Epoch Times reporter Nadia Ghattas recently returned from a tour of the resorts and brought back a beautifully-designed cookbook with a local epicurean focus. In my experience, the best recipes use what’s available locally and Chef Barnes makes good use of northern harvests of sea and land. “"All ingredients are fresh and come from the ranch. We use indigenous meat and we produce our own meat. We have on the ranch about 400 buffalo and elk, fresh salmon and halibut.”
Appetizers whet the appetite using tuna, salmon, duck, pheasant, and escargot as the main ingredient. In the soup section, the lobster and squash chowder is an enticing alternative to New England fish chowder and the salmon chowder recipe adds leeks and fennel to standard salmon chowders of the U.S. Northeast.
But the fish and meat main dishes set Simple Treasures apart. Trout, Sablefish, Halibut, salmon, scallops and mussels are combined with autumnal vegetables in enticing combinations. Then, one won’t find wild game recipes anywhere like these. Elk, Buffalo, Venison feature prominently in hash, ragout, fricassee and—a new one for me—osso buco, an Italian dish using cooked-until-tender venison, beef, veal or pork shank with the marrow bone.
The blueberry mustard sounds interesting, is recommended for game meat and “is great on a sandwich although a rather startling purple color.”
Among the desserts, a unique offering are the two bumbleberry recipes for pie and jam—bumbleberry being, I assume, a combination of several berry fruits. The pie features raspberries, blueberries, blackberries, and strawberries. The jam requires blackberries, sour cherries, cranberries, strawberries, blueberries, raspberries and rhubarb. “We have lots of berries in the summer where we even make fresh rose jams to accompany the gamy meats,” Chef Barnes said.
And what would a cookbook be without a really good chocolate dessert. Chef Barnes serves up a few with Chocolatissimo the one for chocoholics.
Photographs take up an entire page of the larger-than-normal layout and appear more like artistic conceptions than common fare. But they tempt one’s salivary glands just the same. The recipes themselves are explained in a straightforward manner.
The only problem is that one may need a hunter in the family to snag a deer or elk in-season to enjoy some of the tempting entrees. All in all, Simple Treasures is a nice introduction to Canadian delicacies in any season.
For more information on Emerald Lake Lodge, Deer Lodge and Buffalo Mountain Lodge, visit crmr.com.
Chocolatissimo
CAKE
5oz dark chocolate
5oz butter
3½oz sugar
2 egg yolks
3 eggs
2tbsp strong espresso coffee
CHOCOLATE FILLING
9½oz semisweet chocolate
7½oz cereal cream
14oz whipping cream
1tsp gelatin
CAKE ICING
5oz semisweet chocolate, chopped
5oz whipping cream
1oz sugar
Melt chocolate and butter together over double boiler. Whisk eggs, yolks and sugar until light and fluffy. Fold chocolate and eggs together with espresso. Pour evenly into 2 prepared cake tins and bake at 325°F/160°C for 20 min. Cakes will fall when removed from oven. Allow to cool.
Heat cereal cream to tepid and dissolve gelatin in cream. Add cereal cream to chocolate and melt over double boiler. Allow chocolate mix to cool below room temperature until almost starting to set. Whisk whipping cream until it starts to thicken, fold into chocolate. Divide chocolate into two and pour one onto cake base in a spring form pan.
Add another base onto filling then pour second filling and top with remaining base to create 2 layers of chocolate. Allow cake to cool.
Bring cream and sugar to a boil. Pour over chopped chocolate and stir until smooth. Place in fridge and stir frequently until cool to touch. Pour slowly over cooled cake and place in fridge until it sets.
