A break from the bleak mid-winter...with a summer treat

Every once in awhile, I just want something light to eat. I've made a serious effort in the last year to reduce the amount of red meat I eat and serve my family. My lunches are often vegetarian and I've definitely incorporated more fish and vegetarian dishes into our family dining. So, overall we've "lightened up," but sometimes I just need a break.

Yes, I just posted yesterday about the amazingly wonderful cheese course and you'll hear from me later on the importance of multi-course dining, but I'm also a big proponent of listening to one's inner-girl. Last night my inner-girl wanted a salad for dinner.

I made my own version of salade nicoise for us and it was so easy and refreshing. It took no time at all to prepare and was loaded with good stuff. There was even enough left over for me to take to work for lunch and it was still good. My recipe is below and all amounts are estimated as I cook by look and feel much more than by measurement.

I had one piece of foccacia with this salad and some sliced pear for dessert. Perrier and white wine to drink.

What are some of your favorite light meals??

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Kelli's Nicoise

Baby spinach leaves
Tuna (in oil, drained, tossed with dried thyme, salt, pepper and a squeeze or two of lemon)
Asparagus (broken into pieces, steamed in the microwave, tossed with a tiny bit of butter, salt, pepper)
2 red-skinned potatoes (cut into pieces, steamed in the microwave, tossed with a tiny bit of butter, salt, pepper)
Calamatta olives (pitted is great if you can find them) or oil cured olives from Provence
Cherry tomatoes, sliced
Hard-boild egg, chopped
Chives, chopped finely
Mustard vinaigrette
Fresh ground pepper to taste

In a salad bowl, create your mustard vinaigrette. Place spinach leaves in bowl. Arrange all other ingredients, except for the chives, on top of the spinach. Sprinkle with chopped chives and ground pepper. Keep in the refrigerator until ready to serve.

At the table, toss the salad and serve.

Bon appetit!

Time to make this French tradition your own

Like blue shutters and lace curtains on houses in the French countryside, the cheese course is about as quintessential francais as it gets. As you know, in France, cheese is served after the main course and salad. When we were in France last summer, I often opted for a cheese selection instead of dessert at restaurants. It's interesting, a wonderful way to top off a delicious meal, satisfying and very chic.

So why then do Americans eat their cheese before the meal? I'm sure there is a reason, but at our house, cheese is after salad. Here's how we do it:

We typically have a cheese course after our Saturday evening meal. I select three different cheeses. I've been pleasantly surprised that our local Whole Foods http://www.wholefoodsmarket.com/ has a very nice selection and knowledgable helpers. The cheeses are well marked so that you know the country of origin and the type of milk (cow, goat, sheep). They have tranches already cut for you or you can ask for a specific size to be cut for you. I'm especially pleased that they have what I'll call a mini-tranche available. For a couple of dollars one can purchase a nice slice of Mimolette, the perfect cheese course size. Also, smaller ethnic markets (we have a darling Italian market in our neighborhood) often have nice cheese selections. The larger chain grocery stores have gotten much better (beyond cheddar!!) and are fine if your choices are limited. You might also want to check out online purveyors like www.igourmet.com.

I typically choose a soft (Boursault , Camembert, etc), a blue (Roquefort, Bleu d'Auvergne and others), and a hard (Beaufort d'Alpage, Abondance, and of course Mimolette with its distinctive cantaloupe appearance). I slice the firmer cheeses into individual slices and arrange them all on one of a few pretty cheese boards I have so the children don't have to fiddle with slicing all but the softest cheeses. This board is placed on the table with thin slices of baguette in a basket. The bread is passed and the cheese is passed and everyone takes portions of the cheeses they'd like to try. We get fairly adventurous and the children like to tease about the extra stinky ones. But, you know what? They eat them and comment on their taste and texture. Last fall they had the idea to add a bit of sliced pear to the offering because it would be "so good" with the gorgonzola. It makes this mother weep with joy.

Experiement with cheeses from different countries. Mix and match cow and goat and sheep milk offerings. Play around until you know what your family likes...and then mix it up again.

