Pan-Roasted Asparagus

It's April near Paris, and you know what that means...cold, windy, rainy weather. I still wouldn't go so far as to call it the cruelest month. That would be November. But April also means the beginning of spring produce: strawberries, sorrel, peas, spring onions, asparagus.

Northern Europeans, however, seem to appreciate white asparagus more than the green stuff. I personally could never make friends with white asparagus: it requires peeling, and even then it can be stringy. So I was delighted to find beautiful green asparagus at a roadside market while we were on the return trip from vacation. 

This dish involves three basic elements: toasted breadcrumbs flavored with anchovy, lemon zest, and garlic; asparagus that's been roasted on the stovetop, and fried eggs that create a bit of a sauce and make the dish substantial enough for lunch.

The asparagus comes out of the pan somewhat toasty but also tender-crisp. However, I made the mistake of using the wrong kind of oil (the "good" olive oil, meant to be used as a finishing oil ) and overheating the pan: the asparagus picked up an unpleasant burnt-oil taste. I haven't had this problem roasting my asparagus in the oven, so I would recommend using a "normal" olive oil and the oven.

The bread crumbs were controversial: Claire immediately picked up on the fishy taste and was not happy about it. I thought it was kind of OK, but the dish would also have been good without the anchovy. Maybe even better.

And finally, the fried eggs. I picked up an awesome technique from Elle magazine: You can fry eggs in the oven! I put a bit of olive oil in my nonstick (oven-safe) skillet, cracked the eggs into it, and put the skillet in a 350 oven for 5 minutes--the eggs and asparagus started cooking at about the same time. They turned out great: the whites were completely set (which is normally a problem for me), but the yolks were still nice and runny.

I liked this dish, and I think it has the potential to be something I love. Changes I would make would be to roast the asparagus in the oven (since I would be turning it on for the eggs anyway) and to replace the anchovy with Parmesan. With those changes, I think it would make a perfect springtime lunch/brunch dish.

Roasted Chicken Legs with Smoked Paprika

Once again I took Melissa Clark with me on vacation, and this time it turned out really well. Sadly, there is no photographic evidence of the meal, so let me show you where I cooked it.

This is the gîte, or vacation house, that our friend Nadine rented to celebrate her birthday with friends and family. It's in south-central France in a small town called Servas. The house was huge and gorgeous, and the location was also not too shabby.

We could look out our windows and see the hills and the small medieval towns and the olive orchards in the area. It was too cold to enjoy the pool, so instead we played a lot of card games and did some sightseeing and ate. And drank. And enjoyed being together in such a lovely place.

 Somehow I found myself spending a good deal of time in the kitchen, which was no hardship (especially since that got me out of most of the dishwashing). I had remembered my knives this time, and the equipment was otherwise really great. I cranked out a lot of "exotic" meals: pancakes (for Claire's birthday), couscous (because it feeds a crowd), scalloped potatoes with hot dogs on the side (again, Claire's special request), and the roasted chicken recipe.

 Many of the others at the house had never had pancakes or couscous before, but everyone was willing to give this strange food a try, and they all seemed to really like it. Therefore, I figured I could go ahead and fix the spicy chicken. There were two chickens, so I did one "classic" roast chicken with mustard and butter, and then I had Sami butterfly the other chicken (with many exclamations of awe and surprise from the others) so that I could marinate it in the strange ingredients I had brought. Ginger, chili, smoked paprika, cilantro: these are all still not an everyday part of the French pantry, and when I combined them with orange, salt, and olive oil, everyone seemed a bit skeptical. Especially when I sliced in about three chiles, realizing that they had no heat at all.
So the chickens went in the oven, the wine for the evening was opened, the snacks came out, and we played some cards while the chicken roasted. Once Sami had carved the chickens and we had brought them out with the leftover couscous, the taste testing began. Everyone wanted to try the "strange" chicken, and they all seemed to like it a lot--there was none left. What amused me, though, was that our American friend Jean preferred the classic French-style chicken while Nadine's French mother, who had been the most skeptical of all about my cooking decided that the "spicy" chicken was more to her liking.
In any case, this recipe was quite a success. It's sweet and a little spicy (your results will vary depending on the chiles you use) and very flavorful, without one flavor dominating. And while it would (and will) make a great weeknight dinner, for me it's now all about sitting around a giant table with a lot of good people, relaxing and enjoying life.

