Less red meat, more duck

My two daughters are back at home for the summer, and the family diet needs adjusting to take into account two young adult bodies. Whereas my husband and I can perfectly subside and even prosper on soup and salad, my daughters resist a steady diet of fish, steamed vegetables and chicken. To eat meat in lesser quantities, I add a lot of colorful vegetables and choose lamb and duck rather than beef. Duck breasts are a wonderful and fast cooking option. And to keep the meal interesting it suffices to dig into two old culinary cultures: Chinese and French. To the Chinese, the crispy skin of their Peking duck and the incomparable richness of the French side dishes. Two classics come to mind: baked duck in an orange sauce paired with turnips and duck confit with sautéed potatoes. The dish that starts shaping up in my mind includes duck breasts baked at high temperature in the oven, sautéed potatoes and a stir-fry of root vegetables. Availability then becomes a factor: I do not grow turnips but I have an overabundance of radishes. Tired of eating them raw, I have started preserving them in red wine vinegar and sugar. Their slightly tart taste and lovely red color calls for the orange of some carrot sticks. To match and mix traditions, I add fresh ginger and orange juice. The sauce is now created in the vegetable medium rather than in the meat and gains lightness. The whole meal requires a 40 minutes preparation and cooking time and serves four. The duck leftover combined with a green onion, a cucumber, store bought plum sauce and Mexican flour tortillas can be used to create an appetizer.

Pickled Radishes (Easy, Preparation and cooking time: 30 minutes, Cheap)
Ingredients:
1 bunch radishes
¼ cup (60 ml) vinegar
1 tablespoon sugar

Material:
1 saucepan and cover
1 plastic container and lid

Wash and dry the radishes. Cut off the leaves. Cut each radish in quarters.
Place the sugar and vinegar in the saucepan over the medium setting of the gas. Bring to a boil while stirring. Lower the temperature and add the radishes. Cook for 15 minutes, or until the radishes are easily pierced with a knife.
Carrot Stir-fry (Easy, Preparation and cooking time: 20 minutes, Cheap)
Ingredients:
6 medium-sized carrots
1 3-inch (9cm) fresh ginger piece
1 tablespoon sesame oil
1 recipe of pickled radishes
The juice of ½ an orange

Material:
Wok or large frying pan
Wooden spoon
Paring knife
Peeler

Peel the carrots and ginger piece. Form matchsticks out of the carrots and ginger.
Place the sesame oil in the wok and set the gas medium to high. After 1 minute, add the ginger sticks. Let them color lightly. Add the carrots, stirring constantly. After five minutes, add the orange juice and lower the gas. Add the radishes and simmer for another 10 minutes or until the carrots soften.
Baked duck breasts (Easy, Preparation and cooking time: 12 minutes, Reasonable)
Ingredients:
Two duck breasts
Coarse salt and pepper

Material
Baking dish
Paring knife

Remove the breasts from the refrigerator an hour in advance. With the knife, crisscross the skin without piercing it all the way to the meat. Sprinkle with salt and pepper.
Move the shelf in the oven as high and close to the grill as the baking dish will allow.
Preheat the oven at 425 F (220 C) and turn on the grill function.
Bake for 10 minutes. The meat will be rare and the skin crisp.

Serve with Michel’s sautéed potatoes (January 12th blog)

Next day Chinese duck appetizer (Easy, Preparation time: 10 minutes, Cheap)
Ingredients:
Leftover duck meat cut in long strips
Mexican flour tortillas
Bunch of scallions
Cucumber
Jar of plum sauce

Material:
Peeler
Knife
Cutting Board

Peel the cucumber and cut in sticks, discarding the seeds in the center. Wash the scallions, discard the green part and cut in three. Form a flower by cutting each top crosswise. Cut each tortilla in 4.
Plunge the flower in the plum sauce and brush the tortilla all over its surface. Place a piece of meat, a stick of cucumber and the scallion used as a paintbrush in the middle. Fold the tortilla as an envelope over the filling. Repeat until you run out of material.
Propose more plum sauce to dip.

