Nems (Spring Rolls)

This is a very basic recipe; it would be good with lots more garlic and with any spices or herbs you'd like to add. Mint and basil work very nicely. I recommend serving it with dipping sauce: soy, plum, hot mustard, chili, whatever you like for rolls and potstickers.

Equipment:

large frying pan
mixing bowl
pot for boiling noodles
colander
bowl for soaking mushrooms
spoon
fork or whisk
cloth
plate for folding rolls; plate for draining rolls
paper towels
large pot for wetting wrappers

Ingredients:

300 g ground meat (your preference--chicken is good)
100 g rice noodles
1 carrot, grated
1 onion, finely chopped
20 g (or more, to taste) dried black mushrooms
1 egg
10 rice flour wrappers (in France, you can substitute "feuilles de brick"; in the U.S. you could probably get away with whatever you would normally use for egg/spring rolls)
1 tsp sugar
oil
salt & pepper
4 cloves of crushed or minced garlic

Directions:

1) Boil water in a pot (just enough to cover your rice noodles). Throw the noodles in and let cook 30 seconds. Drain them immediately and rinse with cold water. Chop them coarsely.

2) Let the mushrooms soak 15 minutes in warm water. Drain them and press them between your hands to get rid of any excess liquid. Chop them coarsely.

3) In your mixing bowl, beat the egg with a fork or whisk. Add the rest of the ingredients and mix well.

4) Cover your folding plate with a dry cloth or towel (a large napkin works well). Fill a large pot with enough water to wet the wrappers. Put the first wrapper into the water and transfer it to the plate when just wet enough to fold easily. Fill the wrapper with the noodle mixture and roll tightly. Repeat till you run out of wrappers, filling, or both.

5) Heat a good bit of oil in a pan till very hot (almost smoking), then lower the heat a setting or two. Cook the rolls 3 or 4 minutes on each side, till golden brown. You can cook several in the same pan at once. When you take them out, to cut the greasiness, set them on a plate lined thickly with paper towels to soak up the excess oil.

6) If you have extra filling, fry it after all the rolls are done and use it as a side serving or as baby food. You can serve whole rolls to your baby once they are thoroughly cooled if you don't mind a big mess; otherwise spoon-feed him the filling only.

Infinite Chocolate Cookies

I call them that because, like the last recipe, they are infinitely variable. You could add mint, cinnamon, any other flavor, nuts, berries, fruit... Also, they are infinitely chocolatey.

Equipment:

double boiler (or two pots to improvise one)
Mixing bowl & fork
Baking dish (or any flat sheet)
parchment paper

Ingredients:

200 g of chocolate designed for melting
80 g of flaky grains--oatmeal works nicely

Directions:

1) Melt the chocolate in a double-boiler.

2) Mix the grains into the chocolate, and stir together with a fork.

3) Put the parchment paper on the baking sheet. Spoon gobs of the mixture onto the paper, in whatever size you prefer.

4) Put the baking sheet in the fridge and let cool at least one hour.

Cucumber Smoked Salmon Rolls

Okay, so this is kind of a strange one. It's delicious, and we picked it because it's easy and infinitely variable, but the name is misleading. I will give you the recipe as written, but I don't recommend serving it in rolls; it's hard to eat that way. I recommend serving it as a salad. I made so many changes myself that I'll incorporate them in as alternate instructions rather than listing them first.

Ingredients:

2 cucumbers
100 g smoked salmon (or to taste, or what you have left in your fridge)
chives
chervil
dill
parsley
[NOTE: Obviously all the herbs must be fresh. I replaced the chervil and dill with mint; you could use any fresh herbs you have on hand that you think would go nicely.]
15 cl creme fraiche
[NOTE: If you can't find creme fraiche where you are, it will be taste different. You could use thick whipping cream or buttermilk, but it will be too runny and fattty; you could use yogurt but it'll be too sour; you could use sour cream but it'll be too sour creamy--use what you'd use as a base for ranch dressing and it'll be similar enough to work.]
juice of 1/2 lemon
salt & pepper
[NOTE: I served this with sliced tomatoes and put the extra sauce on top of them, which was great. I consider the tomatoes essential to the success of the dish. Jonathan suggests the addition of roquefort, which sounds good but is as yet untested. We highly recommend serving this with French bread.]

Directions:

1) Wash the cucumbers, and [OPTIONAL] peel them. If you are serving this as salad, slice or chop them as desired. If you want to try the rolls, cut them into fourths, making eight sections. Use a thin knife (like a steak knife) to hollow out each section. Put paper towels on a plate, and put the sections upright on that to drain.

2) Put the creme (or your substitute) into a bowl. Chop the salmon finely and mix it in. Snip in the herbs and mix. Mix in the lemon juice. Salt and pepper to taste.

