Cooking all day long

I'm pooped. I've been cooking all day long, in order to get as much done as possible for St. Sylvestre festivities. We are "doing" the food at my sister-in-law's house. I have a list as long as my arm of utensils and other kitchen items to take with us. I don't know if she and her husband have all the things I need to cook with.

This the "compoté de pommes" for the base of the "Verrines de foie gras et pommes façon crumble". Verrines are small glasses that one fills up with all kinds of yummy foods, either savory or sweet.

Next, I'm doing "Vol-au-vents aux escargots et au Pinot Gris". I adore Burgundy snails (Helix Pomatia) in any kind of dish. This is a new recipe that I found on 750grams with some minor changes.

We're very lucky to have found a farmer near my parents-in-law who breeds turkies. Monsieur Titi is out picking up our fowl today. The woman assured us that the turkey was bred for "un chair fin" (delicate meat). I fixed a stuffing from Mise-en-Bouche's blog that I found quite tempting. As usual, I customized it. What's so nice about this stuffing is that it calls for both sausage meat and boudins blancs, plus apples and raisins and lots of spices.

I will print all these recipes out for you with photos of the finished product.

I still have a lot to do tomorrow morning before heading off to Sabine & Laurent's house. There, I'll only have to construct the verrines, prepare the appetizers and roast the turkey.

Wish me luck!

The Christmas Menu

We were invited to my brother- and sister-in-law's house for Christmas day dinner. They have two children, Julie, who will be 14 at the end of January, and Enzo, who turned 7 on December 28.

Both are good kids and lots of fun. Julie wrote the menu for Christmas dinner. My father-in-law and Monsieur Titi both worked for years in the printing business. My FIL was not only a typographer but also a proof reader. He couldn't help himself correcting Julie's French. Anyone who's ever tried to learn French will appreciate how difficult the language is! The masculine and feminine, the accords between the gendered nouns and the adjectives... it's enough to make you scream!

Hope you can read the menu and the corrections. Even with the many grammatical and spelling errors, the dinner was excellent.

Christmas Cards

I love sending and receiving Christmas cards. I am so lucky to be part of a group of wonderful women who are all expatriots and who live all over the world. There are 12 of us and we've been sending cards to each other for 4 years! Isn't that wonderful?

Sending Christmas cards is such an American and English thing to do. In France, people send out cards but only for the New Year. Which means that I have until January 31st to get my New Year's wishes out to the folks in France.

We've received one NY card from a French cousin. It's exciting to know that card-receiving isn't over.

Bored on Christmas? Here's a quiz

Sorry, Santa, you can't use Wikipedea for this quiz!

(Getty Images)

I saw a quiz on the Guardian recently. I'm killing a bit of time while waiting for Monsieur Titi to get home so that we can start the Christmas Eve festivities. This quiz tests you on a multitude of topics that you should've learned in school. I scored 17 out of 30! I've forgotten most of my public school eduction.

Have fun, Merry Christmas!

One Last Laugh -- isn't it sad?

This cartoon comes from Time Magazine.

Maybe you haven't heard or seen the news clip where dear Mr. Bush got a shoe thrown at him by an Iraqi journalist. Maybe you've been living on the moon the past few days.

Bush has given me one good, last laugh, which helps me to remember what a sad clown he has been for the past 8 years. In only 30 days, Obama will be sworn in as President.

Bush's gaffe has put a smile on my face for the first day of Winter. Here's to winter, here's to the end of a big mess.

A Lazy Saturday

It was a very exciting day yesterday. I made a lovely cake to take to the Christmas Fair in Ouzouer-sur-Loire. The Association de Jumelage (Twinning association) was having a "English goody" bake sale at their stall. I'll tell you more about the Christmas Fair as soon as I get the pictures.


Today, I am worn out! It's drizzling (il crache or il pleuviotte) outside and I have no motivation at all. So here's what's happening at my house...


Monsieur Titi is doing the accounts downstairs while singing silly French Christmas carols to the dog. He makes up the words as he goes. I don't think Pacha is impressed.


