Sunday, December 11, 2011

Cut Night at Casa Diaz

I've been dying to visit Wolfgang Puck's Cut, ever since my friend Elisa told me about her incredible dinner there. But I'm deterred every time I think about how expensive it is. My friends and I recently started a new food club, and one of our new members is an actual chef trained in France. We hit the jackpot! For our first food club theme, we unanimously picked the menu at Cut.


Jonathan picked up four large slabs of 28-day, dry-aged rib eye steaks from Harvey's Guss Meat in L.A., the same meat purveyor for Cut. Total: $170.

Jonathan's wife, Nina, is from Switzerland, and she made us some delicious mulled wine with red wine, sugar, and vodka.


Eggs poached using the Curtis Stone method.


This was my dish: roasted asparagus, poached eggs, bacon, with a bacon vinaigrette.


Fire up the grill!
Look at the beautiful gill marks. The steaks were finished in the oven at 400 degrees for about 10-12 minutes.



Beautifully cooked.


The majority of us wanted rare, while a couple others preferred medium rare.


Nina's amazing potato gratin with rosemary. There were no leftovers.


Peggy's green beans with almonds, tarragon, and loads of buttery goodness


Look at the spread.


Everything was amazing, including Kimie's creamed spinach.


Esther's Nutella Semifreddo, inspired by Giada De Laurentiis' recipe.


I can't believe we found room for dessert, but I'm so glad we did. Worth every single calorie.

We each pitched in $25 for the steaks, which probably won't even cover the valet parking at Cut. Good deal, great food, even better company.