Automn Quiche

Ingredients for 4 people: 1/2 medium sized onion, 300g Chards (only the white part of the stalk), 2 medium Carrots, 80g Bacon, 2 slices Emmenthal or Fontina cheese, 3 eggs, 1 cup of milk or cream, pastry crust Brisée (made from 250g of flour, 100g of butter and 1 egg), a little parsley, salt and pepper

Clafoutis

The Clafoutis is a typical dessert of the Limousin, a region of south-central France whose territory is situated around the Massif Central and that includes 3 departments: Corrèze, Creuse and Haute-Vienne

 The original Clafoutis is only made with cherries, although today quite often the same name is used also for other desserts which in fact should be called Flaugnarde and that are prepared with the same method but  with different fruits such as apricots or plums, apples, pears, blackberries, peaches, plums, etc..

The term Clafoutis derives from the occitan dialect verb claufir, that means to fill and come from Latin clavum ficere = to fill of points similar to nails ( that are in this case the sweet cherries).

image from Wikipedia

The Clafoutis or Clafouti is a cake made with cherries and pancakes batter.
It is a very popular dessert in France but it's not rare to find others similar to it, as the cake called millard in Auvergne.

Sauce of Mushrooms

Ingredients: 50g Mushroom , approximately 30 grams of any kind of mixed mushrooms (optional), 1 Shallot , a small piece of Butter, ½ glass of Port, 1 cup of beef broth concentrate, little Parsley, Salt and Pepper.

Finely chop the shallots.
Clean  mushrooms and cut them into slices.
If you have them available, cut in pieces also the other mushrooms (Pleurotus and even frozen mushrooms).

Patatoes "à l'échirlète"

Ingredients: 3/4 ]b. (about 16) 1 1/2 inch new potatoes, 1 cup water or chicken or beef stock, 3 cloves of garlic, 2 tablespoons goose fat, salt. 

Wash patatoes.
If you do not have the new one, you can choose yellow potatoes and cut them into small pieces  giving them a rounded shape typical of this recipe. Put them in a saucepan just covered with water or stock, with garlic cloves and salt.
Cover and cook 15 minutes or until potatoes are tender. If all liquid is not absorbed, take patatoes out of the saucepan and let them to dry on a dish.
Take a large skillet, add goose fat and when it will be warm add patatoes.
Cook slowly until they are lightly browned.
Serve with roast of pork, beef, veal or lamb.

Sauce Hollandaise

This is one of my favorite sauces.
Although many claim that it is hard to do because it can easily "go crazy", this never happened to me, since the first time I have cooked it.
It is only a question of patience proceeding carefully and without haste.
The best method of cooking in a bain-marie, but you can also cook directly over a vry low flame using an heat spreader.

Ingredients for 6: 1cl of Water, 125 gr of Butter, the juice of 1 Lemon, 2 Egg yolks, Salt and White pepper.

Merveilles, Carnival fritters

Everywhere fritters are the Carnival sweets.
In the south of France, in Aquitaine they are called Merveilles and are quite similar to what we call Chiacchiere in Italy .

It’s a simple recipe, but there are several variants with different yeasts, different liquor and more or less sugar.

Ingredients: 1/2kg flour, 100gr sugar, ½ small bag of yeast, 10gr butter, 4 eggs, orange scent water, a pinch of salt, oil for frying, powdered sugar.

In a bowl, mix flour with sugar, orange water, yeast and a pinch of salt. Add eggs and then the melted butter.
Mix very well to obtain a homogeneous mixture.
Knead until it detaches from your hands, adding a little flour if needed and then put it to rest for 1 or 2 hours in a cool place, covered with a sheet.
To make fritters, heat the oil for frying and lightly flour the work surface.
Take a small amount of dough at a time (a little more than a walnut) and roll it out very thinly with a rolling pin. Cut portions of various shapes, square, rectangular or even sticks and put them immediately to fry. It's traditionalyou to make lozenges engraved in the middle.
The frying time is fast cause the Merveilles must have a light golden color. To make they swell well, it is necessary a very thin dough and an oil temperature hot but not smoking, because this would affect the result.

image from the blog 123Merveilles

As you remove them from the oil, drain immediately the Merveilles on a sheet of absorbent paper.
Garnish with powdered sugar and serve warm or cold.

Roast Chicken with Tarragon and Citron Confit

If well cooked, this chicken is delicious and the sauce has a delicate lemon scent.

