Elizabeth Bard's Blog, page 3

July 29, 2011

Tomato Porn


It's a slippery slope. In the pulpy afterglow of fresh tomato everything, comes (what's a girl to do) roasted tomato everything. I'm helpless. Give an inch, my grandmother would say, and you'll find yourself with a face full of seeds and olive oil dripping down your elbow.

Roasted tomatoes are inherently greedy. Slick with olive oil and mellowed with garlic, they are my attempt at pleasure hoarding, not unlike R's father's Playboy collection stashed in the attic (my mother never liked that girl). I want to be able to peek into the freezer in December and know I can use this spark of sunshine to light up a winter pasta sauce, or guarantee a sensational base for braised veal shank or white beans. Of course, the nature of greed means that I couldn't wait until December to explore my pasta fantasies. As it's bikini season, I've been doing my best to limit carbs, measuring out proper, back-of-the-box portions of whole wheat spaghetti (85 grams). I'm not one to deprive myself, so a moderate dose of pasta means lots of sexy topping to fill up my favorite shallow white bowls from Habitat.

The right dish is the oldest diet trick in the book. I recently bought a whole service of Limoge dishes at a local flea market. Guess what, my French dinner plates (like French baby clothes) are a good inch smaller in circumference than the set of American plates my mother brought over.

There's only so many times a week a girl can make ratatouille, so I used part of this week's eggplant allotment to make my pasta sauce. I used a tablespoon or two of the roasted tomato oil to sauté the eggplant until tender, then added shrimp, the roasted tomatoes, a splash of white wine and a pinch of cayenne pepper at the end.

I've never been sure if the realization of a fantasy is meant to satiate passion, or to fuel it. I suspect it's the later. Which, if my freezer holds out, is fine with me.

Roasted Tomatoes

4 lbs of perfect heirloom tomatoes, sliced approx. 1 inch thick
1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil
1 head of garlic - wet (i.e. fresh) garlic is ideal
Sea salt to taste

Heat the oven to 325F.

Line your largest baking sheet with aluminum foil. Arrange the sliced tomatoes in a single layer, tuck the cloves of garlic (unpeeled) between them, pour over the olive oil. Sprinkle with a pinch or two sea salt. Leave for 1 1/2 to 2 hours in the oven, until the garlic is tender and the tomatoes are soft and a bit wrinkly. Make sure you save all the liquid along with the garlic and tomatoes.

Store in the fridge (cover with additional olive oil to keep longer) or freeze for a snowy day.

Roasted Tomato Pasta with Shrimp and Eggplant

This is an approximation - who takes notes during a fantasy? Oh. Well, I don't.

2-3 tbsp of your tomato olive oil liquid
2 smallish eggplant, slim and dark
1 pound raw frozen shrimp (I don't ever recommend using frozen cooked shrimp - in my experience they are limp and watery)
2 cups roasted tomatoes (give or take), with a bit of the liquid
A pinch or two of cayenne pepper
A splash of white wine
1/2 tsp sugar (optional)
Small handful of basil leaves, ripped by hand

Slice the eggplant in thinnish strips (about 1/4 inch thick by 2 inches long), you want it to cook through in a reasonable amount of time. In a large sauté pan, heat 2-3 tablespoons of your tomato olive oil liquid. over medium heat, sauté your eggplant until really tender (nothing worse than eggplant that bites back. Add frozen shrimp, tomatoes, cayenne, wine and sugar. Cook until shrimp turn pink, about 5 minutes. Turn off the heat, stir in the basil, leaving aside a few leaves for garnish.

Serve over whole wheat spaghetti.

Serves 4
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Published on July 29, 2011 05:27

July 25, 2011

Golden Days


I love my summer refrigerator. That said, I love my refrigerator most times of year, but I get a particular kick out inspecting the contents of my summer fridge, especially after a hefty trip to the market. Summer guests and my husband (aka the fruit monster) make sure that we go through at least 2 cagettes of peaches and nectarines a week. Tomatoes are neatly stacked next to the rare sight of French corn on the cob (the French feed corn to animals, not people) and a pot of almond pesto made by a German woman in Reillanne. The jar in the back right is Mr. C's homemade pieds pacquets, stuffed tripe, which has been there for several months, and will probably be there for several months more, until the first frost brings out the offal eater in me.

