The greek pressure cooker

It looks like the whole country has gone postal back home: SNAFU. I hope it cools down soon.

Returning...

It's been a while since I posted anything, mostly because I haven't cooked anything of interest lately. Usually I get home late from work, and then I'm too tired to feel like cooking, so I just throw together something quick to snack. But, work went well, I got some things finished and out of the way, and I'm going home for almost two weeks, so I'm going to try and blog more now.



For now, I'm just posting a couple of pictures from the Alps that I took on Sunday, on the way to try skiing. The scenery was breathtaking, the pictures don't do it justice.


Skiing was nice too, I'm definitely going to do it again... as soon as my shoulder stops feeling sore. Next time I'll try to avoid nasty falls, though.

A post with no pictures

When we got back from Paris last week, it was well into the night (we got home around midnight), but we were very hungry. Unfortunately, we didn't have anything readily available in the fridge, as I'd been away for 6 days and I had thrown away everything that wouldn't last. There were two eggs, a small unopened bottle of whipping cream that was still OK, a bit of butter, and some shrimp in the freezer. On the shelf I had a couple of potatoes, a bar of chocolate, and a jar of flour. All in all, perfect scenario: tired, hungry, time-constrained and with limited ingredients.

I put a potato in a pot with water and set it on the stove. The shrimp went into a second pot in water, on low heat, to defrost. While I was waiting for the potato to boil and the shrimp to defrost, I used one egg, the small piece of butter and half a bar of chocolate to make the chocolate fondants (see previous post) and put them in the fridge for later. In the mean time, the potato was boiling, and the shrimp water was getting warm on low heat. The potato wasn't done after only 15 minutes of boiling, but we were getting too hungry to wait, so I took it out and finished cooking it in the microwave. Next time I'll do it right, though. After a bit in the microwave, the half-boiled half-microwaved (yuck) potato went outside on the balcony table to cool down a bit for a few minutes. Then I peeled it, mashed it with a fork, put it in a big bowl, along with half cup of flour, salt, a teaspoon of olive oil, and the remaining egg. I mixed and kneaded everything (adding a bit more flour) until it wasn't sticky, but was still a soft dough. Normally you'd let the dough rest for a bit (20 minutes), but no time--too hungry, so I put it in the freezer for 5 minutes. I have no idea if this is equivalent, but I couldn't wait for the 20 minutes it needs to rest, so I thought I'd give it a "nap" instead.

While the dough was in the freezer, I put a bit of olive oil in a frying pan, put it on medium fire, and sprinkled it with some pepper and tarragon. In a few seconds they were warming up and started smelling nice, so I fished the shrimp from the hot water with a straining ladle and added them in the pan. After one or two minutes of sautéing the shrimp like that, I put it out with a bit of liquor (I used French "eau de vie", but you can use raki, or ouzo, or vodka), and then I added a bit of heavy cream, lowered the flame to minimum and let it thicken for a bit.

After that I took the dough out of the freezer, rolled it to about half an inch thick, and then cut it into half-inch thick cubes. I rolled each cube into a small dough ball, and using a fork (on slightly floured table, if it's sticky), pulled the dough-balls into gnocchi. In the mean time, the water I used to defrost the shrimp had come to a boil, so I used it to boil the gnocchi in three batches, for about 2-3 minutes per batch. The shrimp cream sauce had thickened by then, so I split the gnocchi into two plates, added the shrimp with its cream sauce on top, opened a bottle of red wine (I didn't have any white), and started preheating the oven, so that it'd be ready for the chocolate fondants when it was time for dessert.

I think it took about an hour to throw everything together, and it came out pretty good in the end.

Chocolate fondant

Hello, I'm back. After a couple of trips back home, and to Paris, I'm back at work, and finally have some time to write a small blog entry.

A couple of days ago we had a nice dinner with Despoina, and we made chocolat-fondants for dessert. This is an easy and very tasty dessert, the recipe is from Ioanna (thanks!)

I'm not sure about the quantities, I just mixed things until the mix looked proper. I think this is about right.

1. Butter and flour the ramekins, and put them into the fridge.
2. Melt some (half a bar) of chocolate with approximately 40-50 grams of butter in a bain-marie.
3. Beat an egg with a bit (3-4 spoons) of sugar until smooth.
4. Combine, and add flour, about 2-3 spoons.
5. Pour into the ramekins, and refrigerate for a while.
6. Preheat the oven.
7. Put them in the oven until the outside is done. This should only take a few minutes, you don't want the whole thing to thicken, just the outside.
   

After they were done, I flipped them on a plate, and put a bit of cocoa powder to garnish them.