Ingredients: A small chicken or a cockerel, 2 thick slices of fresh bacon, Citron confit, Tarragon, Olive oil, Salt and Pepper

Take a baking pan with high walls and with a lid.
The ideal is a Pyrex baking dish.
Ungetene the bottom and appoggiateci chicken.
Guarnsh the breast with 2 slices of fresh pork bacon that with some toothpicks.


Put inside the chicken at least 4 slices of citron confit (a total of at least ½ lemon) and add a generous teaspoon of dried tarragon.
Pour over the chicken a few tablespoons of olive oil
Add salt and pepper. Cover the pan and place it in the oven at 180° C for 1 hour and a half and after continue cooking until at a temperature of about 160°C until tender.
Check the cooking. The sauce must be clear, abundant and without burning.

Fresh Appetizer of Prawns and Langoustines

It 's a fine appetizer particularly suitable for the Christmas table. If necessary, it can also be enriched with other crustaceans.

Ingredients for 6 people: 1 lettuce, 1 medium tomato, 6 grapefruits not bitter, 1 can of crab, 100gr peeled prawns, 1 cup mayonnaise, ½ cup yogurt, 18 blanched langoustines, salt and pepper

Peel, wash and drain the lettuce. Remove the seeds and cut tomatoes into small cubes.
Peel one grapefruit and remove the skin from each slice. Put aside for decoration as well as the best crab pieces, chop the rest of crab removing cartilage.

Cut the other grapefruits in small pieces and mix them in a bowl with tomato cubes, half of the prawns, the chopped crab, yoghurt and mayonnaise. Add salt and pepper to make the taste intense.

Share into individual bowls lined with lettuce leaves, garnish with grapefruit slices, prawns and langoustines. Serve well chilled

You can do without langoustines.
If you use blanched fresh crab instead of canned, this appetizer will be even better.

Blinis Demidoff

We have an example,  though incomplete, of this excellent dish in the film Babette's feast

from "Babette's feast"

For 10 persons: 20 blinis, caviar, smoked sturgeon or salmon thinly sliced, Salsa Smetana.

On a service dish, arrange the blinis (1 or 2 for each person), very hot, and put on each a tsp of caviar, a slice of smoked fish and 1 Tsp of Smetana Sauce.

Serve immediately.

This recipes requires several ingredients and the preparation of both, Blinis and Smetana Sauce.

I like very much salmon caviar, which is less expensive than dark sturgeon caviar, so I use indistinctly both types. I also like the delicious smoked sturgeon and, if I can find it at a convenient price, I buy it.

If you use these blinis as entrée you would not need a large quantity of each ingredient.

It will be different, instead, if you will make them the main course of the dinner. In this case, blinis as well as salmon and caviar will be abundant.

Orange Sauce

A sauce of many uses, ideal for roasted duck but also pork meat.

To garnish 2 Magret: 3 oranges, 2 tsp honey, salt and pepper

Squeeze 2 oranges and put their juice in a small saucepan.
Peel the third orange and divide it into small cubes, slices or wedges, as you want. Put them in the pot with the orange juice. add 2 teaspoons of honey, salt and pepper and simmer for 5 minutes.

You can also enrich this sauce with a teaspoon of vinegar, balsamic if you like, and even with a little Grand Marnier and orange peel, cut in thin slices and then scalded in hot water.

Magret de Canard with Orange scent sauce

A Magret is the breast of a Duck or Goose. It is different from the usual duck we find easily at the supermarket, because it comes from a special breed of duck.

The term Magret comes from the Occitan word magre meaning lean meat.

Now it’s more easy to found it, not only in the finest shops but also, vacuum-packed or frozen, in some supermarkets

It can be smoked and treated as a ham but it is more often cooked in a pan or on a grill and served, rare or pink, cut into thin slices.

The cooking is very simple but it requires attention

Ingredients:  One magret will  serve 2 persons

After unpacking the breast remove with a small and very sharp knife the thin film on the flesh side.  It is a natural film that usually enveloppe any muscle. Then, simply cut slits in a diamond pattern across the breast fat side and season this side only with salt and pepper. That will prevent the fat will distribute into the meat when you cook it.

Use a heavy iron skillet or cast iron pan and absolutely don’t oil it.

Place the breast, fat-side-down, in the cold heavy pan and cook until it’s an appetizingly golden-brown color  and fat is melted.

The Magret will "inflate" when seared and it will render lots of fat in no time

Turn the breast and continue cooking in its own fat for 2-6 minutes depending on the point you desire the meat will be cooked.

Do never poke Magret to return it but use pliers kitchen or wooden spoons. After cooking, let your duck breast to rest for at least 5 minutes, loosely covered in foil. This ensures that it will be juicy and easy to slice.

