One of my favorite dining experiences in Paris was at L’Atelier off the Rue de Bac. Master chef Robuchon has a small empire now using his name, all around a concept of being able to watch your dinner being prepared, in a type of “workshop”, at the counter. I like the concept, and the ability to find consistent fine dining from among a collection of cities is welcome for the avid traveler.

I recently visited L’Atelier de Joël Robuchon in New York City, located inside the Four Seasons Hotel.

Amuse of parmesan foam, port reduction, and foie gras mousse:

There are basically three menu choices; you can choose small courses which are similar (or the same, in some cases) as those in the tasting menu. There are also larger full plate-sized entrées as well. We chose to choose from among the à la carte offerings, and one in particular that evening was also part of the tasting menu: Le caviar par Joël Robuchon.

This is presented in a caviar tin; below the layer of caviar is a gelée of lobster and below that, crab. Everything was delicious, but I would have wished for more caviar and less crab.

Many dishes have one of two “fats” in them: butter or foie gras. So was the case with the simple salad of haricot verts, cold foie gras played a delicious role in this light and delicious salad.

The best dish of the evening was likely this one, of foie gras hamburger sliders, with the most delicious fries. This was an absolute favorite dish, I must say, likely of all of 2011. Rich, juicy, and more flavor than you could imagine.

Dessert was on the light side, thankfully, a passion fruit soufflé, with a canelle of ice cream. Delicious!

My dining companion chose seafood offerings, all reported as delicious, and quite enjoyed the white chocolate/raspberry sphere dessert:

We knew what was going to happen. In Paris, it was dark chocolate, and the sphere melted before our eyes as hot chocolate sauce was poured over the top. But the pre-melt is more beautiful than the aftermath.

I really like the trend in counter-dining (although traditional seating is available) and doing so at the high-end. It’s great for smaller parties of 2 when you want your emphasis to be on a culinary adventure. It was like a small enclave of Paris in New York.

Highly recommended.

To those I added a third “course,” a little recipe of my own invention. My dad bought white asparagus at the supermarket. He does not eat any asparagus. So, I had to come up with a way to cook it (not my favorite, as it snaps easily and requires peeling). So first, we had this salad.

On top of herbed greens, I placed cooked, and “pickled” white asparagus. After cooking in salted water, I let them rest (without an ice bath) in a lemony vinegar. It soaks it up, making a quick pickle of the vegetable.

The greens were tossed with a dijon-based dressing made with some bacon fat. Bacon lardons covered everything, along with some sautéed mushrooms. Topped with chives.

The onion soup by Keller takes a long time; you cook down your onions until they are very dark brown, like weak coffee.

I went all out and made the mornay sauce and used the fried egg on top to make a croque madame.

Inside I amped the fat level by using Saint André cheese instead of plain swiss.

The recipes are simpler than those in The French Laundry, and tonight I made

• Butternut Squash Soup and
• Frisée aux Lardons Salad with Egg

Nothing extraordinary, except the little extra touches that make Keller’s recipes sublime.

Vinegary shallots made the salad great; the brown butter swirled into the soup was the right touch, along with the scent and aroma of sage leaves and fresh nutmeg-spiced crème fraïche in the center of the soup.

We tried the mussels in a simple preparation with a wine and Pernod-based broth. Traditional. Delicious.

The heirloom tomato and feta salad was delicious and light; the only thing I didn’t care for were the hand-placed herbs on top.

My partner in most things wasn’t happy about having to open the fish and “fish around” for the meat amid bones in this whole fish preparation. Yet, by the end, he was very happy. Delicious, moist, and flesh that was easily acquired.

I went for the chicken with Parisian-style gnocchi (the kind you squeeze out of a bag into boiling water). If they can’t do chicken right, then… forgetabbouit.

It was delicious. Yum! Good skin, good flavor, and again, nice light cuisine. I love my chicken at home with butter. This lacked the fat but still managed to satisfy. (Not that I will be giving up my Thomas Keller version with butter.)

Since we drove all the way to C’Ville, we had dessert. Profiteroles and a panna cotta.

Having tried both, the panna cotta was the better dessert. The choux-paste shells tasted… maybe a tad stale. The panna cotta was light and giggly, the way it ought to be, with accents of fruit, including an orange foamy sauce.

The restaurant is in a converted service garage. I liked it. I’d be back soon if I lived in C’Ville. Since I don’t, I hope I find myself there again soon.

Cooking a steak is a simple meal preparation, and in this case, I matched it with French green beans and mushrooms. The star ingredient is a sauce, which helped glaze the mushrooms and in a further reduction, mounted with butter, the steak.

