Fall is one of my favorite times to create desserts and one of the best fall combinations (in my opinion) is dark chocolate and cranberry. I love the way the richness of the chocolate works with the tart cranberries.
For The Dining Room at Woodlands Inn, I created a dish that centers around these flavors. I [Read More]
At Woodlands we try to use local product when it’s at its best. Most often, we try to get local fish. In the picture is a 34lb wahoo fish caught off the coast of Wadamalaw Island in Charleston, SC. We’ve also had swordfish from there as well. This fish was not only a monster in size [Read More]
Here at Woodlands we have monthly wine dinners on the third Tuesday of every month, except December when we have two champagne dinners. The wine dinners are a great event where we get to taste wines a month or so before down in the wine cellar of Woodlands with Stephane Peltier our Sommelier. During the tasting [Read More]
I often face the challenge of wanting to put comfort desserts on the Woodlands menu while keeping the dishes new and unique to Woodlands Inn. I think about how to manipulate a traditional dessert to make it more modern. We made brownies one day for the staff and it got me thinking about how to create a brownie sundae [Read More]
The Fall Beet Salad
Months ago I did a post on beet salad during the summer. Well now it is fall coming into winter. Sometimes in kitchens you like a dish so much you don’t want to remove it from the menu but revise the dish so it better fits the season or state of mind. It’s getting colder [Read More]
This is a technique that I learned from Michel Richard of Citronelle in Washington DC. It is an interesting way to “hide” components of a dessert. Michel Richard is know for his Christmas Snowmen which also utilize this technique. These meringues can be tricky, but are totally worth the effort.
Start by making a french meringue; [Read More]
Right now, I am working on a new dessert menu for the fall and thought that it would be interesting to blog my process of creating a dish.
The dish pictured is from last fall and I am going to use it as an example for my explanation.
There are many different things I think about when creating a dish. I believe that [Read More]
Dry aged beef is a prized jewel in most restaurants and, if done right, is the most rewarding in flavor. First, it is important to note that wet aged beef (beef left in crypo-vac-sealed plastic is only tender but does not have the flavor of the dry aged beef) isn’t really the way to go. Dry aged [Read More]
For the beginning of the fall season, we have decided to prepare a Chinese 5-Spice Pot d Creme with Ginger Poached Pears.
This combination is amazing. The crisp, clean flavors of the pears work so well with the spice of the pot d creme. The pears were actually hand-picked by our Assistant General Manager, Brent Gresham, [Read More]
We are always looking for ways to make the experience at Woodlands Inn more enjoyable for our guests. We have been talking about including truffles in our service, but had not yet found a way to make it feasible.
One day while I was watching Giada De Laurentiis, (yes, I watch The Food Network) I saw that she was making balsamic [Read More]
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