The overflow makes its way down to the wine cellar. This cellar is the reason we found the house - the French poet and Resistance leader Rene Char buried the manuscript of his most famous work underneath the dirt floor (for the full date with destiny click here).

It is also a very fine wine cellar (14C all year round), where the previous owners left us a dusty (but perfectly serviceable) garde-manger – a screen front cabinet for storing food.

The golden days of summer find me obsessed with the local saffron. Provence is turning out to be the source of some surprising staples in my kitchen. I knew the tomatoes would be great – but who knew that I would living smack in the middle of spelt (Épeautre), saffron (safran) and chickpea (pois chiche) country. There is a couple at our Sunday market who grow their own saffron (I've been invited to see the harvest Sept/Oct – stay tuned). And I recently tasted a little saffron hazelnut carrot muffin at the market. It was a tiny bit dry (by and large, Europe sucks at muffins - I find it comforting to know that there are some things where European cuisine simply fails), but it got me thinking about the possibilities. Perhaps a version of my carrot cake with ground hazelnuts instead of walnuts, the egg and sugar mixture infused with saffron. This is what happens, my cooking brain gets ahead of my cooking hands. There's a limited number of recipes I can make in one day, unless I want to serve nothing but carrot muffins for dinner. No one would mind, I'm sure, but hey, it's bikini season…

My saffron success story for the moment is the simplest of dishes: a peach, nectarine and apricot compote, which I've been eating every morning with yogurt and muesli. The trick to getting slightly overripe fruit is to go at the end of the market, when vendors are trying to get rid of product that won't last another day. I'm such a good customer with my local peach man, he usually throws in a kilo or two of fast ripening fruit for free – piling them on top of the 2 or 3 cartons of perfect table peaches I've chosen by hand.

Saffron is more of a smell than a taste – my local variety gives off dried peaches and sandalwood. Unfortunately, cheap (or old) saffron will often do nothing but turn your meal a charming (actually quite Provencal) shade of yellow. Good saffron will give your dish a undertone, not exactly spice, but some distant glimpse of the spice caravan, almost out of sight over the next sand dune. I think works perfectly with the sweet/tart flavor of peaches.

When I get my canning act together, this is what I'm going to make, jars and jars of golden days to last me through the chill of winter.

2 pounds of slightly overripe fruit (a mix of peaches, nectarines and apricots)
1 tablepsoon of turbinado sugar
2 good pinches of saffron

Cut the fruit into 1 inch cubes. I don't especially feel the need to peel. In a heavy bottomed saucepan, combine the fruit and sugar. Bring to a boil, stir in the saffron, let simmer over low heat until thickened and slightly reduced, mine took about 40 minutes. Serve hot or cold, over yogurt or pound cake – I was even thinking it might make a superb substitute filling for my grandmother's apple cake. Bon appétit!
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Published on July 25, 2011 01:37

June 1, 2011

With a Cherry on Top



I'm an old soul. "3 going on 30", as my mother used to say. In this, as in so many things, she's not wrong. There's something about my 30's that fits. When I hit 31, I somehow felt right in my skin. My mental age and my real age finally merged, like overlapping film negatives, suddenly schronized for a perfect technicolor image.

So how did such an old biddy find herself, this past week, giggling, 6 feet off the ground in the limbs of a cherry tree? I've been helping Mr. C in his garden - planting potatoes (ye of little faith) and learning the ropes. Spring sprung rather early in Provence this year. The lilacs were wilting by the first of May, and now the cherry trees are groaning with fruit, several weeks in advance.