Ingredients

• shallots
• garlic
• herb (terragon)
• peppercorns/salt
• cabernet wine
• beef stock
• EVOO, butter
• 2 mushrooms (crimini, porcini)

The sauce starts with 40/60 beef stock and red wine. Reduce! When it’s mid-way through, we add some aromatics, like black peppercorn, some of the rehydrated porcini mushrooms (I only found the dried variety), a garlic clove, mashed, and an herb of choice. Strain this when you reach the desired consistency. From the picture, you can see the almost-stickyness of this sauce, which had been mixed with a little butter at the end.

The green beans get parboiled in salted water before cooking at the end in butter, shallots, and garlic. I added some aged balsamic sea salt. The mushrooms get sautéed with the same shallots and garlic, but are cooked until they burnish with color, and then I added a lighter-mixture of the reduction sauce. I reduced it with the mushrooms until it was sticky, and seasoned the ‘shrooms with pepper and salt.

It was a delicious preparation, without having to buy/make a demi-glace or do much except start the cooking process with making a reduction.

He makes the layers using real-butter puff pastry, baked for almost 50 minutes between two sheet pans (use parchment or silpats).

For the last 5-7 minutes, you cover the layer with corn syrup to create an impenetrable barrier.

This is the first time I made it, but in all actuality, it wasn’t hard. Assembly was okay. The most challenging part was making the pastry cream (a custard with cornstarch).

You let the pastry cool, and then get ready to cut your three slices.

Use a serrated knife; and start piping-on the pastry cream.

The pastry looks dark, but that’s the color it was in the cookbook, too.

By the time it’s served, you’ve got raspberries in the top layer, and you can garnish with powdered sugar or even chocolate sauce. I did both.

Before serving, here’s a shot of the side-view. It was great.

Find Bouchon in a 2-cookbook set on Amazon.

The evening I visited they featured a tasting menu:

• Himachi with Rhubarb and Sea Beans
• Strawberry Gazpacho
• Halibut with Morels
• Foie Gras with Heirloom Tomatoes
• A Berry Soda with Cinnamon
• Lamb
• Taleggio Cheese, served warm with Jamón Serrano
• Sacher Torte

Wow! If I had to choose the weakest dish, it would have been the dessert… it was good, but the other dishes were on a whole other level higher… and one of my favorites was the first (pictured left, above), the most clean tasting fish, with briny sea beans, watermelon skin that had been pickled, plus soft rhubarb. Absolutely delicious and fresh. I could have eaten a bowl of that, piled high.

That’s how the next dish read, too, a berry-infused gazpacho with all kinds of interesting things to throw into your bowl, including flowers. “Yummo!” we might hear from Rachel Ray. The MC also said Yummo!

Mushrooms are a special treat for me, and this menu featured both morels with a butter-poached halibut, but also porcini later on with the lamb. Foie is always a hit, no? Luxurious, yes, but also so well-paired with the flavors. Each course seemed an ideal size. Just enough to whet the appetite for more, then soon newer, if not richer flavors, were to follow.

The cheese was an extra course, and they will let you split it to share with a dining partner. This is wise, both because you do start to get full around dessert time, and plus, you ought to taste their quality ham and warm cheese combination. Taleggio isn’t Spanish, but it is a favorite stinky (Italian) cheese of mine. Having it served warm and crispy on the outside was a real treat.

Lacroix does offer in-kitchen table dining for those who just want to turn it up a notch on the foodie dial.

The atmosphere was more formal than I had imagined, but since it’s located in a hotel, not all guests were formally dressed.

This meal was offered at a very competitive price, considering the quality of flavors and ingredients. Warmly recommended.

Yet, I’m a fan of tomatoes and with our own easy access to our Hanover tomatoes, this soup can be a treat. You may also decide to make your gazpacho from a single heirloom variety, and of course, you can adopt tomatoes that are not typically red.

I featured a gazpacho recently here on the site, one inspired by some more tame flavors — a soup we might even call more French than Spanish. I’ve had gazpacho laced with cilantro and chunky, almost like a salsa. But my inspiration is leaning to a more complex, subtle flavor profile. This only works when you’re using really good produce.

The other aspect is texture. I like a gazpacho with a smooth flavor, but thick, too. It should be creamy, yet cold. How is this done?

Gazpacho, Take 2

• variety of ripe heirloom tomatoes
• red and yellow bell peppers
• Extra Virgin Olive Oil (EVOO)
• Salt/Pepper
• cucumber, seeded
• herbs (parsley, basil)
• crustless-bread
• red onion
• garlic cloves, smashed
• vegetable stock or filtered water
• mustard ice cream (optional)
• sherry vinegar

So, here’s the thing… I didn’t measure much of anything to make this recipe. But I like tomato to be the dominant flavor, so I obviously used more of those. Peel your peppers with a vegetable peeler; you won’t remove 100%, but the peel is more difficult to digest. Core your tomatoes, peel the cucumber before de-seeding. (A spoon works wonders here, after the cucumber is split into two halves.)

