First, I’d like to say it’s cold in Paris right now. Very cold.

This weekend we went to have a look at the green booksellers’ stands along the Seine. “Bouquinistes” have been selling old books, magazines, posters, etc. along the riverbanks for centuries and since 1991 the “boxes” have been classed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. For the last several months, the City has been repainting those in need. Now, several prototypes are on display for possible replacement of hundreds of traditional boxes currently lining the Seine. There are somewhere between 900 and 1,000 boxes and about 230 booksellers concerned. The prototypes, designed by Matériaupôle Paris Seine Amont, are exposed near the Hotel de Ville.

The idea is to “modernize” the boxes and make everyday outdoor life for the “bouquinistes” easier. In the near future, the stands may be equipped with heating systems and protection against rain. (Did I mention it’s cold in Paris right now? Very cold?). The plan is also to have them specially treated against graffiti.

So, for the past few weeks, the specialists (the booksellers themselves) have been able to test out these new boxes, and passers-by have been able to ogle them. What do you think???

(old box 54)

(new prototypes)

I did mention it was cold, so here’s how we’ve been keeping warm: buckwheat “galettes” and sweet crepes.

It all started Thursday evening. February 2 is traditionally a religious celebration, the presentation of Christ at the Temple of Jerusalem, but if you ask any French kid what “Chandeleur” is, they’ll tell you it’s the day you eat crepes. Thus, Joy made crepe batter – lots of crepe batter.

This is actually why I was glad it was so cold this weekend. I had lots of crepe batter to store, but our fridge (as I’ve probably mentioned at some point) is rather small. There was no fitting it all in (not with the half butternut squash, lettuce spinner, champagne bottle, tahini, almond butter, milk, hummus experiment…etc…etc… already in there). The magic solution was storing it in the cupboard under the windowsill – believe it or not, this sport was colder than the actual fridge!

Here are two recipes: one for savory Buckwheat “galettes” (as made in Brittany) and one for dessert crepes (this is an updated version since my last crepe post). What made the real difference in the sweet crepes was my French grandmother’s secret: crème fraîche.

To make them smell wonderful, I added some fleur d’oranger (orange blossom water found in the baking isle of French grocery stores) and some vanilla extract.

The other secret is to let the batter sit overnight (or in our case, a couple of days).

Buckwheat Galettes Ingredients

250 grams buckwheat flour

Pinch of salt

1 egg

Cold water (about ½ liter)

Buckwheat Galettes Recipe:

1. Pour flour and salt into a large mixing bowl.

2. In a small bowl, beat the egg.

3. Add the egg and a little water to the flour. Continue adding water and mixing until you have a batter. Thick ribbons should form when you lift the whisk.

4. Let sit for at least a couple hours then cook over a hot griddle.

5. Decorate with your favorite ingredients.

Some suggestions:

- Swiss cheese, mushrooms (pre-cooked with garlic and olive oil) and a fried egg

- Goat cheese, walnuts and arugula

- Parmesan, sun-dried tomatoes and artichoke hearts

- Raclette cheese and potatoes (pre-cooked)

(photo by Sébastien)

Dessert Crepes Ingredients

250 grams flour

Pinch of salt

1 teaspoon sugar

2 eggs

1 tablespoon butter

About ½ liter milk

2-3 soup spoons fleur d’oranger

1 soup spoon vanilla

Heaping soup spoon crème fraîche

Dessert Crepes Recipe:

1. Melt butter.

2. In a large bowl, mix flour, salt and sugar.

3. In a small bowl, beat the eggs.

4. Add the eggs, butter and some milk to the dry ingredients. Slowly add more milk and mix until you get thick ribbons of batter when you lift the whisk.

5. Add the remaining ingredients and let sit at least two hours (overnight really makes a difference!).

6. Cook on a hot skillet and decorate with your favorite ingredients.

Suggestions:

- Homemade chocolate sauce (melt dark chocolate with some milk and/or crème fraîche)

- Apricot jam

- Salted butter and sugar

- Fresh bananas, kiwi, strawberries…

Most baked goods (like cookies) taste best right out of the oven. Carrot cake, however, always seems to get better over a few days.

