I bought my first cookbook in the south; Alabama to be specific, in 1955, the year I graduated from high school. What possessed me, I have no idea, but I was destined to learn to cook. My first cookbook has wooden covers and is called Fine Old Dixie Recipes. Some of the pictures would not be politically correct today. Things and people were different then. Looking at the book now the southern cookbook made it seem that people were once delighted to be picking cotton in the heat of the sweltering day. Or a large fat woman appeared giddy to be cooking over a wood stove when it was one hundred degrees in the shade with only a bandanna tied to her head to keep the sweat from dripping into the three daily meals, all the while children sat on stumps eating watermelon. I have never made one dish from that recipe book, but continue to hold on to it as though it were my favorite. Dishes like molasses pudding and raw apple float and hot frosted gingerbread sound delicious but I have no desire to try to make them. (Hot frosted gingerbread sounds good to me at the moment, since I have had no sweets for two weeks.)
Around My French Table by Dori Greenspan is a five hundred-thirty page tome. I am enjoying it to no end because it is not just recipes but Paris experiences, some of which I have had myself. Each blurb before the recipe is extensive, different, and well put together. I saw her picture of short ribs in wine with carrots and potatoes and made it the next day. (The picture here is from Williams-Sonoma, although mine looked pretty good too.) I made a beef-vegetable soup from the left overs the next day. One looks at short ribs and may think there is not much meat there, but the meat is so rich with wine and herbs that one cannot eat a lot of it...or at least I can't, so it suits my expandable family as a good winter meal or two. Dori's recipe is pages long and must be delicious, but she had me at her picture of the dish. Mine is short, sweet, and delectable. Buy the beef short ribs, season and sear them. Slice a sweet onion and pop it in after the meat has been seared. Caramelize it all around and then put it in the crock pot along with the seared short ribs. Put in a bouquet garni of fresh herbs like rosemary, thyme, a little sage, parsley--any herbs that meet the occasion. Pour a good red wine over the meat and onion, put in some beef stock, a hand full of garlic cloves, some stalks of celery, some carrots (and later potatoes and some fresh carrots). Put the crock pot on high until it is all perking along and then put it on low if you have plenty of time to let it go, if not, keep it on high. It's done when the meat seems as though it will fall from the bone, but not quite. (I put the fresh carrots and potatoes in about an hour before serving.) This can be done in a Dutch oven and placed in the oven or even on top of the stove to simmer all day. I like the crock pot or the oven best. This is a French bistro dish and when you order it there, you had better be hungry. It is served with knuckles of toasted croutons or the regular baguette. The French do not like you to leave food on your plate--it's insulting to them.
Betty Rosbottom's blog turned me on to the new kitchen tool shown above.(Be sure to check out her blog as presented in my previous entry.) The fish turner has so many uses it needs a new name. I ordered mine from Amazon.com and it came pronto. There are several different kinds averaging around $13. I have yet to buy the mashing fork (shown on Dori Greenspan's blog.) 'Julia" introduced it on television many years ago. I need that too.
Cooking Blogs:
A couple of months ago, The London Times published a list of The World's 50 Best Food Blogs : among them Smitten Kitchen, Orangette, Chez Pim, Steamy Kitchen, Simply Recipes, The Bitten Word, David Lebovitz, Tartelette, The Kitchen, Cafe Fernando, La Tartine Gourmande, The Wednesday Chef, Chocolate and Zucchini, The Amateur Gourmet. I thought you might like to check some of these out for yourselves. (Mine was not on the list. LOL)
Since this winter goes on forever, I have read until I am nearly blind. C'est la Vie by Suzy Gershman is a fun read--she writes the 'born to shop' books and moved to Paris six months after her husband died. I am on a Paris reading kick, but not because I want to go back. I just like the different points of view about the City of Light and its inhabitants. 'The read' was triggered by my Paris driver who emailed me in January to tell me about all the changes in his life. Changes that I did not even imagine happening to him. He now lives in CANADA with a new wife and new family. How does that happen in such a short period of time? The cadence of life seems off to me.
Almost French by Sarah Turnbull is next on my list. I have often been told that a novel is in me, but I think I have moved to a phase in my life where family is front and center and my whims have been satisfied. I've had the notes and pages of ideas and funny and sad situations on hand for a long time, but the effort to put them all in order seems gone. Eight books about antiques is enough for me, I think.
I have also just found the delight of On Demand television. I have ignored it for years, but the reruns and lack of interesting shows has driven me to the movies on demand at $6. a pop. Cheaper still than leaving the home in this weather to trot to the movies. A couple spends close to $40. to see a movie with snacks now days. I remember seeing a movie for fourteen cents! So far I have been watching The Girl movies--The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, The Girl Who Played with Fire, The Girl who Kicked the Hornets Nest. Normally, for me, the books are better than the movies, but in this case, the movies are better. There are sub titles, but that is not annoying to me. The acting is good, the story lines are compelling, but the one draw back is the graphic rape scenes in one of the movies. It's something you don't want to watch with anyone else in the room, but necessary to the plot. I saw Wall Street 2 last night. (They should have stopped with the first one.) The first on demand that I watched was Eat, Pray,Love
Hated it!
To me, the worst movie of last year was Sex and The City 2. When Carrie Bradshaw went shopping in Dubai in a ball gown skirt and tee shirt, I could have slapped her. It was ridiculous! The entire movie set my teeth on edge as Mama Mia had done the year before. Eat, Prey, Love was not far behind the other idiot movies.
Back to food:
Ohhhh, I like to fix frittatas. They are fast, easy and full proof. They can stretch a menu for unexpected pop in guests or to take to a neighbor in need.
Baked Potato Frittata (from Williams-Sonoma)
My comments are here and there in this recipe:
2 russet potatoes, scrubbed and diced
(or use left over potatoes)
Preheat oven to 400. Combine potatoes, olive oil, salt and pepper and transfer to a baking sheet. Bake for about 30 minutes.
crisp the bacon, discard fat (I save it for the rest of the recipe)
In large bowl, whisk eggs, salt and pepper, 1 cup cheese and 1/4 cup chives. In frittata pan (or a skillet) warm 2 tsps. oil (or I use the bacon fat that some discard) Put the potatoes in the pan with the diced, cooked bacon, pour egg mixture over potatoes and bacon. Cook, using a spatula to lift the cooked edges so the egg mixture can seep--seep and lift, seep and lift. Once the bottom is set, sprinkle the top with cheese and slide it into your preheated oven at 400. (They say 500, but that ruins the eggs in my opinion.) Bake until the egg mixture is set and no longer jiggles.
You can set yourself free with a frittata. I've used ham, tomatoes, vegetables of various kinds--as long as your egg mixture is basic, what is under the eggs should please you and your guests.
