For the first time in a week my head didn’t spin and seeing the world so still is quite strange now! I kind of got use to living in a spinning boat and adjusted to it. My appetite is coming back too! But I still prefer to eat simple food. So I made a new potatoes omelette. Some kind of comfort food. I just used two new potatoes washed and brushed that I cut in small cubes and cooked in olive oil until golden, then added 4 eggs beaten with black pepper and salt and cooked under cover. I flipped the omelette when the top is almost dry and cooked a little longer before cutting and serving. Really nothing amazing about that recipe bit honestly delicious.
Spring in the plate!
It’s getting warmer, out the winter coats! And the spring vegetables are everywhere on the market shelves! I couldn’t resist to preparing the first spring vegetables sautéed of the year. A classic in our house that can accompany fish, meat, tofu, eggs, or just be eaten like that. Choose the spring vegetables of your choice: new potatoes, asparagus, green peas, snap peas, new carrot today for me, but you can add new onion, green beans… a bit of olive oil in a pan and start to cook the potatoes, then the carrots, the green peas, finish the asparagus hardest part and later the heads and the snap peas. Add kosher salt and pepper and serve!
Shiitake and spinach quiche
This is the end of winter, but it is still chilly and though the spring greens are quite attractive, sometimes a good all winter quiche with spinach and shiitake is a perfect dinner. And because I find that a short movie is easier to understand the technique than long sentences I am trying again to make videos of the cooking process. Tell me how you like it. I’m craving to know your opinion to improve from your feedbacks!
Spinach and shiitake quiche:
For the quiche crust
– 160g of flour
– 20g of wheat bran
– a pinch of salt
– 1 egg
– 40g of butter
– a bit of water eventually
In a bowl mix all the ingredients and knead until the dough is soft. Add water or a bit of flour to adjust the hydration level. In a floured top roll the dough to the size of your pie dish.
For the filling
– 3 eggs
– 20cl of milk
– spinach to your liking
– shiitake to your liking
– salt, pepper
Wash and blanche the spinach. In a bowl beat the egg, the milk and yhe salt and pepper. Set in the dough. Wash and slice the shiitake. Add the spinach and shiitake.
Bake at 170deg for 30min (the cooking time depends on the depth of the filling) or until golden.
Have a nice week!!!!
Ricotta-basil-prosciutto ravioli
I can’t help making ravioli. And even more when I have fresh ricotta. But because A. doesn’t like cheese too much I added prosciutto to the basic ricotta-basil filling. And I prepared a tomato-basil-prosciutto sauce to go with it. It was a very simple dinner to celebrate our 10th wedding anniversary enjoyed in our country house after a very intense week.
For the ravioli pasta, same recipe as usual (100g of flour, 1egg, a bit of salt and olive oil), for the filling I used a pack of fresh ricotta, 3 branches of fresh basil, a few slices of prosciutto. In a bowl mix the ricotta, the basil washed and cut, salt and pepper. After making the pasta and setting one layer in the ravioli shapes, I put a few pieces of prosciutto in each ravioli then cover with the ricotta mix. Add the second layer of pasta and finish the ravioli. Boil in a large amount of water. Fresh pasta takes only a few minutes to be ready, once they float remove and drain. Serve immediately.
For the sauce I used 2 tomatoes, 2 branches of fresh basil, a few slices of prosciutto. Wash and cut the tomatoes and the basil. In a heated frypan or a pan, add some olive oil, the tomatoes, salt and pepper, stir until most of the juice is gone. Then the basil. In the very last minute of cooking add the prosciutto, you don’t want to cook to much. Use to top the ravioli.
Cauliflower
How do you like your cauliflower? For me it’s raw, steamed, boiled, grilled, in gratin, in soup, in purée, with olive oil, with butter, with lemon juice, with just a pinch of salt… yes, you’ve got it. We love cauliflower at home, as well as his friends broccoli and romanesco and it is just the pick season for these versatile and easy to cook vegetables in Chiba. So I’ve got some beautiful ones at the farmers market, youpi!!! The question was what will I do with them, how could I cook them? Because I came back from work very late and it was very cold I wanted a very quick solution so I decided to cook (steam and grill) them with spices.
