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Strawberry Rhubarb Tart

There’s a certain ease and simplicity to free-form tarts like this. Sometimes they’re called a crostata, sometimes a galette. You can call it whatever you want, but I call it a fast way to use great fruit when it’s in season, without a lot of fuss. At the beginning of summer, when rhubarb is still lingering around, and strawberries are elbowing their way forward, it’s a…

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Summer Fruit Tart with Almond Cream

This is one of the simplest fruit tarts to make. Juicy fruits are embedded in a rich almond frangipane, making it easy to slice, and it keeps well, too. So now that we’ve got that out of the way, let’s talk about nectarines. Peaches get a lot of press. Yes, they’re juicy and yes they’re sweet. But honestly, I prefer the more assertive flavor of nectarines,…

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Flan Parisien

When people inquire about recipes from the pastries on offer in Paris pastry shops, I look at the recipes we used when I went to pastry school at Ecole Lênotre and it’s hard to imagine cutting down a recipe that makes a hundred canelés into a recipe that makes six or eight for a home cook, who likely doesn’t want to go out and buy…

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Bostock

One of the lesser-known French pastries is Bostock. Perhaps it’s the funny name that doesn’t sound very French, as pain au chocolat or chausson aux pommes do, that’s been keeping it out of the spotlight. True, the name does sound like a Swiss bouillon mix and although I’ve read it’s from Normandy, I haven’t found any conclusive evidence of that. But wherever it’s from, the…

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Tourtiere

I’m not going to beat around the bush here: The new Joy of Cooking is huge. When I first heard about it, I wondered, “Do we need a new Joy of Cooking?” First published in 1931, the book went through several revisions over the years, to become what has the most enduring of all American cookbooks. Yet I wondered if the book would (or could)…

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Sandrine Chappaz Chocolate

A couple of weeks ago, I took a trip to the Savoie, a region of France that was once a dukedom of Italy. As you travel through France, especially away from the center of the country, you see more influences from neighboring countries, such as in the Basque region, where cornmeal and chile peppers figure into the cuisine. In Nice, pistou and socca from Italy are…

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Creme Brulee

When it was on the cusp of popularity in the U.S., I sort of introduced crème brûlée to a restaurant where I was working at the time, and, predictably, they took off. So much so, that most of my nights were spent torching crème brûlée as fast as I could. Finally, I put an end to that (popularity is overrated), and that was that. There…

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The Best Apple Tart in Paris

I take a tough line at calling something “the best.” As anyone who’s tried to get the best chocolate shop, the best bakery, the best bistro, etc., out of me knows I’m always coy with an answer. (Someone, however, once got so upset about it that they went on an online tear about me on one of those bulletin boards. Ouch.) Lest you think I’m not…

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Edwart Chocolatier

I’d been meaning to stop into Edwart Chocolatier since it opened nearly three years ago. But I had my head buried in the books and I wasn’t let out until after dark. And once released, I’d make a sprint to the nearest bar or café for a drink or glass of wine, before retreating again. When we finally connected, Edwin Yansané said I should come…

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