Desayuno

I spent December at home, between jobs, and devoted the whole month to concocting new plans to fatten up my parents and sisters. This recipe for chocolate cakes from Louis XV’s pastry chef Becary, posted at La Tartine Gourmande, seemed to work best. My family is always glad to have me back at home for a while, but I get the feeling their stomachs are a bit relieved when I leave. Read more

In response to Teresa’s orange tart, I offer a dessert that is both complex and inelegant. But it is very good.

I had my first gob (I did not name them) less than a month ago, but I already consider myself a devoted fan. The concept is simple: A soft, cake-like chocolate cookie, filled with vanilla cream. It almost sounds like something you would buy wrapped in plastic at a corner store and regret eating. But home made, with the tang of buttermilk and the richness of good cocoa, it’s a thing of beauty.

The original gob is from a friend’s old family recipe, and my only modification is in form: I have made them much smaller. As someone commented the first time I made the recipe myself: “this isn’t a cookie, it’s a commitment!” And it was. As a generous dessert, or a light meal, the cookie was well portioned. But for a snack, it was just too daunting. I made the next batch about 1/4 of the original size, and they were perfect. Two bites each, and you can always have a second. After brief consultation, it was named “the goblet.”

(My best friend immediately doused one in brandy and ignited it, to create a “goblet of fire.”) Read more

In my lazy but obstinate pursuit of glamour, I am always happy to run into things that both look fancy and are easy to make. This creamy orange tart doesn’t need luxury ingredients or excessive preparation, but the result is smooth and delicate. It is even a little small, like really expensive bottles of perfume. The recipe was adapted from Billy Grant’s Very Lemon Tart on a day when we had no lemons, but a big net of Valencia oranges. Read more

I love to make crepes. There is something about the process of it, the flipping, the folding, or maybe the friends lining up with plates. I made up this combination on New Year’s eve, having decided at eight PM that we needed to have something that tasted good. We can’t be in Paris every New Year’s eve, but we can eat like it! Even with frozen berries, it turned out very well. (Despite that, I have included a variation here for fresh strawberries. Because if you have them, you should use them.) In any case, here it is: The last thing I cooked in 2006. Read more