bleudauvergne

Hey! Ho! Wait a minute! I've taken about 54,876 bad photos in my day! About the restaurant thing, I'm sure this will be a repeat of what someone else said, but for the most part, restaurants have wierd lighting and its dificult to get good photos, especially at night. For that reason I gave up taking photos in most restaurants and now only draw pictures. But that's really not the issue here. It's that the chef personally came out and barked at this guy during their meal and then sent them a cease and desist letter through her attorney. Dude, if there's anything that will turn me off to a restaurant is getting attacked by a chef. It has never happened to me before, but I think if it did, it would possibly give me nightmares or at least make me lose a little sleep, especially if they threaten to sue me for expressing my love of food in a hobby like a full time blog -- My sympathies go out to the guy this happened to!

I decided to read your blog today from the beginning - I love the rhythm you take - and the ground you cover - It is just the juice I need today as I get myself ready to get my requisite words on the hermit computer (it doesn't have a connection). Thank you for everything you give us, Marlena. You are so beautiful in your ways and the food sounds just right, so many things reverberate just exactly with what's been on my mind. How do you do it? I can't wait for your new book.

Great work indeed! That looks wonderful. I am inspired and just wanted to pop in and say I love this blog. The tuna and the oysters plate looks simply beautiful. I like the counterpoint of the simply presented sardines. Yum.

I only took extra condiments once. I was at a Taco Bell on my visit home. When I go home I have to have taco bell once. We were at the checkout, and I paid with the visa. I lapsed into a daydream and the girl said, if you approve of the total, press OK. I did, and then I realized that the total sum was $1.00 more than the 6 dollar cost, I had been charged an extra dollar. Confused, I told the girl I thought the total was wrong. I looked at the machine, and there was a sticker that said simply: "$1 charge". When I had seen it at first I didn't realized that it meant they were going to charge each and every transaction and extra $1. I told the girl I did not realize that I was going to be charged about 18% extra for lunch just be using the card, and wanted to cancel the transaction. She looked at me with a flat challenging stare and said: "You pressed OK". I felt justified in filling my take out sack with all flavors of salsa. We brought them back to France. Silly, I know. Blame the whole thing on culture shock.

I was thinking of serving Bloody Mary's for a brunch which will have the New Orleans theme. I got this recipe from a French book La Cuisine de Louisianne in which they also give some historical details which may or may not be correct. (I am not sure they did a whole lot of fact checking for this book due to some obvious misinformation in other parts of the book). Their recipes come from New Orleans Chefs. Here's what they said: The drink is named after Mary I of Tudor, (1516-1558) Queen of England and Ireland who was nicknamed "Bloody Mary" due to her heavy handed tactics with the Protestants at the time. She married Phillipe II of Spain. (they then list the ingredients on the bottle of the Worcestershire sauce and where to find it in France) The recipe: 1/5 measure Worcestershire Sauce Tabasco to taste (they say two drops but come on...) 1 Measure Vodka 2 Measures Tomato juice the juice of 1/4 lime ice cubes. Put the ice cubes in a tumbler 1/2 and add the lime juice. Add the other ingredients and stir. I tested this recipe just now, breaking this down to 1 T. W sauce to 1/3 cup Vodka and 2/3 cup tomato juice, and 1/2 a lime to get two modest sized Bloody Marys. I think the recipe is a good one.

What is this thing with the flowers we come bearing to dinners - coming in odd numbers only?

Yes, please heed Bux's remarks about the cooking. Bourdelaise, the juniper based marinade for a leg of lamb is very good - I take it (and my laziness) one step further and marinate the leg with green Charteuse periodically over two or three days, and pierce it with slivered garlic along with the grain of the meat to make sure you don't lose the juices when you cook it. I give it a good smear of duck fat and a corse salting and spin it on the broche (rotisserie). We did this just before Christmas. In winter, served with white beans with whatever aromatics I've got hanging in the kitchen, this is one of my favorite special meals for guests, one they won't forget. Remember to catch the drippings and make a sauce... If you get it sous vide with Chartreuse, you might only have to use about a half cup!

