Grandma's Kitchen Table

MTAofFC: Petit Pois au Beurre (Peas in Butter...and with mint)

La Cuisine Helene put forth her desire to cook a bit in Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Vol. I and Vol. II, and invited those so inclined to cook along with her each week, selecting a recipe of their own choosing, and posting on Fridays whenever we so desired. 

 

This week I picked Petits Pois Etuves au Beurre (Buttered Peas II, and this version has mint in it), on pages 463-464 in Vol. I.  (I have decided that a good focus for me for the coming weeks will be to concentrate on learning how to make side dishes from MTAofFC as at Whisk Wednesdays I learned quite a few main meat/chicken/fish courses, so now I need some things to go with them.) 

 

Side dishes can get quite boring if you cook the same veggies in the same way all the time, so am hoping to learn a few new tricks and techniques for advancing the veggies around here.  We all love vegetables, my family will eat almost any vegetable dish that I want to make and serve.  Currently I have very few ways to prepare peas as they don't lend themselves to long cooking times or roasting, etc.  In fact, no one will eat peas overdone here. 

 

The recipe this week used simple ingredients: peas, a little sugar, salt & pepper, butter, and some fresh mint leaves.  It didn't take long to prepare and the result was tasty and refreshing.  The mint really adds something to the peas and gives them a delightful newness in taste.  I have lots of mint growing, so I will take advantage of this recipe until the snow buries it all.  Have no fear, mint is one of those things you cannot possibly kill off, no matter how hard you try, so it will all be back again in the spring in time for the crop of new spring peas. 

 

Recipe:  Delicious: a winner and a keeper.

MTAofFC: Gratin de Pommes de Terre et Saucisson

Helene at

La Cuisine Helene put forth her desire to cook a bit in Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Vol. I and Vol. II, and invited those so inclined to cook along with her each week, selecting a recipe of their own choosing, and posting on Fridays whenever we so desired.

 

This week I picked Gratin de Pommes de Terre et Saucisson (Gratin of Potatoes, Onions, and Sausages), on pages 154-155 in Vol. I.  This recipe was chosen for Mark as he loves potatoes, onions, and Kielbasa.  If you mix them all up together with some heavy cream, cheese, and eggs, well, life is good.

 

A polish sausage with a French preparation.  It's Octoberfest season, Julia specifically called for Kielbasa for this recipe, and it just seemed like this was the time to make it for him.  (Be warned:  No matter how much steamed broccoli you heap on the plate, there is no way it can offset the other ingredients, so this is not one for the regular recipe lineup rotation if you are at all concerned about fat and cholesterol.  I figure once a year might be okay.)

 

The prep was easy, pre-boil the potatoes, slice, layer half in bottom of casserole, top with caramelized onions, top with sliced kielbasa, top with other round of potatoes and onions, pour over the egg/cream/salt/pepper mixture, top with grated Swiss cheese, bake for 40 minutes at 375.

 

It was all delicious, he raved and raved about it...one very happy guy.

MTAofFC: Duxelles

Helene at La Cuisine Helene put forth her desire to cook a bit in Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Vol. I and Vol. II, and invited those so inclined to cook along with her each week, selecting a recipe of their own choosing, and posting on Fridays whenever we so desired.

This week I picked Duxelles (Minced Mushrooms Sauteed in Butter, on pages 515-516 in Vol. I).  The Duxelle mixture is a mushroom flavoring for stuffings, sauces, etc. and can be kept up to several weeks once made, or even frozen (I put that part in for you, Nancy, as I know how you love things that can be frozen).  Because it is reduced down by mincing the mushrooms finely before the stint in the saute pan with the shallots, salt & pepper, and if you choose, Madeira and brown stock, the flavor is intense and delicious.

 The idea behind it all is that mushrooms have great flavor, but contain a lot of water, which can make a sauce or stuffing watery if they are not cooked down beforehand.  The Duxelles are cooked almost dry so that the flavor is intense and not watery at all.

  A few weeks ago, when I made the small Cornish hen recipe for Whisk Wednesdays from Julia's recipe in MTAofFC, it called for chicken livers on a toasted crouton to be placed underneath the baked chicken when plating.  I did not go that route as we don't like chicken liver, but it dawned on me, too late for the meal and post, that an alternative would be to use a Duxelle mixture on the toasted crouton in place of the chicken liver pate.