Arrange it on a dish and serve

To garnish  I have made a simple orange sauce with mashed sweet potatoes aside.

Mashed sweet potatoes

Ingredients for 4 people: 800g sweet potatoes, 1 cup cream (20 cl), Olive oil, Salt, Pepper

Cook in a large quantity of water sweet patatoes, peeled and cut into pieces. Cook them in boiling water for 10 minutes.

When cooked, after draining, mash them and mix with cream and olive oil. Salt and peppe.

Note:

This mash goes perfectly all your meat, expecially pork or duck meat, and spicy fish but but also beef and poltry stews and gravy.

How to cook red meat

This video from youtube is really well done, complete and clear.
It is in French but I think that no one will have trouble understanding.

Good cooking meat is measured by its firmness.

To help us to measure it well, we need the of our hand, as you can see in the video.

• Near Raw: join the thumb and forefinger, the muscle of your thumb will have the same firmness that must have meat with this cooking 
• Rare: join the thumb and middle finger 
• Medium: join the thumb and ring finger 
• Well done: join the thumb and little finger

I am testig Meat Pies

I am testing meat pies. In fact, it is a long time I am doing this, but considering that we are near  Christmas, these tests have taken a certain acceleration.

Pâté of my experiment are made by meat and poultry and especially liver which, in recent months I've cooked quite often.

It is not something new. I've always loved these meat pies because they are gorgeous when they are good, and finally not particularly difficult if we are well organized .

The final result is every time better and better and superior to the effort and cost.

It is convenient  to clear some misunderstanding thet you can find on the net, many of which are created by a certain linguistic ignorance, to give precise information

One of the best sources of information is Wikipedia, which is not always completely reliable when talking about foods and recipes.

First, the name: Pâté is a dish prepared by combining different ingredients mixed together.

Today they are a specialty of French cuisine but we find various Pâté in different European national cuisines .

Until less than a century ago, they were part of the few systems available to our ancestors to preserve food.

French have the best references about them because their ancestors, Celts and Gauls, were known to be excellent in preservation of meat, as mentioned by many ancient authors such as Polybius, Cato and Pliny. Strabo in the first century BC wrote that Gaul was a country where people were able to preserve meat. It is not strange that over there we find excellent confits and terrines.

Today that storage and transport are no longer a problem, these preparations belong only to the domain of gluttony .

Generally the mixture of a meat pies is rather coarse, even it is not a rule.
In the past, they were often wrapped in dough and dipped in jelly. Sometimes inside there was even whole portions of meat.

Terrines and mousses are always pâtés. Terrines are prepared, as the name implies, in their own container and mousses are generally very refined and spreadable. Making a mousse, was in the part very challenging because the mixture was sifted by hand, but todayeverything it is more easy because we have blenders, food processors and mixers. Mousse contains always also a large amount of butter .

Automn Dessert

I must confess, pears are not my favorite fruits, but any times I eat them I’m obliged to reconsider this idea.
However, they are one of the best fruits to make jams, cakes with or without chocolate and also to be cooked with aromatic herbs and spices. In this recipe I combined them with orange to prepare a simple and pleasant dessert that will be very appreciated in your autumn dinners.
 

This preparation is also suitable for other fruits such as apples or quinces.

For 6 people: 6 pears quite big , 1 orange , 8 tablespoons caster sugar, 60gr butter, 6 eggs, 250gr cream.

Peel pears and cut them into quarters. Then brown them in a pan with 60 gr of butter and 3 or 4 teaspoons of sugar. Pour the orange juice, cover and cook for 5 minutes.

Pour fruits into a baking dish .
Beat the eggs with the cream and the remaining sugar and pour this custard over fruits .
Put the dish in the oven in a hot water bath and cook for about 40 minutes at 200°C.
 

You can make more intense orange flavor perfuming the cream with some drop of Grand Marnier . Serve warm.

Pâte Brisé e Pasta Frolla

I put toghether these two preparations because they are similar.

They are, however, both of ancient Arabic origin.
 
They share three important characteristics.

• The content of butter is always half the weight of flour. 
• The protein content must be low, so if possible, choose a low-protein flour that is different from the flour to make bread (so don't use Manitoba) and use only few egg whites. 
• Kneading should be very short in order to limit the formation of gluten. Do it only with your finger tips, as much as possible, to avoid to warm ingredients with the hand palm. 

Pâte Brisé

The dough Brisé is widely used in France not only for savory preparations but also for the sweet ones, such as Tarte Tatin 

The components are: flour, butter and eggs, proportions, two parts flour, one part butter, the yolk of an egg each 250g of flour and a pinch of salt.

