Potatoes Roasted with Duck Fat, Green Salad with Grilled Chicken Livers, Creme Caramel

Duck Fat Roasted Potatoes
As I mentioned last week, duck fat is a healthy alternative to butter , French people are proud to say that in the south west part of France where people uses duck fat versus butter, the heart attack rate of the population is lower than other French regions..... This recipe comes from Sarlat, a medieval town in the rural region of Dordogne.
  

Serve 6 to 8 persons

Ingredients:
1kg of potatoes
4 garlic cloves
2 spoonful of duck fat
optional:small pieces of black truffle mushroom
Coarse salt and pepper 

Peel and slice the potatoes in the shape of French fries. Wash them and dry then. Peel and press the garlic cloves, put aside.
In a stone ware pot, heat up the duck fat and when it fries, add the potatoes. Let them golden. Add salt, pepper and the garlic. Stir the potatoes and cover the stone pot. Let the potatoes cook at low heat for 45 min, stirring from time to time. before serving, sprinkle the black truffles on the potatoes.
 


Green Salad with Grilled Chicken Livers 
If you want to give it a go for this amazing tasting salad, make sure to buy extra fresh, organic chicken livers as the liver filters all the toxins passing through the  animal body .... so...ask your butcher for the best  !

Serve 6 to 8 persons

Ingredients:
1 large cos salad
2 white onions
1 French shallot
10 stems of chives
500g of extra fresh organic chicken livers
5 spoonful of olive oil
4 spoonful of wine raspberry vinegar
Salt & Pepper

Rinse the salad (to remove any unwanted creatures hiding in the salad, soak it in a large bowl of water with 2 spoonful of white vinegar). dry the leaves and cut them into eatable size.
Peel and slice the French shallot and cut finely the chives. Put aside.
Prepare the dressing with 4 spoonful of olive oil, 2 spoonful of wine raspberry vinegar, salt and pepper to taste. 

Cut the chicken livers in to or three pieces ( depending of their size) after removing the central nerve. Peel and slice the 2 white onions. Heat up a frying pan eith 1 spoonful of olive oil and fry the chicken livers for about 10 min (they should be cooked and firm but do not over cook them as they will harden).Put them on top of your green salad. Heat up the frying pan again adding 2 spoonful of wine raspberry vinegar in it. Turn off the heat when the vinegar starts bubbling.
Sprinkle the French shallots and chives over the livers and finish with the cooked vinegar.
Serve when the livers are still hot. 
Pour the vinegar the 

Creme Caramel
This dessert is really simple and everybody loves it ! in Summer or Winter you can serve it with cookies.

Serve 6 to 8 persons

Ingredients:
6 eggs
1 litre of milk
1 vanilla bean 
6 spoonful of brown sugar
3 spoonful of sugar

Heat the oven at 150 degrees.
In a small pan, dilute 3 spoonful of sugar with 2 spoonful of water. Heat up to do a caramel. When the sugar+water turn gold, turn off the heat and pour the caramel in a large glass bowl (style pyrex) or in small individual ramekins.
In another pan, heat up the milk with the vanilla bean that you have incised in its length.
 In a bowl, crack the eggs and add the 3 spoonful of brown sugar. Stir well and pour the hot milk over it and stir again.
Pour this mixture over the glass bowl or the individual ramekins where the caramel sits.
As the creme caramel will cokk in the oven in a Bain Marie, you will need to place the glass bowl or the individual ramekins into a larger oven proof dish and fill this one with water up to 3/4.
Cook in the oven at 150 degrees for 90 minutes.
Get the creme caramel out of the glass bowl or the individual ramekins before serving coating with the caramel.
You can serve the creme caramel  still warm or cold as you wish .

Bon appetit ! 

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Zucchuni Soup with Coriander, Duck Breast with Raspberries, Chocolate Mousse

Zucchini Soup with Coriander
Very easy  to prepare and kids love it ! Serve with toasted bread

Serve 6 to 8 persons

Ingredients:
4 small zucchinis
2 potatoes
1 litre of vegetable stock
3 laughing cows cheese portions
salt & pepper
10 stem of fresh coriander
3 garlic cloves
1 spoonful of olive oil 

Peel the zucchinis and potatoes, wash them and cut in small pieces.
Peel the garlic, pick the leaves from the coriander stems and cut them finely.
In a casserole, fry the vegetable in olive oil for 10 minutes, add the garlic and the fresh coriander. Add the vegetable stock, cover and let it cook for 30 min.
Add the laughing cow cheese portions and blend slightly the soup with an electrical blender or use a julienne mill it is even better ! 


