Excursion to Russia, 3: Russki a la frangourou!

Traditional Russian dishes are great, and I've had a go at making lots of them--but I've also created my own new dishes, inspired by that distinctive flavour and style. The other day, I made a meal that was entirely Russian in inspiration, but not all the dishes in it were classic Russian--rather they were 'russki a la frangourou'. I used ingredients that are easy to obtain and economical as well. All the vegetables for it came out of our garden but of course can be got in the shops(with the exception of sorrel, which might not be easy to find--but you can substitute a little chopped rocket with the addition ofa little lemon juice, to approximate it.)

Incidentally, before the meal we had a small aperitif--a shot of vodka accompanied by a small dish of olives and gherkins--a very minimalistic zakuska. You can also add chopped rollmop herrings, smoked salmon, etc etc if you want to go more elaborate for that part of the meal. The vodka we usually buy is 'Russian Standard', (standard meaning 'top quality' here), from St Petersburg--it's made on a base of pure cold water from the vast sea-like Lake Ladoga, near 'Peters'. It's an excellent vodka with a good clean flavour--we first tried it in Russia but you can easily get it anywhere now. But there are other good Russian vodkas easily available, like the famous Moscovite vodka Stolichnaya, as well as Polish and Swedish ones which aren't bad(though this is considered heresy in Russia!) There are even vodkas made in France these days! If you want real Russian--which I recommend--check the back of the bottle for provenance.

Here's the meal:

Entree: Green 'shchee' soup made with sorrel and spinach

Main course: Chicken breast fillet in a vodka and cranberry sauce

Vegetables: Roast beetroot with garlic and sour cream

Carrots in milk sauce

Salad.

Dessert: (not illustrated): Meringues with coffee cream.

For the entree:

This is a traditional Russian dish--'shchee' soup could almost be the national dish--it is basically a hearty vegetable soup, most often on a base of cabbage. But green 'shchee' is a spring dish made when the cabbages etc have finally run out and you get the first of the spring vegies popping up, ie sorrel and spinach. It is very simply made. Take a medium potato, cut into small dice. Chop an onion. Crush a clove garlic. Take a handful spinach, about eight leaves sorrel, and some dill. Fry the onion in some butter, add the potato, then the garlic. Stir till beginning to go golden. Add the spinach and sorrel, chopped. Add salt and pepper and some dill, stir well till softening. I then add a small splash of white wine or vodka(this is not traditional but tastes good!)and then some good stock--chicken or vegetable stock. Let it simmer till potato is soft, then either process or mash and sieve. Take a little milk--about 100 ml, mix in two egg yolks, beat. Stir through soup, and warm but do not boil. Serve soup with a dab of sour cream, and some chopped dill or chives.

Main course: This dish is my own invention but based on traditional Russian elements. Cranberries are frequently encountered in meat dishes. Fry the chicken breasts in a mixture of butter and olive oil till beginning to colour. Add a good splash of vodka to the pan, then some cranberry juice and dried cranberries. Salt, pepper to taste, also I add a little chopped tarragon. Cook gently in the sauce till the meat is cooked through. Add a little more vodka or juice as needed. (Sauce should be thick and glaze the meat nicely--you can also remove the fillets when they are cooked and reduce the sauce till thick then pour it over the chicken.)

Vegetables: Beets are often served with sour cream and garlic. This is my version: Parboil some small beetroot for about ten minutes, cut into pieces, sprinkle with olive oil and some garlic--either crushed or a couple of whole cloves can be nice. Roast for about 20-25 mins or until the beet is nicely glazed and the garlic is soft. Serve with a dab of sour cream and chopped herbs like chives. You can also use preserved beet for this if you like but it will have a different, more acid taste.

Carrots: this is a very traditional, and delicious, way to eat carrots. Cut some carrots either into sticks or rings, as you prefer. Cook them in a little butter till softening, then cover them with stock, either chicken or vegetable. Let them cook till completely tender, then drain off the liquid, add a nub of butter, a little flour, to make a roux. Stir around then slowly add a little milk till the sauce thickens up nicely around the carrots. It should coat them but not drown them.

You can also have boiled potatoes, if you wish, and/or rye or pumpernickel-style bread to sop up the vodka and cranberry sauce!

Salad: Whatever you normally have--we usually do lettuce and other salad greens plus tomatoes, with vinaigrette.

Meringues: This is a simple gesture towards a spectacular special-occasion meringue cake known as 'The swallow's nest.' The meringues can be home made or shop-bought. The coffee cream is made from whipping cream up with a little coffee powder, a little softened unsalted butter, and some sugar to sweeten it but not excessively(as the meringues are plenty sweet enough).

White wine goes well with this dinner. A good tea, like Russian caravan tea, can add an extra touch at the end, with caramelised (Vienna-style!) almonds and perhaps a nip of cherry brandy or similar, if you want to!

Prijatnovo appetita! (Bon appetit!)

Traditional Russian dishes are great, and I've had a go at making lots of them--but I've also created my own new dishes, inspired by that distinctive flavour and style. The other day, I made a meal that was entirely Russian in inspiration, but not all the dishes in it were classic Russian--rather they were 'russki a la frangourou'. I used ingredients that are easy to obtain and economical as well. All the vegetables for it came out of our garden but of course can be got in the shops(with the exception of sorrel, which might not be easy to find--but you can substitute a little chopped rocket with the addition ofa little lemon juice, to approximate it.)

Incidentally, before the meal we had a small aperitif--a shot of vodka accompanied by a small dish of olives and gherkins--a very minimalistic zakuska. You can also add chopped rollmop herrings, smoked salmon, etc etc if you want to go more elaborate for that part of the meal. The vodka we usually buy is 'Russian Standard', (standard meaning 'top quality' here), from St Petersburg--it's made on a base of pure cold water from the vast sea-like Lake Ladoga, near 'Peters'. It's an excellent vodka with a good clean flavour--we first tried it in Russia but you can easily get it anywhere now. But there are other good Russian vodkas easily available, like the famous Moscovite vodka Stolichnaya, as well as Polish and Swedish ones which aren't bad(though this is considered heresy in Russia!) There are even vodkas made in France these days! If you want real Russian--which I recommend--check the back of the bottle for provenance.

Here's the meal:

Entree: Green 'shchee' soup made with sorrel and spinach

Main course: Chicken breast fillet in a vodka and cranberry sauce

Vegetables: Roast beetroot with garlic and sour cream

Carrots in milk sauce

Salad.

Dessert: (not illustrated): Meringues with coffee cream.

For the entree:

This is a traditional Russian dish--'shchee' soup could almost be the national dish--it is basically a hearty vegetable soup, most often on a base of cabbage. But green 'shchee' is a spring dish made when the cabbages etc have finally run out and you get the first of the spring vegies popping up, ie sorrel and spinach. It is very simply made. Take a medium potato, cut into small dice. Chop an onion. Crush a clove garlic. Take a handful spinach, about eight leaves sorrel, and some dill. Fry the onion in some butter, add the potato, then the garlic. Stir till beginning to go golden. Add the spinach and sorrel, chopped. Add salt and pepper and some dill, stir well till softening. I then add a small splash of white wine or vodka(this is not traditional but tastes good!)and then some good stock--chicken or vegetable stock. Let it simmer till potato is soft, then either process or mash and sieve. Take a little milk--about 100 ml, mix in two egg yolks, beat. Stir through soup, and warm but do not boil. Serve soup with a dab of sour cream, and some chopped dill or chives.

