Bom chika wah wah ...

It's time for a little food porn.

Chocolate mousse with its crème anglaise and confit de cédrat.



Ok, so this dessert I'm bragging on isn't entirely homemade. Actually, it's mostly store-bought. I'm using the soft lighting and artificial glow that Picasa have provided me to (almost) hide the traces of the plastic mold that this chocolate dessert came in. (Welcome to the Semi-homemade with Sandra Lee episode of Mas de Bonheur!)

What you should really be looking at, though, is what's on top of the purchased chocolate dessert and crème anglaise. That's homemade confit de cédrat, or citron marmalade.

Last year in Grasse, we saw a citron tree, but I had never seen a fully ripe citron, until James brought this one home from the market.


They're all weird and knobby on the outside, and pithy on the inside.


So what to make?

The tarte lady's fiadone seemed like too much of a challenge. And, besides, we also wanted to see what the citron was like on its own. So candied citron it was ... until I cooked it a little longer than I had planned to and it became citron marmalade.

Citron marmalade
1 citron
sugar
water

Juice the citron and set aside what little juice there is for later. The juice is pretty intense. It was a little like *really* acidic grapefruit juice ... or something that's gross and would make you stay away from citrons. (And you shouldn't do that, because the end result is really tasty.)

Using a sharp knife, remove the outside of the peel in long strips. Cut the swaths of peel lengthwise into narrow strips. Try to resist rubbing the zest all over yourself and save it for the marmalade. (It really does smell that good.) You should also resist eating the rind because in its unprepared form, it doesn't taste as good as it smells.

Actually, there isn't much point in giving a recipe here, because there isn't really one to give. It sort of makes itself.

But in case you're actually reading down to the bottom, basically, you make some candied citrus peel, but with a little less water than you might use if you wanted a syrup. I used something like a little teacup full of sugar to two teacups of water (a scant 1/2 c. to scant 1 c.?). Stir the sugar into water over low heat until it dissolves, then add the citron peel and simmer while your dinner finishes baking (20mn?) and then cools enough that you can eat it.

Then add the juice and let it simmer until you're ready for seconds, or until what's in the pot looks like marmalade. Remove from heat.

It smells unbelievable while it's simmering. Just stick your nose over the peel and it's like the best lem-apefr-ange you've ever smelled, with a little something different and special that isn't entirely unlike something that's in molasses.

It's good on bread or brioche, and especially good with chocolate in both its homemade and not-so-homemade incarnations.

Mirabelles

A mirabelle is a delicious little plum that is about the size of a quarter in diameter. Sometimes, although these don't, they have a red blush.


Lorraine is the region of France best known for its mirabelles, especially the cities of Metz and Nancy, which both have their own varietals ... and festivals celebrating the mirabelle (Metz even has a Miss Mirabelle!). In fact, the "Mirabelle of Lorraine" has something called an Indication Géographique Protégée which says that only mirabelles grown in a specified list of cities, towns and villages can be called Mirabelles of Lorraine (kind of like the AOC label on wine, but with seemingly fewer restrictions). The list of towns in the "appelation" is determined by, among other factors, historical references dating from the 16th century about the place of the mirabelle in literature and in texts on local gastronomy.

They ripen in August and are still quite tasty in early September, although I haven't seen any in the markets for a couple of weeks now. They are extremely flavorful. Put that colander of mirabelles on the table next to you and you will smell apple-vanilla-plummy goodness without even sticking your nose down next to the fruit. They're unbelievable.

The one area where they don't excel, at least not the ones we have tried, is in texture: they're often a little mealy (for me). But you don't notice that at all when they're made into the jam. I guess technically what James made is a compote because it's just cooked down mirabelles, lemon juice and a little sugar, but we eat it like jam. And by "like jam" I mean out of the reused Bonne Maman jar, by the heaping spoonful.

Or you can do things the more traditional way and eat it on bread.

How 'bout them apples?

France doesn't seem like a top spot for exotic fruits. At least, not to me. The fruit here is really good, but it's really good cherries, peaches, plums, pears ... the usual. And then the not-so-usual: la nèfle, or loquat.

Well, it's a distant relative of the apple, so maybe it's not sooooooo exotic after all.

It turns out that there are two nèflier du Japon, or "loquat trees" growing at the lab. (So, technically, the fruit is a nèfle du Japon and not just a nèfle, which is a "medlar", but people just call them nèfle.)



In late June, these beautiful fruit appeared on them.


A colleague was kind enough to tell us what they were and that we could eat them.

They were delicious. They're juicy and tangy and they remind both me and James of a kiwi in flavor.


The flesh is the same color as the peel and surrounds four or five pips that look like super-sized apple seeds. Although you can't see it in this picture, the seeds are a pretty sort of mottled, pearly dark brown color.

I can't wait until next spring so I can eat them again. I have to say that I think that there are probably better specimens than these loquats (not to be confused with what I had been told were loquats, but are actually the very delicious wampee) because the trees aren't really cared for, they just sort of grow in the lab parking lot. Also, we picked these in late June after the fruit had been there for a while. So if you've had loquats and they looked different, maybe that's why.

This was just the first of our 'wild'-found fruit of the season.

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Gariguettes

'Tis the season for strawberries!

