Blueberries and Almond Bundt Cake made by our daugther for my husband's birthday

We celebrated my husband's belated birthday yesterday evening. Following our family tradition, he got to pick his "Menu" and he opted for Empanadas. De Carne. Obviously.
We had not made empanadas for a while and since our daughter does not eat meat these days, I improvised a vegetarian version replacing the meat in the original recipe with spinach and ricotta and omitting the olives. That way, everybody was really happy about the main dish. However, the best part was our daughter's Bundt Cake with blueberries and almonds. She got the recipe from one her friends' and adapted the icing because she had never made a cream cheese-based icing before and did not want to try it on this cake.

For a few weeks now, she has been taking baking classes as an afterschool activity offered at their school on Fridays. She has been enjoying learning new tricks and recipes but, much to my husband's dismay, there is never enough leftovers from him to taste when he gets home. As a present for his birthday, she therefore offered him 4 weekends of baking whereby she would bake at least once during the weekend for him for 4 weeks. Useless to say that he was really excited but made sure that the Bundt Cake was not Week 1!
We'll update the blog with her recipes - and, if I have time and make something really fun and special, I'll post the recipes as well. It's not that I have not been cooking from scratch most nights these days, it's just that I have not made anything really different. That said, as I am looking for new ideas for the daily cooking, I'll find new recipes in the different cookbooks we have around the apartment. Bon Appétit.

Link to the original recipe is here: 
https://beyondfrosting.com/2018/04/04/blueberry-almond-bundt-cake/

Our daughter's Lemon and Chocolate Chips Cake - Made in France

We are back! The year went by very fast... and yes, we did cook a lot, mostly vegerarian every night as our children decided to give up meat. But, as my husband would say, nothing really interesting, worth putting on this blog!! No comment!

Now that our children are in France for most of the Summer, our daugher is using her stay as an opportunity to bake, watch baking competition shows and eat pastries from top pastry chefs whenever she can! Below is her message and the recipe she used for her new lemon cake.

Hello eveyone! Today my mom is not making this cake, I juste arrived in France for the summer (yes, jetlaged), and have decided to put my hands in baking again. During the school year I don't really have the time, but as soon as go to France, I take my opportunities. Today, there was a soccer game, I am not a fan of soccer, but I do watch the World Cup and mostly when France plays. Today my grandfather asked me to bake, and I was up to do my first baking in France. I decided to make a lemon cake. This is one does not use butter and milk, because the oil replaces it. This is a very easy and simple cake to make everywhere with anyone. My mom had made a lemon poppyseed cake, very good too (but mine is better, still love you mom) but my grandmother didn't have  poppy seeds , so I decided just to make it with lemon. Juste before putting the dough in the pan, I thought that the cake needed something else. I thought why not put small chocolat pieces, just enough that that there are some in each piece of cake. I then after the cake was baked I added a lemon icing to give it even more taste!! Bon appetit


Ingredients (for 8 people)

• 94 g flour

• 170 g sugar

• 10 g baking powder 

• 1 pinch of salt

• 3 eggs

• 7.5 cl neutral oil (canola)

• 1 lemon (zest + juice)

• Shredded chocolate - to taste

• Preheat oven to 360 F (180C)

• Mix in the dry ingredients and add the beaten eggs and oil. Mix well.

• Add the lemon zest

• Add 1/2 of the lemon juice, including pulp and mix well until smooth. Add the chocolate shreds.

• Butter your mold and pour the batter

• Bake for about 25 minutes

• For the icing, please see the Lavender Cake recipe here.

Comments

From my grand-father: you need to add a tablespoon of rhum in the batter

My comment: you don't have to put too much chocolate

Our Daughter's Cake à la lavande - Lavender Pound Cake

Hello and happy summer! For once, this recipe is not my mom's!  Since I am really into baking these days,  I figured out that, since I am in France (yes vacation! for 2 1/2 months - too much right?),  I should use this time to bake. The weather in Normandy (one of the places I'm staying over the summer) has been sunny and really hot ;  and then rain, rain, rain!

With my grand-parents, my brother and some of my cousins,  we went to a Gospel concert organized in the village's church. After the concert, we had a "collation" for the artists. We helped out to make something for them, and it had to be a dessert. Good for me, I was up for it! My grandmother told me I should make a chocolate cake, but I thought it was too ordinary. I thought that maybe I could make a lavender cake. Since there is fresh lavender (and no chemicals on them!) in my grandmother's garden (yes lavender in Normandy!), I did not have to purchase any. 

It was a success - they all loved it! So I even made it again for a "goûter" (afternoon snack) and it got  eaten quickly! Hope you love it too! Bon Appétit!

For one pound cake

• 200g flour plus some of the mold
• 8g baking powder
• 2 ts organic lavender buds and some for decorating
• 100g butter + some of the mold
• 200g sugar
• 3 egs
• 125ml whole milk

For the lemon icing:

• 150 g powder sugar
• 10 g water (more or less depending on consistency). .
• 1 organic lemon

• Infuse lavender in milk (I generally do it while we eat or a few hours before baking the cake; the milk should really taste like lavender)
• Preheat oven to 360 F
• Soften butter in microwave oven - it has to be soft but not melted
• Mix sugar and butter together until white and double in volume.
• Add the eggs, one at a time
• Mix the flour and baking powder and add them to the sugar mixture
• Pour the milk (with lavender buds) and mix well with a spatula (my mom calls it the indispensable tool (outil indispensable) in a kitchens)
• Butter + flour the mold
• Pour the mixture in it and bake 40 -45 min
• Unmold the cake and let it cook on a rack 
• While it cools down, prepare the icing

• The icing has to be liquid enough to drip on the sides of the cake but solid enough to create an opaque layer.
• In a pot, mix water and powdered sugar
• Add a few drops of lemon and half of the lemon zest
• Pour on the cake when the cake is cool and decorate with lavender sprigs

Personal Comments

• You could use smaller individual molds - just adjust cooking time to 15 -20 min
• Make sure to use organic lavender as you don't want to eat pesticides!
• I use butter + flour even on a silicon mold
• The cake tastes better cold but you could eat it warm as well

Pissaladière

It's Summer again! Well, technically,  we are still a few weeks away from Summer but as I have come to realize "Summer time" is a very cultural theme.  For French people, l'été really means July and August - the time of year when everyone gets some time off. June is when everyone starts to think about their Summer vacations ; this is why I really like going to France in June. Days are really long, Parisians are starting to slow down, eating outside ,and easing into their Summer days....
In the U.S., Summer officially starts at the end of May with Memorial Day weekend and finishes early September with Labor Day. This is when plane tickets prices soar; this is when everyone starts barbecuing or, if in Philadelphia, talking about their weekend at the Jersey Shore....

