This recipe adds a couple of twists to a French classic, endives au jambon, which is enjoyed across the north of the country in the winter months. Twist Number 1: Dry-cured ham is used instead of the traditional baked ham. This adds sophistication and flavor. Twist Number 2: Cream is used instead of Béchamel sauce, making for a lighter dish. Travesty! Yes, for purists, but just try it.
Endives gratinées au jambon de pays / Endive gratin with country ham
Endives, aka Belgian endives, figure prominently in the cuisine of northern France and, you guessed it, Belgium. In the usual version of this dish, the endives are first boiled or braised and then covered with ham, smothered in Béchamel and topped with grated cheese before being baked. The problem is that the Béchamel, made with flour, butter and milk, is a bit heavy for contemporary tastes. Even in winter. And baked ham lacks the pizzazz of dry-cured hams like France’s Bayonne, Italy’s prosciutto or Spain’s serrano.
This version produces a flavor-packed one-dish meal that may be happily enjoyed at lunchtime or, of a winter’s evening, by the fireside, accompanied by a glass of hearty red and a green salad. For a more elaborate dinner, start with something from the sea — perhaps a curried crab remoulade or shrimp with homemade mayo. And for dessert, something fruity, like pears poached in red wine or a French apple tart.
With the start of the new year, I’d like to wish you all the very best for a pleasant, healthy and peaceful 2017. Including many cheery moments in the kitchen.
Happy cooking!
There is an art to making potato pancakes, known in French as galettes de pomme de terre, or potato flat cakes. The basic recipe is very simple — grate the potatoes, mix with a beaten egg, season with salt and pepper, and fry in oil or duck fat. A humble dish served in many forms around the world, potato pancakes are supremely satisfying when they come out crisp and light. But achieving this is more difficult than one might think.
Roast duck is a festive dish in any season, but perhaps never better than in winter, enjoyed with a glass of hearty red beside a crackling fire. In this recipe, the duck is coated with a glaze of honey, thyme and balsamic vinegar, with garlic added to the roasting pan for a dish imbued with the flavors of southern France. Want to stay with the provençal theme? Serve the duck with pan-seared baby artichokes, this week’s second recipe.
Duck is served in many guises in France, although it is rather rarely seen roasted whole. The most common versions are 
We’re galloping toward the holiday season, so this post kicks off a series of recipes that you may enjoy pre-, post- and during the end of year festivities — beginning with two tartes fines, the French version of pizza. The first marries bacon and fresh sage, while the second sets baby spinach and mushrooms on a layer of cream. These are of course not holiday dishes, but they’re perfect for serving between the feasts — quick, simple, crowd-pleasing.
Tarte fine bacon et sauge
A couple weeks ago, on a bright October day, I made this dish for a friend who was coming to dinner. I’d had pumpkin risotto at lunch that week at Merci, a café with creative cuisine across the street from me, and found it so delightful I wanted to try my hand at it. Now, in this dreary season, it’s good to have dishes like this to turn to for solace. Pumpkin risotto is comfort food at its best, and escaping into the kitchen is, for me, a kind of zen.
This fantastic recipe comes to me from 
Every French school child learns that, back in around 1600, ‘good King Henri IV’ wanted to put a chicken in every pot. How much truth there is in this legend is still being debated by historians. What is incontestable, though, is that the dish called poule au pot to this day carries royal connotations. And yet, it is so simple. A chicken (or a hen) is boiled with vegetables to make a two-dish supper: first the soup, then the chicken and veggies.
Soufflés are often regarded as too difficult to attempt at home. I found this to be true when, as a young woman inspired by Julia Child, I set out to make one. Julia’s recipe for cheese soufflé in Mastering the Art of French Cooking stretches across nine pages, with long paragraphs on subjects like how to beat egg whites by hand. Not to be intimidated, I tried — with dubious results. Only after moving to Paris did I discover there is an easier way.
We’ve been having a September heat wave. Maybe this explains why so many Paris bistros are featuring Italian dishes at the moment. Most popular seems to be the assiette italienne, typically melon, parma ham, tomatoes, mozzarella and basil. But pasta is omnipresent too. At the ultra-trendy café Merci the other day, the special was a salad of pasta in pesto. In tune with this spirit, I decided to post one of my favorite pasta recipes.
We just returned from a week at the shore in southwest France, where the beaches are vast, the waves are impressive and the food is fantastic. One of the specialties I most love in that corner of the world is squid grilled with garlic and parsley. The squid are cooked using a method the French call aller-retour, or back and forth, a phrase most commonly seen on round-trip tickets. In culinary usage, the phrase means that the food is placed on an extremely hot grill and cooked very quickly on one side (aller) and then the other (retour).
