Summary

Top food stylist and food writer Jennifer McLagan has a bone to pick: too often, people opt for boneless chicken breasts, fish fillets, and cutlets, when good cooks know that anything cooked on the bone has more flavor -- from chicken or spareribs to a rib roast or a whole fish. In Bones, Jennifer offers a collection of recipes for cooking beef, veal, pork, lamb, poultry, fish, and game on their bones. Chicken, steak, and fish all taste better when cooked on the bone, but we've sacrificed flavor for speed and convenience, forgetting how bones can enhance the taste, texture, and presentation of good food -- think of rack of lamb, T-bone steak, chicken noodle soup, and baked ham. In her simple, bare-bones style, Jennifer teaches home cooks the secrets to cooking with bones. Each chapter of Bones includes stocks, soups, ribs, legs, and extremities (except for whole fish -- they don't have any). Many of the recipes are simple, with the inherent flavors of the bones doing most of the work. There are traditional, elegant dishes, such as Roasted Marrow Bones with Parsley Salad, Olive-Crusted Lamb Racks, and Crown Roast of Pork, as well as new takes on homestyle favorites, such as Maple Tomato Glazed Ribs, Coconut Chicken Curry, and Halibut Steaks with Orange Cream Sauce. Stunning, full-color photographs of dishes like Rabbit in Saffron Sauce with Spring Vegetables; Grilled Quail with Sage Butter; and Duck Legs with Cumin, Turnips, and Green Olives are sure to inspire. In addition to the recipes, Bones includes a wealth of information on a wide range of bone-related topics, including the differences among cuts of meat, as well as the history and lore of bones.

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Excerpts

Bones
Recipes, History, and Lore

Guinea Hen with Raspberries

Serves 4

The guinea hen is a West African relative of the chicken and partridge, originally from Guinea. It has a gamey taste and can dry out easily because it has little fat. Cooking the bird in a covered pot and adding fat solves that problem, and raspberries match its stronger flavor. The raspberries inside the bird will tint the bird's juices red: don't let this fool you into thinking that it needs more cooking.

Ingredients:

1 guinea hen, about 3 pounds (1.35 kg)
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
2 cups (250 g) raspberries
2 tablespoons (30 g) unsalted butter, softened
3 thyme sprigs
½ cup (125 ml) port
1 tablespoon raspberry jam or jelly
1 tablespoon red wine vinegar

Instructions:

Preheat the oven to 425°F (220°C). Pat the bird dry and season it inside and out with salt and pepper. Set ½ cup (62 g) of the raspberries aside and place the rest inside the hen. Truss it, then smear the skin with the softened butter.

Place the hen and the thyme in a Dutch oven or flameproof casserole. Pour in 1 cup (250 ml) water, cover, and place in the oven. Cook for 1 to 1 ¼ hours or until the thigh juices run clear when pierced with a skewer or an instant-read thermometer inserted into the thigh reads 165°F (73°C). Transfer the hen to a platter, breast down, and cover loosely with aluminum foil.

Skim off the fat from the cooking juices and bring to a boil over medium-high heat. Add the port, raspberry jam or jelly, and vinegar and bring back to a boil, then boil for 3 to 5 minutes, until reduced to 1/3 cup (75 ml). Add any juices from the resting hen and check the seasoning. Strain the sauce through a sieve into a sauceboat and add the remaining raspberries.

Remove the trussing string, from the guinea hen. Carve and serve with the sauce.

Barley Marrow Pudding

Serves 6

This recipe is based on a medieval recipe recorded by Dorothy Hartley in her book Food in England. It is really a rice pudding made with barley, because at the time the recipe was written, that was the readily available grain. The barley is cooked in milk, Then enriched with bone marrow. The dish is highly nutritious, and according to Chinese medicine, the combination of barley and bone marrow is an excellent tonic for the body. If you need a pick-me-up, this is the dish for you.

The marrow must be soaked ahead of time in salted water, changed frequently to remove any traces of blood. It must be also very cold so you can finely dice it.

Ingredients:

4 cups (1 L) milk
1 cup (200 g) pearl barley, rinsed well
½ cup (100 g) sugar
½ cup (70 g) currants
Pinch of kosher salt
3 tablespoons (30 g) finely diced bone marrow
Finely grated zest of 1 lemon
1 teaspoon vanilla extract (essence)

Instructions:

Pour the milk into a medium saucepan and add the barley, sugar, currants, and salt. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat. Lower the heat, cover, and simmer very gently, stirring from time to time, for 15 minutes.

Uncover the saucepan and continue to simmer very gently for another 15 minutes, or until the barley is just tender.

Remove the pan from the heat and stir in the marrow, lemon zest, and vanilla. Cover the pan and let it stand until barley has completely absorbed the milk. Serve warm or cold.

Excerpted from Bones: Recipes, History, and Lore by Jennifer McLagan
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