French Fridays with Dorie - corn soup

Nothing says summer more than fresh corn (and fresh tomatoes...but they play no part in this week's FFwD recipe).  Corn soup sounds pretty simple...straight forward and easy.  And guess what?  It pretty much is.  First, you cut the corn off the cob (Dorie suggests doing this in a big bowl and it worked great...I've always done it on a cutting board and ended up with corn everywhere.  Score 1 for a new tip from Dorie!)

Boil some whole milk and add corn cobs (this is my favorite part...I love that we use the corn cobs to infuse the milk with the essence of corn!)

Then you gently saute onions in butter until they glisten, but do not take on any color.

Then you add in the other veggies and saute until tender.

Amazing colors!

Notice the lovely herbs in the pan?  The rosemary is from my herb garden (a term I totally use loosely, as the herb garden has two herbs right now...rosemary & basil...but hey, it's plants in the ground so it qualifies as a garden).

Also, I wasn't suppose to put the herbs in the pot while the veggies were sauteing, so I had to fish them out and then add them with the liquids a bit later.  Jeez, if I'd read every word of the recipe before I start, I wouldn't have to fish rosemary and thyme out of a hot pot.  After sauteing the veggies, you add the liquids and simmer for about 20 minutes.  Then you pick out whatever herb stems you can, use your immersion blender and blend it all up.  Dorie says if you want really smooth soup, put it through a sieve...I didn't want really smooth soup. 

I loved how the carrot added a little color (unfortunately, I had to use white corn, so my soup was not an amazing yellow, but it was still pretty enough).  I'm going to serve the soup for lunch later today with Dorie's suggested crumbled bacon (my own home made bacon of course) and a bit of sour cream (can't find creme fraiche close to home).  The soup on it's own is really light, flavorful and delicious, can't wait to try it with the bacon and sour cream.

Not nearly as pretty as when it was cooking.

 Curious how my fellow Doristas did this week and what wonderful modifications/additions they might have made to this recipe?  Well check them all out here.  Might I also suggest getting Dorie's book and making this lovely summer recipe yourself.  You'll thank me, really!

French Fridays with Dorie - vanilla eclairs

This recipe was my first official Dorie disaster...twice!  That's right...I failed at making beautiful, light, airy eclairs with smooth, delicate pastry cream.  Instead, I ended up with flat, eggy, doughy things, stuffed with slightly lumpy (but oh, so damn delicious) chocolate pastry cream and lemon curd whipped with cream.

While my eclairs will win absolutely no beauty awards, they were actually quite delicious.  I had wanted to use Dorie's tip and pipe my eclairs with a star tip.  However, I accidentally used a ribbon tip...leading to my first batch of eclairs being a complete disaster.

I also piped some in a creme puff shape...however these puppies fell the second they came out of the over.  So I ended up with flat cigars and smooshed frisbee shapes (actually I think they look like partially melted hershey kisses...because I left a little curly cue on the top when I piped these).

On my second batch, I decided to just follow the easy way and pipe smooth cylinders.  As they went into the oven, they looked beautiful.  I was sure I had a winner this time.  They did puff up as they were baking and looked terrific; however they started to deflate as I removed them from the oven and I had more flat cigars.  Not quite as flat as the first batch, so I was able to slice through them and create two layers to "stuff" with filling.  I decided to make chocolate pastry cream and then lemon curd (my Meyer lemon tree has finally started producing lemons after a two year hiatus).  I folded the amazing lemon curd into whipped cream and then pipe the fillings into my sorry, oh so sorry, eclairs.  Some of the eclairs were so flat, I just used one for the top and one for the bottom.

I decided not to glaze the eclairs...given the inordinate amount of time I had dedicated to getting a good batch (and still failing).  Maybe a glaze would have made them more lovely (but I really doubt it).

I didn't do any research on why my eclairs failed me.  I've made grougeres several times with this recipe and never had an issue.  I know my fellow Doristas will have the answer for me.  Oh well...we were all still very happy with the tasty results...if not appearance of these eclairs.

