Sunday, November 28, 2010

Poires Savoyards

I'm not a big fan of pears. I'm not crazy about their grainy texture or their thick skins. If someone else cuts them up and presents them on a plate as part of a fruit salad, or as an accompaniment to cheese I will gladly eat them , but they're not my favourite. I do actually like the taste of pears though, so I enjoy them cooked, poached in red wine or baked into a tart. Last year I discovered a recipe for poires savoyards in Diane Henry's book Roasted Figs Sugar Snow, one of my favourite winter cookbooks.

It's quite simple.

Butter a baking dish, lay slices of peeled pear in, sprinkle with 4 tablespoons or so of caster sugar and then pour a bit less than a cup of double cream (with a drop of vanilla in it) all over. Bake in the oven at 200 degrees for about 20 minutes until the top is golden and burnished.

Nothing to it but it makes a gorgeous rich but at the same time light dessert. We ate it often last winter.

So, pears in the fridge, I made it for dessert the other night when Tara came over. Delicious as always and I made quite a bit so I had leftovers - it is ridiculously good cold - the sauce thickens and it's divine.

Anyways I just got home, starving, from pilates and decided to make some breakfast. I made oatmeal and added four slices of the pear and a bit of the sauce. A pinch or two more of sugar and I ate the most luxurious delicious oatmeal I have ever had. Total win.

Poires Savoyards

I'm not a big fan of pears. I'm not crazy about their grainy texture or their thick skins. If someone else cuts them up and presents them on a plate as part of a fruit salad, or as an accompaniment to cheese I will gladly eat them, but they're not my favourite. I do actually like the taste of pears though, so I enjoy them cooked, poached in red wine or baked into a tart. Last year I discovered a recipe for poires savoyards in Diane Henry's book Roasted Figs Sugar Snow, one of my favourite winter cookbooks.

It's quite simple.

Butter a baking dish, lay slices of peeled pear in, sprinkle with 4 tablespoons or so of caster sugar and then pour a bit less than a cup of double cream (with a drop of vanilla in it) all over. Bake in the oven at 200 degrees for about 20 minutes until the top is golden and burnished.

Nothing to it but it makes a gorgeous rich but at the same time light dessert. We ate it often last winter.

So, pears in the fridge, I made it for dessert the other night when Tara came over. Delicious as always and I made quite a bit so I had leftovers - it is ridiculously good cold - the sauce thickens and it's fabulous.

Anyways I just got home, starving, from pilates and decided to make some breakfast. I made oatmeal and added four slices of the pear and a bit of the sauce. A pinch or two more of sugar and I ate the most luxurious delicious oatmeal I have ever had. Total win.

Wednesday, November 24, 2010

Roasted Tomato and Sausage

When does a recipe become your own? How many times do you have to make it without following the original step by step to call it yours? How many changes, however slight, give you ownership of a set of instructions?

I think about that often while reading food blogs.

After the April sausage making class we had an abundance of sausages. In fact the freezer was quite full and it's only now that the numbers have dwindled enough for me to think about purchasing sausages again. For awhile we ate our homemade, artisan sausages with glee and they did in fact taste delicious - pride does add flavour! But then I started getting bored and looked around for sausage inspiration. I found a recipe on Jamie Oliver's site for sausages roasted with tomatoes to form a lovely sauce. Excellent. I followed the recipe and made the dish. Great - delicious, absolutely a make-again. And dead simple.

So the next time I glanced at the recipe and then went forth and made some changes. And then I made it again and didn't consult the recipe. And now, while the inspiration may have come from Jamie Oliver, the recipe is mine and it is one of my favourite comfort foods at the moment.