I think one of the keys is to remember that this is a nice way to finish a meal and shouldn't really be thought of as a course, which just sounds big. Like anything, too much of a good thing can be bad. I think as Americans we have to constantly remind ourselves and relearn proper portion size. Until you know what that size is, eat slowly and STOP when you're full.

One note on bread and cheese. When dh was in France a year ago he visited our au pair's family. When the cheese course was served, he served himself a slice and then, ahem, popped it in his mouth. "Madame" tsked him and commented that one always eats the cheese with bread. She teasingly followed up with, "I'll make a Frenchman out of you yet." Since he's diligently continued with his French lessons, she might just be right!

I opened the February issue of Martha Stewart Living this month to find a whole "Mathar" article on...drumroll...FRENCH CHEESE and the lovely custom of the cheese course. www.marthastewart.com I admit I was a bit surprised, but I'm not sure why. Maybe because it feels uptown, upscale, and frankly, a little fancy for Martha! But, nevermind, I applaud her efforts to bring this lovely French custom to light, er, table.

Until next time,

Au revoir

Celebrate, Everyday!

Despite the sad defeat of my Denver Broncos by the Pittsburgh Steelers yesterday, today is a good day! Yesterday’s game was disappointing, but hey, now I don’t have to worry my way through the Super Bowl hype. Well, you might be thinking, isn’t this a lifestyle and cooking blog? Why is she going on about football?? Well, I’ll tell you: because every occasion is a reason to celebrate! Read on.

I like to make events out of everything. I guess I like an excuse to have a party…real or for just our family of four. Football playoff games are no exception. The fun started last week during the Saturday night airing of the New England Patriots at Denver game. Instead of creating a “regular” Saturday night meal (which we’ll talk about in a later post…our Saturday night dinners are often spectacular), I decided to have fun. In the spirit of “devouring the enemy” I planned my New England/Denver menu carefully: wanting to grill the competition, we dined on grilled lobster tails, twice baked potatoes, salad (always) and blueberry pie. That was a winner dinner and so were the Broncos.

Yesterday’s game called for a lunchtime creation. At first I was not really enthused by the Pittsburgh cuisine I was finding on my searches, that was until I found the recipe for Devonshire Sandwiches, a Pittsburgh original from the 1930s http://www.post-gazette.com/food/20020704devonp9.asp . How great is that?? These would make a terrific brunch addition, by the way. The recipe from the Post-Gazette is VERY rich and I tailored it to suit my family’s taste. Here are my suggested revisions to the original:

~ I could tell from the recipe that the sauce was going to be way too thick and glue-like for us, so I cut the flour down to a ¼ of a cup and simply simmered and reduced the liquid in the sauce until it was a nice consistency. It was a nice, creamy cheese sauce that held its own with the sandwich and through the baking step.

~ I added more cheese than the recipe calls for. Granted, it may have been necessary because my cheddar was too mild and not sharp enough. If you start with a sharper cheddar, you should be fine with the amount in the recipe.

~ Instead of any old “toast with the crust removed,” I toasted 6 slices of very good artisan Italian bread. I did not remove the crust. It was yummy!!

~ Use high quality, thick-sliced bacon…one that will stand up to the cheese sauce.

This is not an everyday sort of dish. I’d look like those Pittsburgh linebackers if I ate this very often! But, it was very tasty and even my 7 year old daughter declared that it was delicious! I served it with a salad and garlicky vinaigrette and crisp potato chips for the little ones.

Now, if only the Broncos really had smothered (cheese sauce or no) the Steelers, it would have been much more appetizing.

These are a few of my favorite things

Raindrops on roses? Perhaps. But this beautiful morning in the Rocky Mountain west made me think of my favorite things...

~ A crisp winter morning after a snowfall. The city has a clean, white, crystalline blanket of snow; the sky is bright, bright blue; the sun is bright. Just another day in paradise.

~ My daily mid-morning cup of bancha green tea http://www.enjoyingtea.com/bancha.html brewed in my pretty iron tea pot http://www.enjoyingtea.com/rednahecairt.html.