Main course: This dish is my own invention but based on traditional Russian elements. Cranberries are frequently encountered in meat dishes. Fry the chicken breasts in a mixture of butter and olive oil till beginning to colour. Add a good splash of vodka to the pan, then some cranberry juice and dried cranberries. Salt, pepper to taste, also I add a little chopped tarragon. Cook gently in the sauce till the meat is cooked through. Add a little more vodka or juice as needed. (Sauce should be thick and glaze the meat nicely--you can also remove the fillets when they are cooked and reduce the sauce till thick then pour it over the chicken.)

Vegetables: Beets are often served with sour cream and garlic. This is my version: Parboil some small beetroot for about ten minutes, cut into pieces, sprinkle with olive oil and some garlic--either crushed or a couple of whole cloves can be nice. Roast for about 20-25 mins or until the beet is nicely glazed and the garlic is soft. Serve with a dab of sour cream and chopped herbs like chives. You can also use preserved beet for this if you like but it will have a different, more acid taste.

Carrots: this is a very traditional, and delicious, way to eat carrots. Cut some carrots either into sticks or rings, as you prefer. Cook them in a little butter till softening, then cover them with stock, either chicken or vegetable. Let them cook till completely tender, then drain off the liquid, add a nub of butter, a little flour, to make a roux. Stir around then slowly add a little milk till the sauce thickens up nicely around the carrots. It should coat them but not drown them.

You can also have boiled potatoes, if you wish, and/or rye or pumpernickel-style bread to sop up the vodka and cranberry sauce!

Salad: Whatever you normally have--we usually do lettuce and other salad greens plus tomatoes, with vinaigrette.

Meringues: This is a simple gesture towards a spectacular special-occasion meringue cake known as 'The swallow's nest.' The meringues can be home made or shop-bought. The coffee cream is made from whipping cream up with a little coffee powder, a little softened unsalted butter, and some sugar to sweeten it but not excessively(as the meringues are plenty sweet enough).

White wine goes well with this dinner. A good tea, like Russian caravan tea, can add an extra touch at the end, with caramelised (Vienna-style!) almonds and perhaps a nip of cherry brandy or similar, if you want to!

Prijatnovo appetita! (Bon appetit!)

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A culinary excursion to Russia, 2: Markets

Itook these photos in the markets of Yaroslavl, an ancient provincial town on the Volga River about 300 km north of Moscow. We were really impressed by the amazing range of food available at the market, and how beautifully it was presented. The colourful fruit stalls--both fresh and candied fruit, as above, which came from all over Russia-- were particularly attractive!

But there were also excellent fish stalls(above), which sold not only fresh but smoked and salted fish, and lovely red caviar(salmon roe); stalls selling pickles of all sort--gherkins in all sizes, pickled cabbage, pickled garlic, pickled onions; stalls selling nuts and spices like caraway and a variety of Caucasian spices..Vegetables included root vegetables like carrots, potatoes, beetroot--cabbages, red and white--lots of lettuces, tomatoes, peppers, spinach, sorrel--and lots of garlic(Russian cooking uses quite a lot of garlic) and onions, and herbs such as parsley and dill. Olives and olive oil(which surprisingly are also used a lot) and dried mushrooms(it wasn't the mushroom season) were also sold and there were various preserves of fruit, and jams. There were also dairy products--there's apparently a famous Yaroslavl cheese, though we didn't taste it, and butchers sold local lamb(there is a famous local breed)and beef, chicken and pork from further afield. There were also stalls piled high with Russian-produced biscuits, sweets and chocolates, and a stall selling, among other grains, the pearl barley which is used to make 'kasha', the famous Russian porridge, of which the charming (modern, English-language)Russian cookbook we bought in Moscow says, 'Man's thankful attitude to his daily bread is expressed in beautiful and tender names given to dishes. Take for example a pearl barley kasha. It is not a mere chance that the word pearl is present in its name. The dish bearing such a poetic name came to us from the distant past.'

I love it!

Itook these photos in the markets of Yaroslavl, an ancient provincial town on the Volga River about 300 km north of Moscow. We were really impressed by the amazing range of food available at the market, and how beautifully it was presented. The colourful fruit stalls--both fresh and candied fruit, as above, which came from all over Russia-- were particularly attractive!

But there were also excellent fish stalls(above), which sold not only fresh but smoked and salted fish, and lovely red caviar(salmon roe); stalls selling pickles of all sort--gherkins in all sizes, pickled cabbage, pickled garlic, pickled onions; stalls selling nuts and spices like caraway and a variety of Caucasian spices..Vegetables included root vegetables like carrots, potatoes, beetroot--cabbages, red and white--lots of lettuces, tomatoes, peppers, spinach, sorrel--and lots of garlic(Russian cooking uses quite a lot of garlic) and onions, and herbs such as parsley and dill. Olives and olive oil(which surprisingly are also used a lot) and dried mushrooms(it wasn't the mushroom season) were also sold and there were various preserves of fruit, and jams. There were also dairy products--there's apparently a famous Yaroslavl cheese, though we didn't taste it, and butchers sold local lamb(there is a famous local breed)and beef, chicken and pork from further afield. There were also stalls piled high with Russian-produced biscuits, sweets and chocolates, and a stall selling, among other grains, the pearl barley which is used to make 'kasha', the famous Russian porridge, of which the charming (modern, English-language)Russian cookbook we bought in Moscow says, 'Man's thankful attitude to his daily bread is expressed in beautiful and tender names given to dishes. Take for example a pearl barley kasha. It is not a mere chance that the word pearl is present in its name. The dish bearing such a poetic name came to us from the distant past.'