  With that inspiration in mind, I did such, and although the photo doesn't do it justice, you can sorta kinda maybe see how it would all work.  It was delicious! 

MTAoFC: Coquelets sur Canapés (Roast Squab Chickens with Chicken Liver Canapés and Mushrooms)

  This week for Helene's blog along using the book Mastering The Art of French Cooking by Julia Child, I am having one recipe do the work of two posts as we made a recipe from Julia's book for Whisk Wednesdays.  If you scroll down a tiny bit to the Whisk Wednesday's post, you will be able to see and read about this particular recipe, which we all found absolutely delightful and delicious. 

MTAoFC: French Onion Soup (One Sentence Blogging Week)

   Helene at La Cuisine Helene put forth her desire to cook a bit in Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Vol. I and Vol. II, and invited those so inclined to cook along with her each week, posting on Fridays, so this week I picked Soupe a l'Oignon Gratinee (French Onion Soup on pages 44-45 in Vol. l as French Onion Soup is a particular favorite of mine) and in the book are several variations of the recipe with choices of broth, etc. so this time I chose the vegetable broth, made the croutons with homemade baguette slices, and melted grated Swiss on the top by passing it under the broiler for a few minutes...recipe is in the book so you can make it and find out for yourself just how wonderfully delicious this version is, making me one very happy participant who is looking forward to trying ALL the versions!

Mastering the Art of French Cooking: Tomatoes à la Provençale

      Yep, another cook along blog, what can I say?  I evaluate carefully these days as I am enjoying the cooking, but the posting requirements get a bit tedious at times.  That said, I enjoy reading everyone else's posts, and I learn a lot and make notes in my books about it all, so I feel I must play along nicely. 

      "What is this," you ask, "another French cooking assignment each week?"  "Yes," she replies, happily! 

      Helene at La Cuisine Helene put forth in Twitterworld last week (Helene works FAST) her desire to cook a bit in Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Vol. I and Vol. II, and invited those so inclined to cook along with her each week, posting on Fridays. 

      I had actually just ordered the book as Susan and I thought we might cook along together now and again from the book, but sadly my book has not arrived yet, so this week I am scrambling about trying to find a recipe that will qualify for the cooking/posting this first week.  Nancy kindly checked various recipes that I had in another Julia book, and we came up with one that would work to get me by this first week. 

      In this blog along, Helene has decided that each participant can pick each week the recipe of her/his choice from the book, Vol. I or Vol. II, so that it will match nicely with their own family's interests, tastes, budgets, etc.  What a deal!  I immediately embraced this idea for I could see at once that I could pick things from Julia's books that would compliment the things I was making each week from the Le Cordon Bleu at Home cookbook that we are using at Whisk Wednesdays.  They would fit together perfectly!  Yep, I'm in! 

      The first recipe I chose to make was Tomatoes à la Provençale,

page 507, Vol. I (thanks, Nancy, for looking up the page for me amidst your very busy day) because I needed something quick and easy. 

      You begin by washing and then slicing the tomatoes in half around the equator, scooping out most of pulp and seeds (infant baby spoons are very good for this chore), seasoning (salt and pepper) the tomatoes, making a mixture of fresh bread crumbs, shallots, scallions, garlic, and parsley, and adding a little drizzle of olive oil, to fill the cavities of the tomatoes. 

      Place the stuffed tomatoes into a shallow baking dish, drizzle on a little more olive oil, and bake at 400 degrees for 20 minutes. 

      Simple, easy, can be assembled ahead to be baked at time of dinner, and very colorful and tasty.  A perfect side dish for almost any meal.  We all loved the dish and will make it often, especially in the winter when we only have those hard hothouse tomatoes at the markets, I can see where the seasonings and herbs would do wonders for those.

      This is the part where I usually tell everyone to click on a site if they want to see everyone else's recipes, so just click on Helene's site above and she has a few listed this week.  And, this is the part where I usually list the recipe for next week, but I don't have my book yet, have not decided on a recipe, so I guess it will just be a surprise next week.