Ham- Eric Ospital’s Ibaiona brand from the Basque Country.

Asparagus- local, just picked and carried to the market so fresh it snaps.

This week, my Kitchen Godmother, Vétou Pompele,  came by for weekend breakfast (a decidedly not French event) and asked me what I would make for her.

I grabbed a copy of my first cookbook that chronicled my early days sailing on the Julia Hoyt and said,

“Your Asparagus and Ham dish, of course”.

She had forgotten about what was long one of my favorite dishes.  It’s easy. When you cook everyday, EVERY DAY, that’s a lot of recipes under the bridge. We have both forgotten half of the wonderful dishes we cooked together over years of sailing the canals and rivers of France on the Julia Hoyt. This was always one of my Spring favorites, because unlike my life BF (Before France), asparagus is a once a year event, a few scant weeks of spear-ful delight. 

ASPARAGUS: Not only does this showcase the first thin green asparagus barely warmed in a saute pan, but gives green garlic, spring onions and the first mint leaves a supporting role to join in the Spring celebration. Wild foraged asparagus would work great as well.

HAM: The Ham? oh, the HAM. This is indeed HAM spelled in big letters. Eric Ospital’s Ibaiona hand-crafted HAM is aged in sechoirs or drying rooms near Hasparren in the Basque Countries. As sweet as salty, and barely both, there is a toasted nut flavor that lingers as the ham melts on your tongue. It has spoiled me forever. No more cheap ham! or maybe your home-made wild boar ventreche, Hank Shaw?

GREENS: We gathered, some garlic shoots- a good reason to plant garlic last November- thanks Lisa! Then hunted down the mint which is just sprouting after a hard winter, and picked some thyme. I call this ‘frontdoor foraging’- the things I planted, let go wild and then provide my kitchen with high points all year long.

This is a great dish to just use the tips and reserve the stalks for soup or my gingered aspargus stem pickles. I served the barely cooked asparagus while Vetou poured Champagne. The poached eggs have yolks as deep orange as only home-grown eggs can be so I slipped one over a nest of asparagus; more ham was left to pile on the plate, the thin slices waving like little Basque flags before we popped them in our mouths.

These are the meals I love best. Friends, family, some good food and a great idea. Merci Madame Pompèle!

and now the recipe…

Asperges de Vetou 

• 1 tablespoon duck fat (you forgot I was in Gascony?)
• a couple oz or 60-80 grams of thinly sliced ham, ventreche, bacon, etc…
• 1 small bunch new spring onions, sliced in half lengthwise
• a few fresh green garlic shoots- we call them aillets, also sliced lengthwise
• 1 bunch perfectly fresh asparagus- white or green, peeled, trimmed and cut in thirds
• 1 mint leaf (swear that Vetou only uses one!)
• a few springs of fresh thyme
• seas salt and freshly ground pepper
• half a glass of white wine

1. heat the duck fat in a heavy saute pan over medium high heat. Add the ham and warm briefly.
2. add the onions and garlic, sauteing gently until half-cooked.
3. add the mint leaf, a little thyme, salt & pepper. Now cover, turn down the heat a little, and cook for 10 minutes or so. keep an eye on it, you don’t want mushy tips, but nether do you want a crunchy mess. the flavors have to melt into each other. No need to add water because the asparagus is so fresh it gives up it’s sap and makes a nice pot liquor.
4. now, take off the lid, add the wine and let it become sauce as it finds the fat and flavor.
5. when the asparagus is perfectly done, remove to a warm dish, and crank the heat up to reduce the sauce further if desired. for those so inclined, a knob of butter swirled around the pan will emulsify and enrich the sauce. Because we are serving this with poached eggs, I skipped this unnecessary addition. The egg yolks are the sauce!
6. serve with poached eggs and copious rashers of thinly sliced very good ham.

Enjoy a weekend breakfast with friends…

little goats cheesecakes

There is something about these little cheese cakes, tangy with fresh goats cheese- les faiselles- softer than cream cheese, rich but not too. I make them with eggs from the little black hens here at Camont so they are stained deep saffron yellow and taste beyond delicious. I spooned the thick batter into brown paper baking cups I bought so long ago I can’t remember where. They puffed and huffed and rose above the edges so beautifully…then sank into themselves in a rather self-indulgent way. ‘Eat me now!” they seemed to taunt. So we did. Next time I buy the fresh clean goats cheese from Marie de Chèvre,  I’ll decide if I want a more stable batter or just given in to my whisk driven idea of a Gascon Goat Cheesecake. Soft, dense, not too sweet…more like a tender canelé inside or a miniature torteau

The recipe for les petits gateaux de Marie de Chèvre:

This made about a dozen muffin tin size cakes.