Spicy romanesco and cauliflower:
I wash and cut the romanesco and the cauliflower and put them in a pan and I grilled them at high heat then I add 1mm of water. Add a tsp of curcuma powder, 1tsp of curry powder, 1tsp of cardamom powder, salt and black pepper. Serve and eat while hot!
A French basic
One things that is a bit my Proust’s madeleine as we say in French is a cery simple skillet if spinach with cream ir béchamel, poached eggs and bread croutons. A large part if the good memories about are the croutons. For some reason (probably because we have very little bread leftover) I very rarely make fried croutons, but these are so delicious with a cauliflower soup, a pumpkin soup or with spinach. Now I almost bever cook with cream or béchamel but spinach and croutons are always a good combination. I served them with pan grilled flounder and shiitake.
Fried croutons:
– a piece of bread, it doesn’t have to be fresh, but you still need to br sbke to cug it! It can be white, whole or whatever, it’s slways good!
– 2tbs of vegetal oil
Cut the bread in 5mm to 1cm dices. In a frypan hest the oil. Add the bread and turn regurlarly at medium heat, until each side of the bread is golden. Simple and delicious!
One-plate lunch from the country
I love to prepare one-plate for lunch, in particular when we have friends visiting. It is easy to prepare and to serveat anytime because the vegetables can be cooked very quickly and the rice, the meat etc… can be kept warm or re-heated very easily. So when the time comes to eat I just need a few minutes to prepare the plates. So simple with some seasonal vegetables grilled and deglazed in soya sauce, a piece of pork filet for the meat eaters, rice, and of course some umeboshi, some pickled Chinese cabbage…
Petits sablés- プチサブレ
Nothing simpler and tastier than little homemade sablés to go with fresh strawberries and help you combat a cold and gloomy Saturday! I made three variations: plain, black sesame and macha. It takes only a few minutes to make them a few more to bake them and they make everyone happy!!!
Petits sablés:
– 180g of flour
– 50g of brown caster sugar
– 40-60g of butter depending on the size of the egg
– 1 egg
– 1tsp of matcha powder
– 1tbs of black sesame seeds
In a bowl mix the flour, the sugar, the egg. Add little by little the butter until obtaining a dough that is dense but doesn’t stick. If it sticks too much add a little more flour. Pre-heat the oven to 170deg. Split the dough in 3. In one of the 1/3 add the matcha powder and stir well, in a second 1/3 add the sesame and stir well, in the last 1/3 do nothing. Roll each of the dough until 3-4mm high on cooking paper and cut with the size and shape you like. Bake until it just dtarts to golden (usually about 10min depending on your oven).
Back to the kitchen!!!
After a break away from my kitchen and obviously from Tokyo-Paris sisters, I’m pleased to be back and cook for A. and me. I hope you have enjoyed Prunellia’s posts while I was away and the website renewal just before I left (we’re still open to hear what you think!). I’m starting back in the kitchen with a very simple classic leek and Japanese mushrooms quiche. Nothing difficult, a classic I could say, just added a twist of fresh lemon juice with the mushrooms, and thought afterwards that I should have added a lemon zest in the piecrust sablé dough. So I’m going to give you this recipe without having tried it for resl myself but I’m sure it is delicious since the lemon would fit perfectly the sablé dough and the olive oil. I wish you a happy continuation for this week!
Leek and Japanese quiche with a lemon twist:
a recipe for 2 as a single main dish or for 4 as a starter
– 200g of flour of your choice
– 4 eggs
– 3tbs of olive oil
– 1/2 lemon
– salt, pepper
– 3 leeks
– oyster mushrooms, shimeji…
Pie crust: in a bowl mix the flour, 1 egg, the olive olive oil, salt pepper, and the zest of the 1/2 lemon. Knead until smooth, with the olive oil it shouldn’t take long. Roll to the size or your pie dish. It’s nice to have it a bit thick and that the pie dish is a bit high.
Filling: wash and cut the leeks in little half or quarter trunks and set in the dough an homogeneous layer. Beat the 3 eggs with salt, pepper and the juice of the 1/2 lemon. Add on top of the leeks. Wash and cut the mushrooms and set on top. Bake for 25min at 180deg, or until just golden. Serve and eat write away!
Tip: it is never easy to cut leeks cleanly so think of how many pieces you’re going to cut and arrnage them to avoid cuts as much as possible.
