Category: Pasta

16th December 2014

Spaghetti, clams, coriander and soy paste

I usually stick to one style or one cuisine when I make or change dishes but here the Italian and Japanese traditions where so close that I could not resist to mix and match. So instead of using white wine, olive oil and parsley for spaghetti alle vongole, I used a soybean paste, coriander and some seaweed powder. The result was excellent.

Main dish Mushrooms Pasta Seafood

13th October 2014

Autumn spaghetti dish with scallops and ceps

Sometimes a dish creates itself when you walk around the market. The fishing season for scallops had opened and I wanted to do a simple spaghetti dish with it. The greengrocer’s had some of the last ceps – small brown button mushrooms from the Millevaches plateau in Corrèze, between Limoges and Ussel. I cooked the ceps and scallops separately in butter. Then I brought a […]

Beef Main dish Pasta Soup

4th August 2014

Beef and chervil soup with pasta

This is a very pleasant and nutritious soup for when you are trying to lose weight after spending some nice holidays. I found some interesting beef shank at the supermarket – my butcher’s is closed for a few weeks – and started by making a beef broth. The next day I removed the (little) fat from the stock and added vegetables, chervil and pasta. The […]

Pasta Seafood

5th January 2014

Ouistreham clams

We spent a Saturday at the Normandy coast, with nice moules frites — mussels and fries, in this case with ham, chorizo and cream — in Houlgate and large windy villa’s in Cabourg along a sandy beach. In Ouistreham, a small port down close to the Orne estuary from which ferries go to Portsmouth and Southampton, there are some fish stalls on the quai and […]

Beef Cheese Main dish Pasta

3rd January 2014

Pasta with meat sauce

Sometimes you want something simple and pasta with meat sauce is a kind of comfort food for colder days. I do not like to buy pasta sauce in tins or jars and I did not want to go into the trouble of making a real Bolognese sauce because with the bacon (and mushrooms) it adds up to a rather filling and a bit fat sauce. […]

Pasta Seafood

10th December 2013

Spaghetti with clams

At the fresh market in our town we found a fishmonger from Brittany who had a good selection of sea food. We bought some, including fresh clams to use in an Italian inspired dish of spaghetti con vongole.

Main dish Pasta Seafood

9th October 2013

Bucatini with lobster eggs and zucchini

Part two of three recipes I made with one single lobster. Here I will be using the eggs that were under the belly of the female lobster and which I scooped up with a spoon. The little biology I know of lobster is that the eggs first start inside the female. A female lobster mates after she has shed her shell – which lobsters do […]

Cheese Pasta Sausages

21st June 2013

Pasta, pesto and sausage for the Sopranos

The death in Rome of James Gandolfini, the American actor who played a leading role in the Sopranos series, gave me pause to think. At just 51, his demise was a reminder that a heart attack can strike anytime. Especially if you do not exercise regularly and do indulge in the pleasures of life. It also reminded me of the scenes in Mafia movies where […]

Cheese Main dish Pasta

10th June 2013

Spaghetti with mascarpone and chives

If you are serious about cooking with the seasons, then one of your first tasks is to check what is growing in your own garden. Or, in our case, the flower boxes hanging outside the windows. This week that meant, due to recent potting of herb plants by my darling wife, that I had a lot of chives to work with. They are a bit […]

Pasta Poultry Vegetables

22nd May 2013

Grilled chicken breast, penne and fennel

I prefer to buy my ingredients straight from the producer even though in our modern supermarket world this is not very practical or economical. Most of the time I do my shopping at the local grocery store or on the outdoor market that is held three times a week in my town. But when I do encounter a producer, I fill up the freezer compartment. […]