So, it's Summer again in the U.S. and time to entertain outside. Since we only live in a two-bedroom apartment in Philadelphia, we can not entertain a lot during the cold months of Fall/Winter/early Spring.We are fortunate, though, to have a large roof top in our apartment building, which we use as an extra room everytime it's hot enough to sit outside.  This varies a lot -  we experienced a very hot Winter, which made it possible to eat outside in February! Most generally, we really start opening up the terrasse at the end of April. This spare open space with full view of the Benjamin Bridge enables us to host a few parties during the warm days of Summer in Philadelphia...

Since apéritif is one of my favorite meals, we tend to organize large "apéros" on our roof top. This makes it easy to organize and host: no back-and-forth with the kitchen downstairs : the food is already out. Everybody can help themselves with what they like (or want to try).... It's just a nice way to chill out and enjoy the company of friends.

Among all the things we make are the usual suspects : Guacamole, Hummus, white beans and fennel dip, salsa and chips, nuts, cake aux olives et au jambon, charcuterie and cheese, etc.  This year, I made a few variations of pissaladières. Pissaladières are from the South of France and traditionally involve caramelized onions, black olives, anchovies on bread dough. Since I know few people  who like anchovies, I tend not to make them with anchovies, especially when a lot of children are coming over. This year, I had extra feta cheese so I added feta instead of anchovies since we were having more than 12 kids over with their parents. I don't bother making my own dough anymore (my sourdough starter died a while ago) so I just purchase pizza dough at the local supermarket.
Really easy to make - and as usual, something you can improvise around to adapt to the palate of your guests. It's also very easy to bring Pissaladières to a Summer pique-nique or your next BBQ since it's officially in season!
Bon Appétit!

Ingrédients

• A ball of pizza dough
• Onions (more than you think you need - I use 3 large ones for one Pissaladière)
• Herbes de Provence
• Anchovies, black olives, feta cheese

• Pre-heat oven to 400F
• Lay out the dogue in a square pan
• Cook the onions in olive oil until translucide but not caramelized (although you could caramelize them)
• Add herbes de Provence, salt, pepper to taste
• Lay the onions on the dough
• Add Anchovies/black olives, etc.
• Bake in the oven for 25 minutes

Crottins de Chavignol Chauds en Salade - Hot Baked Goat Cheese with Greens

One of our daughter's favorite dishes is hot baked Crottins de Chavignol served on a piece of toast along a plain salade verte. Crottins are small round-shape goat hard cheese. The most famous ones come from Chavignol - a small village near Sancerre in the Loire Valley. 
France (and Europe) being very strict as to protecting regional products and savoir-faire,  the crottins can only be called Crottins de Chavignol is they are actually coming from the Chavignol area.  They are protected by what we call an Appellation d'origine contrôlée (AOC) which is a French certification granted to certain French geographical indications for wines, cheeses, butters, and other agricultural products that come from certain terroirs. Other areas in France produce crottins  de chèvre - they are just not labeled "de  Chavignol". 
We grew up eating crottins de chèvre chauds either as an appetizer or a lunch/dinner entree  They are an easy-to-choose-easy-to-make affordable dish that pleases most cheese lovers. For those of you who have traveled to France, they are generally on many casual restaurants, served on a slice of toasted Pain Poilâne (or any other pain de campagne if pain Poilâne is not available.)
Unfortunately, this is one of the dishes I hardly make in the US. Much to my family's regret. Reason? Price of the crottins. In France, you could purchase crottins de chèvre for less than 1 euro each (2 euros if you want them organic or de Chavignol), while in the US, I find them at at least $5/piece for locally-made cheese. What is an affordable entree in France become luxury across the Atlantic! 
We therefore serve them on special occasions only (or when they go on sale, which is to say... rarely.) 
As a result, whenever we go to France, our daughter makes sure to eat a lot of them, always volunteering to help prepare them whenever she can! I think that if we were not living in an apartment building in the center of Philadelphia, she would try to get a goat to make her own crottins! If you have access to crottins where you live, please try to make this salad. You would not be disappointed! Bon Appétit!

Ingredients
- 1 (or half) a crottin per person
- 1 (or half) of wholewheat bread
- Olive oil
- Salt & pepper
- Thyme/Rosemary (optional)

• Put the crottin on a slice of bread with rosemary/thyme on top
• Pour some olive oil on the crottin and the bread
• Bake in the oven under the High Grill for 5 minutes (or more depending on the power of your oven; you want the crottins to start melting but the bread should not be burnt)

Tarte au thon de l'été

Don't ask me what I did these past few months.... I did cook a lot but never managed to bring it to this blog. My apologies! Fortunately, Summer being in full swing, we all have a little bit more time to cook and experiment.
My nephew from Marseille came to spend the month of July with us in Philadephia to attend a ballet camp. Since our children were in France for their Summer-long vacances and that my husband joined them, C. and I ended up spending most of July together. Apparently, he was worried that spending time with his gluten-free vegan aunt, he was going to eat "des graines" everyday! My worry was that because of him spending time in the US, he would fall victim to the double-frappuccinos, supersized French fries and other double-cheeseburgers!!! At the end, it was a balance of easy-to-eat French and US food. We had vegan and beef hamburgers, blue corn tortilla chips (a lot!) and haricots verts (beaucoup), salade verte and Sweet Potatoes Fries....
One evening, C. suggested to make this Tarte au thon that my sister-in-law and many of my friends cook in France this time of year. We used the Marmiton recipe (for those of you who want the French version) and C. found it very tasty. I will definitively make it again for our family when they are all back from France. Until then, I would encourage you to try it! Served with a salade verte, it makes the easiest Summer dinner.
Bon Appétit!