~ Friday "clam night." The years when dh (darling husband) I were dating and first married, living in the Washington, DC area, we had a Friday night tradition of going to one of our local neighborhood Italian restaurants (Pines of Florence in Arlington, Pines of Rome in Bethesda, and Vicinzo in Silver Spring), sharing a bottle of white wine and feasting on white pizza and linguini with white sauce. When the first baby came along, going out every Friday night became difficult to manage and dh took matters into his own hands, creating his own version of linguini with clams. To this day, the default Friday night plan includes clams. The children get to enjoy a movie night complete with cheese pizza while dh and I share a bottle of Prosecco http://www.wineloverspage.com/italwineguide/prosecco.phtml, and catch up from our busy week while the clam sauce simmers, the noodle water comes to the boil, and I prepare a fresh salad with balsamic vinaigrette and slice some fresh bread. Ah, life IS good!

What are your traditions? The things that help define you as a couple, as a family, with your friends? Traditions help ground us and provide a framework for sharing and reconnecting...and my favorite traditions usually center around good eating. What about you?

dh's Linguini with White Clam Sauce

2-3 T. olive oil
4 cloves garlic, diced
3-6 (depending on how spicy you like) dried Italian hot peppers, ground with a mortar and pestle
3 6.5 oz cans chopped clams (we use Snow brand), clams and juice separated
1 bottle clam juice (again, we use Snow brand)
Dry white Italian wine (typically we use Pinot Grigio)
1 T. dried oregano
Fresh Italian parsley, minced
1 lb. De Cecco brand linguini

In a large skillet, gently saute garlic in olive oil until light brown and then remove garlic from pan and discard. Saute peppers in olive oil until they release their scent. Add reserved clam juice and the bottle of clam juice to the pan and simmer gently until sauce thickens slightly. Add white wine (about 1 1/2 cups) and and oregano and continue to simmer, reducing the sauce by about a third. Boil pasta according to package directions. When pasta is nearly ready, add chopped clams to the skillet and heat through. Drain pasta and put into a large serving bowl. Pour clam sauce over linguini and garnish with the fresh parsley. Serve in pasta bowls, making sure to ladle out plenty of nice sauce so that you have something to dip your bread in. Have a nice salad with balsamic vinaigrette to enjoy after your clams.

Bon Appe'tit!!

First things first...

Ah, Paris. Baguettes, cafe au lait and confiture. I've always been a francophile. Always. What's not to like? The food, the clothes, the language, the style, and yes, the attitude. I love it all. I've been an avid cook all my adult life and have enjoyed taking French cooking classes and experimenting with new recipes. My husband and I loved to entertain when we were first married and it seemed that life was a constant dinner party, a perpetual feast. I was always thin so I didn't think twice about enjoying the best food...just thought that was me. Easy peasy.

Fast forward 15 years: married with two children, executive at a large corporation, always on the go. And, alas, heavier than I cared to be. It didn't hit me until I saw a picture of myself with my son. I was 30 lbs. heavier than I was when I became pregnant with my son. My face looked bloated and the dress I was wearing had no shape. Wait a minute! How did this happen?

Friends, what happened to me had everything to do with what I wasn't cooking...I wasn't dabbling in continental cuisine anymore, I was opening boxes and adding water. I was making casseroles with ingredients that included, among other things, cream of mushroom soup (not chic!). I was focused on feeding a family of four quickly and conveniently, not deliciously. My natural, easy to maintain size 4 had bloated up to a 12. Pour moi, Quel horreurs!!!

So then what? I knew I was not my former svelt self, but I didn't really know why. Then, the summer of 2004 happened and a lovely French girl from Reims came to live with us and care for our children as our au pair. Within two weeks of her living in our home, I quickly realized...something very different is going on here. Her approach to everything was so different and I loved it. I set out on a mission to find out everything I could about the French diet and lifestyle. Wasn't it just the early 90s when the 60 Minutes piece on "The French Paradox" had everyone dumping their white zinfandel (mercifully) and buying cases of red wine?? 18 months, 30 lbs, and one trip to France and a whole lot of champagne later, I can't say that I've cracked the whole code, but I can tell you that it's all good. More soon. A bientot!