It is sausage made from the chopped entrails. Whether or not a person loves it or not, I think, really depends on the first experience. My first andouillette experience was very positive, in fact, I did not think it tasted "poohey" at all! Knowing what it is and making the decision to order it is the first step in establishing a good relationship with Andouillette. The next step is to appreciate the texture, the flavors, especially with the mustard... It is a special dish that you either love or you hate. Bux's photo of the Andouille, which is a sausage made from the same thing but they are not chopped up, brings back memories of when we toured Britanny. I noticed that like a lot of foods in this country, the local products taste better when they are delivered directly from where they are made. I have no doubt that Bux's andouille comes straight from Brittany - and that it was a real pleasure to eat. In fact, here in Lyon I can't find andouille anywhere as good as the kind I had sliced in my crepes in Brittany. Maybe I'm just not looking hard enough, I'm not sure. Andouillette is a local product here in Lyon and we serve it at home from time to time. The quality varies significantly from butcher to butcher. Once you find one that pleases you, don't forget where you bought it! Sometimes people make a gratin of Andouilette here in Lyon, but I personally think it's simply perfect just plain fried up and served with frites and plenty of mustard or a mustard sauce. When I make a mustard sauce for andouillette (the sauce is optional, really), I always make it with very good mustard and a stock base instead of cream or milk. I think creamy mustard sauces make the meal seem heavy. There is also the famous Andouilette de Troyes, which has enough of a good reputation for restauanteurs to note it's provenance on the menu when they have it. Maybe someone who has had some experience with it can tell us more about it. I have only had it once, when we were driving through the Bourgogne countryside.

I asked the butcher about cooking in the pouch and he said that it is just for packing and not for cooking. Boy that andouillette looks deliious!

What have I not been inspired to cook on eG? Here's one example. Yesterday I had an errand in Chinatown. All of those threads in the China and Elsewhere in Asia forums kept coming to mind. It has become so much easier to imagine preparing all kinds of things at home that I never would have thought of! A couple of years ago, my radar for certain things was limited to what I had learned in cooking lessons in Beijing, and now when I go through an Asian grocery I find myself reading labels and being able to judge the things they have much more easily. Now my trips to Chinatown are much more fruitful and entertaining. Another thing is the Pastry & Baking forum. Although I can't really participate since where I live the flour is different, that doesn't stop me from being inspired again and again by all of the beautiful wonderful desserts that people are making. What particular posts or threads have inspired me enough to change my habits? Definitely the EgCI classes. MobyPs pasta threads got me making pasta (much cheaper and better than buying it, and easy!), and I have gotten in the habit of preparing consomee regularly. I also get a lot of inspiration from the dinner thread. Another thing that eG has done is to inspire me to share what I learn on a daily basis.

Kitchen diaries. I write it all down. The books are filled one by one. I paste the map of the place I live when I start the book on the outisde. Each dish gets a number and every week or so I update the contents which are in some blank pages I leave at the beginning of the book. As the seasons roll by, I then categorize the contents into the yearly seasons with brackets. For me, the important thing is to write it down right after dinner, or the next morning. Definitely make it a point to remember what you are doing! Just kind of replay in your head what you did, most of those blurry moments will come back to you if you try! I now serve a lot of things that just came to me as flashes of inspiration with what we had a long time ago. Just make it a habit to write it down while it is fresh in your mind! Write down things you think will be easy to remember, too, and also dates and variations, because don't worry, you'll forget them if you don't write them down. Don't forget to write detailed notes on your ingredients too, because if what made a dish great was a certain type of sage sold at the market that day, you want to remember that! Take pictures and paste them in. That reminds me, I have to write something down in my book... Hey, Welcome to the forums, btw! Great topic!

Link to Article Yes, as I suspected, in the first paragraph of the section entitled "Data and Methods" on page 4, we see that indeed these statistics are based on sales: and page 5: So all of the wine purchased by tourists is counted as French "consumption". Lets face it, wine is a major major industry here, and well integrated into the tourism industry. A whole lot of it is sold here and delivered abroad, but I doubt that if you counted actually what the French are drinking, you would get anything close to the figure above.

I wonder if this researcher is basing his stats on wine sales. Because I can tell you that here in France we buy cases and cases more than we actually drink (it goes into the cave), and we use wine freely in cooking. A bottle of wine is given as often as a bouquet of flowers in a social situation. I'd say that wine circulates (is bought and sold) much more in this country but I have serious doubts that these stats could be based on actual personal consumption.