PS...for all those wondering...the sugar cleanse went great last week and I feel so much better.  I will be watching my sugar intake going forward (so only one eclair a day, thank you very much)...and now I just found out I have high cholesterol...goodness it couldn't be all the butter and bacon...could it???

PPS...did I mention that I cut the recipe in half so we wouldn't have 20 eclairs...then had to make them again, so we still ended up with 20+ eclairs.

PPPS...maybe the reason my eclairs fell is because I shouldn't have really been making eclairs at all...but some lovely, healthy vegetable concoction.

Charcutepalooza - It's all about the smoke!

This month's Charcutepalooza challenge was to smoke something.  Your choice was salmon or pork.  If you know me at all, you know which one I picked.  That's right...this month I went the canadian bacon route.

Did you know that this is how canadian bacon starts?

It's true, really.

First, you start with a lovely brine (which we know all about from last month).  My brine had beautiful sage and thyme from my garden, a little garlic, salt, sugar and pink salt (nitrates).  See...it really is pink.  You put your pork loin in this brine for 3 days.  I had a humungo 6+ pound loin, which I cut in two and brined for 3 days.  Then the loins sat in the fridge uncovered for 24 hours and developed a lovely tackiness...all the better to hold on to the wonderful smoke they were about to encounter.

Now, the smoking was the real challenge this month.  All month long I hemmed and hawed over buying a real smoker.  I really wanted The Big Green Egg (but at over $500, that seemed a bit silly at this stage of the game).  I also looked at smaller smokers, including some electric models.  After a bit of research, I realized there was absolutely no reason that I could use my already owned gas grill.

So, with a few easy modifications (pans of water over the lava coals and tin foil in the end holes), I converted my grill into a smoker.  I used the indirect heat method and kept my grill at between 200 and 225 degrees and in about 2 1/2 hours...I had beautiful, smoked canadian bacon.  (I also purchased a dual gauge, remote control thermometer, which measures the temperature of the meat and the grill itself...so cool!)

I now have about 6 lbs of canadian bacon (which is a lot of canadian bacon).  

So, I sliced up much of it and wrapped it well and put it in the freezer for later use.  

The boys and I sampled some slices of it and it was quite tasty.  A little smoky, a little sagey, a little salty...really quite nice.  I then decided to make eggs benedict (with homemade hollandaise sauce...but store bought english muffins).

It just hasn't been my week with egg based dishes.  My hollandaise scrambled a bit and I had to strain it. It wasn't near lemony enough, nor salty enough.  I will definitely have to try this again (especially since the boys gobbled these up...even in their imperfect state).

Just keeping it real!

All in all, another fun month playing with meat.  I really can't wait to see what May's challenge is.

Charcutepalooza - It's Bacon

I've discovered something about myself...at the tender age of 45 I'm amazed that there are still things I don't know...about myself that is.  I'm not amazed that there are things I don't know in general.  What I've discovered is that I'm an instant gratification kind of girl.  When I want something, I pretty much want it now.  Right now!  You are probably thinking...how could you not have known this about yourself?  How can this be a revelation?  Well, let me explain.

I've always been patient.  I've set my goals, worked hard, enjoyed my rewards.  I eat my veggies first, then my meat and then my dessert.  I save the best for last.  I savor the anticipation, the planning, the dreaming.  Sometimes, I've thought the lead up to an event was better than the event itself.  Just sometimes.  Until recently.  Recently, I haven't wanted to wait.  I don't want to anticipate, savor, plan.  I want the experience and I want it now.  As I'm writing this, not really knowing where it's coming from...I just realized where it's coming from and where it's going.

February 17th is the one year anniversary of my mom's death.  It's been lurking in the back of my mind...hovering there...waiting to step forward and make itself known.  I've been wondering whether it was going to be like a sharp slap in the face or a gentle caress of a warm and loving memory.  Now I know...I still have some processing to do...some coming to terms...some mourning and some celebrating.  It's funny, the death of a parent...the ways it affects you.  I've realized life is short (mom was only 67) and waiting for stuff is way overrated!  Hence, if I want it...now is okay...never know what tomorrow will bring. 

