In France, the early summer is the end of the school year, and more than often children go on day trips. In which case parents should provide a lunch box. I have no idea what today’s lunch boxes look like, but when I was a child (saying that feels like I 80 years old or something!!!!), one very popular recipe for the lunch box was “rice salad”. There were two main versions: the cheese and ham one, usually with mayonnaise dressing, and the tuna one either with mayonnaise or olive oil. I personally liked the later best. With a piece of fresh local bonito, some cooked rice, and summer vegetables plenty, the menu for dinner tonight was all set: it would be a classic rice salad. Of course rice is a key ingredient in the recipe and I wasn’t sure it would work well with Koshihikari rice, but it is truly perfect.
For the other ingredients, that would be normally can-ready food: corn, tuna… but I don’t by much canned food, and it is the season for delicious local corn now. And it makes a much much better meal. Almost fancy!
Here is my recipe.
Rice salad (2 servings, one dish meal)
1/2 cup of rice
1/2 fresh corn
1/2 filet of fresh bonito
1 tomato
1/2 cucumber
Olive oil
Salt and pepper
1 leave of laurel
First, cook the rice, and boil the corn.
In a pan set the bonito filet, some olive oil and salt, pepper, laurel add a little of water and cook slowly under cover.
Dice the tomato and the cucumber.
In a large bowl, set the rice (much better if it has had time to cool down. Generously splash olive oil and stir. Add the tomato and the cucumber. Stir again. Once the corn is cooked and had cooled down, add the husked corn, pull the bonito, like you would do with pork and add too. Stir, add salt and pepper if you feel it’s needed. Enjoy at room temperature or chilled.
It’s been a long time, right! Well the blog is not dead at all, I just encountered technical issues between the web hosting and wordpress and finally A. solved the problem for me!
So I am back!!!
There has been quite a few recipes I wanted to share here, but they have become obsolete since the ingredients are not seasonal any more. All the beautiful foods from the autumn are gone and now it’s getting really cold and winter mode, with leeks, daikon, cabbages. And because it is right before Christmas I am baking pompes a l’huile every weekend.
Since the first I made in 2015 and the recipe I used then, things have evolved a little. I solely use citrus fruits, and more than often yuzus from the garden, which I didn’t have back then. Also I don’t use yeast anymore, it’s been 3 years now I have started using sourdough. The result is amazingly delicious!!! I have also become much better at rolling and shaping. Back in 2015 I was rolling it too thin.
My pompes now look much more like this!
Pompe a l’huile
200g of flour
20g of sourdough
80g of olive oil
30g of sugar
6g of salt
The zest of a yuzu (can be replaced by orange or any other citrus fruit)
The juice of the yuzu (same, can be replaced by any other citrus fruit)
Water
In a large bowl stir all the ingredients but water. Add water little by little while kneading until the dough is smooth and can form a ball. Let rest for a few hours in a warm place. The dough don’t rise much usually, but you should feel it has changed consistency.
Roll in a circle about 30-35cm and make the cuts.
Bake at 200C for 18-20min or until lightly golden.
I think it is almost impossible that this recipe goes wrong!
When I was a child my grandmother would only make things I love to eat. My favorite were cannelloni and “croustades” and “tomates a la provencal”. But when I stayed longer with grand parents she would also make millions of other things I love: stuffed vegetables, bouillabaisse, paella, cantonese rice, floraline, butter macaroni and “kromsky”.
That was a long long time ago, when I was eating beef (I stopped when I was 15 or 17 I think…), but I think what I really loved with kromsky (I guess it was inspired from Russian kromeskies but my grandmother recipe seems very different than the actual recipes I could find online), is the parsley. I think my grandmother always had parsley in her kitchen or in her garden and used it a lot. Contrarily, I have a tendency to forget how parsley is delicious, and mine in the garden is under used.
So, after browsing the garden this morning and harvesting some parsley I decided to make kromsky like my grandmother would, or almost… Kromsky for her are just meat balls, with a lot of parsley, I replaced the ground beef by ground chicken. So here is my recipe. I hope you’ll enjoy it as much I did!
Kromsky (for 2 servings)
100g of ground chicken (or beef)
1 bouquet of parsley
1 egg
a bit of cooking oil
In a bowl chop the washed parsley. Add the egg and the meat. Stir well.
Grease a pan with the oil and heat at medium high. With a fork or a spoon make bite size balls of the mix and cook until golden. Flip on the other side and repeat. That’s it!!
