My most favorite favorite food from as far back as I can remember is Bearnaise sauce (yes, a sauce is a food, especially when eaten by the *ahem* spoonful). I don't even remember when I first had it, but I do very clearly remember eating so much of it one night when I was six that I actually made myself sick (ok, side story: we never went out to eat as kids, but our family had this weird thing where my parents would take one kid out to a nice dinner as a reward for not biting our fingernails.  I never bit my fingernails, ever.  I think I picked at them, but never bit them. But still, for some reason I got to go to some nice restaurant anyway when I was six, and I remember clearly having steak with Bearnaise sauce.  And parsley.  I loved the parsley on the plate more than the steak, I think).  I would eat Bearnaise on anything.  My French grandmother probably made it for me first, but I think my father made it after that.  He probably used a package of Knorr mix, for all I know, but it didn't matter -- I loved loved LOVED the stuff.

These days I make my own Bearnaise, but it's a rarity because of the amount of butter involved. Still, occasionally, something just screams for it -- like Beef Wellington, my second most favorite favorite food ever.  (Third in line is sauteed mushrooms, followed by Cassoulet - which, ironically, is cooking downstairs right this very moment).  And nothing could be simpler to prepare when camping than my deconstructed version of Beef Wellington with Horseradish Bearnaise.  Honest.

Since we often camp in places where campfires are illegal, and since I don't tend to carry a Girl Scout box oven around with me, we generally avoid things that must be baked.  So in order to enjoy beef Wellington when we're outdoors, I figured out a way to turn the "Wellington" part into a biscuit of sorts.  A true beef Wellington usually has duxelles (a mixture of sauteed mushrooms and shallots), prosciutto or sometimes pate, and occasionally a coating of mustard on the beef filet.  I've taken all these things and turned them into a pie or biscuit you can create at home, leaving only the grilling of the filet for the campsite -- which is super easy to do and only takes a few minutes.  Just reheat the Bearnaise, reheat the biscuits, and grill the filets...that's it.  Super easy, practically no clean up involved, and so much better than the hot dogs or foil packets that your camping neighbor is probably having...

On the menu tonight: Beef Wellington with horseradish Bearnaise; parmesan butternut squash puree; tarragon mustard roasted Brussels sprouts.

This view from my cooking rock, though not what most would find spectacular, was particularly wonderful because of what you CAN'T see...other people, mostly.  We had an entire inlet and bay all to ourselves, and our nearest camping neighbors were an entire island away.  This was a very pleasant surprise, since when we put in at the beach that morning, we were surrounded by dozens of other kayakers and canoers...including an entire Boy Scout troop and their whole adult entourage.  What a huge relief to find that 99% of the entire population staying on the lake that night chose to go east; two of us chose to go west. 

On the menu tonight was one of my favorite things ever -- Beef Wellington.  You can't really do it justice over a backpacking stove, so instead I chose to deconstruct it at home, and then reconstruct it (to a point) on the plate at our campsite.  Recipes will follow in the coming week, but this spin on Beef Wellington might (MIGHT) even make Gordon Ramsay, the king of Beef Wellington, proud -- or at least not make him drop ten F-bombs over the sight of my rustic camping version.  The squash puree and roasted Brussels sprouts are regulars on our fall camping menus; both are always reliable, they travel well, and they're easy to pair with just about anything.  Recipe links will be live this week.

Black Friday means nothing in this house, since most years we're not only nowhere near a mall, but also nowhere near electricity or running water. 

For the past several years, we've spent Thanksgiving at the camp I run (ran? Yes, I'm retiring, but no, I haven't announced it yet, so if you're a camp person...well, I guess now you know). We don't go just to play -- we go to burn. I don't know what it's like in other areas, but in CA we are super aware of the threat of wildfire. All. The. Time.

We spend the summer and early fall creating huge burn piles of dead wood and excess fuel that has accumulated on the forest floor, and then when it snows, we head back up to burn it.  Burning is not a one-day undertaking, though; aside from the fact that we have to snowshoe just to get into camp, the lack of water and electricity makes the entire experience a bit more difficult than in most other places conducting similar fuel reduction programs.

So if we're going to go to the trouble of getting permission to park (there's no road into this place, either -- and getting permission to park about 1/3 mile away isn't as easy as it sounds), packing up all four kids and the dog, along with all our sleeping gear, securing rental snowshoes (coincidentally from REI, since we only own two sets), we may as well throw in some gourmet food for our efforts.  In the next few weeks, I'll share last year's Black Friday feast, in time for your own outdoor Thanksgiving.

This year, REI is jumping on OUR bandwagon and they've started the Opt Outside campaign.  REI WILL BE CLOSED BLACK FRIDAY, halleluia.  If you visit their website, you can join them and create your own Opt Outside photo, too.

And hey, if you want to Opt Outside and help us burn, just let me know...

This was the main dish on our recent beach picnic. At first I was worried about doing duck because in the past I've managed to seriously screw it up -- probably one of the easiest gourmet foods to cook, yet I somehow turned it into what I can only describe as smelly squishy leather. Not kidding.

But now I know where I screwed up -- a good duck breast needs to be cooked over medium LOW heat, so that all the fat is rendered beautifully, not burned off.  The other key is to just trust yourself -- when the recipe below says "cook for 10 minutes without peeking," it means "cook for 10 minutes without peeking." Trust that everything is working out just fine under there, and when your 10 minutes is up (yes, use a timer), flip it over.  If it looks a little underdone, you can always carefully spoon the rendered fat up and over the top of the breast to keep it cooking a bit longer, but don't flip it back over. 

When it's done, take it off and let it rest before slicing.  This recipe is perfect for those of us who are impatient -- the time it takes to cook the potatoes and the sauce is just the right amount of time the duck needs to rest.  Don't skip ahead in the recipe -- follow it in order, and instead of trying to save time by slicing the duck while you wait for the potatoes to cook, do something else...have a glass of wine, clean up your previous course, etc.  When we cook outdoors, I try to plan my meals so that while something is cooking (something that doesn't need my immediately and constant attention, like these potatoes), we can be eating a different course.  If you use my beach picnic menu, start cooking the duck when you start eating your soup...that way, the multi-tasker inside you will be thrilled that you're eating, the duck is resting, and the potatoes are cooking, all at the same time.

I found some amazing maitake and chanterelle mushrooms while shopping for duck, so I added them to the pan right after cooking the potatoes and sauteed them briefly.