I want my soup smooth. So I processed it in batches in a food processor. With each volley of tomato, pepper, salt and cucumber, I added some bread and some of the onion. Buzz… buzz… buzz… make it smooth! Through the feed tube, pour in some of the broth or water, then the EVOO. This soup is as much about the bread and the EVOO as it is the other things… you’ll give he soup a velvety texture and help to emulsify the soup, too.

I found the texture a little lumpy, and some stuff didn’t get well-chopped. Time for step 2.

Filter the gazpacho through a sieve. You’ll get the watery part to pass through, and taste this for seasoning. Then, re-process the chunky stuff. Re-integrate the two parts, and taste again for seasoning. If anything, I go light on the salt here because I plan to garnish each bowl or mug with salt and pepper.

It’s best to refrigerate the soup for 12-24 hours. Stir before serving, and you have a few choices for garnish.

I used the left-over mustard ice cream described by Patricia Wells in her Paris, the Cookbook. It’s a nice cold, creamy addition to the bowl. The cream has no seasoning, so it tends to wash out the salty-component. I garnished the top with Maldon salt and a lot of fresh-cracked pepper (my only addition this time for heat). I have found in the past if you want to use heat, try some hot sauce while making the soup.

Bon appétit!

While gazpacho is a cold soup, I don’t like to serve it “cold cold.” Leave it out of the refrigerator for an hour before service.

This recipe is published because I think it’s not about exact proportions (you can’t record in a recipe how flavorful the tomatoes are, or how big they are, or how much liquid they give off). My hunch is that gazpachos are not precise in origin, it’s a quick mixture of various vegetables in a savory/sour/salty mixture that’s fresh and rustic. But this is an excellent type of recipe for discovering your own palate and taste preferences. If you want to change the texture, you can use bread croutons instead of using bread as a thickener. Or, if you like cilantro and spice, you can do that. Add a squeeze of fresh lime juice at the end instead of the sherry vinegar. Add coarsely chopped tomatoes for texture. Add chive oil. The possibilities are endless, really.

The recipes are not simple, but there is much to learn about making excellent cuisine.

I chose three recipes. Let’s go in reverse order.

Sorbet

The recipe takes 2 lbs of fruit, 1.25 cups of sugar, and a little acid. I mixed half strawberries and blueberries.

While some recipes call for corn syrup, or even a sugar syrup, Keller’s is simple. Mix everything up in the blender. If you have a Vitamix or Blen-Tec, no need to strain. I have a Cuisinart, so I strained.

Then put the mixture in your ice cream machine.

I used lemon, but lime would have equally been well. I cut back on the sugar, and added a squirt of honey for the flavor.

The color and flavor were superb.

Cod with Pipérade

Keller calls for oil-poaching some cod fish, at 6 oz. per serving. You flavor some EVOO in thyme and garlic for 30 minutes at 150 degrees. I found my thermal/laser thermometer was excellent for grading the temperature.

Meanwhile, the complicated part is to create a pepper dish which acts as a base, called pipérade. It’s a mixture of an onion/tomato base (long cooking time), roasted red and yellow peppers, and a little spice. This mixture gets further cooked-down with vegetable stock.

The fish gets poached in oil for about 14-15 minutes. Take out the aromatics first, and regulate the temperature between 120-140 degrees F. I thought it was a mistake, but it really works.

The pepper part took a long time; I am sure there is a shortcut method, but the depth of flavors was outstanding. I brought me back to my lunch at Au Bascou in Paris where I enjoyed pipérade over eggs.

Salad with Asparagus

I roasted the pencil-thin asparagus with EVOO, salt and pepper for about 7 minutes at 450 degrees. Then I immediately put them in a mustard-vinaigrette to sit, then refrigerated them.

I used the left-over dressing to dress some greens, put the asparagus on top, and then shaved parmesan cheese over the top. Delicious. The warm asparagus soak-up some dressing and give them real flavor.

Bad bacon? Perhaps.

But I had so many interesting dishes I wanted to make after making a run to the library for some cookbooks.

For a salad, I wanted something light. I thought about making scallops on a bed of lettuce, but we took a more Italian direction, with my garlicky croutons, salami, and more. I dressed it lightly, but used mustard as a base.

The real star was a gazpacho. I had watched Laura Calder make one this Saturday, and she did the crouton thing on top. But then Patricia Wells, in her The Paris Cookbook, talks about gazpacho, too, and using a special touch she discovered one hot July afternoon. Her soup was adorned with a canelle of Dijon mustard ice cream. She even includes the recipe.

I liked the coolness, but would have preferred more Dijon. Note for next time.

Some fool on TV told us not to cut our basil, but instead tear it into our food. Yuck, big chunks of basil in a cold soup is nasty. Chiffonade it up, my friends.

