Sur le pouce, is literally translated by “on the thumb”, je mange sur le pouce, or I eat on the thumb, which means eating fast. It originated in the XIX century when workers didn’t have time to eat, they cut a piece of bread with a knife, and eating it using their thumbs.

Today two things made me happy and brightened up my day, this quick lunch sur le pouce (even though I used a fork!) and my new lamp (created by Shmulik Krampf, an extremely talented Israeli Artist who blows glass they way they do it in Murano, Italy). What do my lamp and this meal have in common? well they’re both colorful, vibrant and make me feel alive.

Sometimes when I come back from the gym, I don’t have time to cook for myself, so I eat snacks…and today I decided to not eat snacks and indulge myself…but still having a limited time, I had to make something quick. It all took me 20 minutes, which I think it’s almost like fast food.

Why do we call this mimosa? Mimosa refers to devil eggs, we call them “oeufs mimosa“, so here since we have boiled eggs, we can call them mimosa. I am not sure if “we” can, but I do.

Asparagus can be used if you don’t have green beans, it’s as delicious, and you can use scallops instead of the shrimps. Garlic, herb, butter those ingredients are a perfect match with seafood.

Ingredients for 2

For the green beans

• 250 g fine green beans
• 2 eggs, hard boiled and grated
• 2 tbs capers, rinced and chopped
• 1 scallion, chopped
• 1/2 tomato, seeds removed, and diced
• 2 tbs olive oil
• 1 tsp balsamic vinegar
• salt and pepper

For the shrimps tartine (3 toasts each)

• 18 shrimps, peeled and deveined
• 1/4 ts paprika
• 1 garlic clove, sliced
• 1 tsp dill, chopped
• 1 tsp parsley, chopped
• 1 tsp butter
• 6 slices baguettes, or country bread, toasted
• salt and pepper

Preparation

For the green beans

Bring a large pot to a boil with water. Cook grean beans for about 5-7 minutes until tender but still a little crunchy. Drain, and place in a container filled with iced water. Set aside.

Prepare the vinaigrette, mixing the capers, scallion, oil, vinegar, salt and pepper.

Drain green beans, place on a plate. Add grated eggs, tomatoes, then pour vinaigrette on top.

For the shrimps tartines

Add paprika to the shrimps, and coat well. Add salt and pepper.

Mix butter, garlic and herbs with a fork and form an homogenous paste. In a pan melt butter/herbs slowly, then add shrimps. Cook at medium temperature until the shrimps are cooked but still juicy.

Toast bread slices. Place three shrimps on top of each tartine, and pour some butter/garlic mixture on top.

Serve with green bean salad on the side.

Crushing these gorgeous baby artichokes into a pesto broke my heart. I have always wanted to make artichoke pesto but never really managed to turn the artichokes into a paste. They’re so cute and delicious as hearts that really putting them through a mixer, is something I hate to do. Today, I got the courage to do it. Here, we got something different and quite delicious. Honestly, I am not sure I will have the courage to to this again. I simply love to bite into an artichoke heart, I love the crunchy bite, it’s that simple. You could use this pesto on pasta of course, or as a sauce for grilled meats…or even to spread it on some country bread.

When you’re eating spaghetti squash prepared this way, you almost forgot, it’s not pasta. I undercooked the squash to get a crunchy bite, to get the “al dente” feeling. I loved this pesto. Now for the vegan crowd, you can omit the parmesan and add more walnuts. I use very little parmesan to enhance this pesto a tiny bit. You don’t want to add too much cheese either and overpower the natural delicious flavor of the artichokes.

This pesto tends to be lighter than regular basil/pine nuts pesto, its texture is more dense too, so I added a few tablespoons of water to make it creamier.

I am flying tomorrow for France, to go see my father who had a stroke last December, so I will try to post a few local recipes, in the meantime, have a nice and colorful June.

