Happy Birthday Julia: Rocquefort and Pear Spirals

Happy 100th birthday to a woman who forever changed American kitchens.

As I wrote in my tribute for PBS.org's celebrations, Julia Child was a woman who taught more than just cooking. She taught viewers to think on the fly, because no matter how much we prepare for perfection, perfection is never guaranteed.

Think about that in context of today's Stepford Wife-ian cookery shows. Click over to Food TV and tucked in amongst the plethora of Amazing Race-like competitions, "reality" shows from the back rooms of bakeries and restaurants and shows focussing wacky food-related adventures, you will find what passes as instructional cooking offerings.

Seemingly perfect food, seemingly perfectly prepared by seemingly perfectly coiffed presenters. Sure they can hit their marks, tilt their heads so klieg lights glint off their bleached teeth and have perfectly mastered the forced, authoritative yet approachable "Mmm--that's so good!" They rate well with the 18-55 year old male demographic, don't intimidate those who could easily live with only a microwave, fridge, and are the darlings of those proud to have perfected "finger cooking."

But do you actually believe those presenters would know what to do if--horror of horrors--a bit of shell followed along with the yolk, or a drop of water found its way into a pot of melted chocolate? Without a doubt Laura Calder, Anna Olson, Nigella Lawson, Bobby Flay, Jamie Oliver and Gordon Ramsay (to name but six) would. But others? Well I'm sure they've mastered the art of the teleprompter.

When I watch Julia Child I watch a woman who was passionate about food and cooking...but she was also focussed on instilling that same passion in us. In Julia's world, it was more than figuring out which of the Chicken Sisters would make the best roast or how to pan-fry mushrooms. In her world, part of that passion came from knowing what to do when things go wrong.

Although she wanted to show us the proper way to prepare recipes, sometimes things didn't quite go to plan. Mistakes weren't to be feared but to be quickly and deftly dealt with. They were lessons that made us stronger in the kitchen and, by extension, in life.

So when it came to a dish to prepare to mark her centenary, I went to the very first Julia Child cookbook I purchased: The Way to Cook. It wasn't the first cookbook I bought, but it was within the first five...maybe three.

I was drawn to all the loveliness found in the pages dedicated to pâte feuilletée--puff pastry. In a perfect world I would have spent a day dedicated to layering butter within pastry dough. But this is not a perfect world and I don't have a day to devote to making puff pastry. However...in this imperfect world of mine I do have a mediumscarymegamart around the corner that does stock frozen butter puff pastry.

Julia would understand--in the first French Chef episode, the one about Boeuf Bourguignon, she counselled viewers on using canned beef bouillon instead of consommé. Yes, she advocated making stock, but she seemed very aware that not everyone had the time or ability to make their own beef stock.

Her variations of cheese tarts caught my eye, so I decided to improvise slightly. I decided to make spiral nibblies, with (as she suggests in a tart variation) a mixture of bleu and cream cheeses. Since I'm a fan of pears and nuts with bleu cheese, I chopped a couple of sugar pears and pulled my walnut pieces from the freezer as well.

The resulting Julia-inspired appetiser is easy, with a tasty contrast between flaky pastry, crunchy nuts and soft filling, sharp cheese and sweet fruit. Serve them as nibblies, or along side a simple salad made of rocket (arugula) lightly tossed in balsamic dressing.

Rocquefort and Pear Spirals
Yield 12- 16 spirals

Ingredients:
225g (0.5lb) puff pastry
165g (approximately 6oz) softened cream cheese (2/3 package)
55g (2oz) Roquefort cheese
2 small sugar pears, peeled, cored and cut into a small dice
a couple of handfuls of walnut pieces
black pepper

Method

Preheat oven to 200C/400F. Line a cookie tray with parchment paper.

Roll the puff pastry into a about a 0.5cm (0.25") thick rectangle.

Mix the cheeses together until well blended. Spread the mixture on the puff pastry, leaving about 1cm (approx 0.5") clear boarder around the rectangle. Strew the chopped fruit over top the cheese, followed by the nuts.

Roll the smeared and sprinkled pastry and lightly pinch the ends together. Slice the long roll into 2.5cm (1") rounds. Place the discs onto the lined cookie tray. Sprinkle with pepper.

