Recipes: 651 results
Crème brulée
(Found inTextsStages)Crème brûlée (burned cream) is quite easy to prepare: it's a simple egg-cream dessert. The only difficulty is in making the delicious crunchy caramel layer on top. The perfect crème brulée (for me) is a cold and soft cream, with on top a nice hot caramel crust. This is a completely new version...
1.6M 74.3 4 hours 38 min. December 31th 2011
Baked apples from St Aubin le Vertueux
(Found inTextsStages)Under this pretty name, my personal version of "Les pommes au four" (baked apples).
242K 24.2 1 hour 7 min. February 21th 2011
Almond cream or frangipane
(Found inTextsStages)Light and delicious, it is used in a lot of desserts like tarts, cakes and pies (epiphany galette).
444K 25 44 min. January 23th 2022
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.
296K 24 32 min. February 21th 2011
How to succeed in making sabayon (syllabub)
(Found inTexts)A sabayon is a delicious and delicate preparation based on egg yolks and sugar, with a liquid added (wine, alcohol, fruit juice, etc), which is then whipped in a bain-marie until it is both light and smooth. Usually sabayon is sweet (syllabub), but you can make it savoury, in which case there is...
924K 54 18 min. November 12th 2017
Potato gratin
(Found inTextsStages)This classic French recipe is made with sliced potatoes baked in milk and browned on top.
1.1M 14.6 1 hour 47 min. February 21th 2011
Montbenoit's canapés
(Found inTextsStages)A recipe from Franche-comté (lovely region of eastern France): large slices of bread coated with melted shallot, grilled bacon dice, a big slice of Morbier (cheese from the same region) and a brief spell in the oven. It really is a winter dish.
269K4.6 1 hour 45 min. October 13th 2010
Foie gras cured in salt
(Found inTexts)This a quite different preparation from the terrine of foie gras, this time it does not go in the oven, the liver is salted for 48 hours and it "cooks" (or cures) in this way.
554K5 2 days 16 hours 28 min. December 23th 2017
Tomato tart
(Found inTextsStages)This tart is very easy and quick to prepare.
272K4.8 1 hour 18 min. January 13th 2011
Fougasse with bacon and Comté
(Found inTextsStages)This is a richer version of the traditional Mediterranean recipe (originaly, it was a simple olive oil bread).
329K4.1 3 hours 9 min. October 24th 2017
Ramekins of duchess potatoes
(Found inTextsStages)Duchess potatoes are a mix of mashed potato and egg yolks, cooked in the oven, in a decorative shape and delicious. In this recipe they top a ramekin containing a layer of mashed potato, cooked leek, and thinly sliced bacon.
289K 24.6 2 hours 5 min. March 4th 2020
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.
1.2M 23.8 6 hours 26 min. May 23th 2017
Pitta bread
(Found inTextsStages)This Lebanese speciality is made as a flat round pocket, which can be filled with all manner of things.
515K 14.5 2 hours 55 min. February 21th 2011
Pizza dough
(Found inTexts)Pizza dough is a lind of bread dough with olive oil, which make it softer. This is the same dough that I use for pizzas and flammenkuches, this is no doubt incorrect, but it's very good nevertheless. At home we used to make pizza dough quite thick, and flammenkuche as thin as possible.
499K4.6 1 hour 59 min. August 27th 2020
Salmon "en papillote" with small vegetables
(Found inTextsStages)A fresh salmon escalope just salt and pepper with small dices of small vegetables.
239K 15 1 hour 28 min. June 22th 2011
How to butter a dish or a mould easily
(Found inTexts)Often when making gratins, crumbles or other oven-cooked dishes, you will need to butter the dish or mould. To butter (or grease) means to rub inside the mould with a knob of butter to prevent the mixture sticking too much. Instead of putting a knob of butter in the dish and wiping with paper, here...
139K4.1 1 min. February 21th 2011
Almond tuiles
(Found inTextsStages)These delicious little biscuits ("tiles" in French) get their crunch and lightness from the use of flaked almonds rather than ground. It is not difficult to succeed, you just need to work fast after taking them out of the oven.
373K4 1 hour 18 min. August 21th 2019
How to dust
(Found inTexts)"Dusting" in cooking is sprinkling a very fine layer of something in powder form. Icing sugar or cocoa powder on cakes for example. As this is not very easy to do evenly, here is a way to do it.
145K5 2 min. October 13th 2010
Hotpot my grandmother's way
(Found inTextsStages)If you like slow-cooked dishes prepared with loving care (mitonné), you will certainly love this hotpot recipe, with the taste of Franche-Comté, inspired by my grandmother. It's an old-fashioned dish full of flavours and aromas, cooked vegetables, stock, smoked sausages, all cooked long and slow.