Ingredients:
 - 1 pie dough (in France, people tend to use the puff pastry one; since I don't always have some handy, I generally make a pâte brisée)
- 2 cans of tuna (in water, no salt added)
- 2 small tomatoes
- 3 tablespoons Dijon mustard
- 2 eggs
- 20 cl light cream
- 3 tablespoons milk
- Add salt and pepper to taste
- Swiss cheese (optional)

• Pre-heat the oven to 400F
• Lay the dough in a deep pie dish.
• Spread the mustard
• Spread the tuna
• Slice the tomatoes and lay on top of the tuna
• In a bowl, beat the eggs and add the creme fraiche and milk
• Add salt and pepper to taste
• Pour the batter onto the tomatoes and tuna
• Add the cheese if using some
• Cook in the oven for 40 minutes

Gluten-Free Chocolate Cake

A few months ago, I was in San Francisco and a friend of mine introduced me to a great local artisan chocolatier and we got to talk "excellence in Chocolate in the US and France" while visiting his atelier...  It was really fascinating to hear him talk about his passion for chocolate and innovation in chocolate-making... I do believe in "innovation" in companies; some of our Executive Education clients are actually coming to Wharton to get their executives to be more innovative.....  Obviously, it was even more mouth-watering to talk about innovation in... chocolate making! The very interesting thing he told me is that when he wants to bounce ideas, he calls up a French artisan chocolatier (excellent as well, trust me!!) and the two of them talk shop! From a business standpoint, this is really exciting to see two competitors helping eachother come up with another great product. It's a win-win situation: they both have something to win in coming up with new products because it will help their profession against the industrially-made chocolates that are out there and stealing some of their market share....
I could not leave the atelier without purchasing some chocolate bars to take home to Philadelphia to share with my husband and our children. This started a discussion among us as we tend not to agree on what defines "un excellent chocolat"...  Like everything else in food, it does take time and experience to be able to distinguish and appreciate differences in chocolates... I am no expert... but do know that I'd rather not eat chocolate than a mediocre one... A real treat? A really nice piece of dark chocolate with an espresso after lunch (once all the dishes is done so that I can really enjoy my coffee!)...

Despite all that I just wrote,  when it comes to baking with chocolate, I generally use the  IKEA dark chocolate bars.  IKEA chocolate??? Yes, I know that it is definitively not the best chocolate out there but it is good enough to bake a cake for a Sunday afternoon tea-break! This is my price/quality hat taking over....

Here is a recipe I got a few years ago. This recipe is a great recipe, and not just for people who avoid gluten.... The best thing? It's even the next day.. so very practical when I don't have time to bake something on Sunday morning...  Verdict of the Chocolate-cake eaters in our family? They all love it! Would it taste better with a more-upscale chocolate? I am not sure. Will have to try! Bon Appétit!

Ingredients:

• 275 gr (9.7 oz) dark chocolate
• 5 medium eggs separated
• 175g (6.1 oz) sugar
• 140g (4.9 oz) almond flour (ground almonds)
• 1 TBs of rhum or orange liqueur (optional)

• Preheat ovent to 170C (340F)
• Roughly chop about 50g of the chocolate and reserve
• Melt the remaining chocolate in the microwave or in a double-boiler
• Whisk the egg whites until they form soft peaks. Gradually whisk in half of the sugar, a tablespoon at a time until incorporated - you have a soft meringue.
• Beat the egg yolks together with the remaining sugar until pale and doubled in volume.
• Carefully fold in the meringue mixture into the egg yolk mixture. 
• Gently fold in the chocolate
• Fold in the rest of the meringue
• Fold in the almond flour and the chopped chocolate.
• Add the rhum/liqueur.
• Fold into a round mold and bake in the oven for 30mns. After 30mns, turn the oven off and leave the cake for another 15mns. 

Cranberry - Orange - Ginger Relish

French people don't celebrate Thanksgiving and very few actually know that Americans get together with their family on that special Thursday in November to eat a Thanksgiving feast made of Turkey, squash and cranberries. This is not to say that French people don't eat turkey. I grew up eating roasted turkey (in a wood-oven mind you!) for Christmas lunch or New Year's lunch at my grand-mother's house when we would all get together with my relatives (about 20 of us). She would wake up really early to start her wooden stove and have the turkey ready by lunch time around 1pm. She would stuff the very local (I remember picking it up at the farm!!) bird with with shallots, oinions and chestnuts (no bread!)... and to this day, this is the best stuffing I have ever eaten (just maybe so because I love chestnuts in savory recipes...)
Although there were about 20 of us, the turkeys were much much smaller than the ones I have seen in local supermarkets around Philadelphia. No way she could have cooked such a big bird in her wood oven and have it ready by 1pm! When my parents come to visit and see the size of turkeys we all wonder how my grand-mother could have cooked such birds in her oven...