Bake for 10-12 minutes and serve warm

Note:
You can make your own puff pastry, or you can buy a package from the shop. If you do buy it , make sure it's all butter puff pastry.

Bon appetit!

jasmine

I'm a quill for hire!

Cook For Julia: Seeni Sambol

For the next few days PBS food celebrates what would have been Julia Child's 100th birthday. Their senior food editor sent me a note several weeks ago asking me to write a tribute--you can find it here.

In as much as she was a great force in American (and North American cooking) I have to admit that I really didn't know all that much about Julia. From her various cookery shows, I knew she was a cookbook author and teacher; she was tall and has a sing-song voice. She was devoted to her husband Paul, loved cats and she was, at some point in her life, was part the US's Office of Strategic Services, where she worked on top secret things during the war. I also gleaned this and that from Nora Ephron's Julie and Julia.

I picked up Noel Riley Fitch's Appetite for Life: The Biography of Julia Child. I'm about half-way through (various things kept distracting me--I hope to finish it by summer's end). I've just gotten to the point where Julia McWilliams has returned to the US, from OSS duties in Asia, and she is absolutely besotted with the older and much more worldly Paul Child.

I am totally engrossed in this love story...and I say that as someone who rolls their eyes at such things (well, except for Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy)...I know there are decades ahead for them, and I'm looking forward to following their journeys.

When I thought of my own foodish tribute #CookForJulia tribute, I decided to not go with one of her recipes, but instead take inspiration from an important point in her life.

Julia met Paul, when they were both stationed in the OSS in Sri Lanka. She was young and free. But then came Paul who would open her to many new experiences, including exploring local cuisines where they were stationed. Not much is said about the foods they ate (or if there was, I don't recall). My guess is their cooks made available meals palatable to Americans and the British who were homesick, as well as some curries. That said, in my mind, I want to believe Paul may have introduced her to local home cooking.

In looking through my cookery library for Sri Lankan dishes, I came across Sri Lankan sambols--condiments made by grinding ingredients with a paste, served with meals and snack. Most of the recipes I have are for uncooked sambols, but I chose to make Seeni Sambol, a cooked condiment from Jeffrey Allford and Naomi Duguid's Mangoes and Curry Leaves.

This is a very easy dish to make, but it does require time and attention. The end result is a gorgeous brick red, salty-sweet-sour-hot dish that can be used to accompany meats, used as a dip, or to flavour soups, or mixed with other ingredients for marinade.

Seeni Sambol

Adapted from Jeffrey Allford and Naomi Duguid's Sri Lankan Seeni Sambol in Mangoes and Curry Leaves.

Yield: 310ml ( 1.25c)

Ingredients

60ml (0.25c) flavourless oil or coconut oil

750ml (3c) thinly sliced red onion (approximately one very large onion)

60ml (0.25c) minced garlic (approximately 10cloves)

2Tbsp (30ml) minced ginger

10 fresh curry leaves

8 dried red chillies, stemmed and crushed

1.5tsp (7.5ml) fish sauce (optional)

5ml (1tsp) ground cinnamon

0.6ml (1/8-tsp) ground cardamom

0.6ml (1/8-tsp) ground cloves

185ml (0.75c) coconut milk

0.5tsp (2.5ml) salt, to taste

juice of one lime

sugar, to taste

Method

Over a medium-hight flame, heat the oil in a heavy-bottomed pan. Add the onions, garlic and ginger. Stir frequently until all the water has evaporated and the onions have softened and caramelized, turning colour from a spring lilac to a golden colour.

Stir in the curry leaves, dried chillis, fish sauce, cinnamon, cardamom, cloves and coconut milk. When the mixture starts to bubble, turn down the heat to a bare simmer and let blurble for about 30-40 minutes, stirring every so often, so the mixture doesn't catch on the bottom of the pan. Don't be concerned as to it's pinkish-grey hue--it will deepen in colour as it simmers.

Remove from heat, add the lime juice, salt and sugar. Stir well. Puree to a smooth paste (the curry leaves are slightly fibrous, so don't be surprised if you see threads wrapped around the blades). Balance flavours to taste.

Let cool to room temperature before storing in a sealed jar. This will keep for a month in the refrigerator.

