Soupe au Pistou #CookforJulia

Soupe au Pistou is a classic vegetable soup with a topping of tomato pesto from Mastering the Art of French Cooking by Julia Child.

Julia Child’s first television show was aired in February 1963, just 19 days after yours truly made my world debut.  And yet, this woman has influenced me in tangible ways.  First off, I have learned that fear of failure has no place in the kitchen.  As Julia said, “In cooking you've got to have a what-the-hell attitude.”  Even as medical professionals were saying to avoid butter and eat lower fat margarine, I held to Julia’s belief that butter was not evil.  (And we were vindicated!)  “Everything in moderation, including moderation.”

I have learned to enjoy a glass of wine while cooking, at least on weekends.  I have learned to wing it, as if cameras were rolling, if something doesn’t go the way it should while cooking.  I have learned that we learn best by doing.  A quote from the famous fallen potato pancake episode:  “The only way you learn to flip things is just to flip them!”  Also, "every woman should have a blowtorch."  I agree, Julia, and I do!  

I have learned that a cook should never deprecate her own food.  Accept compliments graciously.  And most importantly, share.  Share food, share skills, share recipes.  Thank you, Julia Child, for doing just that.  We have been blessed by your generosity.  Long may your legacy continue!

In honor of Julia’s 100^th birthday, folks worldwide are cooking her recipes and PBS, where you can still see her shows, is celebrating one of its biggest stars.  Head over to their site and check out the recipes and cook one in honor of a great lady. 

I’ve chosen a recipe from Julia’s first and most famous book, Mastering the Art of French Cooking (mine is the 1971 edition) - a lovely summery vegetable soup finished with a sharp garlic tomato pistou that I believe honors her love of fresh produce cooked into the ultimate comfort food.   Who doesn’t feel better after a bowl of soup?

Ingredients

For the soup:

Good drizzle olive oil for sautéing vegetables

6 oz or 170g onions

7 oz or 200g carrots

10 oz or 280g potatoes

1 tablespoon salt (I used 1 tablespoon vegetable stock powder and 1 teaspoon of fine sea salt.)

7 oz or 200g fresh green beans

14 oz or 400g can cannellini beans

1 oz or 30g spaghetti or vermicelli.  (I used tagliatelle.  Because that’s what I had.)

1 slice stale white bread

A few good grinds of fresh black pepper

Pinch of saffron

For the pistou:

4 cloves garlic

4 tablespoons tomato paste

1/4 cup chopped fresh basil or 1 1/2 tablespoons dried basil (I actually used 1 tablespoon dried oregano.  Can’t seem to find fresh basil this time of year in Egypt and because I love the fresh stuff, I’ve never bought dried basil.)

1 oz or 30g Parmesan cheese plus more for serving, if desired

1/4 cup or 60ml fruity olive oil

Method

Peel your onions and dice them finely.  Drizzle a little olive oil in pot big enough to hold at least 5-quarts or 4.75 liters.  Put your onions in to sweat over a low heat while you peel and chop your carrots and potatoes.

Peel the carrots and cut them into small squares.  Pop them in the pot with the onions and give it a good stir.  Give the pot another drizzle of olive oil, if it looks dry. 

Peel the potatoes and cut them into small squares.  Add them to the onion pot and stir briefly.

Add in three quarts or just under three liters of water.  Season with the salt or the stock powder and salt, if desired.  Cook over a medium heat for 30-40 minutes.

Meanwhile, make the pistou.  Put your tomato paste into a mortar with your fresh or dried herb and four cloves of garlic.  Bash it about gently until the garlic is no longer visible.

Grate your Parmesan and add it to the mortar.  Mix thoroughly. 

Add enough olive oil to loosen it up a bit – about 1/4 cup or 60ml.   Set this aside.

Top and tail your green beans and cut them into short lengths.  Crush your pasta of choice into small pieces as well.

Crumble your stale bread slice or cut it into tiny pieces with a serrated knife and rinse your cannellini beans and leave in the colander to drain.  (Sorry - forgot to take a photo of the bread!)

When you are about 20 minutes from serving, add the green beans, cannellini beans and pasta to the pot.   Give it a good stir and let it cook for a few minutes.

Add the bread and stir.  Cook for about 15 minutes.  The bread will disintegrate and thicken the broth deliciously.  If it is too thick for your taste, add a little more water. 

Season with black pepper and the pinch of saffron.

Remove some of the broth with a ladle or measuring cup and add it into the tomato pistou.   Stir to loosen. 

