The Book Corner. Guestblogger Fleur

Greetings to you, friends and patrons of Britt-Arnhild's Blue Cafe! This past fall, I acquired a new cookbook called The Ethnic Paris Cookbook. For The Blue Cafe, I decided to make from it a recipe called Kabylia Lamb with Semolina Dumplings. It is an Algerian family recipe given to the authors by the owner-chef of the celebrated 404 restaurant in Paris. I thought it sounded good and was curious to see how it would turn out.

You will need:

For Lamb Stew:

Olive oil
3 pounds of lamb (1and1/2 kg) from the shoulder or leg, cubed
1 onion, grated or diced
2 cloves garlic, chopped or minced
2 (-to 4) tablespoons tomato paste
2 carrots, peeled and sliced
2 turnips, peeled and cut into eighths
2 stalks celery, diced
1 large potato, peeled and diced
1 teaspoon paprika
1 teaspoon ground coriander (powder)
Salt and freshly-ground black pepper

For Semolina Dumplings:

2 cups coarse semolina*
1 large egg
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 small onion, finely chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
1 tomato, diced
2 tablespoons finely-chopped fresh coriander leaves (cilantro)
2 tablespoons chopped fresh mint leaves
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon ground coriander (powder)
freshly-ground black pepper
2 teaspoons baking powder

Fresh coriander leaves (cilantro) for garnish


1.)
To make the stew, heat some olive oil in the bottom of a large cooking pot over medium heat. Add the meat cubes, onion and garlic, and cook, stirring the meat to brown evenly, about 10 minutes. Add the vegetables, paprika, ground coriander (powder), salt and pepper to taste, and enough water to just cover the vegetables. Simmer, covered, until the meat is tender (anywhere from 45 minutes to an hour).

2.)
While the meat is cooking, prepare the dumplings. In a medium bowl, mix all the ingredients except the baking powder, stirring well. Add about 1/2 cup of the lamb stew liquid to the dough and stir to blend. Set aside for 20 minutes to allow the semolina to soak up the moisture from the liquid ingredients. Stir in the baking powder, then form dumplings by pinching off large teaspoonfuls of dough mixture and rolling between your palms to make walnut-size balls. Set aside on a plate.

3.)
When the meat is cooked, use a slotted spoon to remove the meat and vegetables to a deep serving platter or bowl. Cover and keep warm. Return the stew broth to a low simmer. Gently place the dumplings in the simmering broth in a single layer (you may have to work in batches). The dumplings should be submerged in liquid and not touching -- add a little more water if it's necessary. Cover and
cook 15-20 minutes.

4.)
Using the slotted spoon, place the dumplings on the meat and vegetables, then spoon over with the hot broth. Garnish with the fresh coriander leaves (cilantro).

And how did it turn out? Well, I used pieces of lamb stewing meat with the bone in, not cubes, so I had to cook mine for quite a bit longer -- nearly 2 hours (which had no adverse affect on the vegetables, thankfully). The amount of meat was only 1/2 what the recipe called for but the broth probably became a bit thicker and richer with the longer cooking. The taste of the stew upon completion was hard to describe. It was actually somewhere in the neighborhood of "delicate, sweet and delicious", belying its hearty peasant ingredients.

I had some trouble with the dumplings. I couldn't find coarse semolina at the market and so was forced to buy the medium-to-fine grain. Wrong. They were very gooey and fell apart in the broth. I didn't photograph them because of this. However, once they were cooked, the pieces held together as they were supposed to, and the herbs gave them a wonderful tasty zing that was a perfect counterpart to the mild sweetness of the stew.

Also: the original recipe calls for huge amounts of herbs (1/2 bunches of each!) in the dumplings but that just looked wrong to me. So I changed the amounts I used (and changed the recipe above). I think the lesser amount is entirely satisfactory.

I'm looking forward to getting ahold of the correct coarse-grind semolina and trying this dish again. It's a great bet for those who aren't too crazy about lamb because it comes out so sweet, tender and non-game-y. I'd serve it with some warm Middle-Eastern flat bread, maybe with feta cheese toasted on it, and a crisp green salad.

Happy cooking and eating! Best regards from Fleur at Frangible Pie

*************************

Thank you Fleur for being my third guest blogger.

You can visit Fleur at Frangible Pie.

The Book Corner. Guestblogger Julius Elefante

Thanks, Britt for having me as your guest this week.

Baking from my Home to Yours by Dorie GreenspanProlific baker and cookbook writer Dorie Greenspan was once told by Julia Child that they got on very well because they were both home cooks. This is of course believd by Ms Greenspan's culinary pedigree - she has been in the kitchens of the great chefs Pierre Herme, Jean George Vongerichten and Daniel Boulud. Her numerous collaborative and solo works are multi-awarded and tend to favour stylized Parisian pastries. Her newest outing, Baking From My Home to Yours, published last year and now widely embraced by bloggers all over, is perhaps the tome that many occasional bakers will find to be the most familiar and accessible. It has become my one favourite baking cookbook.Leafing through the gorgeously photographed pages, I honed in on her Best Chocolate Chip Cookies. I set out to bake a batch:
True enough, these are exquisite enough and deserve being called the "best." They are moderately thin, crunchy around the edges but substantial and chewy at the centre. They are also very of the moment: lately, I have been noting that high-end bakeries are retiring their puffy, chewy, doughy cookies in favour of these thin, craggy-edged beauties. Ms Greenspan provides the recipe for these cookies on her website.
Once in a while, one may want a treat but without all the fuss associated with making a cake. The Dressy Chocolate Loaf is as easy as it is delectable.