Here's how it looks when you take the first spoonful out, and the melted chocolate inside appears... It tasted as good as it looks.

Mountains

This is not a cooking post. On Sunday, I went to one of the mountains around the city, and climbed a bit. The view was breathtaking, the city is surrounded by lots of mountains. The little white spot you see very far in the distance is Mont-Blanc, it was a very clear day and it was visible. Awesome, literally, inspiring awe.

This was a 5c route, I think. It should be around a 5.8 or maybe 5.8+ just because of the first move. It was around 20m high, and I saw a couple of small lizards on the way up.


I climbed easy and not-so-easy routes, 5a to 6a. I'm still sore today, but not too much, and I'm definitely going back. Climbing on rock, rocks!

Weekend cooking

Vegetable Soup update

I made some more soup. Here's how to serve it with a bit of crème fraîche and parsley. The white side is yogurt, more about that later in the post.

And with some baguette, and eggplant salad, here's my all-vegetable lunch.


Yogurt

I woke up at 4am on Friday, and couldn't go back to sleep, so I made yogurt, which turned out to be much easier than I expected. All you need to do is mix a live culture (existing yogurt, from the supermarket) with milk, and keep it warm for a while. I only made a little bit, this being the first time. I took full fat milk, and warmed it up over low heat. I didn't boil it, but it was getting close, the point was to kill all the live bacteria that are in the milk, so that the yogurt culture will have no competition. I let that sit for a while until it was lukewarm, and I could easily hold the pot with my hand, and then I dissolved two full spoons of existing yogurt in it. I got that from the supermarket. Then I put the whole thing in a bowl and in the oven, in the very lowest possible setting, so that it'd be kept around body temperature, or a few degrees more. I let it there for 4 hours, and then moved it in the fridge. Done! My own yogurt.

Being Greek, I prefer strained yogurt, so I strained my yogurt through a cheesecloth. I hanged it to strain, collecting the whey in a bowl underneath and went to work. I stayed at work until late in the afternoon, so it was way too strained when I got home, it looked like a cheese, too solid. So I mixed a little of the whey back in, to make it more like yogurt, and saved it in the fridge. It tastes normal. I didn't throw away the whey either. Why waste protein? I made some bread, and added the whey in the dough instead of water. In theory, the extra protein should make the dough more elastic, but it wasn't that much, so I don't know if it makes a difference. We'll see how the bread comes out.

At first, (thinking it'd be similar to making a bread starter) I thought you could somehow harvest yogurt culture from the air, but it's not like normal yeast. You can't get yogurt culture from nature, it has to be from someone that makes yogurt, I found out. The reason is that people have been making yogurt for a very long time (some millenia), and the original bacteria used have evolved to adapt and can only feed on lactose, no other sugars. So nowadays they are not found in nature, only in man-made yogurt. Creationists, no yogurt for you!

Tarte Tatin

Some time ago I was looking for french food recipes over the net and came across this one, which is a cool idea. Instead of putting the dough first, and then the filling for the tart, you can put the dough on the filling, cook it, and then flip on a plate. I had gotten some apples from the farmer's market, and on Friday I thought about making an apple tart, or "tarte aux pommes." I made the dough, filled up the tart-pan for a normal tart, and there was some dough left. Thus, I decided to try out this idea, and make a Tarte Tatin with the apples instead. The catch here is that you need a frying pan that can also get in the oven. What better occasion to try out the cast-iron frying pan that I got last week, I just hope the oven doesn't hurt the "seasoning" of the iron.

Parenthesis.
Apparently, with cast iron cooking utensils, you need to "train" them at first. At least that's what the manual said (yes, a frying pan that came with a manual). The pan should be oiled at all times, so I oil it after washing it with a napkin, and I re-wash the oil away before using it every time. One should do this for a while, and after a few times the cast iron becomes "seasoned" and you can use it and store it normally.
End of parenthesis.

I made the dough for tart. First, rub the flour with butter.

Then add one yolk, a bit of water (not too much 1-2 spoons) and mix.

Then I used a big jar (for lack of a rolling pin) to make it flat.

Finally, I put it in the tart-pan, punched holes with a fork, and put it in the fridge. Here you can see the leftover dough I used for Tarte Tatin.

Back to the Tarte Tatin. Preheat the oven, I have no idea in what temperature, I used a 5 on my oven's non-linear scale to 8. Peel and chop the apples, each apple in half, each half in three. I coated the pieces with lemon, so that the first pieces wouldn't oxidize and go black until I was done with all the apples.
Put some butter in the pan, melt it, take it away from the flame, and sprinkle 2-3 spoons of sugar on the butter. Then put the apples in. Return to a low flame and caramel-fry the apples until the sugar is caramelized (brown, not too dark) and the apples are also slightly caramelized (but not too much, they shouldn't be done).

