September in Paris

Bonjour from Paris!

Our plane from Detroit landed earlier than usual and no luggage was misplaced or sent to Cairo, so we were tucked into our shuttle bus and whisked away at noon. Thankfully, the desk clerk at our hotel found us a room and were were able to nap, shower, and be on our way by 3:30 p.m., just in time to enjoy a balmy and golden September afternoon.

I have always wanted to come here in September.

We are near Gare de Lyon and the Bastille, and so far have meandered through our favorite St. Paul Village and the Place de Vosges. We've explored a few new areas, and found places I want to revisit.

We contemplated a dozen different eating places before choosing a small cafe in the shadow of the Gare de Lyon clock. We ordered salads, a bottle of deep rosé from the Midi. The waiter was engaging enough to allow us to share a piece of apple tarte for dessert without telling us this was not done in Paris (I am certain it is not. Perhaps I read that somewhere.)

We are here. We are happy. We are off on the train today. Our journey will cut pleasant swath through the Loire, the Berry and skirt the Massif Centrale. On to Cahors!

Oh, Paris. Je t'aime.

Bonjour Paree! Vive La France Profonde!

French Kitchen in America is on vacation in France for 16 days. We will try to catch up with you from Paris, but our tiny village on the old wine route is not wired for Internet.

Au revoir,

Mimi

The Well-Stocked French Kitchen

The first thing we will do at Chez Bateau is check the larder, and then drive down the south side of the causse to the nearest supermarche for provisions.

Chez Bateau's sunny little kitchen is well-stocked and we will likely find staples like pasta, rice, coffee, tomato sauce and olive oil. We will also find a cupboard that is completely stocked with essential kitchen tools and utensils. We will take our time cooking, and if the weather is fine, dine out by the pool overlooking the vineyards.

In Paris last year, we made do with a few cutting boards, a bread knife, a steak knife, a colander, skillet and sauce pan. Not so at Chez Bateau!

"How would you stock a French kitchen?" a reader asked me last winter. I thought about that for a while, then came up with my list of French kitchen essentials. These few items would do, I think, and keep my kitchen from becoming too cluttered

Pots and pans: A skillet, a sauté pan, sauce pan, roasting pan and stock pot.

Utensils: A good set of knives, a large whip, a small whip, a strainer.

Tools: Corkscrew, herb scissors, mortar and pestle, pastry bag, pie weights.

Miscellaneous containers: Large bread bowl, two smaller bowls, colander, souffle dish, tarte pan or pie plate.

Nice to have: A banneton, a French bread pan, an egg basket, a copper bowl for egg whites.

There are many, many other "essential tools," but these are the ones I have found to be the most useful and have collected over the past several years. Each time I go to Paris, I vow to find a mortar and pestle, which is the only item missing from my list.

With these tools, I can prepare the soups, salads, soufflés and stews that remain my favorite French dishes. And I can make baguettes and boules when the baking urge strikes. Did I mention tarte tatin?

What's missing from the list? I want to hear from you!

Manuka Honey-Drenched Whole Grain French Toast with Walnuts

It is gray and damp in Wisconsin today, but we were outdoors early to clean out the nest boxes, fill the bird feeders, take down the wind chimes and move the copper birdbath inside. We stashed garden tools and pots in the horse barn.

I attended to the compost pile, adding vegetable scraps from the crisper, and plucked the remainder of the cherry tomatoes from the potted plant on the deck. Walking down into the garden, I noticed a small toad making its hip-hoppity way to a hiding place under the spreading yew. We take delight in these small creatures and happily share a yard with them.

Working outdoors on a cool morning helped us work up a hunger. It was obvious we needed a hearty breakfast.