• 400 gr fresh goats cheese called faiselle here in France
• 200 gr white sugar (150gr for yolks- 50gr for whites)
• 50 ml milk (about 4 tablespoon)
• 4 eggs, separated
• 50 gr flour
• Splash of vanilla/rum/Armagnac

1. Pass goat cheese through a food mill or ricer.
2. Beat in egg yolks, 150 gr sugar, milk and flour. (I use a hand whisk.)
3. Whisk egg whites with 50 gr sugar until stiff peaks. (I use a copper bowl and hand whisk)
4. Fold in a large spoonful of whites into the cheese/yolk mixture. Stir well.
5. Fold remaining whites into cheese/yolk batter.
6. Splash in the flavoring (we use  the Secret formula!).
7. Spoon into individual serving size muffin tins, ramekins or paper molds brushed with butter.
8. Place into hot oven (220’C/425’F) for 10 minutes. Turn down to 200’ C/ 390’F.  The tops will soufflé puff up round and start to brown immediately. Don’t panic! Let it cook.
9. Then let the little soufflés cook for another 10 minutes. remove from oven and serve while warm with some spring ripe strawberries from the market.

a MAGYC PIE...

There are pies and there are PIES.

There is magic and there is MAGYC.

And yes, this is a bonafide, real, authentic MAGYC PIE.

Over the years, I have dabbled in savoury pies as the visual and gustatory homage to Monsieur Monet’s painted pies here, here and here, of course!

But this week as Fran and Ian from Melbourne, and Hilary from Sonoma, and Matt from Welbeck descend on the Chapolard home for lunch, we’ll be bringing this fat MAGYC PIE with us.  MAGYC stands for Mastering the Art of Gascon Cooking (with a nod to Julie Child’s masterful book). What’s in this golden-crusted succulent pie? Read on…

This MAGYC week of Gascon food is a 4-day winter exploration from Farm to Market to Kitchen. We swooped into Lavardac market on Wednesday and filled our baskets with: a guinea hen or pintade, a stewing hen, 2 demoiselles or duck carcasses some pork sausage, fresh foie gras, thinly sliced jambon de campagne and enough vegetables to make a rich stock- carrots, onion, celery, leeks, garlic, bay, thyme.

Less a recipe than a blueprint- we built the pie like this:

• boned the pintade then reserved the breasts and thighs.
• make a rich and short bouillon with the carcasses of the duck, pintade and the stewing hen.
• seasoned the 500 gr of pork sausage meat and pintade & chicken liver with onion, salt and pepper.
• deveined the foie gras

special delivery

Back to school clothes. Blustery bright weather. A turn in the garden.

Arriving this week  with a suitcase of sweater/jumpers for the beginning of a year of practical butchery & charcuterie classes at the School of Artisan Food was like taking a peek into the past. Nervous/excited students joined nervous/excited teachers, all eager to get their hands into the daily work that will occupy them for the next 10 months. Back to school. Autumn. A new year begins.

As a cook, I look to the garden to help reset my calendar, to reboot my year so that when October & November arrive, I am ready for the longer nights, the colder days, and the work at hand. when I asked a student who was heading over to the farm shop to pick up some vegetables for me for dinner (we already had the makings of a pork tenderloin from today’s class), they arrived fresh on the stalk… by special delivery.

It didn’t take long for a bike load of Brussel sprouts to become a tasty companion to our freshly butchered pork. Recipe? Just half a sliced onion and the sprouts sauteed in some Devon butter and olive oil with fresh thyme, salt and pepper finished with a squeeze of lime.

With the school year starting like this, I look forward to more velo-driven rewards from Welbeck’s Farmshop to accompany the talented Mr. Viv Harvey’s teaching results…

Two tartes.

One with goat’s cheese; one without.

A gathering of fruit from Camont- half a dozen last figs, handful of grapes from the arbor, several walnuts fresh from the trees.

A buttery crust bound with an egg cradles a base of fresh goat’s cheese, egg and sugar; or just half a jar of quince/orange preserves.

Popped in a hot oven 200′C/425′F for 25 minutes. Don’t forget a sprinkle of sugar across the top. Perfect for a sunny fall lunch.

