Fruits Deguises

Christmas is approaching and I am remembering the sweets we had in France while growing up! Oodles of chocolate truffles, rochers with almonds, chocolates filled with liqueur and marzipan delicacies. My dad used to bring all these goodies home after his suppliers gave him Christmas presents of food and sweets. What a delight !! One year we even had duck "foie gras" from Perigord. Ah!! the holidays in France!! We eat well!

Now, the following is a home made recipe of dried fruit and marzipan that the whole family can make!

Ingredients:

2 8oz of marzipan

25 mini baking cups

prunes

dates

walnut halves

food coloring

Knead the marzipan and divide in 3 piles. Color each pile with a different food coloring for example pink for prunes, green for dates and yellow for walnuts.

Cut the dates and prunes in half and remove the pit. Stuff them with the colored marzipan.

Take 2 walnut halves and make a little ball of marzipan. Press the walnut halves on each side of the ball.

Place the "fruits deguises" in mini baking cups and save in a metal box for Christmas.

Makes 25 or more!!

Fall apples are delicious!

Fall is the full season for apples. I have been enjoying all the varieties fresh and now that the cooler days are in, I feel like making an apple tart. It is an appropriate dessert for a fall dinner and a perfect end to a Thanksgiving dinner too : light, not too sweet and delicious.

Tarte aux pommes

Pie dough is something between a cookie dough and a bread dough!! I like to use ingredients that are very cold (butter, water). If you do so, the flour will cook before the butter melts completely.
Pate brisee:

1 cup flour

6 Tbsp unsalted butter

1/8 tsp salt

4 Tbsp cold water

1/4 cup sugar to sprinkle on the fruit

3 Tbsp butter cut in small pieces and placed on the fruit

With a pastry blender mix flour, salt and cut up butter in a bowl. Gradually add water and mix with your hands until it forms a ball. Pieces of butter will show but that does not matter since you do not want to overwork the dough. On a floured board, roll the dough with a rolling pin and place in a buttered 10 inch tart pan. Refrigerate at this point.

Turn on the oven at 400 degrees Fahrenheit and peel about 4 Golden Delicious apples. Slice them and place them in circles in the tart shell. Sprinkle the sugar and butter cubes on the apples and bake for 50 minutes or until golden.

Sign up for a cooking class and find out the secret on how not to make the dough too tough and how to make a glaze with a professional look.

This should serve up to 8 persons.

This is almost the end of summer and produce abound in the garden : Peppers, zucchini, tomatoes. It is a good time to make a vegetable stew as they make it in the South of France using all the fresh vegetables that are plentiful right now. Ratatouille is a specialty from Nice but you can find it all over the French "Provence" region and the "Cote d'Azur". It spells summer and smells so good with the garlic and the olive oil from that region!

Ratatouille Nicoise

2 or 3 cloves of garlic minced

2 onions sliced

2 green or red peppers sliced

1 or 2 eggplants depending on the size cut in chunks

2 zucchini cut in chunks

1 lb of tomatoes

1 bouquet garni

1/2 c olive oil

Salt and pepper to taste

On medium heat put olive oil in a big pot and throw in garlic, onions and peppers. When limp put the other vegetables with tomatoes last and then the bouquet garni and salt and pepper. Cover and cook for an hour. If too much juice, uncover half way through. Mix while cooking on simmer.

Ratatouille is usually eaten warm or hot, in an omelette, with veal stew or pork chops and rice or stuffed in crepes. You can add a jalapeno pepper if you want more spice.

Serves 4 to 6 people depending if it is served as a main dish or a side dish.

Summer is for salads!!

When school is out, I am ready to cook and become more creative in the kitchen. Goodbye to the days of the school year when we rush home from work and cook whatever because we run out of time!! In the summer I also like to cook dishes from the warm regions of France like Provence or any place in the sunny South. It is time for a salade nicoise! There are a lot of variations on this recipe but as long as you have the olives, the tuna, the vegetables and the olive oil dressing you are good to go!! With good crispy French or Italian bread this is a full meal!

This recipe brings back a lot of memories of my childhood when my parents used to pack the car in July/August and drive to the Cote d'Azur to vacation on the French Riviera. Good times!!

This is a specialty of Nice but is served all over the South East coast of France. It is very healthy too!