Take away from the flame, and let sit for 5 minutes. Roll the tart-dough on the frying pan, and push it down near the sides, around the apples. I did that quickly so I wouldn't burn my fingers.

Then I put the whole thing in the oven, and waited. About half an hour later, I took it out, and flipped it on a plate.

The dough had hardened (as it wasn't touching any liquids) and was biscuit-y, and the caramel was running thick, downwards on the apples, which looks quite appetizing.

It makes for a nice "show-off" dessert, and it's easy too. Some apples were left stuck on the frying pan, and I used a spatula to put them back on the tart, and also to scrape off the extra caramel from the pan. It'll be nice with vanilla ice-cream. I'm keeping this recipe.

While waiting for the Tarte Tatin, I made the filling for the other tart, which was the reason for having leftover dough in the first place. I didn't have many apples left after the impromptu Tarte Tatin so I decided to make two kinds of fillings to make up for the loss. I chopped the two apples left into small bits, and put them in a saucepan.

I added a spoonful of honey.

This was a strong honey, too sweet, made from lavender(!). It is white, and doesn't look a lot like normal honey, but it smells unbelievably. Unfortunately it's too sweet, so next time I'll use half or less than what I used now. I added a bit of cinnamon, a drop of lemon, and set the pot over a low flame. After a while the apples were soft, and caramelized but not like with sugar, it wasn't as burnt. The apples gave out their juice, which mixed with the honey and gave a thick sauce. It smelled nice, but the lavender honey dominated the apples, unfortunately.

In a separate pot I put pieces of lemon. I used the whole lemon, chopped, similar to the apple. I wanted the yellow color from the skin, and the sour taste from the inside.

Unfortunately, I didn't add only those two, I added the whole thing, which also includes the white, bitter part between the peel and the juice. This made it a little too bitter, but I'll know better next time. So, I boiled the chopped lemon in water with a bit of sugar for quite a while, until the liquid was yellow and a little thick. I used a sieve to take out the lemon pieces, and threw them away. I then mixed flour and corn starch in a bowl with cold water and poured it in the hot lemon-liquid to thicken it more.

I emptied the two saucepans on the cold dough, across from each other, and smoothed them to resemble a yin-yang shape.

I thought that the two sauces had similar colors, and it wouldn't show, plus I was just having fun with it, so I decided to stress the separating s-shaped line. I needed something dark to draw that line between the yin and the yang, and chocolate is the closest thing to Zen I can think of! I tried scraping a piece of chocolate with a knife, and using the bits to draw an "S" between the two sauces, but it wasn't very successful. Next time I should have some ganache, and use agarnish-thing (not sure how it's called) or an empty ketchup/mustard bottle to draw a thin, continuous chocolate line.

OK, I stopped fooling around at that point and put it in the (preheated) oven. After about half an hour I took it out and let it cool down overnight.

The next morning I put it in the fridge, and Saturday afternoon I had a piece. It was OK, but, sadly, not exactly what I was going for. The dough was good, but the apple side had too much honey, and the lemon side was a bit bitter. Oh well, lesson learned. At least the apple Tarte Tatin was good. I feel like trying again, but I still have a lot left, there's only so much I can eat, and I don't want to throw it away. I need a roommate to help with the eating, any volunteers? Thano, help!

Samedi soir: sauce au poivre
I was experimenting with a beef and pepper sauce today.

Sauter l' oignon en trois cuillères d' huile d' olive, epuis ajouter le beuf, coupé en petits pièces, et aussi demi cuillère de poivre gris. Stir, or shake the pan, until slightly browned, and add the cognac/brandy. I tilted the pan a bit and the brandy caught fire, satisfying the pyromaniac in me. It doesn't make a difference in taste, it only adds to the effect. Then I added two glasses of water,
and one cup of chicken broth (the one that I have left). I capped the pan and let it simmer for about an hour (depending on how tender your meat is, this could be less), until it reduced a lot, becoming a thick sauce with bits of meat. I wanted more sauce, so I sprinkled half a spoon of flour on it, and mixed. Then I added the rest of the chicken broth (about half a cup) and it thickened fast. I mixed in 2 spoonfuls of crème fraîche, and I got a grey-brown thick sauce with
bits of meat, that smelled and looked good. I had a bit with bread (the bread I made using the whey from the yogurt, it was good) for dinner, but I think it'd be best served alongside a risotto, or on a base of basmati or maybe couscous (without crème fraîche for couscous). I could filter the bits of meat out of it, and then maybe use it to escort a steak, I think. Mushrooms would be fantastic in
this sauce but I didn't have any, unfortunately. I should get some from the farmer's market next time, I think this is the best season too, it's quite humid, and still not too cold. They have a big variety, but I don't know enough about mushrooms yet to know the right ones.

