Provençal Olive Fougasse

Dorie Greenspan: Around My French Table: Recipe 4

The dough was easy to make and the instructions given were clear.  The dough was enough to make two breads, but they should be eaten the same day you bake them.  Luckily, you can leave half the dough in the fridge for up to three days so that you do not have to make two breads on the same day.  Olives, lemon zest and rosemary get mixed in with the dough all add good flavor to the bread with the exception of the rosemary.  There either wasn’t enough to make an impact or perhaps I minced it too fine.  I used coarse grey sea salt as my finishing salt of choice.  The dough was easy to handle and shape- didn’t give me any trouble at all.  The finished bread only needs about 20 minutes to cool after it comes out the oven before you can eat it.  I shared my first loaf with a number of people, all of whom really liked it.   Most surprising perhaps was that I like it, and I am not a big fan of olives, though I keep trying.  It was easy to just keep eating this bread and it didn’t need any accompaniments like butter or more olive oil.  This would be a nice appetizer for a get together or just a nice treat to snack on.  I will be making this again.  Hurrah! 

Skate with capers, cornichons, and brown butter sauce with Go-with-everything celery root puree

Dorie Greenspan: Around My French Table Recipes 2 & 3

This is a good recipe, and also a quick and easy one.  The Skate cooks quickly, as it is a thin wing, and the sauce comes together quickly and easily as well.  I couldn’t find a skate wing anywhere near the 6 ounces that Dorie calls for and so compensated by getting the correct number of ounces, amounting to 4 skate wings.  The recipe is tasty for two reasons.  One, skate just has good flavor naturally, and two, the sauce was good.  The sauce consisted of all the things in the title- cornichons, brown butter, capers, and also sherry and grainy French mustard.  I’d certainly make this recipe again, but not anytime soon.  Currently, fishing for skate is not ecologically sound, but luckily, as far as I am concerned, the sauce can probably be paired with another white fish, and so this recipe, and wild skate, can live on.  Dorie suggested putting the finished skate on a bed of Go-with-everything celery root puree, so that is what I did. 

I liked using celery root- it was novel and I was glad to be able to get a new vegetable into my diet. Also, it tasted good.  This recipe involved boiling in a mixture of milk and water celery root, one russet potato, and one onion.  When tender, liquid is drained and vegetables are pureed in a food processor with salt, pepper, and butter.  That’s it.  While we did think this tasted good, neither of us thought it was special enough to make another time.  I bet this is even better if you are a farmer and do not have to buy celery root- more of a reason to make it again.  But if you are like me and have to go out of the way to get celery root, you may agree that is not special enough to warrant many remakes.   

Chicken in a Pot: The Garlic & Lemon Version

There was a lot of anticipation for this meal.  We talked about making chicken in a pot long before we finally decided we were going to do it.  Having a photo of it on the cover of Dorie's book was a good reminder to make it happen.  It wasn't difficult, nor very time consuming.  The chicken, from the farmers market, was very good in itself, however, Dorie didn't call for much to be done with it, and it ultimately lacked flavor- no rubs, marinades, or seasoning other than salt and pepper.  The carrots and potatoes (yukon gold) were very tasty, the broth was good, but this seemed merely a first step- the chicken in a pot needed a boost, more time cooking, more flavor, more drippings, more something.  There was not much garlic or onion flavor despite having 4 heads and 16 bulbs respectively.  The dough around the rim of the pot was not worthy of eating and was merely a seal.  The results were not bad overall, but also not impressive.  Chicken and company only spent 55 minutes in the oven.  Would the original Richard Olney version have been better?  

Dorie Greenspan's Around My French Table

1) Our meals had again become routine, 2) It is the new year, and 3) We are going to France; these are the reasons to begin the recipe book project again, hopefully with better luck, and again we have attempted to immerse ourselves in French cuisine. Greenspan's book was chosen because all the dishes seemed to have the right ingredients and immediately looked like the very thing you want to be eating. The caveat was that we had already tried one entrée, the one on the cover, actually, Chicken in a Pot: The Garlic and Lemon Version; and it didn't go well at all. But we own the book and need to give it a more representative chance. Besides, how would the chicken in a pot taste if we tried it again? Even if we have our doubts much of the time retesting  may be necessary in order to draw a valid conclusion. An aim will be to get to know French cooking before we arrive so that we can compare notes. How does our food approach theirs? What are we doing wrong or, maybe, more preferably? When we are at a café, bistro, or restaurant, what will we order? Hopefully we'll have a better place to draw answers from with the six months homework we expect to undertake.