G., Augustin and I went down with a cardboard fruit crate. We barely had to touch the fruit, it almost fell into our hands. Augustin giggled, and ran around our feet, picking up strays. Somewhere in the stretching, tugging, and plucking of the cherries was a childlike sensation that I can't ever remember feeling. (Not to mention the forbidden pleasure of staining a perfectly good white tee-shirt with cherry juice.)

I don't have many early childhood memories. My parents divorced when I was seven, and much of what came before is a blank. It felt strange, and strangely logical, to be collecting cherries, making new childhood memories. Maybe it's cheating, to be creating my own childhood memories at the same time as my son, but I guess Augustin won't mind me piggybacking onto his pleasure. He might even show me a thing or two.



Of course, how I have to figure out what to do with several kilos of ruby red cherries. Once again, Mr. C came to the rescue with two recipes neatly printed on an index card. The first, a clafoutis, uses the brust of fresh cherries for a hearty breakfast flan, the second was a recipe for "cherry marmalade" - cherries are too watery for jam, but this was perfect - slightly wrinkled, toothsome cherries in a velvety syrup. Mr. C does all his own canning, and he has his own method of "insta-sterilization", which involves flipping the jars and storing them upside down. As with many family recipes, the instructions were lacking a few salient details, like the fact that the cherry syrup needs to be burning hot when you're doing all this. Long story short, we will be eating cherry marmalade for breakfast lunch and dinner this month. Come to think of it. That sounds like another thing my childhood self might have dreamed of.




Mr. C's Cherry Clafoutis

This is more of a dense flan (in Brittany it's called a 'far'). Next time I might reduce the flour a bit and see what happens, but G., Breton that he is, thought it was perfect this way. The French leave the pits in their cherries when making clafoutis -they say it adds a nutty taste. Warn your guests, or be prepared to pay for the dental work.

750 grams cherries
100 grams flour (I might add a bit less)
90 grams of sugar (white or turbinado)- I might add a tablespoon of brown sugar on top next time, just before putting it in the oven
6 eggs
250 ml of whole milk
a pinch of salt
1 tbsp kirsch (cherry liquer) or rum

Preheat the oven to 375F. 190C.

Butter and sugar a ceramic tart pan , or 9x13 casserole dish.

Beat the eggs and salt together. Sift in the flour, stirring just enough to combine. Little by little, add the milk. The batter will be thin, like crepe batter.

Distribute your cherries on the bottom of your casserole dish. Carefully pour over the batter. Bake on the center rack for 30-35 minutes until custard is set in the middle. Serve warm or at room temperature, sprinkled with powdered sugar.

Personally, I love it cold for breakfast.



Mr. C's Cherry Marmalade

The canning process in this recipe is a guess, I can't speak to its success rate, as I haven't done it properly yet. What I can promise is that if you make 3 jars worth and stick it in the fridge, it will disappear pretty darn quick! Plain yogurt is your friend.

1 kilo of cherries
750 grams of sugar (I used a mix of white and turbinado)
1/2 cup of kirsch (cherry liquer), I suspect cognac might work as well...

Wash and dry 3 jam jars.

Pit the cherries and pour over the sugar and the alcohol. Stir to combine, let the mixture sit for 12 hours. In a heavy bottomed saucepan, bring the mixture to a boil, simmer for 20 minutes. Fish out the cherries, set aside. Continue to simmer the syrup for 1 hour, a bit longer won't hurt, until reduced by half.

Mr. C's canning method (once again, I can't vouch for its safety or effectiveness just yet - if you have your own reliable canning method, by all means, use that): Distribute the cherries between your clean jars. Pour over the hot cherry syrup leaving a 1/4 inch space at the top. Tighly close the jars and immediately turn them over. I imagine you'll need a good grip oven mit for this part. Let cool, wash off any stray drips, and store upside down in a cool cellar until needed.