The recipe takes into account adjustments for a more pungent ice cream.

Gazpacho Soup MessyChef Style

(Don’t make a mess in your kitchen like I did, bumping a side-shelf of sticky Asian condiments onto the floor from inside the refrigerator, with broken glass.)

Ice Cream

• 1 cup whole milk
• 1/2 cup cream
• 3 egg yolks, beaten
• 2 Tbsp. sharp Dijon mustard

Warm the milk to around 160 degrees, then mix into the yolks. Add the yolks back into the saucepan, and stir, heating to around 170 degrees. I use a thermal/laser thermometer which makes this process easier to do.

Strain yolks mixture into a clean and cool bowl, add in cream and mustard, stir to cool. Refrigerate for about 30 minutes.

Make into ice cream following your manufacturers instructions. Makes about enough ice cream for 4-5 bowls of soup.

Soup

• variety of 6 heirloom tomatoes
• 1 cucumber, de-seeded
• 1 red pepper, peeled and cut into large wedges
• 4 Tbsp. EVOO
• salt, to taste
• basil
• 1/2 cup chopped red onion
• 4 cloves garlic (2 for croutons)
• 1/2 cup tomato juice or veggie stock
• EVOO and garlic croutons (red pepper flakes)

Chop ingredients in a food processor, and strain through a sieve. Refrigerate for 4-6 hours.

Once ready to eat, take the soup out to take the chill off, taste for seasoning.

Garnish with homemmade croutons, made by toasting torn Italian bread in EVOO in a hot pan with salt, 2 split garlic cloves, and red pepper flakes.

I would put the basil in with the soup instead of using it as a garnish; alternatively, you can chop it in little ribbons and use it as a garnish.

Put a dollop of the ice cream in the center of each bowel. The ice cream really keeps the soup cool, and I know would work well in hot weather.

Despite the Spanish nature of this dish, I felt the simpler recipe here, gilded with Dijon ice cream, was a French “translation.”

My own creativity finds many outlets, from writing in blogs like this one, to making new sounds on the piano, and yes, my creativity has more recently flowered in the kitchen. A dream of mine would to take on Julia’s early profession, and host cooking classes. Think about what folks like Patricia Wells is doing now, between her home in Provence (using Julia Child’s own oven), and in Paris. She of course has far more skill and culinary experience than I have - which is why she can command 4-figure fees for students who come from the US and beyond to cook with her.

But it isn’t too soon to start thinking about what you’d like to do in retirement, is it? Or if you lose your job?

Tonight’s dinner was one such example, a compromise even.

“You like steak. I am not hungry, I only want a salad.”

Steak salad.

The big flavor profiles were from the dressing, crumbled blue cheese, and red onions. A really delicious heirloom tomato was in the mix too, with baby salad greens and herbs.

I seared a filet mignon in a frying pan in bacon grease (to use up two last strips of Applewood-smoked bacon, and use them in the salad), until about 115 degrees in the center. It later rested, before being carved into thin strips.

The dressing was made by reducing 2 parts beef stock to 1 part balsamic vinegar with thyme in a saucepan. When it gained some body and thickness, I let it cool, then whisked in a little grainy Dijon-style mustard and EVOO. It emulsified great, and had a great depth of flavor, including a savory sweetness. Dress the greens with this, and reserve some to anoint the pieces of steak on the salad.

Back to my original theme here… it’s simply a lot of fun to share your creativity with others. I find that in everything I do.

We’ve yet to see Chef Richard there in the kitchen, but this was a second trip; our first is quite memorable and well-regarded. This time around, there were some signature repeats, and many new touches.

We opted for the tasting menu, called Le Promenade Gourmande, since we sat down at 6 PM. We had the time.

• Amuse of seafood, oyster shooter and salmon tartare
• Split Pea Soup, Coteccino
• Virtual Calamari Risotto with Lobster and Crab
• Halibut in Lobster Broth
• Lobster Burger with Chips fried in Clarified Butter
• Lamb chop, in jalapeño-cumin sauce
• Short Rib, braised 60 hours
• Cheese course with Shiraz
• Egg-ceptional Lemon Meringue
• Pear Vacherin with Muscat de Beaumes de Venise 2007
• Petit Fours

The amuse arrived at the table, lit dramatically with a special plate embedded with LEDs. My beloved companion thought it was tacky, I liked it. This was an outstanding dish, the shooter included a cucumber water that was bright green and ever refreshing.

The pea soup had thin slices of an Italian pork sausage, and it perfumed the dish. Salty and scrumptious.

The Calamari risotto reminded me of the dish done at Town House in Chilhowie, but this was so much better. Other seafood added texture, and the “sauce” that made up the risotto was deeper in flavor.