I wanted to try my hands at making a healthy cake (or is it more of a bread?) that I could eat either for breakfast or as a mid-day energy snack. I wanted this cake to look and taste healthy, yet still be addictive.

Usually, I grate the carrots so small you can hardly tell they’re there. This time, I was going for a hearty texture, so I used a bigger grate. This also let me see the colorful combination of veggies I put in the cake – for I didn’t just use any old carrots! No, in addition to an orange one, I also used one purple carrot (according to this site, all carrots were purple up through the Middle Ages!) and one parsnip.

I didn’t use much sugar in this recipe. For one, I was going for healthy. For two, carrots are naturally sweet. They were once used to sweeten desserts in medieval Europe (sugar wasn’t readily available). While I didn’t altogether get rid of it, there’s much less sugar in this recipe than in any others I know. Also, I used “cassonade” (raw, unprocessed) sugar.

For the salt, I used “Diamant de sel du Cachemire” or pink-colored diamond salt from Kashmir that we found at G. Detou here in Paris. This had to be crushed with a mortar and pestle.

For the frosting, I used the French cheese “St Môret” in place of cream cheese (but either would work). I whipped it with a little bit of agave syrup and fresh lemon juice to taste.

The two longest steps were opening the fresh walnuts – a slightly tedious task, but worth it – and waiting for the cake to cook – about an hour.

Did you know that February 3 is National Carrot Cake Day in the US? I hold carrot cake in pretty high esteem – glad to know I’m not the only one!

Shopping List

1 cup chopped walnuts

2 carrots and 1 parsnip (about 3 ½ cups when shredded)

2 cups whole grain spelt flour

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 teaspoon ground cloves

½ teaspoon salt

2 teaspoons baking powder

4 eggs

½ cup raw sugar

¾ cup olive oil

For the frosting:

250 grams soft cheese

Agave syrup

Fresh lemon juice

Recipe:

1. Prepare nuts and carrots.

2. Mix dry and wet ingredients separately.

3. Add wet ingredients to dry.

4. Add carrots and nuts.

5. Line a cake mold with parchment paper and bake at 180C or 350F for about 1 hour (a knife should come out pretty clean).

6. Let cool and frost (see above).

Keep covered in the fridge and enjoy over several days.

What a joy to get back to my Sunday farmers’ market and familiar kitchen! The last months of 2011 were filled with lots of excitement, from several trips (including Berlin and New Mexico) to some fun Parisian restaurant discoveries – promise to keep you posted on all that soon.

There’s nothing like getting back to cooking though, and this recipe for Buckwheat Banana Bread is fitting to start off a healthy new year. Since moving to France, I’ve been a fan of galettes de sarrasin (buckwheat crepes), which are savory and traditionally eaten before sweet crepes. I’ve been experimenting with incorporating more buckwheat flour into my baking. Usually, I mix it with regular white flour, but I wanted to try making 100% gluten-free bread, so used only pure buckwheat for this recipe. The health benefits of buckwheat are numerous (high in protein, fiber, B vitamins, amino acids…). It’s also a great alternative for those who can’t tolerate gluten because, despite its name, buckwheat is not wheat, but a fruit seed.

When I make banana bread I’m always worried it’ll be either too dry or not cooked enough. I actually think the buckwheat, which isn’t too compact, actually helped with this problem. I also tried an experiment by whipping lots of air into the bananas before combining them with the rest of the ingredients. Whatever the secret, this recipe worked well for me. The bread tasted yummy, yet healthy at the same time.

Random thought: For a couple years now I’ve been using a kitchen scale to weigh butter. It is so much easier that scooping chunks of cold butter into my measuring cups! I’d definitely recommend equipping your kitchen with one, especially if you’re an American cook living abroad or simply enjoy using European recipes. I still tend to use my American measuring cups and spoons for the rest though, so bear with me as I try to find “balance” in my proportions!