I love it!

reade more... Résuméabuiyad

Excursion to Russia, 1: The rebirth of Russian cooking

I'm doing something a bit different for my next two or three posts, which is take you on an excursion into the food of a country I've been fascinated by since I was about eleven, but whose food I only really discovered on a trip there last year: and that country is Russia.
I was drawn magnetically to this extraordinary country, its colourful, passionate, turbulent, imaginative people, their frightening and inspiring history, and magnificent literature, music and art. As a child and adolescent I read lots of Russian fairytales, plays, novels and short stories, and listened with delight to recordings of Russian folk music we had at home. For years, I dreamed of going there, but it wasn't till May 2010 that I was finally able to fulfill that dream. Not only did the country meet my expectations, it far exceeeded them. Even the things I was expecting: the awe-inspiring scale of rivers and lakes and forests and plains, the gorgeous distinctiveness of the architecture, the scary relics of the past, the amazing richness and depth of the artistic traditions that still remain, had a huge impact, at first hand. But other things were quite unexpected: a combination of dry humour, nonchalance and exuberance; riotous spring vegetation and clothing and bright blue skies; the charming,intimate beauty of smalltown houses, the vibrant energy of the cities. And the excellent food.
Food wasn't really something I'd ever thought about in connection with Russia. Aside from caviar, vodka, pickled fish and borscht, I had no real image of it. And of course during the long Soviet dictatorship, there were so many food shortages and privations that the notion there was such a thing as Russian cuisine fell by the wayside, at least in Western minds. The few tourists who braved Soviet restaurants reported stodgy, badly cooked, badly presented food, and though the upper classes of the Soviet system ate very well out of the public eye, the majority of people certainly did not. And that did not improve but actually worsened for a while after the regime finally crashed in the early 90's. We kept hearing horror stories from people who'd visited Russia in the past, and resigned ourselves to an amazing cultural experience but bad food. So it was wonderful to be surprised into the discovery that things had completely changed. In my opinion, it's as good a sign as any of a country's recovery from hard times, when people start taking pleasure and pride in preparing and cooking food again, not only for themselves and their families and friends, but for strangers. And not just for tourists, or the wealthy, either, but for ordinary locals looking for a meal out. But the excellence of the food wasn't the only surprise; the other was the discovery that this was no modern phenomenon, and that travellers in pre-Soviet times had also commented on the excellence of the food.
A fascinating 1857 English book I own called Russians at Home, by Sutherland Edwards, describes the menu at a typical modest restaurant in Moscow then: 'the usual dinner supplied for three-quarters of a rouble(half a crown) consists of soup, with a pie of minced meat or minced vegetables, an entree, and some kind of sweet. That, too, may be considered the kind of dinner which persons of moderate means have every day at home. ' Edwards also talks about a popular Russian cookbook of the time, entitled 'Forty-Two Dinners' which rather in the manner of the successful Four Ingredients cookbooks of today, centred around a gimmick: four dishes only per dinner, up to dinner 42, with always a soup to start with(starting with soup is very much a Russian tradition.)Edwards quotes some of the menus: Dinner Twenty-Seven, for instance features a/batvinia, a hearty soup made of boiled beef, boiled beetroot, spring opinions, caraway seeds, and a puree or sorrel or spinach, with a somechopped boiled egg; b/stuffed carrots; c/roast mutton with mushrooms; d/ Compote or jelly of almonds. Thirty-Three, a Lenten dish(Russian Orthodox tradition strictly observes the no-meat fast all through Lent), was: a/Oukha, or sterlet soup(the sterlet is a popular fish found only in the Volga); b/Fish cutlets with a sauce of oil and vinegar; c/Fried perch; d/Kissel(a kind of blancmange made with almond milk and fine oatmeal.) Other foods he mentions include various sorts of game, icecream, gingerbread(he makes the intriguing remarks that in pre-Christian times pagan Russians used to makes offerings of carved gingerbread to their deities—the tradition of shaped and decorated gingerbread endures to this day.) He also lists traditional drinks, from gallons of tea of course; kvass, an effervescent drink made from the flour of black bread and malt and served very cold(though rather an acquired taste for foreigners, it is still very popular in Russia); vodkas of all sorts, from the plain kind to flavoured ones(there are many kinds: for instance in Dr Zhivago a red rowanberry vodka is mentioned; and in Russia we sampled a honey and pepper vodka from Ukraine)and champagne, of which, he says, the Russians are very fond and consume in great quantities. While wealthy people drank French champagne, most people then as now drank the bubbly made in the Crimea or the Don River area, which cost only a fifth of the French variety.
By contrast, while Edwards extols these home-grown champagnes, the Frenchman Etienne Taris, in his 1910 book, La Russie et ses Richesses, sniffily says that the Russian wines can appropriate French place-names all they like, 'one can always tell their true origin'! Grudgingly, he admits that the soups are very similar to peasant soups in France; that the mushrooms are excellent, the fish and game very good; but otherwise he is not enamoured of Russian food, with its sweet and sour dishes, pickled fish, sour cream and black bread, tastes which are foreign to the French repertoire: and he makes the acid observation that 'no wonder there is such a fashion for French food in Russia!' But in both books, the exuberant Russian attitude to food—and life—is amply documented and obviously delighted in by the writers; but that's even more obvious in the quintessential Russian cookbook, Elena Molokhovets' A Gift to Young Housewives, which was the massive best-selling cookery tome of its day. It was an amazing compendium, a mix of hilariously extravagant, slapdashly insouciant and thriftily careful recipes, and a good deal of household advice, written by an extraordinary woman who ran a country estate. Reprinted umpteen times from its first appearance in 1861 to 1917, it became a huge cultural phenomenon, cherished by generations, carried into exile, and lovingly parodied by Chekhov, among others. Repudiated by the Bolsheviks as a symbol of 'bourgeois decadence', the book went underground after 1917, was circulated in 'samizdat' copies, and was never officially reprinted in its entirety during the whole of the Soviet period. But a few short months after the crash of the Soviet regime, reprinted copies of the book were being sold on the streets of Moscow, and today the book has once again taken its place as the great classic of Russian food writing. (It is now available in English, translated by Joyce Toomre, as 'Classic Russian Cooking', Indiana University Press)
That exuberance and abundance has come back now; and so we discovered a Russia where markets and shops are again filled with colourful arrays of fresh ingredients from every corner of this vast land; where even modest restaurants offer simple, fresh and delicious traditional menus and street-corner vendors sell smoked sausage hot dogs, cold glasses of kvass, caramelised almonds and luscious icecreams. We discovered the most spectacular and tasty candied fruit ever, specialities of southern Russia, from whole cumquats to apricot and strawberries; beautiful salads, from grated beetroot with garlic and vinegar to spectacular bowls of greens, tomatoes and olives; fantastic smoked and fresh fish from the cold northern lakes; a wide variety of soups; mushrooms served in all kinds of ways(Russians are very very fond of mushrooms—it's a favourite family outing, gathering mushrooms in the forest) a tempting array of zakuski, the tapas-like nibbles served with vodka, from olives and gherkins to pickled fish and little pies and dumplings; lovely berry and nut tarts; and the prettiest gilt gingerbread outside of fairytales. We also discovered that Russians, like Australians, love cooking outdoors, and a favoured recipe for a good meal out with friends consists of a handy river bank, a barbecue constructed of stones and charcoal, some freshly-caught fish, lamb shashliks with spicy sauce, various salads, some loud music on a radio, and plenty of beer!
Traditionally, Russian cuisine is dominated by the bounty of waterways and forest, by fish and game and mushrooms and nuts and berries and honey, but also by the necessities of long winters: by lots of pickled and smoked and salted fish, meat and vegetables. But because of the vastness of the land and its many climactic zones, it has access to an extremely wide variety of other things: the Caucasian vividness of fruit, vegetables, wine and lamb, for instance, and rich dairy products, especially cream, but also good yoghurt, and some cheeses. And the imaginative quality which has always characterised the Russian temperament is being fully applied now to local cuisine, so that traditional dishes are not only being cherished for what they are, but also experimented with, and new ways of highlighting the country's excellent produce, borrowing from all kinds of culinary traditions, are being tried.
It's not going to be long before the West generally discovers another foodie paradise; indeed it's already beginning to happen. This September will see the first-ever Flavours of Russia culinary tour organised from Australia, featuring celebrity guest and famous gourmet Maggie Beer. Watch for a touch of Russian becoming the new foodie fashion!

