Our Holiday Gift: The Barnes & Conti 21st Annual Virtual Feast

About the Virtual Feast

Our year-end newsletter traditionally comes with a “virtual feast” of recipes from our staff. The feast was inspired by our annual December potluck lunch, a long-standing Barnes & Conti tradition. The virtual feast is so popular, that we continue making the virtual feast the centerpiece of our holiday newsletter.

As our expression of gratitude to you—our readers, clients, friends, and associates—we hope you will try at least a few of these and will enjoy them.

We had a smaller virtual feast in our Thanksgiving Newsletter, and in case you missed that, we’ve included links to many of those recipes too.

Kim Barnes, Barnes & Conti CEO shared this classic salad recipe.

Kim Barnes, Barnes & Conti CEO

Here is classic from the collection of Kim Barnes. Even though it appeared in a Virtual Feast many years ago, this recipe is still very much in Kim’s repertoire. It is seasonal, festive, and delicious!

Ingredients:

• 2 ripe Bartlett pears
• 1/4 cup olive oil
• 3 tbsp. balsamic vinegar
• Kosher salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
• 8 oz. Gorgonzola cheese at room temperature, cut into 4 pieces
• 2 bunches of watercress, washed, dried and stems trimmed
• 16 walnut halves, coarsely chopped

Method:

1. Cut the pears in half and remove the core and stem with a melon baller.
2. Cut off a thin slice of the round part of each pear half so it will sit flat on the plate. Set aside.
3. Whisk the olive oil into the vinegar. Season with salt and freshly cracked black pepper to taste.
4. Place a pear half in the center of each salad plate. Lean the cheese slices up against the pears. Drizzle 2 tablespoons of the vinaigrette on top of the four pears. Toss the watercress with the remaining vinaigrette and mound on top of the pears. Sprinkle with the walnut pieces, and season with salt and freshly cracked black pepper to taste.

Bertha Maslow’s Cabbage Borscht

Kim Barnes, Barnes & Conti CEO

What a coincidence that Kim Barnes, founder of Barnes & Conti, a leadership development firm, would have a cousin who worked for Abraham Maslow’s wife. As you may recall from your introductory psych courses, Maslow was the father of modern management who developed a way to look at human motivation that has prevailed for years.

Says Kim, "“When my cousin, Simone, first moved to the Bay Area with her husband, she found a job cataloging the papers of famed psychologist Abraham Maslow, who had recently died. His wife, Bertha (who unfortunately, was to die that same year) hired her and as they worked together over the next few months, she gave Simone (who herself was an artist and a chef) some of her favorite recipes, including this one for cabbage borscht. I was delighted to learn about this, since I always liked this quote from Maslow about his mother-in-law, who was an excellent cook: “A first-rate soup is better than a second-rate painting."

Ingredients:

• 3-4 beef shanks*
• 1 medium cabbage, shredded
• 1 large onion, whole
• 1 large onion, chopped
• Sour Salt to taste
• 2 large cans of tomatoes
• 1 small can of tomato paste
• Sugar to taste
• Salt and pepper to taste
• Sour cream (garnish)

Method:

1. Boil shanks in 6-quart pot filled halfway with water, plus salt, pepper, sugar, sour salt, and large onion which will be thrown away later
2. Cover and simmer until meat is tender. Take meat out and cool. When meat is cool, remove from bones and put back into stock.
3. Shred cabbage and add cabbage and onion to pot.
4. Add tomatoes and tomato paste.
5. At this point, taste soup for right combination of sweet and sour taste as you like it.
6. Let the soup simmer for hours…the more the better, or even overnight (I would use a slow cooker for that). Or…
7. Do it in two steps. Day before serving, do the first step. Before adding cabbage and tomatoes, cool and refrigerate. When the fat is solidified, remove it and cut away just the lean part of the meat and put it back into the bouillon. Several hours before serving, reheat the bouillon and then add cabbage and tomatoes and adjust the balance of the sweet and sour taste.
8. Garnish with sour cream when serving.

*Note: If you can't get beef shanks, you can substitute 3-4 lbs. or so of beef short ribs, or 2-3 lbs. of beef stew meat or boneless chuck. Of course, if you are using boneless beef, you won't need to cut it off the bones! But your broth might not be as rich tasting...

Mustard and Red Wine Marinated Chicken (aka “Chicken Beaujolais”)

Joel Kleinbaum, IT Guy and Newsletter Editor

Here is a reprint from our first ever Virtual Feast in 2001! Joel Kleinbaum, our tech person and amateur home chef, developed this recipe. Joel says this recipe reminds him of family and friends; he first concocted it while cooking for a crowd a few days before his wife's sister's wedding. Joel learned the technique of rubbing mustard into meats from his grandmother. Joel says that 20 years later, he still makes this, but has a distinct preference for bone-in chicken thighs. Also, it's nice to add a pressed clove of garlic or two to the marinade.

