Warm apple feuillantines

(Found inTexts)
It's a rather long recipe but which never fails to impress, perfect for a special dinner party. It's made up of 3 circles: one almond "tuile", 2 of caramelized brik sheets, with a caramelized apple layer between each, whipped cream on top, and custard all around. Everything, except whipped cream,...
May 28^th 2012321 K5 3 hours 9 min.

Passion fruit jellies

(Found inTexts)
Usually to make fruit jellies or (fruit "paste"), it's like jam but you need to cook fruit pulp and sugar much longer. Unfortunately, this long cooking is bad for both vitamins and flavour. In this recipe we use a special jam gelling agent, to reduce cooking time as much as possible .
July 4^th 2018328 K4 2 hours 30 min.

European glass

(Found inTexts)
A little dessert that's rather long to make, but which will always impress your guests. Layered in a glass: a jellied red fruit coulis, a layer of pineapple charlotte cream, a layer of kiwi coulis, topped with a peeled clementine segment. It's "european" because it resembles the italian flag, and in...
August 15^th 2010227 K5 2 hours 30 min.

Finger biscuits

(Found inTextsStages)
These small biscuits, that look a bit like savoy biscuits, are delicious alone or with Champagne, but are also the base for charlottes or Tiramisu.
July 30^th 2021337 K5 50 min.

Meringues

(Found inTextsStages)
A very simple recipe but which always impresses.
June 10^th 2019389 K4.5 4 hours 20 min.

Chocolate sauce

(Found inTexts)
This rich smooth chocolate sauce, with its full flavour, is one of the indispensable ingredients of profiteroles, but it can be used with many others desserts.
February 21^th 2011301 K 24 35 min.

French dressing (vinaigrette)

(Found inTexts)
Here is a very simple recipe, but it could completely transform, maybe even transcend, your salad.
July 7^th 20111.04 M4.5 7 min.

Couscous

(Found inTexts)
In couscous, the meat and vegetable mixture is rather long to cook, but not difficult. And the couscous itself (a kind of coarse semolina) is simple and quick to prepare.
November 16^th 2017511 K4.3 2 hours 40 min.

Four quarters

(Found inTexts)
It's "the simpliest cake in the world", called four quarters, because it's made with 1/4 eggs, 1/4 sugar, 1/4 flour and 1/4 butter.
February 21^th 2011314 K3.7 1 hour 15 min.

Home-made terrine of foie gras

(Found inTexts)
Preparing your own home-made foie gras from raw is immensively satisfying: good quality liver and a simply amazing flavour – much better than anything you can buy. This recipe is a bit tricky, but quite within everyone's grasp, as long as you follow the 3 most delicate stages carefully. These are,...
December 17^th 20235.23 M 64.2 4 days 15 hours 50 min.

Natural leaven

(Found inTextsComments)
Leaven is a natural raising agent, a fermented mixture of water, flour and the microscopic yeasts which are present in the air. It's a delicate living substance, sensitive to the external environment. The recipe is around 4000 years old and dates back to the Egypt of the Pharaohs, via a beautiful...
April 3^rd 20201.69 M 304.0 7 days 15 min.

Sandwich bread

(Found inTextsStages)
Soft and moist, almost like brioche, it can be made in a tin or mould or as a classic long French-style loaf.
October 24^th 2017346 K3.9 3 hours 30 min.

Leavened bread

(Found inTextsStages)
It might be harder to achieve good results than with traditional yeast bread, but what a flavour! It also keeps better. This recipe is designed for baking bread in a wood-fired oven but, of course, you can use the conventional oven in your kitchen.
May 23^th 20171.19 M 23.8 6 hours 30 min.

Chocolate rolls (petits pains)

(Found inTextsStages)
Here is a recipe for "real" chocolate petits pains, i.e. with a milk bread dough (not croissants dough) and with a stick of chocolate inside.
October 30^th 2021433 K4.6 5 hours 30 min.

