This one is strictly for the gourmets

[mint]

Ok, Ok, la fève!  I'm going to ask the OH to plant some in March (it's March, isn't it?) because I love les fèves.  The smell is very strong but not unpleasant.

Hey, Sue, you clever thing, I would never have thought of serving chicken pie.  But, I don't know how to make suet pastry.

I have English friends to lunch on Monday and I do believe I will make chicken pie.

How about:  vegetable soup (OH can then eat it, non-meat eater), chicken pie (with perhaps some lardons for colour and taste) served with mash potatoes, carrots and cabbage or haricots verts, then cheese, then fruit salad and ice cream or cream with some lightly roasted walnuts in honey (walnuts from the garden)?

Hmm...........sounds good, n'est ce pas?

 

[Frenchie]

Adress, please, and tel number !!   LOL

[;-)]

[mint]

Frenchie, when you come to visit me, I will cook for you any food you like:  les curries, les noodles, le shepherd pie (tu aime ça?), les sausages et onion gravy!

Et si tu veux, I can cook you le petit déjeuner anglais avec le bacon, le fried egg (ou les scrambled eggs), le fried bread, le grilled tomato, les mushrooms.  Après le pain grillé avec le marmalade et le English Breakfast Tea![:D][:D][:D]

 

[Frenchie]

I'm on my way   LOL

In that case, you will also come over here and I will cook  coquilles st Jacques, une daube à la provençale, et.. Laisse moi le temps d'y ré"fléchir STP   LOL

I'm going to go to bed soonish, I feel tired   YESSSS   , that's unusual for me !!

Gros bisous mon amie [kiss]

[mint]

Bon nuit, ma chère Frenchie.  Beaux rêves.

[Gardengirl]

Another great sounding menu, Sweet. Another vote for the frangipane galette from me. [:)] And I love chicken pie too; the first meal I ever served to my in-laws was a Good Housekeeping chicken pie.

Hope you're all sleeping soundly, no bad back spoiling your dreams I hope Frenchie. Mine is a nuisance tonight, so it's email and soduko time again!

[suein56]

[quote user="gardengirl "]

... the first meal I ever served to my in-laws was a Good Housekeeping chicken pie.[/quote]

Can't remember what main dish I served  but I do remember I made sherry trifle for dessert. At some point I must have put the oval dish on an uneven surface so that all the sherry accumulated at one end. This was obviously the end I served the parents in law from as they got all the sherry, They thought the trifle was great.

[quote user="gardengirl "]Hope you're all sleeping soundly, no bad back spoiling your dreams I hope Frenchie. Mine is a nuisance tonight, so it's email and soduko time again![/quote]

Sorry to hear your back is bad again. Finger's crossed that the sudoku lulls you back to sleep.

[Frenchie]

Bonjour,

Merci for your thoughts GG, my back's feeling better today, but I didn't sleep enough.

Sorry to hear your back's hurting today.

As for the galette, frangipane is also my favourite, but my son's Guillaume's favourite is briochée.

It takes all sorts ! [:)] 

[mint]

Poor GG and poor Frenchie!  I hope you both feel better today.

The weather here has turned colder again and OH has both our fires going.  Plus, of course, I have the poêle de pétrole in the hall at full blast.

Had a lovely surprise today.  A French neighbour whom we'd only met at the Election Booth last year (but OH did meet her a couple of times walking the dog) called and brought us a pot of honey made by her husband!

How lovely is that!  You'd realise exactly how lovely when I tell you that we live on a very busy departmental road and this elderly lady had walked several hundred yards up the road, braving the cold, to call on these anglais whom she didn't really know, to bring us this wonderful gift and to wish us "bonne année"!

I was so touched, especially after she told us she had to ask the maire's secretary where exactly our house was..........

Anway, to stay on thread, I have bought a big, impressive looking chicken today which I will roast in the bois-charbon oven tomorrow, ready to be cut up into pieces for the pie.

Have decided to do an old-fashioned chicken pie (no fancy herb crust or biscuit topping or whatever):  just chicken pieces, peas, carrots, onions, leeks in a roux and my usual mascarpone pastry on top.  Hope there's bits of pastry left for making pastry leaves!

Then good old mashed potatoes and no other veg because there will be lots of veg in the soup and a salad with the cheese (à la française, ie batavia or similar in a simple dressing).

Strange, I haven't thought of chicken pie for decades and now Sue has reminded me of it.  Hmmmm.....will try and perfect it and it could be one of my signature dishes!  LOL [:D]

 

[osie]

I seem to have missed 17 pages of replies... but I would have said that the fois gras terrine would have gone off by the time you got round to eating it...

I would not eat it after 1-2 weeks of being made.

Now, I did see that it was done with one of those... super sealant jars, so maybe it would last longer... I know you can but them with dates several years in the future but they seem to have preservatives in them.

Would be interesting to know how it went..

osie

[mint]

Osie, all the French guests said it was very good foie gras..........me, I know nothing about it other than what I have learnt on here.

