Lunchtime in Paris

My first ever tag - thanks Betty

Wow, I've never been tagged before and so forgive me if I don't really do this correctly. Betty over at Cuisine Quotidienne tagged me for a French meme that she got here (nice music included...).

So, Betty posted the questions in French and answered in English but I will post them with my English translation/interpretation/complete alteration with photo illustration and of course my answer in English and here goes -

1.  Le dernier livre que j’ai savouré – the last book that I savored (that I really took a lot of pleasure in reading):

I will pick two here. One is my favorite cookbook by Paula Wolfert  Couscous and Other Good Food from Morocco (link to my rendition of the fabulous Chicken and Olives recipe) and one is a novel that I really loved – End of the Story by Lydia Davis – I really enjoyed this book and plan to read it again and again....

 

Couscous, Tunisan Style

2 ) Le film qui m’a le plus transportée – The movie that most moved me:

And here again I have several and will unfortunately have to limit myself and so I choose three – Dolce Vita by Fellini, Ai No Corida by Oshima and of course My Dinner with André by Louis Malle (no comment other than that I watch and re-watch them all three of them with pleasure).

Unfortunately I didn't have any good pasta or sushi photos available but I really would eat this again with pleasure...

3 ) Le plat que je mets au dessus de tout: the dish amongst all dishes or my favorite dish: 

Hmmm, I am so adventurous it is hard for me to choose just one dish to be faithful to...but since  I have to choose, I suppose I can never go long without an oyster…

These Brittany oysters were particularly delicious.

4 ) Mon plus beau souvenir des 10 dernières années – My most wonderful memory of the last 10 years:

the most delicious soup ever, in Sam Neua, Laos...wow, the best soup I ever had.

5 )  L’instant beauté que je préfère – my favorite moment for me or perhaps my favorite beauty treatment/moment:

This is a hard question to translate so I'll just go with the beauty theme and say that when I see beautiful things I get some inner peace, my stress levels go down, my frown and wrinkles fade, I get a sparkle in my eye and I just feel so wonderfully lovely...like here along the Mekong...    

6 ) L’endroit où  je me sens le plus moi-même – Where do I find my own real self, where do I feel most at home: 

Travelling, although I don't always eat well there...it's just that as soon as I take my seat in the plane, train, or bus I let out a sigh of relief and let myself go.....

7 ) Mes petits moments de bonheur – My small indulgences

chocolate cake?

Anyway, this was really fun and I still do have some Paris Chinatown photos to post so hopefully I will get around to that soon.

And, and all you food lovers the Salon de l'Agriculture is upon us!!! Woohoo, my favorite eating event of the year in Paris!!! and yes, I will use 487 exclamation points to describe it because there is nothing I love more.

It starts on the 23rd of February and runs through the 2nd of March. Here is a Link in English. It is just simply the most fun event of the whole year in Paris and well worth the 12 euros admission price.

Hope to see you there, Happylunching! 

An idea for 2008 - cake and books "Let Them Eat Cake Extravaganza" part II

Here I am just fooling around as part of my "let them eat cake series".  Some time back I joined Librarything and I really just love it as a way to organize and keep order in my book collection (I am aemilys on the site). But it's also a part of my life and so I've been thinking about ways to blog food and books at the same time...

this is an experiment - so on your bedside table you have some books and a snack and perhaps it looks like this...

or perhaps like this

I'm wondering if this is a concept? The books were good, the cake was delicious...

Last lunch of 2007 - Paris "Let them Eat Cake" Extravaganza part I

I'm still feeling motivated and I think it may be in part due to the very kind Wildschwein who have actually nominated me as blog of the week on their site (this is my first ever nomination for anything, wow). 

So thanks very Wildschwein and since I know you are dreaming and saving for Paris here is some more inspiration for you...I hope you like it (and please remember it's only part I ), so -

Others may prefer the jewels of Place Vendome but for a foodie there is only one place for a window shopping  pilgrimage in Paris...

Place de la Madeleine - home of Ladurée  - look at that line to buy macarons...

And here, some truffles at Maison de la Truffe  (the truffle house)

This is such an artsy photo (check out my Alfred Hitchcock like cameo appearance) of Hediard and what a nice window display that is!

