June 25, 2016 by Marios

Cornmeal Cake with Apricots

We landed in Paris on the first day of the Euro 2016 soccer championship. The violent clashes between fans were still a day or two away. The water on the Seine was down from the historic flood levels of the week before, though still high enough to lap at the edge of the road. The bad weather, however, wasn’t over. Daily rain, sometimes heavy, and temperatures cool enough that we needed a jacket in late June. As we left the Rodin museum on Monday afternoon, we saw cars at a standstill for blocks and blocks, the result of a violent demonstration at the Montparnasse against the new employment law being passed by the Hollande government. Walking around the same neighborhood a few days later, we saw the results: store after store with their glass fronts shattered. And the constant sight of soldiers in full gear and police in bullet-proof vests throughout the city made it clear that the country was (and is) still in a state of emergency. We were too, always on alert (we hate to admit it), scanning the faces of the passengers in the Metro, ready to make a quick exit, or choosing seats facing the street on the cafe terraces, not wanting to have our backs to the street.

But also, there were our dear friends and many nights eating and drinking with them, laughing uncontrollably at our inside jokes, shaking our heads in disbelief at the state of the world. When Orlando happened, they were as devastated as we were, their own wounds still fresh from last November. Despite the floods and the soldiers on the streets, the hooligans and the damp weather, the angry strikers and the swollen rivers, this was still the same old Paris, with its charming streets and fairytale-like center, its daily markets and boisterous nights, its bizarre fascinations (this year it’s all about bagels, everywhere you look) and its amazing food. We ate many amazing meals, but we still remember the simple fruit we bought from the neighborhood primeur on the day that we arrived. The mara de bois strawberries smelled like a flower-strewn valley and tasted like roses. The cherries were firm and deeply red, achingly sweet and just tangy enough to make us pronounce them the best cherries we’d ever eaten. And the apricots were honeyed and juicy, with whispers of mango and coconut.

Cornmeal Cake with Apricots – Inspired by a recipe at David Lebovitz

Ingredients:

2 ounces (56g) unsalted butter, melted and cooled
3/4 cup vegetable oil
3/4 cup (150g) sugar, plus 1 tablespoon sugar for topping
3 large eggs
2 tablespoons brandy or cognac (use apple juice or orange juice if you are avoiding alcohol)
1/2 teaspoon pure almond extract
3/4 cup (125g) finely ground cornmeal
2 cups (215g) almond flour/almond meal
6 tablespoons (55g) all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
10-12 ripe apricots, pitted and halved

Directions:

Lightly grease a 9-inch springform cake pan and line the bottom with parchment paper. Preheat the oven to 350ºF (180ºC).

In a medium bowl, whisk together the cornmeal, almond flour, all-purpose flour, baking powder, and salt, until there are no lumps. Set aside.

In the bowl of an electric mixer, beat the 3/4 cup of sugar with the oil at medium-high speed for about 1 minute. Add the melted butter and beat for another 2 minutes. Add the eggs one at a time, beating each egg into the mixture. After adding the third egg, beat the mixture for 3 minutes at high speed until it thickens and lightens in color. Mix in the brandy and almond extract.

Add the dry ingredients into the oil and sugar mixture in three installments. After each addition of the dry ingredients mix at low speed for only a few seconds, just until most of the cornmeal mixture is incorporated. You can also do this by hand with a spatula. After the third and final addition of the dry ingredients, use a spatula to make sure the mixture is well-combined. Do not overmix.

Scrape the batter into the pan, smooth the top, and add the apricot halves, skin side up, to cover the cake’s surface. Sprinkle one tablespoon of sugar on top of the cake and bake until it is light golden brown on top and a toothpick inserted into the center comes out almost clean, 55-60 minutes. Let cool on a rack for about 30 minutes, then run a knife along the outside of the cake before you remove it. Let cake cool completely before serving.

November 15, 2015 by Marios

French Apple Cake

It’s that moment when you turn onto a dimly lit, narrow street, with sidewalks barely wide enough for one person, the pre-Haussmann medieval buildings curving over you as you look up, and you know that you are experiencing Paris as it was, and will be, decades ago and decades in the future. It’s the cool autumn day, when you are having lunch, sitting by the window, and you watch the two elderly Parisian women, warm in their fur coats, carefully unwrapping their chocolate squares before delicately sipping their coffee.

It’s the knowledge that the cheese lady will wrap each piece of cheese you’ve chosen like a precious small gift, which it is, a gift of land and sky and love and hard work, which you will taste with each bite as the Parisian sun (so precious in itself) streams through the big windows of your apartment and you clink your wine glasses, knowing that this lunch, of cheese and meat and bread and wine, is one you really can’t have in any other city in the world.
It’s that sense of magic, as you sit outside on a restaurant terrace with your friends on a warm summer evening, finishing dinner at 10pm while the sun is still stubbornly refusing to set, and the waiter smiles as he pours the final bit of wine for all of you and you are happy, because the night isn’t over, there’s still the lazy walk back home as the sky furiously changes colors before it finally gives up and goes dark.