Frenchie et al, forgot to tell you that when I showed the ceramique fève to the French neighbour who called this afternoon, she pointed out that the figure was the baby Jesus!!!!

God, did I feel stupid or ignorant or what???[:-))]

[Swissie]

Oh là là - I hope I never have to play hosts to gourmets - that would be really intimidating!!! LOL.

BTW, do you know what 'gourmette' means (it is not the feminine for 'gourmet). xx

When we were kids we used to break the 2 halves of a peanut to see Jesus inside (try it) - and when our eldest was little and we used to see rays of sunshine coming through trees, she'd say 'mummy is Jesus coming?' !

[Gardengirl]

My translator says 'curb chain'. Is that right?

[Swissie]

Bravo - it is one of those flashy bracelet with the name on a plaque, à la Johnny Haliday!

[mint]

Can't stand names engraved on anything:  not on your car number plates, not on gourmettes, not on those thingies that you wear on a chain round your neck!

Guess I'm just congenitally secretive! LOL

Anyway, back on thread.  Today, I carefully dipped the most perfect walnut halves in honey, baked them at 180 degrees, as per Cat's instructions, drooled over them, showed them to the OH, looked forward to peeling them off then..............une catastrophe!  Damned things wouldn't peel off without bringing some paper with them!

So, what did I do wrong?  Perhaps Cat said on buttered or greased paper and I wasn't listening or had forgotten!

Anyway, did my best to peel the paper off the nuts and anyway, I tasted a couple and thought nothing of baked paper, so there!

Won't say anything to the guests about the paper:  there used to be a saying when I was young "what the eye doesn't see, the stomach does not get upset over!"

I am waiting to see people's eyes light up when there is fresh fruit salad (nice one with grapes and kiwi fruit and some of that Monbazillac wine that didn't all get drunk!) then vanilla ice cream topped with roasted walnuts, honey and greaseproof paper![:D]

 

[mint]

Sue56, are you there perchance?

The chicken pie, ma pièce de resistance, looked pretty damned good, even if I say so myself.

I had initial problems with making the pastry leaves, then I made a huge pastry rose in the middle of the pie, I brushed the pastry well with an egg yolk and salt wash and, fair play to the Godin, the pastry puffed and crisped up a treat.

In the innards, I had a whole free-range chicken (skinned and boned), lardons, leeks, mushrooms, peas and carrots.  I thought back to school dinners and so I got it just right.

The pie was made in a pretty big rectangular dish and, my goodness, if you want to impress anyone, there's nothing like a perfectly rolled out pastry piece that is at least 10 inches by 14 inches, just an expanse of pastry that glistens and begs you to cut into it!  LOL

Wondered whether to make gravy as well but ran out of time and energy

So, thank you, dear Sue.............I see this as something I'll make again.

[just john]

Probably a bit late now, but looking through my latest cookbook Van Gogh's Table at the Auberge Ravoux which sets out to give recipes from the artists time, and at three levels, Cuisine Poplaire, Cuisine du Terroir, and Cuisine Bourgeoise; I bought it for the recipes and menus but found it an interesting book in its own right, the cafe Auberge Ravoux has been renovated and is open for business.

 I found the following for serving Fois Gras:

Prepare vinaigrette with sherry vinegar, Dijon mustard, walnut oil, peanut oil and seasoning;
lightly season a third of a pound of mache or mesclun salad greens and divide between four plates,
sprinkle a tablespoon of pine nuts over each,
then dip a long sharp thin blade knife into hot water and cut the Fois Gras into paper thin slices, place about 6 slices [:)] on each plate and sprinkle with a few grains of coarse salt and toasted whole grain bread. 

[mint]

JJ, that is mouth-watering stuff and I might even be converted to eating foie gras again.

"Paper thin slices"........well, that bit, at least, wasn't a problem because that WAS all the amount that was available to go round five people![:D]

Will make notes of your recipe though....in case there's a next time!

[just john]

Tonight I am mostly trying Monkfish and Mussels in Fumet and Cream sauce [:D]

[Frenchie]

I didn't know what to cook [Www]

Are we invited?

[just john]

This week I have been mostly eating . . .[Www]

 

[Rob Roy]

We had Monkfish in Mussell and Saffron sauce for Christmas dinner - it was delicious[:)]

Sweet, you said something about Mascapone pastry - where did you find the recipe please?

[mint]

Recipe was on this very Forum.  It was Teamed-Up's recipe, dead simple.

6 oz plain flour

3 oz butter

Take a tub of mascarpone (250g) and cut through it, using half.

Mix all of the ingredients in a bowl, using a fork.

Gather mixture in your hands and knead lightly

Some people who talked about making this, don't bother resting it but I do usually give it say 15 minutes rest

Rolling out is very easy, doesn't break, doesn't stick much

When I made a chicken pie recently, I adjusted the quantities upwards and rolled out a ginormous sheet of pastry, the biggest I've ever done and it was perfect!