Tag Archives: french comfort food

Cassoulet

When I moved back to the States, I was awfully thankful to have moved back to a food-centric city like New York.  It certainly helps having a distraction from all I left behind in France.  But these days, I’ve been eating on dime.  Fortunately, I recently started working in a sleek little tapas restaurant, which gives me enough culinary thrills to make it through with my weekly pot of beans at home.  (Pickled ramps do wonders for my morale!)  Nevertheless, I had a bag of dried beans lying around (gulp) and had the ambition to recreate a rustic French dish by the name of cassoulet.  It is a slow-cooked stew of white beans with the hearty addition of various meat parts, which can include duck legs, sausages, and pork pieces.  I have never actually made this dish for myself.  But like most time-starved French home cooks, a delightful version can be found in the prepared food isle at the local Monoprix in Paris.  But this time around, I was nostalgic for some French comfort food this rainy week in New York.  Although I had aimed for a traditional meat-centric version, I was discouraged my local Greek bodega does not carry any of the duck fragments traditionally used in the recipe.  So I took the challenge to make it sans meat, which turned into a tasty abomination of the classic.  Since I had the luxury of an afternoon off, I was hoping to cook it slowly until it attained the same silky hearth of my fond food memory of the dish.  And I was quite pleased with what I came up with!  As soon as the thyme hit the sautéing carrots, celery, and onions, France was all up in my face.  It made me nostalgic for the sunshine in the South of France and the lazy nights C would reheat a jar of this French favorite.  I’d recommend to serve with baguette, but that’s one bit of nostalgia still to be satisfied…

1 16oz. bag of white beans, soaked in water overnight and drained

1 medium red onion, chopped

12 oz. chopped carrots

1 cup chopped celery

2 tomatoes chopped finely

5 stalks of thyme tied together with string (bouquet garnis)

1 handful chopped Italian flat-leaf parsley

2 cloves garlic, chopped

1 teaspoons salt

1 teaspoon black pepper

zest of 1 lemon, minced

1.)  Sautee onions, carrots, celery, salt, and pepper for 8 minutes until caramelized and tender.  Add chopped garlic, thyme, and tomatoes.  Stir until fragrant.

2.)  Add the soaked beans and 5 cups of water to the mixture.  Let come to a simmer.

3.)  Cook over a low heat for 60-90 minutes until the beans are soft and the broth thickens.  Add more water if needed.

4.)  Pull out thyme bouquet.  Stir in lemon zest and parsley.  Season to taste!  And enjoy!

1 Part Tomatoes+1 Part Red Peppers

There’s nothing like a soon-to-be mother-in-law!  Fortunately, as of now, I’ve only good things to tell.   When I moved to France, I quickly learned that Sunday was the ultimate day of relaxation.  I mean a ‘watching 3 movies, not moving the couch’ type of Sunday.  And thanks to France, I was finally able to train myself to do this without feeling a drop of guilt.  When I started seeing C, I learned Sunday was the ultimate day of family, too.  Whenever we weren’t glued to the couch or scavenging for food after noon, we were more than likely on our way to his parent’s place in the 15th arrondisement.  C’s mother is a very striking beauty.  She’s impeccably preserved with radiant, olive skin and dark tresses.  Only her slow walk gives away the fact she’s in her early 70s.  She’s a retired primary school teacher.  Thankfully, she speaks clearly and simply enough for both a 4h grader and a barely bilingual Americaine like me to understand.  And she just adores her son.  She beams when she sees him and buys him a chocolate basset hounds every Easter and is quick to pull out his childhood photos.  But I knew she finally warmed up to me when she whipped out the vegetables just for me!  And plenty of them! Carotte rappe with just a touch of olive olive, cucumbers simply dressed with vinegar, and the most beautifully sumptuous red pepper and tomato salad/confiture/thing you must try at home!

So, it’s just a kilo of tomatoes and a kilo of red peppers.  It’s that easy.  They are scorched on either an open flame or in the broiler until their skins are completely black and pull away from the flesh.  From there, wrap them in a papertowel and wrap in a plastic bag until they cooled. Remove the skins and slice into strips.  From there, place the sliced peppers and tomatoes into a skillet with some olive oil and let them slowly concentrate until they morph into their own sauce.  Add a little water here and there to keep them from sticking to the pan and to continue the caramelizing.  After about 45 minutes-1 hour, you are left with is just the silkiest and smokiest thing that has ever come out of 2 kilos of vegetables.  The sweetness of the peppers mellows out the acidity of the tomatoes brilliantly.  With the necessary addition of baguette, you’re set for a terrifically light lunch or first course.  Or reserve a little for your omelet the day after.  Or place on top of a crostini with a little goat cheese for an elegant hors d’oeurves.  But from my experience, the salad won’t last long enough to consider sharing.

From this day on, I still haven’t seen this little salad anywhere else! Unlike the Thai chicken wraps or the Mexican tortilla soup my family has adopted as our own family recipes from the supermarket periodical aisle, I can assume this recipe is one of those time-treasured Marseillaise recipes made in C’s family for at least a couple of generations.  And nothing can taste as good!  Not even a molten chocolate Martha Stewart recipe from my family recipe vault.  Enjoy.