3) Slice or chop your tomatoes. If you are making rolls, spoon the dressing into the hollowed out cucumbers and serve on a plate with the tomatoes. You will probably have extra dressing. Put it on the tomatoes. If you are making salad, mix the cucumber and tomato in a large and bowl and, according to your preference, toss with the dressing or serve it on the side. Serve with bread.

For variations, you can do pretty much whatever you want--add, subtract, substitute, change the presentation--as long as you have some sort of dressing and some sort of vegetable matter on which to serve it. This dish is surprisingly filling and satisfying, especially with bread, so you could do it as a main course or as a starter or side salad.

Pineapple-Carrot Cake

Modifications:

I'm giving the recipe as written, but here are the changes I made: I put in about 1/2 cup of molasses instead of 1/3, and since I'm in France I used "levure chimique" instead of baking soda & powder (which don't seem to exist here).

Ingredients:

2 eggs, beaten
1/3 cup maple syrup or molasses
1/3 cup plain yogurt
1/4 cup canola or safflower oil
1 3/4 cups crushed pineapple, drained
1 1/2 cups grated carrots (about 3 carrots)
2/3 cup ground almonds or other nuts
1 1/2 cups pastry flour (ideally whole wheat)
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
3/4 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1/4 tsp ground nutmeg

Equipment:

2 Mixing bowls
wooden spoon
grater
9-inch cake pan (ideally springform)

Instructions:

1) Preheat oven to 300*F. Oil the cake pan.

2) Beat together eggs, sweetener, yogurt and oil until smooth. Stir in pineapple and nuts.

3) In a separate bowl, sift together flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, ginger, and nutmeg. Stir flour mixture gently into carrot batter.

4) Pour batter into pan. Bake 60 to 70 minutes (till a toothpick comes out clean).

This recipe came with a recipe for pineapple-yogurt frosting, but it sounded ridiculous to me--you have to drain 16 oz of yogurt for at least 12 hours to get the liquid out, and mix in crushed pineapple and coconut. I decided to go without frosting. It was delicious.

Roasted Seafood

Ingredients:

400 g of salmon (about a pound)
24 large shrimp
6 small tomatoes
3 onions (French onions are tiny--if you are in CA buying normal onions, you probably only need one)
bay
salt & pepper
olive oil

Equipment:

roasting pan/baking dish
cutting board & knife

Directions:

1) Preheat the oven to 150*C/300*F.
2) Cut the salmon into bite-sized pieces and peel the shrimp.
3) Chop the tomato and onion.
4) Mix in your baking dish. Add the seasoning and drizzle with olive oil.
5) Bake for 20 minutes (check at ten minutes to see how the salmon is doing, and every five minutes after the first 20. It's done when the salmon is done, which may be more or less time.).

Suitable for baby food: Yes, but obviously if your kid isn't eating shellfish yet don't feed him the shrimp. I don't eat the skin on fish or chicken, because it's too fatty, but Tristram loved eating the skin off our salmon for this recipe.

Makeshift Thanksgiving

We finally had something like a Thanksgiving dinner. It was largely improvised; I'll transcribe the recipe as I made it and not as the book gave it. It was originally supposed to kebabs, and called for slices of lard in with the turkey and prunes. I didn't think that lard kebabs sounded particularly appealing, and without a grill there's not a great way to do kebabs, so I decided to ditch the lard and just put everything in a big baking dish to roast. I also decided, since I was already being unFrench by not doing my seasoning with fat and fat alone, to add some spices, It's not the best recipe in here, but it's quite respectable and it satisfied our Thanksgiving longings. You could easily put things on a stick instead of in a dish if you would prefer to do so.

Ingredients:

2 turkey breasts
24 prunes (1 small bag)
2 Tbsps honey
salt & pepper
paprika to taste (probably a teaspoon or so)
dash of ginger
olive oil

Equipment:

cutting board & knife
baking dish

Directions:

1) Cut the turkey into bite-sized cubes.
2) Mix all the ingredients in a baking dish/roasting pan and drizzle with olive oil.
3) Roast at 220*C for 20 minutes.

Suitable for baby food: Yes, if you cut it up small. Tristram loved the prunes but was ambivalent about the turkey; it's hard to chew.

Artichokes with Roquefort Dip

Ingredients:

4 artichokes
1 yogurt
50 g of Roquefort (4 tbsp) or other good bleu cheese
juice of 1/2 lemon
minced chives
salt and pepper

Equipment:

pot for cooking artichokes (or steamer, if you prefer)
fork or spoon to mix the dip

Directions:

1) Wash the artichokes thoroughly.
2) Boil them in lightly salted water for 45 minutes.
3) Prepare the sauce: Mix all the other ingredients together (mash the roquefort well; you can heat the sauce slightly in a microwave if you want it smoother & more melted. You can serve the sauce either in individual cups or a center bowl. Use it as a dipping sauce.