Dinner Party

I am completely exhausted and I have one hour until it's time to set the table and two hours until time to start cooking dinner.

We started our day at Wegmans. I was thrilled to find a one-gallon glass sun tea pitcher for $5.99 but distraught to find pineapples were $3.99 and that cored pineapples were $5.99. That's nuts.

I spent $48.76, which I'm counting toward the August budget even though it's July 31. I was bummed about that until I remembered I bought the sun tea pitcher.

I bought:

• 2 pounds Wegman's butter, one salted, one unsalted, $1.50 each
• one pineapple, $3.99 (grrr)
• the large bottle of coffemate vanilla chai spice creamer, $2.99
• 2 pints heavy whipping cream, $1.49 each
• 3 packages of celestial seasoning tea (blueberry, almond, and berry), $2.29 each
• 1 liter of Orangina, $2.49
• 3/4 pound sliced ham from the deli, $4.31
• shredded gruyère (domestic?), $3.60
• smoked gouda, $3.47
• the sun tea jar, $5.99
• 3 lbs bananas, $1.09
• 6 ounces raspberries, $2.50
• strawberries, $2
• ground nutmeg, $2.99

Before we left, I made the pear soup and I had set the brioche out and shaped it. When we got home, I baked it and brewed iced tea (green with berry). Then we went to the liquor store for wine. My husband came home early for lunch, so we had leftover crêpes and then I prepped the pineapple crumble and the zucchini cakes.

At 3 p.m., I'll set the table.

At 4 p.m., I'll start the crôque monsieur.

When the crôque is in the oven, I'll fry the zucchini cakes. While we eat the first courses, the pineapple crumble will bake.

Recipes:
Follow these links:

• Brioche-- from The Paris Cookbook by Patricia Wells, also should be accessible via 'French,' 'bread,' and/or 'brioche.'
• Chilled Pear Soup-- Vegan, eileen bresslin
  
• Zucchini crabbiless cakes-- The Imus Ranch Cookbook, 'vegan' (Deirdre Imus calls it vegan even though she used eggs because she has her own chickens) and zucchini
• Perfumed Pineapple Crumble-- Venez Diner, C'est Prêt by Dominique Malet, follow pineapple or French or the name of the book
• Crôque Monsieur-- obviously French, it's from The Barefoot in Paris Cookbook by Ina garten
• Rye bread-- clicking on rye will show you all my experiments with rye flour

My daughter made me a lovely four-course meal:
Tomato salad (pictured)
Piled-High Sandwiches
A cheese and egg platter
Chocolate-Carrot Crumble

Perfumed Pineapple Crumble (Crumble d'Ananas à la Vanille)

We had leftovers for lunch. Fruit from yesterday's 90th birthday party for Nana. The last of the chicken salad with pecan-raisin bread. And some more American brie.

My husband set that up while I prepared a Perfumed Pineapple Crumble for his cousin's baby shower this afternoon.

I adore this cookbook that Jessica got me from France. I had some pineapple from the farmers market so I thought I'd give the pineapple crumble a go. Jessica, when she cooks from one of these French cookbooks, translates the entire recipe and does the conversions, writing it all on the cookbook before she starts.

I don't.

I read over it, look up unfamiliar ingredients (like cassonade, I didn't know that was brown sugar) and then bring the laptop with me for conversions and last minute questions for wordreference.com. Most of the time, I start preparing it and realize I hadn't even read the whole recipe.

So, Crumble d'Ananas à la Vanille called for:
100 g de buerre mou + 1 noix pour le moule
150 g de sucre cassonade + 3 cuillierées à soupe pour le moule
1 ananas
4 cuillerées à café d'extrait de vanille liquide ou en poudre
150 g de farine

So, my conversion calculator suggested that 85 grams equals a cup...
1 cup butter, plus some to grease the pan
About 2 cups brown sugar, plus three "soup spoons" for the pan
1 pineapple
4 "coffee spoons" of vanilla extract (in liquid or powder. I would love to have vanilla powder.)
2 cups flour (okay, I ended up doubling this because my crumbs were really wet and sticky)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Butter the pan and sprinkle (saupoudre- isn't that a great verb?) with three tablespoons of brown sugar.