It’s the giddy feeling you get every time you end up at the Eiffel Tower, wanting to be blasé about the whole thing, but being unable to resist the overwhelming beauty around you and the shared joy of so many people for whom being there is a lifelong dream. It’s the moment you take as you cross one of the Seine bridges to stop and look and take in the unquestionable beauty of this city that is loved and loves back. When you know that no matter what happens, you will always have Paris in your heart.

French Apple Cake – Very slightly adpated from Cook’s Illustrated

Ingredients:

1 1/2 lbs Granny Smith apples, peeled, cored and thinly sliced
1 tablespoon Calvados or white rum
1 teaspoon lemon juice
1 cup plus 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1 cup plus 1 tablespoon granulated sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 large egg
1 cup vegetable oil
1 cup whole milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 egg yolks
Confectioner’s sugar for dusting

Directions:

Step 1: Adjust oven rack to lower third of the oven and preheat oven to 325 degrees F. Prepare a 9-inch springform pan with vegetable oil. Place prepared pan on baking sheet lined with aluminum foil.
Step 2: Place apple slices in a microwave-safe dish, cover and microwave until apples are pliable, about three minutes. Toss apples with lemon juice and rum and let cool whilst you prepare the cake batter.
Step 3: In a large mixing bowl whisk one cup flour, one cup sugar, baking powder, and salt together.
Step 4: In another bowl whisk together one egg, oil, milk, and vanilla. Add dry ingredients until just combined. Transfer 1 cup of batter to a small bowl.
Step 5: Whisk 2 egg yolks into remaining batter. Gently fold in cooled apples. Transfer batter to prepared pan and smooth surface.
Step 6: Whisk remaining 2 tablespoons of flour into the reserved batter then pour over the top of cake. Sprinkle the surface of the cake with 1 tablespoon granulated sugar.
Step 7: Bake for one hour and fifteen minutes, until golden brown and set. Transfer pan to a wire rack and cool, five minutes.
Step 8: Run a paring knife around the sides of the pan and remove from form. Let the cake cool completely on a wire rack, 2-3 hours. Dust with confectioner’s sugar.

June 20, 2015 by Marios

Johnnycake Bread

I took a two-week break from the blog because Steve and I were on vacation. We took 10 days off and spent five of them in Paris and five of them in Norway.

Paris was lovely, as always. We had incredible weather the entire time (as well as in Norway). We saw our good friends who live there and we explored some new restaurants. One night they took us out to Claude Colliot for my birthday, where the meal was beautifully prepared, with fresh ingredients and unfussy preparation. On another night we went the the Frenchie wine bar, where we had “bar food” that was better than what most restaurants serve. On our last night, our friends introduced us to Le Sergent Recruteur. The meal was fantastic. The service exceptional. The first course alone, a mix of tomatoes with a licorice-like herb (not tarragon), covered by a disc of frozen tomato water, was worth the price of the whole meal.

But perhaps the biggest surprise was our lunch at Lafayette Gourmet, the newly renovated high-end food market in the center of Paris. We found the whole market a little too sterile for us, the food displayed like jewels, the walls pure white and pristinely clean. But we ate lunch at the butcher stand (all of the different stands also serve as restaurants). We both had steak and it was one of the tenderest, most delicious pieces of beef we’ve had in a long time.

Next, we flew to Oslo, Norway. Norway is a beautiful country. We took the train from Oslo to Bergen on the west coast and hit a fjord cruise on our way back to Oslo, the steep slopes of the mountains on both sides of the boat watching us as we dodged the hordes of screaming kids that had joined the cruise with us. The train ride to Bergen was almost better than the fjord cruise. Our train went from sunny Oslo up to completely snow covered mountains (at 2,000 meters above sea level) and down to cloudy and cool Bergen in the span of seven hours.

We ate some good food in Norway and some not so good (like the hot dogs we ate on the train because nothing else looked good). In our hotel in Oslo, we were surprised to find out that our room not only included breakfast, but also included a “light dinner” every day, which was a full dinner with soup, appetizers, a main dish, and dessert, all for nothing. Given how insanely expensive everything in Norway was, this was very welcome. The breakfast buffet every morning was huge, with everything from eggs and “Norwegian paté” (no idea what was in it, but it was tasty), to fruits and muesli, pickled herring, breads and cheeses, including traditional Norwegian brown cheese, or brunost.