At this point you are probably wondering where the hell this is going.   Sorry...the title does say bacon doesn't it!  Ok...I'm participating in a year-long series of challenges...all wrapped up in bacon.  Well, maybe not all wrapped up in bacon...but this month's challenge has been all about bacon.  I'm playing with about 300 other bloggers in Charcutepalooza...the brain child of Cathy Barrow and Kim Foster.   We're going to be exploring Michael Ruhlman's Charcuterie: The Craft of Salting, Smoking, and Curing.  


The funny thing about where I am in my life right now with the whole instant gratification thing is that charcuterie is not about instant gratification.  It's not even about waiting a little bit.  It's about long, slow processes that yield incredible edibles...that in the end you decide are well worth the wait.  So, I find I have to restrain the instant gratification girl (or let her make cupcakes or cookies to keep her happy) to participate in this adventure.  And, I don't think this is a bad thing.


The first challenge was to make duck prosciutto...which I have made and it's waiting to be eaten.  As it was the first challenge, and many folks weren't quite ready yet, we are allowed to post about the duck prosciutto anytime this year.  So, stay tuned for my post on hanging breasts in my wine fridge and then in my closet!  For the rest of the year, we post our challenges on the 15th of the month.  Hey, that's today!  Yeah!  I'm on time.


February's challenge was all about salt cures.  There are two challenges each month...an apprentice challenge and a charcuterie challenge.  For February, I only managed the apprentice challenge...which was to make fresh bacon.  You heard read that right...we're making bacon!  It's actually a very simple process.  Get a belly (pork belly for this family), get some pink salt (have to order it...can't buy it over the counter in California), and dextrose, make a cure, pat your belly with the cure, bag it up, put it in the fridge, flip it every other day for 7 days (or maybe 9 if your belly's fat), rinse it, roast it, slice it, eat it!  

That's it!  Very, very easy.  Kind of!  Sourcing the belly and pink salt took a little effort.  Remembering to flip the belly every other day was a little difficult, since the belly resided in the fridge in the garage...so I didn't see it every day when I was getting the milk out.  But, I managed to remember!


We are not posting the charcuterie recipes, so please check out Ruhlman's book to see how simple it really is.  What we are posting is our own recipes that we make using the monthly charcuterie item.  When the bacon came out of the oven after it's slow roasting, I took a large nibble off the end and so did Ethan.  We both swooned with pleasure.  He wanted to know if we could slice it and eat it right then.  It was 9 pm and I had to say no, wait til morning.  So, in the morning we did slice it and fry it and eat it.  Just like that.  No special recipe...just fabulous, thick, juicy, crunchy bacon.


Did I mention that I had purchased two pork bellies, each about 14 lbs a piece.  The first belly, I cut in half and made a sweeter bacon (by adding some brown sugar to the cure) with half and a non-sweet bacon (which is actually going to be applewood smoked) with the other half.  So, we've got about 12 lbs of fresh bacon (a little weight is lost in the curing process as the bacon dries).  Think about that.  12 lbs!  When you buy bacon, you usually buy 12 - 16 ozs


When I got home from the new store on Saturday (another long week)...I was starving.  Because even though I help hundreds of moms feed their families every month, I can't seem to remember to feed myself when I'm working.  I decided a BLAT was necessary.  This is my own recipe...which everyone has made themselves, I'm sure (except, probably not with homemade bacon and maybe not with citrus sea salt).

BLAT - Bacon, Lettuce, Avocado & Tomato Sandwich

Two slices of country white bread, the softer the better.
Mayo
Homemade Citrus Sea Salt
Pepper
Sliced Tomatoes
2 butter lettuce leaves
Slice Avocado
3 thick slices of home made bacon


Fry up the bacon and drain.  Reserve your bacon fat to add to all sorts of things in the future.  Slather your bread with mayo, artfully arrange your tomato slices on one slice of bread.  Sprinkle with the citrus sea salt and fresh cracked pepper.  Arrange your lettuce leaves on the other slice of bread and add the avocado slices.  Strategically place the bacon slices over the avocado slices to cover as much of the bread as possible.  Do a little magic and flip the slice with the tomatoes over onto the slice with the lettuce, avocado and bacon.  Slice and eat.  (And don't tell anyone in your family about it, or they will all want a bite...even though they have eaten lunch already and you haven't!)