I'm doing something a bit different for my next two or three posts, which is take you on an excursion into the food of a country I've been fascinated by since I was about eleven, but whose food I only really discovered on a trip there last year: and that country is Russia.
I was drawn magnetically to this extraordinary country, its colourful, passionate, turbulent, imaginative people, their frightening and inspiring history, and magnificent literature, music and art. As a child and adolescent I read lots of Russian fairytales, plays, novels and short stories, and listened with delight to recordings of Russian folk music we had at home. For years, I dreamed of going there, but it wasn't till May 2010 that I was finally able to fulfill that dream. Not only did the country meet my expectations, it far exceeeded them. Even the things I was expecting: the awe-inspiring scale of rivers and lakes and forests and plains, the gorgeous distinctiveness of the architecture, the scary relics of the past, the amazing richness and depth of the artistic traditions that still remain, had a huge impact, at first hand. But other things were quite unexpected: a combination of dry humour, nonchalance and exuberance; riotous spring vegetation and clothing and bright blue skies; the charming,intimate beauty of smalltown houses, the vibrant energy of the cities. And the excellent food.
Food wasn't really something I'd ever thought about in connection with Russia. Aside from caviar, vodka, pickled fish and borscht, I had no real image of it. And of course during the long Soviet dictatorship, there were so many food shortages and privations that the notion there was such a thing as Russian cuisine fell by the wayside, at least in Western minds. The few tourists who braved Soviet restaurants reported stodgy, badly cooked, badly presented food, and though the upper classes of the Soviet system ate very well out of the public eye, the majority of people certainly did not. And that did not improve but actually worsened for a while after the regime finally crashed in the early 90's. We kept hearing horror stories from people who'd visited Russia in the past, and resigned ourselves to an amazing cultural experience but bad food. So it was wonderful to be surprised into the discovery that things had completely changed. In my opinion, it's as good a sign as any of a country's recovery from hard times, when people start taking pleasure and pride in preparing and cooking food again, not only for themselves and their families and friends, but for strangers. And not just for tourists, or the wealthy, either, but for ordinary locals looking for a meal out. But the excellence of the food wasn't the only surprise; the other was the discovery that this was no modern phenomenon, and that travellers in pre-Soviet times had also commented on the excellence of the food.
A fascinating 1857 English book I own called Russians at Home, by Sutherland Edwards, describes the menu at a typical modest restaurant in Moscow then: 'the usual dinner supplied for three-quarters of a rouble(half a crown) consists of soup, with a pie of minced meat or minced vegetables, an entree, and some kind of sweet. That, too, may be considered the kind of dinner which persons of moderate means have every day at home. ' Edwards also talks about a popular Russian cookbook of the time, entitled 'Forty-Two Dinners' which rather in the manner of the successful Four Ingredients cookbooks of today, centred around a gimmick: four dishes only per dinner, up to dinner 42, with always a soup to start with(starting with soup is very much a Russian tradition.)Edwards quotes some of the menus: Dinner Twenty-Seven, for instance features a/batvinia, a hearty soup made of boiled beef, boiled beetroot, spring opinions, caraway seeds, and a puree or sorrel or spinach, with a somechopped boiled egg; b/stuffed carrots; c/roast mutton with mushrooms; d/ Compote or jelly of almonds. Thirty-Three, a Lenten dish(Russian Orthodox tradition strictly observes the no-meat fast all through Lent), was: a/Oukha, or sterlet soup(the sterlet is a popular fish found only in the Volga); b/Fish cutlets with a sauce of oil and vinegar; c/Fried perch; d/Kissel(a kind of blancmange made with almond milk and fine oatmeal.) Other foods he mentions include various sorts of game, icecream, gingerbread(he makes the intriguing remarks that in pre-Christian times pagan Russians used to makes offerings of carved gingerbread to their deities—the tradition of shaped and decorated gingerbread endures to this day.) He also lists traditional drinks, from gallons of tea of course; kvass, an effervescent drink made from the flour of black bread and malt and served very cold(though rather an acquired taste for foreigners, it is still very popular in Russia); vodkas of all sorts, from the plain kind to flavoured ones(there are many kinds: for instance in Dr Zhivago a red rowanberry vodka is mentioned; and in Russia we sampled a honey and pepper vodka from Ukraine)and champagne, of which, he says, the Russians are very fond and consume in great quantities. While wealthy people drank French champagne, most people then as now drank the bubbly made in the Crimea or the Don River area, which cost only a fifth of the French variety.
By contrast, while Edwards extols these home-grown champagnes, the Frenchman Etienne Taris, in his 1910 book, La Russie et ses Richesses, sniffily says that the Russian wines can appropriate French place-names all they like, 'one can always tell their true origin'! Grudgingly, he admits that the soups are very similar to peasant soups in France; that the mushrooms are excellent, the fish and game very good; but otherwise he is not enamoured of Russian food, with its sweet and sour dishes, pickled fish, sour cream and black bread, tastes which are foreign to the French repertoire: and he makes the acid observation that 'no wonder there is such a fashion for French food in Russia!' But in both books, the exuberant Russian attitude to food—and life—is amply documented and obviously delighted in by the writers; but that's even more obvious in the quintessential Russian cookbook, Elena Molokhovets' A Gift to Young Housewives, which was the massive best-selling cookery tome of its day. It was an amazing compendium, a mix of hilariously extravagant, slapdashly insouciant and thriftily careful recipes, and a good deal of household advice, written by an extraordinary woman who ran a country estate. Reprinted umpteen times from its first appearance in 1861 to 1917, it became a huge cultural phenomenon, cherished by generations, carried into exile, and lovingly parodied by Chekhov, among others. Repudiated by the Bolsheviks as a symbol of 'bourgeois decadence', the book went underground after 1917, was circulated in 'samizdat' copies, and was never officially reprinted in its entirety during the whole of the Soviet period. But a few short months after the crash of the Soviet regime, reprinted copies of the book were being sold on the streets of Moscow, and today the book has once again taken its place as the great classic of Russian food writing. (It is now available in English, translated by Joyce Toomre, as 'Classic Russian Cooking', Indiana University Press)
That exuberance and abundance has come back now; and so we discovered a Russia where markets and shops are again filled with colourful arrays of fresh ingredients from every corner of this vast land; where even modest restaurants offer simple, fresh and delicious traditional menus and street-corner vendors sell smoked sausage hot dogs, cold glasses of kvass, caramelised almonds and luscious icecreams. We discovered the most spectacular and tasty candied fruit ever, specialities of southern Russia, from whole cumquats to apricot and strawberries; beautiful salads, from grated beetroot with garlic and vinegar to spectacular bowls of greens, tomatoes and olives; fantastic smoked and fresh fish from the cold northern lakes; a wide variety of soups; mushrooms served in all kinds of ways(Russians are very very fond of mushrooms—it's a favourite family outing, gathering mushrooms in the forest) a tempting array of zakuski, the tapas-like nibbles served with vodka, from olives and gherkins to pickled fish and little pies and dumplings; lovely berry and nut tarts; and the prettiest gilt gingerbread outside of fairytales. We also discovered that Russians, like Australians, love cooking outdoors, and a favoured recipe for a good meal out with friends consists of a handy river bank, a barbecue constructed of stones and charcoal, some freshly-caught fish, lamb shashliks with spicy sauce, various salads, some loud music on a radio, and plenty of beer!
Traditionally, Russian cuisine is dominated by the bounty of waterways and forest, by fish and game and mushrooms and nuts and berries and honey, but also by the necessities of long winters: by lots of pickled and smoked and salted fish, meat and vegetables. But because of the vastness of the land and its many climactic zones, it has access to an extremely wide variety of other things: the Caucasian vividness of fruit, vegetables, wine and lamb, for instance, and rich dairy products, especially cream, but also good yoghurt, and some cheeses. And the imaginative quality which has always characterised the Russian temperament is being fully applied now to local cuisine, so that traditional dishes are not only being cherished for what they are, but also experimented with, and new ways of highlighting the country's excellent produce, borrowing from all kinds of culinary traditions, are being tried.
It's not going to be long before the West generally discovers another foodie paradise; indeed it's already beginning to happen. This September will see the first-ever Flavours of Russia culinary tour organised from Australia, featuring celebrity guest and famous gourmet Maggie Beer. Watch for a touch of Russian becoming the new foodie fashion!