Ingredients for 2 as a main course

• 1 large spaghetti squash
• 1 lb artichokes, trimmed and cleaned
• 1/2 cup parsley
• 1/2 cup basil
• 2 tbs raw unsalted walnuts
• 1 garlic clove, crushed + 1 chopped
• 2 tbs parmesan (optional)
• 3 tbs olive oil
• water
• salt and pepper

Preparation

Cut the squash lengthwise, wrap in parchment paper and cook in a pre-heated oven at 400F for about 45 minutes to an hour.

Remove seeds first, then the spaghetti pulp. Set aside and keep warm. Save eight artichokes quarters for decoration

Heat up a pan, add the crushed garlic, stir and add baby artichokes cut in quarters. Adjust with salt and pepper, add 2 tbs white wine, and cover, decrease heat and let cook until tender. Let it cool.

For the pesto, mix  artichokes with all other ingredients a mixer. Adjust with water if the pesto is too thick.

Add pesto to the spaghetti squash and mix well using your hands, to coat the squash with the pesto. Serve with an extra tablespoon of pesto on top and four artichokes quarters on each plate.

For the pastry “connaisseurs“, Napoléon is a famous pastry from Eastern Europe, made out different layers of crème patissière (custard), and puff pastry. While in Lithuania, and during its Russian campaign, Napoléon fell in love with this dessert, and named it after himself. The rumors even say that he lost the battle of Waterloo, because he ate so many of these the night before the battle. But of course, those are earsay, and only historians can prove this fact.

This is my savory version of Napoléon. This savory Napoléon has different layers of king oyster mushrooms and eggplants. King oyster mushrooms are simply oyster mushrooms that are grown to a large size, just like portobello are cremini mushrooms grown until they reached a particular size. What I like about king oysters is their meaty legs that remind of the fresh porcini, you can just slice them and enjoy them saute with garlic and parsley or any way you like.

This savory version of Napoleon has manchego and a drizzle of a parsley/garlic/paprika/olive oil mixture in between the layers, which adds a pleasant note to each bite. The concassée finishes the dish with a nice balance of chili and slight acidity of the tomato.

These cute little bundles of vegetables can be served as an appetizer, then two would be perfect, but then there is no rule in the number want to add on each plate.

Ingredients for 4-6 pieces

• 1 medium size eggplant (seedless), sliced
• 1 large king oyster, sliced
• 1/2 cup manchego, sliced
• 1 zucchini, sliced lenghtwise
• 1 tbs olive oil
• Fleur de sel
• pepper

For the herb-oil

• 1 tbs parsley, finely chopped
• 1 garlic clove, crushed
• 1 tsp balsamic vinegar
• 1/4 tsp paprika
• salt and pepper

For the tomato concassée

• 2 medium sized, heirloon tomato, chopped, peeled and seedless
• 1 tbs extra virgin fruity olive oil
• cayenne pepper
• fleur de sel

Preparation

Grill eggplants on a grill pan or cast iron grid. Set aside. Saute mushroom slices in 1 tbs olive oil. Slice zucchini with a mandoline, making ribbons. Grill zucchini on a grill pan. Set aside.

For the herb-oil, mix all ingredients together in a small bowl.

For the tomato concassée, after peeling the tomatoes, crush one tomato, with a mixer to make a purée. Cut the other tomato in small pieces. Mix both tomatoes, add cayenne, pepper and fleur de sel. Add olive oil. Mix well.

Start assembling the napoleon. In a flat surface, place one slice of eggplant. Add 1/2 tsp of herb-oil. Place one slice of mushroom on top. Add manchego. Proceed with another slice of eggplant, mushroom and manchego. Wrap it all with two slices of zucchini (one might be too short to be wrapped around). Place in a pre-heated oven at 390F until the manchego has melted.

Serve in a plate with one tbs of tomato concassée. Drizzle extra olive oil on the tomatoes, and add some cracked black pepper.