Salade Nicoise

Ingredients:

1 head butter lettuce

2 boiled potatoes

1/2 lb cooked green beans

1 can well drained tuna

1/2 cucumber thinly sliced

2 peeled tomatoes cut in wedges

2 hard boiled eggs quartered

1 green pepper cut into strips

1 Walla Walla or red onion sliced

1 can flat anchovy fillets

10 nicoise black olives

Line an oval platter with lettuce leaves. Arrange potatoes in the middle. Arrange green beans around. Sprinkle the tuna over the potatoes. Put cucumbers slices around. Place tomato and egg quarters in a spoke fashion. Put slices of onions and strips of pepper here and there. Place the anchovy fillets in a star fashion or in a lattice fashion and place olives in-between. Pour vinaigrette over just before serving.

A vinaigrette with olive oil and balsamic or red wine vinegar is the best. Enjoy!

Serves 6 persons.

The local strawberries are coming!!

End of May -beginning of June around here, the local strawberries are coming!! We also have rhubarb so why not make a rhubarb/strawberry tart? It is a staple at our house and I hope you enjoy it.

Tarte aux fraises a la rhubarbe.

Pastry (recipe follows)

Creme patissiere (recipe follows)

1lb rhubarb cut up about 4 cups

1 1/2 cup sugar

1/4 cup lemon juice

2 pints strawberries hulled

Pastry:

1/2 cup unsalted butter

6 Tbsp ground almonds

1/4 cup sugar

1/4 tsp salt

1/8 tsp almond extract

1 cup all purpose flour

Beat butter in a mixer until white and fluffy. Add the ground almonds, sugar and salt. Continue beating. Stir in almond extract. Work flour into mixture with wooden spoon until dough is soft and smooth. Refrigerate wrapped in waxed paper for 30 minutes.

Heat oven to 350 F. Roll dough between two sheets of waxed paper into 10 inch circle. Fold pastry into quarters. Ease and unfold pastry into a 9 inch tart pan with a removable bottom. Press pastry against the sides and bottom of the pan. Refrigerate 30 minutes. Bake 20 minutes or until golden. Cool completely on a wire rack.

Creme patissiere:

Makes 1 1/3 cup

3 egg yolks

1/2 cup sugar

2 Tbsp flour

1/4 tsp salt

1 cup milk scalded

1/8 tsp vanilla

Beat egg yolks and sugar in medium size saucepan until mixture is thick and forms ribbons. Stir flour and salt into eggs. Stir in hot scalded milk. Heat the mixture to boiling stirring constantly. Boil for 2 minutes. Take off the heat and whisk until cool for 2 or 3 minutes. Stir in vanilla. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate.

Make the pastry first then the creme patissiere.

Combine rhubarb, sugar and lemon juice in a medium saucepan. Heat to boiling covered. Reduce the heat to low and simmer uncovered until rhubarb is tender about 20 minutes. Drain and reserve the rhubarb juice. Pass rhubarb through the food mill using fine blade.

Mash 1/3 cup strawberries in a medium saucepan. Stir in reserved rhubarb juice. Heat the mixture to boiling. Reduce heat to medium and simmer uncovered until reduced to 2/3 cup. Strain and reserve.

When pastry is cooled fill it with cooled creme patissiere. Spread with pureed rhubarb. Arrange whole strawberries on top of the tart. Brush the strawberries with strawberry-rhubarb mixture for glaze.

Refrigerate for 30 minutes.

Makes 8 to 10 servings.

Flaugnarde or clafoutis?

Flaugnarde ou clafoutis?

We are in the middle of Spring and my mouth is watering for a clafoutis!! Well the cherries are not here for another couple months!! Yes, a clafoutis is made with cherries.

In the Limousin region, where Mamy Gisele is from, we call that dessert a Flaugnarde or Flauniarde and it is more creative because in that region, they use all kinds of fruit so, basically you can make it year round!! Youpie!! I can now satisfy my craving and make that dessert with apples or pears or berries (will have to wait another month for those!!) My favorite is actually apricot so I will have to wait for summer. In the meantime I will make one with apples. There are lots of apples at a good price at the market right now.

It is very simple to make at the last minute. It is just like a crepe batter.

Ingredients for 6 persons:

4 large eggs

2/3 C sugar

2/3 C flour

1 C milk

4 Tbsp melted butter

a pinch of salt

1 tsp of vanilla extract

1 lb of apples or pears or cherries pitted or fresh berries or apricots

Beat the eggs vigorously. The more you beat them the more the batter will puff up when cooking. Add sugar and salt. Sift the flour over the egg mixture. Mix well. The batter should be smooth. Add the melted butter and the milk.

Butter a ceramic or glass pie dish. Slice the apples or pears or apricots or pit the cherries. Make sure berries are dry if washed. Place the chosen fruit at the bottom of the dish.