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Childhood markets, 2: St Jean Pied de Port, Pays Basque

We dodge a flock of sheep being driven up the steep cobbled street to the stock-selling part of the ancient markets. Up and down the street are stalls of all kinds, and farmers in the large flat berets characteristic of the Basque country and blue overalls. Many of them are speaking the ancient tongue of the region to each other and the stall-holders while a steady stream of incoming tourists like ourselves rubs shoulders with the locals. I'm a teenager on holidays in the Basque country with my paternal grandmother Mamizou and her two daughters, my aunts Betty and Genevieve, and we've driven up into the mountains to the famous markets at Saint Jean Pied de Port, deep in the ancient province of Navarra, on the French Basque side of the Pyrenees. St Jean Pied de Port is a gorgeous medieval town, built of local pink and grey rock, set beside the rushing Nive River, and it has a feeling of ancient fastness which percolates into your veins.
On the way up, we've seen some amazing sights: rows of beautiful old houses, a team of men in white shirts and trousers and red belts playing pelote, the Basque handball, against village walls built specially for the purpose; and best of all, a pair of patient oxen harnessed to a haycart. Betty takes a photo of me near—but not too near!--them, and I have for ever the exciting proof that a sight right out of the history books was still alive in the late 70's in the Basque country. I'm delighted; the past and especially the distant past is my obsession. I love romantic ancient tongue-twisting languages—Gaelic, Welsh, Breton, Basque—and I read old sagas and myths and Arthurian romance and to my relatives' somewhat pained dismay often dress like something out of the Middle Ages or rather a fantasy-reader's impression of that period, haunting old-clothes markets and junk shops for turn of the century lace camisoles, long satin nighties worn as dresses and gypsy-style coloured skirts and velvet jackets.
Today though I've dressed in black and though my grandmother and aunts aren't keen on that either, because all-black outfits should in their view be reserved for mourning or else for old peasant women—they haven't said anything, just in case I might take it into my head to wear something really outrageous. But as we trudge up the cobbles to the market, I'm suddenly aware how out of place we look—my elegant grandmother and aunts in their city clothes and patent leather shoes, and me in my toned-down 'bohemian' style. We're so very obviously tourists, and for a while that's all I can see. But nobody else seems to notice. The locals couldn't care less if you're there or not; this is their own gathering, held since time immemorial, and tourists are the least of their concerns. There are one or two stalls catering specially for tourists, with little Basque flags and knickknacks; but to the locals, they might as well not exist. So soon I forget all about my self-conscious preening and just enjoy taking it all in, the sights, the sounds, the smells..
These markets are famous because they are the focus of the region. Hundreds of farmers come from a wide radius to buy and sell stock and poultry and a bewildering range of farm produce, from eggs and honey and sausage and cheeses to vegetables and fruit and preserves. As well there are any number of stallholders selling things bought by locals as much as tourists, such as pottery or the famous stripy Basque linen which makes such striking tablecloths and aprons. We wander up and down, buying bits and pieces but mostly looking, and I remember another time I was here, a few years before, with my father and some of my siblings. That time, Dad had bought a vast wheel of cheese cheap from an old Basque lady with deceptively candid blue eyes. He thought he'd got a bargain; when we got it home hours later to La Nouvelle Terrebonne, he cut it open and discovered it was full of worms..Everyone yelled in horror, except for Dad, who gamely asserted that cheese was only improved when it was worm-riddled; everyone except him refused to touch it. Oddly enough not long after he'd defiantly tasted it, the cheese mysteriously disappeared—and he wouldn't answer Maman's sardonic question as to where his 'bargain' had gone!
Today though there's no wormy cheese to be seen, or if there is, we don't buy it, though we stock up on sausage and eggs and honey and fresh herbs and more, with my aunt Betty, the (very fine) cook of the family, examining each purchase as carefully as a local, earning the respect of the stallholders who soon discover that elegant city clothes don't mean she doesn't know what she's looking at!
And then comes my favourite part of all: after an hour or two jaunting through the market we repair to a charming little cafe near the river and eat a wonderful meal of chicken a la Basquaise and salad, followed by a big slice of a delicious, fragrantly fresh Gateau Basque, the whole washed down with light local wine and a nip of a herby local liqueur afterwards. When my grandmother compliments him on a fine meal, the proprietor tells us all the fresh ingredients came out of this very market. 'There's no better in the whole of the country,' he tells us with superb local assurance, and nobody is disposed to argue with him, not with the sun shining on the Nive, and our bellies cheerfully, happily full.

