FrogPrincesse

Two-bite one-chip cookies

Now that I have the book, I am wondering what recipe to begin with! It's a very heavy book by the way, square format, over 500 pages. It's a minor detail but I don't care much for the thinner and glossy paper it's printed on. It makes me paranoid that I am going to rip one of the pages if I am not careful. Also the look of the book is a bit plain. I think they could have done a bit better to make it more visually appealing. But again, these are minor details of little importance if the content is good!

This week's dinners (when I remembered to take a picture! ) Monday: a grilled ribeye with an insane cap (about 1/2 the size of the steak), baby potatoes (cooked in the pressure cooker), oven-roasted eggplant. Wednesday: grilled lamb loin chops with chimichurri sauce (April Bloomfield's recipe), baked carrots with thyme, cumin and vermouth (Jamie Oliver; the dry vermouth was substituted for white wine), smashed potatoes with herbes de Provence. Friday: a traditional quiche Lorraine (Anne Willan) served with a red leaf lettuce salad.

Reading Amaro, so I automatically reached for my bottle of Cynar last night. Little Italy (Audrey Saunders) with Rittenhouse rye, Cocchi vermouth di Torino, Cynar, brandied French griotte cherries (and a bit of the (boozy, kirsch-flavored) syrup from the cherries).

I prefer smaller chunks myself, so I just slice the fruit a bit thinner than what she calls for in her recipes. But it really depends on the size of the fruit. If you use small apricots and cut them in half, it works out fine, but if they are large obviously you need to cut them further. Here is a local jam, Waters Catering's Meyer lemon vanilla bean "marmalade". I used the quotation marks because it is runny unlike a traditional marmalade, not jewel-clear, also less caramelized. But you know what, it is delicious. The Meyers lemons are great in there, they are bright, slightly tart, with a flavor that reminds a bit of bergamot and that is anchored by the vanilla.

Haha. I can see that, although being French and somewhat of a purist, I rarely think of mixing fruit with my cheese! But you are right, that sounds pretty great.

And here is the fig & vanilla jam on toasted bread this morning. It is a bit sweet but super flavorful, and the pieces of fig are almost candied. Excellent in small doses. I am going to serve some with foie gras in a few days for a dinner party...

I also made this Fig & Vanilla jam (Christine Ferber). I used black mission figs from Specialty Produce that are local (and organic). I went into the area where they keep all the local produce, and asked someone who works there what fruit was at its peak right now and that is what they recommended. And I wasn't disappointed! From the minute I cut them, I had to fight the urge to eat them all before using them in my jam. I had to go back after the jam was made to buy more so I could eat them as is. The jam set very easily after about 12 minutes of vigorous boiling. At my thermometer it never reached 105C that she says to target, it was closer to 95C but I am pretty sure it will be fine. Day one - preparing the fruit and pre-cooking Day two - cooking and transferring into jars

Here is an interesting documentary about jam (in French), covering its various aspects including an annual jam festival/competition, small-scale artisanal methods (Christine Ferber makes an appearance), and large-scale industrial production.

Christine Ferber's Quince Christmas jelly (with orange, lemon, cardamom, cinnamon). This was a very small test batch with a single pineapple quince. I cooked it briefly (10 minutes, without checking the temperature - I have since watched a couple of her videos and she seems to boil her jams much more vigorously than I do) and it doesn't seem to have completely set (let's call it a "soft set"...), so I am giving it a few days before I try it. I did thoroughly lick the pot however, and it was really delicious then.

You are very brave!

Page 87 - 220 are cocktail recipes (with plenty of full-page pictures). Pages 223 - 233 have a small section on making your own amaro, with four recipes.

My local bookstore had a copy of it, so I was able to resist for about a second and a half... It is a collection of recipes for the most part, but there are some interesting stories interspersed.

@Pooya KhodadadiYou are very welcome! Please report once you've tried it!

It is, and 51 people already own the book! Also there is a large portion of the book on preview on amazon. My own copy is arriving on Saturday. I pressed the buy button last night! She wrote that it is the book she had been wanting to write since she began writing cookbooks 25 years ago, so it's absolutely packed full of recipes. I justified the purchase telling myself I bought it for my daughter so she can have new cookies as a snack every week, and maybe she will be inspired to bake some of them with me...

Unfortunately I am pretty sure this is NOT an intentional parody...

I forgot to post this last month apparently. I was gifted a bag of amazingly fragrant and ripe passion fruit, so I made pavlovas with them. That was quite a treat!

I can't remember what I bought that day, but sometimes I just like watching! This is Holiday Wine Cellar in Escondido, and it's only a small part of the selection. Whiskey More whiskey And more whiskey Rum. They didn't have the Hamilton I was looking for. More rum & rhum Gin

A Negroni variation with 33 Portland dry gin, Campari, Cocchi vermouth di Torino, amaro Ciociaro. Amaro Ciociaro is delicious stuff, and it's great on its own too. This was inspired by the A-Frame but with Torino vermouth instead of Chinatto.

Reverse Brooklyn (Erik Ellestad) with Cocchi vermouth di Torino, High West American Prairie bourbon, Bigallet china-china, Luxardo maraschino. This is very well done. It's hard to find well-balanced aperitif/lower alcohol cocktails.

@tanstaafl2Thanks for sharing your tasting notes! I still have dreams of the Capovilla... which means that I will need to buy a bottle eventually once I get past the sticker shock. I am on the fence about Rhum J.M XO. It's not as smooth or as harmonious as I would like... but I keep trying it regularly, in case in starts growing on me.

French Pearl (Audrey Saunders) with Uncle Val's botanical gin, lime juice, simple syrup, St George absinthe, mint. The gin doesn't disappoint in this drink, and the cucumber notes come through.

I had Phil Ward's Martica again. A rich cognac & rum-based Manhattan variation, I still find it delicious!

This is a bit ridiculous and semi-impossible to resist - she has 10 recipes for brownies apparently, and that is just the beginning. A recipe for Leckerli which is a gingerbread-type cookie from Basel I've been obsessed about. And all these incredible sounding cocktail cookies... 248 recipes total according to Eat Your Books. I really don't need another cookbook, but I've added this one to the wish list!

In the mood for a White Negroni, I realized as I was making the drink that I didn't have any Lillet on hand! I used a dry sherry instead, and the drink turned out great. This particular sherry gives some depth to the drink with nuts and dried fruit flavors. White Negroni variation with 33 Portland dry gin, Suze, and Lustau Los Arcos amontillado sherry.