The halibut was disappointing; the sauce was to die for, but the fish, as the first time, comes across a little too dry. At this point, the portions are getting larger, and in retrospect, I could have skipped this course. But give me that sauce in a thermos anytime.

The lamb was so succulent, so well-cooked. The sauce was intriguing. Again, the portion was generous. Getting… full.

The short rib is cooked sous vide for anywhere between 40-70 hours (each time, you’ll hear different lengths, I think it depends on the day). This is a delicious piece of meat.

The cheese course was nice, but again, with a full stomach, I could have saved this for another day. Their bleu was the star, reminiscent of chocolate!

The star dessert was the lemon meringue which was stuffed into a white-chocolate shell, to look like an egg. Whimsical, delicious. White chocolate and lemon curd = a good match!

The pear was another meringue creation, this time dried out, and painted with food dye powders. It was really beautiful, and I loved cracking the shell to see what was inside. This was visually stunning.

Petits fours = eh, I could have skipped this. I was over-stuffed.

Kathryn Morgan did an excellent job with wine pairings, although nothing compared to the Turley Zinfandel they served the last time I was there. The most outstanding was the 2004 Margaux, from Chateau Rauzan-Gassies.

Both times we’ve compared this to The French Laundry. Keller’s restaurant beats Citronelle on service, I think, which isn’t to say we weren’t served well at Citronelle. But everything at the FL had less personality, I have to say. The food was outstanding, but it lacked rough edges or punches. The flavors offered from Chef Deshaies menu at Citronelle simply seemed amplified. Flavors are more robust, more extrovert.

And the FL doesn’t offer wine pairings.

This is serious eating with serious prices - but for a special occasion, it’s still in top form, I think. Take two courses out (the halibut and cheese), and package to-go those little sweet snacks at the end, and I think you’d shore up a long promenade into even more perfect meal.

If sitting for 3.5 hours through 10 courses seems like torture, the other entrées which come in larger portions looked very appetizing.

Citronelle is located in the basement of the Latham Hotel in Georgetown, at 3000 M Street NW. Recommended!

I followed the recipe for Dorie Greenspan’s sweet crepes, which includes a little rum and the zests from lemon and orange. I tried first using 50/50 buckwheat and A/P flour, but those didn’t turn out, so I made the recipe again.

The key towards using my crepe pan successfully is to get it hot. Those little brown marks on the crepes give them character and the right texture!

I smeared a little Nutella chocolate-hazelnut spread inside each one, before folding them into triangles. The strawberries were macerated in a sugar-Cointreau mixture for 5 hours in the refrigerator before cooking the mixture down, with a little extra sugar and a tab of butter. I added a little lemon juice, which helped balance the richness of the chocolate with the berries.

Crèpes Suzette again it would be.

I used a crepe recipe which called for:

• 2 eggs
• 1/2 cup flour
• 3 Tbsp. melted butter
• 3/4 cup whole milk
• flavorings (in this case, it asked for spirits and lemon zest)

While David Rosengarten suggests letting your batter sit for 30 minutes, the more re-knowned baker Dorie Greenspan suggests hours if not a full 8! So, I made this batter in the morning in the blender, and let it sit in the refrigerator. I buzzed it again before making my crepes in the evening.

I like buckwheat, so I actually pulled back just a few Tbsp. on the flour and replaced the wheat with buckwheat.

I made the crepes in advance, separating them with sugar, as per Greenspan’s suggestion. It worked.

This new pan is not “non-stick,” which means they don’t stick, but they also don’t slide.

You try and cover an even layer. About medium heat was good for this small pan.

Once the first side browns and it begins to dry, I used an offset spatula to flip them over. Be prepared to use your fingers.

I don’t use a recipe for the sauce, as it’s been in my repertoire since the 1990s. I start with making a caramel with white, vanilla-infused sugar.

Next, break the caramel with your favorite orange juice, and when reduced, add your favorite orange spirit of choice. Crank it.

Mount in butter like a mad man until you get your consistency… then add in the folded crepes to sauce and warm.

Garnish as you like; the sweet sauce is well-offset with the tartness of fresh raspberries.

Bon appétit!

Folks like Gael Greene will say with great drama “simply a delight, 4 stars…” and then they go to another judge, who might award the dish “5 stars, I can’t imagine anything better…” and while these are being announced, the stars and the addition takes place magically on our screens. When I have our friends over, I usually do a 3-course meal, an appetizer, entrée, and dessert. Last night I decided to step things up, as I wanted to challenge myself. One of the challenges was offering a fourth course.

And after each one, I asked them for their ratings. With your friends, it’s more difficult, because I think they don’t want to hurt your feelings. But if you take a 5-star system, 4 raters (including myself), and an “80” as a perfect score, I earned a “68.” Incidentally, I was the most harsh of the critics, offering “3s” where others were giving away “4.5”s.

