Daube de Mouton

Thanksgiving is the perfect time to cook and perhaps cook somethings that you have made before. However, this rule never applies to this household. There is a big competition between the husband and the wife (Bobby and me) to show off our cooking skills. As Bobby offered to make Pecan Pie, for the first time, I also offered to make a Lamb Stew.

In order to decide which Lamb Stew to make, I didn't bother to go back to my previous recipes. I opened my very new Julia Child book and went through the recipes. Then I found it: "Daube de Mouton" and J'étais en amour.

 The result was unbelievably good, but there are some things that I wish I knew before starting (Note to self for the next experiment).


First, the timing in the recipe is really for an expert. For an amateur like me, it took twice as long. I had to make double the amount in the recipe as well. 


I did marinade the Lamb over night. In the morning, I started preparing the tomatoes and mushroom. The recipe is for Beef and Julia says to do the same for lamb. For some reason, I still cannot imagine eating bacon with lamb, so I did escape the bacon layers.Also, the recipe says to add beef stock, I wish I didn't have some lamb stock prepared, since I didn't have that I poured Veggie stock in it.

 

 As you can see, the pan was too small for my stew. So you might be able to picture the mess that it made in my only working oven. 


After 2 hours of cooking in the oven. My stew was only half done. Still missing a flavor. So I tried adding a bit of tomato paste to a small amount of stew to see if that works. And Hallelujah! It was sent from heaven, by Julia herself!

On Thanksgiving day, I skipped the oven and poured the whole stew in a big Pot and let it simmer slowly for 2 more hours. God that was the best stew I ever had in my life. I didn't have any leftovers to bring home after the party:-)


If you do have the book of "Mastering the Art of French Cooking", go to the meat section, the recipe is on page 322.

Pies with Paula

Paula was kind enough to come over to our house and teach us how to make our own pie crust. I have no shame to say that I have no talent in baking. I think I actually scared Paula.

The Pie dish that I bought was too big and too deep, so it was a big challenge to put the crust in it.

 

It was a complete silence ...

  

And Done....

And here is the crust all set for the filling :

Then While I was making cookies out of the left over dough, Bobby and Paula made pumpkin pie filling. 

Time to leave her in the oven for a little while... while I watch Dirty Sexy Money

And now we are ready for Thanksgiving!

Seasoning Shelf

So I went out and looked through the antique store in our down town and finally got the shelf that I had in my head. It is wood, chipped and just perfect. Just the way I wanted it. There was only one problem. The walls in America are not made from bricks. You can actually cut through your wall with a knife! A KNIFE! And we call those four walls Home! Anyways ... So to keep my shelf on the wall I have to make sure it is not too heavy. After playing with some ideas, I finally agreed to look for tins at antique stores.

 

I went to Luccett and bought 4 tins. When I came back home I found out that they were tins to store tobacco. Oh well, I washed them couple times and lined them with food safe papers. Now I have my very own seasoning rack.

Poached Eggs

Last Saturday was my first brunch hour at Palio. As the whole menu was completely unfamiliar to me, I just preferred watching closely and try to remember all the steps. I couldn't wait for an order for Eggs Benedict to come in. And finally my prayers were answered. Juan Carlos (he calls himself JC) made the poached eggs and it looked to simple to do.

Lettuce topped with Poached Eggs, Cranberries and Croutons. Dressing was a mix of
Lemon Juice, Wine Vinaigrette and Olive Oil.

On Sunday, for lunch I came up with this salad. Well, it is not a salad that you would eat everyday, but it is the salad that you come up with when you can barely wait to make poached eggs. And not only 1, but 4 and no broken yolks!

آش ماست

Aash is a very thick soup that we usually eat in Iran when the weather is cold like now. Ash is very traditional specially when someone leaves country or town for a long time. They make the aash after they are gone and usually the family or friends throw a party for that. I made this aash simply because I miss home and even now thinking about it I am on the verge of crying. I am far away from home and I miss every single bit of it. My mom usually makes this dish for us in winter. It is by far my favorite. Eating it here all the way across the world from home made me travel back in time to 15 years ago sitting in our cute kitchen in Tehran at the round table with my brother eating aash.

I used the recipe from Najmieh's book, but I also was on the phone with my mom so she gave me some good tips. Najmieh says that the aash is ready an hour after you add the last ingredients, however, to me aash is ready whenever it smells right. So for us it took 2 hours on a very low temperature an let it cook slowly.

 

 This is after I added the chick peas, lentil and rice. I don't like the Basmati Rice here. It just doesn't taste like home.

Now I added chopped Parsley, Dill and Green Onion. Since working at Palio I have become an expert in chopping Parsley or onion. Danny showe me the trick. Before it would take me for ever to do either, now it takes couple minutes to have it all ready:)

While I was waiting for aash to get ready I made some tea to just make the whole theme right:).

And it is ready.  This kind of aash you usually eat with yogurt! Well I did forget making mints to top the aash with and decorate, but imagine my impatience after waiting hours for this deliciousness to be ready.

My Life in France

How to Make Pasta From Scratch

I haven't tried it yet, but this looks very easy

Video