Fauchon is doing some fashionable cakes this season. I particularly like this disco one covered in silver leaf - is it edible?

They've also got some lovely canapés for your next fête.

Oh, and what's this? the Holy Grail, the Hope Diamond, giant king crab's legs on ice - perhaps I will win the lottery some day.

But, until that time comes I've still got Duthil (no site) in the neighborhood and they've some lovely cakes as well.



Three chocolate cakes.



First cake...



Inside the first cake - the little orange cookie like thing is a macaron - what you wait in line for at Ladurée.



Ok, now that we've been to Fauchon we know that silver is in and gold is out but this lovely litte neighborhood cake has gold...and it was delicious;



if a little blurry.



and here is the chocolate monument, very nice as well.

Anyway, that's it for today. I wish you all a very Happy and Prosperous New Year, lot's of good food, good friends, and good fortune!

Quiche and cake for lunch today

After all the horrible salad misadentures let's all breath a collective sigh of relief...ouuuui, no more bizarre Parisian salads (ever again).

Anyway, today's lunch was such a pleasure... and therefore it is a pleasure for me to share it with you. Enjoy!



Two quiches and a lovely cake.



First up is the quiche Lorraine...



and next up is the quiche poireaux...these are traditional favorites.



Here we have a close up on the quiche poireaux...the crust is delightful and the filling is just heavenly.



And here is the quiche Lorraine...



The two delicious quiches were followed by this very interesting cake. At the boulangerie they call it "Caraibes" which means Caribbean..obviously, I was expecting some Caribbean fruits...and so, do grapes and strawberries come from the Caribbean? Perhaps I will do some research.



In any case, this was a very nice cake and since the whole lunch cost less than what I had paid for my various salad fiascos, I'm happy. It's also so much more fun to take photos of food that is good.

This weekend I am going to make a chicken machbous which require lots of spices, oh happy me! Please pray that I get out of bed early enough tomorrow morning to start the whole delightfully complicated process...I'll try to get the results in on Monday but since I also have plans to go and check out "Le Diable s'habille en Prada" Sunday afternoon...who knows? anyway, Tuesday at the latest and big biz de Paris!

Happy lunching toujours!

Search for the perfect lunch salad

I've  been eating a lot of sandwiches since I came back from vacation...but now I'm bored with ham and cheese and I've decided to look for the perfect lunch salad.

Today's post has two lunches, one for yesterday and one for today. Both have salad and both have tartes (one tarte sucré (sweet) and one tarte salée (savoury)).



Monday's lunch was a salade de terrine de poisson (fish mousse salad) with a tarte tatin (upside down apple tart) and a diet coke. This cost 9,50 EUR and I got it at the boulangerie where I usually buy my sandwiches.



Today's lunch cost 9,90 EUR and included a salade d'endives au Roquefort...my favorite cheese. My first remark about the salad lunches are that they cost more than a sandwich. Eating healthy is expensive.



This salad started off excellent, the fish terrine was really nice and light.



Unfortunately, this is what I found underneath the terrine...cold canned corn and some cold canned bean salad...this is a weird and frequent thing in Paris. I hate it and that was the end of this salad, never again. I couldn't even eat the lettuce underneath because it had a horrible canned vegetable taste although I will admit that people must like this because you see so much of it around. Go figure.



Happily today I had a salad I could live with. Endives, roquefort, walnuts, apple and raisins...delicious! and nothing was from a can.



Tarte tatin, very nice.



This is dessert so I should have saved it for last but it did go with the first salad so here it is in order on the inside.



With the roquefort salad lunch for 9,90 EUR I had a choice of salad, sweet or savory tart and a drink or a yogurt or a fromage blanc (sort of soft cheese  dessert). I chose to have a savory tarte, this one is spinach. I liked the little seeds on top.



A lovely spinach tart. Happy lunching!

Lunch from Hungary

This weekend's food adventure was a Hungarian Chicken Paprikash...or as they say in Hungary...Csirke Paprikas. As you may or may not know, I've decided to do a recipe from every country represented on the flags in the side bar, this weekend it was Hungary. I found quite a number of recipes on the net but this is the one I followed the most closely www.epicurean.com, there is a nice article all about the history of Hungarian food as well, really quite informative.