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Published on June 01, 2011 11:46

May 5, 2011

Mother/Daughter Test Kitchen



Last September, I got a lovely email from Lynne, a mother of two (and classically trained harpist - how cool is that) living in Sydney, Australia. She and her daughters had decided to cook their way through Lunch in Paris. (Mother-daughter cooking is always special. I have vivid memories of my mother, wrist deep in seasoned chop meat, urging me to try some right out of the bowl - my first steak tartare!). Never having had a professional test kitchen for Lunch in Paris, I was truly excited to see their results - to make sure the recipes worked as well in readers' kitchens as they had in my own. In honor of Mother's Day, I asked if I could share some of their marvelous pictures and cooking experiences with you.



Dessert was a big theme - I'm especially fond of this series of photos, taken while making the mini raspberry financiers. (Total 2 for 1 extra credit for the picture with the anchovy goat cheese tarts baking in the background!)









"The girls have loved doing all the recipes but the desserts have been their favourite, especially the INSTANT YOGURT AND SUMMER BERRY PARTAITS one as they can do that themselves, and now they improvise and change the ingredients as there is no cooking so they are free to do what they like. The ones they liked to prepare, watch, smell and eat are the two chocolate ones that were perfect..."





Even Aunt Joyce's Coconut macaroons made an appearance in a spiffy glass jar.





Lynne's pictures of the pork ribs and fennel salad got me thinking about creative ways to get kids to try new foods (zucchini flowers, anyone?).

Lynne and her husband hit the nail on the head. (As someone who grew up arranging cookies into precise pyramids on my mother's best china, I particularly love their idea of a "presentation contest" for the prettiest plate.)





"Cooking together has made the kids appreciate the time spent in the kitchen,made them more patient but more than anything it has made them more adventurous in trying the food - somehow new food doesn't look so bad when they have cooked it themselves. My husband is in hospitality so we are surrounded by good food and food art, so with each recipe we used to have 'presentation' competitions which was probably the best part for them."





French cooking often scares the pants off of home cooks, but Lynne & Co. took it in stride.





"My sister lives in France and is married to a French Chef - so the french way of cooking has been part of my life now for over 20 years, but I think what I loved about these recipes is that they were not coming from a real cookbook so somehow there was less pressure to get the recipes right - and so with NO PRESSURE they all came out perfectly."

I daresay, my "Student Charlotte" never looked quite that good...



The most recent image that Lynne sent along was this picture-perfect postcard of the lambshanks with orange and star anise. I'm thinking seriously about having them printed up as next year's Christmas cards!





My mom and Paul are in Provence at the moment. After last year's rocky start, I think they are really enjoying the pace of village life. We chatted with the fishmonger at the local market this morning, and taught Augustin how to use a straw in his apricot nectar at the cafe. While I'm writing this, they are up at the new playground, inspecting the slide.



In my mother's suitcase, underneath the Elmo underpants and Dr. Suess books for Augustin, was a package of blue marshmellow bunnies, just for me. Heirloom tomatoes may be my future, but a taste of the past is always welcome.







If you have pics of Lunch in Paris recipes you've made at home, SVP (that's French shorthand for "pretty please") share them on the Lunch in Paris facebook page.



Thank you so much to Lynne and her family for sharing your creations. Happy Mother's Day to all!



P.S. - I also asked Lynne for tips and any mistakes she might catch. Definitely use regular, not self raising flour for the choquettes. And some early editions of Lunch in Paris have a conversion error in the baking temp for the strawberry rhubarbe crumble (wihch I might well make this weekend!) - it should be 375F.



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Published on May 05, 2011 08:52

April 5, 2011

A Long Life




A sad note: Marcelle Pons Sidoine passed away yesterday, at the age of 95. Marcelle was an active member of the French Resistance during WWII, and the wartime companion of French poet and Resistance leader René Char. The couple operated the local Resistance network from Marcelle's family's home - the house where we now live.

We had the good fortune to meet Marcelle several times when we first came to Cereste; here's the story of how we found the house.

Even at 94, Marcelle was a decisive woman - short of sentence and sure of opinion. When asked about Char, she said: "He was always hanging around, this tall guy, being nice to my mother. Il m'agaçait, celui la. He annoyed me." I guess love is always the same; when he starts being nice to your mother, you're in real trouble.