]]> http://www.citronetvanille.com/blog/appetizers/a-little-bundle-of-joy-napoleon-of-eggplants-king-oyster-mushrooms-and-manchego-tomato-concassee/feed/ 28 http://www.citronetvanille.com/blog/appetizers/the-well-dressed-shrimps-shrimps-wrapped-in-soba-with-pomegranate-chili-dipping-sauce/ http://www.citronetvanille.com/blog/appetizers/the-well-dressed-shrimps-shrimps-wrapped-in-soba-with-pomegranate-chili-dipping-sauce/#comments Fri, 18 Jun 2010 23:19:30 +0000 silvia http://www.citronetvanille.com/blog/?p=11368 Les crevettes bien habillées – Crevettes enroulées de nouilles soba et sauce pimentée à la grenade

Well here I am again with shrimps…when we cook we all find our inspiration from different sources, it can be our moms, grandmothers, books, chefs, travels, anything. For this particular recipe, I inspired myself from one of Alain Ducasse’s recipes that I twisted around quite a bit, but I kept his idea of wrapping the soba around the shrimps. Isn’t this a great idea? What I love about Alain Ducasse or Christophe Megel is that they mastered the art (it truly is an art) of blending contemporary influences with classical cuisine which awaken all your senses into a taste bud ecstasy.

At first, I thought it sounded strange, borderline unappealing, then after looking at it, and reading the recipe a little longer, I realized that this would be an amazing little appetizer. I made my own dipping sauce with pomegranate, chilis and garlic, and I could not get enough of those shrimps. Now, the original recipe deep fries the shrimps, I somehow refuse to deep fry anything, you can do it, if you want but I have a little “mental blockage” with fried food, so the devil did not manage to make me deep fried this, even if Alain does. Désolée Alain, je n’aime pas la friture! I am sure he would understand!

What I love about this recipe is its composition of textures and flavors.

The soba get a very pleasant crunchy bite due to the batter where ice cubes have been added at end of the process, they melted in the mixture, it helped make the batter light therefore give a particular crunchiness to the soba. There is a feast going on in your palate at first bite, and it’s such an exciting sensation!

Ingredients for about 10 shrimps

• 10 shrimps, deveined
• 2.11 oz (or 60 g) regular soba or green tea soba
• 1/3 cup (or 75 g) cornstarch
• 1 egg
• 1/2 cup (or 100 g) flour
• 1/3 cup (or 75 g) water
• 1/3 (or 75 g) cup ice cubes
• salt and pepper

For the pomegranate-chili dipping sauce

• 1/2 cup pure unsweetened pomegranate juice
• 2 tbs pomegranate glaze
• 1 tbs honey
• 2 tbs rice vinegar
• 2 garlic cloves, crushed
• 1 chili, finely diced
• salt

Preparation

Bring a pot of water to a boil, add soba, cook for a few minutes until still a little crunchy, then remove from heat, drain and place in chilled water. Let cool, drain and set aside.

Dip shrimps in corn starch.

In a mixing bowl, mix egg with flour and water, stir well. Add ice cubes and keep stirring until they dissolve.

Dip soba in batter, remove excess batter and wrap around the shrimps.

Heat olive oil in a pan (enough to get 2 mm of oil in the pan), then add shrimps, let them brown on all surfaces. When cooked removefrom pan, and pat dry with a paper towel to remove excess oil. Serve hot with dipping sauce.

For the dipping sauce

Mix all ingredients together except the garlic and chili and cook for a few minutes until the honey is dissolved and the sauce has a little reduced. Let it cool, then add chili and garlic.

This one will be among my favorite seafood salads…When you are in love with so many dishes, it’s hard to just pick one, so I have a list of dishes, and this one is a part of the “killer list” or “la liste qui tue“.