Some green beans slipped in.  Not a big deal.  Just try to mix without mashing them. 

Reserve two or three teaspoons of pistou (for garnish when serving) and stir the rest of it into the soup.  Taste for seasoning and add more salt, if necessary.  The Parmesan may have added enough, but it is a good idea to check before serving.

Serve each bowl topped with a reserved 1/2 teaspoon of pistou and some extra grated Parmesan, if desired.   (At our house, extra Parmesan is compulsory.)

Enjoy!  Now give this a try or go to the PBS site and choose yourself a Julia recipe!  Or at the very least, open a bottle of wine and raise a toast.  To Julia!

You might be interested in these other Julia Child recipes I have made:

Rustic Potato Bread - because there is nothing more divine that the smell of bread baking and you can't beat this potato bread for a soft crumb and crunchy crust.  No bread pan required!

and Coq au Vin with Cornish Game Hens - Julia's classic French dish with little birds

and Cherry Clafoutis - Once again, a classic French dessert.  Cherries in a eggy batter, baked to fluffy perfection.

Double Nutella Swirl Muffins for Muffin Monday

I was first introduced to a type of Nutella, that delightful spread made from hazelnuts and cocoa when I was a small child, living in Caracas, Venezuela.  There it is called Nucita since the Spanish word for nuts is nueces and it isn’t actually made by the Nutella company but by a Venezuelan enterprise.  Unfortunately, after one year there, my parents divorced and I moved back to the United States with my mother and two sisters.  So the hazelnut paste romance was short-lived.  According to the Nutella website, the real deal didn’t arrive in the US until 1984, and then, only in the northeastern states.  (As for my old friend, Nucita, I’ve never seen it in the States, although it’s possible that some stores in Florida might carry it, since there is a large population of Venezuelans living there.)   As I grew older, I would run across Nutella occasionally while overseas but as my preferred tastes changed from sweet to savory, I never regained the lost love.  My daughters are a different matter.  I have been buying Nutella for them since they were young and they like to eat it with a spoon.  Never mind the original toast it was meant to be eaten on.   Last year, for World Nutella Day, I sent them each two jars through Amazon.com.  Because some holidays are well worth celebrating.  Put it on your calendar now, folks!

Before writing this post I did a little research about this much loved spread and discovered that the original recipe was created by pastry maker Pietro Ferrero using hazelnuts because chocolate was in such short supply due to World War II rationing.  Hazelnuts, on the other hand, were plentiful in his native land, the Piedmont region of northern Italy.  I must confess that I was probably in my twenties before I figured out that Nutella wasn’t made from just chocolate, despite its name.  Call me slow but I just never thought about it.  [bows head in shame]

Anyway, back to Muffin Monday where we are making Nutella-filled and Nutella-topped Muffins!  You can find the original recipe here, which called only for Nutella topping but you know I am always looking for ways to raise the bar.

Ingredients

3/4 cup or 170g sugar

1 large egg

1 1/2 cups + 2 teaspoons or 190g all purpose flour

2 tsp baking power

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 cup or 60ml vegetable oil

3/4 cup or 180ml milk

1 tsp vanilla extract

About 1/3 cup or 100g Nutella for filling

About 1/3 cup or 100g Nutella for topping

Method

Preheat oven to 350°F or 180°C.  Grease a muffin tin with cooking spray or line it with baking cups. 

Measure your first 1/3 cup or 100g of Nutella into a small bowl and place it in the ice tray of your freezer.  We just want it to stiffen up a little bit.  If you live in a cold climate, this step may not be necessary but here in Egypt in the summer, my Nutella is pretty runny.

In a large bowl, mix all of your dry ingredients together: sugar, flour, baking powder and salt.

In another smaller bowl, whisk together the wet ingredients: egg, oil, milk and vanilla extract.

Add the wet stuff to the dry ingredients and mix until just combined.

Fill each muffin cup about two tablespoons of batter.  I use a cookie dough scoop for this because it is more accurate and so easy.  Also, it reminds me of the friend that bought it for me here. 

Divide your Nutella from the freezer between the muffin cups and then top with the remainder of the batter.

See, nice and firm, so it doesn't run all over the batter.

Add a dollop of the other 1/3 cup or 100g of Nutella to each muffin cup and swirl it around a few times in the batter with a toothpick or a pointy knife.  I always have a supply of satay sticks on hand so I used one of those.  If you are in a cold climate, you can give it quick zap in the microwave to get it moving.  Definitely not my problem here. 

