Saturday Night Mole Sides

For side dishes with the Blackberry Mole, Mr. Zen kept it fairly simple. He served grilled baby hearts of romaine and corn on the cob.

While the mole sauce was simmering, he started making the dressing for the baby romaine hearts. He started out with a sardine and some of the juice from the container. He then added olive oil, garlic salt, black pepper, Worcestershire sauce, parsley flakes, balsamic vinegar, pinot grigio balsamic vinegar, capers, and lemon juice, and mashed it all together in a bowl.

At first it tasted too lemony, so he added more salt and diluted the mixture by taking some of the liquid out with a spoon.

He then cut each head of baby romaine in half.

Then he drizzled some olive oil over them and sprinkled on some truffle salt before putting them to the side to wait to be grilled.

Mr.Zen then showed me how to husk corn, which I'd never done before. He first pulled one strip of the husk down under the running tap water, and rinsed off as much of the fibers as possible. Then he pulled down the rest of the pieces of the husk, still rinsing off all of the fibers. There's only so many to get off, and after that he showed me how to pull the husk down in the opposite direction of the cob and twist it off all at once. After doing that, we each held a thick pad of butter with a paper towel and rubbed it all over each piece of corn.

We put the corn in a casserole dish and ground salt and pepper over the corn pieces.

Then he started melting butter in a small saucepan on the stove and chopped cilantro to add to it.

While the chicken breasts, romaine hearts, and corn were on the grill, he kept the mole and cilantro butter sauce warm on a stove beside it.

When the corn was ready, he poured the cilantro butter sauce over the pieces and then I transfered them to their individual dishes. When the romaine was done, I poured the dressing down the center of each heart. It all led to a beautiful table and a delicious meal!