Menu

• 1^er: Asperges à la hollandaise et tomates rôties
• 2^ième: Oeufs à l’italienne
• 3^ième: Cuisses de poulet Marengo
• 4^ième: Gâteau mousse au chocolat à Roustang

Aspereges

I used a typical recipe here, asparagus with Hollandaise sauce (lemon, egg yolk, and butter with parsley), but the sourness of the lemon juice was counterbalanced here by using oven-roasted tomatoes. The tomatoes were mixed with EVOO, some balsamic vinegar, and a paste of 4 cloves of garlic with salt. This went over very well, and received 4- and 5-star ratings.

Ouefs

This dish was the least successful of the bunch, and I blame it on my own cooking methodology; I followed no recipe, but tried something based on a luncheon dish I had in Paris.

The idea is, you cook eggs in a tomato sauce, and earlier in the day I made tomato sauce using Italian-style whole tomatoes with onion and garlic. Once cooled, I added fresh basil, and then put the sauce in the bottom of ramekins. This part was fine, but I only used the broiler. I should have cooked them at around 350 for 8 minutes, then pulled them out to add the panko/cheese topping. Then, use the broiler to set the cheese.

The crisp texture was there, and the runny egg yolk, but in some ramekins uncooked white remained. It won’t kill you, but it’s not so appetizing. I also might employ a less-tall vessel, a wider oven-proof dish might be better, without the depth. But the flavors were spot on. Have work to do here.

Cuisses de Poulet

In her From Around my French Table cookbook, Dorie Greenspan has a recipe for something we love, Veal Marengo. We took this stewed veal dish elsewhere, using instead chicken thighs. We think it’s a superior dish with chicken!

Wine and onions make the basis of a sauce that’s perfumed with a bouquet garni of herbs. Mushrooms and pearl onions complete the stew, colored and flavored with tomatoes. The chicken gets browned first, then is braised in the oven for only 30 minutes. This is a quick stew-type dish, and although Greenspan uses a large sauté pan for hers, I used my new Staub casserole.

Gâteau de Chocolat

This is another Greenspan recipe, borrowed from the French chef Michel Roustag. She offers three methods for making it, as it must be double-baked using two layers. Her method, however, leaves a lot to be desired.

She suggests using a springform pan on top of a Silpat. Well, honey, the batter leaks out. I would recommend you do her recipe with the bottom in (she says take it out), and line the bottom with parchment. Then, it’d be perfect.

This can be served warm or cold, but we served it warm, and it was delightful with freshly-whipped cream, a contrast in texture and temperature.

This one earned 4- and 5-stars as well. I loved getting feedback on the meal, and it’s always fun to take your French food skills further.

I apologize for the “not so appetizing” photo, stylized with Instagram. The dish is simple to make, but oh so complex and deep in flavors.

• butter
• Belgian endive
• apple
• grapes
• rosemary (the secret ingredient)
• salt and pepper

That’s it, folks. Cook this for about 40 minutes over medium-low heat in a non-stick pan. Flip stuff around after 20 minutes. Sweet, salty, bitter, and the pan sauce is simply divine. Credit goes to Dorie Greenspan. I don’t know her, but I love her cookbook Around my French Table. Every time I make something, it’s special, and I wish I could hug the woman. She has superb taste.

The dish is crepes with tomatoes. We start with some buckwheat crepes.

To make mine, I mixed 1/2 cup each of buckwheat flour and all purpose flour. To that, two eggs, some crème fraîche, milk, and oil. I thinned it out after resting 30 minutes with water.

Make the crepes in a non-stick pan with a light coating of butter. Set aside, when you start the tomatoes.

For two people, take three tomatoes, and cut them in half. Cook them at medium heat with butter, almost 10 minutes on each side. Towards the end, season with salt and pepper, and add thyme.

Add cream, more salt, and fresh thyme.

To serve, place the tomatoes on the plates with the crepes. Reduce the cream slightly, and pour over the dish as a sauce.

This was delicious. As she stated, the acidity in the tomato was well-balanced with the cream and butter. The thyme was a nice touch, but another herb would have worked well too.

With a name change, I wasn’t sure what might have changed. New owner? New chef? Completely new restaurant?

While some of the artwork has changed, not much else has — the menu looks similar, and I recognized the owner/chef’s wife tending the bar in the middle of the restaurant.

For lunch, I tried their foie gras appetizer with a blood orange sauce. The foie was firmer than I’ve had before, and the toast that came with the liver was nicely done… but I could have used more sauce. It was delicious.

I also had one of their lunch crepes, made of buckwheat, it featured mushrooms and a fried egg on top. The flavors were great, but the crepe’s edges were burnt. This didn’t affect the taste, it seemed, only giving the edges a papery-texture. It was delicious, if not delicately pretty.

