For this new installment of our Draw Me A Fridge series (read about it here), Alexia met with Professor Hervé This.

Hervé This (pronounced “tiss”) is an internationally renowned physico-chemist, a professor at the AgroParisTech institute, and the only person to hold a doctorate in molecular gastronomy, a cutting-edge field he co-created with Nichola Kurti. (See also: Notes from the moleculat gastronomy conference.)

A long-time accomplice to famed French chef Pierre Gagnaire, a popular French television personality, and a bestselling cookbook author, he uses the latest research in the chemistry, physics, and biology of food to challenge traditional ideas about cooking and eating.

Amongst his many projects, he has been commissioned by the Ministry of Education to create cooking workshops in French primary schools, and he is tirelessly determined to reinvent the way we cook. At the time of our meeting, Professor This was on his way to Canada to introduce his concept of “note by note cooking” or, in his own words, “the world’s next culinary trend” (more information on his blog). His latest, just-released book is called La Cuisine note à note en douze questions souriantes.

AC: What are your fridge staples?

HT: My wife laughs about the fact that there is always a piece of smoked lard to be found in the fridge, even though the lard is smoked and salted precisely so that it can be kept outside of a fridge!

My fridge is actually really, really, packed. On the top shelf, I keep all sorts of homemade preparations such as chutneys (that could be kept outside the fridge as well), harissa, ketchup, and ginger preserves.

The freezer is also very crowded. In it you’ll find meat filling for pâté vosgien* since I always make too much of it. You will also find small containers of stock from pork trotters Sainte-Ménehould [an age-old specialty made of pork trotters that have been bound and slow-cooked in white wine, with herbs and spices] that has cooked for over four days. The result is a stock so tasty that just a teaspoonful is enough to bring flavor to any dish.

AC: That sounds good.

HT: You bet. I make a mean pork trotters Sainte-Ménehould! Oh, you will also find a bottle of vodka.

But back to the fridge… I keep dried tomatoes in oil (baked at 95 degrees Celsius and preserved in olive oil with lemon juice, salt, sugar, thyme, and rosemary); lemons preserved in salt; homemade pissalat [a condiment from Nice made with puréed anchovies, flavored with cloves, thyme, bay leaf and black pepper, and mixed with olive oil] of which I made three kilos — I should have enough for years since I only use a tiny bit at a time.

In the door of the fridge, I keep poutargue [a.k.a. bottarga, a sort of fish spawn pickle preserved in salt, also known as the “Mediterranean caviar”], capers, unsalted butter and salted butter, fat from foie gras, and a garlic saucisson.

You will also find foie gras that was cooked in the dishwasher (in a Ziploc bag closed with paper clips with a mix of white wine, port, salt and pepper). Obviously, we also have eggs, and yogurts for the whole family.

Right now, you will also find two small terrines, one with a beautiful bread dough that I had to retard because it was proofing too quickly, and the other one for an Arabic-style bread. There is also a shrimp curry — for tomorrow probably –, shrimp bisque after a typical regional recipe from Charentes, and an asparagus and watercress soup.

You would also find Laughing Cow cheese wedges, because they melt well and are quite handy to have. Also, some crottins de Chavignol [a goat cheese produced in the north-west part of the Sancerre wine region] that have been in there for ages.

And I always keep fruits and veggies on the countertop.

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In the midst of the August heatwave, Maxence and I sat at a dappled table of a restaurant in Urdax, a pretty village in the Spanish Basque country, and ordered gazpacho.

It was brought to us in white ceramic bowls, with a side plate of toppings to sprinkle in — cucumbers, green bell peppers, and onions, all of them finely diced, flakes of serano ham, and tiny croutons — and we slurped it all down thirstily.

The nostalgic remembrance of this beautifully quenching tomato soup inspired me to make an easy gazpacho at home with one of the last batches of sun-kissed, ripe-to-bursting, fleshy tomatoes I got this summer.

Usually, when I lay my hands on excellent tomatoes, which is hard enough to do in Paris without taking out a mortgage, I tend to eat them simply, à la croque-au-sel (sliced and sprinkled with salt) or in very elemental tomato salads, dressed with a good olive oil, a touch of balsamic vinegar (I like the one from Beaumes-de-Venise I get from Première Pression Provence), a scatter of fresh herbs, and possibly a spoonful of black tapenade stirred in.

But the nostalgic remembrance of this beautifully quenching tomato soup inspired me to make it at home with one of the last batches of sun-kissed, ripe-to-bursting, fleshy tomatoes I got this summer.

To make this easy gazpacho I worked with the ingredients I had on hand, and therefore skipped the cucumber, which is often added, but wasn’t missed. And for practicality‘s sake, I opted to not peel the tomatoes, and to process the soup finely enough that it wouldn’t need sieving. (I also thinned it a little further after taking the above picture.)

