Is it to early for Christmas shopping?

Because I think I just found a perfect gift for my southern parents...



Fall Cozy

I love fall.  If it was constantly 55 degrees and a little overcast, I'd be the happiest girl in the world.  I'd be perfectly content to spend my days wrapped in cashmere sweaters, drinking huge cups of green tea (read: my favorite cabernet) while I nearly burn out my crockpot in an attempt to slow roast the largest cut of meat i can fit in there (seriously, that was the best $20 i've ever spent).

In fact, I really don't know why people love summer so much.  Especially New Yorkers.  I mean, the subway constantly smells like hot pee!  Is that not a deterrent to you?!  Don't get me wrong, I love picnics and grilled corn, and laying on the beach as much as the next guy.  But I would tell a weekend at the beach to bite me, in exchange for a weekend of chilly farmers markets visits and fireplace coziness.

And so began my need to make a yummy soupy-stewy something.  But alas, what soupy-stewy something should I make?  And then I found this in my freezer...

Yep, a good ole smoked turkey wing.  How that managed to say hidden in the back of my freezer for so long, I'll never know.  But as soon as it made it's way out, it ended up in my crockpot with a bunch of lentils, and carrots, and onions, and herbs.   And several hours later, in my belly.



Mmm mmm good.

JV - Part Trois: Le Finale.

Oh Napoleon.  You tyranical dictator you.  Of COURSE they named a complex after you. 

And I'm not saying that they also named a dessert after you.  But maybe if you had a little more puff pastry and salted caramel cream in your life, you wouldn't have been such an a-hole.

This was my final course that fateful night at Jules Vernes.  At least I thought it was.  I completely forgot that in traditional French fashion, dessert comes with a side of, what?  Dessert.  Enter, the cookie bites.

And the homemade marshmallows.

Yes, I know they look like pats of butter.  But I promise, they're marshmallows.  I might be an occasional glutton, but I'm not trying to have an aortic aneurysm. 

Oh Jules...I can call you Jules, now right?  I mean, I'd hope we're on a first name basis now.  Especially since I have to tell you something kind of personal.  It's just that...  Well...  In case I don't see you again for a little while, I just wanted you to know....I'm in love with you.

A bientot!
-Monica

A Little Bit Southern

I was at the farmer's market this weekend, and there were green tomatoes everywhere.

 And it got me to thinking... 

 

I might be feeling a little bit southern today.

 I might even be feeling a little Paula Deen today.  Maybe Paula Deen with a little Emeril sprinkled on top.

Hmpf...That sounds kind of pervy.  I don't want that visual in my head.  Oh great, now I can't get it out of my head.  I don't want to think about Paula Deen with some Emeril on top!  Ew.  She'd have all this butter and whipped cream, and he'd be screaming "BAM!" every 5 seconds.  Ew.  Make it stop!

But I bet they'd make some damn good fried green tomatoes with chipotle aioli.

JV - Part Deux

So if I had any sense, I would have just gotten up after eating those snail balls, and asked for my coat, and hailed the nearest taxi back to my hotel.  But alas, I have no sense.  So how do I top fried snail balls?  There's only one way that I know to do that...

...And that way is foie gras.  Oh pardon me, I meant to say foie gras that sits next to filet mignon and ontop of truffle broth.  GET IT!  Let's look at it from the top so we can really see how big that piece of foie gras is.

Yes!  And what did they serve on the side?...

The puffiest, most delicious potato chip in the whole wide world.  I mean....come....ON!

39V

I went to Paris and lost my damn mind.  Let's just start with that.  Because I don't need to spend this post, or those that may follow, defending my abhorrently large appetite.  I've certainly had more than my share of gluttonous moments.  But I really took it there this time.  There wasn't a plate of food that anyone put in front me that I didn't clear, and then ask for some bread so I could sop up any sauce that was left on the plate. 

The trouble really started here...