Boy you guys sure are scientific about it - I just cooked it till it started smelling done! Excellent note, Lori, about the changes in cooking time for the terrine that you have chilled overnight. It will be interesting to note the differences in texture. So with the terrine, we generally cook it at a rather low temp a rather long while. Since they contain a mix of meats, often pork, poultry, and other meats, we should be careful to cook it through. The Terrine des deux lapins, above, cooked for an hour 15 mins and then sat in the oven for an additional 15 minutes. Besides smelling done, I also went on the color of the juices (clear). It will continue to cook once out of the oven. Lori cooked hers to 140F/about 65C. For those who have prepared terrines and used thermometers, what temps were in your recipes? Lori, it looks very good. Once you slice it you'll see, it will be beautiful. But do wait as long as you can. The longer you wait, the better it tastes.

Leave it in the terrine until you're ready to slice and arrange your platter. Some nice fresh greens around the edges, some of the herbs you used in the terrine... I love your terrine dishes, by the way.

Wow Moby, that looks like a fine terrine! Now where did you get this idea to run the meat through a tamis? Was it worth your obvious hardship, will you do this again, or are we better with a rough marinated chop? Give me more tasting notes!

This looks like one magnificant terrine. Wow! Can you tell us more about the way it tasted? Was it all about leeks or did you feel that the flavor of the meats were strong enough to hold their own? Salt? How much did you use?

I have eaten a pate de campagne from the butcher but not prepared any. How do you plan to arrange your terrine platter, Lori? Garnish ideas?

Wow, this all looks excellent! The weighing down is important. Use a nice sharp knife when you do slice it, Lori, the results are much better. About how long a terrine stores, if you make a terrine today or tomorrow, weigh it for a day and leave it covered in the fridge, on Christmas it will be just wonderful. I'd say that a terrine will last unsliced for at least 2-3 weeks. My policy is to let a terrine sit for five days to a week before cutting it. Remember terrines are listed in the old time cookbooks as a means of preserving meats, they'll keep. Don't forget your salt. Lori, your idea of keeping a little of the forcemeat on the side is one I always follow, too. I like to stuff veggies with it the day I actually cook the terrine. For weighing down, I use a piece of cardboard which I have covered with foil cut slightly smaller than the top of the terrine, to give it a chance to sink as much as possible. On top, I place inverted ramekins or cups, or anything that will allow the board top to sink down as much as possible and then balance a stack of big books on top. I manually push it down pretty hard with even pressure all over, and let the juices seep over the edge into another container. I pour off the juices from time to time, and leave it for about 4 hours to cool and press before placing it in the fridge for 5 days to a week (removing the books before chilling). Details to illustrate how much it should be pressed down: Before going into the oven it was slightly mounded above the top of the terrine. Here is a photo of it ready to slice. Note that the top now is significantly lower than the top edge of the recipient. An image of this final Terrine des Deux Lapins (wild and farm raised), which was served during my last foodblog.

From comparisons of the American cuts and the French cuts, I see that the bavette d'aloyau (no. 22 of the French cuts diagram) is a combination of the the tip end of the American flank plus the bottom sirloin (tri-tip) combined. Thanks for the both the sites which are interesting to compare.

I'm going to have my "grillade" at lunch today at the same place where they said it was a Lyonnais specialty when it was called the pierrade. I'll ask some questions about that. I suspect that they may have said this to add to the romance... We'll see.

Yes, at CDG they are notorious nail clipper and manicure equipment snatchers. Last time my hubby went to California, though, on the return trip, someone at the L.A. airport actually removed the blades from his safety razor from the dop kit in his checked baggage! He had to go to an important meeting looking all scruffy! Food items, though, normally can be taken onto the plane and consumed there if they won't make it through on the other side.

I think that's what it is, Margaret. The ones I have seen in restaurants are square.

It's this thing where they bring out a hot stone to the table along with the meats and you cook it there at the table. Here's a translation of the page entitled "Everything about La Pierrade" (emphasis theirs). The rules state that you must buy a license to use the name, and renew it yearly if you want to Pierrade, Serve La Pierrade at your restaurant, or sell cooking stones. Not only that, but on your menu, you must put the registered trademark sign after it. Click here to register and pay the fee (which is €110 per year). There are links to two books that 'confirm' that legal judgements have upheld that Pierrade is a trademark and can be used only with permission. It's silly!

I went back to the restaurant that served the Pierrade, and since that time (about 5 years ago) they changed the name of the dish to grillade. I haven't had a chance to talk to them about it yet but will ask when we do go.