Ingredients

• 2-3 lbs chicken parts (breasts, thighs, legs, not boneless)
• 2 medium onions, sliced
• 2 carrots, peeled and sliced
• 5-6 tbsp Dijon mustard
• Light red wine, such as Beaujolais
• 3 tbsp fresh thyme, chopped

Method

1. Lightly salt and pepper the chicken pieces on both sides. Make a marinade with the Dijon mustard and red wine, use just enough wine to thin the mustard into a marinade. The marinade should coat the chicken, not soak it--it's more mustard than wine. Marinate the chicken pieces for an hour, turning once.
2. Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Lay the sliced onion and carrot on the bottom of the roasting pan. Sprinkle the chicken pieces with the thyme, and lay skin side up, on the bed of onions and carrots. Bake for about 15-20 minutes at 450 degrees, until the skin begins to brown. Baste as needed with leftover marinade or pan juices.
3. When the skin begins to brown, turn the oven down to 350 degrees and bake another 15-20 minutes. Prick the thigh or leg with a fork near the bone; when the juices run clear without any pink or red, the chicken is done.

Note: You can roast a whole chicken by stuffing the chicken loosely with more sliced onion and carrot and a few sprigs of thyme--rubbing the marinade all over the outside of the chicken, sprinkling the outside with chopped thyme, and roasting for 75 - 90 minutes (depending on your oven and the chicken) at 350 degrees.

A Decadent Sauce

If you must have a sauce, Joel says you can make a very decadent one by taking the pan juices from the chicken, skimming of the fat, adding 3/4 cup or so of red wine (or white wine, if you don't want a pink-purple sauce) reducing it 2/3, adding 1/2 cup (or more, if you dare) creme fraiche or heavy cream, and heating until the sauce thickens slightly.

Serves 4-6

Sweet Potato Pie

Elaine Turcotte, Operations Manager

This recipe was adapted by Elaine from Norma’s Black-Bottom Sweet Potato Pie by Patti La Belle. Pre-Covid, Elaine prepared this recipe one weekend and shared the leftovers with us on Monday at our Berkeley Office. It was absolutely delicious! The black bottom is achieved by caramelizing a layer of brown sugar on the bottom crust before you add the filling.

Ingredients

• Pie crust for a double crusted pie
• 3 large yams, scrubbed
• 1 stick butter, melted
• 3/4 cup packed light brown sugar
• ½ cup granulated sugar
• 2 large eggs, beaten
• ¼ cup half-and-half cream
• ¾ tsp cinnamon
• ¼ tsp nutmeg

Method

1. On a lightly floured surface, roll out dough into a 13-inch circle about 1/8-inch thick. Fold dough in half.
2. Unfold dough to fit a 9-inch pan with a one-inch overhang. Fold the dough under itself so its edge is flush with the pan’s edge. Trim remaining dough and flute the dough over the edge. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate while making the filling.
3. Bring a pot of lightly salted water to a boil. Add potatoes and boil for about 30 minutes until soft.
4. Drain and run under cold water until cool enough to handle to peel.
5. Mash with electric mixer until very smooth and measure out 3 cups.
6. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
7. Uncover the pie shell and brush the interior with some of the melted butter. Sprinkle 1/4 cup of the brown sugar over the bottom of the pie shell. Bake until the pie dough is set and just beginning to brown, about 15 minutes. If the pie shell puffs, do not prick it.
8. Meanwhile, using an electric mixer on low speed, mix the mashed sweet potatoes, the remaining melted butter, 1/2 cup brown sugar, granulated sugar, eggs, half-and-half, cinnamon, and nutmeg.
9. Spread into the partially baked pie shell, smoothing the top.
10. Reduce the oven temperature to 350 degrees F. Bake until a knife inserted in the center of the filling comes out clean, about 1 1/2 hours. Cool completely on a wire cake rack. Cover and refrigerate until ready to serve.

Chocolate Pecan Pie

Lauren Powers, SVP, Business Development

Lauren says, “This is a great compromise for those who want chocolate and those who want pecan pie at the holidays. The recipe was one of my mother’s finds. It’s always a hit and very easy!”

Ingredients:

• 9 inch pie shell
• 4 eggs, slightly beaten
• 1 3/4 cups sugar
• 1 cup pecans, chopped
• 2 and 1/2 squares semi-sweet chocolate
• 3 tbsp salted butter

Method:

1. Bake pie shell in 375 degree preheated oven for 25-30 minutes.
2. Melt chocolate and butter.
3. Mix ingredients together.
4. Pour into baked pie shell.
5. Bake 40-50 minutes until firm. Refrigerate.
6. Serve with ice cream or whipped cream.