Strawberry field

Our vegetable gardens are now filled with strawberries, a paradoxical fruit which bears its seeds as a coat. Its name seems to instruct the gardener to place straw between the plant and the soil, a technique well designed to prevent spoilage. In fact, the word preceded the custom: it designates the ability of the plant to spread by sending off runners. Although strawberries are listed in the King’s Vegetable Garden in the seventeenth century catalog, the Sun King did not gorge on the same “fruit” we now enjoy. His was the woodsy variety, ours a happy marriage of the native Virginian (for the taste) and Chilean (for the size) plants celebrated on European soil.
What to do with all the strawberries we gather at this time of the year, besides eating them with a dusting of sugar and or dipped in heavy cream? Strawberry and rhubarb is a match made on earth: they come out at the same time and enhance each other's sweet tartness in a pie. For the chocoholics, the combination of chocolate, caramel beurre salé and strawberry sauce can prove addictive, but delaying consumption may be an even better option. To freeze them: clean them, remove the stem and just lay them on a cookie sheet in the freezer until hardened or for a day. Then, place them in a labeled plastic bag and put them back into the freezer. In the winter time, indulge in a spring strawberry and banana smoothie. Or make a strawberry and rose sherbet, which will taste lovely when the red currant and raspberries are ripe.
Rhubarb and Strawberry Pie
(Easy, Preparation time and cooking time: 40 minutes, 1 hour resting time, Cheap)

Ingredients:
For the sweet dough (broken pastry)*:
1 stick (113g) butter
1 cup (230g) flour
¼ cup (60g) sugar
1 egg
For the garnish:
6 stalks rhubarb
¼ cup(60g) sugar
2 cups (500g) strawberries
2 tablespoons red tea syrup

Material:
Food processor
Knife
Parchment paper
Rolling pin
1 11-inch (25 cm) pie mold with a removable bottom
1 saucepan with cover

Cut the butter in pieces. Place it with the sugar in the food processor fitted with the dough blade. Pulse. Add the flour and the egg and pulse until the dough resembles coarse meal. Gather into a ball or a disk and place in a plastic bag in the refrigerator for an hour.
Cut and discard both ends of the rhubarb stalks. Cut the rhubarb in one-inch pieces and place in the saucepan. Sprinkle the sugar on top and cover with a lid. Place on the low range of the gas stove and cook covered. When the content boils, the rhubarb sauce is ready.
Wash the strawberries. Remove the stem and reserve.
Preheat the oven at 360F (180C).
Butter and flour the mold. Roll out the dough on a parchment paper or, as the dough is very fragile using your hands press it evenly into the mold. Pierce with a fork. Bake in the oven for 20 minutes.
When the pastry sheet is cool, dispose it on a serving platter. Layer with the rhubarb sauce. Add the strawberries on top and glaze with the red tea syrup.
*Pâte brisée in French is a sweet pastry to which an egg has been added. It is particularly suitable when dealing with a pie the garnish of which does not request additional cooking.

Chocolate-caramel pudding in a strawberry sauce
(Easy, Preparation and cooking time: 40 minutes, Cheap)

Ingredients
Pudding:
4 large eggs
¼ (50 g) cup granulated sugar
3 oz (88 g) butter
9 oz (250 g) 62% semisweet chocolate
Caramel:
3 oz (88 g) crystallized sugar
1½ oz (40 g) salted butter
¼ cup (60 ml) heavy cream
3 pinches salt flower
Sauce:
2 cups (500g) strawberries
¼ cup (60ml) red tea syrup

Material:
Eggbeater
Saucepan
2 medium bowls
Mixer
Rubber spatula
4 individual silicone muffin mold
1 ovenproof dish