We dodge a flock of sheep being driven up the steep cobbled street to the stock-selling part of the ancient markets. Up and down the street are stalls of all kinds, and farmers in the large flat berets characteristic of the Basque country and blue overalls. Many of them are speaking the ancient tongue of the region to each other and the stall-holders while a steady stream of incoming tourists like ourselves rubs shoulders with the locals. I'm a teenager on holidays in the Basque country with my paternal grandmother Mamizou and her two daughters, my aunts Betty and Genevieve, and we've driven up into the mountains to the famous markets at Saint Jean Pied de Port, deep in the ancient province of Navarra, on the French Basque side of the Pyrenees. St Jean Pied de Port is a gorgeous medieval town, built of local pink and grey rock, set beside the rushing Nive River, and it has a feeling of ancient fastness which percolates into your veins.
On the way up, we've seen some amazing sights: rows of beautiful old houses, a team of men in white shirts and trousers and red belts playing pelote, the Basque handball, against village walls built specially for the purpose; and best of all, a pair of patient oxen harnessed to a haycart. Betty takes a photo of me near—but not too near!--them, and I have for ever the exciting proof that a sight right out of the history books was still alive in the late 70's in the Basque country. I'm delighted; the past and especially the distant past is my obsession. I love romantic ancient tongue-twisting languages—Gaelic, Welsh, Breton, Basque—and I read old sagas and myths and Arthurian romance and to my relatives' somewhat pained dismay often dress like something out of the Middle Ages or rather a fantasy-reader's impression of that period, haunting old-clothes markets and junk shops for turn of the century lace camisoles, long satin nighties worn as dresses and gypsy-style coloured skirts and velvet jackets.
Today though I've dressed in black and though my grandmother and aunts aren't keen on that either, because all-black outfits should in their view be reserved for mourning or else for old peasant women—they haven't said anything, just in case I might take it into my head to wear something really outrageous. But as we trudge up the cobbles to the market, I'm suddenly aware how out of place we look—my elegant grandmother and aunts in their city clothes and patent leather shoes, and me in my toned-down 'bohemian' style. We're so very obviously tourists, and for a while that's all I can see. But nobody else seems to notice. The locals couldn't care less if you're there or not; this is their own gathering, held since time immemorial, and tourists are the least of their concerns. There are one or two stalls catering specially for tourists, with little Basque flags and knickknacks; but to the locals, they might as well not exist. So soon I forget all about my self-conscious preening and just enjoy taking it all in, the sights, the sounds, the smells..
These markets are famous because they are the focus of the region. Hundreds of farmers come from a wide radius to buy and sell stock and poultry and a bewildering range of farm produce, from eggs and honey and sausage and cheeses to vegetables and fruit and preserves. As well there are any number of stallholders selling things bought by locals as much as tourists, such as pottery or the famous stripy Basque linen which makes such striking tablecloths and aprons. We wander up and down, buying bits and pieces but mostly looking, and I remember another time I was here, a few years before, with my father and some of my siblings. That time, Dad had bought a vast wheel of cheese cheap from an old Basque lady with deceptively candid blue eyes. He thought he'd got a bargain; when we got it home hours later to La Nouvelle Terrebonne, he cut it open and discovered it was full of worms..Everyone yelled in horror, except for Dad, who gamely asserted that cheese was only improved when it was worm-riddled; everyone except him refused to touch it. Oddly enough not long after he'd defiantly tasted it, the cheese mysteriously disappeared—and he wouldn't answer Maman's sardonic question as to where his 'bargain' had gone!
Today though there's no wormy cheese to be seen, or if there is, we don't buy it, though we stock up on sausage and eggs and honey and fresh herbs and more, with my aunt Betty, the (very fine) cook of the family, examining each purchase as carefully as a local, earning the respect of the stallholders who soon discover that elegant city clothes don't mean she doesn't know what she's looking at!
And then comes my favourite part of all: after an hour or two jaunting through the market we repair to a charming little cafe near the river and eat a wonderful meal of chicken a la Basquaise and salad, followed by a big slice of a delicious, fragrantly fresh Gateau Basque, the whole washed down with light local wine and a nip of a herby local liqueur afterwards. When my grandmother compliments him on a fine meal, the proprietor tells us all the fresh ingredients came out of this very market. 'There's no better in the whole of the country,' he tells us with superb local assurance, and nobody is disposed to argue with him, not with the sun shining on the Nive, and our bellies cheerfully, happily full.

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Vegemite Tofu

I always cook Matthew's Delicious Tofu for dinner. It is fast, full of protein (3x500g tofu!!) and yummy.

The other day, K and I were talking about serving pan fried tofu with the vegemite gravy we made before.  And now we have a new easy weeknight dish.

Instead of vegemite or NON-gluten-free Marmite, we used Freedom Foods' Vege Spread.


Vegemite Tofu
(serves 6)

What you need:

3 packs of 500g firm tofu, sliced or diced (We love Yenson's so does Cindy & Michael)
Whatever amount (within reason) of vegies, chopped 
Handful of sesame seeds
1 TBSP of sesame oil or raw coconut butter
6 gloves of garlic, minced (or you can use the whole thing)
2-4 TBSP Freedom Foods' Vege Spread
1 to 3 TPSP of corn flour or any gluten-free flour
1 1/2 cup of water
Dash of tamari or gluten-free soy sauce (We use Chang's)

What you need to do:

- Brown sesame seed on fry pan, set aside.  

- Heat oil and pan fry tofu on non-stick fry pan or wok, add dash of tamari on top of tofu just before you flip it.  Set aside in a big metal mixing bowl or tray.

- Heat oil on non-stick fry pan or wok.  Saute minced garlic for a moment and add vegies.  Stir fry for a moment.

- Add Vege Spread and water.  Stir fry until it's mixed in with vegie.

- Slowly add gluten-free flour to the pan.  Keep stirring until it is thick enough.


- Add tofu back to the pan and sprinkle sesame seeds on top.

You can serve it with brown rice, noodles or even mashed potatoes!

I always cook Matthew's Delicious Tofu for dinner. It is fast, full of protein (3x500g tofu!!) and yummy.

The other day, K and I were talking about serving pan fried tofu with the vegemite gravy we made before.  And now we have a new easy weeknight dish.

Instead of vegemite or NON-gluten-free Marmite, we used Freedom Foods' Vege Spread.


Vegemite Tofu
(serves 6)

What you need:

3 packs of 500g firm tofu, sliced or diced (We love Yenson's so does Cindy & Michael)
Whatever amount (within reason) of vegies, chopped 
Handful of sesame seeds
1 TBSP of sesame oil or raw coconut butter
6 gloves of garlic, minced (or you can use the whole thing)
2-4 TBSP Freedom Foods' Vege Spread
1 to 3 TPSP of corn flour or any gluten-free flour
1 1/2 cup of water
Dash of tamari or gluten-free soy sauce (We use Chang's)

What you need to do:

- Brown sesame seed on fry pan, set aside.  

- Heat oil and pan fry tofu on non-stick fry pan or wok, add dash of tamari on top of tofu just before you flip it.  Set aside in a big metal mixing bowl or tray.

- Heat oil on non-stick fry pan or wok.  Saute minced garlic for a moment and add vegies.  Stir fry for a moment.

- Add Vege Spread and water.  Stir fry until it's mixed in with vegie.

- Slowly add gluten-free flour to the pan.  Keep stirring until it is thick enough.


- Add tofu back to the pan and sprinkle sesame seeds on top.

You can serve it with brown rice, noodles or even mashed potatoes!

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Kangaroo a la frangourou!

