Crème brulée

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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 of the former recipe, with video.

Peach and verbena feuilleté

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In French, a "feuilleté" can be anything, sweet or savoury, wrapped in or with a base of puff pastry, from a sausage roll to a millefeuille. This is an elegant tart-style feuilleté with a caramelized pastry base, topped with a light custard flavoured with verbena. This is based on a confectioner's custard (french pastry cream), lightened with meringue. On this bed of delicious custard, the finishing touch is a double rosette of peeled fresh peach slices.

Bistro-style red endive salad

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Have you tried red Belgian endives? They are similar in size to the more common white sort, just as crunchy, but slightly less bitter. They are the main feature in this salad inspired by French bistro cuisine: combined with chopped hard-boiled eggs, fried ham and croutons, in a rémoulade dressing.

Chicken and mushroom pie

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This lovely pie has a puff pastry crust filled with a mixture of fried mushrooms, diced chicken and parsley, all bound in a cream sauce.

Rustic chicken and mushroom pie

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This homely looking pie gets back to what good, old-fashioned pies are all about: it's round, deep and has both a proper bottom and lid. The one small concession to modernity is the use of puff pastry for a lighter, crisper crust. The filling combines mushrooms, leeks and diced chicken in a cream sauce.

Verbena flan

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In this recipe, a delicious variation on the Parisian flan with verbena, you'll see that the delicate taste of verbena goes very well with the slightly creamy sweetness of the flan.

How to make tart cases

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It's not easy to make beautiful, even tart cases, but here I'll let you into the secret of how the professionals do it. You will see that there are a lot of little details that make all the difference. It's a bit technical, but don't worry, I'll guide you through the important points.

Mouna

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Mouna is a delicious citrus-flavoured brioche from the Oran region of Algeria. It origins are much disputed, but it was no doubt inspired by a brioche brought over by Spanish immigrants from the Valencia region: the "Mona de Pascua". However, it is also amusing to remember that the citizens of Oran used to enjoy their Sunday picnics, with brioche as the dessert, near to Fort Lamoune, so...

Mont d'or in brioche

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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 dripped onto the layers below.

Surprise bread

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This recipe is for a large surprise bread so you can make six layers (48 small sandwiches if you divide each layer in 8), with three different flavours: smoked salmon/lime, smoked ham/butter, mayonnaise/chicken.

How to bake blind

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This method allows you to cook a tart case, and then fill with a preparation which may or may not need further cooking (fruit, chocolate, crème patissière , etc...).

Fresh mint ice-cream

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This well-flavoured ice-cream is excellent on its own, or in profiteroles with a chocolate sauce for example.

How to prepare sorrel

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Here is how to clean and cut fresh leaves to use in a recipe, by removing stalks and central vein, to retain only the very best of the sorrel.

Involtinis

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Involtinis are small rolls of meat, usually veal, and cheese. Here is my version.

Poached eggs

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Poached eggs are cooked, without the shell, in barely simmering (nearly boiling) water. White should be firm and yolk soft, that's the difficulty. This recipe teaches you how to succeed with three important points.

Peach and mint salad

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Here is a very simple, fresh and delicious recipe; the flavour of mint goes very well with peaches.

Chinese style chicken

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Only "chinese style", not a true chinese recipe.

Paté en croute (terrine in a pie crust)

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The French classic "Paté en croute" is a terrine of different meats layered and baked in a pie crust. There are many recipes which vary the kind of meat and the seasonings. This is my version with pork, veal and chicken, which is not too difficult, though it does entail quite a lot of work.

Courgette tart with mint

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Fried rounds of courgette in a puff pastry case with a feta and mint filling. You will find that this combination of feta with mint gives an agreeable fresh lift to this tart.

Spaghetti with mussels and basil

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Mussels and pasta cooked separately, then combined in a cream sauce made with the reduced mussel juices.

Cooking with herbs

Herbs: there's nothing else so small that can add so much to a recipe. They are not only for garnishing, but are a true part of the dish, sometimes one of the main ingredients. A small example of the "power" of herbs: you make a chopped carrot salad, which is very good with a vinaigrette, but if you...
June 3^rd 2024228 K 13.9

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 2023219 K 14.3

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 202383 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 202368 K4.1

fresh coriander (cilantro)

This is a plant of which the leaves are used fresh. It has a very subtle flavour which is remarkable in salads. It is an indispensible ingredient in Asian and Mediterranean cuisine. The seeds are also available (like white pepper grains but paler), which have a different taste.
August 29^th 202347 K4.2

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 202356 K4.1

mint

There are several kinds of mint with different flavours, some stronger than others. The important thing, if you have the choice, is to use the strongest flavour possible (crush a leaf with your fingers, and smell to compare).
August 29^th 202343 K4.2

Whenever you have fresh herbs - parsley, chervil, coriander, mint, etc. - to incorporate into a recipe, we tell you to chop them up. In this case, "chopping" means separating the leaves from the stems, keeping only the leaves, and chopping them more or less finely. It's not very complicated,...
September 12^th 202315 K5