Ah Le 39V.  It looks innocent enough, right?  I mean it's fine French dining, so sure, I expected to have a delicious meal that begins with perfectly crisp on the outside - soft on the inside bread, and perfectly salted butter.  And yes, I expected to have good service, which in this case means that they don't smack me in the mouth as I butcher the French language while I order.  But I did not expect to nearly pee my pants when they served me the amuse bouche.



Yes, that is an herb-scented parmesan ravioli with a truffle-cream sauce.  WHAT?  Yes, there was sopping involved.  Shut up.

Then my first course came.  I'm a sucker for mushrooms.  And I'm a sucker for a perfectly cooked egg.  And when people get them both right in the same dish, sometimes my eyes well up.  And that's what happened when this showed up.

 And that, my friends is the organic soft-boiled egg with a mushroom emulsion.  YES!  Do you think "organic soft-boiled egg with mushroom emulsion" is too long to be a middle name?  Because I'm thinking of changing mine to that.  And I think we all know what happened when I cracked the egg...

Well after that happened I really tried to maintain some modicum of composure.  I was already in a very quiet French restaurant snapping pictures every 5 seconds, and being way too loud with my American friends.  So the fact that I wanted to jump out of my seat and scream "BRING IT!" upon the announcing of the main course, was really just inappropriate.  But that's how I felt...on the inside.  Enter the chicken...

I have a lot of feelings about ordering chicken in a restaurant.  Most of my feelings revolve around the fact that that idea is dumb.  But then again, most restaurants don't serve this as the side dish to their perfectly roasted and sauced chicken...

Yes, that would be a side dish of chicken...chicken sausages...chicken livers...all the best chicken bits that didn't make it onto the main plate.  Why should the breasts have all the fun?!  (insert obvious joke here).  And just when I thought it was over...Just when they were rolling up the wheel-barrow with which to roll my fat ass out of there...Dessert showed up.  And while I'm not a huge dessert fan, I can't help love a dish whose topping reminds of what my hair looks like when I wake up in the morning.





JV - Part 1

No not Jr. Varsity.  JV.  At least that's what we who know and love him call him.  To the rest of you, it's Jules Vernes.  I realize I'm not the first person to have written about one of the most classic of classic French restaurants.  And truth be told, I almost didn't post about this, because well, what else do you say about a legend?  But here's the thing about legends: They're legendary!  Sometimes their amazingness deserves to be shouted from a rooftop!...or at least from a keyboard in my one-bedroom apartment. 

The meal I had there was so amazing, so ballsy, so SICK, it deserves multiple posts.  So here, in part one of a mini-series I'd like to call "The Night I Amost Cried About A Snail", I will cover my first course. 

And here goes.  I think we all know how this classic story begins...

...with that long, crowded walk toward the base of the Eiffel Tower. And if I had to to elbow a couple of grandmas, and kick a few baby carriages out of the way to get there, it was all worth it.  Because when I sat down, before they showed me a menu, before they even took a drink order, these arrived...

Perfectly petite gougeres.  Oh, pardon me, correction: melt-in-your-mouth perfectly petite gougeres.  And to those, I ALWAYS say: hells yes.  But even those paled in comparison to my first course.  Ordinarily, when I order escargot I can be assured I will receive some version of a hot bubbling cauldron of herbacious snaily buttery goodness that will always leave a pool of said buttery goodness for me to dip bread into.  Standard decadence.  Which is why I was confused when something other than that arrived at my table.

Hmmm?...Am I looking at this from the wrong angle?  Maybe I'm missing something?  Let me turn it to the side?

Nope...it still looks like arancini from that angle too.  And it appears to be sitting atop mushroom duxelle?  Well if I've somehow butchered the French language (again) and ordered arancini on mushroom duxelle, I'm certainly not sending it back.  I want to eat that!  And then, I cut one open.

OH...MY...GOD.  These fools have figured out how to encase escargot and all it's herbacious buttery goodness in some fried balls!  And then as if that wasn't good enough, they put it on top of slow roasted mushrooms with just enough cream to hold it together.  I LOVE THE FRENCH!