My only complaint with this lunch was the butter curls served with their flavorful, fresh bread. I found them difficult to manage. I understand making them thin so they’re more easily spread, but… butter should not be ice cold if it’s intended for you to spread it. Not a big deal.

I can only imagine they changed the name as to not be confused with Thomas Keller’s Bouchon line of bakeries (and restaurants). This Bobette, né Bouchon may not have the pedigree, but they do operate an inviting space in downtown Richmond with a new emphasis on local ingredients.

I usually make mine without a recipe, utilizing an Italian meringue. This means you whip the egg whites and then pour-in a very hot sugar-syrup. This firms up and stabilizes the egg whites, making them sweet of course, but also glossy.

This time around I used an easier method, simply adding some sugar at the end. They came out good, but heed my recommendation for chocolate.

I used 5 egg whites (at room temperature), 5 oz. of chocolate. Ok, I lie. I used 7 oz. of chocolate, but I should have used the 5 I originally measured. Don’t trust your eye, but your scale. 2 egg yolks, 5 whites, and 5 oz. That’s the Messy Chef’s formula, for 4 souflées.

I was making these to impress, so what could do that more than topping each one with homemade ice cream? “What kind,” you ask?

Caramelized white chocolate ice cream, with vanilla bean.

As everyone is waiting for the soufflés to come out of the oven, it’s fun to peek and declare, with great concern, “My gosh, they haven’t risen!! What are we going to do?” When you pull them out, bam! Nice soufflé!

The cold ice cream was better than my typical crème anglaise sauce, as it was cold, against the hot soufflé.

I ended up using Valhrona (recommended by chef/author David Leibovitz) for the white chocolate ice cream, and my favorite, El Rey (74%) for the soufflés. So, in a sense, this was a double-chocolate soufflé dessert.

As ever, bon appétit!

Messy Chef Chocolate Soufflés

Top with caramelized white chocolate ice cream.

Beat 5 extra-large egg whites with a half-teaspoon of cream of tartar until stiff in a stand mixer.

Melt 5 oz. of chocolate over a double-boiler until smooth, and add 1 Tbsp. heavy cream and 2 egg yolks. Cool mixture. You can also add flavorings, such as vanilla extract, or a flavored liquor. The chocolate you use can be from a bar, or use pastilles. This is sweetened sugar, of course.

Fold the two mixtures together, when the chocolate is cool. Spoon into buttered/sugared ramekins.

Bake at 375 degrees for 12-17 minutes, until risen and set.

Serve immediately, and top with scoop of ice cream!

I made a version recently, based on what I was seeing on an episode of Jamie Oliver’s garden show. He called his “English Onion Soup,” and the big change was using chicken broth.

Many authoritative recipes will tell you to use beef stock. One of my favorite recipes growing up came from the Three Rivers Cookbook, a Pittsburgh, PA classic. The chef contributing the recipe, from the Dusquene Club, used a mixture of half chicken and half beef. To me, that’s always been ideal.

So, this time around, I tried it Jamie’s way. All chicken. Here’s the basics:

• cook a variety of onions (purple, white, sweet yellow, leek with salt) in butter for anywhere between 30-60 minutes until they turn light brown and carmelize.
• have good stock at the ready (I made mine from both a cooked and a raw chicken carcass, vegetables, and peppercorns)
• french bread slices
• a melting cheese (I used a swiss-style cheese that had been smoked, and this was a really good idea!!)
• herbs (bay, thyme)
• salt, peppercorns
• sherry or cognac

I always like peppercorns in my FOS. I put them in when the onions are cooking. When the onions meet their color, add the liquor and let it burn off a bit; add hot stock, bay, and thyme, plus more salt. Cook on a simmer for about 10 minutes to reduce, no cover.

Load each crock with bread croutons and cheese; send it under the broiler.

While this was delicious, I will never make it this way again - use a mixture of stocks. There’s a richness and affinity for me with onions, cheese, and a beefy flavor.

Go into a supermarket today (okay, maybe an upscale one), and you’re likely to find a variety of different types of frozen treats. Note, I’m not talking flavors, but just styles.

• Ice Milk
• Ice Cream
• Gelato
• Sorbet
• Frozen Yogurt
• Sherbet

And who knows - there are also now variations with goat milk, soy, organic this and that, whipped varieties, etc. Which just goes to show - at least in the U.S. - ice cream is a big deal.

So someone asked me: “Why is it now, on your second trip to Paris, did you have to go back for the ice cream?”

Yes, on a cold, November morning, I got a triple-scoop of ice cream from Berthillion, and ate it happily with the wind in my hair. I had a hat on, so the wind didn’t bother me in the least. But I did return home with a nasty cold.