Oh my god, the brown cheese! Shaped in a cube with the color of dulce de leche or caramel sauce, it didn’t look very inviting. But I took a slice and as soon as I put it in my mouth I was hooked. The cheese is made with milk, cream, and whey which are boiled until the milk sugars caramelize. This gives it a sweet, caramel-y taste and a wonderful stick-to-the-roof-of-your-mouth texture. It’s like cheese made out of caramel. I went crazy with it and had it every morning. I don’t know where I can find it in the U.S. but I’ll look for it. I think it will be fantastic on top of a slice of this johnnycake bread.
Johnnycake Bread – From Bon Appétit

Ingredients:

¼ cup vegetable oil, plus more for pans
1¼ cups all-purpose flour
¾ cup cornmeal
¼ cup granulated sugar
1½ teaspoons baking powder
¾ teaspoon kosher salt
2 large eggs
1 cup whole milk
¼ cup mild-flavored (light) molasses
1 tablespoon maple sugar or raw sugar

Directions:

Heat oven to 325°. Lightly oil two 5×2½” loaf pans (or one 8½x4½” loaf pan). Whisk flour, cornmeal, granulated sugar, baking powder, and salt in a large bowl. Make a well in the center, add eggs, milk, molasses, and ¼ cup oil, and whisk in dry ingredients. Divide between pans. Sprinkle with maple sugar.

Bake breads until golden and a tester inserted in the center comes out clean, 40–45 minutes for small loaves (50–55 minutes for large loaf). Transfer pans to a wire rack and let cool 10 minutes before turning out.

DO AHEAD: Breads can be made 1 day ahead. Store wrapped tightly at room temperature.

June 28, 2014 by Marios

Caramelized Tomato Tarte Tatin

I’m back after a three-week hiatus from the blog. I was abroad, first back home visiting my family and then for ten days in France, mainly in Paris, with a two-day escape to the Bay of Somme. Here are a few odds and ends from the trip:

Parisians seem to follow New York politics more than New Yorkers. On multiple occasions, we were asked about our opinion of the new mayor, Bill de Blasio, and about how he was doing.
You know you have great friends when they surprise you with a birthday dinner at Septime, an incredibly tough-to-get-a-reservation restaurant in Paris that is all the rage among both the French and Americans. How tough is it to get a reservation? They accept them only three weeks in advance and our friend called 22 times in a row (!) as soon as reservations opened until she luckily got an answer. It was well worth it. The meal was fantastic, with fresh ingredients, minimally prepared, letting them shine on the plate.
French restaurants are making a great comeback. Yes, it’s still a crapshoot if you just duck into any corner bistro, where you are still likely to get food that was prepared in a processing facility, prepackaged, frozen, and then reheated in the microwave of the restaurant. But new places, like Septime, are rejuvenating the Paris food scene. Our new discovery: Le Cotte Rôti (1 Rue de Cotte) in the 12th arrondissement. An unassuming restaurant next to the Marché d’Aligre where we had a three course meal for 39 euros that left us gasping with excitement.
The Bay of Somme is a spectacular, huge bay in Normandie in the English Channel, that empties daily during low tide. It goes from a vast expanse of water, to a desert-like land that you can walk on for a few hours until the water returns. Just know that if you go towards the end where the old concrete german bunker is lying on its side, like a giant alien spaceship that crash-landed decades ago, you will find yourself shin-deep in black silt that is sticky and stinky. By the time we realized it, we were well in the middle of it and had no choice but to walk through it to get to the other end. I can still smell the putrid odor.

So, in honor of our trip to Paris, where we had the most amazing weather we have ever witnessed in France, I give you today a more savory version of the famous tarte tatin. The dessert is traditionally made with apples that are cooked in caramel and sit on a bed of puff pastry. This version uses tomatoes. It makes a great appetizer or a light summer meal, paired with some good cheese, a green salad, and a glass of ice cold rosé.

Bon appétit!

Caramelized Tomato Tarte Tatin – From The New York Times

Ingredients:

1 14-ounce package all-butter puff pastry
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
3 red onions, halved and thinly sliced
1/4 cup plus a pinch of sugar
1/2 teaspoon sherry vinegar
1/4 cup chopped pitted Kalamata olives
1 1/2 pints (about 1 pound) cherry or grape tomatoes; a mix of colors is nice
1 tablespoon chopped fresh thyme leaves
Kosher salt, to taste
Freshly ground black pepper, to taste.

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 425° F. Unfold puff pastry sheet and cut into a 10-inch round; chill, covered, until ready to use.

2. Melt butter in a large skillet over medium heat. Add onions and a pinch of sugar and cook, stirring, until onions are golden and caramelized, 15 to 20 minutes. Add 2 tablespoons water and let cook off, scraping brown bits from bottom of pan. Transfer onions to a bowl.

3. In a clean, ovenproof 9-inch skillet, combine 1/4 cup sugar and 3 tablespoons water. Cook over medium heat, swirling pan gently (do not stir) until sugar melts and turns amber, 5 to 10 minutes. Add vinegar and swirl gently.

4. Sprinkle olives over caramel. Scatter tomatoes over olives, then sprinkle onions on. Season with thyme leaves, salt and pepper. Top with puff pastry round, tucking edges into pan. Cut several long vents in top of pastry.

5. Bake tart until crust is puffed and golden, about 30 minutes. Let stand for 5 minutes, then run a knife around pastry to loosen it from pan, and flip tart out onto a serving platter. Cut into wedges and serve immediately.