bleudauvergne

Well, I'm back from vacation, ahem. I only gained back 2 pounds on my little sabbatical, which came as a suprise when I stepped on the scale this morning. It wasn't a complete fall off the wagon, in fact I've been very aware of every "cheating instant" for weeks now, and for that reason I haven't really been that bad, but I have had desserts and I have enjoyed a piece of bread with my cheese. Naughty me. I stopped stepping on the scale altogether for several weeks, and I stopped stage 1. A change of habits, i.e. going back to work after the summer break, had me a bit stressed out and the first thing to go was my Montignac plan. I was very busy. But now I plan to pull myself back in. At the market today, I sought out a special stone hearth oven boulanger that makes a real pain integrale, and got two loaves. This evening I cooked up some chicken livers. I have had a love affair with celery root for about two weeks now. So I decided to use the nice sweet flavor of the celery root to offset the flavor of the fois. Chicken livers, that is. This dish costs about 29 cents a serving to make, by the way. Lucy's Chicken Livers and Celery 1 celery root 5 juniper berries 4 French bay leaves juice of one lime 1/2 t. salt 1/2 t. pepper 1T. duck or goose fat or olive oil 4 T. chicken stock 250 grams chicken livers 6 prunes 1T. farm butter more salt and pepper to season Step One: Peel, cube, and grate 1 celery root. In a large bowl, mix the celery root, juniper berries, bay leaves, salt and pepper, and the juice of the lime. Combine well, and let Let macerate for one hour. At the end of the hour, put 1T. duck or goose fat or 1T. olive oil in a hot pan, and combine with 4T. chicken stock. Add the celery root, and turn several times while on high heat. Lower the heat to medium, cover and let simmer, turning two or three times, over the next 5 minutes. While this is going, put your livers on to saute (again in duck or goose fat or olive oil). When the 5 minutes is up with your celery root, drain it and press the juices into another pan, being careful to turn your livers and not to let them get overcooked. They should be pink inside when the dish is done. Watch them carefully. Cover and set the celery root aside, keeping it warm. Whisk a tablespoon of butter into your celery root juices over the heat and add 6 halved prunes when it thickens. Cook until warmed through. Put a mound of your celery root on a plate, placing chicken livers on that, and then garnish with a few prunes and some of the sauce. Season and serve immediately. Bon appetit! Vivia, I hope you're still around! All fruits are fine on the Montignac plan - and yes, cheese is OK if you are eating a lipid meal.

What a lovely description, lxt! I so enjoyed reading your experience. I wish I could contribute to this discussion with a dish from a restaurant I tried years ago and then today, to be able to compare and contrast. It's difficult for me to do because my main French culinary experience centers around preparing the food at home. One thing that I have remarked in general is that many of the recipes for tried and true classic dishes don't change with time. I was recently struck by the number of dishes in a 100 year old French cookbook I recently bought, are almost exactly the same as recipes for the same dish in contemporary cookbooks. Yes, the recipes have changed in format, i.e. the old ones incorporate the ingredients in the description of a dish, without the list at the top, and they have basic technical differences, but they really are the same formula, varying little. You often hear about people coming to France, ordering a dish at a restaurant, and then coming back 20 years later to find that it's just not the same, or that the chef has changed and the dishes have changed with the chef. This tells me that method and choice of ingredients play a huge role in the end product. I suspect that this the type of experience you are asking about. Can anyone share other dishes they've enjoyed in their favorite French restaurants, signature dishes or not, that they continue to come back for and enjoy as much as the first time they've experienced them? If your experience has been just the opposite, that things just aren't the way they once were, can you shed some thoughts on why you think this could be? p.s., lxt, please give me an idea of the size of the lobes you had at Lucas Carton. 200 grams? More? L

I usually blanch or steam them, depending on my mood. We usually prepare much more than we'll eat in one sitting and I love to serve them in various cold marinated salads, like 3 bean salad. They are a staple in my vegetable soup.

Such a lovely blog, Jack. That bread looks sublime. Do you fire up the oven often? How long did it take for you to get the oven built, concept to concrete? Nice project. Can you smoke things in it?

I'll ask at the magazine shop tomorrow.