Serving Suggestions

• Alongside puri, parathas
• As a condiment chicken, fish or pork or kebabs
• Mixed into tuna salad
• Spread on toast
• Mixed with mayonnaise and served with fish or chicken fingers
• Mixed with sour cream or Greek yoghurt as a dip for pitas or tortillas

For other Julia Child-related posts I've done, click here.

Bon appetit!

jasmine

I'm a quill for hire!

Julia's Legacy

Hello,

As many of you know, PBS.com's food section is marking what would be Julia Child's 100th birthday on 15 August 2012.

Several weeks ago, their senior editor contacted me (as well as chefs and other foodbloggers), asking if I'd write a tribute, noting Julia's impact on my life. What an honour!

The celebrations started a little while ago, so you can explore many aspects of Julia's life--the site will grow daily, and culminate in a 10-day cooking and baking tribute to America's favourite chef.

In the meanwhile, my own tribute was uploaded today. If you'd like to read it, you can find it here.

cheers!

jasmine

I'm a quill for hire!

Film Review: Julie and Julia

I must admit when I first heard that Nora Ephron was making Julie and Julia, a film that combined the lives of Julie Powell (former food blogger) and Julia Child (American culinary institution), I was torn between wanting to camp out at my local cinema for opening night and washing the cat.

In as much as I have fond memories of Julia's confidence (and voice) in her highly influential cooking shows, I never took to Julie's blog or her book. When Jenny of All Things Edible suggested she, Mary of Beans and Caviar and I see the film, how could I turn down a night out with two food bloggers to see a film about Julia and food and blogging?

Ephron mines Child's autobiography (written with Alexander Prud'homme) My Life in France with Powell's blog-cum-memoire Julie and Julia: My Year of Cooking Dangerously for a screenplay that intertwines the two women's stories.

Yes, there are parallels: Julia Child, a diplomat's wife in post-war France, finds purpose in food and along the way enrolls in Le Cordon Bleu and, over the series of years co-authors Mastering the Art of French Cooking a seminal two-volume work that eventually brought Child and French cooking into American homes via television. Julie Powell, a New York City municipal worker answers phones in the aftermath of 9/11, blogs her way through MAFC (Vol. One) in one year as an escape from daily existence and in the process becomes one of the blogosphere's first to find mainstream popularity, sharing her adventures with thousands of online readers.

Production quality is high: Meryl Streep's eery chameleon-like ability to transform herself into any character is amazing and Amy Adams' performance as a disillusioned 20-something is something many can easily identify. Set decoration and costuming are impeccable--important, I think in what is a double period piece, although I must admit that I was partially distracted looking at Streep's shoes and other tricks to give her Child's height.

I laughed. I sympathised. I was hungry. At one point I wanted to go into Powell's kitchen and show her how to poach an egg. At another I wanted to step into Julia's kitchen and give her a hug as she found out her sister was pregnant. Throughout I wished smell-o-vision had been invented because I could just imagine the aromas wafting from both kitchens.

Let's be honest: It's a chick flick. It's a foodie film. It's a film about "finding yourself" (good gravy, I hate that phrase). It's a film about relationships--my heart melted whenever Streep and Stanley Tucci (who played Paul Child, Julia's husband) were together. If you're looking for sex amongst the sauciers, hand grenades in the pomegranates or a gun that shoots bullets instead of frosting...this film's not for you. Really--go see one of the other mindless bits of Hollyweird drivel and leave this to people who cook and eat.

I left the cinema with one thing in mind: "If they release a DVD version that cuts out all the Julie Powell parts, I'll buy it."

Powell's qualities I picked up on while flicking through her various posts as well as leafing through her (still unbought) book which turned me off were more than evident on screen: narcissism, over-inflated ego and her profanity crutch (it's mentioned in passing, probably to keep a PG-13 rating).

For me the cinematic moment that encapsulates Powell's ego was when she found out Child, her idol and the woman to whom she hitched her fame-brought wagon, didn't really care for her or her blog. The reaction was that of an entitled, talentless and overly-protected and overly-lauded little girl who is faced with the cold reality of their mundane ineptitude for the first time: shock/disbelief and sadness (Powell probably went through the other five stages of grief, but there's only so much time and celluloid).

