FFWD: Chicken Liver Gâteaux With Pickled Onions

January 18, 2013January 20, 2013 ~ Teresa ~ 21 Comments

It’s been an interesting month for us at French Fridays. Last week’s recipe caused controversy over technique; this week’s recipe provoked one of the liveliest Problems & Questions thread that we’ve ever had. Liver is a challenging ingredient for many and this recipe seemed doubly challenging for some because the chicken livers are blended into custard cakes. (Meat custard…mmm…)

The results, however, are wonderful, at least for those of us who love pâté. This isn’t the pâté of my youth, a hearty country version that my mother’s family used to bring to us (safeguarded in their carry on luggage) when they were visiting from Manitoba. That pâté, Del’s, is famous amongst those who grew up in St. Boniface and gets shipped around the world to nostalgic Franco-Manitobans. Dorie’s Chicken Liver Gâteau is a much lighter affair, with subtle hints of sage, thyme, and rosemary.

I elected to ‘lighten’ it even more by using a lower fat milk in place of the whole milk and heavy cream, but it’s still very rich. There are several eggs in this recipe (and that’s before you add more yolks). I also put the custard into smaller molds, since I was serving these as an appetizer. My mother suggested baking them in mini-muffin pans for a Christmas buffet. I’ll have to put a note in my calendar to remind me of this ’round about mid-November.

The onions take a very short time to prepare and after a day in the refrigerator, they’re addictive. It’s a little dangerous knowing how easy pickling can be. I have to be careful not to make too much, since we’re a two-person household. Or, I could just make them for the rest of the family, as I did this week.

The gâteau is meant to be plated on a bed of mixed greens, with the pickled onions on the side, but I served it on a plate with olives and herb crackers along with the onions. It made a lovely savoury appetizer plate and was absolutely not as scary as our P&Q conversation might have led you to expect.

You can find many other blogged descriptions of this week’s FFWD recipe here: Chicken Liver Gâteaux With Pickled Onions

FFWD – Long and Slow Apples

January 11, 2013May 4, 2014 ~ Teresa ~ 12 Comments

You wouldn’t think baked apples were controversial, but this recipe caused a lot of consternation amongst the French Fridays crowd this week. It wasn’t the long bake at 300° or the layers of melted butter and spiced sugar. It wasn’t even figuring out what to use to press down on the apples as they cooked. It was that the recipe asks you to wrap the ramekins in a layer of plastic wrap under another of foil.

I’ve long been scared away from using cling wrap in the microwave, for fear of leaching chemicals, so I was also dubious about putting some into a conventional oven. My brother (a chef) advised that there are two kinds of wrap – restaurant-grade wrap that’s oven-safe and the cling wrap most of us have at home, which isn’t. I decided to brush the leftover melted butter onto foil and leave it at that.

That seemed to work just fine. My layers of apples were reduced to about a quarter of their original height and their texture had changed, too. They’d absorbed the butter and sugar and had become dense and rich. I used homemade vanilla sugar, skipped the zest, and added ground cardamom along with the ginger. It was a nice mix of flavours.

The apples are meant to be served with whipped cream, but I decided to dust them with icing sugar instead, which promptly melted into the apples, which were still a little too warm. This (relatively) quick apple confit made a great late night snack last weekend and I’d happily make them for a dinner party (with whipped cream, of course).

I’m curious to see what choices the rest of the Doristas made when they wrapped these for the oven. You can find their links here: Long and Slow Apples.

In the meantime, this week’s recipe was published here.

FFWD – Herb-Speckled Spaetzle

January 4, 2013May 4, 2014 ~ Teresa ~ 32 Comments

As you can see, my spaetzle are a little creamier than they are supposed to be. I made them gluten-free and though I think they’re pretty good for a first attempt at converting the recipe, they’re not exactly what you’d expect if you were ordering spaetzle from a menu.

