[Clotilde’s Corsican Sandwich, as seen at Cojean’s]

I cannot begin to tell you how gratifying Chocolate & Zucchini has been, since the very early days. But this, having a sandwich named after me at one of my absolute favorite lunch places, is a benefit I clearly hadn’t foreseen. You must forgive my candor, but : how unbelievably cool is that, I ask you?

Okay, a little explanation is in order. Cojean is a sandwich and salad restaurant, founded by someone named Alain Cojean. Being a great fan of that place, I wrote a review for Bonjour Paris, and mentioned on C&Z that one of their sandwiches had been the inspiration for my Salade Figue et Poire à la Bresaola. This caught the attention of Fred Maquair, Alain Cojean’s associate, who liked C&Z and got in touch with me, to express his thanks.

I was delighted of course, but not half as much as a few days ago, when he sent me an email to let me know that a new menu was coming out, featuring a sandwich inspired in turn by my Tartine Corse, which was thus to be named, quite simply, “le sandwich corse de clotilde”.

“Aflutter with joy” is an understated description of yours truly, upon hearing the news.

Of course, I took a trip to Cojean’s as soon as I could, digital camera in hand, to immortalize the moment. I stepped in, right in the middle of the lunch rush, and quickly located my spiritual baby. “Nouveau“, said a little yellow label. “Le sandwich corse de clotilde”, said another, baby blue label. “Oh my”, thought I. I asked a waitress for permission to take a picture : “I’d love to take a picture of the sandwich corse de clotilde”, I said, “because um… you see, I am Clotilde.”

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Do you know what inspired this recipe, of all things? The TGV.

TGV, or Train à Grande Vitesse, is the pride and joy of France, a technology of high-speed trains that peaks at 300 km/h (186 mph). Last week, for my job, I rode this train to Lille (a city in the North of France) in the wee hours of the morning.

It being quite early, I had closed my eyes in the wild hope that this would somehow re-energize me and help with the feeling of having just been grabbed and thrown out of bed. I had fallen into that state of half-sleep where your thoughts wander around idly, taking rational paths then sharp turns into weirdness or fantasy, morphing little things into giant, convoluted versions of themselves, twisting reality into confusing shapes, and leading you along unexpected routes.

It is in this state of mind that, after considering project management questions for a little while, my thoughts turned to the idea for a dish, which constructed itself out of nowhere behind my closed eyelids.

A few days later, I followed the dream’s instructions, and brought these fish and nectarine skewers to life, served with herbed couscous and a nectarine chutney. They turned out to be everything I had hoped for: pretty, summery, and delicious.

Nectarines — yellow nectarines — are very high on my list of favorite fruits, and strongly associated with childhood summer vacations in the mountains, where we would buy crates of them, plump and sun-kissed, at the local market.

This was the first time I’d ever paired them with fish (or anything savory for that matter), and they turn out to be a great match. I also whipped up a chutney to serve alongside.

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I’d been wanting to roast my own peppers for years, but never had.

I’d always loved roasted peppers, be they red, green, or yellow. I had read about the different possible methods, about the tips and tricks, about the things that could go wrong and how to avoid them, about how freshly roasted peppers were astonishingly better than jarred — I knew all that.

Somehow I could not imagine how my bell peppers, fresh and firm and plasticky to the touch, could actually roast and char and blisten in my oven.

But for some obscure reason, I held the belief, deep inside of me, that it just would not work, not for me. Sure, it worked for thousands of others, but somehow I could not imagine how my bell peppers, fresh and firm and plasticky to the touch, could really cook and soften in my oven, or that their skin could actually get charred and blistered. It was beyond me.

And then the other day, we had two organic green bell peppers in the fridge from our weekly basket, and I decided it was high time I test my own limits, and see whether I was indeed the X-File of bell pepper roasting.

The good news is, I’m not.

And what an incredible discovery! It is the easiest thing in the whole wide world! It works beautifully! And the result is so delightfully good and pretty, so tasty and tender that really, I need to stop myself from thinking about all those wasted years, spent not roasting my own bell peppers.

I will note that I prefer to deseed my bell peppers before roasting, when they can just fall out from inside, rather than struggle to scrape them off from the sticky flesh after roasting. It’s up to you, though.

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Just when you thought that some things, like salt, couldn’t be improved upon, someone has to go out and invent mushroom salt!

This pretty grinder, which I bought at the Grande Epicerie de Paris, contains thick crystals of sea salt and chunks of dried mushrooms — chanterelles, porcini and African caesar mushrooms — so that the seasoning you grind out is a very pleasant blend of salted mushroom flavor. This is, as you would expect, particularly good on eggs and tomatoes, on potato-based dishes and buttered toast, but I tend to pretty much use it on any and everything, these days.

It is made by a company called The Cape Herb & Spice Company, based in South Africa, interestingly enough. They offer different kinds of spice-based products, including this line of grinders, called Elements of Spice, mixing sea salt and peppercorns with a variety of herbs, spices, seaweed or even flowers.

The blends have well-designed labels and imaginative names, which account for half the attraction, I’m sure : mine is called “Magic Mushrooms”, and for my next acquisition I have my eye on “Darling Buds”, a blend of sea salt, rose buds and petals, lavender and chamomile flowers. Or wait, let’s see, maybe “Fruits Alfresco”, with sundried tomatoes, roasted garlic, olive, bell peppers and red onion? Or maybe both?