Tarte aux clementines/Clementine tart

WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 20, 2010

Lydie’s cookbook has a basic tart shell recipe (pate brisee) that is an excellent basis for all kinds of goodies – sweet and savory. My favorite tomato tart uses this recipe. Lydie also has suggestions for sweet tarts for every month of the year. For January the “tarte de mois” is Clementine. It is a delicious yet simple concoction that uses sliced clementines poached in a sugar syrup, then placed on an orange custard. Once you master the basic tart recipe, (it’s really rather foolproof) it is easy to make an elegant dessert with little effort. It was the perfect cooling ending to a dinner of pork tenderloin marinated in a spicy chili sauce (not a Lydie recipe). I hope my guests liked it. I think they did.

Coulis de tomates avec des tomates en boite/Tomato Sauce Made with Canned Tomatoes

SATURDAY, JANUARY 2, 2010

Well, the holidays are past. The turkey, goose, quiches and tarts have been eaten. (The onion tart appeared to be a hit, by the way.) I don’t know about you but after a while all that bland, rich food makes me yen for something simple and comforting. I thought I would have on hand some good tomato sauce in case there was call for a non-holiday meal. This, I thought, would be a good opportunity to try Lydie’s alternative tomato sauce recipe: the one made from canned tomatoes. I had the illusion that it would be simple to prepare. It was, up to a point, but when you double a recipe, things begin to take more time. For example, this recipe calls for using canned whole tomatoes, which one must chop. Not a momentous task, but still, time consuming when the cans number six. The recipe, like the fresh tomato recipe, relies not on Italian herbs, but on onions and garlic for its flavor. The sauce is cooked over high heat – something I’m still getting used to, given my belief that good things come from long-simmered foods. The high heat helps concentrate the sauce into a rich thick one.

Indeed, we had an evening when turkey leftovers were just not going to cut it. I combined the tomato sauce with store-made meatballs over spaghetti (yes, the meatballs were store-bought…there’s only so much that this person is willing to make from scratch during the holiday busy’ness.) The verdict? The tomato sauce was a good, serviceable one. I’m not sure that it’s spectacular and I may be just as inclined to open up a jar of my favorite Dell’Amore sauce.

On a side note: I was inspired to make spaghetti and meatballs mostly because I wanted another reason to have roasted red peppers, this time, served as an antipasto, with salami and cheese slivers instead of anchovies. I discovered that the delicate flavor of the roasted peppers deserves to stand on its own, not next to spaghetti and meatballs. It really should be served as a separate, first course (which I didn’t do). Or, I still really like it best served over pasta.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Tarte campagnarde a l'oignon/Country Onion Tart

SUNDAY, DECEMBER 20, 2009

I haven’t been trying any Lydie recipes lately. First of all, we were away celebrating my daughter’s graduation. Then, it’s holiday time and there are many traditional recipes that have to be made. No time for experimentation. I’ve been making a bunch of quiches for our annual holiday brunch. I am adding to my repertoire by including this onion tart. Quiches are delicious but they do contain lots of butter, cheese and cream. No wonder we put on weight during the holidays. (I won’t even mention the cookies!) Lydie’s tart does use the all-purpose butter crust but the filling is simply onions and a couple of eggs. You’ll note that I’ve added the lattice work of anchovies and nicoise olives to only half the tart – in deference to the revelers who aren’t as fond as I am of those ingredients. I plan to freeze this and bring it out next Sunday.

Gratin leger de coucourdon/Light Pumpkin Gratin, Sauce aux Airelles/Cranberry Sauce

FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 27, 2009

Lydie’s cookbook has two recipes for pumpkin gratin: one that is standard and one that is a lighter version. I decided to try the lighter version. My husband arrived from his travels, quite jet-lagged. As a result, we did not have a traditional Thanksgiving. If we had had a traditional Thanksgiving I had thought of making this pumpkin gratin. Since it was still on my mind, I decided to make it the day after Thanksgiving and serve it up with one of those store-bought roasted chickens. This recipe calls for diced pumpkin baked in the oven with garlic, parsley, bread crumbs, and covered over with skim milk. I never would have thought that it would coalesce into a rich, creamy texture, but it did. It was very simple to put together. Then it is baked in the oven for 1½ hours. It was made particularly simple for me because I couldn’t find pumpkin at our local grocer’s. Instead, I substituted already cut acorn squash. No more chopping and peeling pumpkin for me! I suppose I’ll have to make the standard version as well someday (and use pumpkin!), given my goal of making all of the recipes in the cookbook. I feel little incentive for it, though, because this recipe was so good and so uncomplicated compared to the other version.