Powell has since argued that the Julie Powell on film is not the Julie Powell in real life. In reading her plea two things came to mind. Minor details like what you did or didn't do in school, as well as who you do or don't hang out with is irrelevant because as many of us who've a few braincells to rub together know: Hollywood makes stuff up so characters and events are interesting to the popcorn-munching masses. The other is: Powell's probably never had her portrait painted by someone without a vested interest in placating her ego. In other words: she doesn't like the interpretation derived from the thousands of words she's committed to pixels and print.

At the same time, the Julia Child on film can border on caricature. If Julia were alive today, what would she think of her cinematic doppelganger? I don't know: the film paints her as knowing her mind, so I'm guessing that she would have voiced her opinions. One thing I'm fairly sure of is she probably wouldn't whine.

What we are presented with are character and feat interpretations as amassed by writers, actors, directors and editors as well as focus groups and marketers. There are thousands of words and hours and hours of film about and by Child, far fewer about and by Powell. I think they did the best they could with what they had. As Kalyn wrote in her review, it would be better if Ephron and her team better translated Powell's culinary and blogging feat to screen. I wonder what pre-FoodTV cookbook authors (aka not the "I appeal to the 18-55 year-old male demographic and those who'd rather look at food than cook food" bobbleheads) have to say about getting published about the treatment of Child's accomplishments.

My guess is Ephron is neither a home cook nor a motivated blogger which is a shame because that part of the film was not handled as well as it could have. It's akin to making a movie about travelling to the moon written, produced (etc) by a team who's never studied the space sciences, but may have looked into a light-polluted night sky. In other words: it lacks consistent authenticity.

One thing I cannot fault is the food. It looked wonderful--even Julia's mountain of chopped onions looked fabulous. I just wanted to eat everything...

In prepping for this review, I decided to revisit Shari's MAFC index. Truth be told I'd love to have done a poached egg dish for this, but I just did Oeufs à la Bourguignonne for Hélène's MAFC event. Being the stubborn person I am, I kept to the egg theme and did a favourite breakfast-brunch dish: Oeufs en cocotte. It's easypeasylemonsqueezey, highly adaptable and is a non-recipe recipe, but Julia's recipe is in the link.

I did two versions: the first had a layer of mushrooms sauteed in garlic butter and the other was prepared in a ramekin lined with shaved salami. I like baking them until the whites are opalescent ad the yolks are thick and creamy...perfect for dunking toast tips.


cheers!
jasmine

PS. I will never hear Talking Heads' Psycho Killer the same way ever again:

What I'm reading: The Heart is an Involuntary Muscle by Monique Proulx

I'm a quill for hire!

Julia's oeufs à la bourguignonne

"It's called microblogging--all you do is very quick updates about what you're doing."

Ummm...yeah. (That was me two years ago, when I first heard of Twitter)

I checked it out and all I saw were a lot of "Just got in from a great night out!" and "Finished dinner. Kids in Bed. All's quiet." and "Waiting for the movie to start" type posts.

Ummm...yeah.

I had better things to do.

And in the intervening years, it became the new online it-thing to do. I was still skeptical about it all. But in these two years, it became less about bursted updates and more about community building and knowledge sharing. This is something I could be interested in.

After having a post or two of mine Tweeted and ReTweeted, I decided to give it a shot. I'd known there was a pretty thriving food community there: food is one of the topics groups coalesce over, so I was pretty sure I'd find yet another online home. I was right.

No, don't worry, I'm not going to evangelise about microblogging. All I'll say is that I'm having fun with things, communicating with others, challenging myself to the 140 character limit and trying a few different writing techniques--my favourite thus far is the serial--sequential posts that tell a tale in real time. As usual, if my longposting schedule leaves you hungry for more of my inanities in bite-sized portions, you can find me @cardamomaddict.

Anyway, our dear Hélène of La Cuisine d'Hélène mused about a Tweeted and blogged event celebrating Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking and the Julie and Julia film. Truthfully, I don't follow that blog and when I perused the book I thought the writing was pedantic and lacklustre. Yes, I know they're popular--they're just not my cuppatea.

But the idea of a Julia Child blogging event kept hold of my imagination.

To participate all we had to do was blog a recipe from either Volume One or Two of Julia's influential books.

Problem. I don't have a copy of either--they are on my "eventually I'll get to them" list. No copies were found at any of the used book shops I checked and I really didn't want to drop $50 on either tome. Desperate to participate the answer came to me: in the thousands of foodish posts housed on the interweb should be a number of recipes from these two tomes.