Cut butter into cubes and let it soften at room temperature out of the refrigerator.
Then mix it with the flour very quickly, preferably using just your fingers so as not to heat the pasta.
Then add egg yolks and let the dough to rest in a cool place before use.
There also exists a version without egg.

Pasta Frolla (Shortcrust Pastry) 

We can say that this kind of dough is the queen of Italian tart dough, it is a cross between a pâte brise and a pâte sablée full of eggs. In Italy it is an traditional preparation and there are however several version of it, slightly different in doses.

This dough is great also for cookies and tea pastries.

Here are the proportions I prefer: 500gr flour, 200gr butter, 200gr sugar, 4 eggs (including 2 and 2 yolks).

These doses are enough for a nice amount of pastry which, if not completely used, you can store in the freezer wrapped in a transparent plastic film.
Knead quickly flour, sugar, butter (very softened), whole eggs and egg yolks, preferably by hand and only with the your finger tip to not heat the mixture with the temperature of your hand.

Kneading by hand or by a mixer, what you will get is always a cluster of small portions of dough that you'll shrink with hands.
In this case however, knead for a short time and at intervals to avoid that the preparation will warm. Make a ball and put it to rest in a cool place wrapped in plastic wrap.

Here are some photos of the various steps:
Here it is! There took more than 5 minutes. I wrapped in transparent film and is ready to be put to rest in the refrigerator. The rest is good but if you hurry you can also use it right away .

Small pieces of butter and flour

I recommend that you cut the butter while it is still solid, just taken from the refrigerator, and add it to the flour as in the picture and then let it soften.

Tthe dough when you begin to kead it

You feel impossible to get a homogeneous mixture but do not despair !
Add the eggs and butter that you can rely on is melting and you will see that in a few minutes , just by applying a slight pressure of the hands will come to get what they want.

Aggiungete le uova ed affidatevi al burro che si sta sciogliendo e vedrete che in pochissimi minuti, soltanto applicando una lieve pressione delle mani arriverete ad ottenere quello che desiderate.

Here it is!
I tooks no more than 5 minutes.

I wrapped in transparent film and is ready to be put to rest in the refrigerator.
The rest is good but if you hurry you can also use it right away .

The problem with the pastry is often to pull a thin sheet without losing time.

Here's how to do it .
Remove from refrigerator and slice it, because slices will soften quickly the whole piece.

To roll out, place the dough between two sheets of parchment paper and it's  done.
What you see is my rolling pin.
It 's very thin and looks like a broom handle, but it is not. The type that is used in Greece to spread the sheets of pasta Phillo . 

The best TARTE TATIN

Tarte Tatin is one of best the desserts made with apples and it is also very easy to prepare. In addition if it is well made it looks very nice.

We can use the same method with other fruit and even with some vegetables and make a Tatin with pears or tomatoes, fennel , etc. . but the original is with apples and ... the best of all.
 
In this post, I’ve used pastry ready-to-use that you can buy in all supermarkets. 
But you can prepare it at home, like I did  quit often. 
The same applies to the Pate Brisé, the native dough of this French recipe .

For 6 people: 4 or 5 apples (about 1 kg) sweets end not chalky, ½ lemon, 25gr butter , 4 or 5 tablespoons (about 150gr) of sugar, pate brisé or pasta frolla ( ready to use ). 

Peel apples, remove the core, cut into quarters and each quarter again into 3 or 4 regular slices and thin enough.
From each medium sized apple, at least 12 slices.
Melt the butter in a large pan and pour the apples to brown gently for a few minutes.
You can also sprinkle with a little caster sugar.
Do everything quickly, this is only a preliminary step .

Now take a baking tin with low sides and large about 30 cm , pour inside the sugar and 2 tablespoons of water and make with it a light caramel by placing the pan on the fire and stirring with a wooden spoon for 5 minutes.

The sugar should melt but not darken to much. The caramel should to become of a clear honey color. Switch off.

It’s also possible to caramelize more apples and make them more colorful than what I did today , in the recipe in photography.
Place apples in baking dish and distribute over the entire bottom of the pan .
Now take the dough you have decided to use.
Gently take it out of its packet and lay it on the baking dish, placing the edges inside of the pan to completely enclose apples.
Bake at 180° C for about 25-30 minutes.
Be careful not to brown too much the dough .

Let cool and then turn it into a flat service dish wide enough, in the case apples and have still retained caramel syrup.
Serve preferably warm, accompanied by a small pot of cream or whipped cream or vanilla ice cream .
It’s a gorgeous dessert to lick your fingers.

