green sauce, a mixture of parsley and other herbs hand-chopped with anchovies, garlic, capers, and olive oil. The cubes of bread accompanying the green sauce absorbed the liquid; the whitefish, flaky and tender, held up well to the assertive taste of the sauce.
Trotter Prune and Rabbit Pie: Advertised "for one," the pie came in a hefty little cast iron pan. A flaky suet crust sat atop segments of achingly tender rabbit meat. The rabbit had been braised in a flavorful liquid most likely made with wine and Henderson's signature "Trotter Gear," an extremely gelatinous stock of pig's feet simmered with chicken broth and Madeira. As with all well-executed meat pies, the meaty liquid soaked into the pie's bottom crust, leaving it enticingly flabby.
Braised lamb neck: It arrived whole and unadorned. The entire neck was nestled in a pool of soupy, lamb-intensive broth. Redolent of garlic and rosemary, the neck meat was fork-tender and fell quickly off the skeletal structure of the bones. Segments of the neck bone detached easily, inviting plenty of gnawing around the tendons and connective tissue.
Pot Roasted Pig's Head: The centerpiece of our meal, and perhaps the heart-pounding highlight of my entire year. Using an entire pig's head split exactly in two, our half of the head came served on a platter of wilted spinach. The spinach was so intensely porky from the broth of the head that it barely qualified as a vegetable.
The surface of the pig's head was a diverse landscape of textures: the snout, soft and gelatinous, gave way to a crispy cheek that shattered as we cut down into it. The tip of the ear was hardened over hours of cooking time; the fatty, meaty lobe was chewy and cartilaginous. The crisp casing of the skin, which had been browned like that of a roast suckling pig, gave way to meltingly tender meat within. The meat was so soft and silky (or, as Henderson would say, "yielding") that slivers of it seemed to dissolve in my mouth. This was especially true for the rich chunks of cheek meat.
Plundering the head : An immensely pleasurable act. Reaching my hand into the mouth, I felt around for tidbits to eat. The incisors on the bottom half of the mouth came out with ease, but the molars were lodged in between layers of gummy strips (soft and good to eat). Delving further in, my fingers clasped something warm and pointy: the tongue! I pulled it out with glee—nicely chewy with a sinewy grain, the tongue was a textural contrast to the softness of the meat.
Needless to say, I took my excavated skull home with me. The bones are as archaeological as I'll ever get in the culinary world, aside from being a nifty souvenir of a wildly extravagant and memorable meal.
The eye: Though I made sure to ask my fellow diners' permission, I had my heart set on eating the eyeball by myself. They graciously bowed out and watched as I dug my spoon into the socket of the eye. While I'd expected the eyeball to be gelatinous, its texture was really no different than that of the cheek: rich and silky. Buried in the middle of the eye was the lens, which I bit into by accident.
Finally, after I'd dispensed with all the attachments in the head, I pulled apart the jaws of the pig. We all watched as the tender meat fell from the bones.
Raspberry Ripple Float and Chocolate Stout Syllabub: The latter is a whipped cream concoction containing a generous dosage of the stout. With little Pop Rocks that tingled in the mouth, the Raspberry float was perfectly tart, with creamy dollops of ice cream on the bottom.
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20 Comments:
really bad slideshow engine (page refreshes on prev/next??) but it looks gangster. thanks robyn (although i'm sure you were paid back fully in pig parts that night)
avisualperson at 5:47PM on 10/18/09
Oaky, except for the bone marrow, I am officially somewhat grossed out. The eyeball thing, did me in.
And I only ate the bone marrow in small bites at the end of the steak when I was a kid.
Or the pork chop. I'm from Michigan, this shouldn't bother me. I know where food comes from and how it is slaughtered. But looking at the half pig face and the head of bone, got to me.
Sorry. I'm sure it was delicious.
Scoreboard44 at 7:22PM on 10/18/09
:o ....
that turned my cold, miserable morning into a warm, optimistic day, so
cheers for that!
yongo at 8:09PM on 10/18/09
Great pics Robyn, and nice writeup, Chichi. Wish I was there!
FYI - what you bit into was the lens. The pupil is just the hole in the middle of the iris. Can't really bite into it - it's like saying I just ate the pig's a**hole.
J. Kenji Lopez-Alt at 10:46PM on 10/18/09
I'm sure all this is great, but it's not really a slideshow if the page has to refresh every time. Just something that's been frustrating me in a few posts, SE.
amadaun at 12:43AM on 10/19/09
Egads that all looks killer-diller!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And I don't use exclamation points lightly. Robyn your pix are so good I was licking my monitor screen, then I realized it was just a photo of lamb neck.
Chichi, you're my kinda gal, you took the skull home. You should get some of those little beetles that the Museum of Natural history uses to clean the flesh off animal skeletons.
Joe DiStefano at 4:40AM on 10/19/09
Eating a pig's eyeball... uugghhhhhhhh.....!!! (But I must say you've got seriously large balls if you can eat something like THAT!)
Sameer at 5:46AM on 10/19/09
Does the pig's eyeball taste and have the same texture as fish eyeballs? I looove eating fish eyes since I was a kid. The texture is great.
Cassaendra at 7:28AM on 10/19/09
Great interactive thumbnail feature!
...for some reason I think the 'head' looks really apetizing!
hungrychristel at 9:47AM on 10/19/09
I am jealous beyond belief, ugh! I had the roasted marrow at Prune this spring, it was one of the most memorable meals of my life. That head looks decadent and wonderful, but I have to admit, the eye is all yours :)
I don't think of Fergus doing desserts (or at least desserts that don't have brains or spleen ;), both looked lovely.
Mandyhello at 9:52AM on 10/19/09
I am sad today, folks. I tried to clean the skull but had no idea what i was doing and now it is in the trash can, with the bones severely softened and meat still clinging to the eye socket.
Joe - maybe I will take your advice and get some of those beetles the next time I have a pig's skull :)
Chichi Wang at 10:38AM on 10/19/09
You should have made stock with it.
simon at 10:59AM on 10/19/09
wow-i'm so jealous-that's looked incredibly delicious, but the thumbnail nonsense was a little frustrating and took away some from my enjoyment.
gastronomeg at 11:09AM on 10/19/09
Thanks for the new screensaver!
browngravy at 12:01PM on 10/19/09
Thanks for the comments regarding the slideshow feature, all. We'll be making changes to the system shortly.
Carey Jones at 12:09PM on 10/19/09
Nice photos. Good to see some adventurous eaters out there. I wrote my own post about FergusStock at the Breslin at http://demianrepucci.com/2009/10/17/the-breslin-fergus-henderson/
Thanks!
Demian Repucci at 6:49PM on 10/21/09
The desserts were from The Breslin, not St. John.
sweetnyc at 8:53AM on 10/27/09
No thanks for the eyeball, but I'd love to try the head. It's all pork skin and fat what's not to love?! Lamb neck looks amazing too.
2 slices at 10:02AM on 11/06/09
I'm sure pig's eyes are edible, but why bother? I know I'm man enough, but I just don't see the point of testing our mettle by eating bugs, eyeballs, Fugu, or boars testicles just to prove that we can.
That said, April made us an awesome dish of cod sperm at John Dory, and we loved it.
mymymichl at 7:44PM on 11/08/09
Why bother with the pig's eyeballs? Because they are DELICIOUS. I just want to emphasize that - the meat in the socket was extremely tender and gelatinous, like a braised trotter. Soooo....that's WHY :)
I don't want to get into bugs and testicles right now, but I have very similar sentiments about those as well! More on that some other time!
Chichi Wang at 12:46PM on 11/09/09