Summer!

This week P. Got married, and it was the first weekend of real summer feeling. Very hot weather, blue skies, beautiful ocean swims, hydrangeas blooming everywhere and rice growing fast. The farmers market was full with summer fruits: plums, cherries, peaches, blueberries, melons, watermelons… so I decided to prepare a light a simple fruit tart with a simple crust based (flour, egg, brown sugar and a bit of butter) and to juste add the fruits (one peach, a handfull of cherries and two of blueberries) on top and bake everything for 20-30min. The simplicity of the preparation reveals perfecty the taste and sweetness of the fruits and the crust, rather dry, pumps the sweet juice of the peaches, while the berries and the cherries pop in the mouth!

Have a beautiful week ahead!

July 3, 2017

Rough puff

With the terrible weather on Saturday, I thought it was a good occasion to work and cook. And for cooking, I was thinking of making something that I usually don’t have time to do when the weather is nice and we spend most our time outdoor gardening or playing tennis or swimming. My objective was to make puff pastry. Since I have never really made puff pastry (only a version for pain au chocolat, with yeast…) I decided first to browse a few recipes, before deciding what to do, and that’s how I found a recipe of “rough puff” on by Clotilde Dusoulier on her blog Chocolate and Zucchini, a quick version of the real puff pastry, that doesn’t require to insert the butter layer by layer and to be rolled every hour or so. This version only require one hour in the fridge. The layering is done before. Since I had to work and I am always looking for sustainable recipes that I can repeat easily, trying rough puff was a must for me! So instead of classic puff pastry, here I am trying this new recipe. Of course I slightly changed the proportions because I like it less buttery, I used only 100g of butter but may be 115g would have been good for a more golden finish. I use soya milk instead of water or milk. Contrarily to what announced it gave me much more pastry that expected so I made an apple tart, two half moon apple pues and with the rest a bowl of sesame crackers. Making the pastry was really easy and it was really quick (quicker is better because the butter need to stay cold and hard). The pastry was indeed puffy, but not as much as a regar puff pastry, as expected. The taste and crispiness was great. For the sweet version I would have definitely add a bit of sugar. May be it’s because I use nothing but apples without sugar nor flavoring. The sesame salty crackers were addictive (top picture)!!! A great recipe that needs a little improvement to fit my taste but so easy to make that I will use it againand again!!!

May 15, 2017

Golden week

So, here we are, right in the middle of the golden week. All our friends have left and we’re planning to spend a few days doing some DIY and gardening. Having friends at home I spent a lot of time in the kitchen to prepare them my classics: breakfast with freshly baked bread, creamy scrambled eggs, local products: ham, fresh fruits… For lunch, it is more about vegetables and salads, and for dinner, since evenings are still chilly, cocotte cooked Isumi pork filet with new potatoes and angelica. And the little bonus for dessert: fruits tarts with coconut custard. All my recipes are meant to take the best of the local ingredients with simple preparations.

So here are my recipes:

Cocotte pork filet

– 1 pork filet, the size depends on the number of persons you are cooking for

– 2 large new potatoes/person

– a bouquet of fresh angelica (ashitaba)

– olive oil

– salt and pepper

Cover the bottom of your cocotte with 1mm of olive oil. Set the pork filet and start cooking at low heat. Brush the new potatoes undr water to remove soil and dust and the thickest skin. Cut them in 4, add them in the cocotte. Cook under cover for 25min, stir regularly. Wash the ashitaba, cut the hardest part. Add to the cocotte with salt and pepper, and continue cooking until the bottom is all golden, and stir a few times while cooking at high heat. Finish with a bit of olive oil to melt all the extracts. At the moment of serving cut roughly the ashitaba with scissors.

Coconut custard fruits tart

The recipe is basically the same as here except that I added some fresh coconut in the custard, and added mangoes to the strawberries. The result was 12 superb little tarts! I now often do individual fruits tarts to avoid having to cut them and damaging there beautiful balance and aspect. I also find it easier to keep them that way.

May 4, 2017

Strawberry tart, coconut custard

There is almost nothing as simple as making a strawberry tart, yet as delicious and pretty. It may look like a lot of work but it is not. I have my strawberry tart ready in 20min all included: from making the pie crust to washing the strawberries, including some nice new versions. In addition I’m trying some new features to share more ecperience, with a new youtube channel, where you will be able to see how to prepare some classic recipes. It is all new so I’m still trying to find the proper angle and tools, and sometimes I forgot to turn on the camera, but of you like it, I’ll put more.

