Asparagus Soup

Per Nana~

A delicious soup that will be repeated again and again. 

I purchased two bunches of pencil thin green asparagus with the idea

 of making half the recipe and using the rest for dinner. However, it 

looked so good that I just kept going.  

Such an easy soup to prepare, I loved the combination of the leek and

 the white onion added to the asparagus. I did not have any sour cream

 or creme fraiche, so I grated some smoked cheddar that Tricia and I 

picked up in Vermont on one of our short holiday weekends. 

We truly enjoyed it. Sorry that I did not take too many photos,

 but all that matters is the end result  - and it was fantastic !

Per Tricia~

This truly was an easy recipe to prepare and the results delicious.

 We love soup in my family and all of my guys love asparagus, 

so this was a welcome combo.  

            I forgot to pick up fresh chives so decided to just go "au natural" with 

            the initial testing of this recipe, but look forward to adding garnishes 

            when I make this again. And I will be making this again. My younger

           son sat down and ate 3 bowls in a row- he loved it.  My husband added

           freshly grated Parmesan cheese and said he is looking forward to trying

           it served cold.  My older son James and I also gave it two thumbs up 

          and everyone agreed that they would like smoked bacon  crumbled on 

           the top next time since this makes just about everything perfect, no ? 

 Happy French Friday ~

Food Revolution Day !

Dorista's choice in honor of "Food Revolution Day". Food Revolution Day is a chance for people all over the world to come together and stand up for good food and essential cooking skills. It’s a chance for people to come together in homes, schools, workplaces and communities to cook and share their kitchen skills, food knowledge and resources. Food Revolution Day is a global day of action to raise awareness about the importance of good food and better food education for everyone.

The theme for this year’s Food Revolution Day is “Cook it. Share it.” – something all of us here at French Fridays with Dorie are passionate about already!

Per Nana~
Since this week is "cook's choice" I decided to prepare one of my favorite dishes. Roasted peppers are a perfect summer dish because peppers are in season. Hubby and I love them for topping a sandwich and they make a wonderful appetizer that I pair with anchovies.  I buy a small jar of anchovies that are marinated in olive oil with crushed red pepper. Dorie's recipe uses herbs, which I had never done before but the addition was fantastic. I broiled the peppers until they were blackened all around and then slipped them into a plastic bag to steam, so that the skins would loosen. 

When cool, I peeled the blackened skin, removed the stems and seeds and cut them into slices.  For my roasted peppers I use "Pompean" extra virgin olive oil. It has a flavor that just seems to work. Surprisingly, I never use that particular oil for anything else.  I am anxious to see what everyone else has chosen for this week's selection - I am certain it is going to be interesting !

Per Tricia~

Leave it to my schedule that the one French Friday where the theme is focused on coming together and sharing in cooking...and my family is spread out again. To make things fun (and logistically practical) I chose an uber easy recipe for Tzatziki. I had not made it at home but enjoyed it in restaurants and knew my guys would too. My older son agreed to make a version from his location as well - dual Tzatziki's ! The goal was to show him how truly easy it is to prepare such a yummy dip, and how fun it is to share it.  Mission accomplished. Happy bellies in all locations, with very little effort expended.

My version:

Easy and YUM.

My older son's results:

 

He reported that the dill and the garlic were too strong and he will cut back

 next time, but there WILL be a next time. Score one, Food Revolution Day ! 

He found it very quick and easy (would have been slightly harder if he had 

remembered to peel the cucumbers....:) and enjoyed serving it with the Naan. 

Great job James !!!

Happy Food Revolution Day  !

Coupétade

Per Nana~

I am definitely not a fan of bread pudding. 

 When Hubby and I were married in 1954 and returned from our honeymoon

 in Upstate New York, we found that my French mother had turned our 

leftover wedding cake into bread pudding. Back then, people did not do

 much in the way of freezing foods and my Mom never wasted anything.....

Also the texture of wet bread is GROSS. 

 If I order a Philly cheesesteak, it had better not be soggy.

For this week's recipe I decided to use panettone, an Italian specialty cake

 that was in from freezer from Christmas.  Since there are raisins and dried

 citron pieces in this case, I only added dried apricots. Panettone has a distinct 

flavor all it's own and I should have added the full 2 1/2 tsps of vanilla.  

The aroma while cooking the French toast was wonderful and the rest was 

easy enough to put together.  I baked it for 1 3/4 hours and Hubby tasted 

it when it had cooled a bit. He thought it was good, but he prefers my

 bread pudding made with panettone and crushed pineapple.

Personally, I prefer Texas style French toast with butter and syrup
 whenever we go to the diner. Not exactly healthy, but oh so good !  

I look forward to seeing how the rest of the Doristas made out with this one.

Per Tricia~

I am very lucky (or maybe cursed ?) since the "Le Bus" bread company
has it's only outlet across the street from my office.  For this dish, I
bought both challah and  brioche, but tested the recipe with the challah.