331K5 4 hours 7 min. February 21th 2011
Pages: 19 results
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...1.2M3.6 June 3rd 2024
Advice on heating oven
Construction of a Fayol bread oven: advice on heating and preparing for baking bread.176K4.0 August 29th 2023
Finishing touches
Construction of a Fayol bread oven: finishing touches and accessories.71K4.4 August 29th 2023
Open fire cooking
Construction of a Fayol bread oven: open fire cooking, with the embers inside.89K3.9 August 29th 2023
Closed fire cooking
Construction of a Fayol bread oven: closed fire cooking, with the embers removed .51K4.4 August 29th 2023
Films and papers in the kitchen
Various papers and plastic films used in cooking .570K 93.6 August 29th 2023
My best addresses...
My good addresses, favourite suppliers, ingredients, products and equipment.297K4.0 August 29th 2023
The name of the elements
Where the names of the elements that make up matter come from.72K3.6 August 29th 2023
The amateur baker
You may have noticed over the pages of this site, I am passionate about everything that is related to the bakery: I love making bread, pastries, maintain my leaven, etc.. This page contains links to all the different parts of the site where we talk about bread: recipes, special pages, etc.166K 44.1 August 29th 2023
Flours
At the most basic level, wheat grain is put through a mill, which produces a white-ish powder flour... Well, actually it's not quite that simple. First of all we need to distinguish between the different grains that can be made into flour: wheat of course, but also rye, barley, buckwheat, etc. So we...723K 413.6 June 3rd 2024
Blog articles: 40 results
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. .28K4.6 July 4th 2011
Kitchen ovens
You certainly have one in your kitchen, an oven, the essential tool for all kinds of cooking, whether in the kitchen of course, but also in pastry, bakery, pizza, and many others. Here is some information on its structure and operation.23K4.4 May 16th 2020
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...14K 14.6 February 6th 2011
Maillard reactions
This subject cropped up recently in a discussion with my three charming nieces; do you know what Maillard reactions are? With a name like that, they could well be some principle in mechanics, but in fact the term applies to something much closer to all of us: it's what gives food more flavour...32K4 January 28th 2015
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...37K4.2 February 9th 2011
Devising a recipe
A question I'm often asked is: how do you come up with your recipes? How do you perfect them? This is something I've already mentioned on this page, but I'll take this opportunity to go into a bit more detail.14K4.4 October 15th 2012
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.12K4.4 October 15th 2012
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...56K4.0 January 30th 2015
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...137K4.5 June 16th 2021
5 really useful cooking tips
Cooking is about recipes, of course, but it is also an impressive collection of small gestures, ways of doing things, knowing what to do and what not to do. All these little tips and tricks can be very important: they can affect the way a recipe turns out, simply because you did just the right...19K4.9 March 29th 2016
What is the difference between bakery and patisserie?
This is a question that you may well have asked yourself and which I will attempt to answer. In France the two trades of "boulangerie" (bakery) and "pâtisserie" (patisserie and confectionery) have always been quite distinct, but where exactly do the boundaries lie? .121K 14.1 February 7th 2017
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...105K4.5 May 2nd 2017
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.54K 24.2 June 21th 2017
The Holy Grail of French bakers
While browsing through the recipes on this site, you may have noticed that while I adore cooking (everything, in fact, to do with eating and drinking), I am particularly drawn to bakery: bread, viennoiseries and all that goes with them – it’s a real passion of mine; I love making them and I...15K 34.7 March 24th 2018
The mock CAP baker's certificate exam
The next instalment in my life as an apprentice baker at the French INBP professional school. I’m now halfway through training and it’s still as exciting as ever, and exhausting – but maybe I’m just getting old, or both… Anyway, a few days ago we had to go through the mock CAP exam. A sort...16K4.4 May 1st 2018
Should a sausage be pricked before cooking?
If you are using sausages in a recipe, you may have already asked yourself the question: Should you prick it before cooking it, or not? You will certainly find as many opinions "you should prick" as "you should not". Let's try to untangle all this.42K4.1 September 29th 2018
For well opened (puffed) cakes
It's always nice to have a well puffed up cake after baking, not only will it taste good but it looks great too. Let's see how to get this beautiful shape almost every time.27K4.2 January 23th 2019
The first breads of humanity?