Shopping List

120 grams salted butter (about half a cup)

3 very ripe bananas

1 ½ cups buckwheat flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/3 cup brown sugar

1 egg

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 teaspoon cinnamon

¾ cup fresh, chopped walnuts

Recipe:

1. Melt the butter and set aside.

2. Whip the bananas with a hand blender until they are smooth and airy.

3. Add the sugar, egg, vanilla, cinnamon and butter to the bananas.

4. In a separate bowl, combine the flour and baking powder.

5. Add the wet ingredients to the dry.

6. Mix in the walnuts, but don’t over work the batter.

7. Bake at 180?C or 350?F for about 30 minutes (until the center is fully cooked). Note: if the top begins browning too quickly, cover with a piece of foil until the center catches up.

This bread keeps well for several days in an airtight container. It’s nice toasted for breakfast.

Before I get to the chocolate cake part, let me talk about the BEST MACARONS IN PARIS. Promise you they’re linked…

Last year for my sister’s 25th birthday, my mom and I trekked all over the city collecting macarons. The first part of our goal was to surprise the birthday girl with 25 (yes, an ambitious number) of these fancy (and easily squished) cookies. Our second goal was to find the very best in Paris.

We were successful in our quest and ended up in Montmartre (the best place to surprise someone with a plate-full of macarons) with four different names. Of course, we didn’t tell my sister or my husband which macarons came from where. Here was the verdict:

4. Random corner boulangerie (so-so compared to the others)

3. Ladurée (well-known and delicious, but on the sweeter side and not as original as the winner)

2. La Maison du Chocolat (pretty close to heaven)

…According to us, the very best macarons in Paris are from….

Pierre Hermé

(My favorite was olive oil and vanilla)

What’s the connection to the cake? Well, it’s already been a year since this macaron hunt (oh, yes, and we’ve been back to Pierre Hermé since!) and last weekend my sister celebrated another birthday. Since the weather’s been so nice (well, until yesterday), we had a picnic and I wanted to surprise her with a cake. I always bring my staple moeulleux au chocolat and wanted something more original. It’s hard to beat a pile of macarons! That was my inspiration, though – almonds. They are one of the essential ingredients in French macarons. So, I altered my recipe a bit and came up with a cake I was quite happy with. More moist than ever.

In this recipe, I used salted butter and a bit less sugar.

Shopping List

1 1/2 sticks (170 grams) salted butter

8.8 ounces (250 grams) bittersweet chocolate

1/4 cup (50 grams) granulated sugar

4 eggs

1/4 cup + 1 tablespoon (50 grams) white flour

1 cup (125 grams) ground almonds

Recipe

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (180 degrees C).

2. Slowly begin melting butter over low heat.

3. Separate eggs.

4. Put sugar in mixing bowl, add egg yolks and mix.

5. Begin melting chocolate in double-broiler.

6. Add butter to sugar/egg-yolk mixture and mix.

7. Combine flour, salt and ground almonds, then add to the rest of the batter and mix.

8. Add melted chocolate and mix.

9. Beat egg whites until they are stiff and carefully fold into batter.

10. Butter a round baking pan and pour in mixture.

11. Cook until the edges begin to dry and break away from the pan (10 or more minutes). The inside should remain moist and stick to a knife when tested.  Keep an eye on it and don’t overcook!

If you’re still in a cooking mood, try your hand at macarons. This is a fabulous book: Mad About Macarons! by Jill Colonna.

The second part of this post is all about the minestrone soup I made after this Sunday’s farmers’ market.

First though, I want to tell you about last weekend and the “Journées européennes du patrimoine” (or, European Heritage Days). I had already re-scheduled (note RE-scheduled) an eye appointment for Saturday afternoon, and Sébastien was set to play two tennis games Sunday. Though we’d been talking about it for about a month (“Oh, yeah, can’t wait to see that!” and “I’m sure there’ll be a long line, but we could try anyway.”), neither of us had realized the heritage days were this particular weekend when making all our other plans. I wasn’t about to re-schedule my appointment yet again, and, well, when there’s a tennis game, there’s a tennis game. So, we sadly didn’t think we’d end up taking much advantage of the long-awaited festivities.