Koulibiak in pie dish

(Found inTexts)
Koulibiak is a traditional russian recipe from, usually served in a flat puff pastry fish shape. Here is an easier version, in a pie dish.
September 7^th 2018363 K3.8 3 hours 20 min.

Express chilli con carne

(Found inTexts)
This is a really express recipe, a "true" chilli is longer and more difficult to do.
February 21^th 2011388 K3.8 35 min.

African style chicken

(Found inTexts)
This is a sort of smoked chicken, cooked in a tomato-coconut sauce, and served with kidney beans and plain rice. It's quite a simple recipe, with ready-made ingredients, but which needs a long cooking time on low heat (one hour).
February 21^th 2011403 K5 2 hours 4 min.

Five hours poultry

(Found inTexts)
Perhaps simplest recipe on this site, but what a result! The idea is to cook the bird, without fat, at low temperature, covered, and for a long time. In this way, the poultry cooks so as to be almost like a "confit": soft and very tasty. The effect is more spectacular with duck because it is a...
January 27^th 2012535 K3.8 5 hours 15 min.

How to peel a fruit

(Found inTexts)
Usually French chefs says "peler à vif", which means to completely peel the fruit (removing skin and core) and keep only the very best of the flesh. Here is a method for grapefruit, but it can be used for all the other citrus fruit, and many other fruits.
February 21^th 2011178 K4.3 35 min.

How to prepare tomatoes

(Found inTextsStages)
Yes, I know you will say to me: why peel tomatoes? The answer is very simple: it's much better, gives a better texture, softer in the mouth. The skin is tough, adds nothing to the taste (and you will have noticed that commercial tomatoes have practically no taste), and finally it's there (on/under...
June 6^th 2012327 K 24 40 min.

What is this site, and who am I?

The important thing is the content of the site, the recipes and information you can find, but some of you want to know who is behind it all.
August 29^th 2023210 K 44.2

Website technical evolution

This page lists all the improvements/modifications that have been made to the site, in chronological order. .
August 29^th 2023206 K3.8

A little molecular gastronomy

Long-cooked meat becomes meltingly soft. What happens to achieve this result?
August 29^th 202339 K4.4

Making your own bread

You'll find a whole range of bread and pastry recipes on this site, but before you get started, perhaps you'd like to know more about the subject, get some tips and tricks, and find out what the main mistakes beginners make? If so, this page is for you.
August 22^th 2024565 K 63.9

Bread oven

Building a bread oven was until a few years ago a job for the professionals. But now you can buy a kind of kit which allows you to build your own bred oven without professional masonry know-how. You should know that the kits only provide the main part of oven, the hearth, where you light the fire...
October 15^th 20241.16 M3.6

Recipes

A recipe is really quite a simple thing (or should be): a list of ingredients, a method, and that's all there is to it. Unfortunately its not always the case. Sometimes you might get the impression that a recipe, found in a magazine or on a web site, has been concocted especially to make you fail:...
June 3^rd 2024170 K3.6

My best addresses...

Quite a few of you often ask me where I can find this or that? or is such and such a thing a good buy? or which brand is best for this or that? On this page, I'm going to group together my good addresses for suppliers of this or that product or utensil, and good books on the subjects that interest...
August 29^th 2023300 K3.9

Advice on heating oven

For good results with a wood-fired oven, it's very important to manage the heating process well. Here is some advice to help you succeed in this delicate operation.
August 24^th 2024177 K4.0

Closed fire cooking

For this method, the oven is emptied of embers, cleaned, and door closed until it drops to the cooking temperature of 250°C or 482°F. It's the method used for breads, pies and tarts, cakes, etc.
August 24^th 202452 K4.4

Slashing loaves

When it's time to put them in the oven, the dough pieces for future breads or viennoiseries need to be "lamés", i.e. made with a very sharp blade, by making quick incisions at the top, known as "grignes". Let's see how it's done.
August 29^th 2023282 K 43.6