It's true that we don't normally see smiling happy young waiters in colorful polo shirts, khakis and white sneakers bouncing up and greeting us with enthusiastic smiles the instant we approach the cafe. It boils down to a question of when the service starts for the French. You won't be ignored in a cafe if you are patient. Seat yourself, don't wait for a greeting, as it is not customary. The waiters are usually in constant motion and busy all the time. In fact, I don't think I've ever seen a waiter taking a break. If they are talking to another customer, part of their job, they will finish their discussion, as is the French custom in more places than cafes. (they also do this at the grocery store, butcher, baker, etc.) Here it is completely proper for them not to address you at all until they are taking the order - in most cases they won't even make eye contact to acknowledge your presence before they serve you, which some people interpret as ignoring. It's really just the custom. If you accept this and don't take it personally, your experience will be generally more agreeable. If you get wound up feeling ignored and act unpleasant when they do get to your table, you'll usually get the same coming back at you. It's also generally understood that if they are busy they will not take more time than absolutely necessary to take your order, unless, of course they are serving a regular customer, and in that case, they may stop to exchange words and keep their regular happy. The efforts to "improve service" are most likely rhetoric in reaction to a memo coming from somewhere, in my opinion. It's true that the French becoming more aware of the way the customs here are interpreted by international visitors, and the article show that. But whether it's going to make much difference in the long run, I'm not sure. The problems come in when people expect things that are not in the French way of doing things, people react with anger, and then both sides are insulted.

What you need to do, Bux, is to come here and cook for awhile. Your faith will return. There's been much talk about this year being especially good for mushrooms, and especially for truffles due to rain. The price for the real ones was nearly €1.00/gram for last year, this year should it should come down somewhat. I want to go mushroom hunting with someone who has some experience. Our recent attempt was a fiasco. John, do you have a recipe?

Is there one word? I mean, can I say "that paticular word" and mean spatchcock? - A verb is what I'm after. If the term is buried in names of dishes or some kind of description you give to a butcher, so be it. But when discussing, isn't there a verb for this action?

Yougurt, yes, available. But I don't know if that's an import or not. Not used in cooking, normally.

Most of my Chinese friends thought cheese was a disgusting rotten milk product, when I lived in China. It was almost impossible to find unless imported (ah I had a source of French brie...). There was one rather bland local cheese made in Beijing, like a Babayel (sp?) that managed to stay in business over three years, so I guess they sold enough. It was a relatively new product. Not everyone I knew was lactose intolerant, contrary to the popular belief that all Chinese are. People just thought that cheese was disgusting, that's all. On the other hand, tofu, served in all forms, new old, smoked, rotten, molding, and fermented, was always popular. I ate it all.

Today we decided we'd book a conference room on the sly and each bring something. We smuggled a bottle of wine in a box that once contained binding spirals (wine's allowed, we just don't want to look like we're having a great time, that's all, people would get jelous). Jacqueline made a lovely terrine d'aubergines with a tomato coulis. Rita contributed a tablecloth and a jar of rabit confit maison. I slathered leftover mushroom soup on toasts painted with jest a little bit of duck fat and salt and then topped them with lettuce and braised carrots and called it a "sandwich" (very bad idea hatched at 06h30 this morning but that's ok because I'm American.) Someone brought 6 servings of fromage blanc. Someone else a bottle of water and a large chocolate bar. Someone else, leftover eclairs which she'd carefully sliced and presented. In short, lunch. They talked and I listened, politics, the office, until the topic turned to food. First they ranted and raved about their teenage sons eating them out of house and home! I could not believe this conversation because it is exactly the one that has taken place here on e-gullet in the past couple of days. "you fill the fridge on Monday and it's empty by Wednesday!" "Pasta. Pasta is the answer." "the girls, they eat much less". (strangely they attribute this to "control" and not the growth factor) Then it goes to Jacqueline's terrine. Then, the whine. I'm cooking the same thing over and over again, I have no ideas. I speak. When I speak, people usually listen because I'm usually silent. "I have an idea. Take a chicken. A good chicken fermier. Push tarragon, parsley, and sage under its skin, slather the outside with butter and garlic, and put it on the broche. " "I usually add cheese to my herbs. Stuff it nice and full" "Oh you can stuff just about anything under the skin, sausage, it's wonderful." "Under the skin? What? What do you mean?" (lady with no ideas) "Well you have to not be afraid to touch a chicken..." (laughter.) "My husband and I used to do this a lot when we were first married. But what we'd do is cut it, and flatten it, and cook it like that." (she's got her hands together and spread, palms down, to show.) "Yes, to cut and flatten is good". "I'm going to do that, tonight, yes." I'm thinking, 'these women are spatchcockers, they are'. But is there a term for this in French? A cooking term? Please advise.