As luck would have it though, Saturday was our day, as the eye doctor (over near Rebublique in the 11^th) proved to be a fabulous way to start the weekend (believe that!). Not only did the doctor say my view had gotten better (I know, right?), we stumbled upon La maison des métallos (more or less, the “house of the metal workers”). Now a cultural center in the heart of a diverse Parisian neighborhood, this was once a factory where wind instruments were made (and apparently sought after by American jazz artists in the 1930s). Then, the building was bought by the “Union Fraternelle des Métallurgistes” – with an entire history that we learned all about on our tour (thanks to the heritage days!). Now I’m looking forward to attending some of the center’s community-oriented performances, debates….

Sunday, we (after how many years in Paris?) went to the Musée Chaillot (directly across from the Eiffel Tower and dedicated to “architecture et patrimoine”). We chose it thinking it wouldn’t take too long and was doable between tennis matches. Wrong! We spent about an hour and need to go back. We didn’t see everything, but what we did was pretty neat.

This was the conversation upon arrival at the ticket desk (yes, even when museums are free for the day, you still have to get a ticket):

Ticket agent: Would you like to see the Gaultier exhibit?

Us: Um, uh. Oui?

Ticket agent: Okay, I’d recommend going directly there since it closes at 5pm.

Us: Merci!

Up the elevator we go, into a sort of dream world. We enter a room covered (completely covered) with blue and white striped fabric. It’s pulled tight over the walls and furniture – making you feel simultaneously dizzy and quite curious. Imagine pulling a giant pair of striped tights over your living room – you can distinguish the objects (like tea cups), but they’re under a haze. We continued to a small series of rooms after that – taking note of the amazing view over Paris out the windows. (The exhibit’s on until October).

Back down the elevator, we saw the rooms dedicated to different architectural casts (life-size) from around France (like church facades and statues). Then, we headed to the architecture floor. Quarter to six came too fast and we had to skedaddle.

Heritage Minestrone

Didn’t I say I’d write about soup? Well, here it is: after a busy weekend and an equally busy week coming up, I made minestrone – to last several days.

It’s easy. My only recommendation is cooking and keeping the noodles separate – otherwise they get soggy after a day. I prefer them al dente all the time.

Also, soak the dried beans in water overnight (that’s what my mom’s always done with pinto beans back home). It keeps them more digestible (we’ll leave it there). It also means less cooking time, and thus more nutrition.

Shopping List

1 onion

2 potatoes (diced small)

2 carrots

3 stalks celery

A handful or two green beans

1 can crushed peeled tomatoes and their juice

1 cup dried red or white beans (soaked overnight and cooked – about an hour)

1 cup small elbow pasta (cooked)

Olive oil

Rosemary

Thyme

Salt

Pepper

Parmesan cheese (finely grated)

Fresh basil

Recipe:

1. Chop all ingredients into small squares or pieces.

2. Sautée the onion, then add the potatoes, carrots, celery and finally the green beans.

3. Cover with water, add some rosemary, thyme and salt.

4. Let simmer until all the veggies are cooked.

5. Add the tomatoes and their juice (Maybe you could add this right away, but I had to run out to get it – stove-top burner turned off of course!)

6. Add the cooked beans.

7. When ready to serve, dish a small amount of pasta into bowls, cover with the soup, grated Parmesan, pepper and fresh basil.

The best is making this soup on Sunday and enjoying it all week. The flavors just get better and better.

P.S. This weekend, September 23-24, is the Fete de la gastronomie in France.

]]> http://thetomatoknife.com/2011/09/heritage-minestrone-recipe/feed/ 2 http://thetomatoknife.com/2011/07/bell-pepper-tabouli-recipe/ http://thetomatoknife.com/2011/07/bell-pepper-tabouli-recipe/#comments Thu, 07 Jul 2011 13:54:02 +0000 Joy Anna Becvarik http://thetomatoknife.com/?p=1812 Whenever we have a picnic, I make tabouli salad. Each time it turns out a little different (depending on what ingredients I throw in). This particular recipe (featuring fresh bell peppers) is one of my favorites and probably the one I make the most often.

The red and yellow organic bell peppers that I buy at our nearest farmer’s market have just been so good lately. I haven’t even wanted to cook them. They have their own sweet flavor and can easily be eaten raw.