So, starting with the ingredients: chicken, paprika, sour cream (creme fraiche in French), onion, green pepper, tomatos, tomato paste and flour and eggs for the dumplings...that is a whole 'nother story...and various other things.



This is just for fun...a close up on the tomatoes, and guess where they came from? Surprise, I grew them on my tiny little balcony cuz I'm an urban survivor (got about 15 in all but they were pretty tasty). Also, since the only homemade chicken stock I had in the fridge was Asian flavored (ginger and lemon grass), and I really didn't have the time to make more stock this weekend I opted for some special Eastern European boullion cubes (I know it's cheating but it seems like such less of a cheat since I did have to go out of my way to get them).



Chicken, I don't know what its like where you come from but here in Paris, no matter where I buy my chickens they are never really totally plucked. There are always some feathers left on.



Next to an open fire out in the backyard the best thing is a gas range to singe all those annoying feathers off. This really works.



Here is the start of preparation. Once the chicken was cleaned of all the feathers I cut it into pieces and put the pieces in a plastic bag with 1/4 cup flour, 2 teaspoons of paprika (or maybe a little more), some salt and some pepper (1/4 teaspoon each...more or less depending on taste). Then shake to coat well.



Then brown the chicken pieces in a mix of oil and butter (I used peanut oil). Some recipes call for lard, which must be delicious but I have a resident non pork eater so that was out for me.



After the chicken pieces are nicely browned on each side take them out of the casserole and put them aside. The next ingredients to get ready are some chopped onion (one large), some paprika (lots...I think I used 1/4 cup minus the amount to toss the chicken), some tomato paste (two tablespoons) and should be one cup of stock but I used water and the cube.



Sautee the onions and paprika in the cooking juice from the chicken til the onions are soft, then add the tomato paste, and then add the stock (or water and cube).



This will make a nice rich thick base for the sauce, cook for five minutes but not too hot.



Here is the browned chicken that I set aside, with some green peppers cut into rings and some chopped tomato (three small). If I hadn't of been so lazy this weekend I would have peeled them, it's really not all that much of an effort...and I promise that next time I will show you my foolproof tomato peeling technique.



Put the chicken pieces, the pepper, and the tomato into the casserole with the nice thick sauce, mix and turn the heat way down. Cover and cook 'til the chicken is done...and here is where you must watch out. It's best if the chicken cooks in its own juices and that you don't add water. But, since the sauce is so thick, the heat must be way down so nothing sticks and burns...I decided to let my chicken cook for one hour, however I was checking frequently at the end and at about 40 minutes it was starting to stick.

If this happens to you don't despair. Just transfer everything to a new casserole and DO NOT scrape up any of the stuck bits because they will give a bad taste to your sauce. Then put the old pan in the sink to soak.



At the very end, put two cups of sour cream (creme fraiche) into a bowl and gradually stir in some of the hot sauce the chicken has been cooking in. This is because your cream will curdle and cook strangely if you just pour it in on top of the cooking chicken. The idea is to raise the heat gradually and then mix the whole thing together.



And here you have it, the creme fraiche has been added to the chicken, pepper and tomato mixture and the whole thing smells really delicious. Nice color too, I think.



And this is a close close up on the chicken paprikash with peppers and onions.



This is a really tasty dish. My only disaster this weekend was the dumplings and I am just going to have to do some more research. They were so strange, like these gobs of weird dough, perhaps that is what a dumpling is? In any case, I was not satisfied with my results and so I will attempt them again at a future date.

In case you would like to compare paprikash recipes here are some other links I found interesting:

Chicken Paprikash 2

Chicken Paprikash from Hungary

Chicken Paprikash and other good things from June Meyer

Extensive list of Hungarian recipes including Chicken Paprikash

I'm thinking about a delicious Chicken Machbous for next weekend, this is a traditional Persian gulf recipe and fairly complicated too (my favorite kind) and since I've had at least one visitor from Bahrain, one from the Emirates, and one from Kuwait... that means three flags in one recipe.

See you then and in the meanwhile, happy lunching!

Lunches with dessert

I was really tired last night and so I didn't post. I had my Arabic class and then it is the "Semaine Culturelle " (culture week) here in Paris so at the Syrian Cultural Center where I'm taking my classes they showed a marvelous film by Mustapha Al-Akkad  called Lion of the Desert. This is a sad and tragic story which lasts for three hours so I got home really late (but still an excellent film and I'm glad to finally learn the story of Omar Al-Mokhtar).