Matzo Brei

Matzo is not something I buy or eat on a regular basis. When we were kids, we would sometimes get it and eat it spread with salted butter. But other than that, it's pretty much been a novelty item to eat at Seder meals.

So when Maddy proposed we make the Matzo Brei, I had to think about whether matzo was even available at the grocery store here. Fortunately, since it's Passover now, there was in fact plenty of matzo to be had. Of course, the first thing I made with it was this. And Claire sampled it with butter and salt and pronounced it good.

 But now it was time to make the Brei. In German, Brei means porridge, and that kind of makes sense here, since you soak the matzo down to a soft mass.

 The recipe is basically a matzo frittata: you beat eggs and milk with salt and plenty of pepper, and then you thrown in your soaked and drained matzo.

 Strangely enough, while I was cooking this recipe, this story popped up on my iPod, so I could fully appreciate the effort that went into my matzo.

 But matzo brei? Not so much effort. Now we're ready to melt the butter. Melissa calls for SIX TABLESPOONS of the stuff. This is probably half that, and it's still pretty darned buttery. (If you're wondering about the little white things, the salted butter here has large salt crystals--yum--that create that effect.)

Your matzo mixture goes in the pan and cooks for a while until it's nice and brown. What's nice is that you can flip it over in quarters, so you don't stress as you might with a frittata.

 I did the caramelized onions on the side because we're a family of caramelized onion fans (Claire said she wanted the whole batch for her dinner). It was a good decision: I liked this better with the onions than with the honey, especially when it's for dinner.

While this recipe seemed weird, we all really liked it. Julia said it was like a German pancake. It's substantial yet fluffy, and I can see taking it over to the sweet side some time. Claire tried it with a variety of toppings, from honey to sriracha, and she said she liked it best with ketchup and caramelized onions. The rest of us stuck pretty much just to the caramelized onions and that was just fine. I made two batches for the four of us (one batch=4 squares of matzo and 4 eggs), and that was just right for everyone but me--I couldn't finish mine.

So I'm glad Maddy picked this recipe and that the store had matzo. I would never have tried the recipe otherwise, and that would have been a shame.

Curried Coconut Tomato Soup

In her quest to seize more control of the kitchen, my daughter Claire now cooks every Monday. That actually works out great for me, since I teach until 5 on those days, and by the time I've gotten on the train and back home, it's after 6 and I'm beat. She loves it because she gets to cook whatever she feels like cooking, assuming that she has planned far enough ahead to give me a shopping list. She and Julia also both love Mondays because Claire likes to get dinner on the table early. I have adjusted somewhat to French mealtimes and usually start cooking at 6, but Claire usually has dinner ready on the table at shortly after 6, or right when I get home. Apparently French cafeteria food isn't that good, and the girls are ravenous when they get home.

And so Claire was the one who made this soup on Monday night: she didn't feel like planning, and I knew that the recipes in Melissa Clark's book are pretty easy to follow, so I gave her this task. I told her to take photos, but she forgot.

I was not there to witness the cooking process, but could piece together the following information: Claire followed the recipe to the letter. I saw the scale (to weigh out the tomatoes) and many measuring spoons out on the counter. She seems to have started the soup in a deep skillet and then realized it would have to be moved to a soup pot. And she would like to pass on this word of wisdom:

"If you have a blender full of hot soup, it's probably not a good idea to use the 'pulse' function." She did a pretty good job of cleaning up the ensuing soup volcano (fortunately, she doesn't seem to have been injured), but I'm guessing things got pretty messy in the kitchen.

So when I arrived home, the apartment smelled fabulous, but Claire told me that "the texture isn't right". I took a look and had a taste, and we did some adjusting. 

We are not big fans of the "brothy"soup, so I decided to add a handful (maybe 1/4 cup) of rice to thicken things up and add texture. Claire told me she had already added more curry powder and more coconut milk for thickness. I added a bunch of salt and also threw in a couple of sugar cubes for flavor balance.

We served the soup with toasted almonds and chopped frozen herbs and squeezed lime juice on top. It was delicious with the baguette pictured. Grilled cheese would also have been a great addition.

If you make this recipe, I recommend you follow Claire's advice and "add more of everything except the water".