Boris, from what I understand of the article, the PDO is sought only by the Swiss. A quick search shows that three appelations with the term :Emmental are already protected in Europe under AOP (German?) Or IGP (Indications géographiques protégées) - Allgäuer Emmentaler (AOP) (Allemagne), Emmental de Savoie (IGP) (France) et Emmental français est-central (IGP) (France). It will be interesting see how this plays out.

Your coverage of this has inspired me to plant some grape seeds in a pot and put them on my windowsill... In the meantime I eagerly await you next installment!

When it comes to certain products, it's pretty clear that knockoffs and cheap imitations that hop on the gravy train, and eventually become known in their parts as that product are all over the place, and something should be done to stop it. Look at Meunster Cheese in the states. Champagne. etc. Something really should be done to protect the orignal product. Then again you'd think that after a product exists for a certain amount of time and becomes a common name, they should have the right to keep using it. They're talking about a cheese with the name "Emmental" in Germany that has been made for over a hundred years, and it's clearly a completely different product from the original Swiss, but it doesn't claim to be Swiss. I can certainly understand the Swiss perspective and their desire to protect the name. When I buy Emmental, I basically think I'm getting a product from a certain place and I know that type of cheese. If I saw a package of some industrial product that clearly wasn't the product I was expecting in an emmental, I'd pass it by and go look for the real thing. The sad thing is that some people have never tried the original and they encounter one product and think it all is like that. Jurisdiction is the big question. I think that if they protected "Swiss Emmental" it might be ok.

Bux, you're embarrasing me. But I am really happy that you and Esilda enjoyed yourselves, because we both felt like it was a real pleasure to have you and to cook for you. And we thank you heartily for the California Zinfandel from the Pagani Ranch which is going in the cave for a special occaision. We just can't find this wine here.

Dave, where do you look for them? Under what kind of tree or in what conditions can a person find them? You must have been really tired at the end of the day. How did you come into this agreement with the restaurant? It sounds great. About the cauliflower mushroom, I say soup. You might try just a little soup, anyway...

I am following with interest! Please may I ask a stupid question: What is rusk? Thank you.

About 15 minutes before Bux and Esilda arrived, I put some thought into what I might serve with the aperitif. I know, cutting it close, but I rarely ever have a big plan for anything complicated with aperitif anyway. I was thinking I might serve olives and gratons, which were goose cracklings (sometimes they are pork but these were goose), but as I was putting them in a dish, I tasted one and realized they tasted a bit old. I changed my idea and decided to make a spread on little toasts. Last spring we ate at a restaurant in Megève called Michel Goudin. Although the meal was generally a disappointment, one thing that I did enjoy was an amuse bouche that tasted like a liver paté in which had been incorporated some pain d’épices (or at least that’s what it seemed like to me). This was what popped into my mind just before they arrived, and I mashed some pain d’épice with some fois gras paté, and seasoned it. Spread on little bite sized flute toasts, and topped them with little slivers of fresh fig for color. Just as I was finishing up with the figs, the bell rang. They arrived at precisely the right time, with apologies for being late, which made us feel at ease at once, because this precisely the way things are done here. Under normal conditions, something must always happen to delay guests’ arrival. This gives the hosts ample time to tend to last minute touches. For Bux and Esilda, well, they got a little bit lost, and it was raining, so everything turned out fine, although I was sorry they were caught in the rain! What a wonderful and interesting couple! We had a great time. To start, Loic fixed some kir royales, with which we had the toasts, and green olives which the pits have been cracked to give them a bitter flavor, and small black niçoise olives. Our first course at the table was my favorite octopus recipe (thank you Hathor, for the idea!), which I prepared on Sunday, served over small mounds of celery root rémoulade. This was served with a 1999 Domaine de d’Elise Bourgogne blanc from the town of Chablis. Click here for recipe w/pics for the Octopus Next were escargots served in their shells with all of the implements and sizzling in their herb butter, with the same wine. While the escargots were in the oven, I took a moment to start a soup: VELOUTE FORESTIER Made on the occaision of Bux's visit to Lyon, September, 2004 1T. leftover fat from some confit de canard 1 small eggplant, peeled and cubed 2 small courgettes, washed and cubed 6 medium fresh cèpes, stems peeled to remove dirt, roughly chopped. About 2 cups home made chicken stock (this had been made with cèpes over the weekend) About 2 T. flat parsley leaves 2 cloves roasted garlic or one 10 gram black truffle. 3T. creme fraiche epaisse 2T. fresh farm butter Salt & Pepper Sauté the vegetables for 3-5 minutes, until they start to give off their juices. Cover the vegetables with stock, and add the parsley. Once it comes to a boil, reduce the heat to low and simmer, covered, for 15 minutes. Add the roasted garlic (at this point I searched in vain for the garlic and did not realize that my husband had thrown it away, thinking that I had absentmindedly put some icky burned peels in a small plastic container. Therefore an emergency measure was taken and the truffle was tossed into the soup with a wish and a prayer!) After 5 more minutes of simmering, put the soup in the blender with 3T. crème fraîche épaisse, and 2 T. fresh farm butter au lait cru (made from unpasturized milk). Blend until smooth and creamy. Adjust seasoning, and serve in hot bowls with a thin slices of truffle on top and a sprig of chevril. This soup would be great using roasted garlic instead of truffle. Afterthoughts on the soup: I think it would have been a better color if I had peeled the courgettes. The soup was served with a Graves, a 1999 Chateau de Callac. After the soup, we had a simple plate of mixed greens with vinaigrette. Then came the cheese plate. The one thing I was careful to do in advance was to prepare that. Photo of the plate after service... Starting at 2 o'clock: Comte St. Nectaire Brie St. Marcellin Brin de Marquis Le Garnoire (H. Vienne) Rove de Garrigues (x2) Banon Fermier Epoisse in the center I went to les Halles to choose the cheeses and took pictures there. They have a really wonderful selection there and you can usually find exactly what you want. My first stop was Le Cellerier. I chose A Gournoire from the Haute Vienne (circled with blue) and a Banon Fermier. I really wanted Bux to try the Roves de Garrigues, and I noticed that the Fromagerie Marechal in Les Halles had it fresh, and also about 2 weeks old. I picked up one of each so we could taste how the flavor develops with age. Époisse was a must. I also got some Brin de Marquis, a Corsican brebi to add some variety. Unfortunately I did not think to take a picture of the cheese plate before we served it, and it was really very dark - too dark for a good photo after the cheese course. Sorry. Last, we served a nice lemon tart from a pâtissière in our old neighborhood, called La Gribiche. Their lemon tarts are so good that we order from them and make the trek to get them whenever we have an excuse. I called in the order yesterday morning and Loic went to pick it up after work. No, I did not follow the diet at ALL last night.