The first thing that struck us when we visited the house was the danger, and at the same time, the warmth, of the memories associated with the war. The following story took place in our living room:

The Gestapo were looking for Char, they ordered the entire village out of their homes, with instructions to leave the doors ajar. Marcelle and her mother wrapped Char's head in a bandage, like an old woman with a toothache, and left him in bed, up the short flight of stairs just off the living room.

When the German's arrived, Marcelle was standing in front of the door, key in hand. "Leave it," said the soldiers, "Go to the square." "I don't trust these people," she said, "There are thieves in this village. If you want to search the house, go ahead, but I will stay here and lock the door behind you."
The Germans came in looked around the living room, out into the garden. They got halfway up the steps to Char's room and turned around. "There's no one here. Let's go." It was only after the soldiers left that Marcelle noticed the grenade lying carelessly on the table in front of the fireplace. The Germans didn't see it. The grenade (to say nothing of hiding Char) would have been enough to get the whole family shot.

"I was sick for 8 days after that." said Marcelle, as if risking your life was like coming down with the flu.

I hope the picture gives you an idea of how small the room is. On the left is the door where the German's came in, on the right, the six steps up to Char's bedroom. Barely 12 feet between them.

We are busy spring cleaning, making the house and the garden our own. But we will never forgot why we first came to this place; drawn by the good-luck lilies of the valley and an extraordinary history.

This year's lilies will be popping up any day now.

It will always be her garden.


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Published on April 05, 2011 04:00

February 28, 2011

Maple Scones


Sometimes there's nothing to do but bake. The baby is sick; I spent the morning making a list of adminstrative calls - accountants, and even more terrifying, a driving school. Roadsters of Provence, beware.

By three o'clock Augustin was back in bed, the essay I've been working on, for an anthology about the first year of marriage, remains a scattering of notes and unconnected thoughts, and I found myself browsing my cookbook shelves, hunting a recipe for scones.



Many people find baking soothing - not only the promise of a sweet reward, but the silent act of measuring, massaging, stirring, kneading, spooning. The repetitive glances into the mouth of a hot oven. It's the perfect something, when nothing else will do.

This recipe is adapted from the slim, thoroughly unpretentious Maple Syrup Cookbook by Ken Haedich, that I come back to again and again.


Maple Cream Scones

These don't have a particularly strong maple flavor, they simply use the syrup instead of sugar.
2 cups all purpose flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
3/4 teaspoon salt
4 tablespoons cold butter, diced
3/4 cup heavy cream (I use mostly creme fraiche topped up with a bit of milk)
1/4 cup maple syrup (I might add an extra tsp for sweetness)
Additional syrup and cream to finish
Crushed walnuts or sliced almonds to garnish (optional)

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees. Line a cookie sheet with parchement paper.
Combine flour, baking soda, and salt. Add diced butter and rub together until the texture of coarse crumbs (I never quite get the crumb texture - I end up with some clumps and powder).
In a small bowl, combine cream and maple syrup. Make a well in the flour mixture, add the cream mixture, and stir with a fork until just combined. Like all biscuit dough - do not overmix! Turn the dough out onto the parchment paper, flatten to about 3/4 inch. Using a biscuit cutter or small glass, cut rounds 2-3 inches across - the little Chinese teacup I used was my father's.

Stir together a bit of maple syrup and cream, brush or spoon this mixture onto the top of the scones.

Bake for 12 minutes, until golden brown.

Serve warm from the oven with strawberry jam.

Makes 10 scones.
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Published on February 28, 2011 07:35

February 22, 2011

Poultry Zen


Home. Awake. That doesn't sound like much of an accomplishment, but these days, it is. I love going back to States, but I find I spend more and more time running in circles like a headless chicken. That's a lie - I had 4 uber relaxing days in San Francisco, if you put aside the issue of my dead laptop, which kept me from taking advantage of the very pleasant cafe-office culture. (San Francisco is a bit like Paris that way. No one looks like they actually work for a living...)