Turkey was served with additional chestnuts, cooked apples and maybe green beans... but definitively no cranberry sauce. French people don't know cranberries. Well, let me be more precise, the only French people I know who know what cranberries are (canneberges in French) are the ones who use it to prevent/fight UTI or the ones who traveled to the US/UK and got exposed to fresh/canned cranberries.....
I personally like cranberries but hardly ever cook them except in a pound cake/muffins where I mix them with apples and other Fall spices.  The other recipe I discovered last year through a friend of mine and have been enjoying (alone - no one else except my mom would eat it at home)... is this orange-cranberry relish.  I like it because I cut the sugar amount in half and let it "cook" overnight in its juice. I eat it as dessert or with some roasted winter squash and .... chestnuts.  I have seen this (or very similar) recipe in cooking magazines this year so maybe some of you just had it with your turkey a few days ago! If not, make it with leftovers/discounted fresh cranberries you can find around you these days. It's really worth it... and a most welcome change from the canned cranberry sauce I have tasted in the past! Bon Appetit!

Ingredients
Makes 8-10 servings

• 1 orange, unpeeled and preferably organic, scrubbed
• 2 bags ( 12 oz each) fresh cranberries
• 1-1/2 cups sugar  (300 gr) ( I use anywhere between 1/3 to 2/3 of that depending on how sweet I want it)
• 1/3 cup (2 oz) peeled and finely chopped fresh ginger

• Cut the orange ( with the peel on) into 16 chunks and discard any seeds.  Working in batches, combine the orange chunks, cranberries, sugar and ginger in a food processor.  Pulse to chop finely and evenly, stopping once or twice with each batch to scrape down the sides of the bowl.
• Transfer to a storage container, cover and refrigerate for at least 24 hours to develop the flavors. 
• Bring to room temperature and stir well before serving.
• Can prepare up to 3 days in advance.

Cold Celery-Cucumber Soup

I just came back from two (too short) weeks of vacation in France where we spent time with relatives and friends in rural Normandie, Lozère (that's in the middle of nowhere France) and the French Alps (near Annecy - a city worth visiting both in the Summer and Winter!) Needless to say that we had a great time....

It was really hot (unusually hot for the season), which made us eat a lot of salades composées, generally made up with fresh vegetables from the potager. Spending time with friends who are lucky motivated enough grow their own vegetables in their potager (think fresh lettuce, peas,  tomatoes, fresh French beans, fava beans, zucchinis, eggplants, etc....) reminded me of my grand-mother's silly cucumbers & zucchinis!What I loved about gardening with my grand-mother in the Summer was to watch the vegetables grow and trick us into growing too fast for us to harvest and eat (hence a lot of canning!) My grand-mother got really upset when one zucchini/cucumber would escape her thorough gardening and hide from her to become so big that we could only puree them into a soup...

If you are feeling overwhelmed with cucumbers this summer, here is a quick recipe. I make this soupe froide a lot either with celery or with fennel. The recipe below is vegan (and my husband did say "hmm c'est super bon!!) but you could definitively use cream or yogurt instead of silk tofu and raw cashew nuts. Bon appétit!

Ingredients
- 2 small or 1 large cucumber (skin off but with seeds unless too bitter)
- 1 small celery stalks & leaves
- 1 small red hot pepper (optional)
- 1/4 cup of raw cashew nuts
- About 1/2 lb of silk tofu (250g)
- 2 Tbs of olive oil
- salt, pepper

• In a blender, put the silk tofu
• Add cucumber and celery (cut into small pieces)
• Add cashew nuts, hot pepper, salt and olive oil
• Blend until really smooth
• Add salt and pepper to taste
• Serve cold

My Personal Comments

• In total I have about 7 cups (1750 ml) of ingredients in the blender (loosely packed)
• The trick is to blend the soup longer than you would want at high speed so that it becomes really smooth.
• I would add about a cup (250gr) of plain yogurt instead of the silk tofu.
• If using fennel, two small bulbs would do the work.

La salade composée verte....

May already went by, pff... And June also (re  pfff). I just can't really remember why it went by so fast.. but May brought our first CSA produces: fresh rhubarb, fresh asparagus, fresh French beans, fresh garlic, fresh lettuces etc.  Petit plaisir du dimanche... Nothing better than fresh local produces... Even though I have to be more creative when it comes to serving the same vegetables weeks after weeks... I feel fortunate to be able to have access to and be able to afford such produces. That said, I don't purchase ALL the fruits & vegetables we eat from the local Farmers' market. For once, it would require me to spend even more time in the kitchen to find good recipes to cook with the vegetables -I-could-only-find-at-the-market-that-Sunday. Then, I am not sure that my family would approve of eating within the limitation of this supply (Kale is definively not their favorite food.... yet!)... but more importantly, our already-high-food budget would explode...  So we compromise or, rather, mix-and-match.  When mix-and-matching, I use Farmers' market produces for dishes where they are served with minimum transformation and supermarket produces for the rest. For instance, if I am only serving a zucchinis compotée, I will use the Farmer's market zucchinis. If I am making a ratatouille, I will use the local supermarket ones. I am sure there is a difference. Maybe I would be able to tell it. Would it really matter? No. Will we enjoy the dish as much? Yes.

The only time when I don't compromise is when fruits or veggies (generally from the supermarket, including high-end ones like Wholefoods) have no flavor. I'd rather not buy these produces and fall back on something else, even if it means serving it twice the same week, than purchasing des fruits et légumes sans goût. Fruits AND veggies are meant to be flavorful. The flavor might be subtle (zucchinis for instance) or fragrant (raspberries)... but they have to taste flavorful! Unfortunately, for the sake of supply chain, supermarkets have been pushing for growers to forgo flavorful varieties (heirloom varieties, anyone?) to the benefits of varieties that can travel miles (some of which have been genetically modified to do so...). And unfortunately, some of these travel-resistent varieties do not taste as good (Canadian tomatoes exported to Philadelphia in February? Really??) It's a shame but not matter how many fresh produces I want to include in our family diet, I will try to avoid purchasing those as much as I can.  I want my children to know to appreciate fresh good produces and develop a taste for them.  I don't believe that they are too young to do so; they are already there when it comes to certain fruits (pears and strawberries especially)... so even if Kale is definitively not their favorite vegetable (yet!), I'll keep serving different varieties to them so that maybe, just maybe, one tastes better to them than another. I know what I will get at the Farmer's market this week-end....