One day in my childhood, Dad came home indignantly from a scouting expedition at the butcher's one day in my childhood, to report that the kangaroo meat he'd tried to source for a meal was unobtainable for human consumption in Australia. There was some to be had but only the family dog could enjoy the Australian equivalent of venison back then as, Dad was told,' it was processed in unhygienic conditions in the bush and then treated with something or other that made it unfit for people'. He's always been keen on trying local specialities and had simply assumed kangaroo would feature on the menu in Australia, and was bitterly disappointed when it wasn't. Eventually, though, he got his wish, and a bowl of kangaroo tail soup, at a traditional pub in Inverell in north west NSW, where he'd travelled on company business preparing a tender to build the Pindari Dam. It was the late 60's or early 70's and Australian country towns were excitingly exotic territory for Dad. He talked a lot about it: the iron-laced pubs, the laconic farmers in big hats, the itinerant rabbit dealer displaying his skinned and dressed wares on a long stick he carried, and most especially, the kangaroo tail soup.

These days in Australia you only have to go as far as your local supermarket to buy kangaroo meat, as fillets, steaks, mince and even sausages. Hygienically processed and very lean but tasty, it's a meat that's found a good deal of gourmet favour. We eat it fairly often here, maybe once a week or every 10 days. We're not keen on the sausages--sausages definitely need fat to be properly tasty, and kangaroo sausages dry out far too much--and the mince is sold in too-big quantities for us. But the fillet and steaks are delicious.

You can eat them simply as themselves--we usually tenderise the steak a little, but not the fillet which is already very tender, and eat them rare with either salt, pepper and mustard, or Bearnaise sauce(see my earlier post on eggs)or a herb and pepper butter. Other times we make other dishes out of them--slow-cooked kangaroo steak makes great roghan josh, for instance, or wonderful red-wine stews or 'hunter's sauce' style dishes for game. And the fillet makes an intriguingly different macropod version of classic dishes like 'beef stroganoff' or 'fondue bourguignonne', where you use quick cooking, not slow stewing.

Last night David made an absolutely delicious and easy dish of his own invention using kangaroo fillet, onions and garlic, sour cream, mustard, and tarragon(illustrated). The fragrant and lusciously-textured sauce seemed to highlight the juicy tenderness of the fillet. With a salad entree, home-made thick-cut chips made from potatoes freshly dug in the garden, newly-picked cauliflower steamed and buttered and herbed--and the remains of the Pithiviers pie for dessert!--it made a fantastic and very frangourou meal!

Here's how to make it(it should be cooked just before you're ready to sit down to eat--vegs etc should be prepared before it, this isn't a dish that should hang around):

Kangaroo fillet.

One onion, finely chopped.

One or two cloves garlic, crushed.

Olive oil.

Butter.

Some chopped tarragon.

1 teaspoon Dijon mustard.

1 tablespoon sour cream.

Salt, pepper.

Fry the onions and garlic in a little olive oil and butter till golden and soft. Remove from pan and add kangaroo fillet, adding more butter and oil if needed. Cook only for about 1 min each side if you like rare, more if you don't. Take steak out of pan, sprinkle with salt and pepper. Add cream and mustard to the pan, quickly stir so that it cooks through, add onions and garlic, then fillet. Serve immediately with chopped tarragon on top.

One day in my childhood, Dad came home indignantly from a scouting expedition at the butcher's one day in my childhood, to report that the kangaroo meat he'd tried to source for a meal was unobtainable for human consumption in Australia. There was some to be had but only the family dog could enjoy the Australian equivalent of venison back then as, Dad was told,' it was processed in unhygienic conditions in the bush and then treated with something or other that made it unfit for people'. He's always been keen on trying local specialities and had simply assumed kangaroo would feature on the menu in Australia, and was bitterly disappointed when it wasn't. Eventually, though, he got his wish, and a bowl of kangaroo tail soup, at a traditional pub in Inverell in north west NSW, where he'd travelled on company business preparing a tender to build the Pindari Dam. It was the late 60's or early 70's and Australian country towns were excitingly exotic territory for Dad. He talked a lot about it: the iron-laced pubs, the laconic farmers in big hats, the itinerant rabbit dealer displaying his skinned and dressed wares on a long stick he carried, and most especially, the kangaroo tail soup.

These days in Australia you only have to go as far as your local supermarket to buy kangaroo meat, as fillets, steaks, mince and even sausages. Hygienically processed and very lean but tasty, it's a meat that's found a good deal of gourmet favour. We eat it fairly often here, maybe once a week or every 10 days. We're not keen on the sausages--sausages definitely need fat to be properly tasty, and kangaroo sausages dry out far too much--and the mince is sold in too-big quantities for us. But the fillet and steaks are delicious.

You can eat them simply as themselves--we usually tenderise the steak a little, but not the fillet which is already very tender, and eat them rare with either salt, pepper and mustard, or Bearnaise sauce(see my earlier post on eggs)or a herb and pepper butter. Other times we make other dishes out of them--slow-cooked kangaroo steak makes great roghan josh, for instance, or wonderful red-wine stews or 'hunter's sauce' style dishes for game. And the fillet makes an intriguingly different macropod version of classic dishes like 'beef stroganoff' or 'fondue bourguignonne', where you use quick cooking, not slow stewing.

Last night David made an absolutely delicious and easy dish of his own invention using kangaroo fillet, onions and garlic, sour cream, mustard, and tarragon(illustrated). The fragrant and lusciously-textured sauce seemed to highlight the juicy tenderness of the fillet. With a salad entree, home-made thick-cut chips made from potatoes freshly dug in the garden, newly-picked cauliflower steamed and buttered and herbed--and the remains of the Pithiviers pie for dessert!--it made a fantastic and very frangourou meal!

Here's how to make it(it should be cooked just before you're ready to sit down to eat--vegs etc should be prepared before it, this isn't a dish that should hang around):

Kangaroo fillet.

One onion, finely chopped.

One or two cloves garlic, crushed.

Olive oil.

Butter.

Some chopped tarragon.

1 teaspoon Dijon mustard.

1 tablespoon sour cream.

Salt, pepper.

Fry the onions and garlic in a little olive oil and butter till golden and soft. Remove from pan and add kangaroo fillet, adding more butter and oil if needed. Cook only for about 1 min each side if you like rare, more if you don't. Take steak out of pan, sprinkle with salt and pepper. Add cream and mustard to the pan, quickly stir so that it cooks through, add onions and garlic, then fillet. Serve immediately with chopped tarragon on top.

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Deliciously simple Pithiviers pie

For a long time, as a child, I was puzzled by the name of one of my favourite pastries, which appeared quite often on our family dessert table. Never having heard of the town in the Orleans region where this lovely almond pie originated, I misheard 'Pithiviers' as 'petit vieux'--or 'little old man'. What little old men had to do with pies I had no idea, but I didn't ask the obvious question because there are so many other such bizarre names in traditional French cuisine--from the alcoholic 'confiture de vieux garcon', or 'old boy's jam' I wrote about in a previous post to the rather coarser 'pet de nonne' (literally 'nun's fart') which was the popular, traditional name given to the deliciously light and sweet choux pastry known these days, much more discreetly, as a 'religieuse'.

