[Spiced Carrot Fries]

Winter is the blessed season of root vegetables. Since it is noticeably drawing to a close here – longer days, sunny and mild weather, daffodils all around -, now’s the time to make the most of the kind of carb comfort our winter friends have to offer, before we turn the page and say hello to nature’s spring collection.

Having a bunch of carrots to use up, I decided to go for my favored cooking method for root vegetables, oven-baking. I considered cutting them in slices, but in the end decided faux fries were the way to go.

The faithful readers among you will certainly notice that this recipe is but a variation of the root vegetable fries I talked about recently, with the additon of honey and carrot-friendly spices (cumin and ginger). Baking carrots really concentrates their sweet taste and underlines their depth of flavor. Carrot fries are pretty and fun to eat, and are also very easy to make, although they do take a little while to cook.

On an unrelated side note (I love these), I went to the Belle & Sebastian concert at the Grand Rex yesterday, and had the most wonderful time. I do wish they had sung Like Dylan In The Movies, but I guess Get Me Away From Here I’m Dying more than made up for it…

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[Goat Cheese and Sprouted Seeds Tartine]

And today is the day of the Tartine Edition of the world famous Is My Blog Burning? distributed blogging event! Please meet the tartine I made as my contribution : a tartine with goat cheese, ham and cherry tomato jam, decorated with sprouted seeds and served on a bed of watercress.

As with most tartines, it is easy (it’s mostly just assembling ready-made ingredients) and fun to make : I love the sort of artistic attention and care involved, when you line up the tartines and try to reproduce the same harmonious arrangement on each of them, and then when you plate them, correcting the shape of the watercress bed to ensure that it frames the tartine in a flattering way, tilting your head to the right to get a sense of the general picture. It also turned out really tasty : what more could one ask of a tartine, I ask?

This would make a really nice opener, if each guest gets one small tartine, or it could be served as a light main course, in which case two tartines each is good.

It happens to use several ingredients featured here in the past : the wonderluscious olive bread I buy at a nearby boulangerie, the cherry tomato jam I made at the height of last summer, and mixed sprouted seeds, proudly home-grown.

I am maintaining a rapidly growing record of all the participants’ contributions, check back tomorrow for the complete list!

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A Take on Chicken Nuggets and Fries.

My sister Céline came to have dinner with us the other night. She has recently started working for a major French car company, and part of the integration process for new hires is to go through four weeks at one of the factories, working the line just like the other workers. This is a trying experience to say the least (a loss of 6 pounds, a large bruise on the hip, a swollen and bandaged wrist – how’s that for good working conditions?), and the end of the day sees her thoroughly exhausted and achy, her head spinning from the infinite chain of cars she has worked her way through.

This sounded like the perfect time to provide a little comfort with a mock fast-food dinner, home-made and healthy.

The three of us ate these chicken nuggets and root vegetable fries with pleasure – and our fingers -, chatting away until Céline’s fight against her shutting eyelids and general sleepiness became a lost cause. At which point she dragged herself home, a couple of metro stations away, for a few hours of deep and blissful sleep.

A note on variations : I made the root vegetable fries with potatoes and celery root because that’s what I had on hand, but they would work equally well with any and all types of root vegetables, including carrots, sweet potatoes, turnips, parsnips, beetroot, etc. Mix ‘n match to your heart’s content! You can also experiment with the spices you sprinkle on, as well as the spices that you add to the chicken breading : cumin, paprika, ginger, onion flakes, celery seeds…

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And here is the second batch of notable tidbits from the Salon du Fromage! (Read the first part here.)

– Mont d’Or is a cow cheese, soft inside a thicker rind, wrapped in pine bark and sold in a round wooden box. A popular and wonderful way to eat it is the “Boîte Chaude” (Hot Box), where the Mont d’Or is oven-baked in its box, with a little white wine. Les Monts de Joux, a cheese producer from the Jura, sells their delicious Mont d’Or in a fun DIY kit, which includes a small bottle of vin d’Arbois and all the necessary instructions to prepare your own Boîte Chaude. Baked Mont d’Or is, in my experience, a great dish to share with a few close friends, along with a nice salad and good crusty bread : each guest helps himself, more or less messily, to a spoonful of gooey and tasty cheese. And before long, everyone resorts to just dipping his bread directly in, then passing the cheese on to his neighbor. A wonderfully comforting and laid-back pseudo-meal.

– A producer from Poitou-Charentes was offering fresh goat cheese flavored with herbs and condiments in convenient little trays, petit-four style : balls of goat cheese rolled in raisins, chopped walnuts or shallots flakes, or small triangles sprinkled with herbes de Provence, dill, crushed pepper or cumin seeds. Reminds you of something?

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