The French Market Cookbook (10 page)

2. Add the hot stock and pour in a little more hot water if needed to cover the vegetables. Bring to a simmer, cover, and cook over medium-low heat until the vegetables are soft, about 20 minutes.

3. Using a blender or an immersion blender, purée the soup until completely smooth. Taste and adjust the seasoning.

4. Reheat if necessary and ladle into bowls. Sprinkle with black pepper. Add a swirl of cream and serve with garlic rosemary croutons, if desired.

Shocking Pink Pasta

SHOCKING PINK PASTA

Pâtes rose vif

SERVES 4

For this unusual and remarkably quick pasta dish, you simply blend raw beets together with cream, garlic, and a touch of cumin. This produces a shocking pink sauce that is perfect for tossing with cooked pasta—preferably long strands, such as spaghetti or bucatini—and crowning with fresh parsley and chopped almonds. If you want to push it up a notch in terms of sophistication, roast baby beets and cut them in quarters to garnish the pasta.

12 ounces / 340 g beets, peeled and diced

1 cup / 240 ml light whipping cream or unsweetened nondairy cream alternative, such as soy or rice

1 teaspoon whole cumin seeds or ½ teaspoon ground cumin

1 pound / 450 g long pasta, such as spaghetti, bucatini, or linguine

Freshly ground black pepper

1 cup / 20 g chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley leaves

⅔ cup / 85 g almonds, toasted and roughly chopped

1. In a food processor or blender, combine the beets, cream, garlic, salt, and cumin. Process until smooth.

2. Bring salted water to a boil in a large pot. Add the pasta and cook until it’s a minute shy of al dente. Drain, return the pasta to the pot, and fold in the sauce. Return to medium heat and cook until heated through and al dente, about 1 minute.

3. Divide among warm bowls, sprinkle with pepper, and top with the parsley and almonds. Serve immediately.

PREHEATING PASTA BOWLS

To prevent pasta from cooling too quickly after serving, preheat the serving bowls or plates: a few minutes before your pasta is cooked, scoop a few tablespoons of the boiling pasta water into each bowl and set aside. Pour out the water just before serving; there’s no need to dry the bowls.

Mushroom Broth with Parisian Gnocchi

MUSHROOM BROTH WITH PARISIAN GNOCCHI

Bouillon de champignons et gnocchi parisiens

SERVES 4

Recipes often call for mushroom caps only, relegating the stems to the trash bin. Instead, I save the trimmings in a container in the freezer and, when I have enough, use them in this warming broth. Of course, you could use whole mushrooms, too, and if you have a mix of varieties your broth will be that much more aromatic.

This mushroom broth can be put to a great many uses. Here, I use it to poach gnocchi served in a bowl of the steaming broth with sliced mushrooms, a squeeze of lemon juice, and a bit of fresh parsley. I also use it as the base for vegetable and grain soups, with pearl barley for instance, which I cook in the broth itself, adding thinly sliced green cabbage a few minutes before serving.

2¼ pounds / 1 kg mixed or brown mushrooms

1 small yellow onion (4¼ ounces / 120 g), finely chopped

1 medium / 125 g carrot, peeled and thinly sliced

1 stalk / 125 g celery, thinly sliced

¾ ounce / 20 g dried mushrooms, such as porcini or shiitake

3 black peppercorns, crushed with the side of a chef’s knife

½ teaspoon dried thyme

Grated zest and juice of 1 organic lemon

Parisian Gnocchi, refrigerated and uncooked

Freshly ground black pepper

Cold-pressed hazelnut oil or extra-virgin olive oil, for drizzling

1 cup / 20 g fresh flat-leaf parsley leaves

1. Trim the mushrooms and set aside 7 ounces / 200 g whole mushroom caps, about 20 small ones. Chop the rest of the mushrooms and/or trimmings finely.

2. Heat the cooking olive oil in a large saucepan over medium heat. Add the chopped mushrooms, onion, carrot, celery, and salt, and cook, stirring often, until softened, about 4 minutes. Add the dried mushrooms, peppercorns, thyme, bay leaf, and lemon zest. Pour in 6 cups / 1.5 liters cold water. Cover, bring to a low simmer, and cook for 30 minutes.

3. Set a fine-mesh sieve over a large bowl and ladle the broth into the sieve to filter out the solids; discard the solids. Rinse the saucepan and pour the filtered broth back in. Taste and adjust the seasoning.