I was right.

Shari of Whisk came to the rescue with this post that lists a number of Julia Child recipes as posted by various bloggers. Given my own time and pantry constraints, along with a craving for gooey-centred poached eggs, I found my entry recipe for oeufs à la bourguignonne, courtesy of Melissa of The Traveller's Lunchbox.

Really: mushrooms and bacon in a red wine sauce with poached eggs. It combines so many of life's good things...why would I choose anything else to celebrate Julia?

Red wine sauce is incredibly simple and goes wonderfully with eggs, beef and chicken and really should be part of the usual repertoire. Of course the ideal is to make your own beef stock, but I used water-soluble squeeziebeefie. The sauce didn't take that long and can be left to its own devices for most of the time it's on the hob. I made a full recipe, keeping leftovers in the fridge to be used with a bit of beef and umm...for dipping torn bits of bread and bagel into.

Thanks Hélène for organising the Mastering the Art of French Cooking event. If you're interested in what others are doing, please visit her round-up.

cheers!
jasmine

I'm a quill for hire!

Daring Bakers: Julia Child's French Bread

I think it's a rare North American home cook who can claim to be pristine against the influence of the great Julia Child. I remember watching her show, The French Chef, as PBS repeats: her distinctive sing-songy voice teaching viewers how to make sauces or crêpes or beasts in a way that was very matter-of-fact, but approachable. More importantly, I thought she was having fun.

When our fabulous Daring Bakers hosts, Sarah of i like to cook and Breadchick of The Sour Dough challenged us to make Julia Child's French Bread, I knew this would be a combination of fun and, well...work.

Yes, I'm fully aware of those glorious home bread machines that via prest-o-change-o magic fill homes with scrumptious aromas in three hours. Relatively effortless, all you have to do --apart from measure out the ingredients-- is dump the fixings into the gadget and walk away until it dings its "the bread has loafed" ding. Then all you need to do is cool it, wipe down the inside of the machine and wash the tin. It's a little too sterile for my liking...and truth be told, I usually wind up losing one of the kneading paddles into the crumb, so I end up massacring its underside, pulling out huge wodges of bread in search of a wandering machine part.

I wasn't forced to use the bread machine, something an uncle convinced my parents to get, but being the lazy sort I am, it became very convenient...and a very lah-di-dah excuse to not be lassoed into doing something as exciting as digging my eyes out with the catbox scoop--"Oh no, thanks for the invite, but I really do need to make some bread...yes, I do bake my own...it's terribly complicated...I really can't leave it, even through the second rise...yes, there's more than one rise...it's that sort of thing." Given the bread machine was usually hid under a tea towel, many people never noticed it.

To tell you the truth, there was a bit of me that was happy when the bread machine broke some 10-odd years ago. I'd rather have my hands stuck in a mass of sticky, yeasty and, well, farty dough than letting some dispassionate contraption have all the fun.

Let's face it, breadmaking by hand is not for the feint of heart, nor wimpy of arm. Although not required, a...healthy, if not plumptious physique helps with all that kneading and rolling and slapping and smacking that goes on when taming yeast bubbles. It also helps if you have a wee bit...or a whole bushel-load...of frustrations to work through. Think of the dough as a soon-to-be edible stressball.

If you've ever wanted to make French Bread, this recipe is one to try. Whatever you do, don't be discouraged by its copious notations, nor the total amount of time needed to make this bread from start to finish: Sarah's and Mary's hints, suggestions and clarifications are a fabulous way to calm even the most nervous of novice breadmakers, and well, you really aren't that active for all that breadmaking time (up to nine hours, if you want to know)...most of it is spent letting the dough grow, so you can go about your normal housey antics...cleaning, flitting through blogs, chasing the cat, watching Coronation Street, all of the above...

I was so pleased with my humble little loaf. I knocked on the crust--it had that lovely deep sound a good crusty loaf should have. The outside was a beautifully burnished colour and he crumb was soft and yielding. Fresh, it's delicious with butter and jam. Cut into thick batons and lightly toasted, it's fabulous dunked into (Nigella's) Oeufs en Cocotte.





To read what the other DBs did with this challenge, take a meander through our blogroll.



cheers!
jasmine