A great and easy recipe for a succulent guinea fowl cooked in a bag with garlic and tomatoes.
Garlic and pepper sauce for roast lamb
The other day I had ordered a leg of milk-fed young lamb at the butcher’s for Easter, but he provided an older and heavier animal and I ended up with 2,5 kilos of meat.We decided to invite four people over for an impromptu Easter Sunday lunch.
Red Mullet with a crust of salt
Red Mullet, rouget-barbet in French, is a rock fish of which some amateurs even eat the entrails.
It has a thick layer of scales that normally need to be cleaned but with this recipe you can leave them on.
Red cabbage, Dutch style
A red cabbage stew with spices and apple, as in the Dutch tradition. Very good in winter.
Soup with kale, a Dutch transplant in France
On the farmer’s market here in Mirepoix, I found fresh kale just had to take it home. Kale, chou frisé, is called boerenkool and the Dutch eat it as a healthy and cheap vegetable in winter.
Pyrenees crawfish
Crawfish are a rare delicacy in France, especially as they are far less abundant than several decades ago when the red legs and white legs still populated many streams and lakes. But they are for sale, or can be caught, here in the season in the Pyrenees.
Turbot in the oven
Turbot is not the least expensive of fish, but it had a very delicate taste and the meat stays firm during cooking. In France, there are many recipes with parts of a large turbot – of up to 5 kilos – with white sauces, mushrooms, shrimps and oysters or mussels. I do like mushrooms, shrimps,Read More
Trout simply baked in a skillet with butter and lemon
More and more, I am returning to pure cooking where the basic ingredients pay the starring role and complicated or incongruous extras are left back stage, as with this trout. The fresh food markets in Paris and Saint-Germain-en-Laye were already brimming with great produce, while here in the Ariège you are very close to theRead More
Mounjetado/Mongetado – cassoulet in Ariège
There are a lot of recipes for cassoulet here in the southwest of France. Castelnaudary, Carcassonne or Toulouse fight for the crown of the best recipe or the most original one. Cassoulet is a hearty dish and meant for winter, but restaurants here serve it to tourists in the summer when a lighter diet mayRead More
Braised lamb shanks with carrot, tomatoes and quince
Lamb shanks are called “souris d’agneau” in French and are the top end of the leg, which is often sold in slices at the butcher’s. They give nice one-person portions and look pretty with the bone sticking upwards. It takes a long time of cooking and can be prepared in advance. Many restaurants do thatRead More