1- Preheat oven at 360F (180C). Place the butter in a pan and melt it on the lowest gas setting. Turn off the gas and add the chocolate in small pieces. Stir until the chocolate is melted. Beat the eggs and sugar in a medium sized bowl until creamy yellow. Set the bowl over boiling water and stir until warm to the touch. Remove from the heat and beat with an eggbeater until light and fluffy. Fold into melted chocolate and butter. Place the silicone molds in an ovenproof dish. Fill about ¼ of the silicone muffin with the batter.
2- Pour the sugar in the non-stick pan and melt over the lowest setting of the gas. Do not stir while the sugar transforms into caramel in about 3 minutes. Remove the pan from the gas and add slowly the cream while stirring. As the cream hits the caramel, it will boil. Add the butter and stir well. Set the pan over the low setting of the gas and stir constantly for another three minutes to melt any hard piece. Add the salt and stir. Pour on top of the batter. Spoon the rest of the chocolate batter on top of the caramel.
3- Add enough very hot water to the baking pan to come halfway up the sides of the cups. Bake for 15 to 20 minutes or until a wooden toothpick inserted into the cake emerge clean. The batter will somewhat rise.
4- Wash the strawberries. Remove their tops and place in the bowl of the mixer with the tea syrup. Blend and strain.
The cakes can be refrigerated up to a day. They should be served reversed on a plate and surrounded with the strawberry sauce.


Red Tea syrup
(Easy, Preparation time: 15 minutes, Cheap)

Ingredients:
2 cups (1l) cane syrup
8 teaspoons (100 g) tea leaves

Material:
1 saucepan
Strainer
Glass jar

Place the syrup and the tea leaves in a saucepan on the medium setting of the gas. Bring to a boil. Remove from the stove. Filter and store in a glass jar.

Strawberry and rose sherbet
(Easy, Preparation and freezing time: 1 hour)

Ingredients:
4 cups fresh strawberries washed, stem removed
½ cup sugar
1 cup rose syrup
The juice of a lemon

Material:
Blender
Ice cream maker
Plastic container

Place all the ingredients in the blender. Mix until smooth.
Follow the ice cream maker instructions. Either eat when ready or store in a plastic container in the freezer for up to three months.

Guy Savoy and the Pea

Le Roi-Soleil (French for Sun King) Guy Savoy and I all share a passion for le petit pois (peas in English). So Guy, a great chef and friend graciously gave me his “Myriad of young peas” recipe, already translated in English to share with you, the next best thing after going to his namesake three star restaurant in Paris. In the United States, you can taste his cuisine at his twin restaurant at the Caesar Palace in Las Vegas, opened in 2006 under the direction of his son, Franck.
Myriad of young peas is quintessential Guy. It concentrates on a simple seasonal product and combines a three-stage transformation on one plate. There is the jellified juice, the purée and the barely cooked pea itself. Add a soft-boiled egg, a few drops of chive-infused olive oil, some edible flowers and herbs, salt and pepper et voilà, a star is born. The original recipe calls for a wild flower, the cuckoo whose botanical name is cardamine pratensis. I suggest using instead a mixture of nasturtium, borage for their taste and viola for its look. If shiso is not readily available, any young mixed greens will work. I am lucky to grow all of these ingredients in my vegetable garden but they are also easily found in your local supermarket. The dish is quite simple to reproduce at home: I particularly enjoyed putting to good use all the machines that occupy my countertops. To prevent an almost natural phenomenon, the jumping pea from occurring, I suggest filling the juice extractor with the peas prior to turning it on. The recipe serves four.

Myriad of young peas
(Easy, Preparation time: 1 hour, Cooking time: 20 minutes, Cheap and Healthy)

Ingredients:
8 lbs (4 kg) fresh peas
1 small edible flowers tray cuckoo or nasturtium, borage and viola
1 small shiso or young mixed greens tray
1 bunch of chives
1/3cup and 2 tablespoons (100 ml) olive oil
Coarse and fine sea salt
Freshly ground pepper
Gelatine sheets: 1 sheet per 1/3 cup and 2 tablespoons (100 ml)
½ cup (125 ml) heavy cream
4 eggs

Material:
Kitchen scale
Juice Extractor
Blender
Salad spinner
Paper towels
Saucepan
Strainer
3 glass bowls
1 rubber spatula
1 wooden spoon
Soft-boiled egg pan

