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.