Small history of elements classification

The road to Mendeleev's table of tables has taken centuries. Here's a brief chronology.
August 24^th 202441 K3.9

The name of the elements

The names of the elements in Mendeleyev's table are generally derived from Latin, Greek or German, and refer to properties such as color, brilliance or geographical origin. Here's the origin of each element's name.
August 24^th 202473 K3.6

Polynesian arrow

A Polynesian arrow is an arrow with a tail that is thrown by hand, using a piece of string. The result is a "slingshot" effect that propels the arrow much further than if it were simply thrown by hand.It's a craft to do with children, for example on an afternoon when they're a bit idle...
August 29^th 2023191 K 14.3

A mist free mirror

I don't know if you're like me, but I find it very annoying after a shower or bath to have to wipe down the bathroom mirror 36 times with a towel just so I can see myself shaving (or putting on make-up for the girls).How do you solve this tricky problem? First of all, by looking at the cause of the...
August 29^th 2023219 K 13.6

Home Automation and CP290 with Excel

If you're using a CP 290 interface to do a bit of home automation and, for example, regulate your heating, you must have used the "Lighthouse" software under DOS and Windows 3.1. Apart from the fact that this software is in English with AM and PM times, and that it wasn't very user-friendly, the...
August 29^th 2023145 K4.2

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.
August 29^th 202376 K3.8

parsley

There are different kinds of parsley, the two main ones are curled parsley and flat-leaf (or Italian) parsley. The most important difference between the two, except the leaf shape, is taste: flat-leaf parsley has much more flavour.
August 29^th 202360 K4.1

tarragon

Tarragon is a herb with strongly aromatic leaves. These are used for their characteristic flavour that goes very well with meat and fish.
August 29^th 202351 K4.1

Submitting a comment or image

You can, if you wish, add a comment on the pages, articles and recipes of the site. This comment, or question, will be immediately put on line and available for consultation. Here are a few tips for your writing. .
August 29^th 202379 K 23.9

Start off well to cook well

What do I need to get started in the kitchen? First of all, a good website! That's it, you're there ;-), then a minimum of equipment, and the few products you should always have in your cupboards or fridge. Here are a few things to help you make your choices.
August 29^th 2023308 K 13.6

The long fermentation of bread

I had already told you in a previous article about the delicious little alchemy that happens when we make bread, let's try to go a little further this time, and try to discover what makes a good bread, in other words, which has taste. .
April 13^th 20235,7614.9

Properly cooked! (the taste)

Going out to a restaurant is getting harder at the moment. In France, at least, you have to try and find one that has agreed to pass on the new lower rate of VAT at anything other than a symbolic level, and there aren't many. And then, most importantly, you have to find a good one: one where you...
February 6^th 201114 K 14.6

In praise of slow cooking

You will no doubt have noticed that in cookery, it's often the actual cooking process that gets neglected. This is understandable; it comes at the end of the recipe and getting the dish in the oven is something of a relief (ah, that's done!), which frees us to cope with what's left: tidying the...
February 9^th 201137 K4.2

The ideal restaurant

Like all passionate cooks (I suppose), from time to time I dream of opening my own restaurant. I imagine loads of things: it will be like this or like that, we'll do this, I'll cook that, the room will have this or that – in short, I dream.
October 15^th 201213 K4.4

Should I believe my oven?

Can you really trust your oven? This is an important question as we are always tempted to take the temperature indicated as gospel truth and, unfortunately, this is rarely very precise. .
July 4^th 201128 K4.6

The time of the jams

We are well into summer as I write this, and this is the time when most of the fruit is giving or about to give in full. And for many of us, it will also be the time for jams and jellies, one of the best ways to preserve fruit for the next winter.
July 12^th 202124 K4.5

Choosing a chopping board

It's a no-brainer, surely? If you want a chopping board, just find a piece of wood, and Bob's your uncle! You can happily chop away with a knife and not damage the table or worktop. But in reality, it's a bit more complicated than that. You need to be careful what you are buying, in particular the...
May 8^th 201246 K4.6

