May 2010 archives

One of my favorite summertime memories was having mint chip ice cream back when I grew up in New England, which we ate outside and had ordered from a window at our local dairy. Even though the ice cream was freshly made, they made sure it bright-bright-green, so we knew we were eating mint, I guess.

I remember a few years later, after the dairy closed, when we bought a tub of Breyers ‘all-natural’ ice cream at the supermarket and I lifted the lid off the tub of mint chip ice cream only to be surprised to find that mint ice cream wasn’t really green at all, but almost pure, snowy white, save for the chunks of chocolate studded about here and there.

When I wanted to come up with my own mint ice cream recipe, I used handfuls of fresh mint leaves for flavor, unlike what the store-bought stuff is made from, so it had a leafy, herbaceous flavor. A few people noted to me at various times that their mint-infused milk didn’t get the delicate green hue that mine has, but mint is a plant and most plants aren’t standardized—at least not the ones I want to eat.

So, naturally there will be variations in strength and color depending on the mint that you use. If you’d prefer to have absolute certain, 100% standardized results, you could simply make a plain vanilla ice cream and add mint extract or crème de menthe in lieu of the vanilla, but I’ll stick to using only fresh mint in my ice cream.

Continue Reading Mint Chip Ice Cream…

There is an interesting emergence of things that are ‘green’ or écologique, in Paris. Words like commerce, responsable, équitable, éthique, durable and solidaire are being seen on more and more products in supermarkets, and even on some restaurant menus these days. Paris has two popular organic markets and discount grocery stores are now offering products like bio (organic) crème fraîche, butter, and pasta. And the city even has an official to preside over sustainable development and ecological initiatives.

(Although no one has asked me, I’m sure quite a few trees could be saved if there wasn’t so much paperwork to fill out, photocopy in triplicate, classify, then re-classify, around here.)

The forward-thinking action that got the most press internationally was the Vélib’ bike program. The program still has a few kinks to work out, though, most notably the costs and excessive vandalism: a recent article in Paris Magazine estimates that the annual upkeep for the program is €20 million and if the roving bands of repairmen were to stop fixing them, there would be no operable bikes in Paris within ten days.

As a user of the program, I think it’s pretty great, considering that they had to reconfigure a good portion of the city, and some attitudes around here, to accommodate it. Yet in spite of the obstacles, it has survived the initial grousing by drivers and other naysayers. And the bikes, along with various other initiatives that have been applied by the local government, has helped to reduce pollution in Paris by approximately 30%.

Continue Reading Milk from Here…

This week I saw the first promise of tomato season. A few brightly colored cherry specimens were brought home from the local market, as well as the more standard varieties. I was down in Gascony visiting my friend Kate Hill, and her photographer friend Tim Clinch was there preparing to lead a photography workshop. Looking for something tempting and colorful, tomatoes seemed the obvious choice as willing subjects.

In addition to the profusion of flowers plucked from the lush garden by the canal du Midi, the tomatoes had their moment in front of the camera. But once the participants stopped clicking, we grabbed them and put them where they rightfully belong: In the kitchen.

Continue Reading French Tomato Tart…

I’m sitting in a charming trailer, my makeshift room for a few days, parked alongside a serene canal surrounded by chickens and a few baby lambs roaming about here and there. So yes, I have to watch where I step. But it’s here that I’m unwinding after a rather curious weekend of wine tasting, which I’m slowly recovering from. Sure, there was a lot of wine, but as the temperature shot up to 38ºC (100ºF), and many of the events involved standing for a few hours in the blazing French sunshine, unprotected, it was hard to stay focused on task at hand.

I’d been to Cahors before, which is in the region called the Lot, when I went truffle hunting, and to the amazing truffle market in Lalbenque.

Continue Reading The Lot…

I realized that a little while back I posted some pictures about my visit to Les Crayères, a Michelin-starred restaurant in the Champagne region, about an hour from Paris. But I never wrote about the meal or my experience. Since I’ve been planning another trip back—hopefully soon, it prompted me to share my lunch, at last.

Perhaps some people coming to Paris want to take a day trip out of the city. Or for those of use who live here, it’s a nice break away from the hectic city life and away from the stress of it all. (Especially after tangling with those Monoprix cashiers.) If you fall into either of those categories, a swift, new TGV train will whisk you from the Gare de l’Est and right into the heart of Champagne country in less than an hour. And before you know it, you’ll be sipping sparkling wine in high-style, surrounded by trees and servers waiting on you dressed in sharp suits, with a bottle of bubbly always ready and waiting.

Let’s just get this out of the way right now: I love Champagne. When I worked at a well-known restaurant, we had a rule (which, admittedly, we made up on the spot one evening), that every night that we did over a hundred diners, we’d open a bottle of Champagne from the cellar for us.

Continue Reading Les Crayères…

I don’t have conclusive proof, but I’m going to say it anyways: the cashiers at my local Monoprix are perhaps the least pleasant people in all of France. I once needed to use their photo machine for some documents, which required a €5 note. So after waiting in two lines, asking two different cashiers to change a €20, they both refused. So I went downstairs to the supermarket and bought some groceries, which totaled something like €9.68.

When the cashier handed me back a €10, I politely requested 2 fives, mentioning that I needed one to use their photo machine. When she refused, I asked her why. And she snapped back, “Because I don’t have any change!” So I walked to the end of the counter where I could get a pretty clear view of her her cash box brimming with bills. Even though she had a sizable wad of €5 notes stacked up in there, if I wanted to change, I had to go back upstairs to the one particular register that is equipped to give change.

After waiting behind four customers, which I won’t tell you how long that took, when it was my turn, I handed over the €10, asking for 2 fives.

When she said, “What for?”…it took every gram of patience for me not to say, “So I don’t strangle you.”

Continue Reading Biscoff Spread (Speculoos à Tartiner)…

This coming week, I’ll be doing a book signing for my new book, Ready for Dessert, at the WHSmith bookstore in Paris. The event will start at 7pm and promises to be as fun as last year’s event. Although I won’t be reading wacky messages this time around, because I’m all out.

(But the weekend isn’t over yet…so there’s still time.)

If you’re in town and would like to attend. But please RSVP so they know how many absinthe jello shots* to prepare.

Would love to see you all there!

*Just kidding. But wouldn’t that be fun?

When the recent cloud of volcanic ash cruelly snatched my vacation away from me, not only was I miffed I wouldn’t be heading across the ocean (and let me tell you, there’s nothing more depressing than unpacking a non-used swimsuit, sandals, and sunscreen out of a suitcase), but I was sad I would be missing dinner with Yotam Ottolenghi at his restaurant, Ottolenghi. I’d written him a fan letter, and after agreeing to a psychiatric evaluation, and a pass through a metal detector, he consented to have dinner with me.

I swooned over his first book and featured his gently salted, crisp almond chocolate-dipped Florentines a while back, which I had trouble not finishing the moment the slick chocolate coating had cooled on their underside.

Usually when flipping through a new cookbook, I bookmark a few things that catch my eye. Like his previous book, if I’d bookmarked all the recipes I wanted to try in his new book Plenty, my copy of the book would’ve been twice as large as it originally was.

Continue Reading Ottolenghi’s Fried Beans with Sorrel, Feta & Sumac…