I can't wait to see what we're making next month...I bet you can't either.

French Fridays With Dorie - chicken b'stilla

Do you ever have those times where every gosh darned thing just seems to go wrong.  Like someone is trying to tell you, get off this path...avalanche is coming?  Well, my experience with this recipe is kind of like that...but with a happier ending than being buried alive in a mountain of snow.

Let me explain my FFwD process, so you get an idea of how organized I think I am (but turns out, not quite so much in reality).  Laurie over at the FFwD site usually posts the month's line up of recipes at the beginning of the month (or maybe a week earlier).  I take a look at what we'll be making and I put cute, little thin bright pink stickies on each of the recipes in my around my french table book.  This way, I know what we're making and it's easy to flip to the recipes without constantly consulting the internet.  I also read all the recipes at the beginning of the month to decide when I'm going to cook them (in case I'm going to do them in a different order...but also to have the ingredients in my mind so if I see a great sale or the farmers' market has a fabulous item one week...I know to pick it up).  I'm so clever...I'm sure many of you use this system too.  But your stickies might not be bright pink.

For January I used this process and marked paris mushroom soup, gnocchi a la parisienne, michel rostang's double chocolate mousse cake and chicken basquaise.  The first three recipes went off without a hitch!  On Sunday, I planned on making the chicken basquaise.  I made a shopping list and bought onions and peppers and chilies and tomatoes and chicken and some fresh basil and thyme.  This recipe calls for a lot of peppers and tomatoes (which are of course out of season...I hate buying tomatoes out of season and never do...but for Dorie I did it!)

I get home from the store and sit down at the computer for a short break.  I see in my Google Reader that there's a new post over at FFwD...the P&Q's for this week's recipe.  I think, we'll I'll just pop over and see if any one's posted any suggestions or tips (that's one of the great things about this adventure...I'm doing it with lots of other really experienced cooks who always have great tips to make things easier). 

When I hit the link for the P&Q's, I think, how odd...that picture doesn't look anything like the picture of the chicken basquaise in Dorie's book.  I then thought, hmmm...Laurie must have made some interesting modifications to the recipe...like omit all the peppers and chilies and add filo dough.  (Aren't you glad that you get to see how my brain works...or doesn't work in this case.)  Seriously, it took me reading a couple of the comments left in the P&Q's before I realized I had the completely wrong recipe.  We weren't making chicken basquaise...we were making chicken b'stilla!  As the immortal Homer says "Doh!"

Now I need to do a new list and add things like filo dough, coriander, saffron, lemon and honey.  Then, I turn to St. James and ask him if he'll run to store for me (I hate going to the store twice in one day)!  He agreed and off he goes.  The only thing I told him is if the saffron is $10 or less, buy it...if it's more...don't get it.  St. James comes home with the goodies and tells me it's my lucky day...the $20 saffron was on sale for $10!  Yippee!!  Then, as I'm looking at things he bought I see that he's bought ground cardamon instead of coriander.  And, I laugh!  Because when I was buying cardamon for the carrots recipe in December, I accidentally bought caraway seeds (which I HATE) and didn't discover it until I got home and then had to go to two more stores to find the cardamon seeds.  So, when St. James brought the wrong spice home, I just laughed and said we could live without the coriander and started cooking.  I figured, we like the cardamon seeds, so we'd like the ground cardamon and I'd just keep it...maybe I'd put it in this recipe instead of the coriander.  As I was throwing away the grocery receipt, I saw that the total was $30.  I thought, why would it be $30 for saffron, filo dough, lemons and cardamon, even with the $10 saffron?  Would you believe it, the cardamon was $12!!!  St. James never looked at the price...only at the price on the saffron.  Too funny! 