It was only when one day, leafing as a teenager through Dad's Larousse Gastronomique, that I came across the entry for Gateau Pithiviers that the penny finally dropped. As a teenager struggling to appear dignified, I was of course very glad I hadn't asked any silly questions, imagining the mortification and the endless reminders about my ridiculous mistake from my siblings!

Misheard moniker or not, I still love Pithiviers pie every bit as much as I did when I was a kid. And these days not only do I make my own but I've devised my own version of it which is very very easy to make.

Traditionally, Pithiviers pie is made with puff pastry, but my version uses a much quicker and easier rich shortcrust pastry which though it doesn't puff, does flake quite satisfactorily in a similar way to puff pastry, and it's also deliciously moist so stays fresh for longer. Puff pastry is lovely but not only is it time-consuming (if not difficult) to make, it also tends to be at its best on the day it's baked, and that goes for the shop variety too. The pastry I make for my Pithiviers pie can be easily made at home, with flour, butter and either buttermilk(which you can buy in the supermarket in cartons, look in the dairy section) or if you don't have that, a mixture of yoghurt and sour cream. I put no water in it at all. You could use just yoghurt or justsour cream if you want but experiment has proved to me that only using yoghurt makes the pastry too sour while only using sour cream makes it too heavy. Buttermilk is ideal, but the mixture of sour cream and yoghurt also works very well. I also never ever put almond essence in the almond paste which is the filling of the pie, as I loathe the taste of it in sweets(I don't mind it in liqueurs). Instead I use vanilla essence mixed in with the almond meal, sugar, softened butter and egg yolk.

A wonderful alternative to the basic almond filling of Pithiviers pie is substituting the almond meal for hazelnut meal, and the vanilla essence for melted chocolate. Otherwise it's made the same.

Here's the recipe for my Gateau Pithiviers a la mode frangourou: (makes a small pie suitable for four people at one sitting)

Pastry:

150 g plain flour

50 g cold unsalted butter

Buttermilk, or sour cream and yoghurt.

Filling:

125 g almond meal.

50 g castor sugar.

1 egg yolk.

About 30-40 g softened unsalted butter.

drop vanilla essence

Optional: drop armagnac or cognac

For glaze: 1 egg yolk.

To make pastry, cut the butter into pieces and rub through flour till mixture ressembles fine breadcrumbs. Add enough buttermilk or sour cream/yoghurt to make a soft but not sticky dough. Set aside to rest in a cool place while you make the filling.

Mix almond meal, sugar, egg yolk, softened butter and vanilla essence in a bowl, and brandy too if you wish(I mix the whole thing with my--clean!--hands, it's easier to get a nice consistency than using a spoon.) It needs to be fairly soft but holding together well, a bit softer than bought marzipan.

Divide the pastry in slightly unequal halves(the bit for base and sides needs to be a bit greater than the bit for the top. ) Roll out each part. Lay the base and sides part in a buttered pie dish and then spread the almond mixture over it to cover it to every corner. Place the pie lid on top of that, pinch sides together. Then paint top with egg yolk and score it with a sharp knife taking care not to go right through top(it's just for decoration really.) Bake in a moderate oven for about 40minutes.

It's just as good freshly made as the next day, and as delicious warm as cold.

For a long time, as a child, I was puzzled by the name of one of my favourite pastries, which appeared quite often on our family dessert table. Never having heard of the town in the Orleans region where this lovely almond pie originated, I misheard 'Pithiviers' as 'petit vieux'--or 'little old man'. What little old men had to do with pies I had no idea, but I didn't ask the obvious question because there are so many other such bizarre names in traditional French cuisine--from the alcoholic 'confiture de vieux garcon', or 'old boy's jam' I wrote about in a previous post to the rather coarser 'pet de nonne' (literally 'nun's fart') which was the popular, traditional name given to the deliciously light and sweet choux pastry known these days, much more discreetly, as a 'religieuse'.

It was only when one day, leafing as a teenager through Dad's Larousse Gastronomique, that I came across the entry for Gateau Pithiviers that the penny finally dropped. As a teenager struggling to appear dignified, I was of course very glad I hadn't asked any silly questions, imagining the mortification and the endless reminders about my ridiculous mistake from my siblings!

Misheard moniker or not, I still love Pithiviers pie every bit as much as I did when I was a kid. And these days not only do I make my own but I've devised my own version of it which is very very easy to make.

Traditionally, Pithiviers pie is made with puff pastry, but my version uses a much quicker and easier rich shortcrust pastry which though it doesn't puff, does flake quite satisfactorily in a similar way to puff pastry, and it's also deliciously moist so stays fresh for longer. Puff pastry is lovely but not only is it time-consuming (if not difficult) to make, it also tends to be at its best on the day it's baked, and that goes for the shop variety too. The pastry I make for my Pithiviers pie can be easily made at home, with flour, butter and either buttermilk(which you can buy in the supermarket in cartons, look in the dairy section) or if you don't have that, a mixture of yoghurt and sour cream. I put no water in it at all. You could use just yoghurt or justsour cream if you want but experiment has proved to me that only using yoghurt makes the pastry too sour while only using sour cream makes it too heavy. Buttermilk is ideal, but the mixture of sour cream and yoghurt also works very well. I also never ever put almond essence in the almond paste which is the filling of the pie, as I loathe the taste of it in sweets(I don't mind it in liqueurs). Instead I use vanilla essence mixed in with the almond meal, sugar, softened butter and egg yolk.

A wonderful alternative to the basic almond filling of Pithiviers pie is substituting the almond meal for hazelnut meal, and the vanilla essence for melted chocolate. Otherwise it's made the same.

Here's the recipe for my Gateau Pithiviers a la mode frangourou: (makes a small pie suitable for four people at one sitting)

Pastry:

150 g plain flour

50 g cold unsalted butter

Buttermilk, or sour cream and yoghurt.

Filling:

125 g almond meal.

50 g castor sugar.

1 egg yolk.

About 30-40 g softened unsalted butter.

drop vanilla essence

Optional: drop armagnac or cognac

For glaze: 1 egg yolk.

To make pastry, cut the butter into pieces and rub through flour till mixture ressembles fine breadcrumbs. Add enough buttermilk or sour cream/yoghurt to make a soft but not sticky dough. Set aside to rest in a cool place while you make the filling.

Mix almond meal, sugar, egg yolk, softened butter and vanilla essence in a bowl, and brandy too if you wish(I mix the whole thing with my--clean!--hands, it's easier to get a nice consistency than using a spoon.) It needs to be fairly soft but holding together well, a bit softer than bought marzipan.

Divide the pastry in slightly unequal halves(the bit for base and sides needs to be a bit greater than the bit for the top. ) Roll out each part. Lay the base and sides part in a buttered pie dish and then spread the almond mixture over it to cover it to every corner. Place the pie lid on top of that, pinch sides together. Then paint top with egg yolk and score it with a sharp knife taking care not to go right through top(it's just for decoration really.) Bake in a moderate oven for about 40minutes.

It's just as good freshly made as the next day, and as delicious warm as cold.

reade more... Résuméabuiyad