The trickiest part of the dish had nothing to do with the recipe and everything

 to  do with my not being able to get the heat consistent for the French toast.  

In hindsight I should have grabbed my griddle.

The already golden bread got a further suntan in the oven. I think the shape

 of  the  my bread ended up with too much exposed and this led to too much 

browning.  Next time I will watch it more.  Luckily I tested before the 90

 minute  mark and took it right out. I have no taste testers in the house so

 enjoyed a slice  myself. Lovely but there was no way this wasn't going to be

 with those ingredients :) All taste testers will be home tonight from college

 and elsewhere and this is a  wonderful  treat to remind them of what

 adventures occur in the kitchen each French Friday  ~

PS- that was the first I ever heard about the wedding cake being
 "repurposed"  by my own Nana.  Very cool and very funny.

Happy French Friday !

Creamy Mushrooms & Eggs

Per Tricia~
Sorry to report that we have no lovely photos to share, as unfortunately we had to cancel our trip the day of our flight. Nana had a particularly bad flare up of knee arthritis and this would not have worked with our grand plans for touring. 

Very disappointing indeed but luckily we have both been to Paris and the countryside on a few other trips together (Nana has several more trips under her lucky belt than I :) so please do not feel badly for us.  She is feeling much better but had a challenging few weeks, so it was clearly the right decision. And let's not forget that I have a son attending Boston University- yup- right in the midst of all the tragedy in that town we would have been miles and time zones away. 

Things do have a way of working out, no ? So we took a much needed "staycation" and recuperated all around.  We are refreshed and looking forward to catching up with our fellow Doristas.  Nana even managed to make last week's dish but when she reported the results, I took a pass :)                                         Sorry Dorie.

This week's creamy mushrooms and eggs, however, were a big hit. My guys love everything in this dish. I substituted Rhodes frozen dinner rolls as my market did not have brioche and they were the closest substitute (and I was not baking brioche this week.....).

My younger son said he would love the mushroom sauce on a burger with swiss cheese. Sounds like a plan....

Per Nana~
This week's recipe of creamy mushrooms and eggs were so good. I used English muffins instead of brioche and it worked out well.  The mushroom sauce was easy to prepare and the shallot gave it such a wonderful flavor.

Hubby and I both love poached eggs so putting this all together was a perfect light supper. I served a tomato salad on the side.  I will definitely be making this again and think it is perfect for a Sunday brunch. 

Since I did not post last week's swiss chard pancake recipe I will include it here as a make up.  

As much as I enjoy swiss chard, I was not pleased with this particular dish. The combination of onions, shallot and garlic was not one I cared for.  I filled the crepe with an old Italian recipe called Jambort/Gianbort (sp ??).  It consists of fried Italian peppers which are stewed in crushed tomatoes with seasonings.

I was very pleased that I made my very first crepe and now that I see how easy it is, I plan to make a regular crepe batter and top it with a sprinkle of sugar. When I was growing up my French mother often made sucre crepes and they are still one of my favorite desserts. 

 Happy French Friday~

Financiers

Our last post.......till we return from France in early May :)

PerNana:

Nana's "Yankee Doodle" financiers......Taking advantage of some

 of the odds and ends of ingredients left from our   recent recipes, I decided

 to use Dorie's "bonne idee"  and make the chocolate financiers.

I thought this was going to be a tricky recipe but it all came together easily.  

 The most important part was making beurre noisette, and even that 

worked for me.  I lined my mini muffin tins with paper rather than butter 

and flour, and they turned out great. I was afraid they might stick to the 

paper but they didn't. As I was chopping the chocolate into smaller pieces 

I realized that I did not have the 5 ounces called for, so I substituted 2 tsp

 of Hershey's cocoa.  It actually worked quite well and made a lovely ganache.

  When they came out of the oven all I thought about was stuffing them with 

whipped cream- they looked like Drake's Yankee Doodle cupcakes.

I actually did serve some with cream and they were good. 

This is a fun recipe and I am definitely going to the vanilla

 version and see how that works out. 

Per Tricia:

Sorry all, I couldn't swing this even if Nana had delivered my little

 tupperwares  of ingredients this week - but for a very good reason.  

Today is my last work day before taking a 3 week vacation with Nana 

to enjoy France.  Hence the downward spiral in my leaving comments 

(sorry  all !!)  and then being able to even get to the recipe.   Things are 

hectic at work and  home as we plan our adventure and we look forward to

 sharing our adventures when  we return in early May.

I will leave you with photos I took this weekend while waiting for my son

 to take a life guarding class.I took advantage of having to drive him an hour 

away and then kill time - so I  road tripped a bit further to the charming town

 of Lambertville, NJ.  I was stalking looking for the "Canal House Cooks"

 location and hoping they had something open to the public. 