First, you should understand, many books on Paris tell you about this place, so my first trip, I had to try it. I mean, Ina Garten raved about it, and I generally trust her taste.

Second, the place is kind of cute. It’s located on the Île-Saint-Louis, the smaller of the two islands in the center of Paris on the River Seine. In fact, it’s positioned about dab-center in the island! It’s closed in August, when it’s hot, and yes, it’s open in the morning on cloudy, cold November mornings. And no lines!

I read that Italian ice cream may beat this out, but having not yet traveled to Italy, I can only speak for this stuff versus all those choices I mentioned above. First, texture is first rate. It’s a firm ice cream, but not necessarily as firm as the stuff in some of those small pints we have. It’s also extremely creamy and rich. Delicious stuff. But the real win is the complexity and weight of flavor. This is serious ice cream, and my favorite non-fruit flavor is the salted caramel. “Yum-O!,” I think I dreamt Rachel Ray yelling. (No, I didn’t really have a dream about Ms. Ray eating this ice cream, but you can sort of hear that voice of hers saying “Yum-O!” whenever you choose to write it out on the computer.)

Their ice cream can be purchased at a few satellite locations, and in select cafés. But it’s not available here, and I love that it’s still a family business. And yes, that ice cream was so good, should I get the opportunity to return, I’ll go for more. Just remember - there’s nothing called Berthillion in your grocer’s freezer here in the U. S.

Please note - two trips - one each per trip to Paris - really isn’t that bad. I’ve yet to buy my own ice cream machine (I’m looking for a self-freezing model the day I get a bigger kitchen that can accommodate it), so I really don’t get to try my hand at creative ice cream making. But I know this recipe might be the first I try.

The gratin is an easy-to-make dish, and it basically goes like this:

1. Pre-cook the cauliflower for 5 minutes in boiling, salted water.
2. Cook off some bacon.
3. Butter an oven-proof pan.
4. Mix bacon and cauliflower in the said pan.
5. Mix together eggs, milk, and some soft cheese. We used comté, since I’ve had a lot of it.
6. Cover the top with more cheese. You could even mix a few.

So, what comes out (seen above) is a very spoonable, delicious side dish for the table. Nutmeg added flavor, as did white pepper and salt. I imagine you could do this with a lot of vegetables, as this basically is a play off the more famous potato gratin (the authentic ones omit cheese, but the best ones include it!).

Bon appetit to all in the new year! Purchase Greenspan’s book with this link and help pay to keep Messy Cuisine online!

One of the neatest looking things to eat is a Parisian macaron, a cookie, if you will, but one made of two lids made of egg and almond, and a sweet filling. I find them adorable to eat, and when I went to Paris in 2009, I tried some from Laudurée. They were good, but not necessarily outstanding. (My first sample came from Laudurée in Harrod’s, in London.)

This time around, we visited the store of the guy currently best known for his pastries: Pierre Hermé.

Just look at the concotions! Don’t you want to sample each one?

And there they are, down the line a bit, the macarons! We visited the store in the 6th, just across the street from the St. Suplice church.

As you can likely make out from the signs, Hermé is into some interesting flavor combinations, each one scrumptious.

I’m not sure how you’re really supposed to eat these - but I took the box back to my hotel and enjoyed them in solitude. Each one bursts with flavor, each a delicate sweet sandwich. Chocolate, tea, passion fruit. Caramel.

There are so many pastries to enjoy in this city, but don’t forget to try the macarons.

But our favorite place this time around is located across the street from the Islamic Center, and is called l”A.O.C.

First, it has such a homey atmosphere. The name refers to France’s designated agricultural regions, and features different foods from these diverse places. In effect, you’re getting some of the best eating ingredients from across France.

I started with some jambon, or ham. It was simple, served on a wooden platter, and delicious.

XS had what were advertised as giant snails, although they were “regular” size by his estimation. I loved the garlicky butter, which I soaked up with bread.

My dish was baby pig with crispy potatoes, and it was divine.

Served in Le Creuset, XS got the cassoulet, featuring sausage and pork belly as my favorite contributions. It’s a rustic stew with beans, and it had an incredibly flavored sauce.

Most highly recommended. Their homemade ice creams were delicious, as was the Île flottante.

Learn more online through their website.

For my entrée (think appetizer) I ordered something particularly regional to the basque region, piperade.

This is an egg dish featuring different peppers. The eggs were done gently, and the flavors were good. If I had to describe the flavor and aroma, smoked paprika came to mind.

A special that day was a truffled ravioli. It too was delicious, served in a mild creamy sauce.

XS’s favorite dish was the appetizer of Pyrenees ham, close in flavor to jamón serrano.

Be sure to visit the bathroom; it’s an interesting area, and the sink is operated by foot pedal. Very convenient for hygiene.

Recommended!