I'm back in Provnce, I slept through the night for the first time in a week, and as of right now, I aspire to be a chicken WITH a head. A chicken with its head screwed on straight, to be exact. I need to stay put for a while. Experience life here. It's almost gardening time, and I'll need to learn to plant my peas right side up, and which corner of the courtyard will be best for purple basil.

With this aura of poultry-zen in mind, I've found a woman at Apt market who raises and prepares her own birds. She leaves the heart and liver in, so they conserve better.

Yesterday was my second experience with a head-on chicken. (For those vegetarians who I continue to alienate with my beady-eyed dinners, I'm making a lovely veggie cous cous stew tonight, the recipe to be posted forthwith.) Gutting the remaining bits was quite visceral - queue that squishy sound that accompanies field medics in WWI films. More troubling still, it appears I've spent much of my life looking at a chicken upside down. We are so used to cooking and serving chickens breast-up, I just got it in my head that they walk around that way. (Yes, this is one of the many, many reasons no one has ever asked me to fly an airplane.) Similar to the first time I saw a whole leek, it's taken me more time than I'd like to admit to figure out which end is up.

The first chicken I purchased was a poule au pot - a older stewing chicken, meant to sit in a covered casserole with vegetables, water, salt and rice for several hours - producing a falling apart bird and a thick, well-greased peasant risotto. The vendeuse doling out her instructions at top speed, I failed to catch the rice bit, so I ended up with a passable, (if painting worthy) stewed chicken, and a lot of fatty broth. Doesn't she look peaceful, though?

This week, I bought a pintade - guinea fowl - a trickier, but more flavorful bird. It requires a slow roast in a moderate heat, to keep everything moist and supple. I decided to add some red potatoes, a few rehydrated shitake mushrooms and a splash of white wine to the bottom of the pan.

2 1/2 hours later, the result was less than thrilling. Something about his grumpy visage took me back to the day my father almost vomited during "The Dark Crystal". Not ideal for jetlag recovery. Apparently, cooking - as well as being- a chicken with a head requires some practice...

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Published on February 22, 2011 00:27

February 14, 2011

And the winner is...


And the Le Creuset/LinP winner is: DeAnn Okamura! Not only do I dig her daughter's shades, but DeAnn brought her own cherished mini Eiffel tower, bought in Paris many years ago. Her caption: "Ooh la la! The next best thing to having lunch in Paris... is reading it!" - I guess it's exactly what I hoped the book and the blog would be, a virtual vacation to France for everyone.

All the pictures were fabulous (Hello, Paris-themed dinner party!). I'm very new to this sort of thing, so I think I underestimated the huge effort I was asking people to make in the middle of a snowy and exhausting winter. That's me, ambitious and oblivious, all at the same time...

I want to thank everyone who took the time to participate (take a quick scroll down the LinP Facebook page for the photos!), and everyone who spread the word. And of course, Le Creuset, for their generosity. If you are looking for inspiration, here's a special Valentine's Day recipe - guaranteed (in my one-woman statistical sample) to get someone groping you over a hot stove.

Wishing you an extra cup of love and laughter today!
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Published on February 14, 2011 06:44

February 13, 2011

Love is in the air, and it smells like...bacon



I can't help it. I'm a sucker for Valentine's Day. I love the guys on the subway gripping single roses in cellophane - talking to themselves (are they rehearsing?). I love chewy cinnamon hearts and the chalky message ones (SWEET TART). I love paper cutout cupids and the idea of a daring, unlikely paring over sushi. This is one Hallmark holiday I've always swallowed hook, line and sinker.

Since I can remember, I've loved sweet and savory tastes together - the dried apricots in my mother's stuffed cabbage, the cooked-to-oblivion prunes in my grandmother's Tzimmes. A sour patch kid. My French kitchen is full of these sweet/tart pairings - goat cheese and fig jam, lamb and pears tagine.