I took the cardamon back Monday morning...I sure didn't want it for $12 when I still have a jar of seeds in my pantry.  Vons didn't have any coriander...jeez!  St. James felt bad and decided he needed to find me coriander, so off he went...to a different store and found it for me.  Are you starting to see why I'm thinking maybe I should just get off the chicken b'stilla path?  No you say, not really!

Well, after marinating the chicken over night (which smelled heavenly) and then cooking the chicken on Monday morning, I was ready to put the chicken together for dinner that night.  This is where the final straw comes in for me.  I call it the battle of the filo!  I've discovered, filo and me...we are not friends!  Not at all!  Did you know that you need to thaw your filo for 4-6 hours (or overnight) before you use it?  Did you know you should read the instructions on your filo the day before you want to use it, not 5 minutes before you want to use it? 

At this point, the chicken and sauce are done and they smell so good, Ethan is coming in every 5 minutes to ask when dinner will be ready.  I'd made the mistake of letting him sample the sauce and he loved it, so there was no way I was going to be able to say...for another night...sorry...we're having this tomorrow because your mom can't get her act together and read the box to thaw the filo in time.

Nope, he was definitely not letting this dinner go past one more day.  So, I did what all resourceful women do...I stuck the damned frozen filo in the microwave!  Unfortunately, the filo had the last laugh.  Let's just say...you don't want to nuke filo to defrost it.  It makes what is already a very temperamental dough just have complete conniption fits!  Once again, many bad words were uttered in my kitchen as I attempted to mold the filo to my will.  In the end...I think I won.  The dish tasted amazing!  Really amazing...both St. James and Ethan had seconds...and ate it the leftovers the next night when I was working (without me telling them to).  St. James and I both agreed that a few raisins in the dish would have been perfect. 

The chicken has a wonderful middle eastern spicy flavor with the cinnamon giving it a sweet undertone.  You also sprinkle some cinnamon and sugar on top of the filo crust...yum!  Dorie's right, this dish doesn't hold over well, just because the baked filo gets soggy...but the flavors are still great the next day.  In the end, it was a great dinner...I'm just not sure what all the drama was about leading up to it!  However, as you probably noticed, I was too frazzled to take any process pictures, so we just have the end result.  I actually risked it and unmolded the pie...I know I was living dangerously...but it came out of the pan with no issues.

I had extra filling, so I made two miniature b'stilla's also.  They were quite cute...and just as yummy! 

Sorry for the long post...I'm amazed if you made it this far!  Also, sorry for the sucky pictures...that's a whole story in and of itself...which I will spare you!

Wonder how my other FFwD friends fared?  See their adventures here.

French Fridays with Dorie - gnocchi a la parisienne

This week we made a delicious, comfort food dish from Dorie's Around my French Table for our French Fridays with Dorie cooking club.  This is not a weekday evening, quick dinner.  I made this on Sunday and was glad I had given myself plenty of time to cook.

You start by making the gnocchi.  These are not traditional gnocchi, as they do not contain potato.  Rather, you make a pate a choux dough, which is a dough that you cook.  You then form the gnocchi and cook them.  I chose to form the gnocchi and then freeze them, rather than just drop teaspoons of the dough into boiling water.  I was hopeful this would ensure that my gnocchi were beautiful.  Little did I know that with the thick bechamel sauce, it didn't really matter what my gnocchi looked like.  I definitely want to make this gnocchi recipe again and serve it with a lovely, light marinara sauce.  I used two teaspoons and "shaped" the dough much like you would a quenelle (if you were so inclined).  It took about 20 seconds per gnocchi and I ended up with two full trays (about 60), so it took a bit of time.

After I froze my gnocchi, I boiled them and made my bechamel sauce (a white sauce made with flour, butter and milk).  The recipe called for a lot of flour (much more than I ever use when I make my regular bechamel sauce).  Sure enough, the sauce was very thick...much too thick to enjoy, so I added an additional cup of milk (and could have added a little pasta water too).  You put a little parmesan cheese on the bottom of a deep pie plate, add a little sauce and then add the gnocchi.  You add the rest of the sauce over the top of the gnocchi and then cover with emmenthal cheese, dotted with butter.  I think the butter was overkill and I'll leave it off the next time I make this.