Pour the batter over the fruit and bake in a medium hot oven at 400 degree Fahrenheit for 45 minutes. The dessert will puff up on the side.

Before serving sprinkle with powdered sugar.

Eat warm or lukewarm.

Vinaigrette Mamy Gisele

Vinaigrette Mamy Gisele

Spring is here and in the garden, salads are growing still, through the March showers, hail and sun. Salads of all kinds can be composed. Mesclun, tomatoes, radichio, endives... no matter what kind of salads you are making you need to have a good homemade dressing. Forget those expensive, fattening, sugary store-bought dressings. You can make a tasteful homemade dressing at a fraction of the cost in the store. Here is my mom's standard recipe.

Ingredients :

1 Tbsp Grey Poupon mustard

salt and pepper

1 clove of minced garlic

1/4 cup red wine vinegar or any other flavored vinegar

3/4 cup oil, peanut and olive oil are good

Mix that dressing in a bowl in the order given. Pour over or mix with salad at the last minute so the dressing does not burn the greens. You can add a chopped hard boiled egg, parmesan, or anchovies for a different flavor. This will make enough dressing for a salad for 8 persons.

February: the month of Crepes

Ah! February!! Winter is slipping by and we are getting closer to Spring. In France, we do not celebrate Groundhog Day on February 2nd, but we celebrate La Chandeleur or Candlemas which is a midwinter festival of lights. That day, we are making Crepes. Also when you flip the crepe in the pan with one hand and you have a coin in the other hand, you will get rich for the rest of the year, if the crepe flips back into the pan. If the crepe does not flip back into the pan, you might have financial woes!!

In February, there is also the more famous celebration of Carnaval, with Mardi Gras in the middle of the month. Though a lot of people eat Beignets on that day, many also make Crepes. This is the time where we traditionally empty all the cupboards of eggs and fats so it is a perfect day to make Crepes.

Crepes are very versatile. You can be real international by using them as egg roll or pancakes for Mushu pork for an Asian flair, as a tortilla for Mexican flavor, or as a canelloni for an elegant Italian dinner. Crepes can be made as entrees, stuffed, with a sauce over them, or for desserts with a fruit or jam filling with a cream sauce over them or also plain with sugar and flambeed with liqueur.

They must always be paper thin, like lace on the outer edges!

Crepes

4 eggs

2 cups flour

2 1/2 cups milk

3 Tbsp melted butter

1/2 tsp salt

1 Tbsp sugar

2 tsp vanilla extract (those last 2 ingredients are used for dessert crepes only)

With an electric mixer, mix eggs with milk, melted butter and salt. Add flour slowly to avoid lumps. If there are lumps strain the batter. If using the dessert recipe, add sugar and vanilla when mixing the eggs. The batter can sit one hour on the counter. It will thicken a bit and be smoother.

A small non-stick pan is perfect for the job. This recipe makes 16 normal size crepes.

This is what my mom Gisele used to do: bandage a stick with a cotton cloth to oil your pan! ( I have used brushes but they get burnt with the heat so the above works better!!) Dip that bandaged stick in some oil or margarine or melted butter and run it all over the pan. A little will go a long way! Use medium high heat, pour a scoop of batter and swirl it around until it coats the pan thinly. Start with half a scoop at first and then see if more needs to be added. After a while, you will know how much to use in the pan you have. Cook on the stove until bubbles form and the edges become slightly brown. Run a spatula around the edges to detach the sides of the crepe. Flip over and cook the other side of the crepe for a shorter time, 1 minute at the most. The crepe is ready when the center is soft and the edges are crispy.

Stack on a plate and keep warm in a 150 degrees Fahrenheit oven, covered with foil.

Ideas for entrees crepes:

Stuffed entrees crepes with a sauce over can be made a day ahead. They will keep better because the filling and the sauce will prevent them from drying out. Try Chicken a la King, or ham topped with a Mornay sauce, broccoli or spinach or sauteed mushrooms with a Mornay Sauce. Also sausages or ground meats in a tomato sauce or even with ratatouille.

Ideas for dessert crepes:

The French are famous for Crepes Suzette, which are crepes in an orange sauce (with the juice and zest of 2 oranges) flambeed in Cointreau or Grand-Marnier. In Normandy, the crepes are stuffed with sliced cooked apples and flambeed in Calvados (Apple Jack). They can also be filled with strawberries and whipped cream on top. My favorite is filled with orange marmalade and sprinkled with Grand-Marnier. You can flambe crepes with dark rum, brandy or Cognac, Cointreau or Grand-Marnier. Try them filled with pastry cream too!! Ooohh! Delicieux!!!