 

Terrines, mon amour

Until about a century ago, terrines and pâtés, specialties of the south west of France, were one of the few systems available to store food.

As often happened in the food history, making a virtue of necessity, these recipes have been improved becoming often masterpieces of gastronomy.

Today refrigerators and freezers prolong considerably food freshness and modern shipping methods easyly allow to have fresh food on our tables so terrines are only pure gluttony.

It is not strange anyway that these preparations are popular in France, though certainly due to many contributions from different sources. Since ancient times, in fact, ancient Gauls were particularly skilled in the preservation of meat, as says Strabo. There was many methods used, as I will tell in future posts.

Making a terrine is neither difficult nor challenging but certainly requires time, especially for cooking. The base is a filling where meat is cut more or less thick and there's quite a lot of fat meat and animal fat. This filling will sink undamaged parts of flesh and entrails. The whole, well disposed in a bowl covered and sealed, should be cooked to medium-low temperature for at least 3 hours. The fat meat is essential and typically the animal fat that melts during cooking will cover the meat, sealing te filling that can, this way, will last longer.

The terrine described here today is based on wild rabbit, that in France they call Lapin de Garenne.

This recipe comes from Périgord, a region north of Toulouse and Montauban, famous for truffles and good food

Terrine of rabbit

Ingredients:

• A rabbit, chopped, or ½ rabbit and the corresponding weight of turkey breast.
• One or two slices of fresh bacon.
• 1 or 2 chicken livers, or one or two slices of calf liver.
• Few shallots
• 2 eggs, 2 tablespoons of flour
• Brandy
• 2 bay leaves
• Quatre épices
• Slices of bacon, or rather sweet pork lard not smoked

Clean the rabbit, keeping aside the innards (liver, heart and kidneys) that you will put together to the chicken giblets. Take completelycand carefully off the bones. Put asideto the best parts of the meat. Coarsely chop the rest of the meat. If you use also the meat of turkey, mix the minced rabbit.

Let giblets in cold water for about 15 minutes, changing several times the water so that all the blood in it comes out.

I use generally to massage chicken livers with a mixture of table salt and sugar and after I let it rest for at least ½ hour or longer. This treatment will greatly softens the flavor by removing a large part of their strong taste. At the end rinse them again with cold water.

Choise the better portions of chicken liver and add them to the rabbit meat that you had set aside and mince the resto of them with the bacon. Stir fry quickly in a pan the minced meat with some goose fat or eventually with a little butter .

Stir fry with some finely sliced shallot the chopped bacon and crushed chicken livers. Then add the minced meat of rabbit, mix well and season with ginger powder or with cinnamon, nutmeg , cloves and pepper (the so-called quatre épices ) as I do quite often. Moisten with a glass of brandy, thicken with 1 or 2 tablespoons of flour and 2 egg yolk and salt.

Before assembling, stir fry quickly the meat and liver that had put aside, fiammeggiandole with white wine or brandy. Set aside . Saltate velocemente in tegame anche le parti di carne e di fegato che avevate messo da parte, blazing with white wine or brandy and set aside.

Now, finally, take a oval mold suitable for pâtés or a Pyrex mold for plum-cake.

Arrange on bottom 2 bay leaves and then coated the bottom and edges with the slices of sweet bacon. Make a first layer of minced meat and place orderly on it the meat and the livers you have set aside, cut into rectangular sticks. Garnish here and there with some pistachio and also with a few slices of truffle, if you have any.

Cover with another layer of minced meat. Depending on the size of the pieces of meat you can do one or two layers. Finish with the stuffing that you will cover with the last slices of bacon.

Above all moisten with 2 tablespoons of brandy.

Tightly close the mold for pâtés welding the lid with a glue made by mixing thoroughly flour and water or close the plum cake mold with an aluminum foil in which you will make a small hole to allow steam to escape (the terrine for pâtés have a small breather in their lid).

Cook bain marie in the oven at 150°C for about 3 hours.

After cooking let cool. Then, remove the lid and pour some goose fat or some good pork fat melted, to fill the gaps sealing everything.

Close again with its lid and seal the edges with aluminum foil.

This bowl, in a cool place, will keep well for 2 or 3 weeks and even more.

Perfect accompaniment may be small pickles, a salad of mixed lettuce or some good sauce as wine sauce, sauce Chasseur or, better, a Périgueux sauce flavored with truffles. I'll talk of these sauce in some future post.

This terrine is a good appetizer in a formal dining but it's gorgeous for a quick breakfast, in all intimacy with friends.