This is another version of the tarte that Mrs. Wheelbarrow wrote about here. It’s that time of season here.

Result: One happy Camp Cassoulet Camper at Camont!

]]> http://kitchen-at-camont.com/2011/10/10/harvest-tarte-in-few-words/feed/ 2 http://kitchen-at-camont.com/2011/08/27/hurricane-soup-dont-forget-your-duck-confit/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=hurricane-soup-dont-forget-your-duck-confit http://kitchen-at-camont.com/2011/08/27/hurricane-soup-dont-forget-your-duck-confit/#comments Sat, 27 Aug 2011 07:18:51 +0000 Kate Hill http://kitchen-at-camont.com/?p=5860

I was just going to call this Workday Soup- a 20-minute solution to feeding a small crew at Camont. I’ve been working on my homework for SAF  (actually, my homework will be your homework, you lucky Butchery & Charcuterie students who begin next month!). I hate to get interrupted when working on tables and calendars. When the Noon siren blew from the nearby village spire, I just started shouting cooking advice into the kitchen. Cut up some potatoes! Chop up that Ventreche into lardons! Throw it in a pan with the duck fat!

Twenty minutes or so later, the potatoes were creamy and tender, the duck fat broth was golden rich, and a jar containing an solitary confited duck breast was popped in a pan to warm through, crisp up and garnish the steamy thyme and bay infused broth. Eh Voila!

This is the sort of nourishing and soothing meal that might help in a hurricane ravaged moment- grab a sack of potatoes, a jar of duck confit and your sterno stove. To all my dear friends and family in Irene’s path, I dub this soup for you!

ps- don’t have any duck confit in the larder? I still have one place open on the October 3 Confit Course -http://kitchen-at-camont.com/programs/cookery/dig-in/cassoulet-confit-coq-au-vin/.

Last night, as the kitchen crew began to lose control between increasingly large portions of truffle-related wonders, Jack uttered a solitary phrase as I suggested we taste the fruits of our week’s labors- a recreation of a historic hunting-inspired terrine favored by Henri IVth.

“Let’s taste Kate’s small terrine of joy”.

The Small Terrine of Joy- henceforward referred to simply as STJ- had been resting on the counter perfuming the air above and around that corner of the kitchen, wafting up the stairs and sneaking under the pigeonnier’s chambres with a heady hint of forest and field elevated to a sublime taste of… game, pork,and veal bound by truffleness.

Less a recipe than a celebration of special ingredients, bound by traditional respect for lean and fat, natural flavor and added seasoning, we began with an idea and ended up with delicious mouthful of succulent savory textures that played between toothsome and tender as foie gras melted onto truffles under a lean strip of marinated pheasant.

This is a lesson in cooking, as we let the ingredients dictate how we treat them, slow or high heat, moist, covered or browning. This is not a recipe of proportions or weights; this is an afternoon of friendship and inspiration manifested at the table and on our plates in the Kitchen-at-Camont. For Tim Clinch’s lovely take on this: http://timclinchphotography.tumblr.com/post/3561477421/the-small-terrine-of-joy-actually-a-terrine

It’s easy. Be not afraid of crust. It will be delicious and your friends will love you and your tartes

Tart Dough
1 1/2 cups (210 g) flour
4  ounces (125 g) unsalted butter straight from the refrigerator. Cut into cubes
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 large egg
2-3 tablespoons cold water as needed.

Preheat the oven to 425ºF (220ºC). The oven should be very hot to seize the pastry to hold its shape.
1. Make the dough by mixing the flour and salt in a bowl. Add the butter cubes and use your hands to break in the butter by smashing the butter with your fingers into the flour. Continue until the mixture has a crumbly, cornmeal-like texture.
2. Mix the egg with 1 tablespoon of the water. Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients and add the beaten egg mixture, stirring the mixture until the dough holds together. If it’s not coming together easily, add additional water.
3. Gather the dough into a ball and roll the dough on a lightly floured surface, adding additional flour only as necessary to keep the dough from sticking to the counter.
4. Once the dough is large enough so that it will cover the bottom of the pan and go up the sides, roll the dough around the rolling pin then unroll it over the tart pan. Prick the bottom of the pastry with your fingertips a few times, pressing in to make indentations. Who needs a fork?

You can then brush the pastry base with an egg, sprinkle with sugar or just fill and bake. How long? Depending on the filling about 25-35 minutes.