I recently found a new sweet/tart combo – and it's a winner. Getting over jetlag from my last trip to the US, I needed to use up a red cabbage that had been wilting since before my trip. Wide awake at 4am, I consulted my Joy of Cooking. Their version of braised red cabbage is more like sauerkraut, with lots of salt. What I wanted was a quick sauté with a sweet finish. So I tweaked and dabbled, and this is the result.

This recipe is what I call almost-elegant food. I would make this for an informal dinner party; it's so homey, yet something about the royal purple cabbage gives it a bit of gravitas – and dare I say it, flair. Sausage and cabbage may not have the ring of a romantic Valentine's Day meal, but the first time I made this, G. kept coming into the kitchen and sticking his nose straight in the pot. To get to the pot, he had to put his arms around me. See where I'm going with this?

If you were trying to stuff your Valentine like a Thanksgiving turkey, I suppose you could add mashed potatoes, but I prefer my dining companion devote less energy to digestion, more energy to other things.

For dessert, why not try these spicy chocolate pots, served in espresso cups – again, less is more. Enjoy!

Pork Sausage with Honeyed Red Cabbage

2 best quality lean pork sausages - try to find a butcher who makes his own - after all it's is Valentine's Day, so why not go a little out of your way...
1 small head of red cabbage (approximately 1 pound), thinly sliced
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 medium onion, diced
1 teaspoon mustard seeds
4 whole cloves
10 whole Sichuan or black peppercorns
3 tablespoons red wine vinegar
3 tablespoons honey

Slice the cabbage thinly, and soak in a bowl of cold water for 15 minutes. You'll get this gorgeous royal purple water (which will stain your hands and your clothes – so please, wear an apron!

Meanwhile, in a large non-reactive heavy skillet (stainless steel) or a Dutch oven (I use my enameled Le Crueset), brown the sausages with the olive oil. Add onion and spices, sauté until just starting to color. Deglaze with honey and vinegar. Then quickly throw in the cabbage, drained of purple water.

Lower the heat a bit and sauté for 15-20 minutes. I like my cabbage al dente – but if you like yours fondant, keep cooking, adding a little water along the way.

Serve the sausages on a bed of cabbage with Dijon mustard, and a sturdy Cote de Rhone.
Serves 2.


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Published on February 13, 2011 20:39

February 7, 2011

BE MY VALENTINE (aka Take the Lunch in Paris/Le Creuset Valentine's Day Challenge)



In honor of the paperback launch of Lunch in Paris (that's today!!) and my favorite Hallmark holiday (oh, those chalky candy message hearts), I'm issuing a special Lunch in Paris Valentine's Day Challenge.

The prize: One cherry red Le Creuset 5.5 quart French Oven (courtesy of Le Creuset - Merci!), just dying to snuggle up on your stove.

Your mission (should you chose to accept it): Walk into your favorite bookstore, pick up a brand new paperback copy of Lunch in Paris and press it into the hands of first friendly browser (or cutest guy, or most stylin gal, or most hapless tourist) you see. You might even point out your favorite recipe. Then snap a photo together with this person and the book, and voila, upload it with a witty caption to the Lunch in Paris Facebook Page. Complete your entry by filling out this short entry form. Any coffee dates come out of this, I want to know. Any weddings come out of this, the cheese is on me!

Shy of strangers? Why not go with your best friends, dog, sister, husband or sock puppet and take a silly cancan photo with a copy of Lunch in Paris (costumes and/or berets get extra credit). You have until midnight on February 13th (anywhere in the world) to post. I'll chose the best photo and caption to win the Le Creuset 5.5 qt. Round French Oven in cherry (which, by the by, retails for $235). I"ll announce the winner on Valentine's Day. Now even cynical people who wear black on Feb. 14th (you know who you are), have something to look forward to...

If you need a bit of help uploading your photo to Facebook, click here!

Bonne chance!

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Published on February 07, 2011 07:34

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