Nothing (yet) open for their fans, but a glorious day to be in a lovely town 

and I did manage some paparazzi shots of their location. They have an 

amazing site & wonderful cookbooks if you have not already checked them out.   www.canalhousecooking.com

  PS- Kathy, the Canal House ladies were at the Bridgewater Commons 

mall's Williams Sonoma a week or two ago, but Nana and I couldn't 

swing it !  But we thought of you !! And Mary- I know you get their lunch
 emails so I was thinking of you as I stalked checked out their place :)

Pierre Hermés olive sablé

A novel use for an Easter egg ~ 

Per Nana ~

A very interesting recipe and simple to prepare. When I noticed  that the recipe called for potato starch, only 6 tbsp,  I thought why can't I just use more flour? I had no idea what I could  possibly use it for after making this recipe, plus I  have so many herbs,  spices, etc. left from other recipes.  However, I checked out the super  market and when I read that it was used for gravies and had  many  other uses, I decided not to be so cheap and purchased it.  To make it  even more economical I would share some with Tricia.  The recipe called for oil cured olives so I used "Greek olives", as they  are called in New York.  They have just the right amount of salt and I do  think it went well in this recipe. I  used  Pompeian olive oil, not sure if it is  considered a fruity oil, but it was a better choice than my garlic-infused  olive oil. The dough came together pretty well, and after refrigerating  overnight, the dough was easy to slice. I had divided the dough into three  rolls and planned to only bake one now and freeze the rest.  However,  once I tasted the first sablé - I baked the whole batch and haven't  stopped eating them since. All in all, this was a tasty little treat that  Hubby and I enjoyed it with a glass of wine.  I would like to make a note  regarding the MARTHA WRAP- the foil  backed parchment paper. This is the first time that I have used it and  found that for baking cookies or the above recipe, that the corners curled  up in the process.  I only used it for the first tray of sablés, then switched  to regular parchment paper which lasted through 3 more bakings. I'm not sure if this was intended for baking cookies, I know it only  mentioned being used for cooking  en papillote on the box.  I wonder  if anyone else has used this and had the same problem ?

Per Tricia~

Note the tupperware of ingredients presented to me by Nana.

 Impossibly, I still almost managed to mess this easy recipe up.
First, I completely forgot to actually add the olives as I pondered

 how silky my dough was. P&Q comments showed folks having issues

 of dry, crumbly dough - so of course I figured I had messed up the

 dough  when mine was not dry. After making the logs I realized my

 error, put them back into the bowl and tossed in Nana's adorable

 little container of olives. Which had not been chopped.

 Since she basically did my "mise en place"- I thought they were

 chopped. So I then picked them back out of the dough and chopped them. 

At this point my teenager had to leave the room because he was fearing

 the downward spiral of my mood (or perhaps he could not stand

 watching his Mother's continued failure......)

Aside from user error, the recipe was quite easy. The results were

 good but they missed the mark for my family. The olives were too 

subtle and we just didn't get that perfect balance between sweet and 

savory. The final verdict is that for a cocktail hour we would not 

repeat these when compared to Gougeres or Gerard's Mustard Tart

 or Batons- found elsewhere in the book.

Kudos to our admins for finding a recipe calling for the yolk of a hard-

boiled egg at Easter time - when we had lots of colored eggs to use up !

Lemon-Steamed Spinach

Quick, easy and Spring green ~
Per Tricia~

I was delighted that we ended up with a recipe that was more 

of a trick/technique than a standard recipe on this busy week.  

We celebrate the Easter holiday and while Nana is carrying the load and 

treating both our families to the Easter meal- it was a particularly busy 

week nonetheless. A perfect week for an easy recipe and I put this one to

 the test when I bought the spinach after 9 pm this evening.  The dish was

 knocked out within minutes of my arriving home from the grocery store.

Bonus points before I even tasted it :)

I could not believe that dressing the spinach before steaming it would work

 but it did and my husband raved about it.  Yes, he gets spinach snacks at

 9:00 at night and is happy to taste test any "Dorie food" at any time :)

 I had not dressed spinach with grated lemon zest before so he really 

enjoyed the flavoring while I appreciated the  technique and the lovely

 aroma as  it steamed - the lemon zest smelled wonderful.

My new taste tester.  Still getting used to the fact that cats can jump where dogs
 cannot- and no worries-my family did not get this portion to eat

 Happy Easter and Passover to those that celebrate ~

Per Nana~

I do not own a steamer so I improvised, as you can see from my photo.

Normally when I cook spinach I use olive oil with a bit of crushed red 

pepper and garlic.  As you know, spinach cooks very quickly and is 

done in a matter of minutes. This recipe was a nice change. 

I liked steaming the spinach and we enjoyed the flavor of the lemon. 

 All in all, this was a lovely side dish that I served with fish fillets. 

 Happy Easter to all who celebrate it.