So today you get two lunches for the price of one.

The first lunch is chicken and crudité (raw veg) on baguette with a delicious chocolate macaroon cake and a diet coke.

The second lunch is feuillité jambon champignons (feuillité is a kind of pastry dough, feuille is leaf and so since it has so many layers it's like saying "leafy"), an extra special chocolate mousse cake, and a diet coke.

A delicious chicken sandwich French style.

And the feuillité...this is typical of boulangerie food and only cost 2,20 EUR. Flaky pastry dough filled with succulent mushrooms and ham.

I'm experimenting with taking pictures in the sun...anyway, here is the first delicious cake called a craquant (meaning crispy or crunchy or crackling...). It is composed of two macaroons, some rasberries, and some creme patissiere (I really don't like this...it's like butter cream frosting).

And here is the most extraordinary and exquisite "trois mousses" (three chocolate mousse) cake, wow, what can I say, it glows and you should try and get your hands on one of these.

Inside the chocolate rasberry macaroons.

Inside the three chocolate mousse thing, oh please hit me again...

Just another lovely look for my chocolate loving friends out there.

And so, tomorrow's Friday and TGIF. I had originally planned to do something Mexican this weekend but my research has shown that there is a really complicated pepper situation there and so I'm going to need more time to sort that out from Paris.

But do not despair because there is an Eastern European shop in my neighbourhood and I can buy some real true Hungarian Paprika and that means that this weekend I'm going to do my utmost to make a very authentic Chicken Paprikash...

Stay tuned and happy lunching!

Malaysia: Laksa for lunch

First of all, Ramadan Mubarak, a joyous and blessed holiday to all my Moslem friends and visitors!

And now for today's lunch (which was prepared with a halal chicken from my neighborhood Islamic butcher shop...quality meat and reasonable prices). As I stated in my last post, I've decided to do a recipe for every flag that appears on my sidebar. Today's recipe is from Malaysia, a very delicious Laksa.

I got the recipe here at www.soupsong.com. If you want to follow along you can get today's recipe precisely here: soupsong Laksa recipe.  An excellent site and a must for you soup lovers out there. Also, there is an extensive collection of international soup recipes, enough to keep me busy making soup for many weekends to come!

I actually made three trips to the supermarket for this recipe and here are some of the ingredients (the easy ones).

This is where I ran into difficulty. There are just so many Asian herbs...is this Laksa leaf? It's the very essential ingredient and so I did not want to make a mistake.

Or is this Laksa leaf? The recipe calls for "Asian basil"...I live in Paris and everything has a different French name, even Asian herbs. The first herb was labelled rau ram in the Asian grocey store and the second was labelled "Thai basilic" who's to know? In the end I went to www.asiafood.org where the Laksa leaf entry refers to "Vietnamese mint" and I chose the first green herb pictured above...what a lovely smell it has.

This recipe has several steps to it:

First you must have cooked chicken and four cups of stock (I suggest you make your own it's so much nicer),

Secondly you must make a spice paste for the flavor,

Thirdly you must cook some noodles and prepare everything for the final soup, and

Finally you put the soup together and make the garnish plate.

Since I would be needing cooked chicken and stock, the first thing to do was make both. I decided to follow my instincts on this one and so I made my stock using some of my green herbs (I bought lots of different kinds), fresh ginger slices and scallions.

This is the start of the spice paste: lemon grass (only the tender hearts), galangal (like ginger but milder), shrimp paste, garlic, scallions, and some red hot peppers.

This goes into the food processor and the recipe says it should look like "a speckled mush" well, perhaps.

Then once that is done, you add some chopped coriander, some tamarind paste, some sugar and some tumeric.

And I put the food processor back in the cupboard and get out my trusty morter and pestle...the food processor makes everything just too watery and this is supposed to be a "paste".

Here is the cooked chicken (from the chicken I used to make the stock with)  and the cooked rice noodles.

Here is the sauce that I made by frying the spice paste in two tablespoons of peanut oil until lightly colored, then adding four cups of my homeade stock plus a mix of 1/4 cup chopped coriander and 1/4 cup chopped laksa leaf and then adding  a can of coconut milk.