I stumbled on an old picture from a Christmas long ago. I showed this picture to my English class this week as a souvenir of a memorable holiday. One fellow, who's been in my class for the last 4 years, asked me "Which one is you?". Ha, Ha! (Hint: I'm on the left.)

You'll see my very best friend (in the middle), whom I've known for over 30 years, at her house with me at 19, her sister, and the boyfriend at the time.

It's probably normal to get a little nostalgique at this time of year. I do miss seeing my friend regularly, but luckily we still keep in touch.

Next, I'll give you an update of the Christmas Fair and my recipe for Carrot Cake with a Cream Cheese frosting.

Christmas cookie marathon - Thumbprint Cookies and Chocolate Rum Balls

Last night, my Tuesday night English class had their Christmas party. I brought the 3 different Christmas cookies that I made. Luckily, I didn't take all of them, as the students gobbled up everything! One woman made truffles -- yummm! Another brought chocolates, and a lovely man named Guy brought his famous dried apple rings. Françoise brought the champagne and we played a Christmas guessing game. Lots of fun.

I grouped two recipes together today for you. The first is for Thumbprint Cookies. I'm surprised that I didn't need to make any substitutions for this recipe. All the ingredients were available.

Thumbprint Cookies

150 grams Butter, softened
70 grams Sugar
2 Egg yolks
1 teaspoon Vanilla extract
1/4 teaspoon Salt
190 grams Flour

roll in:
2 Egg whites, slightly beaten
90 grams finely chopped Walnuts (Grenoble AOC of course)

fill with:
80 ml Raspberry preserves (or other good quality preserves)

Directions:
Preheat oven to 175°C (350°F). Line cookie sheet with parchment paper.
In a large bowl, cream together butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in egg yolks, vanilla and salt. Gradually stir in flour.
Shape dough into 3/4 inch balls. Dip in beaten egg whites, the roll in the chopped walnuts. Place 1 inch apart on the prepared cookie sheets. Press down center of each ball with thumb. Fill each indentation with a bit of the preserves.
Bake for 15 to 17 minutes, or until golden brown. Cook on paper on a rack.
If you want to make these in advance, don't fill them with preserves. Keep them in the fridge then fill them before serving. These store up to a week in a tightly-covered container.

Chocolate Rum Balls

I had to be very clever to find adequate substitutions for these delicious no-bake goodies. I scratched my head for along time trying to figure what I could replace the vanilla wafers with. Forget about finding corn syrup. It does not exist!
Here's how I did it here in France.

3-1/2 cups crushed Langues de Chat (2 packages of 60 langues each)
3/4 cup Confectioners' Sugar
1/4 cup unsweetened Cocoa Powder (type Van Houten's)
1-1/2 cup finely chopped Walnuts
3 tablespoons Maple Syrup
1/2 cup Rum
More Confectioner's Sugar to roll balls in.

Note: I've also read that you can use Shortbread instead of Vanilla Wafers for the base. That would be delicious, but given the price, it didn't make sense to me.

Directions:
In a large bowl, stir together the crushed Langues de Chat, 3/4 cup confectioners' Sugar, cocoa and nuts. Blend in maple syrup and rum.
Shape into 1-inch balls and roll in additional confectioners' sugar. Store in an airtight container in the fridge for several days to develop the flavor. Roll again in confectioners' sugar before serving.
My students LOVED these!

P.S. I hope Santa brings me a new camera for Christmas. These pictures are awful!

Christmas Cookie Marathon -- Snickerdoodles

Yummmmm! What's better than a platefull of Snickerdoodles to snack on? All weekend I made cookies. Saturday, I made Chocolate Rum Teaballs. Sunday, I made Thumbprint Cookies with Raspberry jam. Today, I just finished the Snickerdoodles.


The original recipe comes from Allrecipes. However, there are always ingredients that I can't find here, so I make substitutions. The recipe called for shortening and cream of tartar. Surprise, in my neck of the French woods, I've never seen shortening nor cream of tartar. After a bit of searching on the Internet, I found out that butter is a dandy replacement for shortening. And even more surprisingly, I found out that double-acting baking powder is simply baking soda and cream of tartar combined!