I considered a gras double, but reflection into the matter has got me thinking on a completely different tack. Bux and his wife have been visiting with friends, who live here in France. They have, undoubtedly, been treated the that the best that the bas Languedoc has to offer, in a plentiful celebration among friends. Knowing their clear enthusiasm for all things culinary, their hosts have already undoubtedly served them obscene amounts of the things we don't get much outside of France. This is my first consideration. My second consideration is that they ate here in Lyon last night. Where, I don't know. They could have gone out for a bowl of clear broth and a light salade composee drizzled with aged basalmic vinegar. But my guess is that given their one night to eat in a restaurant here, they chose local fare, which is invariably served in large quantities in restaurants and has a good chance of being heavy. (this is only a guess) Thus I am going to prepare a meal from my kitchen after hearing what they've eaten these past few days. I have the basics ready, and bits of this and that already prepared. I'm going to see how they feel and execute accordingly, this way too I won't be cooking from a recipe ... Chicken stock - check Various leftover meats - check Just a little rillettes and gratons - check One cold appetizer prepared over the weekend - check Roasted garlic - check Market Vegetables for a veloute if that's best- check Beautiful cepes - check Herbs of various kinds, tarragon, sage, chevril, parsley, and chives - check Olive oil, gras de canard, gras de oie, and butter. Fruits - figs, r. claudes, plums, grapes, mirabels - check Wines for every possible course and theme (cave) - check Makings for simple salad - check Cheese - check It's been raining and it's rather cool, we'll see.

Since Bux could be reading this thread, mum's the word for me until after dinner Tuesday!

Hmmm, that looks like a great recipe. It would work well with leeks too.

It's a good time of the year for a light soup. I was thinking for the first course an escargot watercress soup with fennel. Or maybe a light creamy mushroom soup, incorporating escargots as a garnish? Anyway I'll be going to the market tomorrow and Sunday. I'll report back on what looks good.

When alone: 1 glass wine + cheese plate = dinner hey not all the time but it works in an emergency!