4. Bring to a low simmer and poach the gnocchi in the mushroom broth using the method described in the gnocchi recipe. With a slotted spoon, divide the cooked gnocchi among 4 bowls.

5. Thinly slice the reserved mushroom caps and divide among the bowls.

6. Sprinkle each bowl with pepper, drizzle with hazelnut oil, squeeze in a little lemon juice, and add chopped parsley. Ladle the broth into the bowls at the table, pouring it against the sides to avoid disturbing the solids.

MUSHROOMS

Buy whole mushrooms with even-colored caps that show no signs of bruising and feel firm to the touch, not soft or damp. The stem should be firmly attached to the cap. Buy them loose if you can, so you can check that all of them look healthy; crates or boxes may have moldy specimens hiding at the bottom.

Store mushrooms in a paper bag in the refrigerator and use soon after purchasing. Just before using, brush them briefly with a soft brush or kitchen towel under a stream of cold water to remove the dirt. Avoid soaking; mushrooms absorb too much water.

Corsican Turnovers with Winter Squash

CORSICAN TURNOVERS WITH WINTER SQUASH

Bastelles à la courge

SERVES 4

Everywhere I turned in Corsica, my gaze fell on a table stacked with golden turnovers called bastelles, the dough folded up neatly like an envelope. Corsican cooks typically garnish them with brocciu (a ricotta-like sheep’s milk cheese) and onions, along with fresh herbs or chard greens in the warmer months and winter squash in the fall.

Bastelles are traditionally made to celebrate All Saints’ Day on the first day of November, and their preparation is a communal affair; the women gather into an assembly line to chop the onions, roll out the dough, and fold up the turnovers, destined for a wood-fired oven.

They make for a wonderful fall meal, served with a salad of mixed greens and fresh herbs dressed in Honey Lemon Vinaigrette. They’re fun to make, all the elements can be prepared ahead, and there’s no need to be too fussy with your folding technique; rustic is a good look on a bastelle.

3 small red onions (4¼ ounces / 120 g each), minced

1 garlic clove, minced

Fine sea salt

1 small / 900 g red kuri, butternut, or kabocha squash, seeded, peeled, and diced

Olive Oil Tart Dough, made with the egg white and without the seeds

1. Heat the oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Add the onions, garlic, and ½ teaspoon salt and cook, stirring often to prevent coloring, until soft, about 10 minutes.

2. Add the squash, rosemary, and ¾ teaspoon salt. Cover and cook, stirring often, until the squash is soft, 15 to 20 minutes. If the squash has released juices—this will depend on the variety—turn the heat up to high and cook for a few minutes longer, uncovered, until the juices have evaporated. Sprinkle with black pepper, then taste and adjust the seasoning. Set aside to cool.

3. Preheat the oven to 400°F. / 200°C. and line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

4. Divide the dough into 4 equal pieces. On a lightly floured surface, roll out one of the pieces into an 8-inch / 20 cm square. Scoop one-fourth of the squash mixture onto the middle of the square. Bring two opposite corners of the dough into the center of the square and pinch them together. Lift the two remaining corners up to the center, matching the seams so they meet to form raised ridges. Crimp to seal. You’ll get a square turnover, with ridges forming an “X” on top. Lift carefully with a spatula and transfer to the prepared baking sheet.

5. Repeat with the remaining dough and filling to form 3 more turnovers.

6. Bake, rotating the sheet in the oven halfway through cooking for even coloring, until golden, about 30 minutes. Let cool for 5 to 10 minutes before serving.

RED KURI SQUASH

Potimarron, aka Hokkaido squash or red kuri squash, is France’s favorite winter squash. Shaped like a giant fig and roughly the size of a soccer ball, it has a smooth, bright orange skin. Its flesh doesn’t fall apart when cooked, so it can be served in roasted chunks or used in warm salads, and its subtle chestnut flavor explains its name, a portmanteau of potiron (pumpkin) and marron (chestnut). The skin is thin, and if you buy organic, there’s no need to peel it at all.

PARISIAN GNOCCHI

Gnocchi parisiens

SERVES 4

Parisian gnocchi may well be the least known use for choux pastry, yet it is one of my favorites. Most recipes using pâte à choux bake it in the oven so it puffs up; for Parisian gnocchi, you drop small pieces of the dough into a simmering liquid and poach them until they bob back to the surface, producing the tenderest little pillows imaginable. The one trick is to make sure you have all the ingredients measured out before you start cooking.