Here is my modified recipe:

SNICKERDOODLES

makes approximately 90 6-8 cm. cookies


1 cup Butter, softened (one package of 250 grams)
1-1/2 cups White Sugar
2 Eggs - large
2 teaspoons of Vanilla extract
2-3/4 cups of White Flour
3 teaspoons Baking Powder (one package of levure chimique)
1/4 teaspoon Salt


roll in:
1/2 cup White Sugar
3 teaspoons Cinnamon


Preheat oven to 200°C. (400°F)


Cream together butter, sugar, eggs and vanilla extract. Blend in the flour, baking powder and salt. Chill 15 minutes.


Mix together the 1/2 cup sugar and cinnamon in shallow bowl. Shape dough by rounded spoonfuls into balls about the size of a ping-pong ball. Rolls balls of dough in sugar/cinnamon mixture. Place 2 inches apart on a cookie sheet, lined with cooking paper.


Bake 8 minutes (not ventilating heat!), or until set but not too hard nor too brown. Remove immediately from baking sheet and let cool on rack.


This recipe made over 90 cookies. I spent about 2-1/2 hours cooking them. I only ate 3! Now, excuse me while I munch another.

Noix de Grenoble

I love walnuts! In Oregon, which is where I grew up, we had tons of walnut trees and a seemingly, never-ending supply of fresh walnuts. On our property here in France, we have a couple of young walnut trees, but they aren't old enough to produce much yet. I do get some local walnuts here and there in late Autumn from neighbors, but never enough to last me all winter.

The best walnuts in France are the noix de Grenoble. These little dandies are so delicious. They have an A.O.C. (appellation d'origine controllée). The A.O.C. defines where the product came from, standardizes the quality and protects the name from being used by products that come from outside the specified region. In this case, the walnuts must come from the Grenoble area to have the A.O.C.

Grenoble is a city in the south-east of France not far from Lyon at the foothills of the French Alpes. I almost moved to Grenoble one year, but that is another story!


Walnuts from Grenoble were given their A.O.C. in 1938. Did you know that there 3 types of walnuts and only 3, that have the A.O.C.? There are la Franquette, la Mayette and la Parisienne.

We all know how good walnuts are for our health. Here are the nutritional values:
(source: Professor Josette Alary, Laboratoir de chimie analytique, Faculté de Grenoble)
Nutrional value: 100 grams of dry, shelled nuts:
- protein : 17 gr.
- fats : 66 gr.
- carbohydrates : 10 gr.
- phosphorus : 500 mg
- potassium : 500 mg
- magnesium : 128 mg
- calcium : 90 mg
- sulphur : 172 mg
- iron : 4,5 mg
- zinc : 4 mg
- sodium : 2,5 mg
Calories : 100 grams of shelled nuts : 702 calories

I didn't tell you what I am going to do with them, did I? I'm doing a Christmas cookie marathon! Today, I'm making Chocolate Rum Balls (pictures and recipe to come when I've succeeded.) For the Christmas Party for the English class, I'm taking the Rum Balls, plus Snickerdoodles and Thumbprint cookies. Yummmy!

I bought 2 sacks of 1 kilo each for 10.75€! Gad, these are expensive, but so worth it! I should be able to make several batches of cookies and have some walnuts left over.

I feel the Christmas spirit

The Christmas song CD arrived today from Amazon UK. How exciting! I put it on and I'm starting to feel the Christmas spirit. This CD is pretty kitsch but it really takes me back to the holidays in my youth.

There are 100 songs on this CD, some traditional and some very 1940s! Lots of smiles and laughs as I listened to it for the first time. I'm not sure which carols are my favorites. I love the traditional carols; Silent Night, We Three Kings, Angels We Have Heard On High for example. When I heard "I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus", it made me giggle. I got weepy when "I'll Be Home for Christmas" and "O Holy Night" played.

I want to have a really nice Christmas this year. I've been looking over the cookie recipes and the eggnog recipes. I'll let you know what I find.

Here's to the upcoming holidays, and no bah-humbug!

Saint Nicholas Day

Happy Saint Nicholas day. This is quite a celebration in many parts of France. The children receive the visit of Saint Nicholas and also receive their first Christmas presents.