I served them with spinach and rice. In the summer my grand mother would probably serve them with tomates a la provencal, which are oven slowly cooked tomatoes topped with chopped parsley.
When I was a child, my mum would come to pick us at school for lunch, then we would walk to the car and somedays, on the way stop to buy some bread at Mr. Richard bread shop. And one bread in particular, fougasse. His signature fougasse unless most other bread shop was not the one with olives, or whatever else you can put in, it was the simplest plain fougasse, and instead of the classic shape it would little hearts cuts and you could pull the little hearts of bread. We lived to eat the little hearts on the way back to the car, and even more when the bread was still warm!!
While fougasse is eaten all year round, I like to have some ready in the summer. It makes the perfect meal with some fresh vegetables and a piece of grilled fish. And it is even more perfect when you have it ready when you get back home after a surfing session at sunset. I love to go surfing on Sunday evening after 17:30, when most day trippers are leaving and you get the ocean for just you, your friends and a couple of regulars. I love driving back home at dusk, seeing the sky becoming purple and the rice paddies turning yellow. And then I am hungry and the fougasse and a fresh cucumber from the garden are waiting to be eaten!
Fougasse
250g of flour
20g of olive oil plus some for the finish
20-30g of sourdough starter
8g of salt
70g of water (may need adjustment depending on flour and sourdough)
Mix all the ingredients and knead lightly. If the dough is too dry add a bit of water, if too wet a bit of flour. The dough must be rather hard and have not much moisture.
Wait a few hours until it has grown.
Then flatten the ball with the hand and wait 15 minutes. After that, roll the dough with a cooking pin to obtain an oblong shape of about 2-3cm thick. With a shaped cutter of the shape you want, I chose plum because I didn’t have hearts like Mr. Richard’s fougasse, cut a few places with the design you fancy.
Bake at 230deg for 15min or until golden. When out of the oven spread a layer of olive oil with a brush.
When on travel, eating out for every meal has always been a problem for me. Too much food, too rich, too many ingredients, too much preparation, too far… not enough simple food, not enough traceability… there are so many reasons why I love homemade food… I have been used now for a long long time to making my own food even with the simplest ustensiles and in the most rudimentary kitchens, but for long stays cooking with a kettle, a plate and a knife used for eating, that would be a little too constraining. So when we decided to travel to Paris I had one strong requirement: our hotel room should have a kitchen. We found a place that checked all the boxes finally: the Majestic hotel. The kitchen wasn’t even tiny, with a great opening on the terrace, but minimally equipped: a frypan and a pan. I bought a kitchen knife, a wooden spoon and a bottle of olive oil, and I was ready to cook for 10 days. I need nothing more than that.
The farmers market down the street on President Wilson Avenue on Wednesdays and Saturdays provided us with all the basic, local and seasonal ingredients we would need. The fish mongers, the cheeses and the organic stalls are really great. For breads there is also a nice stall. You can also find there beautiful flowers, kitchen knives, and a few Italian food stalls, perfect for ravioli and others stuffed pasta. We didn’t test the meat stalls, as I barely cook meat, but there are a few with a nice selection.
May in France is the season for strawberries, the very first cherries, green peas, asparagus, artichokes, new potatoes, new carrots etc… I focused my shopping on products I would usually not eat in Japan. Artichokes and white asparagus definitely were on the top of my list.
Nearby you can also find one of the trending patissier-boulanger shop: Cyril Lignac, which is the first one to open in the area: 7:00AM. With the jet-lag it’s almost too late, but we could manage to postpone breakfast until then and eat fresh pastries for breakfast. I would particularly recommend their pain aux raisins. Extremely delicious.
As a result, I tested some classic recipes and also created a super simple white asparagus recipe that I’d like to share with you.
White asparagus in tomato sauce
5 white asparagus/person
2 ripe and large tomatoes/person
1tbs of olive oil
A pinch of salt and pepper
Wash and peel the asparagus. Cut in 3cm long chunks. Blanche them. Drain, let cool down and pat dry. In a pan add the olive oil and the diced tomatoes. Cook until it has reduced enough and it becomes a thick tomato sauce. add the cooked asparagus. Stir well and serve. That’s it!!!
If there is one traditional food I don’t care much about it’s the Epiphany kings’ galette, the “galette des rois”. Whether the brioche or the frangipane, I don’t care much about them. Not that I dislike them but I don’t like them either. They are not part of my must-eat food. And since I am bad at making puff pastry, that’s even easier to forget about it… but this year IG was covered with galettes and though I was insensitive to them A. wasn’t… and he asked me why we never have galette though he loves it so much!