Cut the pineapple into pieces. "Perfume" them with two teaspoons of vanilla and mix well. Arrange in the pan.

In a mixing bowl, mix the remaining sugar, the flour and the butter (sliced and soft) with the tips of your fingers to make "sandy" crumbs.

Add two teaspoons of vanilla and mix.

Cover the pineapple and bake for about 45 minutes.

Serve lukewarm or cold with vanilla ice cream.

Rabbit with Sage and Lemon (Lapin à la sauge et au citron)

I bought a three-pound rabbit at the farmers market today. I thought I'd make 2/3 of it, but half fit better in my pan. I got the idea of making rabbit from my Venez Dîner C'est Prêt cookbook that Jessica brought me from France.

Now, I didn't read the recipe very closely and so it took me a while to realize I needed a beer, and not just any beer but a "bière blonde" (blonde beer).

The recipe suggests that one rabbit will feed four people.

Ingredients
1 rabbit cut in "morsels" (the butcher cut mine in four center sections and each leg)
1 lemon, not juiced
4 cloves of garlic, whole, in the "skin?"
8 fresh sage leaves
1 bottle of blonde beer
12 black olives
salt, pepper

Preheat oven to 410 degrees.
Arrange the rabbit (I only used half the rabbit) on a platter and salt and pepper it. Place in baking dish with the lemon in quarters (I sliced into eighths). Add the sage leaves and the cloves of garlic.
Add the beer.
Cook one hour, adding the olives at the mid-point. Cook until the meat is tender and the sauce caramelizes. If it cooks too quickly, add more beer. If it doesn't reduce enough, return to the oven.

I'm serving with broccoli sautéed in garlic and olive oil and fresh pineapple.

The rabbit disappeared. I think my daughter could eat two pounds of rabbit meat by herself. Tender, moist, but like buffalo wings-- a lot of work to get the meat off the bone.

The sauce had a lot of flavor for how simple it was.

Chicken Sauteed in Ginger and Basil

Well, as usual, my dinner didn't end up anything like the picture in the cookbook. In this case, it's because I was translating an Asian-style recipe from my French cookbook, Venez Dîner C'est Prêt by Dominique Malet. The cookbook was a souvenir from France from my friend Jessica.

This recipe was Poulet Sauté au Gingembre et au basilic. (Chicken Sauteed in ginger and basil)

Please, please understand that while this turned out delicious, I relied on my own brain for the translation and I may not have read the recipe correctly.

Ingredients
Four chicken breasts, skinless and boneless, cut into stir fry pieces
4 cloves garlic, chopped (I'm going to up this next time)
1 tablespoon fresh ginger, grated fine (I may double this next time)
One 15-ounce can chicken broth*
1 tablespoon oil
3 tablespoons soy sauce (I use low sodium)
1 tablespoon powdered sugar (weird, eh?)
2 tablespoons sesame oil
2 handfuls basil leaves (I used a lot and I shredded mine by hand, next time I may double)
Sesame seeds for decoration

*The original recipe called for three tablespoons bouillon, prepared, but I have no idea how much that would be so I just used a can and made extra sauce to cook broccoli and pour on the rice. Maybe that's why mine tasted mild. And I ended up cooking the meat in juice, as opposed to stir-frying it in a wok. My wok is too small for all that chicken.

Gather ingredients so they are easily at hand for cooking.
Heat oil in pan. (on high)
Add garlic and ginger. Cook for several seconds. Add chicken and cook for two minutes. Reduce heat to medium. Add sugar, soy sauce and then the broth. Cook five more minutes. (I cooked longer, my chicken chunks were on the thick side.) At the end of five minutes, add sesame oil and basil leaves.
Serve immediately with rice. Garnish with basil leaves and/or sesame seeds. I also poured a Vouvray, though the book recommended a meursault (bourgogne).

I pulled all the chicken out of the juice and then cooked some fresh broccoli in it. I also put a fresh baguette on the table.

Sesame Pork with Pears

Tonight for dinner I really wanted to make Dominique Malet's Sesame Pork with Pineapple and Coriander. Except I don't have pineapple. Or coriander. Or sunflower oil. So... I winged it. Big shock, right?