Saturday after a delicious dinner at a famous San Francisco seafood restaurant, located at the Embarcadero facing the Bay Bridge called the Waterbar, I met again with octopus. If you ever end up in San Francisco and want to stay away from the touristy seafood restaurants on the Pier 39, try the Waterbar. I think it’s a little pricey but if you want to spend a nice romantic evening “déguster” (savor) amazing fish and seafood, the Waterbar is a great choice. Nothing is fried like in many restaurants, every dish has been carefully prepared and cooked with refinement to enhance its natural texture and flavor. You get the most amazing seafood dishes staring at the gorgeous Bay, so nothing to complain about.

This salad has been inspired by the octopus dish I ordered. The octopus was sliced and topped with an abundant and garlic chutney, arugola, and some potatoes topped with tapenade. I fell in love all of the sudden. I saw it, my heart melted. You must think that I do fall in love quite easily, if you give me grilled seafood (looks like I am back eating fish and seafood) with fresh herbs, garlic , I just cannot help myself.

I found this cute cuttlefish at the store that reminded me of Italy, cuttlefish is very popular in Southern France and Italy where they use its ink to make risotto al nero di seppia (squid ink risotto), seppia means cuttlefish, but squid and octopus ink is also used in gastronomy. So cuttlefish has replaced octopus here and I felt a little closer to home. Cuttlefish is thicker than squid, so it require a little more cooking time.

I made extra tapenade which is a traditional spread from Provence (Tapena means capers in Provencal language) made out of olives crushed into a purée. It can be stored for days in the refrigerator and be used in so many other ways.

Ingredients for 2

• 8-10 baby cuttlefish
• cherry tomatoes, cut in halves
• some arugula or other greens leaves

For the potatoes

• 6 medium yukon potatoes
• 1 tbs tarragon, chopped
• 1 tbs parsley chopped
• 2 tbs extra fruity cold pressed olive oil
• salt and fresh cracked pepper

For the tapenade

• 1/2 lb (or 250 g) kalamata olives
• 1 garlic clove
• 2.11 oz (or 60 g) capers
• 1.41 oz (or 40 g) anchovies
• 1 tsp lemon juice
• 3.38 fl oz (or 100 ml) olive oil
• pepper

For the garlic vinaigrette

• 1 tbs olive oil
• 1 tbs walnut oil
• 1 garlic clove crushed
• 1.5 tsp orange champagne vinegar
• 1.5 tsp pomegranate glaze
• 1 tsp chives, chopped
• salt and pepper

Preparation

Cook potatoes in water until cooked. Peel and let them lukewarm. Crush roughly with a fork leaving some big chunks and incoporate herbs, olive oil, salt and pepper. Mix carefully.

Grill cuttlefish on a grill pan, turning them around until cooked, about 7-8 minutes or less, depending on the size of the cuttlefish.

For the tapenade, place ingredients in a mortar, and crush all ingredients into a paste, except for olive oil, lemon juice and pepper. Add olive oil gradually at the end like you would proceed for a mayonnaise while stirring. Add lemon juice and pepper when tapenade is ready.

For the vinaigrette, mix all ingredients together, mix well.

Place a small amount of potatoes in a plate, top it with a tsp or more of tapenade. Place cuttlefish and cherry tomato halves around the potatoes and drizzle with vinaigrette.

Today I said goodbye to my long time and faithful friend, my VW Golf I had for over 10 years, and that over the years turned into an old lady. I gave it to a charity and I have to admit that when the tow-truck came pick it up, I was somehow sad. I know it’s just a thing, and I should not get attached to material, but still, it was the first car I got in the US and I was somehow attached to it.  We went through some good and bad times together. I did not feel comfortable selling it, since the steering wheel was really hard to manoeuvre and I stopped driving it for a month, fearing it would break down in the middle of the street…and many other things were wrong with it, so I figured I would give it to charity.  C’est la vie, nothing lasts and things like people sooner or later quietly go. 

OK, let’s not dwell on this, it’s just a car after all! 

Let’s go back to the fun world of cooking, I love to play with quinoa, it’s delicious in soups, salads, taboule and any kind of side dishes. The great flavor comes from the herb salsa I made, which enhanced this whole salad.