One of the salade composées I have been making with our CSA produces is what I call my "salade composée verte" (as opposed to a salade verte, which in French, means plain lettuce). My sister-in-law made one for us last year when we were in Singapore to visit. Since then I have been serving it many times, and as usual, playing with the ingredients that are available to me when I make it. The key is to have a good balance between bitter-sweet and crunchy....It will work with whatever you get at the Farmer's market this week-end or at your local supermarket. No worries! Bon Appétit!

Ingredients

• 1 cup of cooked Quinoa (couscous or orzo would be fine too)
• Aragula or mixed greens thinly sliced
• Green veggies such as asparagus, snap peas, snow peas, cucumber, raw fresh zucchinis, avocados, edamame, celery etc.
• Toasted Pumpkin seeds (for added crunch)
• Green herbs (basil, parsley, tarragon, chive, green onions) - I generally pick one only.
• Feta cheese (if you have to have cheese in your salad)

My Personal Comments:

• There are no set-proportions but you want the veggies to dominate (ie, you don't put as much quinoa/couscous); the balance depends on what you like and have available to you. If you have fresh zucchinis, then I would not use cucumbers or celery.
• If I have vegan or lactore-intolerant guests, I serve the feta cheese on the side
• I serve it with a regular sauce vinaigrette for dressing

Cranberries - Orange Pound Cake

Spring is just around the corner. We got a nice glimpse of it last week-end when temperatures climbed up to the mid-60s (15C) for two days: everybody was out, students had already traded their down-jackets for t-shirts, their winter boots for flip-flops (??? don't ask!!) It felt that everybody was coming out of their house, fully alive and ready to dance! People were crowding public parks again (we once counted two benches with people in Rittenhouse Square one Sunday in February... last week-end, if two benches were inoccuppied, we were lucky!!)
It was unfortunately short-lived.  We are now back to wearing our down-jackets again (some students are still in T-shirts but because they are hot from celebrating Saint Patrick's Day today!!) .... and I have to say that I have a hard time dealing with this grey-dump-cold weather!

On those days, I only want to stay inside, eat some nice hearty soups, read a good book and/or watch a good movie or play a nice game with our children. Unfortunately, with two children in need of energy-burning exercises, this Sunday-inside is not an option for us (we were homebound for 36 hours when Hurricane Sandy hit last Fall and it did not do us any good. By Tuesday morning, we were already outside for a walk in the neighborhood....)

Nice or not-so-nice weather,  off we go!  Our children bundle up, take their scooters and we go out for at least 2 hours...  If we are lucky, they will take a good nap, which is when I have a few minutes to read a book (or take a nap myself!); my husband taking advantage of this quiet time to work...

One thing that I always do on these gloomy days is make some soups for dinner and, if I feel zealous, a nice pound cake for our afternoon goûter. With a nice cup of tea to warm us up, it helps us deal with the grey weather outside. Until it is nice enough again to be able to enjoy a more fruity (ie, no more citrus) pound cake on our roof terrasse. Allez, encore quelques semaines! Bon Appétit!

Ingredients:

- 1.5  (200g) cups all purpose flour

-  2 ts baking powder

- 1/2 ts salt

- 1 cup (250 ml) plain yogurt

- 1 cup (200g) sugar

- 3 eggs

- zest of 2 organic oranges

- 1/2 cup (125ml) canola oil 

- 1/3 cup (80ml)  orange juice

- Dried cranberries

- 2 ts Grand Marnier

• Pre-heat oven to 375 F (185C)
• In bowl, combine al the dry ingredients and the orange zest
• In another bowl, combine the eggs and yogurt and mix well. 
• Add the orange juice and Grand-Marnier and mix gently
• Incorporate the oil gently.
• Combine the wet ingredients in the wet ingredients
• Add the cranberries at the last minute - stirr
• Pour into a mold and bake in the oven for 45mns - 50mns or until a knife inserted comes out clean

Rutabaga Fries

I don't like kids Menus in restaurants. I don't even look at them. The only time I allow them on the table is if they have some games for the children to play while we order our food from the "adult" menu.
I know that if the restaurant outing has to be an enjoyable experience for both adults and children, (ie children are not dictating where the whole family is having dinner) feeding children what they like very much is a close guarantee to a peaceful dinner. I get that. I am a parent as well. However, the idea that the only things children will be allowed to eat until they are 8 or older (12?) are chicken nuggets, hamburger, cheese sandwich, mac&cheese or pizza makes me roll my eyes! Children above one are NEVER too young to try and eat new food...

When my parents came over for Christmas, we went out to one of our favorite restaurants BYOB (Bring Your Own Beverage - small restaurants that don't want to pay for the liquor & alcohol license and for buying a large offering of alcohol beverages allow patrons to bring their own bottles and don't charge a corking fee). As we were waiting inside the restaurant for our table to be ready, a man in his early fifties who was on his way out saw our children and told them "you are going to eat here? You are too young for this food!" We were all in shock! My children did not understand why he was saying that! Obviously, he had a few drinks too many but still, insead of telling them how lucky they were going to be able to enjoy really good food, he just thought that it was a waste of food and money for our children to eat with us. Needless to say that I jumped into the conversation and asked why he thought that they were too young? He did not really took the time to answer me properly; he only mentioned that the sweetbreads were really good. I would not know because we did not order that dish but I can just say that we all had a great dinner... and look forward to going back.
Do our children eat everything? No. However, they know that they have to try. It might not be their best dish ever... but at least they try. And more than once as it takes a few good trials to develop and acquire a taste for new textures & flavors.
Take the Rutabaga fries I made for us one Sunday evening. Our children tasted them but could not really care for them. I have to say that I am not a big fan of rutabaga either but will I make them again? Yes. Will our children will have to eat a few again? Yes. Will they eat them? Yes. Will they like them? Most likely not. But at least, that evening, I will have managed to make them eat something different.
Bon Appétit!