I have already told you in a previous article the beautiful story of the croissants, but do you know what it is about the bread, who "invented" it, where and when? Well, you can imagine that recent discoveries, in 2018, have profoundly changed the history of bread.9,3215 February 16th 2019
Drawing a pattern in pastry
Often in the kitchen, in pastry-making, or in baking, we need to trace a pattern on a pastry. It's just a question of aesthetics but it has its effect after baking on a galette, pithiviers, pâté en croute (terrine in a pie crust), etc.26K4.1 May 23th 2019
The cake and the raisins
When you bake a cake, like a cake or pound cake, you may have already encountered this thorny problem: How to make sure that the raisins, or the candied fruits, or any other small filling, do not fall to the bottom of the pan during the baking process?11K4.7 May 31th 2019
Lexicon: 4 results
Dry roasting
(Found inTexts)Dry roasting (torréfication in French), usually seeds (sesame, linseed,...) or nuts (almonds, walnuts, ...), means to heat without water or fat, in the oven or a heavy pan, to drive off all water they contain.It make seeds crunchier, very pleasant in the mouth, with an improved flavour.
776K 1
To bake blind
(Found inTexts)To bake pastry "blind" means to cook it on its own or as an empty tart case, when it will be assembled with or have a filling that will not go in the oven. .
776K 2
Utensil: 13 results
Cake and pastry moulds
(Found inTexts)For cooking all your cakes. Available in various shapes and sizes for tarts, cakes, madeleines, financiers, etc.
776K
Electronic thermometer
(Found inTexts)When cooking it is frequently necessary to know the temperature of a preparation. Sometimes it's indispensable, like for recipes using cooked sugar or foie gras.
776K
Bannetons (bread rising baskets)
(Found inTexts)Once dough is kneaded and worked, it needs to be left to rise in a warm place before baking. Turning the risen uncooked dough onto the peel for transfering to the oven can be a tricky moment, especially if the dough has stuck to the container. To avoid this, bread is traditionally left for its final...
776K
Bread dough at the right temperature
(Found inTexts)For bread dough to rise well, it should be left in a warm place, protected from draughts. Bakers use a special room, for this called a "chambre de pousse" (growing room). Difficult to do this at home...Instead I use my kitchen oven (off) where I put a small light bulb of 15-20 watts. This light bulb...
776K
Rake
(Found inTexts)This is a kind of metal scraper, used to move or remove embers and ash from the oven, especially just before closed fire cooking.It's also useful for tending the fire, rearranging the woo, the embers....Apparently in days gone by such rakes were often made of wood so as not to damage the fragile...
776K 2
Oven brush
(Found inTexts)Once the embers have been removed from the oven, the ashes missed by the rake need to be swept out, and for that you will need an oven brush.
776K
Bread crate
(Found inTexts)This is a large wooden crate for airing loaves after they come out of the oven, and where they cool more easily than on a table (air can pass all round the loaves).Mine is 90 x 45 cm (35 x 16") with a handle to hang it for storage.
776K
Steam machine
(Found inTexts)It's essential to have a lot of steam in the oven during baking to get lovely golden crusty loaves.Bakers have a special steam control on their ovens which injects water at the start of baking. With a wood-fired bread oven a simpler system is needed.I've try several systems and ideas, here is the...
776K
Baking sheet
(Found inTexts)This is a metal sheet or tray, covered with a non-stick coating, similar to the lining of an oven. It can be used for cooking a wide range of things, but mainly small items to be cooked together such as rock cakes or profiteroles. .
776K
Silcon baking mat
(Found inTexts)Sometimes using a nonstick baking sheet is not enough when cooking items that stick well, such as macarons or coconut tuiles for example. In this case it's possible to line the sheet with cooking parchment,but one can also use a silicone baking mat which is a flexible sheet with a silicone coating,...
776K
Ingredient, product: 3 results
apricot glaze
(Found inTexts)Apricot glaze is an apricot jelly (strained jam), used to coat tarts, to protect them from the air and give them a glossy appearance.
776K
baking powder
(Found inTexts)Baking powder (also called "Alsatian yeast" or "chemical yeast" in France) is a chemical raising agent, mainly bicarbonate of soda (or sodium bicarbonate), which acts with heat to make cakes rise.It is used in most cakes, like for example chestnut cake, added to the mixture, and put in the oven...
776K
herbes de Provence
(Found inTexts)The "Herbes de Provence" (Provençal herbs) preparation, as used in France, is a mix of dried herbs, crumbled fairly small. This mix is used for the typically "Mediterranean" flavour it brings. It is usually a combination (quite variable) of rosemary, thyme, basil, parsley, marjoram, summer savory,...
776K