Most cuisines have a comforting dumpling or pasta and this German version was tasty, if a bit messy to execute. I pushed the batter through a flat grater to shape them and it seemed to work well enough. Though you can’t tell from the photo, the spaetzle held their shape through boiling and pan-frying, though they never lost the creaminess that came from not getting the proportion quite right in my gluten-free flour substitution.

I served the spaetzle as I would rice, alongside the pork version of Dorie’s Chicken, Apples, and Cream à la Normande from a few weeks ago. The next day, I sprinkled a few of the leftovers in red pepper and tomato soup, as I was heating it up. Noodles and dumplings are something my partner doesn’t get much of since his celiac disease diagnosis, so the spaetzle have been a nice treat for him. Still, I don’t think I’ll be making spaetzle often. Maybe it’s a post-Christmas abstemiousness, from so much rich food over the holidays, but I’m leaning more toward soups these days. (This carrot soup, for instance.)

I don’t feel finished with desserts, though – I finally caught up on the chocolate mousse from November and am trying to come up with an excuse to serve it again. So good and far too quickly put together for something so elegant. It’s also much prettier than my version of the spaetzle. Not that we stopped to admire it long before eating it.

You can find many other blogged descriptions of this week’s FFWD recipe here: Herb-Speckled Spaetzle

Here’s everyone else’s take on the Top Secret Chocolate Mousse

FFWD – Go-With-Everything Celery Root Purée and Beef Cheek Daube With Carrots & Elbow Macaroni

December 28, 2012March 14, 2015 ~ Teresa ~ 14 Comments

Since the beginning of our time together, my partner and I have had a special dinner on Christmas Eve. We usually watch It’s a Wonderful Life, too. This week’s assigned recipe (along with a catch up from late November) was perfect for our Christmas Eve meal.

The celery root purée was almost as simple as mashed potatoes, just cubed celery root and potato boiled in a mixture of water and milk along with onion (and in my case, garlic), then puréed in the food processor with lashings of butter. I skimped a little on the milk, because I had other plans for it, but I don’t think that harmed the flavour of the purée at all.

The purée seemed like a great accompaniment for stew, so I also made the beef daube that I’d missed at the end of November. I didn’t bother tracking down beef cheek – the week before Christmas is hectic enough and I’d gotten a great deal on stewing meat at the grocer’s. I also skipped the elbow macaroni and replaced the regular flour called for in the recipe with a gluten-free all purpose blend. Beef, red wine, carrots, and a little chocolate at the end make a beautifully rich braise. Along with the buttery, slightly sharp taste of the purée, it made for an elegant supper.

This time of year, I think about how important societal rituals can be for making life meaningful, while at the same time, how hard they can be for some folks. Creating personal traditions helps to mark our passage through the year, while removing some of the hurt that many people carry through the standard holidays. At the darkest time of the year, we need all the light we can get.

This is my last post of 2012 (and it also happens to be the 200th post on this blog). I hope you ring in the New Year safely and joyously. See you in 2013.

You can find many other blogged descriptions of this week’s FFWD recipe here: Go-With-Everything Celery Root Purée

Here’s everyone else’s take on the Beef Cheek Daube With Carrots & Elbow Macaroni

FFWD – Cheez-it-ish Crackers

December 21, 2012December 21, 2012 ~ Teresa ~ 10 Comments

I’ll admit from the outset that I’ve never seen a Cheez-it, but if they’re anything like this week’s cracker recipe, I’m in. These Cheez-it-ish crackers have the texture of a very dry sablé, without its sweetness. Instead, they’ve got the richness of Gruyère, with the bite of pepper and cayenne.

This cracker is just begging to be served with a nice wine, so much so that I wish I’d had some on hand yesterday when I visited Campbell’s Gold Honey Farm and Meadery. We arrived just in time for a wine tasting, starting with some dry mead and working our way through apple, currant, and cherry honey wines. I’m tempted to go back for a bottle of the apple honey wine to go with the rest of my crackers.