Ingredients
- Rutabagas, peeled and cut in fries-shape
- Olive oil
- Thyme and salt to taste

• Pre-heat the oven to 400F (200C)
• Lay the fried into a frying pan and coat them with olive oil. Add salt and thyme
• Roast in the oven until golden brown.
• Serve hot

Meringues Francaises - French Meringues

We don't go back to France for the Holiday season. It's too expensive and too exhausting to cross the Atlantic (flight +6 hours jetlag) and spend most of our time either driving or eating and not necesseraly being lucky with the weather to enjoy time outside. As we say, we need an extra week off after we come back to recover! This is why we'd rather go back in the summer when we have more time, the weather is (generally) nice and we don't spend the whole time eating!

This year, we were lucky to have my parents come and spend Christmas with us. We were all very excited and took advantage of their presence to have a formal, albeit early, Réveillon on Christmas Eve and formal Christmas lunch on Christmas day (with a nice breakfast with viennoiseries in between!)  And since it is very French to share eachother's Holidays menus, here are ours. On Christmas Eve we had a soupe a l'oignon, escargots, fresh oysters, smoked salmon, and a tarte tatin. On Christmas Day, we ate a nice orange-cumin salad, a stuffed capon with chestnuts and apples and a Charlotte aux fruits rouges. I can't remember what wines we drank; and yes, you can add a few munchies for the apéritifs (on both days) as well as sweets (mostly chocolates) for additional (!) sweetness. I thought about making meringues but since my husband had made some chocolates, I decided against it. I might make some for New Year's Eve.

Meringues are a typical French petit four (ie, a small piece of dessert served after a nice meal or with coffee) and unlike some other petits fours, they are really easy to make. They look intimidating but honnestly, the only thing I don't like about meringues is that they need to bake for about one hour in the oven. Unlike chouquettes or savory gougères, I don't make meringues often. I have never been a big fan of meringues, which I find extremely sweet and nothing to write home about.  My children (and husband) really like them; they have some everytime we get together with my relatives in France. My sister-in-law makes very good meringues and always makes a few batches for us to eat with coffee ; although our children are not drinking coffee yet, they are entitled to the small treat we, adults, eat with our espressos (most often a piece (or two) of dark chocolate; once in a while, when available, meringues.) Un petit plaisir... Bon Appetit!

Ingredients:

For about 20 meringues :

• 2 egg whites
• 125g (4.4oz) sugar (or about 50g (1.76oz)/egg white)
• 2 drops of lemon juice
• 1 pinch of salt

• In order to maximize your chances of success, it is best to leave the egg whites rest for an hour (covered by a kitchen cloth) on the kitchen counter. 
• Pre-heat the oven to 200F (100C)
• Put the egg whites and the salt in a bowl
• With an electric batter, start to beat the eggwhites until they become a little bit foamy.
• Add the lemon drops
• Steadily add the sugar while beating the egg whites
• Beat until the egg whites are "firm", ie they don't drop from your batter anymore.
• With a spoon (or a poche a douille),place each meringue on a baking sheet covered with parchmin paper.
• Bake in the oven for about one hour; every 20mns, open the oven to let some steam out. 
• The meringues are ready when you can easily peel them from the baking sheet.
• Turn off the oven, open the door and let the meringues cool in the oven until it is cold.

My Personal comments

• Don't use a silpat; the meringues don"t cook well on a silicone mat.

Pea Soup - Soupe aux Petits Pois

Our son is now fully recovered from his very bad coxsackie virus; he does have a few scars on his hands and feet but they are steadily disappearing. Pff! What a relief! His case was so bad that I took him for the second time to the pediatrician to request stronger pain relievers to have him start eating and talking  again. He stopped talking!!  (that's when we realized how sick he was!). When she saw him, the nurse's very first words were "I wish I had some students to show them a REAL case of coxsackie!!!" (???!!!!! Although I am totally in favor of teaching-clinics, I did not find this sentence really appropriate to say to a parent who comes desperate to get CARE for her sick child! However it did make me realize that our son did, indeed, developed very serious symptoms! (Apparently the nurse had seen a father develop such symptoms and yes he was MI-SE-RA-BLE!))
Now that our son is out of his misery, we are steadily working our way down his list of "dishes-I-am-going-to-have-when-I-can-I-have-real-food-again": viennoiseries (checked), fish with wild rice (checked),  candies (checked), Pho (checked), bagels (checked)...
While looking for fresh lemongrass at the Asian supermarket to make Moules-Frites, my eyes caught "fresh peas leaves". Since I can not leave a supermarket without trying something new, I decided to purchase (among other Asian vegetables only my relatives in Singapore could identify without hesitation), a small bag and to make a soup out of it. I did not dare to just saute the vegetables in case they would be too bitter.
This reminded me how my grand-mother used to feed us fresh peas (without the leaves though) that were grown by farmers in the two fields surrounding her house in the country. She would go and steal pick small peas... Nothing too wrong with that, except that they were a variety made to feed... cattles! And certainly not grown the organic way!!  She could not care less. She thought that because she was picking them very young, they were not too starchy for us to eat! Anyhow, we survived the few summers that peas were the crop-of-choice in the region!

In order to spice up this soup a little bit, I made a feta-and-parsley (mint would have been a more British version) dip to doll up on top of the soup. This was a real add-on that we all enjoyed very much.
Our children liked having a few round peas in their soup as well... and were asking for more the next day! This would be perfect for very young children (without the feta-dip). One more nice-and-easy soup to make for the winter! Next on the list? Empanadas! Bon Appetit!

Ingredients   - A bag of fresh peas leaves
- A bag of frozen peas
- 2 cloves of garlic

For the optional feta-dip (made in a blender)
- Feta cheese
- 1/2 bunch of fresh parsley (I used curled but flat would have been OK)
- 1 TBs of Olive oil
- A spoon of plain yogurt (if you need more liquid to blend the feta and the parsley).