Variation: Then I got too decadent, and chopped a bit of raclette cheese (emmental would also be nice) in small pieces, and added them to the pan, where it melted. Sinful. I think this variation would be best on pasta, probably linguini or fresh papardele. I'll save this recipe for cold winter days...

Vegetarian soup

On Tuesday I made vegetable soup.

• 1 beet
• 1 leek
• 1 potato
• tomato purée
• 1/2 cup of milk
• 1tsp salt, pinch of pepper, curry
• 2tbsp olive oil
• water
  

I peeled the potato and the beet and cut them in 1inch cubes. Chopped and washed the leek. Put everything in a pot with water, and let boil for a while (until potato and beet were soft and done). Then I kept the liquid through a sieve, and put the solids in a dish. I put the potato pieces, the beet pieces, and a bit of milk in the blender, and blended them to a thick crème. I added this in the liquid left in the pot and set it on low heat. Then I added the tomato purée (about half a box, ready made). I didn't have fresh tomatoes, but 2-3 tomatoes in the blender would probably be better, I'll try it next time. Added 1tsp of salt, a pinch of curry and a pinch of pepper, and stirred until it boiled, then I added 2tbsp of olive oil and let it boil for a couple of minutes more. It tasted good, I think.

I might try to serve it to other people next time for feedback. I think a nice presentation will be to put the soup in cups, add a spoon of crème fraîche in the middle of each cup, and a bit of fresh parsley on top of that. I poured the soup left into an empty wide-neck orange juice bottle, capped it an put it in the fridge. Took it to work the next day, it was a nice lunch, and very nice for the chilly weather, too. I'll have to find something to do with the boiled leek that is left, I didn't want to blend it with the beet and potato. I think I might use it as a filling to make a pita (as soon as I get a roller to make phylo).

A funny detail: I poured the soup in the bottle while it was still hot, and capped it. That caused the metal-cap security seal went inwards as the soup cooled down, and the next day it went "pop" as I uncapped it, as if it was bought. Heh.

Dinner for 5

It's been a long time, so I forgot most of it, since the last post. I took the rabbit out of the marinade and threw away the marinade. The rabbit went quite good. I caramelized it a little bit in oil, threw away the oil, put it in an oven pot, added onions, a bit of chicken buillion (I made that too, I'm now sold on home-made buillion instead of cubes, its much much better, if you can afford the 5-6 hours it takes), 1 cup of wine, 3 cloves, a pinch of cinnamon, a pinch of nutmeg, a teaspoon of balsamic vinegar, a teaspoon of red wine vinegar, and of course lots of love :), and I let it in the oven (in low heat) for about 3 hours. I think it was quite good, because there was nothing left.

But, first things first. The menu for the day:

1. Aperitif: stuffed cherry tomatoes (2 kinds) and salmon/avocado wrap.
2. Entrée (i.e. appetizer): Bruschettas with various toppings (too easy, I know, but oh well...)
3. Salad: pretty standard, green, dressed with mustard and honey vinaigrette.
4. Main course: rabbit with onions slow-cooked in the oven.
5. Intermission: lemon & rose-water sorbet (see last post)
6. Dessert: Chocolate-mocha cake with "framboise" (raspberries) on top.
   

OK, now in detail (as far as I remember, that is).

Apéritif
I would have 4 guests, so the goal was 3 tastes for 5 people. I got about 15 cherry tomatoes, washed and uncapped them so that the cap stays connected but "opens" up. I used a teaspoon and carefully emptied the interior, as best as possible, without breaking the tomato. Kept the interiors/seeds, and put the emptied tomatoes upside down on a paper to drain from liquids for a few minutes. Then, I took black olives (about 10-12, not sure), took the core out, and chopped the flesh very finely. I also took 1 achovie, took out the bones, and pressed it into a pulp with the olives. Don't worry, it only works as a flavor enhancer and substitutes salt, it doesn't stink like fish. Added pepper, 1 tablespoon of cognac (brandy), 1 tbsp of olive oil, basil, and 5-6 capers, also pulped. Mixed everything together, to make olive paste. I stuffed 5 of the tomatoes with olive paste, and set aside. I then took a bit (1/2 tablespoon) of the olive paste that was left, and mixed with fromage blanc (I think that's like yoghurt). Then I crashed a bit (1/2 piece) of garlic, and mixed it in, and stuffed another 5 of the tomatoes. I was out of tomatoes by now (even though I got 15 from the market), because I crashed 2 on the way home, I also ate 2 through the process, and I accidentally opened one all the way down when trying to dig into it with a teaspoon, so I ate that one too...
OK, so the goal was 3 different bites, with 3 different tastes for aperitif. And I couldn't make a 3rd stuffing for cherry tomatoes, so I opted for a salmon bite. I got two slices of smoked salmon (1mm thick), and an avocado. I opened the avocado, took the pit out, and spooned the inside into a bowl. Added a bit of lemon juice, salt and pepper, and mashed everything together. Then I took the paste, and layered another 1mm of it on the salmon slices.

