Back To The Present Future

I had friends over a Sunday evening or two ago. It was a split meal deal where I made stuff and they made stuff and we did indeed have a lovely time.  I hardly ever entertain, but this was fun and I will attend accordingly to my lack of it.

I am a fan of the Roux Brothers' cookbook,  The New Classic Cusine.  Important to the development of the Nouvelle Cuisine movement The Roux Brothers  (one of the the most apt surnoms a French chef could be born with) were amongst its early champions, if not inventors. I lost my original copy of the cookbook to misfortune but I still remember the recipe for an artichoke heart with poached egg, smoked salmon and hollandaise sauce. I found a recipe of a similar kind by son, Albert Roux, who runs Le Gavroche, their London establishment, and decided to adapt it.  Mine ended up looking like a sloppy hamburger as you can see from Tony's picture, but after a couple of bottles of Prosecco and such, and many visitors along the course of that afternoon, what would you expect?  I did trim and poach the artichoke, whipped up a sauce rosemarie and added chopped dill and gravadlax which formed a bed for the soft poached egg. On top of that you can see the home cured salmon topped with a little mustardy mayonnaise I had left from the rosemarie sauce and then there is that ornamental sprig of dill. It fell apart on the plate, and in my mouth, and for that I am thankful. More about that dinner soon.