It is just 26 days to D-day. January 1 2010 is Duck Day and I’m  counting days to my arrival on Podchef Island to help the @podchef himself, farmer, chef and food guru Neal Foley, kill, cook, cure and eat a few dozen meaty Rouen ducks. Someone declared December as ‘all-duck, all the time’ month. So as December’s kitchen becomes more and more infused with the scent of duck, I took a break from savory to sweet with these melt in your mouth shortbread cookies.

In the spirit of Ashley Rodriquez’ great post on bacon fat shortbread cookies here, ‘nothing goes to waste’ in the Kitchen at Camont. So with a bit of tweaking from Ashleys’ recipe and an inspirational nod to my sweet guru David Lebovitz easy jam tart use of cornmeal (after all ducks take to corn like… ) I baked up a first batch of these crumbling rich, nutty-flavored shortbreads. Duckys.

Here’s the recipe for a few dozen Duckys

What:

70 gr duck fat

70 gr butter

50 gr white sugar

50 gr brown sugar

2 large eggs

1 Tablespoon white armagnac- (or rum)

200 gr white flour

80 gr fine cornmeal

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 Tablespoon baking powder

How:

I melted the duck fat and butter together with the sugar until it formed a broken caramel.

Then measured all dry ingredients into a large bowl, poured in fat/sugar mix, broke in the eggs with the armagnac then stirred like mad.

Next, I divdied the dough in half, formed two rolls, wrapped them in parchment and stuck them in the frigo until I was ready to bake.

Cut the rolls into thick slices. Place on cookie sheet. Bake in a hot oven (400′F) for 15 minutes or until slighty toasted. Quack! Quick, make coffee or tea!

Nothing like a little frost on a Sunday morning to bring out the baker in us all. So when Julia Leach, the Kitchen-at-Camont’s fall intern, fell under the Pain d’Epices spell, we turned on the oven and began a day learning about dough, pastry and good smells.  Here in Gascony, Pain d’Épice or Spice Bread is thought of as a foreign treat- from the north, another region, a taste of winter.  Usually, I buy thick slices of honeyed pain d’epices made near Rocamadour from Kakou & Francoise at the Saturday market and serve it in the Gascon way with duck rillettes or thin slivers of foie gras. Dense, solid and studded with walnuts or candied orange peel, prunes or even chocolate chips, this honey bread is made by a former beekeeper turned patissier specialist in the Lot at la Noyeraie des Abeilles.

With that tasty inspiration at hand, we turned to a monograph on the subject published by Les Editions du Coq a l’Ane and signed and prefaced by the late Bernard Loiseau. I found it one year in Dijon, one of the spice cake centers of France and have hoarded it since waiting for a chilly baking sort of day. All secrets lie within this thoroughly researched and well written book, from history and folklore to dozens of recipes. From the sucrée- actual recipes for dozen’s of versions of honey spice bread, to the salée-including a killer looking Lapin au Pain Épice for rabbit with cream, mustard and pain d’epice breadcrumbs.

But first things first, I chose this basic recipe “like in Dijon” to honor the book, the source and inspiration to cook regionally. We used local honey, mixed flours and upped the spices some. Results? Perfect! A chewy caramelized crust, moist but substantial density and just right  balance of honey, spice and orange flavors. Have fun!

Adapted from Le  Pains d’Épice by Lise Bésème-Pia.

Le Pain d’Epice Comme a Dijon.

• 250 gr wheat flour (we used half white wheat flour &  half whole wheat; rye and buckwheat are traditional choices as well)
• 125 gr honey-
• 125 gr sugar
• 200 ml warm milk
• 1 tsp spices (1/4 teaspoon each of cinnamon, ginger, allspice or cloves, & anis)
• 1 tsp of baking soda
• zest from one orange

Place the flour in a  bowl. Add the sugar and spices. Melt the honey with the warm milk and add to the flour. Whisk together and work the batter (not using machines much here, we whisked by hand for 10 minutes). Then add baking soda and whisk again until well mixed, stir in orange zest. The batter should be smooth and fluid. Pour into a well-buttered loaf pan (22 cm or 8-9 inch) set on a baking sheet. Place in cold oven; turn on and set at 180′C or 350′F. Bake for 45 minutes, then lower heat to 150′C or 300′F for another 15 minutes; total baking time 1 hour. Remove from oven, cool some, remove from pan, cool some more. Then attack with knife and fork with good coffee or tea at hand! A taste of honey for you sweet things…