I rolled the salmon slice and avocado together, pinched it with toothpicks, and cut at bite-sized distances. That was easy, and it yielded about 12 bites. I ate two, of course, and had 10 for two bites each later. I put every aperitif on a plate and in the fridge.

Entrée
I got one of the big baguettes (they call them "flutes") from the bakery and sliced it diagonally to get 0.5inch thick slices. I got 1 piece of garlic and sliced it in very thin slices, as thin as I could, and with my knives, that's quite thin. I put a teaspoon of olive oil on every bread slice, and topped some of them with 2-3 thin slices of garlic. Then I got a bit of reblochon cheese (that's the smelly-feet, soft one that melts), a bit of another creamy cheese (not sure about the name, think of brie, only smellier, but not stinky feet), and a bit of hard yellow cheese (not sure about the name again, think Gryviere, only nuttier, fuller taste, I should be noting the names down, but I'll recognize it when I go to the market next time). I put a bit of cheese on some of the bread, not mixing cheeses. I kept some bruschettas without cheese, one of my guests doesn't eat dairy stuff. I also sliced a bit of "saucisson sec" (french, hard, dried sausage) and sliced it thin, 0.5mm slices. I used these to top the bruschettas so that I got lots of combinations. I also chopped and used the cherry-tomato seeds and interior for some bruschettas, under the cheese (why waste it?). I put it on a wide oven pan and set aside. I put them in the oven for 5 minutes, just when I took out the aperitif, and by the time we each had 4 bites of aperitif, they were ready.

Salad
Lettuce from the farmer's market. I got two kinds green and red, the french call them "salades," quite fitting. I tore these by hand roughly into 1inch-wide pieces. I personally prefer finely chopped lettuce (it gets more dressing on it), but I learnt this is how they do it here, so "when in Rome..." I chopped 2 green onions (these by knife, not by hand) into 1mm thin slices. Added dill, parsley, and half an avocado (I had it lying around, why not..), finely chopped. I made a vinaigrette with 0.5tsp of honey, red wine vinegar, mustard, olive oil & salt (not in that order...) and warmed it up to thicken it a bit but not too much and make everything dissolve better, and set it aside. Just before serving the salad, I chopped half an apple in small bits (last moment, so it wouldn't oxidize and go black), poured the vinaigrette on top, and mixed. Simple salad, no fancy tricks here, the parsley, dill and vinegar work as a kind of a palate cleanser. I won't use honey next time, a palate cleanser shouldn't be very sweet I think, except before dessert. Well, nobody complained, so OK.

Main course
I described that, I'm not going over it again, here's what it looked like.


After main course
Sorbet, a palate cleanser before dessert.
I got this recipe from Elise, thanks! (My sorbet wasn't as perfect, but I'll keep trying.) Probably a chocolate dessert doesn't need a clean palate as much as a lightly, subtly flavored dessert does, but I had all the spices, wine and onions in the main course, and I didn't want interference, and also I like sorbet anyway (and got to eat the rest later by myself). Maybe next time I should also use a "coloring agent" for the sorbet, lemon and rosewater don't have color, and it looked like just snow, someone said (and then "hmmmm, it has taste").

Dessert
Chocolate cake with mocha cream filling, covered in ganache and with "frambois" (raspberries) on top. This was quite an improvisation, but I think I'll keep it. I made the cake mix: butter, sugar, eggs, cocoa, flour, milk, baking powder (I usually use baking soda too, half and half, but didn't have any), and vanilla extract. I beat everything in a bowl (start with sugar & butter, until fluffy, butter should be soft and sliced, then add eggs, then dry ingredients and a pinch of salt). I put this in the oven in medium heat (until a toothpick at the center comes out dry). Then I sliced it in half to get two layers, and set aside to cool down.