For two

Four sausages (Italian, cumberland, whatever. Preferably homemade ;)
A small mountain of cherry/grape tomatoes. I usually use a punnet and a half or so.
4 cloves of garlic, still in their skins
Herbs!
Rosemary, a sprig or two, finely chopped.
Thyme, three sprigs or so, finely chopped (or about a teaspoon of dried).
Oregano, half a teaspoon or so
Olive Oil
Balsamic vinegar
Salt and Pepper

The tomatoes get thrown into a roasting tin, the herbs sprinkled over top, douse with a bit of olive oil, be generous. Then add a tablespoon of balsamic vinegar. Mix about. Toss in the garlic.

Roll the sausages in the oil and place them on the tomatoes. This whole thing goes in the oven (180 degrees) for about 45 minutes. Turn the sausages and mix up the tomatoes about half through. You want them to roast and blacken a bit. Sometimes my sauce is too watery and then I pop in on the stove to boil away and simmer, adding the sausages at the end to warm up before serving.

It's unctuous and herby and warm and served over polenta that's got a shocking amount of butter and cheese in it it is one of my favourite meals of the moment.

The thing is, we are actually almost out of sausages and while the class was fun I don't really see us going back... so we'll have to BUY sausages like regular people. Ew. How common.

Thursday, November 18, 2010

What Did We Eat?

I have a day book. I've kept one each year since 2003. I write down what happens that day, keep track of birthdays and important appointments. That kind of thing. I also record what I eat. Not every single day. But most. They are short entries normally:

Tuesday February 9
So anxious. Went home and made spectacular, elaborate aubergine wrapped ricotta gnocchis with brown butter sage sauce. Divine, esp. on a tuesday.

Saturday March 6
Up so early! Bought an octopus, jeans, made a pie!

Friday July 16
A date night that wasn't. Both home late & tired so we ordered indian and watched television.

If we have a particularly epic meal I will do my best to write a full description of what everyone ate. If I make some particularly delicious but can't remember where the inspiration came from I'll record that too, just in case.

I write food down because it helps me remember. I may not remember what the weather was like or what was going on in politics, but if I've written down the food I can usually pull up a pretty good picture, visuals, smell, of the day. It's like the moment gets captured in the food and saved there. It's likely it acts as an aide-mémoire for me because sitting down to eat requires you to slow down and breathe and relax, even for a few moments.

The reason I bring it up is because of this lovely short article in the New Yorker about a man who also wrote down what he ate.

Friday, November 12, 2010

Then a treat, now commonplace

Homemade candied tomatoes made me think of the homemade sun dried tomatoes that my Aunt made one year.

They were hard as rocks and needed much love in order to soften them up so you could use them but she made them and they were free. They were kind of special. I received them at a point in my life where sun dried tomatoes were a novelty and an expensive treat and something that I rarely, if ever, bought for myself.

What other ingredients are there like that? Ones that were a treat, a special event, something to be treasured that now, as semi grown ups with incomes and choices, are things we eat regularly and don't treasure in the same way. Nice wine. I remember when buying a nice bottle (nice being relative, right?) was an event and something special. When mangoes where pricey and buying one and eating it, savouring it, was the height of luxury.

Cheese. God. I am so utterly spoiled now. I can get all sorts of cheese, it's not a big deal, it's not outrageously expensive like it was in Calgary, and I munch on it as a snack all the time. But there was a time, in my undergrad, when going to get cheese from the Janice Beaton cheese shop was an Event.

It was pretty much the only dedicated, artisan, cheese shop in Calgary. Or at least the only one that I knew about. It was not far from my house, but it was on 17th Avenue in the cool kids district, so I usually got dressed up a bit. Not a lot, but I didn't run out in my lululemon gear. I'd go in and the guys who worked there were wonderful. So knowledgable. So willing to talk, to explain, to try things with me and explain why and how and what. I'd buy an obscene amount of cheese for one poor Classics student, grab a baguette and some fruit on my way home and study and write and devour a king's ransom in dairy love.

The cheese I buy now is probably better. I live in England. It doesn't have as far to go (food miles and all). It's not as expensive. I still like to learn about it. But it is something I take for granted in a way that ten years ago would gave seemed crazy.