And here is the final Laksa lunch. First I put some of the noodles into a bowl, then I added some chicken, and then I ladled some of the sauce on top. Serve with a plate of various greenery and condimets...really delicious and your kitchen will indeed smell wonderful if you make this.

Just a bowl of Laksa.

Wow, what an adventure but I still have so many questions. I liked this dish and my daughters liked it too but...was this really Laksa and did I pick the right leaves? I would really appreciate any comments, criticism, or suggestions on how to make an even better Laksa! What a fun afternoon cooking.

So, next weekend I think we will head to Mexico and I am going to spend the week searching for a most traditional Mexican dish. In the meantime I will be posting my usual sandwiches and various other things from the office...

Thanks for stopping by and Happy Lunching!

Lunch in Tunisia

Last weekend I made a lovely Tunisian speciality, brik à l'oeuf.  I hesitated before posting this entry because I was not really thrilled with the results. But, since Ramadan is just around the corner and I probably won't be making these again for a while, here goes.

First of all, the ingredients:

Sheets of brick (or brik)...more about that later

Oil for cooking

Canned tuna (packed in water is better)

Capers

Parsley (finely chopped, flat leaf only)

Shallots (or finely chopped onion, as you wish)

Fresh eggs (and I do stress FRESH...the whole problem for me today was old eggs...)

Here are the briks. And so what is a brik? Check out this link www.ochef.com. I can buy brik in the supermarket in Paris, you may have to substitute phyllo dough or Chinese spring roll skins...you get the idea.

In any case, making brik à l'oeuf is not an exact science, everyone has their own special filling, I chose to fill mine with:

Tuna, chopped parsley, minced shallots, and capers as well as the egg.

The technique for making brik à l'oeuf  involves placing the sheet of brik into a shallow bowl, and then putting  some small amounts of  tuna, minced shallot, minced parsley, capers and then a whole egg in the middle. Then you must somehow move the whole thing to the frying pan where the hot oil awaits...

Into the frying pan...

The sides of the sheet of brik will stick together naturally, but as you can see if you don't have really fresh eggs the yolk will break and your brik won't be so much fun...

Spoon some oil over to cook fast but once again with these worthless old eggs...the yolk is supposed to stay runny but when they break they cook too fast...

This is what it will look like in the end. A lovely golden brown color.

If only the eggs had been fresh....please scroll all the way down to the bottom of this next link and you will see what happens when fresh eggs are used www.davidgreer.ca The yolk is still a little runny and the whole thing is gorgeous. You can use lots of other things to fill the brik as well, potatos, minced meat with spices...it's only a question of imagination...

And, keep reading if you're still interested in Tunisian food because my kids brought me back this excellent vacation photo...

What else but a magnificent Tunisian couscous with peppers on top. Taking this step by step and from the top down we start with the peppers

They look like this when they are raw and  in French they are called "corne de boeuf": beef horn.

Just cut a slit in the side and pour in some salt

Then shake the pepper to get the salt all over,  put them into some hot oil and cook until tender...and then put them on top of your couscous...which I will make another day...

til then, happy lunching!

A sandwich and two cakes for lunch

Well no, I didn't actually have two cakes for lunch today. What has happened is that I've fallen in love with the wonderful Bayonne/Reblochon sandwich from the boulangerie and so I had it two days in a row...FYI Bayonne is a kind of ham and Reblochon is a wonderful French cheese.

The first lunch started like this: a bayonne and reblochon sandwich with a chocolate religieuse (a sort of cake, keep reading...)

Melty cheese and salty ham on fresh bread...great sandwich

Actually, a really great sandwich so it gets another photo

This is the religieuse (religieuse means "nun" in French and it is also the name of  a very typical cake that you can find in all the boulangeries), very delicious too. And this whole lunch cost 8 EUR.

The bottom layer of the religieuse

And the top

So, the next day I went back to the very same boulangerie and got the very same sandwich because it is so extra delicious but, I got a different kind of cake. This one is a millefeullle (thousand leaves...because of the flaky crust).

A fabulous millfeuille for 2.20 EUR, the religieuse is about the same price.

Once again, I do suggest that you look into the boulangeries in Paris for your lunching needs.