Strawberry tart with coconut custard

For one large tart for 6 people

For the pie crust: same recipe as the plain petits sables lasr week

For the filling

– a little basket of strawberries

– a pack of coconut milk or coconut cream (200ml)

– 2tbs of sugar

– 2 egg yolks

– 2tbs of flour

In a pan heat the coconut cream/milk. In a bowl mix the sugar and the egg yolks. Add the heated milk. Stir well, then add the flour. Stir well again. Move back in the pan and cook at low heat until it gets thick.

Set in the pie crust a 5mm layer and thn add the strawberries on top. Ready to be eaten!!!

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February 25, 2017

Lemon and ricotta tart

A. cooks once a year and it is for making my birthday cake. I like to have it with tea, because then it all about the cake rather than having it for dessert. Every year I choose the cake I would like to eat and he makes it the way I like it. He usually searches for recipes on the internet, and from this base adjusts it to the gears and ingredients we have, and to my taste. Since he has little experience he usually gets a bit of help or some advises from who is available around. This year, since we were in Sicily, country of citrus fruits, I chose a lemon tart with meringue. But I like my cakes not too sweet, not too buttery, not too creamy, so my mum and I helped him a bit. The result was amazing. So here is what he did for a 25cm tart: first pre-heat to 180deg ghe oven.

for the dough: a classic sablé dough with 200g of flour, 1 egg, 75g of butter. Mix all the ingredients and roll the dough to the size of your pie dish. Bake for 10min, the dough must not change color too much.

for the lemon filling: instead of preparing lemon curd we opted for something easier. The zest and the juice of 2 lemons is mixed with 2 egg yolk and 1 egg, 120g of brown sugar, and 4tbs of fresh ricotta. Mix all the ingredients to obtain a smooth creamy texture. Set in the dough. And cook in the oven at 180deg for 30min.

for the meringue: 2 egg white, 70g of icing sugar, a pinch of salt. Beat the egg whites and the salt until firm, continue beating and add the icing sugar slowly until all is smooth, shiny white and firm. Put the mix in an icing bag and decorate the tart as you like. Bake at 180deg for 10min. Check to be sire the meringue doesn’t burn.

We finished the decoration with some very thin slices of Sicilian sweet lemon grilles on the oven for a few minutes.

Best wishes!!!

December 31, 2016

Summer fruits tart

Crazy time of the year, one day is summer: 35 and not a single breeze, sudden thunder storm and pouring rain, the next it’s almost chilly. Yet summer fruits start ripening and are delicious. Peaches season has started as well as plums, melons and watermelons season is also well advanced. When this time comes I love to prepare poached fruits, clafoutis and simple tarts where the fruits have the leading part. This time it’s a peach and plum tart. I like the mix of the super sweet peaches and the slightly sour plums. For the dough I prepared a sable dough with oat bran to add a bit of texture. I roll the dough, cut the fruits and bake. That’s all. No added sugar, no flavoring. Just fruits.

July 6, 2016

3 types of cabbage tart

At the local farmers market the other day I found beautiful cauliflower, romanesco and broccoli. Having all them together I couldn’t help but cook something mixing it. I love the idea of having ingredients close in shape but different in taste and color, and the first idea that I had was to make a tart with a piece of each. And becauseI really love the idea of mixing Japanese flavors with western ones I decided to add in the base some katsuobushi flakes. For the dough, I opted for a classic sable dough. A perfect balance.

January 12, 2016

Another version of the kabocha tart

Spending the weekend in Tokyo we often eat out, so at last I wanted a simple dinner at home on Sunday evening. I hesitated between risotto and tart and finally we opted for the tart. As for the veggies to put in it was all decided: leek, tomato and kabocha, I had also some nice bacon that I added to the mix but it is optional.

So, in a pan with a little of olive oil I grilled the leek cut in slices, the bacon, then added the kabocha and the tomato. I cooked until all the moisture from the tomato was gone. I also added 2 beaten eggs, salt and pepper before putting it in the dough. For the dough I opted for an olive oil base half-half white flour and buckwheat flour. II baked 20min at 180deg. Ready to serve.

December 7, 2015

Kabocha and mushrooms tart

An other tart with another composition, and another tart crust.

This one is largely inspired by chef Georges Ennis (@chefgygglz) kale-nutternut-shiitake tart last week, but my recipe is much lighter, quicker and features no cheese (not that I wouldn’t like, but my husband yes). I like very much the addition of the kabocha, first visually, then tastewise because it’s soft and sweet.

For the dough I prepared a classic simple sable dough that I rolled thinly in a large circle to fit my tart dish. I washed and sliced the mushrooms: shiitake, shimeji, oyster mushrooms and cooked them in a bit of olive oil and salt. I then topped the pie crust with them. Added 1/4 of kabocha thinly sliced. I finally prepared a batter with eggs, soya milk, salt and pepper and added to the rest of the tart. I baked the tart 30min at 180deg. You can serve warm or cold, both are delicious!

November 22, 2015