Duck Breasts with Raspberries 
Magret de canard in France is the duck 's breast  that has been overfed so they can be  bigger than the normal  Duck breast.  In Australia, I do not think you can find "magret" but you can use the normal Duck breasts. You will need to remove the bones if they are still in,  but keep the skin and the fat under the skin...Raspberries can also be replaced by blueberries,  sour apples or pears...

Serve 6 persons

Ingredients:
3 duck breast (1 duck has 2 breast fillet)
300 g of Raspberries
2 spoonful of raspberries wine vinegar
coarse sea salt & pepper

Take the meat out of the fridge at least 1 hour before cooking it.
Trace and cut slightly the skin into a grid so the fat will melt during cooking. 
 Heat up a frying pan at high temperature and put the duck breast into the frying pan. A lot of fat will melt. Remove this fat from the frying pan during the cooking and put it into a glass jar.(you can store it in your fridge for grilling potatoes as duck fat is a healthy alternative to butter).
When the 2/3 of fat on the breasts has melted, turn the breast over to the other side and cook for 7 to 10 min depending of how well cooked you like your meat to be. 
Put the cooked duck breast on a wooden board and slice them and cook again both side of the slices in the same frying pan. Add the vinegar, salt and pepper. Put them on a serving dish aside.
Use the same frying pan with the juice of the meat to cook the raspberries in it for about 2 min. Put the cooked raspberries on top of the duck breasts and serve straight away.

You can accompany this dish with simply mashed potatoes, steamed green beans with garlic or boiled potatoes grilled in duck fat....

  Bon Appetit !

Dark Chocolate Mousse 
This very simple dessert is known by everyone and this one is from a very well known French chef called George Blanc. You need to prepare the Chocolate mousse the day before. I prefer to serve the mousse into individual ramekins  when I invite friends but you can also serve it in a big bowl on the family table. It is important to use very fresh eggs for this recipe as the eggs are not cooked .

Serve 6 persons

Ingredients:
4 egg yolks
6 egg white
250g of bitter dark chocolate(between 50% to 70% cacao)
100g of butter
40 g of sugar
1 pinch of salt

Separate the  eggs putting the whites into a large bowl and the yolks into a smaller bowl.
Melt the chocolate in a bain-marie casserole(this is important as chocolate should never be melt on a direct heat). Add the butter to the chocolate and mix to a thick mixture. Remove from heat and incorporate the egg yolks until you obtain an even consistency.
Whip the egg whites until they are firm. To do this, add a pinch of salt to them and whip in a slow speed so more air will incorporate into them, giving them a nice flexible texture.
Add little by little the sugar while whipping the whites.
Pour the chocolate over the egg whites and gently fold with a wooden spoon until you get a fluffy mixture.
Pour into individual ramekins and refrigerate overnight.

  

 
 

Rillettes du Mans, Quiche Lorraine , Walnut Cake with Chantilly and Berries

Rillettes du Mans

This is a delicacy for the French... and you do not ( I mean do not) spread it over a slice of bread, non non, you need to put a bit of rillettes at the end of your piece of bread and crunch it. Then put again some rillettes at the edge of your bread and crunch again.... Yum!

Originally from Le Mans (French town in the Loire valley) this is a preparation of pork meat slowly cooked in its fat.  An ideal dish for the aperitif or an entree with a glass of white wine...

Serve 6 to 8 persons

Ingredients:

500g of pork neck

500g of pork rashers without the skin

1 spoonful of 4 spices

15 g of sea salt

5 g of white ground pepper

1. Cut the pork neck and the pork rashes in small cubes. Put this meat in a stoneware pot (Le Creuset style) or any slow cooking pot and add 100ml of water. Let it cook at really small temperature during 3 hours steering from time to time (the trick is that it should not burn in the bottom but cook slowly in the fat. When the meat begin to disintegrate add the salt, pepper and 4 spices. 
2. let it cool down and add again salt or pepper to taste.

Put in small jars and refrigerate. This can stay for 1 week in your fridge (if it is not all eaten before).

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Quiche Lorraine from my mother's recipe

Almost everybody I know from the Lorraine region have this recipe from their mothers... it is such a popular family dish in France. This one is from Estelle 's mother and as she describes the dish it sure brings childhood memories...

