Poached Pear Clafoutis

so precious that i had to drive with the clafoutis on my lap

baked clafoutis!

arrangement

slicing the poached pears

poaching the pears

rolling the dough

making pate sucree the night before

I recently splurged on Michel Roux's book "Pastry", which I've been happily devouring for the last two days.  French pastry is so charming!  So here is my first attempt at both making a pate sucree dough and a poached pear clafoutis.  I made two: one for my mother's office staff and one for my aunt who recently hurt her back and obviously nothing heals the body quite like copious amounts of butter and sugar.  

The results of a beginner's attempt: Clearly my pate sucree tart could afford to be more delicate but let's just say I was going for the "rustic" look.  Yeah.  The clafoutis was very light, airy, a lovely custard-y flavor.  This took a lot of work though, and I'm working on 4 hours of sleep because of it.  Delivering the clafoutis made me really anxious.  I kept imagining them flying around in my car and breaking apart, and me--terribly deflated.  But I couldn't cover them to keep them in place on their plates because then the pretty fluff of the egg batter would collapse.  So I drove with the clafoutis very lovingly in my lap.  I felt very protective.  

Golden Beets, a trilogy

You should know, this is the mileage I got from two beets.  Sam found golden beets at the farmers market last week and was generous enough to share some with me. Thank you Sam!

I've been wanting golden beets ever since Spring rolled around, mostly because I've been wanting to to layer the colors of red and golden beets--I mean, can you think of a more fantastically colored vegetable?  

Here is what I did with Sam's golden beets:

1. Beet, Goat Cheese, Caramelized Onion Tart

Ingredients:

1 medium sized golden beet (or half of one enormous one)

1 medium red beet

8 sprigs of fresh thyme

1 yellow onion

1 1/2 tablespoons of butter

1 sheet of puff pastry

3 tablespoons of goat cheese

4 garlic cloves

olive oil

kosher salt

pepper

1) preheat oven to 425

2) in foil pouches, roast the beets with olive oil, slightly smashed garlic cloves, salt and pepper.  make sure to have separate pouches for the red and golden beets so the colors don't bleed

3) roast the beets for about a hour and 15 minutes or until fork tender

4) meanwhile caramelize onions by slicing them lengthwise and slowly sauteing them in the butter (try to move them minimally so that they caramelize and keep the heat low so they do not burn)

5) defrost a puff pastry sheet and cover with the caramelized onions and thyme

6) slice the roasted beets into rounds of equal thickness and layer on top of onions in a pattern

7) top with the garlic cloves that were roasted with the beets

8) crumble goat cheese on tart

9) in a 400 degree oven, bake the tart for twenty minutes

2. Golden Beet, Roasted Garlic, Mandarin Orange Salad

ingredients:

1 cup roasted and sliced beets

5 cloves of roasted garlic

1/4 cup mandarin oranges

a handful of toasted pine nuts

1/2 lemon

5 tablespoons of red wine vinegar

5 tablespoons of olive oil

2 tablespoons orange juice

1 tablespoon whole grain or dijon mustard

1. roast beets as indicated in the tart recipe and slice in wedges

2. roast garlic in a foil pouch with 1 tablespoon of olive oil for about 45 minutes or golden brown

3. toss the beets, toasted pine nuts, roasted garlic, and mandarin oranges together

4. in a separate bowl, whisk the olive oil, red wine vinegar, mustard, lemon juice and orange juice together

5. dress the beets and top with mint or cilantro

3. Pickled Golden Beets

ingredients:

1 beet

1 teaspoons whole mustard seed

1 cup white distilled vinegar

1/2 cup honey

two bay leaves

1/2 teaspoon whole cloves

2 garlic cloves

2 sprigs of thyme

1. boil the beet for 45 minutes, peel, and slice in rounds of equal thickness

2. in a saucepan bring the vinegar and honey to a boil

3. process a canning jar by putting in the oven for 10 minutes at 225 degrees

4. put the sliced beets, spices, and thyme in the processed jar

5. pour in the vinegar/honey mixture carefully into the jar. do not overfill

6. immediately close the lid tightly

7. leave for about two weeks before eating

Sometimes We Are The Kind Of Family That Barbecues

roasted vegetables and portobello mushrooms for those of us who did not want doc's 2 pound burger patties

the assembly line

despite have an excellent grill, doc prefers this thing

doc doing doc things

ridiculous.  that's about the amount of red meat i eat in a year

balsamic glazed red onion relish

caramelized yellow onions

I think we're not really the kind of family that barbecues.  I think Doc would like us to be.  But once in a while a barbecue can be quite fun.  The weather was perfect for this sort of thing and there were kids in the pool and we were all communally preparing food--it felt very all american.  It felt like fourth of july.  The food was good. The clean up afterwards and general exhaustion afterwards was not. 

Haute Cakes With A Clan of Murrays (a sprinkling of chos)

kristina, daniel, brian

doc, doc's mother, kelly (doc's sister), and mom

something with potatoes

blueberry cornmeal pancakes

the best egg salad in the world

oatmeal with brown sugar and mixed fruit

A favorite, for many reasons. There is much to love here. I've never had anything that didn't taste cozy at Haute Cakes. I had their blueberry cormeal pancakes for the first time and they were amazing--just the right amount of grit.

Saeyoung had the best egg salad sandwich i have ever tasted. It had olive tapenade and anchovies. Wonderful.

Also, I had a nice conversation with Dr. Murray's mother about the books she was reading. That was pleasant.

Haute Cakes

1807 Westcliff Dr

Newport, CA 92660

949.642.4114

242 Cafe Sushi

my favorite people

salmon and tuna sashimi with lotus root

sushi soup

swiss chard on a roll

45 minute wait. okay.

Today was unexpected. I was at a writer's retreat when I got a series of texts from my sister considering a nice dinner with just my mom, my sister, and me. Maybe this was impractical--to drive to Orange County unexpectedly but nothing seemed as comfortable and lovely as having dinner with them, just them.

We went to 242 Cafe Sushi in Laguna Beach, which is one of our favorite sushi places. I can say with a good amount of confidence that I couldn't live without Japanese food, it's just a life not worth living in my opinion. Authentic, 242 Cafe Sushi is not, but the quality of their fish is excellent and where else can you get your roll wrapped in Swiss chard? They don't serve soy sauce because all of their sushi comes with its own specifically complementary sauce. I believe the owner was the former sous chef for Nobu, but I could be wrong about this.

It's a very small restaurant, just a sushi bar and 3 tables. They only have one server. We had to wait 45 minutes to get in, which was a little excruciating because I was beginning to have hunger pains but in the end, everything was worth it. My favorite of the evening was the sashimi with lotus roots and garlic chips. Lotus root is amazing. I want to put lotus root in everything. I think it would be great in sandwiches (note to self).

242 Cafe Sushi

242 N coast highway

Laguna Beach, Ca 92651

949.494.2444

The Many Iterations of Nancy Cake

blue (berry) nancy cake

ew! it looks like there are bugs in my cake, very organized bugs!

It's official, Nancy Cake is my go-to recipe.  It's pretty fool proof and you can add any fruit to it.