Still bent on cleaning out the larder before we take off, I came up with this healthy concoction:

Whole Grain French Toast with Walnuts and Manuka Honey

4 slices dense whole grain bread
2 organic eggs
1/4 cup vanilla soy milk
pinch sea salt
2 teaspoons brown sugar
dash cinnamon
4 tablespoons butter
2 tablespoons Manuka honey
1/3 cup walnuts
your favorite maple syrup, optional

Coat walnuts in 1 teaspoon butter, dash sea salt and 1 teaspoon brown sugar. Roast at 350 degrees for 5-10 minutes, tossing frequently. While nuts are roasting, beat eggs, soy milk, sea salt, 1 teaspoon brown sugar, cinnamon in broad flat bowl. Immerse bread in egg mixture and soak for 3-4 minutes to ensure bread is thoroughly coated. Melt remainder of butter in skillet. Add soaked bread and cook over medium heat for 4-5 minutes until browned on both sides. Midway through cooking, add Manuka honey, which is reputed to have beneficial qualities. Remove French toast from skillet and place on plates, topping with walnuts and syrup.

Thanks to Fiona in New Zealand for the honey!

Tart, Sweet and Earthy

I'd never describe myself as a country girl. Never mind that I grew up in a small town. I love the fast pace and heavy traffic of a big city, as well as the hidden corners of quiet you stumble upon. I love the cacophony of street sounds, the blare of car radios and the hustle-and-quick-step jive of the city.

But every so often, give me a country road. Especially in the fall: The breathtaking scarlet of the sugar maple, the shimmering golden of the aspen, even the bronze and ochre that comes later in the season, once the razzle-dazzle is spent and the leaves are mostly in piles on the forest floor.

It just makes me feel good.

Mid-September has a subtler charm. The foliage may be mostly green but it abounds with hints of the glory to come: Trees are showing flashes of crimson, the fields are tinged with gold and there's a haze that softens everything.

Farm markets and farm stands are beginning to display apples, pumpkins, squashes and gourds. I love the color and the tart, sweet and earthy flavors.

Nothing beats coming home at night to a dish or dessert that tastes like the season. Some of my favorites are pork with apples, cider and Calvados, rustic apple-pear tart, gingery pear crisp with salted almonds and pumpkin pots de creme.

In a few weeks, I'll fill Grandma Laura's big earthenware bread bowl with decorative gourds and Indian corn. You can't eat them but they sure are colorful!

Caramel Apples: The Sweet Rituals of Fall

I heard gunshots this morning, an early sign of the approaching season.

Every September they begin (It's always hunting season in Wisconsin, it seems), just about the time I am tumbling out of bed and shuffling downstairs for the strong and hot cup of coffee that will nudge me into the shower and eventually propel me out the door. I am no fan of guns, but these shots remind me of the welcome rhythms of the season (and in any case, they are coming from the other side of the river or perhaps the wetland a quarter mile away, known in the old days as Hunter's Slough).

There are other seasonal markers to appreciate: The smell of woodsmoke at night, the pumpkin stands along the highway, the skeins of geese that fly overhead at dusk, our sudden preference for red wine and hearty stews and soups. And caramel apples in the grocery store. We have made our own a time or two, but it has become tradition for me buy the first one of the season as an offering to my husband.

I bring it home and present it to him with a small bit of ceremony, a smile, a slight bow, a kiss. It might be silly of me, it might not be, but it is a ritual I enjoy and I think he does, too. We are adults with all too many responsibilities, but our relationship is based on a million silly little gestures, too. I like them, all of them. They, too, are part of life's rhythms.

Caramel apples, succotash, pumpkin pie, apple cider: The first taste of each in the fall is a marker of sorts, an essential rituals that provides us with a measure of security and sweetness.

It is early in the season yet, and there is much ahead to savor and appreciate.

What is your first culinary ritual of the fall?

A Chevre Souffle with Herbs on a Saturday Night

What do you do with a small packet of goat cheese, a little cream cheese and some eggs?

It's a no brainer. You make a soufflé.

This one was inspired by a recipe in Patricia Wells' The Provence Cookbook. Although I must hasten to mention: Patricia Wells does not add cream cheese to hers. She uses other soft cheese, none of which I had on hand.

It took all of 15 minutes to make, and was perfect served with a salad of mixed greens and dried cherries with a tangy-sweet dressing.