Serve 6 to 8 persons

Ingredients:
classic pie pastry dough (called "pâte brisée"* in France)
250g of smoked speck
1 yellow onion
3 eggs
250ml of whipping cream
250ml of milk
2 spoonful of flour
200g of grated Swiss cheese or Gruyere
Salt, pepper and grated nutmeg to taste

*For the pastry dough: 250g of flour, 125g of melted butter, 1/2 coffee spoon of salt and a small amount of water to help agglomerating these ingredients .
Mix the ingredients for the dough and form a ball.Roll down the ball of dough into 2 sheets of baking paper and place into the fridge for 20mn.
Cut the onion and the speck (or smoked bacon) in small pieces and cook until the speck releases some of its fat. Set aside.
In a bowl, crack the eggs incorporate the flour to the whipped eggs and mix slowly adding the whipping cream, the milk and a handful of grated cheese.Add the salt, pepper and nutmeg.
Take the dough out of the fridge and place it in a quiche dish or tart dish (a quiche dish is slightly deeper than a tart dish). Remove the upper baking paper and pour the mixture over the dough. Add the rest of the grated cheese on the top.
Place into the oven at 210 degrees for 30 to 40mn.


This dish is delicious when served hot with a green salad but it can also be served cold as finger food when cut in small pieces.


This recipe is not limited to speck as you can replace it with smoked salmon, mushrooms, spinach, capsicums or fresh goat cheese...get creative and try!

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Walnut Cake with Chantilly and Berries

In France, walnut recipes exist since the Middle Age.There are 3 different varieties of walnuts (Franquette, Mayette and  Parisienne). Walnuts are rich in mineral salts, good fatty acids and vitamin B and D.

Serve 6 to 8 persons

Ingredients:
400g of walnuts
8 eggs
250g of sugar
100g of flour


For the Chantilly: 200ml of whipping cream, 50g of sugar
Berries: blueberries, raspberries, strawberries, mulberries or else


Grind the walnuts and mix with 50g of sugar. Crack the egg separating the white and the yolk. Mix the egg yolks with the rest of the sugar(200g) until the yellow colour turns lighter. Whip the egg whites adding a dash of salt to help them getting firm quicker.
Mix the walnuts with the flour and add the egg yolks preparation. Incorporate delicately this to the firm egg whites. 
Place a baking paper over a large tart oven dish. Pour the preparation into it and bake in the oven for about 30mn at 210 degrees.
Whip the whipping cream with the sugar (50g) until it gets firm but do not whip it too much as it will turn into butter.
Prepare the dessert plates: cut small portions of the walnut cake and place a spoonful of Chantilly on top of the cake portion. Sprinkle berries on top of the Chantilly.
Et voila ! 

Enjoy your meal...

New ambiance

I think this is a better ambiance for this site and I will continue to learn and make efforts to present these recipes better...

French Lentils Salad, Sea Trout Papillottes, Chocolate Tart with Poached Pears

French Lentils Salad from the Lyon region

This is a delicious entree from Lyon (this town in France is also called the Capital of Food) that can be completed with other salads or cold cuts but also can be served to accompany a barbecue or roast meats.

Serve 6 to 8 persons

Ingredients:
250g of French du Puy lentils or bondi lentils*
200 g of Bacon or smoked speck
1 small yellow onion
1 red onion
3 carrots
5 branches of parsley, 1 laurel leave
1 litre of vegetable stock
*bondi lentils are distributed by - jcsqualityfoods - available in most of Sydney's fruit shops

for the dressing:
1 coffee spoon of french mustard, 3 coffee spoons of olive oil,1 coffee spoon of wine vinegar, salt and pepper.

1. Cut the bacon or speck in small rectangles of 2 cm long and 1/2 cm wide (what we call lardon in France).
   Slice finely the yellow onion.In a pot, fry the yellow onion slices and the "lardons" in 2 spoonfuls of olive oil for a few minutes. The onion should get transparent but not turning brown.Add the vegetable stock and the laurel leave. add salt and pepper.Let this cook for 30 to 40 mn at low heat.Taste the Lentils (with a wooden spoon), they should be tender, not hard and not turning into mush either. Strain the lentils and let them cool down.


2. Peel and grate the carrots in a salad bowl. Add the sliced red onion and the parsley finely cut.Prepare the dressing.


3. Take the laurel leave out of the lentils and mix with the other ingredients in the salad bowl.Pour the dressing over it and mix again.

You can serve the salad warm, cold or at room temperature, to your taste.