For the filling, in between the two layers, I made a mocha creme. Milk, sugar and vanilla, set on low fire, bring to a slow boil. I made a cup of strong coffee and added it in. Meanwhile, I mixed a bit of cold milk, flour and corn starch, and as soon as it boiled I poured it in and mixed, turning the heat off. It thickens pretty quick. Set aside to cool down a bit. I also made a syrup: mix sugar, cocoa (even parts) with water, and set to boil. It looks almost thick (but not really) after simmering for a couple of minutes. Set aside to cool down a bit. Of course, I made everything at the same time (although I wouldn't recommend it, it could go awfully wrong, has in the past...), but somehow I managed to keep stirring two boiling pots, mix cold ingredients and cut a cake in layers, with no major accidents, so all was well after all. When the chocolate syrup cools down a bit, I added a bit of brandy in it, and then spoon by spoon I fed it to the cake. Be careful, the cake is VERY easy to break after it gets soaked, and unfortunately I couldn't can't feed the syrup to the second layer after putting it in place, because it doesn't have "holes", it's smooth from baking it. So I put the syrup in while it was flipped, and then *very* carefully flipped it on the rest of the cake. Next time I might just "shave" off the shiny part and make it easy to add the syrup without moving the cake afterwards, because it's very susceptible to falling apart when wet. I didn't want to put the shiny side down on the creme either, because I wanted to maintain the "risen, swollen" shape of the original cake. OK, the cake absorbs the syrup and becomes ready to melt in your mouth (hehe) and very unstable.

Then I poured the ganache on it. For the ganache, I melted 1 and a half bars of chocolate, and mixed it with whipping cream (not whipped, liquid). It was a big overkill, because I could have covered the cake top with melting half a bar of chocolate probably, but no worries, chocolate ganache is a nice leftover, I poured it on some fruit, and had it the next day (It's strange I'm not 200lbs, not yet). Anyway, I poured the ganache on the cake top, spoon by spoon, letting it run to cover the whole top surface. It even dripped around making a nice effect.

Then I got the raspberries, and drew a circle of them on top of the (still liquid) ganache.

Then I put everything in the fridge to help the chocolate solidify, and make everything a bit more stable.

Next time, I'll use more fruit on top, and maybe a layer of raspberries (or other berries, or cherries) in the middle. But then it'll be like a black forest, without the white part... Well, there's nothing wrong with that. Here's what the cake looked like when cut.

OK, that's all folks. Luckily my guests were satisfied, or at least they were polite enough to fake it.

Oh, I almost forgot the drinking... Oh, the drinking. When the first two people showed up, we started with a light red wine (Côte du Rhône) while waiting for the others to arrive, and finished the bottle. When everyone was in, we had some nice belgian and czech beers with the cold fish-aperitif and also with the hot bruschettas (a bit unorthodox, but it mixed well with cheese and sausage toppings...).

Then everyone switched to chilled white wine with the salad, and we finished the bottle (it doesn't take more than 1 hearty glass for each if it's five people, so bottles were easy to deal with). Then we switched to a serious red wine with the main course. This one I had bought from the local Cave, suggested by the old granpa-looking owner as very good to escort my "lapin aux oignons" (rabbit with onions) dish. That wine wasn't kidding, you could tell it wanted meat for company. Naturally, that bottle was easy prey too, bringing the total wine-bottle casualty count of the evening to 3, not counting the half bottle I used in the food. OK, OK, I used only a cup of that to make the food, and the rest to "escort" my cooking...

It was time we "cleansed our palate" with the sorbet (which did have a bit of raki, but was only very subtly alcoholic, I don't think one could tell after a glass of wine). So, after that we cut the cake, and well, serious dessert wants a serious "digestif", (the brandy in the cake doesn't count), so we had a shot of raki to help digest. We then had a second shot of raki just to make sure, and, by the end of the night, the 1-litre raki bottle was empty, and I think at least two of my guests promised themselves never to drink again (until next time...)

Dinner for 5: preparation

Tomorrow I have invited some friends for dinner (not the same people). I'm making Stifado, ala Polyvios (somewhat improvised)

Marinade:

• 2 sp sugar
• 1 tbsp honey
• about 2 cups wine - I didn't measure it really, I just used whatever was left in a couple bottles from previous dinners.
• 4-5 cloves
• 1 sp red wine vinegar
• a pinch of cinnamon - a piece of cinnamon would have been better, but I only have ground cinnamon now
• 1-2 sp. salt - yes I know it sounds too much, but i'll throw away the marinade tomorrow and keep only the meat
• 1 tbsp of olive oil - it's too little I know, but I don't want the meat to be oiled too much, that'll prevent the alcohol from the wine to interact with the meat and bring out the smells and flavors. Maybe next time I won't use any oil in the marinade.
• 1 rabbit - Yes, bunny rabbit. I'm eating Bugs Bunny! Yummy!
  

