Coquilles St. Jacques is a French classic which I used to make with some regularity, but had not recently. I spotted a recipe in Saveur magazine which included mushrooms as well as scallops, and since Carol is quite fond of sautéed mushrooms, I thought it would be a nice welcome back dinner after her visit Read More …
Back in February, the Wall St. Journal published a “Slow Food Fast” recipe about making a variation of salad nicoise suitable for the winter, since it used only pantry ingredients and broccoli, which is readily available in the winter. I thought this was a good idea since it was a salad based on a vegetable Read More …
This is the version of baguettes that I have been making the most often lately. The starter was from breadtopia.com and I followed their Almost No Knead Baguette recipe except that I substituted 250 g.of the sourdough starter for the poolish in the original recipe. (The sourdough starter has 100% hydration, i.e. equal weights of Read More …
This was adapted from Mimi Thorisson’s new book, French Country Cooking: Meals and Moments from a Village in the Vineyards. The main change I made was cooking the pork sous-vide at 140 degrees rather than panfrying it. I also forgot to soak the prunes before making the sauce, so I cooked them longer Read More …
I was in a Middle Eastern grocery last week and saw that they had rabbit in the freezer case. That inspired me to make this French classic. This version is adapted from Marie-Pierre Moine’s excellent book Cuisine Grand-Mere: Traditional French Home Cooking. As indicated by the title of the book, this is not Read More …
Aioli is essentially a garlic mayonnaise made with olive oil. I needed some for dressing for a grilled corn salad, and turned to Serious Eats for a recipe. The two key steps are to use an immersion blender (or food processor) to make an initial emulsion with a neutral oil, and then to whisk in Read More …
This simplified version of a classic cake from Brittany originated in Jeffrey Alford and Naomi Duguid’s book Home Baking: The Artful Mix of Flour and Tradition Around the World, as further refined by Food and Wine magazine, and then as I further adapted it. I made it the first time per the recipe with Read More …
In the book Julie and Julia, author Julie Powell sets out to cook her way through Mastering the Art of French Cooking. In the movie based on the book, I think that one of the first dishes she tries is chicken breasts in cream, which is indeed a very tasty dish. I made this Read More …
On my latest trip to Houston I decided to watch a Craftsy class, The Art of Caramel, and when I returned home, I wanted to make something from it, so I chose a classic, crème caramel (or flan). This version turned out well, although I did use a few pans and bowls making it. Read More …
This classic appetizer is a French take on a Greek way of fixing mushrooms. This recipe is adapted from Craig Claiborne’s Gourmet Diet, which was published in 1980 after Craig Claiborne, then the food editor of the New York Times, was advised that his blood pressure was way too high and he needed to do Read More …