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Papillottes of Sea Trout with Julienne veggies, Beurre Blanc sauce

A "papillotte" in France is a portion of fish with cut vegetables and spices wrapped in aluminum foil and cooked in the oven. This way of cooking keep all the fish and spices flavors together and the sauce is added to the taste of each guest. The way of cutting vegetable in a long and fine stick shape is called Julienne.

Serve 6 to 8 persons

Time to prepare: 40mns

Ingredients:

6 to 8 sea trout portions
2 carrots
2 turnips
1 large red capsicum
6 to 8 branches of Fresh Thyme
salt and white ground pepper
Olive oil

For the "Beurre Blanc" sauce

1 French eshallot (type of sweet onion), 1 glass of dry white wine, 50g of butter, 3 large spoonful of sour cream, salt and pepper to taste.

1. Peel the carrots and turnips. Cut the red capsicum and take out the white flesh and seeds. Cut the carrots in long and fine sticks of 3mm wide and 5 to 6 cm long. Do the same for the turnips and the capsicums. Cook these vegetable in boiling water for 5/10 Mn (the veggies should be tenderised but not fully cooked). Strain the veggies and let them cool down.


2. Choose an oven dish or oven tray that will hold all the aluminium squares with the fish portion.Place the fish portion in the middle of the alu.square and lift up both side of the alu.square.Place them all in your oven dish / tray. Add some vegetable julienne on the top of each fish portion and finish with a small branch of fresh thyme. Add a little salt on each portion (fish is salty by definition so you do not need to add a lot of salt) and add generously some white ground pepper.Finish with a a dash of olive oil. Wrap the alu.squares lifting up the ends so the juice in the wrapping won't escape during cooking. Place in the oven and cook for 20 Mn at 180 degrees.


3. Cut the French eschalotte and put in a small pot with the glass of white wine.Cook until the wine has disappeared the add the butter and the sour cream. Cook for 5 mn until all ingredients are well mixed. Add salt and pepper and 2 spoonful of water and use an electric soup mixer to lift up this sauce so it gets airy.

You can serve the "papillotes" directly on the table or you can prepare each plate on your kitchen board, removing the aluminum wrapping directly from the plate, sliding the fish portion in its juice,topped with the veggies straight into the plate. Place the Beurre Blanc into a hot bowl (a sauce is nicer when it is hot, therefore the serving bowl should be soaking in hot water to keep the sauce warm).

You can add a spoonful of nice white Basmati rice or 2/3 boiled peeled kiffler potatoes with this dish.

Sauvignon blanc or a white chardonnay (not too sweet)will accompany this full flavor dish.

Bon appetit !

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Well, after all this a plate of cheese will be placed in the middle of the table aside of crusty baguette slices. Usually, a minimum of 3 different types of cheeses constitute a simple cheese plate.

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Chocolate Tart with Poached Pears

I have always thought poached pears are delicious with a chocolate sauce. I made up this chocolate tart recipe and added some poached pears to it to decorate the choco tart and add this beautiful flavor association.

Serve 6 to 8 persons

Chocolate filling:

4 pears
20cl of whipping cream
150g of dark cooking chocolate
1 egg
2/3 drops of Vanilla extract

Shortbread crust:

250g of flour, 150g of melted butter, 1 egg, 1 spoonful of sour cream, a pinch of salt, 2 spoonful of sugar.

Mix all these ingredient to form a dough. Roll down the dough in between 2 sheets of baking paper. Place in the fridge for 30mn.

1. Prepare the chocolate cream. Melt the chocolate in a bain-Marie saucepan(the saucepan with the chocolate will be placed into a bigger pot with boiling water).In the meantime, peel the pears, cut them in half and remove the middle seeds.


2. Boil for 5 Mn the pears to tenderise them. Strain them and keep aside. Place the shortbread crust into an oven tart dish.Remove the upper baking paper, pick the crust with a fork and cook in the oven for 15/20mn until it golden. Look if the crust lift during cooking and simply open the oven and pick it with a pointy knive to let the air go. Do not over cook the crust, take it out of the oven when it starts to have a golden colour. Let it cool down.


3. Pour the whipping cream over the melted chocolate. Turn off the fire after 5 mn. Add the egg and 2/3 drops of vanilla extract and mix again. Pour this filling into the shortbread crust. Cut bottom of the pears so they look like a hand-fan. Delicately place the pears on the chocolate filling and push them down so they open as a hand-fan.


4. Put the Tart again in the oven for 20mn at 150 degrees. Remove from the oven and let it cool down. Before serving, sprinkle a little bit of icing sugar.

Et Voila!