Paris-Brest

(Found inTextsStages)
The Paris-Brest is a famous French patisserie: a ring of choux pastry, scattered with flaked almonds and icing sugar and filled with a praline cream. The name comes from a historic cycle race between Paris and Brest (600 km or 372 miles), as the shape is like a bicycle wheel.
180K4.6 2 hours 18 min. May 8^th 2011

Strawberry tart

(Found inTexts)
For this great dessert classic: a sweetcrust pastry case, vanilla confectioner's custard and the best strawberries available. This recipe is simple yet demanding, but the result is an exceptional tart.
117K4.6 2 hours 30 min. June 16^th 2013

Mont d'or in brioche

(Found inTextsStages)
For this delicious winter Comtoise recipe, we enclose a layer of grilled onions, diced Morteau sausage, sautéed potatoes and a Mont d'or in a brioche pastry. The whole thing, rather like a large pie, is baked in the oven, before being slit open to enjoy the melted Mont d'or that has deliciously...
4,460 3 hours 36 min. February 18^th 2024

Small foie gras pasties

(Found inStages)
Dainty pasties, filled with a morsel of seasoned foie gras.
308K4.6 2 hours September 7^th 2018

Gisèle's Pasties

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These small pasties ("rissoles" in the original French version) are made with shortcrust pastry, filled with a mixture of cooked meat, onion, parsley, garlic and egg.
198K3.8 1 hour 14 min. September 10^th 2018

Little apple turnovers with almonds and raisins

(Found inStages)
These are small apple turnovers ("chaussons") of puff pastry, filled with a mixture of caramelised almonds, stewed apple and rum-soaked raisins. To be eaten just as they are...
294K3.8 1 hour 31 min. September 11^th 2018

Gâteau Breton (Brittany butter cake)

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Gâteau breton is a rich cake that uses a lot of butter (from Brittany, of course) with sugar, egg yolks and a little rum to add flavour. This cake is traditionally served with coffee.
86K4 1 hour 10 min. September 11^th 2018

Vol-au-vent cases

(Found inStages)
Vol-au-vents, whether large or bite-sized, need a special pastry case that is hollow to take the filling. Here is how to prepare these delicate cases using puff pastry.
292K4.1 44 min. October 16^th 2013

Dublin fruit scones

(Found inStages)
Scones originated in Britain and Ireland. The Irish version is often made plain and traditionally served with tea. Scones are more of a bread than a cake, eaten split in half and spread with butter or jam, for example. There are also sweeter versions and scones with dried fruit, like the ones I have...
106K4.2 48 min. September 12^th 2018

Mini lemon millefeuilles

(Found inStages)
These dainty and delicious mini millefeuilles have layers of puff pastry filled with lemon confectioner's custard (pastry cream). They are a bit tricky because they are quite fragile and do not keep well once assembled. But freshly made, they are a true delight.
34K 2 hours 22 min. March 25^th 2018

Olive and pesto bread

(Found inStages)
This bread with olives and pesto has a very Italian flavour: a ciabatta dough, herbes de Provence and green olives. The loaf is baked in a tin, with a thin layer of pesto spread in the middle between two pieces of dough, and green olives (with stones removed) pressed into the top.
60K3.8 3 hours 57 min. October 24^th 2017

Linzer torte

(Found inStages)
Linzer torte, or tart from Linz (Austria), has a cinnamon-flavoured crust filled with raspberry jam. The special and rather crumbly sweet pastry used for the case is made with cinnamon, ground almonds and the yolks of hard-boiled eggs. There are many different versions. In this rather unusual one,...
45K4.7 1 hour 5 min. November 27^th 2016

Agen prune cake

(Found inStages)
This cake from Agen, in southwestern France, is a type of brioche. Inspired by the famous "tarte au sucre" (sugar tart), it is like a thick "galette" with a moist texture, filled with prunes and marzipan with Armagnac.
34K3 1 hour 51 min. September 16^th 2018

Buckwheat almond biscuits

(Found inStages)
In this sweet biscuit recipe, some of the normal wheat flour is replaced with buckwheat flour and ground almonds. This gives them a very distinctive flavour.
78K4 2 hours 40 min. October 7^th 2015

Fried egg in bread

(Found inStages)
This is a novel way to cook an egg in the middle of a slice of fried bread. For a continental twist to the English breakfast, it comes with a slice of grilled bacon and a little pesto. The tricky part (explained in full in the recipe) is to cook the egg white through but keep the yolk runny.
112K 15 29 min. September 8^th 2015

Two-coloured chocolate-orange tart

(Found inStages)
This tart, with its twinned chocolate and orange flavours, is a bit fiddly to make. The fillings are fairly straightforward (classic chocolate ganache and orange curd), but it is tricky to ensure that the fillings do not run into each other. You will need to make a divider but, as you will see, this...
52K5 2 hours 35 min. April 15^th 2015

Ice-cream Vacherin

(Found inStages)
Ice-cream vacherin is a festive French dessert. It consists of two different flavours of ice cream (blackcurrant and vanilla here) sandwiched between two circles of meringue, topped with whorls of Chantilly (whipped cream) which is then frozen. It is not too complicated, but involves a bit of work...
164K4.5 8 hours 45 min. December 21^th 2014

Grated potato cakes

(Found inStages)
These grated potato cakes (similar to hash browns, but without the onion) can be deep or pan fried. They are excellent with meat, but quite delicious on their own. Children love them.
145K4.3 39 min. November 23^th 2014

Cigarettes Russes (Piroulines)

(Found inStages)
The French name for these tubular biscuits means "Russian cigarettes". Cigarettes Russes are perfect for serving with ice cream or other desserts. The basic biscuit is fairly easy to make; the tricky bit is rolling the tube once cooked.
95K 54.5 46 min. May 25^th 2014

Rum babas

(Found inStages)
Rum baba is a classic French dessert, consisting of a small cake soaked in rum syrup and filled with a little Chantilly (whipped cream).
90K3.9 3 hours 33 min. November 24^th 2013

My best addresses...

My good addresses, favourite suppliers, ingredients, products and equipment.
295K4.0 August 29^th 2023

Finishing touches

Construction of a Fayol bread oven: finishing touches and accessories.
71K4.4 August 29^th 2023

Make your own hot-wire or styrofoam cutter

Cut polystyrene and foams easily with your own hot-wire cutter.
501K 433.5 February 20^th 2024

Polynesian arrow

Launched with a piece of string: the Polynesian arrow.
184K 14.3 August 29^th 2023

chives

Chives grow in clumps, and the leaves used as a herb have an extraodinary taste. It's an essential for adding to salads, and everything else that can be eaten cold, because it doesn't like long cooking during which it loses most of its flavour.
75K3.8 August 29^th 2023

How to choose a centrifugal juicer

A centrifugal juicer is an appliance designed to extract juice from all kinds of fruit and vegetables. It will produce juice from tomatoes, carrots, apples, pineapple, blackcurrants, etc. The idea is simple: the chosen fruit are fed into the top of the machine through a tube.The fruit should be...
39K4.4 April 1^st 2011

The right weight of pastry for a pie

Let's try to solve a thorny problem: How much dough will I need when I make my next pie? You're planning to make a pie, you're going to use your favourite mould or circle, but how much pastry will you need to fill it completely with a well spread pastry, without being too thin, or on the contrary...
58K4.3 March 20^th 2020

Circles vs. moulds tins

If you like to bake or make quiches, pies etc. you must surely have one or more pie pans at home, in different diameters and perhaps materials. They are indispensable, without them there is no way to make beautiful pies, and they work very well, but you have another option, instead of moulds,...
11K5 October 2^nd 2020