Home » Archive for February, 2007

Butternut Squash and Sage Ravioli I never get tired of eating squashes. I love their funky shapes, varied colors, the sweetness of the vegetable and the numerous dishes that can be prepared with them, ranging from savory to sweet food. I can still remember a Paul Gayler’s cake that P. prepared a long time ago [...]

Vanilla Brown Butter and Almond Cake with Warm Vanilla Crème Brûlée Custard Filling From here you just think, Rien de spécial ! (nothing special), this cake is a mere teacake, nothing less and nothing more. But wait until you get to know the rest of the story. There is really a secret treasure hidden inside. [...]

Caramelized Onion and Fresh Anchovy Tart “I feel tired, crevée (wrecked)”, I thought as I looked at our orange cuckoo clock in the dining room. The small plastic canary caged inside seemed to be staring at me. Why was he not moving? Stuck in time? It was Friday late afternoon and my body could still [...]

Plum Cake The month of February, février, is an odd month. Short, always confusing as I never can remember how many days there will be each year, cold when we are in the Northern hemisphere — on the North-Eastern coast of the US especially — but also a month with a lot of memories of [...]

Red Beet Risotto “It really makes you pee red, you know”, I told P. “What is this joke?”, he said. “Trust me, it really does! Beets do that to you!” And I can tell! I eat beets often. I know that it could well be that I am an exception. I do not think that [...]

Tea Time There is always a need of something sweet with a nice cup of tea. Am I reliving a Proust’s moment? I look up to check the time on our orange cuckoo clock. This time the canary moves. No wonder that I keep yawning. It is 11 pm. Despite my heavy eyelids, I suddenly [...]

Coconut Cream with Fruit and Crumble I know this might sound surprising, but P. and I have never been fans of going out when we are “supposed to”. Like say, on Valentine’s day. Too crazy, too many people, too much fuss. Instead, we like it quiet and simple. Chez nous. Coming home last night, P. [...]

A few things here and there. Number 1: I will most likely be in Paris in next April — yeah — sometime mid-April (never long enough but better than nothing). So, if anyone in the area would love to meet up, say even organize a mini food-blogger meeting, why not, let me know. I do [...]

Chestnut and Crab Cake with Smoked Salmon and Horseradish Cream Chestnut and Crab Cake The movie looked promising despite the bad critics it had so far received. We opened my MacBook to watch the preview of Breaking and Entering in which Juliette Binoche played along with Jude Law. The story seemed good. IMDB talked about [...]

Buckwheat Herb Galettes and its Mixed Salad I can say this the way it is. I am one lucky girl. I was raised on eating salade with every meal. A green salad very often, or une crudité (raw vegetables dressed into a salad) at other times. It was pretty much a family ritual, a habit [...]

Comforting Break and Apple Cake Wishing you all a nice day. Hope you can take a break, to enjoy a nice cup of coffee or tea? And a nibble to please your palate. Apple Cake for me. Bonne journée à tous. J’espère que vous aurez le temps de faire une pause, café, thé ? Avec [...]

Raspberry and Black Sesame Tuiles Dentelle Beautiful is the word that keeps coming back to my mind. Gigantic elephants bathing in a stream, gorgeous and majestic snow-capped high mountains, clear skies and colorfully dressed people move in front of us. We travel through a monastery, cross a crystal-clear lake to get to a remote village [...]

Apple Nutty Cinnamon Cake The question to what makes the texture of a cake perfect remains vague and impossible to answer. Light and airy? Dense and compact? What makes it the best is what makes le dégustateur or la dégustatrice, you, happy. Factors such as how you feel, how hungry you are, what season it [...]

Chicken Pastilla I have always found difficult to give an answer to the often asked question “what is your favorite cuisine?” Because there is not one. There are just too many cuisines that I like, that transport me to exotic places, areas that I do not know that well. And so yes, just like Italian, [...]

Chocolate Mousse, Raspberry and Croustillant The only shot I managed to take of the dessert I made last night for our dinner at home with friends! A variation of this one. Everyone was more interested in starting to eat (smile)! It is good once in a while to make my own recipes more than once! [...]

Watermelon Radish Spaghetti Whenever I walk outside, I like to play this game: Pay close attention to try to discern the details of the amazing palette of colors available around me. I can still remember P’s Irish cousin G. telling me about the numerous shades of green to be found in Ireland when he compared [...]

It is not every day that I make confessions like this one. I guess I must be feeling comfortable. A l’aise ! Like many of you, when I was a kid, I had a nickname. We all did, didn’t we? In fact, I even had more than one. The first one came from the first [...]