Tête de Moine with Sauerkraut and Toasted Caraway Seed Vinaigrette

Before I get started, have you seen the new feature in the right-hand column? Scroll down for a sec and check out "What Else Did I Eat This Week?" which I created in response to regular emails asking how I used leftover ingredients from these dishes, as well as requests for me to share other cooking ideas. I'm keeping this blog focused on one thing -- cooking my way through The French Laundry Cookbook. But, I thought it might be fun to show you different ways I incorporate some of the elements in these dishes into my everyday eating. Plus, you'll get countless opportunities to bust my chops for the inevitable, recurring appearance of Pad Thai and coffee on the list. Everyone needs a vice. Or two.

We now return you to your regularly scheduled programming... the Tête de Moine with Sauerkraut and Toasted Caraway Seed Vinaigrette. I hate to say it but from the outset, this dish had three strikes against it.

Strike 1 -- Rye bread croutons. I hate rye bread and have detested it from the moment I first tasted it in third grade. Even the smell of it gives me the dry heaves. I may be exaggerating a wee bit (who, me?) but you get the gist.

Strike 2 -- Caraway seeds. Remember the Poli-Grip commercial from the 70s where they show how their denture adhesive is so strong that a little seed can't even get between your gums and your dentures? The seed they used in their demo was a caraway seed, and ever since then I've associated caraway seeds with toothless elderly people.

Strike 3 -- Cheese and sauerkraut. Bleargh. Sauerkraut is something you eat on New Year's Day, and you have it with pork chops and mashed potatoes to bring good luck in the new year. I can't imagine this is a tradition limited to my family or our PA Dutch culture. The rest of you did this too, right? Anyway. Cheese and sauerkraut? Am I wrong to have a visceral reaction to this? THANK you.

This dish took nearly a week to make; the sauerkraut is a five-day process. It all started with half a head of cabbage:


I cut the cabbage into somewhat of a chiffonade and put it in a bowl. In a saucepan, I brought to a boil some champagne vinegar, white wine, salt and sugar. After it came to a boil, I turned off the burner and let the liquid come to room temperature. The first night I did this, I ran across the street to visit my neighbors for a little while, and when I came back in the house, I was assaulted with the smell of feet. I took the shoes that had accumulated under the coffee table and threw them onto the front porch, and still the smell would not go away. I took all the dog's blankets off his bed and put them in the laundry. I ran all over the house trying to figure out what had gotten trapped and died behind a wall somewhere. And then, I walked into the kitchen and saw the liquid in the saucepan... still a little bit warm, but almost room temperature. I'm glad it wasn't a dead animal, and I'm glad I didn't have to throw away all my shoes, but I'm sure you can imagine how excited I was to be prepping something that for the next five days would smell like a 7th grader's gym locker.

Once the liquid came to room temp, I poured it over the cabbage in a bowl:


I covered it with foil and refrigerated it for 24 hours. The next night, I drained the cabbage, rinsed it with cold water, put it back in the bowl, made the vinegar/wine mixture again and soaked the cabbage in it for another 24 hours. After the 5th day of repeating this process, I drained and rinsed it and put it in a baking dish.


I covered the baking dish with foil and put it in a 275-degree oven for 2 hours. When it was done, I let it cool to room temperature and put it in a container to store in the fridge for another day until the cheese arrived at my cheese shop.


Let's talk about the cheese for a minute. Tête de Moine translates as "monk's head." When I picked up the Tête de Moine, it was much smaller than I'd imagined. I had the fleeting idea that I might take the shuttle to New York and have a friend who also happens to be the only monk I know hold the cheese up next to his head to compare, but I opted not to.

To cut the cheese (HA! Clearly, I am nine), The French Laundry Cookbook recommends using a Girolle:


I opted not to buy one and went with the book's alternate suggestion of cutting the Tête de Moine into triangles. Except, I didn't really do that, either, now that I think about it. I'm getting off track here. You'll see how I cut the cheese (sorry, again, nine here) at the end of the post.

Where were we? Oh yes, the sauerkraut is done and the cheese is here. The last thing I had to do was make the caraway vinaigrette. I chopped half an onion and simmered it in water for ten minutes to soften it. When it was done cooking, I drained it and put the onion into my blender. I added sherry vinegar, dry mustard, salt, sugar and white wine vinegar. I puréed the mixture for about a minute, then slowly poured in some olive oil. I then added toasted caraway seeds and blended the vinaigrette until the seeds had been sufficiently ground. I strained the dressing into a small bowl and got ready to plate. I ignored the book's directions to serve this with a rye bread crouton. No can do. I made croutons out of a baguette instead.

To plate, I put a small spoonful of vinaigrette in the center of the plate. I put the crouton on top of that, some sauerkraut to the side, and a small wedge of cheese on the other side:


I will confess that all week my neighbors jokingly asked, "Hey, when are we having that nasty-sounding dish?" and I sort of had to agree. The thought of it was not as appetizing as prospect as some of the other dishes in this book. But I was willing to give it a taste. My tasters claimed to like it, and they finished everything on their plates, but I didn't love it. First, the croutons got a bit chewy because it's so freakin' hot and humid here this weekend. I should've quadruple-ziploc'd them. The sauerkraut was too acidic for my taste. I loved the cheese, and I didn't hate the dressing. I didn't save the leftover dressing, and I'll be delivering the leftover sauerkraut to my neighbor who claims he has a whole mess of hot dogs he wants to eat tomorrow. As for the cheese? That's staying here. It was really delicious and will make a nice afternoon snack all week long.

I wouldn't make this dish again. It wasn't completely sucky... it just isn't something I'll remember fondly.

Up Next: Roulade of Pekin Duck Breast with Creamed Sweet White Corn and Morel Mushroom Sauce

Resources:
Cabbage and onion from Whole Foods
Tête de Moine and baguette from Arrowine
Bogle Sauvignon Blanc
Caraway seeds from TPSS Co-op
Vinegars, mustard, seasonings from my pantry

Music to Cook By: Art of Noise; (Who's Afraid of?) The Art of Noise. I used to looooove these guys back in 1984-85 and haven't thought about them much since then. For some reason this week, I remembered the title of one of their songs: "Paranoimia" and then remembered the little girl from the "Close (to the Edit)" video. Since then, I've been on an Art of Noise downloading frenzy. Because I made you sit through a post about cheese and sauerkraut, let me leave you on a positive note -- chainsaws and pianos! La, la, la indeed!