The art of the charlotte

In cooking, a charlotte is a delicious moulded dessert, with biscuits around the outside that have been soaked in a flavoured syrup, filled with a light cream or mousse. The charlotte is left to set in the fridge before being turned out and served in slices. It is very light and a lovely sweet...
February 27^th 201340 K4.3

Preserving egg yolks

If you're using only the egg whites in a recipe (such as meringues ), you'll need to store the yolks until you're ready to use them again. There's nothing very complicated about this in principle - all you have to do is chill them, but there are a few pitfalls to be avoided in practice.
June 18^th 20244,0345

How to choose a good password

These days more and more websites ask you to create a user account, so that you can be identified before being allowed to access some service or other. To create an account you need to choose a user identity. This is simple, as your email address is used in most cases (ann.other@gmail.com, for...
March 29^th 201317 K4.1

20 measures to protect your privacy

As we use more and more new technology, we leave ourselves increasingly vulnerable to companies who make money out of collecting our personal data. For instance, when we use the internet, we need to be wary of what is collected about what we do, our habits, etc. Here is a list of simple...
April 16^th 201318 K3.9

Raising (or leavening) agents

When we want to make a dough or batter rise when baking, either in patisserie or bread-making, we need to use a raising agent or leavening agent, one of which is called leaven. In the context of baking, a raising agent is simply what "makes something rise". It is a substance which, when added to...
June 16^th 202152 K4.8

The window-pane test in bread-making

The home bread-makers often ask themselves “Have I kneaded my dough long enough?” . A good question, as dough that is insufficiently kneaded will not rise properly or will fall flat when the top is slashed, which is very frustrating. To know when the dough is ready, one can rely on the length...
June 16^th 202189 K 23.9

Making the most of seeds: Dry roasting

In cooking, and particularly in baking, there are a lot of seeds we can use, such as linseed, sesame, poppy, etc. Usually, recipes simply say to add them just as they are to the mixture or dough. To make a seeded loaf, for example, prepare a plain bread dough as usual, then, towards the end of...
January 30^th 201557 K4.0

Steam for baking bread

What does steam have to do with bread-making? This is not only a bakers' secret, it is something you might not think of at all: if you make bread and bake it like a cake, you will end up with bread, but pale and with a thick, hard crust – a long way from the golden-brown crusty loaf you had in...
June 16^th 2021138 K4.5

Perpetual stock

It's something you have probably have done yourself: cooked or pre-cooked vegetables before adding them to a recipe. This is almost always done the same way: peel the chosen vegetables (carrots, for example), cut them up, boil them in salted water (using a tablespoon or so of coarse salt per litre),...
November 22^th 201625 K5

What can I use for blind baking a pastry case?

When it comes to home-made desserts, tarts are always popular. They can be divided into two basic types: those cooked with their filling, such as an apricot and almond cream tart, and those where the filling is added after baking the pastry case, such as a strawberry tart or chocolate tart. For...
May 2^nd 2017106 K4.5

The right way to use a blender

You may well have a blender in your own kitchen. You know, that useful gadget that allows you to liquidize stuff at high speed into a smooth liquid. Of course, the most obvious use that comes to mind is for soups: if you have boiled some vegetables in water, with just a quick blast of the blender,...
May 31^th 201720 K5

Candied fruits: don't get ripped off

Do you like candied fruit? You might like to nibble a handful or add it to a recipe, like a classic fruit cake or delicious Italian specialities like panettone or sicilian epiphany pie.
June 21^th 201757 K 24.2

A few tips for effective kneading at home

When you have to knead dough for bread or some other recipe, you may well use a food processor or the type of machine known as a stand mixer. The best-known brands are Kenwood and KitchenAid. They are useful tools, but here are a few tips to help you get the best out of them.
June 23^th 2021272 K 23.7