French Cuisine

                                      Lers Ros Thai on Hayes Street (across from my old fave the Hayes St Grill) is a place open just a year recommended by an eating companion in Paris and was he spot-on.  I took one look at the daily specials and knew this was no hole-in-the-wall place like a thousand others.               The garlic and pepper rabbit spoke to me but i figured I needed a first so I ordered what I thought was a throw-away, a Thai Herb sausage; fantastic, deconstructed with green chilis, onion, sliced ginger, peanuts and lime - one of the, if not the, best Thai dishes I've ever had.  Then I had the rabbit which was toasty with skin like a crusty suckling pig's - my oh my. For drinking I went for the Talmar, if you would believe it in May, a Beaujolais Villages Nouveau that was most unGamay, unNouveau, unBeaujolais, another surprise. With 2 glasses of the wine, no bottled water, tea, coffee or dessert, my bill was $56.16. Go?  For the best Thai meal I've ever had, in Thailand or elsewhere; it reminded me of the food I tumbled on in Toronto that was nouvelle Korean, this was not old stuff, this was new, exciting, innovative; wish  had it around my neighborhood. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Today is Food Revolution Day, the brainchild of Jamie Oliver and a worldwide event. The purpose is to support hands-on food education and the theme this year is one close to my heart: Cook it! Share it! It's a theme also near and dear to the cooks and bakers at French Fridays with Dorie -- especially to wonderful Mardi Michaels of Eat. Live. Travel. Write. who is working to help coordinate this event in Canada. I'm participating in this event with FFwD by sharing Salted Butter Breakups, a recipe from Around My French Table.When I first learned about Food Revolution and knew that I'd post an entry, my friend Mary said, "You have to make the Salted Butter Breakups - they're perfect for sharing!" She was right - the cookie was made to be shared. It's a big, freeform, ragged-at-the-edges cookie that's meant to be served whole so that everyone can break off a piece. And everyone did.The radon-inspecting workman with a piece of Salted Butter BreakupsA kindergartener up a tree with a piece of Salted Butter Breakups After more kids broke off piece, more workmen and George, the neighbor, had a nibble, Lefty, the cat, got the last morsel. Thank you, Mary, for the inspiration and the photographs.Here's the recipe so that you can Cook It and Share It and teach it to friends, so that they can do the same. SALTED BUTTER BREAKUPSAdapted from From Around My French Table, by Dorie Greenspan Even if this weren’t wonderfully good, and it is, I’d want to make it just because it’s so much fun to serve. Essentially a large, buttery, flaky, salty, sweet rectangular cookie with a pretty little cross-hatch pattern on top, it gets put in the center of the table and, instead of cutting portions for your guests, your guests get to serve themselves by reaching over and breaking off pieces of the sweet. Yes, it’s messy – it’s impossible for this to be a crumbless endeavor – but everyone, young and old, easy-going and stuffy, likes it. Of course, for neatness’ sake, you could break the cookie up in the kitchen or you could even roll the dough out and cut it into cookie shapes, but that wouldn’t be as amusing, would it?Called broyés in French, meaning crushed, the cookies are a tradition in the Poitou region, where butter is prized, so don’t even think about a substitute. Similarly, another of the cookies’ defining characteristics is its saltiness – it is undeniably salty and, now and again, you can even feel the salt on your tongue. In France, the cookies are made with sel gris, a moist, slightly grey (or gris) sea salt with crystals that are large enough to be picked up individually. If you can’t find sel gris, go with kosher salt. Makes 4 servings 1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour2/3 cup sugar3/4 to 1 teaspoon sel gris (see above) or kosher salt1 stick plus 1 tablespoon (9 tablespooons) cold unsalted butter, cut into 18 pieces3 to 5 tablespoons cold water1 egg yolk, for the glazePut the flour, sugar and salt in the workbowl of a food processor and pulse to combine. Drop in the pieces of butter and pulse until the mixture looks like coarse meal – you’ll have big, pea-size pieces and small flakes. With the machine running, start adding the cold water gradually. Add just enough water to produce a dough that almost forms a ball. When you reach into the bowl to feel the dough, it should be very malleable.Scrape the dough onto a work surface, form it into a square and pat the square down to flatten it a bit. Wrap the dough in plastic and chill it for about 1 hour (or for as long as overnight).When you’re ready to bake, center a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Line a baking sheet with a silicone mat or parchment paper.Remove the dough from the fridge and, if it’s very hard, bash it a few times with your rolling pin to soften it. Put the dough between sheets of plastic film or wax paper and roll it –

This photo is the best illustration that I’ve got of an important tip: Sniff and taste before you pour, sprinkle, chop, cook or bake. So many things can go wrong with ingredients and when any one of them does, there goes your dish.My husband snapped this picture of me shortly after I’d found a bottle of lavender syrup hidden behind way too many things. Good thing I smelled it before making those Kirs – it was off by a mile. And I thought mold was the only bad thing that could happen to sugar syrup! Hmmm. The usual suspects for rancidity are oil and ingredients with oil. I never pour a drop of any kind of oil without smelling it first and, if the sniff test leaves me wondering, I taste. No amount of mustard and vinegar can cover oil that’s off. Oil should be stored in dark, cool places and nut oils should be given extra care, since they go off faster. Here’s the rule I follow: if the storage area is good enough for wine, then it’s good enough for oil. And while nuts

My dear – and now many-miles-distant – friend Melissa has tagged me with the Liebster Award, a fun, navel-gazing meme that’s been going around. To start, I’m supposed to share 11 things about myself. I thought it would be interesting to think of eleven ways my life has changed since moving to Paris, so here we go: 1. I was never particularly passionate about driving (though I did love my car, which you’ll read more about later), but now I’ve become a devotee of public transportation. I’ve got the Métro map memorized – well, most of it – and would usually rather take a Noctilien or a Vélib than a taxi after hours. 2. I can’t really imagine life without a CSA. I love Paris’ markets, but even there it can be challenging to find locally and sustainably grown produce. Now, I get fresh, organic vegetables and eggs delivered to a nearby shop almost every week, year-round. I know where the food comes from, and I get a little direction in my weekly me

St. Patrick’s Day, 1997. It’s spring break of my freshman year of college. I’m at a party with my boyfriend in his hometown, surrounded by his friends from high school. I’m halfheartedly sipping a Budweiser, as someone had given it

I knew I couldn’t do chocolate mousse month without a visit to Patrice Chapon‘s shop on the rue du Bac, because the single-origin mousse bar is pretty much the best thing to happen to chocolate mousse since, well, ever. Four (or more!) diffe

Which came first, the bread or the beer? And what happens if you use beer as the liquid in bread? I can’t answer that first question with any certainty, but I can tell you that the second is a worthy experiment. Curious about the flavor that a beer

Friends were stopping by for a too-fast hello and a drink last night and I was prepared: I’d put wine in the refrigerator, bought nuts and some peppery dried sausage (saucisson sec) cut nibbling thin. But an hour before they were due to arrive, I f

Perhaps I was a touch ambitious with my plans for the Paris Pastry Crawl. Eating all that pastry is not for the faint of heart, nor is it for people who are used to working in kitchens but now find themselves leading a much more sedentary lifestyle, nor i

Longtime readers of this blog (and pretty much anyone who’s ever met me) know how much I love beer.  So when I saw (via the always awesome Jenni, aka Pastry Chef Online) that Sophia of NY FoodGasm had gotten a group together to blog about beer this