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Go to Recipe Go to Video The French Are Involved in Everything As often happens with an amazing invention, culinary or otherwise, the French are hovering close by. This appears to be the case with one of the best cookies ever invented, shortbread. Here is the legend: The French who were at court with …
Once a Simple Quick Bread From the griddles of the British Isles to the chic cafés of Paris, the humble scone has come a long way. It was once a simple, and surely very heavy, quick bread made throughout the British Isles with the grains at hand, primarily oats, but also barley and, perhaps, wheat. …
I admit to being a Normandy chauviniste which means that when something is delicious in Normandy, it is the most delicious in the world. The Best Sablé in Normandy While doing research in Normandy, I discovered the very best, most tender sablés in a patisserie in a small town called Caumont l’Eventé. It was by …
Go to Recipe Go to Video Flamboyant Vegetable The modest yet flamboyant radish, that little harbinger of spring, has a most distinguished history. The people of the Levant – Turkey to Ethiopia – were the first to enjoy their crisp texture and sometimes spicy flavor. The radish travelled to Europe through the Mediterranean basin to …
Go to Recipe Go to Video Each year as spring arrives with its bouquets of daffodils and hyacinths, its early tulips and clear sunshine, faithful Christians begin to celebrate the Easter season. The celebration takes on different guises, but it almost always includes fasting, eschewing rich foods in order to focus on more spiritual subjects. …
Go to Recipe Go to Video Have you ever really THOUGHT about mashed potatoes, I mean REALLY thought about them? They are so often served to fill the gap, the stomach, the plate with their bulk that their true nature tends to be ignored. Poor little mashed potatoes. Originally From Peru Potatoes have always been …
Go to Recipe Go to Video This little cake holds a dear place in the heart of every French cook, for it is the one recipe that is taught to children at school when they begin their educational career, and it. May well represent one of their most fun school activities in what is, from …
Go to Recipe Go to Video Pate brisée literally means “broken pastry”. Translations can often be somewhat awkward, making something so ethereally delicious sound like something that just crashed to the floor and shattered into a thousand pieces. But the allusion isn’t all wrong, for the pate brisée that results in the recipe you will …
Go to Recipe Go to Video The history of Sauce Béchamel is a knotty one of subterfuge and false claims, heavy stuff for a sauce made with four simple ingredients. It begs a question: does this matter? There is only one answer. YES! Because what would French cuisine be without mystery and intrigue? It is …
Go to Video Many might experience a traditional French breakfast and say “Why, that’s not a breakfast at all!” But they would be wrong, because like so many a French gastronomic traditions, the French breakfast is simply perfect. After all, it includes four major food groups: coffee, bread, butter, and jam. Nutritional Guidelines? But what …