I’m also on a parsley kick and find that a tabouli dominated by it (rather than by grains) is much better. I used to put in a lot of bulgur and only a little parsley – lately, I’ve been doing the exact opposite, and only putting in a small portion of grains. That’s the great thing about making tabouli – you choose the ratios. In this version, the dominant tastes are parsley, bell peppers and lemon – lots of lemon.

I’ve also been playing with the type of grain I put in. My favorite so far is a combination of both bulgur and quinoa. Straight bulgur, I’ve decided, makes the salad too heavy for summer picnics.

These ingredients are just to give you a rough idea. I don’t actually follow them, but let the salad tell me what it wants!

Shopping List

Bulgar and quinoa (about 1/2 cup uncooked)

Parsley (2 bunches, chopped)

1 bell pepper (red or yellow, diced)

1 cup chickpeas (cooked)

1/2 red onion (diced)

2 cloves garlic (minced)

1/2 cup feta cheese

Olive oil

Red wine vinegar

Lemon juice

Salt and pepper

Recipe:

1. Cook the grains and set aside to cool.

2. Prepare the other ingredients and mix them together in a big bowl.

3. Add the grains.

4. Sprinkle with olive oil (copious), a dash of vinegar, lots of lemon juice, salt and pepper. Just keep tasting and adding until you’re satisfied.

5. Pack in a box and refrigerate. It’s ready for a picnic.

Even the day after, I’m still enamored with this dip

I was at the library yesterday, around 4pm, trying to get some research done and couldn’t stop thinking about how hungry I was. It’s obvious, one shouldn’t go to the library hungry - especially when one is looking at books about food. By 5pm, I was out the library doors, heading to the nearest natural food store: for almond butter and hot sauce. I’d finally decided to try out this dip idea I’d had for way too long (a year’s long for one of those “I’ll-get-to-it-one-of-these-days” recipes, isn’t it?).

What I like about this dip/spread is that is tastes almost creamy, but has no dairy in it. Instead, it has protein and calcium from almonds. I feel like this makes the savory taste of the roasted red peppers stand out even more.

Shopping List

2 large red bell peppers

4 tablespoons almond butter (without sugar)

1 clove garlic (minced)

Several dashes of hot pepper sauce

Salt and pepper

Recipe:

1. Cut the red peppers into pieces and bake with a bit of olive oil at 210C/410F. Cook until completely soft and blackening at the edges.

2. In a blender, mix the roasted peppers with the other ingredients. Add hot sauce, salt and pepper to your taste.

3. Refrigerate for about half an hour.

That’s all, really.

Lemon bars are one of my very favorite desserts – they always have been.

The next time I tasted lemon bars as good as these, was six years ago in California. I was playing bride’s maid in a friend’s wedding, and was thus a lucky witness to all that goes on behind the scenes in the days before such a big event. There were many things to be done – pick up the dress and hide it away, cut out place cards, catch up on old memories, stack cumbersome boxes as UPS dropped them off, find thread to stitch girls into their dresses… you get the idea. In order to keep us going, we ladies required regular nibbles – including the Maid of Honor’s lemon bars (homemade from freshly picked Meyer lemons).

I kept the recipe and made it many times – with success! They always turned out because I followed the directions. Problems arose, however, when I got a scale and began weighing ingredients (like butter) in grams. Despite careful calculations, my lemon bars were no longer turning out the way I wanted – something had gotten lost in translation.

Finally, this weekend, I succeeded in making my best lemon bars yet. The main secret was going for more butter than less and doubling the top layer (filling) on the original recipe. I also used a rectangular cake pan (like for making a loaf), so ended up with a much thicker crust. In other words, these are very “gourmand” lemon bars.

Instead of powdered sugar, I used “cassonade” (except for the sprinkles on top). This is a type of crystal-like brown sugar that is easily found in French groceries stores. It’s a staple in our house.

Most important: DO NOT OVERCOOK THE TOP LAYER!!!

Shopping List

For the crust:

125 grams softened butter (that’s a standard small “stick” in France)

¼ cup cassonade sugar

1 teaspoon lemon juice

1 cup flour

For the filling:

4 eggs

½ cup sugar

4 tablespoons flour

6 tablespoons lemon juice

Recipe:

1. For the crust, beat all the ingredients together and bake for about 20 minutes (180C/350F). You’ll put this back in the oven, so don’t worry about it being undercooked.