It was astonishingly good, fruity and tangy and savory, all qualities a good gazpacho should display, and so gratifying I vowed to make it more often in the future. And after consulting my crystal ball, I saved a few servings in the freezer, in preparation for the gray months ahead.

A final note: some people say a chilled tomato soup that’s thickened with bread loses gazpacho naming rights and becomes a salmorejo; I’ll let you decide what you want to call it. And for a detailed discussion on the gazpacho-making technique, I’ll refer you to Felicity Cloake’s take on How to make perfect gazpacho.

Join the conversation!

What’s your favorite use for those late-season tomatoes? A panzanella, slow-roasted tomatoes, a tomato and einkorn wheat salad, or something else altogether?

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As you may or may not know, I have a new cookbook in the works that’s all about French cooking and vegetables, scheduled for publication in the spring of 2013. (You can read more about the project in the posts About my new book, and Shooting photos for my new book.)

I wrapped up the manuscript shortly before I had the baby, and it then went into my editor’s hands for some edits, and in the copyeditor’s for more tiying up of loose ends (copyeditors are my personal eagle-eyed heroes). The designer worked on the layout of the inside of the book, submitting a few different ideas for our consideration before perfecting the one we all felt happiest about (and I am very happy about it).

I should be receiving the first dummy soon, i.e. the complete text integrated into the layout, and there will be a bit of work there to make the copy fit neatly within the boundaries of the pages.

But at the forefront of my mind now is this all-important question: what should we call the book?

Up until now, the book has been referred to as “Untitled French Vegetable Book” (glamorous, no?) and my editor and I have been exchanging title ideas back and forth, but we haven’t yet found the one.

So I thought I would come to you, dear readers who are so good with words, and ask for your help: what would you name a cookbook that celebrates the love story between French cuisine and vegetables, one that focuses on fresh, seasonal ingredients combined simply but tastefully in vegetarian dishes, one that comes with lots of stories about shopping, cooking, and living in Paris?

Of course, there is a prize! If you’re the first person to suggest the title we end up using, you’ll receive a signed copy of the book when it comes out, and a surprise gift from Paris that I will tailor specifically to you and your tastes*. (I’ll send that out to you at any postal address on the planet, so feel free to participate regardless of your location.)

If you want to play, I’ll be so very grateful for your ideas! We most likely need the words “French” or “Paris”, and “vegetables” or “vegetarian” in there, but don’t let that cramp your style. Please submit your title suggestions — with optional subtitle — by Sunday, September 23 in the comments section below, or send them to me privately, if you prefer, via the contact form. (In both cases, make sure you enter a correct email address, or I won’t be able to contact you if you win.)

Thank you so much!

Edit: The call for submission is now closed. Many, many thanks to all who participated with such enthusiasm. You’ve really outdone yourselves, and I am thrilled with all your ideas! As soon as the definitive title is chosen, I’ll announce it here, along with the name of the winner.

* It is understood that we will then be able to use the title free and clear of any obligations.

If Julia Child hadn’t died in her California retirement home in 2004, she would have turned one hundred this August. Learning this made me realize that she was just a few months younger than my own grandmother, who turned a century old last fall, and passed away in the spring.

Looking at Child’s biography, it seems the two lived in Paris during some of the same years, and because my grandmother was also an avid cook, I like to imagine their paths crossing at one point or another, over some market stall or perhaps browsing the shelves at G.Detou.

Although I own Julia Child’s monumental Mastering the Art of French Cooking, I’ve only ever used it as a reference book, but I credit her for introducing me to the idea of baked cucumbers.

In my mind before then, cucumbers were firmly entrenched in crudité territory, their quenching crunch typically enjoyed in sticks with an appetizer dip, in slices for a Japanese-inspired salad, or grated for tzatziki. I was therefore intrigued by Child’s recipe for concombres au beurre, a preparation I’d never heard of before.

In it, she peels the cucumbers and cuts them into sticks, tosses them with salt, sugar, and vinegar, leaves them to rest awhile to draw out the excess moisture, then bakes them with butter, scallions, and herbs. (You can read the detailed process here.)

I confess I never followed the recipe exactly, but I took the concept and ran with it, tinkering with the measurements a bit, substituting olive oil for the butter, holding the herbs until the moment of serving, and baking the cucumbers along with the small pink turnips I get this time of year (see below).

The result is absolutely lovely, and has made frequent appearances on our table over the summer: cucumbers take on a surprisingly silky, tender texture when baked, and the subtle bitterness of the turnips is an ideal match to their sweetness.

What about you, do you have any cooked cucumber experience to share? Or unusual ways to prepare the cucurbitaceae ?

Cucumber and pink turnips

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