les marchés ouverts

I love open-air Parisian markets -- and it's nice to be staying in a place where I can cook. There were also sardines, which I think will be wonderful with fennel and leeks. All those artichokes were only 2€, which would be unimaginable in Chicago.

fried risotto

Risotto from the other night, tossed in flour (mixed with mace, cayenne, crushed fennel seeds), then in egg, and then in some coarse breadcrumbs (from toasted sourdough). Fry in olive oil mixed with grapeseed oil (maybe just under 1/4" of oil). Garnish with fennel fronds. So good.

orange-fennel risotto

This was a mostly-by-chance and with-food-laying-around success: risotto with sautéed fennel added halfway through cooking, some lemon zest and juice (cooked with the fennel), a pinch of mace, and orange zest. Finish with parmesan (in the risotto and on the risotto, of course). Used chicken stock.

galettes

I found local buckwheat flour at the farmer's market and knew it was a sign to make crêpes, or galettes bretonnes, those wonderful Breton crêpes made with buckwheat that go perfectly with a wheat beer. These are filled with sautéed fennel, a year-old chèvre from the Hillman's and topped with fennel greens. Most satisfying.

roast chicken

This big fellow was one of the roosters recently slaughtered; I wanted to make its preparation simple to highlight the bird itself — this is the first animal I have eaten in whose slaughter I was involved. I made an herb butter with unsalted butter, salt, tarragon, garlic, lemon, brandy and thyme. I spread that in and out and under the skin of the breast.


I started the bird at 425ºF, rotating it from side to breast-up-to side and then leaving it on it's side at 350º. (Julia Child suggests the majority of the roast to be on its sides — switch sides halfway through). It finished breast up.


I made a quick gravy with drippings, butter and vermouth and we had this with lightly steamed and buttered zucchini and squash (thanks Molly!), a fennel-potato-spring onion gratin, and a brown rice "risotto" with porchini and reduced stock from those feet. The meat was incredibly tender, flavorful and incredibly satisfying. Nothing compared to those industrial birds.

Served with raspberry-cranberry braggot and finished with Molly's tart blueberry-peach crisp, this was perfect.

sardines & fennel.

Every time I'm in Worcester, MA I stop at Ed Hyder's, a wonderful little market that carries hard-to-find items like ras el hanout, affordable and delicious anchovies in jars, ten types of feta cheese, Lebanese, Geeek and Moroccan specialties, three grades of couscous, and various sardines, my favorite being Alshark sardines in oil or in spicy tomato sauce.

Tonight I wanted some sardines, but not on crackers. This chow post had a suggestion to broil tinned sardines. One of my favorite fresh sardine recipes is a Jamie Oliver recipe that uses fennel and sardines to make a pasta sauce. So I set to fond something simple that used fennel and tinned sardines.

This used said Alshark sardines, from Morocco. I generally trust/have had the best luck with sardines from Morrocco, Potugal and Japan. (The Japanese sardines are often packed in miso or something else and exact a different preparation).

This is what I came up with:

Marinate a very thinly sliced small bulb of fennel and toss with salt, mustard (I used a coarse, homemade tarragon mustard) and white wine vinegar. Cook some rice (brown basmati is perfect). Place the sardines under the broiler. Get them very very hot. Toss the hot rice with olive oil and serve the sardines on top with a drizzling of sriracha or another hot sauce.

This was terribly satisfying. So much so that I forgot to take a photo.

N.B.: just discovered the Society for the Appreciation of the Lowly Tinned Sardine blog!