Shell the peas. Weigh them and set aside half to produce the juice. Of the remaining half, half will be used to produce the purée. Try to separate the smallest ones to use barely cooked in the finished dish.
Wash the flowers and mixed salad in cold water. Dry in a salad spinner and lay out between two paper towels
The sauce: place half of the peas in the extractor, close the lid and turn the machine on. Weigh the juice. You should get a little over 1/3 of a cup. Place the gelatine sheet in a salad bowl, cover with water to soften. Warm the juice over the low setting of the gas. Remove the softened gelatin sheet from the water and add to the juice, gently stirring until the sheet has dissolved. Remove from the gas. Taste and add salt and pepper. Reserve.
The purée: cook half of the remaining peas in boiling salted water for about 10 minutes. Taste one: it should be soft. Put the peas in a blender with a small amount of liquid cream and a few ice cubes and blend until you obtain a homogeneous purée. Taste, add salt and pepper as needed and reserve.
The chive oil: pour the oil in a small glass container. Roughly cut the chives and add to the oil. Infuse for about 15 minutes. Strain and set aside.
The barely cooked peas: cook in a large amount of boiling water for three minutes. Strain and reserve in a glass bowl. Season with chive oil, salt and pepper.
The soft-boiled eggs: crack carefully each egg and place in the slightly oiled individual egg compartment. Pour water in the pan and set to a slow boil. Place the egg compartment on top. Close the lid and boil for 3 to 5 minutes.
To assemble the dish, pour a quarter of the thickened pea juice in a soup dish. Place a smaller concentric layer of pea purée on top. Form a smaller circle of edible flowers. Pour the barely cooked peas around. Dispose 3 mixed greens leaves on the cooked peas. Set the soft-boiled egg on the center. Season the egg with salt and pepper. Drizzle a circle of chive oil around the plate. Repeat three times. Serve with toasts.

Spinach: from simple to sophisticated

Its wild ancestors were already present in the medieval garden as The Mésnagier de Paris, written toward the end of the XIVth century by a Parisian burgher for the instruction of his young wife indicates. In it we learn that the chenopod bon-henri and the amaranth were grown in pots. As the edible part of the plant grew above ground, it was ideologically more valued than root plants. The modern spinach plant appeared by selection in the sixteenth century. Grown directly in the earth, it is less fibrous, tenderer, requires shorter cooking time and can be consumed raw in a salad. Although spinach is not the miracle food heralded by Popeye, it is a valuable source of minerals and vitamins: per 100gm, it contains 500 mg of potassium, 100 mg of calcium, 79 mg of sodium, 60 mg of magnesium, 4 mg of iron and traces of selenium, zinc and copper. When consumed raw, a ½ cup of spinach brings 50 mg of vitamin A. Cooked it contains 20 mg. It brings 50% of the daily requirements in folic acid and 100% in vitamin A. As a leaf it has a high water content (90% of its weight when raw) and is the ideal food for a diet. To eliminate some of the water it is preferable to stir-fry rather than boil spinach. The fibers are excellent for the digestion, as was advertised in the medical treaties of the Middle Ages.
The following recipes present the versatility of this vegetable. It can be served as an accompaniment, a vegan meal suitable for wheat and milk allergies, an appetizer inspired by the Greek islands, or a sophisticated supper.

Stir-fried spinach (Easy, Preparation and cooking time: 10 minutes, Cheap)
Ingredients:
1 lb (500g) fresh spinach
2 cloves garlic minced
1 tablespoon vegetal oil

Material:
Large saucepan or wok
Set of tongues
Salad spinner
Peel and slice the garlic cloves.
Wash the spinach leaves in cold water. Dry in a salad spinner.
Place the wok on the medium setting of the stove. Add the oil. After a minute, add the garlic, stirring it constantly so that it does not color. Add the spinach. Stir from time to time, until the leaves withers.
Serve immediately or keep for the following two recipes.
Do not hesitate to refrigerate the washed spinach overnight in a kitchen towel before cooking. For the recipes that call for cooked spinach, press them with your fist in a colander to express all the water out.

