Category: French food

Special guest: La bouillabaisse

Monk fish in the bouillon
Monk fish in the bouillon

For this second special guest, we have picked our mother with a very traditional dish in our family: La bouillabaisse, or Bouillante. This typical Provence dish is a grand summer tradition in our family. Our great grand father used to go fishing near La Ciotat every Sunday and bring back the fishes, our great grand mother prepared it, our grand mother fished too and took over to prepare it , and now our mother prepares it too. 

No one fishes anymore in our family and what was a  fisherman’s hot pot to use all the small fishes and less noble fishes has now turned into a very high end and not so easy to eat/find dish. Of course a lot of restaurants in the south of France serve something they call bouillabaisse but nothing compares with our traditional and familial preparation. Bouillabaisse in our family consists in 3 separate dishes: the fish soup with bread, saffron potatoes and rouille; the fishes cooked in bouillon; the “ramichelle” with rouille. The first thing is to find the proper ingredients and even when living in the south of France it is not that easy! The rock fishes for the soup: wrasses and combers, the white fishes for serving in second: large red mullet, john dory, monk fish.

Soup with the saffron potatoes and bread and rouille
Soup with the saffron potatoes and bread and rouille

Once that is secured it is rather straightforward to prepare. The fish soup must be a clear bouillon. In our family that’s the way it is made and eaten. We use only fishes (no crab…) and don’t keep any flesh to obtain a brown golden bouillon. It is all hand made, no machine here.
Large soft potatoes are sliced roughly and sickly and boiled in saffron water. 
The rouille is a kind of mayonnaise with saffron, paprika, red pepper and additionally garlic if you like it.
The ramichelle are simply vermicelli boiled in the fish soup (not on the pictures because honestly not very photogenic!) eaten with rouille so delicious!

Thanks Mum for this amazing dinner and this familial recipe!

Bouillabaisse family table with croutons, saffron potatoes croutons again, fish soup and rouille
Bouillabaisse family table with croutons, saffron potatoes croutons again, fish soup and rouille

Rice salad Japanese style

Japanese purists would hang me for that recipe!!! In the edamame gohan I’ve added boiled chick peas, and served this “mame gohan” with blanched green beans, cherry tomatoes and hard boiled egg. A sort of “salade de riz” as we call it in France, (so 70’s tupperware cooking!!!) but with a Japanese touch. Of course for the dressing it’s just a little of soya sauce if the green beans and tomatoes, the sacrilege doesn’t go that far!

Speaking of soya sauce, I’ve been selected as a finalist for a cooking contest organized by the soya sauce association! The finale is on August 20th… Let’s see what I can do. It’s my first cooking contest. I have no idea how it is gonna look like… 

Croissant?

My first trial
My first trial
My second trial
My second trial
My latest trial
My latest trial

A. asked for croissants for breakfast last weekend and I really wanted to try making some again after my last trials that were so so. Indeed I tried twice before to make croissant and if there was always something to complain about. For my first trial they had the consistency and taste of brioche, delicious but not a croissant at all. My second trial, more than one year ago, the taste was perfect but they didn’t really grow fluffy so they were tiny and heavy and slightly unbaked because it took actually more time to cook them and I was worried they would dry. This time I used the same recipe as before but the temperature was higher so they grow bigger, but I made a little reading mistake when finalizing the shapes and instead of one layer of dough I rolled two: heavier, less fluffy than expected and twice less croissants! But perfectly baked with the longer time and very promising. I’m getting close! Can’t wait to try again!!!

Back to normal… Socca lunch

Hectic weeks, busy week ends, when we arrived in Ohara last night it felt like we haven’t come for months. Everything in the garden has grown tremendously high and green, no cat was waiting for us… Of course H. came today but we are more a food supply than anything else so far… There is such work to do in the garden that we started early this morning and work until lunch, without even going to shop for frrsh veggies. So when lunch time came and we needed energy before our afternoon tennis game I had to fix something with what I had in stock: sokka and a few vegetables: tomatoes, cucumbers and avocado. Sokka is a traditional dish from Nice in the south of France. It is extremely simple to make!

Socca (chick pea flour galette) 

– 100g of chickpeas flour,

– a cup of water,

– a bit of olive oil,

– salt and pepper.

Mix all the ingredients. Preheat and grease with a bit of olive oil a frying pan. Pour some dough in the pan to obtain a 3-5mm thick layer. Cook, flip, cook again, serve immediately. It is also possible to do it in the oven but the pan is much more convenient for me.

Cherry clafoutis 🍒

We unusually spent the weekend in Tokyo because A. promised his shamisen group to play with them at a volunteer concert in an old folks day care. And I had to go and sing too!!! I like these concerts because giving a bit of our time for these people, it’s always a nice. Though it can be a really depressing moment (I really don’t want to grow old). And this weekend was also the first giving a real taste of summer. I’ve craved for outdoor swimming but outdoor pools will only open in June… I’ve craved for summer fruits and summer recipes. So for once I bought some non-local products: American cherries and prepared a traditional cherry clafoutis for our breakfast. Clafoutis can never go wrong and are always perfect for breakfast with tones of fresh juicy fruits and a simple base of flour-sugar-egg-milk. I use brown sugar only and soy milk, but one can use whatever is available. Now the question of pitting the fruits arises and of Prunellia always pit them, I never pit the cherries. When pitted they have a tendency to shrink and melt in the dough and dry, while not pitted they just bake in their own juice under the skin, ready to deliver it when in the mouth. How do you like yours?

Sable-navette

Guests for dinner at home twice in a raw and working each day until late, I needed something delicious, simple to accomodate with fruits… and that can be prepared in advance.

I invented this recipe of little bites sable with neroli, that feels like eating navettes marseillaises. Just flour, butter, egg, brown sugar and plenty of neroli. 

Japanese quiche

When the quiche lirraine meets Japanese ingredients it gives that: 

The dough is made with plain white flower and olive oil, black pepper and soya sauce. The filling is made of seasonal vegetables: paprika, lotus root, tomato, green peas, broccoli, and an egg and cream base with plenty if katsuobushi and soya sauce again. A very good match of tastes, texture and a versatile dish.

Choux

Instead of the traditional strawberry tart for A.’s birthday, I decided to make choux. It’s not something I’m very found of because ot often goes with cream or filling Idon’t like too much, but A. likes them very much. It’s actually very simple to make and with just an ice-sugar frosting it’s really delicious. It was my first time making some so they were a bit too big to my taste but taste-wise it was perfect! Recipe soon to come!

Tribute to our grand mother’s mironton

Our grand mother was doing magic with left overs of meat, in particular porc filet. It would be used in the filling for stuffed vegetables, in cannelloni, or hachis parmentier for exemple. But she would also use them for “mironton”. Her mironton was just simple: onion, potatoes and chuncks of pork meat fried in oil and butter. It was definitely something I loved very much!!! Now her version may have been a little too rich for us now, so I kept the idea but slightly changed the recipe, but the main attributes remain. I replaced the onion by some Japanese mushrooms, and used only a little of olive oil. I cut in rough pieces the left over of the filet mignon and the potatoes (with the skin), and then simply cook them in a heated and olive oil greased pan until golden. The key is to cook until it’s almost burned, and then stir and repeat. It should for kind of blocks, golden and crispy, but soft inside. Add a bit of salt and pepper when serving.

Proudly powered by WordPress | Theme: Baskerville 2 by Anders Noren.

Up ↑

Verified by MonsterInsights