Prep:

1. Mix everything except the rabbit in a saucepan and warm up a bit, until everything dissolves. Set it aside.
2. Cut the rabbit into portions, here's what I did: Each leg (with shoulder) is one piece, lower back (between the back legs) is one small piece, the middle back is one piece (cut perpendicular to the spine), the ribcage is two pieces (also cut perpendicular to the spine, with care not to break the ribs), and the head & neck is one piece. I also kept the liver and kindeys, I'll either put them in, or make paté, I'm still thinking about it. I threw away the lungs. You don't have to cut through bone at all, cut the flesh, and break the bones/spine by hand, then cut the rest of the flesh. I took care, cause I don't have a bone-knife, and I didn't want to harm the chef's knife I use (THANKS FOR THE KNIFES!)
3. Put the pieces of meat in the marinade, so that it's (mostly) covered. Put in the fridge. Goodnight, we continue tomorrow.

Oh wait, I also prepared some sorbet:
Warm up water and dissolve a cup of sugar in it (a lot of water, I made a full teapot, or one big tupperware container of sorbet). Let it cool. Add juice of 1 or 2 lemons (I added 1.5, saved half a lemon in the fridge for tomorrow), also 2-3 shots worth of rose-water (I didn't count, but it was around that). Also add a bit of raki (and have a shot for yourself)--I was generous with the raki, but carefull cause alcohol lowers the melting temperature... Put in the freezer, and stir every now and then, to stop big chunks of ice from forming. It gets to be like snow(?) if all goes well.

Ok, goodnight, we continue tomorrow...

dinner for 3

I had two friends over for dinner. The menu was:

1. Apéro (from aperitif, "before food"): Toasted bread with avocado dip and eggplant dip
2. Entrée (in French it means appetizer): Oven potatoes flavored with salted lamb
3. Main course ("plat de resistance"): My own version of "imam" a turkish oven dish (vegetarian)
4. Salad (Yes, here they serve the salad last, to refresh your taste buds before dessert. I was surprized to find that out)
5. Chocolate soufflé (individual soufflés) with melted chocolate on top (overkill I know, but it's allowed in chocolate, "non"?)
   

And now the recipes.

Toasted bread
Very easy. I got two baguettes from the local boulangerie, sliced
and toasted them slightly in the oven - yes I didn't make bread
myself, the boulangerie still beats my bread by far...

Avocado dip
Two avocados, juice of half a lime, salt, pepper. Mix.

Eggplant dip

• Half an eggplant (it was leftover from the main dish).
• One clove of garlic
• Salt, pepper
  

Preparation:
Cut the eggplant in 2cm-thick slices, salt very generously and let sit for 1h to get the bitterness out. Beware, a black liquid will drip and make a mess. Wash the salt away, put a bit of the family olive oil in a pan and fry the eggplant slices for 30 seconds on each side, they will suck up the oil, don't worry that's normal. Set aside for the excess oil to drip out, for about 2min. Heat the oven (i was already cooking 2 other things, so it was preheated). Put on an oven pan the eggplant slices. Peel the garlic and slice it in half (slice in the dimension that gives thin halves). Put the garlic in the oven pan with the eggplant, salt and pepper to taste, and put it in the oven. Wait until the eggplant is done, I think I let it about 1 hour, you can test with a fork, it should be soft and dissolv-y. The garlic should be cooked too. Take out of the oven, let cool for a bit, drain
the excess oil (they will spit out some of the oil they soaked during frying). I peeled them and threw away the peel, but that's up to you, i guess it's good if you leave it in, too. Mash with a fork until smooth. Served both hot and cold. The French called it "caviar d'aubergines" which I though made it sound more gourmet than it is.

Entrée
Oven potatoes with a bit of lamb for taste.
OK, I know this isn't really an entrée dish, it could be a main course. But I liked cooking it so who cares. To explain this I have to give context, so, here's the whole story.

The other day (1 week ago, maybe more, I don't remember), I had some friends over for dinner (not the same ones). I wanted to make a lamb dish, but the butcher would only sell me the whole 1.7kg of lamb shoulder, not just 700gr of it, as I very politely asked using my awful, broken, immigrant's French. Oh well. So I got home with a lot of lamb, I cut it into pieces, took out the 700 of mostly fatless meat that I needed, and was left with bones, pieces of fat, and more meat. I threw away most of the pieces of fat and was left with two big chunks of meat, and some bones (with meat on them). So, I made buillion from the bones (what else) and saved it in the fridge for later, it tastes much better than the buillion cubes... I took the bones, meat and vegetables left from the buillion making to work the next day and had a nice, quite healthy lunch.