2. Set aside and let cool while preparing…

3. …the filling. Mix all the ingredients and pour over the crust.

4. Bake for about 20 minutes. Don’t overcook or it will become chewy and lose the moisture. The filling should just barely be solid when you take it out. If you touch it, you fingertip should leave a mark.

5. Let cool and cut into squares. Sprinkle with powdered sugar if desired.

I’ve been shunning exact measurements recently.

With all that’s going on in the world, I seem to find refuge in the simple flow of following ingredients into their recipe – I say “their recipe” because I’ve just been letting them take over. Maybe this is a bit off the wall, but I almost feel like a writer when I’m cooking, and my vegetables are my characters. Any novelist will tell you the characters they create eventually take over the story, lead it wherever they please. I feel like cooking is exactly the same. Yes, I usually rely on recipes (at least to start with) when I attempt baking – I imagine this particular arena filled with a basket of already-tried and tested proofs that are hard for me to compete with. Anything else, though, is fair game and the ingredients (from what just happens to be in the fridge, to what just happens to jump into the pot) dictate.

For me, cooking has two personalities: no stress or completely chaotic. Watch “Top Chef” (the current Monday night favorite chez nous) to witness an example of the latter. Come into our kitchen on a late (preferably sunny) Monday afternoon for the other side of the spectrum, when I let go of the first day of the workweek by creating my “zen zone.” Thanks to vegetable soup, cooking is like yoga – with wooden spoons. I just finished making a huge pot of my “soupe de grandmère” and feel like I’ve just done deep breathing and warrior pose. Unlike my marathon weekends when I  plunge into crazy, time-consuming and ambitious culinary adventures (and we don’t eat until 9 or 10 o’clock!), late weekday afternoons are often reserved for kitchen Bikram.

For my vegetable soup, I usually sauté some onions, garlics and leeks in olive oil. Then I add potatoes, carrot… even corn and white beans when I have them. I cover it all with water, add a couple bay leaves and some salt, and let boil until all the vegetables are cooked. A warm, comforting aroma spreads through the apartment (and the outside hallway and elevator) as it simmers. Like today, I often prepare it early, turn off the burner and reheat the soup when it’s dinner time. All in all, the preparation takes about 20 minutes (chopping veggies) and the cooking a minimum of 45 minutes – longer simmering simply brings out more flavor.

Why buy mayonnaise when you can make it?

Yesterday, at lunchtime, I wanted to make an inside out (or outside in) tuna melt (like a grilled-cheese sandwich, but with tuna). Dilemma: I didn’t have any mayonnaise – and as most of us would agree, tuna simply needs mayonnaise. I knew the closest grocer didn’t carry the only store-bought mayo I’ve ever liked (Maille) and I wasn’t about to complicate my day trekking it down. I was hungry and just wanted to have lunch – simple.

So, I made fresh mayonnaise. In a matter of minutes.

It was one of those first daring days of spring, when anxious (and long-awaited) sunlight floods through open windows. Like I said, I didn’t want to complicate my day – didn’t want to find a recipe, didn’t want to measure any ingredients. Yet, I wanted homemade mayonnaise. I’ve been living in France long enough to know what ingredients one usually uses in mayo and also to know that you have to whip in the olive oil last, in long steady streams with your electric beater. Thus, I started by putting two egg yolks in a bowl and mixing in some mustard and a tad of vinegar. I added salt and pepper…then started pouring in the olive oil. Really fun, actually. I just kept beating until the mixture was thick, stopping to taste and add more of whatever I thought was missing. At first I went overboard with the vinegar, but it all worked out.

SO, no fuss. Just add, taste, beat, taste, beat…until you’re happy with it.

Shopping List

2 egg yolks

Dijon mustard

Red wine vinegar

Salt

Pepper

Olive oil

I ended up with a whole jar (an old yogurt pot). Since it’s fresh, it has to be eaten soon. What could I make? Another tuna melt? Egg salad? Deviled eggs? French fries (mayo is often served with them in Europe)? Avocado and crab?

As usual, I’m finishing my blog post, hungry.