Campbell’s Gold is on the Circle Farm Tour and it’s almost as nice to visit these farms at Christmastime as it is in the height of summer. It’s easy to forget, living in Vancouver, how much the rest of our region has to offer.

But let’s get back to the offerings of my kitchen. I opted to shape the cracker dough into logs and slice the crackers, rather than roll and cut them out. I only baked a few crackers and am saving the other logs to bake for some of the holiday gatherings we’ve got coming up. It’s not quite as elegant as the rolled-out cracker, but it’s awfully convenient. I’ve been favouring slice and bake cookies, too, this holiday season. I guess I’m embracing my last-minute nature…

Speaking of last-minute, I’d better get this post up while it’s still Friday. Merry Christmas to those who celebrate it and a very happy New Year to all. I’m looking forward to cooking and baking with the rest of the Doristas through 2013.

You can find many other blogged descriptions of this week’s FFWD recipe here: Cheez-it-ish Crackers

FFWD – Chicken, Apples, and Cream à la Normande

December 14, 2012May 4, 2014 ~ Teresa ~ 14 Comments

I write about community and cooking here, sometimes trying to combine the two, whether it’s cookie swaps or sharing food with family and friends. There’s another aspect of community that plays into the food writing I do here and that’s the online community built by French Fridays participants. A number of us are participating in a holiday card exchange organized by Alice of A Mama, Baby and Shar-Pei in the Kitchen. It’s been just over two years and 100 recipes since French Fridays began and this card exchange seems like the perfect way to express appreciation to at least some of the people that make our community so worthwhile. It’s been a privilege to get to know these folks a little and to communicate through our blogs and the comments we exchange. Thanks, Alice for organizing the card exchange – I’ve received a few already and they’re lovely.

It’s also good for me to cook something new every week (well, mostly every week) and to compare my results and variations with the rest of the group. I think I’ve become a better and more inventive cook over the course of this project. Speaking of inventive, I played a little bit with this week’s recipe. I added ground herbs to the (gluten-free) dredging mixture, I substituted two-percent milk for the cream, chicken thighs for the breasts and I skipped the alcohol altogether. (I didn’t read the recipe until this afternoon, I’m out of my all-purpose Cognac, and I wasn’t about to brave the lines at the liquor store on a December Friday evening.) Oh, and I added garlic, because I couldn’t help it.

It turned out really well, though I can see that adding Calvados, brandy, or Cognac would make it even more flavourful. We had some tonight on its own and we’ll finish it tomorrow, perhaps with spinach or broccoli as Dorie suggests.

Tonight, I’d also like to let our American Doristas know that I’m thinking of them.

You can find many other blogged descriptions of this week’s FFWD recipe here: Chicken, Apples, and Cream à la Normande

FFWD – Creamy Cauliflower Soup Sans Cream

December 11, 2012January 7, 2013 ~ Teresa ~ 5 Comments

It took me a while to post this week’s recipe, but not because it was a difficult one. This soup is ready from chop to purée in less than an hour and requires only a few vegetables, herbs, and some stock. Cauliflower is a wonderful vegetable for puréed soups, because it gives the consistency and velvet feel of a cream soup without reliance on cream. I usually roast cauliflower before adding it to soup, since I prefer the richer flavour that brings. It is nice to know that you can get good results without roasting it, though, on nights when you need to get supper on the table a little faster.

Dorie’s soup is seasoned with salt, pepper, and thyme, but I added some nutmeg after tasting it, for more complexity. Others in the group added bacon, truffle oil, or gremolata to theirs.

My current favourite cauliflower soup recipe is found at the end of this article on olive oil. It’s similar to Dorie’s, but relies on curry for flavour, which is perfect for cauliflower. I don’t think Dorie’s soup will supplant it in my heart, but I’ll try it this way again and I’ll roast the cauliflower first next time.