What???? Why on earth would you wait more than 20 years to tell me???
How could I have not imagined he would love galette. He who doesn’t like almonds but loves calisson and financiers, he who doesn’t love butter but loves croissants and brioches… of course he loves galette… of course I ignored that…
Well then… I took all the courage it takes to make an attempt at puff pastry when I have failed so often.
So here I am folding and rolling and turning every hour my puff pastry by the book, hoping it will become something… probably because of the cold temperature inside it is not as tedious as I remembered, and no butter spill.
For the frangipane I used a standard recipe: almond powder plenty, 1 egg, a bit of sugar and a tiny bit of butter, stirred into a dense pomade.
The rest is just simple. I decided for a square galette, rolled one layer of dough, topped with frangipane, leaving enough room to close it. Rolled another layer of dough to put on top, sealed the borders well. Paint an egg batter. Made a little seasonal drawing: blooming camellia japonica as we have so many in the garden, and 30min at 200deg. Until just golden. A. couldn’t wait any longer!!!
The result was surprisingly delicious. It didn’t have the sticky sugary top it too often has in shops, it was not too sweet, actually very nice, and the puff pastry worked well! Beginner’s luck!!!
A few weeks ago I started to think about how much I love the French gingerbread called pain d’épices, that I don’t recall seeing any in Japan and that I never made some… It is heavy in the hand, yet light when eaten, with a beautiful golden color and flavors and aromas that sparkle in the mouth, and the texture is a very melting one. One of my favorite pain d’ épices of all time is that of my horse ridding teacher. She has a gift not only for gardening but also for cooking sweets. In summer during intensive training camps, she would bake while we would play around with the horses, and make fruits charlottes with the fruits from the orchard. In the fall or winter she would make pain d’épices. I was so found of it that I remember asking her the recipe, and she told me she just mixes 1kg of flour with 1kg of honey. I was probably 12 when I asked but I still remember this recipe because it didn’t make sense for me at the time, honey and flour, that’s it, really??? and I never tried, too scared of wasting 1kg of honey!
But when I started to look at how to make pain d’épices how surprised was I to see that, this is indeed the recipe for classic pain d’épices from Reims. What I didn’t know then was that the mix, with spices added, should be kept days or weeks to start the fermentation that will guarantee the fluffiness. Last year I would probably have been very skeptical trying such an attempt, as I was not very sure how all this fermentation worked, but since I made my sourdough Lois I feel a lot more confident to do flour base fermentation. Finally, last week I decided to start the experiment and prepared a mix of 600g of flour and 600g of honey together, some said that adding the spices at that stage would increase the development of aromas, so I added them too. I left the preparation in a container under a lid the whole week at home (with the winter temperatures settling in, the house temperature is about 5 to 9 now, so no big risk of seeing things rotting, or mold developing!!!!) And today I just found my mixture, it hasn’t changed much but it is not looking bad at all so I prepared it and baked it. The result???
A perfect pain d’épices! The look, the color, the texture, the smell… Exactly as you would find on in France, a happy A. and a happy me, eaten it with a cup of Christmas tea at tea-time or for breakfast. We even used it for toasts with cheese for me and some pork paté for A. and we were very satisfied. The recipe is very simple and except for the one week wait it is very simple to make. Definitely a must do again one. This recipe is will become a new classic like my pompe a l’huile.
Pain d’ épices (1 big loaf or 2 smaller)
600g of flour
600g of pure honey (liquid is easier but creamy can work too)
1tsp of ground cardamom
1tsp of ground cloves
2tsp of cinnamon
1 ping pong size piece of fresh ginger, pealed, grated or chopped thinly (I use fresh ginger because it is easy to find and I just chopped it roughly but you may use ground ginger, then 1/2tsp should be good enough)
water
additional 1/2tsp of baking soda (if your rise time is short)
About 5days to two weeks before you want to bake your pain d’epices prepare the dough. For that, in a container with a lid mix the honey the flour and the spice. If your honey is really to creamy and hard too work you can melt it in a pan at very low heat to liquify it. Stir to incorporate all ingredients. I used a spatula to do that as the mix is way to sticky to put hands in. One everything is well incorporated put the lid on the container, and let rest for as long as you want, but at least a few days.