• In a pot, saute the garlic cloves in olive oil. 
• Add the pea leaves and stir until they shrink (like fresh spinach)
• Add the bag of frozen peas
• Add water and let simmer until the peas are cooked
• Add salt and pepper to taste
• Serve with fresh peas and a doll-up of the feta-parsley-dip

My Personal Comments

• This soup is vegetarian if you omit the feta dip  

• Mint would have been OK instead of Feta

• You could chill this soup for the summer.

October is Vegatarian Awareness Month

September is over... and I did not get to post during that month. For once I will blame it on my dear husband who takes the pictures of the food I make (I cook, I stage, he captures with his professional camera.) For some strange annoying reasons, he managed to delete 4 sets of pictures of food I had planned to post in the past and coming weeks: caponata, chocolate mousse, babaganoush and another fun one to make with children. Oh well, we will have to wait until I get to cook something new in the coming weeks!! I have to say that since school started and with it our daily busy routine, I have not cooked anything really new. I do cook everything from scratch for most meals but nothing worth publishing on this blog...  So, not having any recipes in store will compel me to make something new...

One thing that my husband noticed in our diet is how more vegetarians we have become in the past year... Part of it started for health reasons. In 6 months of healthy mostly-vegetarian/pescatarian eating, he managed to get his cholesterol levels back into the normal range (whereas he wanted to prove me and his physician than his diet had NOTHING to do with his cholesterol level!!)... and mine have never been as good as since I cut meat from my diet more than a year ago.
Are we vegetarians? No. My husband and children eat chicken and the meat of their choice on the rare occasions when we go out.  We all eat the occasional fish and seafood (how could I give up sushis???), hence the term pescatarian  The rest of the time, we eat mostly vegetarian.
October being the Vegetarian Awareness month, I could only advise you to go vegetarian for at least a day a week. You might be apprehensive of being "food-deprived" but if you have the chance to eat a healthy meal made of beans & veggies, you won't. It is also the opportunity to go out of your comfort zone and order something different in a restaurant or to purchase a variety of beans or vegetables you have never tried before (kohlrabi, anyone?). This is fun! There is nothing worse than eating the same things over and over again. I know. I get no pleasure of preparing the meals; I know that I will get the "encore ça!") from my children and husband... so trying something different is the way to go to make everybody happy! If you want other good reasons, you can read this article from the Huffington Post. If you want recipes, there are plenty in this blog already! Bon Appétit!

Fennel and White Beans Dip

Since our children have been away for their long vacation in France, I have not been cooking as much I  generally do (and nope, even though we are not on our regular schedule anymore, my husband has not been cooking more, with the exception of the occasional BBQ! Sans commentaire!) Added to the fact that Philadelphia has been experiencing temperatures in the 100F (more than 40C), the idea of eating a warm meal does not appeal to me. And just thinking about turning on the oven makes me sweat!
Since both my husband and I have been enjoying the change of rythm to.... work more (pathetic, I know!), dinners have been generally a large salade composée or a cold vegetable dish with a side of dip: guacamole, mango salsa, hummus, edamame spread, etc.  That, with a glass of red wine, on our roof terrasse... a little preview of our upcoming summer vacations in France!

Since we were getting beautiful fennel bulbs with amazing fronds at the farmers' market the other day, I was trying to figure out what to do with the fronds so not to have to waste them (living in a building, albeit with a roof terrasse, we don't compost.) I have used fronds the way I use dill (it's the same family): in a salad or to bake fish in the oven/on the BBQ. I tried to make a fronds pesto but my blender being too weak I never managed to reach a puree-like texture. I was therefore happy to find an article on fennel in the New York times and realized that I could actually use at least some of the fronds.
Fennel, like turnips, has a very different taste when you eat raw versus cooked. I like both but never really ate raw fennel until I started adding it to salads for crunchiness (instead of celery). I never grew up eating pieces of raw fennel just like that as an apperitivo (I went to two different Italian families that did that and told me it's very common in Italy)....but have been more and more prone to doing the same!  Why not, Americans offer raw broccoli to dip into ranch dressing after all. Why not fennel? Try it! It's actually delicious when dipped in this fennel-based recipe! Perferct for your summer entertaining!
Bon Appétit!

Ingredients:
- 1 small bulb of fennel with some fronds
- 1 small can of white beans (I generally use cannellini) - rinsed and drained
- 1 small garlic clove, chopped
- a few fennel seeds, crushed (optional)
- Juice and zest of one lemon
- 2 Tbs of Olive oil (or more)
- Salt and pepper to taste

• Cut the fennel in half. Reserve one half and a few fronds for serving and decoration
• Cut the other half and some fronds into small pieces and put into a blender
• Add the drained white beans, lemon zest and juice, garlic, salt, pepper, fennel seeds and olive oil. Blend until desired consitency.
• Adjust seasoning and put in the fridge for 30mn or until serving.
• Decorate with a few extra fronds.
• Serve with slices of the remaining fennel, other vegetables or pita chips.