Angel's Marinated Sesame Pork with Pears (served over Asian-style store-bought salad)

Four thin pork chops sliced into stir-fry strips

For the marinade:
Two(2) teaspoons cornmeal
Two (2) tablespoons low sodium soy sauce
One (1) tablespoon champagne vinegar
One (1) tablespoon Chambord
Two (2) tablespoons sesame oil*

Prepare marinade in the order listed, so the liquids dilute the corn meal.

Soak pork in marinade for about 15 minutes at room temperature. I prepare mine on a deep plate and sprinkled liberally with roasted sesame seeds I purchased at Forks Mediterranean Deli. I always get my sesame seeds there, they're way too expensive at the grocery store. Spices, too.

While the meat marinades, prep the following:
For the stir fry:
Fresh garlic or garlic powder
pears
soy sauce
garlic

Prepare a wok with canola oil. Heat oil. Add meat. Stir-fry meat for about three minutes on high. Sprinkle with about two teaspoons garlic powder and a pinch of ginger. Add pears in desired size of chunks and sprinkle with one tablespoon soy sauce. Sprinkle 1/2 teaspoon ginger and stir-fry for two more minutes, stirring constantly.

I'm going to serve mine over a Dole Asian Crunch Salad. Which I am augmenting with fresh spinach from my garden. This was my favorite meal in the last week or so...

*Special cooking oils and vinegars: like sesame oil, champagne vinegar, balsamic vinegar, and cooking wines can look expensive, but when you use sparingly to produce an authentic flavor or a special meal... it can really make a standard cheap cut of meat taste incredible.

Pasta with vegetables and artichoke hearts

I intended to make Dominique Malet's "Orecchiette Aux Brocolis" for lunch, but the laissez-faire state of our groceries contradicted that.
So I based a dish on hers.

Ingredients for Pasta with Vegetables and Artichokes
Pasta of your choice
About 3 cups frozen cauliflower, carrots and broccoli, cooked
About 2 cups frozen artichoke hearts, cooked
About four tablespoons garlic powder
one teaspoon garlic pepper
two teaspoons extra virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons slivered almonds
About 1/2 cup milk
grated cheeses
pepper

I cooked about 400 grams of elbow pasta.

While that cooked, I heated the olive oil in a skillet with the milk and garlic powder, garlic pepper and fresh ground pepper. Once it became bubbly I added the almond, the artichokes and the vegetables. I cooked them until good and hot.

I put the cooked noodles in a big serving dish. I poured the sauce over the noodles, holding the vegetables, artichokes and nuts back in the pan and returning them to the burner on high to try and brown them.

While they cooked, I stirred the noodles and noticed I didn't make much sauce.

I added the vegetable mixture to the noodles. As I served, I generously added grated parmesan, romano and asiago. The sauce was just enough to make the cheese stick to the noodles, but the vegetables soaked up most of the moisture.

The family devoured it, which surprised me because last time we had artichokes my daughter hated them.

For dessert, we had a small dish of vanilla ice cream.

Venez Dîner, C'est Prêt

Yesterday my friend Jessica came to visit after her semester in France, in the northern city of Rennes. I asked her to bring me home a cookbook, a real French one in French. She selected Venez Dîner, C'est Prêt by Dominique Malet. (Come to dine, it's ready) As the cover says, "300 menu gourmands pour gagner du temps."

The book offers a mix-and-match approach to quick entertaining, assuming that you're having guests after work or when busy. I flipped through most of it before my brain kicked in and started translating basic things like teaspoon and tablespoon (or, at least that's what I hope coffee spoons and soup spoons are).

It includes pantry lists and mix-and-match menus, based on what you hope to serve (like veal, fish or game) and how many courses you had in mind (appetizer, main course, dessert) or (main course/side and dessert). It even includes a few vegetarian recipes.

I was thinking of attempting one for lunch, or maybe just throwing together a quiche. I don't have many groceries right now as I've been waiting for June to come before spending more money... but I think I could do an approximation of the one broccoli and noodle dish for lunch and for dinner, I can try the pork with pineapple and serve it with the Asian salad I bought yesterday. Another one of those Dole salads.