Bake for 15-20 minutes.  You can't poke these with a toothpick to see if they are done because you just end up with a toothpick full of Nutella so look for light golden brown around the edges. 

Remove the muffins from the muffin tin and let them cool a little bit on a wire rack before serving.   These go great with a glass of ice cold milk.

Enjoy!

Muffin Monday is an initiative by Baker Street.   A culinary journey of sharing a wickedly delicious muffin recipe every week. Drop in a quick line to join her on her journey to make the world smile and beat glum Monday mornings week after week.

Need more muffin recipes?

Banana Bacon Peanut Butter Chip Muffins 

Honey Date Pine Nut Muffins 
Quick Bread Breakfast Muffins

Sour Cream Chocolate Chip Muffins
Strawberry Shortcake Muffins

Crispy Polenta

Crispy polenta is crunchy on the outside and tender on the inside. Perfect on its own or served with topping like grilled eggplant or wilted greens. 

Everybody likes plain things.  Well, so says my younger daughter.  The other day I made some lovely cheesy polenta from this recipe here.  If you haven’t read the delightful Katherine from Eggton,  go a have look right now.  Her dishes always look delicious, she makes me laugh and she has the cutest dogs on the internet, well, right behind my own helper.

Dear husband and I declared the polenta delicious (I served it with a fresh garlicky tomato sauce and grilled eggplant.) but younger daughter thought the cheese was too cheesy.  I think we all know how I feel about cheese.   Growing up in Brazil, she was used to the small squares of polenta that were deep-fried and part of every churrascaria menu.  So just a couple of days later, I obliged, making my own version which still comes out crispy, but is pan-fried with a little olive oil, making it much healthier.  It met with approval.

Ingredients

1 cup or 170g polenta

1 vegetable (or chicken) stock cube

1/2 teaspoon sea salt (I used truffle salt I brought back from a trip to Italy but you couldn’t taste the tiny flecks of truffle at all so normal sea salt would be just fine.)

2 generous tablespoons butter

Olive oil for pan-frying

Method

Find yourself a heat proof cylindrical vessel that will hold at least 2 1/2 cups or 600ml by volume.  Slide in a small bag like you get in the grocery store for vegetables or one of those bags on a roll that still use twist ties.  

Put three cups or 720ml of water into a large pot or saucepan.  Add in the stock cube and the salt.  Bring the water to a gentle boil and then add in the cup of polenta slowly, stirring constantly to prevent lumps from forming.

I started to stir quickly after taking this photo. Couldn't snap and stir and pour at the same time.  I need three hands!

Keep stirring and cooking over a low fire until the polenta grains are completely soft, the water has been absorbed and the mixture gets fairly firm but you can still stir it.  Remember that it will firm up even more as it cools. 

Add in the butter and give it a few more good stirs.  

Remove the pot from the heat and let it cool for a few minutes (because you don’t want to melt your plastic bag) and then carefully spoon the polenta into the plastic-bag-lined cylindrical container.  Fold the top of the bag over so the polenta on the end doesn’t dry out and to smooth the end out.

It's fairly flat on top, you just can't tell. I secured the bag down with a rubberband but forgot to take that photo. 

Allow to cool until stiff and then remove the bag of polenta from the container.  It will finish cooling faster with the just the bag around it.

When the polenta is completely cooled, slice it into circles about 1/3 inch or just under one centimeter thick.

You can cut that rough end off and just eat it. I did. 

I got 13 slices out of my cylinder.

Drizzle a little olive oil in a non-stick skillet and fry the polenta circles until crispy on both sides.  Add a little more olive oil as you turn them over the first time. 

As they cooked a little and shrunk up, I was able to slip in that last one that didn't fit initially in the pan.

Just keep flipping them over until they are nicely browned on both side.

Word of warning:  I fried up store bought polenta (you know, the kind that comes in the tube) just like this back in July, as part of a meal out at my sister’s lake house.  I made the mistake of leaving the crispy polenta visible and by the time we got around to eating, the tasty slices of pan-fried corn goodness were all gone.  Scarfed up - with my three young nephews among the guilty parties.  So I can attest to their appeal to children.  Hide the polenta until you are ready to serve.

I don’t know about you but I am always looking for a way to vary the starches I serve.  I get tired of potatoes/rice/pasta with the occasional couscous.  This polenta is a great addition to any meal.  I served these topped with smothered pork chops, but, as I said, they are also great plain.  And, you can be sure, that is just how younger daughter ate hers.

Enjoy!