Irresistibly Deadly Addictive Nuts Cocktail

Once upon a time, when I was back in France working for a large international pharmaceutical company (that was more than 10 years ago!), I was traveling a lot for my job. Since the company policy was to put its employees in business class for any travel longer than 3 hours, I had the opportunity to fly business class a few times when coming to the US. Back then (we are talking pre-9/11), airlines were still pampering their customers a little bit. Nothing like what our parents could have experienced back in the 1980s or even early 1990s... but still at least you felt that they did care about you. Note that I don't fly business class anymore.. so I would not be able to compare but I have experienced the difference in coach class (as I am sure some of you have too!). Sans commentaire!
On one of my business trips to the US, I was served an unforgettable nuts cocktail. Not the usual boring-too-salty peanuts... no, a real little dish of warm mix of fancy nuts! And since then, being nuts about nuts, I have been trying to find a recipe for nuts cocktail. I tried the one where you soak nuts in egg whites. I have tried some of the store-brand pre-mix... but none came close to the ones I had on that flight...   Then again, I am sure that if I were to taste that same nuts cocktail again today, I would not find them that good! This is why it's always dangerous to want to reproduce something you had once a long time ago and tasted soooo good to you! (Even more true when it comes to a dish that your husband grew up with (ie, that his mother or grand-mother made): unless HE makes it,  you are NEVER going to win!! )

I came up with this specific recipe because, one day, I had decided to purchase some caramelized pecans at a store to make a "healthy basket of American goodies" to offer to Europeans (because, yes, to me caramelized pecans are fully associated with American food)... to realize when reading the label (yes, I ALWAYS read the label!), that they were coming from....... Spain! How disappointing!!! Especially, when you know that the US produce more than 75% of the world Pecans (mostly in the Southern states of the US where there is even such an aread called "Pecans belt"!!) I obviously did not purchase these pecans for my friends. It just gave me the idea to try to make my own instead!
Since I don't like things too sweet and that I had this nostalgy of that 2000-era nuts cocktail in mind, I decided to do something both sweet & savory. The result?
Let me warn you (and the people who have had the opportunity to taste them would confirm), these nuts are deadly addictive! If I make a batch for my family or guests, I know that they won't last long! Always a good sign when it comes to cooking, no?
Now, if I could only find a good salty-cocktail mix recipe!! Bon Appétit!

Ingredients:
- Raw unsalted nuts: I generally use a mix of walnuts, pecans, almonds and peanuts. You could use hazelnuts, brazilian and sunflower seeds as well. However, I never liked when I used cashews in that mix.
- Cayenne pepper (to taste)
- A pinch or two of salt
- Maple syrup : enough to coat the nuts
- A sprig of rosemary, scissored

• Pre-heat oven to 350F (175C)
• Take a baking pan and lay out all the nuts on the pan. If the nuts are on top of each other, you will have to make a second batch.
• Transfer the nuts in a bowl, add the pepper, salt, rosemary. 
• Pour enough maple syrup to have all the nuts nicely coated when you mix them (including in the creases). You don't want them to soak in maple syrup, though!
• Lay the nuts on the baking pan and put in the oven.
• Cook for 15 mns, stirring every 5 minutes. You should start to see the syrup cristallized but the nuts (especially the pecans) should not be burnt.
• Cool on a flat non-sticky surface (I use a silpat) before eating. 

Apple-Rhubarb Healthy Crumble

A few months ago, I discovered that I have a gluten sensitivity. Nothing like celiac disease but enough to make me feel uncomfortable after eating gluten-based pasta or bread. And enough to make me want to avoid any gluten-loaded food to avoid the unpleasant days that follow such food intake.

So no gluten? What it really means is no food that has wheat, oat, barley and rye... so yes, no bread, no wheat-pasta, no pastry made with wheat flour...  Pff!! "How limitative!!", might you say? 

After a few weeks, I can tell you that this is absolutely not limitative as long as, comme toujours,  you are willing to adapt. When you cook for yourself eating gluten-free is not an issue at all, especially if you live in the US where most supermarkets now carry gluten-free options. When you think about it you can choose from: rice, wild rice, buckwheat (which despite its name does not contain wheat), millet, corn, quinoa, lentils, dry beans, potatoes and all the fruits, nuts, and vegetables you want. Nothing to make you go hungry!

It becomes tricky when you eat out or are invited over: your traditional American-Italian restaurant is a poor option but Japanese restaurants are a good one! Worse comes to worse, you eat the filling of a sandwich and not the bread or you settle on a salad without the croutons!

The hardest to give up at this stage? Bread, definitively! I did try to start a new gluten-free starter but my two tentatives with buckwheat flour failed; I have read that some people have been successful with brown rice flour, which is what I will try once temperatures are lower (too much heat killed my starter last Summer). I am also working on a decent crust recipe that could be good enough to make quiches.

As for dessert? Sorbets are always a good option; so are French macarons or crèmes brûlées when available (if they put anything to artificially thicken the custard, it is corn starch)...  So nothing to feel deprived of! Honestly! It's just hard to explain to people who are not aware of what gluten is but once you give them alternative options, then they are generally OK. The worst are the people who doubt that you can have a sensitivity! I just wished them not to have any!! 

I was lucky to find gluten-free oats in a Natural Store close to us in Philadelphia. That way, I am able to eat gluten-free oatmeal in the morning and to make my granola recipe gluten-free... or to use gluten-free oats in this crumble recipe. Unlike other crumble recipes that call on butter and wheat flour, oats and oil are used in this recipe instead (hence the "healthier" title). You don't have to make it with gluten-free oats if you and your family have no gluten sensitivity but if you do (or want to experiment something different ), this is a very good recipe for dessert which you can use all year round. Bon appétit!

Ingredients (inspired from Chocolate & Zucchini)

For the topping:

- 100 grams (3.5 oz) rolled oats

- 100 grams (3.5oz) brown rice flour (or 100 grams AP flour)

- 100 grams (3.5 oz) cane brown sugar

-  80 ml (2.7 Floz or 1/3 cup) neutral oil (I generally use canola)

- 1/2 ts cinnamon

- 1/2 ts salt

- Another spice of your choice (I generally use cardamon or just lemon zest)

For the filling:

- 4/5 medium apples

-  2 stalks of rhubarb, cleaned and cut into small pieces

- 100 gr (3.5 oz) Brown cane sugar

• Prepare the topping and let it cool in the fridge for about 2-3 hours (I generally make it the day before)
• Preheat oven to 360F
• Cut all the fruits in small pieces and mix them with the sugar.
• Put in invidual dish or in a deep dish
• Cover with the topping
• Bake in the oven for about 40 mns