The ingredients:

About 1/2 cup crumbled goat cheese with herbs
About 1 tablespoon cream cheese
1 tablespoon mayonnaise
dash milk
2 eggs
dash herbes de Provence
dash ground pepper

Pre-heat oven to 425 degrees. Place cheese, mayonnaise, milk and eggs in a bowl and beat with a hand-held mixer until frothy. Add herbes and pepper and beat again. Pour mixture into small soufflé dish. Bake for about 10-15 minutes checking frequently but not opening the oven until the soufflé begins to turn golden brown on top. (I did not salt until I'd tasted it, and when I did I used a flake-y salt from Cyprus that I had to crush between my fingers.)

Goat cheese soufflé is a nice transitional dish for a transitional season. It can be quit summery by day now, but our nights are cool. Skeins of Canada geese fly overhead in the morning and at dusk I can hear them down by the river. The air smells of woodsmoke every evening and we've been using quilts for weeks now.

It is a wonderful but all too fleeting time of year.

Meanwhile, Chez Bateau beckons...

Les Courgettes Farcies (Stuffed Zucchini)

With less than three weeks to go before our visit to Chez Bateau, it is time to begin cleaning out the refrigerator. Everything but condiments must go so I can clean it all out before we leave. What do you do with a scant pound of frozen ground beef?

There are, of course, many options. But a friend gave me a huge zucchini, enough for several meals, and so I made my own version of courgettes farci, basically an abridged version of my meatloaf.

Zucchini Stuffed with Ground Beef

1/2 of one large zucchini, sliced lengthwise
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
dash sea salt
dash pepper
1 pound ground beef
1/3 cup Italian style bread crumbs
1 egg
1 tablespoon ketchup
2 teaspoons grainy mustard
1 tablespoon minced or chopped onion

Once the zucchini is sliced, scoop out the seeds and a bit of flesh to create a trench for stuffing. Pour olive oil into a skilled and brown the edges of the zucchini. Season with salt and pepper. Place the zucchini in an oiled casserole. Par cook the zucchini for 3-4 minutes in a microwave under medium heat and set aside to cool. Blend meat and other ingredients in a large bowl. Once the zucchini is cool, stuff with meat mixture and bake for about an hour in a preheated, 375-degree oven, checking frequently.

Next time, I'll add green pepper, red pepper or sun dried tomatoes. A tomato-y sauce with capers would be a nice topping. It was an experiment on a lazy three-day weekend, and one worth tinkering with in the future.

For the time being, I am enjoying the challenge of making do with whatever is on hand. To see what I've done in the past click here. Or, check out this post or this one.

What would you do with a pound of ground beef and a zucchini?

Summer Visitors

For two out of three months this summer, we've played host to two families of mourning doves.

We've always had mourning doves on our property, nesting in the grove of cedar trees or in the older maples. This year, we've got more than one family for the first time. They sit at the crest of our horse barn and coo, or they perch on the roof outside our bedroom and wake us in the mourning.

In June, two doves built a nest in the hanging basket on the side porch, just off the kitchen. For a month, we came and went with caution while the mother bird hatched one of two eggs and the father bird sat watch all day long. The noisy flapping of wings alerted us about 7 p.m. every night when the guard changed and the mother returned to the nest.

The birds left in July and allowed our plant to flourish again. But another pair took up residence in August, and now they've got a darling little baby, technically known as a squab.

No, I'm not going to post a recipe for squab. Sorry. I can't eat my guests. (Don't make any jokes here about famous Wisconsin cannibals, please.)

We've always had birds in our hanging baskets, but rarely have we gotten to know them as well as we have this year. One day I looked up from my supper preparations to see my husband having a conversation with the father bird.

The first couple were unflappable, allowing us to pet their tail feathers and water the plant. The second pair is feistier, and regularly flap their wings in alarm and defense when I come near with my long-spouted watering can.

Still, I suspect I'll feel a bit bereft when they quit the nest in September.

Summer guests are both a blessing and a curse.