After a few days, the spices may have start to color the dough a bit but it may not have changed much otherwise. When you want to bake your pain d’epices, pre-heat your oven to 150deg, just add a little of tepid water to the mix to soften it and knead. The dough is sticky but not terribly sticky. If you think your rise time is rather short (just a few days), you may want to add a little of baking soda now, to ensure perfect fluffiness. Knead and add water to obtain a compact yet smooth dough. Using parchment paper set in a cake dish or split in two and make two, or more. And bake for about 2h if you make a big one (check with a knife or stick if the dough is well cooked inside), for 2 smaller, about 1h should be enough.
I made a very large one and baked about 2h at 150deg, but wasn’t sure it was perfectly baked so I finished with 10 min at 180deg just to be sure. Let cool down before cutting and eating.
Pain d’epices normally keeps well, this is tone he purpose of the original recipe. But in our house, we didn’t had time to see how long it can keep!!! We’ve eaten it in a snap!!!
Look at this beautiful color and perfectly dense but bubbly texture!!!
Blanquette (pronounce “blanket”, but don’t get confused) is a very French, very traditional dish that my grandmother would often prepare when we had family lunches. She would make it with veal meat. But I guess everyone has its own recipe. Hers would also includes some green olives. It’s been a long time since I have quit eating veal… and a few times, long ago, I prepared some with chicken breast, but to be honest this is something I have not prepared in years if not a decade!!! Yet with carrots and mushrooms in the fridge, it suddenly reminded me of blanquette, and felt like I would do a vegetable only version, and eat it with steamed basmati rice for a change. When you use only vegetables it is rather quick to prepare and ended up being a great dinner dish after work and workout. So here’s my recipe, and a few variations possible to twist it to your liking! Enjoy!
Blanquette (2 servings as main dish)
3 carrots
5-10 mushrooms depending on size
1 leaf of laurel
Salt and pepper
15g of butter
1tbs of flour
Water
All the following are optional
10 green olives
1 chicken breast
1 leak…
Melt the butter in a pan. Wash and cut the vegetables. Cut mushrooms in four, carrots in bite size, leak in small chunks, chicken in bite size. Add to the melted butter and stir well to coat them, at low heat. Add the flour little by little while stirring, to make the roux, then add water to just half cover. Add salt and pepper and the laurel. Cook at low heat until the liquid turns into a thick and creamy texture (if too thick just add a bit of water and cook a bit longer, same if you think you want your vegetables more tender). Add the olives if you use some, stir again. And serve hot with rice (not Japanese rice, better with long grain rice)
In France, on February 2nd, it’s Chandeleur. A quick search on the internet told me that it’s Candlemas, a Christian celebration, 40 days after Christmas, the presentation of Jesus to the temple (thanks Wikipedia for enlightening my ignorance), but for me Chandeleur was just the day we ate crepes. A most awaited time as for some obscure reason my mum wouldn’t flip crepes often and we would for sure have some on February 2nd!!! One of my mother traditional savory filling was béchamel and ham, while I did like it then, I now barely prepare béchamel. A. doesn’t like it and I find it a bit heavy unless it is to eat with leeks or mushrooms only. My crepes filling is usually very simple: spinach, mushrooms, ham or prosciutto, eggs, cheese. Usually no more than two at the time, we are eating crepes not a kind of “put it all”… and it’s s good excuse to have a few crepes with different filling combinations!!!
To be honest, I care a lot less now of Chandeleur, because, as you may know if you follow me on Instagram, I flip crepes more often then I don’t! Crepes are my quick fix for a snack treat and A. loves them. And once in a while we also have savory crepes, or more precisely galettes, because I cannot help but love buckwheat crepes. I like them simple, with some vegetables and eggs, or ham and melted cheese. So over time I realize I have been skipping Chandeleur quite often, but who cares? As soon as you have a good crepe basic recipe you can make them anytime and realize how easy it is! You can easily change the wheat flour by 2/3 of buckwheat in my recipe to make galettes, you can even increase more the percentage of buckwheat, but don’t forget that with wheat comes gluten and with gluten comes consistency and firmness, so going gluten free means more cooking time before flipping and extreme carefulness in handling.
I don’t have a shallow crepes pan so I simply flip them in a large non sticky frypan slightly greased with butter, and it works perfectly well, no need to clutter the kitchen with this kind of goodies!
Have a good crepes flipping if you are planning to make some! I made some last week so I’ll pass today! Oh! And this year Setsubun 節分 is on February 2nd (it usually is on 3rd or 4th)… a celebration to welcome the new season (spring) that I love very much. I prefer by far traditions that are linked to seasons cycles or natural events rather than religions, so let’s throw beans to chase the evil out and hope for a quiet and peaceful home and year for everyone.
