“Life should be lived with a smile on your face
and no one does a better job
of putting one on my face than you.”
Happy Birthday!

• 

Shortly after our Thanksgiving dinner together, I asked my son what his plans were for his upcoming birthday. He planned to spend his birthday with his girlfriend and wanted to spend the following day with me to celebrate.

In a normal year, I would take my son out for a birthday dinner at his favorite restaurant. Unfortunately, most of the restaurants have closed due to the pandemic. I offered to cook and bake whatever his heart desired.

He had never had Beef Wellington nor my famous family recipe of noodle kugel.  He also wanted me to make his favorite dessert I make, Chocolate Mousse. So, with that request, having never made Beef Wellington before, I had time to learn how to make this classic traditional English comfort food.

I spent hours watching YouTube videos of dozens of chefs from around the World share their techniques for Beef Wellington. Taking notes and making a long list of ingredients required, I spent one day just shopping at a half a dozen stores for all the ingredients for my son’s special birthday dinner.

The recipe I ended up using was Gordon Ramsay’s, which seemed to be the most popular among Michelin star chefs. The few changes I made to Ramsay’s recipe is, refrigerating the prepared beef tenderloin a day before rolling it up in the puff pastry. I also cooked it almost 40 minutes because the tenderloin I had bought was 2.5 pounds and required more time in the oven.

Here are some photos from my son’s birthday celebration:

Shine On