Battle Fig

I love watching Iron Chef.  A few years ago I decided that it would be fun to do my own, at home version of Iron Chef.  I don't actually compete against anyone and I certainly don't finish in 1 hour.  But I do make an entire meal using a secret ingredient that my mom picks out.  Yesterday was Battle Fig.  We got fresh black and brown mission figs, really nice dried figs, plain fig spread and chocolate-fig spread. With this, I made a four course dinner using figs in every course.

I realize that this doesn't technically qualify as baking and, as such, shouldn't be on my blog.  But that's the great think about it being my blog, I can put this on it if I want to.  Anyway, I figure it is still cooking, which is pretty close.

First Course: Arugula, Parmesan and Fresh Black Fig Salad with a Fig Balsamic Vinaigrette. 

For this I just sprinkled small chunks of fresh parm over arugula and put a quartered fig on top.  I made the vinaigrette by whisking together some of the plain fig spread, dijon mustard, balsamic vinegar and good extra virgin olive oil.  It was a very nice salad.

Second Course:  Steak with a Fig and Red Wine Reduction Sauce and Fig Mashed Potatoes.

First I soaked halved brown figs in a nice pinot noir (because that's what we had).  Then I took out two of the nicer looking halves to grill later.  I lightly mashed up the remaining halves with a fork and put them (with the wine) in a sauce pan over a medium heat.  After it came to a boil I let it simmer for a minute or two.  Then I took out the figs, added some cornstarch and let the wine boil down until it thickened a little.  Meanwhile I had the steak cooking on a le creuset grill pan.  I made a baked potato and peeled it.  I scraped the pulp out of the mashed up figs and mashed it up with the potato.  I used an ice cream scoop to serve neat mounds of the fig-potato mash.  Strained the red wine reduction (to get rid of the fig seeds) and I served it on the steak, which was cooked and had very nice grill marks by that point.  Then I quickly grilled the two fig halves cut side down and put one next to the steak. YUM!

The third and fourth courses were more dessert-y so I will post them in a separate (and more relevant to my blog) entry later today.