You can't walk through the markets without smelling strawberries. Really. Saturday morning was a perfect example of the red, fragrant fields of strawberries that are displayed at the market...but I was in a hurry and didn't have my camera so no pictures.

There are basically two kinds: regular and gariguette. Actually, that's a huge lie. It turns out that there are over 600 strawberry cultivars grown around the world. (You can get a look at some of the names of them here.) The "regular" strawberries, so-called because they look pretty much like all the strawberries I've seen before (large, dark-red when ripe, but with way more variation in shape here than at home), stand in stark contrast to these gariguettes.


Gariguettes are early strawberries and have been in the markets since the very end of March. They are somewhat smaller, flatter and paler than the "regular" strawberries. The skin is also a lot thinner and they're softer and juicier. These would never survive shipping from California to Chicago (but then, neither would the "regular" strawberries, which are also noticeably softer than what we are used to), although they're a common varietal here in southern France and represent 20% of France's strawberry production.

They are a bit pricey though. And now that it's late April, they don't look quite as good as they did a month ago. So, we've been eating a lot of those "regular" strawberries that smell as sweet as candy (if only strawberry-flavored candy actually tasted like strawberries).

And since we don't have an oven to make shortcakes, crêpes are a great substitute.



Crêpes (compiled from a million different recipes on-line)
2 c. flour
pinch of salt
0 - 3 Tbs. sugar (sweet or savory?)
3 eggs
1 c. milk
1 c. water
2 Tbs. oil

Whisk the flour, salt and sugar in a bowl and make a well. Crack the eggs into the well and start whisking them into the dry ingredients so the eggs start to get incorporated into the flour (but not fully -- apparently this would result in grainy crêpes and make incorporating the liquid really difficult). Then, whisking constantly, slowly pour in the liquid and whisk until flour is fully incorporated. Mix in the oil. Let sit in the fridge for at least an hour or even overnight.

When it's time to make the crêpes, whisk the batter again. Get the pan good and hot. Grease it with a little oil (or clarified butter if you prefer). Then pour some of the batter into the pan and tilt the pan around to spread the batter evenly. Cook about a minute then flip and cook for another 30 sec. or so.

Top with strawberries or fill with nutella, or both!

You should stand around the kitchen and eat (or fill, or top and then eat) the crêpes immediately when they're still warm, but you can also stack them and cover them with a towel or foil to keep them warm while you make a bunch.

Both the batter and the cooked crêpes will keep a couple of days in the fridge. The crêpes themselves are best when fresh so I usually put the batter in a big jar after making it and then I can just shake it up and make them fresh.

Market fare

The markets still haven't ceased to be exciting. There's still so much produce, and it still looks better than what you can get at the grocery store. One thing that's interesting (at least for us as Americans) is that both at the markets and at the grocery store, the produce is still predominantly from this part of France, (except citrus, which comes mainly from Spain and Corsica). Being a "locavore" isn't that difficult here, and you have a much better idea of what's in season.

Obviously the markets are dominated by root vegetables, cabbage relatives and citrus these days, but there are still lots of lettuces. I like this vendor a lot because they have a lot of different kinds of root vegetables, and lots of different lettuces. In the foreground of the picture on the left, you can see black radishes in a bin with carottes rouge (which, despite their misleading name are not carrots, but chioggia beets), golden turnips, and then in the next bin, topinambour or sunchokes/ Jerusalem artichokes. It reminds me of Green Acres. And, despite the fact that we don't have an oven, we've been able to take advantage of these root vegetables through pan roasting.

There has also been something of a resurgence in mushrooms, although it's still not like when we first got here. Here are a couple that we got a while ago when things were at their peak. This first kind is called lactaire délicieux, or saffron milk cap. I prefer the English name because I really didn't think they were all that delicious. The ones here are pretty young and very fresh. They actually turn green when bruised, and the last time I saw them at the market, they were mostly green. (You can see a little green on the cap of the one on the right in the front, but like I said, these were in really good shape.) People were still buying the green ones, though, so I guess that bruising doesn't change the flavor. I, however, won't be buying them again. They have a nice texture and stay pretty firm when cooked, but they have a strange mildly sweet flavor that seems out of place -- maybe it's piny? What's kind of interesting about these is that when you cut them, they release a milky-orange liquid. It's not a lot, but it's enough to coat the knife and to collect on your fingertips. And there's something about the coloring that does not get broken down by the human digestive system and even seems to intensify in the body. I won't go any further than that.

A mushroom that we did like a lot were these chanterelles grises. These had a good earthy, mushroomy flavor and they were nice in a wilted escarole salad with fresh croutons (courtesy of our France-aquired non-stick pan) alongside some squash soup. It was a really nice fall meal. Not that you'd be able to tell from the pictures. We're still working on the food photography. And our weird octagonal black glass plates don't help the situation.

One thing that's not in season anymore that we just caught the end of when we first got here were currants. A couple of vendors had them approximately twice, and then they were gone. These beautiful little red jewels were really tart so James had the great idea to mash them up with honey. Then we served them over faisselle, which is a fresh cheese that actually tastes more like greek yogurt than cheese. On a day like today, when it rained really hard all day long and only stopped raining about an hour ago, it's nice to remember summery things.