The gnocchi puff up when you boil them and mine continued to puff when I baked them with the sauce.  I ended up with an incredibly rich dinner that the boys and I really enjoyed.  We had quite a bit left over and even though Dorie says you have to eat all of this at once because it doesn't hold well, I've been eating a bowl of it a day since Sunday and it's been delicious (but, I love leftover macaroni and cheese and this reminds a bit of that).

Straight from the oven, golden delicious!

To see how everyone else's dish turned out this week, take a look here.  If you'd like to cook along with us, it's easy to join!

French Fridays with Dorie - paris mushroom soup

Such a lovely simple soup...so many interesting observations and mishaps!  First, I realize why there is a beautiful, artistic picture of some of the ingredients of Dorie's paris mushroom soup in her book and no picture of the actual soup (did you notice her photograph has fresh thyme in it, but there's no thyme in the recipe?)  This soup doesn't photograph very well.  Although, I did try!  I took about 75 pictures and think I might have gotten one or two good ones.  But they are currently "stuck" on my flash card.  They won't download to my mac and they won't download to my pc.  And, this is all my fault!  At Christmas, I accidentally pulled the flash card out of my sister's computer while it was still active.  It hasn't been the same since.  However, each time I've used it since then, I've been able to coax the pictures off of it.  But I keep forgetting to put a different flash card in my camera.  I shot all my soup pictures yesterday and even had my son get in on the action for the "pouring" pictures.  Then, when I went to download the pictures...no luck!

So, unless I can get the pictures off later today...this is a picture-less post (addendum...see the end...I got some pics!).  Perhaps it's not too tragic.  After all, it's just mushroom soup.  But, oh what a wonderful mushroom soup it is.  It's hard to believe there's no cream in this recipe.  The pureed mushrooms make it very "creamy."  Here's where mishap number two comes in (although it occurred before the flash card revolt)...my blender doesn't like me.  Really, don't laugh.  I have a brand new blender and it works like a charm.  But when Dorie says...puree in small batches...she means it!  I thought I was doing a small batch until my blender EXPLODED!!!  Thank goodness I had my hand on the lid or I'd be writing from the ER room with 2nd degree burns on my face.  As it is, only my floor, counter and clothing got traumatized.  So, heed my warning...only put about 2 cups in your blender at a time.  It will take about 4 times to get it all blended.  But it's worth it in the end.

The soup was a total hit with my son, although he left his "salad" at the bottom of his bowl.  I found the fresh mushrooms slices and green onions a great treat and a perfect complement to the soup.  I made the soup with no alterations and thought it was great.  It would also be great with a dash of cream, which I might add to the bit I've got left.  That's right, my son and I ate almost the entire pot.  But, I didn't feel bad, this soup really doesn't have that many calories...except for the butter!

I also made roast beef paninis to go with the soup and they were super yummy.  If you don't have a panini press, you don't know what you're missing.  If you do have one, you know what I'm talking about!  Paninis are so easy to make.  Butter your bread, put fixings on, put on panini grill.  Watch the magic happen.  I have some nice photos of the paninis too.  On the faulty flash card.  Boo hoo! (addendum...see below)

My third mishap, which is the worst of all, is my hot water heater decided to develop a leak in the connecting pipe...in the wall.  And while I was merrily cooking, leaked inside the wall and under the hardwood floor.  There are no pictures of this because it is too awful!  We are currently without water and hopefully the plumber can come first thing this morning.  The damage is pretty bad and I have a feel it's going to be expensive to repair...two walls and a couple square feet of hard wood floor.  Bummer!

Even though many things went wrong around this soup...none of them were the soup's fault and I'd recommend making it.  You can see how my fellow French Friday participant's fared with the soup here.

And...while I was writing this post...I once again convinced the flash card to give up the images...so here's a couple of pictures of the soup and panini.  Yeah!  Maybe the leaking pipe will be easy too.

The "salad"

Pouring the soup

The panini...I didn't notice the cheese drop when I took the picture...but I kind of like it.

This was so good!

Soup and Panini...perfect, simple winter dinner

Thanks for sharing my soup making adventure!