Spinach brick appetizer (Delicate, Preparation and cooking time: 50 minutes, Cheap)
Ingredients:
5 brick sheets
½ lb (200g) fresh goat cheese
1 recipe stir-fried spinach
1 cilantro bouquet
2 tablespoons pine nuts
1 egg and 1 white
Salt and pepper
Vegetal oil for frying

Material
Parchment paper
Salad bowl
Scissors
Large wok or pan
Set of tongues

Crack the egg in the salad bowl and beat it. Wash and mince the cilantro. Mince the cooked spinach and garlic cloves. Add it to the salad bowl. Add the cheese in pieces, the spinach shredded, salt and pepper. Mix until you obtain a uniform paste.
Cut each brick sheet in 3. Set them side by side on a piece of parchment paper. Set a spoonful of filling a little after the lowest extremity of a brick strip. Using your index finger, paint the rest of the strip with the egg white. Fold the extremity closest to the filling over it at an angle. Form a triangle by folding and refolding once toward the left, once towards the right. Repeat the process until you are out of bricks and filling.
Pour the oil into the saucepan and bring to a boil. Fry a few triangles at a time until they are golden. Remove them with a spatula or a set of tongues and set on a paper towel until all are cooked
Serve the 15 pastries warm as an appetizer.

Vegan spinach pie (Easy, Preparation and cooking time: 45 minutes, Cheap)
Ingredients
1 frozen pastry sheet unfrozen overnight in the refrigerator
1 stir-fry spinach recipe strained
1 cup spelt flower
1½ (340g) cups silken tofu blended
½ cup (130g) sunflower oil
1 teaspoon of salt
½ teaspoon red pepper flakes

Material:
1 11-inch (25 cm) pie mold with a removable bottom
Rolling pin
Parchment paper
Rice to weigh the pie
Salad bowl
Whip

Preheat the oven at 360 F (180 C).
Roll out the pastry sheet on the parchment paper. Butter and flour the pie mold. Lay out the pastry sheet on the pie mold. Pierce with a fork.
Place the spinach to cover the pastry sheet. In a bowl, mix the silken tofu, sunflower oil salt, red pepper flakes. Add the spelt flower until well blended. Cover the spinach with the batter.
Cook for 35 minutes, or until a tooth pick inserted in the pie comes out clean.
Serves 4 for a light lunch. A salad composed of young fresh spinach with a fruity dressing provides the perfect complement.

Fruity dressing (Easy, Preparation time: 3 minute, Cheap)
Ingredients:
Salt and pepper
3 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
3 tablespoons freshly squeezed orange juice
2 drops of Maggi seasoning
2 tablespoons fresh herbs (chives, dill or basil)
1 tablespoon shallots minced

Material:
Salad bowl
Whisk

Put the salt and pepper in the bowl. Whisk in all the other ingredients starting with the vinegar.
I keep my old jam jars and use them as I would a shaker, pouring in all the ingredients of the salad dressing.

Spinach flounder and scallop roll (Easy, Preparation and cooking time: 30 minutes)
Ingredients:
4 fillets of flounder
8 sea scallops
8 spinach leaves
2 cups (500ml) fish stock

Material:
1 4-quart pot
1 ovenproof dish
Set of tongues
Paper towel
Toothpicks

Preheat the oven at 360F (180C).
Bring a pot of water to a boil. Dip the spinach leaves in the boiling water for a minute. Remove from the boiling water with the set of tongues and lay on a paper towel to dry.
Separate each flounder fillet in two by the middle. Lay a spinach leave on top. Place the scallop on the side of the fillet closest to you and roll until the scallop is nested within the fillet. Secure with toothpicks. Repeat 7 times.
Place the 8 rolls in the ovenproof dish. Cover with fish stock. Bake in the oven for 20 minutes.
Serves four with rice and stir-fried spinach.