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 cup quinoa
• 1/2 cauliflower
• 2 carrots
• 1 cup  cooked cannelli beans
• 2 bay leaves
• 1 celeri stick
• 3 cloves

For the salsa

• 2 scallions
• 2 garlic cloves
• 1/2 bunch parsley
• 1/2 bunch cilantro
• 1/3 bunch mint
• 5 tbs olive oil
• 1 tbs balsamic vinegar
• 1/2 tsp cumin
• 1/2 tsp paprika
• a pinch chili powder
• salt and pepper

Preparation

If you are using dried cannelli beans, they need to be soaked overnight in water, if you didn’t have any and don’t have time, you can use canned beans, but they don’t taste as good as the dried ones.

Cook quinoa by steaming it, like you would make steamed rice. Add double its volume of water, bring to a boil, and reduce heat to a minimum and cover with lid. Cook for about 20 minutes.

If used, dried cannelli beans, cook them in water for about 30 minutes with 1/2 onion, 3 cloves, 1 celery stick, and 2 bay leaves. When cooked remove onion, cloves, celery, bay leaves, and drain beans.

Cut cauliflower in small florets, cut carrots in slices, then cut in half. Steam for about 10 minutes and set aside.

Mix the salsa ingredients in a mixer to make it into a smooth mixture.

When quinoa is cooked, place in a mixing bowl, add vegetables. Spoon salsa at the end and mix well.

Quail eggs…have you ever seen something cuter? They’re very popular in France to add to any appetizer but unfortunately they are not available everywhere in the US. Whole Foods and Sigona market sell them, but those are the only grocery stores where I have seen them on the shelves. Whole Foods sell ostrich eggs for about $30 each but I bet you can feed 4 or 5 people with one of those eggs.

Those adorable quail eggs found a nest in the middle of a potato, they fit perfectly in it, they’re just waiting to be savored with a bit of salmon and fromage blanc touch. I like to use fromage blanc, instead of heavy cream or sour cream, it’s a lot lighter and does not taste sour. If you cannot find fromage blanc, you could substitute it with greek yogurt either the plain one or the 2%. Fromage blanc is a dairy French specialty which has the texture of something in between greek yogurt and sour cream. Very smooth, creamy and velvety. 

For the mixed greens you can use any leafy greens, such as spinach, collard greens, etc…

Ingredients for 4 as appetizers

• 4 medium size purple potatoes or any other potato
• 8 quail eggs
• 2 large slices of smoked sockeye salmon
• 1/2 lb mixed greens
• zest of one lemon
• juice of one lemon
• 1 garlic clove, crushed
• 2 tbs fromage blanc or Greek yogurt
• 1 tbs chopped chives
• 2 tbs olive oil
• 1 tsp rice vinegar 
• salt and pepper

Preparation

Wash the potatoes. Pat dry and cut them in half lentghwise, the largest surface should be the one cut in half so that the quail egg would fit in each hole.

Drizzle olive oil and vinegar, add salt and pepper and broil at low heat. Cook until the potatoes are tender but browned on the outside.

In the meantime, bring water to a boil, add salt and cook greens for about 10 minutes. Drain.

Wash lemon and remove zest. Cook lemon zest in boiling water for 3 minutes. Drain and pat dry. Chop in smaller pieces. 

In a mixing bowl and lemon juice (keep one tsp to add to fromage blanc), olive oil, lemon zest, garlic, salt and pepper. Mix well. Add to the cooked greens.

When potatoes are cooked, remove from the oven and break a quail egg in the middle of the hole, sprinkle with salt and pepper and place back in oven for 3 minutes. Do not overcook the eggs, the yolks need to remain liquid.

Mix fromage blanc with chives, 1 tps lemon juice, salt and pepper.

Cut salmon in strips. Place on top of eggs, and add 1/2 tsp of fromage blanc mixture.

Serve two potato halves on top of 1 tbs of greens.