You can serve these gnocchi in a clear broth, such as with Mushroom Broth. Once poached, you can also sauté them in sage butter until lightly browned and serve them over a bed of sautéed greens or other vegetables, or combine them with Béchamel Sauce and grated cheese in a casserole to be baked into a golden gratin.

1 cup / 240 ml milk (not skim) or unflavored, unsweetened nondairy milk

5 tablespoons / 65 g high-quality unsalted butter, diced

½ teaspoon fine sea salt

1 cup / 130 g all-purpose flour, sifted

¼ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

Freshly grated nutmeg

1. In a medium saucepan (not nonstick), combine the milk, butter, and salt and bring to a simmer over medium-low heat. Remove from the heat, add the flour all at once, and stir quickly with a wooden spoon until well blended and smooth. Return the pan to medium-low heat and keep stirring until the dough leaves a thin film at the bottom of the pan, indicating that the excess water has evaporated, about 3 minutes.

2. Let cool in the pan, off the heat, for 3 minutes. Add the pepper and a grating of nutmeg. Add the eggs one at a time, stirring well after each addition. When you first add an egg, it will seem as though the dough can’t absorb it, but it will if you insist.

3. Transfer the dough to a sturdy freezer bag (to be used for piping the dough), press the air out, and zip or tie it shut. (You can also store the dough in a piping bag fitted with a ½-inch / 1 cm plain tip.) Refrigerate for 1 hour or up to a day.

4. Remove the freezer bag from the fridge and snip off one corner to create a ¾-inch / 2 cm opening.

5. To poach the gnocchi, bring salted water (or broth) to a low simmer in a large saucepan. Holding the bag close to the simmering water, press gently on the dough to force it out. As soon as it forms a small log about ½ inch / 1 cm in length, trim it off with a paring knife or kitchen shears so it falls into the water; be careful not to cause a splash and burn yourself. Repeat until you’ve used up all the dough; if you’re not the most well-coordinated person on the planet, get an assistant to help you with the squeezing and snipping.

6. After 3 minutes, the gnocchi will rise back up to the surface, indicating they are done. A cooked gnocchi should feel bouncy between your fingers and will not taste like raw flour. Lift them out of the water with a slotted spoon. If you’re still busy cutting fresh gnocchi into the pan when the first ones bob back up, you can leave them in for a short while; they won’t suffer from an extra minute’s cooking.

Couscous with Vegetables

COUSCOUS WITH VEGETABLES

Couscous aux légumes

SERVES 8

Couscous is so deeply ingrained in France’s culinary landscape that it is the nation’s second favorite dish, between blanquette de veau (a creamy veal stew) and moules-frites (mussels with fries). Our colonial history and a century of rule in North Africa—for better or worse—has left us with a pronounced taste for this brothy stew served over fine wheat semolina.

The version that’s served in restaurants is meat-heavy, featuring grilled lamb skewers, spicy sausages, stewed chicken, and sometimes all of the above, but my preference goes to vegetable couscous: a flavorsome stew of seasonal vegetables and chickpeas ladled over the steamed grain, and sprinkled with raisins and herbs.

This is a festive, communal dish that is conducive to stress-free entertaining, since the stew can be cooked in advance.

⅔ cup / 100 g golden raisins

Olive oil for cooking

2 small yellow onions (4¼ ounces / 120 g each), minced

Fine sea salt

1 pound / 450 g small waxy potatoes

1 pound
450 g thin carrots, cut into 2-inch
5 cm segments

7 ounces / 200 g small turnips, quartered

4 stalks celery, cut into ½-inch / 1 cm segments

2 quarts / 2 liters Vegetable Stock

1 pound / 450 g winter squash, peeled and cut into 1-inch / 2.5 cm pieces

1 pound / 450 g thin zucchini, cut into 2-inch / 5 cm segments

2 cups / 320 g cooked chickpeas (from about ⅔ cup / 125 g dried)

Extra-virgin olive oil

3 cups / 550 g whole wheat couscous

3 cups / 720 ml boiling water

1 cup / 20 g chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley leaves

1 cup / 20 g chopped fresh cilantro leaves

Harissa, homemade or store-bought

1. Soak the raisins in ½ cup / 120 ml hot water for 1 hour.

2. Heat 2 tablespoons cooking olive oil in a large stockpot over medium heat. Add the onions and ¼ teaspoon salt, and cook, stirring often to avoid coloring, until softened, about 4 minutes. Stir in the ras el hanout.