Anyway, I was stuck with the two chunks of lamb meat that were left, but I didn't want to cook more lamb in the same week. So I decided to cure the lamb. At worst, I'd throw it away. I made a cure-liquid (I don't know a better word for
it) with salt, water, sugar, and a few spices (thyme, oregano, pepper), by boiling everything together for 2mins. I let that cool to room temperature, put the meat in a tupperware container, poured the juice on top, covered it and put it in the fridge. I have one piece left still, maybe I should take it out, wrap it and dry it for a month, see what happens.

Back to the task at hand, I wanted to use a piece (small, admittedly) of semi-cured/salted lamb to flavor my oven potatoes. I got small red-skin potatoes, washed them thoroughly, and cut them in quarters leaving the skin on. I put a bit of salt(i should have avoided that, given the meat), pepper and oregano on the potatoes, a bit (about 3-4 spoons) of olive oil and mixed
until all potatoes were oiled--this oil wasn't from my family's produce, it was from Despoina's, just as good!

Then I washed the lamb piece, put it among the potatoes, added a cup of water and put the oven pan in the (pre-heated) oven. I checked every now and then, and added a bit more water when it had dried up, but that depends on the oven. I'm still learning my new oven, so it needs care now in the beginning. It came out quite good, the lamb fat melted and the potatoes tasted very nice. The lamb was a little salty compared to my usual outcomes, but then again I don't like too much salt, my guests quite politely said they liked the meat too. So that was entrée (appetizer).

Main course
Imam (almost):

• 3 eggplants
• 2 bell peppers: 1 green, 1 yellow
• 2 tomatoes
• 1 zucchini
• 4 onions
• 2 cloves of garlic
• 5 spoons of tomato puree
• 1 pinch of sugar(optional)
• salt, pepper
• plenty of olive oil (about 1-2 cups, for frying)

Preparation:
Cut and salt the eggplants to take out the bitterness. Usually I slice them at length, and then stuff the slices with the other vegetables. This time I cut them in round slices, around 2cm thick. Fry (slightly) the eggplants and layer the bottom of an oven pan. If you have leftovers you can make eggplant dip. Cut the onions in rings or half rings, and fry them until slightly soft (not much). Layer on top of eggplants. Same with the zucchini (cut in 1cm slices). Cut the peppers thin and layer on top, and tomato slices above (don't fry the peppers and tomatoes). Add salt and pepper, and a pinch of sugar. Throw away the left frying oil (some recipes pour it on top, but that's too oily then). Add the tomato puree as evenly as you can. Slice the garlic very thin and also spread evenly on top. Add herbs if you want, I added a bit of parsil, basil & oregano. Pour half a cup of water (more like sprinkle it) to take some of the herbs spices and puree down with it to the rest of the vegetables (depending on your oven, the water might be unnecessary, then you might want to put the herbs in with the layers,
not on top). Put in the oven (medium/low heat), and wait. It took me less time than I expected to prepare everything, so I left everything in the oven for 3 hours, in low heat (gas oven, set to 2 on a 10-scale). It all came out well cooked, but not dissolved (just right). I guess the vegetables could be done in under 1 hour on medium/high heat, and so could the lamb, but I overestimated the prep
time...

Salad
Some kind of lettuce I got from the farmer's market torn by hand (I learned that you're not supposed to cut lettuce with a knife in France...) , small cherry tomatoes halved, green onions chopped, a bit of dill, and a vinaigrette (mustard,
honey, balsamic & wine vinegar, olive oil).

Dessert
Chocolate soufflé: In chocolate we trust.

• 5 eggs separated: make marengue with the whites, beat the yolks with a bit of sugar (I didn't measure, it looked to be around 1/2 cup) until pale.
• Melt 200g chocolate (1 bar) with a bit of butter (fresh butter I bought from the I-sell-100-million-cheeses-guy at the farmers market this morning), let cool, and slowly pour in the yolk mix (keep stirring).
• Fold marengue in, lovingly and tenderly... (Which reminds me, I need a rubber spatula, I miss my old one).
• Butter and flour the ramequins, pour the mixture in. One could put it in the fridge for 2h and serve as a chocolate mousse, but you have to trust your eggs to serve them raw...
  
• I put it in the fridge for 1h, and then cooked in medium pre-heated oven for 10 mins. Being cool helped keep the interior slightly uncooked and melt-y.

It was nice....

OK, we ate all that, we started with light lager beer, then we split a Chimay blue (trappiste beer, nice!) during the lamb and potatoes, and then we had a bottle of white wine with the main course and a last glass with salad. I served dessert with cold raki, I think I got them a bit drunk.