Just near the intersection with route 3, between Watertown and Dexter New York, a woman in a long black patchworked gown with her head in a scarf squats duly by her wooden shack displaying a sign: “Home Garden Vegetables”. We were home this summer from France, and we’d made a run to the city for food, where we’d perused the waxy finished cool spritzed aisles of peppers and spotless bundles of carrots imported from hothouses afar. I’d looked with interest, but thought twice about buying, nothing looked just right in the produce section. We’d loaded up on cases of beer, dozens of fresh bagels for the crowds and pounds of Philadelphia cream cheese. We’d gathered large scoops of shrimp for the barbie, big packs of sausage in various forms, and I’d finally chosen three shiny halepeno peppers (for salsa). We were on our way to the lake. The sun was getting low and glowing near the horizon over the flat open plains scattered with enormous rolls of freshly bundled hay, and there was a cool steady wind coming from the direction of the ever-present body of water that was still miles away, making the trees that lined the fields all lean to one side in unison. The rusting yellow traffic light swaying in the breeze at the center of the intersection turned its mechanical green and we wound our way across the farmland in the direction of the last town before our turn off. We found ourselves drawn over just then, our tires grinding in the roadside gravel on the warm summer roadside. In comparison to the mountainous vast landscape of every conceivable vegetable imaginable for sale at the supermarket, at first, the little baskets looked meager and tired. The haggard woman stood like a pool of stillness, sucking in light, and watching us very steadily with no expression as our gaze drifted over the carefully laid out selection. We’d have to get something; we couldn’t make a big to do about pulling over to the side of this rural route and then not buy. I searched for something, anything. Alright, I’ll take some celery. She grasped the muddy but firm bunch of long stems in her sun browned fist and put it into a dingy looking old plastic bag that had been crumpled and tucked into something for a long time, it seemed. OK, and these potatoes. These things are going to need a scrubbing, I thought. Oh, and look, there are some beets. They lay 4 in a row, like sick kittens lined up with their wilted leaves but I knew just what to do with them. I’ll take them all. Oh, there’s beans. A quart of crisp string beans were turned into a sack, as she guarded the baskets in a stack behind her. Plums. Take those plums. She put them in a separate plastic bag. Hey, did you see this garlic! Perfect tight little heads in bouquets loosely tied by their hard stems, like a bunch of pickup sticks. Do you see anything else? We greedily pointed at one thing after the next until she was heavily laden with sacks along both sides of her long black skirts. Alright. Done. We searched for cash and found the right change in just the glow from the horizon that spread up into what was going to be a magnificent night sky. The woman still hadn’t spoken – and she shocked us with the gruffness of her voice. “God Bless You.” I responded with the same and a smile. She then spoke in her mysterious language. “Karrrnobruuk”. I repeated the word, rolled my R’s and mimicked exactly the word she had articulated to me with a flourish. This must mean God bless you in her language, I thought. The woman waved her hands from side to side in my face as if to stop me, her cragged face suddenly taking an energy we hadn’t seen before. "NO, YOU. Kar." She animatedly pointed to my mother’s Buick sedan. NO. she said, wagging her finger. We patiently tried to get the gist of her message. “Kar no broken. For you. God bless you.” The words tumbled in groups from her mouth. At home. In the bustle of the kids and kites, sounds of the downstairs fridge being loaded, Lolo playing the piano, my brother recounting a race tale from the cozy nook, I went straight to the sink and put the beets on to boil, snapped and stringed the beans, got things simmering, as the meats sizzled out on the deck. Home and all is well. The brush felt right in my hand as I scrubbed the potatoes, and when the beets came out of their burgundy liquor, their skins slid off in happy complicity. I sliced them and served them bare. What a glorious feast we had! So fresh and clean and crisp and good for us. The children asked for more beets, their mother beamed with delight. “We like Aunt Lucy’s beets!” they squealed. After the meal we all gathered on the dock with blankets to look at the stars. And I told them the story of the lady from forest in the Ukraine who fixed things with a magic word.

I love tartiflette too. And it's a nice idea but I just can't serve it, it's too hot right now in Lyon. We'd all be sitting around feeling like we were in a hot sauna by the time I got finished cooking it, and then once we'd had a plate we'd all fall asleep right there at the table. Anyway, here's a Link to the tartiflette recipe and pics (I just love that we can link to the individual posts so easily now!) I want to try these savory sorbets being offered at Nardonne, though. If I serve a mini itty bitty tartiflette and then follow it with a nice cool savory sorbet... Nah. It'll never work. Tripes are good, very good idea pedro, but if they both love em you know they'll be ordering them when they eat out in Lyon the night before... But just for discussion's sake, lets say I prepare some tripe. What would I build around it to make a memorable meal? I'm going for the whole ensemble here. What have you seen tripe served with? Wines? Types of Salad? Entree? I need a theme here.