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A New Love: Jacques Pépin's Fast Food
Talking Him Into It - Feeding The Guy
Another Change, and Two Summer Shortcakes
« I'll take any excuse to cook... | Main | Saigon Noodle Roundup from Noodlepie »
This week was tons of fun in the kitchen with so many yummy recipes to try. We started with the Maccheroni Quattro Formaggi Villa D'Este (or, as we call it, Macaroni with four cheeses) from Gourmet. The recipe was orininally featured in 1970, and was from the hotel Villa d'Este, which was situated on Lake Como. The macaroni was divine. Although I was a little concerned about adding tomato sauce to mac and cheese, the effect was wonderful, softening the stronger, more complex tastes of the cheese that went into the mix and blending well with the many herbs the recipe calls for (the recipe calls for Fontina, Bel Paese, Gruyere and Parmigiano-Reggiano, and fresh rosemary, sage, and oregano - not to mention the 6 oz of bacon). As you can see from the picture, the pasta looked kind of dry, but the taste and texture were perfect. It was comfort food with a wonderful sophistication. I'm definitely making it again.
My other Gourmet entree of the week was the basic Steak au Poivre, which was lovely and easy to make. I didn't follow the recipe exactly since my steaks were a little thick and needed to be thrown in the broiler to cook through, and I didn't have quite enough cognac to get the mix exactly right for the sauce, but everything was great, and it was done much faster than most dinners I usually make.
This week we also tried the Pan-Fried Jerusalem Artichokes in Sage Butter from Bon Appétit (had to use up the bunch of sage I bought for the macaroni), which were fantastic even though I forgot to add the lemon to the sauce, and the Slow-Roasted Tomatoes from Everyday Food. These were not quite what I expected - they had a brighter, more tart flavor than the ones I had in Paris. In the interest of full disclosure I should admit that I used regular on-the-vine tomatoes instead of Roma, but I don't think it could have made that much of a difference. The recipe was still good, just not quite the one I've been looking for. And lastly, we had the Carrot-Ginger Dressing from the last page of Gourmet. It was wonderful, and I'm sure it would have been even better if we actually owned a blender and could have gotten the dressing smooth.
Next week...German Apple Pancakes, Butterscotch Chiffon Pie, and any other dessert I can get my hands on - I've been good long enough.
Posted by georgia to on January 12, 2006 11:03 PM | permalink | Email this post
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I checked your blog this afternoon and as soon as I saw the pic I had to immediately close the link. I was at work and about to go into a 2.5 hour training session and I knew that if I looked at that pic for a second longer I would have spent those 2.5 hours drooling!
Gorgeous picture! Incredible recipe! I love your blog!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Posted by: Ivonne at January 13, 2006 11:30 PM