I’ll also be trying the mussel version of this recipe some time – it sounds wonderfully flavourful.

You can find many other blogged descriptions of this week’s FFWD recipe here: Creamy Cauliflower Soup Sans Cream

FFWD: Mushroom and Shallot Quiche

November 30, 2012November 30, 2012 ~ Teresa ~ 14 Comments

I haven’t made the beef daube that everyone’s raving about this week, as it got pushed back in our schedule by Kevin’s lovely version of this gluten-free red curry soup – no complaints from me, though, as this has become a favourite. I’m planning to get to the daube later this weekend.

Instead, I’ll take this opportunity to catch up on a dish from the beginning of November that I made and photographed, but didn’t have an opportunity to post. Quiche has become a standard dish in our household, not least because Dorie’s tart dough adapts so well to gluten-free flour. This time, I made an olive oil version, as I forgot to pick up butter when I got the ingredients for the quiche. I was surprised at how well it turned out, though the dough wept a little olive oil – next time I make this substitution (if there is one), I’ll use a little less.

I deviated from the recipe for the filling, too, adding bacon (I couldn’t help myself) and substituting smoked cheddar for the Gruyère (it’s what I had on hand). I used all cremini mushrooms, because they were the nicest available that day. I added extra shallots and significantly more cheese than called for in the recipe, as well.

That’s what I love about a good quiche recipe – it adapts to whatever you have on hand and whatever your taste buds decree. What I especially appreciate about Dorie’s recipes is how well she explains technique, so that when we do vary the recipe we can do so with confidence.

My gluten-loving family loved this quiche, experimental gluten-free, olive oil tart dough and all. I might be making another for just Kevin and me, soon, because there’s a beautiful cave aged Gruyère at our local food co-op right now that’s calling out to me. After the daube, of course.

You can find many other blogged descriptions of this week’s FFWD recipe here: Mushroom and Shallot Quiche

FFWD – Herbed Olives

November 23, 2012 ~ Teresa ~ 14 Comments

Tonight is one of those nights for grazing, rather than dinner, with a glass of red wine firmly in hand. These olives will go nicely with the cheeses, pâté, and spreads we’ve got on hand. Usually as the grey and wet of November takes hold, I’m wanting to make stews and soups, but this week, I want to keep it simple. My kitchen urges are all about sweets, lately, anyway. I’m rifling through my cookbooks for Cookie Swap ideas, even though I have to wait a couple of weeks before the baking can begin. Perhaps I’ll need a few test runs – there are some recipes in my copy of the Gourmet Cookie Book that might warrant experimentation.

I hope all our American Doristas are having a lovely long weekend. As for me, the weekend’s going to begin as soon as the wine has breathed a little longer.

You can find many other blogged descriptions of this week’s FFWD recipe here: Herbed Olives

FFWD – Chicken Tagine with Sweet Potatoes and Prunes

October 26, 2012 ~ Teresa ~ 28 Comments

A last-minute post for this week’s dish. It’s been a busy few weeks and I’ve been home less than I’ve been away. I’m looking forward to having time to read and comment on other folks’ posts, as well as getting back to my Tuesday posts. I’ve really appreciated how easy our French Fridays picks have been lately, so I can at least keep up with the group.

This tagine was simple to put together and full of subtle sweetness – saffron, honey, and prunes, spiced with star anise, cinnamon, and a little cayenne for equally subtle heat. My just-before-dinner snapshot doesn’t do it justice, but it’s a lovely dish, too – the colours look beautiful on the plate.

I was happy to hear Dorie suggest that quinoa makes the best accompaniment for the tagine, as it’s my usual gluten-free go to for Moroccan-inspired recipes. I cooked mine in a mixture of water and chicken broth this time.

I’m looking forward to leftovers tomorrow. It’s the sort of dish that’s even better the second day.

You can find many other blogged descriptions of this week’s FFWD recipe here: Chicken Tagine with Sweet Potatoes and Prunes