French Fridays with Dorie - speculoos

On Friday it's Christmas Eve day, so what better FFwD recipe to showcase than Dorie's delightful holiday cookies... speculoos.  Speculoos or speculaas as they are known in Belgium, are thin, crisp spice cookies.  As Dorie mentions, it doesn't matter when you eat these cookies, they are going to remind you of the holidays.

I will confess, I didn't make these cookies right off the bat.  I waited until some fellow FFwD participants had made them and read their comments and hints.  They were very helpful.  I am not a rolled cookie person.  Rolled cookies stick and tear and make me tear up (like that little play on words?).  And crying in the kitchen is just so damn sad!  I've never been much of a fan of sugar cookies (either making them or eating them) and I thought the speculoo was probably just a brown sugar cookie.

And, actually, it is...but it's so much more than that too.  The spices really bring the cookie to life.  Dorie says you can make these big or small, thin or thick and spicy or spicier.  I went medium size, thin and just spicy.

 I also took her up on her Bonne Idee and made sandwiches out of the cookies too, using Nutella and Gingerbread Butter (idea stolen from another FFwD blogger, who it is I can't remember...I'm sorry).  I also bought dulce de leche, but when I opened up the jar...the seal had been broken and it was molded...YUCK!  I was going to share a picture and then thought better of it.  Serves me right for not having the guts to make my own by with this recipe.  However, the thought of boiling a can of condensed milk for 3-5 hours is more than I can handle!

With Nutella

The cookies were not that difficult to make, as long as you follow the instructions.  That means, make your dough, roll it out and then refrigerate for at least three hours.  I refrigerated over night, which made cutting the cookies very easy and I think melded the flavors together even more.  I used a great scalloped edge cookie cutter, but these cookies go soft very quickly and don't hold there shape perfectly.  So, I wouldn't use a fine detailed cookie cutter for these. 

With Gingerbread Butter

If you want a last minute holiday cookie that Santa will enjoy, try making these today!  To see what everyone else made this week, click here.  Happy Holidays!  I hope your holidays are filled with love and magic and cookies and lots of great food!

French Fridays with Dorie - my go-to beef daube

This is Dorie's go-to beef daube...and it will forever more be mine too!  This is one fabulous dish.  When we were in France this summer, friends had us over for our last night at the farm house and made Boeuf Bourguignon, which is similar to a daube.  The bourguigon is a fairly simple dish to make (unless you're following Julia's recipe) and the daube really is too.  Get a good cut of meat, season it with lovely winter vegetables and a bouquet garni, add lots of red wine and then braise for a couple of hours.  What you end up with is a little bit of heaven.

Gather your ingredients

Admire the lovely produce

Admire a little more

You have to admire the meat too, you don't want it to feel left out, after all it is the star of this show!

Put your herbs together in a bouquet garni (that's just fancy talk for wrapping up the fresh herbs in cheesecloth)

All tied up!

Everything is better when you start with bacon

Browning the meat in bacon fat...yum, yum

Onions and shallots get to sweat

Carrots and parsnips join the fun (don't leave out the parsnips, they're important!)

Almost forgot the garlic

Every thing's ready to cook for a couple of hours

When it's all done, here's what you get

Up close and personal...too personal?

I made Dorie's herbed spaetzle to go with and it was fabulous!

The spaetzle was so yummy!

The daube had layers and layers of flavor.  The smoky bacon was underneath everything, the herbs added just the right amount of perfume and the wine tied everything together.  I used Dorie's suggestion of a coastal syrah (from Kendall Jackson) and it was perfect!  I'm going back to the store and buy a case...this is the wine to use for stews.

If you are looking for the perfect way to show your family some wintertime love, this is the meal for you!  If you'd like the recipe, buy Dorie's book (don't worry, I don't make a commission...I just want to make sure Dorie sells enough books so she can write another one!).  If you'd like to see what everyone else at FFwD made this week, check it out.  If you are feeling inspired to join the club, do it.  It's so much fun and we are cooking so many great things...the more the merrier!  Leave a comment and let me know what you think.