In the U.S. we don't celebrate this holiday. I do know however, that my mother's family celebrated this as they were German immigrants.

The above legend is rather macabre, but aren't all fairy tales? Here's the translation:

Three little children, who had been out picking up vegetables in the field, went one evening to the butcher's house asking for a place to sleep.

As soon as they entered his house, the butcher killed them, cut them into pieces and put them into barrel full of brine.

After 7 years, Saint Nicholas passed by the same field, and once housed at the butcher's asked to eat a "petit salé" (salted, brine pork). The same "petit salé" which had been cut into pieces and put into the barrel 7 years earlier by the butcher.

Upon hearing Saint Nicholas' words, the butcher ran away. Saint Nicholas touched the 3 sleeping children with 3 fingers, and brought them back to life.

My first award

I'm so excited! I've received an award, and it's my very first. I don't see these awards much on the french blogs, but I'll be passing this one along to a couple of notable bloggers.

This award was graciously given to me by my dear friend, Lynda, from Food, Fun and Farm Life. You must drop by and read her adventures on a farm in East Africa. Plus, she's a great cook.

The rules for this award are :

* Put the logo on your blog

* Add a link to the person who awarded you

* Nominate 10 other blogs for this award (although I only awarded 5, I'm a bit short of time.)

* Add links to those blogs

* Leave a message for your nominees on their blogs

* Give a reason why you consider their blogs cool

I'd like to award this “Butterfly Award” to the following 5 blogs -:

Terrie from Feasting ... on Pixels. There are several reasons why I think that this blog is cool. Terrie's lived in France and still has that French "je ne sais quoi" about her. She is a FANTASTIC cook! She takes wonderful photos. And she's a very gracious lady.

Poppy Fields from Poppy in Provence. Poppy is another expat here in France. She talks about her everyday life in the south which is very interesting. She encounters many of the daily "embêtements" that I see here in central France. Poppy is another very lovely lady who's visited my blog.

Doria from La Cuisine de Doria. I love her recipes (see the gâteau au fromage blanc et orange). She explains her recipes very, very well. She is a respected member of the food blogger community here in France. Merci Doria, pour toute ton inspiration!

Ken B. from Living the Life in Saint Aignan. Ken is a keen observer and a wonderful writer. He talks about the people around him with such imagery that I can imagine talking to them myself. He finds such yummy French food to tempt us with and of course, the appropriate wine to go with it.

Betty C. from La France Profonde: An American in Aveyron. Betty's a brave woman as she has 3 blogs! They are all great and all very different. She's been in France as long as I have and I think that's cool!

I'll leave you now, as I must get ready to go teach my beginner English class. Talking about clothing tonight.

Have a lovely evening and we'll talk soon.

Bien et Mal Luné(e)

Monsieur Titi wakes up some mornings and tells me that he is "mal luné". He means simply that he's in a bad mood.

In French you can say either "bien luné(e)" or "mal luné(e)" for either being in a good mood or in a bad mood. These expressions are so colorful! I find it particularly interesting that the French refer to the moon so easily.

Last night in my English class, we talked about this expresson. One lady said that it showed how much our bodies are influenced by the moon. I agree!

I found this explanation on Internet:

Cette expression date d'une époque où les hommes étaient persuadés que le satellite de la Terre avait une très nette influence sur leur humeur ou leur psychisme.Celui qui était bien luné était donc dans une phase favorable, propice à la bonne humeur, et inversement pour le mal luné.Au milieu du XVIIIe siècle, on employait "être dans une bonne ou une mauvaise lune" pour dire exactement la même chose.

This expression dates from a time when humans (men) were persuaded that the Earth's satellite had a clear influence on their humor or their psyche. The person who was "bien luné" was in a favorable phase, encouraging good moods or humors, and inversely for the person who was "mal luné". In the middle of the 18th C., we talked about "being in a good or bad moon" to say exactly the same thing.

In English, we talk about the moon too, but in the sense of "lunacy" or "to shoot the moon". Being in touch with how the moon effects you almost every day is so very primitive (not in a bad way). The psychological connection to our environment and our humor remains part of our daily life.

So if you are in a great mood, thank the Moon.