These recipes left me wondering what defines a gratin. I always thought it meant something in a cheese sauce. So, I consulted my trusty Wikipedia. It said: “an ingredient is topped with a browned crust, often using breadcrumbs, grated cheese, egg and/or butter”. Well, I guess the operative word is “often”. I learned that it needn’t have cheese, or egg or butter for that matter. This recipe is a real find. What a way to have gratin without all the rich ingredients. I learned that a gratin is also defined by a gratin pan – a shallow baking dish. I don’t have one of these but it worked out just fine.

Lydie has a recipe for homemade cranberry sauce. My husband always makes homemade cranberry sauce for Thanksgiving, with a little zest of orange grated in for a lovely flavor. The trouble is, the sauce almost never gels. I thought I would try Lydie’s recipe to see if it would gel. It didn’t. I referenced other cookbooks of mine and learned that the key to gelling is having enough sugar. I guess I’ll try again in the near future, since I’m on tap to make Christmas dinner this year and am determined to have gelled cranberry sauce (as well as the canned jelly type, which my sister prefers)!

Poivrons et anchois encore

SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 22, 2009

I’ve been obsessing all week about the deleted photos of the peppers and anchovy dish that I made last week. Then I decided, why not make it again? I still have some scallions left and even some leftover dressing. Peppers are a snap to roast. My husband is still away so why not have a second food indulgence? Here it is: just as good the second time around.

Salade de poivrons aux anchois/Pepper and Anchovy Salad

SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 15, 2009

What is your food indulgence? What would you make if you only had to cook for yourself, taking no one else’s food preferences into consideration? I recently had such a conversation with a group of women friends. Not surprisingly, pasta figured prominently in the selections. As it does for me.

My husband is traveling for about 2 ½ weeks. I figured I wouldn’t be cooking much during this time. Then I came across Salade de poivrons aux anchois. Anchovies seem to be an item that no one is neutral about: either you adore them or detest them. I’m definitely in the adore column, but I don’t get to use them very often because of the "detest" factor among most of my friends and family. When I saw a recipe that combines yummy roasted peppers and anchovies how could I resist! I would put them over pasta and have me a double food indulgence.

Roasting peppers has become an easy endeavor. This recipe uses red and yellow peppers. I was struck once again by how much tastier they are made fresh than the jarred variety. These were topped by slivers of anchovy, sprinkled with an oil and red wine vinegar dressing, and topped with chopped scallions. The dressing was interesting because it contained the juices of the roasted peppers as well. One could even leave out the anchovy (or substitute strips of salami) and have one nice antipasto. Putting it all on top of pasta was like icing on a cake. Yum!

(I took a photo of this dish. It looked very pretty, with the peppers arranged attractively on a plate. However, in an effort to be efficient with my camera’s memory, I accidentally erased the images. Aaaaugh!)

Sirop pour coulis/Sugar Syrup for Fruit Sauce and Coulis de fraises/Strawberry Sauce

Part II of the Halloween meal: Since the chicken was a fairly rich dish, I decided to keep dessert simple: some ice cream with a strawberry coulis (sauce). I used Lydie’s recipe for making a simple syrup. This is added to fruit to make a sauce. Lydie’s cookbook has recipes for several fruit sauces, such as blackberry or red currant. None of these are in season so I made a strawberry sauce, using frozen whole strawberries, which I pureed. It tasted very refreshing. And, once again, it was simple to make.

So…in total I was able to tick off four more recipes from the cookbook. All in all a successful experience, I think.