After creaming butter, sugar, and eggs, one adds sour cream and the sifted dry ingredients. I counted three, maybe four, steps. Follow this up with an even easier sour cream ganache, then you'll have something that is the epitome of beautiful simplicity. Which is probably why Ms Greenspan loves this recipe - it appears in another of her cookbook as "Chocolate Midnight." A recipe can be found in Cooking the Books.Of course, what good is a cookbook without its show-stopper cake? Without a doubt, the one cake to trump them all is her Devil's Food White-Out Chocolate Cake. This is shown on the cover of the book, and here is my rendition of it:

Thanks Julius for being my guest blogger.

I have already put this book on my wish list.......and Christmas is right around the corner......

You can visit Julius at his blog:

http://occasionalbaker.blogspot.com

The Book Corner - Guestblogger Darla

There are so many wonderful cookbooks. As a Guest Blogger it was hard to choose just one. I decided to share the book Mexico the Beautiful with you. I've used a number of the recipes but the photographs in the book are so magnificent that sometimes I just leaf through it and I'm transported immediately. This is a cookbook and an art book in one.

Mexico is a big country and the cuisine is traditionally quite diverse and tied to what is available locally. We've visited many times and several places. Our favorite is a small village on the Pacific Coast in the state of Oaxaca. A little trivia question, did you know that the turkey is indigenous to Mexico?

Perhaps one of the most commonly known foods from Mexico is Salsa. There are many types of salsa, again recipes are regional.

Here are two salsa recipes with ingredients that are pretty much readily available, especially if the summer if you have a garden. Thank you Britt-Arnhild for inviting me to the Blue Cafe to blog. I enjoyed it although now I feel an urgent need for a tortilla.

Thank you Darla for being my first guest blogger here in The Blue Café's Bok Corner. The Book Corner is open for guests every Sunday. Let me know if you want to come over.

The Book Corner - Greatest Ever Chocolate

It is Father's Day in Norway today. We have just had coffee and a cake we call "Verdens beste" (best in the world). I will blog about that later, and the cake is so good there was too little left to serve in The Book Corner, so here comes instead some coffee flavored sweets which Marta gave to her father this morning. The bag was huge, so I can share with you :-)

Several of you have responded to my Guest Blogger request, and I hope to have a guest blogger in The Book Corner next Sunday. Today though the scene is mine, and I have a book filled with chocolate dreams to share with you. Not exactly healthy with so much sugar, but soon advent and simpler food is here. Advent was traditionally a period when people ate little, and simple food, to prepare for the grandest of all feasts - Christmas.

Greatest Ever Chocolate is Martas book, and she love to look through it, to read the recipes, to look at the photos and to plan which ones to try. She has tried several of the recipes already, both with my help and alone, and her favorite is a fondue - pieces of fresh fruit dipped in hot and rich chocolate.

Amazon doesn't have an image of this book, so instead I'll share with you the chocolate fondue recipe:

Chocolate fondue

225g dark chocolate, 2dl dobble cream, 2tsp brandy (not in Marta's fondue)

Cut the chocolate, add the cream and walm till the chocolate is melted and blended with the cream. Add the brandy. Pour the mixture into a fondue pot and keep warm. Cut fresh fruits into small pieces and dip them into the melted chocolate. Enjoy!

The Book Corner is open.

I have a huge appetite for cookbooks. I braise them, I bake them, I make salads and I eat them raw. Sometimes I eat all, other times I am satisfied with just a piece of cake. And I love to share. So hereby you are invited to a new corner of The Blue Café - The Book Corner.

There will always be pots of fresh coffee here, and a colourful variety of china will be used for serving, home made cakes will fill the plates on the tables, and please don't hesitate to remove the stack of books from the chair before you sit down. And don't be afraid, I don't mind coffee stains in my books, they will taste even better I believe :-)

I plan to open the Book Corner once a week, and I would love to have guest bloggers here. Let me know if you have a book about food you want to come over and share. The Blue Café has its special gift for all guest bloggers who takes part.

*************************************************************

The first book out in The Book Corner is The French Kitchen by Joanne Harris and Fran Warde. Being a huge fan of Harris and her fiction books for years, I was curious to see what she could write about cooking. Well, of course I knew she could write about chocolate in such a way that I gain kilos just by reading about it, but that's in her fiction books of course.

I had nothing to fear. Absolutely nothing! The French Kitchen is filled to the brim with Joanne's wonderful writing topped with her love for food and her amazing collection of old family recipes. With chef Fran Warde she has cooked it all together to one of the best meals I've had in a long time. Warm Goat's Cheese Salad, Blue Cheese Bake, Roasted Aspargus Spears, Roulade Bicolore.............luckily I have just had dinner (Terje's fantastic moose soup). If not I would not be here writing, but in the kitchen cooking right now.

*******************************************************

Do you want to be a guest blogger in The Book Corner? Send an email to knitwoman1958@yahoo.com and let me know what you want to blog about.